Neon Genesis Evangelion Fan Fiction / Ranma 1/2 Fan Fiction ❯ Evangelical History ❯ Evangelical History: Chapter 6 ( Chapter 6 )

[ Y - Young Adult: Not suitable for readers under 16 ]

---Title---

Evangelical History - Chapter 6
A Ranma 1/2 - Evangelion fusion
By Suekeiichi Kaiton
(Skaiton@netscape.net)

---Okinawa-bound ferry, 6:30 p.m.---

"So where are we heading?" Ritsuko pinched Ranma on the elbow as she settled next to him on the railing of the ferry. Dusk had fallen and the diffuse glow of the deck lanterns spread across the prow. Okinawa could be seen before them, a wide expanse of dense vegetation and rural homesteads, lights dotting the way up a hillock to a much larger structure standing tall atop the bluffs overlooking the beach. Ranma sniffed at the air and smelled the fragrant smoke wafting from her cigarette.

Her hands were laced on the rail as she leaned down and a slim smoke dangled from her fingertips. Her eyes were glued to the luminous island and her glasses hung from the thin cord around her neck. A slight smile graced her ruby lips and the soft spray of salt water rustled through her short blonde hair, the roots of which were clearly brown. Ranma wondered on that for a fraction of a moment but dismissed it as not really his problem. He turned his back to the ocean, the cold metal at his back, and plucked the cigarette from her hands. He blew three rings into the starry sky.

"I have a few friends that own an inn here. I come by a few times a year for a visit."

"Is it alright?"

"It won't cost you anything."

"That wasn't what I meant..."

Ranma flicked the filter out to sea and boosted a new one from his box. He lit it with a minute flare of ki and took a long drag, blowing it out in one cloud and passing it to the polymath genius. "You mean NERV? Don't worry, Commander Ikari gave his go-ahead for a few days of R&R. Just enjoy it, we've got the whole weekend and all of tonight. We'll be there by eight." He turned around and leaned next to her, siding next to her shoulder and brought his face in close. "It's right there, see that hotel at the top of the cliffs?"

"They own that whole complex?"

"Yup!" He wrapped his arm around her shoulders and buffeted her against a sudden cold chill. "You'd better make sure you have everything before we dock." She finished off his cigarette and flicked the stump out into the brine.

"See you when we dock." She brushed her hand through her locks and proceeded below decks.

"How are things, Saotome?" Ranma rolled his eyes at the newcomer and turned back around, noticing for the first time Kaji leaning against the observation binoculars.

"Just fine, Kaji, how's Sergeant Watanabe?" The younger man grimaced and rubbed his back, almost as if favoring some long-healed wounds. "Her nails as long as everyone says?"

"Times two, Saotome, times two." He stalked forward to the railing and stood still next to his superior officer, both smoking casually into the black night. Unbeknownst to either, Misato and Asuka were peeking at them from behind a bulkhead. Across the deck, Shinji, Rei, and Hikari were joking around with Touji and Kensuke. "On the subject of love-lives, it seems you've had a doozy..."

"And just what is that supposed to mean?" Ranma raised an eyebrow and flicked his cigarette into the waves.

"That you get around."

"Oh, that! I get that from my wife all the time."

"Wife?" Kaji's eyes shrunk to pinpricks.

"Don't ask." Ranma waved at the waves. "Continue...just who are you talking about?"

"I won't name names, but it seems that you've left quite a trail on your way up." Misato and Asuka both frowned at that and began to growl. "Doctor Heller and Major Schylling? At the same time as well....tsk, tsk..." Kaji shook his head as if scolding a small child.

"Hey," Ranma replied with a smirk which caused Misato's heart to swoon, "accidents happen. It's not my fault we all were stuck in an elevator for six hours." He shrugged and began walking to the other side to join Shinji and the others.

"Saotome."

"What?"

"Just don't break her heart...alright?" Kaji didn't look at Ranma as he spoke, his head tilted to the stars and the diffuse glow of the inn atop the cliff-face. Ranma shrugged while grinning knowingly.

"I have no idea what you're talking about."

He walked past the open bulkhead where Misato and Asuka shrunk back at his advance, continuing on to the bow of the large ship where the Children were talking amiably. Shinji seemed far more comfortable among kids his own age than he had among adults, his close friendship with Touji, Kensuke, Rei, and Hikari speaking volumes about his kind nature and agapic concept of friendship. According to the reports, Shinji was the sole individual second only to his father that had coaxed a response from the stoic and unflappable Miss Ayanami.

"Yo, Shinji!" The brown-haired boy looked up and stood up from the bench.

"Y-yes?"

"You and your friends better double-check and make sure you have everything, we'll be docking in a few minutes." The entire group nodded and Ranma nodded back, walking casually through the bulkhead and walking down to the glass-walled sitting room. A hand-painted sign was hung above the door declaring that alcohol would not be sold until they were a mile off the coast. At the bar sat Misato with Ritsuko and Maya. "Good evening girls."

"Can you believe it? They won't give me another beer 'cause we're too near the harbor!" Misato slurred from her stool, splaying her legs and parting her short dark mini-skirt in a very unlady-like fashion. Ritsuko pinched the bridge of her nose and shook her head at the drunk woman's antics while Maya held a hand over her mouth to conceal her mirthful smile. Ranma noted that she was wearing black lace panties before righting her back on the stool and setting her head on the bar. "An I was just starting to get...a buzz..." She managed to mutter a few more incoherent groanings before falling under the power of booze.

"Does this happen often?" Ranma prodded her to better balance the unconscious body on her stool, and sat next to her, wrapping an arm around her to steady her.

"Only when she doesn't have to worry about work."

"So work is what keeps her sober?" He shook his head in wonderment. "This woman never ceases to amaze me..." A loud horn sounded from the deck and the sputtering, crackled voice of the captain blared from the brass speakers.

"Attention all passengers, this ferry will be docking shortly, please remember all packages and belongings. The Otohime Ferry Service will not be held responsible for any lost or forgotten articles. Thank you, we hope you have enjoyed your time aboard." The man's grunting voice faded from the air as Ritsuko and Maya waved happily at him before quickly making themselves scarce. By Misato's feet was her dufflebag. Ah well...

---The long walk---

They were nearing the top of the long stairs when Misato finally began to stir. Purple lashes fluttered open and were greeted by bleak darkness, she began to move before feeling the arms around her calves tighten in warning that too much movement could land her flat on her ass. She looked into the darkness before her eyes and saw nothing more or less than the dreary landscape.

"What's the matter with you?" Ranma shook her slightly on his back. Looking back down into the blackness she realized that what she'd seen as night was simply his raven hair.

"Why am I on your back?"

"You passed out."

"When?"

"On the ferry...I'll set you down when we reach the top."

"Why not now?" She looked at his arms and saw the multitude of bags piled in both of his hands, his fingers turning white as circulation was cut by her three bags and his two. "Nevermind."

Kaji and Ritsuko were talking about NERV's public image while Maya followed, Makoto and Aoba were too busy peeking up Misato's skirt to care if they fell all the way down the stone stairs. Finally, Shinji and the other children were filing up slowly, Asuka bitching all the way about how long of a walk the hotel was from the ocean.

"Why did you bring all this stuff?" Ranma raised one of his hands, gasping for breath as the movement put his baggage off balance which in turn caused slim but muscular arms to wrap around his neck. "...can't...breathe..."

"Deal with it! Don't do that again!" She released her chokehold and grabbed his shoulders again, watching the light pour down from their intended destination. "I, being superior NERV personnel, have to bring equipment and supplies anywhere we go so that communications with HQ are secure."

"Well, why wasn't I briefed on this?" He looked up at her face and found her head petulantly turned to the side.

"You weren't told because I am still in charge of secure communications and our team's contact with headquarters. Just because _you_ took _my_ position doesn't mean that you have all of my duties. Commander Ikari asked me to relinquish command of Tactical Ops, not hand you all my responsibilities."

"TouchŽ! We're almost there." The glow of the inn lights was growing as the stone stairs disappeared under their feet, the soft diffuse illumination accompanied by a steady staccato rhythm of flesh on flesh. "I see they haven't changed."

The walk evaporated as the NERV group arrived at the top of the bluffs and beheld a massive and ancient hot springs inn, the wood burnished with age and smelling of generations worth of autumnal leaf-burnings. Misato almost leap off Ranma's back, kicking with her legs until he let her go and standing rather unsteadily in her high-heels. Ritsuko wasn't really impressed by the sight, she had seen many such buildings before Second Impact but the display of physical prowess taking place in front of the main doors did cause an eyebrow to rise. Aoba and Makoto were too exhausted to care about the display, collapsing under the weight of all the luggage and lying prone on the cobblestones. Shinji, Asuka, and the rest of the Children simply stared slack-jawed.

There were two girls about fourteen sparring. That in and of itself was not surprising since Folun Dafa, Tai Chi, Tai Kwan Do, and Karate were still practiced amongst the youth not only for self-defense but also exercise. What surprised the group was the skill with which the duo fought, each strike echoing in the night air as bone met bone and muscles strained against their foe. The quick booms that accompanied their attacks were the girls' fists nearing the sound barrier as they lashed out at each other again and again.

"What are they doing, Ranma?" Shinji asked as he walked over to Ranma's side. Asuka favored him with a superior snort of disgust.

"They're sparring, Shinji, they're practicing the Musubetsu Kakuto Ryu."

"What is that? What is the Musubetsu Kakuto Ryu?"

"Nothing that concerns you baka-Shinji!" Asuka tore her arm away from Ranma's and took a step forward across Ranma's front to point a finger dangerously at the Third Child. "Why don't you just stand next to Misato? She's your guardian after all!"

"Now, now, Asuka, don't jump down his throat." He turned to look down at the short boy as the girls leapt off the submerged boulders around the entrance to the inn. "Shinji, these girls are practicing Anything-Goes Martial Arts. It is a form of The Art where anything can be used as weapon or defense, as it sounds that makes the style very adaptable." Shinji looked up at Asuka's guardian from the red-head's finger, curiosity and awe evident in his face.

Asuka frowned at being ignored.

"C-can anyone learn it? I mean...that's not to say that I want to or anything, I just meant to ask if it required some kind of special training or something."

"Ha ha! Don't worry about it Shinji, I understand perfectly. I can teach you if you like, Asuka already has the basics." Ranma patted him on the head and chuckled a little bit, changing Shinji's embarrassment into something more akin to na•vetŽ. The pig-tailed tactician turned back to his own charge. "Shall we?"

"Mmm-hmm!" With that the two leapt into the fray, Asuka attacking the shorter, Ranma launching a volley of Amaguriken punches at the taller. Misato's shoulders were slumped in stupefaction, Ritsuko was observing the one-sided fight with scientific detachment, Maya and the rest of the bridge crew could have cared less, and Touji was wildly cheering Ranma on as the battle began in earnest.

Satomi and Saya knew they were in trouble as Satomi was tackled out of mid-air without their danger senses giving the slightest indication of possible threats. When a taller figure landed opposite Saya, the duo knew they were facing warriors of consummate skill. In the humid blackness their attacker's faces were hidden and the clothes they wore were relatively nondescript, the man in a jumpsuit, the female a yellow sundress. Saya cursed as the man exploded into a burst of fists, his arms a blur as she felt her vital points hit with deadly efficiency. Satomi was bodily thrown over the girl's head and landed with a grunt on the gravel walk, the wind knocked out of her lungs in a single painful gasp.

"I was expecting a little more of a fight than that, Saya-chan, have you been slacking off in your training?" The defeated girl's scowl of hate and disgust was quickly replaced by the glow of admiration and happiness as the tones of her sensei registered. It was pure luck that at that moment the inn lights blazed to life and illuminated the yard in hazy yellow light. The roguish good looks of her teacher came into focus as well as Asuka's face opposite Satomi's prone form.

"Auntie Kasumi doesn't want us to push ourselves too hard so we only get a few hours a day for practice."

"I'll have to have a word with your aunt before I leave." He turned as the main doors opened and two women appeared in the light, their silhouettes revealing thin and evenly proportional figures in thin yukata. "Good evening." He waved to them.

Aoba and Makoto were already at the door with the bags before the twin shadows began to move, their gait light and purposeful as they crossed the distance of the yard and helped the two girls up off the ground. Misato, Ritsuko, and Maya saw that both were older women, although only by a few years, still devoid of wrinkles and elegant in their stance.

"What have I told you about pushing yourself?" The taller woman was helping the diminutive redhead up off the walk. The girl, Satomi, had the good grace to look embarrassed at being reprimanded but a defiant fire burned behind her azure eyes. "Now go inside and get washed up."

"Don't mother the girl, they're both tough enough to handle the next stage." Ranma walked past the shorter woman and grasped the other's arm. "If this is what they want you can't stop them."

"I will not see my niece hurt because of your ideas concerning training, Ranma!" She wrenched her arm out of his grip and time stood still for a fraction of a second as his face showed a cast of betrayal against her cool anger. "Now you and your guests should come inside and get settled. Dinner will be ready in a half and hour." She turned and walked back inside, the crowd never getting the briefest of glimpses at her visage.

"Saya," the other spoke, drawing all attention to her, "please take our guest's bags inside and show them to their rooms."

"She didn't have to be so cold..." Ranma kicked a stone off the cliff.

"And you don't have to act like a petulant child, Ranma, but you are; so get your ass inside." She turned her head back to the group of NERV workers and bowed. "I'm sorry for all this, my daughter and her cousin tend to get a little carried away."

"Oh, it's no problem! Ranma gets carried away all the time! Usually by men in white coats!" Misato's eyes were flat in irritation. She grasped the sides of her red jacket and pulled it taut against her back. "I'm Captain Misato Katsuragi, pleased to meet you."

"Nabiki Tendo. Glad to meet one of Ranma's co-workers."

---Inside---

"So, Saotome, is Nabiki the hot little number you've got stashed in this place?" Kaji was leaning behind the martial artist with a saucer of sake in his hand. "When do we get to meet this gorgeous 'wife' of yours?"

"Hopefully never, Kaji, and lay off the sake until you learn to handle your liquor." Ranma jerked away and moved to the low table.

"I have, or else I'd have told all the women about your hubby." A smile broke on the disheveled man's face, countered by a subtle shakiness in his step. "C'mon...just between men...who is she? Nabiki? The tall one, er, Kasumi?"

"Just stop talking about it Kaji." The two men were sitting in the common room high above the beach overlooking the hot springs. The women had run off to change into yukata and use the restrooms, the children for much of the same, while Shigeru and Makoto took a well-deserved soak. The rooms were off of the main building and higher up the cliff, connected by a covered wooden bridge over the steaming water, one person per room except for the kids. Needless to say, Asuka was unhappy.

---Elsewhere---

"Who do you think? Nabiki or Kasumi?" Ritsuko chuckled as Misato's lipstick went horribly awry, the swath of luscious crimson cutting a line from the crook of her lips to a shapely ear. The good captain didn't explode however, and simply took a piece of tissue to begin wiping the stray mark off her cheek.

"Wh-what do you mean?"

"I mean, which one do you think Ranma is sleeping with?" Maya flushed the toilet in back of them and opened the stall door. "He is a healthy man...and those two seemed to be _overly_ familiar with him if you ask me."

"I didn't see that, sempai, they just seemed like friends to me." Ibuki was drying her hands but looked up at her superior.

"Poor na•ve Maya, you really don't get it do you?" Ritsuko closed her lipstick and placed a well-manicured hand on the lieutenant's shoulder. "Ranma is more than a 'friend' to one of those women." Misato's second attempt at applying her lipstick met with much the same result. "Isn't that right, Misato-chan?"

"Oh shut up."

---Inside---

"Oh shut up." Ranma poured himself a cup of sake from the warmed bottle on the table, helping himself to the sliced okra on the side. "That's my own business Kaji, and my business is NERV business." He looked over his saucer at the other man and tried his best impersonation of Gendo, which, while it lacked the malice of the commander, was enough to close the double-agent's mouth with the clack of teeth.

"I get it...you're doing both of them."

Ranma simply sighed.

---Outside---

"This is pretty relaxing, isn't it Shigeru?"

"It sure is."

"Only thing better than this-"

"Would be if the girls were here with us."

---Elsewhere---

"What the hell are you talking about!? My Ranma would never do anything with Nabiki-obasan or Kasumi-obasan!" Asuka kicked the other stall door open and stepped out fuming. "His family knew their family before Second Impact and they were the only two to survive...it makes perfect sense why they're so close." She crossed her arms haughtily and thrust her nose in the air.

"You don't really believe that do you, Asuka?" Ritsuko pursed her lips at the mirror and patted them with a piece of paper. With a clack of metal her purse snapped shut and she turned to face the auburn-haired Child. "Ranma is more than familiar with both of them. In fact, I bet one of those girls we saw fighting outside is his daughter."

"I think you've been reading too many romance novels, sempai."

---???---

"Oneesan, has Ranma truly returned?" The refined figure tossed back her hair and touched up the tight bun in back.

"He just arrived, he and the other NERV people are in the common room." Kasumi looked up from her pot of broth. Cooks were bustling around her every which way running to finish the seven-course meal for their most distinguished guests. "Are you thinking of talking to him?"

"That is the least of what I have in store." Her pink tongue lanced past the black lipstick her wore and licked the pigment so that it glistened under the fluorescent lights.

---Inside, common room---

"Why I bet one of those women is just waiting to pounce on you, Saotome. I mean, after so long away...a wife has urges too you know." Kaji was sitting by the window looking out into the moist evening. Ranma was again seated at the table chewing on a teriyaki squid. An empty bottle of sake lay on its side next to his saucer.

"Why are you still talking?"

"Because he could never keep his mouth shut." Misato threw open the doors and pranced in with her hair braided and curled into a bun in back, a pair of lacquered chop-sticks keeping the precarious style from unraveling. She sat down roughly at the table opposite Ranma and slammed her elbow down. "Pass the sake."

In short order the others arrived, Maya, Ritsuko, and Asuka from the bathrooms; Shinji, Touji, Kensuke, Rei and Hikari from their room; and Makoto and Aoba from the hot springs. A few minutes passed before a knock was heard and cooks entered with three more tables, placing them end on end to make a long runner with enough room for fourteen people. Ranma seemed unimpressed. The others were astounded by the abundance of food placed before them, each steaming dish served on platters fit to serve ten, fourteen platters in all. Dishes were laid out with chopsticks and rice, sake was placed in a ceramic pot and set on a hotplate, and everyone left before Kasumi and Nabiki arrived.

"You outdid yourself this time, oneesan, I think this is quadruple the amount of food you served him last time." Nabiki was garbed in a blue yukata with red koi, Kasumi in a solid plum.

"Well, he did bring guests this time." Kasumi moved away from the door as the girls ran in wearing twin green and sat next to their sensei.

"Did you bring us anything, sensei?" Saya tried to keep the excitement from her voice but failed as her ear-to-ear grin threatened to split her face, her black bangs hiding her mirthful eyes.

"Yes, did you bring the chocolate?" Satomi was bouncing on her heels. Ranma looked like the most tortured man alive between the two Tendo girls as they played tug of war with his arms. Ritsuko hid her smile with a sleeve and reached for the sake. Kaji smiled past his cigarette by the window. Shinji, Kensuke and Touji were openly gawking at the beautiful girls their age while Hikari and Asuka tried to drill holes in their heads by sheer force of glaring will. Rei sneaked a bite of cabbage from one of the platters while no one was looking. Maya was eyeing the sashimi hungrily and the other two idiots were giggling inanely as they eyed the clay cauldron of sake by their end of the table.

"Now, now, girls, I think there will be time for gifts after dinner, don't you agree?" A melodic voice wafted from the hall and a vision in full kimono appeared in the threshold, her glossy dark hair pulled into a bun and her brown eyes deep pools of privilege and opulence. She was dressed in an indigo cloth with black roses, the flower petals virtually lost in the expanse of dark fabric. "It is wonderful to see you again, Ranma-sama."

Kodachi Kuno, the Black Rose, entered the fray.

---To be continued---