“You did what!?” bellowed Serenity.
“I was simply following my Master’s orders,” Serena waved off, as the duo of holographic avatars continued to walk through the corridors of the Serenity Ascendant.
“And I told you not to,” Serenity responded.
Here, the bubbly blonde hologram turned, stopped, and kept a devious smile on her face. “Well, yes, you did.
“However, Master is confirmed to be Master, and since you are technically an AI installed within the Moon Palace Computer systems, he outranks you.”
“… What?” growled Serenity.
Serena just nodded. “In the chain of command, you are over me, but now Master is over you!” she chirped. And now, she could begin all those projects she had wanted to do for centuries, ones Serenity had blocked her on, projects to better help her Master fulfill his duties!
“BWA HAHAHAHAHAHA—OWIE!” she cried, having forgotten that her fellow AI was not above smacking the back of her head, as well as that her fellow AI—being a fellow hologram as well—could in fact make contact even if Serena assumed a soft-light form.
“And why would he order you to do this?” Serenity asked, her voice showing that she was struggling to remain calm.
Serena turned her head slightly. “I believe it was in part due to our adventures during the week of his absence from Earth, where I was helping him relearn about himself.” They had also stopped some nasty little Grays from grabbing more people for a slave trade, found out one of the slaves for market on their ship had been a princess for a nearby kingdom of five systems from a race that had developed after The Great Fall, and returned her after finding out the local law branch of what currently passed for galactic law was corrupted like … well, any political establishment currently on Earth.
Although, for some reason, after rumors started to circulate that said princess was petitioning her father to allow her handsome rescuer to have her hand in marriage, Serena’s Master made a quick excuse, returned to the Serenity Ascendant, and left that system at maximum velocity.
It had also shown how bad the defenses were for Sol. Slavers would never have made it past the Outer Planets, let alone get close enough to the Inner System to abduct sentient beings.
So, her Master tasked her with fixing them.
Well, he had just said he was surprised that only the Serenity Ascendant seemed to be able to defend Sol and that it was a job that needed more than one ship to handle, but she felt she understood the true meaning behind his words.
So now, repairs were being done to hidden installations for the purpose of restoring Ye Olde Silver Millennium War Machine—peace was a great dream, but it didn’t mean you shouldn’t have a big pointy stick just in case you needed to poke the asshole trying to take it.
Thus, several ships that were in the planning stages, several others preserved in drydock due to the vacuum of space, and a few she had found drifting after the battle or left drifting in the Oort Cloud and the Kuiper Belt when the mainframe giving them orders was destroyed, were soon to be in service.
Granted, it would be easier with millions if not billions of helpful servants/citizens of the former kingdom to do such, assisted by a fleet of automated service drones and the brightest, well trained minds of their generations. As it was, she had to use what materials she had available to increase her android production, so they could get systems up and running. That didn’t even include building dedicated systems to run everything or what she had been able to remotely store beyond Pluto by hacking and controlling some of those automated crafts.
Oh yes, she was going to be a very busy AI for a while. So many ships and weapons of mass destruction to create in preparation to rain fiery death on idiots who didn’t listen to the pointy stick, so little time…
“And when the governments of Earth discover activity within the solar system not of their own designs?” Serenity asked.
Serena shrugged. “All of them will be—if not already—outfitted with my previous design for a cloak that worked flawlessly from 1999 through 2003, their calendar; before I upgraded them.”
Serenity huffed in anger. True, she knew that technically, the reborn Admiral Ruby was in charge of the forces of Sol. Not only was he the most senior officer—at least awake—but he had connected enough to his past life to earn his position being returned to him.
Hell, the Senshi with the exception of Pluto and perhaps Saturn couldn’t even claim that.
The fact the AI of the Serenity Ascendant was more loyal to him than perhaps the former Moon Kingdom was beside the point ... for the moment, worst case scenario.
True, her reborn daughter would be ahead of him … once she ascended the throne, even if she never recalled more than a few memories of her past life. But as long as she was the reborn Princess Serenity in name and title, she couldn’t command an order from room service.
Sighing, she sent a command along her one pathways to the Central Computer back in the palace. If need be, perhaps it might be time to alert the Senshi of what was now available.
Granted, she’d only been able to ever reach them in a few dreams, as for some reason, Mercury never answered her emails. But with an AI of questionable sanity, running around to build a fleet, collared only by a teen that had yet to fully regain his old memories…
Perhaps it was time for her to try and hack those satellite networks and see if she could at least call those reborn girls of hers.
As the duo had arrived at the school, the scene that greeted them was not one of dreams.
It was of nightmares.
Bodies strewn about the ground, the lucky ones groaning to signal they lived. Forms mangled and twisted, the grounds torn and shattered; it was as if they had been slaughtered by a force of nature.
With a flick of her wrist, a Force Lance in its compact form slid from the side out of her school uniform sleeve into her hand, as she looked around for whatever force had done this to innocent school teens.
Ranma just sighed, ignoring Serena’s reaction—she was new to Nerima, after all—and looked about. Finally spotting a target, he careful stepped over the downed forms, approaching one dressed in Olde English attire—he was still confused as to why a Japanese school did so many English plays—before tapping the figure on the side with his foot.
“Hey, Ichi!” Ranma called out. “Stop pretending before I give you something to moan about.”
Slowly, the downed figure dressed as a character from a certain play that should never be named in a theater, opened his eyes. “Saotome?”
Ranma just nodded. “Kuno?”
“Kuno,” the actor stated, slowly getting up.
Martial Arts Acting: make them truly believe they won … until the Second Act. For the Drama clubs and classes, it was a great method to ‘allow’ Tatewaki Kuno to believe you were participating in his challenge, but without being on the receiving end of a beating from Akane ‘Melee’ Tendo.
Letting out an exaggerated sigh, Ranma rubbed his forehead, a habit from Ruby. “How long?”
The guy shrugged, stretching out a bit—pretending to be hit, tossed around, and laying on the hard schoolyard ground was murder on the spine. “Day after you were last here. He claimed to have accomplished some quest and your disappearance was proof it was successful in the eyes of the Gods. You want what really happened, try Nabiki. But my curiosity isn’t worth satisfying for that amount of Yen.”
Chuckling lightly, Ranma nodded. At least he hoped he was now smart enough to deal with the middle Tendo. He would hate to send Serena after her…
Actually, he probably should consider ordering Serena about how to handle the people in his life. Nothing says ‘bad day’ like a high energy plasma shot to the heart.
“Master?” Serena asked, still on guard, her Force Lance gripped tightly in her hand.
Ichi just raised an eyebrow.
Ranma shrugged. “Space, aliens, rescue, culture shock,” he offered to explain things without really explaining them. He didn’t want anyone to know the real truth, lest he have to deal with what it might shake up.
“Ah,” Ichi replied, deciding that the short little details would be enough. Sometimes, it was better to not know what was happening in Ranma’s life; safer too. And judging by how the odd blond was acting, it would probably be safer for practice today to take all day … and use the stage on the other side of campus, the one with the large fire exits and access to the old fallout shelter.
“Going to class today?”
“For a while,” Ranma muttered, looking about as he noticed several bodies—male Drama students—were now gone. A few of the lower-ranked people Nabiki hired out to drag students in were hard at work; most likely freelance since Nabiki had abandoned that business when the Hentai Horde had first disbanded when Ranma came onto the scene. “At least a couple of periods,” he finished, looking about. His luck; that would be all it took before chaos ruled here.
Kuno was up to his old habits, Akane looked to be kind of stressed, and it was all but certain that he was going to walk into a major brawl if he went inside Furinkan High.
Overall, your standard day in Nerima.
Sighing, Nabiki continued to work on a bit of homework she would have due in a few periods. Not that it would be collected or graded, as the teachers were still in an unusual state since Ranma had disappeared.
A few were of the camp to celebrate—which said teacher that said homework was for was in, had said teacher been doing said lessons written on said syllabus. They were enjoying the disappearance of what they referred to as ‘the linchpin of insanity’ for Nerima. Assuming Saotome was still gone in a week or two, they might join the minority camp.
Said minority camp was the newest teachers at Furinkan, those who had yet to deal with the insane Principal Kuno’s actions. In fact, the only one among them who had run into said mad Kuno, took the case of what the principal had done to her before the school board.
Some women didn’t enjoy the long flowing locks they had grown for nearly a decade being shaved off.
Anyway, this camp was made of teachers who did something very odd: they taught. They did their jobs, didn’t attack the students, and followed the code of discipline teachers in other districts had to abide by.
She gave them also a week or two before they left … one way or another.
The next camp was the totalitarian camp: those who viewed Ranma’s disappearance as a chance to crack down and restore an order not seen since the fall of communism in Russia. With the principal currently trying to save his job, and Ranma gone, they had felt it was their duty to crush any other power and assume absolute control try and restore law and order in Furinkan.
Outside though, they couldn’t care less, as shown by Akane’s morning ‘ritual’ being restarted. Though if the rumors she heard were true, they were waiting for the elder Kuno to be fired before trying to remove the younger Kuno.
Finally, you had the ‘whatevers’ as the students were labeling them. These were teachers who really could have cared less, no matter who was missing or under investigation, and were doing the bare minimum set down by the Nerima District Educational Board, just to get to retirement.
Why, her current homeroom teacher was doing shots off his desk—legal by the doctrines—and mumbling about life before Second Impact
Damn drunk otakus… she thought bitterly. At least she didn’t have a class with the man after homeroom.
Though she did feel unsure how the Driver’s Ed class would handle him being that drunk. Last she heard, they had a bet on what they could get away with during class. The current leader was a group who had managed to get involved in a police chase with the Driver’s Ed car, before Major Takahashi smoothed things over.
Or was it Colonel now… For a secret organization, you would think they’d keep their ranks straight.
Shrugging, Nabiki finally paid attention when one of her office lackeys entered the classroom, bypassing the teacher—who was now rumbling about how logarithms meant something back in his day—and handed her a note, before quickly exiting the classroom.
Looking down at it, Nabiki unfolded it and read the information, a predatory smile developing on her lips. “Oh, Kuno-baby?” she spoke, slowly turning towards the grumbling kendoist beside her.
“What is it, Nabiki?” he asked.
“It appears I now have some information on the location of Ranma-kun,” she purred, watching as his eyes went wide and several other classmates attempted to ‘casually’ listen in.
“I say impossible!” he proclaimed. “For even the foul sorcerer could not have escaped from the banishment visited upon him while I completed the tasks assigned to accomplish such!”
Snorting—as she didn’t particularly know or care what Kuno had proclaimed he had done, as it probably was a scam and/or had actually been done by Sasuke—she did know well enough to play into his delusions.
It was easier that way … and could lead to a bigger payout. “Looks like he did.”
Eyes wide, Tatewaki turned towards her. “Well?”
“¥10,000,” she stated, holding out her hand.
Tatewaki glared at her. “Outrageous! I have already paid you the hefty and absurd sum of ¥50,000 for such information!”
“No, you paid me that to look for the information; I never said that it included said information when I located it!” she said with a cheery smile … one would almost believe would be perfect for the devil when he got your soul. “Also, didn’t you proclaim that deal finished when you had Ranma ‘banished’?”
“Fine!” Kuno growled, slamming the money onto her desk. “Now, give me that which I seek, so that I might finally free my—”
“One moment,” Nabiki interrupted him, taking her time to count the bills, and ensure the appropriate amount was there.
Seeing that there was—as well as pretending not to notice as Kuno’s face turned several shades of red, she turned to concentrate on him. “As of five minutes ago, he was in the office, accompanying a blonde transfer student, female.”
Waxing poetically as only the Blue Thunder could, he grabbed his bokken and dashed out of the classroom.
Nabiki could only smirk, not just because her pigtailed money-maker was back, but at what would likely happen in the next few minutes. Assuming the standard plan was followed, by the time the note reached her, Ranma and this mystery girl, named ‘Serena Tsukifune’, would be on their way shortly to class, and her people in the office would ‘have no idea their direction’. Thus, Tatewaki would either search, or realize Nabiki may have more information for him to purchase.
He paid her to search for the information, paid for said information, but had given her nothing to make a guess about where they might be now.
Smiling, she leaned back in her chair, wondering what ice cream flavor she’d purchase after classes today to celebrate her windfall.
Sayuri and Yuka just stared at the huffing Akane.
“I just asked about the weather, Akane,” Yuka spoke, looking with concern.
“Oh, I…” Akane stuttered, flushing in embarrassment.
“Wow, you really miss him, huh?” Sayuri teased.
“No, I don’t!” Akane growled, only keeping her voice low enough so Ms. Hinako didn’t drain them before the end of Homeroom, let alone before they even started her English class next period.
“Sure,” Yuka teased with a smile. It was an unspoken rule among the trio—and sometimes so unspoken, they wondered if Akane even admitted the truth—that the Tendo heir did care for the pigtailed Jusenkyo victim, despite her denials and the violence they could sometimes take.
Huffing at her friends, Akane sulked—but don’t say that to her, not unless you wanted to be the next example of Tendo Anger Management.
If even in the deepest recesses of her mind, Akane would admit she was worried about Ranma. When he had first disappeared, she had immediately jumped to the conclusion that he had spent the night with one of his other arranged marriages that were only somewhat his fault, as in the case of Shampoo hussies.
But they hadn’t seen him either. They had started their own searches. Of course, she knew they hadn’t had any luck, as they always stopped by the Tendo Dojo at night to ask Kasumi if she had heard anything.
The fathers were insisting that she immediately go search for him. She pointed out they had no clue where to start, they offered to help her, and now they were quiet, constantly telling her they were planning what to take and ‘collecting information’.
Where are you, Ranma? she thought, looking out the window, worry etched on her face.
Her answer was not in a form she had expected, but should have, given the standard chaos of Nerima … as Ranma entered the room.
The first thing she noticed was the smile on his face, somehow … calmer than before, as if he had figured out some great mystery.
The second was that his usual silk outfits were not to be found on his body. In fact, while the outfit seemed to be modeled after some sort of uniform as well, she couldn’t call it silk. And the jacket over it was far from what she expected him to wear, looking almost leather-like in quality.
And finally, she noticed the happy-go-lucky blond girl following Ranma in.
“RANCHAN! WHAT THE HELL!?”
Ukyo, however, had a faster processor speed and less cluttering of her BIOS.
“Delinquents!” yelled Ms. Hinako. “Naughty language should not be used in school!” With that, she produced her trusty coin, reading to drain them.
“YOUMA!” snarled the new girl, flicking her wrist, producing a short pole-like object, which Ranma quickly grabbed.
“EVERYONE CALM DOWN NOW!” he yelled, making everyone freeze in class.
Seeing that no one was about to get drained/shot/pummeled, he nodded. “Sensei, her paperwork and our passes,” he started, handing the items to Hinako, making the child-like figure blink.
“She’s not a youma, she uses a martial arts technique to drain excess energy from an aura, but it cannot be fatal,” he continued, addressing the blond.
“… You sure?” Serena asked.
“Yeah, fully human, just a bit skilled in draining,” he offered. Draining had been a useful technique during the Silver Millennium, allowing quick dealing with a violent enemy. After all, if they didn’t have the energy to fight, then they could not hurt you, no matter how violent their impulses were. It was great for those under a form of mind control, or the idiots who liked to included suicide attacks on the royalty.
Of course, the most famous of those had been the Cult of Metal-A, who would later on sacrifice themselves to summon Beryl’s Youma army and Metalia.
Looking over the paperwork, the teacher currently in the form of a young woman had an annoyed look on her face, like a petulant child who just had her candy taken away. “Well…” she replied after a moment, before offering the ID back to the blonde while her other hand tosses the passes into the garbage pail. “These seem to be in order,” she then smirked deviously. “But since you’re both late to class you have to go stand in the hall! Go grab a pair of buckets and fill them with water; you’re holding them for the last fifteen minutes.”
As Serena blinked her eyes, staring at the shorter brunette, Hinako frowned. “Well? What are you waiting for? Chop-chop!” she shouted, clapping her hands firmly.
Lowering his head, Ranma released a small, quiet sight. “I can’t win, can’t I?”
Slamming her hands on her desk, the chestnut-tressed ‘cute fiancée’ of the pigtailed martial artist stood with a huff. “HEY! WAIT A MINUTE! YOU CAN’T JUST SEND RANCHAN OUT IN THE—”
“DELINQUIENT!” the young child hissed as she withdrew a coin. “HAPPO GO YEN SATSU!!”
Serena just blinked as Ukyo—and the three unfortunate students in their seats in front of her—were drained to exhaustion, collapsing on their desks. “Wow,” she murmured. And she had heard that the Silver Kingdom’s military academies had had the strictest regimes of discipline.
Earth is weird, she thought, as Ranma handed her some buckets.
Ranma himself, just sighed. True, he could actually argue his way out of this, now knowing the rules the teachers had to follow.
Of course, that only worked in a sane school system. Logic was a naughty word in Nerima.
Chaos was another five-letter word, as evident when Ranma opened the door, to see Tatewaki Kuno.
“So,” bellowed the demi-samurai, “the foul sorcerer has returned!”
“… Serena?” Ranma asked, hand behind him.
Nodding, the blond android used her free hand to hand him a force lance.
“While I doth not know how you escaped your—ARRRRGH!” cried Kuno, as Ranma touched the tip of the lance against the upperclassman, and activated a electrical discharge.
“ARRRRGH!”
“…”
“ARRRRRGH!”
“… One more; he’ll go down with one more,” Ranma muttered, a bit amazed that Kuno was handling so much voltage and current, going through his body.
Feeling a bit of pride at how Tatewaki was becoming a crispy critter, Ranma turned his head to his personal A.I. “Hey, Serena! Can you make this thing more powerful?”
“Of course I can, Master!” Serena cooed, ever the loyal artificial intelligence. “But I need your permission to raise parameters of electrical amperage.”
Raising a hand to his chin while the other kept the lance pointed at the downed and twitching form of Kuno, Ranma seemed to mull over that for a moment. Finally, after a few seconds of thought, the pigtailed warrior that was also a reincarnated Knight Admiral of the Silver Millennium replied, “I’ll allow it!”
“Yay!” the blonde android chirruped as she took the force lance, a quick bit of wireless computing quickly making the internal safeties disengaged. The voltage output raising by a few thousand volts more, she pressed the force lance to the Blue Thunder once more.
“AAAAARRRRRRRGGGGHHH~GURGLE~Gurgle~gurlge~gurgle~gurgle…”
As Ranma reached out and removed her implement of battle from the kendoist’s chest, he couldn’t to whistle in appreciation. The idiot was charred, his hair puffed up into an afro, and the lower half of his face covered in a beard of saliva as he foamed violently from the mouth; his left foot twitching erratically. “Nice … can’t wait to try this on the Old Man.”
“Can I help?” asked Serena, having heard many stories from her Master about his new ‘father’.
“Nah, need to have an enjoyable family moment, Old Man will love it,” Ranma replied with a smirk.
“Um, Ranma?” asked Hiroshi, wondering what was going on.
“Space, aliens, rescue, culture shock,” Ranma replied as the duo exited the room.
“Wow,” Daisuke muttered in awe. “Saotome in space.”
The two were quiet as they imagined Ranma-chan in some revealing outfits from whatever sci-fi crossed their mind.
“… Really?” asked Yuka.
Hiroshi shook his head. “What is more likely: Ranma was abducted into space, or he ran off with a woman?”
“… He has a point, Akane,” the girl replied, turning towards her steaming friend.
Sayuri didn’t even say anything, merely holding a tea-kettle out near Akane’s head as steam shot out the young Tendo Heir’s ears. “Now, now, Yuka … just a few moments more. I’m almost done here.”
Looking past Akane to her other friend, the brunette considered this for a moment. “What flavor?”
“Tomobiki blend, heavy on the citrus,” she replied as the steam started to make the tea-kettle bubble.
“Yes, I’ll have a cup.”
Twitching irritably, Akane was tempted to see if there was such a thing as ‘justifiable manslaughter’.
“The current educational system in this district leaves a lot to be desired, Master,” Serena offered, holding the buckets in both hands. Sadly—for the school—the weight of each bucket didn’t even come close to the maximum her body could handle.
Nor Ranma’s. “Yeah, didn’t know how bad until recently,” he murmured, looking out the window.
“Bzzt, 1 s33 d34d p30pL3,” Kuno twitched.
He could only shake his head in sadness—back when Nabiki ran things, the guy would already be in the nurse’s office by now. “Remind me to get forged credentials for my education later.”
“Of course, Master,” Serena nodded. “Would you prefer average grades or Valedictorian?”
“… I’ll have to think on that,” Ranma replied, wondering if he even wanted to attend college on Earth. His military academy training from Ruby’s life was a bit more thorough … but then he was basing that on Nerima standards.
Who knew what other districts could require.
Serena nodded her head, filing that information away for later perusal and debate. “As it stands, Master; once we’re done holding the buckets, can we just leave?”
Looking over to the A.I. with the surprisingly human appearance, the pigtailed martial artist calmly told her, “We can’t, Serena. This is only the first class of the day. Once it’s done, we have to go to the next one.”
“True,” the female android replied in understanding. “But considering your current level of skills and knowledge is there really anything to gain here besides further frustration and attacks from others of the student body?”
That gave the heir of the Saotome School of Anything Goes Martial Arts pause. He frowned as he considered that carefully, his fingers clenched around the bucket handles tightly. Come to think of it, why should he stick around when it was obvious that, thanks to the supposedly valid medical practice of mallet-to-the-head, he was much smarter and mature than this school could help him with?
Granted, he could learn present-day history, but still, that only covered so much.
“… We’ll stay to lunch,” Ranma replied. “If we leave now, my fiancée will just be even bitchier when she comes back to the Dojo.”
“But wouldn’t it be better to head elsewhere for lunch? I’m sure we can get you something more appropriate than whatever your fiancées may try to give you, let alone what the school serves,” Serena suggested as an alternative.
“True, but right now, we put in the appearances,” Ranma replied. “Otherwise, Takahashi will throw a fit, and the proverbial explosion will just be greater.”
“Ah,” Serena nodded. “By staying longer, we are defusing the tension that has accrued since we were reunited.”
“Exactly,” Ranma replied, before motioning for her to be silent, as a student finally came to collect Kuno, dragging the man off.
“Bzzt, 1 b B4tm4n, bzzt.”
“… We may need to rethink using electricity on him,” Ranma muttered. “Either we shocked him to normal, or a lateral move on the crazy train.”
“Understood, Master,” Serena nodded, before blinking. “Oh, do you have any preferences for the sick piglet I also transported with you.”
Blinking, Ranma turned to her. “Um … fill me in, and please tell me that thing is still alive.”
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(Posted Mon, 29 Jul 2013 00:20)
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