Two clusters of Wabbits saw the tall, dark-clad figure emerge from the hole high in the wall, and made haste across the broken ground to his obvious landing point, tails waving hungrily. When he landed, it would be in the midst of an animate mincing machine!
This was a mistake. vii vii “fireball.” Theo levitated down into a scorched circle on the fractured concrete, calmly nodding towards Peebri, still stranded by the gate behind the pit of shaving cream. He strolled across the disputed schoolyard towards his wife, blasting Wabbits and the occasional crustacean as he went.
The Cheetah Brigade struck at full speed directly in the centre of the Principal’s lines. Not, of course, that they had any other way to strike. The land-bound speedsters ploughed through the outer cordon of monkeys and lobsters, chomping, shredding and ramming with abandon, leaving a wake of disoriented or dismembered defenders of the Hawaiian Way behind them. Ukyo howled gleefully, setting her battle spatula just before they hit and scooping a platoon of monkeys aside like a deranged snowplough. Overhead, Brianna strafed the enemy positions with high explosives.
Against all odds, the Principal evaded the attack. The spatula dipped at just the wrong moment, Ranma didn’t see which way he jumped, and Ukyo barely clipped him with the monkey attached to her spatula by the tail of the Wabbit. Seeing this, Brianna quickly triggered one of her weapons pods, dropping its warload into the Hawaiian position before blasting the ammunition dump with the chain guns.
Ranma followed Peebrit through the artillery park behind the front lines. Ukyo turned her head forwards from where she had missed the Principal just in time to set her spatula once more.
“Tim-ber!”
The Principal rose from the devastation left in the Brigade’s wake, and swiped the diaper from his face. “Never! I shall fight until the last clipper is torn from my cold, dead hands!” The artillery palm flattened him just as the chemical weapons cocoanuts exploded.
Shampoo cycled over the wall, calling cheerily to her Airen as she tweaked the brakes to stop precisely and lovingly on his head. She slammed abruptly into the ground and had to put a foot down to keep balance.
Goddess, she hoped no one from the village ever heard about that, she’d never live it down.
She looked around in some confusion; her intuition had told her Ranma was just there, but all she could see was a pair of huge cats running away (one of them with a blonde on its back waving a spatula) and a lot of rabbits. And lobsters. And some monkeys. And Palm-tree-head getting up from under a big palm tree, waving a rubber ducky.
“Aiyah! What go on here?”
The bike sagged, and she looked down at the front wheel. “Aiyah, Shampoo have flat wheel!”
That notion percolated up through her consciousness. Something wasn’t right about it, and there was that rabbit sitting by the remains of her front wheel. And one by her back wheel. And another creeping up on the pedals. In her experience, rabbits ran away from people.
Well, they couldn’t hurt her, and if they sneaked close enough she could catch them for lunch. She looked around. Across the field, a magnificent figure caught her attention: a warrior woman from the legends, surely, dancing across the broken ground with her sword swirling, dismembering monkeys and rabbits with every stroke.
“Aiyah! Shampoo wonder if she give lessons?” Amazons were immune to heroine worship. Honest. No, they were.
The cats circled past behind the heroine and charged across the remains of the schoolyard. Monkeys, rabbits and lobsters (and parts thereof) showered in their wake. Shampoo watched with a warrior’s fascination as one monkey was grabbed by the throat and cleanly decapitated with one bite, its partner halved by the huge spatula.
With a sickening feeling in her stomach, she realised they were coming back towards her, and they were far too fast to run away from.
“Aiyah!” she wailed as she drew her bonbori. “What Shampoo do to giant cats?”
As they came closer, she realised they were led by a smaller figure, presumably their cub, and that their maws were stained with the blood of the creatures they had recently devoured. Then they were upon her, and she raised her weapons in defiance as they leapt.
The bonbori slammed together behind the head of the monstrous animal that took her throat in its jaws, and she commended her soul to her ancestors and apologised to her Great-Grandmother for slacking off on her speed training.
Then it dropped her. As she gathered her wits to fight to the death, it wavered into a huge catwoman wearing the stupid dress thing the school insisted everyone except the boys should wear, and growled in her face, “Stop gawking you stupid bimbo and kill the rabbits!”
Nabiki covered her face and shook her head. This really wasn’t a good day to give up being the Ice Queen.
“...three hundred. Miss Nabiki, we’re out of coolboxes.”
She looked up at the butcher. “Pardon?”
“We’re out of coolboxes. I’ve filled them all.”
“Oh.” She thought. “Well, I can’t see getting any more just yet. Gather round for a moment, guys, I want your input. Should we go for more rabbits, with a view to keeping the skins, or lobsters in hopes they will keep longer out of the coolboxes?”
The Fly Fisher shook his head. “The lobsters we’ve had so far have been freak chances, Nabiki. I can’t hope to catch them reliably; the hooks I’ve got aren’t made to go through their shells.”
“I don’t think seafood keeps better, anyway,” added the Hunter.
“Couldn’t tell you,” said the Fly Fisher. “The only red meat I get is frozen at the supermarket. Fresh fish doesn’t keep too well, though.”
“Hey, boss!”
Nabiki leaned over the parapet. “What, Sachiko?”
“We’ve talked to that Indian Restaurant in the docks district, boss. They say they aren’t allowed to serve monkey, but their supplier isn’t too picky about sources for the Indian market. Sounds like a winner to me, boss.”
Ichiro and his men approached the steps into the school. Only a few metres, and a single squad of monkeys, to go. He stepped up onto the unbroken concrete.
SPUTTER! “Ah! My eyes, my eyes!”
The statues lining the path had spat shaving cream, and his left flank shrank back. On the right, brave Matsena was distracted clearing his vision long enough for a pair of monkeys to reach him, and he fell into a pit of crabs. Dutiful to the end, he dragged both monkeys with him.
| Furinkan High | Carnivorous Rabbits | Outsiders | ||||||||
| Kendo Club | Principal and Hawaiian Forces | Ranma & Fiancees | Men in Black | Sword & Sorcery Couple | Science Woman | |||||
| R | A | U | S | |||||||
| Kendo Club | - | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| Principal etc | 4 | 41 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 104 | 2 | 0 | 0 |
| Ranma | 0 | 42 | - | 0 | 0 | 0 | 174 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| Akane | 2 | 38 | 0 | - | 0 | 0 | 150 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| Ukyo | 0 | 38 | 0 | 0 | - | 0 | 122 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| Shampoo | 0 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 0 | - | 3 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| C. Rabbits | 21 | 53 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 2 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| MiiB | 0 | 57 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 58 | - | 0 | 0 |
| S&S 2 | 0 | 33 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 83 | 0 | - | 0 |
| SciWoman | 0 | 43 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 68 | 0 | 0 | - |
Noriudo Eiji raised his bokken in defiance. The daemonic creatures the sorcerer had unleashed upon the school might overrun him and the last desperate hope of the Kendo Club, but they would sell themselves dearly before the corruptions of woodland innocence were permitted to desecrate the interior of the training hall!
In the end, Kasumi had been unable to choose between all the old favourites that had been put into store, and descended from the attic carrying three boxes of toys, and the box of books. It wasn’t like they were as heavy as she remembered – although she had only been a little girl when she helped mother put them away.
She set them down beside the dining table, that nice Romeo boy helping her. “You really ought to have a look at these before we let little Tiffany play with them, Brittany-chan. I don’t think some of them would be appropriate for a little girl her age.”
“Well, that’s fine,” said Brittany, opening the nearest box. “I hadn’t expected you to have anything for her to play with, so we brought some of her favourites anyway.”
Tiffany wriggled in Aunty Nodka’s arms. “Bogses!”
Gina gravitated to the books. “Um. ‘The Cat in the Warhelm’?”
“Oh, my, that was Akane’s favourite for years. I thought it was silly and childish – I much preferred ‘A Children’s Tale of Genji’.”
“Ah, right. ‘Sun Tzu’s Popup Art of Play’?”
“Hey, Romes!” exulted Moisha. “Do you remember your first naginata?” she asked, brandishing a short length of stick with a rubber dagger on the end.
“Fudge it, watch where you’re waving that thing!” objected Lydia, clutching a doll in a gi.
“Oh, Ranma had one of those!” laughed Nodoka. “He used to love chasing his father around the house with it.”
Stryyp lifted a ragged book from the last box. “‘Paper Masks: Demon Heads, Dragons, and Heroes’ by Tendo Soun. A family member?”
“Oh, yes, Daddy’s book – we were so proud of him when he got that published. Well, Mummy and I were, Akane and Nabiki were still too young to appreciate it.” Kasumi smiled in reminiscence. “We had such fun helping him check the designs, as well!”
“What’s a ‘Demon Head’?”
“Oh, I was never very good at those,” said the werehousecheetah. “Let me see...” She concentrated for a moment, and then...
“There! I knew I could do it!”
The guests stared, hair SPROINGing in all directions. The ‘Demon Head’ was about five feet across, with a tongue trailing out like a ribbon. The happy smile and halo utterly ruined the effect.
“Yay! ‘Gain!”
“Hello, dear. fireball.”
“Hello, Theo. Did you find what you were looking for?”
“Yes. I closed the Dimensional Gate in the clock tower, explosion array but by my scrying about a thousand Wabbits came through first.”
“Is that all? Nothing more, I don’t know, impressive? It seems out of character for any mage to unleash a horde of Wabbits instead of trying for something... bigger.”
“No, the only other thing to cross over seems to have been a perfectly normal fox. turn to rubber”
“I didn’t know there were any foxes anywhere near the Forst Miores!”
“Neither did I. fireball However, whoever it was signed the scroll they used, so it should be uncommonly easy to track him down. Findelman’s surprising bouquet”
“Good. I look forward to questioning him. And thank you, dear, they’re beautiful.”
Kodachi perched elegantly on the wall of her father’s professional domain, and admired the carnage. She found it difficult to discern the causes of parts of the mess, although the monkeys and crustaceans were assuredly her father’s fault. Briefly, she regretted not learning the use of any true missile weapons, for her parent was clearly visible standing on that fallen palm tree directing his troops against the small party of men and women in sober suits, and in the confusion surely no one would notice which direction the shot that took him out came from.
But no, he was out of reach of even a thrown club, so she moved her regard to the portions of the battleground she could actually reach immediately.
Lollop-ching. Lollop-ching.
“Oh, my, how cute!” She flicked out her ribbon and ensnared one of the little armed rabbits, catching it by the hilt of its yari. “Oh, my, I wonder where these came from?” Thoughts skittered through her mind. Surely, some genius had created these darlings; they were too deliberately similar to the nauseatingly cute bunnies other girls her age doted on for her to doubt that. She wondered if, perhaps, she could improve Midorigame the same way?
The captured Wabbit bared its fangs, and lunged at her bare arm.
“Bad rabbit! Oh.” She had tugged a bit firmly on her ribbon, and the creature’s head fell off. Perhaps she would have to improve Midorigame, rather than investing in a warren of these darlings; they were a fraction fragile. Still, with a little work, perhaps she could improve the rabbits...
Spotting a distinctive, dark-furred rabbit in the swarm now gathering against the wall below her, she scooped that up and set it on the wall beside her. “Stay there while I catch a few more of your friends, won’t you.” The ribbon snapped out again.
The dark-furred Wabbit regarded the meal. He was aware of his follower’s declining numbers, and aware that this place was not like the forst he and they were familiar with. They needed a Wabbit who knew the ground.
He sprang for the leotard-clad figure’s neck even as she deposited a third Wabbit on the wall.
For Kodachi, there were a few seconds of confusion. The pain at her neck as the disobedient Wabbit attacked her threw her off her train of thought quite nicely, and then she felt – changes. She wobbled.
Kami, she hoped no one from school ever heard about that, she’d never live it down.
Then the world changed shape, and she found herself dropping her ribbon into the ravening mass below. Two packets of paralysis powder and her clubs followed it, and the Wabbits keeled over.
She looked around. The dark Wabbit sneered smugly, and gestured towards the battlefield. She understood it perfectly.
Her tail waved and swirled, just like her ribbon. She sprang, and snapped it forward.
And so died Max, Alpha Wabbit, his halves being consumed by Robber Crabs under cover of shaving cream.
“Oh, rats.” Nabiki could think fast when she needed to – in fact, she thought fast all the time – but this time she really pulled out the stops.
“Here!” she snapped to the Fly Fisher. “Put this on your hook and deliver it to Ukyo. Then I’ll have some for Shampoo and the others.”
The Fly Fisher looked at the piece of paper confusedly. “Uh, what...”
“Kodachi just got turned into one of those angry rabbit things, and Ranma would never forgive himself if he ate her.”
Three women – one purple-haired with bonbori, one blonde with a giant spatula, and one furry with fangs – stood around Ranma and the little yellow robot. A fourth woman hovered overhead, high enough to keep watch but low enough to join the planning session.
“One more time at the Principal, then we set about clearing the grounds of those ‘Wabbits’,” decreed Akane.
“Ragh,” agreed Ranma.
“Is make more sense we attack from side,” suggested Shampoo.
“Curve over by the gym and then straight in?” said Ukyo, nodding. She suspected that Shampoo might actually have some training in group tactics.
“Better if we had a diversion,” added Akane.
“Well, I can outrun even a werecheetah in this thing,” inserted Brianna, slapping her armrest. “I could loop around and come in high on the other side, make lots of noise, and then you come in underneath.”
Shampoo eyed the flying chair. She was trying to be properly dismissive of modern props, but if she was honest what she really felt was jealousy. It was way better than her bike.
Ukyo eyed the Principal’s position. “That would nearly work. Look, if you come in along the front of the school, you’ll get a clean alley into his right flank; if you start your run when we get to the corner of the gym over there, the timing should be about right.”
“Alright! Lets go!” The LBD rose, and Ranma turned towards the gym.
“My turn ride Airen!”
“Hey! Me and Ranchan have a well-balanced working relationship, and I can’t run fast enough to keep up otherwise.”
“Shampoo see cat-form run very fast, no keep up either. Spatula Girl ride Violent Girl now, have had turn ride Airen!”
“I’m not letting either of you ride me!”
Brianna, seeing that the others hadn’t moved off yet, dropped back into the conversation. “Uh, I figured he’s already bitten you, Ukyo? So couldn’t you use your hybrid form?”
“Bite me – yes, he did, but...” Ukyo settled her gaze on Ranma. “So that turned me into a, a cat-person, too?”
“Werecheetah, yeah...”
Ranma shifted nervously.
“Ranchan you Jackass!”
Ranma bolted. Ukyo set off after him, and the battle spatula swept past the end of his tail.
“Ah, she’ll have to get used to wearing looser clothing. She’s lucky that outfit didn’t burst altogether.”
“Ranma’s got a pendant that spells people so their clothes change size with them, but he hasn’t had time to use it on Ukyo,” explained Akane.
“Why he have time use it on you?” asked Shampoo suspiciously.
“He bit me last night.”
“It work on people you bite?”
Akane blinked. “I – uh, I don’t know...”
“Shampoo very angry with Violent Girl if no work. Amazon Dresses no cheap and loose clothes just make Shampoo look fat!”
“D’you think it might work on my sister Brittany? She has a hell of a time finding bras that fit in both forms.”
Akane looked from angry Amazon to curious American, and felt her blush getting even hotter.
Ranma soon discovered that Ukyo, after her first surge of anger was over, wasn’t much faster than Akane. He made a long, curving run around the schoolyard, snapping up Wabbits and the occasional remaining lobster, past the woman who was really good with that sword and the guy using some sort of ki attack to fry anything that moved, and hared back towards Akane and Shampoo. He skidded to a halt at Shampoo’s feet, rammed between her legs when she didn’t immediately get the idea, and set off again, this time with Ukyo and Akane at his heels and Peebrit under his nose.
The surviving artillery Sergeant-Monkey heard the whine of the flying chair, and barked orders. Only a few of the palms had ready rounds available, and the entire ammunition supply had be reduced to a creamy crater, but a single, partial salvo could be fired even without the fallen tree. As the chain guns rained down death, destruction and children’s crayons, monkeys laboured to load and aim their weapons.
Another tree was severed at the roots, springing into the air and spilling the cocoanut onto the commander. Another had the pineapple shot out of its head to burst among its own crew.
Finally, the palms SPROINGED for the last time, and the Sergeant-Monkey ordered his troop forward to fight hand-to-shears against the cats surely in the chair’s wake. He himself watched the hated enemy vehicle, wishing the commander had managed to bring in the seagulls, as it curved in to pass directly overhead.
“Jinkieees!!!” The chair swerved violently, a pineapple scraping against the armrest, and – yes, it had! It exploded, and the chair swerved still more erratically, spiralling away to the left over the onrushing cat and armed women into the small extension to the gym.
Wait. Onrushing cat and armed women?
| Furinkan High | Carnivorous Rabbits | Outsiders | |||||||||
| Kendo Club | Principal and Hawaiian Farces | Ranma & Fiancees | Men in Black | Sword & Sorcery Couple | Science Woman | ||||||
| R | A | U | S | K | |||||||
| Kuno Club | - | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| Principal etc | 4 | 44 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 112 | 2 | 0 | 0 |
| Ranma | 0 | 55 | - | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 192 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| Akane | 2 | 50 | 0 | - | 0 | 0 | 0 | 161 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| Ukyo | 0 | 48 | 0 | 0 | - | 0 | 0 | 131 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| Shampoo | 0 | 10 | 0 | 0 | 0 | - | 0 | 12 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| Kodachi | 0 | 4 | 0 | 0 | 0 | - | 0 | 12 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| C. Rabbits | 22 | 65 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 2 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| MiiB | 0 | 66 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 71 | - | 0 | 0 |
| S&S 2 | 0 | 40 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 112 | 0 | - | 0 |
| SciWoman | 0 | 63 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 93 | 0 | 0 | - |
Noriudo Eiji sagged in despair. How might he hold his head up before the Blue Thunder in the wake of this failure? Not only had the entire might of the Kuno Club been reduced to himself and a mere freshman. Not only had the entire school been overrun by daemons disguised as the most harmless of natural creatures. But now, he had even failed to maintain the sanctity of the training hall, for the flying woman had succumbed to the cunning of the Captain’s never-to-be-sufficiently-accursed parent, and her mount had exploded within the confines of their refuge.
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(Posted Fri, 11 Aug 2006 23:56)
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