Infinity's Shore Ch 6 By James Barnhill Thanks go out to my prereaders Jerry and Phillip Penty and the Ranma Fanfic Forum for C+C. Thanks also go out to those people who took a few moments of their time to respond and tell me that they liked this story. Disclaimer: Same as above except I can promise you that the Ranma in this fanfic will never wear a Sailor Fuku! Because if he did then I might as well make this a twisted anime version of The Rocky Horror Picture show using various anime characters. And I dont think anybody (especially me!) is ready for that:) Psychological Disclaimor: Great, I spend three weeks trying not to think of a anime version of the Rocky Horror Picture Show and this happens! Oh no......Im starting to remember the Time Warp song........help? --------------------------------------- Alia watched them from her quantum prison. The Senshi were beginning to fracture at the seems from the stress of killing Ranma. Some of them could probably feel how *wrong* their timeline was and instinctively felt the need to correct it without knowing how or when to start. Unfortunately Pluto's plan made no allowances for such corrections to the past, as it was there could be no trips to the foreseeable past for any of the Senshi with the amount of power that Pluto put into stabilizing their timeline. Surprising really, she would have thought that Pluto was one of those people who could be very patient for exceedingly long periods of time that would allow them to carry out plans that took decades if not millennia to complete, maybe this was a new trend developing within her mind that made her impatient for the older days and the stability of those times. Alia looked again to the future of Crystal Tokyo and saw that the gleaming city of crystal no longer seemed....whole...was that right? She looked closer to see that distinct portions of the city were phasing in and out of existence in some pattern that she couldnt quite see at this time. In fact, it almost looked like someone was destroying those buildings in the past while another person remade them. The buildings within the effected areas changed from the modern structures built of crystal to the same buildings but made out of more simpler materials. Slowing down the image before her she could see small ripples starting from the center of the phased areas. Everything they touched changed, either becoming more modern in construction and design or very primitive. Her eyes widened when the effected area started to spread and flow about the rest of the city, though never quite reaching the center tower where the royal family lived. She sped up the image to see the effected areas moving more quickly over the entire city of Crystal Tokyo while at the same time a shimmering around the edges of the phasing eddies seemed to be pushing it back or stopping it before it could get to the center. For a moment Alia felt worry gnaw at the pit of her stomach. This looked like a temporal war, but those never worked, the participants...... The portal showing Crystal Tokyo shattered into a thousand pieces. Reflexively she jumped away from the falling shards of muon particle sets. She smiled when she saw that Pluto's ideal future was now destroyed. Alia turned her perception matrix away from the shattered and twisted temporal portal to the present. Before doing so she looked back at the shattered portal with a questioning glance. Or was it? -------------------------------------------------------- Kima walked through the crowded passages, only her status kept her from being jostled about as everyone tried to impatiently move from their homes on the higher levels to the shelters deep below the mountain where most of the art and artifacts they had acquired were kept. Kima walked slower then she wanted to, looking at the people she passed and seeing the fear in their eyes. She understood that fear all too well. For thousands of years her people had lived inside the mountain, their military might enough to turn away all who had tried to destroy them and their home. And now they were being forced to seek refuge for the first time in their lives because of threats they either hadnt heard of through rumor or chose not to believe. She knew that all too well and had wished several times to wake up and discover this horrible nightmare had only been a dream. She walked through the crowd, the people before her saw her approach and made space so as not to impede her. The smell's, the faces, everything too real to be anything but reality. And yet with a heavy heart she could do nothing to alleviate these people's fear, all she could do was help the guards keep the lines orderly and make sure the people didnt jostle each other too much. When Kima reached the end of the passage she could see the hold up. Apparently some of the higher nobles had chosen to have their personal possessions moved with them and the moving of said possessions required so much manpower and space that no one else from the levels below could get through. She looked through the descending workers and furniture, seeking the person(s) responsible. One of the workers fumbled with a small carpet, nearly dropping it but just managing to catch it. Overhead Kima heard some man, she assumed to be a high noble, screaming for the worker to be careful. With a flap of her wings she was upon him, noting who it was she tried to hide her expression of hatred from his eyes. Kro, one of the most irritating high nobles she had the misfortune to meet. The last time they had met it was at a party to celebrate Saffrons rebirth, only the spirit and customs of the event prevented her from gauging the high nobles face off when he tried to tell her her 'proper' place. Since then he had sobered up and had not tried any more advances on her lest she challenge him to a duel. She slapped him across the face as hard as she could to get his attention away from the workers who were moving several of his chests. Everyone of the workers stopped in disbelief, looking to Kima and the high noble cheek that was rabidly bruising from the slap. Kima turned on the workers while noble Kro went through his little period of shock. "All of you take that junk up to Kro's room. From now on I dont want to see any of you workers moving junk like that while there are still people to get to the shelters." She looked at all of them as they just stared at her. "MOVE IT!!" The workers hurried to comply with her orders, the guards that had been helping to hold the people at bay flew up to assist them. Kima took a moment of satisfaction from the orderly evacuation of the higher levels before turning back to one of her problems currently laying on the floor before her. Kro, one of the many nobles of Pheonix mountain who had inherited his title and wealth from the deeds of his ancestors. For years he and the people he had associated with had tried to bring back the 'Glorious Pheonix Empire' of old and to that end they had caused quite a bit of trouble with the Musk and Amazons to start a war. Their own greed for power and prestige blinding them to the horrible consequences that war with any or all of those nearby would have, all they saw was the opportunity to assert their own malformed ideas of how everything should be. The expression he had on his face while he wiped at the spot of blood coming from the corner of his lips almost made her laugh out loud. Instead she held it in and looked at him as if he were the lowest form of life on the planet. And at this moment when people's lives were at stake and he wasted their precious time moving furniture from his room to the shelters gave her a good enough reason to break a few of the bones in his body. As long as she left his wings intact, that is. He almost looked like he was going to attack her with the way he continued to glare at her. But he wouldn't, most likely he would tell his friends what happened at this moment but make himself look like the victim. "How DARE you! Have you any idea how long those works of art have been in my family line? Their irreplaceable!" From the corner of her eye Kima could see several guards fly a bit closer to her position. Beyond them the regular traffic of people evacuating their homes resumed at a more rapid pace. "I dont care if those works of art belong to Saffron himself. Only people are to be evacuated to the shelters in a time of emergency. Your possessions can 'burn' for all I care." Kima smiled when Kro got up off the stone floor, his face flushed as his hands clenched and unclenched into fists. "You...!" Kro shut his mouth, unable to come up with a proper response to the insult Kima had just delivered to him. Instead he settled for glaring at her with every ounce of hatred he had ever felt for the dammed woman. Time and again she had resisted his offers of political alliance, and more. Acting as if he were some sort of barbarian landwalker. How she had ever become a warrior eluded him and the rest of his allie's. And now this! She was purposely countermanding his authority in front of everyone for the sake of time. What did she think would happen? For centuries their people lived in this mountain, resisting numerous attempts throughout history to crush their home. He knew that nothing bad would happen, and to show his viewpoint he ordered several workers to take down some of his possessions to the shelters so that he might enjoy a few creature comforts while waiting for the all clear. Was that too much to ask? He stared at Kima for a few seconds before forcing his hands to his side, walking past her to fly down to his assigned shelter. Kima turned around to watch Kro fly down with the rest of the people, some of whom were giving him dirty looks as he flew alongside or past them. Kima took a deep breathe to calm her nervous heart, she had been aching for a fight but knew that Kro liked the indirect method when it come to vengeance of any sort. She looked up and smiled at the guards who had also been watching Kro descend to the lower levels. "Thanks." They bowed in unison to her before flying off to help other people move to the shelters. Kima looked after them for a moment to make sure that she wouldn't be needed before spreading her wings and flying down to the middle of the mountain. She entered one of the corridors that had the emblem of a scroll sculpted onto the arch. Down the corridor she could see several people in thin dark cloaks carefully loading books into large trunk- like cases. She swore softly when she saw how few people were helping them save the collected knowledge of their people. ------------------------------------ The mountains had proved a great obstacle for the three divisions of Chinese armor and their escorts of APC's, fuel tankers and mobile Howitzer platforms. The way the mountains and terrain had formed around Pheonix Mountain left few routes to the main gate. Or rather few routes that didnt involve transport via cargo plane or heavy lift helicopter, they'd tried that before. And lost. During those few attacks the transport helicopters had been taken out by spears in the rotor shafts before they could discharge their load of death. The soldiers in the APC's shifted uneasily against their restraints. Some of them had heard the orders to attack Pheonix Mountain, that info had been spread to all the other soldiers through their version of the grapevine. Some of them didnt care what their target was but most of the others had heard of the mysterious mountain. Some of the legends told of a birdman with the powers of a god that could easily decimate a mountain, others were mere rumor that involved the mountain and how it wasnt natural but built thousands of years ago. Still other stories told how the soldiers that had tried attacking the mountain before them had been taken prisonor and used as slaves. The speed of light had nothing on the rapid interchange of gossip and rumor and myth that had left even the staunchest soldiers looking for an easy way out that didnt involve getting killed. When the column of armor stopped they waited in silence, hoping that their commanders would order them to pull back at the last instant. Instead they were ordered to get ready for a siege scenario. Apparently the officers in charge had sent a ultimatum to the Pheonix People demanding their surrender to the rightful political codes. The soldiers looked at one another and shook their heads, guessing the story was false but afraid to speak out for fear of being overheard by bugs or political spies. They were given one hour to make final checks on their weapons while their superiors debated on the best method to attack. Near the back of the column the army engineers were making final checks on the large drilling machines as several cranes stood ready to deploy them and or lift them for more detailed maintenance checks. When that was done and there was nothing more to say they sat there on the hard metal benches and toyed with their night vision gear. Around them the Howitzer's began to move past the carriers to the front sides of the formation. ------------------------------------ Benar sighed for what must have been the twentieth time in two hours. Two hours ago he'd been woken up along with everyone else on his living level and told to start moving down into the shelters. Instead of going with everyone else he went down to the library to start moving all of the books. To that effect he'd collected as many of the apprentices and Elder Keepers to organize the materials for moving along with workers to actually move the texts and scrolls to a secure location. Normally he wouldn't even consider taking such actions but with the way the warriors kept hurrying everyone along made him very uneasy. "This one, and this one, and.....this one." Benar pointed to several shelves of thick books that the workers and the younger trainees immediately starting hauling to the storage cases outside. In the distance one could hear an argument from several of the Keepers as they debated over the contents of one bookcase, one of them could be heard saying that they should search further while another one was strongly against it and the third sounded confused. Kima walked past the ornate stone doorway decorated with a bass relief of a scroll and book into the center of a whirlwind. All around her there was shouting, arguing, moving piles of books, and more shouting creating a deafening roar that nearly drove her out of the large room. The only thing that stopped her was the head Keeper of the library that immediately waved her over as he was still talking to a worker. As she got closer however she noticed that he wasnt so much talking to the seemingly small worker as yelling at him as the voices from the rest of the vast chamber faded into a general background murmur in the face of Benar's verbal lashing. "HOW ARE WE GOING TO MOVE ALL OF THESE BOOKS WITHOUT THE LARGE TRANSPORT CARRIERS? IT TOOK US TWO HOURS TO EMPTY THREE CASES WITH JUST THE SMALL CARRIERS! SPEAK UP!" Kima looked from Benar's flushed face to the cringing Worker and felt some pity for the poor man. Unfortunately with Benar if you showed yourself to have a weak spine he'd immediately attack you. Fortunately with his advanced age he didnt physically attack people anymore. Hopefully the worker wouldn't cower. "I-I-I-Im sorry b-but the large carriers a-a-are unsafe to u-use....." Kima walked between the two men before Benar could tear into the terrified worker. "Now Keeper Benar, Im sure that this young worker is doing everything he can to help. Right?" She turned to the worker and winked at him, hoping he would get the message. The young worker blinked several times before comprehension dawned on his face. "Y-y-yes. S-since the large carriers haven't been maintained in some time were converting several of the larger mining carts for transport." Kima narrowed her eyes and looked to the exit, the worker got the message and hastily left before Benar could explode. "MINING CARTS!? THERE GOING TO TRANSPORT THE WHOLE OF THE PHEONIX PEOPLES KNOWLEDGE IN DIRTY MINING CARTS!?! THE IMPUDENCE! WHEN I GET MY HANDS ON THAT...THAT...!" Kima took his arm like she had done so many times before to cool him down when his temper got the best of him. Otherwise he would rant and rave for hours on end until either she or some other woman happened to grab his arm or shoulder to distract him. Benar looked down to Kim and shrugged her arm off before turning around to hide his blush by pretending to examine some random book. Kima just smiled slightly at his back. "Weren't you being a bit rough with that worker? He was only doing his job to the best of his abilities." Benar growled slightly. The sound was lost to the shouting from various corners of the room but the way his shoulders tensed up and the way his winged began to twitch from side to side told Kima to wait. "If he was doing his job the large carriers for these books would have been well maintained. But INSTEAD, they let the repair schedule fall into disarray. Like everything else around here." He took several books and passed them to a apprentice wondering by before turning back to Kima with a sorrowful look. "The rumors are true, aren't they? This emergency drill is all fake and the Red army is really going to attack." Kima looked around, the general din of conversation and shouting had died down somewhat but not enough to eavesdrop on someone without resorting to lipreading. Seeing no one watching them she turned Benar so that they were both facing away from anybody watching. The last thing she wanted to do was cause a panic. "Yes. Prince Herb has informed us that the Red army has started to move their heavy infantry and tanks into the general area. We dont know when, or even if, they are going to attack but given Ranma's arrival and the assassination attempt on Saffron this seems too much of a coincidence to ignore." Beran closed his eyes, for a moment Kima thought he would faint but then his eyes opened and immediately fixed on her. "What will we do should they get past the main gate?" "There are several old tunnels that run near the Musk Citidel. Well use those to get everyone to the Citidel. But Benar, there aren't enough workers to move all of these books.." "Lady Kima!" Kima steeled herself. This was the first time he had ever used 'Lady' with her name. She could understand him not wanting to abandon most of their peoples knowledge but in times like this there are priorities. "NO. First we save the people and get them to safety. Then the books and scrolls." "B-b-but Kima!" He briefly looked around as if expecting someone to notice them talking before continuing. "All this knowledge. It would take centuries to replace all of it." "I wish there was something I could do, but your knowledge can be replaced easier then the lives of everyone living in this mountain. Ten more cases and thats it, choose whatever we can use and is harder to replace." She walked away from Benar to stop him from arguing with her. She hated what she had done to her friend. Later, when she got the chance, she would apologies to him. From behind her she could hear him yelling at everyone to stop. --------------------------------------------------- Everywhere around him people were running or walking from place to place as they raced to prepare whatever had to be done before the Chinese Red Army attacked them. Most were leading people to the underground shelters, though others were helping carry large crates of foodstuffs from the upstairs kitchens to stock the kitchens in the emergency shelters below that hadnt been restocked in nearly a century and a half. Beside him Koran and several of the guards were watching the lines of people to make sure that no one lost their place in line or got separated from their families. Most of them were also stealing glances at him from time to time as they talked amongst themselves. He'd seen people talk like that at school as they spread rumors about his 'love' life or about how cruel he was when he wasnt being watched by one of his fiance's. These soldiers were probably doing something similar, maybe trying to figure out why he was here or when they should attack him. The best thing to do in such situations as he'd learned was to keep his mouth shut and ignore those people while eating his lunch. Or in this case watching the crowds move forward into the complex system of tunnels down and outward from the mountain. Above the clamor of voices he could hear frightened children asking their mothers or fathers what was happening and the hurried and ill practiced lies that they used to make their offspring feel better. He grimaced, he knew what they were telling there children was a lie but most of the people going into the shelters didnt know. One of the lines at the opposite end of the tunnel had stopped to allow several workers carrying a small generator to get through before the line was allowed to move again. Again the voices but this time they were the questions of adults as they tried to ferret out some tidbit of information that would make them feel more in control of their lives. But as the questions persisted and were directed at the soldiers they became a bit more frantic, somewhat pleading in tone, as they strained to keep their voices level so as not to worry their or anyone else's children. He stared at those moving lines for minutes. At some point he began to notice that he wasnt feeling anything. No shame, hatred, anger, blood lust, shock, disorientation, nothing. No, that wasnt true. He was feeling something, something he hadnt felt in a long time. Emptiness. With all of his fiance's and enemies now working with the Senshi he was essentially alone. Even if he managed to make freinds with some of the people in this mountain he would always feel like an outsider. Where as in Nerima he had been almost...normal, compared to everyone else there. Now for what was really the first time in his life he was alone. From now on he would have to plan for whatever moves Pluto made in the future. His face twisted into a grimace. With the Nan-ban mirror gone he lost his ability to see into the future. The future he'd originally seen didnt have the Chinese Red army attacking Pheonix mountain at this time, or Prince Herb's meeting with him and Saffron. But the anger didnt fade. Surprisingly he felt it blossom and grow as if it had become aware of its predicament and wanted to lash out at anything potentially dangerous. Without focus the anger made him recall memories and each memory made the anger stronger then before. All he could do was watch. Koran walked up to Ranma's side. But if Ranma did notice him then he was ignoring him. Curious, he waved a hand in front of Ranma's eyes which elicited no response. Looking at his face Koran could see several expressions form and fade to be replaced by others. Some of the expressions he recognized as hate, sorrow, but the others seemed to be a blend of emotions he couldnt quite identify but got the overall idea that whatever he was thinking about didnt feel too good. Odd. The man before him had defeated Saffron, and here before this old Healer he was slowly falling into shock. Deciding to stop this while he could he applied a pressure point technique to Ranma's shoulder. When Ranma felt someone tapping his shoulder he turned to see Koran with a worried expression on his face. It took him a few seconds to consciously see the old man and refrain from smashing his face in. Shaking his head slightly Ranma noticed that most of the people had gone except for several groups of workers that were taking several barrels down the tunnel entrance and the soldiers that had stood beside Koran were now gone. He turned back to the old man. "What?" "You've been here for four hours strait, Ranma. When I got here you appeared to have gone into a trance. Is anything wrong?" Four hours!? Where were the Chinese Army? He tried to keep the shock from his face while inwardly he seethed at how much time he had wasted just staring off into space for no damm reason at all. Now wide awake he looked all around him to get some sense of what was now happening before he answered Koran in what he hoped was a level voice. "N-no. Just thinking. Whats happening so far?" Koran began to lead Ranma up the passageway away from the shelters. "Its been four hours after sunset with no word from our scouts. Some of the soldiers think the Red army is just conducting exercises in the area. But we know differently, dont we? At this moment half of the soldiers are awake manning the gates, the other half is sleeping. All we can do now is wait." Ranma began to answer Koran when the mountain began to shake. The last thing he saw before losing conscience was the floor rushing up to him. ----------------------------------------------------- Authors Notes: And heres the $200 (Monopoly money) question: Who wants to see armed conflict, lots of explosions, and confusing stuff happen in the next chapter? (As if this wasnt confusing enough!!) In the next chapter the fight scene will be a bit rough, I still have to work on that part. BTW, does anyone know where I can find up to date information on the Chinese military, specifically its weapons? So far all Ive come up with are webpages for the US Army, not bad but not what I intended to find. By the time you read this chapter seven should be halfway done, baring any horrible accidents. But what are the chances of that happening? *Blink, blink* Yep, that was thunder. Oh boy. Of course if I were a very sadistic person I might have Ranma wake up and everything else turn out to be a dream. C+C, questions and random thoughts can be sent to Mecvolve@zdnetonebox.com. But no flames, I warned you in the first chapter after that any damage whether physical or psychological are not my responsibility.