Project A-Ko Fan Fiction / Ranma 1/2 Fan Fiction / Vampire Hunter (Darkstalkers) Fan Fiction ❯ Nabiki 1/2 (A Very Scary Thought) ❯ Darkstalkers' Waltz ( Chapter 130 )

Nabiki 1/2

(A Very Scary Thought)

Written by Jim Robert Bader

Proofread by Shiva Barnwell

Based Upon the Altered Destinies Storyline

Inspired by the works of such fans as

Wade Tritshler

Richard Lawson

James Jones

And Many Others

Standard Disclaimer: This is inspired by the work of Takahashi Rumiko and is not my original creation. All characters belong to her. This is only a fanfictional work, and is not intended to compromise the rights of the original owners, distributors and publishers of the Ranma series. I have no money to spare and would very much appreciate if no one tries to sue me.

"Oh my, Kuno-chan?" Kasumi said as she drifted over to where Natsume sat huddled over her stricken fiancé, "Imoutochan? Is he…?"

"Yes," the word was forced between lips that refused to utter the sound as tears fell from the novice Slayer's eyes as she clung to her man feeling her world beginning to crumble all around her.

At the moment it practically was as they came under withering fire from the Zevumbre cyborgs under the command of the Hougan Priest, Jumaji, who was urging his minions to crush the interlopers who dared to intrude upon the sacred ceremony of his allies, who even then were confronting challenges of their own in the form of enraged Tendo Posse members and Darkstalkers.

"Get up!" Nabiki was snarling, "You started all of this, now it's your turn to may, Dimitri!"

"I see," Dimitri said as he rose to his full height, "In other words it is you who are seeking blood here. But you presume too much if you think this minor interruption will prevent my rise to power, Tendo-san."

"Power?" Nabiki's eyes seemed to blaze from within with a yellow light, "You want power? Then let me give you a taste of my power!"

And with that she brought her hands together and energy coalesced between her hands, forming into a compact ball that she then proceeded to unleash upon the vampire, power that shot from her like a cannonball and would have flattened a truck, but which Dimitri caught with his own two hands, absorbing the energy even as it drove him relentlessly backwards, his heels digging up a huge rut that displaced stone altars and tombstones in his passage…

Meanwhile, Frank was presently engaging the werewolf named Darkwulf in hand-to-hand battle, trading blows on an order of thirty times-plus the strength of a normal pair of fighters, even while Keiko was busy fending off the attacks by Anakaris, who attempted to wrap her in bandages while she avoided his attacks and came back at him like a whirling dervish.

At that moment four girls who had been formerly engaged in helpless moaning and groaning rose up, the effect of the Kamasenken upon their collective nervous systems having finally worn off, and the one named Lilith gasped, "Hey, there's a fight going on…and we're missing it?"

"No…way!" BB Hood declared as she cocked one of her shotguns and prepared to enter the fray, as did Queen-Bee and Atros…

"This is nuts!" declared Natsumi to her partner as they changed clips for the third straight time during the battle, "At this rate we'll run out of ammo long before we run out of bad guys to shoot!"

"At least our bullets are proving effective in wounding and evil killing some of the vampires," Miyuki noted, "But those HK cyborgs are another matter entirely. Too much armor, and they're already dead to begin with."

"Oh swell," Natsumi grunted as she took careful aim at yet another target, "Then how do we make them even deader…?"

At the moment, Julian Fries was answering that question in a rather decisive way, his butterfly swords making short work of a Zevumbre that he had methodically chopped to pieces by targeting its joints and weaker places. The effort was, however, time consuming, and it left him exposed so that another HK killing unit was able to get in an effective shot that took him in the back and knocked him momentarily sprawling.

"Julian-san?" Nodoka asked as she paused in the middle or reducing another HK unit to so much scrap and used body parts.

"Ugh…I'm all right," the man pushed himself back up to his feet, wincing slightly, "Clean shot, missed the ribs. Takes a moment to heal as all, hardly terminal, which would be…inconvenient…"

The HK that had wounded him was moving in for a better shot, but it made the mistake of coming within sword reach, and Julian was quick to whirl around and slice through the arms holding its primary weapon. A moment later the sharp steel of his blades severed the metal-reinforced joints of its neck vertebrae and rendered it hors d'combat. Nodoka went back to work finishing off her own latest opponent, then turned in search of other prey and found herself coming face-to-face with Jumaji himself as the Hougan priest decided to take a more direct hand in the battle.

"You are skilled, Samurai," the man declared as he took a small doll-like object in his hands and held up a lock of hair with a smile, "But you failed to detect me when I removed this from you, and that will prove to be your undoing.

As he said this he attached the bit of hair to the doll, then took it between hands and began twisting it, causing Nodoka to spasm as some invisible force seemed to be applying crushing weight to her body. She fell to one knee holding her side and straining against the power of the evil Voodoo priest, who smiled and applied pressure to the doll's own neck, causing the Saotome Matriarch to stiffen…

"What is wrong here?" Pyron growled in frustration, "Why can I not strike this insignificant flea? He is nothing to me! I don't even sense a power level worthy of so much bother!"

Happosai stuck out his tongue and razzed the fiery giant, then he taunted, "What's the matter, can't even hit a harmless old man like me? You must be getting slow if you think an attack like that is gonna get my attention!"

"Annoying pest," Pyron growled, "This time I will not miss, even if I have to set fire to the entire…"

"Pyron!" Jeddah snapped, "This is wasting time that we do not have! The spell is not yet completed, but I can feel that it is still active!"

"What?" Pyron reacted, then with a start he said, "You are right…I feel it too! The energy current…they are shaping themselves in accordance to the pattern…but how?"

"Whatever Lord Dimitri did to the woman appears to have unleashed great energies equal to or superior to that force that would have been expunged upon her death," Jeddah realized, "That means that I have only to complete the last part of the spell and the gates will be opened and the tribulation will at last be unleashed upon a corrupt and degenerate humanity!"

"Then what are we waiting for, Man?" Dimitri replied, "Let us take this to the next level and set the final spell in motion!"

"Oh no you don't!" Happosai declared as he suddenly realized the seriousness of what these two were contemplating, but as he prepared to launch himself at the dastardly duo he saw their outlines fold in on themselves, and then in a blink of an eye they vanished altogether.

"What?" the ancient perverted Master blinked, the belated realization came over him and he said, "Oh no…this isn't good…"

"Damnation!" Leguire was exclaiming as this happened, "What in Hell's name does it take to kill these creatures? Can they even die?"

"They are soulless animations kept in a quasi-state of unlife by artificial means," Yasmina deduced, "Therefore we must attack the artificial half that keeps their bodies in motion if we are to destroy them utterly."

"Well, why didn't you say so in the first place?" Nagi asked as he stopped seeking for vulnerable flesh to stab and instead turned his blade towards the mechanical joints and tubes that were projecting from the otherwise heavily armored creatures.

Miyu and Larva were faring much better against their prey, the Princess being too quick and powerful for the cyborgs to lock onto, and when she struck it was always in a vulnerable place, while her Shinma partner could appear and disappear at will, to overwhelm a cyborg and envelop it in his cloak of darkness. Yui followed up by making sure that the cyborgs Miyu took down remained permanently out of the battle, disconnecting loose wires and tubes and such while making prayerful gestures over their motionless bodies as though wishing the souls of the departed a safe journey to the next world.

Himiko had taken injury during the fight and had found shelter behind a tomb where she could heal back from her injury. She was therefore free to witness as Kasumi knelt down beside her sister and offered a comforting hand, though Natsume refused to be consoled for her loss.

"Imoutochan, do not despair," Kasumi urged, "It is not too late for Tatewaki-kun…I can feel his spirit still clinging to his body."

"Eh…what?" Natsume asked from beneath the tears that were obscuring her vision.

Kasumi smiled at her and touched her sister on the forehead, and at once Natsume relaxed and seemed to go a bit limp for several moments. Kasumi then turned her attention towards Tatewaki, staring at the wound in his body as though she could see right through his clothing, skin, and muscles to the internal organs that had been severely damaged. The bullet had just barely missed the right ventricle but had collapsed the lung while nicking the main arterial vein. It was lodged near to his spine and might have caused him paralysis had he lived, but Kasumi saw how the metal stood out from flesh and reached into the body with her mind, extending a hand to extract the bullet and draw it out of his body, after which she sent a wave of soothing energy from her palm into the wound and caused the cells there to spontaneously regenerate, knitting themselves back together at a greatly accelerated growth rate.

Kuno's warrior soul, which had not yet given up on the fight, reacted to the strangely soothing balm that Kasumi provided by reactivating his shut-down nervous system, and then he gasped aloud, returning breath to a lung that had self-inflated, the internal leakage of blood being absorbed back into the body as though he had never been wounded, and as his heart started beating once again Natsume felt her own heart lurch in her breast, for a dead man had just come back to life in her arms, leaving her in a state of wonder and confusion.

Said confusion lasted only until the man himself breathed out the words, "Natsume…chan…?"

"Tachi-sama?" Natsume gasped, then all at once she hugged him tightly, "Tachi-sama! You're all right? But…how…?"

"Gently, my love!" Tatewaki urged with a slightly pained expression.

"Gently?" Natsume felt like laughing and crying at one and the same instant, "Is that all you have to say to me after this…miracle rebirth?"

"GENTLY!" Tatewaki squeaked in obvious distress.

"Oh my," Kasumi said, "I believe you are holding him a bit too tightly, Sister. I'm sure Tatewaki-kun appreciates your enthusiasm, but be mindful of the fact that he is still human and you are…well…a bit stronger than him at the moment…"

"Oh," Natsume belatedly realized how much stronger she had become at the moment and at once relaxed her grip over her future husband. The next instant, though, bullets kicked up the ground around them, causing her to snap, "What…now?"

"Oh my," Kasumi said as more bullets bounced off her hastily re-raised mental shielding as they looked up to see a looming form that bore a slight resemblance to a man but was much bigger and nastier looking than any of the other HK units, and it had a gattling gun attached to one arm, which same it was spraying indiscriminately in the direction of all the nearest combatants.

Nabiki was too busy pounding the daylights out of Dimitri to pay much heed to this, her fists charged with Ki energy and slamming into the larger man with the force and speed of a twin pair of steam-driven pistons. Dimitri fended off her attacks as he had the energy ball by calling upon his own inner darkness, but then he smiled as he saw and opening and struck back, aiming to attack Nabiki through her central nervous system, calling upon his stolen knowledge of the Kamasenken to cause the Tendo-Saotome heir to stiffen up and back away, her body wracked by familiar sensations of building, indescribable pleasure.

"You are quite formidable…for a mere human," Dimitri noted, "But such an irony that your own husband's special attack should prove your undoing…eh?"

He blinked in dismay as Nabiki-exerting a self-control that was nearly superhuman-managed to touch her own body in a number of places, and then she straightened out once again and smiled, then growled back, "My turn!" and went back on the offensive.

Dimitri was too surprised to get his defenses back up in order to meet this new onslaught, but for some strange reason none of Nabiki's blows seemed to hurt or even bother him very much. He straightened out as she backed away out of his reach and glared, "Was that supposed to mean something to…me…?"

All at once the vampire lord felt his own body begin to stiffen and tingle in places…then sudden he glanced down at his own crotch and felt something bulging down there, swelling to unbelievable proportions while rendering him paralyzed from the waist on down, the very act of movement causing the thing (that had seen so little use in recent years) to react in such a way that it made it quite difficult to remain in an upright posture. Like being hit by cramps, only worse-much, much worse-and all at once he started to look cross-eyed as the real force came down upon his nervous system, causing him to blanch in disbelief at the betrayal of his own very masculine body.

"Surprised?" Nabiki smiled back, "I've been working on developing my own Kamasenken. Congratulations, you're the first one I get to use it on, though I'd much rather it be that cocky stallion I call my husband…"

"You…WITCH!" Dimitri all but exploded, but rather than physically attack her it was a wave of dark energy that lanced out from his body to send Nabiki flying backwards. Her surprise was so great that she failed to brace herself and almost wound up being smashed against the altar, but something moved into her way to block her from disaster, and with a start Nabiki turned to look up into the face of the one whom she most wanted to see.

"Hi," Ranma said, "You having fun without me, Nab-chan?"

"Are you kidding?" Nabiki smiled as he helped her back to her feet, "Never."

"Guess you came to rescue me, huh?" Ranma nodded, "Well, consider me rescued. Now let's go stomp on fang-face together, shall we?"

"Oh yeah," Nabiki felt her spirits buoy up as she once again cracked her knuckles, "I've not even begun showing that twit what it means to mess with either a Saotome or a Tendo."

"Especially when it's both of us together," Ranma replied as they stood side-by-side ready to pound on the bad guy…

"Cousin Ling!" Tsien-Ko cried out as she and Mei-Ling found Ling-Ko huddled on the ground with hands moving over private areas of her body, "Are you all right? What has that bastard Dimitri done to you?"

"From the looks of things something far worse than he was doing to us," Mei-Ling noted, "Cousin…is there anything that we can do to help you?"

With great effort Ling-Ko managed to grate out, "H-Help me…to stand…please…"

"Sure thing, Cuz!" Tsien-Ko said as she bent down to offer the Blood Mother her assistance, but to her surprise Ling-Ko seized hold of the blue skinned vampire and promptly bit her on the neck, causing Tsien-Ko to gasp and stiffen while Mei-Ling automatically made a warding sign and prepared to use an Ofudo strip that could control vampiric hunger.

But the drinking was brief, and when Ling-Ko pulled back from the stunned Tsien-Ko she had a glint of sanity in her eyes, and then she smiled as she said, "Thank you, Cousin…I need that badly…"

"Hah?" Tsien-Ko asked, reflexively putting a hand up to her neck.

Ling-Ko managed to get her feet back under herself, though she was rather unsteady, and with great effort she declared, "Dimitri is a dead man…for doing this to me, for subjecting you to his tortures…but most of all for depriving me of my dignity. He will pay for that, Cousins, this I swear you!"

Tsien-Ko glanced up at Mei-Ling, who looked back with mixed emotions, then the both of them shrugged, only to turn in surprise as someone handed the upper half of his gi to Ling-Ko.

"Madam," Soun Tendo remarked while trying not to look at her luscious body, "Forgive me that this isn't clean enough to be worthy of your donning, but it is the best that I have to offer."

Ling-Ko seemed genuinely touched as she accepted the gi, wrinkling her nose a bit at the sweaty smell of a man that it reeked of, then wrapping it around her upper body before smiling at the gallant human and saying, "I thank you…that is the most generosity that anyone has yet shown me tonight."

"So howzabout a kiss as payback for me helping you to get loose, Honeybunch?" Happosai popped up, much to Soun's considerable disconcertment.

"How about if I let you live," Ling-Ko retorted, then swept her glance over the cemetery battle field in order to assess the current situation.

Kurumi was just getting used to the idea of winning against the cyborg Zombies when a new player entered the field, firing wildly in her direction and forcing the speedster to dodge a rain of bullets that were more accurately aimed than the random shots fired by the remaining mercenaries and Zevumbre. Her attacker-a heavily armed blonde nutcase-seemed to be taking a special interest in plugging the youngest of the Tendo siblings, and it all that Kurumi could do to keep one pace ahead of this golden haired Rambo clone as nine millimeters and buckshot kept scoring closer and closer to where Kurumi stood at a given moment.

"Stand still and let me plug you, you damned rodent!" BB Hood demanded as she tossed spent weapons aside and reached for the high explosives.

Not one to pass up an opportunity like that, Kurumi crossed the distance between them and landed a solid blow to the chin that knocked the blonde girl sprawling, but then she found something towards her and reflexively caught it, discovering too late that it was an active grenade with the pin pulled out. For one instant she stared death in the face…

And then Mousse arrived with a firebucket and casually plucked the grenade from his Airen's hands, then made the whole thing disappear into the folds of his sleeve while Kurumi stood there feeling her heart pounding in her mouth.

"Next time try throwing it away," the Chinese boy advised her, "As an elder of my tribe once told to me when I was just a small boy, once you pull the pin out of Mister Hand Grenade then he is no longer your friend."

Kurumi allowed annoyance to trump fear as she glared up at him, but then the sound of a double-click brought them both turning about to find BB Hood standing with a double-barreled Winchester aimed in their direction.

"Say cheese!" she smiled as she prepared to pull the trigger and "Swiss" them, but before she got the chance a hairy hand hit her from behind and knocked her to the ground out cold.

Talbain stared down at the blonde and said, "Who's afraid of the big bad wolf now, eh Red?"

Mousse was holding Kurumi, having reflexively attempted to protect her with his body, but now he managed to casually ask, "I take it you and the lady have history?"

"Kinda," Talbain shrugged, "It's…a pretty long story."

"What is she?" Kurumi asked, "The resident homicidal maniac of you Darkstalker guys?"

"Yeah," Talbain sighed, "She's got…issues…has to do with her late grandmother, who used to be wanted in about seven or eight states for robbery, arms smuggling, homicide, kidnapping, prostitution…"

"I get the picture," Kurumi said before turning in startled dismay, seeing the new Cyborg entering the field, at which point she grabbed Mousse and the both of them went diving for cover.

Talbain started when he saw who the giant mechanized terror was who was stalking onto the field and in dismay he said, "Gun-OW?!?" he glanced down, seeing a big hole open up in his stomach…

Frank also turned away from battling Darkwulf to see who it was who was tearing up the field with heavy caliber weapons fire, and then his face took on a look of abject horror and he said, "Gunther? Is that…my nephew?"

For reasons of his own Darkwulf ceased brawling with Frank and instead turned a disguised look towards the hulking terminator, "Yeah…shame ain't it? Even I've gotta wince when I think what the boss did to him, all on account of a little misunderstanding…"

The lurching terror was almost as big as Frank but had straw colored hair and an unusually gray complexion. Those parts of him not covered in armored plating look hard and heavy as he easily stood up to the shots squeezed off by Natsumi and Miyuki. The pair had to duck down with a sharp yelp as Gunther opened fire upon them, kicking up large chunks of plaster and marble as he scorched the field in search of new prey to eviscerate…

"Natsume-chan!" Kuno cried as his fiancée left his side in a hurry.

"Forgive me, my love," Natsume declared, "But I cannot sit idle while our friends are being cut down all around us!"

"Oh my," Kasumi said as she watched her adopted sister dart around the slow-moving cyborg, trying to get around behind him. Then she turned to Talbain, who was on all fours and holding onto his stomach and she called out, "Do you need help, Talbain-san?"

"Naw…I'll heal up…soon enough," Talbain winced, "Smarts a bit, though…"

"Bet it doesn't hurt as much as this!" Lilith cried as she leaped into the fray and struck Talbain a blow to the side of his head the knocked him sprawling, even as she turned and grinned at Kasumi with a haughty, "Your turn!"

"Oh my," Kasumi murmured, realizing that she was about to become yet another combatant…

"Ready to give up, Woman?" Jumaji asked of the stricken Nodoka, "Too bad if you are, because I have only just gotten started."

He twisted the doll's neck again, hard enough to be paralyzing but not hard enough to snap it, and Nodoka felt the pressure against her own neck as she struggled against the pain that this was causing her, leaning heavily upon her scabarded katana.

"I can keep this up all night if you like," Jumaji said as he stuck a needle into the doll, causing Nodoka to feel acute agony at where she felt as if she were being jammed, "Feel free to scream if you think that it will help you…"

Nodoka suddenly opened her eyes, and though it might have been a trick of the light, almost it seemed in Jumaji's eyes as if her hair turned briefly lavender, and all at once he felt his psychic link to her being broken.

"What?" he gasped as he stared in dismay at the foot or two of steel that protruded from his abdomen. In shocked disbelief he saw Nodoka yank the bloodied thing out of his body, and then Jumaji stared down stupidly at the blood that he was suddenly gushing, feeling the strength begin to drain from his limbs as his knees began sagging and he fell to where his shinbones hit the ground while the rest of him behaved as though his body was shutting down as the creep of death rapidly overtook him.

"Don't feel too bad," Nodoka urged. "You were quite good, really, but you forgot one little detail…your powers work sympathetically, and they can be blocked out if you find a big enough distraction."

And thus she revealed that her left arm had been gashed by the edge of her own katana, helping her to concentrate by the use of the pain that had not been caused by Jumaji. He was only just beginning to comprehend this when Nodoka moved her sword again, and then his cares went to another place very far away as he fell to the ground quite lifeless.

"What you were doing to me I might have forgiven," Nodoka said coolly to her fallen adversary, "But for what you have done to the dead and their remains…that can never be forgiven."

"Whoah," Julian paused in the middle of his own fight to take note of the Hougan's major-league "shaving problem," then he said to Nodoka, "Lady, remind me to NEVER make you angry…"

Leguire and Yasmina mirrored the sentiments as-all of a sudden-several of the Zevumbres remaining ceased their forward advancement and fell silent, slumping over as though they were puppets who had just had their strings cut.

"Guess he was controlling them all along," Miyuki noted as she risked looking up from concealment.

"About time, too," Natsumi said as she popped one of her pistol magazines then counted three bullets left and swallowed, "At little too close for my comfort…"

Meanwhile, Keiko was holding her own against Anakaris as the cloth wrapped Mummy grew increasingly frustrated with his inability to wrap his bandages around the agile kickboxer. A dozen times he almost managed to contain her only to see her move her body with impossible limberness and avoid entrapment all together.

"Stand still!" he declared, "You won't get away from me by doing that, little grasshopper!"

"Oh no?" Keiko mused, "Looks to me like I'm doing just fine, Mister."

"But you shall not prevail," Anakaris declared imperiously, "I have waited far too long for this day, and when Lord Dimitri ascends to glory I shall at last have the power to wreck my vengeance upon the false believers who plague the upper and lower Kingdoms that I have sworn to protect!"

"Huh?" Keiko blinked, only to react in dismay as grains of sand began to whirl about her, and as she threw up her arms to protect her eyes she felt as though the ground itself was swallowing her, then with a yelp of dismay she realized that she was sinking into the ground as if it had been converted to quicksand.

"You see?" Anakaris declared, "This may not be the native soil of my homeland, but it obeys my will and has captured you, Woman. So too will the sands of Egypt rise up to swallow the false believers of a pretender god and their Imams, leaving the sands pure and free of their blasphemous ranting!"

Keiko winced as she found herself trapped up to the level of her head in the now-compacted soil, which in turn began to squeeze against her body, crushing the breath out of her lungs and threatening to turn her into a human-shaped tube of toothpaste…

Lilith struck with a savagery that was as superhuman as her strength and demonic power, but to Kasumi it seemed almost as if the blue haired girl were slowing down to a crawl even as she studied her movements. It was almost ridiculously easy to move out of the way as her foe appeared to be moving through molasses, and then she emerged on the opposite side of the succubus, who stumbled in dismay upon failing to find her intended target.

"Please stop," Kasumi urged, "I don't like fighting, and I don't want to hurt you."

"Hurt me?" Lilith reared, "That's a laugh!" and now she executed a flying leap, summoning dark energies to surround her body as she turned herself into a living top, but once again Kasumi stepped to the side and avoided her as it seemed as though the blue haired girl was in very slow motion, striking the ground where Kasumi had been and plowing into it without coming close to harming her intended target.

"Oh my," Kasumi sighed, "I really don't like fighting…"

With a snarl Lilith came at her once again, but this time Kasumi allowed borrowed reflexes to come to the fore and she caught the other girl's arm and effortlessly twisted it, flipped the succubus over and slamming her down into the ground with force enough even to stun the demonic younger sister of Morgan.

"Please don't try that again," Kasumi urged, "I really don't want to hurt you."

Lilith snarled and came rocketing back up from the ground once again, but this time Kasumi moved her hand forward and struck the other girl with a palm to Lilith's breastbone, forcing the wind out of her lungs even as she expended energy and froze the demon girl's nervous system in place, thus rendering Lilith paralyzed so that she flopped to the ground like a fish out of water.

"I do wish you had tried being reasonable," Kasumi said sadly, "I don't enjoy seeing anyone suffer."

Unseen by the transformed eldest Tendo sister, however, Queen-Bee was gesturing with her arm and causing a swarm of her subjects to flow from her fingertips, forming a deadly cloud with which she intended to sting Kasumi to death, but before the killer bees made it halfway to their intended victim a cloaked figure thrust himself into the path, then removed a glove and held out an outstretched hand that caught the bees and sucked them in through the demonic mouth that was visible in the palm. Like that the killer swarm was gobbled, and then the mysterious D smiled at Queen Bee, who stared back with compound eyes all registering the disbelief of her expression.

"Sorry to cut in on this dance," D said, moving like a blur to bring the blade end of his hand hard against Queen-Bee's neck, felling her like a tree limb, "But I do so dislike it when people try sniping at you from behind your back. It's so very…unsporting…"

All at once the last remaining member of the B-Girls surfaced to make her presence known, unleashing a scream that caused even Kasumi to cover her ears and turn away in a pained effort to escape the deafening burst…

Meanwhile, far enough removed from these exchanges as to be able to carry on a level conversation, the mummy known as Anakaris was boasting to his latest helpless victim.

"The false god shall be replaced by the true gods as I awaken them from their millennia of slumber!" Anakaris triumphantly cried, "Let all unbelievers who dare to challenge me beware! The time that I have awaited for forty-seven centuries is finally at hand when I shall claim my rightful place as Egypt's protector…nay, it's Master!"

"So that's…why you'd doing this…for that Dimitri guy?" Keiko grunted as she struggled against containment, "So tell me…something…why's your name…sound so much like a girl's…?"

"What?" Anakaris blinked.

"I said…your name…sound's like it belongs…to a girl…" Keiko faintly panted.

"You…you dare to mock me…even as I crush the life out of your body?" Anakaris shook with rage and fury.

"Hey, y'know something?" Darkwulf turned to Frank, "She's right…it does sound kind of like a girl's name."

"Yeah, now that you mention it…" Frank rumbled in reply.

Anakaris turned to his colleague and said, "You too, Darkwulf?"

"Well, hey man…" Darkwulf shrugged as if to signify the plainness of his own statement.

Keiko felt the slight distraction in the Mummy's field of concentration and murmured the soft word, "Sucker…" and then she drew in the Ki-force of the energy currents that were holding her pinned and used them to fortify herself as she built up a massive charge of raw life energy into her body, and then all at once released it, shattering his hold altogether.

Anakaris gave a muffled grunt and turned in dismay as the redhead burst forth from her containment, prompting him to declare, "Impossible! How could you do that? You were beaten!"

"Yeah, well…I give you an A for effort," Keiko shrugged while stretching herself to restore full circulation, "But you ought to make sure that your opponent is down for the count before you brag about your fiendish plans and all that. Didn't they teach you that in villain school?"

Anakaris glared, "Clearly there is more to you than meets Ra's Eye, yet in the name of Seth and Anubis, I will not be thwarted! Prepare to meet Osiris in oblivion!" and all at once he called up another sandstorm, preparing to unleash it upon the pigtailed Kickboxer.

But Keiko Arigami merely squared her legs and smiled to herself, then summoned up her powers once again, this time channeling them into the center of her being and holding them in preparation as the winds began to kick up and the sands began swirling all around her.

"Let the sands pick clean your bones!" Anakaris cried as he unleashed his sandstorm on a motionless Arigami, but to his amazement Keiko stood her ground and seemed untouched by the maelstrom, and then all at once she began to chant as bursts of Ki force began to spark and flare from all around her.

In a voice that somehow carried over the din of the sandstorm she cried, "I AM INVINCIBLE! I AM ARIGAMI KEIKO, MASTER OF MY OWN FATE! NO MAN CAN MATCH MY POWER, FOR I AM SUPREME UNTO MYSELF! LET THOSE WHO STAND BEFORE ME FEEL MY WRATH-KI STORM-UNLEASHED!"

Like that the power of the sandstorm was broken, the winds shredding apart as though the forces controlling them had been cut off at their flow. Anakaris stared in dismay as a wave of raw Ki energy lanced towards him, and then all at once he was struck by a force that felt like a raw tidal wave of pure life essence, and it disrupted the negative forces that gave mobility and pseudo-life to his ancient, withered limbs, and all at once he was blown away like a candle snuffed out by the winds of ill fortune.

So great was the surge of energy thus exchanged that it briefly broke up the fight between Dimitri and the double-team of Ranma and Nabiki. All three heads turned to witness the fate of the ancient undead pharaoh, and then all eyes shifted towards Keiko, who relaxed with a sigh and flexed her arms before grinning and saying, "Been a while since I've been able to cut loose like that! Don't feel too bad, though…it's not your goals I was faulting, but your methods stink to high heaven."

"Whoah," Ranma said, visibly impressed at the redhead's achievement.

"Anakaris?" Dimitri marveled, "I sense no trace of his energy. What have you done to him, Woman?"

"My bandaged buddy…he's gone?" Darkwulf dropped his tail and gave a faint whimper.

"Wow," Nabiki said as she studied the Kickboxer's profile, "I didn't know you were that good, Kei-chan."

"Yeah, well…you may not be a Seville, Nab-chan, but I took my title a couple of years ago," Keiko boasted cockily, "What's the matter? Surprised to find out that there's one field in which I excel you?"

"So, you know the Shadowskills, do you?" Morgan asked as she dropped into the middle of the field, surprising Dimitri and the others with her sudden reappearance, "That explains how you survived our little tryst. I'll be mindful of that the next time I make a meal out of your sweet energies, Morsel," she leered in a way that made even Keiko feel uneasy, "But first…I have a score of me own to settle with my so-called partner," and she turned to glare meaningfully in the vampire Lord's direction.

"Morgan?" Dimitri evidenced genuine surprise, "What are you…?"

"Doing here?" Morgan glared right into the face of her erstwhile partner, "In case you happen to have missed the point, my dear Lord Dimitri, I am rather put out about you and what you just attempted to do with the Blood Queen!"

"But…I was merely torturing her, my dear," Dimitri insisted, "Making her suffer the throes of damnation, the usual sort of thing. That's no cause for you to feel jealous…"

"WHO BE JEALOUS?" Morgan snapped, "Admit it, you were never really planning to sacrifice her from the beginning, were you? You were just stringing us all along while you worked your will on her to make her more tractable by using those Senken maneuver ye stole to break her will and turn her into your adoring sex slave!"

"So what about it?" Dimitri blinked, then said, "Now…wait a minute there, Woman…!"

"You were planning to replace me with her all along, weren't you?" Morgan all but shouted, "You may have had Jeddah and Pyron fooled, but I knew all along that you were planning something big, but while you've been tarrying with these mortals, where do you think our supposed allies have gotten off to? Do you see them anywhere about doing their part in the fighting?"

"Er…" Dimitri swept the area with a glance and said, "No…you don't mean?"

"Then what are we waiting here for while they grab up all the power?" Morgan asked, "They've gone on to the Interim realm to open the gates, Man, and you stand here gawking while playing around with children?"

"Hey!" Ranma protested.

"Interim realm?" Nabiki repeated.

"Our apologies," Dimitri said as he turned and smiled in their direction, "But it seems that other business must call me away before we can complete this rather interesting battle…"

Then before their very eyes the vampire lord and succubus seemed to fold in on themselves, becoming thin one moment and then vanishing the next. Into the stunned silence Frank said, "Uh oh…this is bad…this is really, really awful…"

"What do you mean, Big Guy?" Keiko asked.

"He means that they've gone sideways through a slip in the timefield," Happosai revealed, "They're in an in-between zone slightly out of phase with us where those fiends intend to complete whatever horrible spell they've been crafting…fortunately without the cutie they meant to sacrifice."

"But it was my energies they stole to make it possible," Ling-Ko revealed as she appeared from behind the protective wall formed by her cousins, "And now they have what they need in order to perform the summoning ritual. They mean to bring a Rakshasa King over to this world where they will bind and destroy him, then utilizing his energies…"

"Dimitri will become a god," Frank remarked, only to turn in dismay as he saw the lumbering shape being dragged across the field by a furious Natsume, who had somehow managed to find enough chain to imprison the massive cyborg.

"What the hell is that?" Ranma said in dismay.

"That," Frank replied, "Is my wayward nephew, Victor Gunther Frankenstein…and fortunately out of ammunition."

"You knew that…guy…from before?" Nabiki asked as delicately as she was able.

"Uh…" Darkwulf glanced around and said, "Uh oh…don't tell me that's all that's left here of our side…?"

"Don't feel too lonely…Cousin," a voice growled from behind him, "I'm sure we could send you to join the rest of your teammates if you give us any reason for trouble."

"John?" Darkwulf nervously responded, "That you, Cuz?"

In response his fellow werewolf gripped Darkwulf by the scruff of his neck and forced him down into the dirt, driving his muzzle into the compacted earth while holding him there with one arm twisted behind the renegade's back.

"Hold still or I'll snap you in half!" Talbain growled, "You oughta feel lucky I don't do it anyway, but I promised your mother I'd look out for you, fat lotta good it's done me after all of these years!"

"Well, that's one more of the pact down for the count," Frank remarked, glancing around before adding, "What about Atros?"

"Ran out of steam after screaming herself nearly hoarse," Kurumi revealed as she and Mousse brought their own prisoner forward, the amphibious finned woman wrapped neatly so that she almost resembled a mummy in her own right though her eyes appeared more than slightly glassy.

"Of course it was D here who actually subdued her," Mousse nodded to the dark cloaked vampire hunter in question.

"The least I could so since it appeared that she was being mind-controlled the whole while," D held up a device that was slightly moist and bloody, "Took a bit of effort to remove it, after which it was childsplay to hypnotize her into submission. She'll be all right, more or less, but she'll have explaining to do when her father hears about the company that she's been keeping."

"Swell," Frank remarked, "Then it's almost over except for the top guns among the bad guys," he paused to sweep the field, "That's funny…Donovan should be here. Anybody see him hovering on the edge of this fracas?"

"Now that you mention it," Tsien-Ko remarked, "It is odd, but I don't see Don anywhere around here, or Anita for that matter."

"It's unusual for Donovan Bane to hold back from being a part of any battle between good and evil," Mei-Ling observed, "But he has been unusually subdued today, almost taciturn…and that's even by his standards."

"Wonder if he's saving it up for round two?" Talbain mused as he finished binding the wrists of his fellow werewolf, "I know Donovan well enough that if he thought Armageddon were heading our way he'd be the first one on the front lines ready to wrestle with the devil."

"I wonder…"Kasumi stepped forward and stretched out a hand, "What is this?"

"Huh?" Nabiki said, "What is what, Oneechan?"

"Hey, I see it too!" Ranma said, "Some kind of…silver light or…"

Kasumi moved her hand and all at once a curtain of night drew back to reveal a shimmering portal.

"Uh…or a curtain?" Ranma finished lamely, "Yeah…guess that's what it is…"

"It's the gateway!" Tsien-Ko said, "It must lead to the interim dimension!"

"Tendo Kasumi found it while the rest of us remained too clouded in our vision," Mei-Ling sounded astonished.

"Clearly there is much more to you than meets the eye, Tendo-san," Ling-Ko said in obvious admiration.

"So…what are we waiting for?" a bare-chested Soun asked as he and Genma came up to join the others, with Nodoka and Julian beside them, followed by the others, "If that is where the enemy has gone to…"

"And I'll bet that's where Donovan's already headed," Talbain smiled, "He's probably gone ahead to head the bad guys off at the pass."

"Head them off at the pass?" Darkwulf growled, "I hate that stupid old movie cliché…"

"Now hold on here!" Frank spoke up, "No sense in a whole crowd of us joining in on this battle. I'll take the strongest among us who are still able to fight, and the rest of you wait here for us to return. If we don't manage to stop the spell from being cast, then we'll need a backup plan to prevent a Rakshasa invasion."

"Makes sense," Nabiki turned to the others, "Ranchan, you and I will lead the way along with Frank, Keiko, Natsume, Kurumi and Talbain…"

"I am coming with you, Imoutochan," Kasumi said softly, and her very tone suggested that she had no intention of remaining safely on the sidelines.

"And so am I!" Happosai declared, "No crummy Darkstalkers are gonna mess with my family and expect to get away with it! Besides, without me you wouldn't even know what to look for."

"Makes a kind of sense," Frank shrugged before turning to glance at Yasmina and the others remaining behind, "Look after my nephew. He may be a bit dim, but he's still family."

"We understand the ties of family, Doctor," Yasmina noted.

"But it still seems unright that the fate of vampire and human should be trusted to a bunch of…children."

"Those children have proven themselves time and again as warriors of stout heart and mind," Nodoka confidently declared, "I trust my son and his wife, and I've raised many of these other girls as though they were my own. They are more than capable of dealing with whatever awaits them in the other world."

"Hey, we're coming too!" Tsien-Ko declared forthrightly, "Isn't that right, Sis?"

"No," Ling-Ko spoke before Mei-Ling could, "The both of you are staying here with me."

"What?" both twins turned to look askance at their half-naked cousin.

"You heard me," Ling-Ko replied, "I am in no condition to fight, and you will be needed here in case these heroes fail, in which case you will fight beside me…AFTER you assist me in taking care of a certain…condition."

"A certain…condition, Cousin?" Mei-Ling marveled.

"Not here," Ling-Ko pointed off towards some bushes, "Over there…I will explain my needs to you while we are in private, but not before others."

"Are you certain that will be wise, my lady?" Julian asked.

"Quite certain," Ling-Ko turned and marched stiffly away, her tone brooking no opposition as she snapped, "Cousins?"

"Er…right," Tsien-Ko exchanged confused looks with her twin, then the both of them fell in step and followed the Blood Mother as she sought some privacy away from the eyes of others.

"That was weird," Natsumi murmured.

"You think so?" Miyuki asked without glancing at her partner, "I wonder…"

"Ah…is it just me?" Yui asked, "Or was Ling acting kind of…funny all of a sudden?"

"Really?" Miyu mused, "I hardly noticed."

"I think someone has something other than fighting on their minds," Larva turned and glanced towards the altar, "Whatever Dimitri did to her, I think Ling-Ko has needs that must be fulfilled if she is ever to get her energies back in balance."

Nabiki turned a look on her husband and Ranma blinked, "What? What did I do?"

"Never mind," Nabiki sighed, "Oneechan?"

Kasumi nodded and pulled back the curtain, then the designated heroes moved forward and seemed to wink out of sight one by one, moving sideways through time into a near-parallel state where the battle lines would be drawn in a clear and decisive confrontation that might well spell the doom of humanity if they faltered in their chosen mission…

Continued

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