Nabiki was close to purring as she soaked up the sun and watched Ranma spar with Rain. Kasumi had been lounging beside her in a similar state of relaxation, but was now over by Shampoo, calling encouragement to the combatants.
This was the life. Totally relaxed, no worries, surrounded by packmates. No challengers, no rivals, no insane stalkers trying to steal them.
Of course, Nabiki was well aware that this was only the calm before the storm. The shores of Japan were now in sight, and soon they would be back in the midst of this entirely-human world that Ranma called home. That was sure to provide more than enough challenges to keep her on her toes.
It hadn’t taken them long to discover that just traveling in human society posed its own share of challenges. Pokegirls were unknown in this world, and people tended to be spooked by girls with non-human features.
It helped that, of Ranma’s on-hand harem, three were very-near-humans. Shampoo, Usagi, and Rei (when she dismissed her wings) could travel openly and draw only appreciative stares. Well, their collars usually got them a second look, but none of the girls were willing to have theirs removed. Even if it did attract attention.
Rain was a bit more of a challenge, but fortunately she looked as nearly human as a Mareen could. A hat to hide her ears, and a careful arrangement of clothes to conceal her tail and other less-than-human features, allowed her to pass all but the closest checks.
That just left herself and Kasumi. While they both were classed as near-human, that just meant that they had roughly the same body parts. There was no way either could pass for human at close quarters, even wearing lots of clothing.
Putting them in their pokeballs had been brought up, but nobody really liked that idea, especially Nabiki. In the end, a workable solution was reached.
Cheshires were natural spies. With their Fade, Teleport, and Chameleon abilities, they were well-suited to avoiding notice. So for now Nabiki shadowed the group unseen. The only problem was that while Nabiki was quite skilled at this, keeping it up all day was something of a strain. Still, she would much rather go to bed tired each night than be cooped up in a pokeball and miss all the action.
And while Nabiki hid, Kasumi went in the other direction. Griffons were metamorphs, with a near-human normal form and a much more animalistic battle form. Over the past year, Kasumi had mastered this ability, allowing her to shift in a range from an almost-human form that looked much like a Kitten with wings, to a battle form that appeared almost completely animalistic. An enormous winged lion drew more than a few stares, but very few had the nerve to question her presence in that form, or anger the young man who controlled such a fearsome beast. As long as she behaved herself, they discovered that most officials preferred not to even acknowledge her presence. The main drawback was that constantly maintaining her battle form tired Kasumi fairly quickly. So Kasumi now took long afternoon naps in her pokeball when necessary, before rejoining the group each evening.
It wasn’t a perfect solution, but still, it should help them avoid most problems. As long as…
Nabiki shot up in sudden alert, tail twitching. Uh oh. Why hadn’t she noticed it before? Usagi and Rei were nowhere to be seen. This could be bad.
--FLASH--
The bright flash was accompanied by a pulse of power strong enough to raise the fur on her back.
Yep. Very bad.
A few minutes earlier…
“The subject is now secure.”
Usagi looked over at her blue-haired packmate and nodded. She knew she could count on Rei. Many people scratched their heads at two pokegirls with such entirely different personalities getting along so well, but somehow they did. Of course Nabiki kept griping that the two of them together was like combining gasoline and a match, but really, those... situations... hadn’t been their fault! Mostly. Besides, it all turned out well in the end, right?
But now was not the time to get distracted by such thoughts. Now was the time to give her Master a gift. Usagi had noticed that Ranma was a bit depressed over his father’s transformation and she resolved to do something about it. After all, she was a Megami, right? Dealing with curses was right up her alley!
She had tried to explain that to Ranma’s father, but for some reason he kept trying to scramble out of her hands. So she had passed him off to Rei to hold while she focused on gathering her magics.
Now ready, she moved over to the now very distraught cat. A cat currently strapped to a packing crate with what some might deem an excessive amount of duct tape.
Smiling, she carefully placed her palm on its forehead.
--FLASH--
“Calm down Pop. At least now you can talk.” Whether that was a blessing was something Ranma was suddenly unsure of.
The entire pack had rushed over in response to the flash. At their arrival, a sheepish Usagi had explained to Ranma that she had been trying to remove Genma’s curse. It just hadn’t quite worked as she intended.
“Calm down? CALM DOWN?” Genma was less than pleased. “Oh, woe that my only offspring is so indifferent to his poor father’s plight!”
“Pop, you’ve been a cat for a while now. I would have thought you would be more used to it by now.”
“Actually, I’m referring to all this tape on my fur. Do you have any idea how painful it’s going to be to get all that removed?”
Ranma smacked his face with his hand and groaned.
“Now get me loose from this crate! Whatever that girl did is causing my forehead to itch abominably!”
“Oh my.” Kasumi used her claws to slice through the strips of tape still holding Genma down and picked up the small black cat for closer inspection. “Look. It’s just like one of Usagi’s markings.”
Although most had already noticed the alteration, Ranma and the other girls still took this opportunity for a closer inspection. Sure enough, on the cat’s forehead was a yellow crescent moon, much like those that marked Usagi.
Shampoo took advantage of this pause to voice a different question.
“Shampoo not understand. Why Ranma father sound like girl?”
“And one with a bad British accent at that?” observed Ranma. He had been wondering that as well.
Nabiki, Kasumi and Rain exchanged glances. They had all smelled it back when Genma had first joined them, but Genma had never brought it up and they hadn’t really known how to break it to Ranma. Now it looked like they had no choice.
“Well…” began Nabiki. “I don’t know about the accent, but… uhm… I guess there’s something you should know about the cat form your father turned into…”
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(Posted Thu, 05 Jul 2007 20:11)
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