Ranma 1/2 Fan Fiction / Sailor Moon Fan Fiction ❯ A New Future 2 - First Blood ❯ The NWC Ride: Back at the Ranch ... ( Chapter 19 )

This was originally published by me under the name Anduril at Anime Addventures, with the only changes being a few corrections in spelling, punctuation and the occasional word choice to make things clearer. If you like the beginning of my story but think I've gone off the rails, or have your own ideas for a great branch-off, or think I'm taking too long to update and want to continue the story yourself, come to Anime Addventures and join in the fun!

I claim no ownership rights to any of the works of Rumiko Takahashi, Naoko Takeuchi, or anything in the GURPS Ogre and GURPS Tales of the Solar Patrol settings published by Steve Jackson Games. Everything else is mine.

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Sailor Mercury, once again crouching by a car, stared at the screen of the Mercury Computer she held. The blue-haired Senshi of Ice was barely aware of her fellow Senshi, the bubbly blonde Sailor Venus and the grimly determined brown-haired Sailor Jupiter, providing cover beside her. She was completely unaware of the kangaroos bouncing around in front of them except as a rotating silhouette on her screen — at least, you could call them kangaroos if you ignored the outthrust, gaping, slavering jaws and rows of teeth to do a Great White proud; the long claws protruding from the even longer individuated toes on their lower feet; and the long whipping tail with the large, sharp chiton-like maybe-stinger on the end.

“This's getting old!” Venus grumbled beside her as she sent a line of glowing chain whipping down-range toward one kangaroo rex (as she'd instantly dubbed them on first sight). “Yes!” she exulted as the chain wrapped around its prey. Dropping the chain's end, she lifted her hand and clenched it into a fist. Instantly, the chain contracted around the kangaroo rex and Mercury and Jupiter winced as the crackle of shattering bones was almost drowned out by the thing's scream before it was choked off in an explosion of blood fountaining out of its mouth.

Venus spread out her fingers from her outstretched fist and the chain around the messily convulsing creature shimmered and vanished. “One down!” she shouted, then returned to her earlier complaint. “This's the second time in the last couple of weeks I've needed to come out, I'm missing a recording session right now, and I think my agent is wondering if I'm on drugs or something.”

Jupiter shrugged, her pony tail bouncing, as she sent a bolt of lightning flying and another pain-filled shriek filled the air along with the smells of burning hair and roasting flesh. “Bitch about it later,” she advised, eyes sweeping the road around them as the two monsters left fell back further and continued their back and forth bouncing. “The people maybe filming this shouldn't have mikes strong enough to hear us if we keep our voices down, but you never know.”

Venus grumped but fell silent as she sent another chain snaking out only to wrap around a curbside tree's trunk as her target dodged.

“Jupiter's right.” And sometime I'm going to get you to tell us what happened in London that was so bad you hid inside your bubblehead persona, Mercury thought absentmindedly as she hit a few keys, then grinned at the sight of the data that flashed onto her screen. “Okay, these ones are clean — no magic power sources for mystic attacks, they're purely natural. At least, as natural as a kangaroo crossed with a shark and a touch of spider tossed in can be,” she added, looking up finally at the things crossing back and forth in front of them across the street. There was something bothering her about the way they were acting, something familiar ... and then she had it — they were acting just like the rocky monstrosities from two days before. Pack mentality!

She whirled in place, beginning to rise from her crouch even as a pair of kangaroo rexes slammed down onto the roof and hood of the car the Senshi were using to cover their backs, crumpling in the metal surfaces around their feet. “Venus, about face!” she shouted, even as her computer vanished and she brought her hands into a position that resembled holding an invisible spear pointed at one of the newcomers. Then the spear was no longer invisible, the ice reflecting the sunlight as it sprang into existence between her circled fingers, the butt smashing backwards against the asphalt even as the point's explosive growth slammed it forward through the chest of the newcomer she'd targeted.

Venus had whirled at Mercury's shout, and her chain flickered into existence and lashed out, circling tight around the neck just below the jaw of the monster Mercury hadn't targeted. Even as the thing's barbed tail whipped forward, an energy heart formed around the chain and flew along its links, growing larger and brighter as it went. As the tail's spike slammed into and through Venus's chest and out her back, the spinning heart slammed into the kangaroo rex's throat and head, vaporizing everything above the shoulders and spraying bits of bone, flesh and brains against the brick wall and glass window of the building behind them. The creature's torso dropped straight down onto the hood of the car beside Mercury's kill with a thud, blood spouting from what was left of the neck stump to splash a narrow `V' on the street and running down the side of the car to pool around the tire.

Mercury heard Venus's explosive grunt at the spike's impact. Quickly scanning the street and sidewalk behind them and finding nothing even as she heard the thud of a body on the street at her side, she whirled to Venus and gasped at the sight of the tail protruding from her friend's chest and the spike protruding from between her back and the asphalt.

“Jupiter, take it to them, finish them off!” she shouted. As her green-skirted friend charged forward toward the last two kangaroo rexes with a shout, lightning arcing ahead of her, Mercury formed an ice blade and with one quick slice cut off the tail a few inches about her friend's chest. At least it missed her heart — blood's seeping out, not pumping, the smartest Senshi thought, grasping for what straws of comfort she could find.

“A little ...” Venus started to whisper, then broke off to cough up a gout of bright red blood. “ ... little slow, there,” she continued. Gasping for breath, she added, “Hate exercise, but ... think sprints would help?”

“Couldn't hurt,” Mercury replied with forced cheer as her ice blade vanished to be replaced again be the Mercury Computer.

She looked up as Jupiter dropped to a crouch beside the two, careful not to touch them as a leftover charge sparkled around her hands and up her arms. “Oh, kami!” the Senshi of Lightning breathed, face going white at the sight of Venus even as she touched the car beside them to bleed off the last of the charge. “What do we do?”

Mercury ignored Venus's attempted cheery whispered “Hey, watch it, you're scaring me!” and subsequent cough to clear out fresh blood. Bringing up the city map and pinpointing their location she frantically typed in a search and: “There! A hospital a mile to the north. Jupiter, bring Venus and follow me.” Pausing just long enough for Jupiter to gather up their fallen comrade, she dashed across the street to the nearest alley and used the close in walls to bounce from side to side up to the roof then raced off toward the unseen hospital.

As she ran ahead of Jupiter and her burden, she summoned her communicator and hit the button for their leader. As Sailor Moon's face appeared in the tiny screen, she asked without preamble, “Moon! Where are you?”

“Nerima — I'm in Nerima with little sis. Why?” Moon responded, a confused look on her face.

“Damn, too far. By the time you could get here, Venus will either be healed on her own or dead,” Mercury said distractedly as she leaped across an alley to a new rooftop, whirling to trot backwards for a moment to make sure Jupiter was still with her.

“What?!” came Moon's shout from the tiny communicator in her hands and, on seeing her green-skirted friend land safely on the roof with Venus still in her arms, she turned her attention back to its screen as she whipped back around forward.

“We're headed to the hospital right now, I'll call you back as soon as we know one way or the other,” she hastily told her Princess, then shut off the communicator and sent it away so she could concentrate on running while searching for a sight of the hospital. And ... it came into view slightly off to one side, and Mercury angled over toward it. Within a minute the Senshi were back on the ground and charging across the road toward the emergency entrance.

Every eye in the emergency waiting room turned to them at the sound of Mercury smashing through the swinging doors with Jupiter and her burden right behind her. “Medic! Right now!” the blue-mini-skirted Senshi shouted.

The young man that had been in the glass-separated receptionist cubicle slammed through the interior swinging doors and ran toward them, shouting over his shoulder for a gurney. His eyes widened at the sight of the blood staining the entire front of Venus's uniform and splashed on Jupiter's chest. More blood spread across both girls as Venus coughed up a fresh gout and drew a shuddering breath. “What do you need?” he asked as two more nurses rushed into the room with a gurney between them.

“As soon as we pull out that tail fragment Venus's uniform should close up, and that'll keep her from bleeding out,” Mercury said as she watched Jupiter gently lay their friend on the gurney with the help of the two nurses. “But it's right through a lung. What we need is some way to keep Venus from drowning in her own blood before the regeneration ability we all have can take care of the internal bleeding.”

`Right, we can do that,” he said, and strode toward to doors the gurney had just come out of. “Follow me!”

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The kangaroo rex's name and some of its appearance comes from the second story in Janet Kagan's excellent scifi book, Mirabile (not an action thriller like my usual, but a lot of fun).

And yes, this isn't entirely canonical when it comes to the Senshi's attacks. I figure the Senshi are going to have come up with some variations in the last few years. If anyone can think of a fancy new attack that builds on the ones in canon, feel free to help me out!