DNabikiTHCh10 Nabiki 1/2 "A Very Scary Thought!" THE HONEYMOON HENTAI CHAPTERS! By Jim Robert Bader (Inspired by the works of Rumiko Takahashi & Others, with a nod to Bill Black, Siegal and Shuster, and various other talents...) Part Eleven. HENTAI ALERT---YOU ARE ENTERING THE LEMON-LIME ZONE, WHERE NORMAL STANDARDS OF INTERPERSONAL RELATIONS DO NOT APPLY! PROCEED NO FURTHER UNLESS YOU CAN ENJOY A FANFIC THAT DELVES INTO EXTREME NAUGHTINESS, WITH WANTON EXAMPLES OF PERVERSITY AND DEPRAVITY THAT WOULD LIKELY BE USED AS A BAD EXAMPLE IN A CONGRESSIONAL COMMITTEE! THIS IS THE FIC YOUR MOTHER WARNED YOU ABOUT, SO ABANDON ALL GOOD TASTE YE YOU ENTER BEYOND THIS POINT! YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED! "Are you sure about this, Ranchan?" Ukyo asked nervously, "You won't let us talk you out of it, or..." "Afraid not, Ucchan," Ranma replied as he tore some silken sheets into wide strips that he could use to fashion a makeshift loin-cloth, "Nabiki's been gone way too long, and I don't for a minute believe the captain when she says that's being treated well for her condition. I'm going out there to find her, and this time I won't let myself be distracted by anything." "You sure about that?" Perfume asked mildly, "The last time you stepped out that door you barely got three paces before one of those Undines nailed you and sucked your cock for all it was worth." "Aiyaa," Shampoo agreed, "Ranma very formid---formid...is good fighter, but Water girls who serve cousin Lao no fight fairly. Is all can do to just hold on for ride and be ridden like mountain pony..." "Hah, they won't even see me leave this time," Ranma said, finishing the touches to restore what dignity he could to his person by hiding the one distinguishing male feature that made him a marked man in the center of Lao's harem, "Don't forget, you're talking to the Senken Master, and that means I know how to slip right by those guards without being detected." "Oh yeah," Ukyo smiled, "That's right...the Umisenken...that invisibility trick of yours would sure come in handy at a time like this." "But that's only if you can keep yourself calm and not react to anything you see or hear going on around you, Saoto---ah---husband," Perfume reminded, "The Umisenken won't work if you can't erase all trace of yourself, or your concentration slips at the wrong moment..." "Don't worry," Ranma assured the trio of naked girls who comprised three quarters of his own peculiar "harem," "I got that problem covered. After all, we've been staying here for over a day now, which means that I've pretty much seen everything that goes on in this place, and I won't be shocked by stuff, especially since...ahm...well...let's just say that I'll be able to concentrate just fine and keep my mind on the business of finding Nabiki." His wives eyed him dubiously, but little did they suspect the real reason Ranma felt so confident about being able to remain focused on business. After nearly forty hours of near-constant sex (interrupted only by sleeping, eating and the mad scramble to escape a sinking ship that had landed them in Lao's clutches in the first place) his male member was as limp as a cold bowl of ramen noodles, and he'd pretty much been drained of remaining semen by that felatio-loving Undine who had serviced him before, so---at least for a few more hours anyway--- he was reasonably assured that his mind would not be on sex or evidence any sexual interest for the duration. Shampoo was less than certain of this, having a healthier appreciation of her new husband's regenerative capacities, and the idea of allowing him to wander free on a ship that was literally full of hot and raunchy girls just eager and willing to "service" him was enough to make her want to protest his leaving. The fact that she still had Lylac to care for alone dissuaded her from standing by her man when she was certain that he would need defending. Ukyo was in much the same boat, having little Fragrance to look after, while Perfume did not seem inclined to abandon the side of her beloved wife. Besides, talking Ranma out of anything was almost as bad as trying to talk Nabiki out of something reckless, a losing prospect before one even started. "Well, here goes," Ranma said as he finished tying his makeshift loin cloth into place, "Wish me luck and all that," and then he bowed his head and scrunched down his shoulders into a folded "Preying Mantis" stance, and with his eyes half lidded began concentrating on erasing all trace of himself from his surroundings. His wives looked on in amazement as Ranma became much harder to see, almost becoming translucent as the eye slid away from him, unwilling to focus in his direction. Satisfied by their looks that his technique was still effective, Ranma took his leave of the nubile trio and ventured out into the seraglio, failing to turn any heads (for once) in his passage. Perfume stirred herself from her mild amazement at seeing Ranma confound even her heightened perceptions and said, "I'm going after him. Will you two be safe if I go, Airen, Cousin?" "Sure thing, Sugar," Ukyo replied, "I was gonna suggest it myself...but...those Undines..." "Don't worry about that," Perfume smiled as she picked up a glass of water from the counter, "I've already got it covered." With that she poured the water over herself and reverted to cat mode, shrinking down to a kawaii, furry shape that had helped earn her the nick-name, "Sex Kitten." With a leap she was off scaling the nearest of the silken curtains that adorned the room and by leaps and bounds vaulted over the walled partition that separated their private room from the rest of the seraglio, scaling to the rafters whereupon she effectively vanished. "Aiyaa," Shampoo said as she knelt down to pick up the fallen glass container, "Hope cousin know what she do. Can no fight effective in that form..." "I think Per-chan knows exactly what she's doing, Sham-chan," Ukyo turned with an affectionate look to her lovely co-wife, "She can't really fend off the Undines in her human shape, especially without any of our weapons, but as a cat she can avoid being spotted and move about the ship a lot more freely than we can." "Is true," Shampoo nodded, "So...what we do to keep busy now that babies take nap?" "Why, Sugar," Ukyo purred sensuously, "You all don't need to be asking a question like that, do you?" "Is good point," Shampoo leered back, and before you could say, "Once More into the Breach," the two of them hopped onto their silken bed and began mussing up the remaining sheets with lots of furious and fun activity that sprang from the lust that the two of them had discovered for one another. Absent their respective Airen, Ukyo and Shampoo had learned to appreciate the similarities in their respective bodies that went beyond the mere fact that they both had recently delivered babies for their respective marital partners. Having at long last been granted the permission and the ability to do something about the smoldering ardor that had built up between them over the course of several months, they found that they fit perfectly well into each others arms with a snugness that made everything they did together feel like magic. Shampoo's larger breasts were still lactating even after four months of continuous breast-feeding, while Ukyo's (somewhat smaller) boobs had just begun to yield copious amounts of the sticky, semi-transparent fluid. As such it delighted Shampoo to be able to suckle someone else for a change, and---being how well she knew that a woman's breasts could ache from generating more milk than their babies could drink, she was determined to help relieve Ukyo of some of her "excess." This, of course, was with Ukyo's implicit and heartfelt approval, having also come to appreciate the flavor of Shampoo's own breast milk, and the delight they indulged in sharing milk together made the two young mothers feel that much closer as lover, co-wives and oathbound sisters. In a way it felt as though they had been making love to each other for a long time rather than the mere day-plus since they had started out on this Honeymoon that had turned into an adventure in Hentai Heaven, and when they twined their legs together, grinding brown pelvis a against neatly trimmed purple bush, their bodies in sinuous entanglement, like two otters in heat with their breast-mounds meshing against one another, it was a wonder that their sheets did not catch fire. They burned with a lust that needed to be shared, and having each the other woman to freely "play" upon to their hearts content made everything they did together an act of love and sensuous contentment. Looking on the observing Undines were amused at seeing the two human girls once more going at it with real heat. It delighted these elemental servants of Lao to no end to learn how flexible and open were these new additions to the harem, and how accommodating they could be when provided with the right amount of coital "stimulation." It felt both natural and right that these talented young people should be co-joined in marital bliss, and the longer the two went at it the more their souls seemed to be sparking off one another as their spirits gradually achieved a kind of mutual synchronization. Of course the Undines also dutifully reported to their Mistress the activities of both Ranma and Perfume, which their captain picked up even while in the midst of some rather vigorous activity of her own. Several levels up and away from the harem proper, Lao hardly broke stride as she maintained her pelvic motions, continuing to drive her double-dong strap-on-vibrating harness in and out of the loins of a grunting and groaning Martha, who was poised in the classic "Doggy" position with her knees spread wide and her face propped up in a restraining harness. "I see," Lao mused as she continued to hump her rubbery "cock" into Martha with the steady, relentless force of a piston, "So, Saotome has decided to make his move, eh? Hardly unexpected..." "Eh?" Martha gasped, "What's that?" "Oh, nothing, my sweet," Lao smiled as she patted Martha's firm bottom, "Nothing to interfere with me ravishing you until you break down and acknowledge me as your true and rightful Mistress." "Yes Master," Martha half-playfully teased, delighted to note that Lao was continuing to ream her into sweet and delightful bliss. She had thought that she had heard the pirate captain name someone else besides her, which would have been...most annoying...but just so long as the Hentai continued to probe her like THAT, then she would abide her helpless condition, hands still cuffed behind her back even as her gold manacles continued to drain away her excess super-energy, leaving her---well...not so much as weak as a kitten as maybe a tame lioness---but it was just the same quite enjoyable, and she felt no great urgency to be let loose from the harness any time shortly. Lao was amazed at the resilience and energy of her comely new charge, finding this Martha to be a wealth of pleasurable surprises the more that the Slaver played with her body and learned the subtle mysteries of what it took to bring her off in a series of hot, sweaty orgasms. Martha Kent was proving to be even more of a closet case than she would have imagined, and it was just too much fun to interrupt now, even given that Saotome Ranma was loose and most likely on the warpath. She mentally relayed orders to her Undines to maintain a lookout for Ranma, but opted to take a "wait-and-see-what-he-does-for-now" approach to the whole matter. Of slightly less concern was what her adopted cousin would do in Neko form. It would be a mistake to underestimate the Enforcer, even if---at the moment---she was a small and playful kitten. (Ah well), she mused, (Nothing to be done about it at the moment. Let's see what young Saotome will do first before we clip his wings and return him to his gilded cage...provided my people can find him. That Umisenken of his is quite...intriguing...) Of course, had she actually seen where Ranma was headed at that moment, she might have been considerably less sanguine about the whole matter, but the truth is that she did not and so did not "see" Ranma ease himself out of the seraglio, not headed towards Nabiki (on this ship everyone who did not know the lay of the landscape was as helpless as a Hibiki) but rather to another area that was used for a far more domestic purpose... What effectively amounted to the Day Care center attached to the regular harem... Ranma was actually shivering as he at lest escaped from what he had thought was the seraglio of the ship, having tested his thesis about being too "drained" to be distracted by the sexual antics of Lao's women and found the concept somewhat...wanting. Instead of being "too pooped to pop," his treasonous man- meat was threatening to burst forth from the makeshift containment that had alone kept it in the whole time he passed by one debaucherous sight right after another. Even now he could still see them in his mind, the writhing bodies, the probing of orifices, Undines plying their subtle bodies to overwhelm and contain a girl to "cleanse" her of impurities so that she could continue to screw her nearest partners without abandon. Age was impossible to determine in such a place, by these women were all young and hardy and in the prime of physical condition without an ounce of fat that did not belong there, and with faces that ran the entire spectrum of loveliness from the fairly attractive to the outright breathtakingly gorgeous. And EVERY one of them was a potential danger to Ranma's powers of concentration, just as he knew that the vast majority of them were "closet Heteros" just waiting to pounce on the first man to brave their stronghold. It was like being a tasty male deer treading softly through the midst of a pack of starving lionesses, and the effect would likely be much the same if he were discovered there rather than constantly putting out, "Don't Notice Me" vibrations. To slip his guard at such a moment would be to invite himself being at the bottom of a near dog-pile, and it was not just Lao's concubines who could pose him a problem...more than a few of the "loyal" members of the crew were obviously indulging in one of the perks of the job by taking their liberty-time as "part- time" Harem Slaves (he knew they were crewmates, having watched them in other capacities, some even venturing above deck). Before learning that he was to be married to four very "flexible" women---heck, even before he knew Nabiki---Ranma might once have subscribed to the common male myth that Lesbianism was just a fetish indulged by a few confused women who somehow took a near-masculine appreciation of their own sex, and that all they needed was a male cock to "cure" them of their "perversity." He had long since abandoned any notion that there was anything "weird" or "unnatural" about two women making love, which he had thought---for a time---made him pretty much "enlightened" for a modern-aged guy. Now he knew beyond question how wrong- headed and naïve he had been to think that two women together would have a very limited sex life! These women not only did not much suffer privation from being without men (though they were happy to "switch-hit" when the opportunity was presented) but they knew a thousand different ways of bringing each other off with great proficiency, and some of the methods they used were of the sort that- --quite frankly---left him mind-boggled. At the same time he was mentally taking notes, cataloguing and storing away this new information so that he might eventually incorporate these techniques to his own budding lore as a Sexual Master of the Kamasenken. It was the only way to maintain something like an objective state of mind while wandering literally into a land where "Men Dared Not Venture," and the minute he allowed himself to react to what he was witnessing, his cover would be blown and his Umisenken aura would be dissipated. Losing his invisibility shield in the midst of these certified "ball-breakers" was a fate not to be relished, and so he kept a level mindset and progressed beyond the seraglio, only daring to breathe when he believed himself to be out of immediate danger. He panted hard as he fought to regain control. This was no time to be playing voyeur...he had a job to do, and Nabiki was counting on him. Coming to her rescue (for a change) was a far more appealing prospect than the other way around, and so long as there was a chance of finding her hale, whole and hearty (and never mind what she might otherwise be doing, or who with---DOWN BOY!!!) then he had to hold it all together, even if "holding" it was the thing he most wanted to do at the very moment! He looked around at his new surroundings and found that he was in a different chamber, one that appeared to be an auditorium or common room of some sort. There were tall wooden columns that were carved to resemble marble, and a throne-like chair at one end, which itself suggested something more imperial minded. Could Lao envision herself as a Mandarin holding court among her people? Maybe this was where they had special parties and showed film clips from various home movies...maybe even a slide-show on the far wall (could Lao even resort to that level of torture, he wondered?). At the moment, though, it was somewhat darkened by muted lighting, giving it an eerie cast, and one not at all to his liking. And then Ranma sensed another presence, realizing that he was not alone, that there was someone else in the chamber...someone sitting beneath one of the columns, aimlessly tossing an object up in the air and catching it again. Ranma wondered if she were one of the slave girls, but then noticed how small the darkened form was and took a moment to assure himself that it was indeed a small girl, maybe no more than nine or ten years old by appearance. Even as he approached to get a better look at this young girl, the child paused in what she was doing to glance his way and ask, "Who's there?" "Ah..." Ranma was so surprised at being discovered that he lost what was left of his Senken protection, which helped him decide to "tough it out" by pretending nonchalance as he replied, "Who wants to know?" The girl scrambled to get to her feet, giving Ranma a full look at her, though she was only dimly reminiscent of the young child he had caught a glimpse of the first time her and the others had been on Lao's ship. The blue hair was a definite give-way, and he could even see something of a family resemblance. "What do you want?" she asked belligerently. Ranma raised his hands in a disarming manner and said, "I don't want any trouble, and I don't want to hurt you, so back off kid. I'm just...um...looking for the furo..." "So why don't you ask an Undine to take care of you?" the girl frowned suspiciously, "You're that guy they brought in, one of the outsiders who want to hurt my momma." "Kid," Ranma said sincerely, "I don't want to even have anything to do with your mom, but she's the one who grabbed us, not the other way around, remember?" "Stop calling me a kid!" the young girl responded, "I'm not a kid, I'm almost eleven! And besides...you're not even supposed to be here..." "Ah...well..." Ranma wondered how to proceed from this point, but it was not exactly the sort of thing that got covered in his martial arts training, "...What is this place anyway? Looks...kind of like a throne room..." "It is," the young girl replied, "It belonged to Han Solo, the original owner. He built it to resemble a Mongol palace from the pre-Han era...which is kinda funny, since the Mongols never really lived inside of buildings...they had huts on wheels, or that's what Momma tells me..." "Well, your Mom probably knows her history," Ranma conceded, adding in a subtle undertone, "Kami knows every Amazon I've run into sure can give you an earload on the subject..." He waited in half trepidation for someone to upbraid him on that, but instead the youth---Breeze, he remembered belatedly---just heaved a sigh and said, "I've never seen a hut on wheels...I've never been anywhere except the POJ. The only wheels I know is on the chariots that Mom likes to ride in. I've seen rickshaws from when we pull in port, but Mom doesn't want me to go on shore. What's it like to live on land?" "Uh..." Ranma had almost forgotten how a child's mind could flit from one subject to another, or change moods abruptly without warning, and this was obviously a very intelligent child, for all that his experiences appeared to be...surprisingly limited, "Well...I'm not quite sure how to answer that..." "I mean...what's it like to live where everything stands still?" Breeze asked, "I hear from some of the women that dry land stays in one place, only I don't know what that means myself..." "I guess maybe they mean...because a ship's deck is always moving," Ranma hazarded. "You think so?" Breeze frowned a moment then said, "I guess I wouldn't notice. I guess maybe I'm used to it, like the way the earth is supposed to be a round ball that's spinning through space, but we never feel it spinning...is that right?" "I...guess," Ranma relaxed somewhat, "You're Breeze, right? I'm Saotome Ranma." "I know who you are," the young girl said, "Momma talks about you all the time, and the others. She says I was born on land...before we came to live on the POJ, but I don't really remember. She says you're one of the best fighters of your generation, tough enough to beat both of her cousins, so I guess you're pretty good...not that I'm afraid of you. I'm a pretty good fighter myself..." "I'll just bet you are," Ranma said, "Your Mom's one of the toughest opponents I've ever gone up against." "Want to see how good I am?" the blue haired girl asked, tossing her ball and baseball mitt to one side, "I'll fight you to show you what I can do." "In a minute, okay?" Ranma asked, staring at the glove and mitt, "You play baseball?" "One of the girls taught us how to play," Breeze said, "She says it's a popular sport in your country of Japan. We use this room for playing in, it's just big enough to put in a diamond, and sometimes Momma lets me play left field..." "Left field, huh?" Ranma smiled, "I'm usually either the first baseman or the pitcher." "Oh yeah?" Breeze asked, "Can you throw a strike?" "Are you kidding?" Ranma puffed up with pride, "I can curve a slider in over the plate faster than you can blink, short stuff." "I'd like to see that," Breeze smiled, then sighed, "Not enough people around here want to play, and everybody's too busy right now. I asked some of the ladies I normally play with but they tell me Momma's got some project that she's working on, or something, so I have to wait until the end of the week, when it's going to be finished." "A project, huh?" Ranma asked, "You know what it is?" "That's just it," Breeze pouted, "Nobody will tell me. All they say is, 'Wait until you're older,' which is the same stuff they say about the sex stuff...but how am I supposed to learn about that if nobody will teach me?" "Are you sure you're ready to learn?" Ranma asked, "I'm a lot older than you and I'm still learning the basics." "Well, you've got four women in your harem, so you must be doing something right," Breeze reasoned, "Mind you, Momma's got twenty-three girlfriends, not counting the crew and the undines, and she keeps them pretty busy with stuff, so you're gonna have to work hard if you want to beat her." "Twenty three women," Ranma noted dryly, just thinking of how hard it was to satisfy the four he already had, "Yeah...terrific..." "So...do you wanna fight, or play?" Breeze asked, "All the same to me either way. I can get a baseball bat if you want to play baseball." "Er..." Ranma considered declining the offer, but since that would mean tipping his hand and possibly risking having Breeze sound the warning cry that would likely bring every Undine on the ship down on his tail (a gang-bang scene he DID NOT look forward to!), and as the alternative to that was knocking the child out (he shuddered at the very thought of hurting a child, even incidentally), he decided to buy himself some time and said, "All right...you're on...but only for a few minutes. I've...um...gotta go find Nabiki when this is over..." "That's cool with me," Breeze cheered up, already moving to retrieve a bat, which---oddly enough---turned out to be propped up next to the throne, "I'll explain the rules on how we do it in here...you got a name for your team?" "A name?" Ranma blinked. "Yeah," Breeze said, "We like to play by teams even when it's one-on-one. Momma says it teaches us about unity and teamwork. The guys I normally play with call ourselves the Concubines. How about you?" "Er...the Posse?" Ranma suggested. "That works," Breeze nodded, "Okay, I'm Home team, you're Visitors, it's top of the first inning with all of the bases clear. Now, you want to pitch? I'll hit whatever you throw at me." "Heh, piece of cake," Ranma replied as he accepted the ball and the mitt, then tossed it experimentally a few times to get a good feel for the balance of the round-laced spheroid, deciding that the matter with Nabiki could wait just a bit, and he was sure that she would understand no matter whatever it was that she was up to at that moment, it really could not be so urgent as making a child happy...now could it...? At that precise moment Nabiki was deciding which thing she would most rather do when she got loose from her rope prison...Kill Lao, Kill Ranma, Rape both Lao and Ranma, or just take it out on the first sentient thing that she ran into, Man, Woman or Undine? Waiting around feeling increasingly hot and horny will do that to you, play upon your moods like nothing else in creation, causing you to slowly and gradually lose focus on the world around you until all that matters is that you feel like you need nothing so much as to relieve your aching pussy! Having a catheter shoved up your rear can do that to you...a different plug (she assumed) from the one used earlier in her crotch when the comedy team of Lotus and Blossom thought kindly enough to help relieve her aching bladder. Now she had OTHER needs that had to be attended, and all because Lao had put some kind of a hex on her that was keeping the Undine away, who were much more efficient at this sort of extraction! Right at the moment it was Lotus and Blossom whom she was considering raping...those two clowns had come around a couple more times in the past several hours, each time to **play** a little with Nabiki's limp and helpless body, and one time even to let her down from her ropes, giving her a few moments in which to recover lost feeling in all of her limbs...then promptly tied her up again before she got enough feeling back to break their skulls in! Now she was dangling upside down facing up towards the ceiling with her hands and feet spread outward at all four corners, a "spreader bar" between her legs while her face was covered in a kind of gag-harness that was held up by a rope that kept her neck from drooping...which was considerate after a fashion. The thing that was ticking her off was the way in which Lotus and Blossom had taken advantage of her helplessness each time they came by...the last time with Blossom putting her mouth between Nabiki's legs for a much-needed session of cunnalingus. Nabiki had almost welcomed being ravaged at that point, the fire in her loins having grown increasingly to a raging bonfire, but---just before she was to experience full climax---the damned cobalt-topped harridan had broken off and said, "Well, that's all for now...gotta save the rest for later, orders of the Mistress and all that..." The same thing went for Lotus, who had paid her respects to each of Nabiki's breasts, especially her nipples! After a few minutes of teasing and fondling and generally kneading up both breasts like they were playdo, then suckling on Nabiki's nipples until they were has hard as round grapes, the pink haired trollop then wound a length of rope around both hardened breasts and bound them tight to Nabiki's body, then attached strings to a pair of clips and suspended her aching nipples to the ceiling, in all leaving Nabiki hanging there aroused, unsatisfied and damned HORNY!!! She had been like that for an hour, and in that time her breasts had gotten reddish-purple, which meant that just enough circulation was getting through those knots to prevent them from going "bad," as in gangrenous. How this kind of bondage was supposed to be for her own good she had no idea whatsoever, only that the two Amazon treated it like it was a mere game, leaving in mention the fact that they had gone through the same thing themselves many times at the hands of their "Mistress." All Nabiki knew was that she had gone through quite enough of this treatment and wanted letting down in the worst way possible! She was not only ravenous for sex, she was thirsty and hungry as well, and not at all comforted by the joking remarks of those two jokers, who had playfully informed her that the only meal that she would be dining on for tonight would be the juices from their loins...and---the worst thing imaginable from her point of view---she was actually feeling hungry and thirsty enough to consider such a meal a delicacy! After all, it was---at least technically---a form of liquid protean... Of course she would much rather have been dining on Shampoo's sweet nectars, both her loins and her breast-milk, though Ukyo and Perfume would do just as well in a pinch. Even better than that, she wanted a taste of Ranma's own juicy "sausage," but the way she was feeling right now, there was a good chance that she might bite it off and swallow it in one gulp! AND WHERE THE FUCK WAS HE??? FOR ONCE SHE WOULDN'T MIND IF HE CAME RIDING TO HER RESCUE, AND THE BAKA GOES AND GETS...WELL...DISTRACTED? Yes, that seemed about right...distracted, in fact...if she found out that he was dipping his candle in some other girl's wick right then and now, she really was going to bite it off! Her already fragile mood was slowly souring the longer she tried to hold out against temptation. She would not submit to these people, she would not give in to her own horniness, and---above all else---SHE WOULD NOT BEG FOR RELEASE OR FOR SATISFACTION! In fact---! "Meow?" It was amazing what a single word or sound could do to completely alter someone's mood and perspective. That single lightly voiced tone of feline inquiry caused her mind to rivet and go numb, and then her eyes swiveled to spy one corner of the rafters where---sure enough---she saw the face of a cat peering down at her...Perfume without a doubt, but still a CAT by her estimation! Perfume felt mildly elated upon discovering Nabiki's scent amid so many others that inhabited this vessel. Her hunch had been right about the Undines not noticing her as she moved stealthily through the bowels of the ship in search of her missing co-wife, only to find Nabiki dangling like a piece of limp salmon, spread-eagled and hanging above the floor with her breasts tied up like knotted gifts. Of a certain she did not look comfortable with that object dangling from her rectum...a catheter, she believed they called it...something used to extract solid waste from the body by injecting one with water, then pumping it back out. Nasty. Perfume then considered what to do about her discovery. They needed Nabiki freed, yet she was too far from the harem for the others to stage an effective rescue. Perfume might be able to move about in cat form with impunity, but not Ukyo and her cousin...and wherever Ranma was, he was bound to be in the middle of something, which meant that Perfume had to wrestle with this one for herself, and without the use of her axes! If she could find hot water soon enough she could resume her human form and then untie Nabiki, but as she sat in the rafters contemplating what to do she saw Nabiki looking back at her with a look of naked panic. There was recognition there too, of course, but... Perfume smiled kittenishly. She knew exactly what to do to get Nabiki out of her own mess...and it was so obvious she wondered that she had not thought of it immediately. Her senior co-wife might not enjoy the next few minutes, but...Perfume was certain that she would derive a fair measure of pleasurable satisfaction. Thus---without any further preamble, she judged her angle and distance, then lightly leaped down onto Nabiki's naked stomach, feeling muscles contract involuntarily at the contact as Perfume pranced a bit to get a measure of her balance, then walked right up to look Nabiki in the eyes, framed between the twin peaks of her dark-rosy bosoms, flexing her claws a bit to add an extra element of tactile sensation. She cleared her throat a bit, and then without preamble Perfume said, "Meow." The result was as expected, causing an immediate shift in the entire psychological makeup of the hapless Tendo (or Saotome) girl. Like that Nabiki's mind shot from fear to panic to ultimate terror and right out again out the other side to madness. Perfume could feel the rise in Chi-levels as the battle aura of the Tendo girl flared up like a hot set of lighter-saturated coals, causing a tingle to flare over Perfume's fur as the fury of the Nekoken took over...the ultimate secret art of the Saotome Ryu. Lao had arranged it so that the ropes would drain off small levels of Chi if Nabiki had tried to summon up her power for an effort at liberation, but nothing to compare with the intensity at which her energy levels soared at that precise moment, going from red-to-white hot in a matter of seconds as the word "CAT!!!" rang through Nabiki's mind like the mother of all clarion calls, a sense of danger drowning out all other awareness! Perfume sensed it was a good time to dismount when she felt the nylon cords melting from the heat of a blast-furnace aura, and no sooner did her paws touch the deck then she hear Nabiki breaking loose from her bounds, instantly flaring to life as numb limbs were fed with ivory-hot Chi levels. With a snarl she tore loose her gag as though the straps were made of wet tissue paper, and she landed on the deck in a three-limb crouch with her forth arm cocked and ready to strike, a snarl turning her face into something bestial and inhuman. Perfume had to admit that the effect was everything that she had expected, and even more, but standing only a meter away from a snarling co-wife did not seem like the most prudent course of action at the moment, so without further preamble on her own part she took off running. Nabiki, ignoring the plight of the many girls around her, saw the smaller cat taking off at a run and immediately followed, pulled along by instinct as much as any other drive, as though vaguely recognizing the smaller cat as someone she would like to play with, and play was exactly what she had in mind, feeling the urge to mate cross beyond any issues of gender and species. Perfume had a sense that she had literally lit the fuse on a keg of powder, and now she had to find some way of putting the feline terror hot on her trail to some sort of good use. Fortunately for them both there were lots of potential targets worth using in a trice, and so she redoubled her speed to follow the trail of her nose, detecting the scent of a pair of special "morsels" who would be ideal targets upon which Nabiki could vent her wrath and feel good about it afterward. The alternative, letting her catch up with Perfume, would only have been appealing if the Amazon could find a handy kettle of hot water...otherwise it was very likely that the next few moments would be excruciatingly painful, well beyond even what she was used to enduring on a near constant basis... Ahead by several chambers, Lotus turned her head and said, "Eh...did you just hear something?" "What do you mean?" Blossom looked at her partner, then followed the horrified expression that just then crossed Lotus's face. Both Amazons turned together in time to see a figure of carnal nightmare come barreling right towards them with blood in her eyes and a snarl on her lips, and as one both of Lao's most faithful retainers cried out, "OH-SH---!" Lao paused in the act of giving Martha her tenth orgasm of the evening to vocally declare, "Those idiots! Can't they do anything right?" "What's wrong?" Martha asked, gasping and panting from near-breathless anticipation, and not wanting the other woman to bring a halt to their lovemaking...not at such a critical juncture. Lao sighed, "Nothing really...just something I was prepared for but expected would happen at a somewhat later juncture. The timing really bites, but what can you do about that? I'm afraid I'm going to have to leave you now and go to the rescue of my two chief minions before they wind up as table scraps to a more voracious predator than any save myself." "You have to leave?" Martha gasped, "NOW?" "Now, now, my Sweet," Lao patted her affectionately, "You just wait right here and I'll be back...perhaps not right away, but soon enough, where we can pick up where we left off, and I'll try to make it up to you, honest." "Well...if you have other duties..." Martha tried not to sound as disappointed as she clearly was. "We'll spend more time getting to know one another later, I promise," Lao winked, "And I never forget a promise. Until then, be well." With that she released Martha from the harness and setting her down on the bed, then left her to fend for herself as she made haste to race to the rescue of her minions, hoping she would not arrive too late, or that Nabiki had not been driven so far past the edge of sanity that she vented all of her outrage upon the hapless Lotus and Blossom, who were guilty of nothing so much as doing the bidding of their Mistress. It was just the sort of thing that could make any Slaver's already eventful day a little more interesting... "Are you sure these are the coordinates?" "Yes I'm sure, Aiko-chan," Beatrice replied, already suited up in her Akagiyama battle armor and at the controls of their plane-like cockpit, "I've checked with the global tracking system and we are definitely in the area that my Nanoprobes indicated would be the place. I'm going to try triangulating our measurements to home in on them within a one hundred square kilometer grid, and once we have it narrowed down that close we should be able to find them using more conventional methods." "All right," Alison balled a fist, "And once we know where Lao's ship is, then we can find out what happened to Oneechan and the others. Of course we're going to need your help to find our way once we get there. You gonna be up to it, Kuno-san?" "But of course," Kodachi replied, "I spent well over a month on board that ship and I know full well the layout, as does Kei-chan, who lived there much, much longer. Isn't that right, my sweet Kei-chan?" Keiko did not, of course, reply, owing largely to the ball gag that was presently filling her mouth, nor did she move around a lot as she was bound up like a package kept in storage with the others. "Are you sure she's comfortable back there?" Alison asked for what had to be the fifth straight time since leaving Japan, "I know you guys are into bondage and all that, but..." "Oh, they'll be quite all right, and they take up much less space this way," Kodachi smiled, "Didn't you say that there was limited cargo space in your mother's invisible plane? Well...this way we won't need to be too concerned about squirming around and bothering you about whether or not we have arrived at our destination, yes?" Alison slumped in her chair, even as Beatrice smiled at her and said, "Well, you wanted to come along, and so did they, and since this plane is basically designed as a two-seater..." "Yeah," Alison grumbled, "A plane designed by an Amazon genius named Paula. I can't believe I've actually let you talk me into hot-wiring the thing and taking it from its hanger. Mom and Dad don't even know that I know the combination to their secret underground hideout..." "We did leave a note to explain that it is an emergency, to say nothing of it being a matter of life and death," Kodachi reminded them, "And I was given to understand that the process of commandeering this craft was a great deal more sophisticated than merely splintering two wires together in the ignition." "That is certainly an understatement," Beatrice replied, "This machine is an amazing marvel representing principles of science light years ahead of conventional aircraft. It is commanded as much by thought as it is by these controls that I am using...it took me all of four-point-three minutes just to figure out how it works, and slightly less than half that again to mentally master the recognition code it uses in order to verify the qualifications of the pilot." "Indeed," Kodachi agreed, "It is surely a wondrous hybrid of science and magic, employing principles of levitation and anti-gravity that---along with inertial control and astrometric guidance---propels this craft forward by riding the Earth's electromagnetic currents...and composed of a material that is totally invisible to the unaided eye...indeed, truly an engineering marvel beyond compare..." "Great, just great," Alison rolled her eyes, "I would be stuck having to share the cabin with the two of you brain-junkies while all the normal-speaking people are tied up in back. I should have brought my Walkman...at least then I'd have some in-flight music..." "Methinks, love of my heart, that thou dost protest too much," Beatrice smirked, "You are a lot more intelligent than you tend to let on, and I---for one---know better than to take your act at face value." "Hmph," Alison frowned, "Well, I suppose I ought to expect you both to be impressed with Aunt Paula's handwork. I've only met her a couple of times myself...she came to Paradise Island many years ago as a refuge from what they call 'Man's World,' a genius who wasn't taken serious because of her sex, but with the backing of my grandmother, Queen Hippolyta, she became their chief scientist and resident mad scientist, inventor of the Purple Ray and a bunch of other stuff that scientists here haven't even come close to inventing. That's why the Amazons went from a permanently Bronze Aged culture to having their own air force, not that they can afford to make too many of these things...just enough to replace the ones that Mom keeps smashing in the course of her missions." "Then we will endeavor to bring this one back in as intact a condition as when we borrowed it," Beatrice replied, "It will, of course, depend on Madam Lao and whatever schemes she plans in regards to our missing colleagues." "I am certain that the Mistress will understand our concerns and do her best to alleviate them," Kodachi said in reassuring tones, "And that with our help we will be able to bring matters to a satisfactory conclusion without needing to resort to any unpleasantness." "I sure hope you're right about that," Alison said, "I just wish we had a bit more muscle on our side to even things out...and where the heck is Joan anyway? She was supposed to meet us here..." "She has," Beatrice replied. "Huh?" Alison blinked, "What do you mean?" "Look over there," the genius nodded as their invisible plane banked slightly to the left, and---sure enough---off to their right was a form hovering still in the air directly before them...a figure who remained where she was floating with arms folded over an amble chest, just hanging there as if she had been waiting there for hours. Beatrice brought their plane (actually a Jet, for those who are technical about their terms) to a near vertical stall, using the planes energy thrusters to bring their momentum down to virtually nothing, and then pulled up alongside the figure, who watched them pull up as though the Jet were a car and she were merely a street walker. Of a certain that description would have been fitting for the way that she was dressed, for though she was six feet tall and perfectly proportioned, she was a far cry from a typical Amazon, or even a conventionally dressed superhero...in fact, she was as far from conventional as one could get and still distinguish her from someone of an even less savory profession. Although she appeared to be blonde, there were roots around her hair that suggested it had been dyed in some manner, and the fact that some parts of her hair were streaked with pink added further credence to that observation. It was also styled in a wavy hair fashion that partially covered the right half of her face, even as her right eye was covered in a black star tattoo, adding something almost tribal to her appearance. Her costume (for such that it was) had cut outs in places that were barely code-approved and consisted of flaring spiked shoulder pads and thigh-high jack-boots, the color scheme being red, white and dark navy blue on the whole, along with a chain that was slung over one hip, and in her nose there was a ring, lending further credence to her somewhat ultra- modern barbaric appearance. That she was obviously levitating on her own power was plain to anyone who could see that she was not wearing enough to conceal a levitation device, and her glare as much as dared you to risk your life by asking. Her scowl gave her an even more intimidating presence, even though she took no action and merely watched as Beatrice retracted cockpit hatch in order to converse with the levitating woman. "{You are, I take it, Joan Wayne, otherwise known as Rad?}" Beatrice asked in flawless English. "{Yeah,}" the other woman replied, "{You the frail on the phone who claims she knocked up my Aunt?}" "{The same,}" Beatrice replied, but before she could go further Alison spoke up, her English somewhat more shaky and heavily accented. "{Joan-san...glad you could make it!}" "{Hey, Ali-san,}" the one named Joan replied, nodding to the redhead, "{I'd ask how you were doing, but...I guess that's kind of self-evident, huh?}" Alison patted her belly and said, "{Yeah, tell me about it.}" "{So,}" Joan frowned again, "{What's this about Mom being taken by pirates?}" "{We believe that she is close nearby,}" Beatrice replied, "{I am attempting to narrow down the signal that we have been tracing to this location. The ship is masked from normal detection by a field of dimensional inversion...}" "{You mean magic, huh?}" Joan replied, "{I gotta buddy who knows her way around that stuff, and what she doesn't know about it ain't worth knowing.}" "{Please, Joan-san,}" Alison said, "{Won't you help us find it? Your mom and some friends of ours are counting on us to find them...}" "{I ain't saying I wanna help,}" Joan said indifferently, "{But if Mom got herself into another fix, then I might as well bail her out...so I can kick her ass instead of whoever it is that was stupid enough to take her hostage. Now...where are you guys looking?}" Beatrice studied her dials and then removed one hand from the control to point in a general direction, "{That way...another ten kilometers...I am picking up a large surge of energy that is concentrated over that way...}" "{Fine,}" the towering Joan unfolded her arms and turned about in mid-space, moving forward with rapid acceleration that left the invisible plane literally eating her dust. "Charming," Beatrice remarked as she closed the hatch and studied the retreating form of the other woman. "She's like that," Alison said, "Of course she wasn't always such a hard case...she's had a lot of...issues lately..." "One would suspect that," Kodachi said with a look of ironic rue in her expression. Beatrice started them up again and soon they were on the trail of the other woman, covering the distance rapidly until they located a curious cloud bank that was flowing a little too close over the water. "That's it," Beatrice nodded, "That is where the signal is coming...weak though it is, I would bet my former allowance on that being our target." "So that's that cloud that hides the ship, huh?" Alison sniffed, "Doesn't look like much from here..." "Do not judge by appearances," Kodachi cautioned, "That is always a mistake when dealing with the Mistress." "Sage words of caution," Beatrice agreed, "Too bad certain parties couldn't wait to hear them." "What the...?" Alison blinked, "JOAN, YOU IDIOT!!! She's gonna try and take her on all by herself!" "Indeed," Kodachi mused, "But is that not what you were expecting?" "We had better get down there before matters get further out of hand," Beatrice remarked as she aimed the plane for the cloud, preparing to ride out the certain turbulence that they were likely to encounter, "Hold on...this could get bumpy." "You're telling me with Joan involved?" Alison winced, "Oh, why couldn't it be Jade's number instead of hers? My green-haired cousin was never this impulsive!" "Things are never entirely as we would wish them to be," Kodachi nodded sagely, "But on the whole, I do hope that the Mistress is ready for this. From the look of matters your niece is a dangerous lady when angered...but then again...so is the Mistress..." Perfume lifted her head from where she crouched in concealment and watched as Nabiki snarled over the two cowering and badly mauled Amazons. Blossom and Lotus looked as though they had been tossed into a cement mixer, minus the cement, and the way Nabiki was pressing them to the flooring made it plain that both of Perfume's fellow countrymen were about to experience a ravishing that they would surely long remember. Blossom was the one whose position was the least advantageous, pressed atop Lotus like the middle layer of a sandwich as Nabiki held her down with one hand and rubbed her crotch against the blue haired girl's upturned bottom. Lotus did not seem comfortable, even with her face buried in the space between her companion's ample bosoms, the motions of Nabiki's pelvic thrusts grinding Blossom's chest against Lotus's head, and not in such a way that either woman could well appreciate. Of course the alternative to doing what Nabiki demanded was likely to be a lot worse, as they had already discovered from having only mounted a token of resistance. Nabiki's eyes were feral and inhuman, and it was plain that she would brook no denial in sating her anger and lust against her former tormentors, asserting her dominance like a true pack Alpha even though she had nothing between her legs that would have made the mounting seem more...official. Only in that respect did her moves fall short of actual rape, and yet given what she had just gone through for the past few hours, Perfume could hardly have blamed her for her animalistic behavior. But then Perfume felt a hand fall around her neck and a familiar voice said, "So you're the cause of all this, young lady. I might have expected this." Too late Perfume recognized her danger as she was hauled out of her cubbyhole by the scruff of her neck, the grip of the Pirate Queen effectively paralyzing her as Lao held her up for closer examination, sniffing in a disapproving manner before saying, "Well, what you sow you reap, and what a happy coincidence that you should have led Nabiki into this particular corridor of all the decks and levels of my ship." Perfume would have struggled and possibly even scratched her way to freedom, but the pain of being gripped this way held her immobile as Lao turned and--- momentarily ignoring the plight of her two henchwomen---carried the Neko-form of the Amazon Enforcer to a particular doorway that she then forced open with one hand. The heavy wood slid to the side, exposing a dark chamber that was barely illuminated by the ever-present ship lichen. Lao then conjured up a ball of water and heated it to the appropriate temperature before dousing it over the cat, then tossing the transformed Perfume into the room and sliding the door back into place behind her. "Now then," Lao smiled, "It think I've let Lotus and Blossom suffer enough for their carelessness. As clumsy as they are, they are still my friends, and friends must look out for one another, eh what?" The sound of her voice distracted Nabiki from consummating her vengeance and she turned with an inhuman snarl as she caught sight of her true quarry. Lao just held her ground and waved at her, then pleasantly chimed out, "Here kitty-kitty- kitty! Come and get me if you want me!" Nabiki-neko needed no further invitation, shoving Blossom rudely to the ground and turning at once to spring with an incredibly powerful bound towards her ultimate tormentor. Lao smiled as she waited for the Nekoken-possessed girl to come within arms reach then moved with great speed to shove the door behind her to one side, side-stepping a lunge as Nabiki sailed right past her and into the darkened chamber where an astonished Perfume looked up with rounded eyes, seeing her co-wife about to collide with her entirely naked body. Lao slammed the doorway back into place and hastily barred it with a heavy wooden beam, then listened to the sounds of a commotion taking place within the reinforced and heavily padded chamber as Perfume attempted to calm down a ravenous Nabiki. There was much yelping and howling for several minutes, and then a sudden calm settled over the room as matters resolved themselves with a finality that was almost chilling. Lotus pried herself out from underneath a semi-stunned Blossom and said, "My lady...is she...?" "Fortunately for my cousin," Lao nodded, "Nabiki is not so far gone into her berserker state that she fails to recognize a familiar scent. A good thing I prepared this chamber in advance for just such an emergency or things might have been...more difficult for all concerned parties." "You mean...?" Blossom asked. "That they should be a bit busy in there for the next hour or so," Lao replied, "I believe I will wait a bit before disturbing them...no sense in riling Nabiki any further up than she is already. Now, as for you two..." Lotus and Blossom hung their heads in shame, the former saying, "We have failed you lady, we deserve to be punished..." "I believe that you already have been," Lao replied, "And with sufficient gravity that I am certain you will not soon forget the lesson. Never turn your back on a Tendo...they are a surprising lot and should never be underestimated. Consider the same thing true of Saotome and my cousins. I warned you that there was a danger of Nabiki freeing herself prematurely, but now you should appreciate this better the next time you tie her up and leave her hanging." "Mistress," Blossom said, "You are more merciful than we deserve..." "I know," Lao replied, "But if I punished you for every time you make a mistake I would never get any work done around here. I value you too much to lose you to carelessness, so be mindful not to lower your price by getting yourselves too damaged." Both of her loyal retainers were about to bow in respect of her mercy when a sudden crashing noise was heard on one of the upper decks. Lotus whirled around and said, "What the heck was that?" "It sounded like an explosion," Blossom reasoned. "No," Lao said with a look of concern in her expression, "It's worse...MUCH worse! Get to the bridge and hold her steady on course. I'll deal with this emergency by myself." The two sidekicks knew better than to argue with their Mistress and so headed off towards the stairwell. Lao knew that it would take too much time to reach the upper decks by going the conventional route, so she called up one of her Undine servitors and had her minion form a dimensional portal. With one leap she exited from the portal conjured up by another servant, just in time to see her loyal cadre of Mercenary Marines fighting a helpless defensive battle against a single woman who shrugged off their best assaults as though she found their very attempts to be personally insulting. "{GUNS?}" she snarled in colloquial English, "{You think you can take me out with your pop-guns? Get away from me, you losers!}"" Lao did not have to ask who this was, her borrowed memories informed her that this was the formidable Joan Wayne, daughter of a half-Kryptonian and a Green Lantern, and that she was no casual stranger to dismiss in an off-handed manner. "Why me?" she sighed, not bother to wait to hear a litany of her offenses to the heavens. Instead she raised her voice and called out, "ALL UNITS FALL BACK AND REGROUP! CEASE FIRE AT ONCE, THAT IS AN ORDER!" So great was the conditioned obedience of her crew that her minions at once stopped wasting ammunition with small arms fire and instead moved away from the sight of a one-sided battle. Joan contemptfully tossed aside one mercenary who had come too near to her reach and oriented upon Lao, saying, "{Are you the fuck-nut who put the grab on my mother?}" Even knowing full well that there would be pain in the answer, Lao faced her foe squarely and said, "{I am the Captain of this ship...my name is Lao Kahn...}" "{Big whoop-dee-doo," the bleach blonde replied, and all at once she moved with a rush that was as superhuman as the force behind her fist. Even rolling with the punch Lao felt the blow to the roots of her intestines as she went slamming back through the wooden wall behind her and kept right on going until she hit the second wall, then the third, each time feeling worse for the travel. Master that she was of hydrostatic shock, Lao felt her body reeling from the force of that single blow, immediately coming to the conclusion that trading blows with the other woman was not a very good option. Fortunately her minions did not wait for her instructions before throwing themselves in the path of the charging woman, hardening their bodies to form a wall-like consistency as Joan slammed into their mass and temporarily rebounded. "No further, you!" one Undine cried. "You shall not harm our Mistress!" declared a second. "Not without going through us first!" promised a third. "{What the fuck are you jabbering about?}" Joan snarled, clearly not understanding the language of the elementals, "{GET THE FUCK OUT OF MY WAY!}" With that she slammed her fist into the mass of the elementals, hard enough to sent a shockwave that reverberated through their bodies and tore their semi- solid mass into so much loose water droplets. This barrier to her further progress removed, she stalked up towards Lao, who was only then just beginning to recover. "{Still got your head attached to your neck, huh?}" Joan declared, "{Well, if you wanna keep it that way you'd better produce my mom and quick!}" She seized Lao by the collar of her shirt and lifted her off the deck, raising her other fists to deliver a blow that was bound to be fatal, yet in spite of this Lao smiled at her and seemed unusually calm for some reason. "{Far be it from me to separate a mother from her child,}" Lao said simply, "{And ordinarily I would be happy to accommodate your wishes, but...I don't negotiate from a position of weakness.}" "{Your loss,}" Joan replied, her fist already rocketing forward, only to go right through the body of Lao, which rippled and shifted to form a solid shape that imprisoned said fist, "{W-Wha-at?}" "{Like mother, like daughter,}" said a voice off to one side, "{I never would have expected that you would both fall for the exact same trick.}" "{H-Hey!}" Joan tried to free her fist, only to find this particular Undine's grip was tenacious. "{An amazing thing about the element of water,}" Lao remarked as she conjured up a plane of glass-like liquid with one hand and cradled it in one arm as though she were holding a violin, "{It is incompressible and yet can be hardened by simply polarizing its molecular structure to a hardness worthy of diamond. Another feature is that it produced an interesting array of sounds when you harden it...like this..." And with that Lao conjured up a stone-like object, which she then began to rub against the flat sheet with the roughened surface, producing a sound that was at once both harsh and eerie and caused the very air to vibrate at the key of frequency similar to scraping your fingernails against a chalkboard...only much, MUCH louder! The result was that Joan cried out in pain and with her free hand tried to block out the sounds from one eardrum, even as Lao played the sound again with slow and easy rhythm, vibrating the air with a nerve-jangling acoustic that would make whales turn and blanch for miles in all directions. For Joan it caused the mother of all hangovers and drove her to her knees, almost weeping for the pain she evidently suffered. "{I am very sorry to do this to you, truly,}" Lao remarked as she continued to play the sound until Joan finally passed out, "{I must make apologies to your mother, but---as with her---I feel that I had no choice about the matter. You are much too dangerous to let roam about unencumbered...and I do owe you for nearly dislocating my jaw just now. You understand this, right? I thought so.}" Joan did not reply, being already unconscious. Lao sighed and banished her water-conjurings, then knelt to examine her new "guest" to insure that she was not faking her condition. Satisfied that Joan Wayne would not be springing up and causing her immediate trouble (and giving her a nerve pinch just to insure she did remain unconscious, Lao lifted the woman into her arms and carried her off in the direction of the nearby stairwell... "What happened?" Alison asked, "It looks almost quiet down there...if you overlook the big hole in the deck and all that other collateral damage I can see..." "I am detecting some movement," Beatrice noted as they circled around the large wooden ship, "Mostly crew, doing what amounts to makeshift repair work, but no signs of an ongoing altercation." "Could matters have been resolved this soon?" Kodachi said in disbelief, "Forgive me for jumping to conclusions, but the impression I had of your sister was that she was not the quiet sort who can be talked down all that easy." "I don't believe this!" Alison exclaimed, "First Martha and now Joan? Just how powerful is this Lao character anyway?" "I suspect that we are about to find out the answer to that question," Beatrice mused, "Because, unless I miss my guess, that figure standing astride the bow is none other than the elusive captain." "It appears that she is...waving to us," Kodachi remarked, "I believe that we have been spotted." "I concur," Beatrice said as she brought the plane around to a near-hover once again, "I do believe that she is bidding us to land...but the deck does not appear large enough to support a jet of this size..." "Just wait for it," Kodachi mused, "You're about to see that our Mistress is prepared for every occasion." "Your Mistress," Alison sniffed, "Not mine." "Whatever," Kodachi smiled with a look of serene contentment... "There they are, Mistress, as we reported," Lotus indicated the circling ship. "About time they arrived," Lao mused, "And invisible plane...yes...that is about what I would have expected." "Excuse me, Mistress?" Lotus blinked, "Do you mean to say that you expected them to show up here?" "I knew sooner or later that they would be unable to resist coming to pay us a visit," Lao replied, "Have the crew deploy the helipad to receive them...that plane should just about fit on the raised platform. I want every courtesy of hospitality to be afforded to our guests. They are to be treated fairly and hot restrained in any way. Kodachi and Keiko-chan are with them, and we ought to greet them in the manner of a homecoming." "Very good, Mistress," Lotus replied, "It will be exactly as you wish it. And...what of the other matter concerning Nabiki?" "Let me worry about that one, old friend," Lao replied, "I must now play hostess once again, only I hope this visit will be more cordial than the last. I shall also have to inform Martha that her loved ones are here...and that may take a bit more explaining when I inform her that her daughter is presently in the company of the Kraken." "I do hope she won't be too mindful or resentful, Mistress," Lotus replied. "Me too," Lao agreed, "But...I'm getting the most curious sensations...I do believe that our dear Joan has been a very naughty girl and has been ingesting illegal substances that have messed up her constitution. Perhaps that would explain why she was so easy for me to take down...I dare say she could have put up quite a fight if she had been battling with all of her senses clear of internal rubbish." "Children these days," Lotus nodded. "Tell me about it," Lao smiled, then paused before gaining a somewhat distracted air, then saying, "I believe the other matter concerning Saotome can be postponed for a little while. Such an interesting fellow, and my Breeze seems to like him." Lotus cocked an eyebrow at that but said nothing, knowing how lonely her adopted "Niece" had been of late, going through that "awkward" age when a young girl was on the verge of becoming a woman. That said girl had actually been born a man was, of course, a further complication, but such was the way things could be on the POJ, where the bizarre and unusual were the norm of everyday existence. Life was simpler when one allowed the Captain to weigh the great and heavy issues of existence...but even given that freedom from having to contemplate the deeper meanings of her life, Lotus still had times such as these to pause and reflect on the strangeness of their existence. How would such things that they took for granted be viewed by outsiders? How would she---the Lotus of ten years back---view the Lotus of today, who was very different from the young and impressionable girl that she had been when following her friends into voluntary exile. Then she shook her head and dismissed such concerns, having duties to fulfill as she gave the orders that would be needed to set the landing pad into place. These visitors, two of them strangers, would be greeted with honor as though welcomed into the village of Joketsuzoku, and the Nyanchiczu knew how to present themselves as a proud and noble people. Let come what may, Lotus would continue to fulfill her duties as the trusted servant that she was, leaving it to her Mistress to decide what else would be their fate. It was safer that way, not to mention allowed her to sleep better at nights, though whatever her Mistress had planned this time around was likely to get messy, in which case the sensible thing would be to go hunting for the nearest fox hole. Of course, Lotus silently reminded herself, if she were a sensible person she'd had stayed in bed at home in China... Continued. Comments/Criticisms/Chippendales of Joketsuzoku: shadowmane@ridgenet.net Lao plays the hostess while the Kraken chews the fat with Joan, and Martha has to make a fateful decision, while Nabiki and Perfume have a nice, friendly "discussion." Will Ranma hit it off with Breeze and become the next recreational counselor for the POJ, or will he strike out as a role model? Find out next time in: "Scoring at Home Plate," or "The Family ties that Bind and Gag!" Be there!