Not that he was a corward. Little Ranma was one of the bravest and most capable kids around, often to the point of getting into trouble. Very often. Even when Akane was tagging along and slowed him down.
The problem was, the Tendou temple had been attacked by a group of demons. Those demons had been able to take on Mon, Dad, Uncle Tendou and Aunty Kumiko, as well as basically ignoring the children’s efforts. On the plus side, the hadn’t gotten Kasumi or Akane like they wanted. That was about the only bright point, as they caught him as planned and got Kumiko instead of her little girls.
Aunty Kumiko had pleaded with him for a long time, but eventually she got him to slip out of their holding cell and run away to get help.
That lead to the problem of finding out he was in the demon beast’s home world. Lots of jagged rocks and sickly red sky, with an abundance of beasts, demons, oni, and every other kind of creature that typically scared a young child to boot.
Luckily for Ranma, he wasn’t so intimidated by scary looking monsters, even if they were stronger than him. He wasn’t a quitter, and he would find help. He also realized the monsters were running him ragged, and he’d have to do something soon to break pursuit so he could rest.
The ground to the right started to change texture, becoming dark and brittle in appearance. Not having anything better to go on, he turned right. The ground flattened into bed of black sand, with something white sticking up form the middle. Still running he made for the odd white object standing out among the black sand.
It looked to be a five foot long white claw, but made of bleached white bone. There were other smaller claws and what looked to be an organic looking complicated spine to the weapon which would serve as a handle. Coming to a stop, he grabbed the spine handle of the object and used his momentum to help him pull it from the ground. Struggling with a weapon that was about as heavy as him, he managed to swing it around and over his head, hitting the ground with an overhead strike. He was very gratified to see that not only had he swung the strange weapon that was bigger than him, but it had created a long crack in the brittle stone under the sand which some of the sand filled.
Some of the trailing beasts were alarmed by this development. Some of them didn’t like the feeling coming from that strange weapon. One particularly odd one didn’t like the sight of a six year old grinning at him like that.
Most of the demon beasts just grinned and stalked forward, not letting this development deter them at all.
Little Ranma grinned at them, not letting his concern show. By the time they finished stalking forward, he should have caught his breath. As large and heavy as the sword was, he may not have been able to pick it up, but he could pull with his whole body and do some huge circular swings with it. As large as the sword was, he could probably injure those stupid beasts with it, though it would certainly be a clumsy attack, they weren’t really all that skilled either.
While they were grim odds, they were decidedly brighter than any other odds he had gotten so far today.
Those odds went out the window as a tanned slender hand much larger than his own reached from over his shoulder to grasp the handle of the strange sword. As young Ranma paused in preparation for a fight or flight decision, a soothing feminine voice reached his ears. “Don’t worry, I will take care of them.” So saying, the sword was lifted upwards and temporarily out of his sight.
The young boy twisted about and craned his head upwards, finding what seemed to be a black floating cloak with one tan slender arm revealed and upraised holding the strange weapon. Then the weapon itself moved, the bone white blades swiveling as the spine handle twisted and elongated, transforming from a clumsy sword into a large scythe with a multitude of wickedly arranged giant claws for blades.
With a sweeping one-handed motion, the scythe cut forward through the air in a wide arc, cutting nothing. Nevertheless, the beasts dissolved away as an arc of sand eroded into dust, leaving young Ranma alone with the scythe wielding figure.
Feeling a good bit nervous, little Ranma backed away from the creature a few steps before he felt comfortable again. “Ah, is that your sword thingy?”
The figure lowered the scythe, which folded to once again be an awkward sword, before resting it tip first into the sand before Ranma. “No, It is yours.”
Seeing the young boy hesitate and show some common sense, the figure pulled back her cowl, causing the entire cloak to fade away, revealing herself to be a woman. Darkly tanned skin, long vibrant green hair, and very little clothing to hide her natural beauty. Besides the silvery collar, she wore a matched golden band on her right wrist and one on her left ankle. For clothing, she had a black thong, and a cross between a vest and a cape, which buttoned in the front and held her breasts, while most of the fabric floated behind her like wings. Overall it was just a fancy bikini, but she was glad to have that much, as her other outfit was just the bands.
Seeing her young master relax some, she floated forward, tucking her legs in and kneeling in mid-air so she could bring herself level with him. Gently she placed her hands on his shoulders while giving him her most encouraging smile. It wasn’t much, but hopefully it would do, she needed him now. “I can’t stay long for now, but after you catch your breath, you can go that way and find some small green fruit you can eat. Then you go over there, and you should find a place to rest. Then I should be able to talk to you again, and help you some more, okay?”
Little Ranma gave the strange woman a hesitant nod, which seemed to make her a lot happier. For now he figured she was a good guy helping him out, but he wasn’t about to completely trust her. Still though, he didn’t have a better plan, so he would trust her that much. “Uh, okay. Can you help me save Aunty Kumiko?”
Setsuna’s smile became a lot more genuine. “Yes, when you become strong enough to wield that sword, you will be able to save her. Just be sure to take it with you. I know that may be a lot to ask, but it’s where I sleep, so you have to have it so I can help you.”
Ranma blinked, she lived in a sword? Did that make her a genie? Well that he could certainly deal with. It was also nice to have something of a plan for helping Aunty Kumiko. “Alright! I’ll get a lot stronger then.”
Setsuna smiled sadly at him, realizing how much he would have to go through. Before Ranma could spot her expression though, she faded and flowed into the sword.
Giving one last look back where he came from, little Ranma started towards where the food should be, hopefully the fruit would be juicy enough to quench his thirst too. Straining slightly he trudged forward, dragging the large sword by his side through the sand.
Inside the sword, Setsuna was little more than an awareness. The sword was actually her body now, while her human form was more of a puppet. She had waited a little under a decade there for Ranma, which gave her a long time to contemplate things.
Meddling with time, even to her had been forbidden. Just stopping time was instant death, while actually meddling with the stream was much worse. Some were foolish enough to believe simple death to be a punishment for something as grand as tampering with the time stream. Being dead until Usagi brought her back to life was just a light warning.
Getting the attention of some powerful being tied with the Time Stream or some backlash was the real punishment. Her current fate as a demonic rune weapon was actually fairly light, as she still got a chance at a human life and some happiness. It wasn’t great though, she either belonged to Ranma and did her best, or she could sulk within the sword and rot away, but as punishments went, it was relatively light.
So she had decided to make the best of it. Ranma might be her future master, and hopefully would own her body and soul so she could know completeness, but until then, she got to guide him as he grew up.
She could have manipulated him, and he could just as equally seal her within the sword and use its power just fine. At the other end of the spectrum, she could embrace her new life and make it pleasant. Belonging to a kind and caring person was actually a fairly appealing fate, she had never wanted to be saddled with being the guardian of time and forced away form people.
She just hoped her presence would be enough for Ranma. Finding friends for him would be very unlikely in the spirit world.
The Elder Plushy of Time had foreseen something like that. It wouldn’t do for Ranma to grow up alone in the lower planes without some friends. Arranging for those friends was rather trivial afterall, and would do so much good.
The Elder Plushy of Time chose…
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(Posted Fri, 06 Jun 2003 09:51)
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