[Ranma][FanFic] Biker 1/2 chapter 29
Doghead Thirteen
Don't blame me, or my evil twin either. Or my good triplet for that matter.
Words in "{this}" kind of brackets are spoken in Cantonese. Those in
"[this]" are in wolf-speak.
Previous chapters of this fanfic are archived at...
http://www.kistunesden.com
Chapter 29: End of the beginning.
"You left me incomplete, all alone, but the memories still remain..."
Pantera, 'Cemetary Gates.'
"My life was over. Ranma was gone... but it got worse. Shampoo in a coma,
Genma gone, Dad gone, Herb gone... nobody I knew was left untouched." -
Akane Saotome, describing the period just after the Second Battle of Nerima.
***********************************
"No... NO!"
Akane stumbled to the edge of the crater. Pieces of cooling debris were
still falling, smashing into the tarmac around her.
Her empty minigun hit the rubble-strewn road with a solid chunk. Her aura
lit up, lighting the darkened street with it's sickly green glow.
She turned to the smirking trio - two vampires and a werewolf - who were
staring at her from the far side of the massive pit the explosion had
formed.
Her hands came up, unknowingly following a pattern of motions that had been
old a million years before as she howled her denial into the night.
A section of that glowing aura broke free and rocketed across the crater,
exploding with a dull thump right into the trio of enemies faces. Akane
didn't see it, nor would she have cared if she had.
***********************************
"Dana's love..."
Mi Soon whispered the invocation. Kou Loun was wearing an equally shocked
look.
"The Shi-Shi Hokodan."
Every Amazon within hearing range made the same gesture; they kissed their
own palm and touched their hands to their hearts. It was an old, old gesture
for warding off demons.
"What in the name of Ehir Diau have you done, Kou Loun?"
"I did what I had to."
One of Kou Loun's allied vampires decided he didn't like the look of the
storm of ki Akane was unleashing; he pulled a hand grenade out of his
pocket, yanked it's pin out and hurled it at Akane. It was an HE
fragmentation grenade with a two second fuse. Mi Soon, Kou Loun and
Morranion all tried to knock it away from it's target with precisely thrown
objects - a shuriken and two chunks of pavement.
Unfortunately they were too close together and their projectiles knocked
each other out of the air.
The grenade exploded right in front of Akane and knocked her flat on her
back; she screamed and clawed at her face.
There was another flash, this one yellow-green rather than white. A massive
cloud of ki leapt away from Akane's body.
A chill ran down Mi Soon's spine as it smashed straight back down into where
Akane was lying. Kou Loun shook her head.
"She's dead. She may not know it yet, but she'd dead."
***********************************
Nodoka turned away from the scene and started walking, unable to believe
what she'd just seen. She arrived at her truck before anyone else had even
moved.
An AK cracked and she felt a single hammerblow at the base of her spine.
Then everything went black.
***********************************
Nabiki steadied her shaking hands on the chopper's controls. Ranma, her
father, Herb and Akane - gone, just like that.
As if to add insult to injury a line of fire leapt down the street followed
and instant later by the bellow of a JGSDF T-72 tank's main gun.
The cavalry had arrived and they were far, far too late.
***********************************
Twelve hours later the survivors were sat round the Tendo's dining table,
cigarettes hanging from their mouths and beers clenched in their hands.
Mi Soon voiced the thought that was on everyone's mind. "So who's still
missing?"
Nabiki sighed and started counting people off on her fingers. "We found
what's left of Genma." She paused. "He killed Akira. We found Shampoo -
she's unconcious but should recover. No sign of Dad, Ranma, Herb, Ryoga or
Ranko. It's like they dropped off the face of the earth. Just over three
hundred dead not counting vampires, 103 of them positively identified as
ours, 216 theirs. 604 regiment lost seven men, mainly the crew of the tank
that got blown."
Happosai popped another cigar into his mouth. "Well, first things first - we
have to keep our people going." He thumped the table. "For better or worse,
we are their leaders. It's our job to keep their morale up... I suggest we
set them building everything we'll need to turn this mess into a self -
contained Amazon village. Nabiki darling, have you managed to keep the army
and the pigs off of us?"
Nabiki nodded tiredly. "Yeah. Colonel Honda's backing us up with the
fatcats. He's a great guy... I told the cops to steer clear of our part of
town after the first battle. The JSDF are under the impression we're part of
Honda's team so they'll leave us the hell alone."
Mi Soon finally breeched the subject everyone had been avoiding.
"How's Akane?"
Nabiki sighed again. "She's alive... just. What the hell was that massive ki
blast she shot off?"
"I told you about the Shi-Shi Hokodan, huh?"
"Yeah..."
"That was the perfected version. It is only possible if the practitioner is
feeling nothing but total and utter despair... it involves channeling heavy
ki through every cell in your body. Akane is the only living person ever to
use it."
"Uh... what happened to the others? There were others?"
"Yes, four are recorded. They are dead." Mi Soon stopped.
There was an uncomfortable silence then Nabiki asked the million dollar
question.
"What happened to them?"
Mi Soon looked her straight in the eye.
"They committed suicide."
***********************************
"OH SHIIIIIIIIIIIIIIT!"
Buckle your seatbelt, Dorothy. 'Cause Kansas is goin' *bye-bye*.
End: Biker 1/2, book 1.
And thus book 1 reaches it's apocalyptic conclusion. Ya I know this chapter
in fact the entire battle sequence are a lot shorter than planned, shit
happens OK?
I plan to take a short break from this fic and work on something else for a
while - a change is as good as a rest, as they say. Don't worry, Biker 1/2
will be back after the intermission with Book 2: After the Apocalypse,
wherein... well, all will become clear with time.
But then I've already gotten the first few chapters of book 2 hacked out so
what the hell, it's on with the show.
God-damn, what a monster this fic is turning into. I ran a word count while
I was working on chapter 27, and I can safely say this book is just over
110,000 words... Ye Gods, I've created a monster.
Oh, and by the way - did anyone spot the self-insert? The fellow ratbiker
Ryoga passed in a Scottish village during chapter 2 was me.
Hmm, the history of this story...
The genesis of Biker 1/2, firstborn of my fanfics, began one night in
November 1999.
I had just finished reading Shampoo 1/2, an eight hour marathon read. I
hadn't had a smoke or any caffein in all that time, therefore not only was I
feeling slightly deranged, my brain was also fizzing with ideas.
I suppose it was only a matter of time before I asked myself how Ranma 1/2
might have gone if most of the cast were bikers.
The first version of Biker 1/2 (which I still have on my hard drive) was -
how shall I say - pathetic. I reached chapter 18 before realising how many
faults the story had, but I managed to miss the biggest one.
So, on April 7th 2000 I started to rewrite Biker 1/2, adopting a tighter
writing style and putting less of myself into the characters. This version
also saw the first appearances of the Amerai in this story and the
introduction of the illustrious Colonel Honda and Akira Saotome.
The result read far better; I rewrote parts of it on several occasions but
never posted it. Sadly, this version was doomed - a hard drive crash in
early November 2000 sent it to the digital equivalent of Heaven. After
moping for several days i sat down and began to hack out Biker 1/2 version
3. The date? November 20th 2000.
It was about this time I cottoned on to the fatal flaw in version 2; no real
underlying plot. One had begun to emerge but there was no sign of it as late
as chapter 8.
Before doing any work on it I decided what I wanted to include in the story
and came up with a rough (about 200 words) outline of the plot for books 1
and 2, based on the plot that had begun to form itself from the later
chapters of version 2. I then sat down and expanded on that up to the
conclusion of book 1, describing the basic plot of each episode in one
paragraph each. This done I started work. I have pinpointed when to within a
minute I wrote the opening line of chapter 1; six minutes past nine in the
morning. I had at some stage decided to tie Biker 1/2 across to another
fanfic I was at the time in the process of writing; the fic in question
(which I have given the preliminary name 'All Creatures') has since been put
'on hold' almost indefinitely or rather until I've got halfway through book
3 because that's when it'll stop being a spoiler. It essentially acts as a
'prequal' of sorts dealing with the murky pasts of Gary, Shan, Angel and
Janine (remember them? They were involved in the first few chapters then
abruptly vanished...) Where they went and more importantly who the hell they
actually are will be revealed in chapter 15 of book 3 of this monstrosity. I
call it a monstrosity having just recently done a word count of book 1 and
discovered, much to my horror, that it contains in excess of 100,000
words...
At any rate, on December 8th 2000 Biker 1/2 finally hit the Internet. The
rest is, as the saying goes, history.
Thanks must go to several authors who inspired me; I cannot at present acess
the net (I Hate British Telecom) so I'll have to just name the fics in
question and find out the authors names later.
Thankyou, the authors of the following, whoever you may be.
Shampoo 1/2
Black Rose, Blue Thunder
Star Wars: A faint hope
Childhood/Adulthood of a Modern Dynasty
Tales of Ranma and Ranko
I have also received inspiration from several things that definitely don't
count as fics, namely...
The books written by Tom Clancy (Hunt for Red October et all)
The Appleseed and Ghost in the Shell manga and anime (thankyou, Mr. Shirow!)
Mad Max 2 (known as Road Warrior in the States)
The Akira manga.
And, of course, The Matrix - without which most of my fight scenes would
have sucked bigtime.
Thanks must also go to the following life-forms, organisations and
objects...
My very good friends Rob Johnston, Alex Brown, James G. Elmslie and Matthew
'Sutekh' Shand for helping me during one of the worst patches my life has
ever taken - thanks, guys. If it wasn't for you I probably wouldn't be here
today.
My brother Ruairidh for putting up with me spewing plot ideas at him, for
letting me talk him into buying Oni and for repeatedly talking me out of
bouts of depression.
Neo for providing a role model.
The ghost I saw back in 1985 for getting me interested in the supernatural.
The folks at work for indirectly financing this fanfic, oh and for putting
up with my ugly mug and warped sense of humour all the time.
Mum for repeatedly bailing me out of debts.
Heavy rock and roll for always being there for me.
White Wolf for feeding my obsession with the supernatural.
Caffein and nicotine for preventing instant zombification.
Suicidal Tendancies for 'How will I laugh tomorrow' and 'Whack time'
Gothdom for accepting me despite my myriad flaws.
Iron Maiden for 'Be quick or be dead' and 'Holy Smoke'
rec.arts.anime.creative for providing me with a near inexhaustable supply of
reading material - without books and fanfics, insanity would not be far
away...
White Zombie for 'Super Charger Heaven' and 'More Human than Human'
Heckler&Koch for the MP5.
The Sisters of Mercy for 'Walk Away' and 'Vision Thing'
James G Elmslie again for being the most utterly goth person I have ever
met.
Metallica for 'Of Wolf and Man' and 'Enter Sandman'
Everyone at the Findhorn Foundation for being a bunch of hippies and still
accepting a fucked up goth bikie metalhead like me.
Guns 'N' Roses for 'Paradise City'
That biffer Matt Shand again for getting me into Apoptygma Berzerk and
pointing out that I'm a goth - I honestly hadn't noticed.
The Offspring for 'Bad Habit'
Kawasaki for the Ninja; wheelies anyone?
Napalm Death for being the heaviest metal I've ever come across.
My sister Kirsty for letting me outgrow her by about a foot.
Moonspell for 'Hand Made God' and '2econd Skin'
Honda for the bike that became Underdog.
Pantera for 'Cowboys from Hell' and 'Cemetary Gates'
Matt Shand yet again for repeatedly recusitating my self-esteem.
Ducati for the Monster Dark.
Wolfsbane for 'Wings'
Mud for being fun to ride crossers on.
Marilyn Manson for 'Rock is dead'
Sarah for first keeping Matt sane then keeping Rob sane.
Rammstein for 'Du Hast'
Mr. Kalashnikov for the AK47.
Godsmax for 'Sick of my life'
Ryoko for being Ryoko.
Dime bars for being an interesting alternative to armadillos.
Monster Magnet for 'Ninteen witches'
Ryo-oh-ki for being indescribeably cute.
Apoptygma Berserk for 'Love never dies' and 'Deep Red'
Scotland for being wet, cold, windy and my kind of a country.
The Goon Show for being incredibly silly.
Cruxshadows for 'Deception'
Cannabis for getting people stoned.
Beer for making me belch like a redneck.
Dark Army for 'Lord of the dead'
Yamaha for the V-Max; black sheep of the cruiser bike world.
SPF1000 for 'Pass out' and 'Consumption'
Robot Wars for mass destruction of radio-controlled gizmos.
Ministry for 'Jesus Built my Hot-Rod', 'Hero', 'So What' and 'Just One Fix'
Rumiko Takahashi for making me laugh a lot with her manga.
The Prodigy for 'Hyperspeed' and 'Mindfields'
Terry Pratchett for making me nearly wet myself laughing.
White Wolf for figuring out what werewolves should really be all about and
for 'Dog Head Yoda Goat'.
Palladium for getting me interested in high-tech firearms with their 'Rifts'
RPG.
Barrett for the Light 50.
Games Workshop for the accent used by Orcs, for assorted technological
madness and for being easy to take the piss out of.
Dad for being an all round great guy.
KTM for knowing what off-road bikes are *really* all about.
Cows for putting up with being turned into pies and leather jackets.
Steff Czert for riding a dirtier bike than me and inspiring me to rat the
Underdog.
Dad's Dad Graham Wallace for being another all round great guy.
Suzuki for the GSXR1100 and Bandit 1200.
Harley-Davidson for that exhaust note and religious service to chrome.
Chevrolet for the Corvette and Dodge for the Charger RT and Viper - the
saving graces of four wheels.
Hot-rodders the world over for building hot-rods, without which...
Judge Dredd (not the film, the comic) for being the ultimate in anti-hero.
Varied skaters, trendies and spooky kids who will remain unnamed for being
easy to take the piss out of.
The British Army for the Challanger MBT - now THAT is what I call a tank.
Steve Jobs for repeatedly stopping Apple flatlining.
The Dutch special forces for being the meanest bunch of badasses on the
planet.
The Morayshire police force for not hassling me for going 'Oink' at them
when I'm drunk despite the fact I look like a complete weirdo.
Pixie sticks for containing hyperactivity.
Barrs for Irn Bru (caffein, wheee...)
And, of course, everyone out there on the Net who's read and enjoyed this
story. I am dyslexic, mildly autistic and thorughly fucked up; your support
has been invaluable. Biker 1/2 and by extension all you folks have been with
me through a very rough part of my life indeed; between lonliness, lack of
transport, depression and all the other shit that's gone down in the last
year it hasn't been at all easy being me. You folks, my readers, have
brought a certain amount of light into my life with you words of support and
incouragement.
I love the lot of you.
Laters, thanks and please remember that werewolves need love too...
Calum 'Wolfman' Wallace.
There are, sadly, several things, persons and organisations to which I must
deliver an almighty 'Fuck You', namely...
Slipknot for being a bunch of pathetic little wankers who are incapable of
out-rocking Napalm Death with nearly twice the bandmembers.
Spooky kids for being a bunch of moronic little point-missing shits.
British Telecom for being a bunch of meglomaniac, monopolistic fuckfaces who
like setting outrageous prices and giving appalingly shit customer service.
The Northern Constbulary for being a bunch of shitheads who have fun and
games hassling innocent bikers and goths while ignoring crime.
Tony Blair for being a jug-eared smarmy little creep who thinks everyone in
Britian is about as responsible as a five year old - we're perfectly capable
of running our own lives, so he can go to hell and stop forcing nanny state
legilation through the House of Parliment.
Marshall Mathers for being an annoying prick.
The son of the ex-Lord Provost of Ross-Shire for being the sort of fucking
idiot who'd drive on the wrong side of the road at ninty miles per hour and
wipe my best mate off the road, causing him to flatline at least once before
the docs managed to save his life, oh, and the fucking pigs again for
letting that fucking speed-mad shithead off scot free.
Trendies, skaterfucks and the Nike army for being too fucking stupid to
realise that me and my mates don't actually care what their opinion of our
clothes, hairstyles, hobbies and lifestyles actually is - if we gave a damn
we'd ask.
The government for setting ludicrous taxes, making stupid laws and generally
having less braincells that they do teeth.
The Royal Air Force for thinking it's funny to buzz villages and fishing
boats with a jet fighter - practise your goddamn target lock on rocks, you
pricks.
That Bin Laden shithead for giving a perfectly respectable religion the
worst reputation on the planet.
Britney Spears for being an annoying little jailbait generator.
Bill Gates and Microsoft for seeming to like system crashes.
And finally, that fat ugly balding snot-nosed crap car driving bricklayer
across the road for whining to the landlord about me and my mates playing
heavy metal and whooping it up during our New Year party.
An' I'll be awa', I have tae go tae ma bed the noo.
GLOSSARY OF TERMS
Alternator - Higher tech version of a generator.
Artic - The UK term for a semi truck. Short for 'articulated lorry'.
Binned - crashed. Normally means written off. Derived from 'bin' as in
'rubbish bin' (the British term for a trash can)
Chain lube - Motorbike chain lubrication oil. Comes in a spray can and
lookes a bit like snot.
Conrod (connecting rod) - The bit of metal that connects the piston to the
crankshaft. Shaped approximately like a flat dumbbell.
Engine clicking - An internal combustion engine heats up when run. Run it
hard and it heats up more, then when you switch off the engine will start
emitting a series of sharp clicks as the metal cools and contracts.
Final drive - the drive chain that goes from the gearbox to the back wheel
and the cogs (final drive sprockets) that it runs on. Not to be confused
with the primary drive - the chain/sprocket or belt/pulleys between the
engine and gearbox.
Gasflowing - trimming off excess metal from inside the cylinder heads to aid
the burn rate of fuel within the engine. Gives a small horsepower boost.
Gixer - Slang for a Suzuki GSXR (one of the craziest bikes they make).
Header tank - Tank that contains the spare water for the radiator on a
sealed cooling system as found in most cars and some high performance bikes.
Honda CG125 - Small single - cylinder 4-stroke road bike. Not very much of
anything but supremely reliable and dirt cheap. It's reliability stems from
having very little to go wrong and a low - revving 4-stroke engine.
Honda 250 Superdream - CB250. The next up the Honda model range from the
CG125 and just a bigger version of the same.
Honda 500 Superdream - CB500. A CB250 with a bigger bore and heavier frame.
Honda Fireblade - Insane Honda sportsbike. Mad but beginning to show it's
age.
Kill switch - The engine's 'off' switch. Turns off power to the ignition.
Lid / skidlid - Slang for a crash helmet.
Nitrous oxide - Laughing gas. A petrol - nitrous mix burns faster than a
petrol - air mix therefore produces more horsepower and more wear in the
engine.
Ratbike - A motorbike made to look as fucked up and unroadworthy as possible
while still being street legal. Normally painted flat black.
Steering damper - a long, thin shock absorber that fits between the forks
and the frame. Helps steady the steering. A steering damper is essential for
disabled bikers who have lost the use of one arm as without it there's no
way you'd be able to steer at low speed or pull away one armed.
Stocker - unmodified factory-built vehicle; I think this comes from the term
'sales stock'.
Supercharger - A pump driven off the crank that forces more air into the
engine thus forcing it to run faster.
Toby - An Inverness Collegeism; slang meaning something along the lines of
widget, gizmo or thingy. Derived from angling parlarance (toby = a small
wooden fish used as a lure.) May be related to the epithet 'Toby Tishbein'
and can be said 'Tobyracho' for no apparent reason. (I'm not making this up!
Honest!)
Top yoke - The yokes are two pieces of metal that hold the front forks
together and to the bike. The top yoke is the upper one. Known as triple
clamps in the US.
JASDF - Japanese Air Self Defence Force. The Japanese air force.
JGSDF - Japanese Ground Self Defence Force. The ground forces arm of the
Japanese military.
JSDF - Japanese Self Defence Force. The collective Japanese armed forces.
What likes - Slack Scottish grammar. Means something along the lines of
'please could you explain that'. Only considerably less posh.
Wheelie bin - a square green plastic trashcan about the size of a normal
bin, with a flip top and two wheels.