[FFML] [Fanfic][Anime][X-over]Darkness Chronicles: Book I: Part I: Chapter I

[Craig]

Right; here's Ch. 1.  Of course, any C&C is appreciated.  Just a note 
though: unfortunately, I've had to ban hotmail.com from my SMTP server 
(the thing's just spam-central :( ), along with e-mail direct from dynamic 
addresses that don't resolve to a real outgoing mail server.  So if you 
get a `Rejected' error when trying to e-mail, probably that's why.

--------------------

Pain and numbing fear, and a terrible, soul-deep cold. These were the 
first sensations that told her she was waking once more, returning from 
the soothing, gentle oblivion she had prayed would take her at last, to 
the nightmare ruin and the terror that she alone of them seemed still able 
to endure.

A scream; then the wild, depraved laughter of their captor. Was that what 
had woken her? She could no longer tell.

The scream came again, a long, drawn sound of unimaginable pain.

Mousse, she thought, with a numb horror and terrible detachment. Shampoo 
would follow, Mousse so drained and broken that he could do nothing save 
to watch and whimper helplessly, as she was tormented yet again. Then 
would come Ukyou. Ryoga was already lost, his ruin all too easy once he 
had been trapped in his cursed form, powerless to act while she was 
tormented and shattered while he writhed and screamed in helpless 
negation.

Ukyou would scream, her madness divided between pleading for his 
forgiveness, and her witless shrieking for her Ranchan somehow to find 
her.

Then would come Tofu. Kasumi, mercifully, had died during the beginning, 
and before her complement could claim her, incredibly, admirably stoic and 
silent in the face of horror and nightmare beyond all any of them could 
once have begun to comprehend. Without her, Tofu had seemed to collapse in 
upon himself, broken at last when it had seemed he was almost the 
strongest of them all.

Perhaps, with the last vestige of humanity and compassion: with the last 
dying flicker of a soul able once to understand warmth and laughter and 
something other than the twisted, nightmare perversion of ruinous delight 
and appetite, their captor had spared kasumi the agony that seemed to 
stretch back in her own mind into nightmare eons beyond hope of recall. 
She prayed still that it might somehow be so.

Who next? Tatewaki. He would rave again, his mind a shattered, broken 
thing, ranting in imbecilic, lunatic soliloquy of the glory of his 
sacrifice for his two loves, and the splendour of the celebrations upon 
the day when they should understand at last the fullness of his triumph; 
when they would be freed from the accursed Saotome, and be his own until 
the uttermost end of time.

She would cry then in the dark and the terrible cold, her heart breaking 
again and yet again as she understood too late how impossibly, desperately 
brave and faithful he had proved at the very end, when she had hated him; 
when she had refused to understand.

"Oh my Ranma!" she would whisper, her soft words choked with emotion, not 
ashamed to cry whilst alone, pain more than any terror their tormenter 
could give, tearing at the shattered ruin of her heart. "Oh Ranma, forgive 
him. Please forgive! He understood, even if his pride would never let him 
speak until it was too late. Oh my love, my life, forgive him; forgive us 
all!"

Of the others, she could not bare to think.

Genma, bound now as had been Ryoga, in his cursed form, a shattered, 
mindless ruin of the man he had been, having long lost all power of 
thought and reason, would roar and howl in witless agony for the little 
time their captor still troubled to spend in his torment; after all, he 
gave her now little sport, less even than his life-long friend whilst he 
had yet lived. At Genma's breaking, Soun had retreated swiftly, his last 
hope lost, his mind fleeing the terror into memories of his wife and the 
three daughters he had once had, when such an end as this was beyond all 
save the darkest madness of nightmare. His end too, mercifully, had been 
swift.

Nabiki would be last, before herself of course, her own torture exquisite 
and prolonged, the screams and pleading in the cell next to her own, and 
the laughing wild words of her tormenter seeming to freeze her very soul 
and heart, while she fought desperately to hold only to the rage and the 
hatred, praying to whatever gods might exist still beyond the wreck of the 
world that her Ranma might somehow still escape the crystal into which 
Cologne, desperate for a last trump to play against the darkness, had 
sealed him ere she and Happosai had died during the final assault, and ere 
he could be taken.

The dungeon was bitterly cold.

She shivered, trying even in her bonds to curl about herself, desperate 
for what little warmth she could find.

She could not stand much more. The others were already broken beyond hope: 
lost, shattered ruins of what they had been. Only Ryoga, through sheer 
physical endurance and the desperate, struggling love for Ukyou he had 
found after akari's death in the last bitter days before his end, and she 
herself, her faith in Ranma a bright, shining thing that no pain or 
torment could break, had shown any real resistance.

And now he was gone. Alone, without help or hope, only she was still aware 
and rational enough to fight with what little remained to her. If their 
captor broke her: if she shattered at last the last of the souls by which 
Cologne had bound the crystal, then Ranma was hers, mind and soul: hers 
for ever.

And with his taking would end all hope for what remained of the physical 
world, and the broken fragments of humanity that fought yet against the 
horror of the things from the antireal oblivion beyond any hell, that had 
come to claim them. With that, her mistress's power: her triumph, would be 
complete, and all would end; for ever.

She shivered again. Mousse's screams had ceased, dying to pitiful 
whimpers, before he fell at last into sounds beyond the reach of her ears. 
For a long moment there was silence. Then suddenly there came the echoing 
boom of the heavy iron door of his cell.

She waited, knowing that Shampoo's lost, agonised screaming would soon 
begin. But instead, she heard the sudden wild peal of searing, terrible 
laughter, and a moment later, the sound of approaching footfalls.

Terror leapt in her. She *never* changed her routine. Not once since their 
capture had it altered. Each was tormented with exquisite care, the 
torment at first for their benefit, then, as each broke, for that of those 
remaining, as much as for her own pleasure. But now the footfalls drew 
nearer, until at last they halted at the cell beside her own.

The door opened, then the voice purred, soft and silkily warm, yet with an 
added, hideous something that stung the ears and seared the mind and soul 
with a wrenching, twisting agony and poisonous dread: "Wakey wakey, 
Nabiki-chan! Visiting time again! A little play for a while, and for her 
benefit. She's listening, you know: her ears straining to catch every last 
sound, even though she never wants to hear, while her eyes are staring so 
wide into the dark. And I imagine her poor little heart is going 
pitter-pat, pitter-pat so *very* fast, knowing what will happen when you 
stop being fun today. Oh, her fear will be exquisite.

"Well, shall we get started?"

Then the screams began. She did not listen. Despite what their captor 
believed, she had learned to shut out the worst of the horror, knowing 
that to do anything else: to think or hear while the torment continued, 
meant the end.

She waited, curiously astounded that she could pick the moment the torture 
would end with such precision, counting down the seconds with a numb, 
horrible detachment until the last screams had died to tiny whimpers, then 
at last to silence.

"Still a little fire, Nabiki-chan?" the ruinous voice purred again. "Still 
just a little hope?

"What price for your freedom, I wonder? What would you ask? Shall we 
bargain, Nabiki-chan? Shall I name a price, a payment in someone else's 
pain: the torment of a friend to spare you any more?

"No? Still that doesn't appeal to you?

"Perhaps something else? A dream, a fantasy of the wealth and power you 
could have possessed? A moment with poor, mad Kuno-chan, perhaps?"

Abruptly there came the ringing crack of a frigid, searing hand against 
skin, followed by another scream of wild, depraved laughter.

Nabiki did not answer. She would be passed responding for the moment.

For seconds that seemed to stretch to eternity, the laughter continued, a 
sound of horror to flay the ears, and fill the mind with a broken, 
gibbering despair. Then there was a second crack, a tiny whimper, then the 
door crashed closed once more and the footfalls drew near.

It was time.

Fighting down the leaping terror with a strength born of rage and savage 
desperation, she dragged herself erect, facing the door and the coming 
torment with all the will and courage she yet possessed, determined still 
to deny them, and to endure.

Then the door crashed open, and the thing that had once been a girl stood 
before her.

For what seemed a timeless moment both appeared frozen, she staring at the 
creature of nightmare oblivion, the blazing blue-black hair wild and 
lifted as though with some inner power, the red blood-covered lips parted 
in a depraved smile of ruinous triumph and unholy appetite.

Then the thing that had once been Tendo Akane surged towards her, and Kuno 
Kodachi began to scream.

 				     ** ** **

Darkness Chronicles

An anime-Manga Cross-over

 				     ** ** **

Book I:

Part I: The Gathering

Chapter I:

 				     ** ** **

"Ranma-sama!" The wild, sultry voice purred. "Awake my darling; the guests 
are waiting. You can't possibly sleep now. Oh my Ranma-sama, do wake up!"

"Ranma not sleep now while wedding so close, and Shampoo waiting! Shampoo 
not here to sit and watch husband sleep!"

"Oh Ranchan, how could you sleep now, when I've waited so long for this 
moment?"

"Ranma! Ranma, wake up!"

This last was a scream almost in his ear. In the next moment, a bucket of 
icy water caught him full in the face.

With an "Apppplbbb!" of startled shock, the now female Ranma shot from her 
futon, her eyes darting wildly about her for a moment with the remains of 
her nightmare, before coming to rest at last on the smirking girl who had 
settled back on her heels, a momentary almost playful smile dancing in her 
eyes as she fought to control her rising laughter.

Ranma glared down at her. She had slept far from soundly, troubled yet 
again by surreal, chaotic dreams of that last, nightmare trip to China and 
the near-disaster of the failed wedding, and she was in no mood for her 
fiancée's amusement at her expense.

"Oh very funny, Akane!" she growled, her tone a good deal harsher than 
usual. "Whad'd'ya have to do that for? Can't you just wake me up like any 
normal person, or is that too much to ask?"

For answer, Akane's laughter vanished, her own expression darkening as she 
glared back in her turn.

"What do you *think* I did it for?" she demanded, snatching up the 
discarded bucket, and surging angrily to her feet. "We *do* have school 
today, in case you'd forgotten, not to mention two tests this morning for 
which you should have been ready weeks ago. Baka; I could have just let 
you lie there; in fact, it would have served you right if I had."

"Yeah?" Ranma shot back. "Well at least then I wouldn't've been female and 
half soaked to start the day! Only some crazy, kawaiikune tomboy like you 
could think it was a good idea to wake someone up by screaming in their 
ear and half tryin' to drown them."

"Is that so?" she flared furiously. "And only some insensitive, baka 
hentai such as you could forget that you promised me last night that you'd 
wake up early this morning so I could help you study, something you should 
have been doing for the past week. Unless of course you'd rather fail the 
end of year exams? I only tried five times while you just lay there with 
your baka mouth open. I don't know why I bothered. I get up early to help 
you, *and* to spar with you while your father's away, *and* to cook you 
breakfast, and this is the thanks I get."

"At least if I'd woken up myself..." Ranma began. Then abruptly the last 
part of Akane's statement penetrated.

"You cooked breakfast!" she exclaimed in horror. "Wha'd'ya trying to do! 
Today's gunna be bad enough without food poisoning to add to what's 
already waiting for me. Jeez Akane, I told you I'd do the cooking while 
everyone else's away. At least then I might live to see them come back. 
Even Kodachi's cooking'd have to be better than the stuff you call food, 
and you'd have to be as crazy as her and Kuno to try anything she made. I 
dunno why yours waits till its on the plate before it tries to kill me! 
Why don't you just let it loose in the house if you want to get rid of me 
so much? I bet it could find its way right up here and--"

She might well have continued like this for some considerable time, but 
for the fact that by now the room was positively bathed in the blazing 
blue glow of Akane's battle-aura as she glared hideous, screaming pain in 
her fiancé's direction.

"Oh, is that right!" she said, her voice deceptively quiet. "Well then," 
she screamed suddenly at the very top of her lungs, "why don't you just go 
and find out just how good Kodachi's cooking is, since you know so much 
about it!"

In the next instant, the familiar, but in this case particularly enraged: 
"RANMA NO *BAKA*!" seemed almost to shake the house.

A moment later, Ranma was given a ticket care of Tendo sub-orbital express 
into the stratosphere. A faint cry of: "See what I mean! CRAZY 
KAWAIIKUNE...!" could be heard fading swiftly into the quiet of early 
morning. Then there was silence, save for the patter of falling plaster, 
and the soft, almost inaudible choking as the tears fell and Akane glared 
murderously in the direction she had taken.

So pointless, like all the increasingly bitter words since the disaster of 
the failed wedding, when she had believed somehow that the madness was at 
last at an end, and the anger and misunderstandings that seemed to have 
characterised their fractious relationship since that first fateful day 
Ranma had entered her already chaotic life, behind them for ever.

A thousand memories played yet again in her mind, a sudden almost 
overwhelming exhaustion and futility settling over her, as the tears 
continued to fall unchecked, and still she stood and did not move.

She supposed she should have known better: that it had been absurd to 
believe that this latest fiasco could end in any other way than disaster. 
Yet it did not lessen the pain and the sense of overwhelming betrayal. She 
should not have expected more of Shampoo; the amazon had made it clear 
from the outset, and despite any fleeting sense of camaraderie or perhaps 
even a genuine if ever-transient friendship, that she would win Ranma no 
matter what the cost, and to expect anything other than the worst of 
Kodachi was at best a study in dangerous self-delusion.

But Ukyou had been at least nominally a friend, despite all their 
differences and the rivalry that had kept a distance between them. That 
she had stooped to something like that, and worse, in a situation in which 
innocent bystanders could seriously have been hurt...

Akane clenched her hands yet again as she recalled Sayuri's tears, while 
Hiroshi and a trembling Yuka had tried to calm her down, and Daisuke had 
stood, eyes blazing and fists clenched convulsively at his sides, and 
could do nothing.

The Okonomiyaki chef had vanished before she had had a chance to confront 
her, and she had turned her anger that evening (perhaps unfairly, she had 
realised too late) upon Ranma, their increasingly bitter argument ending 
with her screaming at him that if this was what she could expect of their 
future together, then perhaps after all it was just as well things had 
turned out as they had before she had made the biggest mistake of her 
life.

She had regretted the words the moment they had left her lips, but as 
always it was too late, and she had watched with a rising sense of 
helplessness as he had frozen, a momentary anguish and incomprehension 
flickering deep in his blue-grey eyes, before both had vanished and he had 
simply turned away.

Akane had watched stunned as he had tensed, then leapt away without a 
backwards glance, vanishing swiftly into the twilight before she could 
think to call to him, or hope to follow. She had tried vainly for nearly 
two hours to find him, while the anger grew both with him and herself, 
until at last she had returned defeated, and slipped silently to her room 
so that no one would see the pain or the tears.

Only next morning had she learnt to her shame that he had gone in turn to 
the home of each of the guests and the few friends from Furinkan who had 
been invited, apologising personally to them and to their families, before 
moving quietly on. The news had stunned her at least as much as anything 
Ranma had yet done, the more so when she understood that Sayuri had found 
it easy to forgive him, and that even Yuka, although still furious on her 
friend's behalf, had simply nodded and forced a smile, and declared the 
incident passed, if not yet entirely forgotten. Akane had felt very small 
then, recalling her words of the night before, when as always she had 
simply exploded without giving him a chance to explain or say his piece.

The last week had been one of the worst she had known in the year since 
his arrival, with their arguments growing increasingly more bitter, while 
a slow weariness and sense of hopeless despair seemed to settle ever more 
heavily in her heart, until at last, two nights before, after a 
particularly protracted and pointless row throughout the evening meal had 
ended with her shattering a plate to a thousand fragments on his head 
before sending him yet again on an impromptu flight, Kasumi had risen 
quietly from her place, given her a single glance that had frozen her 
where she stood, and said quietly that she wished to speak to her in her 
room the moment she had finished in the kitchen.

Akane had waited, her initial trepidation growing to an unreasoning fear 
as the minutes passed and all seemed unnaturally still and silent, until 
at last there had come the sounds of her elder sister's approaching 
footfalls, and the quiet tapping at her door.

It had been one of the hardest half-hours in her life, with Kasumi's quiet 
admonitions seeming to hurt far more than any anger might have done, until 
at last she had simply collapsed in tears in her elder sister's arms, 
unable to explain why things seemed suddenly so hopeless, or understand 
what she might do to try to make amends.

Kasumi had simply held her until the tears had ceased. Then nodding as 
though reaching some long-considered decision, she had risen quietly to 
her feet and left the room, pausing only to assure herself that Akane had 
calmed and would be all right.

It was the next morning that their father had announced to an unusually 
subdued household that the family would be leaving that afternoon for 
three nights and two days to give her and Ranma some time entirely to 
themselves. What they did with that time was their decision, but he hoped 
they would use it wisely.

Akane had been shocked. This was not yet another transparent attempt on 
his part to force them closer together, although she had found herself 
wondering later whether thought of it might not have made at least the 
elder Saotome so amenable to the idea. Like Kasumi, her father had at last 
reached the limits of his patience, and was giving them this last 
opportunity to prove themselves adult and responsible enough to sort out 
the chaos their lives had become, before the next fiasco saw someone 
seriously hurt, or worse. Just where the others were going, and how Kasumi 
had convinced even Nabiki to agree without complaint, Akane had not asked, 
and a single warning look from both her father and her eldest sister had 
forestalled any protest she might have made.

As promised, the house had been deserted when she and Ranma had arrived 
home from school that afternoon, with a brief note in Kasumi's neat hand 
wishing them luck, and assuring them that the kitchen was well stocked 
with all they would need, the not so subtle inference being that they 
would be expected to fend entirely for themselves, a supposition proved 
correct when Akane entered the kitchen to find that her sister had either 
disposed of or taken with her anything that could possibly be prepared 
simply by reheating.

That had precipitated the first argument of the evening, with Akane 
setting immediately to work in the kitchen, while Ranma first tried to 
insist that he do the cooking until the others returned, and then simply 
insulted her until she had sent him to the koi pond for his trouble.

The meal had been a disaster, and she had fled crying to her room, 
emerging only hours later to find the house deserted, but a covered dish 
left for her in the kitchen.

She had been tempted simply to wash what Ranma had made for her down the 
sink, insensitive arrogant baka! But hunger had won out, and she had 
forced herself to finish it, her momentary temptation to admit he had been 
concerned for her replaced by a growing anger at the realisation that he 
had proven himself yet again so much better than her at something she 
longed desperately to be able to

do.

It was perhaps an hour before midnight when she had been roused from a 
restless half-sleep by the quiet tap at her window. Her anger had cooled 
but not vanished, and she had been tempted to hurl an insult or worse at 
him. But finally she had let him in, and they had tried to talk, the 
conversation stumbling as always, until at last, desperate to do 
something, she had made the offer to help him early next morning with the 
coming tests she knew he had tried to ignore, suggesting tentatively also 
that she might spar with him before school, since his father was not 
there. Neither had mentioned the taboo subject of food, and he had left, 
promising that he would be awake and ready early in the morning.

Akane shook her head, trying yet again to dash away the tears. She should 
have known something like this would happen: that they could not go a 
single morning without some ridiculous incident precipitating yet one more 
pointless exchange. And now any chance of their sparring or studying 
before school was ruined, and she would have to arrange for the hole to be 
repaired, and the day would be as hopeless as these last few before it, 
and... Suddenly the exhaustion and depression seemed almost too much to 
bear. She was tired: so desperately tired of the hurt and the anger and 
all the madness that seemed destined to pursue them until the end of time. 
If only just once things would go as she wished: if just once she could go 
a single day without finding reason to be angry with him, and he a day 
without the seeming insatiable need to hurt her.

Fighting the sudden almost overwhelming urge to burst again into tears, 
Akane turned, moving wearily from the room and towards the stairs once 
more. Breakfast was a disaster. Perhaps after all it was just as well she 
had not thrown away the additional food Ranma had prepared the night 
before.

 				     * * *

With a sigh, Ranma-chan looked down at Nerima from her new vantage point. 
The district certainly looked picturesque from up here in the early 
morning. Not that she was in any mood to appreciate it just at the moment.

"That crazy, kawaiikune otemba!" she muttered yet again, feeling gingerly 
at her jaw, where a purpling bruise was already beginning to rise.

Why was it that she did not seem to be able to go a single morning, let 
alone a day, since the fiasco of the wedding, without Akane trying half to 
kill her? And why was it so impossible after all this time, for her 
fiancée to accept that her cooking could best be equated to some kind of 
slow and particularly sadistic torture, and leave it at that?

Ranma-chan shook her head, simply dismissing both problems as insoluble. A 
moment later her mind turned to more immediate concerns as she began to 
descend once more, a momentary half-smile of wry amusement touching her 
face as she noted that, even now when she was already female and half 
drenched, fate or the curse was still determined to prove a very hackneyed 
point before she reached home again.

With another sigh, she surrendered to the inevitable as the canal 
approached. Moments later she had reached the end of her morning flight, 
and the water closed over her. There was a swirl, then a sopping-wet head 
of red hair poked above the water.

"That violent, kawaiikune--" Ranma-chan complained as though in completion 
of the ritual, as she scrambled ashore and took to the roof-tops. She was 
certainly not going to use a more conventional route to return to the 
Tendo-ke, given that she was clothed in nothing but the boxers he had worn 
to bed the night before. "Just how many times does she have to nearly kill 
me before it sinks in? Jeez, even Kotobuki Shiko's cooking'd have to be 
less dangerous than hers! At least you seem to be able to tell what that 
stuff's gunna do just by looking at it, and it only tries to poison Eiko 
once. Akane's has to do the big stomach dance first! And even when it 
looks and tastes kinda alright, that's only because it hasn't quite 
decided just how it's gunna try to make me regret daring to eat it!"

Abruptly she felt another smile tugging at the corners of her mouth, as 
she imagined with a sudden appreciative shudder the havoc the animate and 
Akane would cause together in a kitchen.

Akane had not seemed particularly to have appreciated his sense of humour, 
when he had inquired, after a particularly painful incident less than a 
month before, as to whether she had somehow managed to have the creators 
of Project Eiko try some of what she called food, for them to get so close 
to the truth in the anime, and further, why Nabiki had never considered 
trying to sell the stuff to the SDF as some kind of biological weapon. 
Surely she'd make a lot more than selling photos of Akane and his female 
form.

The elder girl had favoured him with a considering smirk, touched for a 
moment with something warm and genuinely amused, before Akane had chased 
both of them furiously from the house, although she had confined her 
subsequent retribution to Ranma.

Smiling still more at the memory, Ranma-chan made the last leap and landed 
on the Tendo roof. Moments later she was climbing in at her window and 
heading for the furo. From the kitchen came the unmistakable sounds of the 
microwave, mixed with the faint smell of something burning, and Ranma-chan 
shook her head, giving its general direction one resigned glance before 
turning hastily away and entering the bathroom, sliding the outer door 
closed with excessive care behind her.

Not that it would do any good. Akane seemed to have a sixth sense where 
her cooking and Ranma were concerned.

Shaking her head once more, Ranma moved quickly to the inner room. Soon, 
the furo filling, she was pouring cold water over herself, while the faint 
sounds from the kitchen quieted, and she thought she caught an exclamation 
of irritation and dismay, quickly cut short. Finished at last, she moved 
swiftly to the furo, grinning for a moment at the thought that Akane might 
actually have had to try the toxic concoction she had created, before she 
settled at last into the hot water with a sigh of content.

Ranma felt the familiar tingle as the change began to sweep through her. 
In the next instant her stomach lurched violently. Then for a timeless 
moment, the room was gone, and there was nothing save a stark, nightmare 
confusion and a sudden almost overwhelming sense of plunging headlong into 
some incalculable, soaring abyss, while a fleeting swirl of jagged, 
nauseous colour danced savagely across her vision. And at the edge of 
hearing was a sound that had no name, but was ancient and dreadful beyond 
the last end of a final, ruinous oblivion.

Reeling, aware for a terrible space almost of nothing save the impression 
and the primal, leaping horror it had wrought, Ranma swayed, clutching 
with convulsive force at the furo, the unreasoning terror surging wildly 
in its wake, until at last the dreadful intensity was gone, and he was 
himself again.

For a time he remained frozen, hands clenched painfully about the cool 
smoothness of the wood, while his heart hammered savagely in his chest, 
and his breath came in rapid gasps. But at last as the immediacy of the 
experience began to fade and common sense reasserted itself, he shook his 
head, trying to dismiss the moment as his imagination, or perhaps some 
sympathetic reaction to what was no doubt awaiting him in the dining-room.

Releasing his hold, he shook off the last of the fear as best he could, 
and lay back in the soothing warmth of the steaming water, determined to 
savour these few minutes of peace before the insanity the day would no 
doubt become. Sighing, he let his eyes drift half closed, the barely-heard 
sounds of Akane attempting some further disaster in the kitchen fading 
slowly as he let the stillness take him, and tried to forget his troubles 
for a while. Yet the lingering sense of horror and taut, irrational unease 
would not leave him, and he could not quite relax.

 				     * * *

"Shampoo? Where are you, child?"

With a sigh, the purple-haired amazon set the comb aside, glancing for one 
last moment towards the half-open window, before turning to make her way 
quickly from her small room, and along the short passage to the stairs.

"Coming, Great-grandmother," she called as she began down, wincing a 
little as her careless speed jarred her left arm again.

Her great-grandmother had done her best, but the arm was still painful, 
and her hand still a little swollen, although she had been able to remove 
the splint the night before.

Shampoo shivered, the momentary savage stab of pain reminding her yet 
again of the fiasco that had very nearly ended in such disaster. Never had 
she imagined Ranma capable of such anger, nor that she would ever see such 
a look of mingled fury and betrayal in his blue-grey eyes as he had met 
her gaze for one frozen moment, before he had come hurtling towards her, 
and her world had exploded in pain. She should have known; the signs could 
not have been clearer after their last near-disastrous trip to china, and 
his final climactic battle with Saffron. But as always, she had ignored 
the warnings and her own growing sense of futility, and gone ahead despite 
her misgivings and her great-grandmother's warning that she feared at last 
that her great-granddaughter's prospective groom had reached the limits of 
his patience, and that she would need this time to be consummately careful 
if she were to have any hope of winning him without destroying her chance 
for ever.

Shampoo knew she should have listened: that in retrospect, nothing could 
have been more foolish than to attack Akane so directly and with such 
ferocity; the days when such tactics might have had any chance of success 
were long passed. But she had been desperate, understanding suddenly that 
her last chance might be slipping away from her, and that should she do 
nothing, it could be lost beyond hope of recall.

She shivered again, quickening her pace despite another savage flash of 
pain from her still-healing arm, as she reached the foot of the stairs and 
moved quickly into the small private dining-room-come-parlour where her 
great-grandmother was waiting for her.

She preferred not to think about her return to the Nekohanten, the shame 
of her disgrace, and the still-deeper hurt of the knowledge that this time 
Ranma might very well never forgive her, far worse than any physical pain 
as her great-grandmother had tended to her broken arm and hand and the 
countless other lesser injuries, while she fought savagely against the 
sudden desperate desire to weep, and Mousse stood by silent and unmoving, 
and for once, said nothing.

She had returned to work as best she could, even though she suspected her 
great-grandmother would have let her rest, at least for a day or two. But 
at night she had cried herself silently to sleep in the dark where no one 
would see, until at last, the night before, long after Mousse was safely 
asleep, the ancient amazon had come quietly to her room and told her 
firmly, although not without kindness, that it was time she stopped hiding 
from the consequences of what she had done, and made an attempt to win 
Ranma's forgiveness before it was too late.

For a fleeting moment Shampoo had been furious that her great-grandmother 
would suggest she was afraid. Then she had raised bleary eyes to catch for 
an instant the flicker of something resigned and weary in the elder's 
face, and her anger had fled to be replaced by shame and acceptance. It 
was true; she had barely left the restaurant since the disaster of the 
wedding, insisting to herself that she had too much to do, and that she 
did not want to risk more severe and protracted an injury should she risk 
riding before her hand and arm were better healed. Yet she had known that 
in truth she was simply afraid: afraid to approach Ranma: afraid to see 
again the look that had torn at her heart and left her helpless and unable 
to defend herself as he had launched himself savagely towards her.

Unable to think of anything to say, Shampoo had nodded, waiting unmoving 
while her great-grandmother had held her gaze for a moment more before the 
elder had reached to lay a gnarled hand gently on her arm.

"All is not yet lost, child," she had said simply, her fingers tightening 
briefly before she released her. "We will talk in the morning."

And with that she had turned and moved quietly from the room.

"Shampoo?"

With a start at the sudden sharp tone, Shampoo shook off her introspection 
and turned her full attention to the elder who sat in the low chair facing 
her, a small table drawn to her side on which Shampoo saw now lay several 
bound scrolls and a small jade box, set with an intricate lock in which 
was set a fine silver key.

"Do you intend simply to stand there?" Cologne inquired peevishly, her 
eyes flickering and her wrinkled face stern as her staff flicked out to 
tap her great-granddaughter lightly but painfully on her wounded arm. "We 
*do* have work to do, child, before we open this morning. Come," she 
ended, rising to her feet and moving towards the kitchen.

Sighing, Shampoo made to follow her, then paused, her eyes drawn for a 
moment irresistibly to the scrolls and the little box, as a sudden new 
hope mixed with apprehension leapt in her.

Noticing the direction of her gaze, the old woman shook her head and 
smiled.

"Not this time, child," she said simply. "I think Son-in-law has had more 
than enough magic and potions to last him a lifetime. Apart from which," 
she added, "such subterfuge might not be the best means by which to regain 
his trust, given the circumstances; would you not agree?"

Shampoo nodded mutely, her momentary hopes dashed, even as her 
great-grandmother vanished into the adjoining room to an accompanying 
crash and exclamation of annoyance as Mousse, already in the kitchen, did 
or dropped something Shampoo could not see.

"Then what scrolls and box for, Great-grandmother?" The young amazon 
inquired, ignoring the din as she hurried in the elder woman's wake, now 
both curious and bewildered, and certain nothing would have been left 
where she could see without good reason.

But Cologne only shook her head.

"Later, child," she snapped in a tone that brooked no argument; "we have 
work to do."

And with that she turned quickly to the shelves and the spices.

Shampoo sighed again and shook her head. It would be useless to argue with 
her, and plainly she was not going to get any further explanation for the 
moment.

Shooting a quick dismissive glance towards Mousse who was just picking 
himself up after scrabbling furiously on the floor for his lost glasses, 
Shampoo stepped quickly passed him to her great-grandmother's side. It 
would not be long before the first customers would be arriving on their 
way to work, and she had yet to have her own breakfast and finish 
preparations for the first rush of the day.

Yet even as she moved about the kitchen, the image of the little curious 
box would not leave her, and she could not work in peace.

 				     * * *

"Oh man I *really* didn't need that today!" Ranma was stalking gloomily 
towards the lunch-room, his bento conspicuous by its absence. "And I 
didn't have a chance to make my own lunch this morning. If that macho 
chick really expects me to eat the stuff she calls food--."

He shuddered at the memory of the green, indefinable something that had 
looked like some particularly malignant cross between deformed, over-sized 
noodles and some ill-conceived, deep-sea abomination, that had seemed 
almost to leer up at him tauntingly, when he had opened his lunch-box that 
morning to dispose of and replace its contents, while Akane was looking 
for something in her room. He could still remember the feel of the thick, 
worm-like tentacles as they had curled around his hand.

"How does she do that?" he muttered to himself. "I swear sometimes she 
just dreams the stuff up, and there it is. She should get a job as a 
biologist. She could make new species all on her own, without having to go 
looking for them."

He sighed.

As he had expected, the morning's test had been a near disaster, although 
perhaps not quite as appalling as he had anticipated. There might still 
just be hope, were he to spend the next week in a study regime of which 
Mizuno Ami herself might be proud.

He laughed. Who was he kidding? If he passed at all, it would be a 
miracle, and Akane would be no help. It was not that she was not capable; 
Ranma had to admit that actually she would not be a bad tutor if she had 
more patience, and that she had a far better chance than himself of 
getting through their final exams. It was simply that she could not go two 
minutes without pointing out some inadequacy in anything ranging from his 
memory to his attention span, resulting in a protracted shouting match, 
and himself taking an impromptu flight for his trouble.

He shook his head, resigned gloomily to the prospect of extra study at his 
mother's arrangement to make up the marks he needed.

"Ranma? Oy! Ranma?"

At the call, Ranma jerked his thoughts back to the present in time to see 
Hiroshi and Daisuke waving in his direction through the usual push and 
shove.

He waved back, moving to make his way to join them.

Then in the next moment, the wall exploded in a shower of bricks almost 
beside him, and Ranma ducked, just in time to avoid a flying fist.

"Saotome!" a familiar voice roared as Ryoga leapt through the new entrance 
he had made. "At last I've found you!

"How dare you!" he continued, his voice more enraged with every word. "How 
dare you hide here while I've been looking everywhere for you, and how 
dare you betray Akane at her own wedding!"

Then a storm of bandannas had Ranma ducking and weaving wildly, as other 
students yelped and scattered in all directions.

"Damn it, Ryoga!" Ranma exclaimed with uncharacteristic anger, avoiding a 
follow-up round-house, while trying desperately to knock as many of the 
flying projectiles as possible aside before they hurt someone. "Wha'd'ya 
think you're doing! Didn't you learn anything the other day? You can't 
chuck those around in here!

"And yeah; of course I'd be tryin to hide at school, where I go every 
day," he added sarcastically. "And it was my weddin' too, bacon-breath, in 
case you'd forgotten!"

Ryoga leapt back, glaring furiously at the insult. But whatever he might 
have said was lost.

"Saotome; you accursed cur!" Came another cry, and Ranma glanced aside in 
resignation. A moment later, Kuno was leaping towards him, his usually 
spick kendo outfit slashed from neck to waist. "How dare you treat the 
blue thunder of Furinken with such malevolent disdain, and attack without 
honour or challenge. By all the gods you shall rue this day."

"Look; that was Ryoga, you idiot!" Ranma shouted in his turn, ducking a 
bokken-swing while lashing out with a fist that passed within a hair's 
breadth of catching the lost boy in the mouth.

"Silence, peasant!" Kuno raved. "Seek not to attempt to deceive the blue 
thunder, and cast aspersions upon another with thy accursed lies and 
calumnies."

"Yeah?" Ranma sneered, suddenly at the end of his patience. "Then what's 
that around your neck?"

Kuno reached up a hand, and extracted the black and yellow cloth that had 
lodged in the torn material that had once been his shirt.

"Then it is true!" he thundered. "The accursed Hibiki commoner has chosen 
yet again to ally himself with the treacherous sorcerer Saotome. No doubt 
you plan to divide your unholy lusts between my Tendo Akane, now that her 
heart has been shattered, and my beautiful Onna no Osage! Then Hibiki, 
prepare to meet thy doom."

"Who're you calling a commoner, you pervert!" Ryoga snarled in return, 
parrying a dozen swings with his umbrella before leaping back through the 
hole he had made, leading Kuno outside where he would have more room. "And 
she's not your Akane!" he ended in a scream.

Shaking his head, Ranma leapt to follow them, determined for once to see 
that they took this where no one else might be hurt in the cross-fire.

But as usual it was no good. Already, a considerable crowd was gathering, 
eager as always to see what was happening, if not so willing to become 
part of the spectacle.

"Stand and defend thyself! Coward! Infidel!" Kuno ranted, charging at the 
still retreating form.

Abruptly, Ryoga whipped about, and with one tremendous blow, brought his 
umbrella down on Kuno's swinging bokken. There was a crack, and Kuno found 
himself holding a considerably shortened piece of wood.

"Dog! Peasant!" Kuno blazed, seeming somehow even more deranged than 
usual, before a kick to the face from Ryoga ended the fight.

"Idiot!" the lost boy commented as he turned once more to face Ranma.

"Don't think that little distraction of yours has made me forget why I'm 
here!" he said furiously. "I demand an explanation."

"Wha!" Ranma gaped. "*My* distraction! You must be an even bigger idiot 
than I thought, P-chan."

"And don't call me P-chan!" Ryoga screamed, rushing wildly at him.

"Look," Ranma told him as he leaped over the attack; "I'm happy to beat 
the stuffin' out'a you Ryoga; I'm just in the mood to work off a bit of 
steam after the last week. But I ain't doin' it here. I've had enough of 
people gettin' hurt because everyone else's too damn stupid to realise you 
don't go fightin' where their are innocent bystanders. So let's take this 
somewhere else; all right?"

Not waiting for a reply, Ranma leapt away, Ryoga following in his wake as 
he raced for the fence and the park beyond.

Behind them, a sudden scream of "Ranma! What are you doing? Stop picking 
on Ryoga, you baka!" made Ranma redouble his pace, as Akane came racing, 
her blue battle-aura blazing, mallet raised in fury.

Ignoring everything else, the crowd surged behind her, intent only on 
seeing the coming mayhem.

Alone at last, Kuno stirred feebly.

"That didn't hurt!" he muttered.

Then realising everyone had gone, he pulled himself abruptly to his feet.

"Curs! Dishonourable cowards!" he cried, and took off fiercely after them.

He reached the fight just as Ranma flipped end over end to avoid yet 
another storm of the seemingly endless supply of bandannas Ryoga 
apparently possessed.

At Kuno's outraged scream of: "How dare you flee my challenge; cravens of 
cravens!" both combatants glanced for a moment in his direction.

"Wait your turn!" Ryoga shouted, sending a fresh flurry hurtling at the 
upper-classman, even as he launched a fresh barrage of blows towards 
Ranma.

"Yeah!" Ranma added as he dodged Ryoga's attack and countered with a 
Kashuu Tenshin Amaguriken that had the lost boy back-peddalling furiously. 
"Can't you see we're busy?"

Kuno drew himself up, a fresh bokken already raised high, glaring in rage 
and righteous indignation as he prepared again to charge into the fray.

Then suddenly a piercing, terrified scream tore through the rising 
cheering of the Furinken crowd.

Taken utterly off-guard, Ranma and Ryoga pivoted away from one another in 
mid-attack, both whirling almost in perfect unison towards the park's 
further side and the street beyond, from where the sound had come.

"What--" Ryoga began.

Then a second scream shrilled from the direction of the street, and Ranma 
gestured urgently.

"There!" he shouted.

For a moment Ryoga stared in confusion. Then a green flash leapt out 
brilliantly for a moment, and there was a ground-shaking explosion.

"Come on!" Ranma cried, even as he leapt forwards. "I dunno what's goin' 
on, but we gotta get over there."

Nodding, the fight forgotten, Ryoga surged to run at his side, Kuno almost 
on their heels.

"Ranma!" came a furious exclamation from behind. "Ranma! Wait for me!"

A moment later, Akane was racing to join them.

Behind, the greater part of the crowd, displaying as always far more 
curiosity than sense, came pounding in their wake, calls and exclamations 
creating a bizarre counterpoint to the shouts and screams coming from the 
street.

Ranma and the others had almost reached the further side of the park when 
the first panicked flight came racing towards them from ahead, some 
veering off to left and right, others ploughing headlong into the 
following crowd of Furinken students in their haste to escape whatever was 
happening. A moment later the four martial artists pounded out into the 
street, and skidded to a halt, staring dumfounded at the scene that met 
their eyes.

Not fifty feet from where they stood, a car lay slewed across the road, 
its nose almost against a fence, its roof peeled back as though someone 
had taken to it with a gigantic tin-opener. Flames were leaping from the 
bonnet and the broken windows, and an acrid smell of burning filled the 
air.

But it was not the wreck that had caught their attention, but the creature 
that stood some ten paces closer to where they had halted. Nominally human 
in shape and quite plainly female, she was somewhat larger, and horribly 
sleek and scaled, as though someone had reshaped a python into the 
semblance of a human female form, complete with every curve. The limbs 
were long and uniform as a snake, with no hint of knee or elbow, and 
seemed to ripple and quiver as she stood. Set upon a long, serpent's neck, 
her head was horribly human, long, jet-black hair falling in a shadowy 
cascade to her shoulders. The face was young, and might even have been 
beautiful had it not been for the appalling look of unbridled malice, and 
the serpent's eyes, a horrible, uniform hell-red, that glared with rage 
and hate and a hungry lust for death as the creature swayed snake-like 
back and forth.

For a moment she remained shifting, glaring balefully this way and that. 
Then lifting both arms, she threw back her head, her mouth gaping 
impossibly wide, revealing a long, forked tongue and teeth like those of a 
crocodile.

"Come back," she screamed, her voice that of a woman, but with an 
additional, snarling undertone that made one think of nothing so much as a 
rabid, wild animal. "Scum! Coward! Craven, ill-born bitch! Return! Return, 
hunter, and face me!"

Then she whirled, searing green fire like corrupted ki leaping from her 
right hand to slam through the window of a second car, some hundred feet 
away. Immediately, the interior became a blazing inferno, a concussive 
blast shredding its roof like tin-foil, even as the creature whirled again 
in a flowing arc, preparing to loose yet another attack.

But abruptly, she froze, her head pivoting as her eyes fixed on something 
closer at hand.

Aghast, Ranma saw the small figure as she twisted wildly from the path of 
a fleeing, middle-aged man on a bicycle. Then a sleek, snake-like arm 
stretched out impossibly long, and in the next instant the little girl 
screamed a high, terror-stricken scream as she was snatched from the 
ground as though she weighed nothing and whirled high in the air.

"Face me, you filthy, ape-spawned bitch!" the snake-woman howled, whirling 
the screaming child in a wide, sweeping arc with terrifying speed. "Face 
me and die, or I will rip out this imp's throat and dash out her brains in 
the street!"

As though to prove her threat, the creature swept the little girl 
forwards, her face a sudden demonic smile of hungry anticipation as she 
brought her in close, sharp teeth lunging for her throat. Then Ranma felt 
the movement at his side, and in the next instant the snake-woman keened a 
high, piercing shriek of agony as the spinning bandanna ripped through the 
arm that pinned the child.

With a convulsive lurch the thing released the girl and staggered back, 
clutching wildly at her wounded arm, even as she spun to face the 
direction from which the attack had come.

"Ryoga!" Ranma shouted, sparing him a quick glance even as he started 
forwards. "Keep that thing distracted while I get the girl.

"Akane! Get those idiots out of the way before someone gets themselves 
killed!"

With that, he was racing towards the creature and the screaming child, 
aware peripherally of the storm of bandannas streaking passed him as Ryoga 
sped in a wide arc, trying to keep the snake-woman's attention fixed in 
his direction as she writhed back and forth with impossible agility to 
avoid the incoming projectiles.

Ranma reached the small figure of the girl and swept her from the ground. 
Then a rabid snarl almost at his ear had him leaping away just in time to 
avoid vicious snapping jaws as the creature's head darted down on its 
impossibly long neck. An instant later he was gone, racing back to the 
others, even as the writhing hell-thing screamed again as a second 
bandanna slashed a jagged, savage line across her face.

"Here!" said Ranma, pushing the half-stunned girl into a gaping Kuno's 
arms. "Make yourself useful, and get her out of here."

"Come on!" he said, turning to Ryoga, and ignoring Kuno's half-stupefied, 
half-furious glare in his direction at being effectively shunted aside. 
"We gotta take this thing down before anyone gets killed."

Nodding, Ryoga dived left as Ranma somersaulted right, their adversary 
screaming in rage as she tried to track the racing pair whilst avoiding 
the continual storm Ryoga was sending towards her.

Snarling, she raised a hand, her arm following Ranma's arc, green fire 
gathering in her long fingers. Then abruptly she twisted with staggering 
speed, her serpent's neck stretching an impossible distance as her head 
dived suddenly straight at Ryoga's face as he passed.

Stumbling, Ranma whirled, ki building in his hands with desperate speed, 
knowing with a sick certainty he would be too late. Then a hundred chains 
seemed to explode from nowhere, engulfing the snarling creature in an 
avalanche of whirling metal. In almost the same instant, a swarm of 
shuriken came screaming through the air from an entirely different 
direction, and the snake-woman screamed again, a piercing, ear-splitting 
scream of hate and agony as the tiny dart-like blades slashed her writhing 
form, seemingly in a hundred places.

"Now!" Mousse's voice shouted above the hell-thing's screams as he leapt 
down from a roof-top, even as Konatsu bounded into the street, the 
kunoichi's hands blurring as a second barrage flew. "Saotome! Hibiki! 
Strike now!"

Ranma nodded, the bright blue glow wreathing him even as he turned to 
catch Ryoga's glance as the lost boy built heavy ki for his own attack. 
Then both martial artists raised their hands.

"Mouko Takabisha!"

"Shi-shi Hokoudan!"

Writhing, spitting curses like oblivion, the snake-woman thrashed this way 
and that, her face twisted with malice and venomous hate as she fought 
against her bonds.

"Scum!" she screamed, her voice a keening shriek that hurt the ears. 
"Craven! Human hunter filth! Sending others to do your work, while you 
skulk and hide in the shadows! Ape! Muck-bred bitch! Face me and die!"

Then the combined attack crashed into her, and her screams became a 
tearing, nerve-shattering shriek of agonised torment, and a limitless 
desire to kill, her writhing body burning sun-bright, even as she strained 
with a last, hopeless hunger to escape.

With a rending, splintering explosion, the chains burst in a thousand 
pieces. But the snake-woman staggered, her blackened, shredded limbs 
convulsing wildly as she lurched and stumbled. Then she pitched forwards, 
collapsing to crouch in the crater the twin attacks had melted into the 
road, her ruined face twisted in murder and agony as she lifted her head 
to fix hate-filled, serpent's eyes on her tormentors who had gathered 
together, and stood now facing her.

For a space she remained, great, shuddering gasps tearing through her 
burned and broken body as she fought to breathe, while a black, glutinous 
ichor leaked slowly from her eyes and mouth. Then at last she stirred.

"You are mine!" the snarled words were low, laced with pain and hate and a 
venomous, hungry promise. "When I return, you are mine. None save a hunter 
can slay us, and you have not the power of her line. I will come again, 
and then you will scream!"

With that, she raised her shattered arms, her seared hands moving in a 
complex pattern, and her mouth speaking words they could not catch. For a 
moment a blackness seemed to grow and gather in the air before her, as 
though a hole were being opened in the world of midday into an abyss of 
deepest night. Then suddenly twisting, jagged colour burst into being at 
the heart of the portal, and Ranma gasped, a sudden, primal horror seizing 
him as the unnatural, impossible colour of his vision in the furo waxed 
and surged, and he could not look away.

For a moment, time seemed stilled as he stared, aghast. Then searing, 
white-hot agony struck him with the force of a tsunami, and he doubled 
over, unable even to cry out, aware dimly through his torment that Ryoga 
had collapsed beside him, and as though from some great distance, also of 
Akane, calling and calling his name.

With a shriek, the snake-woman reeled back, screaming a high, keening 
scream of sudden terror and agonised pain, her ruined arms beating the air 
before her, her mouth gaping wide in a rictus of leaping horror and numb 
incomprehension as the corrupted, impossible gate writhed and rippled, and 
her scream grew and grew until it passed the threshold of pain. Then the 
gate exploded outwards, engulfing her in a moment, her body turning 
instantly to leaping, searing fire, her last, shattered scream dying 
swiftly to a long, broken wail of ruin and despair as she burned away, 
that faltered, and failed, and was stilled.

The last flickering embers of her form disintegrated, vanishing swiftly in 
ash and smoke. Then with a hiss and crack, the ruins of the portal 
disappeared, something light and red as though of some bright fabric 
fluttering in its passing, to settle at last soft and unmoving at the very 
centre of the crater, and the battle.

With a groan Ranma staggered to his feet, for a moment too stunned with 
the aftermath of the pain and the nightmare memories to understand what 
was happening. Then Ryoga dragged himself upright beside him, and he 
turned to glance passed him to where Mousse was just beginning to stir.

"What...what just happened?" the Chinese martial artist groaned, accepting 
Ryoga's hand to help him stand.

Ranma shook his head, then turned at the sound of running feet. A moment 
later, Akane stumbled to a halt beside him.

"Ranma?" she gasped. "Ranma, What happened! Are you all right?" Then 
something else caught her attention, and she glanced aside. "What's that?"

Startled, Ranma followed her glance in time to catch a flash of bright 
colour as something small rose fluttering from the scene of the fight. For 
a moment it hovered, caught on some cross-wind, before it came sailing 
towards them to fall almost at his feet.

Perhaps almost the size of his splayed hand, it was a bright red, and 
looked as though it might have been torn from a dress or decorative 
kimono.

"What! Where?" he said, pushing away the last of the lingering horror as 
he gazed down at the fluttering cloth. "I don't... That thing wasn't 
wearing anything, and the little kid wasn't dressed in something like 
this."

Bending, his left hand reached out, his fingers snatching at the fabric 
just as a fresh gust was about to carry it away.

"No! Son-in-law!"

The shriek was so utterly unexpected that Ranma froze. Then the 
brightly-coloured scrap fluttered up about his hand, and white-hot, fiery 
agony exploded in its wake, surging through his arm and shoulder to engulf 
him again in searing, tearing pain.

With a strangled cry, Ranma leapt back, his arm flailing wildly as he 
tried frantically to shake free the clinging, burning stuff that seemed to 
have become melded like searing acid to his skin. Then something struck 
his hand with enough force to send fresh shards of agony exploding through 
his fingers, and the fabric was gone, the burning excess of the pain 
vanishing with it to be replaced by a dull, relentless ache in his hand 
and lower arm, that grew quickly to a sense of numbing, frozen cold.

"Haven't you learnt anything!" Cologne's voice was tight with anger and 
something that might well have been real anxiety as she reached out a 
gloved hand to snatch the fluttering cloth from the tip of her staff, and 
tuck it away securely beneath her robes. "Son-in-law, how could you have 
been so foolish as to touch such a thing without more care?"

Ranma turned to stare dumbly at the ancient Chinese Amazon for a moment, 
trying unsuccessfully to shake some warmth back into his aching hand.

"Hey, old ghoul!" he managed defensively at last, the look becoming a 
glare. "Don't blame me! How was I supposed to know something like that 
would happen?

"And what was that snake-thing, anyway?"

But Cologne shook her head.

"For once," she said uneasily, "I have no idea. The creature was some kind 
of demon, yet..."

At her words, Ranma's eyes flashed.

"That mad old pervert!" he snarled, his voice laced with uncharacteristic 
rage. "I'll bet that crazy pervert is behind this! When I get my hands on 
him, I swear, I'll take him apart! Innocent people could'a been killed, 
and I've had just about enough of idiots like him doin' crazy things like 
this just because they want to get at me, usually for somethin' Oyaji's 
done!"

He glared furiously about, as though expecting the ancient pervert in 
question to appear suddenly, ready for the pounding of his life.

Then a gnarled hand reached up to rest with surprising gentleness on his 
arm.

"I don't believe Happy was responsible for this, Son-in-law," said the 
ancient Amazon quietly. "There is something very much amiss with this 
situation. Why do you imagine I came with such urgent haste, when I first 
sensed the creature's presence? It was wrong...strange and unnatural in a 
way I have never felt before.

"Any demon entering the physical world leaves a trail; a gate is intrinsic 
to their mode of travel, and it cannot be disguised or hidden from one 
able to perceive such intrusions. Yet there was no gate, nor any 
indication of a means by which the creature entered our world. She was 
simply suddenly ‘here’, with no transit to sense, nor any path by which 
her origin could be traced.

"More; although undoubtedly inherently evil in nature, her aura was wrong: 
twisted and corrupted in a fashion I do not understand. I cannot describe 
it in any other way. And even were that not the case, it was not that of 
any demon kind I have encountered, and believe me I have encountered many. 
That is not in itself impossible; there are many variations, and even 
someone of my years and training need not have seen all that may be seen. 
But this difference was more...fundamental, as though she came of a plane 
utterly unlike anything ever yet encountered, whose very nature is 
intrinsically alien and incompatible, and whose kind have never before 
been seen.

"Then where?" Mousse began, only to be silenced by a glare and an 
imperious gesture from the elder.

"I have not finished," she said grimly, her eyes flashing a warning. 
"Alone, all this would be concern enough. But did none of you notice 
anything more: something inherently strange in your encounter?"

"Only that she hit us with some kinda attack, even after she was dying," 
said Ranma, shifting his arm with growing unease. The ache was not 
relenting, and the sense of frozen chill seemed to be creeping slowly 
higher, while his stomach had begun to churn uncomfortably. "I dunno what 
it was, but I'd rather not feel anything like it again."

Ryoga and Mousse nodded emphatically in agreement. Then suddenly Mousse's 
eyes widened.

"The curses!" he exclaimed. "I know it makes no sense, but could that last 
attack have had something somehow to do with our curses? Konatsu was 
standing almost beside me when the snake-woman did...whatever she did. Yet 
he was unaffected!"

"Well done, boy." said the matriarch, seeming genuinely pleased. "You've 
hit unsettlingly close to the mark.

"But," she added, her voice again suddenly tight with unease, "you are, I 
think, all making still one fundamental mistake. All of you are assuming 
that what happened to Ryoga, Mousse and Son-in-law was the result of some 
directed attack. The truth, however, may be a great deal more disturbing.

"I believe that the effect was entirely incidental, caused when the 
creature tried to build her gateway home using a form of magic altogether 
alien to the most basic precepts of such abilities as we understand they 
must exist.

"There are many forms of magic; I've seen many in my time. But like the 
Art, all magic must, by definition, be based upon fundamental principles, 
principles as immutable and unchanging as any other natural law that 
defines our world. Without those principles, any such power is 
uncontrollable.

"What your adversary tried to do to escape could not have worked. It is as 
though every assumption she made assumed fundamental magical precepts 
intrinsically incompatible and at odds with all we understand, and all we 
know must be. Yet it is inconceivable that a demon of her power could not 
have known: could not have understood what would happen. And yet somehow 
she made an impossible, unimaginable mistake. That is more concerning than 
any of you yet have begun to appreciate, and something about which I won't 
speculate further; not yet. But it was this difference: this basic 
incompatibility I think, that destroyed her, and that reacted with such 
violence with your curses, a conclusion reinforced it would seem by what 
happened to you, Son-in-law, when you touched that piece of cloth. You 
contacted something that should not, that *cannot* be in our world, and 
the inherent magic of your curse fought the contact with primal negation."

"But that can't be right, Cologne-san!" Akane protested. "The attack also 
affected Ryoga, and he isn't cursed."

The martial artist in question squirmed uncomfortably, while Cologne shot 
the youngest Tendo an almost pitying glance.

"Additionally," she continued, as though Akane had not spoken, "did none 
of you think, during the fight, to pay attention to what the creature was 
screaming? She demanded again and again that the ‘Hunter’ return and face 
her, and seemed as shocked and bewildered as everyone else by her sudden 
situation, as though somehow she were brought here in the very midst of 
her confrontation, and against her own volition. Certainly you were not 
her intended targets.

"Lastly, as I said, there is this." Reaching the still-gloved hand beneath 
her robe, she drew out the piece of fabric once more.

"Look closely," she instructed, her glance fixed suddenly keenly upon 
Ranma. "Not simply with your sight. Can you sense nothing?"

Ranma obeyed, Akane, Mousse and Ryoga following his example, each with 
varying ability. Almost immediately the wrongness struck him, a twisting, 
nauseating feeling that seemed somehow to intensify the frozen ache in his 
arm.

"Something's... something's wrong with that thing!" he managed at last, 
averting his eyes, and swallowing down a sudden clenching lurch as he 
stepped a pace back. "I dunno what it is, but it's not right; like...like 
ki that's been all knotted and twisted, but somehow different; worse! 
Sorry, Old Ghoul, but would you mind puttin' that away?"

Nodding, Cologne tucked the fabric out of sight once more.

"Exactly," she said, her tone tight with an unnerving intensity. "Now you 
begin to see. I'm surprised only that you didn't think to examine the aura 
of your adversary.

"This cloth doesn't contain the sense of inherent evil and malice the 
demon possessed, but in the same indefinable, terrible way, it is amiss; 
wrong; somehow utterly alien, almost inimical to natural order as it 
should be. Furthermore, the fabric possesses a sense of life and being, as 
though it were an extension of something living and vital, rather than 
simply a scrap, torn from a piece of clothing.

"An exceptional martial artist or magician can imbue a valued tool or 
possession with their ki, to enhance its power or protection. Ryoga would 
be familiar with the idea," she gestured towards the black and yellow 
cloth bound about his head, and the lost Boy nodded, "and even the Kuno 
boy does so with that bokken with which he is so unaccountably fascinated.

"But this is so much more, as though this scrap were an extension of the 
very soul of its wearer. If I were to hazard a guess, I should say this 
belonged to your adversary's antagonist, torn from her in their battle, 
and that somehow it followed the demon to this world.

"But unfortunately," she said suddenly, her tone abruptly brisk as she 
turned for a moment to glance towards the park, "all further discussion 
must wait. As usual, it seems the Furinken population are displaying their 
typical disregard for basic common sense, and appear to be intent on 
ignoring Tendo Akane's advice. It would serve them right should another 
demon appear to frighten them into better regard for their own safety.

She cackled.

"Besides," she continued, "I have a restaurant to run, and Mousse some 
spices I expected nearly an hour ago, assuming of course he hasn't seen 
fit to lose them during his inspired entrance into the fight?" She shot 
him a look that promised dire consequences if she were proved correct.

"If you wish to know more of what I believe may have happened," she ended, 
"call the Nekohanten this evening. I may know more then, and we can 
arrange to discuss this further.

"But now, we all have other things to do."

And with that, she turned, and was gone.

"Old Ghoul!" Ranma muttered unhappily, glancing to each of the others in 
turn. "I'll bet she knows a lot more than she's telling."

But Mousse shook his head. "For once, Saotome, I don't believe so," he 
said uneasily.

Konatsu nodded. "I've not a great deal of experience with Elder Cologne," 
he said quietly, "but I felt she was being unusually candid, and I think 
we should accept any invitation she offers. I believe this is very 
important.

"But now, I too must go. Ukyou-sama has still not returned," he sighed and 
shook his head sadly, "and I must see her business doesn't suffer.

"Ryoga-san? If you would care to return with me, I can accompany you to 
the Nekohanten this evening if we are to go."

Ryoga nodded, as usual embarrassed concerning his eternally appalling 
sense of direction, but grateful for the offer.

A moment later Mousse had also taken his leave, and Ranma and Akane were 
alone.

"Are you all right, Ranma?" Akane demanded, as Ranma again flexed his left 
arm, unable to relieve the ache and increasing impression that his hand 
and arm were immersed in a bath of frigid, ice-cold water, no matter how 
he tried.

Ranma nodded silently, for once too preoccupied to answer.

"Come on then," she said, shooting him an uneasy glance before turning 
back towards the school. "I want at least some lunch-time before our next 
test this afternoon."

Ranma nodded again and moved to follow her. But his arm continued 
mercilessly to throb with a dull, frozen ache, and he shivered.

 				     * * *

"Oh jeez; come on Akane!" Ranma sighed as he entered the kitchen.

The remainder of the school-day had been one of the worst he could 
remember. The second test had been every bit as bad as he had imagined, 
and throughout the afternoon his left arm had continued to ache with a 
relentless, frigid ice, while a slow lethargy and an increasing churning 
nausea had grown with every hour.

He had tried at first to dismiss the matter as simply the fact that he had 
had nothing to eat since breakfast. But the very thought of food had made 
his stomach twist in rebellion, and as the afternoon progressed and he 
felt no better, he had begun to realise that something was terribly wrong.

The school-day over at last, he had slipped away to walk home alone, a 
slow, unreasoning fear growing on him as the frozen ache and sick twisting 
nausea grew ever worse, and he tried to decide what he should do.

He had reached the Tendo-ke at last to be greeted by a furious Akane, 
demanding to know why he had not waited for her. Uncharacteristically 
short, he had snapped irritably that he had wanted some time alone to 
think, and stalked upstairs to his room, while Akane stared after him, her 
expression shifting between enraged, stunned and uneasy.

Settling on his futon, he had tried to rest. But the aching chill and the 
churning in his stomach would give him no peace, and at last he had given 
up and made his way again downstairs, to find a disaster in the making, 
appalling even by Akane's unique standards, awaiting him in the kitchen.

Ranma shook his head, his stomach clenching in sudden fierce negation as 
he stared hopelessly at the unrecognisable something that looked vaguely 
like a particularly nauseating cross between luminous green pea-soup and 
stewed worms and maggots, hissing and spitting on the stove. A thick, dark 
smoke with a horrible, greenish hue choked the air with a smell like 
burning tyres, while things he could not name floated here and there, and 
the occasional bubble rose lazily to disturb the surface of the thick, 
porridge-like mixture with a sullen ‘blurp’ that made him want suddenly, 
desperately to be sick.

Akane, her apron covered in some dark brown oily stuff, and her hair 
dusted with a fine soot that was the same colour as the smoke, was busy 
hammering away at the mixture with what looked to be one of her patented 
mallets.

"Listen, Ranma," Akane growled dangerously through clenched teeth, the 
ferocity of her hammering increasing as she glanced in his direction with 
a look that warned him that any negative comment would result in prolonged 
and extreme pain; "I'm not in a very good mood tonight. If you want to 
help, you can set the table. Otherwise, leave me alone."

Abruptly there was a loud, squelching bang, followed by a tearing crack, 
and the pot burst almost exactly down the middle, half the appalling stuff 
launching itself straight up into the exhaust fan, while the rest gushed 
in a searing, hissing torrent on to the stove.

"I don't need this, I *really* don't need this," Ranma groaned as his 
fiancée turned on him.

"Baka!" she erupted, lighting up with fury, while a thick sluggy something 
slithered slowly down her shoulder to fall to the floor with a soft, 
liquid plop. "Now look what you made me do!"

A moment later, the mallet crashed down on Ranma's head.

"And get" ‹slam "out of" ‹slam "my" ‹slam "kitchen!" she finished, 
driving him through the open doorway and into the floor.

Ranma twitched and stirred feebly. But the usual "kawaikunee" did not 
come, and a moment later, Akane realised that he was making no attempt to 
struggle to his feet.

"Ranma?" she inquired, a sudden unreasoning thrill of unease gripping her 
as still he did not move.

Dismissing the mallet, Akane dropped to her knees beside him, and reached 
to shake his shoulder. "Ranma! This isn't funny!"

A moment later she jerked back her hand in alarm. Ranma's left arm was icy 
to the touch, and reaching to catch his hand, she gasped in shock. It was 
as though his hand had been in a freezer.

"Ranma!" she demanded, now both frightened and angry. "Ranma, wake up!"

Slowly, Ranma stirred and opened his eyes. But it seemed to take a few 
moments for his gaze to track to her face, and abruptly Akane realised 
just how pale he was. Usually, no one looked more alive and vital. Yet 
now, it was as though something were bleaching the life and colour from 
his face and his blue-grey eyes, and especially his left hand and arm.

With seeming effort, he pushed himself up from the floor.

"Crazy, kawaikunee..." he said as he got slowly to his feet.

But the words had no life, and Akane felt the fear coil tighter as Ranma 
swayed for a moment where he stood, before he seemed to recover and steady 
himself.

"Ranma," she demanded, anger winning the battle with her growing alarm; 
"Why didn't you tell me you weren't feeling well!"

"Look, it's nothin' Akane; all right?" he said, his tone again 
uncharacteristically short and irritable. "It's just an after-effect of 
touchin' that scrap of...whatever it was. I'll be fine after a lie down, 
assuming you stop tryin' to poison me, that is."

With a supreme effort, Akane fought down the almost overwhelming urge to 
give him the beating of his life for that, and shook her head.

"It's not all right, Ranma!" she answered angrily. "Your hand's like ice, 
and you look really sick. That's not like you; you're *never* sick! 
*Never*!"

Ranma sighed, suddenly too tired and preoccupied to argue.

"Listen," he said, just wanting this finished, so he could go upstairs and 
lie down until whatever it was was over. "Just let me do this my way; all 
right? I do know somethin' about usin' ki to fix things like this. Just 
let me try, and if I don't feel any better in an hour or so, then you can 
call Tofu-sensei, or the Old Ghoul, or the Pervert, or whoever else you 
like. But I ain't in the mood to argue now, so just leave it till later."

With that, he turned, making again for the stairs.

For long seconds that seemed suddenly for ever, Akane stared after him. 
Something was wrong; she knew that suddenly with a certainty beyond 
anything she could name.

Yet she hesitated. Ranma was very highly trained; despite all his father 
had done, that at least could never be denied. Perhaps, if he really did 
know what he was doing, it *would* be best to give him a chance to deal 
with this as he wanted. After all, surely an hour or two would not make 
any difference? Except, of course, that she would be worrying herself 
sick.

Sighing unhappily, Akane turned away and stepped back into the kitchen. 
Any idea of preparing a meal herself was out of the question; one had to 
be in the right mood for cooking, and she was too worried about her baka 
of a fiancé to think about that any more tonight. She would have a small 
something now to tide her over, and order take-away in an hour or so, when 
she was sure Ranma had fixed whatever was the matter with him.

"Ranma no baka!" she said softly, her tone tight with sudden mingled 
frustration and anxiety.

With another sigh she searched out a few dry biscuits and something to put 
on them. Then, moving into the sitting-room, she settled in front of the 
television, and tried to relax and forget her troubles for a while.

 				     * * *

She woke to the sounds of gunfire, and Priss's scream of "SYLVIE!"

Shocked, Akane bolted upright from her slumped position on the couch, 
staring in alarm at the television for a moment, before she turned to 
glance at the little clock that stood on the crystal cabinet, and that had 
belonged to her mother's family. Not that there was any point. She knew 
very well that BGC was being repeated, at half past nine, as it was one of 
the few chances she had to sit in companionable quiet with Nabiki, and 
watch something both of them enjoyed.

She must have fallen into a sound sleep in the unusual peace of the house. 
And now it was almost half ten, and the hour she had agreed to give Ranma 
had become over four.

She leapt to her feet, half expecting and hoping that she would see him 
standing smirking in the doorway, ready with some clever remark at her 
expense. But he was not there, and as she stepped out into the passage, 
the unnatural quiet and stillness of the house hit her with a sudden 
overwhelming intensity.

Moving along the passage, she hurried upstairs, apprehension growing as 
she reached the room Ranma shared with his father.

"Ranma?" she called softly, tapping quietly at the door, 
uncharacteristically unwilling to disturb him, yet needing with a sudden 
urgency to know he was all right. "Ranma, are you awake? Sorry; I fell 
asleep. But I'm about to order take-away, so I thought I'd better find out 
what you wanted."

A chill silence greeted her.

"Ranma?" she tried again, her voice rising in unreasoning fear as she 
knocked with much greater force. "Ranma?"

But Ranma made no answer.

For a moment, Akane stood very still, irrationally terrified to open the 
door for fear of what she might find. But at last, common sense reasserted 
itself.

She was being ridiculous. Given the right circumstances, Ranma could sleep 
through just about anything, and like her, probably he had simply fallen 
asleep, unused to the quiet with everyone else away.

Pushing down the irrational unease, Akane swept the door open with sudden 
considerable force, and switched on the light, abruptly angry with him for 
making her worry for nothing.

"Ranma!" she cried, her steps quick and furious as she stamped across to 
the form sprawled out on the futon, "Ranma, wake up, you baka!"

But Ranma did not move or stir, and close now, Akane could see that he was 
curled in upon himself as though against some bitter cold, and that he was 
shivering.

Fear leaping again, she dropped down beside him, reaching once more for 
his left hand, that had slid from the edge of the futon, and lay upturned 
on the floor. To her horror, it was if anything even more icily frozen 
than before, and studying him closely, she was sure that the unnatural, 
terrifying pallor was far more pronounced. Even his hair seemed pale and 
lifeless, as though somehow he were fading before her eyes, becoming 
increasingly insubstantial: a cold, ghost-like wraith of himself.

Frightened suddenly beyond words, Akane remained crouching for some time 
in the still, terrible silence, clasping Ranma's ice-cold hand uselessly 
in her own, while her heart hammered savagely behind her ribcage, and she 
had no idea what to do. But at last she forced herself to try to think. 
Staying here like this was not going to achieve anything. She had to get 
help; she could not do anything on her own.

With a convulsive lurch, she let his hand fall and leapt with sudden 
urgency to her feet. Then she was flying from the room and down the 
stairs, nearly plunging headlong in her frantic haste to reach the phone.

Tofu's number rang and rang without answer. But to her overwhelming 
relief, Cologne answered the Nekohanten's line on the third ring.

Akane poured out an urgent explanation, while the ancient amazon listened 
in silence.

"Yes," she assured her when she had finished, her tone more alarmed, yet 
somehow at the same time more kindly than Akane had ever heard it. "I will 
be there as soon as I can. Fetch something with which to keep him warm, 
and do not leave his side. Also, try to wake him if you are able."

The next few minutes were some of the worst Akane had known, while she sat 
by Ranma's unmoving form and waited in growing terror for the Chinese 
matriarch's arrival. Every now and then she would try again to wake him, 
or elicit at least some response. But as before, he remained very still, 
only his shivering and his tight, uneven breathing assuring Akane that 
things were not worse even than her fear was suggesting.

She was brought back from her increasingly anxious vigil by the sudden 
sharp tapping at the window. Relieved beyond measure, Akane hurried to 
open it, and a moment later Cologne had hopped into the room and moved to 
squat by Ranma.

For long, tense moments while Akane waited, the ancient Amazon remained 
still, her eyes studying the unmoving martial artist intently, while her 
gnarled fingers probed his left arm and hand with careful skill. But at 
last she rose to her feet and shook her head.

"This is utterly beyond my experience," she said, her wrinkled face tight 
with anxiety. "Plainly Son-in-law's malady has been caused by contact with 
that piece of fabric. Yet I cannot even begin to speculate as to why it 
has affected him as it has, only that in some way the sickness is linked 
to the magic of his curse. In some indefinable fashion, it seems that the 
interaction between that and the unnatural, alien magic inherent in the 
cloth has proven inimical. But why, I cannot say.

"We are dealing here with the impossible, and I do not use that word 
lightly. As I said earlier today, like the demon who brought it, that 
fabric should not...*cannot* exist in our world; Its very nature is alien 
and inimical to every natural law of magic as it must be. Yet it is here, 
and in some terrible, impossible way, it has corrupted or infected the 
Jusenkyo curse, and through it Ranma's ki and body, and indeed, perhaps 
every fundamental that defines his existence. If only he had been a little 
more circumspect, or I had arrived in time. He should never have touched 
that thing."

Aghast and horror-stricken, Akane stared at the ancient Amazon, numb with 
a leaping, terrible dread as she realised at last that this time, the 
matriarch had no answer; that she was as lost and helpless as herself.

"Then...then we can't do anything?" Her voice was suddenly very small in 
the cloying stillness, tears threatening as she recalled every pointless 
argument and stupid misunderstanding that had characterised the week since 
the disaster of their failed wedding.

Then to her surprise, a wrinkled hand laid gently on her own, ancient 
fingers tightening for a moment with a warmth Akane had never imagined the 
Chinese matriarch possessed.

"There *is* something I might try," said Cologne quietly. "There is an 
ancient divining ritual, used once long ago, when it was custom for 
members of the Amazon tribe to travel secretly as guards for the emperor. 
After all, assassins tend always to underestimate a woman. It allowed us 
always to know where each traveller might be, and to contact her through a 
possession imbued with her ki, and left with us before her departure.

"But it has not been used for many hundreds of years. Nor do I know 
whether it will serve, or whether it might not be very dangerous to use it 
with something alien to the very nature of our world. Yet there is a 
chance that through it, I might reach the wearer of the fabric, and that 
that wearer may be able to help in a way I cannot."

"I know it is a slim chance," she agreed, seeing the helplessness in 
Akane's face. "But it is all the hope I can offer. What we are dealing 
with has perhaps never before been seen, yet it is just possible that our 
mysterious, other-world demon hunter has encountered such a thing, and can 
advise us on what can be done."

Numbly, Akane nodded, unable to speak through the sudden tightness in her 
throat.

"You should sleep here tonight," Cologne continued. "I have strengthened 
Son-in-law's ki as best I can, and he has placed himself into a healing 
sleep that may also do good. I had no idea he knew such a technique. That 
father of his never ceases to amaze me. With all his monumental 
incompetence and in-born stupidity, still somehow he has taught the boy 
with astounding skill and dedication."

She smiled.

"Stay here child," she ended kindly, "and sleep if you can. I will return 
as quickly as I may. Good night."

And with that, she leapt to the window, and vanished swiftly into the 
night.

 				     * * *

The Nekohanten was dark and still as the ancient matriarch slipped 
soundlessly inside, locking the door quietly behind her. Both Shampoo and 
Mousse were long asleep, and Cologne moved silently, carrying only a 
single candle to find what she needed.

Soon she sat cross-legged in the quiet stillness of the restaurant, a fine 
copper tripod set on the floor before her, supporting a delicate ceramic 
censer in which a sweet-smelling incense burnt with a gentle glow. A fine 
dusting of a soft, blue powder lay about the tripod in a sealing circle, 
whilst Beneath the stand she had set the fabric she had taken, the 
decorative cloth seeming impossibly innocuous as she settled more 
comfortably in her place, and unrolled an ancient, worn scroll.

For many seconds she remained, her eyes scanning the old symbols as she 
confirmed one last time what she must do. Then nodding to herself, she set 
the scroll aside, and shifting her position a little, she fixed her eyes 
on the flickering glow and the gentle curl of smoke. For a long moment she 
was still. Then softly, she began to chant, the words of an ancient mode 
no longer remembered, save by the elders of her tribe, and perhaps those 
of the Musk.

Almost immediately, the smoke swirled, shifting softly in the stillness. 
Then, slowly, images began to form, fleeting and ill-defined as though 
seen through a thick, cloying fog from very far away, and words came to 
her also, fading and returning as from some almost infinite distance of 
time and memory.

Yet through the fleeting glimpses and the broken, whispering echoes, the 
twisting, soul-deep wrongness and sense of something alien and strange, 
and somehow inimical to the world and everything in it grew and grew, 
until as the ancient Amazon's chant reached its peak and she prepared to 
raise her gnarled hands in invocation, the feeling leapt suddenly to an 
appalling, savage horror and certainty of imminent, terrible danger.

Suddenly more afraid than she had been for years uncounted, Cologne 
changed the words, her hands moving urgently in a complex pattern as she 
began the closing and banishing of the ritual.  But the numb, terrible 
fear surged higher, and she knew with a sickening certainty that it was 
too late, and that she had made an appalling, incalculable mistake.

For a moment more the smoke swirled, the fractured images and broken words 
a surreal, horrible complement to her rising dread. Then, as she had seen 
in the ruined gate of the demon, jagged, hideous colour leapt out suddenly 
stark and twisted, and the universe cracked and opened.

For one moment Cologne stared aghast into a soaring, vast oblivion more 
ruinous and more terrible than she could begin to comprehend. For one 
instant she glimpsed thrones of ruin, and powers of madness, and things of 
horror vast and ancient beyond the beginning of time, for which there was 
no name. For one timeless space that was eternity, she looked beyond the 
last walls of creation, and saw dread and torment, and damnation beyond 
the last end of a broken, gibbering despair.

Then, even as she teetered, poised upon the very brink of a shattered, 
splintering madness from which there could be no return, a flash like 
lightning leapt up, bathing the restaurant for a split second in a stark, 
brilliant radiance. In the next instant a cataclysmic roar and crash shook 
the Nekohanten to its foundations.

Stunned, barely aware of what was happening, Cologne pitched backwards, 
staring dumbly as a slender, female form was hurtled from the heart of the 
explosion, tumbling headlong from the maelstrom to sprawl limp and 
unmoving amongst the shattered remains of a table. For a moment through a 
growing ice and confusion, she was almost certain that as the figure slid 
to a stop, the bright cloth fluttered of its own accord to fall softly at 
her side, merging seamlessly with the dress she wore. But the world was 
spinning and falling away from her, and the last thing of which the 
ancient Amazon was aware was a faint, terror-stricken scream, and Shampoo, 
calling her, again and again.

Then the blackness closed about her, and she knew no more.

 				     * * *

It was deep night when Ranma woke, starting horribly from some cloying 
nightmare of ice and pain, and a lurking fear he could not remember, to 
stark silence and a bone-numbing cold worse than anything he had known.

For a long time he lay still, a slow, nameless dread growing on him as he 
fought his shaking and the clenching, twisting nausea that washed over him 
in wave after wave. His left arm and shoulder burned with a searing, 
poisoned ice, while the numb, bone-deep chill seemed to have spread 
throughout his body, sapping the scant warmth beneath the blankets as 
though he were lying in frigid water.

"This ain't good! This really ain't good!" he muttered to himself again 
and again. (I got'a do something; I can't just lie here like this."

Yet for minutes he remained where he was, not daring to move, until at 
last by sheer force of will he fought down the rising panic, and wrenched 
himself convulsively into a sitting position. But the room spun horribly, 
and it was several seconds before he could focus on anything but the 
giddiness that threatened to make him pass out at any moment.

It was a soft sound that brought his attention back to his surroundings. 
For a moment in the sickness and the surreal horror of his situation, he 
imagined that the last week had been some strange fever-dream, and that 
his father was there as always in his usual place beside him. But the 
breathing was soft, and coming from a little distance, and the place at 
his side was empty.

Carefully, Ranma turned his head, his gaze tracking slowly to the chair by 
the open door. Akane sat slumped, wrapped in a blanket, her head half 
turned, her face tight with concern even in sleep. A book lay open in her 
lap, but her hands were clenched on the arms of the chair, and Ranma 
doubted she had touched it.

For a moment, a sudden intensity of gratitude tightened his throat, 
together with the almost overwhelming need to wake her: to escape being 
alone in the horror of the silence and the cloying fear.

But disturbing and frightening her would not help, and there was nothing 
she could do, save perhaps to panic and make things even worse by 
insisting she do something crazy and dangerous, such as calling an 
ambulance. Ranma knew that would do no good: that if anything was to be 
done, he would have to do it, or find someone who could. And there were 
only two people who might be able to help. Well, maybe three, but even if 
he were prepared to risk whatever aid he could give, he had no way to 
contact the old pervert, just like that.

Clenching himself against the sickness, Ranma struggled from his futon, 
and pushed himself slowly to his feet. He would try Tofu-sensei first, 
then the Old Ghoul.

For several seconds he swayed, his legs threatening to give out at any 
moment. But at last he crept slowly to the door, moving as silently as he 
could. As though sensing him, Akane stirred and murmured in her sleep. But 
she did not wake, and at last Ranma slipped from the room and along the 
passage. He would get himself a drink of water before he rang, to steady 
himself and to try to hold back the giddiness and nausea.

Reaching the stairs, he hesitated. But standing there was not going to 
help, and at last he moved forwards, humiliated and furious with himself 
for the need to clutch to the banister like some ancient cripple, but not 
fool enough to risk a fall. His heart labouring, feeling worse with every 
moment, Ranma reached the bathroom at last and stumbled, almost losing the 
battle for a moment while he clutched convulsively to the door, before he 
staggered inside and across to the basin.

Stilling the violent shaking as best he could, he raised his head, staring 
for a moment in confusion at his own reflection in the mirror, before he 
remembered why he was there, and slumped to his knees, leaning forwards as 
he turned on the tap, pushing his head towards the cool, reviving water.

Akane was awakened from a dead, dark nothingness by his first, agonised 
scream.

Heart suddenly racing, she leapt up, staring wildly about the room, for a 
moment with no idea what had woken her. She had one frozen instant to 
realise Ranma was no longer in his futon. Then the next rending, 
pain-racked scream tore through the house, and Akane was moving, the door 
kicked savagely aside as she sped from the room and along the passage.

She nearly broke her neck as the stairs dropped away from her, 
somersaulting twice before she hit the ground floor, still running. She 
reached the bathroom just as a third scream tore into the night.  Then she 
was slamming the door aside, the rebounding edge catching her a savage 
crack in the forehead before she smashed it viciously out of her way and 
burst into the room.

Akane skidded to a halt, staring in numb, nightmare horror at what she 
saw. The door to the furo was ajar, the sound of running water a surreal, 
horrible counterpoint to the scene. Ranma was crouched by the bath, blood 
streaming from his skin like perspiration, his head half turned towards 
her, his face a rictus of agony as his body rippled and twisted, seeming 
to melt and flow like some horrible molten glass.

For a moment, sickened and terrified beyond endurance, Akane could do 
nothing but stare stupidly, utterly unable to move or react. Then, 
screaming his name, she lunged towards him, with no notion of what 
possibly she might do, knowing only that she had to do something: that she 
had somehow to stop what was happening.

It seemed that he heard: that even through his pain and his torment he 
knew she was there. For a second his head lifted, his agonised face 
turning fully to her, his mouth working as though trying to shape words he 
knew no longer how to speak. Then Akane's hands touched the place that 
should have been Ranma, and her world became fire and pain, and a 
nightmare ruin beyond anything she could hope to understand.

Her mouth gaped wide as she drew breath to scream. But the world tumbled 
away from her, and she was falling, down, down into a vast, soaring 
oblivion, fleeting, horrible visions and jagged, savage colour for which 
she had no name dancing like torment incarnate across her mind, before the 
blackness came to claim her. And she fell swiftly into the nothingness. 
And it swallowed all that she was, and all she might have been.

She heard and saw no more.

 				   ** ** **

Notes:

 				   ** ** **

First chapter, and one of the three that kept this revision back for 
years.  The original was a joke, but something I simply could never find 
the motivation to tackle until a few weeks ago, even though I've known for 
nearly ten years pretty much exactly how it needed to be changed.

I've only two real concerns.

First, the description of the dress fragment needs to be improved.  I'd 
like to include something that gives the reader a hint as to its origin, 
without just giving the game away at the beginning (I imagine most have 
worked it out anyway, but I won't say more to spoil it for anybody who 
hasn't), so I'd be interested in any suggestions.

The second problem is the chapter's somewhat introspective nature in some 
passages, something that characterises the first few chapters.  But better 
I think to get all the personal angst and twaddle out of the way early on, 
rather than put up with it later.

Still, overall, I think this has been improved beyond all recognition, and 
sets DC's generally dark, oppressive tone at last as it should.

Craig