Chapter One

Hissssssss… 

Ranma woke with a start, one hand coming up reflexively to touch the spot of pain at the base of his neck. He could feel his heart beating in his chest, fast and strongly; each beat echoed in his ears. He could feel a thin sheen of sweat forming on his hands.

Did I have a nightmare? He couldn’t remember any dreams, but that didn’t necessarily mean anything; he’d often forgotten dreams. But he’d usually remembered that he’d had them… he had no such memory this time. He looked around the dark room carefully, wondering if something in the real world had disturbed him, but there was nothing. His senses, as sensitive as a cat’s whiskers, – he shivered at the metaphor - detected nothing. All was peaceful. 

Shaking his head, he laid back down to go to sleep. Surprisingly, it came quickly.

***

When he woke up that morning, the memory had faded and grown fuzzy, and he assumed it had been a dream. Yawning, he stretched and headed towards the bathroom to get ready, leaving the oversleeping panda behind in the room.

Once he was washed and dressed, everything felt normal again, and he actually found himself looking forward to the day. It had gotten off to a good start, at least, with his father oversleeping; Ranma had noticed that he was more likely to do that if he slept as a human rather than in his cursed form. Ranma had never understood why the old man liked to sleep as a panda so often – but then again, he had never really cared. As long as he didn’t have to acquire the habit himself, it was fine.

He walked downstairs, noticing that he was the first one up. That wasn’t unusual; he was usually one of the first ones up anyway, it was just the crack-of-dawn spars that made him constantly late in the morning.

Kasumi seemed a bit surprised to see him up. “Oh, good morning, Ranma,” she greeted him with a pleasant smile. “Breakfast isn’t quite ready yet, I hope you don’t mind.”

“It’s okay.”

Kasumi smiled and nodded again, then turned her attention back to the dining room table, which she was straightening. It only took her a few more seconds to complete the task, and then she headed back into the kitchen.

Ranma blinked as Kasumi passed him. What was that… he had suddenly been reminded of his dream. Ignoring it, he absently rubbed his sweaty hands off on his pants and turned on the television. Anything to fill the silence.

It wasn’t long before the others awoke and he had to turn the TV off, though. But he had other things on his mind, this time. The feeling that he had had earlier came back. With a vengeance. It seemed everyone caused some sort of reaction with him… he sensed something… just like with Kasumi, just like his… dream. 

But everyone else acted normally. The flurry of emotion and activity unnerved him now, rather that just seeming normal. He tried his best to ignore it, but that proved impossible – he could hardly hold a pair of chopsticks to eat with; it seemed that he had barely wiped the cold sweat off his palms before his hands were coated again. 

He had managed, with some care, to hold a mug long enough to sip some tea. His attitude was earning him some weird comments, but he heard them as if they were part of a conversation that a group of strangers was having. Suddenly the mug slipped; it was all he could do not to drop it. 

“P-chan!” Akane exclaimed. He heard that one, and looked up just in time to see Akane stand and rush past him – causing more of the hairs on the back of his neck to stand on end – to pick up her pet, where he had apparently entered the room. Ranma turned. His danger sense was flaring like he could hardly remember it doing so before; he wondered if Ryouga was in a particularly bad mood, although his cursed form wasn’t a threat. 

The cup fell, and shattered, from his nerveless fingers at what he saw.

P-chan had indeed shown up. But it wasn’t the P-chan that Ranma remembered. Instead, it was a pig-shaped… robot. There was no other word for it. It gleamed metallic silver, and its eyes glowed bright green. Cords of wiring were visible at its  joints when it moved, taking a step forward and lifting its head slightly to greet Akane. She didn’t act as if she noticed.

But that wasn’t what elicited a reaction from Ranma so much as the fact that Ryouga, human Ryouga, stood behind the automation. His eyes were dead and his body limp, but he mimicked the motions of the ‘pig’ somehow, the movement not seeming natural. 

What caused Ranma to suddenly faint was the fact that he could see the back yard, albeit a little dimmed and dark, right through Ryouga’s translucent body.

***

~Mordain

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