Ranma Saotome, martial artist and unwitting astronut, plucked at the shiny black matterial of his newly made ‘flight suit’. “Why do I have ta wear this?”
“Because it’s either be a last minute addition to the crew, or admit that you only stowed on board to hide from your father,” Ami, in light blue, stated calmly.
“Besides, black suites you, Ranma-kun,” added Minako, in golden orange. “Stop fidgeting.”
“Yeah,” Ranma puffed up, then added, “but, hey, why the color coordination anyway?”
“Because it’s stylish,” responded Usagi, in plain white (with navy blue trim). “We figured that if we were going to make history traveling through space, we had to look good for it.”
“Actually, it was so we could identify ourselves with our helmets on,” confided Ami.
“That too,” Makoto, in dark green, agreed. “But at least we don’t have to wear those things for this shindig.”
“Well, anyway, let’s get this stone rolling,” Minako urged. “Our adoring fans are away!”
They made their way onto the stage behind the podium from where Professor Tomoe was addressing the press. Ranma waved ‘hi’ to Hotaru, sitting front row with Doctor Mizuno. Minako frowned and looked around. “What was that?”
“What was what?” Ranma whispered back.
“Just a stray radio transmission, I guess,” Minako guessed. “I thought I heard someone say something cryptic, that’s all. Something about ‘the egg is in the basket, the hawk is ready to strike’.”
“That sounds oddly clear coming from you,” Ranma commented.
“What’s that supposed to mean, boyo?” Minako demanded with a glare, just as the ninja crashed the party through the skylights.
“Okay, who invited ninja?” Makoto wondered suspiciously. Five heads turned accusingly at one.
“Hey! Why are ya all looking at me for?” Ranma demanded and pointed out, “it’s Hotaru they’re going…” At which point he doubled his take. “They’re after Hotaru!”
Indeed a ninja garbed raider had rappelled down on a line right in front of Hotaru and zapped her with a taser. While three others covered him, he pushed Doctor Mizuno roughly aside while hefting the limp cyborg into a fireman’s carry.
The colourful group rushed forward with a cry of “stop right there!” Ranma sped to the lead. To which the covering ninja raised their arms and fired.
“What kind of flippin’ ninja use bullets?” Ranma cursed in startlement as he dropped. He’d been taken by surprise and the wind screen he raised wasn’t enough to block fast projectiles. The padded flight suit fortunately, was. It still hurt like the first time he’d been punched with a jackhammer. He guessed that his ribs were at least cracked.
With a “foosh!” Rei became a pillar of flame. Beside her a “ka-chink!” announced that Ami had been sealed inside an armor casing of ice. The others ducked back behind them as the bullets continued to fly.
The ninja holding Hotaru reached the ceiling. The others reached for their lines, only to have them severed by blasts of flame and light. This delayed them exactly long enough for them to decide to spring and tumble through the audience towards a more conventional exit. At least they moved like ninja, a corner of Ranma’s mind observed through his pain haze.
Ranma suddenly felt a lot better. Usagi had reached him and the silver glow from her hands spread healing warmth through his chest. He was able to gasp out an order, “Rei, go after Hotaru!”
“Roger!” the flame agreed and blasted towards the skylight. He joined her with a leap and a rush of wind. He would have expected the ninja to be roof hoping away, or to have vanished into an alley. Instead they found Hotaru being loaded onto a helicopter.
The ninja wannabe turned and raised his arm. No longer taken by surprise Ranma rushed forward, propelled as much by wind as by his legs. He had time enough to note that a snub barrel was projecting from the ninja’s forearm, before his foot sweep connected and knocked the arm aside.
Rei was held back by indecision. Sure, she could blast the helicopter blades to bring it down, but Hotaru was inside and she wasn’t quite so certain the little cyborg would survive a crash. They’d only trained to control their abilities despite Ranma’s urging to learn to fight with them as well. Maybe, she thought, they should have listened to him.
‘Eh, at least he moves like a ninja,‘ Ranma observed dismissively. His opponent was stronger, faster, and more resilient than a normal human, and with sneaky devices hidden in their bodies, it was true enough. But, for all his inhuman reflexes, the supposed ninja fought like an amateur; he was all power and no technique. Which meant Ranma had no real trouble taking him out at all.
Still, it had given the helicopter time enough to scramble across the cityscape. Yet with Rei trailing it like a blazing comet, Ranma had no trouble following. He raced across the rooftops like the wind, then took to the air only when he’d caught up.
The pilot cursed as weaving and dodging failed to shake his flaming pursuiviant. Despite the recent press coverage, they hadn’t considered the astronut kids to be a serious problem. ‘At least the flaming bitch is keeping her distance. Maybe if I lead her back to HQ, security can take her down there?’
“Yo!” a voice called, and the stunned piolot looked back to see the that black clad boy had ripped off the hatch and started in to tear away the restraints. “You better let Rei lead you back. Without a hostage, she ain’t gonna hold back anymore, ya know.” With that the boy leaped back out the way he’d come —without a frickin paracute even— taking the captive with him.
Eying the comet streaking towards him like a hot headed missile, the pilot decided it just was not his day. Swearing perfusely, he saw no option but to reach for that button.
“Damn it!” Ranma cursed as he eyed the ball of fire above him. It seemed that they were like true ninja in at least one way … they didn’t let themselves be captured.
“Cyborgs?” Usagi gasped after the cleanup. “Like Hotaru?”
“No, not like Hotaru,” Professor Tomoe denounced. “Inferior. They used second rate pirated copies of the technology.”
“Wait. I thought they were ninja,” Minako frowned, “not pirates.”
“Feh, they sure weren’t real ninja,” Ranma said.
“Of course not. Real ninja don’t exist,” Ami said firmly. “They’re just a myth.”
“Uh… right, yes,” Ranma nodded, “don’t exist, just a myth. What was I thinking?”
“Anyway,” Ami said, eying Ranma darkly, “the Professor means they stole his technology to make cheap knockoffs. I guess they wanted the original to take apart a working model and see how it ticks.”
“Oh, that makes sense,” Usagi nodded. “Wait, they what?”
“Or at least use her as a hostage to force the Professor to hand over more secrets,” Makoto added hopefully.
“Nah, ‘fraid they ain’t the kind to use kid gloves,” Ranma pointed out. “They all hit the suicide switch rather than let themselves be captured, after all. We ain’t dealing with ya ordinary kidnappers.”
“So we have a bunch of cyborgs with rusty nails after Hotaru,” Minako observed in her own unique way.
“That’s ‘loose screws’, Mina-chan,” Ami corrected, the hypothesised, “and they’ll be after us next. After the way we took out their little strike force they’ll want to study us, and gain access subspace technology, as much as improving their cybernetics.”
“Oh, dear,” Professor Tomoe dithered. “I think I preferred it when nobody took my theories seriously.”
“So what do we do next?” Usagi asked.
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(Posted Mon, 22 Jan 2007 05:12)
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らんま1/2 © Rumiko Takahashi
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