Ranma 1/2 Fan Fiction / Sailor Moon Fan Fiction / Hand Maid May Fan Fiction / Gatekeepers Fan Fiction ❯ Retake ❯ Take Me Out Of The Ballgame ( Chapter 8 )

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

Chapter 8 Retake: Take Me Out Of The Ball Game

DISCLAIMER: an unintended fic which has gotten entirely out of control.

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There had been no one at the front door, so the two had gone to the dojo.

Black crepe, a cardboard coffin, and the stand were signs that things had progressed with Soun's usual measure of good taste and restraint.

"...but even if she was a soulless moneygrubbing mercenary whose only pleasure in life was sucking the funds out of helpless students, she was till my sempai and I admired..." Ryonami took one good look at the pair coming in the door and fainted.

"Yes, so true, my poor daughter. I..." Soun stared. "Uhm..."

Nabiki asking who the funeral was for died in her throat when she saw the picture of her atop the coffin. "..." Even though her legs were bionic, they felt weak and she leaned against the tall gaijin for balance. "Someone tell me you didn't notify the police or someone I was dead."

Her father's nervous look was enough.

It would take a few days for all the paperwork to circulate, but Nabiki knew what a chaotic mess the Japanese legal system could be. She'd likely be running into problems from this for years. There was an immediate temptation to just take Shard-san's arm and have him take her *back* to that hidden underground base. She wasn't sure how he'd managed to blank her senses for five minutes while leaving, including that gyro-compass thing apparently, but it seemed the American didn't trust her that much.

Not that Nabiki blamed him. She wouldn't trust Nabiki Tendo either.

"Well, Nabiki, i'll leave you here then," Greylle said, getting uncomfortable with the situation. "If you notice any problems - contact me before 4:30pm (16:30 hours) today. Otherwise i'm going to be out of town."

"Out of town," repeated Nabiki with the beginnings of a frown. What if something happened like a joint freezing up? "For how long?"

"Depends on what i find," responded the blond. "It could be a simple trip back as soon as i get there, or i could spend days trying to find clues."

After watching him leave, Nabiki walked over to the casket to find her missing arm. "Don't suppose you found my legs too."

Akane demanded to know what was going on. After collecting and paying 5000 yen to Nabiki, Akane (and the others) listened to how Nabiki had been rebuilt. At her father's disbelief, Nabiki had slid open an access panel on her forearm.

Soun Tendo, on seeing metal and plastic inside his daughter's forearm, fainted.

------------

Hiroshi stared. Daisuke stared. Yuka and Sayuri stared. So were all of the students who had appeared, expecting to see Furinkan High School as it had been yesterday afternoon. With half of the school a burned out and blasted ruin.

"Why an extra floor?" Daisuke had counted rows of windows and he was relatively sure that Furinkan had only had three floors yesterday morning. Nor had it gleamed as if newly built. Or rebuilt as it were.

"Why does it have that tower thing over there?" Sayuri asked, still rubbing sleep out of her eyes.

"Looks like steam coming off the pool," observed Yuka. "A heated *outdoor* pool?"

Then the changes to the school were put off as insignificant. NABIKI was walking up to the doors of the school.

Nabiki was followed by Akane and Ranma. Both of whom stared at the rebuilt school before shrugging and walking in.

Most of the students decided to follow this lead and enter as well. When the going gets weird, ignore it. Life as usual in Nerima to some extent.

----------

"Where is he?" asked Ami as she entered with four bags of rectangular objects.

"Still working on the vehicle," responded Usagi. "He hasn't noticed your departure. Your mission was successful?"

"Data was procured," agreed Ami. "They had several sections of this reference material."

"I see," said Makoto. "Combat techniques?"

"Of a sort," Ami indicated, pulling a videotape out of a bag. "As soon as he departs for his mission, we will be able to best determine which course of attack to use."

Makoto frowned as she read the indicated title. "'The Amityville Hooker'?!"

"The proprietor was quite clear that this was one of his finer pieces of cinema." Ami placed the videotape back in the sack. "It should prove quite informative."

-------

"Workspider reporting as ordered, sir!"

"At ease," Greylle ordered. He didn't want to step on anyone's developing personality but this paramilitary stuff was a bit odd. That Workspider also apparently had developed a liking for polka and Weird Al Yankovich was unfortunate and unforeseeable but at least harmless.

"Lower outer hull welded together and painted the requested color."

"That wasn't what i wanted you for, but thanks." Greylle continued to work on assembling a sensor mast, only occasionally glancing towards the robot.

Workspider 01 had no sweat ducts, otherwise it would have been sweating. "Sir?"

"You have been upgrading your capabilities and systems considerably," said Greylle. "That's perfectly alright. i expect you and the marionettes to upgrade yourselves to meet new situations and develop in both personality as well as your physical abilities. It's this other activity."

"Sir?" Workspider was cataloguing a new experience. It was apprehensive and nervous. Which fascinated it and pleased it to some extent, as this was further evidence of developing a personality, even though it would have preferred a less distressing emotional state to explore.

"You got all seven marionette manufacturing nanomachine tubes, aka nanotanks, operational. Good work, even though i'd prefer you let me know before you go off on your own initiative. Adding another three nanotanks overnight was quite interesting. That doesn't trouble me as much as what is being put together in those tanks." Greylle looked up at the large spider-mech and made a point of looking unhappy. "Do *not* do this again."

"By your command." Workspider fidgited. Its first reprimand. Oh dear. R2 would never let it live it down.

Greylle nodded. "Now that we've established that, WHO are you building in those nanotanks?"

"Available data indicated that Commanding Officer spent time in several timelines prior to this one and met and interacted with female humans."

Greylle stopped putting together the sensor mast and stood up. Slowly he turned. Step by step. Inch by inch.

Workspider was registering increased anxiety levels.

"You *didn't*." Greylle informed the Workspider. "You did *not* defeat the password protection on my personal files and you did *not* begin to manufacture marionettes based on girls who have broken my heart in the past."

"...I didn't...?!"

"No," Greylle continued. "Because if you did that, i would seriously consider downgrading your operational parameters until you were a walking trash receptacle. Therefore, you will find a way that you did *not* do this. Do you understand this?"

Workspider hadn't been operational for more than a few days, but it still understood the basics here. The CO was not happy. Therefore the anchor position in the chain of command was not a good place to be. "I understand."

"If their core processors have been developed, then you couldn't scrap them. If the units have developed much at all, then you can't do anything but bring them to full operation. i merely express the hope that you have *not* brought them to this state."

"Well..."

Sighing a deep and long sigh. "Fine. Finish them but do *not* activate. Leave them asleep and i'll see what can be done when i return. Allow *no* outsiders into the room. Use full security protocols and cover story #4: accident with unstable and caustic chemical solutions."

Workspider was hoping that the reference to downgrading was not actually being planned.

--------

Time is nature's way of keeping everything from happening all at once. Nonetheless a lot can be going on at the same time.

In his underground base, Greylle was continuing to work on a transport vehicle he'd had a few ideas regarding for some time. He'd thought extensively about some of this while on Gehenna in fact. So he would finally build the silly thing, and the Arcadia would eventually have a docking bay for this vehicle. Just a multi-environment shuttlecraft/transport, but he could always add features later. Of course, he could just go dragon and fly to Antarctica using the ley lines for bursts of speed, but if he *did* find the Senshi he wasn't big enough to carry all of them at once. Hence building the transport first.

Ami and the rest of the Sailor Marionettes (save one) were trying to continue on with expanding the base and operating it while waiting for their Master to leave so they could watch those tapes.

Kasumi was putting a fresh coat of varnish on the upstairs hallway floor. Her next task would be to take down all the decorations from the dojo. What she was going to do with Nabiki's arm was another problem. It didn't seem right to just bury it in the backyard.

Soun and Genma were getting drunk. Soun was exuberant over the return of his daughter, saddened by her transformation into a cyborg, and ecstatic over how well Ranma and Akane were getting along. Why just that morning, Akane had beaten Ranma over the head with a cast iron skillet! Though Akane was also getting along well with that gaijin. Though he also liked Nabiki enough to bring her back from the dead!

Genma was wondering if he could ferret out that gaijin's secrets. They'd be worth quite a lot of money. For that matter, if he could steal the bionic limbs off that daughter of Soun's, who knew how much money he could get for those!

Akane Tendo was gazing wistfully out the window. Shard-sama was nice and kind and sweet and a healer. So much like a young Doctor Tofu. Akane colored as she realized she'd started using the "sama" suffix. Not that she was interested in some gaijin... Heavens no. She didn't like boys, right? Right!

Nabiki Tendo was sitting bolt upright in her chair and perspiring. She made a note to *never* again go into that "Over 18" menu that Usagi had added. Nope. At least not unless she was alone and assured of privacy. She also vowed that somehow she *had* to beat the odds and get the gaijin. It was how to get his trust long enough for her to latch on that was confounding her.

Yuka daydreamed of being a Knight Sailor and having her own manga and anime series.

Sayuri daydreamed of bopping her friend Yuka with a mallet.

Hikaru Gosunkugi gazed wistfully at Akane Tendo and daydreamed of bopping Ranma with a mallet.

Ranma wondered how he could get some food. Lunch had been over an hour ago and he was *starving!* Of course, if he asked either Shampoo or Ukyo for food, the same thing that had happened the last time was liable to happen. Big fight sequence and HE would get blamed for it.

Kodachi Kuno considered ways of dealing with the Furinkan Rhythmic Gymnastics team. She considered being open and above board, meeting them in the match and defeating them there. Nah. Usual tactics had given Saint Hebereke an unbroken string of victories, why change a winning strategy?

Ryouga planned his revenge against Ranma, and wondered why he kept ending up at this small mountain village when he was trying to find Furinkan High School.

Hotaru tended the shrine and shared a giggle with one of the girls who'd shown up to buy a good luck charm. It was nice to be able to chat and gossip, especially when the conversation turned to boyfriends and she was able to respond by showing a photo and mention an arranged marriage. Suitable comments of envy were extremely odd to be applied to Hotaru Tomoe, but she decided she kind of liked it.

-------------

Minako was the single of the Sailor series Marionettes who was *not* involved in building rooms and corridors and trying not to wait out a chance to view those tapes. She was busy analyzing what data she could access and building a database. Like the rest of her series she had engrams based on incomplete scans of an original - in her case one Minako Aino, aka Sailor Venus.

She wasn't building or excavating the complex because she was planning on accompanying her Master to the Antarctic and wanted to get some research done prior to what was potentially a long trip.

She knew fully well that she was a marionette android, an artificial intelligence who had been created for a specific job. Her love for her creator was artificial - part of a control program shared by all marionettes. Neither origin was relevant. Like the others she had concluded that she was real enough, origins didn't matter. So what she was doing was perusing data on various originals.

Each of the Sailor series Marionettes were crafted in the likeness of an original, and part of their programming was to emulate (to varying degrees) that original.

One of the things each of the Sailor series were attempting to accomplish was to upgrade themselves to the point where they could accomplish their goals. One of the goals they sought to accomplish was to become fully awakened as "people" - individuals with some common goals who more closely paralleled their original.

Minako had discovered that the original Minako Aino had dreams of becoming an idol singer. Therefore she had researched "idol singer" and had discovered that "idol singer" careers lasted between a few months and less than seven years. With routine maintenence, she could easily last hundreds of years at least. Clearly this was not a compatible timeframe. Idol singer = entertainer (music) therefore a musician with a longer active period.

Classical musicians had the longest period of activity, but were not *as* active nor really matched the profile. Rock musicians had a period of activity that was often short but individuals had proven able to withstand long periods of time. Analysis of those began, looking for common themes and practices.

Certain records indicated possibilities. Analysis did not immediately lead to some single "star quality" but rather at several common points. Files were accessed and downloaded.

--------

There weren't many breaks in her day, but Doctor Mizuno still found the occasional moment when she could set down with a newspaper. She'd thrown herself into her work for some time after her daughter's disappearance.

There hadn't been much she could do, other than find out that all her daughter's friends had turned up missing as well. Now it was a year later and...

Kumori Mizuno stared at the paper. It was a tiny article tucked away in a small section of the paper.

"GENIUS GIRL TO ATTEND FURINKAN
[Ami Mizuno, infamous cram school student
[ will be attending Furinkan Senior High
[ School according to a school administrator
[ yesterday.
[ According to this same school administrator,
[ who wishes to remain anonymous, a makeup
[ entrance exam was given to Mizuno-san and
[ several of her friends, and perfect scores
[ were attained by all.
[ Furinkan Senior High School, in the Furinkan
[ section of Nerima ward, has been marred by
[ less than stellar academic achievements to
[ date."

One of the nurses wondered out loud where Doctor Mizuno was going in such a hurry.

--------

Mamoru Chiba stared at the paper. The white cat on his shoulder likewise stared at the paper.

"Ami?" Mamoru said in a disbelieving tone.

"It can't be." Artemis said. "It says 'several of her friends' here too. Do you suppose that means..."

"But then why hasn't she come back?" Mamoru's jaw tightened slightly. "Didn't Luna say that guy she saw was in Nerima?"

"At a high school," agreed Artemis. "Looks like a trip to Furinkan needs to be scheduled."

--------

The school clock ticked from 4:29 to 4:30.

Nabiki and Akane watched as Ranma continued to play around in the water like a dolphin. Apparently being able to swim while staying a guy was something he missed, and the water in the pool was sufficiently warm that he stayed male.

There was a rumble and those outside the pool could see the bottom of it sliding aside.

Ranma yelped as the water rocked back and forth and the temperature suddenly lowered enough that Ranma-kun became Ranma-chan.

A color was visible first, a bright yellow shade often seen on construction equipment. Then a large shape broke the water and began rising into the air. That Ranma-chan was clinging to it and yelling something about the unfairness of the situation was idly noted by the people who had been waiting to use the pool. A few noticed that the bottom of the pool had once again slid into place.

Minako was standing on the deck and noticed the audience and pulled a Jigglypuff manuever. Crowd = audience = need to perform. Clearly with this particular vehicle, a specific song was called for.

"In the town where I was born,
Lived a man, who sailed to sea,
And he told us of his life,
in the land of the marines."

Lots of staring faces as the dripping vehicle slowly rotated around.

"So we sailed unto the sun,
till we found a sea of green,
and we lived beneath the waves,
in our Yellow... Submarine!"

Ranma-chan managed to yell as she fell fifty feet into the pool. Unfortunately drenching Akane, Yuka, and Sayuri. Nabiki mysteriously stayed dry.

"We all live in a Yellow Submarine,
Yellow Submarine, Yellow Submarine,
We all live in a Yellow Submarine,
Yellow Submarine, Yellow Submarine!"

Moving like a big fat yellow blimp, the ship began to ascend.

"And our friends are all aboard,
many more of them, live next door,
and the band begins to play!"

Ranma tried out the odd English phrasing as the ship continued to climb. "They all live in a yellow submarine?"

"A yellow submarine?" Akane asked.

"Yellow submarine," agreed Nabiki.

"Yellow submarine," seconded Yuka.

-------------

"Full ahead, Mister Snoopy!"

The beagle turned and saluted, then focussed his attention on the controls again.

Having only hooked up the navigator's screen and not the majority of displays and scanners, Greylle was completely unaware that Minako was *still* on deck singing with full musical accompaniment. Knowing that Snoopy had programming that he was an accomplished pilot and could avoid obstacles, Greylle turned his attention fully to continuing to hook up systems, run wiring, and bolt seats into place.

The ship itself was relatively small, at least when compared to most modern submarines. Fifteen feet long, seven feet across, ten feet tall. The inside was comparable to a customized van from the era when such gas-guzzlers were a lifestyle. It was intended only as a sort of shuttlecraft, one that could double as a flying sub.

Minako continued to sing. When she reached the end of "Yellow Submarine" she began dancing and singing to other groups that she had files on. Aerosmith's "Rag Doll" was followed by the Bananarama's "Venus" (which she decided to make her signature song due to personal relevance) and ended with "I wanna hold your hand" after the last news chopper started heading back to Tokyo and they were way out over the Pacific Ocean.

Bored, she activated her flight engine briefly to flit about the craft but quickly discovered that this was a *bad* manuever. Her top speed flying was currently about 65mph. The submarine, on the other hand, was currently travelling at 90mph and steadily accelerating now that they were away from Tokyo.

Watching her ride disappear in the distance, Minako made a note in memory to not do that again. Sighing deeply, Minako decided to head back to base. She hoped that Rei didn't chastise her too much for this understandable if unfortunate setback.

---------

"Woof." [Systems nominal. Antigrav active and performing within normal markers.]

"Okay, increase speed to cruising." Greylle began ratcheting the last chair into position.

"Arf!" [Increasing speed and altitude. Will attain cruising speed of Mach 4.8 at two nautical miles.]

"That's good. Keep an eye out for bogeys but do not engage."

"Urf Arf!" [But of course, mein kapitan! You still haven't loaded any weapons, have you?]

"True," agreed Greylle. "Nor the chameleon circuit. The weapons will mainly be on the Arcadia."

"Grrr. Arf." [While I understand that you wanted to maintain a low threat potential so as to avoid alarming anyone, human history is liberally sprinkled with acts of armed barbarians taking advantage of their neighbor's more civilized beneficience - with death and pillaging their method of annoucement.]

"i take it you disapprove of my not putting weapons on this submarine."

"Growl grrr arf." [My Sopwith Camel at least has a pair of charged machine guns. Won't you at least consider a torpedo or two?]

"Well, eventually i hope to add trans-phasic circuitry and a chameleon mode. Weapons would kind of mess up that just from room. i'll consider it though."

"Woof ruff." [We have reached cruising altitude and speed.]

-----------

The easiest way to deal with the tapes was to digitize them. Translated and stored in a digital format, the marionettes could easily access that information and then each could scan different bits for later exchange and comparison.

Also that way they wouldn't keep the tapes past the rental period.

The translation process was subject to high speed observation by the marionettes that had been activated to this point.

Each had their own interests, of course. Their personalities were being shaped in part by the engram recordings of their Originals. They were building on that foundation on their own as their Ishii Kairo developed.

Ami & Usagi watched the "hentai" tapes. Ami studied anatomy and considered upgrades. Usagi watched techniques and situations and fashioned emotive and reactive subroutines.

Makoto and most of the others lost interest after the first few minutes during which the tapes showed small variants of the same scenes and acts. Besides, it was universally decided that tentacled monsters were of limited usefulness. Also quite gross.

More useful data was scanned from the "live action" films though again there did not seem to be much different from one tape to the next.

It took five hours for Ami & Usagi to finish and return the tapes. They didn't understand the looks from the various patrons and clerks at the establishment. None mattered. Though one of the patrons followed and attempted to accost Usagi.

Usagi reacted to the attempt to restrain her and push her into an alleyway exactly in a manner typical of a young girl possessed of the ability to lift 1.6 metric tons. Ami verified that no vital organs or bones were broken before they continued on.

In the meantime each of the other marionettes was occupied in research more in keeping with their own specialties. Makoto analyzing tapes and displays and books on the subject of martial arts. Minako studied music and presentation, and discovered data on a time inefficient process known as "makeovers" which went a lot further than they had originally thought. Haruka and Michiru decided more data was needed on piloting and the artistic process respectively. Setsuna, on the other hand, was busy.

Setsuna's data load had indicated that she wanted to be fashion designer. This made absolutely no sense to her. Clothing served a function and artistic value didn't seem to have a logical basis. Nor did she see anything in the engram data to indicate what was needed in fashionable clothing. Aesthetics were not something that she felt she could guess at.

As with Usagi, if it didn't make any sense, the illogical data was discarded until later information could be used to make sense of it. Since "fashion designer" was unlikely to develop without a better understanding of human aesthetics, Setsuna turned her attention fully to the development of android systems. Upgrading herself and the others seemed daunting beyond a certain point, however notes as to something called "power armor" seemed to offer a way to overcome the limitation of retaining a humanlike form while continuing to increase their ability to overcome potential adversaries.

Which was when she ran across a common theme of sentai series. Sailor Moon followed sentai themes, and yet it did not have a giant robot. Clearly another gap in the datafiles that had to be addressed.

--------

Akane looked out at the night sky and sighed deeply. She was, in her own opinion at least, engaged to an utter asshole. Cute, and every so often he would turn loose a smile that would set sparks along her spine, but to say he was crude and disrespectful seemed to be an understatement.

Why couldn't she be engaged to someone like Doctor Tofu? She could just see him with his thick blonde hair, tightly muscled body, blue eyes that seemed to change hue on their own frequently, yes she knew Doctor... ?!

With a little more effort, Akane brought Doctor Tofu's picture to mind. Yes, with the pigtail and the... ?!

Doctor Tofu. The one with the glasses that fell completely apart whenever Kasumi showed up. Yes. Okay. Got it.

Akane sighed a little heavier. Her father and Mister Saotome seemed determined that she wed Ranma. Family honor. "Death is lighter than a feather, duty is heavier than a mountain." Marriage to Ranma seemed to be rather heavier a fate than a feather though. Would he turn out like his father in a few years? Considering how much he ate, it seemed likely.

Akane pictured Ranma as balding, overweight, eating everything in the house and making a mess wherever he went. Now she tried to picture herself married to him. "Bleaahhhhh!"

"Man, that is so uncute!"

Akane blinked and realized that her fiance was hanging from his toes from the roof. "Don't loosen those tiles, Ranma. They're very difficult to replace and there's a storm front moving through later this week."

"Man, it sure rains a lot here," Ranma said, trying to be polite and nice and all that. He didn't have a lot of experience nor a role model for such behavior. "Uhm..."

"What is it, Ranma? It's late." Akane sat back in her chair and regarded her fiance carefully. He was not, it appeared, a pervert. There were plenty of boys in school far more perverted or sick than Ranma.

Neither Akane nor Ranma realized that due to the breakup of the morning battles and the institutionalization of Tatewaki Kuno, as well as some high powered healing spells, that Akane was calmer and more rational than she otherwise would have been. She had not been driven near-psychotic by the idiocy of Kuno's challenge, and she had been exposed to a non-hentai teenage boy who (in her opinion at least) was in love with her. So while she was railing against the complications in her life, she wasn't quite as hostile towards Ranma as she *could* have been.

That didn't mean she didn't think he was an ill mannered jerk.

"Well... uhmm... that is..." (fidget, twitch, blush)

Akane sighed yet again and waited for the sometimes catgirl to get it out.

"Well. Errr..."

Akane began drumming her fingers against her tabletop.

"HEY AKANE! DIG THIS!"

Ranma fell down.

Akane blinked. "Nabiki? You're flying?!"

"Neat isn't it?" Nabiki had changed to her shorts and a tight top and was exulting in the capabilities of being a "partial conversion cyborg" with an antigrav flight unit. "I'm Nabiki the Super Gal!"

Neither Akane nor Ranma knew of all the soul-searching that Nabiki had been doing lately. Nor how she was trying to "re-invent" herself, with limited success to be sure.

"Nabiki, come inside. It's late and you're gonna scare the neighbors," said Akane finally.

Nabiki smirked, hearing a pang of envy in there. She complied, even though using nightvision she could tell there weren't any neighbors watching. She could always do a little flying later when there wouldn't be any prying eyes.

Though she couldn't help but show off her cyborg strength to Akane. It was all a temporary thing, so best to get the most out of it while it lasted.

----------

Upon reaching the area formerly inhabited by a whole bunch of youma and a Queen Beryl, Greylle had taken the sensible precaution of having Snoopy park a distance away.

He took dragonform almost immediately for several reasons. First, he could deal with the cold better. Second, his senses were a *lot* more acute. Third, if he actually was fighting a youma it would go a *lot* different from when he'd been in that First Labor. Dragons were *not* helpless against youma.

Eyes picked out the scene where icy pillars had been thrust from the ground. It had been a year and snow had fallen and winds had stirred things about, so it wasn't *obvious* but if you paid attention and were looking down on it all - you could make out some of it.

No bodies. Neither the youma nor the Senshi had remained of their big battle.

There was little to see and hearing was of little use after a year, but there were other senses that could be used. A silver dragon had a better sense of smell than a red dragon, though a year's passage had erased that too.

Even more obvious was the pulse of magic. A simple Detect Magic drew him to a snowfield, and through it into the caverns underneath. Further on was more protected from the elements, and scents lingered in the still air.

The scent of magic especially. Attack spells like the typical Senshi power blast faded quickly. Accumulate enough of them in an area and if there weren't a lot of people to disturb the traces there would still be resonances in the area.

Greylle was initially reluctant to cast a spell and destroy what traces remained. That meant gathering information from his senses first in the cramped tunnels and chamber.

Well, they were cramped if you were fifty two feet long. Squeezing through them was a pain. Literally at times. Still the place was dark and cold and being a large armored creature was a definite plus. Not that he found dark spooky caverns where youma had been known to gather in vast numbers ready to suck the life out of people to be the sort of thing that made him nervous. No. Maybe a little apprehensive. Just a touch.

Then a glimmer of light in the darkness drew him.

Which brought a dragon named Greylle to stare at a certain crystal.

Greylle had had extremely busy periods in between adventures, and extremely busy periods during adventures, but some of the times he had been *on* adventures had been dull and boring. So he'd studied and tinkered during those periods.

In a D&D world, Artifacts were one-of-a-kind magical items. Usually indestructible except by a single preset manner and pretty darn powerful. Some were merely minor items like the Ring Of The Rose(1) while others qualified as Don't-Mess-With-It and caused the maps to be rewritten when someone was foolish enough to use the damn thing.(2) There tended to be something of balance involved, the more powerful the effect from using it, the more disastrous the down side or price to be paid.

Call it the Ginzuishou, the Eternal Silver Millenium Crystal, the Silver Crystal, or something else, it was still an Artifact.

In fact, looking at it with the earlier cast Detect Magic still running, he could see the weaves and knots of magical force in the outer layers (too bright to make anything out in the more inward section) and could tell that there were some things about this Artifact not covered in the anime or manga.

Like an awful lot of Artifacts, the Ginzuishou was not intelligent that he could see. It *was* however, aware on some level. Like a low level Artificial Intelligence, one that couldn't pass a Turing Test but could respond to a wide variety of stimulus.

Further examination gave him a theory. Each wielder of the Ginzuishou left something of themselves behind, or at least an echo of themselves, which accumulated. It might not be completely correct, but it fit what he was seeing. The Ginzuishou was also pretty darn powerful but not all-powerful. It ran off a "battery" of energy that accumulated while it was in someone's possession, a continual leeching of "positive" energy from the environment. When this battery was depleted, it would drain the life force of the wielder.

There was a few problems with using it, and he *did* want to use it. Without it he couldn't cast the higher level spells until he was considerably older and therefore couldn't find out what had happened to the Senshi or bring them back from the dead (if they were dead).

The first problem was that it was made to be wielded by a member of the royal family of the Moon Kingdom. Or at least someone from the Silver Millenium. Basalt was *gone* - that Aspect of himself had seperated and gone off and died somewhere. It was no longer part of him, therefore he no longer had any connection to some Silver Millenium.

Still, he was a Healer and a cleric, or a White Mage if he had the basics of this particular timeline right. He was also a dragon, in his proper form so magic was something that came fairly easily to him. Magical artifacts of Order were stubborn cusses, but without a Wielder it couldn't focus its full power against him.

Greylle focussed his will on the Ginzuishou, which responded by sending licks of lightning across his scales.

"Idiot damn crystal, I'm trying to resurrect the Senshi here and bring your proper wielder back..." Greylle grit his fangs and further focussed his will on the device. Without the Crystal, he just wasn't high enough level to manage either a Resurrection or a Reincarnate, and without bodies he'd be best off with Reincarnation. Raise Dead was within his ability, but the spell's limits made it useless here.

Okay, there were problems with Reincarnation. For one thing there was no control over *what* they came back as, it was all either random or karma dependent. Though with the Senshi linked together: if one came back as (for example) a Delphins Amazon, then likely they all would. If Usagi came back as a faerie, most likely Makoto would be a dryad and Ami a snow pixie or something otherwise maintaining them as a group.

Problem was, the Ginzuishou was *not* cooperating. It was reacting to him as an outsider, one who had no business playing with it. Only thick armored scales and innate magic resistance were allowing him to keep ahold of it.

Trying another tack he focussed his need and the task to be done at the Crystal.

Which seemed to pause and then attacked on several fronts at once, thrusting through his mind and body with white light.

---------

Ami snapped to attention from where she had been recharging. "Alert. Detecting energy field of unknown origin. Analysis of waveform: magic. Summoning spell with white band pattern. Analyzing pattern. Outer overlay = Master. Power level considerably in excess of Master's estimated capabilities."

The other Sailor Marionettes looked to her. Ami had the most sensitive and wide-range sensors.

Setsuna frowned as she processed this. "Targets of magic?"

Ami looked down at herself and at the other androids. "Ourselves."

"Running diagnostic," responded more than one of the substitute Senshi simultaneously.

"Interesting," stated Minako. "Engrams have been reinforced regarding base persona and there was some kind of energy field that has... we have Maiden Circuits?"

"Confirming transformational charge. Interesting." Ami sounded more excited, which would only have been obvious to the other androids. "Though not much can be done at this point. Powering down to recharge mode."

The other marionettes gave electronic shrugs. It was true that they couldn't actually do much about it, the whole thing was pretty much out of their hands. Better to enter rest mode now.

Especially since Minako had hit on the idea of a sentai team/rock band after scanning some of those sentai series. After school tomorrow would be their big debut.

The appropriate files had already been downloaded.

------------

Nabiki had double checked her charge, found it very low, and reluctantly left her exploration of her newfound power to a later date.

Flight, enhanced strength and durability beyond anything her younger sister had (she had demonstrated to Akane and caught the glimmerings of envy - adequate for Nabiki's own measure), enhanced senses beyond anything she could have afforded, the ability to run at great speeds, and ability to enhance her own ability to experience pleasure...

Okay, there were some downsides. She'd need to be completely organic before she could have kids, though that was something that was far from being an immediate concern. Between the explosion and all the shrapnel, her torso had lots of bionic parts. While a self-exam had produced a pretty good duplicate of all the original equipment, she knew just from running a diagnostic that her skeletal framework had been reinforced so that the powerful cyborg limbs didn't rip loose from the organic parts. Other parts functioned pretty much as the originals or better, but kids would not be an option.

There was also the relatively minor problems with having a large part of your body composed of metal, psuedo-organic tissues, plastic, and nanomachines. You could place refrigerator magnets on her and they'd stick. Large industrial magnets would cause the nanomachine parts to freeze up. Airport security devices and the similar sort of things at various stores would get set off regularly by her.

Changing into pajamas, plugging in the adaptor, then inserting something that looked a lot like a large stereo jack into her navel had a certain degree of creepiness. It went in with a "schnick" sound and a feeling of warmth, which added to the weirdness factor, and Nabiki had felt an immediate wave of drowsiness as internal systems began shutting down to a different mode.

She had a month to explore this before she went back to being normal Nabiki. Since it *was* just a temporary situation, the middle Tendo daughter found the whole thing amusing and interesting as opposed to something to panic about.

Though she'd have to talk to Usagi and Ami about that Over-18 section. She *had* to get the passcodes for the higher functions. Heh.

----------

Akane may have been suppressing envy of her sister now being The Bionic Woman (or at least Schoolgirl) as well of her fiance being a better martial artist and better built as a catgirl than she was. (Actually there was more than just one pang of jealousy as far as Ranma's cursed form went, especially as she could see how Ranma's strength and speed actually increased in what everyone *except* Ranma realized was a catgirl.) Akane may also have been suppressing envy of her not-boyfriend's association with fuku-clad superheroines, and once she learned of Yuka and Sayuri as powerarmor-wearing Knight Sailors she'd likely be envious of *them*.

As to the fact that Nabiki had never looked better, was more toned and "talented" than ever, and had just this air of superiority now? Akane hadn't even noticed. Really. Well, at least she'd be the first to deny it.

Which is likely while Akane was asleep, she was tossing and turning and dreaming dreams of being left behind by everyone in her family and school all developing amazing superpowers and going out on really exciting adventures and saving the universe from all sorts of vile beasties.

However, in the Tendo household, she was not the only one feeling the barbs of envy and wounded pride.

Ranma Saotome of the Anything Goes School Of Martial Arts was feeling serious envy. That foreigner might not have had the basics down right, but he had some special manuevers that were quite impressive. Serious strength and durability too. And now NABIKI was flying about and showing some serious strength of her own.

Ranma hadn't, it should be noted, quite gotten his mind wrapped around the concept of a cyborg. He had seen the metallic framework in Nabiki's forearm and the cables and gadgets when she'd activated an access panel. He had the pieces (so to speak) but hadn't fitted them together.

So Ranma was still working out ways that he could duplicate the effects of these martial arts special manuevers. Flying would be especially good, the Saotome school specializing in mid-air combat after all.

Kasumi also had dreams. While some of these dealt with Snorlax Au Gratin or similar scenarios, there was the occasional one where she was studying to become a Medical Assistant and married to some blond gaijin and living far far away from her ancestral home.

Genma dreamed too. Mainly of food.

Soun dreamed of uniting the two houses by getting Ranma and Akane together and a long peaceful retirement with the future of the Anything Goes school assured. That nothing weird happened and that there were no dojo challengers, monsters-of-the-week, or even any friction between Ranma and Akane was attributable to this being Soun's dream sequence.

Shampoo dreamed of having two handsome and talented airen, showing them off at the village, then returning to Japan with them. The dream turned a bit strange halfway through, with giant robot transforming Nabiki and at one point she dreamed of holding Ranma's hand only to turn around and find it was *Akane* she was holding hands with. But this was attributable to having sampled one of the cookies that Akane had tried to bake earlier.

Away from the Tendo dojo, others dreamed. Yuka dreamed of being a world-famous Magical Girl With A Big Gun. Sayuri dreamed of throttling her best friend Yuka. Usagi dreamed of electric sheep. Ami dreamed of solving unsolvable math problems. Rei dreamed of Usagi getting a clue. Makoto dreamed of understanding humans. Minako dreamed of riding the space shuttle and being a big rock star while juggling salmon. Michiru dreamed of Haruka swimming. Haruka dreamed of Michiru driving a racecar that transformed into a giant robot for no apparent reason. Setsuna dreamed of becoming real. Hotaru dreamed of a wedding, during which there were giant robot battles overhead and she was on the deck of the Space Battlecruiser Yamato.

In other words, it was fairly much what would you would expect of the circumstances.

--------------

(1) - Ring Of The Rose, created long ago by an old elven wizard named Rosewood. Who apparently had been rejected by nearly every beautiful nubile elven girl he'd come into contact with. He decided that his loneliness was caused by the scarcity of same, and not certain odious personal habits, and so came up with the Ring. It grants some special abilities such as Darkvision, but every use causes a 10% alteration in the wielder until they are a beautiful nubile elven girl. There is an elven village of Larktree where beautiful elven maidens come to spit on the grave of an old elven wizard named Rosewood.

(2) - Hand and Eye Of Vecna, Rod Of Priapus, Orb Of Conflagration, The Monkey's Paw, The Suloise Trump, Amulet Of Meteor Summoning, and other things that are generally passed around in cautionary tales as "Things Only A Total Idiot Would Consider Playing With".