"So what do we do now, Miss Excel?"

Excel pursed her face in contemplation. "Well, what I said to Lord Il-Palazzo was, 'So you want us to seek him out, and challenge him to fair and honourable single combat, and fight him, and lose, and go off and learn powerful techniques in far-off, long-lost lands, and eat really good Korean, the sort you can only get in Los Angeles, and then return, stronger than ever,' and he said I was right, and that's a moment I'll treasure for ever and ever, for it shows that our heart and souls are truly as one, and one day he'll profess his love for beautiful Excel openly, and then take out a tube of cake icing, and... ah, Lord Il-Palazzo, you're so dreamy! You're all that a simple, innocent, yet stunningly beautiful and incredibly sexy girl like me could ever hope for!"

She looked at her fingers and starting ticking items off. "Anyways, so far we've sought Ranma out, and challenged him, and fought him, and lost." She started counting on her other hand. "So now we have to go off and learn powerful techniques in far-off, long-lost lands, eat Korean, and then return." She stared at her hands in surprise. "Hey, Ha-chan, we're half finished already!"

"That's wonderful! But, Miss Excel, how are we supposed to travel anywhere, or eat good Korean? We don't even have enough money to afford a soda." Hyatt sighed.

"Good point, Ha-chan."

"Don't Koreans eat dog?"

"Hey, yeah, they do!" No sooner did Excel speak than she wilted again, resting her jaw on her fist. "But we left Menchi at home." Excel's eyes fell on Gyoza, who she was affectionately pinning to the table with one hand. "What about pork?" she asked over his frantic squeals. Her stomach rumbled loudly, and her grip slowly tightened.

Hyatt considered that, reaching out with a delicate finger to playfully tap Gyoza's flailing trotter. "I think so, Miss Excel, but do we want to use our emergency food supply already? It's not really an emergency yet."

Excel scrunched up her brow. "Good point. After all, we have a glass of water, so we won't starve to death, and we still have to," she quickly counted off her fingers again, "go off and learn powerful techniques in far-off, long-lost lands."

"You wish to be trained?"

In perfect unison, Hyatt and Excel's heads snapped around. Beside the table, a pillar of cold, white fire rose halfway to the ceiling, swaying to and fro in the steady droning breeze of the air conditioner. Gaping, Excel leapt on top of the chair back, hands slamming together as she bent her head in reverent prayer. "Ah! It is a fire spirit come from the Heavens, to give us divine inspiration so that we may develop a powerful school of martial arts based on the theory that the fist can be treated as the flint, and the enemy's tonsils, the steel, which when brought together, strike the sparks of pain, which will catch on the tinder of the teeth, which will eventually ignite the logs of I'm not really sure yet but probably something to do with pressure points or massage therapy or high colonics or something, which when fanned by the breeze of shouting loudly will birth the fire of being kicked repeatedly, which will end only in the ashes of victory!"

The chair she was standing on suddenly vanished, and Excel swan-dove to the floor, feet in the air and her nose nicely cushioning the blow. The rasping, gravelly voice said, "Over here."

With a ratcheting, cracking noise, Excel's head rotated up to face straight ahead, while her body gently levered down to rest on the floor behind her. Her slitted eyes stared at the base of the flames, which seemed to be on top of the head of a.... Excel's right arm snaked forward to point. "You look like a tiny little foot-high wizened ugly horrid troll or probably leprechaun dressed in green clover-leaf-patterned leiderhosen with incredibly tall almost-fire-like white hair but I think this is supposed to be a martial arts episode which generally don't have any leprechauns so I'm thinking instead that I've been hit hard enough on the head that I have a concussion which is weird because normally I don't get a concussion as that really is Hyatt's role and when the characters overlap too much they don't play off well against each other."

"Who are you calling a leprechaun?" The tiny little figure heaved the chair she had confiscated threateningly.

Excel blinked. "You?"

The shriveled old lady tried to smash the chair down on Excel's head, but the legs had gotten tangled in the twisting locks of her massive shock of hair. Struggling briefly to try and free it, she gave up, left it dangling, and crossed her arms in a dignified fashion. "I'm not a leprechaun."

"You look like a leprechaun," Excel pointed out.

The not-leprechaun shook her head vigourously, which launched the chair lodged in her tresses off the side with cannon-like force to explode through the restaurant window. "I am not a leprechaun! I am a martial arts master!" A thundering impact from the street outside was followed by faint screams of, "Kobayashi is bleeding!"

"Really?" Excel jumped to her feet. "That's nice." As she brushed herself, she glanced over the table, and her eyes widened in shock. Dancing a jig of righteous outrage, she shouted, "Ah! Ha-chan, don't hog all the water!"

The entirely-not-a-leprechaun master sighed deeply, and bowed her head as if to summon patience. The act caused her massive coiffure to drive Excel deep into the floor with a ringing gong noise. When she looked up again, the eyebrow over one bulging eye twitching, the two were on eye-level. "I said, I am a martial arts master."

"Yes." Excel nodded firmly. "I heard you say that, when you were saying you were not a leprechaun, which I said you were, but I still say you look like one, and is it possible that when you said...."

"I am a martial arts master," she patiently interrupted, "who can train people."

"Mmm-hmmm." Excel's brow furrowed.

"Who can train people in secret, powerful techniques."

"I see."

"Secret, powerful techniques, like the ones you wanted to learn."

"Right!" Excel burst from the floor, and pointed triumphantly at the crone. "Ha-chan! We can be trained in secret, powerful techniques by this leprechaun in order to fulfill the wishes of Lord Il-Palazzo and defeat Ranma! Ha-chan? Ha-chan? Oh." Her shoulders slumped as she watched the disputed glass of water turn crimson. "Ha-chan is dead."

With a sudden, sharp blurring sensation, Excel found herself face-first on the ground again. The little woman, still holding on to her ankle, said evenly, "I am not a leprechaun."

When she let go, though, Excel did not stand up. Instead, she sat cross-legged, rubbing her brow in worry. "Wait. We might have a problem." She peered suspiciously at the woman, who was blinking in consternation. "Where are you going to train us?"

The shriveled master tilted her head in confusion, which caused her towering tresses to rend a gaping slash in the wall. "At my house?"

"Is that far-off?"

"It's next door."

"Is it long-lost?"

"I forgot my keys yesterday. Does that count?"

"Do you have any Korean food?"

"Nope."

Excel smacked her fists together. "Close enough! Don't worry, Lord Il-Palazzo, we're getting closer and closer to our victory!"

* * *

"A cunning foe," Il-Palazzo murmurs. He stares, unseeing, at the floor where his agents would stand to deliver their reports and receive their commands, and then slowly turns around.

Where once his throne stood, and the stool later followed, is an immense pile of wood, plastic, upholstery, and screws. Hundreds of screws.

"A cunning foe indeed." The episode has again reverted to present tense, and the author has no idea why. He changes it back, and then goes to consult the manual or the warranty or something.

Il-Palazzo opened his clenched hand and stared down at a half-dozen hex wrenches. None of them, he knew, were the right size.

Slowly, he let them drop from his hand, one-by-one, each one bouncing and ringing off the granite floor. And over the chiming clatter, his voice could be heard: "Hello. Ikea Shop-by-Phone?"

* * *

Toting Hyatt on her back, Excel suddenly stopped in her steps. "Hey, leprechaun, what should I call you?" Her head rocked back with a clanking noise as a projectile took her between the eyes.

The woman reached down to retrieve her house keys from where they had landed between Excel's feet, and when she straightened again, she had a cold, vicious smile on her face. "I'm not a leprechaun, child. You can call me...."

Excel leant forward.

"Moira O'Callahan."

* * *

Gy... no! Ryoga knew that it was time to escape; time to make Ranma pay. It was *always* time to make Ranma pay, of course, but now was a time to make Ranma pay *even more.*

A long time with his curse had left him no stranger to people trying to eat him. Heck, for the first few weeks after Jusenkyo, he'd drooled whenever he'd caught his reflection in a mirror. This Excel girl, though... it was like being with a twisted version of Akane. She cuddled him, and kept him close, and spoke to him in gentling and soothing tones, and every time her stomach rumbled, her eyes flashed butcher knives and her fingers reached for a cutting board and drool dripped down her fangs. Those fangs were pretty damn disturbing.

They had dumped him in the room that the leprechaun crone had set aside for her new students, and then gone off to start training. The room was stark, with nothing but a couple of futons, a tiny, high window, and a Western-style door. More than enough to hold any ordinary pig, but -- he grinned crookedly -- he was no ordinary pig.

The Bakusai Tenketsu would be more than enough to free him, but it would make a great deal of noise, and he might not be able to find his way out of the home before his captors came running. Besides, he admitted sheepishly to himself, he really wanted to try out the Five Swallows Fighting And/Or Mating Over Two White Oaks And An Elm With Dutch Elm Disease Fist. He drew himself up onto his rear feet, staring intently at the locked door, flexed his fingers, and... tried to flex his fingers again. Staring in consternation at his hooves, he counted, then blinked and counted a second time. He didn't seem to have Five Swallows at the moment. Which made it all the more vital to make Ranma pay, since it was Ranma's fault that Ryoga couldn't make Ranma pay.

Before he could work up to a Shishi Hokoudan, the door flew open, and the other girl -- Hyatt -- stood there, in an immaculate new karate gi. The tableau was frozen for a moment, as Hyatt stared, and Ryoga was uncomfortably aware of the fact that he was on his hind feet and crouched in a combat stance; behaviour no true self-respecting pig would ever consider.

"What are you doing, Gyoza?" Hyatt asked, head cocked to one side.

Bolting between her legs and trying to make a break for it was an option. So was squatting and doing his "cute little piglet" routine, but Ryoga was also fighting an urge to scratch the back of his head and laugh nervously. Faced with too many alternatives, Ryoga followed his heart, and tried to choose all of them at once.

Hyatt watched the piglet writhe and spasm across the floor, scratching frantically at his entire body, and then smiled faintly as she clapped her hands together. "Oh, I see. You have fleas, so you want to take a bath." She scooped up the near-epileptic Ryoga before the words had a chance to sink in, and headed down the heart-stoppingly short walk to the nearest bathroom. "Don't worry, Gyoza. We'll have you clean soon."

About to squirm free, Ryoga paused. For once in his life, he realized, he didn't have to fear having his curse revealed. He would be dunked in hot water, he would be human, he would apologize profusely, he would leave. Once it was established that he was not, in fact, a pig and hence a food source, they would have no more use for him.

Slavering jaws danced across his mind. Well, he amended, Hyatt would have no use for him.

And so, when they reached the furo, Ryoga eagerly leapt from Hyatt's arms and into the tub, creating a splash that was greatly magnified as he grew to his human form. Sloshing about in the tub to face the entrance, he was careful to keep himself as decent as possible as he bowed towards the dark-haired girl. "Ah, I'm really sorry about this...."

Making the mistake of looking up, Ryoga froze. Hyatt, who had been in the midst of kneeling down when he had dove into the water, sat there, stunned, her thin karate gi soaked to translucence. The white fabric, steaming slightly in the warm humidity, caressed her curves eagerly, sweeping up from the flare of her hips to cup the outer swells of round breasts, pulling away just enough to reveal a deep, enticing valley....

'Oh, damn,' thought Ryoga fuzzily, as blood sprayed forth. Then he realized that it wasn't *his* nose that was bleeding, and befuddled, he could only stare as Hyatt's eyes rolled back into her head, and she toppled, shuddering, to the side.

Ryoga couldn't help but preen; Ranma only wished he was man enough to get that reaction! But Hyatt wasn't blushing, he noticed after a moment, and the blood wasn't just coming from her nose. In a sudden panic, he leapt from the tub, uncaring of his nudity, and cradled the comatose girl in his arms. Checking with trembling fingers, he found no pulse.

"Oh, no," he whispered. His face hardened, and he swept her into his arms. "Don't worry, Hyatt. I'll get you to a hospital!" Smashing open the wall with a single kick, he leapt out onto the street, and ran off in search of medical aid.

The street outside was mostly empty, save for O'Callahan, who craned her neck to stare admiringly after the fleeing pair around the shopping bags she was cradling. "Girl's got ambition."

* * *

O'Callahan's backyard was incredibly spacious for an urban Tokyo dwelling, filled with rock gardens, koi ponds, little bridges and gates, a half-size electrified barbed-wire deathmatch cage, and a plaster lawn banshee.

"Tomorrow morning we will start your real training," the diminutive master had announced. "For tonight, you will work on hardening your hands. Take this stick, and practice striking this oak tree, both on the left and on the right. Do this until you can't do it any more, and then keep doing it until you can, and repeat."

"Right!" Excel grabbed the stick in both hands and gave the inoffensive oak tree a hearty swat. "I will do this!" Spinning it over her head, she struck again. "I will become stronger!" Strike. "For Lord Il-Palazzo!" A deft parry to cut a flying piece of bark out of the air, and then another cut. "You can count on me, Lord Il-Palazzo!" Pulling off a triple combo, she added, "Excel will always do her best for you!" A blurred flurry of blows. "This will make my hands tougher, so I will be tougher, so I will be stronger so I can fight Ranma and defeat him and stomach the really spicy Korean food and then ACROSS will face no obstacles and I will crush the world under my boot and smear it flat with a rolling pin and wrap it up in pleasing yet not effeminate ribbons and deliver it to you for Valentine's Day because," she held the stick up as a microphone, "Iiiiiiiii, ye-iiiiiii, will always love youuuuuuuuuuu...."

The tree, groaning its indignation, toppled over onto her head.

"That," Excel pronounced flatly, "was not my hands."

* * *

Just before dawn breaks, the night takes on a luminous appearance: a darkness by which you can see. In this not-light, Moira O'Callahan carefully studied her lined visage in the bottom-most part of a full-length mirror. "I can do this," she muttered, and then fell silent again. Abruptly, she nodded, her tresses leaning out to push against the mirror until the glass bulged inwards and cracked. "Because I'm old enough, I'm withered enough, and doggone it, people fear me."

Ignoring the glass shards cascading down around her, she strode out through the door and down the hall. Without pausing, she smashed into the guest room and violently attacked the empty futon.

"What are you doing, Teacher?"

Surrounded by drifting wads of padding and cloth, O'Callahan turned to stare with slitted eyes at Excel, who was blinking at her inquisitively from just outside the room. "I was waking you up so that you could being your training in earnest," she said, and stepped closer. Her hair raked across the roof, and dislodged the "Caravan Kidd Babo Exclusive Special Edition With Extra Bean-Induced Airbag" light fixture. "But you were not sleeping. Why not?"

"There was a reason... let me see...." Excel slumped, her jaw slack as she scratched at an eyebrow with one finger. O'Callahan leaned in, drawn towards the soft hum of painful contemplation, and did not quite suppress a jump as Excel suddenly slammed a fist into her palm, her face first brightening, and then collapsing into a face of misery as she fell onto her knees, grabbed O'Callahan's collar, and sobbed down at her face. "Oh, it's terrible, you have to... This is not working." She leapt to her feet, and ripped up the flooring that had been underneath her. Settling herself down into the newly made gap with a grunt, she fell onto her knees again, seized O'Callahan's collar again, and sobbed up at her face. "Oh, it's terrible! Ha-chan is dead and has dissolved into nothing but a pool of horrible blood in the furo and I spent all night using ice and liquid hydrogen to try and get her to re-freeze into human form and it didn't work and you have to help me though if you could arrange for her to be maybe be just a cup-size smaller I wouldn't complain not that I think Lord Il-Palazzo has eyes for...."

O'Callahan quieted Excel by the simple expedient of stuffing a third of a futon in her mouth. "Your friend is not dead," she sighed.

Excel gurgled.

"Well, maybe she is," O'Callahan amended, "but no more than usual. My training and intuition tell me that she has simply left you for a while, to pursue another form of stamina training."

Excel gurgled again and tried to swallow.

"Don't rush your meal, student. You won't get to eat again for a while."

* * *

Ranma stood sweating, the sound of his racing heartbeat echoing off the silent, watching trees. Without closing his eyes, he immersed himself in his other senses, feeling the pollen-laden air as it swept past the trees in bloom and on to him, the whisper of wind caressing the blades of grass, the smell of sunlight slowly baking the earth dry, the rumbling of an idiot pounding through the woods, the imperceptible buzz of gnats buzzing about his head....

"Ranma! This is all your fault, but I'm willing to forget that for just a moment, because you have to help me!"

Senses hyper-sensitive from the meditative exercise, Ranma could feel every ripple of Ryoga's muscles as he was engulfed in a desperate hug, and the still-minuscule damp spot where Ryoga's tears of frustration and desperation were just barely beginning to soak into his shirt. He was also fully aware that Ryoga was stark raving nude. Ranma was, at this point, almost an expert in being involuntarily seized by undressed individuals, and, all told, he would rate this particular experience as one of the worst. Besides, Ryoga didn't know Don't-Hold-On Grenade-Jutsu.

Smiling grimly, Ranma recalled one of Genma's earliest lessons, imparted in a rumbling voice over a campfire to a wide-eyed boy, shivering through his first winter spent outdoors. "Son," the burly man had said, staring contemplatively at his hands held out to the flames, "a martial artist trains to be strong, both for himself and for those weaker than him. We learn to fight to protect those who cannot fight for themselves, and to defeat those who use their skills for gain at the expense of others. But the reason we learn special techniques, Son, the really fancy flashy stuff, is to beat the hell out of mentally deranged men who run around naked and try to molest us. I don't expect you to understand that, not today; but someday, in the future, you'll look back on what I just told you, and what I had to do today, and you'll understand."

Ranma hadn't understood, until now. And, just coincidentally, that enlightenment had come just as he finished learning his newest attack; one so powerful that, the deepest, darkest part of his mind confessed, it scared even him. Summoning his strength, he followed Genma's advice and prepared to unleash the Way Of The Heavenly Mist on his foe.

"Ryoga," he said, in a calm, almost sweet voice.

The lost boy froze, and his grip loosened.

"I really don't think you should be touching me like that," Ranma continued, his tone a blissful hymn.

Ryoga backed further off, his eyes wide and face pale.

"Oh, my!" Ranma cheerfully exclaimed, putting one hand to his cheek. "Imagine if Akane had seen us! She almost certainly would reached the wrong conclusion." Without losing his tiny smile, Ranma leaned in towards Ryoga, finger extended. His target, frozen like a rabbit in the depths of a polar ice floe, could only watch as the tip of the finger slowly drifted in until it rested on his forehead.

"You've been very naughty, Ryoga," Ranma chirped.

Ryoga closed his eyes as the pressure increased slightly.

The finger withdrew. He opened his eyes again.

"There!" Ranma beamed at him. "Now, be good!"

Ryoga screamed in rage and fear, and leapt back, hands before him in a ready stance. "Ranma! This is no time for us to be fighting! You have to help me get Hyatt to a hospital!"

Ranma let the Way Of The Heavenly Mist dissipate and stared at Ryoga in befuddlement. "Hyatt?"

"Yes, Hyatt!" Ryoga crossed his arms and glared at his foe. "She collapsed and she has no pulse! I tried to take her to Nerima General Hospital, but it's not in Osaka anymore!"

Ranma waved a hand at him. "Wait, wait. Hold up. Who's this Hyatt girl, anyways?"

"Hyatt? Well, um, she's this girl who caught me in pig-form," Ryoga stammered, pushing his fingertips against each other, "and she was going to eat me, but she was actually kind of nice about it, and she was really pretty, and she had purplish hair and really pale skin...."

"Oh, wait." Ranma snapped his fingers. "Ya mean the girl who was with Excel and spouting blood and is standing behind ya now scopin' out yer ass?"

"Right!" Ryoga exclaimed, relieved. "Wait, what?"

"Oh, I'm very sorry, Mr. Ryoga," Hyatt said. "I thought it would be all right, seeing as it was out in public."

"Nah, I don't think he minds." Ranma smirked, and leaned a little towards Hyatt, reaching over the frantically blushing and curled-up Ryoga to whisper confidentially. "Tell ya the truth, I think he's an exhibitionist."

"Really?" Hyatt blinked slowly, and then carefully scrutinized Ryoga's fundamental attributes. "Well, I suppose I can understand that. Mr. Ryoga has a lot to exhibit."

Ranma twitched slightly.

Surging to his feet, Ryoga seized Ranma's throat and set about methodically strangling him. "RANMA! How dare you say such things! What if Akane heard you?" Blinking, he stared around the clearing for a few minutes, until a faint gurgling caught his attention. "Oh. Sorry." He let Ranma down a little. "Where is Akane, anyways?"

"Akane?" Ranma echoed stupidly. "I dunno. Around somewhere, I guess."

* * *

"Um, Sister?" Akane whispered into the stifling, sultry darkness.

"Mmmmm?"

"I can't, um, move." Akane twisted uncomfortably against the silk ropes. Spread-eagled, it wasn't easy.

"Mmmph?"

"I don't know!" she hissed. "The knots are too tight. And they're *really* starting to chafe." At least the bed was nice and soft.

"Mmmrphm! Mmmmmm...."

"Nonono, that's not what I meant! C'mon, please untie me... hey!"

A long series of wet, muffled noises followed, throbbing in the musky air, until they were interrupted by Akane's muffled, broken whimper.

"Noooooooooooooooo!"

* * *

"Now, then." The not-leprechaun paced back and forth before Excel, hands crossed behind her back and her hair gently swaying to and fro. "Today, we begin your serious training in the Pot of Martial Arts Tricks School of Martial Arts. The fundamental precept of this school is that fighting, being a natural thing, arises from the things that we consider to be natural. And so, the serious practitioner will find that mastery of the arts will arise through devoting herself to the relentless study and pursuit of everyday activities."

Standing stiffly at attention, Excel raised a hand up high and began making enthusiastic little noises.

"What?" O'Callahan snapped.

"So we're going to eat and breathe and sleep all day?"

"What? No. You're going to deliver newspapers."

Excel grunted sagely as she nodded her head. "Ah, yes. Delivering newspapers, the ultimate expression of man's struggle for divine perfection in a mortal and flawed world."

O'Callahan nodded gravely, and handed Excel a bulging canvas satchel. "Here are the newspapers. Over there on the curb are the advertising supplements." She watched for a second. "Lift with your legs, student, not with your back."

After a few minutes of experiments, Excel deduced that if she took off the newspaper satchel and hung it on a corner of the massive pillbox of advertising, she could, just barely, manage to heave the entire mess on to her shoulders, and that with great straining effort, she could stop her knees from bowing completely out when they got to about right angles. "I'm ready, Teacher! Well, when I say ready, I mean, I'm ready if all of these newspapers need to be delivered just next door, but I think that they probably need to be delivered all over this neighbourhood, so my 'ready' is really just youthful optimism and gung-ho can-do attitude!"

"Ah, no." O'Callahan smiled indulgently. "No, they don't have to be delivered all over this neighbourhood."

Hollywood will also have to insert a sigh of relief here.

"They have to be delivered all over Shinjuku."

"Shinjuku!" Excel exclaimed with starry eyes. "You mean Shinjuku, located exactly 180 degrees opposite Tokyo Eki both physically and psychologically, which is where the metropolis unabashedly flexes its bulging 21st-century muscles? Over two million commuters scurry through its turnstiles every working day, either heading for other parts of Tokyo or into one of Shinjuku's skyscrapers! These towers of steel and glass defy the tail of the mythical catfish that lies under the archipelago, and whose agitated rustlings cause the tsunami and earthquakes so feared throughout the land.

"Shinjuku," Excel continued, waving a cheery little tourist group flag as she pointed at the slideshow projected on O'Callahan's front door, "at the time a mere rice-paddy village, was one of the only areas of Tokyo left functioning after the devastating earthquake of 1923, when it began to enjoy an accelerated rise in commerce. What emerged are two distinct Shinjuku personalities: the west side of Shinjuku Eki is prim and proper, dedicated to business and commerce and emerging as the new financial center of the city; the east side is raucous and bawdy, bursting with stand-up restaurants, discount shops crammed into underground passageways, street musicians, and Kabuki-cho, a constantly humming nightlife quarter."

The last slide clicked out of the projector, leaving a blank white field shining out as Excel cutely cocked her head and kept reciting. "Shinjuku is best known for...." She ground to a halt and gaped, slit-eyed, at O'Callahan. "Being very, very, very far away from Nerima."

"Not by subway."

"Are we taking the subway?"

"No."

"So it is very far away."

"Yes."

"Are we walking?"

"No."

"Oh, good."

"We're skipping."

"Skipping?"

"Skipping."

"As in, tra-la-la-lally, here down in the valley, tra-la, jumping about like fairies, skipping?"

"Ah, you know the song already!"

Sighing, Excel hitched her load a little higher, forcing the concrete under her feet to groan and buckled under the stress. "I do this for you, Lord Il-Palazzo!" And then, mumbling, "I just hope you never find out."

* * *

"Sister."

Kodachi turned her head just enough to see Kuno while she continued to pace gracefully down the footpath twisting between the solemn oaks. "What is it, brother?"

"There is a disturbance to the side of us," he explained in a low voice. "I will investigate it ere it involves us unaware."

Slowing to a stop, Kodachi turned about to glare at her brother. "Brother dear, Ranma darling is just ahead. I have no intentions of letting some new harlot have her hooks in him any longer than necessary."

"Your words wound my soul," Kuno intoned gravely, "but, truly, guaranteeing your well-being and, perhaps, protecting other innocents are duties that I find I must hold as dear as vanquishing the sorcerer Saotome." With a short, sharp bow, he darted off into the woods.

Before she could think, Kodachi followed on his heels. Fast as she was, though, she was surprised to find her brother even faster, and shortly was following his trail rather than his fluttering hakama. Breaking into a full sprint, she broke through a thick bush to almost trip over Kuno, who was kneeling before a tree. Gathering herself, Kodachi stepped closer and stifled a gasp.

Slumped against the trunk was a young man, beaten and bruised, with blood dripping down over his eyes. For a long minute, the tableau froze, and then, slowly, the man lifted his head, wheezing with the effort. "Please." His hand fumbled up towards Kuno's collar, but fell back to the ground before reaching it, spent. "Please. Save my brother... save my village... with my dying breath, I beg you...."

A single tear tracked its way down down Kuno's grim face. "Your words still my soul, and I, the Blue Thunder, hearby swear that I will not rest until vengeance and surcease is found for your kin." He paused. "However, honour compels me to note that I do not believe that running into a tree will cause your life's blood to cease."

The villager had the grace to look embarrassed.

Kodachi prodded the villager with the haft of her gymnastics ribbon. "And what, pray tell, are we protecting your ever-so-humble abode from?"

The villager's eyes went wide, and his hands were trembling as he prostrated himself before the Kuno siblings. "Oh, it's terrible, terrible," he wailed. "They came from nowhere, and ground us under their heels. I'm the only one left who even dares to run away -- the spirits of all the others have been crushed, entirely. They don't dare to fight back, or disobey in the least."

Shaking his head sadly, Kuno inquired, "And how long have you and yours suffered under this withering blight? How can the authorities have allowed this to come to pass, with nary a struggle nor even a harsh word that has come to the attention of those of us outside?"

Staring up at the sky for, the villager counted on his bloodied fingers. "About... one day. They're *very* oppressive," he added defensively.

Eyes hard and face blank, Kuno turned to levelly regard his sister. "This peasant's story compels me, sister, and needs must I temporarily suspend pursuit of our most rightful vengeance upon the demon that I may act upon the wishes of the gods and take up this quest of justice." He hesitated slightly. "It may well be that the angels of duty that ride upon both our shoulders may compel you to pursue Saotome before the scourging of any other evils, but e'en though your aid would likely be of no small import, I must not tarry in my mission, nay, nor waste my breath upon a single unneeded word."

The burning intensity of his gaze knocked Kodachi's breath away, and it was a shaky laugh that she muffled with the back of her hand. "Oh, no, brother dear, you won't get rid of me that easily!" Collecting herself, she graciously doused the stunned villager in rose petals and sprang away. "Follow me, and we will unleash the vengeance of the Kunos!"

* * *

"Ah, this is the start of your route. Not bad running time, but you'll need to be faster tomorrow. People are going to get their papers late!" O'Callahan frowned at Excel. "You can stop skipping now."

"Hweeeeeeeeeeeeez," Excel agreed.

"As good as skipping is for your legs, back, ki, and feminine deportment, the rest of the training will be different."

Excel pondered that. "Hrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrk."

Crossing her minuscule arms across her withered chest, the leprechaun-like master shook her head, hair twisting and writhing. "You're pathetic. Look at me! Do I look anywhere near as winded as you? No! That's because I train!"

"Weren't... carrying... any newspapers," Excel gasped.

"Well, true. But even if I were, my training...."

"And," Excel said a little more smoothly, "you rode on my back for a while."

Brows beetling, O'Callahan explained, "That was part of your conditioning...."

"Then you hailed a cab."

"Time's wasting!" scolded O'Callahan. "You must focus on your training!"

Excel jumped atop a nearby mailbox, popped a party cracker, and pointed dramatically down the street. "Yes! By delivering newspapers, I will achieve my full martial potential!"

Mail boxes in Japan are large, bulky red things, clearly visible to even the casual passer-by. Normally, they have two slots; one on the right for the letters of ordinary size and local destination, and the other for packages of more unusual dimensions and for international destinations. While these mail boxes are considerably more convenient than those to be found in the West, it would be a mistake to consider them "complete" in any sense of the word; a trip to the postal office is required for any truly over-sized packages, or to send registered mail, or if any assistance was required in navigating the often Byzantine rate tables.

Those fees were well-earned by the Postal Service, though, since it was devoted to going beyond the recognized call of duty for postal services in serving the general populace. For example, when Mount Oyama had erupted, and the government had ordered an evacuation, the Postal Service had kept no less than five offices open until the evacuation had completed four days later, and had exempted the residents from postage and fees for registered mail containing monetary contribution as well as parcels containing materials for disaster relief. They had also, as was their standard practice, exempted them from postage for letter-post items and presented them with complimentary items: as many as five postcards and one postal letter per household!

To facilitate this high quality of service, the Postal Service had recently been reorganized as part of an overall streamlining of governmental functions. The Ministry responsible had been changed from the now-defunct Ministry of Posts and Telecommunication to the newly created Ministry of Public Management, Home Affairs, Posts and Telecommunications. It had also been divided into two separate organizations; the Postal Services Policy and Planning Bureau was an internal Ministry bureau devoted to overall management of the Postal Service, while the Postal Service Agency was a state-run corporation that would actually implement mail services. This scheme would allow for flexible, independent management and detailed accounting and financing which did not require direct involvement of the Diet, leading to a reduction in waste.

Enough with the elaborate exposition to impart an air of authenticity to the story, thought Excel. On with the plot!

Wiping a few streamers with "Happy 45th Anniversary" written on them from her face, O'Callahan muttered, "Yes, that's the basic idea. So...."

"So I will attack the delivering of the newspapers as if it was an attack! An attack of newspapers attacking!"

A look of alarm purchased some real estate on O'Callahan's face. "Err, yes. Through the process of delivering newspapers, the mind and body are strengthened...."

"I will move from customer to customer like a ninja! I will launch the newspapers like an archer! I will collect my dues like a yakuza! I will strike down dogs that dare to nip at my feet like a person striking down dogs nipping at their feet!"

"That's not quite the way it's supposed to...."

"Take that, training obstacle!" With a deadly eye, Excel hurled a newspaper through the display window of a camera shop, and followed it by a barrage of four-colour fold-out grocery coupons. With great, reverent care, she withdrew a white bandanna, emblazoned with a rising sun, from her backpack, and knotted it snugly about her forehead. Still standing atop the mail box, she drew one foot to waist-height and began slowly waving her arms about as the proprietor of the camera shop charged out, screaming.

This would have been the moment at which O'Callahan pointed at Excel and feigned innocence, had she not already been halfway down the street peering intently at a display of plastic noodles and whistling in an overly-cheerful manner.

"So! You are to be my first opponent! I will punch you and kick you and noogie you and tie you up and beat you down and steal your merchandise to take photographic evidence of my overwhelming victory and then move on and overcome all of your compatriots and your acquaintances and people who you've never met but are also part of this training exercise so that I and therefore ACROSS which I represent though unofficially of course it being a secret organization so please forget that I mentioned it will become stronger and accomplish our short-term initiatives that lead to our mid-range goals and from there on to our global objectives and hello Mr. Policeman what can I do for you OUCH ah so YOU are the next...."

* * *

The mansion ahead, closely crowded about by forest, was barely deserving of the name. With a low roof, walls of rough-hewn logs, and a cobble-stone chimney spewing dark smoke over a thatched roof, it was the imperial palace of crude shacks, possessed of a barbaric and primeval dignity.

Standing concealed behind a broad and spreading oak, Kuno mused, "It is passing odd that I can see no signs of guards."

Even a bare handful of hours ago, Kodachi would have assumed that Kuno's ability to maintain his equanimity in the face of the horrors they had witnessed in the village below was a direct result of his intolerable idiocy. He had, however, been surprisingly even-keeled since they had begun looking for her darling Ranma, and his actions in the village below... well. He had been, perhaps, a bit foolish, but heroically so.

"A trap, do you think?" She wished that caution was the only thing keeping her voice low.

"Perhaps," Kuno said, as he stepped out and began to stride towards the house, bokken hanging freely in one hand. "More likely it is the mark of a man who thrives so on fear in the hearts of others that he has lost the need to feel fear himself."

Kodachi followed him down to the door, which stood open. Before she could contemplate a course of action, from the smothering blackness within came a hoarse torn voice. "Come in, my uninvited guests. It's far too late to be shy."

While she was still stalling, sure now that an ambush lay within, Kuno stepped straight in. Muttering to herself, Kodachi steeled herself to show no weakness and plunged into the shadows.

The windows had all been shuttered, and the only source of illumination was a brazier of smoldering coals in the middle of the vast room. There were no furnishings, and the starkness of decoration drew Kodachi's eyes directly to a rough-hewn slab directly opposite the door, over which a thick and presumably expensive rug had been carelessly spread. Kneeling on the dais was a slender young girl of breathtaking beauty and grace, dressed in an elaborate kimono patterned with a yellow phoenix chasing orange clouds over a crimson landscape. She paid no attention to the Kunos as they drew near the fire-pit, though, as her attention was clearly preoccupied by selecting choice morsels from the tray beside her and delicately presenting them to....

Despite herself, Kodachi could not repress a shudder of revulsion. The man who sprawled on the heaped cushions was lean and muscled, and likely would have been handsome by any standards if his entire body had not been swathed in tight-fitting bandages. The only exposed skin was the flesh about his lips, which even in the murky half-light was grey and heavily scarred. All he wore was a tattered piece of black cloth, wrapped about him toga-fashion, almost as if he gloried in the wrappings which hinted at his disfigurement.

But what made Kodachi gasp was none of this, but his eyes: brown, laughing eyes that had seen a joke no others had shared, the humour of which had burnt away morals and ethics and cares and replaced them all with a scorching resolve to share the punchline with all others, whether they wanted it or not.

"You are," Kuno asked urbanely, "the cur who is responsible for the abominations perpetrated upon those poor peons in the village below?"

"I suppose I am," said the bandaged man indifferently. The woman offered him another tidbit, but he waved the chopsticks aside while never taking his gaze from Kuno.

Kodachi frowned. Something in the tone....

Whatever it was, it showed no sign of affecting Kuno. "Then," he said almost amiably, "I find myself honour-bound to do battle with you. Do you care to explain your motives? Though it seems a distant chance, perhaps in them I might find some extenuating circumstance that will persuade me to use something less than my full might in chastising you."

"My motives?" Beneath the wrappings, Kodachi could make out the brow of the man lifting. "It's really quite straightforward. This village is placed within convenient striking distance of every major commercial transport route in the Kanto region. When the appropriate time comes, my forces will issue forth from this base to shut them all down, plunging the entire nation overnight into a disarray that will make it easy plucking for the revolution."

Kodachi laughed shrilly. "Fool! Do you really think we will allow you to perpetuate such a diabolical plan?"

The man smiled. "No, not really. That's why I was just joking."

Neither of the Kunos could immediately think of a response.

Settling a little deeper, he continued, "Neither of you have any sense of humour. Actually, I took this place because they have the best okonomiyaki ingredients."

Something in Kodachi's mind clicked. "You're the okonomiyaki slut!"

"That's right." Ukyo nodded affably. "And you're Kuno Kodachi, and he's Kuno Tatewaki, and you're both chasing after Saotome Ranma. I'm afraid, however, I'm going to get him first." She grinned mirthlessly. "But because I just made possibly the best pork-and-shrimp deluxe with extra sauce in my entire career, I'm feeling rather generous, so I'll tell you what. You can have his corpse after I'm done."

For the first time, Kuno sounded startled. "You mean to kill him? Are you not one of those maidens which he has ensorcelled with his demonic magicks?"

"Don't I love him, you mean?" Ukyo smiled coldly. "Oh, yes. Twice, in fact. When we were young, he scarred my heart, and so I bound my chest and sought revenge, forsaking love. My darling Ranchan turned me aside with a single kind word, and I loved him again. This time he scarred my body, and so I wrap myself with bandages, and seek revenge again. And this time, nothing but his life blood will assuage me!"

She rose to her feet, and her wild, roaring eyes pinned Kodachi in place. "I will grind his bones to meal, and grill the batter it will make on a fire of his fat; his tendons I will make into noodles, and his hair into bonito shavings. And the finest okonomiyaki sauce ever will be his blood, squeezed from his still-beating heart. Then I'll kill my father, so that I can lay that okonomiyaki of revenge upon his grave as an offering to the dead, and then?" She grinned, suddenly, sunnily. "Well, then, I think I'll open an okonomiyaki shop that everyone will eat at." The grin stayed; the humour vanished. "Everyone."

Kuno took another step forward, and drew his bokken up into a ready stance. "You will seek to deny me my French cuisine?" His voice was tight and his eyes tense, Kodachi noticed with sudden alarm.

The girl, who had not shifted from her sitting position throughout except to sigh with hearts throbbing in her eyes at Ukyo, made to rise, but Ukyo kept her down with a gentle hand atop her head. "No, Konatsu. I'll take care of this."

For a second, it looked like the girl would protest, but without a word she bowed her head. Nodding in return, Ukyo turned to face Kuno again; to her chagrin, Kodachi seemed to be ignored. "Deny you? In a sense. For, you see, I'm afraid that I'll have to dispose of you here and now." Reaching behind her, she produced a massive, frightening spatula, fire-scarred and saw-toothed. "It will probably be hard enough to dispose of Saotome without the likes of you running about."

"Stay back, Kodachi."

Startled yet again, she stared at her brother. "What?"

"This is a fearsome opponent," her brother intoned gravely, his eyes not breaking from Ukyo's gaze. "Fear not. I will keep you safe."

And then he was dashing towards Ukyo, bokken held high, while she was charging towards him with the spatula held behind her, and their expressions by the flickering embers caught Kodachi's breath in her lungs, and she could not help but scream....

* * *

"It is important," announced Moira O'Callahan, "that your training include techniques to counter strengths of your opponent. In the case of Saotome Ranma, that means developing means to deal with one of his most fearsome abilities: the Cat-Fist."

Cinching her belt about her waist, Excel brightened. "So that's why you've been hitting me in the head with little porcelain kittens!" Another one, bright green and with a textured ball of pink yarn, smashed against her forehead.

"No, I do that because you won't shut up. Look here." O'Callahan dragged a blackboard over and began ferociously sketching. "The Cat-Fist is a fearsome technique which, when unlocked with the presence of a cat, allows the Cat-Fist master to access his inner feline, giving him strength, speed, and reflexes beyond your imagining, as well as the ability to wield his amplified ki as a weapon, natural extensions of his body just as the claws are to a cat."

"Wow." Excel stared at the blackboard. "That's impressive."

"Indeed." O'Callahan nodded grimly.

"I don't think I've ever seen such a realistic pot of gold before," Excel bubbled. "And the way the light glints off it, and makes a rainbow... what a work of art!"

Blushing, the crone mumbled bashfully, "Well, you know, I've seen.... Shut up!" She broke the chalkboard over Excel's knee. "You must focus!"

"Yes, Teacher!" Excel snapped off a salute. "So to defeat the Cat-Fist, you are going to train me in the art of Having A Pack of Ferocious Starving Cat-Eating Rottweilers Around?"

"No."

Excel looked again at the back of the yard. "So why is there a pack of ferocious starving cat-eating rottweilers?"

"Follow me." As they walked over to the pen and the adjacent covered pit, O'Callahan began to explain. "To understand what we are about to do, you must know that the Cat-Fist is trained by wrapping the student in fish sausages and throwing them into a pit filled with starving cats. The trauma of the experience is the key to the Cat-Fist." She rested one hand on the plywood sheet over the pit and looked at Excel, who blinked uncertainly for a few seconds, and then smiled.

"I see," she said thoughtfully.

"Do you?"

"No."

O'Callahan nodded. "The obvious counter, then, is to wrap you in those ferocious starving cat-eating rottweilers, and then throw you into this pit," she threw away the cover dramatically, "of Cat-Fist masters!"

Excel leaned over the pit and looked down. Below was a throng of dozens of men and women, all shapes, sizes and ages, but all fit and dangerous looking. A few of them looked up at her; one, red-haired and cradling a sword in his arms, waved cheerfully back at her.

Reaching into her hair, Moira O'Callahan produced a cage with a massive, grey, one-eyed tabby. "Then, when I poke this cat to make him meow, you will be swarmed under by the Cat-Fist masters! And with this," her eyes glinted in the sudden shadows as thunderheads swept across the sky, "you will become the master of the Cat-Fist-Fist! The mere presence of the Cat-Fist will allow you to access your inner Cat-Fist master!"

Laughing triumphantly, Excel gloated, "Yes! The Cat-Fist-Fist! There is no way I can fail Lord Il-Palazzo when I have the Cat-Fist-Fist! Who could even dream of withstanding the incredibly awesome power that is the Cat-Fist-Fist!" She frowned suddenly. "But, Teacher, since the obvious counter to the Cat-Fist is the Cat-Fist-Fist, isn't Ranma going to train in the Cat-Fist-Fist-Fist?"

"Never mind that!" She waved dismissively, already strapping the rottweilers to her student. "We have no time to waste!" Stepping back to admire her handiwork, she addressed the one finger protruding from the canine hill. "Are you ready, Excel?"

"Ow! Um, yes, Master! Ow! Nice doggies, stop biting me, I'll have you know that I'm the best of friends with a wonderful dog named Menchi ow! ow! let that go, I think we ought to get this over with soon, Master, I think they might think that I'm a cat...."

O'Callahan nodded sharply, and her writhing column of hair knocked Excel into the pit. From its depths, there was a sudden murmur of concerned voices. "Are you okay, miss? Here, let me help you...."

A sardine held up in front of the cage prompted a sharp, demanding yowl from the tomcat, and the voices cut off for a sharp, breathless instant. Then the air was rent by a choral scream of "C-C-C-C-C-CAT!" The ensuing noises of frantic struggle were cut off as O'Callahan slammed the cover back into place, and then tugged herself up to sit on top of it contentedly.

"Soon," she chuckled. "Soon, you will be more than a match for Ranma." Watching the petals float down from the cherry tree, she laughed again, entirely mirthlessly. "And my revenge will be at hand."

"What revenge was that, again?" Excel chirped.

Inscrutably staring at her student, Moira O'Callahan slowly reached behind herself to pat at the indisputably intact cover. "How," she asked evenly, "did you get out?"

Proudly, Excel beat one fist against her chest. "Lord Il-Palazzo is always dumping me into deep, dark pits filled with horrid dangers! But not until now did I realize that he was actually training me in the secret long-lost art of Pit-Fu! Oh, Lord Il-Palazzo," she sighed dreamily, "this is surely a sign of how you care for me! That you would carefully prepare me for this, the most trying trials that I should every try to face! Oooooohh!" She clasped her hands to her face and wiggled. "You musn't, Lord Il-Palazzo! Not there! Not here! Not with basketball gear! Okay, let's do it! I've got the...."

Sighing, Moira O'Callahan reached for a porcelain cat.

* * *

Ryoga stood at the treeline beside Nabeshin, Hyatt to his other side and just behind him. She'd been spending a lot of time behind him lately, which probably wouldn't have bothered Ryoga so much if he hadn't kept feeling like his underwear was riding up. At the moment, though, he couldn't be bothered with that, because he was watching Ranma train.

Ranma stood in the valley just below, slowly circling under a hailstorm of nine-inch nails. There were dozens in the air above him, each perfectly perpendicular to the ground, and as each fell past him, Ranma would flick it back into the air with hand or foot. On occasion, one would make it past, and without breaking step, Ranma would sweep his head down to the earth and snatch the nail up between his teeth and spit it skywards to rejoin its mates.

This had been going on for half an hour now.

"Impressive," Ryoga said grudgingly, and meant it. The speed, the focus, the control required to keep all of the nails in the air and perfectly aligned.... He'd find it incredibly easy to do, of course, if he felt like trying. It was just impressive to see Ranma managing such a feat.

Nabeshin grunted. "He's not doing bad at all."

Ryoga watched some more, until he found his muscles twitching along after Ranma's. When he started looking for shapes in the clouds, though, he became uncomfortably aware of a burning sensation on his backside. Shifting uncomfortably, he turned towards Nabeshin. "So, what is he supposed to learn from this technique, anyways?" Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Hyatt shift to stand behind him again just as he was about to inconspicuously reach back and adjust his underwear, and stopped himself.

Nabeshin kept staring at Ranma, hands in his pockets and eyes narrowed against the bright sun. "I dunno. He's bright. He'll figure something out." Turning, he adjusted his tie and strode off into the woods. "I'm hungry. Let's get takoyaki."

* * *

It is a great irony of life that some of the most brutal and horrific of battles in human history have been fought on days bright, clear, and sunny. So it would come as no great surprise to the connoisseur of planned butchery that the day of the appointed challenge was cold and overcast with a heavy promise of rain later to come, because the gods often delight in ironically violating people's expectations of irony, until someone points out just how paradoxical that is, at which point the gods go back to their primary occupation of smiting wise-asses with lightning bolts.

"Where is Ranma, anyways?" Excel wondered. "We've been waiting for a few hours. Ah! Perhaps the reason that Hyatt has been gone so long is that she took the initiative to undertake a secret ninja mission to tie his underwear into secret ninja knots...."

"Is that the challenge in your pocket?" O'Callahan had learned by now it was better to cut Excel off sooner rather than later.

"Ah, yes. Is that bad?"

O'Callahan sighed. "Well, I suppose we'll just go interrupt them at their training camp." She looked around. "Probably a bad idea to fight in a supermarket, anyways."

Stuffing the egg-carton behind her back, Excel looked as innocent as you can manage with yolk running down your face.

* * *

It was getting close to noon, and Ranma had done no training. Nabeshin had mysteriously suggested that he relax, citing "directorial foreknowledge," which Ranma gathered was a bit like danger-sense. And so he was, for lack of a better word, moping, though he would violently have denied it.

Where was Excel? When would the challenge be? Ranma longed to test his skills against her again, she who had given him the most formidable challenge of his career. It was not, he hastened to assure himself, anything else, certainly not a desire to hear her dulcet voice calling his name, or the feel of her calloused yet gentle hand upon his shoulder, or her repeatedly shaking him while shouting at him irritatedly, or, or, having her scream in frustration while hitting him on the top of the head, oh, gods, yes!

Nabeshin belted him across the chin. "What the hell do you think you're doing? This is no time for manly comradely embraces!"

Ranma let him go and wiped his bottom lip dry, grinning sheepishly. "Um, sorry. Was thinking of something else."

"Never mind. Look down there." Nabeshin pointed down the mountain slope, where two shapes could be seen making their way through the sparse trees. "They're coming."

Snapping to full attention, Ranma shaded his eyes with one hand. Excel was immediately recognizable to Ranma, tromping delicately through the underbrush while singing some song about polishing a palace's pillars, apparently. Squinting harder, he could just make out....

"Hey, Nabeshin," he asked, "who's the leprechaun with fire for hair with Excel?"

"I'm not sure," Nabeshin said shortly. "Excel's teacher, probably. Must be very strong."

Ranma nodded grimly. "Yeah. Only the greatest martial arts masters look that stupid."

"Miss Excel!" Hyatt sighed cheerfully. Ranma started slightly; engrossed in studying his opponent, he hadn't noticed her and Ryoga coming up behind them. "Oh, look, Mr. Ryoga, Miss Excel is here! Isn't that wonderful?"

"Uh, yeah," Ryoga muttered. "Great." Not only was he still hitching at his pants when he thought no one was looking, Ranma noticed, but he'd gone pale. Strange. He'd never seen Ryoga sick before.

"Saotome! I challenge you!" Excel did not say.

"Kuno?" Ranma whirled. Approaching from behind was, indeed, the Blue Thunder of Furinkan High, as well as his sister. Both looked worn, and their clothes were tattered, but nonetheless, Kuno's head was held high and his eyes were narrowed, burning with danger and confidence.

"That is correct, foul cur. For the evils you have perpetrated on the proud tigress, on the pig-tailed girl, on the porcelain goddess, on the...." Kuno ground to a halt, and, the slightest flicker of embarrassment across his face, pulled a list from his sleeve. Mouthing silently as he quickly perused it, he nodded sharply. "And on the porcelain goddess, I challenge you!"

"Hey, you can't challenge him!" Excel protested as she closed the last of the distance. "I challenged him first, and I have to fight him, because Il-Palazzo said so!"

The leprechaun shook her head sadly as she trotted up behind Excel, the whipping of her hair stirring up a gust of wind that flattened Ranma's shirt across his chest. "Hush, student. You'll get your chance to fight Ranma, but there are other matters to deal with, first." She grinned toothily. "Hello, Nabeshin." Her voice was suddenly filled with a cold contempt.

Nabeshin jerked uneasily and tugged at the collar of his shirt. "Do I know you?"

The wizened hag-thing chuckled nastily. "As Moira O'Callahan? Certainly not. I've had many a face and name before." As she spoke, the harridan's hair had twisted and writhed upon itself, fanned by a windstorm none other could feel. "But you should certainly recognize me as...."

With a rustling noise, the pillar of white hair split in two. As it slumped to the side, a man was revealed, wearing the style of red coat and blue shirt that Nabeshin favoured, face dwarfed by a massive brown afro cut the same way as Nabeshin, adjusting a yellow tie that might have been the mate of Nabeshin's, kicking the remains of a leprechaun body costume off his left foot in the exact same way that Nabeshin wasn't but probably would if Nabeshin had the remains of a leprechaun body on his left foot, and, in general, looking like the spitting image of....

"Nabeshin!" The new Nabeshin pronounced. "That's right! I am the true Nabeshin, come to unmask you as the impostor you are and take vengeance on you, in the names of Happosai, the Space Butler, Pedro, my newspaper delivery boy, and a character to be revealed in the sequel, 'Samurai Excel,' coming soon to a mailing list near you! (Soon is defined on a geological time scale; warranty void where prohibited by law; this is prohibited by law.)"

Ranma stared at Nabeshin II, and then turned to cock an eyebrow at Nabeshin I, who looked back at him indignantly. "He's lying! I am the real Nabeshin!"

"Oh, yeah?" Nabeshin II challenged.

"Yeah!"

Propping his bokken upon his shoulder, Kuno snorted derisively. "Come, now, Saotome. Even one of such a low intellect as yours should not be confused by this!"

"Actually," Excel piped up, raising a hand, "I'm pretty confused too. I mean, my teacher who was not a leprechaun but looked a great deal like one and never gave any hints at being someone else other than a leprechaun in hiding is now claiming to be Nabeshin, which strikes me as just the sort of contrived and implausible plot twist I've come to expect.... Okay, I'm not confused."

Ryoga, who had been nodding as Excel spoke, stopped and started scratching his head, and then jumped slightly and edged away from an ever-serene Hyatt.

"Here we have," Kuno elaborated, "a man who has presented himself as 'Nabeshin' from, yea, the very beginning, and proffered credentials to that name which you found impeccable. Then, now, at this most critical of junctures, someone else, who has until now concealed themselves in both identity and visage, steps forward to claim that name for themselves, and denounces the first as an impostor."

"How the hell do ya know all that?" Ranma asked in bemusement.

Kuno waved a hand negligently. "I purchased the information from Tendo Nabiki, who, I believe, obtained it from the listening devices she had surgically implanted in your spleen, for the sum of forty-five billion yen, which is negligible to a scion of the Kuno house. That, however, is unimportant; it was simply a means by which to obtain the facts from which only one inevitable conclusion can be drawn."

He crossed his arms proudly over his chest.

After a few minutes, Ranma threw a tiny pebble at his head. "Oi! Ya gonna tell us what that is?"

Kuno blinked. "Why, they are both impostors, of course," he said condescendingly.

There were another few minutes of silence, and then Hyatt raised her hand tentatively. "Excuse me...."

"Yes, porcelain doll," Kuno said encouragingly. "You wish to confess your love to me?"

"Actually, sir, I'm afraid I don't understand why you know that they are impostors." Hyatt blushed a bit demurely and lowered her hand again, which made Ryoga twitch.

"Ah! Well, for you, one of the most privileged of women to be part of the trinity of my beloved, shall I explain my peerless logic, though I do not doubt it shall still escape the grasp of those uncultured barbarians." Smiling a secretive little smile that seemed almost out of place on his grave features, he raised one finger into the air, took a breath, and ripped off his face.

Despite the fact that Ranma found he wasn't entirely surprised, he still had no words to say when Nabeshin III threw aside his bokken and thrust both hands above his head, making victory signs. "*I* am the real Nabeshin! And neither of you two imitators will walk away from here!"

The tableau was devoid of motion for a long time; a triangle of Nabeshins glaring at each other, Ranma and Ryoga behind Nabeshin I, with looks of confusion matched only, Ranma was sure, by the frown furrowing Kodachi's brow from where she stood behind Nabeshin III. Excel, on the other hand, had plopped down to sit cross-legged behind Nabeshin II, plowing through a bucket of popcorn and following the drama with an avid fascination. Looking around in sudden panic, Ranma found Hyatt standing a few paces behind he and Ryoga, her attention clearly elsewhere.

Oh, good, Ranma thought. She ain't a Nabeshin.

Yet.

* * *

"Well," Nabeshin II said abruptly, "this isn't getting us anywhere. I will confess; Nabeshin, too, is just another mask I wear." Reaching up, he seized his afro, and rotated it ninety degrees. With a click, steam began to hiss from the hairline, and with a ratcheting noise, ex-Nabeshin II lifted the hairdo. As it cleared the skull, vast clouds of fog surged out to obscure everything.

What was revealed, when the wind finally whipped the cloud, was a short and statuesque woman, dressed in a long white Chinese dress. Her black hair was cut in a page-boy bob about her round, pert face, and her eyes, green and cheery, glittered out behind large round glasses, over which lights from no apparent source flickered.

The Nabeshins gasped in unison. "Hashirumi!"

"That's right!" she chirped, pointing at Nabeshin I. A flicker of uncertainty, then she switched to point at Nabeshin III. "Naughty Nabeshin. I suppose I would just let you walk all over me and defile my dreams and works?" Another flicker, and her finger wandered over towards Nabeshin I, and then slowly oscillated between the two before she, with a charming maidenly snort, put her finger away and propped her fists on her hips. "I might be a very nice person, but even very nice people have their limits! And so I trained Excel to make sure that she *would* defeat Ranma, ruining your 'experiment'! And now I'll make you... err, you... Nabeshin pay!"

"What are you talking about?" Nabeshin I snapped.

"What she's talking about," Nabeshin III smirked, "is how my plans are working perfectly." Reaching into his blazer pocket, he pulled out a ballpoint pen and shoved it into his afro. "GORGEOUS RONIN WOMAN ASTEROID HEALING DISGUISE OFF CONFIRM DISGUISE OFF (y/N) Y!"

A shower of pink translucent sparkles engulfed Nabeshin III and spun him into the sky, stripping away his clothes in a storm of twinkling ribbons.

When Ranma had gotten his stomach back under control and could stand to steal another peek, wiping bile from his mouth, Nabeshin III had been replaced by a bear of man, a solid thick column from shoulders to knees. He brushed at his immaculately pressed red flannel plaid dress shirt and took off his fur cap to scrub at deep-set eyes.

"I always hate that. Why do all the good disguise pens have to come from shoujo shows?"

Nabeshin I and Hashirumi gasped in unison. "...!"

"Ansonbi!" he barked.

Nabeshin I and Hashirumi gasped in unison. "Ansonbi!" They looked at each other, and chorused, "Who the hell is Ansonbi?"

The mystery man chuckled darkly. "Who am I? I am the one that set this trap, to lure you both in. And now that I have you, I will kill you, and take your power for myself!" He clenched his fist. "With the power of Nabeshin and Hashirumi, as well as my own, I will reign unchallenged!" He stopped, and with the perfect synchronicity of public restroom toilets running out of toilet paper simultaneously, all eyes turned to stare at Nabeshin I.

"What?" he demanded. "I'm the real Nabeshin!"

The stares did not diminish.

"Really!"

"Well," said Hashirumi tactfully, "assuming for a minute that you *have* brought both Nabeshin and I here...."

"He did!" Nabeshin stomped his foot. "I'm Nabeshin!"

"Do you really think," Hashirumi persisted, "that you're up to the task of taking us both out?" She gave Ansonbi a small smile with the edges of razors lurking in the corners of her lips.

"That's right," Nabeshin said, stepping forward and cracking his knuckles. "Do you think you can play with the big boys?"

"Let's find out," Ansonbi replied.

And the world vanished in a blank inferno.

Stillness. The light/not-light fades, leaving a wind of power, of ki, of the fuel of life, winding about the three. There are others who are not of the three, but they are here only in place, not in time.

Battles are fought with weapons. Weapons are manifestations of battles. There is no battle yet. No weapons have been shown. A squirrel hides an acorn in a tree that will be cut down next week for firewood that will be used to roast sweet potatoes.

"Must we battle?" Spinner of tales.

"We must." Thief of mind.

"It was foretold." Master of dreams.

Faint buzzing fills the silence. An insect, most likely drosophila melanogaster at the terminus of the fertile stage.

A frown, unplanned. "Foretold? By who?"

The head jerks. "Him."

"He doesn't count."

"What do you mean, I don't count?" Offended. Is the destiny challenged?

"If I announce that I'm going to the supermarket to buy some milk, I can't exactly claim that my dairy purchases were 'foretold', now, can I?" Logic must prevail. Reason provides order.

"That's exactly my point." A satisfied grin.

The drosophila melanogaster goes out of the fertile cycle, revealed by the dance of chemical compounds in the pheromones that none of the three can detect. Being outside its normal habitat, it has not bred. Idly, the drosophila melanogaster is swatted. The cycle of life continues.

"Was it?"

"Pretty much, yes."

"I thought it sounded out of character for you."

Another pause. Deep insights are weighed. Paradigm shift. "Wait. Who am I?"

Bemusement passes to scorn. "Master of dreams, of course."

Scorn fumbles and is intercepted by counter-contempt. "That's pretty damn useless, moron. I mean, am I Nabeshin, Hashirumi, or...."

"Shh!" Panic.

"What?" Frustration.

"You can't use names!" Scandalized. "It ruins the... the...."

"Ambiance?"

"Yeah, ambiance!"

A sigh of deep ages. "Look, can we just go and beat each other up and get this over with?"

"We can."

"We must."

"And stop talking like cryptic clowns, too? Please?" Consideration. During battle it is a hindrance, and after battle is the pause before the next battle. Wisdom after the battle is then also wisdom before the battle, except that it is for the battle immediately succeeding it and not applicable to the preceding battle, that is, the battle chosen as a reference point. But what are references, but arbitrary coordinates? References are nothing to the unmated dead displaced drosophila melanogaster.

"We cannot fight here."

"This world does not go deep enough to take our full might."

"No, talking like normal civilized humans was probably too much to ask."

"Where then?"

"What about some Harry Potter fanfic?"

"Good idea."

"No one reads them anyways."

Gone, like a distracted author pursuing a subplot during the climax at the expense of dramatic tension.

* * *

Akane sighed in relief as she smoothed the floral print dress across her hips. It really wasn't the style she'd prefer, and it was made for a woman a fair bit taller than her, but it was definitely better than both the rags that had been left of her school uniform and the... get-up... that the Sister had given her. Most things would be better. She wasn't sure which of those two options had been worse, even if, technically, the latter had covered her whole body.

Turning, she smiled at her rescuer. "Thank you, Pedro."

The tall Brazilian adjusted his purple undershirt, flushing in embarrassment. "Oh, it's no problem!" he stammered. "I deal with that sort of thing all the time."

Her smile broadened. Pedro was so cute, eager and innocent, just like a puppy. Mind you, most puppies didn't have broad, cut shoulders, and a musical accent.... She gave herself a mental shake. She was engaged already. Even if she didn't want to be. And her fiance hadn't done anything to help her. Turning away to give him a chance to compose himself, she looked around the green, rolling hills. "So this is your home?"

"That's right." He stepped up behind her and put one hand on her shoulder, gently turning her and pointing. "Over there is where I grew up... you can just see it if you squint."

"Oh?" Akane found her hand creeping towards her leg to scratch it, and firmly stopped herself. She hated to admit it, but cotton seemed so... itchy, now. Vaguely, she wondered if silk would feel any smoother. Pushing the thought out of her mind, she leaned back against Pedro -- all the better to sight along his arm, of course. "I don't quite see it...."

"Pedro!"

Abruptly, Akane found herself dumped indelicately on her rear as Pedro stepped hastily away, hands carefully raised above his head. "I-I-Ish-chan! It's not what it looks like! I swear!" For some reason, his tone brought equal tides of hurt and anger rising up in Akane, and she twisted to stare at the newcomer. Mouth opened for a biting remark, she let it fall the rest of the way open in shock.

Standing -- no, floating -- there was a... hole in the very fabric of space, a round portal looking out onto a starry expanse of chilling void and swirling galaxies; somehow, Akane knew that the window was, at the same time, the entirety of creation. A pair of slender, feminine arms hung off the sharp boundaries, hands resting on a pair of quasars where an ordinary woman's hips might be.

A delicate alto snort emerged from the dying throes of a supernova. "Oh, of course it isn't!" One hand made a gesture both dismissive and imperious. "Men! Leave them alone for a minute, and they go off and defeat crystalline minions and rescue some pretty little vixen to fall head-over-heels for!"

In unison, Akane and Pedro blushed and stammered, "No, it's...."

They were ignored, except that the stars within began to spin even faster. "Well, I'll deal with you later, Pedro *dear*. But first," she turned, arms spreading wide like the wings of a bird of prey, "I need to show this tramp what happens to girls who mess with the boyfriend of the Great Will of the Universe...."

Akane shrank back as the star-flecked darkness began to sweep towards her. As it grew far faster than mere speed could account for, she whimpered, "Pedro...." Out of the corner of her eye, she could see his hands raised in futile supplication, and then the emptiness engulfed her.

"Noooooooo!"

* * *

Excel yawned hugely. "Hey, Ranma, can we fight now?"

Blinking again to clear his eyes, Ranma looked around. Nabeshin and the ex-Nabeshins had disappeared in the sudden flash, leaving him more than a little confused. Why the hell hadn't Nabeshin taught him that trick? "Yeah, okay."

"Pardon me, Ranma darling," Kodachi interrupted. "Might I quickly clarify something before you begin?"

Ranma and Excel blinked at the gymnast.

"Did I just truly see my brother reveal himself to be, in fact, someone by the name of Ansonbi? That is, not my brother at all, but someone merely posing as him by means of a ruse to cruelly deceive and trap those others who have vanished along with him?"

Exchanging looks with Excel, Ranma scratched his head. "Ah, yeah. Looks that way."

Visibly, Kodachi slumped in relief. "Oh, good," she sighed. "I was rather getting worried about myself." With a maniacal laugh, she leapt into the treetops and bounded off down the mountain. "Lord Ansonbiiiiiiii! Come back to your darling Kodachi!"

Strange, Ranma thought, but neither here nor now. Focusing his attention on Excel, who had struggled to her feet and was now scratching sleepily at her hair while cleaning out one ear, his heart began to race. "Let's get your losing over with," he smirked, dropping into a relaxed ready stance.

Taking up a cat stance, Excel snorted. "You think I shall lose? I fight for the powerful, wise, strong, grade A man-meat Il-Palazzo, and I can't lose!"

"Actually, Miss Excel...."

"Don't bring that up, Ha-chan."

"Yes, Miss Excel."

Mind quickly racing through the possibilities, Ranma countered Excel by shifting to a horse stance. "Il-Palazzo, huh? Sounds like the sort of wimp I could beat one-handed."

In a crane stance, Excel screeched in indignation. "What? A mere boy like you can't even dream of approaching the glory of the Lord of ACROSS!"

Ranma's eyes narrowed. "Oh, yeah? Then prove it!" He assumed an ox stance and waited.

"I will!" Excel snarled.

She had switched to an elk stance, Ranma noted with mild alarm. Assuming the opposing emu stance, he inquired nastily, "You really think you can take me?"

Now a giraffe stance. "I think I can take you, fold you in half, wrap you up, include a self-addressed stamped envelope, and mail you to Santa Claus, except that he is an old outdated myth that has no place in the rational, reasoned regime that is the dream of the Ideal Organization ACROSS and hence my dream because of that being the organization to which I belong!"

Millipede stance. "Gotta bark! Can you bite?"

A pause.

"How are you doing that?"

"I'm... not really sure."

"Doesn't it hurt?"

"Yeah. What about you?"

"A little, now that you mention it."

Unfolding themselves, Ranma and Excel stared at each other, taking no note of the spectators that had long since backed away. And then a leaf hit the ground, and they raced at each other. The battle was fast and furious. Ranma observed, in a detached way, that Excel's style was one he had never seen before, which seemed to be based by running past your opponent at top speeds while launching attacks sideways while never slowing down.

(Pretty effective, doncha think?)

A sudden blink cost Ranma a one-knuckle thrust to the tricep. (Who the hell are you?)

(I'm you, of course. Guess the stress we've been going through has made your mind split.)

(Stress? What stress?)

(Dunno. Work with me here.)

(So, what, you're my girl side or something?) Ranma simultaneously took a kick to the side of the kneecap and a mental slap across the head.

(You don't got a girl side, dumbass. You're a guy, remember? Cheez, next you'll be having homoerotic fantasies about Ryoga and blaming 'em on me and hormones or something.)

(So you're exactly the same as me?)

(Yup.)

(But you're gonna help me by helping me develop strategiesand tactics that I couldn't come up with by myself, right?)

(Actually, I was just going to go off there in the corner and cuddle with your Don't-Hold-On Grenade-Jutsu fantasies. Pretty sexy for a figment. See ya around!)

"Stupid jerk," Ranma muttered to himself as he grabbed Excel in a mid-air pass and threw her to the ground.

She twisted around and landed lightly on her feet, one hand and at her hip and the other arm held across her body. She studied him carefully, her face serene. "You've trained hard."

"You too," Ranma acknowledged, standing across from her.

"Now, let's get serious."

No language has been birthed that can describe the experience of two powerful warriors engaging each other in battle. There are no words that mean, "completely surrendering oneself to death while simultaneously struggling with full might to keep oneself alive and strike down the opponent," or, "scared into empty bowels and flailing around frantically with whatever is at hand to desperately try to keep everyone and anyone at arm's reach," and even if there were, they would do no justice to the heart-racing, blood-chilling, adrenaline-filled, kettle-cold, calculated, burningly dispassionate reality.

The option, then, is to use analogies and metaphors, to liken punches to lightning bolts, and describe attacks as the rushing charge of wolves, and compare tactical decisions to precise and painstaking ballistics computations done by custom written FORTRAN 77 software compiled with Watcom F77 that tax the floating point epsilon of a five-hundred and twelve MIPS processor SGI Origin 3000 server with Irix 6.5 ASE. These, however, cannot come close to capturing the full essence of the warrior's existence, any more than a meticulous, lifeless accounting of strikes, parries, and health insurance deductions. So, why bother trying?

They broke apart again, wordlessly agreeing to a temporarytruce. The clearing in which they had started was long departed; the clearing in which they stood now was one they had made themselves. Out of the corner of his eye, Ranma could see Ryoga and Hyatt watching, huddled behind an improvised firebreak.

"Ready to give up, Ranma?" Excel gloated. She was bruised, but nowhere near as badly as Ranma. "You fought well, and hard, and long, and in a way that would have made me be absolutely starving if I wasn't already very very hungry so that instead I've now moved on to being so hungry that I'm not really feeling hungry now, but you had no real chance of defeating Lord Il-Palazzo, who isn't here, but is the master of ACROSS, which also isn't here, being a sort of non-physical ideal organization thing, but of which I am the agent and representative, and I am most definitely here, as if I wasn't here, I couldn't be kicking your ass as thoroughly as am I now!"

"Yer pretty strong," Ranma conceded, wiping a track of blood from his lip, and then laughed. "But I've been only using a fur... flak... farc... ummmm...." He snapped his fingers in consternation. "A, um, small bit of my full power! Now, I'm going to use a, uh, less small bit of my power, which will be more than enough to defeat you even though it's still only a small bit of my full power!" Clenching his fists, he reached deep inside of himself, to his pride, his grace, his superiority, his mercurial moods, his appetite, his laziness, his disdain for all people not currently feeding him, brought them all forth....

...And unleashed the Cat. Not the Cat-Fist, with its phobia-induced animalistic mind, but the power it had given him. His battle aura burst forth, snarling and surging about him like a hunting leopard, lashing at the air and the ground until they began to swirl up around him to reach towards the sky. He opened his eyes and was barely aware of the not-prey being forced backwards by the sheer pressure of his ki; instead, his full intensity rested on Excel, who froze like the mouse before the fangs of the panther.

"This," Ranma purred, "is the result of a lifetime oftraining." Casually, he flexed his aura and tore a boulder protruding from the ground free to float in the air between them; with an equally nonchalant wave, he tore it into sand. "This is what you challenged." He leered at her ferally. "Now, shall we start to play again?"

A shudder rippled Excel's shoulders as his gaze forced her to drop her eyes. Ranma did not bother to conceal his smile; first, she would admit that he was the better man, and then....

And then her eyes came up, flashing defiance, and she raised her fists, and she pronounced, her voice leaden with final certainty, "I will not lose." Ranma could feel her summon her full ki as she raised her face to the heavens and screamed, "For ACROSS, Lord Il-Palazzo, and really good Korean food!" The mountain exploded.

* * *

"I'd say that I was sorry it had to come to this," said Ukyo, her ponytail sweeping across the linen bandages covering her skull as she sauntered forwards, "but that would be a lie. I don't really care about you one way or the other, actually."

The nun struggled against her manacles, causing her to rotate slowly about on the chain suspending her from the distant, smoky ceiling. "Why are you doing this to me?" she demanded, the strain of her voice causing her leather corset to creak.

"Why?" Ukyo chuckled, and made a beckoning motion with her hand. As Konatsu came forward from the door of the cell, Ukyo answered, "Just like you, I don't want to see your unborn daughter enslaving the world, and disrupting my own plans. It's just that I'm prepared to take more direct measures. You see, the weak are okonomiyaki, and the strong eat. And I," she said indulgently, taking the little control box from Konatsu, "am very strong. Good-bye, Sister."

Nothing happened when she pushed the button. "What...." Ukyo stared at it for a long moment. "Ah. This is the detonator to blow up Ranma's training camp." She sighed, and took the other box that Konatsu hastily produced. "I hate doing things out of order. No big loss, though. Now then, Sister, where were we?"

* * *

Crouching in the depths of age-old bracken, stoicallyignoring the scrapes and scratches, Ansonbi clutched at the sucking wound above his floating ribs. Staunching the bleeding while keeping his breathing even and quiet was difficult, but he did his best.

He could feel them out there, their dark cloaks sweeping across the moor, hidden faces snuffling at the air, bloodless and scabby hands poking at the sod to find the faintest of tracks. They were dogged, and persistent, with no souls to make them question their mission; they would be as nothing to Ansonbi... normally.

One bone shard slipped past another, and Ansonbi winced. The pain slightly lessened, he began worming his way towards the best safety he could hope for. "Well," he muttered to himself as he slid through the muck, "today's experiment... failed." Under the moonless skies, only his grinning feral teeth reflected the starlight. "But they haven't seen the last of me."

* * *

ACROSS Headquarters is still dark, still quiet. The throne is still missing. The episode is still in present tense, which according to the manual is a known bug linked to appearances by Il-Palazzo, who is still in the hall, so the author gives up and pretends that the reader will not care, this being the end and all.

Nestled within the depths of a new Laz-E-Boy, Il-Palazzo surveys his domain, and then regards the plush blue armrest on which he is leaning. "Comfortable," he pronounces, "but lacking in a certain dignity. It will need to go back."

Picking up his Gameboy, he plays for a few minutes more, pausing only to activate the built-in leg rest."In a bit."

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