"What happened?" Ryouga demanded, moving to take Akane off Ukyou's hands.
"It...it was Yuka," Ukyou said nervously, looking back over her shoulder.
"She...bit me..." Akane said, hardly walking at all now. "Ranma... killed her."
"Surely you must be mistaken!" Kodachi insisted. "My Ranma-sama is not a murderer!"
"Hold your tongue, dear sister," Kuno snapped, pointing to Ranma as he was sliding down the wall, obviously in pain. "He has obviously shown his true colors."
"No true," Shampoo insisted.
"Ukyou-sama?" Konatsu asked hesitantly.
"Yuka attacked us," Ukyou said. "She bit Ranma and Akane." The next part she admitted to hesitantly. "Ranma caved her head in."
"Ranma!" Ryouga roared. "How could you?!"
"Already dead," Ranma gasped. "Zombie...more...coming." The mention of zombies triggered a memory in the back of Kodachi's mind, but she couldn't quite lay hold of it.
"There was something very wrong with..." Ukyou was cut off as Akane started crying out in pain.
The group turned to watch as Akane grew darker and the muscles under her skin seemed to be writhing. A few moments later Ranma let out a muffled groan and toppled completely to the floor as he started changing, as well.
"What the hell is happening?!" Ryouga demanded of somebody.
"Aiyah," Shampoo said quietly. "Pervert girl and Airen...changing."
"You fiend!" Kuno shouted. "Remove your grip upon the lovely Akane Tendo this instant."
Akane's skull hardened, the forehead turning harder, and thicker in places, culminating into two pairs of small bumps, almost like budding horns, one over each corner of her eyes. Her muscles grew sharply, as did her overall height, adding several inches and pounds, all muscle, to her form. Her canines seemed to sharpen as her finger nails screeched sharply over the steel floors. Her eyes shifted into yellow irises with slitted pupils.
Ranma was faring no better, his skin color shifting into a grayish manner reminescent of the hallways around them. In contrast to Akane's sharp increase in size, he seemed to grow slimmer, with denser, wiry muscle patterns and slightly longer limbs. His nails also grew longer and seemed to become thicker as well. And, like Akane, he grew a pair of small fangs.
As the group was watching the transformation, they were too distracted to notice the moaning and shuffling of feet behind them.
"Ukyou-sama!" Konatsu called out in warning as he turned to look at her. She turned around in time to watches the small pack of zombies pull her back to the ground.
Ukyou screamed in terror and pain as she felt the creatures, some of whom she recognized as former friends and costumers, dug into her flesh. Now she was serving them in a new manner as the other Nerimites watched, stunned.
"Ukyou-sama!" Konatsu cried out charging forward.
"Oh by the kami," Kodachi whispered. "Raccoon City."
Forgetting herself for a moment she rushed in behind the ninja with her bar to beat the zombies off of the chef. She feared they would need everyone they had to get out.
"Get back you sub-creatures!" Kodachi demanded, smashing one in the back with her bar and succeeding in acquiring their attention.
Konatsu's side kick had made a similar impact, and the two rescuers found themselves pulled down by their targets. Distracted by the surprise that they did not fall from the impact.
Ryouga snapped out of his daze then and remembered Ukyou's description of how Ranma had caved in Yuka's head. He rushed in and kicked the two zombies off of Ukyou, noticing that she was starting to change as Akane and Ranma were.
The distraction cost him as one of Kodachi's opponents turned around and lunged at Ryouga, biting into his side. Ryouga grunted and smashed a fist down into the creatures head as Kodachi, freed up from one of her two opponents, smashed her iron bar into the second's head.
Then she started feeling sick and noted with horror where she had been bitten.
"What madness is this?" Kuno demanded.
"You have to hit them in the head!" Ryouga shouted, as he noted the two downed zombies not getting up.
He glanced to see that Konatsu had worked himself free and taken down one of his opponents, and then interrcepted the two zombies he had kicked off Ukyou before giving into the dizziness.
Kuno ceased his uncertain holding over the now calming body of Akane Tendo and moved to pull the remaining zombie away from the ninja. Catching the creature in a headlock he pulled it back, gritting his teeth as it bit into his arm.
Shampoo cursed herself as she, of all of them, was the last to recover from the shock of the walking dead and moved forward to help Kuno.
"Stick boy let go and let Shampoo kill zombie!" Shampoo insisted, getting into a bit of a tug of war over the crazed creature with Kuno, who refused to let go.
The zombie clawed outward and gripped her side, sinking dirty, bleeding nails into her skin and pulling her forward toward its mouth in a mockish parody of a lover's embrace.
Shampoo growled and first smacked a fist into Kuno's head, the samurai, starting to feel dizzy, was dislodged giving Shampoo the position she needed to smash the zombie's skull. And then she felt dizzy and vaguely nauseous, half aware of the cries of pain around her as she started changing.
****
"Their regenerative capabilities and immune system render the primary method of the T-Virus's attack null and void, no poison or disease we tested on the non-human subjects could take hold," the lab technician explained. "Though physical injury taken too quickly will still be a problem."
"Will they always be disabled in the wake of changing," the official asked, frowning.
"Unknown at this time, sir," the tech said. "Perhaps just the first time."
"Is this their dormant form?" he asked. "Or their battle form."
"Again, sir," the tech said. "Unknown, though I'd suspect this is the battle form."
See other episodes by Thrythlind
(Posted Tue, 12 Nov 2002 05:11)
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