Star of War A Ranma 1/2 - Fist of the North Star fanfiction. By Dragonlord. E-mail: valheru@mixmail.com Disclaimer: All the characters are copyright of their authors. Ranma 1/2 propriety of Rumiko Takahashi. Hokuto no Ken propriety of Buronson and Tetsuo Hara. This story is made for my fun and yours. I'm poor so don't sue me (pretty please). C&C welcome. Chapter 2: Destined meeting. -------------------------------------------------------- Light. The light was blinding him. Still he couldn't close his eyelids. No tears to moist his almost dry eyes. Black dots in his vision prevented him to recognise his surroundings. He tried to feel with his other senses. No strange sound. Only some rare wind's blow; hot air that passed without giving him any comfort from the heat. There: a sensation. Heat. Upon his body. Upon his skin. Hot. The light was hot. His skin was burning, yet he couldn't move. He tried but only came to feel his fingers twitch. He had no strength left in his tired body. Yet the pain increased. Pain. A new-old sensation. Very old. Yet new to his body. Strange paradox. In his mind not in his body, strangely. From his most ancient memories pain was a constant, his only comrade in a world of loneliness. He had to learn to live with it. To fight with it and to use it when any lesser being would have surrended and left unconsciousness or even dead claim them. He never surrended his tired mind told him. Surrender was an alien concept to him. The pain now cursed strongly. His old friend. It was somehow comforting. After all if you are in pain you are alive. Alive. The idea of having survived almost send his mind reeling, but why? Why? Yes, why? Why was that idea so strange? He tried to force his mind to work but it only increased his pain. Only one thing sure in a ocean of doubts. He needed to move. But he had only his pain. No strength. No speed. No mind. Only his stubbornness to surrender and his pain. He used both. His stubbornness to focus his clouded mind: moving. Moving toward the first shelter he could find, some shadow that could protect him. His pain to make his almost non-existent strength to burn. He turned his body, rolling with it. Now he could see. There. Some blackness. He started to move. Rivers of fire answered his mute orders as slowly his hand moved forward. He ignored them. Now only that cool blackness mattered. A meter moving like some agonising animal toward the only protection from the sun and his burning light. Two meters; his hands clenching sand, earth and dirt as he focused in his salvation. When the first shadows covered him he slowly allowed pain to take upon his mind, pain that came with a revenge as his head seemed to be exploding and his skin was screaming and his body shaking. When the darkness of oblivion took him his last concient though was the relative coldness of his shelter. ------------------------------------------------- He opened his eyes. Slowly at first. He was deadly tired but the pain had remitted, if only barely but enough to allow him to move with his returning strength. "Weak..." was the only word to come from his dry lips, cracking them. He could feel the blood coming form several points of his mouth. He licked it the strange salty liquid touching his equally dry tongue. His hand started to search to some support. He found one: a stone wall. He not even bothered to look to the rest of his surroundings. He slowly lifted his body and using the wall as a sit and lifted his upper body. The sun was still raging but its lights were the ones of the afternoon. He guessed that in some hours it would have set and some coldness would arrive. He disdained anything save his body. He needed to check his body, and did so as he closed his eyes, a nearly automatic reflex in him. Memories unfolded in his now more cleared mind telling him of fights, trainings when the first knowledge of his body had saved him of further damages, damaged that could have leaved him crippled for life. After being ten years on the road practising martial arts, anatomy, and more of his own body, was ingrained in his psyche. He started to check his bones form down to high; foots, legs, chest, arms, fingers, neck, skull. His muscles: every one of them. His senses and nervous system. All the things that allowed a martial artist to move and practice his art. Still to his used means of checking he found some disturbing things. First of all his centre of gravity had changed. The change was more radical than anything he had felt before. Second his body was... weird. From what he could feel he was lighter and his bones weren't as strong as before. Also the telltale signs of old fractures and scars in his bone structure had totally disappeared as if he had never been wounded. Strange. The sound of a cracking crystal was heard only a few meters from where he was. By reflex he looked to the origin of the sound, only to found a window or some glass similar to a mirror crashing. It was strange but for a moment it caught his own image. He couldn't have seen what he had seen. He started to move and his body rebelled sending more pain trough his nerves. This time he ignored it. This was more important. As if his life depended on it. He reached the place were the mirror had fallen and he risen it. A young face was greeting him with a shocked face. This wasn't his face! This wasn't his body! And looking in the eyes of the reflection a tilde wave of images, memories and feelings came unbidden to him, filling the gasp that once clouded his mind. Ranma Saotome reminded himself as his mind opened locked doors. He clenched his head as the reality of what Ryouga, Kuno and Mousse had done to him. He refused to believe what his eyes; senses and mind were telling him. He refused, yet... He slowly accepted the heated reality as the last word he heard before his body was destroyed came again to his ears. `We are banishing you, Ranma. Never will your shadow touch this earth. ' For once this three idiots had achieved something. They had effectively banished him. He closed his eyes as a tear crossed his dry cheeks. He was alone. The tear was his first and last show of emotion that he would afford himself to give. He not even bothered brushing it. Not even the idea crossed his mind. Instead one of his hands went to the broken mirror. He picked a fairly sized piece and looked to his new face, fingers brushing the new lines of his feature. He was younger. If he had to give an approximation he would say that he was five or six years old, more of a decade of regression from his previous age and body. Only his eyes betrayed something more. Now to Ranma only sadness and depression clouded his blue grey eyes instead of the usual confidence. More like the look he gave to himself in Nerima when he was alone, when no one could guess that under the cover of the great Ranma Saotome, the Ranma everybody knew was hiding a human being exhausted and desperately alone. A young man that searched comfort from the others but only found hate, dispraise and revulsion. The younger Ranma shook his head. Then he noticed something moving with his head. He reached back and was surprised to see that his pigtail remained from his ordeal. Curious. Maybe there was still some of the old Ranma as he smiled a little while tugging his braided hair. Breaking his gaze from his reflection, he looked to his body only to find him stripped in a plain-looking grey trouser similar to his baggy dark pants. His feet and chest were bare. He put the mirror at his side and put his knees to his chest while looking to the retreating light. As he couldn't do anything else his mind started to move by its own volition, pondering a hundred different emotions and thoughts. The main ones were that he was totally alone and the growing sadness in the whole of his being. Alone. He shuddered as if the heat had disappeared and night as already upon him. All his life his biggest fear was of being alone, without someone, _anyone_. That was the reason why after all the abuses, the mad trainings he still hung by his father when anybody else would have run away from the idiot martial artist. That was why he remained at the Tendo dojo, with the first thing that he could associate with the idea of family, even if it was a crazy one. He already missed some of the things that he grew to take for granted. Alone, so alone that he coped with all the madness of his life, with all the fiancees, with all the rivals, with all the threats. He could have finished with all of it but he grew to like the warm feeling to have something to share his life with, instead of the wilderness that surrounded his life for more than ten years; his father being a stranger, but sadly his only comrade. That feelings engendered a fear more deep than the one for cats: the one to lose all and end being alone. Anything else he could have endured, save from being alone. Anything but _not_ alone. And now he was living his worst fear. All for nothing. It seemed at the end that all the sacrifices he made in order to not be alone, destroyed by those jerks! He didn't know if he was angry or sad, most likely the last. Sadness. The greatest sadness because he lost it all. Sadness. He was alone. Alone. As a void in his soul eating other feelings to the point of making him feel numb, or even worst to no feel at all. His memories and their associated feelings becoming dull in some strange way. He remembered but it was all tainted by his loneliness and the sadness associated. He shook his head as if to stop those feelings to spread and engulf him. He would not surrender to his inner demons and restless feelings. He had to focus his mind and will into other things, like where he was. For the first time he gave his surroundings a look. His mouth opened and stayed like that for what seemed an eternity. Around him a buildings totally destroyed, some upon the others in strange angles, in ways that no one could have expected. Some crashed upon others giving the whole zone a dantesque feeling. In every corner only destruction greeted his eyes. He was in a dead city, ravaged by an unknown cataclysm. His mind was once again send reeling as the enormity of the destruction fully entered his mind. That was stuff of nightmares and his sanity started to doubt itself. He shook his head a new feeling of determination shinning in his eyes. "I can't finish like this! I will survive the world if necessary but I will not surrender to some mind tricks I'm playing myself!" His hands were clenched as he let his anger and rage overpower his sadness and depression. Those were the only feelings strong enough to make his mind forget the more destructive but at the same time more subtle ones. He looked again to his surroundings and noticed for the first time the darkened stones as if they had been burnt. Also he noticed the... wasteland that he hadn't see before, all the ground dry to the point of making the place to look like a desert minus the dunes and sand. Still a dead earth, a dead land. He looked to the desolation around him for some moments more before allowing himself to curl into a ball. Then he closed his eyes, feeling finally emotionally drained; the void and sadness coping with the rest of his being as his last conscious thoughts resonated in the vaults of his mind. And with his last thoughts, Ranma felt asleep, a sleep with no dreams but longing and sadness. -------------------------------------------------- Kenshiro was dreaming. Until that nothing new. But what was new was that the dream was repeating itself since almost a week, and that was unusual, even for someone with a life so filled with tears, blood and sadness. Nothing strange for a master of the Hokuto Shinken style, currently the most powerful warrior on Earth and the most powerful practitioner of this lethal art in its two thousand years of history. For some people Kenshiro possesses the powers of a god. But even that didn't explained the recurrence of the dream, even if he had "understood" some parts of it. First the dream is nothing more than darkness. Then with a weak light his surrounding took shape and definition. He was surrounded by a grey mist, bodiless, floating like a ghost; only able to see. Timeless moments passed in the grey mist until he heard a sound coming to him. Suddenly a wild stallion, with lust dark skin, emerged from it the emptiness that was the grey mist. The sheer beauty and raw power of the animal was breathtaking, remembering in of Dark King but more subtle and stylised, with more grace. He remained looking at the stallion entranced by the sight. As the time passed in that timeless place, the image of a dragon, a chinese dragon, with light green scales, silver mane and blue eyes began to appear on the skin of the horse, as a tattoo but not quite like that. More as if the dragon was the soul of the horse. But suddenly three blue orbs surrounded the horse, who now was trying to regain its freedom, fighting for all he was worth, but ultimately with no success, and as the light from the orbs got stronger the stallion began to disappear in a cloud of white dots. As the stallion and the orbs disappeared the dragon gained more definition until achieving the same reality than the horse had before. Yet as the dragon was flying between the mists, its power growing, the stallion began to appear, but reflected in the scales of the dragon. Then with a roar, the dragon and the stallion disappeared in a flash of light, leaving a five-year old boy where the magnificent animals stood moments before. The boy had black hair made in a little pig-tail and even looking so young an aura of confidence could be sensed, as well as the sadness that shine in his blue eyes, the same blue eyes that the dragon's ones. But what was more shocking was that _he_ stood behind the boy with his hands on the boy's shoulders. And not only him was present, but Raoh and Toki, his brothers, as well, and behind him all the Nanto masters; Shu, Rei, Sauther, Shin, Yuda even his beloved Yuria! All were looking at him, smiling. And finally the stars that formed the great dipper constellation and those of the Southern Cross were shining like suns, blinding him upon the head of the boy. Then the dream ended, but the memory of the face of the boy remained fresh. The only thing that Kenshiro knew from this dreams was that time had come to him to search the new heir of the Fist of the North Star, and he knew were to look. In the northern lands. And maybe when he would have found the boy the rest of the dream will be clear to him. ---------------------------------------------------------- Walking. Since almost five days Ranma hadn't stopped walking, resting at day and continuing by night, fighting the extremes temperatures of this desert, but not quite a desert. Since the first look to that new place, Ranma had the feeling to be living in a dead world. With the remaining buildings tossed as if a giant hand a brush them aside, destruction was the only thing that greeted his eyes hour after hour, day by day. Yet was all that destruction localised in the zone he was now? Or was it at world scale? What kind of destruction, of cataclysm could have done, no, created that nightmarish version of a once huge city? Was he the only human being left in this god-forgotten land? This and other questions clouded Ranma's mind. But there were more questions; questions which his very survival depended on. Where could he find food and even more important where could he find water? His dry throat reminded him of his dangerous state. You can survive for some weeks without food but without water no more than a couple of days. And Ranma was almost in his fifth day without the precious liquid. He knew that his younger body could not survive more time without some. His time was getting short. That possibility had occurred him sometime ago, maybe between his second and third day wandering south. He was still marvelling at his new body, at his new... home when the sensation struck him. Since Jusenkyo there were some signs and feelings that followed him and with time he learned to recognise as the aura of the curse of the drowned girl. But as the feeling in his bones that tell him that he was living in a new body without marks from his old wounds, those feelings indicating him that he was cursed soon disappeared. Almost as soon as his mind dealt with his new body and the conflict with the sixteen years old Ranma and the five one. As well as the shock of this new world. It was slight comfort if he was right. After all the curse wasn't as bad when he was alone, it was more the reaction the other people had when they found he was cursed that he heated. The reaction of repulsion in Akane. The fright in both Nabiki's and Kasumi's when finding something that shattered their confidence on the reality of their life. Even if they reacted smoother after growing used to it. His stupid father finding it as a proof of the failure of his son, a victory for a man that trained him to finally find that the boy he had abused was better than him. The people at Furinkan, drooling when looking to his cursed body, soon forgetting that he was a man when only their hormones raged in their (reduced) brains. That or that he was some kind of freak. And Kuno! He was tempted to laugh, and would have done hadn't his troath send another wave of pain. This was one of the few comfort that he possessed. He would have given anything when he had found that his "pigtailed goddess" wasn't there to him; how sweet it would be that at the very end the insane kendoist realised that he was that girl! Maybe that would be enough to make him accept at least reality. Not that all of that mattered. He could or could not be cursed, but right now he was wondering what had passed to his water magnet problem. For months water had followed him and now that his survival depended on it not a drop! And with those thoughts in mind Ranma continued walking towards south, only relaying on his stubbornness to continue ahead until darkness and thirst could reclaimed him. Something that, after a few hours more, under a unrelenting sun, happened. The tact of dry earth upon the bare parts of his body the last sensation along with his mighty thirst. ------------------------------------------------- Once again his eyes warily opened. At first as darkness met his eyes he believed that it was night. But after a few moments the darkness turned in soft grey as rays of light crossed the place he was in. He turned his head to one side and another, a little surprised. For what it seemed he was inside a bare room with only one entrance, mid open. The rays of the sun giving him a dim illumination his eyes soon adapted to his surroundings allowing him to soon see more clearly the room. It was bare, him being laid upon a hard bed, probably made of wood, with a slim blanket covering him. At his side was a chair were his only clothes, that are grey trousers, were put. He slowly rises his chest up and was looking to his skin and rest of his body in search of some hint of sun abrasion. He was sure that with his prolonged exposure to the hot light he would have all his skin burned but found no trace of burnt. If his guessing was right he had been healed. But by who? And where was he right now (not that he knew were he was when arriving to those strange lands... Feeling well enough, he pushed the blanket aside and put his foot on the ground as he tested the strength in his limbs. After finding it more or less acceptable he quietly took his trousers and put them on. He slowly started to walk still feeling some minor shaking in his legs. Proof that his previous idea about his strength was more or less accurate. Then in the corner of his eye he caught a glimmer, some sun's light reflecting upon a metallic element. He advanced to see what it was and was surprised to see some water in metal bowl. He put his hands in it, reliving in the cool feeling upon his tanned skin and promptly started to splatch it upon his face, upon his head, upon his hair until it ran to his shoulders, the feeling almost alien to this younger body Still the cold water was a blessed feeling, smoothing his wary mind and dry body. He sighed a long time, his eyes closed, feeling relaxed for the first time in a great time. He stopped a moment when the strange thought that something was amiss assaulted his mind. Then he understood. The water _is_ cold. And he was still a man! He looked to his bare chest, to his hands that even being little were so different from the more delicate ones of his cursed form. He turned and turned looking, or trying to, searching for any possible change. None. He patted his chest, still unbelieving, even if he had played with the idea while struggling to find shelter in that wasted land. Now the reality was with him and an idle thought was more than that. It was real. His body was his, not changed by some obscure magic from a time long forgotten to humankind. He sat on the ground some of the cold water running in his back and face as his hair released the excess of liquid. To be true to himself, now that he was so far from his place of birth, from the place were he thought he had found home this... unwaited cure hadn't the same meaning. Sure he was now on his body but without anyone to share the feeling of freedom and integrity what worth had it? None. He sighed once again passing his small hand upon his small face. Nothing since waking up in a world of pain made sense, nor those new feelings and discoveries gave him any warm to his cold soul. Simply he was drained. What once should have been a reason to be ecstatic with joy and happiness now seemed devoid of any positive side. What was happening inside of him? Only feelings that he wasn't used to. "Damn. Its so confusing..." He found some relief in hearing his own voice, even if younger. It brought him some measure of reality to that strange dream that was his life now. He put his still humid hand upon his heart. Strange feelings, like ice freezing his emotions, his memories to preserve his mind. Only one thing clear his wary mind told him: he had to adapt, to go on, to survive. Not for that anger and rage filled promise he said as he departed from his home world, but for him, because surrounding wasn't part of himself, it wasn't a part of Ranma. A part of him. For himself. He stayed there unmoving, until the sound of someone walking toward the door bring him once again to the dim illuminated room. He stopped dead, his brain paralysed as his heart started to beat faster, stronger. For those simple sounds that he could have heard infinitely before were now of a new meaning to that hungry soul, carving for anything human. He wasn't sure of what to expect but the being coming to him from across that wood door was something that he will cherish; human life. Hope. More to him than the water that nourished his thirsty body because it would warm the ice in his heart. The door slowly opened allowing him to see an elder man with a white beard and long white hair. The older man looked in the room before his gaze fell upon the young boy. Then a smile appeared in his face, a smile that made Ranma to feel warm inside. He didn't knew why but that smile reminded him of Kasumi. The same air of goodness and kindness but in this man coupled with some wisdom that shines in a pair of youthful grey eyes. The man approached the still sitting Ranma and kneeling in front of the once martial artist, put his hand in the young boy's forehead. He stood there unmoving until after a time that seemed eternal to Ranma, he removed his hand and his smile grew wider. Then he spoke and once again he was surprised to be reminded of Kasumi. The same feelings of comfort and security that he could find in the elder Tendo daughter he could find in that man, minus the obviousness that marked the young woman. "I was worried for you. You had a fever that refused to release you for the last four days." Yet Ranma's mouth moved faster than his brain. "How... where?" The old man looked at him his smile still upon his lips. "Well young one, we find you four days ago, unconscious and burning by an insolation. The trackers party took you here were we tended your body," his smile disappeared as he reminded the last days. "To be true to you child I was afraid that you would die, and I wasn't the only one. Your body was too weakened. But yesterday the fever lessened giving us some hope. As for were you are, this is Ember, the last town before the desert, an oasis for the ones that need to cross that dead zone, even if few try it due to its dangers." The old man turned slightly Ranma's head, as he looked closer to the tanned skin of the boy. "Absolutely remarkable. You don't have any sequel of your long exposure to the sun. How uncanny. Even stronger people should have die for those burn. Yet your body recovered at a fantastic rate..." He then remarked the puzzled expression on the younger boy and laughed. When he finished laughing he grabbed the boy and sat him on the bed as he took the chair, putting it in front of the bewildered child. Ranma for his part was surprised by the easy demeanour of the older man in front of him; it was as if that man had suffered a great deal and now tried to enjoy life in its more little details. "Excuse me. I let myself forget that you are still nothing more than a child. I'm Yado. And you? How may this little boy be called?" He looked to the still silent child in front of him and for a moment believed to see something... strange in the blue eyes of his patient. Something that he had seen before in the looks of the people that had suffered their harsh world. The boy slowly opened his mouth and said only one word: "Ranma." Yado forgot his momentous reflection as he focused once more on the young boy. "Well Ranma, let get you something to ate and after you will tell me about you." Ranma nodded, his face bright to the prospect of having food. He jumped out of the bed as Yado started to walk towards the closed door. Looking to the child at his side the feeling that something wasn't "normal" in the boy increased as he looked how he moved. The recuperation was complete, even if he knew that when he had grabbed Ranma the young boy wasn't full healed and still weak but in the few moments they talked, somehow he recuperated. The way he moved also was too efficient for someone as young. He gave an internal frown. The boy shouldn't have recuperated from the physical state they brought him. Definitively something wasn't normal in that boy. He opened the door and exited the room with the boy at his toes. ------------------------------------------------- Ranma was staring. He was in the shade of one of the threes of the town thinking of the hours after he left the old healer. The day had been... different from what was his past life. Pleasantly different; brand new and with surprises and future promises. He closed his eyes and started remembering the things he saw, felt and did since the lunch hour. After Yado had given him some food he had let him wander in the little town, as the healer had other people to care. Soon other children asking him to play with them accosted Ranma. At first the was tempted to do so but he had too much to think of. During his small lunch, that he enjoyed immensely and curiously he didn't found the oppressing need to stuff himself full, contrary to his older body. It seemed that the ingrained Saotome way to inhale food was a memory of old times. He didn't knew if being upset about that. It seemed that he was loosing all that marked the old Ranma Saotome. No longer in his home world, no longer in the body in where he learned the Musabetsu Kakuto Ryu, no longer cursed by Jusenkyo; it was as if was loosing himself. For now his memories were still there but as veiled, no longer with much feelings behind them. As far as he knew even his fear of cats was also starting to fade, but slowly. He was "Ranma" now. One of the few things that cheered up in all of that was the knowledge of having left behind all the crap that he had to endure. As he was slowly chewing his food he wished to be bale to see what would happen to the ones left behind. Without him to blame anymore how would they face life? Well that wasn't his problem anymore. As he finished he started to wander Ember Town, and was gladly surprised to found that contrary to the place he arrived, in the desert, this town had more green, even some trees and water was more common even if it was treated with extreme care. For what Ranma knew water was a rare thing, infinitely more precious that in his world. As he walked, without caring of the way he was taking, only enjoying hearing the voices of the people around him as opposite to the oppressing silence of the desert lands. As time passed he was convinced that he was in reality in a reconstructed town as the centre activity of so much human movement was the repairing of houses similar to the ones in Nerima. Anywhere his eyes roamed on he could find people working, making a life better to them and others; children and other younger people helping their elders in anyway they could as if being alive and moving on was the most precious treasure one could have all had the light of hope in their eyes. Looking to all that people made him fell a strange warmth that he sparsely felt in his time at the Tendo dojo. Soon he arrived to a place with more children some more aged than himself while some of a similar age were playing what seemed to be soccer, others simply were playing some child games that to the older mind of Ranma seemed extremely simple. As he was looking to the other children's play checked by their mothers that were talking between them, a young girl of approximately his age, maybe a little older came running after a ball that ended at Ranma's feet. "Please can you give me my ball?" She said as she neared the pig-tailed boy, slightly winded by the run. "Umm, sure." He then picked the ball up and handed it to the young girl. He looked at her. Shoulder-long blond hair and bright green eyes that were gleaming with the light, making them look like emeralds. "Thanks!" she said as she took it. Then she looked at him as if checking him, then smiling gestured to the awaiting playmates. She looked again to Ranma before asking. "Say do you want to play?" she then gave him a cute smile as if encouraging him to do so. Ranma looked at her, then to the other boys and girls. Thought about it for a moment before shaking his head. Simply he wasn't with the mood. And he wanted to see if he had recuperated completely from his ordeals. As soon as he finished he could see the light in those green eyes diminish, and immediately regret his decision. Many things had changed in him but he couldn't stand seeing any girl of any age sad. That was a reassuring thought. Still he had to cheer the blond girl up. "Maybe later?" he asked hesitantly. The girl brightened immediately. "Yhea! By the way my name is Rea. Yours?" "Um... It's Ranma." "Ranma." She repeated the name as if tasting it. "Well then 'till later!" And as she said that, she kicked the ball in the direction of the playing field and ran after it. Soon Ranma could see as the game returned to normality. He looked at it and to the faces full of entertainment of his new peers with mixed feelings. Then he turned and started walking towards some of the sparse trees and their comforting shade. He remained there, not moving and not thinking, only feeling, until the light of the afternoon started to fade. He then returned to the care centre, where Yado had told him he would be waiting, and the memory of a pair of green eyes still in his mind. ------------------------------------------------- The next two days passed in the same way. Yado would ask him some question that Ranma would answer as best as he could his mind being in other things, such as putting order in his feelings and new sensations. He knew that he wasn't very co-operative with the old man but he couldn't help it. What was he going to answer when Yado asked him about where he came from, how he ended alone in a desert area or where were his parents? He couldn't tell the truth, it is simply to fantastic. Stupidly fantastic, that is: "You see Yado, I'm a martial artist that until last week turned into a girl in contact with cold water, was with four fiancees and my father is a stupid panda that more than once sold me for food: one cup of rice and few more." Then he would add: "Don't forget that I was send here by a bunch of idiots all of them delusional. One with directional problems that turn into a pig, another a blind as a bat that turn into a duck and is name is taken after a body-care product, the last one has problems to understand reality and was in love with my girl-side because he was a complete moron." He would be put into an asylum if that place had one. Each time the older man asked him he would answer with monosyllables. As for the old man he could see that he was suspecting that he wasn't a normal children. Each time Ranma would talk he would display, sometimes unconsciously, a knowledge that isn't in the range of a five years old child. His other problem was Rea. He didn't know how to deal with the girl. He wanted to be with other people is age, but what was is real age? The physical five years old or the mentally sixteen years old? He was unsure how to deal with the little girl, she wasn't used to someone not wanting to play with others. She usually tried to trick him into following her in their children play but Ranma was reluctant. Reluctant but at the same time... wanting to forget his older self and be with people wanting to be his friend. The morning of the third day Ranma awake late only to find Yado looking at the window. Ranma neared the older man that greeted him with a warm smile. He then gestured the playing boy and girls, before letting Ranma look by the window, using a nearby chair to do so. The old man then excused him and went to a desk that was in one corner of his house-clinic. He glanced at Ranma that was entranced looking to the others playing. Yado looked to the eyes of his young charge noticing the light in them. He turned his back to the pig-tailed boy and looked back to his papers. After some minutes he turned again to find Ranma in the same position, his eyes displaying the same desire alongside with some sadness and. fear? Yado sighed. He really wished that Ranma opened himself to the others. He remained silent a moment more before speaking aloud looking at the little figure. "You know Ranma, there is nothing that stops you in joining them." Ranma looked back startled by the commentary of the healer. He had been so entranced by the show of the other boys and girls playing carefree, that he hadn't noticed the old man. "Uh? What do you mean?" Yado returned to the boy's side, looked to the window and gestured towards the place the other youngsters were playing. "You have been invited by that young girl, no? That means that they _want_ you to go and play with them. I'm sure that no matter what you have faced this is no more difficult than crossing that door and asking if you can play. I understand that you can be frightened..." "I'm afraid of nothing!" Ranma shouted, startling the older man by the burst. Yado looked at Ranma, to his deep blue eyes, and was convinced. He nodded. "I believe you. I may ignore who or what you are but I know that you are no coward." Ranma relaxed at Yado statement, but was intrigued by the old man. Which was his point? "Still I worry that whatever you passed by, marked you, making you unable to live a normal life. And that girl, Rea I think is her name his starting to feel that also. That's maybe why she is insisting so much into you playing with her and her friends. What hold you back is yourself Ranma. You may be no coward but are you strong enough to move on?" Ranma was in a sea of doubt, his lonely side winning slowly but surely. The truth was that he wanted to play; but more than play move on as he vowed. He looked back at the older man and nodded. Yado smiled and turned again to his work. Ranma jumped from the chair and went to the door opening it and going slowly to the place Once again Rea and her friends were playing a kind of football, and once again the ball came to Ranma's feet. He took it and as he looked at the advancing Rea he offered her the ball. Gazing in her green eyes he tried to sound as confident as he could. "Can I play?" Rea's smile grew more as she gestured him to come in. Then she laughed; a laugh that reminded him of silver bells or the rain upon a lake. He smiled back. Things looked good. ------------------------------------------------- True to tell Ranma had few memories as good as the following days were his circle of friends grew more. Only the brief moment when he was with U-chan before the cat fist training could match those days shared with Rea and her friends, now his as well. The good point is that Genma wasn't here to ruin everything in opposition to the time shared with Ukyou. Here he was free to progress in the friendship offered by Rea that first day in the town. Yado was even happier to see the young boy blending with the other children and sometimes with their parents. The boy had a inner charm that once revealed drew adults and children alike to him, a charm that started to show as he grew his circle of friends. Also Ranma had offered him to help in the clinic. At first Yado had been a little reluctant and, smiling, tried to wave the proposal of his young charge away. He wasn't very lucky. He was surprised to see that, after giving Ranma the pleasure to accept (convinced that Ranma would grew bored after a time of tedious tasks), the boy revealed to have a good basis in the human body as well as acupuncture and chinese healing. Yado was taken aback by the knowledge showed by Ranma. Soon he was asking him about where he acquired that information and medical formation. But as he expected Ranma tried to evade the question; this time with a smile. Yado didn't pressed him. He knew that when Ranma trusted him enough the mystery he represented would be revealed by itself. Another thing that surprised him, and the young boy's playing friends, was the strength and agility that he displayed. In all the games they played, even with Ranma being five years old or so, the pig-tailed child would win and as his friends finished winded he was relatively fresh. Also his co-ordination and balance were uncanny for someone of that age. Coupled with all the precedents and the healing rate the healer had been witness when he took care of Ranma when he was brought from the dessert those days ago, his skin burned so badly, he was unable to define the physical abilities of his charge. He looked were Ranma was once playing, this time a game of tag, with Rea going after him absolutely carefree. ------------------------------------------------- The adults were worried. Ranma could feel it. He had seen it quite a number of times. That feeling in the air, the waiting for something that one fears but is unable to pinpoint the moment when it could strike. As him with Akane's cooking. He could see it in the face of the people around him. Even the children were aware that something wasn't right, that something was disturbing their parents, thus making their games more... cold. The fear was present and Ranma didn't liked to see the people he cared about worried. Even Rea had lost that spark that she had all the time, that spark that Ranma found so... attractive in the blonde girl. He clenched his little fist. He was unable to do anything to make that spark return into the death emeralds that were the eyes of his friend. Not even his "foot in the mouth" could make her laugh. He swore. That was one of the things he liked so much in the girl: she was the first one, apart from Kasumi, not to smash him with the nearest (heavy) object when his mouth moved faster than his mind could. The only thing she did was to look at him for some moments and then start laughing, telling him that he was funny! He had expected her to drew a mallet or to bash him with a table. Nothing like that. She even kissed him in the cheek! Ranma stood after that totally frozen for ten minutes, as if a lightning had struck him. That was one of his fondest memories in this new world. With moments like that the world were he was right now couldn't be so bad. But now that special gleaming in her eyes was gone. He sighed as he walked not looking were he was going. Not to be surprised when he tripled with someone. "Ouch!" "Ugh!" Ranma looked from the ground who he had stumbled with and was surprised to see Rea! "You Ranma! Idiot! Don't you see were you are going?" "And you what? Or did you so willingly?" he asked back. "Umpf!" Ranma was now on his feet and was helping the young girl to stand up. "Forget it." He simply said. The spark was still missing. Rea looked at him and after some moments of staring at him ran away. Ranma looked to the retreating figure with a puzzled look. Then he shook his head. Girls of any age would ever be a mystery to him. He continued walking noticing that some adults were armed with spears, hammers even with swords and bows. At the display of weapons his mind returned to the feeling that things were about to turn to worst. All the signs he had seen until then pointed to some kind of attack, but from whom? Any why would want to attack the village? That was the moments he wished to have asked Yado about the history behind this world he was living in now. Unfortunately he was too much busy with his feelings problems and by moving on to ask for information. Nabiki would be calling him idiot by now. He swore again. After some colourful words that a five years old probably shouldn't know about he continued walking this time towards the small clinic were he had been living for the past days. Still the vision of the weapons the adults were griping nervously didn't allowed him to turn his thoughts from the feeling that something bad was about to happen. He continued walking until he heard his name called by a voice he knew well. He rises his look from the ground to look to the nearing figure of Yado. "Here you are, Ranma!" The boy immediately recognised the same expression of worry he could find in other adults in the face of his old friend. The eyes of the healer were darting from one place to another, frenetically. "What's happening Yado? Why is everybody so nervous?" He asked the older man. The healer looked to the concerned face of his charge and wondered if telling him the truth. Indeed this boy was like no other but still... Things had been bad since several parties of scoots were reported missing, and that was a _very_ bad thing. It pointed something he preferred not to think of. Only one thing comforted him along with the possibility of a freak coincidence. All the men that were trackers and scouts were childless, them killed or taken for slavery years ago; surviving people that unfortunately had lost all their families and tried to prevent that from happening again. He looked once again to his charge. No he would not tell him that he was one of those childless; that he also had lost his family not one but two times. He wouldn't burden that child with more concern that the ones he already had. "Nothing that you have to concern yourself with, Ranma. Let the adults deal with it. After all," he smiled "its not something that such a young boy like should know about. Now let's return to the clinic." He then grabbed the hand of the young boy and started walking. Ranma was tempted to argue with the older man but after some moments stopped considering it. He was in the same position as if he wanted to tell Yado the truth. How could he help without appear as a mad(child)man? He sighed and followed the old man, his hand caught in the bigger one. Not a bad thing per se. Maybe in a passed time while in his home world he would have given much to have such a simple moment, such a simple gesture with Genma. It was a time before the Cat-fist. Before a lot of things, a time when he was more innocent. As he was thinking about all those passed moments a sound caught his hear. A sharp sound, of something cutting air, something... He looked up in time to see three arrows ended into Yado's chest. As the old man's dead body spun due to the strength of the impact, his blood drenched Ranma's pale face. The body landed with a loud sound, like a heavy sac, the sound sounding a hundred times in Ranma's mind as his hand was still in the warm hand of the old man. The man that cared for him, that helped him overcome his own feelings. That kind old man. His friend. Dead. Warm blood flowing slowly upon his face. His hand released the old man's one. He looked to his face for an eternal moment, carving his features in his mind and a thousand mages of passed days in his heart. Yado's face was peaceful, the strains of pain fading as dead welcomed the healer but his eyes were still open. Ranma kneeled in front of the old man that came to be so much to him and slowly closed the veiled eyes. Ranma looked up, his mind still trying to came over the facts, hardly making it. What he saw as soon as reality reached him turned his blood cold. Everywhere, with a speed that seemed madness some hypergrown men were savagely butchering any other human they came across; men, women and children alike, laughing at their cries for help or pity. There and there he could see groups of armed townsmen trying to hold some kind of human wall as they faces the human monsters with their weapons, allowing others to escape further into the town. For some moments Ranma believed they could hold at bay the attackers but soon he realised that those centre of resistance would been overcome soon. Simply those human marauders were too strong for the armed men of Ember Town that were slowly but surely being defeated. Once those men were killed in would be a matter of time for the rest of the town to be destroyed. In front of Ranma all the work and hopes he had seen displayed by the local people were destroyed in a sea of blood and destruction. All that helped him to forget his own feelings of helplessness were turned to nothing. But it was hearing those monsters he realised another thing. Those ravagers were killing only to have food! They were killing because they were strong and their prey was weak. In his reeling mind Ranma realised that the food was only an excuse to show their supposed superiority; to gave their cruelty a way to make then stronger in their mad minds. As he stood there motionless, as his feelings were once more turned into ice rendering him numbness to that nightmare, a voice crossed the ice were his dormant feelings were. A voice he knew as well as Yado's. He looked around him, as people passed were he was standing unnoticed. Then he located the source of that voice; a blond haired girl with tears in her eyes as she ran to the prone figure of a woman. The girl then started to shake the body as mindless sounds came from her mouth one being to dominant one. "MOMMOMMOMMOMMOMMOMMOMMOMMOMMOMMOMMOMMOMMOMMOMMOMMOMMOMMOMMOMMOMMOM" So shocked was the little girl that she didn't notice a towering figure that smiled wickedly as he rise a huge sword. But Ranma saw it, the fear to never again hear that silvery laugh, the fear to see the same veiled gaze in those emerald green eyes, the fear to never again enjoy the company of that special girl that healed him as well as Yado making him to bolt, running as fast as his young body could allow him; becoming a blur. Only one thought in his mind as fear was making adrenaline to flow madly in his body. He was about to reach the little girl, only one minute; nay an instant more and he would save her as he had saved so many people in his own world. "REAAAAAAAAA!!!!!!" He shouted in the hopes of warning her. Her eyes looked at him, shining between the tears, an intelligible look in them. He was only a few meters away when she smiled at him. He was one moment late. The sword flashed and blood was released as a cry of pain came unbidden. Time froze in Ranma's mind as the ice covered his mind; his soul. He saw how Rea's body felt limply at the side of the one of her mother The moment of Rea's dead was replayed inside of him, making him to stop running as shocked he was. He stumbled near her body and cradled it, unaware of the world around him and Rea. The only thing that he was aware was that her eyes were closed. Yet he passed a finger upon her cheeks as her blood mixed with Yado's. He wiped the tears and slowly put the body of his friend with the one of her mother. He had knew the older woman in the days of his growing friendship with Rea and for some moments he had felt what it was to have a mother he that not even remembered his own. He looked at them as he did with Yado, marking their peaceful faces in his mind, carving them in his heart. Forever one with him. He closed his eyes as a tear was slowly shed. A blood tear. As peaceful as he was outside, inside hundreds of changes were happening. The ice that froze his mind blow up and melted as the fires of rage, hate and a million more feelings that he never felt before were cursing his hole being with the same intensity as the nuclear reactions inside of the sun. His mind once again clear was burning with the need of vengeance. The will, determination and rage making his body's muscles to stretch as a soft red aura started to burn around him; blood-red with black hints few moments after the aura started forming until it exploded into a bonfire of ki-energies fuelled by his determination to execute revenge. To kill the ones that killed his starting life. Who killed the people he loved for the sake of cruelty. The power cursed trough his body reaching a point in which the use of that energy was almost painful. But he needed that power; a power that emanated from a side of his inner self that was wild, uncontrolled. What he found was a immense killing potential within himself; one he never knew of consciously that was with him. Now he recognised and embraced it thus becoming a part of him; changing him forever. Another part of the old Ranma died to forge the new one. He opened his eyes; his deep blue turned into solid gold as he looked at his surroundings; searching for a prey, searching for a blood baptism. There. He jumped straight towards his prey. His lips curved into a feral smirk as he recognised the one that killed Rea. In his mind he had forgotten that he was now a five years old boy, that he was in a stranger land. In his mind there were no place for doubts now. He was there to protect those that couldn't do it themselves. He would do it even if the odds were against him in his new body. Yet if Cologne and Happossai could fight in their aged bodies then why couldn't he in is more youthful one, a detached part of his mind, the only cold part inside of him, the one giving him the skill needed to use his new-found power asked rhetorically. The one that killed Rea and her mother never knew what hit him as entranced he was in the pleasure of the killing, of the red blood running trough his sword. He was so centred in the pleasure he had in killing the weak that he crossed that by time he saw a red blur, the world and his surroundings went black as he felt how his face, his skull, exploded by the sheer force of the blow he received. Ranma felt some disturbing satisfaction as he sensed the bones of the man's head exploded due to the strength behind his ki-powered kick. But as the body of Rea's killer went down he knew instinctively that now wasn't the time to ponder about it. He would face the fact that he had killed later. Only one of his numerous enemies was down and the ones that had seen him die would soon react. He had to used the few moments he had before they reacted to the threat he represented. They would want blood for killing one of them. With a jump he was once again running, both his aura and golden eyes burning. There. Ranma lapped towards another one of the raiders who was about to strike a woman who was protecting her two children, a little boy and a little girl, with an enormous broadsword. Ranma directed his body with a twist in mid-air and with another kick snapped the monsters wrist, making the man to shout in pain a look of disbelief as soon as he focused hi sight to the glowing figure that had attacked him. Unfortunately the pain prevented the man to notice that dead was coming once again after him. Ranma jumped one more time, landing on the "man"'s arm and, using the size of his body and his own speed, ran upon the enormous limb aiming the face of the raider. As soon as he reached the startled face he used the gained speed to launched his little knees with a jump, aiming to the nose. As soon as he had heard the satisfacting noise of the broken nose he launched another attack; a quick combination of fist and kicks turning the face intro a pulp. He died without knowing what had killed him as his neck snapped by the strength behind the blows. His body ended on the ground as Ranma landed swiftly near the woman and her children. "Lady! You must go and hide!" Shouted Ranma to the woman trying to get her attention. "I don't know how many time I can hold them back! Run!" The woman was too shocked to react. First she believed that she was going to die and was ready to die protecting her children. Then a blur came and killed her attacker and now she realised that the blur was a little boy no older than her own! But she recognised a voice of command when she heard one, so she did what she was told, even if that was an unreal situation inside of a nightmare. Ranma breathed, relived once he saw the woman running to get cover. What was better the situation wasn't as bad as he had seen before. After the initial shock from the attack the villagers, those who were still alive, were regrouping to made a counter to the ravagers now that the surprise effect was gone. As was gone his own surprise effect towards the raiders. That was proved when three of those overgrown bastards came running towards him. Just in that moment Ranma realised a problem he hadn't took notice the power used would fatigue his old body quickly. In his new body the strain of his power was eating his stamina by seconds. Soon he would be unable to defend himself. He may have still the same amount of ki at his disposal, his cold mind theorised quickly, but this body wasn't used to it. In few words he was in trouble. Looking to the charging monsters he came to a decision. He may die but he would take the major number of those bastards with him. He relaxed and tried to increase the amounts of power, drawing them from his reserves as he focused all of that energy in the strongest emotion of the ones cursing trough him: Anger. He focussed the power into the space between his two hands, put at waist level. His aura seemed to be absorbed in that space and started to grow; first with the size of a golf ball but quickly growing more than a thousand times its original size. Then as his eyes were burning golden he launched his attack with an inhuman roar. The blast turned the world crimson for a moment. The first two attackers were reduced to ashes as Ranma felt to his knees, drained by the taxation of using anger-fuelled ki, part of his clothes torn apart by the shockwave of the blast. Stubbornly, gritting his theet, he started to rise as he noticed the looks of hate and fear coming from the attackers. The surprise of the blast had put a halt to the fighting and now all the attention was focused in him. Then the biggest attacker pointed his sword towards him. "Kill him! Kill that punk! I want his head!!" His men looked at him, again to Ranma as fear was clear in their faces. The raiders boss was now seeing red. "He his exhausted! If you don't kill him you'll be the next ones! GO!" They looked at each others, nodded and charged the stumbling Ranma. He supposed that it would end like this but he had still a last trick in his sleeve.