[FFML] [Fanfic][Ranma / X-COM] The Road to Cydonia Chapter 25

[Justin Wagner]

Ah, an update! I'd hoped to have more chapters done by this
point in time, but circumstance didn't work out that way.
This chapter is half again as long as normal to compensate
a little for the wait.


As always,
Previous chapters of TRTC can be found on FFN
http://www.fanfiction.net/s/2314624/1/The_Road_to_Cydonia

or on my site (which also hosts a UFOpedia and Character Info)
http://www.wagnergrp.com/JBW_Website/Fanfiction/TRTC.htm


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For six years, mankind has waged a Secret War against an enemy from
Beyond the Stars. The UNETCO timetable moves ever forward, but a new
complication has arisen as the alien forces in the Far East surge out in
unexpected numbers and with surprising fury. Though the Sirius
Conspiracy has been crushed, Cologne and the other corrupted martial
artists are among the aliens, refining the development of alien hybrids.
With Mousse and Shampoo in America with Perfume, India Squad heads off
for a mission without him - participating in a trap of Ranma's design.

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The Road to Cydonia

Chapter XXV
Doppelganger

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Written by:
Capn Chryssalid
jbraveboy at gmail.com

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Somewhere in China

"Hey. You guys think Ukyou would go out with me?"

Ryouga looked up from the partly dismantled weapon in his hands to stare
at his team mate. "Excuse me. What was that?"

"Ukyou," Ryu said again. He had a perfectly straight face, too, which
meant he hadn't been kidding. He had already finished cleaning the
ejection chamber of his carbine style plasma rifle, but he hadn't
reattached the Aimdot or optical sight yet. XCOM-make laser and plasma
weapons were customizable to a significant degree, and most soldiers
preferred to reuse the same weapon over and over. As martial artists as
well as soldiers, it fell to them to incorporate the weapons into their
personal styles. It was an experimental and iterative process.

"Well?" Ryu asked again. "Do you think she'd go out with me?"

"Why would you even want to ask?" Ryouga asked right back.

"Come on..." Ryu replied, as if the phrase was, in and of itself, enough
of an answer.

"Ahhh, the fair Ukyou," Kuno mused from where he practiced nearby,
trying to adjust to the weight of his own plasma carbine as he stepped
into a sword draw. Kuno's style was the most rigid of all his peers' so
it took a fair amount of practice for him to adjust to the use of new
weapons and other gear. It also hurt that he wasn't naturally
ambidextrous like most of the other Nerima crew. Not willing to accept a
small handicap like that, he had started work on a sword drawing
technique that incorporated letting go of the weapon and moving it out
of the way without losing speed or momentum.

"Yes, I did ask the maiden out once, myself..." The swordsman directed a
haughty grin towards his comrades. "That cur, Saotome, somehow convinced
her to wear a proper school uniform and I found myself smitten, then and
there. A vision of loveliness... fragile, but fierce! ... so fierce..."

"She hit you with her spatula, didn't she?" Ryouga asked; a droll
expression on his face.

Kuno's perfect teeth sparkled. "Twas quite a blow."

Ryu shook his head sadly. "Did you actually ask her out or did you just
latch onto her like you do with Akane?"

The kendoist just chuckled. "Women appreciate gestures of affection, my
friend. Consider that some free advice."

"Yeah. I'll remember that..." Ryu turned back to India Squad's
Lieutenant. "You know what I mean, though. Ukyou's pretty... pretty hot,
isn't she? And she's a martial artist, just like us, and she's..." He
searched for a word, obviously a little unsure how to talk about this
sort of thing. "Spirited, I guess. I've never met any other girls like
her."

Ryouga lolled his head to the side and sighed. "I guess I can see what
you mean. I thought she was pretty cute, too, when I found out she was a
girl."

"You ripped off her shirt, did you not?" Kuno asked between practice
swings.

"NO!" Ryouga barked, blushing fiercely. "Who told you that?!"

"Twas the rumor I heard," Kuno replied with a casual shrug.

"Yeah, well..." He scowled, trying to force away his embarrassed blush.
"Just so we're clear: RANMA popped her top. And then the bastard kicked
me into a wall."

"Why would Ranma...?" Ryu started to ask, but then he remembered what
his squad leader had said in the past, particularly about how he'd
thought she was a guy at first, and figured it out. "You were about to
cave her head in, weren't you?"

"Huh!" Ryouga huffed defiantly. But he didn't dispute it.

"You guys have known her for two years, pretty much," Ryu reminded them.
"And she doesn't seem to be chasing after Saotome anymore...."

"I don't know about that," Ryouga interrupted. He had finished cleaning
his own plasma carbine, including the attached underslung grenade
launcher, and now took his time adjusting the optics arranged on the
flattop rail.

"You should remember that Ukyou trained for most of her life to fight
Ranma. She trained to get her revenge even longer than I did, thinking
of him as an enemy..." Ryouga looked down the length of the rifle, and
to his annoyance, he found it hard to imagine Ranma as a target to aim
for. He just didn't hate him enough anymore.

Maybe he never had.

"But when the time came, she didn't hate him," he said with a snort.
"She still loved him. Maybe it was a stupid childhood crush; maybe it
was true love. Who knows?  But I doubt she's really given up. More
likely, she's just putting things on hold for a while."

Ryu frowned. "But he's going to marry Akane."

Ryouga grunted, and lowered his rifle to slightly adjust the scope.
"Maybe."

"Nonsense!" Kuno suddenly declared, but instead of stepping forward and
thrusting his sword upwards in dramatic fashion he simply turned and
spoke over his shoulder. "Do not mistake familiarity for affection!"

The two other martial artists stared at him in surprise for a few
seconds.

"Well!" Ryu eventually said, and with a smile. "That's actually pretty
deep, Kuno."

"Besides," Kuno then added with a grin. "Unlike a man, a woman is
permitted but one true love by the virtue of heaven. I believe we have
all seen how both Akane Tendo and the pigtailed girl yearn tearfully for
my affections!"

While the kendoist went back to practicing, laughing confidently at his
chances of hooking up with two women (one of which was actually a
heterosexual guy), Ryu and Ryouga exchanged glances that implied, 'why
even try and correct him?'

"Putting aside where you two would go on a date..." Ryouga returned to
the topic, though it seemed to annoy him slightly. "Why even worry about
it? I thought you wanted to take care of the Dojo thing first."

"That's the beauty of it," Ryu replied with a confident grin of his own.