Time travel—with or without a Paradox Storm messing with things—could be tricky business.
Take Ranma’s cure for his Jusenkyo Curse. Never once had he wondered if not so much when, as where did they land. So in effect, the shed magic of his curse could in fact be what started Jusenkyo billions of years in the future.
Or not. After all, it is tricky business.
Not that those were any of his thoughts at the time. The grizzly business of ‘what or who are we going to eat first’ was a distant thought, one he was trying his best to suppress even deeper than the Nekoken had been. He had decided to focus on the immediate concern: shelter from the oncoming storm. True, he didn’t know what storms in Earth’s distant past would be like. But he did know how some felt when there was nothing between you and them during the training journey.
So here he was now, Eternal Sailor Moon was on his back, as he didn’t want to try this and end up being knocked out of the field, or having it go off course because he choked on the poisonous atmosphere, trying to get it out. On his back, her Atmospheric Shield was all around him, so he didn’t have to worry about that. Moreover, he would be between the resulting explosion and her, thus protecting her.
“I don’t know…,” Sailor Moon spoke.
Ranma gave her a kind smile. “Well, we need a cave to get out of that’s storm’s path, and I figure since this rock’s already got dents in it, I’ll just make one big enough for all of us.”
“But … I can use my tiara.”
“We tried that,” Ranma stated, pointing at the small chip in the rock wall. He wasn’t looking forward to trying to avoid another ricochet like that one attempt had produced, especially not with good air at a premium. Sadly, solid rock seemed a bit beyond what the magical tiara could penetrate.
“So you’re going to try some super sentai move on it?”
“Möko Takabisha.”
“Right, that?”
“Well, I ain’t ever used it to make a cave.” Granted, he didn’t have any better ideas. True, if he knew Bakusai Tenketsu, it could work. But then he’d have flying shrapnel, and to be honest, he didn’t know if magical girl armor could stop that.
Though he had to wonder what it could protect from. It didn’t look that sturdy.
“Okay, hold on,” he said, cupping his hands to his side, hoping that he could gather chi in this world.
“Möko Takabisha!”
System booting up… System Online. Sensor Arrays 1, 2, 3 offline. Main processor unit at 24.6 percent viability. Main power systems offline. Sensor Array 4 functional. Sensor Array 4 now active. Scanning…
Hull damage minimal. Breech detected on Deck 3, Section 5, Wall 2. Repair systems offline. Status of ship: buried under dense rock. Ship’s hull exposed out of rock covering. Hull has come into contact with significant bio-electric charge. Diverting energy to emergency power cells. Two life forms detected. Unknown means being used to generate oxygen rich environment around them. Technique: unknown. Power source: unknown. Intent: unknown.
Unknown signal detected. Analyzing…
“Um … should rocks glow like that?” Moon asked, seeing that of the exposed surface now rock-free, something shiny had continued to glow from the assault.
“Nothing I’ve seen before,” he muttered. The old him would have fired off another shot, seeing if it would happen again.
The new him was smart enough to remember a few manga and anime series where some moron did such a thing and unleashed a massive horror onto the world. Granted, there wasn’t much of a world to wreck now.
But he’d rather put off being the first dead human on the planet for a long time.
“I hope Mercury isn’t mad,” Moon muttered.
“Sailor Moon, Ranma; what just happened at your location?” said Senshi asked over their communications channel. “I just picked up an energy surge there and now I got a new electromagnetic signature.”
“Busted,” muttered Sailor Moon.
“Wow,” muttered Venus, looking at the exposed metal. “What is it?”
“Unknown,” Mercury responded, quickly tapping at her Mercury Computer. “The Mercury Computer can’t penetrate the hull, let alone identify the metal it is made of.”
“Nothing I have seen before either,” replied Pluto, looking over it. The group had set up a large Atmospheric Shield over the area as they studied the ship. “But to be buried like this, it had to come in pretty hot.”
“Hot?” asked Saturn.
“It crashed at a good speed,” Mercury supplied. “For all we know, this gulley or valley behind this cliff face could simply be from where it hit the ground.
“But for the rocks to have hardened over it to such a degree…”
“How do we get in?” asked Uranus.
“It might not be advisable,” stated Pluto.
“Why?” asked Neptune.
“Depending on the damage sustained in impact, the inside could be ready to collapse in on itself, radiation from whatever powered it, or even an atmosphere inside that is even more dangerous to us than the current air of Earth,” Pluto offered. “Not to mention what might be currently active inside the craft, automated defense systems and such.”
Venus nodded, having watched more alien movies than any of the other Senshi. “Yes, Facehuggers, Pod People, evil Greys with death lasers…”
Mars palmed her face. “This isn’t some cheesy B-movie, Venus.”
“What the—?” Mercury stated in shock, as the Mercury Computer registered an incoming data stream.
“What is it?” asked Ranma, looking over her shoulder.
“Energy needed.”
“I think … something is working in there,” Mercury replied in awe. By now, the others were all crowded around her, looking at the Mercury Computer’s onscreen display.
“Energy?” asked Jupiter.
“Sorry, but I left my batteries at home,” muttered Uranus, before looking at the shock on the faces of her friends. “I meant car battery. Get your mind out of the gutter.”
“Ask it what type of energy it needs?” offered Saturn.
“How about asking its intentions?” stated Venus, not wanting to get ‘probed’ … unless it was by a cute guy, such as the one she was leaning against to look at the screen.
“Give me a moment,” Mercury stated, typing frantically on her keyboard, her visor coming down and allowing her greater access. “I’m trying to gain access to the alien mainframe. But … I’m being blocked as quickly as I gain access.”
“Energy levels falling. Energy needed from previous bio-electric source to sustain current activity levels in…”
“EEP!” cried Venus. “It’s an evil alien youma ship!” she cried.
Ignoring her, Mercury sent a request for battery design justifying an infusion of bio-electric energy. Unlike her fellow Inner, Mercury understood a difference between what the ship was asking for and a youma’s feeding. Like both, she hoped a good meal and rest would restore the person’s energy.
Sadly, unless the ship had a useable supply of food and shelter for them, she doubted it would be able to continually feed on their life energies. Because at a certain point, even the Senshi would need food.
Several schematics popped up, making her eyes go wide as her visor helped her interpret the energy. “Wow!”
“What?” asked Moon.
“I’ve never seen such an energy efficient system before,” she replied. “It uses an emergency system for power that can store and accumulate energy, effectively making it achieve higher-levels to extend battery life while increasing the range of what it can absorb.”
“… Huh?”
“She means the battery can take all types of energy in and eventually use it to power the craft,” Pluto offered.
“So … why don’t we simply blast it with our attacks?” asked Uranus.
“Magic creates a disturbance in such systems,” stated Pluto. “The Silver Millennium were working on similar concepts for their crafts before the Great Fall. Magic itself can’t be used. The only one of use whose attack could be viable would be Jupiter, but I don’t believe she has the control at the moment to call down pure lightning with zero magical contamination.
“Even if she could, I don’t think the current situation would be usable,” she reiterated, looking at the approaching storm. “If it is too strong, it could knock her out, even force her transformation to power down, and without that…”
Jupiter gulped.
“So, what do we do?” asked Mars.
Shrugging—and proving that even the Starlight Honeymoon Therapy Kiss couldn’t cure impulsiveness, much like Usagi’s—Ranma stepped up to the exposed surface of the craft and called up his chi … and his world went black.
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(Posted Wed, 05 May 2010 02:32)
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