The Brothers Saotome -- A Self-Insert Anime Fanfiction Multi-Crossover {Ranma 1/2, Sailor Moon, Gold Digger, etc.} Disclaimer: Aside from the characters that my friends and I portray, all characters, references to other anime series, etc. are property of their respective owners. Don't bother trying to sue me, I'm broke.... What happened last time: Chapter 4: Perverts, Peebos, and Mousse, Oh My! ()- other languages, FYI's ~~- thoughts <>- Sound effects **- Written Dialogue *********** A few hours later..... *********** Ken stood on the roof of the Tendo home, and for one of the first times in his life, he was actually nervous! He kept pacing from one side of the roof to the other, trying to delve why it was he was so nervous about whether Nabiki decided to join him. After awhile he figured out that the answer was obvious: he'd never really had much of a chance for any romantic relationship in his lives. Either of them. Even back when he was still Josh Garrett, he could have counted the number of girlfriends he had on one hand. Now, with the advent of his 'second-childhood' and the whole 10-year training journey, nothing had changed. After all, it's difficult enough to have a long-distance relationship with someone who stays still, it's absolutely impossible to do it with someone who's continually moving about the country. On top of that, there was the FACT that he had lost his control over his sexual impulses last time he'd been around Nabiki, and if he was going to have any chance with her, he knew he couldn't let such a thing happen again. The consequences of that happening... well, they just didn't bear thinking about. Stop this, he mentally chided himself. It's not like there's really anything else you can do about it right now, except to simply sit back and wait for sunset. One way or another, your conflict will end then, so stop worrying about it. So decided, he sat down on the Tendo roof and slowly watched as the sun began to dip below the horizon, and the sky began to turn a bright brownish-gold. *** Nabiki looked into the mirror to check her appearance and, nodding at herself and deciding that it was indeed satisfactory, turned and walked over to her window, undoing the latch and stepping out onto the roof. She found Ken sitting there, waiting for her on the opposite side of the house. Picking her way carefully over, she nodded and sat down beside him, and the two of them sat in silence for a few moments, just watching the way the sky flashed in millions of brilliant colors. "Hi." "Hi." Nabiki smiled at the natural display before them. "Nice show isn't it?" Ken nodded. "Nature has a way of creating some of the most breathtakingly beautiful things you've ever seen." He sighed. "Unfortunately, it also has a way of doing just the opposite..." Again there was a moment of silence, before Ken piped up. "I owe you an apology." Nabiki looked over at him. "For what?" "For groping you like that. Both times. I haven't been able to forget about it, and I'd be lying to admit that I didn't enjoy it, but it's still not my right. I'm sorry." Now it was Nabiki's turn to smirk. "Don't worry about it. You're not the only one who enjoyed that." Ken had to take a second to get some moisture back in his throat after that comment, but decided to ignore it for now. Much safer that way. It was fortunate that Nabiki decided to change the subject at that point. "It must be hard, living under a curse like that..." Ken nodded silently. "That it is. But I've found that it's not nearly as awful as people tend to think. In fact, I could almost be grateful for the form I got." Nabiki arched an eyebrow. "How so?" Ken smiled. "Try to imagine what it's like to fly. Now imagine that your method of flight is by having a rocket strapped to your back. Now imagine that said rocket can turn on a dime and has reflexes which make most martial artists seem like sloths. Needless to say, the sense of freedom you experience from flying is already good. Now you get a high-speed rush to go along with it. Then of course, there's the fact that there's no denying I'm adorable as a ferret." "So it's not really a curse for you then, is it?" Ken shook his head. "Nope. Actually out of the four of us, only Ranma still considers his curse as a curse, and not some form of challenge or blessing." For the next few hours, they talked about various things. They spoke of some of the highlights of Ken's training trip to China, then switched over to Nabiki's life and the role she seemed to perform for her family. Nabiki found herself opening up to her arranged fiancee. "That reminds me," she found herself asking. "If Ranma and Duo really do turn into rather attractive women, do you think they would let me..." "...sell pictures of them?" Ken finished for her, as if he'd been expecting this (which he had, considering that Duo had told him a little about what Nabiki was like from the Canon universe). "It all depends. I can pretty much guarantee that Ranma won't agree to it. He's way to self-conscious about his curse. Duo, however, is a rather different story. I'm not certain, but you might be able to talk him into it. Granted, he'd probably ask for a share of the profits, or something, but it's a possibility." Nabiki sat pondering the prospects of this for a minute, but was snapped back to reality when she felt Ken's finger lifting her chin up and turn her head to face him. "Nabiki..." he said, his voice almost a whisper, his eyes seeming to stare into the depths of her soul "... I don't know how else to ask this, so I'll just do this my way. I need to know, before anything else happens... do you want to cancel our engagement? Or do you want to keep it for now? I'm not going to step out on a limb if you're not willing to try..." Nabiki's mind froze for a second. Did she really want to go out with this guy who was cursed to turn into a rat with wings? Did she want to risk what remained of her reputation at school as the Ice Queen of Furinkan High and possibly lose a powerful source of financial income by doing so? Did she truly want to chance it? The answer was obvious, though it took a second to hit her. Nothing ventured, nothing gained. So far, this boy had been kind and considerate toward her, he had shown himself as being easy to talk to and a good confidante, and the muscles she'd glimpsed on him that morning when he was sparring were a definite plus. "Yes. Yes, I want to keep it." Ken smiled and Nabiki felt him reach down to take her hand in his. Her skin felt hot where he touched it, and she felt her breath catch when he gently brought her wrist up to his lips. After a moment, he released her hand and turned away, beginning to sit down. Abruptly, her expression shifted into a frown and, reaching out, she grabbed the front of his shirt and hauled him over to look her straight in the eye. "Oh no you don't, buster. You're not skimping out on me like that, now you'd better finish what you just started." Ken blinked for a moment before he realized what she wanted him to do. Smiling, he ran his hands down her sides from her shoulders down to her hips and, pulling her against him, bent down and brought his lips to hers. *** "Why that sly dog! Duo, remind me to pat him on the back tomorrow." "Shhh. Be quite, Ranma. He'll hear us. "Ha! You must be out of your mind, Sugar! Look at them! They wouldn't notice us if we landed on their heads!" "Is true! Ken and Mercenary Girl numb to world right now. See?" It certainly looked like it. The two of them appeared to be caught up in an act of osculation that would make the face-huggers from Alien green with envy. "Shampoo, what are you doing?" "Ken show good technique. Shampoo take notes." "Shh! Everyone hide! They're coming out of it!" *** Ken finally pulled his face away from Nabiki's, and for a second they both just stared at each other. "Whoa." was all Ken could bring himself to say. "Yeah." Nabiki agreed. They sat there staring at each other for a few seconds, at which point Ken noticed that Nabiki was beginning to blush a rather deep shade of red. He quickly realized why, when he discovered that his pants felt a little constricting. He pulled his arms from around her waist and stepped back, turning around and clearing his throat. "Ah... umm... Sorry." Nabiki quickly regained her self control and chuckled. "Don't worry about it." Ken turned back to her, having managed to calm himself down enough so that he wasn't emberrassed, and had to clear his throat again before he could speak. "Well... it's getting late... I think you had better get some sleep. You do have school tomorrow." "Yeah... I guess that's true." Nabiki paused as a rather awkward silence settled in for a second. "Will you meet me here tomorrow night?" Ken smiled. "Definitly. I'm here almost every night, remember? I'm half tempted to bring my bed roll up here and make it a permanent arrangement." Nabiki smiled mischieviously. "That could be fun..." Ken stopped... "Ah... what do you mean by that?" Nabiki winked at him. "Oh nothing, Saotome." Ken sighed. "Okay. Sleep well, Nabiki." "You too." They both turned to go. "Oh yeah, one more thing, Ken." Ken turned back around. "Yeah?" Nabiki opened her window and prepared to go inside. "Save my ass like you did before and I'll do more than just kiss you next time." Nabiki winked at him again, then stepped through her window and closed it. Seconds later, the light flicked off. It took several minutes for Ken's eyes to return to their normal, non-dinner-plate size. Once they did, though he quickly shook his head to clear it of the images that produced. Suddenly, Ken's head shot to one side and a rather annoyed look crossed his face. He snorted, then headed into the house. A few minutes later, the light to his room winked out. *** "All right. It looks like he's gone to sleep. Let's go everyone. Tonight's show is over." "Couldn't agree more, Ranma-honey." *** Ranma, Duo, Ryu, Shampoo, and Ukyo all snuck silently across the Tendo yard, being careful to avoid the koi pond as they did so. However, just as they were about to open the door and sneak inside, a voice spoke up. "Going somewhere?" As one, they all froze as stiff as boards, then turned around. It was Ken. "Oops. We busted." Ken snorted. "You know, Shampoo, I don't know about the Joketsuzoku, but around here it's not nice to spy on two people while they're making out." "But Ken show such good technique! Shampoo want know how do that!" Ken chuckled at that. "Looks like you better watch out, Ryu..." Ryu just smiled. Ken turned to look at Ukyo. "And what about you, Ukyo? I always thought you were above stuff like this." "Oh please! Are you kidding! I never pass up an opportunity to play matchmaker." Ken chuckled again. "Hold on to this one, Ranma." Ken turned to face Duo and, grinning broadly, walked up and bopped Duo on the nose with his index finger. "Bad kitty. Bad." Duo hung his head and purposefully looked downtrodden. "Mrow...." They all broke up in laughter, just before a certain Lost Boy with a red bamboo umbrella vaulted over the wall shouting, "RYU SAOTOME, PREPARE TO DIE!!!!" ****** Ryoga Hibiki had found me again. Even though there's usually weeks in between the times that he does these 'surprise attacks' to me, I was really starting to get peeved at ever-mundain cycle he and I went through. I would have drawn out the fight longer, but it was late and I was beat. So after I dodged his umbrella attack, I dashed up close hit and unleashed a new take on an old move that I just managed to perfect. "SHINRYUKEN!!!" And in an instant, it was done. Ryoga was unable to move in time and the flaming spiral promtly sent him into LEO. "How long you think Lost Boy take to find us again?" I smirked a bit as I landed. "Four words Sham-chan: Don't Know, Don't Care." Then again, I probably should have cared considering where he landed... ****** A mountain range in the wilderness of Japan... ****** After staying airborn for a few minutes, Ryoga finally landed back on the ground after crashing into a rather large boulder blocking the mouth of a cave. As a storm began to rage above, the great stone guardian cracked and split in two, the protective charms along its sides no longer potent. 'IT' emerged into the chaos around it, the wrath of nature on a desolate mountainside, and smiled. It reared its head proudly into the storm. "PANTIES!!!" it cried, before falling asleep for a quick snooze. Happosai had returned. ****** After returning to Japan, Happosai wasted no time in getting back to his old tricks, stealing women's undergarments. This time, however, he knew he'd hit the jackpot! "Heehee! Triple E cup! In JAPAN! Unbelievable! Happy ol' boy, your luck's finally paid off!" the perverted old troll chortled with glee. He was disturbed from his reverie by something nudging his ankle. He kicked it away in irritation and continued rummmaging through his victim's belongings. "What in blazes is doing that!" He kicked again. "Alright, that's enough of that." He looked down at the floor by his feet. The thing that kept bumping into his ankle looked somewhat dome-shaped, had little racing fins, and seemed to be accompanied by an army of others of its kind. Happosai picked this moment to get curious, and picked the nearest one up. "What the hell is this thing? Some sort of toy?" It spoke, in a piping little voice. "You steal Mistress Brianna's underwear! You bad man. Go boom on you!" "AAAaaaaarrrrrgghhh...!" Off he went, into the wild blue yonder. "Peebos, follow!" ****** "Hold on a sec, Gina. My alert just went off." These were the words of Brianna Diggers as she interrupted her sister. "The Peebos again? Why did you bring those along?" Gina groaned. Here they were, on vacation in Japan, and Bri had to bring along those blast-happy bit bombs - the point was to try to get away from that kind of thing for awhile. No doubt their hotel room was history. Dad was going to freak! "Hey," Brianna said, ignoring her sister's exasperation. "They're moving en masse. That means they're following an intruder!" Gina's attention was caught. "Jinkies, maybe we should check it out then." Brianna, as usual, wasted no time in rushing to the action. Her sister, being unable to achieve running speeds in excess of 300 miles per hour, hit the recall button for the Ginamobile she brought on the trip. ****** Today, Genma and Soun were engrossed in the same discussion they usually were... "Look, Tendo! The Prime Minister!" "Huh? Where?" "Huh... must've been the sun in my eyes. Your move, Tendo." "I could've sworn I was winning just a minute ago..." They were about to be rudely interrupted, however. "Ack! Get away from me, you stupid toys!" The two fathers blinked as the small monkey-like creature ran across the shogi table. "Am I wrong, or was that... the Master?" In stereo, no less. Their day was further interrupted by a horde of little toy-looking devices shouting 'Peebo' as they rolled past. But before the two men could think further on this, a tall figure ran past at a speed that made it impossible to distinguish any features. "..." opined Genma. "..." Soun agreed. Sometimes, there's just nothing you can say about the situation. ****** School was over, and the younger Tendo sisters, Nabiki and Akane, were walking home. Accompanying them were six young people, in varying states of closeness. Ken was walking a discreet distance from Nabiki, but was still noticeably close to her. Shampoo was clamped so tightly onto Ryu that if she decided to pick her feet up off the ground and piggyback ride the rest of the way home, Ryu would hardly notice any weight difference. Ryu was trying to balance being embarassed at Shampoo's forwardness and happy at having her in the first place. Ranma and Ukyo were walking closely, side by side, and trying to hide the fact that they were holding hands as they went. Duo was being his typical feline self, distracting himself by playing hackeysack with a tiny pebble as he went along. "Would you stop showing off?" Akane grumbled, in irritation likely at another thing she could not do being done easily by someone else right in front of her. "Walk like a normal person for once, cat!" "Look, walking bores me. I'd walk normally if I had a good book or something to entertain me, but I don't. So, to entertain myself..." Duo sprung off the ground, flipped and spun, and landed walking backwards. "...I make walking unusual." Duo's ears suddenly perked and flicked a few times. "Uh-oh." "What uh-oh?" Ryu asked. "'Kitty-senses tingling'?" Ken wisecracked. "I'm getting something... coming this way at high speed..." With a start, Duo commanded, "Everybody jump to the fence, NOW!" Having grown used to Duo's cat senses and their seldom-inaccurate warnings, the Saotomes and their entourage jumped to the fence immediately. Nabiki was pulled along by Ken, and Akane was in turn dragged by Nabiki. Their curiosity was satisfied as a blurry chase strangely resembling a twisted scene from the Pied Piper of Hamelin passed by on the sidewalk and street. Duo waited a few seconds, then jumped down to the sidewalk. He listened carefully, and upon hearing nothing but city noise relaxed... "Okay guys, coast is-" ...and was promptly punished for dropping his guard. Apparently, cattish senses and reflexes aren't as fast as a speeding girl. "Hey, are you okay? Did I hurt you?" Duo, still dazed from the collision, attempted to answer the question. However, what was intended to be said as, "I'll be okay in a second, thanks" came out something like "Hello, breasts!" It was understandable that he said this, though, since the target of his vocal outburst was such a tall person that Duo was eye-to-sizeable cleavage with her when standing up straight. When he regained his senses, he was able to (very reluctantly) tear his eyes away from the bounty before them (and _what_ a bounty, being just barely contained within the owner's "Yes, They're REAL" t-shirt) and look up at the face of his new, accidental acquaintance. She was a pretty green-eyed blonde, with a pattern of spots in her hair, a vertical black stripe running over her left eye and down her cheek a ways, and a pair of feline ears. "Thanks for noticing," she said with a wicked grin. "But you didn't answer my question." Duo drew breath to answer her, but was interrupted by a sharp pain in his ribs. He winced and clutched his side. "Guess that's a good enough answer. Sorry about that. By the way, my name's Brianna. Brianna Diggers." "Duo Saotome. And don't worry about it, I heal really fast." "Maybe, but you ought to get those ribs looked at or they might heal the wrong way. I've been there, and it's no fun. Hold on, I'll call for a ride." Duo was about to point out that he could merely rebreak them and set them correctly if they did that (that's what he usually did) but thought better of it when Brianna started speaking into her wristwatch. "Hey Gina, I kinda ran into someone just now and he needs medical treatment. Looks like nothing serious, maybe a broken rib or two." Her watch answered back. "If it's nothing serious, then why bother?" "You'll see when you get here. This one's yummy! We're at..." Brianna rattled off the coordinates of their current location and cut the transmission. The rest of the group, who hadn't yet left the fence and had been watching the whole exchange, noticed the way the tall beauty had almost drooled when she mentioned Duo being "yummy". "...Womans' intuition telling Shampoo that brother of Airen about to get some," the Amazon noted in a hushed voice. The rest of the group sweatdropped. Brianna and Duo, with their greater sense of hearing, also caught Shampoo's outburst. Duo's thoughts were along the lines of "Gods, I hope so..." and "I should be so lucky." Brianna's were much more straightforward: "You'd better believe it, hon." and "Rrrrowrr!" It wasn't long before the Ginamobile pulled up beside them. The driver opened the doors and jumped out. She was also blonde, wore large round glasses on front of her blue eyes, and was of a height and figure that just barely edged out female Duo's in the knockout factor. She gave Duo's male body the once-over, grinned perversely, and gave a wink and thumbs-up to Brianna, who introduced the newcomer. "This is my sister, Gina. Gina, this is Duo Saotome." "Hi! Nice to meet you," Gina said, in that almost-predatory boy-hungry manner of hers. Duo returned her greeting and was ushered promptly into the backseat of the Ginamobile. Brianna followed shortly, intentionally sitting in leg-rubbing proximity to the catboy. The three-wheeled home-brewed auto was soon blasting down the street towards the hotel at a speed that would give a ticket-happy traffic cop an orgasm. ****** "... Finally, I lost 'em..." "PEEBO!" "Oh no..." 'Boom' does not begin to describe it. Suffice it to say, the old lecherous Anything Goes Grandmaster just barely managed to stay on the slow side of the line between "Low Earth Orbit Velocity" and "Exit Terrestrial Atmosphere Velocity". "My silky daaarliiiiings....!" ****** Back at the Dojo, the rest of us returned to find that something had been waiting for us. It was Peebochu, one of Brianna's favorite techno-toys, which then displayed a holographic message that it had been carrying. It said that Duo would be gone for a couple of days and that he'd be well taken care of. That I could understand. (What I couldn't understand was why they had to take Duo with them to America just so they could help him avoid aggrivating any unknown injuries that he might have.) Also, the message said that Brianna's family would arrive for a visit along with Duo when he got back. Once the message had stopped playing, Peebochu zoomed out the door and out of sight. "Shampoo?" "Yea Ryu?" "Something tells me your womans' intuition was right on the money this time." Suddenly, our collective train of thought was halted when a certain someone of diminuitive stature flew in through the window and latched himself onto Shampoo's ample bosom. "HOTCHA! These aren't the set I was looking for, but they're not that far off!" Now it usually takes a lot to get me mad, but when Happi glomped onto Shampoo like that, the ol' lech also found the PANIC button extra fast... "GET OFF MY GIRL YOU OLD FART!" ...and was promtly sent into LEO right after. ******** After a week or so, Happosai had his reputation as the town pervert firmly in place and whenever it came down to his attacks on the school, the duty of defending the female student body usually fell to one or all of the Brothers Saotome, depending on how hard the ol'lech was trying. One girl in particular, was finally reaching the boiling point... "WAAAAUGHH!! I CAN'T STAND IT ANYMORE!!!" Akane screamed at the top of her lungs. Both her and Sakura and gone shopping that particular day, and as the two of them sat down for a quick breather; all the hidden angst and agony just bubbled up to the surface all at once. "C'mon Akane, it's not that bad." Sakura reassured her distraught friend. With each panty raid ol' Happi attempted, each of the Saotomes continued to show their incredible skills time and time again, and the youngest Tendo began to feel more and more depressed and angry at her own abilities. "Oh yes it is Sakura! No matter what I do I can't seem to catch to those four. Even Shampoo and Ukyo are better than me!" With that, Akane fell into another bout of hysterics. Sakura gave a comforting smile and drew Akane into a hug. "You're selling yourself short, Akane...You HAVE been improving a whole lot, it's just they have too." That really didn't do much to lighten Akane's mood, in fact, it made it worse... But it did have the effect of drawing the attention of a VERY elderly woman carrying an oaken staff at least twice as big as she was. Then again, she herself seemed to be a little over 2 ft. tall. Managing to catch snippits of the conversation, she made her way towards the two girls by using her cane as a pogo stick. By the time she made it to them, Akane had stopped talking altogether in favor of using Sakura's shoulder as a crying towel. "*ahem*...Excuse me child..." The youngest Tendo sister stopped and looked up as did Sakura. "Forgive me for eavsdropping, but I couldn't help hearing you mentioning someone named Shampoo...You see, I'm looking for a girl with that very name right now, but I'm afraid that she hasn't given me much in the way of finding her." Akane, still sniffling a bit, just nodded her head while Sakura started talking for her. "Yea we know a girl like that...long purple hair, brown eyes, impressive figure?" The old woman smiled. "That's my Great Granddaughter exactly. Do you know where I might her then?" Akane nodded, and before long she and Sakura were leading the old woman to the Tendo Dojo. "By the way, Granny," Sakura asked, friendly as ever. "What's your name?" "Cologne...call me Cologne." As the three of them walked on, one thought moved through the Joketsu Matriarch's mind... ~I hope Herb comes to his senses, so I don't end up preparing these boys for war!~ ******** PREVIEW OF NEXT EPISODE: Duo: Well I guess I won't be heard from for a while...Anyway, in the next episode, the focus of our story leaves Nerima and settles on the quaint district of Juuban... You heard me right, Juuban, the very home of Sailor Moon and the Sailor Scouts. Maybe it's a good thing that I'll be away at the time... Brianna: Hey Honeytiger! Where'd you go?! Duo: Uh oh... anyway, all that and more is in the next episode: Moonlight Madness! We'll see ya there!