This is the officially sanctioned continuation to "For Akane." by Soul Survivor. You WILL need to read it before this! Or you'll get this massive head-ache trying to figure out what's going on. Trust me. Find it at the FFML Mini-Archive: http://meridun.tripod.com Or (hopefully) my homepage: http://www.angelfire.com/anime/Slacker Hmmm, sanctioned. Sounds vaguely governmental. Oh, well. On with the fic! ***************** "For Akane-Chapter 1" A Ranma/Sailor Moon X-Over By: Slacker Editing: Soul Survivor **************** "Yes." "Excellent." Beryl smiled cruelly. "Now brace yourself. This might...sting a little." "What? What are you talking about? `Sting'? NNNNNNEEEEEAAAAAAGGGGGGGHHHHH!!!!!" Ranma started to convulse as black energy flowed from Beryl's hand and surrounded his body. Every nerve felt like someone had prodded it with a white-hot needle. His brain felt like someone was examining it with a cutting torch. After what felt like hours, the pain stopped, leaving Ranma curled on the ground in a fetal ball. As Ranma tried not to sob from the pain, Beryl cheerfully spoke. "See? That wasn't so bad, was it?" "What...did...you...do?" Ranma whispered weakly. "I gave you the power to save your fiancee. I had to...fix a few things in order to do it." "Like what?" Ranma asked suspiciously. Beryl continued to smile. Ranma didn't like that smile. It showed way too many teeth. She ignored his question, too. "Time for you to return." Beryl began to motion with her hands. "Wait!" Ranma cried as he struggled to sit up. "Yes?" "What about Akane?" "She'll be fine. You have the power necessary to save her." Beryl began to motion with her hands again. As Ranma faded out, her heard her say "Oh, yes. I'll call when I need you. Be ready." *********************** Ranma blinked. He was back at Jusendo, and Akane was still in his arms. As he knelt, he could feel the power Beryl promised. Something about it seemed wrong out to his senses, but he ignored it. This was the power he needed to bring Akane back. Reaching out with his new senses, he could feel her life force ebbing away, unless he did something, she had minutes to live, maybe less. Energy was the key, and energy was the gift he was given, the ability to manipulate it at least. All he needed to do to save her was to infuse her with energy. The question was where to get it from. Casting about, instinctively using his new power, he located several possibilities. The first and biggest was Jusendo itself, the waters carried a mild amount of life force, possibly the mold for the curse templates. Then there were Mousse, Shampoo, Ryoga, the guide and his daughter.... Any or all of which would make excellent sources of power. Blinking momentarily, he banished that last thought, writing it up to the stress of the moment. Then it hit him. There was one readily available source of magic and life force (and female life force to boot), one that nobody would miss (aside from Kuno and Happosai). The curse. Reaching inside of himself, he took hold of it and prepared to give it to her. The question was: How to best do it? Then he smiled as the perfect method came to him. Strangely enough, it was Ryoga who kept Shampoo from violently interfering as Ranma leaned over and kissed Akane for the very first time. As he kissed her, a glow seemed to surround Ranma, similar to his usual battle aura, but different in an indefinable way. As he continued to kiss Akane, the glow grew until the group could no longer look directly at it. If they had been able to see into the glow, they would have seen it appear to flow from Ranma to Akane. If they had been able to look AT the glow itself, they would have noticed the dark threads shot through it. Unfortunately, no one had brought welding glasses, so this was an impossibility. Then, abruptly, the glow vanished. As their eyes adjusted, the group was treated to a most unusual sight. Ranma was unchanged, still kneeling on the ground holding Akane. Akane on the other hand...was a different story. Her hair had lengthened to where it was pooling on the ground, and now had a definite reddish tint to it. Her body had altered slightly, becoming much...fuller. No one would be able to refer to her as 'flat-chested' again. But those were secondary details. Akane's arms were wrapped around Ranma's back, and, from the look of it, she was now kissing him back, quite well too, if you could judge by the stiffness of his pigtail. ****************** Jusenkyo was flooded. The torrential rainfall had seemed to come out of nowhere, and refused to let up for the entire trip there. A male Ranma stood in the rain and watched as the others stared mournfully at the sodden mess that used to be the cursed training grounds. When the missing curse had first been noticed, he had been swamped with questions of how, and he had pleaded his case of ignorance so many times, he almost believed it himself. Then again, what could he tell them? 'Well ya see, there was this dark queen I made a deal with and...." Riiight. Like that would go over well. Also, he wasn't sure if Akane would approve of what he had promised to bring her back. Hopefully, she would never find out. Besides, she was still getting over her shock at her new appearance, though there was no way anybody could call her sexless now. Hell, Kuno was gonna have a fit when he saw her, that was guaranteed. Ranma could just imagine the look on the would-be swordsman's face when he caught sight of an amalgam of his two 'goddesses'. Then again, that would be fun as well. he mused And that brought him back to his current dilemma: his oath to Beryl. Not a simple promise to be broken, but an oath taken on his family name. An oath taken on his personal honor. Not his father's pathetic excuse for honor, not on the name of the Musabestu Kakuto Ryu, but his and his alone. An oath given to someone he could tell was as evil as they came. As he was sinking under the weight of his honor, he sensed a familiar presence behind him. "Hey, Akane." "Hey, yourself." He turned to see her standing in the rain, as uncaring of it as he was. Even soaked to the skin, dressed in his red silk shirt and borrowed trousers, she was beautiful. He had always found her attractive, especially when she smiled, but now... Whatever had happened had kept all of her best qualities, and added on to them with his cursed form. Her height was unchanged, but her hair now fell to the middle of her back and was now a deep scarlet, as if to match her name. (It had turned from black with reddish tints to its current shade in the space of a few minutes.) Her figure was much closer to his cursed form, but her face and eyes remained the same. She shuffled her feet for a moment then glanced over to where the others were moping. "They're not taking it too well, are they?" "No, they're not..." He muttered, "They probably think it's my fault to, don't they." It wasn't a question, just a simple statement of fact. Ranma had become used to being blamed for other people's problems. She looked at him for a while, her expression unreadable, before turning on her heel and heading back to the guide's hut. "We'd better get out of the rain, you don't want to die of pneumonia after surviving everything else." "I'll be there in just a sec." He watched her leave with mixed emotions. After their kiss at Jusendo, they had hardly spoken at all, neither wanting to be the first to take the next step. He knew how he felt, and, based on the way she had kissed him back, he had a fairly good idea of where her feelings lie as well. The problem was what to do next. Ryoga seemed to be to be taking things fairly well, even asking him for help getting to Akari's house. (Which surprised Ranma to no end.) Mousse was ecstatic, of course, at seeing one less obstacle between him and Shampoo. Shampoo on the other hand.... Well, she hadn't spoken a single word since Jusendo, though the glances she cast his way were sure to spell trouble. And for once, he was right. Unfortunately for him. ********************* Author Note Thingie: Well, yet another first chapter. That makes something like three now. Man, I've gotta stop doing these until I actually get a second chapter written. Aaaaanyways, this was written with a substantial amount input from Soul Survivor. (Like most of the chapter. I love that guy. He makes my job easy.) Here's to actually writing Chapter 2 in a timely fashion! Ja Ne! Slacker