Ranma 1/2 Fan Fiction ❯ Chained World: The Fall of the House of Kuno ❯ One Rescue Down ( Chapter 59 )

I originally published this under the name Anduril at Anime Addventures, with the only changes being a few corrections in spelling, punctuation and the occasional word choice. 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, or anyone else's published work.

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Usagi nervously peeked around the corner of yet another corridor dimly lit by the emergency lights. Empty. She sagged slightly in relief, then stiffened as the sound of angry voices and property destruction echoing through the hallways grew louder — whoever was tearing the mansion apart was getting closer, and quickly. But it didn't sound yet like they were between her and her master's suite, so if she hurried she should be all right. Maybe.

Stepping around the corner, she began to run down the hall, only to whip around and slam into a wall with a loud scream of panic as a hand whipped out of a dark doorway as she passed by to grab her by the arm. For a moment she fought to escape from the hand's grip until its owner stepped out into the hallway — her owner's sister, Kodachi. Sucking in deep shuddering breaths, the younger pageboy-haired blonde sagged against the wall. “Kodachi-chan, don't do that!” she wailed, then blushed — they weren't in her master's private suite at the moment. “Kodachi-sama, I mean,” she corrected herself, her voice subdued.

“I suspect proper protocol is the least of our worries at the moment,” Kodachi replied, her tight smile grim. “What are you doing out here?”

“I was with Kuno-dono when we heard about the mob, and he left but I didn't want to be in a safe room alone, so I was going to join Ami-chan in her safe room, but it took me so long to find my slave chain and then the lights went out and I had to go back but now I think I'm lost!” the terrified Usagi wailed, hyperventilating.

Kodachi gently shook the young slave. “Easy, stand up straight, take slow, even breaths,” she ordered. As Usagi straightened and slowed her breathing, the Kuno heir thoughtfully stared down the hallway in the direction Usagi had been running. “You weren't lost,” she finally said, “but from what I heard coming this way you aren't going to be able to get to your suite without running into the mob. And I don't have time to escort you back, so it seems you are with me.”

Usagi nodded jerkily. “O-Okay, sounds good to me. Where are we going?”

“There's an entrance to the sub-basement a few corridors back the way you came,” Kodachi replied, “stairs instead of an elevator, and a combination lock on the door with an independent power supply. That will get us down where the mob can't find us.” She hesitated a moment, then added, “And Akane-san and Ranma-kun should be down there in need of rescuing.”

“I knew Ranma-chan was in trouble!” Usagi exclaimed. “Wait, Akane-chan's really here, too?”

“Yes,” Kodachi said. She stepped back into the room she'd come out of, to emerge a moment later with a rhythmic gymnastics club in one hand and her ribbon in the other. Without stopping she strode down the hall back the way Usagi had come. “You'd already heard?”

Usagi hurried to catch up. “Kuno-dono said something about it. Is she ... in trouble?”

“She will be if we don't hurry, but Ranma-kun's the one in real trouble right now. Keep up.” And with that, Kodachi broke into a trot.

/oOo\

In a cell now pitch black, Akane listened to the dull thud of her fist slamming into her cell's wall — no, that wasn't the door. She snarled as she unclenched her aching hand and shook it out as she stepped two steps to the left, trailing her other hand along the wall to maintain her distance and orientation. The door couldn't be in the walls with the cot or toilet and sink, she doubted that it was in the wall at the head of the cot, so that left this one. She just wished that whoever had made the cell's blueprints had included emergency lights. Not that they'd have helped, the door was invisible from the inside, but she would have felt better.

Akane flattened one hand against the wall, again clenched her fist, took a deep breath and focused her ki, and struck. “Owww....” But this time, there'd been a slight hollow sound to the strike, a faint vibration felt by the hand flat on the wall — she'd found the door!

Shaking out her hand again, she ran her fingers along the wall, feeling for a seam, and found ... something, maybe... Checked to the right, no new seam, to the left, there! Okay, she had an outline. She stepped back, took another deep breath, and screamed out her kick.

/oOo\

Usagi stepped off the spiral staircase and stood on tiptoes to peek over Kodachi's shoulder. The hallway stretched ahead of them, doorways running along the right side wall visible in the emergency lights, with another door at the end — seeming brighter that the upstairs had been, the dim light reflecting from shiny steel panels making up the floor, ceiling and walls instead of rare woods. And no rioters, like the small group that they'd run into on their way to the stairs. The new Kuno heir had dealt with them handily, charging into a flurry of surprised people dropping and bouncing off walls before Usagi had even really noticed they were there, but the Juuban slave was glad that the upper entrance to the stairwell was hidden behind a false wall — they wouldn't have to worry about the mob breaking their way through a door they didn't know existed, and the Kuno retainers had more important things on their mind than checking out the sub-basement. “Kodachi-dono, where are we?” the young blonde whispered.

“As I said, the sub-basement,” Kodachi replied in a normal voice. “This is where we keep all the things — and people — we don't want anyone else to know about. And you don't need to worry about being heard, the doors are soundproofed. The room we want, where we perform our own rituals, is the door at the end.”

The offset ponytailed girl strode down the hall, and Usagi hurried to keep up, only to pause as a faint sound caught her attention, a dull thudding sound, repeated a few seconds later ... and then again. It seemed to be coming from the wall to her left, opposite the side with the doors. “Kodachi-dono!” she called out, “I think she's over here!”

Kodachi turned around and looked back at the blonde. “She can't be, not with what Hanh-chan —” She broke off, face tightening for a moment, then nodded. “Akane, it has to be — that's our cell for the really dangerous people, the ones that need bank vaults to hold onto.” She hesitated for a moment, then shrugged. “We could always use another fighter, and Ranma might need ...”

Leaving the thought unfinished, she hurried back to Usagi. Handing her club and ribbon to the slave, she pressed her palm against a spot on the wall indistinguishable from any other, and the steel panel in front of her sank back a few inches then slid to the side to reveal another corridor twenty yards long ending in a door with a large wheel in its center. The volume of the thuds jumped, and the door quivered slightly. As Usagi gaped, Kodachi strode down the corridor to grab the wheel as the thuds stopped. For a moment, nothing happened. Usagi hurried to join Kodachi, and the Kuno glanced over at her, an eyebrow up. “Incredible, she's actually managed to jam the opening mechanism — hopefully, just slightly,” she explained, before turning back to the door and bracing herself. With an explosive grunt of effort, the wheel began to turn, its spin increasing in speed with each revolution, and Kodachi motioned for Usagi to step back with one hand as the other kept the wheel spinning.

Then the offset ponytailed girl was jumping back as the door exploded back on its hinges to slam against the wall, the clang mixing with Akane's scream.

/\

Akane rocked back as yet again her kick slammed into the unyielding door. What was the thing made of? The long minutes she'd been kicking at the increasingly hated obstacle were turning timeless, and even ki-reinforced her foot was a massive bundle of pure ache, the pain creeping up her leg and blossoming in her knee. She paused for a moment to step over to the sink, opening the spigot by feel in the lightless cell, and cupped her hands to sip relief for her raw throat. Throat soothed for the moment, she closed the spigot and again felt out the door's location before she stepped back and with a deep breath shrieked her anger as another kick hammered at the door.

The door slammed back to clang into the outside wall, and Akane staggered back with hands raised as the light in the corridor seared into her dark-adjusted eyes. “Akane-chan!” she heard a familiar voice shout, and arms circled her to pull her into a hug.

“Usagi-chan? !” the youngest Tendo gasped as one arm went around the young slave to brace herself as Usagi actually managed to spin them around. Her other hand scrubbed at her eyes. “What are you doing here?”

“Rescuing Ranma, actually,” came a cool, faintly amused voice before Usagi could respond, also familiar if not so happily. “We happened to come across you in the process and thought your presence would be beneficial when we reach him.”

“Ranma!” Akane abruptly braced herself to stop her and Usagi's spinning in place to fix her frantic gaze on the Kuno heir. “Kodachi-san, where is he?”

“Just down the hall, follow me,” Kodachi ordered, and turned to stride back down the hall.

Akane quickly disentangled herself from Usagi and started forward only to pause for a moment, eyes widening as the thickness of the door she'd been kicking registered — no wonder, she hadn't gotten anywhere trying to break out!

Shaking herself back to reality, she ran to join Kodachi, Usagi right behind her, as the raven-haired girl turned one of the corners of the T-intersection at the end of the hall. “What's going on, why does Ranma need rescuing? How does Ranma need rescuing?” she demanded when she caught up.

“Even the strongest need to breath, and I have had Ranma-kun helpless at my mercy before,” Kodachi replied shortly as they approached another door at the end of the new hallway, Usagi coming up behind them. “But more explanations will have to wait.” She stopped in front of the door and laid a palm on a blank spot on the wall to the side. A panel popped open, and Kodachi hastily typed at the number pad now revealed. “Locked like I thought, but not now,” she said. “Usagi, my weapons.” The young slave handed the club and ribbon back to the Kuno heir from where she stood behind the other two girls, Kodachi holding them both in one hand as she pressed the other hand's palm on another blank spot across the door from the number pad.

The door slid to the side into the wall, and Kodachi was bowled over by a rush of screaming women from out of the room beyond.