A Starseed. Sol's Starseed.
Rage dominated Ranma when he realized what Pluto had done. She had killed him. It wasn't so much death as reincarnation but he would be gone soon all the same.
He could already feel throbbing numbness spread from his fingers and toes. Ranma struggled against it but as strong as he was, his entire being could not compete against the soul of a star. Just the size difference was a insurmountable disadvantage. Ranma combining all his various powers from past timelines could easily blow up planets but the stars exceeded his power.
Impossible heat beyond white cascaded from the starseed planted in his chest. His hands desperately sought to grasp and rip out the foreign intrusion but its very nature worked against him.
Pluto's hopeful and benevolent expression turned his stomach. A smile like that, that kind of smile, it didn't suit her. She was much more beautiful with a slight upward turn at the edge of her lips, her ever enigmatic smirk. /His/ Pluto would never look like that while killing someone she had wronged.
This particular Ranma deviated from the original Ranma Saotome when his old man attempted a past life martial arts spell in place of neko-ken and the temporal backlash nearly destroyed Ranma. For months he was catatonic submerged under a flood of memories from a dozen different timelines. He received knowledge from many of his past echoes but his body and mind weren't capable of keeping up.
Say what one will about Genma Saotome but he loved his son. It wasn't a normal father's love but Genma was not raised in a normal family either, in fact, Genma's parents were more like the Kunos than any reasonable people, which was why he convinced them to allow his martial arts journey in order to raise himself. Unfortunately, he ended up with Happosai, but nonetheless, he turned out better than his parents. At least the girl his parents engaged him to, Nodoka, didn't seem too insane, except that strange obsession with manliness, well, he couldn't have everything.
So when Genma finally had a son, he wanted to do right by him. Having seen his own results with the training trip, Genma decided immediately to go with what worked, martial arts, except Genma would go along so that his son wouldn't end up learning from Happosai or something equally horrible. But apparently he screwed up, he didn't know the first thing about teaching, resulting in Ranma's condition. At this point, Genma was desperate, having prayed to every deity he knew and searched all of Japan for help.
Finally, in a fit of competence driven by necessity, Genma Saotome managed to track down an elusive green haired woman. She was rumoured to be an Immortal Taoist or some other Eternal, who according to the martial arts underground dating back at least a thousand years. This particular incarnation of Pluto, or Lady Setsuna, without any knowledge or prejudice of Ranma Saotome, helped him sort through his memories and curb the temporal energies that clung to him. When Ranma finally woke up, he screamed like a little girl and ran away.
It seemed in his memories, Ranma was faced with Pluto's desire to remove him again and again. When Setsuna finally managed to chase him down nearly a year later, both Ranma and Setsuna were forcefully confronted with some of their worst traits and both changed for the better.
In order to prevent any unfortunate backslide, Setsuna managed to take Ranma from an overly grateful Genma in exchange for a warehouse of sake and a promise to make Ranma a man amongst men. (He is still Genma after all, "Look, I am grateful but even if it's you, I wouldn't give up my son for no less than a million yen of sake. And even then, he's gotta be a man amongst men.") Further negotiation with Nodoka set Ranma up as an 'Imperial Consultant' in supernatural matters. ("My son's going to slay demons! He's so manly!") For years, Setsuna and Ranma worked together becoming comfortable in each other's presence. So much so that they would feel unbalanced when working alone.
Time passed. The seasons came and went. Ranma grew in wisdom while unlocking and practicing the knowledge of his other selves. When Ranma finally reached the age of 18, he proposed to Setsuna.
On that day, while sharing a romantic candlelight dinner, Setsuna was afflicted by echoes of her rather deranged past self. The tainted desire to kill Ranma, that originated from the other, fouled her thoughts and sullied her love for Ranma. For all of three seconds, she tried to kill Ranma. Thank the multiverse, Senshi transformations, even without the full lightshow, took two seconds to complete, and Dead Scream took more than a second to whisper. Later, to diminish Ranma's worry on her behalf, Setsuna claimed it reminded her of the time Ranma got drunk and decided giving her a box of cockroaches was a good idea. To be fair, she had dared him to get drunk. But it was those filthy, black, disgusting monsters so her reaction while extreme was completely justified. A moment after receiving the most accursed box, she proved that she could actually blast Ranma into lower earth orbit, unlike his erstwhile fiancées, they could only perform Nerima express. In truth, she was aiming for the box, but Ranma got what he deserved. Luckily Ranma demonstrated his ability to survive orbit and a day later, after finally realizing his plight, teleport back down. Unfortunately, the horizontal vector of his orbital velocity had not been accounted for. He ploughed a tunnel right through a mountain. Setsuna backtracked and bought the rights to the land. She named the tunnel and associated hot spring Wild Horse's Folly as a reminder of what not to do. She eventually forgave him though her glowing red eyes still glared painful death right up until the most wonderful make up sex. She never told him that blasting him into orbit was an accident. But that was then, this is now. As bits and pieces of memory from Evil Pluto, Setsuna called her that over Ranma's protest, had trickled into Setsuna, there was an adverse reaction. Calling it that was stating Setsuna's turmoil mildly. Her screams could chill blood and her tears drove Ranma into helpless rage. He fumed because for all his power, he couldn't act. He would punish the one who made Setsuna cry, the one who hunted him.
It seemed the timeline had finally caught up with the insane egoist bent on killing Ranma. Setsuna knew this might happen. That's why Ranma went out of his way to avoid making contact with any Senshi except behind obscurification wards. After all, Setsuna thought Evil Pluto might show up. And Ranma knew the unreasonable Pluto was protected from temporal manipulation and paradox by the Gates of Time and thus held superior standing.
Even if the Setsuna went to the Gates, or Pluto left, they would merge and neither would be happy. In fact, they would likely fight for dominance and one would have to be suppressed forever. Setsuna and Ranma had both planned for this though they had hoped they wouldn't have to deal with it. The only way to uncompromising victory was to obtain the Gates of Time and shunt the unhinged Pluto into parallel universe, preferably one where Pluto died and needed to be replaced. Even better if Crystal Tokyo happened to be a better fate than the pre-destined alternative.
Thus Operation Exile Evil Pluto (Setsuna named it) was born. The plan was simple. Setsuna would send Ranma to confront Evil Pluto while tagging the Gate of Time with a magical beacon and a complex array of transportation spells. Then the Gate of Time would be moved to a new location behind obscurification wards where Setsuna would immediately wrest control and then after some conflict, Ranma would offer Evil Pluto a way to reach the pure Crystal Tokyo she was searching for. It didn't work out that way.
Setsuna had helped Ranma reach this temporal artifact from a destroyed past where an absurd caricature of Lady Setsuna Meioh spent ages trying to erase him from the timeline. Setsuna represent his mentor, his lady, and his lover. This Pluto was from sometime beyond his worst nightmare. He had come to scare her off, offer her passage to a different universe so that she wouldn't merge with his Setsuna. Instead he was on the verge of non-existence.
It seemed Sol's Starseeds was parasitic at least until a proper vessel was forged for its power. It greedily consumed Ranma's essence to fuel its champion. Sailor Sol would be born like a blossoming flower, both beautiful and terrible. She desperately wanted to exist and he could that. He too desired desperately to exist. He had experienced something similar when his past selves were erased by 'Evil' Pluto's temporal manipulation, but he would not give in. No, he had the right to exist because the alternate fate was literally worse than death. It would not just be him. With the assistance of Sailor Sol, Evil Pluto would most likely defeat the local incarnation, his Lady Setsuna.
And his soul would not properly pass onto the afterlife as it should. Instead it would be burnt into a new configuration. All that Ranma Saotome had been would be no more. All while Evil Pluto could sooth her conscience by loving the fake girl thing that was left behind.
Evil Pluto was committing menticide on him, and his reincarnation too. The poor girl will probably view him as the villain when his only so-called crime was existing.
It was too late. He struggled and tried to purge the foreign influence. It was like trying to breath air under the ocean. Anger that flared like a thousand suns and supplied him with molten power, but the starseed burnt even hotter.
He was truly innocent. In most timelines he did nothing except help the Sailor Senshi. More often than not, he helped prevent the Great Freeze and saved billions of lives. So why? WHY? Why was Pluto so intent on removing him from the timeline?
He could somewhat understand her reasons, but they didn't make sense. Evil Pluto reasoned like a religious fanatic. In his current Incarnation, he had even found happiness. Usually even when happy his alternate selves never married or planned to have children. He had reached that point with Setsuna. So even as he felt the outermost layer of his mental shields fall, he initiated plan Omega. If there was anything he learned from every alternate timeline then it is this:
*Ranma Saotome does not lose.*
Crash. The shattering of glass resounded throughout various timelines.
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(Posted Tue, 03 Jul 2012 09:55)
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らんま1/2 © Rumiko Takahashi
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