Just as human nature constrained the ways of Man, so too did Sauron's nature limit himself. He had spent so much time and effort, so much lore and investiture into the One Ring ploy that he couldn't simply abandon it.
Here there were no goblins or orcs or uruk-hai. Instead he had to make do with the local forces, and while he could certainly bring forth some uruk-hai - they could never be his main forces.
To that end, he corrupted the races of Men to do his bidding. It was pathetically easy. Man in this world was soft and weak for all their command of these forces of their science. A few glittering baubles conjured forth and he had his army.
Some things remained the same. Some things changed.
"Nerima. S-s-saotome," cried out a woman being put to torture.
Sauron considered that from within the cult compound he'd managed to acquire. Cults were useful things, came with the equivelant of goblin skirmishers except that they were of the race of Man and they were on the whole weaker and in many ways less satisfactory.
He could send his cultists to deal with this 'Saotome' and then have his Nazgul. Were the cultists up to it? Frankly he'd sent Nazgul to deal with some little farmers once before and look how well THAT had gone.
Unfortunately, being within this mortal form had caused it to begin wasting from within. His energies were simply too much for the being who had worn this form previously and it now looked less human than it had. Between that and having to leave the web of contacts and resources he'd spun around himself, going in person was out of the question. Some of those plans and intrigues were at delicate stages. Therefore he had to use agents.
Each layer of Rings was done, each a magically resonant number to defer to the One Ring. Nine for his new Nazgul. Seven. Five. Three. Each had some measure of power unto itself, though the fullness of power would only evoke when they bowed to his will in full.
As he noted earlier, Man had gotten weak and self-serving in this world. Without the dangers and conflicts from outside to strengthen them, without advisors from without their short lived race to teach and remind them, they'd tossed aside any hard-won principals. It had been duty and honor that had united the races against him before, that and a certain degree of self-preservation. Evil was seductive, tempting, and the more intellectual the victim the more that victim would rationalize their taking of that path. Such was the nature of Man.
Males were better warriors in melee. Better adrenal response, generally better upper body strength. Previously his forces had been male fashioned or male in gender. However, a woman had brought down his Witch-King and women had opportunities open to them that males in this society did not. For these 'modern' types of combat, utilizing these 'guns', gender did not appear a significant factor.
Perhaps some of his female minions could succeed where nine former kings of mortal men could previously not?
The Five then. Fives witches that the previous owner of his host body had had as associates. Though frankly one of them was not going to inspire any confidence on his part.
As far as a fellowship went, well, there had been worse groups.
Ranma sulked at being hidden amongst chickens.
Akane sulked at not being able to pack more than could be fit into a backpack.
Genma slept and dreamed about Hawaiian weddings and a honeymoon in Okinawa.
Soun worried about the two girls he'd left behind in Tokyo.
A strange little gnome that had followed them onto the plane for some reason wasn't sulking but seemed to study each of them behind slitted eyes - and found them less than inspiring.
The smugglers worried about being caught and their profits.
The thing with these particular smugglers is that they could have gone into the lucrative drug trade. They could have smuggled in immigrants. They could have smuggled in contraband fruit. They'd gone for chickens because almost everything in Hawaii was imported and the prices for food were nearly at Tokyo standards in Hawaii. Live chickens didn't take much space in their coops, weren't as likely to draw the attention of more established criminal elements, and if one knew the right farmers - made a significant profit margin if you made a run from Shanghai to Hawaii. Bribes took a bite of that profit, but it was a living.
They also smuggled in vacationers, mainly college students and sararimen looking for a little adventure that they could then retell stories about for years thereafter.
So this particular group wasn't that concerning. Oh, the Chinese gal was different. Probably some rival criminal element checking them out. It happened. The panda was a problem, mainly due to size and weight. If it became a problem they'd sell it off to the Honolulu Zoo - but so far all it seemed to do was sleep.
Now if they could just get the damn panda to stop snoring.
She'd just made it in time, using undue haste for her years but epic quests tended to demand a certain amount of hurry and she'd known it.
Cologne spent some time examining these people, at first watching from a distance as they left that 'Tendo Dojo' and gone off to an airport. She'd sent her great-granddaughter to tail the two others and observe them as they went in a seperate direction. A few words to the pilots of a low level chicken smuggling ring and she'd gotten passage.
The more she studied them the more she was convinced she had the right group and that these were mainly idiots.
The boy-turned-girl was the 'Ranma Saotome' the vision had spoken of, obviously cursed at Jusenkyo, and had an exhausted-haunted look. Arrogant but some martial arts skills. She'd have to see him in action before she could gauge the level.
The man-turned-panda, also obviously Jusenkyo, was one of the more experienced adventurers. The trick of sleeping anywhere, anywhen, as the opportunity presented itself - possibly the leader of the group.
The Weeping Man, or so she'd taken to calling him because he was constantly fretting about something, was less experienced but had something going on there. She'd have to watch and see.
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(Posted Fri, 10 Jun 2005 10:07)
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らんま1/2 © Rumiko Takahashi
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