Ranma 1/2 Fan Fiction / Gold Digger Fan Fiction ❯ Golden Oportunity ❯ Chapter 16 ( Epilogue )

[ T - Teen: Not suitable for readers under 13 ]

Notes –

oooooooooo
Golden Opportunity
Chapter 16
Cory D. Rose
ertle2@msn.com
(c) 2006
oooooooooo

The futuristic looking car sped down the street, squealed it’s tires, and skidded to a stop facing a pair of open gates. A section of the ground just beyond the gates rose up just high enough for the car to enter. It moved down a ramp and entered the underground garage.

As it pulled into a small bay, computers activated and the car rose up into the air on a small lift. Machines automatically started changing the tires, fixing and tuning the engine, and downloading the information out of the on board computers. Gina, Brittany, and Ranma climbed out as all this was going on and unpacked their gear.

Gina almost skipped over to the little elevator that would take her up to her lab. “It’s about time something went right for a change.”

“Got that right, who knew that old hill would net us so much gold.” Cheetah said as she unloaded several boxes of gleaming jewels and other precious metals.

“I estimate that we netted at least three hundred million dollars this. Enough to take care of the repairs bills to the house, and net us a small buffer for the next emergency.” Gina explained. “Ranma, I’ll set up that account for you as well. We wouldn’t have gotten this stuff without you.”

Cheetah huffed and frowned at her bandaged hands and foot. She hated dealing with Silver Burn because it took forever to heal. She was just happy that the burns weren't to bad, or they would leave scars. “How the hell was I supposed to know that the stupid vault was made out of silver?”

“Thanks Gina.” Ranma said. “I need to take a shower too. “Running up that shaft was a lot harder than I thought it would be. It taxed my Ki and my magic, but next time it’ll be a lot easier now that I’ve done it once.”

Gina nodded. Her eyes gleamed she eyed the boxes. She hadn’t been this excited in quite a while. As the others headed for their rooms, she entered her lab, checked a couple of things and stepped in front of the large window near the back. She still didn’t like holding Daishi her like this, but there was no way she could just turn the monster over to the authorities.

According to the readings, he was still asleep and would be for some time.
The gas in the room was doing its job. She made a notation in the computer about finding a better way to hold the jerk. Once that was done she put him out of her mind and checked the files uploaded from the car.

“Gina?”

She looked up to see Brianna standing in the doorway. “Hey Bri, what can I do for you?”

“Have you heard from Genn lately?”

Gina shook her head. “No I haven’t. Genn hasn’t been around for a couple of months now that I think about it.”

“I wanted his help with something yesterday and realized I didn’t know where he was.” Brianna explained. “I remember him going with us on the trip to
Jade a couple months back, but after that not a thing.”

“That’s right, he never came back with us. Said he had to visit someone.”

“He didn’t say who?”

Gina shook her head. “We’ll have to find him. He can take care of himself though so I’m not that worried.”

“Dad’s still over on Jade. Let’s ask him if he’s heard from Genn.” Brianna suggested.

“Did you manage to get all that data from the Island in the computer?” Gina asked as she agreed.

Brianna nodded. “It took a while though, you might want to think about getting an assistant by the way, but it’s all in the new computer core.
Putting it in that dimensional pocket space was a brilliant idea.”

Preening, Gina had to smile and bask in her accomplishment. “Ranma gave me the idea when he explained that new idea he was working on from his book. Give me some time and we might have a portable version we can carry around with us that will make the light gate storage useless.”

“I don’t mind the light gate that much. It’s flashy and gives a great show when it’s needed.”

Gina shrugged. “It’s been unreliable and that isn’t efficient.”

“I only reprogrammed it a half dozen times.” Brianna muttered. “So, what’s are we going to do next?”

Adjusting her glasses, Gina’s smirk turned into an evil grin. “Did I tell you that Ranma’s mother showed up last week?”

“Do tell more.” Brianna said with an equally evil smirk.

While those two were plotting, Ranma helped Britanny get up to her room. She wasn't in the best of shape, but insisted that the burns would heal in a day or two. Ranma took her word on it. "Where's your husband? He should be here for this I think."

Brit shrugged. "He's off with The Agency getting trained. He's been coming home completely exhausted lately. He says they're running him ragged most of the day."

"Ah, well he'll get used to that."

She nodded and pointed at her dresser. "Hand me that little pot over there."

"What is it?"

"I got it from Jetta. It's a balm that helps silver burn heal faster."

He handed it to her. "I'd better let you get to work. I want to read up on that move I've been studying."

"Have fun!" Cheetah yelled as he left the room. He didn't hear her whimper start a few seconds later.

oooooooooo

“Two tons.” Peewee said as he made a notation on his clipboard. He was observing his newest bodyguard going through his paces. Ryoga had come out of the chamber more enhanced than he should have been. Sure the process made one’s muscles denser and stronger than normal, but the boy wasn’t even straining under the two ton load.

“Step back and let the load drop, Ryoga.” Peewee ordered.

Ryoga was standing in the middle of the room, using the hydrolic press to test his new strength. He giggled to himself as he stepped back and let the press settle on the floor with a soft thud. There was no way anyone could stand up to his power now. “That was heavy, but not that heavy, can we try increasing the weight?”

“Of course.” Peewee said and touched a dial. “It’s at five thousand pounds now. Give it a go.”

Grabbing the bar, Ryoga set his feet and heaved. He could really feel the weight now. Grunting, he slowly lifted it above his head. “Hell yeah!”

“Hey boss, the new guy is really strong.” Zelda said as she looked over at Ryoga. The kid was young, but standing there with his shirt off, covered in sweat, she had to resist the urge to drool. “Humina…”

Off to the side her rival Link rolled her eyes. “He’s cute, but just to stupid for my tastes.”

“More for me then.” Zelda snapped.

“I like the dark skin though and those little fangs are so cute.” Link said, admiring the boy from the back. “Now I like this view.”

“You stay away from him slut.” Zelda growled.

“Don’t make me kick your ass again Zelda.” Link snapped back and cracked her knuckles.

Ryoga let the load fall when Peewee gave him a signal to do so. “What next?”
He said, interrupting them.

“How’s your speed?” Peewee asked. He ignored the two girls behind them as they screamed at each other and started to fight. Attacks were launched as they flew at each other. Within seconds they were rolling around on the ground and pulling at each other's hair.

Peewee tried not to sweatdrop as they started ripping each other's clothing off. He watched as Ryoga went through several Kata to test his speed and balance. At first he had a few problems, but after a few minutes he figured out his new balance.

Throwing several punches and kicks, Ryoga shrugged and relaxed. “I’m a little faster, but not by much. I’d say it’s normal.”

“Run through a few of those Kata and find your new limits. I’ll check back with you in an hour.” Peewee said.

He nodded and got to work with several rather difficult kata to test his limits. Peewee turned around and blinked as Zelda and Link as they continued to rip each other’s clothing off. He adjusted his glasses as they fogged up a bit. “Ladies?”

They stopped, Zelda had Link in a wrestling hold with her legs wrapped around Link’s back. “Yes sir?” They asked at the same time.

“What have I told you about fighting in the lab?” He asked mildly.

They broke apart in an instant, blushing. “Sorry sir.” They chorused.

“That’s better, now Ryoga won’t be ready for a few days yet and he needs some team work training. Once that’s done I want you to go and break Daishi out of the Digger’s home.”

“She’s just updated the place sir.” Link said.

“I know and we would have gotten him out when they were rebuilding, but
Ryoga wouldn’t have been ready on time. Now that he’s out of the chamber he needs time to get his bearings. So you two will be taking him on his first mission.” Peewee explained.

“Sir, why don’t we just leave Daishi where he is? He did fail after all.”
Link said.






“Daishi has his uses and I have a promise to keep to his family.”

“What about Shin?”

“He’s off on a special mission at the moment. That means I have to use you two idiots.” Peewee snapped.

The laughed nervously, and knew that he just might fire them if they didn’t work together and their enhancements weren’t paid off yet. “We can get Daishi back, Lord Tallon.

“No, every time you two go up against the Diggers you fail. Every blasted time! You will take Ryoga with you and use him to get Daishi back.”

They nodded.

“Now, as much as I enjoy looking at your torn clothing and naked bodies, I have things to do. So. Get. Out!”

They ran out the door, nearly tripping each other up in the process. “Bitch!”

“Slut!”

Ryoga walked over to Peewee. “Sir?”

“What is it Ryoga?”

“What’s a slut?”

Peewee fell over and twitched. “Ah…”

oooooooooo

As Agent M glanced through the folder that had just been delivered to him, he didn't know what to think. He thought things were finally starting to get back to normal after that screw up down in Atlanta. Now he wasn't to sure. He had always tried to stay out of the political side of things and just do his job, but now those politics were starting to make their presence known.

The Mission seemed simple enough on the surface, but he was experienced enough to know when he was being set up. Setting the folder to the side he sighed and considered the options. The mission orders were simple enough, but it was the second page of orders that galled him. Direct orders from his superiors not to do certain things.

His hands were completely tied and there wasn't a thing he could do about it if he wanted to keep his job. They even mention the law suit that Gina Diggers has against him and The Agency just to make him understand that he's still in hot water.

Agent M shakes his head. "Debra?"

His partner/secretary steps into his office. She's wearing her usual outfit, a pale business suit. "Sir?"

"I need the files for Brittany Diggers and Brianna Diggers."

"General Clancy currently has the files sir. I'll have to run up to his office to get them."

That was a bit of disturbing information. "Understood, I just need to review some information before sending Xane and Will out on a mission. Then you can return them if you need to."

"I'll ask sir." Debra said as she left the office.

If he could have, he would have been sweating by now. Instead, M started looking through the mission folder again, looking for a loop hole he could exploit, but they had thought of everything. They had even revoked his autonomy for this mission. All he could think was that The Agency was in deep trouble.

Several minutes later Debra stepped into his office and sat two folders down on is desk. "Here you go sir, he said he was finished with them and that we could return them to the main files when were through."

"Thank you Debra."

She nodded and left the room as he picked up Brittany Digger's folder, other wise known as Cheetah. He recalled that when her adoptive father worked for the Agency years before, he has always talked about his girls. He and Theodore Diggers had rarely agreed on things either, always butting heads about procedure or anything else.

Now his daughter was being pulled in and Theodore just might decided to interfere. M knew he would have to do something to hold off the Aura Mage's rath if needed. He was just glad that Theo was currently on Jade taking care of some crisis over there. Still, it was just one simple spell to open a gate between Jade and Earth.

Now that he was looking at the folder he realized that he hadn't ever really paid much attention to Brittany after she stopped being Avenger's partner. He could recall investigating the arrest of a group of teachers using mind control drugs to control the students and that Avenger and Cheetah were involved in the capture.

They had gone on to a short carreer as superheroes while in college, breaking up several drug rings and taking down quite a few morons in costumes. They started to make a name for themselves among the citizens and that was when he stepped in and offered them a job at the Agency.

What a mistake that had been. Avenger accused him of forgetting who he really was and that she didn't want anything to do with his little club. Brittany had just flat out refused. About a year later Cheetah stopped playing superhero and went home. As a werecheetah she was unique individual, so someone was occasionally sent out to check on her.

He was a bit surprised to see that she had even left the planet once. She was gone for a few months and returned and instantly got married. She hadn't done much since, except shop a lot. She didn't even seem to be around the Digger's newest guest very much either, though they were both being trained by Julia Diggers.

The other sister, Brianna Diggers was essensially a clone of Brittany and Gina that was created by accident. Gina's genius had always surprised him. The girl seemed to be able to build anything that she set her mind to. That ability had transferred over to Brianna and focused mostly on unique weapons and computer reprogramming.

"Debra, could you send Xane and Will in here. I need to brief them on their mission."

"Of course sir."

It didn't take long for Agents Xane and Will to arrive. He heard Xane before he saw her. As she stopped at Debra's desk and begged a cinnamon roll out of her breakfast. He smirked a little as Debra tossed the box at Xane in a huff, just to get her to stop begging. M knew that Will was standing by making sure that Xane didn't break anything.

Xane, The Nubian Goddess of War, was strong enough to toss around tanks and almost completely invulnerable. Will, while not as strong as Xane, somehow managed to keep her from wrecking the building at any given time. M suspected that it was some kind of ESP talent, but Debra had told him that Xane liked to play with Will.

Whatever it was, it worked and he all for it continuing. Xane's office door still wouldn't shut right after she shattered the door jam. At over seven feet, Xane tended to bang her head into the overhead doorjams and then rip them out of her way in a fit of anger. He was glad that she remembered to duck most of the time though.

Today Xane was wearing her form fitting suit with a short skirt and ruffled sleeves. She had a set of tin of glasses perched on the end of her nose as she sauntered into the room. She was scarfing down a cinnamon roll happily. Will was dressed in his usual black suit with a white shirt.

"Mua eebed ua eea us 'ir?" Xane asked.



M just glared at her. "Yes, I have a mission for the two of you."

"Who's our adviser on this trip?" Will asked. As a newbie Agent he wasn't supposed to be out on his own for a while yet.

"No adviser Agent Will, this is a direct order from my bosses." Agent M explained as handed Will the folder. "I need the two of you to head back down to Atlanta."

"Mwwaa?" Xane muttered, still stuffing cinnamon rolls in her mouth.

"One of our sources told us that someone is going to try and assassinate the last werecheetah. I need the two of you to guard her for the rest of the week."

Will frowned. "Is that a good idea sir? The Diggers aren't exactly happy with us right now."

M nodded and sighed. "I know, I don’t think it's a good idea either, but we have our orders. Keep a low profile and try to do it without letting them know your there."

Will gave M a shocked look as if to say 'yeah right' as he glanced at the seven foot Xane. M waved it off and continued. "Now there is a small possibility that Brianna Diggers will also be in danger since she is half werecheetah, so we need to keep an eye on her too."

"Under stood sir." Will said. "When do we leave."

Xane, having finally finished off nearly a dozen cinnamon rolls looked at the empty box as if it had betrayed her. "We can leave at any time." She said. "Might need to stop and get some more rolls though. These seem to be gone."

Will rolled his eyes. "Come on Xane, we need to find a good seat on the plane."

"Okay! You think they'll give us a lunch of some kind?"

oooooooooo

For the first time in the last few weeks Ranma was able to spend an entire morning doing what he wanted instead of learning something new. True to his training though, he was practicing to pass the time waiting for Master Julia to get back. To pass the time Ranko was his sparing partner as they bounced around the yard, off the walls, and flipped over the roof the house at break neck speeds.

Ranma was reminded of when he first fought her on the island a couple months back. He was positive that she had improved her skills quite a bit in that time. She seemed to be faster, more focused, and about twice as strong. This forced him to use more Ki to keep up with her as they tested each other's limits.

He even stopped holding back with the Neko-Ken technique, using everything except the Ki-claw attack. Ranko just smirked a little as she dodged, twisted, and sent him flying across the yard with a shoulder throw. Spinning in mid air, Ranma landed and skidded in the grass for several feet, using one hand to hold his body to the ground.

They fought silently, not yells, no grunts, or anything else. Even the people inside the house didn't know they were fighting unless they looked out the window. Ranma wasn't even resorting to his 'insult them till they get to pissed off to think straight' technique. Fighting at this level always left him feeling exhilarated and ready for more and he didn't waste any time launching another attack at Ranko.

Ranko, who seemed to know every move his father ever taught him, went from stance to stance, changing with every attack. It was at times like this that Ranma completely forgot she was a machine designed to mimic a human. He could even see a little sweat on her face and arms. Ranma detected a burst of Ki from Ranko and they clashed together, sending a shock wave across the yard.

Bouncing away from each other, Ranma jumped several yards into the air even as Ranko raced along the ground. Ranko had watched most of Ranma's training with Julia over the months so she was familiar with what Ranma's change of style. She adapted even as Ranma formed a ball of pale white Ki between his hands and launched at her.

She came to a stop, pivoted, and smacked the ball of Ki to the side. It vanished before it even had time to hit the ground. Ranma landed and almost flew across the ground as they started to lay into each other with a series of punches and kicks that were faster than the eye could see.

Suddenly Ranma shifted with snake like agility around a punch. Ranko almost cursed as he swept her feet out and sent her crashing to the ground. His fist came down and stopped right on her neck. "Got ya."

"I thought I had you stalemated for a little while there."

"You got into a pattern in the heat of the fight. Repeated the same attack combo several times and I took advantage of it."

Reviewing the last several seconds of the fight with her mind, she had to agree. "I'll do better."

Ranma laughed. "You gave me quite a run there. It was fun to go all out like that and not have to worry about hurting you."

Smirking, Ranko jumped to her feet and dusted her black pants off. Her red shirt had several rips along the sides that showed quite a bit of skin. Ranma had lost his shirt early in the sparing and was only wearing his pants. His back and arms were covered in dirt from the fight.

"We need to get cleaned up."

Ranma nodded as they headed for the back door when he remembered he had wanted to ask a question the night before. "Hey, do you know what was up with Brianna last night?"

"At what time?" Ranko tended to be exact about things.

"When she was crawling around the house with that flash light in her mouth, just after dinner?"

"She was looking for one of her missing Peebos. Peebrit has been missing since the explosion. At first Brianna thought she was destroyed, but according to the computers, Peebrit is somewhere under the house."

"Peebrit? That's the one based off of Britanny isn't it?"

The android nodded.

"Well I'm done training for the day, want to go and help Brianna once we get cleaned up? Crawling around all those tubes can't be very easy especially after the house was destroyed." Ranma suggested.

"Well, the lower floors actually survived for the most part. That shield you put up saved quite a bit."

Ranma snorted. "Yeah, but Gina's still complaining about the damage, but not so much now that she's got so much money coming in."

"True." Ranko said.

"I need a snack first." Ranma said as he passed through the kitchen. Peebri and Peegi were on the table, connected to a box with cables. Peebri looked in Ranma's direction.

"Look elsewhere. Nothing to see here, nothing at all." She intoned.

"Yeah right." Ranma muttered as he grabbed some orange juice and headed out of the room.

"I meant it!" Peebri yelled. "Nothing. To. See. Here!"

"Peebri, calm down." Peegi snapped.

Peebri growled.

After taking a quick shower and changing into jeans and a white muscle shirt, Ranma used his Ki to locate Brianna. He headed downstairs easily tracking her to the lowest level, just below the garage. It didn't surprise him to much to see that Ranko wasn't around though.

She tended to come and go at the oddest times. Shrugging, he found the door he was looking for and headed inside. It didn't take him long to spot Brianna tinkering with a one of her Peebos near a small hole in the wall. For a second he was reminded of their time in the VR world and blushed a little, but shrugged it off.

"Brianna."

Her head snapped up and she grinned. "Ranma, what are you doing down here?"

"Just finished my training and figured I'd give you a hand finding that missing Peebo."

"I've found her actually, but she's not moving and I'm, um…to big to get down where she is. I won't try unless it's as a last resort." Brianna said. Ranma couldn’t help noticing that the black stripe over her left eye stood more than usual framed by her long blonde hair.

"So what's the plan?"

"I'm going to send this Peebo down to drag Peebrit back up here." Brianna shifted position a bit so that Ranma would have to look down the front of her shirt. She sighed in disappointment as he knelt down and looked into the hole.

"It seems wide enough to squeeze through."

"Yeah, but it's a tight fit, and I may not be able to get back out once I'm in there." She explained.

Ranma noticed she wasn't looking at him like she usually did, but he just nodded and didn't think anything of it. "You’re the expert here so I'll take your word for it."

Nodding, Brianna finished tinkering with the Peebo and sat it on the floor. It spun around a couple of times and raced down the tube with a yell of glee. Brianna just smirked as she watched its progress on a little monitor by her knee that Ranma hadn't noticed.

Brianna suddenly leaned in close and smiled. "Want to play around while we wait?"

"Um…"

She spread her shirt a bit to give him a good view of her chest and smirked at his panicked face. "I've been wanting to get you alone for a while now."
She said, crawling towards him.

Ranma wondered why the room suddenly felt quite a bit warmer than it did a few seconds before. He inched away from her. "What about the Peebo?"

Pouting, Brianna glanced at the screen and cursed. "It stopped next to
Peebrit and isn't moving either! What the hell is going on down there?"

Ranma sighed with relief. What was it with girls lately? He likes Sheila and all of a sudden everyone seems to want to get to know him better. Bad enough he caught Gina sneaking into his room one morning to replace something in his shower. He wasn't sure what it was, but she was blushing as she edged out and ran for her room.

Hearing a zipper, Ranma blinked and found Brianna pulling her pants off. He froze as she kicked them into his lap with a smirk, quickly followed by her shirt. She blushed a little as she gave him a wink. "I've got to go in. I'll need you to pull me out."

"Um, actually I can just…"

"I'll get Peebrit myself." Brianna insisted.

Shrugging, Ranma just nodded and couldn't help but watch as she pulled herself into the little tube. He was sure she didn’t have to move her butt around like that to crawl through a tunnel though. Bending over, he watched as she shimmied down the tube.

He fell over as he spotted her panties in the middle of the tube about ten feet in. Grabbing his nose he staggered over to the wall. He would never understand girls no matter how much he tried. Shaking his head, he glanced at the little monitor on the floor and saw that Brianna found Peebrit and the the little Peebo.

The uncharacteristic look of seriousness on her face caught his eye as she opened a couple of small hatches in the Peebos. The little Peebo seemed to wake up and spun around to gape at Brianna.

"Momma!" It yelled.

Peebrit on the other hand didn't even move. He watched as she tried several times to get her to reset, but it just didn't work. Shrugging, she started to back out and Ranma relaxed. Really, he should have known better after stripping the way she did.

"Ranma? Could you come in here and pull me out?" She called.

Ranma could actually hear the playfulness in her voice. He had to get out of this or else he was going to be in trouble with Sheila. Several thoughts ran through his mind as he considered this problem. Then the answer came to him in a flash.

Reaching into pocket, he pulled out a small note pad and flipped through several pages. His eyes narrowed as he pulled in a tiny amount of magic from all around him and formed a ball of water above his head. Seconds later he was female and took a second to adjust his pants. Smirking a little, she knelt down and started moving into the tube.

It was easier to move than she thought it would be. It only took her a few seconds to reach Brianna's underwear. Her male mind took a second to admire them as she grabbed them. She smirked even more as she carefully unbuttoned the front of her shirt and let her breasts show a little. The panties fit in her cleavage quite nicely.

She even let a little peak out. Didn't want to disappoint Brianna to much after all. She heard a bit of movement just a second before a little Peebo peaked around the corner up ahead. Its little eyes widened as it spotted Ranma heading her way.

"Who?" It asked.

"Just me Ranma." He whispered, trying to deepen her voice a little.

Suddenly Brianna's bare ankle was waving up and down behind the Peebo. "Oh
Ranma, it's so tight in here. Give me a little tug." Brianna asked huskily.

Once she was in range, Ranma reached out to grab her ankle and pulled Brianna around the corner. She gave such a pulled that Brianna was nearly at her by the time the girl was there. Ranma shifted around a little and suddenly they were sharing the same space, breast to breast, so to speak.

Brianna's lust filled eyes suddenly noticed that Ranma wasn't a guy and widened to the size of dinner plates. At the same time Ranma remembered something from a movie and pressed herself to Brianna. "Now that I've got you, what do I do with you cutie?" She even went to kiss Brianna.


Like greased lightning, Brianna seemed to vanish so fast that Ranma fell to the floor. She heard her scrambling out of the tube behind her and running off. Seconds later Ranma was to busy laughing to wonder what else happened. Snickering, she looked up to see that Brianna had left the Peebos there.
Grabbing them, Ranma quickly exited the tube.

Still snickering, Ranma conjured another ball of water to change back into a guy and decided it might be best for his health if he found a safe place to work out for a while. Setting Peebrit by the computer equipment, Ranma quickly headed for the front door. Brianna's panties landed on top of the other Peebo as Ranma raced out of the room.

"Hey, maybe I can go visit Sheila." Ranma said under his breath as he jumped to the nearest roof. Diggers mansion wasn't to far away after all. Plan in hand, he didn't waste any time racing out of the area.

Back in the house, Brianna was hunched over the toilet with the dry heaves.
Gina was patting her on the back as she handed her sister a bottle of water.
"It almost worked sis."

Brianna shuddered.

"He got you good."

"I forgot all about that stupid curse!" She moaned. "It was horrible."

"He's a tricky one."

"She's better built than me! Me!"

Gina sweatdropped. "Still…"

Brianna just nodded. "They were really soft too."

Gina backed out of the bathroom. She didn't want to hear anymore about Ranma's soft breasts. No, she was positive she didn't want to think about Ranma's breasts. She headed right for her computer, queued up a video of Ranma's morning work out, and played it on the wall screen.

"Oh yeah, that's the stuff." She drooled.

oooooooooo

Down in the tubes below the house, even lower than the garage, three little rats slowly made their way through a complicated maze of wires and other obstacles. These weren't ordinary rats, one had blue fur, another was almost pink, while the third was tan colored. The blue one led the way through the tunnels, only to stop every now and then as the tan one hissed at him and tried to bite his tail every few minutes.

Eventually the tree managed to make their way up into the house itself. Every now and then the blue rat would stop by a small panel and bite through some wires while the other two watched. The tan one seemed to be radiating a small aura as it glared at the blue furred rat.

It cringed back for a second before it would run off down the tunnel. Waving them along with its tail. Eventually it stopped and peaked around a corner and let the other two get a look. Just a little ways down was a small grate used by the air conditioning system to cool the house.

Running up to the grate, it looked out into the room beyond for a few
seconds before nodding. The other two rats ran forward and looked out into
Gina's main lab. "Gina Digger's Lab?" The tan one asked.

Blue nodded. "Yes, and just beyond in that little room with the smoky glass is the target."

"Like, what now?" The pink one asked.

The tan one ignored the pink one. "Gothwrain ordered us to get the behemoth free and have him attack the Diggers as a distraction."

"Lydia, I've been observing this place since before the explosion. I was lucky to survive that, but this lab didn’t even take any damage. She repaired a few walls, that's about it."

Lydia scowled at Romeo. "We've heard it several times already. I'm just not sure how we are going to pull this off. Gothwrain didn't give us any special weapons or anything. At least last time we came here we had that collar and bell to put on the werecheetah."


"We just need to free the man." Romeo explained.

"I don’t like this." Lydia muttered as she stared out into the room again.

Suddenly the pink one lifted its nose into the air and started sniffing.
"Like, I smell something weird."

Romeo sniffed the air, but couldn’t smell anything. "Are you sure Moesha?
All I smell is dust."

Lydia sniffed as well. "I smell it too."

Then they heard a strange sound from behind them and turned around. Filling up most of the already cramped space was a rather large black pig with a bandana on its head. The fur on the rats backs stood up on end as the plastered themselves to the grate.

The thing snuffled and grunted at them as it moved forward to press its nose against the grate. Lydia noticed a small device in the pig's bandana. Then they heard another pig a few tunnels away. Squeaking in fear, the rats raced past the pig and headed down the tunnel. They would have to find another way into the room.

Before Romeo was even sent out on this mission the three of them were briefed on who might attack the Diggers while they were in the house. None of those briefings had included black pigs with bandanas. They rounded a corner and skidded at halt as another pig turned to look at them. It gave an annoyed oink as it looked at them.

The rats screamed, spun around, and with little paws skidding along the metal flooring of the tube, raced off in the opposite direction. The pig cocked it's head to the side, appeared to smirk, and raced off after them. The rats didn't know what to do as they took several blind turns.

Oink!

They screamed, turned, and raced down another tube. Suddenly they heard dozens of pigs in the tubes around them. Skidding to a halt, they looked around fearfully, and spotted a small hatch in the wall. Romeo spotted pigs headed for them from both ends of the tube and started to panic.

Lydia and Moesha, the pink rat, started to kick at the small hatch. It popped open and they dove through without a second thought. Lydia's tail grabbed Romeo and pulled him just as the pigs arrived. They huddled against the wall on the other side as a pig snout pushed through the hole.

Oink! Snuffle!

The three rats lay there gasping for air. They were happy to be away from the demon pigs and grateful that it wasn't werecheetah's instead. Lydia eventually recovered and glanced around. "It appears like we are in the walls of the house now."

Romeo sat up and nodded. "Gina uses her own materials to build and maintain this house, so it's unlike anything else. I know she's got a power source under the house to power everything because using electricity would be to expensive."

"Like, these walls are break away." Moesha said as she sniffed at the base of the wall."

"Last week t-the werecheetah accidentally punched through one of the walls."
Romeo explained. "Gina had it fixed in a matter of hours."

"We're getting distracted. We need to free that guy and get him to attack the people here." Lydia said.

Romeo looked around. "We have to figure out where we are. I've never been in this part of the house before."

"I'm, like, not going back into those tubes." Moesha muttered.

Ooooooiiiinnnnkkkk!

The rats jumped a foot in the air, their little feet pumping already, and

then landed. They took off and vanished into the shadows. They didn't notice
that one of the sensors had spotted them.

oooooooooo

With an enhanced jump, Ranma jumped off the roof and landed on the branch of a tree outside Diggers Mansion. Ranma hadn't had a chance to visit here in several weeks. Dr. Diggers liked to teach him over at Gina's place for some reason, but occasionally they would end up here instead.

Because of the nature of his powers, Ranma didn't really need Dr. Diggers to teach him as well as his other students. Ranma was still a bit wary of his magical abilities, but he learned more with every spell book he read. He was still working his way through the first level book, but within a month he expected to be to the second level spells.

Dr. Diggers was amazed at his progress too. Supposedly it took a year or more to master each level of magic and a decade or more for the high level magics. Still, training wasn't why Ranma was here. He glanced over his shoulder to make sure that Brianna wasn't following him. Snickering at what he did to her, he jumped to the ground.

Reaching out with his mind he pulled in a little magic and cast a quick spell. The focus of his eyes changed and he could see Dr. Digger's security spells layering the house and grounds. It didn't take him long to make to cross across the wide expanse of lawn to the front door.

Julia opened the door a few seconds after he knocked. "Ah, hello Ranma. You have the day off so what brings you by?"

"Just a little misunderstanding at Gina's place. I thought I'd stop by and see if Sheila wanted to go anywhere. Just to pass the time."

The red headed weaponsmaster eyed him for several seconds. "She's left earlier to take Raphael back to Jade."

"When is she due back?"



"Any time now actually." Julia explained as she headed into the house. It didn't Ranma long to realize that she wanted him to follow her. Shrugging, he rushed after her, vaulting a couple of couches to catch up.

A few minutes later they exited the back door. He heard the sounds of a fight long before he entered the back yard to see Julia's three students fighting each other. The two girls worked well together against the one guy Ranma wasn't interested in seeing again, Gar.

Gar was in his human form fending off both girls. Ranma could easily see how much Julia's style filled his ever move. During their fight in the swamp, Gar hadn't been fighting quite like this, in that fight he used more power and speed blows. Ranma could see much more skill in his movements now, more focus, and strategy.

The two girls were a mystery. "I see Gar is fighting quite well." Ranma offered.

"His mind is no longer affected with jealousy and anger, so he's regained
his mental and spiritual balance."

"Who are the girls?"

"I didn't introduce them?"

Ranma shrugged. "I may have been distracted if you did."

"The one with long dark hair is Carla and the other one with short brown hair is Luan. Their were a pair of ninjas under Master Leep. When I was made a Master of the Leep school they became my students."

"They're very flexible and I see lots of Ninjitsu in their movements."

"Indeed, but they have expanded way beyond basic ninja moves."

He watched for a few seconds and nodded. Gar had nailed both girls quite hard already and they hadn't gone down. Julia motioned to Gar. "Watch how moves when the girls come at him. Do you see it?"

Ranma focused on Gar and watched for a few minutes. "Is he anticipating their moves? It's like he knows them to well."


"He's nearly at the stage in his training where he's ready to go to the next level. You're close to the same level, but you haven't picked up that special sense that he's currently using. Gar still needs a few more months of training before he reaches Adept level, but he's close."

"I don't recall him being that good when we fought." Ranma observed. "Was that because of his raging emotions?"

Julia looked impressed. "That's it exactly. It takes a special balance of mind, spirit, and body to master Leep Style. I believe you saw some of what he and his students did in Seer's Hamlet."

"Well not much, but enough to know that his students are quite good."

"Now if only he wasn't the worlds biggest pervert." Julia growled under her breath.



"What?"

"Nothing." Julia said a little too quickly.

"Ah, Ranma."

Turing around, Ranma watched as Dr. Diggers stepped outside and hugged his wife. "Sir."

"You get through that second level spell book?"

"Mostly, I've still got about ten spells left to memorize. And the theory on some of the others doesn’t match what I can do so I'm not sure if I've got the spells down correctly or not. Otherwise they are simple enough."

"I thought that might be the case. Level one spells are mostly easy spells used to practice magic and build up your skills. You've put a whole new spin on those with your odd magical abilities." Theo said, then chuckled a little.. "Several of my colleagues, seem to think you might be a mutation of some kind."

He reached into his mage suit and pulled out a thin red book. "Look through this and see if it helps you. I got it from the library of a friend of mine. He'll need it back in a month or so though."

"I'll look through it as soon as I can." Ranma said as he took the book and put it inside his subspace pocket. He figured he'd be able to read it later, once it was safe to go back to Gina's place again. "Is Sheila back from dropping of Raphael yet?"

Theo shook his head. "The Edge Guard officials wanted to settle him in for a

few more weeks training. Luckily all Sheila has to do is drop him off. She's taking a few months off from the Edge Guard while the city is rebuilt."

"How are you feeling? You used up a lot of magic yesterday when you brought Raphael back."


Theo sighed. "I'll be fine with another night of deep sleep. I'm still trying to figure out why Natasha showed up."

"Who?" Ranma asked and saw Gar shudder as they mentioned the name. It didn’t keep him from defending against the two girls though.

"Natasha is Queen of the Vampires and the Undead Realm. She is slightly dangerous when she sets her mind to something, though she seems to keep building kingdoms, and losing them after a few years. It's happened three times so far. She was after Raphael yesterday."

"But he's not dead."

"True, but he's not exactly alive either. At least in the normal way. Remember, Tanya created him originally as a golem to make Britanny split up with Stripe."

Ranma had heard the story when Sheila explained it to him, though none of the details. "I know a little bit about it, but not as much as the others."

This just made Julia laugh. "You'll get caught up eventually."

"True, and it's never boring around her for long."

"My girls tend to attract more than just dates." Theo muttered.

Ranma suddenly sensed a build up of magic inside the house and went inside just in time to see a portal of blinding white energy form in the middle of the room. Sheila was in her hybrid form as she came through, followed by another guy wearing a simple cloak. Ranma noticed that the guest was actually shorter than Sheila.

"Ranma!" She yelled and practically flew across the room to hug him. He caught her and noticed the guy in the cloak lowering his hood. Theo came up behind Ranma and started talking when he saw who was with Sheila.

"Ah, Genn, it's been quite a while."

Ranma couldn’t place the name. "Who?"

"It's Genn, he lives at Gina's place these days. He went with you guys to
Jade the first time a month or so ago."


A vague memory of a guy leaving the group right when they arrived came to Ranma. "I think I remember."

"Did you find what you were looking for?" Theo asked.

Genn shook his head. "No and I looked all over the place."

"You realize after all this time she might not be alive anymore?"

Genn shrugged. "Oh I'd know if she was dead sir, she's my mother after all, and we share a kind of link. I'd know if something bad had happened to her."

"Very well, have you considered looking here in the Earth Realm?"

"No sir, this realm wouldn't suit her needs."

Ranma couldn't follow the conversation at all. Other than that the kid seemed to be looking for his mother.

"You might be surprised. Those people who can move between here and Jade with ease tend to occupy both worlds. My home is here, but my job is there on Jade. She might be the same."

"I'll give it a shot sir." Genn said, and then looked at Ranma. "Who's this?
One of Brianna's strays?"

Theo smirked. "No, one of Julia's students and mine as well. He has access to a unique form of magic that he's slowly starting to master."

Genn shrugged. "You shouldn't bother, he has next to no aura at all. I can 'see' it after all.

Theo glanced at Ranma in shock. "He's quite good actually."


Shrugging, Genn looked him up and down for a second and suddenly transformed into a rather good looking girl with long strawberry blonde hair, a muscular body, and wearing an outfit with barely concealed breasts. She leaned over to give him a better look. "Well, I wouldn't mind playing with him a little."

Ranma could only gape. He felt some kind of energy wash over him as the guy or girl transformed. He brushed it off and felt Sheila clutch at his arm a little tighter. "Back off."

"Or what?" She asked sultrily. "I can show you things you would be amazed to experience." Her breasts suddenly bounced right under Ranma’s chin.

Now he wanted to groan. Were all girls here in America this forward, or just this group he hung out with lately? He also noticed that Sheila was starting to get mad as well. "Don't make me Kapowee you."

Genn suddenly changed into a buffer version of Ranma without a shirt. "How about I show you just what he can really do, my sweet?"

With a growl, Sheila transformed into her taller, stronger, human form and decked Genn. Theo winced as the boy flew back, crashed into the couch, and collapsed to the floor. Huffing, Sheila stood there for a second before transforming back to normal and hugging Ranma again.

"I like cheese." Genn declared and passed out.

"And to think I was nice enough to bring him back with me." Sheila muttered under her breath.

"Genn must be hungry." Julia said as she came up behind them.

"Hungry?" Ranma asked. "Why would a lack of food turn him into a pervert?"


Theo just chuckled as he left the room. "I'll leave that one up to you, dear."

"Coward!"

"Can't hear a thing." Theo called back.

With a sigh Julia turned back to Ranma. "Genn isn't human, he's from a race called Rakasha. It's very rare and they can live for millennia. They eat the ether or aura of humans."

"I still don’t understand." Ranma said.

"To eat their victim has to be unconscious. Most Rakasha like to bed their victims until they pass out from pleasure, then dine in peace. It also makes the aura taste better supposedly."

"Cheese, yummy yummy cheese, its yellow." Genn muttered from the floor.

"I think I understand." Ranma said as he watched the Rakasha slowly shift back into the neutral form he, or it, had when arriving. Small, no muscle, and little horns on its head.

Shrugging, Ranma put Genn out of his mind and glanced at Sheila. "Want to go do something? I didn't want to do anything at Gina's house today."

"Sure!" Sheila said as she grabbed his arm. "Let's go get something to eat."

Smirking, Ranma nodded. "Sounds perfect."

oooooooooo

Several minutes after Ranma left, Brianna and Gina poked their heads out the front door and looked around. According to Gina's tech glasses, Ranma was moving away from the house, and heading for the mansion. Gina was relieved that her parents were willing to distract Ranma for a few hours.

They were pushing the furniture around the front room, making space for lots of people, when the door bell rang. Gina quickly opened the door and let
Nodoka Saotome and Yomiko Readman into the house. "Hi Aunty."

Nodoka smiled. "Hello Gina. Thanks for helping out like this."

"It's no problem. Ranma will be so surprised when he meets you properly."
Gina said.

Yomiko nodded and frowned a little. There wasn't a book in sight. Not even a magazine or a coffee table book.

"Where is my son at the moment?" Nodoka asked excitedly.

"He's a few blocks from here at my parents mansion." Gina explained as she double checked her tracking device by tapping a button on her glasses. "He seems to be heading downtown with Sheila."

"Who is Sheila?" The red headed woman asked.

"Sheila is a girl that caught his eye a few weeks back. They've been getting to know each other ever since, though things were a bit rocky at first."

"She doesn't mind that he turns into a girl?"

Gina shook her head. "Ranma told her about it and she seemed to think it was neat."

Nodoka beamed. "I bet he's used it to learn all about the female body."


"Ah, I'm not sure." Gina conceded.

This just made Brianna snort. "He knows when to use it for the best effect."
She shuddered.

Nodoka just grinned wider as she examined the girls around her. She just knew that Ranma liked them all. Once he picked the one he wanted, or even all of them, her Ranma would be ready to take his place as head of the family. Until then she would guide him carefully. "So Gina dear, ready to go?"

"Sure, let me grab my wallet and we can head out."

"You're going somewhere?" Yomiko asked.

"We need to get party supplies for Ranma's birthday party." Nodoka explained.

"I've been with him most of the week and he hasn't even mentioned it."

Brianna said. "He would have hinted at it at least once."

Gina came back into the room stuffing a card in on of her pockets. "I only know it's his birthday because Aunty here told me about it."

Nodoka looked perplexed. "Do you think he forgot?"

"Possible." Yomiko tossed out. "Or he doesn’t know his own birthday."

The ensuing silence filled the room.

"How is that possible?" Brianna asked.

"His father." Nodoka said after a couple of minutes of thought.

"Dad told us he used magic to make sure Ranma's father wouldn't be able to find us for at least six months." Gina explained.

Nodoka grinned a little sadly. "Good, we don’t need him spoiling things anyway. He hasn't been in my life for over a decade and I really don't want him back. I remember that he never did anything except lay around, drink, and eat. Once Ranma was born he added training Ranma to his list of chores. Eventually they vanished into the night and I haven't seen them since."

"You don't seem to broken up about it." Gina said.

Nodoka shrugged. "I nearly hunted Genma down so that I could slaughter his precious little plans. The only problem was that he was good at hiding and after a couple of months I had no clue where they were. The only clue I had was the never ending hoard of bill collectors that came to the house."

Brianna winced as she recalled one of Britanny's shoe shopping expeditions.
"How did you survive?"

"The people I work with now hired me on for some consulting. I ended up working several cases and eventually made my way up to fieldwork. Even then I could barely keep up on the bills, so I closed the house down and changed my name so no one could find me. I've been doing quite well ever since." Nodoka explained.

"She's quite good too." Yomiko added. She was searching the nearby rooms as the others talked, but so far she hadn't found one book. She was starting to hyperventilate, how could these heathens survive without any books around?

She looked up as Ranko walked into the room to see everybody standing around. The android was wearing a skintight red and black body suit with the initials 'GD' scrolling down her right leg. The outfit used to belong to Gina, but the color scheme just didn't work for the blonde so she put it in her closet and forgot about it.

Ranko also had her hair pulled back into a pair of ponytails that framed her face. She grinned and sauntered over to the group. "Hi!"

Gina blinked and frowned as she watched Ranko.

"Hello again." Nodoka said as she looked the girl over. "You were with Ranma during that battle the other day."

"Yep, how are you doing? That machine that created your android copy can take a lot out of you humans. It usually leaves them unconscious for several hours." Ranko explained.

"I've always been rather hardy." Nodoka smirked. "So, how do you and my son get along?"

"Son?" Ranko asked, blinking in confusion.

"Ranma; he's my long lost son." Nodoka explained.

"Gina did you know about this?"

Nodding, Gina cringed a little at the odd look in the android's eyes. "Yeah,
but only for a few days. Aunty here stopped by and we had a talk. Today's his birthday and we were thinking of throwing him a party."

"You do know that Ranma hasn't ever celebrated his birthday right?"

Nodoka frowned, but Gina just shrugged. "We suspected it. You have quite a few of his memories don't you? Could you tell us how he will react?"

Ranma hummed. "Shock I believe, and then maybe a fight if you surprise him to much. He has been training to fight all his life so its instinctive."

"That's fine." Nodoka said. "We just give him a little warning and everything will be good."

"Well, maybe it will. He's also been looking forward to seeing Sheila today.
I'm not sure what all he has planed though."

"I'm tracking him with my glasses." Gina explained, giving them a little tap. "He's currently at the ice cream shop a couple miles away."

"Then we can go to the big mall I spotted on the way in." Yomiko said as she came back into the room. She looked a little miffed.

"Is something wrong?"

"Where are the books?"

Gina blinked. "Books? I always use my mini computer or a scroll screen."

"There aren't many books in the house." Ranko explained. "Gina and Brianna both tend to read everything off the computer."

Brianna nodded. "Though there might be a few floating around."

Yomiko looked like she was about to cry, her lip started trembling. This only made Nodoka sigh. She reached into her kimono and pulled out a little book. It vanished from her hand so fast that Nodoka took a second to count her fingers before looking at her partner. "Hey."

Ignoring Nodoka, Yomiko giggled as she read the little joke book. "He's so cute!"

Gina and Brianna gave Yomiko an odd look.

"She'll be fine, books just tend to make her act a little weird." Nodoka explained as she stepped over to the table and sat down. In the background, no one saw three little rats dash from under a chair and hide under the couch. Gina pulled up a chair and sat a small electronic note pad on the table.

"So Aunty, did we need to stop at the bank?"

"What for?" Nodoka asked.


"Money exchange."

Nodoka shook her head. "Nope, I have plenty of money with me. We just have to find some party supplies."

"Smurfy!" Gina crowed. "Now what did you have in mind?"

Ranko rolled her eyes and resisted the urge to call Gina a geek. And why did she suddenly have a craving for a tuna sandwich?

Grinning, Nodoka pulled a note pad out.

"I'll stay there while you go shopping." Ranko said as the craving got a little more intense. "I've got a couple of things to take care of."


"Oh?" Gina asked. She couldn’t think of anything that the android might have to do now that Ranma was out of the house.

"I'm improving myself by going through some of your old college programs and notes. I want to be able to pull my weight better." Ranko lied, she really wanted that tuna.

"Ah, sure knock yourself out. How far along are you?"

"I've completed the freshman year courses so far this morning." Which she had, surprisingly enough.

"So quickly?" Nodoka gaped.

Ranko nodded. "I am an android. I scan all the information, and then quickly cross reference everything with my current systems. It takes about four hours to do a years worth of work and another couple of days to perform experiments."

"That's great! Do you think Ranma could do something like that?" Nodoka asked.

"I doubt it." Ranko admitted. "Genma never really let Ranma get an education. He had to be forced to let Ranma learn how to read and write and he's bad enough at those as it is. Still, he has been improving in all his educational areas since he arrived here so may be possible if you present it to him in the right way."

"I did update his knowledge a little when I healed him in the Regeneration Tank so he might be up to basic high school level. We might want to see about getting him enrolled in college." Gina said.

“Possible, though I was thinking of taking him back to Japan with me for a visit at some point.” Nodoka said.

"Well it's something to think about anyway." Gina said and shrugged.

Ranko nodded. "He can be a little stubborn, so frame your request in a way that involves Martial arts."

This just made Nodoka start laughing. "I used to have to do the same thing to Genma. He was so focused on the art that he couldn't comprehend anything else."

"Then let's teach Ranma the glory and beauty of books." Yomiko said as she
hugged her little book. It was cute, and warm, the paper was a crisp white. "They never let you down."

Gina, Nodoka, and Ranko backed up a little to let the woman have her little fantasy.


oooooooooo

Ranma and Sheila looked at the door before them as they arrived at the mini mall. Sheila was in her human form for this trip. Gina had explained to her that while Atlanta was used to Britanny and rarely had the police show up anymore, it would best not to press her luck. Atlanta tended to ignore most of the weirdness so long as it didn't cause any property damage.

That and Gina's expeditions tended to keep the local businesses in the black whenever Britanny went out to 'pick up a couple of items'. As they entered the mini mall, Ranma led her around to several stores. They even passed by a specialized all silk store that carried a wide range of fascinating clothing and bedding.

"I've only been here a couple of times since I arrived a few months ago, but you can find almost anything you need around here." Ranma explained.

In her human form, Sheila towered over Ranma, but she still managed to draw attention with her amazing curves and long reddish hair. She really hated the birth defect that made her human form have all the muscles and power. While her hybrid for could heal faster than any werecreature she knew. She pointed to the back of the shop. "Let's check those. They look like they might be interesting."

Ranma glanced in that direction and saw several styles of shirts. Unlike regular shirts, these were designed purely for fashion. "Interesting look." He commented as Sheila started looking for something that just might fit her.

He noticed a couple of sales girls head his way, spot Sheila, and gawk.
Shaking his head, Ranma looked at the shirts again. "What about that one?"

Sheila looked over and saw that he was pointing at a wrap around shirt that wouldn't even cover her breasts, though the way they wrapped around her body would provide support. "To revealing."

This just made Ranma shrug. "I've never had an eye for fashion. I just like to wear what fits and allows me to move around without ripping the clothing."

Sheila nodded. "That's why you wear the lose jeans and shirts."


"Yep."

"Girls have to put more effort into fashion Ranma."

He shrugged.

"Ranma!"

Ranma and Sheila jerked up at the same time and turned just as two girls ran over to them. It took him a second to remember them because he'd only met them once, just as Gina's house exploded. "Itchi, Asrial.

Both girls just grinned at him. Asrial spoke up first as she eyed Ranma like a piece of candy. "Me and Itchi were invited to come over to Gina's house this afternoon."

"Oh? She didn’t mention anything about people coming over." Ranma muttered.

"Just a little get together." Itchi explained. "She said there were a few things she wanted to show us. Mimi is also invited, but we haven't been able to find her."

"Have you spotted her anywhere? Her and that cat of hers tend to end up in the oddest situations." Asrial explained.

"Nope." Ranma said. "Maybe she headed home. She really didn't like being here after surviving the destruction of Gina's house."

The two Quagmire girls looked at each other. "Naw, she said she would head back with us." Itchi told them.

"Who's this?" Asrial asked as she glanced at Sheila. Then up at Sheila, way up.

"I'm Sheila. Ranma and I are hanging around today."

"Would you like to join us? We'll be heading back to Gina's place here in a few hours." Ranma asked them, innocently.

Sheila gave them the evil eye.

"Ah, we better get going." Asrial said.

Itchi was about give Sheila a piece of her mind, when Asrial shook her head and dragged her off. They waved goodbye before they vanished from sight. Sheila sighed in relief once they were gone. She was glad the girls took the hint and took off.

"That was weird." Ranma muttered.

"I get that a lot." Sheila informed him. "Let's try that section of shirts over there. They look like they might actually fit me."

"Sure."

oooooooooo

Instead of using a normal van, the Agency gave them a mini van filled with little computer screens and gadgets. This was the one part of being a field agent that Agent Will actually liked. He didn’t have to risk himself for silly reasons and he could sit back and just observe everything.

The Agency frowned on this though and insisted that he be assigned a partner to keep him in line. Agent Xane, seven foot tall Nubian warrior and drop dead gorgeous no matter how you looked at her. Even sitting in front of a mini computer an nibbling on a doughnut. It hadn’t taken him long to notice that she always had something sugary nearby.

A seven foot tall gorgeous Nubian Warrior did not look right wearing a dark brown power suit and skirt. Will thought to himself as he checked his cameras again. About an hour before they had arrived near Gina Digger’s house. The van had instantly deployed a dozen flying micro cameras.

It had taken him several minutes to get them to monitor various sections of the house, but eventually wrangled them into doing what he wanted. The mini van was like one giant mobile computer set up. It could tap into any kind of internet signal, had cameras that recorded everything, and even had a coffee maker for those times when they had to spend hours watching non moving objects.

His danger sense went off. Turning to the side his mind went to Defcon three as Xane yawned and stretched around. That suit did not do her body justice. She turned and noticed him watching and smirked.

“See something you like?”

Will shook himself. “Yep, to bad we’re busy right now.”

Xane pouted. She hated sitting inside these tiny flimsy things that broke so easily. “Let’s just go to the house and pound the assassin.”

“Once we know who that is.”

Inside the house three rats sneezed and looked confused.

“These things always end up with us beating someone up. He’s got to be around her somewhere to do his job. It can’t be that hard to find him.”

“Now Xane, we’re here to guard Britanny and Brianna, not beat up people. We need to wait till a target shows up.”

“That boy just left the house a little while ago. Let’s go get him.”

“He’s not the target.” Will said patiently. When Xane got into one of these moods he started to get nervous. Now she was taking her jacket off. Why was she taking her jacket off?!

“I’m hot, I feel icky!” Xane snapped.

“Just relax, the AC is on so everything is fine.” He explained.

She glared at him, smirked, and started to unbutton her dress shirt. “Well I’m going to get comfortable. It’s a good thing I wore my costume.”

Will gulped and tried to not to look interested. Xane’s old costume would make most bikini models blush and look for something to cover themselves. Her shirt soon joined the jacket, leaving her leaning back, her long red hair nearly touching the floor. When had she taken off her glasses? Her costume, if it could be called that, only covered up the bits that stood out, with cloth and feathers.

Now Will was really having problems focusing on the job. He gulped as sweat started to roll down her chest…

oooooooooo

Brianna had decided not to go to the store with Gina and the others. She just wasn't in the mood for some reason. So she went down to her lab and started tinkering with Peebrit. She wasn't sure what was wrong with her either. She knew that IB had done something to the little one and there wasn't any obvious damage.

As far as she could tell, Peebrit's insides were in perfect working order.
Every one of the wiring connections were perfect, all the gears were solid, and she couldn't find any evidence that one of the power cells might be damaged. The only thing left was what she dreaded looking at, the programming.

Each of her bit-bombs had varying levels of artificial intelligence. Peebrit, Peebri, and Peegi were special creations based off her family and had similar personality quirks to a greater or lesser degree. Peebrit was based off her sister Britanny the werecheetah.

This meant that Peebrit could race around at really fast speeds and had been brought back to the house for speeding more than once. That hadn't happened lately, thank the gods, but with Peebrit out of action she wasn't sure what to do. Sure she could get her working again, but at this point she just might have to start over completely if IB compromised the little bit-bomb's programming.

Grabbing a couple of cables, she carefully plugged them into Peebrit's access ports. Ever since IB showed up she had been careful not to use a computer that was connected to the house's main system until it had been checked at least a dozen times for various kinds of hidden files that IB might have left. The toaster upstairs till tried to fire flaming toast at them occasionally.

That was why she was using a portable laptop with an exterior memory drive that Gina kept around to dispose of anything bits of IB that may be left even weeks after the attack. Peebrit's systems hummed to life for a few seconds, she even opened her eyes, but then quickly went dormant again. On the laptop programming information started to quickly scroll across the screen.

After several minutes Brianna was stumped. Peebrit's systems appeared to be in perfect running order and there was no sign of IB's reprogramming anywhere. She paced back and forth for several minutes trying to figure out what it could be, eventually she decided she would have to take a closer look. Grabbing a special dvd she used to create the Bit-bomb's personalities she inserted it in the laptop and let it run.

Peebrit's systems hummed to life again as every bit of information was scanned and compared to what should be there. The time said it would take several minutes, so she moved over to another computer where another Peebo was under construction. Gina's external memory drive had given her an idea. This Peebo was all about the memory drive.

Peebo Stealth, she would have to come up with a better name than that, was going to an intelligent mobile hardrive able to use several image projectors to turn invisible. It would be a couple of weeks before initial tests finished, but she already knew Stealth would be very handy. She just hoped Peegi and Peebri would get along with him. Peebri could be rather odd at times.

She was just installing Stealth's mini servos when her scan on Peebrit finished. After scanning through the information, she found that a core file corrupted beyond recognition. It was only five lines, but they were completely ripped apart. This was IB's handy work all right, but incomplete, as if Peebrit had cut turned herself off. Gina had to reformat nearly every system in the house to get rid of the little pest.

That was one thing Brianna wanted to avoid if at all possible. Reformatting Peebrit would destroy two solid years of AI development experience. She'd even lost the last copy she had on file to IB's rampage. It only took a few seconds to erase the lines and write them out the way they should look. Ten minute later, after a second scan of the programming, Brianna closed Peebrit up and hit the reset button.

"Momma!" Peebrit yelled.

"Peebrit, do a scan of your drives to see if anything is amiss." Brianna ordered.

"Sure." Peebrit's eyes scrunched up for several seconds. "Updates to my programming have been made in the last seventy two hours. The first was forced into me, but didn't take. The second was just a few minutes ago."

Brianna frowned. "What was the first change supposed to do?"

"I was to seek out IB if he lost the fight and help bring him back." Peebrit explained. "Something interrupted the transfer of programming though and I shut myself down to keep it from happening again."

"You shut yourself down?" Brianna asked in surprise, even though the thought had crossed her mind. The bit-bombs didn't have that kind of programming. Still, Peebrit was an AI, so it might be possible considering some of the things Peebri had pulled recently.

Peebrit nodded. "Yep, it seemed like the only way to keep that monster out of my drives."

"That's amazing." Brianna muttered in shock.

"May I go see the others?"

"I'm not done running scans yet." Brianna said.

"But I'm bored." Peebrit complained.

"Now Peebrit, I need to find out what IB did to you. He finished some of your upgrades after all."

"Boring!" Peebrit snapped. Before Brianna could say anything, the cables popped out of Peebrit and the little bot raced off the table, landed with a bounce, and took off out of the lab.

"Peebrit! Come back here!" Brianna yelled as she nearly took off after the little bot. She screamed as another bit-bomb jumped out at her from under her chair, scaring the hell out of her. She heard it's snickers as it raced out of the room also.

Groaning, Brianna cursed under her breath as the tail end of Peebofox left the lab as well. She was really beginning to regret not going with Gina. As a matter of fact, she was thinking of heading to the weapons testing range to blow off some steam.

Suddenly Peebri raced by the door with half the Peebo in the house chasing her. She had a bra hanging from one of her guns. "I have the booty! Implement plan Zetta D, Spank the Monkey!"



After a small parade of Peebo and a couple of Gina's hurt bots, who also had various items of lace and silk on them, Peegi raced by looking panicked. She spotted Brianna, froze up for a second, then sped off.

Brianna sighed. It was going to be one of those days. She didn't want to put up with another of Peebri's ideas for fun. It was bad enough when she found out about video games, like Super Mario Brothers. She still couldn’t figure how Peebrit managed to think that bouncing off people's heads would give her a mushroom.

Glancing to the side she noticed that one of Gina's access panels was blinking. Narrowing her eyes, Brianna walked over and gave it a tap. This particular warning was supposed to be followed by an alarm, an alarm that wasn't going off. Moving over to the main computer, she accessed the security grid and tracked down the source.

Something the size of a dog was in the houses access tubes. An area that couldn't be accessed from outside the house. All access hatches were inside the house, near the floor. Gina made sure of that during the rebuilding as she updated the inner security grid. The computer focused in on a second alarm as well.

Access the cameras, Brianna nearly fell out of her chair as she suddenly got to watch Peebri, a hundred or so Peebo, and a few bots having what looks like a party in the lower level. She was gonna have to have a little talk with her Peebo about their behavior lately. It just didn’t follow the predictable paths anymore. One of Gina's hurt bots was break dancing on a large piece of card board.

Turning back to the first alert, ignoring the party, she checked her lab for anything and saw something hiding under a nearby bench with Gina's room scanning equipment. Pulling a large gun out of a nearby drawer, she blasted a hole in the table. With a loud oink, a small black pot bellied pig ran into view. It snorted at her and ran from the room. It's cute little bandana flopping around as it ran.

"What the hell is going on today." Brianna muttered to herself as she chased after the thing. Instead she got to see its hind end as it wiggled through a small air vent just down the hall. It squealed louder as she approached and only managed to get through as Brianna started to take aim.

"Damn!" She growled.



Racing back to the lab, she ran over to one of the cupboards and pulled out an expensive pair of sun glasses and tapped the rim as she put them on. Just like Gina's normal glasses, these were designed to work as a mini scanner and heads up display. She gave a pair to Gina last Christmas.

She took a second to download the houses new designs into the glasses hard drive and had them access the alerts. Once that was done she adjusted the setting on her gun to stun. She wanted to take a look at those pigs.

Something just wasn't right about the one she was after. It was too intelligent. It was as if it knew right where to go.

oooooooooo

Xane had a handful of Will’s coat as she tried to yank it off his body. While under normal circumstances Will might have liked to play around, he didn’t think they should be doing so in the middle of a mission like this.


“I want to play.” Xane said as she pulled on the coat with a little more muscle.

“Not now Xane, we might miss something.

“I’m bored and want some action.” Xane grumbled, letting him go an moving back to her chair. She was still wearing her skirt, but that that was about it except for the bits of her costume peaking out here and there.

Will sighed in relief as he sat down in front of the computer again. He noticed something right away. “There are hostiles inside the house.” He snapped.

“What?” Xane yelled.

“While you were distracting me hostiles got into the house. The transmitters are picking up at least thirty different hostiles moving around the house.”

Xane leaned over him, absently pressing bits of her anatomy into the side of his face. He froze in shock and decided not to say anything, he was a man after all. “Let me take a closer look.”

“These aren’t human.” The red headed Nubian said after a few seconds.

“How can you tell?”

“They don’t have enough weight and mass.” She explained and pointed at a dial he hadn’t had a chance to look at yet.

“You’re right, they appear to be small and mobile.”

“Blondie’s moving bombs?”

“Those are excluded from the readings.” Will explained.

Xane frowned. “We need to get a closer look.”

“We can get closer to the house I suppose, but…”

“Let’s go.” Xane grabbed her coat and pulled it on as she jumped out of the van, leaving her shirt behind. She buttoned it up and looked around. “Now which one was their house again.


Will slapped his forehead and sighed.

oooooooooo

Three little rats finally made their way deeper into the house, eventually entering Gina's second level lab. They made sure they were alone and suddenly transformed into their human hybrid forms. Lydia, Romeo, and Moesha stood against the wall. Lydia and Moesha were female, though complete opposites in looks.

Lydia was more like a boy than a girl, with small breasts, short messy hair, and a dark look in her eyes. On the other hand Moesha had long pinkish hair, very large breasts, an and was wearing a skin tight leather outfit. The third was Romeo, a male, and he had short hair and an lanky build. All three of them had tails hanging to the floor and rat ears hiding in or among their. One will not mention their rat like buckteeth.

"Like, this is the right place?" Moesha asked.

Romeo looked around the darkened room. "I believe so. Over there is the cell door we were looking at earlier. This is just the first thing we have to do, so let's get this guy freed, I don't like being in this house at all."

The three of them carefully made their way across the room until they were standing in front of the large observation window next to the door. "Holly
$#@%, he's %$#&#$%$#@ enormous."

"Like yeah." Moesha agreed. "Look at all those muscles."

Romeo rolled his eyes. "Come on, we have a job to do."

"Yeah, yeah, $#@%&." Lydia muttered as Romeo turned to the control panel.

He'd seen Gina type in the sequence several times during his earlier scouting missions through the house.

Lydia and Moesha watched the door stay closed. "Like what?"

"I've seen Gina Diggers enter this code at least half a dozen times, I memorized it." Romeo snapped as he typed the code again.

The door didn’t budge.

"Like #@$%&." Lydia growled.

SNUFFLE!

Spinning around, the wererats found fifteen little black pot bellied pigs spread throughout the room. They were all crouched down as if they were going to attack. Lydia snorted and pulled her sword. "We aren't confined to those little passages anymore. We can fight back and I'm in the mood for a little bacon."

"Like, sounds good to me."

Romeo pulled a pair of daggers and grinned. "Indeed, let's play."

Suddenly silence filled the room. That was all the warning they had before a large stone like hand came out of the window behind them and latched onto the top of Romeo's head. He screamed as his feet left the ground. "What's this? A little rat out of its den, eh?" A voice graveled.

Lydia and Moesha jumped back as Gina's prisoner stepped out of the holding cell. A second man followed moving from behind him seconds later. This one was wearing a ratty green shirt and the same type of bandana as the pigs.

"Well, well, wererats. I've heard rumors of you, but never thought I'd see any of your kind."

With a flick of his wrist Daishi tossed Romeo across the room and bounced him off wall. He fell to the ground and didn’t move. The rock man glared around him as he took notice of the room. "How long have I been in there, Ryoga?"

"Several months. Lord Talon told me that Gina Diggers didn’t trust turning you over to the authorities. So she held you here."

Daishi flexed his arms. "I'd like to get back to Lord Talon and see if he can do anything about this rock."

"He wanted us to play with the Diggers first and bring back as many DNA samples as we could." Ryoga explained as he reached out suddenly and grabbed Moesha's hair, taking a few strands."

"Like ow!" She muttered backing away from the men. "You jerk!"

"Go away and I won't pound you into a pile of mush." Ryoga growled, revealing a pair of over sized fangs. All the pigs in the room suddenly growled as well. Causing both girls to quickly move over to Romeo and kneel down.

"I don't have to take that kind of #@$& from anybody." Lydia snapped.

Ryoga and Daishi just chuckled.

"I don't care what you do." Daishi said as he moved towards the door. "I want my revenge on that $#@%&&%$#@&&%$ that beat me up."

Ryoga nodded. Ranma was in this house somewhere and he planned to beat the hell out of him with his new strength. As they left the room they didn't see three rats heading for an air duct at the back of the lab, though the blue one was a bit wobbly.

"Where are the others? I figured Zelda and Ionis would be sent to get me out of here."

Ryoga coughed. "Well Ionis is currently on leave. He got mad at Lord Talon and said something he shouldn't have."

"Sounds just like him. He has a habit of doing things like that."

"Well right now Lord Talon is testing some of the Jusenkyo Waters on him to see how his magic will be affected by the change."

Daishi sweatdropped. "What was he turned into?"

"A worm." He was forced to stop and wait as Daishi fell to the ground laughing his ass off.

"You have to be k-kidding." Daishi gasped.

"Nope, the moron was ranting at Lord Talon and called him little worm."

This just set Daishi off again, this time he pounded a hole in the floor he was laughing so hard. "What about Janine? They used to be a couple if I recall right."


"That white haired girl?"

"Yeah her."

"Just about what you're doing actually, only she did it right in front of him before Lord Talon found a tank to put him in for study."

"Heh, the jerk had his uses. Still, that's great."

Click Shinnk!

They stopped and turned to see Brianna Diggers holding a rather large gun, pointing it right at them. A red laser light was plastered on Daishi's chest. "Alright Daishi, I don't know how you got out, but you are going back in."


"Yeah right." Daishi growled. "I think we just found out first target."

"I agree." Ryoga said and cracked his knuckles.

Brianna snorted. "I'm the one standing here with a fifty caliber machine gun pointed at you. I think I have the upper hand here."

Daishi just shrugged. "I'm basically bullet proof and the newbie here take care of himself."

Eyes narrowing, Brianna decided that these two needed to know just who they were dealing with. "Boys."

From behind Brianna about three hundred little Peebo rolled into sight, clung to walls, or started hovering over her head. Daishi hadn't dealt with Peebo in some time, but he remembered how useful and explosive they were.

They were one of the few things that could damage him. "Girl, those little toys are useless against me."

"Toys, I've got better things to do than fight toys." Ryoga snorted.

This caused several Peebo to growl at him.

"Go back to your cell Daishi, or else I'll make you. Rock skin or not, they
will hurt you."

"No."

The Peebo surged forward in one large, very cute, explosively mobile pack.
This made Daishi hop back as the front row suddenly sparked. Ryoga ripped a panel out of the wall and slammed it on the ground between them and Peebo.
The explosion went off an instant later, vaporizing most of the wall.

Flying Peebo surged through the smoke, closely followed by an irritated
Brianna as she looked around. Daishi and Ryoga weren't there anymore.
"Spread out and search for them. Attack on sight!"

"Attack!" The Peebo yelled and raced down the hallway and around corner.

"Ah, cordite, it smells like my day is will be fun after all." Brianna muttered under her breath. And to think she started out chasing a little pot bellied pig that wandered into her lab. She took the fifty caliber off safety. This was going to be fun.

oooooooooo

"I can't believe you forgot where the house was located." Will snapped as he clung to the trunk of a tree over looking the Digger's yard."

Xane was crouching behind a small bush that barely hid her from sight. From the front it almost looked like a green bush with red hair high lights. "The whole place has completely changed since I was here and even then I wasn't part of the group that went to the house."

Will grunted.

"It's true!"

"…"

"Don't make me come up there and explain this to you." She growled.

"It's bad enough we had to follow the Ranma boy home, but I'm pretty sure he knew he was being followed. Otherwise he wouldn't have taken the long way here, through the car wash, over the school, and around the block three times before going home."

"He didn't have a clue." Xane muttered.

Higher up in the tree, Ranma rolled his eyes, and wondered if all Agency people were this inexperienced. Sheila was next to him fingering her sword as they watched the two argue. He was just glad that he had the two of them hidden from the Agency people by magic. They heard enough to know that they were there to try and protect someone.

The only thing they were missing was just who that was. Neither of them had mentioned a name just yet, but Ranma was patient, he could easily wait a few hours if needed. He wormed his way down the tree a little to get a little closer to Will's position. Maybe he would hear something from there.

They kept quiet as Will adjusted his binoculars. "Where could she be? The report said she returned to the house this morning with Gina Diggers and Ranma Saotome."

"She's watching TV or eating Doughnuts." She started drooling.

"Now Xane, that's pretty unlikely. Her file actually states that she's quite
active, always moving around doing something."

Ranma frowned, he was narrowing things down a bit, but that description only fit a few people in the house.

"Then she's out of the house."

"I think she's here." Will insisted. "I'm just not sure where."

Xane sighed and slumped a little. "Then we wait until she comes out of the house or shows herself in a window."

"I suppose."

"Want to play around until then?" Xane suggested and looked up at him from the corner of her eye.

Even Ranma could hear the suggestion in the girl's voice and he sensed Sheila tensing up. They nearly sighed in relief when Will shook his head.
"Keep your mind on the mission."

"But I’m bored."

"I don't care." Will snapped.

"Don't make me smack you." Xane snapped back.

Will tensed, adjusted his binoculars again, and focused on the side of the house. "What the hell is that?"

The tall red headed Nubian turned her head to see three little rats wiggling their way out of a hole in the wall. They dropped to the ground, ran around in a most peculiar way, and ran for the back fence. Everyone gasped as the rats suddenly turned into humans and hopped over the fence.

Two females and a male. One female was blonde and average looking, wearing a simple leather body suit. The other female had long pale pink hair, large breasts, and wearing a leather body suit that showed off her impressive legs. The guy was lanky, had bluish black hair, and was wearing a leather vest and pants.

"Wererats." Sheila growled.

Ranma could hear the shock and loathing in her voice. "You know them?"

"They are the vilest creatures on the face of the planet." Sheila whispered.
"Assassins, murderers, criminals, are just some of the names you can call them. There used to be a law about killing them on sight in Seer's Hamlet. I’m not sure what the rules are here on Earth."

"Not now." Ranma said. "I'm still sensing something inside the house, but I don’t' want those two to see us entering. It could cause problems."

"We can knock them out?"

"The redheaded one is strong, very strong." Ranma hissed.

"We can just knock both of them out."

Ranma shook his head. He could feel a lot of power contained inside the red headed Agency woman. It was freaking him out more than a little. Even Master
Julia didn't give off this much energy. "That woman worries me."

"We have to do something."

Nodding, Ranma decided to go inside even though the two Agents would see him entering. "I guess we head inside."

"Why now?"

"Staying here won't work any more." Ranma whispered back as he jumped, grabbed Sheila, and launched them out of the tree without the other two noticing. Ranma had a quickly recast his minor spell of silence and invisibility on them before they reached the ground.

He ran them around to the far side of the house before dropping it. Whatever was going on inside was even stronger from this angle. Shaking himself,
Ranma was now positive that Daishi was out of his cell. He hadn't really been sure until then.

"I don't need this right now." Ranma muttered. He could easily recall his defeat at the monster's hands. "Daishi."

"You mentioned him before."

"Yeah, before coming to Jade I suffered several rather humiliating defeats.
Daishi is a strong master Ninja. The first time we fought he pulled some moves on me that took me down easily. I trained myself up and had a rematch with him later and was winning, until he got this curse."

Ranma nodded. "Stone Skin and magically enhanced strength."

"When the body is armored, go for the eyes, ears, or family jewels to take them down." Sheila quoted.

Holding up his hand, Ranma formed his Ki Claws and watched as bits of static electricity arched from each of the claws jutting out from between his fingers. "These can cut him, but he shrugs off damage that would kill a normal person. I won our last fight, barely."

Sheila shrugged. "You're stronger now. A lot stronger with all the training you've done with Master Julia and Dr. Diggers."

"I know." Ranma said with a little shrug.

"Let's go get him then."

"You're right, but I'll need you to do something for me."

"What?"

"Brianna and Britanny are still in the house. I need you to get them out, so
I can take on Daishi safely. There's a good chance he'll level the house if we leave him in there."

"Call Dr. Digger's and ask him to come over and help. He'll bring his wife, Gar, and those two students as well. We can take this character down quickly."

Gritting his teeth, Ranma looked away. "I'd rather do this alone."

"Why?"

"Because I have to show him that I’m not weak." Ranma admitted.

"Weak? Ranma you're one of the strongest people I've ever met."

"Yet every villain with a bad fashion sense that comes along is able to defeat me. I'm stronger than I was and I'll beat him with my bare hands."
Ranma snapped.

Sheila could actually see a strange kind of pain in his eyes as he turned away and headed for the front door. Her fingers twitched as she grasped the handle of her sword. She recalled Ranma's fight against Gar. Ranma had really pushed himself during that fight.

Just like he was pushing himself now. She suddenly realized that Ranma was afraid to lose, something within him just pushed and pushed for him to beat the odds at all costs. This was why Julia had taken him on a student, his drive to win at all costs, even his own death.

She was going to give Ranma a good talking to about this. It didn't help that she didn’t have any way to contact the mansion and ask for help though. They were on their own for this. She raced after Ranma and caught him just as he arrived at the front door.

Out of the corner of her eye she could see Xane's back side sticking up over
the little bush she was hiding behind. This would have made her laugh if Ranma hadn't been so serious about the situation. The door was open and he was inside before she could even blink. The front room was empty.

"Any clue where they are?"

"No, though Britanny should be upstairs in her room. It think she's asleep."

"I'll go get her. Why's she asleep this early in the day?"

"She was injured during the last mission by some silver. I think she said that it would take her about fifteen hours to heal."

"Would Daishi know?"

"I don't believe so." Ranma said.

They snapped around as they heard machine gun fire going off down stairs.
Ranma ran over and hopped down the whole flight of stairs without touching the floor. "Get Brit!"

Growling, Sheila raced up the stairs. She had no clue where Britanny's bedroom was and listening to the gunfire down stairs was giving her goose bumps. Even know thing Diggers family, she wasn't all that used to technology. This was one of the prime reasons, the people, outlawed in the first place!

Even with the gun fire below, Sheila was able to peek her head into several rooms. Until she found the one she was looking for. Britanny was laying on her bed with her hands, feet, and even her back covered in bandages. One of her eyes opened as soon as the door opened.


“Sheila?” She slurred.

“Cheetah, we need to leave.”

The werecheetah sat up and shook her head. She wore a sexy bra and panty combo that left nothing hidden. Blushing a little, Sheila stepped into the room and made her way over to the closet and tossed an outfit at Brit. “What’s going on?” Britanny asked as she started to dress in skin tight slacks, a halter top, and her running shoes.

“Gina’s prisoner escaped.”

Cheetah paused for a second before she nodded. “Gina sometimes outsmarts herself. She plans for the big fancy plans and ends up being defeated by something as simple as a clothes pin.” She stopped and noticed the gun fire below. “Brianna is trying to take the guy on?”

“Yeah, but Ranma is on his way down to help.”

“Good, between the four of us we can take the moron down.” Said Cheetah as she adjusted her clothing. She didn’t’ want it coming off in the middle of battle.

“Ranma may not let us help.” Sheila told her.

“Why?”

“He barely beat the guy last time. I think he needs to do this alone.”

“Well he’s going to get some help anyway.” Cheetah said.

“Heh, true. What about your wounds.”

“They aren’t that bad.”

“You haven’t had much time to heal Cheetah, this could be a major battle.”

“I’m fine.”

Sheila shrugged. She just needed to keep Cheetah away from the main battle. Still, she felt that something just wasn’t right.

oooooooooo

Down in the hallway just outside Gina’s lab, Daishi and Ryoga crouched on the ground. The walls, floor, and even the ceiling around them was full of bullet holes. Ryoga wasn’t used to fighting people with guns, so he was a bit shocked at the amount of damage the thing caused.

Daishi’s rock like skin was scratched up a little, but otherwise he was perfectly fine. He stood as Brianna dropped yet another empty bullet clip on the ground and slammed another in place. Light around the gun flared to life. “Listen here woman, I want Ranma here, right now, or I’ll start throwing you through walls. That gun is useless against me.”

“I can keep this up all day and we’re just getting into my special ammunition.” Brianna growled.

“Daishi, I’m getting a little tired of this girl.” Ryoga snarled, yanking a bandanna off his head and snapping it with his wrist, making it go ridgid.

“So, what are you going to do about it. You’re the one hiding behind me.”

Just as Brianna rose up to fire another two thousand rounds of her special ammunition, she saw the back haired boy throw something at her. On instinct she aimed at the object and pulled the trigger. A long yellow and black piece of cloth slammed into her gun barrel, almost splitting it in two.

“Oh $#@#!”

The gun kicked and the side of her gun exploded from the side of the weapon. She dropped just as a massive amount of smoke started issuing from the gun. She dove to the floor as a dozen more objects flew through the air where her body was a few seconds before.

Daishi’s hand came out of nowhere, grabbed her by the throat, and lifted her off the floor. She gasped for air and struggled against him as best she could. He growled at her. “You are going to be fun to play with as I destroy everything in this house.”

“You won’t…”

He squeezed, cutting her off before she could say anything. “I don’t feel like hearing you talk.”

“Just knock her out.” Ryoga snapped. “We need to find Ranma. I want my revenge.”

“Not…gasp…here.” Brianna got out.

“He better be here, or else…”

“…down…gasp…town, date…”

“No he’s not.” Ryoga growled. “He’s here in the house, my little friends say they saw him just a few minutes ago.”

“Little friends?” Daishi asked.

“My pigs, they like to help me out.”

“Good.” Daishi said with smirk. “RANMA! GET YOUR LAZY ASS DOWN HERE RIGHT NOW OR I’LL KILL THE GIRL!”

“Eeeep!!” Eeeped Brianna.

“You will leave Mamma alone!” A dozen Peebo said as they appeared around their feet.

Ryoga noticed that their eyes were glowing. “The blasted things are preparing to blow up!”

“Don’t worry about it, I’ll be fine.” Daishi said.


“I won’t!”


“True, but I don’t care about you.”

“Heheheh.”

“What?” Daishi growled, looking through the smoke as best he could.

“You just don’t change do you Daishi.”

“Ranma.”

The smoke swirled around Ranma as he brushed it aside with his Ki. “You still talk to much Daishi.”

Daishi grinned as he tossed Brianna into the lab. He used his fist to smash the control panel next to the door, causing it to shut and lock her inside. “That should keep her busy for a few minutes.”

“Oh, she’ll be out quicker than that. Those Peebo at your feet will make sure of that.” Ranma said as the little bots moved over to the door. He spotted Ryoga standing beside Daishi as a bit more of the smoke cleared to reveal the pissed off teenager.

“Saotome.” Ryoga snarled. “I’m going to send you to hell.”

“Stay out of this kid, it’s none of our concern.”

Ryoga froze in shock and started to get even angrier. “I will make you PAY!”

This just made Ranma blink. “Who are you again? Go away, I’ve got a fight with Rock Man here.”

“You will not ignore me!”

Ranma did just that as he turned back to Daishi. “Let’s get this over with, then I can play toss the jerk around with your partner.”

“Whatever you want. This little hallway gives me the advantage. I remember out last fight, you were jumping all over the place just to attack me. Here your movements will be restricted.”

Ranma gave him a certain look. “I can beat you anywhere.”

"He's mine." Ryoga growled as he stepped forward. "I've been waiting for this moment for over a year now. He's mine."

Daishi's eye slowly moved to the side until it was staring at Ryoga's face. "This is my revenge, kid."

As they started to glare at each other, Ranma flicked his hand at Brianna and watched as she vanished from the floor. He was pretty sure he did the teleport spell right and it hadn't back fired on him, so she would be fine. The Peebo around the started racing around looking for Brianna. Daishi's hand came up, grabbed Ryoga's head, and shoved it through the wall before the boy could so anything.

As Daishi brought his hand back, leaving Ryoga embedded in the wall, he glanced at Ranma. "He's got some skill, but he isn't at my level yet."

Ranma could feel the tension building in the air. "What was his name again?"

"Who cares?"

"True." Ranma said with a smirk.

They jumped forward and within the blink of an eye they were at each other's throats. Just as before, Daishi was faster than expected, but Ranma could tell that Daishi wasn't in shape like before. The man had lost his edge. On the other hand, Ranma could tell that all his recent training was paying off. He was faster than ever before.

Daishi's fist slammed into Ranma and sent him sailing down the hall. With a twist, Ranma bounced off the wall, to the ceiling, the wall, and landed on the floor. He could feel the massive bruise forming along his right shoulder as he stood there. It seemed the man hadn't lost any of his super strength while in Gina's cell. Crouching down, he tapped into the Neko-ken and flared his aura around him, mixing moves.

"Pathetic." He growled as he raced down the hall.

Growling, Daishi met him head on again. They traded blows for several minutes before Ranma got the upper hand. He flipped over Daishi, placed his hand on the man's shoulder, and pictured a pattern. The spell went off, forming a funnel of energy around Daishi as the man collapsed to his knees. The floor around him groaned, forming a dent.

"Gravity Well, a third level magic spell." Ranma explained for Daishi's benefit. "Right now you should weigh about five times more than normal. Considering your size I'd guess at around a ton or so."

The man started struggling to his feet. Ranma was a bit impressed by the man's will power. Even when he used the spell to practice on himself he had troubles moving as well. He figured this was why Daishi was hired as a body guard to the kid in the first place. He could even recall Gina mentioning something about a lack of genetic manipulation in Daishi's blood samples. Though at the time he had been floating in that stupid tank and trying to think of a way to get out that didn't involve breaking said tank.

Raising his hand, the field around Daishi increased its pressure. The floor under Daishi suddenly collapsed and the large man fell into the garage below. Cursing, Ranma jumped down the hall and landed on Daishi's head. Squatting down, he knocked on the guy's forehead a couple of times. "You aren't supposed to break the floor."

Since the spell wasn't affecting him anymore, Daishi tried to swat him off, but Ranma just used the extra space provided by the garage to jump and dodge the man's hand. He landed on his head again, leaned down, and thumped him over the head. "That's just impolite. I'm gonna have to ask you to leave."

"I'm going to break you into little pieces!"

Laughing, Ranma jumped off his head again, twirled in mid air, and landed about ten feet away. He had a big smirk on his face as he faced Daishi. "You will have to do better than that. You aren't in my league anymore."

Daishi screamed in frustration, reached behind him to grab a large metal box, and hurled it at Ranma. With almost snake like abilities, Ranma weaved around and under the flying box. Just as it flew over his head Ranma positioned himself and fired a burst of Ki into Daishi's chest. For a brief second the whole garage was lit up with an eerie blue light.

Staggering back, Daishi examined the burnt rock of his chest in shock. Just a few months ago Ranma hasn't even been able to touch him except with that claw attack. He was prepared to defend against that, but he hadn't considered that Ranma would improve this much in such a short time. Daishi slowly straitened up and glared at Ranma.

He went from a stiff stance into a powerful haymaker in the blink of an eye. Reacting on instinct Ranma had his hand in the fist's path in an instant. It was only as the two met that Ranma remembered that Daishi was about ten times stronger. So the blow was barely blocked as it drove Ranma clear off his feet, connecting with his shoulder, and sent him stumbling back.

Ranma knew in an instant that his shoulder was dislocated. Holding his now useless arm with his off hand hurt like hell. Cursing under his breath, he stepped a few paces back as Daishi realized what he'd done and grinned. This only made the monster straiten up a little taller as their eyes met. "All the speed in the world is useless if I can tag you occasionally. I don't think you can take more than two or three hits and with that injured arm you won't be able to dodge as well."

Glaring at the monster, Ranma considered his options as the thing took a couple of steps towards him. He couldn’t just pull his arm back into place. He needed to brace it against something before shoving it back into place. Daishi's fist flew forward once more and Ranma managed to drop and roll out of the way, but that didn't gain him much space.

Daishi knew he had the advantage now that he knew that Ranma's extra speed wouldn't be able to help much.


Then Ranma knelt forward, spreading his stance out and hissed like a cat. For a second Daishi would have sworn that he felt a strange energy building up around his body as Ranma started at him. "Bring it on." He taunted.

Tapping into the Neko-Ken while injured was a bit of a gamble, especially with the type of injury Ranma had taken. He could feel the extra energy flowing through his body and accelerating his healing ability to the various bruises. It couldn’t do a thing about the dislocated shoulder though. Releasing his shoulder, Ranma sprang forward.

His good hand shot forward in a blur of motion. Before Daishi could retaliate, Ranma was several feet away smirking. Daishi only had a split second to realize that there was a bright red Peebo on his chest. It gave him the Evil Eye of Death and detonated. As did the two on his back, one each leg, and one that dropped down from the ceiling screaming 'Bonzai!'

The multiple explosions sent vibrations throughout the house, but Ranma ignored them as he raced over to the nearest wall to put his dislocated shoulder back into place. Once that was done, he took a second to cast a healing spell on the arm to take care of the remaining damage. His arm would be tender for a couple of days, but other than that it was usable again.

Glancing back at the spot where Daishi had been before the explosion, he noted the jerk was still standing there. Of course there were now little cracks all over his upper body from the shaped charges the Peebo used in their attacks. He was glad he'd thought to use the things in his attack. He'd noticed as they fought that Daishi kept one arm in the same position all the time.

He was positive that it was to block most of his Neko-Ken attacks. Of course, just when you think the fight is over another opponent has to show up. Ranma was starting to notice a pattern from the people attacking him these days. Sighing, he turned just as Ryoga landed on the floor and saw what had happened to Daishi.

"You really should have just gone home." Ranma commented.

Ryoga turned in his direction. "I want my revenge Ranma."

"You think I don't recall how you didn't show up for the last match Ryoga?"

"I showed up and you weren't there!"

"Three days Ryoga, three days and nights I waited. When most people would have left after a couple of hours. You forfeited that fight Ryoga and you know it." Ranma snapped.

"You broke a promise between men Ranma and I will have my revenge!" A dozen bandana suddenly filled the air as they flew at Ranma.


Then evading them was easy and Ranma so barely paid any attention to them. "Ryoga, have you improved at all in the last couple of years?"

Instead of losing his temper, Ryoga just folded his arms and sneered. "You haven't seen anything yet. That stone moron over there is supposed to be a better fighter than both of us put together, but he's so dependent on his stone body that he's practically useless. I've practiced day and night for the last two years, increasing my strength, my speed, and even my skills. You don't stand a chance."


"Brit put it best Ryoga, your lips are flapping, but I don't see 'nothin happening." Ranma snapped and formed a ball of fire in his hand. "How about I show you some of my new techniques."

"Ranma Saotome, Prepare to Die." Ryoga gaveled in a menacing tone of voice.

oooooooooo

Even as the fight raged downstairs Sheila and Britanny were just reaching the living room. Even though Britanny denied it, Sheila could tell the werecheetah wasn’t moving normally. She was even wearing a full body suit instead of her normal revealing clothing.

“Let’s just get out of here and let Ranma take care of this.” Sheila insisted.

“He needs help. Daishi has always given him a problem.”

“Ranma can take care of it.”

“We can still help.” Brit insisted as she leaned over the railing and tried to see downstairs. “Listen to them go! I bet they’re tearing the place up with that much noise. It reminds me of the time that talking dog attacked the house with those clone monsters.”

“Britanny just leave it…”

Sheila stopped talking in mid sentence and looked around the room slowly. Britanny was giving her an odd look as she noticed it too.

“I smell a rat.” She snarled.

“Wererats, and their inside the house already.”

“Those blasted Rats have shown up twice already.” Britanny growled as she scanned the kitchen sniffing the air as she moved around. She quickly made her way over to a small grate next to the door, near the floor. “Here.”

Sheila knelt down and noticed the smell as well. “They are inside this little hole?”

“Air Conditioning grate. Gina used it to cool the house down during the summer.” Brit explained, remembering that Sheila didn’t have much experience with technology.

“Why would they be in there?”

“Because we can’t get in there and they can spy on us.”

“I smell something else as well.”

Brit nodded. “And it smells horrible.”

“What do you want to do?” Sheila asked. “I might be able to squeeze myself inside there in full jaguar form, but I wouldn’t be able to move around that well.”

“We need to flush them out.”

“Any ideas?”

Whump!

“Not…” Britanny’s face suddenly went blank as she exploded into motion, grabbed Sheila, and made it outside in the blink of an eye. They stopped just in time to see a boy explode from the roof of the house and fly into the horizon. Dust and smoke started drifting out of the open kitchen door.

“What the heck?” Sheila gasped.

Then they saw Ranma slowly rising out of the hole in the house. A pale blue glow surrounded him as he hovered in the air watching the boy vanish into low earth orbit. Down below Britanny had never seen Ranma like this. His shirt was ripped to shreds and she could see open wounds on his chest and back. He glanced down at them.

His eyes were glowing a light blue and almost feral in their intensity. Sheila started purring at the sight. Britanny gave her friend a weird look. “Sheila?”

“He’s gorgeous, so…so…manly.”

She gave the boy another look and shrugged. “Not my type really.”

“You’ve already got Stripe, you don’t need anymore than that.”

“Though I suppose he does have a cat like intensity.” She teased.

“Hey.”

“Does this mean the emergency is over?”

“The wererats are still here, and whatever that other smell was.” Sheila reminded her.

Ranma floated to the ground and landed beside the house. The glow slowly vanished as he walked over to the girls. “Thanks for keeping an eye on Britanny, Sheila.”

“Call me Cheetah.” Britanny said and thumped him over the head. “I prefer that.”

With a shrug, Ranma nodded.

“Who was that guy? It wasn’t Daishi, he was to small, and actually looked human.”

“Daishi is down in the garage just below Gina’s lab. He’s not in the best of shape. That guy…” Ranma waved in Ryoga’s direction. “Was the guy that freed him in the first place. Ryoga Hibiki and he was quite a bit stronger than the last time we met.”

“Gave you a challenge?”

“Daishi was easy enough to take down with Brianna’s Peebo running all over the place. Ryoga on the other was able to hold his own against me.”

“What all did he do?”

At this Ranma hesitated. “Well, at first we were fighting hand to hand like I usually do and he wasn’t doing so well against me. Then he…picked up one of Gina’s cars and started swinging it around at me with ease. He was batting me around the garage and laughing about it.”

The girls blinked. “Those cars usually weigh around a ton Ranma. I used to bench press them before Gina built my hydraulic press.” Cheetah said.

“It feels a ton too.”

Now that she looked a little closer Sheila could see a bruise on Ranma’s chest that bore a striking resemblance to tire tracks. “What happened to the car?”

“Ah, I sort of, well, um...blew it up?” Ranma said nervously and scratched the back of his head.

Cheetah whistled. “Gina is going to be so pissed.”

Ranma laughed nervously.

Of course, at that instant, Gina came racing back from the mall. Her tires squealing as the skidded around the corner and onto the property. She jumped out and gaped at the smoke now rising from the hole n the room, fell to her knees, and screamed. “NNNOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!”

Ranma, Britanny, and Sheila all winced.

“She’ll get over it.” Ranma said as he turned to head back to the house. “I’ll be in the house if you need me.”

Cheetah grabbed his shoulder. “You don’t get to run away.”

“I don’t?”

“No.”

Ranma cursed under his breath as Gina came running up, dove over Cheetah with an insane look in her eyes, and tackled him. They rolled a few feet before coming to a stop with Gina on his chest. She started to strangle him and bang his head into the dirt. “What did you do?!”

The girls had to drag Gina off him by force. The girl was snarling like wild animal so Ranma quickly made his way into the house. Maybe fighting the big goof in the basement, away from the lab hadn't been the best idea after all. He just didn't under stand girls at all.

oooooooooo

It didn’t' take long for Ranma to learn to avoid Gina after that. Every time he entered a room, Gina would glare at him and subtly glance at the roof, and then turn an even darker glare on him. It only took him ten minutes to learn that one, but he learned it well. Do not, under any circumstances, fight in the house. Within the hour she had him on the roof patching up the hole.

Of course it didn't help that she was standing over him with an energy whip snarling. Cheetah and Sheila had mysteriously disappeared as well. Ranma could have finished the job quickly, but one look at Gina squashed that idea. Sighing, he took a few hours to fix the hole, then the shingles, and the sun panels Gina used to add extra power to the house.

Once that was done she grabbed his ear, twisted, and dragged him down to the basement to fix everything that was broken down there too. So Ranma didn't see the girls working away in the main room of the house. These repairs, with Gina's special materials and work bots, took the better part of the afternoon. He almost complained when she wouldn't let him up for a break, but one crack of that whip told him she meant business. He sat back on his knees and gave her a look as soon as he finished.

Gina stalked around the basement inspecting every square inch for the millionth time, looking for the slightest flaw in his work. "I suppose…it's adequate."

"Can I go?"

She glanced at the timer on the wall. "My lab is still damaged."

"I didn't break that." Ranma snapped.

"You almost leveled my newly built house. I don't care who broke what." She growled.

Ranma sighed. "Daishi and Ryoga did the damage."

"But this Ryoga, whom you lauched through the house and into orbit isn't here. You are."

He laughed nervously and didn't see her eying him out of the corner of her eye. She was good at that kind of thing.

"I suppose I might let you go…" She hinted.

"What else do you want me to do?"

She frowned. "Do you really want to be taking that tone with me?"

"Aagh! Um, I'm sorry?" Ranma started to sweat.

"How do I know you actually mean that?" She huffed and tapped the folded up whip against the palm of her hand.

"Of course I mean it."

"You knew the house was just reconstructed and yet you nearly leveled it again. Even Brit won't do that kind of thing here."

"But Daishi…"

"Would have probably left on his own." She lied. Gina was starting to wonder just how far she could take this now that she had him right where she wanted him.

She stepped closer to him and knelt down. Now Gina likes to wear skin tight clothing, even when she's on an excavation. So she was wearing her usual spandex clothing as she squatted before him, legs spread wide, resting on her toes. She smirked a little as he leaned back. His eyes were exactly where she wanted them.


"Um…" He gulped. Ranma really wanted to know what it was about girls that made them act so weird just when he thought he had figured them out a little.

"Maybe I should find a different way to punish you for the rest of the damage." She purred, just a hint of malice in her voice.

"No, I think I'll finish the repairs myself." Ranma muttered.

She thrust her chest out a little and watched his eyes grow a little wider. Her shirt allowed for a lot of cleavage to show. Combine that with the fact that she was just a little sweaty after all that supervising, so her breasts really caught his attention. "I think I have other plans now." With a tiny little push he fell back and she crawled over him.

Ranma cringed back as she hovered over him, her long blonde hair falling across his chest. He could hear his heart beating a little to loudly and wondered if she could hear it too. From the look on her face she must be hearing it. Then she went and leaned down just inches from his face and he could feel her breath on his cheek. He looked around desperately for a way to get out of this situation.

"I heard what you did to Brianna this morning. Such a naughty boy."

"Um…"

"I think you know what I want." Gina said, running her fingers over his chest.

Ranma squeaked and vanished from the basement in a flash of light. This left Gina hovering above the floor for a split second before gravity took over and she fell down. Rattling off a sting of cuss words, Gina took a minute to bang her head against the floor. Then with a sigh she slumped and slowly got to her feet and brushed her clothes off.

"I wasn't aware he knew how to do that yet. I'll have to have another look at daddy's training schedual I guess." Gina muttered to herself as she calmly walked out of the room and headed back upstairs. She took a second to tap a micro button on the rim of her glasses and watched as several maps flashed before her eyes.

Seconds later she had to grin a little wider. Ranma had run from her, right to the roof of her father's mansion just down the block. By the time she arrived at her lab she could tell that the damage wasn't as extensive as she thought earlier. She moved over to a terminal on the far side of the room and tapped a sequence of numbers on the keyboard.

A hologram filled the center of the room as she tapped into a couple of satellites. Within seconds she had her father's mansion displayed in the center of the room and could see Ranma laying on the roof looking confused. The boy really needed a reeducation in certain life facts. Pulling out her cell phone, she called the mansion.


"Mom?"

"Gina, how goes the plan?"

"There have been a few bumps, but everything is going to plan for the most part."

"What can I do for you?"

"Can you send Ranma home in about an hour?"

"Sure, I assume he's on the roof for a reason?"

"Yep." She said in amusment.

"Ah, we aren't going to have another rendition of Chase the Boyfriend are we?"

"Why what do you mean?" Gina said, trying to sound innocent.

"Séance still hasn't recovered from your attentions, then having to go through even more with Brianna." Julia said. "Just mentioning your names sends him into cold sweats."

Gina laughed. "Then he needs to build up some endurance."

This made Julia laugh, she knew all about chasing men. She did it, her mother did it, and her mother's mother even did so. It was a family tradition, Gina seemed to just chase more than one man around though. "I'll head up there and talk to him."

"Thanks mom."

oooooooooo

Lydia’s cell phone started vibrating. Frowning, she glanced at Moesha and Romeo, who both looked a bit confused. All three were in the Digger’s attic sitting in a circle. They were in their hybrid human/rat forms. Several dead pigs were scattered around them as well. Moving slowly, Lydia pulled her phone out. “Hello?”

“It’s Gothwrain, why isn’t the house a burning wreck?”

“Sir, something odd is going on in the house. Most of the diggers are gone or doing something in the living room.”

“I don’t like hearing excuses Lydia.”

She shivered.

“I saw that the rock ninja was released, but hasn’t done much damage.”

“Julia’s new student defeated him again.”

“I suspected as much. Now what about the werecheetah?”

“We haven’t been able to find her.”

“Why?” His voice was ice cold.

“S-sir, we couldn’t get into certain areas and continue to maintain stealth, so we’ve been waiting for things to quiet down.”

“The werecheetah is injured. She should be easy to take out. Do it now, or else.” The phone went dead and Lydia could only stare at it.

“Like that was harsh.” Moesha muttered.

Romeo sighed. “We need to take her down or Gothwrain will kill us.”

“I’m so tired of this crap.” Lydia growled.

“We can’t do anything about it Lyds.” Moesha said.

“All we ever get is threats to our lives if we fail. We grew up with that crap, we trained with that bull$#!&, and now this. Putting the bell on the werecheetah’s neck was enough. Almost getting caught at that airport was even worse.”

Romeo nodded. “Gothwrain had Zero beat us for that.”

“Then paying all that money back.” Moesha shuddered. “We have to complete this mission.”

“I just want to live in peace without the threat of death over my head.” Lydia growled. She pulled a dagger out of her and stared at it.

Romeo and Moesha looked at each other. They weren’t used to Lydia talking like this. The short haired wererat glanced at her two companions as she stood up and started pacing.

“Like, are we going to get the werecheetah?”

“No.” Lydia decided. “I’m leaving.”

“Leaving?” Romeo asked. He looked astounded.

Lydia nodded. “I just want to live in peace for a while, without the threat of death hanging over my head.”

“But Gothwrain…”

“Forget him. I’m going to lie on a beach for the next two weeks and forget everything that's happened today.” Lydia said and transformed into her rat form and raced out of the room through a hole in the wall. Romeo and Moesha were right on her tail.

Half a world away Gothwrain watched as his soldiers abandoned the house and took off. He didn’t budge a muscle as they betrayed their oaths to him and the clan. This was exactly what he wanted them to do. His plans were going perfectly, with everyone doing exactly what he predicted they would. Now it was time to set in motion the next step of his plan.


oooooooooo

As the day progressed Ranma spent the afternoon sparing with Julia's two newest students, Luan and Carla. He found that dodging them was easy enough, but if he engaged them they would quickly overwhelm his defenses and send him flying across the yard. Luan he found, tended to draw him into subtle traps before she struck. Usually by locking her legs around his head, flipping them around, and tossing him to Carla.

Now blue haired Carla was a surprise. She was right in his face from the moment she attacked. They would dance around the yard attacking and counter attacking at blinding speeds. Both girls showed lots of acrobatic training as well as a grounding in Ninjitsu style.

Ranma was quite impressed by how serious the girls fought.

They gave everything they had and more. That was something most of his fights seemed to lack at times. Ranma had taken Ryoga out by using some of the very moves that Luan was using, a feint followed by a quick, but powerful attack. He'd fallen for it completely. Ranma also noticed from the way the girls moved that they were wary of his hands for some reason. Always keeping their bodies facing him even while they were in mid air.

He could also tell that they were quite good at Leep Palm style of martial arts. Julia's style just seemed to flow through them. Though he had to admit that Luan was better at the power blows used by the art. She got him in one of her traps and he landed two blocks away in some guys pool. After shaking himself off and a quick change back into a man, Ranma raced back and they started fighting all over again.

Julia watched from a nearby table. She could see Ranma improving on Leep style with every attack the girls made. Ranma just seemed to adapt instantly. Off to the side she had Gar going through several advanced forms that were even challenging his werecat reflexes. The forms were designed to be used by masters only, so she didn’t expect him to get them anytime soon.

Some time later Julia clapped her hands and got everyone's attention. "That’s enough for today. Gar, I want you working on those forms for the rest of the month. You need to feel them, not force them. Luan, you are doing quite well. Carla, you need to work on your hit strength, you have the speed down, but that's useless if you can't hit very hard."

The three students quickly headed into the house to get cleaned up. Julia noticed that Gar didn't even look in Ranma's direction and hadn't since the boy arrived a few hours before. "Ranma, you held up quite well. I noticed that you were giving Luan quite a challenge, she was getting frustrated."

Ranma nodded. "She seems to depend on the same attacks though. The same with Carla. Both girls seemed to keep repeating themselves as they fought. It was easy to pick up the patterns as they fought and block them. If I'd fought them for another half hour I think I would have been able to block anything they sent at me."

"I just got them as students. As for their attack style, they were training under Master Leep and he is a complete pervert. The girls have to always keep him in sight and certain body parts away from or else they were fair game."

"Ah." Ranma said. "Should I have tried to use a Ki attack against them?"

She shook her head. "Both of them know how to deflect a Ki attack. It's something you learn how to do learning under Master Leep."

"So, anything I need to do now?"

"Just get cleaned up and head back to Gina's house. She said that dinner would be done in about forty minutes."

"No problem."

Just as Ranma coming back downstairs, after borrowing Dr. Diggers shower, Ranma noticed that Sheila had come by. She turned and smiled at him. "Ranma, Gina said you can come home now and that she's not mad anymore."

He shrugged. "Good, I'm pretty hungry."

"There are a couple of guests at the house as well. You met them a few days ago on that Island." Sheila said. Gina had been kind of vague about the Island, just saying that it was more than it seemed and that she hadn't gotten enough time to explore something so large.

Ranma looked a little confused. "I thought those two were enemies or something? We did have to fight them a couple of times."

"Gina didn't say."

Julia shooed them outside. "Better get out of here or you'll miss dinner."

That got Ranma out of the house almost instantly. "Let's go!"

Sheila giggled as she grabbed his arm and steered him towards the sidewalk. "Well this should be interesting at least."

"Food." Ranma said and his stomach growled.

As they approached the house Ranma only had one thing on his mind, food. So he failed to noticed that there were several cars parked in the driveway and that the underground garage was open. He absently moved through the parked cars and made his way to the front door. Sundown was nearly over so very little light illuminated the sky.

Light shone from almost every window in the house and still Ranma didn't noticed anything out of the ordinary. Sheila just followed along behind him and looked amused. It was as if Ranma had a one track mind. She smiled as Ranma opened door and stepped inside. Forty people stood in the front room and they all yelled, "SURPRISE!"

Ranma froze in place as he quickly noticed a bunch of people he didn't know standing under a banner that said 'HAPPY BIRTHDAY RANMA'

"What the F…" He started to say, but a laughing Sheila put her hand over his mouth.

"It's a party birthday boy."

He blinked. "Huh?"

Gina came forward, along with several others, with Nodoka at her side. "Your eighteen today Ranma, Happy Birthday."

If that didn't confuse him, he about ran for it when the older red headed woman stepped forward and gave him a super powered hug. "My son! Happy Birthday!"

Several people started to laugh at the look on his face, one of complete shock and a bit of panic.

"Um…"

Then with a naughty smirk, Gina reached up, pulled Ranma out of Nodoka's arms, and gave the birthday boy a kiss on the lips. She didn't let up for nearly two minutes and only broke the kiss to gasp for air. Giving him a wink, she licked her lips, and stepped back. Off to the side Nodoka grinned as her plan started to go into action. Gina and the other girls had been more than willing to go along with it.

Sheila spun Ranma around, transformed into her tall, busty, red headed human form, and tried to suck his tonsils out. By the time she finished Ranma couldn’t seem to think straight and the girls were already lining up for their turn. Brianna took her turn next, giving his butt a good squeeze in the process. Penny jumped in, followed by Asrial, then Cheetah who gave him a kiss on the cheek and a wink.

The room was starting to blur a bit as Charlotte got her kiss in. Ranko, dressed in a tight fitting spandex outfit jumped in took her turn. Ranma stumbled back as she broke the kiss, but this allowed Itchi to get a kiss in as well. Giving him a well executed Stealth Goose just for letting her play. A shorthaired athletic girl stepped in and stuck her tongue into his mouth.

"Genn!" Gina yelled and chased the girl across the room.

Carla, Luan, and a tall girl in a leather outfit stepped forward and gave him a three way kiss. Once they were done Ranma was starting to think straight again and gave the three girls a look. Carla just smirked a little. "You know me and Luan, but this our friend Ayane. She was interested in meeting you after she heard you beat Ryan Tabbot."

"I'd nearly forgot about him." Ranma said, gaining a bit of his confidence back. Having a dozen girls standing around kissing you will do that.

"Ranma has always been a talented fighter." Ayane said.

It didn’t take long for Ranma to realize that Ayane was wearing a pair of sunglasses to hide her eyes. He wasn't really thinking about that though, instead his eyes were drawn to her abs. They were on display and impossible not to notice. Suddenly a hand grabbed his elbow and spun him to the side.

"My turn." Mimi said as she wrapped herself around him.

"Mmmph!"

Blushing like a schoolgirl, Mimi ran from the room as several of the male guest started doing cat calls. Then a pair of massive breasts filled Ranma's vision and he looked up between the valley of cleavage just as Crush leaned down and took her turn. Danielle Carter, the Avenger (Pink Avenger), took over the instant Crush or Barbra Duncan was finished. By now Ranma was learning how to kiss back and the girls were enjoying it as much as he was.

Then Gina pounced on him from nowhere and took a second turn. This time Ranma managed to get her to really get into it. She was panting by the time she finished. Then much to Ranma's surprise Empress Lynn stepped in and out did Gina. As she broke away he noticed Kahn dragging her off to the other side of the room. He nodded at Ranma. Lynn looked extremely pleased with herself as she stuck her tongue out at Gina.

Turning to go and find a chair to sit down in, Ranma found himself standing before Agent Xane and Agent Will. Xane picked him up and bodily to give him another mind numbing kiss. She broke the kiss with a pop and smirked at him. "Not bad kid, you have potential."

Ranma couldn’t form a coherent thought.

"So where's this cake?" Xane asked as she walked off.

"No sweats Xane, you had two dozen doughnuts for lunch." Will snapped.

Just as they left Ranma saw that there was another giant in front of him and looked up into the amused eyes of Monty. Ayane, who had brought the tall man over smirked. "This is Monty, he's one of Gina's friends."

"Aye lad, I've heard a bit about you from Gina."

"Nice to meet you?"

"You ever thought about fighting in the arena?" Monty asked.

"Arena?"

Ayane nodded. "Wrestling, and martial arts, for those fighters that have gone beyond the norm. We only fight the best."

"I've never heard of it." Ranma admitted.

"It can be quite fun and challenging." Monty admitted. "Ayane here has been trying to get Carla into the ring. There are various classes, if you have powers or are a really skilled fighter you can qualify for the higher ranks. You should come and see a few matches just to see if it's for you." Monty said and handed over a book of tickets. "Happy Birthday. Those tickets are for front row seats."

"Cool." Ranma said. He stuffed the tickets into his shirt.

"Rrraaannmmmaaa…." A voice moaned in his hear.

Half a second later Mimi was back for more and this time she pulled a Brianna and squeezed his butt. Off to the side Ranma saw Nodoka again and what she said to him earlier finally registered. He turned and walked over to the woman. "What did you mean by son?"

"You're my son." Nodoka said and gave him another hug. "You're so manly. So many girls that want to please you."

"Are you the one that set this up?"

Nodoka grinned and nodded. "I only want the best for my son."

"Where were you all this time?"

"That's a long story and not something that needs to be discussed on your birthday. I want to see my son enjoying himself." She said and handed him fifty count box of condoms with a little bow on it. "Have fun with the girls."

Ranma started sputtering.

"Oh, that sounds like so much fun." A female voice said and a pair of female arms wrapped around Ranma. "I can go for miles and miles, if you know what I mean." Genn sang.

"What!?"

"Genn! Cut it out!" Brianna yelled and chased the shape changer off before she started taking Ranma's clothing off. "Blasted perv is on a roll tonight."

Now Ranma was starting to get really confused. Everyone seemed to think it was his birthday, some old lady claiming to be his mother wanted him to have sex with the girls, and all the girls were kissing him and right. He was getting looks of jealously from every guy in the room too. It didn't take him long too decided that he needed to get out of there and think.

Several more girls ambushed him as he stood there. His face was getting covered in lipstick marks, though he didn't know it. One of the girls had pulled his shirt loose in the back as well. That was when Gina came back into the room with a large cake wheeled out on a mobile tray. Thanking god, Ranma headed for the food.

He was just a few steps away from the food he wanted so bad when Gina motioned for him to stop. “You need to do a couple of things before you can eat any of this Ranma.”

Now he frowned. “I’m hungry.”

She sighed and lit several candles. “You need to blow these out first. It’s a tradition.”

Now he was becoming frustrated and his stomach growled its own threat. It would not be denied. “What else.”

Grinning naughtily, Gina just grinned. “You only have one eighteenth birthday Ranma. We, meaning all the girls, thought you needed to be educated about a few things now that you’re old enough.”

“Like what?”

“Well Brianna tried to jump the gun this morning with her little stunt, but for tonight you need become a man.” She had ‘that’ glint in her eye that said ‘fresh meat’.

Ranma gulped. “Hey now, no need to get…”

“I think it’s a lovely idea Ranma.” Nodoka said.

“You never mentioned anything about this Gina.” Sheila said flatly.

“He can pick who he wants.”

“Gina, baby, you can’t mean it.” Ryan appeared out of nowhere, but the blonde haired scientist ignored him.

“Well?” She asked Ranma.

“I…”

Several girls stepped towards Ranma. Feeling like a trapped animal, Ranma jumped to the ceiling and quickly crawled into the ceiling crawlspace and vanished from sight. Several of the girls sighed and looked towards Gina. The Blonde frowned and shook her head.

“I thought he would run for the door. I have that booby trapped.”

Shrinking down into her hybrid form, Sheila grinned as she jumped up to the hole Ranma made and moved after him. Mimi quickly followed as well, much to her cat’s astonishment. It made a mental note to get Mimi drunk on spiked punch more often.

“So now what sis?” Cheetah asked.

“I suppose we find him and drag him back. He still has presents to open.”

“I don’t think he’s going to pick a girl.”

Gina shrugged. “I was only teasing.”

Cheetah rolled her eyes. “Yeah right, I know you Gina, you want him even more than Brianna does.”

With a huff, Gina looked to the side. “Aunty, what do you say?”

“He’s to shy.” The older woman admitted. “It’s so cute, but anyone of you can cure him of that…”

“Aghaaaa!”

Gina spun around. “That came from the kitchen!”

“Get off!”

Everyone ran over and looked in to see that Ranma and Sheila had fallen through the ceiling. Somehow Sheila had managed to rip most of Ranma shirt off and was latched onto him like an eel. All the girls drooled at the sight of Ranma’s bare chest.

Nodoka took this opportunity to spike the punch a little more with her secret recipe. She figured that most of the girls were affected by the punch already. Mimi had downed at least six cups before Ranma even arrived. The ghost following Monty around kept coming back for more. The floating cup was a dead give away, along with the floating six-pack.

Stepping into the kitchen, Gina pulled Sheila off of Ranma. “Thanks for catching him. Now Ranma, you need to blow out the candles on the cake and open your presents.”

The boy sat up, making half the girls sigh, and eyed Gina. “What about the other stuff?”

“We can skip that if you want.”

He sighed in relief.

“Now come back to the party.”

Blowing the candles out was easy enough. Once that was done Nodoka handed Ranma some punch and led him over to the front room where a small stack of presents sat on the coffee table. “What do I do with these?”

“Their presents.”

Ranma just looked confused. “So? The only presents I ever got were empty sake bottles tossed at me when pops went on a bender.”

“Just open them.” Gina growled.

“Feh.”

Most of them were relatively small…someone was rubbing their head against his butt and purring. Ranma looked down and half a second later Genn launched out of the roof in a hale of shingles. Huffing, Ranma sat down and grabbed the first present.

“A bag of peanuts?” He blinked.

“That’s from me!” Charlotte admitted with a giggle. “They’re so gooood.”

“Um, thanks.”

Charlotte did a little happy dance, which amused Penny and Ace. They were sitting next to the girl.

His next present was a ball of yarn. “What the heck?” Then Cheetah was next to him looking at the yarn with wide sparkling eyes.

“It’s so stringy…”

“Cheetah!” Gina yelled as the girl stole the yarn and raced out of the room.

Ranma’s eye started to twitch a little. Ripping the paper off the next package, he opened a slightly heavy box to find several magic books from Dr. Diggers. “These will be fun to read.”

“Of course.” The Aura Mage said, startling Ranma. The man smirked around his pipe. “What’s I hear about you trying to do things to my daughters?” His fiery demon head flared up, eyes narrowed, and he growled evilly.

Julia, standing next to him, swatted him across the back of the head. “Cut that out. Here Ranma, I had this made for you a few days ago.”

In her hand was an elaborate very well made Katana blade. He took it and examined the blade a little closer. The weapon was actually combat ready. “Thank you.”

“You welcome. Learning how to use it properly should keep you occupied for the next few weeks.”

Carla and Luan ambushed him suddenly and stole another kiss. They ran off giggling as Ranma growled in frustration and blushed. The rest of the room laughed as he turned back to the table and picked up another small package and ripped the paper off.

“Huh?”

“You can never have to many of those.” Nodoka said with a glint in her eye.”

Ranma’s mother was a complete pervert. He’d never met a female pervert before, but that was the only way to describe the strange woman. “Um, whatever.”

“We’ll have to talk later, but for now, enjoy your party. We have all night.”

Brianna used her foot to scoot a slightly larger present towards him. She grinned a little. “You should like that one.”

Opening the box slowly, he found himself staring at something he didn’t ever expect to see again. “B?”

“Hey $#&hole, how’s it hanging?” B asked as he slowly rose out of the box and hovered in front of him.

“I completely rebuilt him.” Brianna explained. That bracer you wore survived so I was able to download his while personality into his new and improved body. Right now he has three modes that you can use at any time, flight, ground, or water mode. Each one comes with it’s own special weapon.”

“Hey cool, I actually missed the little guy.”

“#$%&*” B growled as he flew around the room.

As B entertained himself, Ranma grabbed the next present. He held up a medallion about the size of a half dollar. “Hmm…”

“That’s a good luck charm.” Mimi tells him. “It’s from me, Asrial, and Itchi. It’s the real deal too. It’ll help you out when you least expect it too.”

Ranma could see the magical energies swirling around the little object with his magical senses. “Thanks.”

Mimi blushed and drank some more punch. Her head was feeling so fuzzy all of a sudden and she couldn’t figure out why her familiar Aloysius was snickering at her from under the chair.

“These are some great presents.” Ranma said as he grabbed the last one. The box was a little small, but he was just confused as he pulled out a computer chip.

“That’s mine.” Gina piped up. Ryan was sitting a few feet away looking like someone kicked his dog. “I saw that Brianna was fixing B up for you, we all have a Peebo from her, so I thought I’d help out a bit. That chip can be put in your computer bracer and it will enhance its abilities a hundred fold. I just need to install it.”

“Cool.”

From there the party was normal enough. Everyone had cake and ice cream while they played around. Monty slapped Ryan around during a spar. Ayane slapped Ryan around too, much to his embarrassment. By the time the party ended a couple of hours later Ranma was on his fifth cup of punch and feeling a little woozy.

Gina took a few minutes to install the chip in his new and improved computer bracer. Along with monitoring B’s status and hard drive, it also connected right into Gina’s computer system, giving him access to her whole library of information. This included missions.

Julia showed him a few sword moves to memorize before their next sparing session. It was late when everyone started to leave. Ranma didn’t noticed this of course, he was to busy practicing with his new toys. Charlotte snatched the peanuts and vanished when Penny headed home. Ranma hoped she enjoyed them.

He was exhausted by the time Julia let him off for the night. After she headed home he headed inside and saw that the Gina’s house bots were cleaning up the mess and returning every thing to normal.

“Where did you put my stuff?”

“In your room sir.” House bot 7007 replied as he lifted the couch up and vacuumed under it.

“Cool, thanks.”

Yawning, he headed upstairs, entered his room, and froze. Seconds later, from outside, Ranma tried to dive out the window. Only to have several arms, female arms, latch onto him and drag him back into the room. His scream was drowned out as the window shut, the curtains shut, and the lights went out.

oooooooooo

The End…For Now

End notes: Well didn’t this take forever and a day to write up. This took quite a bit of effort to get it to this point and a lot of prodding from Gordon to finish it off. I hope everyone enjoys my ending there. Yes Ranma is getting what you think he is, will I reveal just who gets him? Eventually I will, but for now this is the end of the six month GD crossover arc of the story. It’s nearly 60 pages of fun, fluff, and insanity.

What more do you need?

GO will continue, don’t worry about that, but I’m kind of burned out on it right now and want to take a break from it to focus on a few other things without worrying about it in the back of my head. The next few things I post will probably finish off several stories, so keep an eye out.

CRose