Still she wasn't letting that distract her as she tossed out a web-line and swung, laughing loudly as she rocketed through the air and curled up to land upon the top of a roof. She paused a moment to look over the view of Tokyo as it played out before her.
"Impressive," a voice said behind her in Japanese that held too much perfection to be the average native speaker.
She turned to see another woman, no a girl like her, on the roof of this near inaccessible perch behind her. The appearance didn't particularly worry her, if the girl had been a real threat, she would have felt it.
It took a moment for Kumobara to realize who her company was.
"You are this 'Cheng-Huang' that the media has been discussing," Kumobara said trying to keep her own long-habitual haughtiness out of her voice. She bowed politely, even smiling though you could not see it under her mask. "I should be pleased to meet you."
The other girl shifted a bit cautiously, and her posture seemed to speak of more than a little irritation. It seemed to Kumobara that she was aching to say something, but was holding back.
Indeed Shampoo was aching to tell off Kumobara, but she couldn't do that without slipping into her characteristic "cute" speech (not yet anyway) and revealing who she was.
"How did you learn to do that?" the other girl said, still speaking slowly and point perfectly.
"Why..." Kodachi paused.
She was no longer certain of the how. There were two conflicting dreams or memories. One was fading and involved an old man, a cup of coffee and buying a costume. The other involved a delivery of specially bred roses from a New York farm she'd occasionally done business with. There had been a strange blue and white spider...she'd killed it, but not before being bitten. That was the memory that was becoming stronger, but both were still strong enough that when the question came up it confused her.
"...That, I believe, should be left to my privacy." Kumobara insisted. "Unless you would like to tell me how you followed me."
Kodachi thought about the other's identity for a moment.
Cheng-Huang was a Chinese city-guardian kami, and the other seemed to be based in Nerima as she was, if her intellect was any judge of the newspaper reports that is. However, their were only two girls she knew of that had the capability to follow her in her acrobatics.
One of those girls spoke in much worse Japanese (though it was the poor speech of a poorly educated native speaker), was much smaller than the person she was talking to, (about her own size, but with shorter legs, making the red-head shorter even than Kumobara), and, while having a similar bust, it seemed more impressive on her small frame.
The other girl capable of following her was no longer able to do so, to her knowledge, as Shampoo was blind. So that left the question of who this could be.
"That would not be good," Cheng-Huang responded.
Suddenly, Kumobara felt that buzzing in the back of her head. It had been semi-painful the first couple of times, but then she'd gotten used to it. She recognized the "pain" as just an attempt by her brain to alert her to something that needed attending to, and that the "pain" was directed toward the point of the danger. After that it wasn't pain anymore...just a buzzing.
In this case, the danger was coming from the sky, and apparently her guest had noticed it as well, though there was nothing Kodachi could see or hear yet.
Then it started passing by, a police helicopter. Kumobara frowned, wondering why that should be the source of the buzzing.
"Behind the craft," Cheng-Huang snapped behind her. And THEN it became obvious. There was a huge...thing...bearing down on the copter. "Tarou."
Well, that was a confirmation that the girl was from the Neriman area. Kumobara had heard of Tarou but never actually faced him.
Both girls leaped into action. Cheng-Huang leaped off the building in what Kumobara thought was reckless manner as she herself released a swingline to an antenna on the neighboring building.
Cheng-Huang flipped and rolled in an acrobatic maneuver that mildly impressed Kumobara. She was capable of better, of course, but then again, from the looks of it this Cheng-Huang was probably more trained to fighting than she herself was. Striking the side of the building and ricochetting (sp?) back up at the copter and Tarou.
The two girls weren't fast enough to keep the monster from grabbing the police copter and damaging its propeller. Cheng-Huang landed on him as he dropped the copter, and Kumobara could almost SWEAR that the monster smirked, but she didn't have time to consider that.
A second webline was released and the counter pull sent Kumobara on an intercepting course to catch the falling copter. She caught up to it easily enough, but catching the copter nearly tore her arm out of her socket. But she managed to hold it, and direct it's flight until she slammed into the side of a building, nearly getting herself crushed in the process.
With that brief stop she found it quite easy to keep the weight of the copter under control. It wasn't one of the larger copters, and well with in what she could now hold. But it was getting tiring.
"Please hold on," she said to the police officers within. "This might be a little harsh."
"What, who are...?" The police officer didn't get a chance to say more as Kumobara leaped off her perch and unleashed another swingline to bring them all as safely to the ground as she could.
"Excuse me," Kumobara said. "I believe I have a comrade to aide." So saying she took a leap upward and struck the building, then began to virtually run all fours up the side of it.
****
Meanwhile, Cheng-Huang was having bad memories of her first encounter with Tarou. Specifically, she was remembering clinging to his back with Ryouga, Mousse and Ranma as he flew through the air. Only this time, she had much better warning of when and how the beast was going to turn.
Tarou growled. This little task to draw out these heros that had been making news lately had been successful. However, he was finding that actually fighting them was more difficult. His main target (the one he'd been paid to crush) was clinging to him like an ant, and refusing to be dislodged no matter what he tried. And he couldn't really fight her well like this.
It was time to take this fight to the ground. At least temporarily.
There was a heavy thud as the woman on his back punched him again. He growled and dipped low, slashing over the streets.
Cheng-Huang felt the monster grin as it kept lowering further, and Tarou's intention was quickly apparent.
"No way," Cheng-Huang hmphed, taking leave of the beast's body just as he spun and tried to smear her across the pavement.
She frowned at seeing the damage Tarou was doing to the city she was supposed to be protecting. She wasn't doing too well as of yet. But at least that fall should have taken some steam out of Tarou.
Then the beast stood up, shook its head and smiled at her.
"Oh right," Shampoo thought. "It always takes a lot to bring him down." She sighed and got into stance as the creature laughed at her, cracking its knuckles.
And that's when Kumobara made her reappearance. Swinging down on a webline and slamming into Tarou's head, sending the beast stumbling backwards.
She flipped out of the strike and landed on her feet a yard or two away from Cheng-Huang.
"Perhaps you would like some aid?" Kumobara asked. Cheng-Huang hmphed.
"Clumsy kick," she said. "You should stay with weapons." Kumobara blinked under her mask and almost flinched. Either her comrade recognized her style or...she recognized Kodachi.
"I shall bare that in mind," Kumobara said. Then that buzzing, that spider-sense of hers, called out and she was dodging a strike from the minotaur like beast that was much faster than she thought it should be.
"Heh," the creature grunted, rubbing his jaw. Then it struck out again.
Both Cheng-Huang and Kumobara, still acting mostly separately, found themselves on the ropes as they faced an opponent that, when human, could press Ranma and in monster form had taken an alliance of four of the best martial artists in Nerima to beat.
The only thing keeping them safe was their enhanced abilities. Mostly their senses. Kumobara had advance warning anytime something was going to come near her, and Cheng-Huang's array of senses overall gave her even better awareness of the situation.
But both were too busy defending themselves to land much of any strike on Tarou. And every so often, Tarou would manage to clip Kumobara, as she was the least used to close range, unarmed combat. Fortunately, with her improved strength, she'd also acquired a great amount of improved resilience, so she was weathering it.
"Get out of way!" Cheng-Huang demanded angrily as she dodged and rolled under another attack.
"Well," Kumobara said harshly, her own normal personality slipping out a little. "If you insist." And she leaped back out of the normal range of combat, slipping through a mass of grasping tentacles as she leaped behind Tarou.
Tarou glanced over his shoulder and laughed at the retreat. He'd find and deal with her later.
Cheng-Huang was momentarily surprised and then snorted in disgust at the apparently cowardly retreat, despite her own command for the other to leave.
She turned her attention back to avoiding Tarou as a massive fist swung down at her, and was stopped...by a line of webbing.
Tarou tugged at the line, but it held steady. Cheng-Huang didn't have to look, it would have been useless anyway, but she knew that Kumobara was holding the webbing around a telephone pull, using the make shift pulley to make the most of her strength.
Nor was it the last web line to be released. A second reached out to grab Tarou's other hand as he tried to tear at the webbing around his first. A third joined that, binding the hands together. At this point Kumobara rushed forward at the beast that was now facing her, leaped over him, dragging the third webline with her and adding a fourth for good measure.
She flipped down and around into his back and then another small flip to land on the ground.
Tarou roared as he bent all his strength to tearing free of the little girl, but couldn't seem to pull her off the ground as she held fast.
Then a splash of hot water washed over him, and he shrank down, into a very human young man. Kumobara blinked, she knew there was some magic involved in Tarou's form, but hadn't known there was a trigger she could apply.
"He is not much this way," Cheng-Huang said stepping forward.
"You think I'm finished, bitch?" Tarou demanded angrily, slashing forward, arms released from the webbing as they shrank. Cheng-Huang, however, found him quite easy to deal with in human form. And, unlike Ranma, she rarely held back.
Nor did it help Tarou as he was virtually cocooned in webbing, just before Cheng-Huang's fist struck his face.
As the monster-martial artist slipped down into unconsciousness, Cheng-Huang smiled under her mask. This night, at least, she had done better.
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(Posted Sat, 07 Dec 2002 20:05)
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