[Ranma][Fanfic] The Bet - Grand Tour 3

[MetroAnime]

Ranma 1/2: Grand Tour 3a
R.Takahashi owns the Nerima bunch. Aramar and
the Ninefold Worlds are my creation. No money made on
any of these though i may eventually try to do
professional stories set in Aramar. My other works can
be found at the RAAC or on my website at
http://members.aol.com/Metroanime/main.html
just to keep track of 'em:
Grand Tour, World 1: World of Sorrow/World Without Ranma
Grand Tour, World 2: World of Love/Happily Ever After
Grand Tour, World 3: World of Conflict/RIFTS Earth
Grand Tour, World 4: World of Nightmare/Gravesite Nerima
---------------------------------------
It had taken Ranma only a few minutes
(after Shampoo had relayed what she had overheard)
to figure out what had happened on this world.
Cologne had somehow heard of that Wishing Sword
and gotten to it before Kuno.

Whereas Kuno had failed to use the
power of the sword to any great effect, Cologne
was a different matter altogether.(1)

It gave three wishes to the one
millionth person to try to draw the sword from
its prison. Cologne had figured it out, drawn the
sword, and altered this world as a result.

Having figured out What the change
was, the two were now travelling at best speed
towards Nerima.
--------------------------------------------
Kasumi and Nabiki had met outside
of a dojo where Miss Hinako had married Soun
Tendo and neither remembered the daughters.

A tall man with silver hair watched
the two sisters with a bemused expression. "So,
any idea what the Change is from your world."

Nabiki explained that five years
previously, a sudden and apparently contagious
case of amnesia had hit both Kasumi and herself.
In the meantime they had both gone on to other
things. Nabiki was a representitive for a high tech
computer chip manfacturer, married, and had her
own pilot's license.

Kasumi responded by showing her
motorcycle license, a picture of a Honda Goldwing
that she assumed was hers, and a wallet card
proclaiming her to be a member of some odd
group called the Society for Creative Anachronism.
She assumed it was some sort of sewing club.(2)

Frostbite focussed his attention out
the window briefly. Ukyou's presence flickered
across his extended senses. There was also one
of the mysterious watchers nearby.

Whoever they were, they were skilled.
Frostbite's senses were only slightly muted in his
half-elven form, but whoever it was had largely
managed to keep hidden.

"Ukyou is about a half-hour away,"
Frostbite said during a lull in the conversation.
"Ranma and Shampoo I'm not detecting. Any
idea why things got so divergent in this timestream?
It should have been fairly close considering how
well we did in the last world..."
------------------------------
"Ah, so that's it." Cologne listened
to the transceiver. "So these are planar travellers.
Well, there are ways to send them packing."
------------------------------
Three days passed. Finally, Ranma
and Shampoo had arrived. "So, Ranma, you
think you've got the Divergence Point figured
out?"

"Yah, I think so."

Frostbite paused as he stepped into
the center of the courtyard. Something was
wrong, registering on his senses in the manner
of an itch.

"Well, come on, the sooner we're out
of this Alternate, the sooner we can get back to
our own..." Nabiki linked hands with Frostbite
and Kasumi.

"What will happen to our Analogues
here?" Kasumi hesitated briefly before reaching
for Ukyou's hand with her remaining hand.

"They'll remain behind, remembering
what they did and why when you seperate. They'll
go back to living their lives." Frostbite continued
to scan the area with his eyes. The feeling of
something wrong continued to intensify.

Ranma felt the same thing and was
just as nervously looking over the early morning
landscape. "Guys, I think we need to hurry up
here."

Ukyou's free hand grabbed Ranma's.
Ranma linked to Shampoo who closed the circle
with the transformed dragon.

"Now," called Cologne. Dozens of
spirit wards rained down on the small group,
effectively disrupting whatever ritual they were
enacting. The group collapsed where they were
standing.

A few minutes passed and Cologne
looked down into the opening eyes of her son
in law.

"<Great grandmother, what?>" Ranma
asked in the Amazon dialect.

"<It is alright now, son in law.>"
Cologne said in the same dialect with a smile.
She looked around at all the confused individuals
and began to implement her plans for damage
control.(3)
-------------------------------------
Ribbons of blue light crisscrossed
this world. Where they met, portals could open
to other worlds. The problem, reflected Frostbite,
was finding the RIGHT portal.

It had taken most of a year to find out
how to get from Here to There, and to get all the
details on the adaptations that would be necessary
for the trip back to Aramar. During that time, the
little group had picked up some...interesting skills.

Kasumi blasted past the dragon, his own
top speed of 70mph put to shame by the hovercycle
currently going at a little over 120mph.

Nabiki could be heard screaming curses
at the Coalition Transport that was still gaining on
them. Her own vehicle, a sturdy but hardly swift,
modified hovertruck was further slowed by the
"booty" she insisted on carrying.

The only thing keeping the Transport
from catching them was the presence of two skilled
marksmen at the back of the truck. Shampoo's use
of a high powered laser rifle had improved to the
point where she COULD hit the broad side of a
barn, which was roughly equivelant to the huge
transport.

Her companion, Gil, was a different
proposition altogether. The gleaming armored
suit had only one weapon, but his aim and
the power of that weapon commanded respect.

Gil's Boom Gun spoke again, sending
flechettes at just over Mach speeds into one of
the Transport's windows.

Plasma rocket shells from the
Transport's guns replied, causing Nabiki to
drive even more wildly than before. This wasn't
really her style, anyway, but even after one
year in this world, her aim with an energy rifle
was...well...on a level with Ryouga's direction
sense. After a year of practice she could
occasionally hit the barn.

Her skills at driving were just
slightly better, which is why she was doing
that instead of shooting.

Frostbite yelped as an plasma burst
left a smouldering burn across his ribs.

"C'mon, you slowpokes! Put
it in gear!" Ranma was yelling over the
radio again.

"Easy for you to say while
you're driving a damn Tailgunner,"
Frostbite mumbled as he tried to fly a
little faster. As with Nabiki, Ranma's
skill with driving was often ludicrously
bad. Still, he was a better driver than
a gunner, which is why he was driving
and the armored figure behind him was
manning what she referred to as the
BFC Mk VI.

Ukyou was probably being
motion sick. It was one of those odd
things they'd discovered. Shampoo had
no problem with airplanes, jetbikes, or
even jetboats. Ukyou had no problem
flying dragonback or in airplanes. But
put Shampoo on dragonback or Ukyou
on a hovercycle...

The BFC chose that moment
to speak. Some people felt energy weapons
should not have a kick. Some people felt
energy weapons shouldn't make any noise.

Frostbite winced even with the
custom reconfigured helmet protecting his
delicate hearing and the goggles polarization
kicking in to protect his equally sensitive
eyes. Some people, he reflected, needed to
get a clue.

Shyla Montgomery had taken a
particle beam cannon off a very large combat
vehicle, added its own power supply, tweaked
the gain, reconfigured the muzzle, added a
cooling system after the Mk I spectacularly
melted, added a capacitor system when the
Mk II blew up, reconfigured the muzzle again
when the maximum effective range proved to
be about twelve feet on the Mk III, added
backups to the cooling and power supply
when the Mk IV melted AND blew up,
added a spinning drillbit effect that caused
the Mk V to shoot blasts that made odd
curving arcs into non-targets, perfected the
spinning motion in the Mk VI but then had
to re-engineer the power and cooling system...

The result was something that
burned the air away in front of it, resulting
in a thunderous crack and satisfying boom
as the air moved in to fill the gap left in the
blast's wake. It also had a bit of a kick to
it, as evidenced by Ranma nearly rolling
the vehicle from the way it jerked around.

If they'd been on the ground,
Ranma would have left pieces of the
vehicle scattered over a dozen miles.

Frostbite glanced over his
shoulder and was satisfied that the
Transport was NOT closing the distance
anymore. You didn't need to be psychic
to hear someone trying to figure out
what the heck had just shot at them.

As powerful as the Gil's
Boom Gun was, the BFC seemed to
have the edge.

"They're launching missles!"
Shyla's voice came over the radio now.
"Get clear, I'm launching chaff and
countermeasures now!"

Frostbite cursed, apparently
they'd decided the danger of the odd
group had outweighed the desire to
check them for valuable technology or
artifacts.

Still the blue ribbons snaking
across the landscape met in a single
pulsing glow immediately ahead of them.

The BFC was charging, so the
Boom Gun took over, firing a series of
blasts at missles that were coming too
close.

Frostbite saw one get through.
Nabiki's truck was hit, and the resulting
explosion threw the two passengers in
the back out. He banked and dove, but
knew he'd only be able to catch one.

Gil's power armor gave a
thumb's up as he saw the dragon grab
the other figure.

Frostbite cursed as he grabbed
Shampoo, then twisted in midair. The
Coalition ship was getting closer and
even a sizable dragon like himself couldn't
take too many hits from the weapon
systems. Still, he thought he was close
enough, and these "Ley Lines" were the
same sort of feng shui he was used to.

Frostbite abruptly vanished.

He reappeared in the nexus,
where the two lines met. Ranma's ship
entered, followed by Nabiki's. The dragon
reached out with his mind and Twisted
space just as Kasumi's cycle entered the
area again.
--------------------------
Gil watched as the nexus
erupted in blue and white brilliance,
then seemed to fade as the dragon
and the various vehicles vanished,
the Transport sailed through the
nexus a moment later and likewise
vanished.

Gil Monroe, pilot of a power
armor suit that had been a 22nd Century
tank equivalent, ran a diagnostic, winced
at the expense the repairs would be, and
started the arduous task of walking back
to the nearest town.

He kicked at an unoffending
rock. Why did he always end up alone?
"Once, just once, dammit. I want to get
the girl! Just once. Is that too bloody
much to ask for? No, I have to be the
one who gets stuck in the middle of
the damn Sonoran desert, talking to
the damn rocks, while everybody else
gets to go off and have fun..."

The sand, the rocks, and the
iguana all chose to ignore this.
-------------------------------
The sky felt RIGHT, Frostbite
concluded, the magic felt right, the air
felt right. He was home. He blinked
as his helmet abruptly became useless
metal. All the electronic telltales had
just clicked off.

Chucking the useless helmet,
Frostbite noticed that he was perhaps
thirty feet over a snowdrift and his
companions were...

Frostbite winced as their
electronics, thrusters, and various other
technological gadgets abruptly ceased
to function.

Glad that he was a priest of
a god of healing, Frostbite moved into
the tangled wreckage. He hoped that
they weren't too far from the main
shipping lines.
----------------------------------
Another year and change
passed. Frostbite got reamed out by
Lijra for not detecting and countering
the trap.

Ranma continued to work
for the Imperial Courier Service, and
learned three special manuevers as
a result of his duties. Now you see me
(now you don't), Whirlwind Escape,
and the Mind Shield defensive
technique.

Shampoo continued to
train as an amazon warrior among
the amazons of House Southern
Cross, fighting pirates, monsters,
evil sorcerers and the like. Other
than the time she picked up a
cursed bracelet before it had been
tested, she thoroughly enjoyed
her adventures there.

Nabiki started turning
into a half-elf, but felt that as long
as her haircut covered her ears,
nobody would notice. The ability
to learn magic was enough to offset
the minor inconveniences. This was
something she really wanted, after
all. The ability to control her immediate
environment was one of her goals.

Kasumi finished her training
as an acolyte of the White Temple, that
of the pacifist god of healing- Etragar.
She was assigned, oddly enough, to the
barracks of House Southern Cross where
one of her first major tasks was to remove
a cursed bracelet from an amazon who
really should have known better.

Ukyou made okonomiyaki,
accumulated a fair amount of gold, learned
an unarmed combat style, and had her
big bad spatula enchanted by Lijra who
found the idea of a magic spatula to be
positively endearing.

Ukyou's experiences in the
last two worlds had introduced her to one
thing at least, and the idea had slowly
taken root. She didn't need Ranma. Want
him, yes, she still wanted him. The idea
that there were others who could fill that
void in her life had taken time to grow,
but it had finally done so.

Frostbite continued to be
a courier, discovered a fondness for
seafood okonomiyaki, and grew an
additional five feet in length.

Shyla Montgomery found
herself a mechanic in a world where
almost anything more complicated than
the most basic of steam engines failed
to work in most areas.

And so it was when they
gathered again for another try.
-------------------------------
(1) it has very little overall bearing
on the plot, but Cologne's wishes in
this Alternate were:
I) "I wish that Ranma were a proper
amazon husband to Shampoo and with
her now inside her home within the Village."
II) "Though many may think me evil, I
shall be generous. I wish that all of those
others who could or would pursue Ranma
were now in the very sort of relationship
they most deserve, having forgotten
entirely about Ranma and their life here."
III) "I wish for the bloodline and heritage
of the Nichieju communities to continue
indefinitely, always gaining the strengths
of any new genes brought within
the village, without the corresponding
weaknesses."
(2)=the SCA is a medievalist group. not
all members are into sword-swinging or
bawdy comedy. For some reason i can
picture Kasumi taking the role of some
Lady within the Society and engaging in
CosPlay.
(3)=the memory transfer from the plane
hopping Alternates eventually caused
them to break free from their roles. This
only made minor differences, though, as
each of these were fairly happy with how
things had turned out. Ukyou Bateman
returned to Atlanta and continued to run
Ucchan's for many years. Nabiki Wright
continued to be a high management
individual within GENOM, until she and
her husband joined the ranks of the Men
In Black eight years later (this was after
she had leaked GENOM corporate secrets
for a considerable sum, only to find out
that it was a setup.) Kasumi Jamieson
eventually had another child, and worked
in the field of daycare. She never got rich,
but that was never her goal anyway.
Ranma and Shampoo had three children,
all girls who became skilled amazons, one
eventually married Shinji Hibiki, another
married Tetsuo Bateman, and the third
had some VERY bizarre adventures.

----

Ranma 1/2: Grand Tour 3b
R.Takahashi owns the Nerima bunch. Aramar and
the Ninefold Worlds are my creation. No money made on
any of these though i may eventually try to do
professional stories set in Aramar. My other works can
be found at the RAAC or on my website at
http://members.aol.com/Metroanime/main.html
just to keep track of 'em:
Grand Tour, World 1: World of Sorrow/World Without Ranma
Grand Tour, World 2: World of Love/Happily Ever After
Grand Tour, World 3: World of Conflict/RIFTS Earth
Grand Tour, World 4: World of Nightmare/Gravesite Nerima (1)
----------------------------------------------------
from the Book Of Sjul, Diamondrank Runemage:
"It has been noted that there are a near infinite
number of universes, and therefore an attempt to
return a Wanderer to their home universe is nearly
impossible. After all, the quantum signature being
out of resonance only eliminates nine of ten Alternates.
A little trial & error, knowing something of the
background of the Wanderer, why, you can eliminate
99.9% of the Alternate timelines just with a little
research.
"Of course, that still leaves the dimensional
researcher with an umphing big number of
Alternate universes to search..."

_/Nerima, Japan, Earth 1999 AD, Prime +215156\____
A flare of multicolored light expanded into
two outlines.

"Uh-oh, Ranchan."

"What is it, Ucchan?" Ranma turned to
see what she was staring at. "Uh oh. I REALLY
hope this isn't our home reality in the future."

Two grave markers sitting side by side,
which were at least two years old from the growth
of the grass upon which they were planted. Not
a Western style gravesite, merely the little marker
that was the usual marker for someone who had
been cremated.

"Ukyou Kuonji Ranma Saotome"

"So, we manifested here because we're
dead in this timeline," Ranma said. "I've done this
once before and it don't get any easier..."

"What do you suppose did it? An
explosion at the Ucchan's? Maybe one of those
annoying challengers showing up got lucky?"

"Well, I expect we'll find out. I'm not
sure, though. I kinda hope it's close to our own
timeline, cause that'd mean we're close to getting
home. On the other hand, if we're close..."

"Then whatever happened here COULD
happen back home. The operative word here is
that it 'could' happen, not that it WILL happen."
Ukyou looked at the two markers again before
the two trudged out of the ceremony into the
pre-dawn morning.
--------------------
Nabiki stretched and checked the
stand next to her table. What she found there
brought a smile to her face. "All RIGHT! A
diary, this'll make it easy." She turned to
the last page and frowned at the contents.
"4/11/99
The nightmare again. The sight of that night
two years ago continues to haunt me. Still,
I've now got most of the Nanban Mirror pieced
together, another week and I should be ready
to go back and fix one of the biggest mistakes
I've ever made."

Nabiki flipped back through the
diary, only to find the first entry was only a
year old. From what she could read, she hadn't
fallen as far as in that first Alternate- though it
looked as if she were in middle-management in
this timeline.

That wasn't good. Middle management
had some major problems associated with it in Japan.
It was still a step up from Office Lady in most
respects.

The diary gave little details, brief
allusions to money changing hands, little side
events, but nothing major. Then, she hit
paydirt a mere week before the last entry.
"4/05/99
Kasumi called. She is lonely out there at the
formerly Tendo-dojo, what with father not
doing much of anything, me gone, and
Akane still not doing any better. Kasumi
isn't dealing with the memories any better
than me, and it has driven a wedge between
her and Doctor Tofu.
I think she still blames herself
at least a little for not stopping Akane,
for denying or ignoring what was going
on. Never mind all the times we walked in
on the two or defused what could have
been a major blowup.
There isn't much I can do about
their bills, of course, and it looks like the
ancestral home will eventually pass on to
the Bank. A pity, as the memories in that
place were _mainly_ pleasant. Until THAT
night, of course.
Still, what I heard is enough to
give me new motivation on the Nanban
project."

Nabiki puzzled over her own
cramped handwriting. She inspected the
one-room apartment until she found what
she was looking for.

A large cardboard box, containing
the Nanban mirror. It had been mainly repaired,
though there were still some cracks running
through the glass.

She pondered the meaning of some
of the sentences and wondered what had been
so bad that she'd mess with the Nanban to set it
right.
------------------------------
Shampoo awoke knowing that someone was
in bed with her. That it was NOT Ranma registered
just a moment later. That at least it wasn't Mousse
was a relief after that.

Not Ryouga, nor Kuno, nor any of the
usual suspects that she could see. His hair was
too long for that. She stretched, trying to get a
glimpse of the stranger's face.

He turned slightly, and Shampoo made
a face. Razor? He was a healer, not a warrior, he
couldn't beat up Mousse on a good day. A phrase
one of the dragons she'd met in Aramar immediately
appeared in her head. "I will, in my primal shell, puke."
Not that he wasn't a nice guy who knew how to be a
dutiful husband, but Shampoo couldn't see how she
could deal with a nonwarrior husband.

Shampoo slipped silently from the
bed, anxious to leave this reality FAR behind.
------------------------------------
Kasumi flicked on a light, noting
that everything looked well maintained and
cared for. Except for three places. One she
had not checked, as her father's snores could
clearly be heard from within.

The dojo was one of those areas,
it had very obviously not been used or even
cleaned in a long time. It had a thick covering
of dust, especially in the corners.

Making sure that no one was
around, Kasumi called on her training from
the past year. As a priestess of Etragar,
she could draw on a number of sources
for magic, as healing and the beneficial
side of nature were universal concepts.
There wasn't nearly the duration or control
she'd have back in Aramar, but it was
better than nothing.

Colors began to flow in the
empty space of the dojo. Kasumi frowned.
Something had occurred here, something
so terrible that the impression of the event
was reverberating even now.

Kasumi let the spell die, anger
and blood, the feeling of sudden violent
death, these were things she'd seen in her
training as an acolyte. She needed to
dissipate the negative energies left behind,
lest they attract unwelcome attention.
--------------------------------------------
Frostbite looked around at the
crowded street, grateful that he assumed
human form before these little journeys.

Shyla Montgomery, mechanic,
was disappointed. She apparently had no
Analogue in this timeline, but there were
at least machines that functioned in the
proper manner. Electricity! Television!
Internal combustion engines! No
holograms, micro-fusion toroids, or
any of the little things she'd taken for
granted up to a little over a year ago,
but she'd take what she could get.

And there were other humans!
Not that there weren't races in Aramar that
resembled humans: the Delphin had the
appearances of human women, the elves
looked like stretched out humans, the
dwarves looked like short muscular humans,
the ogrii resembled combat cyborgs, the
nymphs looked sort of vaguely like human
women with at least partial genetic
reconstruction, but all had a touch of
alien-ness to them to set them apart.

"You suppose this is the
right world for them?"

"No," Frostbite looked back
into the graveyard behind them as two
figures gradually walked up. "I don't
think it is."

Ranma explained the gravesites
behind them. The transformed dragon and
the mechanic took in the details without
comment.

"Well, your house would seem
to be the next stop on the list." Frostbite
sighed. "At least we seem to be getting
closer. If the event was two years ago,
then it isn't an event in your past that
was different, it is an event in your
future."

"Can't you do some spell,"
Ranma asked. "Hey, when I was doing
some courier duties out in Shadar, I
heard about these forensic sorcerers
and psychics..."

"I might," conceded Frostbite.
"I'm not a mage, though, but..." He
turned and walked into the graveyard,
finally coming to the two markers that
Ranma had indicated.

"I'm a healer, and sometimes
healing includes the psychic. There isn't
anything here, though. No bodies, no
psychic traces, no leftover energies from
whatever killed you two. No, if we figure
out where your Analogues died, I *might*
be able to contact their spirits." Frostbite
shrugged. "Without even knowing where
or how you died, I can't do it."

"Oh," Ranma shrugged and
filed the information in case it came in
handy later. "So I guess it's on to the
dojo."

"I just hope we don't end
up waiting for Shampoo again," said
Ukyou. "That trip from her village is
SUCH a pain."
---------------------------------
Shampoo looked up from her
journal, realizing what the Change was
that set this Alternate apart. She had met
many strong fighters lately, and wasn't as
set on marrying Ranma as she had been,
simply learning the customs of those OTHER
amazons had been eye-opening. Reading
this, though, she decided she would rather
Ranma hate her forever than have this
actually turn out to be a real timeline.

She sighed. She was really getting
sick of the distance between her village and
Japan.
===================================
(1)=each of the worlds teaches our travelers something as
the experience of their Analogues seep into their own lives.
the World Of Love, for example, planted the idea to Nabiki
that she could escape her fate as an OL (revealed in the first
world) by travelling outside Japan.