[Ranma/Xover][FanFic] Reluctant Bet - segment 7 "Reluctant Trainer"
Gregg Sharp
a full version will be there.
The Reluctant Bet
segment 7: Reluctant Trainer
guys, this was so completely not written with any intention
of being other than a playful romp. i don't own most of
these characters, this is about all the disclaiming i'll do.
oh, and there's a single spoiler line regarding the
Evangelion ending, but probably you already knew about
*that* sound effect.
Olympus, The Forge:
Hephaestus continued working. For him, it was as natural as
breathing, it was his Art and he was as dedicated to IT as
most Ranma Saotomes were dedicated to the martial arts. He
toyed briefly with the idea of going back to a timeline,
finding Genma Saotome, buying his son off of him, then
training Ranma as one of HIS apprentices just to see what
would happen. He idly scratched the idea out on a piece of
parchment to follow up later.
The Greek God Of Smithcraft folded the katana a half dozen
more times, letting his hands run on autopilot while he
thought about the changes he'd made in two cyborg clones.
All of these timelines over there were "anime" series in
Grey's original timeline. So, during Grey's brief stint as
an apprentice under Hephaestus, the master smith had gotten
some research done to see if there were any clever ideas out
there. He'd found a few that had appealed to him.
Some, including Urd, were curious why someone as stiffly
practical as Hephaestus would be interested in what happened
to someone who was (at the time) an incubus - a form of
demon. Hephaestus, who rarely left his forge, having turned
his back on the games of the gods to lose himself in his
work. Hephaestus, the gruff and cynical engineer who had
little to do with mortal or deity if he could help it.
Some, including Urd, had apparently forgotten that
Hephaestus had been married to Aphrodite for quite a few
centuries. Some had quite forgotten that for six centuries,
Aphrodite had been having an affair with Ares. Some had
thought that other than Hephaestus continuing to pay
court-ordered tribute to Aphrodite, that he had put the
whole thing behind him. Hephaestus? No, he couldn't be
nursing a grudge or have hard feelings about his
wife-at-the-time sleeping around and making depreciating
comments about "the twisted little gnome" or "the gnome's
little cudgel" comparing it to "Ares' skill with his
magnificent sword." Of course the Patron Of Engineering
couldn't have any bad feelings about that.
And, of course, this Greek god who happened to be short and
misshapen, who was not nearly as handsome or well formed as
the beings around him, could absolutely *not* actually have
a heart. He could not possibly react to honest friendship
with a strong degree of "oh wow" at his craft from a mere
formerly-mortal being who was also singularly unhandsome and
put upon. Hephaestus? Couldn't be.
So most of those who knew him assumed that it was because
of Grey's twisted imagination and because this was a bit of
a challenge that Hephaestus would try to do something to
help out the fellow. Just responding to a challenge and
keeping an eye on a resource.
Unseen by deity or mortal, Hephaestus smirked and began
hammering the metal out again. He couldn't have any sympathy
for the underdog, could he? No, not him. Want to get back at
Ares still? Of course not.
He was above such things, after all. He was an engineer.
-------------------
Dead Millenium:
"YOU CAN'T LEAVE!"
"i must leave," Grey sighed. "Look, this is a stable
timeline. You've been saved. As long as you don't transform
back to Senshi... i mean Scout form you'll be safe from the
manna poisoning."
Amy gestured at the window with its dead cityscape.
"Wiseman and the Dead Moon killed EVERYTHING. If there's any
life left it's out of reach in another solar system."
"We can't transform without opening ourselves to the taint
Wiseman and the Dark Crystal left in the magic flows." Lita
got into the face of the cyborg, even though he towered over
her and outmassed her by several times, she actually managed
to back him up to the wall. "The food isn't going to last
long, what little there IS, is four hundred years old! If
YOU leave, then we're going with you!"
"But you read the sign!" Grey gestured at the gleaming
plaque just outside the hospital that had been formed by a
bolt of lightning lancing out of the sky shortly after the
last of the Senshi had been brought to consciousness.
"I didn't," croaked Mina from her bed, still too weak and
suffering from the effects of her poisoning to get about
without being carried. Rei had the bed next to her and was
in similar difficulty.
"I had to run a translator program on my computer,"
explained Amy. "It was in a derivation of Old Norse.
Basically it was a note to our Visitor here that according
to some rules of conduct, as this is not an immediate
emergency and it is not an unstable universe, that he is not
allowed to ferry refugees to another universe unless they
have a direct relationship to him."
"i called Heaven to try to confirm this, but all i got was
voicemail." Grey shrugged. "On the other hand, i *have* to
leave now. There's a job i've got to be doing and staying
here won't get me any closer to accomplishing it. i've
already sent e-mail to a couple of people who should be able
to help you out."
"But they won't be able to take us out of here either," Rei
put in, not having enough energy to even lift her head.
"Look around you. Even the air is dead and sterile. The
Princess..." Rei's voice trailed off at this.
"Serena. Darien. EVERYONE." Amy gestured again, close to
tears again. "Everyone's dead and gone for four hundred
years. Only our Senshi form protected us this long, and even
then it was slowly poisoning us. We CAN'T stay here."
Grey shook his head. "Look. i would LIKE to take you.
They're obviously watching me though, and if i try to leave
with you all it's not going to work."
"TRY!" Lita yelled, then switched tactics. "Please."
Pleading worked where yelling had not. Grey was finally
coaxed to the center of the room. Lita positioned Rei in a
fireman's carry while Mina leaned against Amy. When Amy
liked her arm with Grey's left arm to mirror what Lita was
doing with his right, the cyborg hit the switch on the end
of the D-hopper.
Air split, lightning crackled, and the cyborg was imbedded
in a wall while various young ladies were knocked to the
floor. The rent in midair closed, followed by a hissing
noise as metal cooled.
Amy was the first up, and noted that a book was on the
floor that hadn't been there earlier.
---------------
Target Timeline:
"Oh..." Kasumi stared back and forth at the twins. Not
identical as one had purple hair and the other had black
hair, one looked as if she weren't wearing makeup while the
other was, and one was dressed in Chinese clothing while the
other was wearing the same t-shirt and jeans ensemble she
had earlier.
The other pair of twins were likewise close in appearance.
"Hi, can we come in..." The Shampoo-twin stared at
something past Kasumi's shoulder.
Kasumi, Nabiki, and Shampoo turned to see what was causing
the girl to stare so. They started staring themselves.
Akane, what had once been a nice yellow dress plastered to
her body, was standing on the sliding doors to the Tendo
living room. Covered in what looked like patches of whipped
cream, jello, and other less identifiable substances.
Dripping some of those same substances on the floor. She
spat a stream of this odd mix of substances out and growled
something indistinct.
Shampoo smiled. She had no idea WHAT the Unhappy Girl was
doing, but it gave her an opportunity. "Akane want be
cleaned off?"
Akane made a noise which might have been construed as an
assent. Or she may have still been trying to clear some of
the odd sludge from her throat.
Shampoo held her bracer up with a grin. "Water Elemental,
Shampoo choose you!"
Akane made a waving away motion, indicating that perhaps
she hadn't actually had the same thing in mind as Shampoo.
There were a few appreciative oohs and aahs as the vaguely
humanoid figure formed.
"Water Elemental. Hose her down!" Shampoo gestured at the
muck covered Akane just to be sure there was no mistaken
identities.
The stick figure grumbled something unintelligible
(sounding rather like the plumbing was backed up) and fired
a stream of water at Akane. This knocked Akane back into the
backyard.
"Clean off girl," ordered Shampoo now gesturing to where
Akane had landed.
The stick figure altered to a snake-like stream of water
which quickly grabbed the flailing martial artist and again
formed a sphere in which she could tumble and swirl about.
"That neat Shampoo," said Shampoo's twin. "You get from
Master?"
"No, Shampoo get this from Grey Ranma." Shampoo gestured at
Kasumi and Nabiki. "These two allies. Also not want to go
back to mainline."
Sakyo stepped forward and seemed to check the two girls
foreheads slightly, then moved to Shampoo and did the same.
"Initial scan complete."
Kasumi and Nabiki blinked, not understanding in the
slightest.
"Excuse me, Shampoo, I believe that Akane is indicating
she'd like to breathe." Kasumi bowed, quite polite for
someone whose youngest sister was currently in the process
of being washed and scrubbed by a water elemental.
"Water Elemental, you do good. Let go Akane now." Shampoo
grinned, glad she had the chance to show off her newest toy.
The stick figure stepped away as it deposited Akane on the
now clean floor. Then began to glow.
"Ah, how nice, your Elemental is evolving to Naiad!" Nabiki
was guessing that would be the correct term.
Shampoo bounced around, giggling like a schoolgirl
(appropriate as she was one).
Shan merely looked at the blue-green nude Shampoo and was
glad that Mousse wasn't around.
Shampoo stopped jumping around long enough to fish in her
sash for the fourth gauntlet. "Oh yeah, Grey Ranma leave
this one behind. Shampoo think was for you."
-----------------------
Asgard, Goddess Relief Office
"Thanks, sweetie." Sif watched her big brawny husband go
off before turning to Urd. "Okay, Urd, Mjolnir took out the
boy's defensive system and threw him back. What's up with
your plan here?"
"Ah," Urd waggled a finger at the younger goddess, "you
don't understand? Look at the book that nice young Anderson
girl is reading."
"The 'Yarikata No Shojo'? It's an odd title and the book
looks new but is fashioned in a really old manner. Alternate
timeline?"
"A place known as Aramar has these wonderful young ladies
known as the Delphins Amazons. One of their nations put
together a bunch of old myths and legends and customs as an
idea of how their ancestors proceeded with mating rituals,
dating, marriage, happy homelife and the like. The 'Way Of
The Shojo' or (if you prefer) the 'Path Of The Young
Japanese Girl' is essentially a handbook on how to find,
select, and procure a husband. As interpreted by the
Delphins, at least."
Sif shook her head. "So basically..."
Urd ran a hand through her hair and looked smug. "If THIS
doesn't get the boy a love interest, nothing will."
--------------------------------
Rider Universe:
"Kodachi! What are you doing with that bullwhip?"
"Oh, my dear little Akane-chan, exactly what you think.
It's only fair you get a taste of life before your
execution. Or, perhaps, I can make the request that you be
turned over to me permanently?"
"I'll never talk, you traitor! You won't get anything from
me."
Kodachi nibbled at the end of her whip as she looked over
the bound form of the Yellow Rider. "Oh? I *do* so love a
challenge."
-------------------
Target Timeline:
"Saotome, how bad is it?"
"Your daughter knocked the trap door off the hinges. The
vat has been severely dented, there... oh just put it down
as a major mess, Tendo."
"Hmmm. Can we salvage it?"
"Maybe. There's shattered wood, broken glass, and twisted
metal down there. We'll have to wait for morning to do it
safely." Genma sighed. He was catching up on his sleep
lately, but missing all sorts of opportunities to train
Ranma. He was already to start with the Catfist training.
Risky yet extreme measures were necessary if the exorcism
didn't work.
"Oh well, I..." Soun began sniffing.
"Tendo? What are you..." Genma also began sniffing. "Oh
my!"
"Chinese food and..." Soun turned his attention towards
Genma but he had already vanished.
-----------
Kasumi scratched Vulpix behind the ears and smiled.
Nabiki attempted to look dignified with her Eevee sitting
on one shoulder. She mostly succeeded.
Ukyo was busy using a fire elemental to cook without using
the range. Her own pokeball was still hanging from her
bandolier. Considering how her t-shirt and jeans fit, no one
was going to mistake her for a guy at present.
"So what are you doing again?" Kasumi glanced back to the
girl whose fingertips were resting on Kasumi's temples.
"My recent upgrade allows me to not only generate
templates, but actually transform to a reasonable facsimile
when I've scanned someone. Besides, there are other benefits
I'll explain later." Sakyo smiled as she continued to
process data.
Nabiki wondered if maybe she should get Akane in on this.
She'd figured it out already, and approved of the insurance
factor. Particularly in light of this new danger of a Reset.
Never mind that they and the world wouldn't notice that such
a thing had been done, losing any part of her memories or
mind was something Nabiki had serious qualms over.
Two fathers leaned in the kitchen door, noted the extra
bodies, but their main attention was drawn to the large
repast being formed.
-------------
Dead Millenium:
"How about that, so he *does* have blood. You just have to
get through layers of artificial tissue and armor plating to
get to it."
"Good thing he hit the wall that hard, then, eh Mina?"
"What's it say to do next, Amy?"
"Each bride mixes a drop of her own blood with the drop of
the groom's blood." Amy checked the various diagrams. "Then
you weave a chain of hairs..."
"This is *some* weird ceremony. You think it'll work and
then we can just go our seperate ways when we get to a
better world?" Rei was a little skeptical.
"I don't see why not," explained Amy. "As I understand it,
this is magic and a lot of magic apparently works on
symbolism. The transport failed because we were no relation
to him, and he was punished. Now, by doing this, we're
related to him for the length of time it takes to get us out
of here."
"I still think it'd be better if he was conscious," Lita
said, checking the cyborg again. Still out, still imbedded
in the wall, though the crack in his outer casing seemed to
be repairing itself.
"He might object. This way we can make the jump and be gone
before he's recovered." Mina sat upright but was still
severely weakened. "If we have to spend months here, all any
rescue team will find are a few corpses and one or two
thoroughly insane survivors. I can't TAKE this world."
"Okay everyone, these are the words of the ceremony. I'm
just changing a few words that seem to refer to some kind of
Amazon. Repeat after me, just use your own names.
"I, Amy Anderson..."
"I, Lita Storm..."
"I, Rei Hino..."
"I, Mina Lovejoy..."
"as a warrior of, uhm, love and justice, do swear now a
blood pact to this marriage..."
If Grey had been conscious, he'd not have been anywhere in
the vicinity.
------------------
Target Timeline:
Akane came out of the bath to observe a madhouse, firming
her desire to get the Saotomes (especially Ranma) OUT of her
house and her life.
Kasumi was alternatively feeding herself, and giving little
bits of a rice-and-meat mix to that fire-fox-thing that kind
of looked like a stuffed toy and smelled like charcoal.
Nabiki was eating, and casting little glances aside at her
kind-of-Nausicaa-fox-squirrel critter who was munching out
of his own bowl.
Shampoo was telling a story about how they'd ended up on
this world with giant metal crabs flying over ruined cities
and trying to hide long enough for their means of travel to
recharge itself.
A girl she didn't know was sitting behind Nabiki with her
hands on Nabiki's temples.
Shampoo's twin kept going to the kitchen and then back with
another laden tray of what looked like some Chinese dish.
Another girl, who looked like the one behind Nabiki, was
adding comments to Shampoo's story.
Some kind of turtle-creature kept playing in the pond,
apparently making threats to squirt people.
Her father and that Mister Saotome were stuffing their
faces.
Akane eyed the meal and wondered how much it was costing
them, and what the manner of coin.
----------------------
Dead Millenium:
"...and bind ourselves to him, under these conditions,
hereafter."
Mina's eyes widened as a flare of energy spread from the
book to each of the girls and the still-imbedded and
unconscious cyborg. "What was that?!"
Rei's voice was dry. "Amy, I think you just royally blew
it."
Amy didn't care, she just wanted OUT. This cold and sterile
world frightened her on a purely atavistic level. She put
one of the cyborg's hands on the rod, took the other and
held it up the button on top. "Everyone ready?"
Everyone linked arms to connect to either Amy or the
cyborg.
"Now," Amy brought the cyborg's hand down onto the button.
The air split and moved across them.
A moment later, noting the absence of any lifeforms within
itself, the hospital shut everything down to Maintenence
mode again.
------------------------------
Asgard, Judgement Hall:
"Fellows, we have seen that this is yet another failure by
Grey. The First Labor..."
"was a success. Just not in the way he intended." Apollo
interrupted. He'd never liked Ares that much, often
referring to him as "that rabid weasel" in conversations
with Athena. "Enough of this, Ares. This wasn't exactly the
sort of thing he COULD do well. I think the Reset idea works
best, as opposed to simply pulling out Grey and substituting
someone else or writing it off as a dark unstable line."
Ares thumped the desk in front of him. "My son, Phobos, is
PERFECT for this task. Put him in the Ranma role, and he can
show you how someone COMPETENT can perform."
"Phobos? Give me a break. Phobos would be plucking Akane's
limbs off just to see how the rest of the family would take
it. Don't EVEN suggest Deimos. He'd be worse."
"What of the future of this timeline?" D'kou asked, resting
his head on the table as he paced behind it. "Both
originally and after Hephaestus made his alteration, it was
one of those with the Jihad discovering Earth and conquering
it in 2014. Except in Hephaestus' alteration, some Canadian
martial artists descended from Ranma Saotome and Shampoo
managed to become successful guerilla fighters until another
group succeeded in destroying the Jihad mainbase in 2027.
What now?"
"Predictions indicate that this will become an Evangelion
timeline. Standard ending."
"Eeeew." Edema didn't particularly like endings that went
Image: NERV test pattern
THE SOUND EFFECT HAS BEEN CENSORED FOR THOSE WHO HAVE NOT
SEEN THE MOVIE: END OF EVANGELION
We now return you to the fanfic in progress.
"So what's wrong with that?" Ares didn't know why anyone
would think of THAT as particularly bad. It was just mortals
anyway.
"Get a clue, Ares. Okay. So we wait till he gets there,
give him a little warning, then hit Reset. He's back to Day
One and we try it again." Apollo doubted it would help much,
but then these Labors were supposed to be serving another
purpose anyway.
------------------
Rider Timeline:
"Where the hell are we? Why did he change? Why are we
younger? What the heck is THAT THING?" Lita was a little bit
upset.
"Another universe, I don't know, I don't know, and I don't
know." Amy had a few hairs toinged out but was otherwise
fairly calm.
Mina looked at her surroundings and voiced an opinion.
"Looks like the Detention Corridor of the Death Star."
"Don't be silly, Mina, that's... you know she's right. It
DOES look an awful lot like some high-tech prison." Rei's
voice turned thoughtful. "You know, I feel a LOT better
since we came here."
"No doubt we're away from the poisoning effects," Amy said
and began a scan with the Mercury computer to determine if
her theory was correct.
"I wonder what's in here?" Lita opened a door.
"Call me QUEEN! Ah-ta-ta-ta-ta-ta!"
Lita closed the door, eyes wide. "Uhm. Guys? Can we, like,
flee?"
The door opened. Lita backed away from it.
"Who dares interrupt Kodachi Kuno, the Black Queen?"
The assembled ex-Scouts took in the skintight thigh high
stilletto-heeled boots. The studded but otherwise matching
upper arm reaching gloves. The corset. All in shiny black
leather. The thick black length of the whip in the girl's
hands.
The way this girl looked them all over, licked her lips,
smiled seductively, and said a single word. "Next?"
"AAAAAAAHHHHHH!" Mina summed up for the group, her hair
actually standing on end.
Akane screamed for help. Unfortunately, with a leather gag
in place, all that came out was a background jumble.
"mmmmmMMMMMMmmmmrrff!"
"Ohhhh," groaned Ranma, finally beginning to recover. "i'd
recognize that hammer anywhere."
Kodachi stopped. "Ranma? Oh, these must be your toys, my
lord. Uhm, can you loan them to me for a little while? I
think they could use some discipline."
"Huh?" Ranma said intelligently.
----------------------------
Target Timeline:
Kasumi smiled, bowed to her opponent, and (having been
coached on protocol from Nabiki's observation of videogame
battles) tried to come up with a good introductory quote.
"Uhm, well. Oh, I know. 'Never underestimate the power of a
Japanese housewife!'"
Nabiki slid into a sentai pose, pokeball held up as if
offering it to the heavens. "Behold the true power of
Anything Goes!"
"You're NOT a martial artist," remarked Akane from the
sidelines, a bit miffed at her territory as Heir to the
Tendo Ryuu being poached on.
"Vulpix, if you would, please?" Kasumi did not make the
most self-confident pokemon trainer in existence.
"Knightshade, come forth!" Nabiki held her bracer up and
the shadowy version of herself poured forth.
"Vulpix, err, Ember but try not to hurt her too much... I
mean..."
"Vulll piiiix!" The little fire fox nodded and spat a
stream of fire towards the shadow. The shadow responded by
hiding behind her trainer.
Nabiki winced as she was hit by the thin flame blast,
leaving her slightly singed. Maybe shadow vs fire wasn't a
good choice. "Knightshade, return. Eevee, I choose you!"
"Nabiki hair on fire. Not worry, Shampoo call forth Naiad!
Naiad, put out fire in Nabiki hair."
"Glubglub!"
"Uh oh. Naiad, let Nabiki breathe."
Nabiki gasped for air. "Interference with the match. All
bets are off."
Akane couldn't resist after the earlier comment. "A true
master of Anything Goes should be ready for anything,
Nabiki. Multiple opponent combat is a strength of the Tendo
School."
Shampoo smirked. Nabiki frowned. Ukyo tossed her pokeball
between her hands a few times. Sakyo and Shan considered
Akane briefly before Shan got out her own pokeball.
Kasumi smiled and tilted her head to the side.
Deciding not to take action at this time, rather than see
her dear (if violent and egotistic) sister get dogpiled,
Nabiki decided to remember the comment for later and change
the subject. "So, those are two more pokeballs aren't they?
What do you two have?"
Ukyo smiled and tossed her pokeball out. "Come on out now,
Staryu."
"Gruh!" A vaguely starfish-shaped creature materialized out
of the pokeball's beam.
Shan pressed a stud on her own pokeball. "Trihorn, I choose
you!"
A four foot tall triceratops made a noise that sounded
suspiciously like "grunk" before it apparently noticed no
enemies nearby and a patch of grass that looked tempting.
Soun and Genma stared about, wide-eyed, as Shampoo released
Ponyta and Squirtle came out of the pond.
"Hmmm. How much do you suppose I could sell..." Genma's
eyes turned speculative as he looked over the various
animals. Exotic animals were often in demand by zoos and the
well-to-do. And those bracers were obviously magical. "Say,
Tendo, you don't like having pets around, do you?"
"Well, no," agreed the dazed Soun.
-------------
Rider Timeline:
Kodachi bounced away, laughing maniacally, promising to
finish with her prisoner later.
Ranma looked in the room, blinked, and considered the
figure on the bed. "You're in to this sort of thing, Tendo?
That explains a lot! Where Kuno came up with the 'you must
beat on Akane to date her', the whole 'love=hate=violence'
stuff, why you thought Ryoga and Ranma were the best of
buddies..."
"mmmmmmmmmfff!"
Amy looked in at the weakly struggling girl. "You know, I
don't think she actually wants to be there."
"mmmmmffff! mmmmmffffff!"
"Maybe you're right." Ranma considered. "Well, I suppose I
can get her gag off without too much problem."
"Where are we, why did we get younger, why did you change,
do you know her," Lita's barrage of questions stopped as Amy
covered her fellow Scout's mouth.
Ranma's hands continued to unlace the gag while he
answered. "Another universe or timeline, not one i
recognize. And i'd like to know how you managed that. You
changed because according to the rules of this timeline, i'd
have to run a full scan to find out which. i currently take
the form of Ranma in any universe that HAS a Ranma. So i
reverted to a Ranma likeness when we entered this timeline.
i know her because i've met about a half dozen Akanes on as
many timelines so far. Most are the sort of people i try to
avoid: violent, bad tempered, prideful, unforgiving, pushy,
arrogant. i've met TWO that were actually worthwhile human
beings or at least redeemable.
"One had killed her fiance and had learned both regret and
consequence. The other was being trained by a master warrior
alongside that world's Sailor Scouts to fight a great
menace."
The gag came off. Akane immediately tried to bite Ranma's
fingers. "Let me out of here! You pervert! You monster! I'll
never... mmmmmfffff!"
"This is obviously one of the nasty ones," Ranma said,
proving that he could not only be wrong but be REALLY wrong.
"I think maybe you're right though, and she DOESN'T want the
Black Queen to get affectionate with her."
"Mmmmmmfffff!"
"I don't know, maybe she's into that sort of thing," Mina
suggested.
"Mmmmff! mmmmFF! MFFFFF!"
"Well, we'll leave this timeline, soon enough. Those are
simple chains through a set of hooks so i can remove them
and then we just go. i AM really curious how you accompanied
me."
"Amy used this," Mina held up the book.
Ranma's reaction was not what any of those present would
have expected, jumping back to the wall and holding his
fingers in a cross as if trying to ward off a vampire. "The
'Way Of Shojo'?! Where did you get THAT?!"
"MmmmfF?!"
"When you tried to crossover to another universe, this came
out." Lita seemed to regard this as validation of her
earlier fear that Amy had made a boo-boo.
"So why not just push the button on that thing again and
get out of here before the guards arrive?" Mina was still a
bit nervous but not enough to risk using the henshiin stick.
"Rei and you are still too weak. She could barely walk from
the corridor into here, and you're not much better. That's
beside the point. How did that book enable you to... URD!"
"Uhm no, actually, it was this section here," Amy smiled a
little uncertainly. Maybe they SHOULD have waited till he
woke up?
Ranma blinked. "You're kidding. You're kidding, right? Of
course you're kidding! Please be kidding..."
"Uhm."
"You're *not* kidding? Oh boy."
"It's... just a marriage ceremony, and it wasn't anything
official, so it... doesn't count right?"
"Uhm, Amy. That particular marriage ceremony is a bloodbond
spell and only requires that a princess officiate..."
"A princess?" Amy repeated.
Mina frowned as she leaned against the wall, ample evidence
about Ranma's point about their weakness. "What's a
'bloodbond spell' anyway?"
Ranma told them. Even Akane sweatdropped.
"So, we're overstaying our welcome, i think, and we need to
get going. Hopefully the next world will be one where i can
try to get some bearings and download my e-mail."
Snagging Akane's chains and lifting one arm free, Ranma
stepped back and pressed the button on the end of the rod.
By the time Akane had gotten herself free, that weird Ranma
had vanished with his friends. It didn't matter, for the
door was still wide open and it was time for the Yellow
Rider to ride again.
Even if she was wearing less than Kekko Kamen at the
moment.
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