The leader took one look at the startled humans in the room before him, and spoke in a low, gutteral voice. "Kill them! Our orders were to not leave anyone alive!"With a collective sneer, the five monsters advanced on the party, fangs dripping saliva in anticipation of the kill.
Walski hefted the sword grimly as he spoke. "You're not gonna get us without a fight, pal." He rushed one of the oncoming creatures and slashed downward with the wooden sword he held in both hands.
Almost smirking with its wide mouth, the creature easily caught the sword with one clawed hand. The acid slowly dripped from its fingertips as the wood began to burn and melt under the touch of the hand of the creature. Walski let go of the sword with a surprised yell, backing up quickly toward the group, which had backpedaled toward the woman that was buried under the rubble. Meanwhile, the creature took a hold of Walski's discarded weapon with both hands, breaking it in half as easily as a pencil. The creatures hissed as they advanced again, and the leader cackled with delight, capering behind them.
"Damn!" said Walski, cursing under his breath. "What kind of things _are_ those?"
"This might be the end.." said Rex ominously, holding the umbrella he had stolen from the prop room in front of him, for all the good it would do.
Laura took a defensive stance. She'd had some kind of martial arts training in the past, but what kind of moves would work against creatures like these? *One swipe of those claws in a bad place and I'd be history* she thought, looking at the creatures.
Emily stood up, walking in front of the group. "You can't hurt that woman underneath those rocks. I won't let you!"
The leader made a throaty sound akin to a laugh. "Get out of the way, girl. We do what we want." WIth an upward flick of his wrist, he let the whip in his hand fly. It snapped in front of Emily's face, and giving a yelp, she backed up, holding her face. Her hand came away with blood and a thin red line appeared across Emily's face where the skin had been broken. She winced in pain.
Something snapped in Laura. Moving in front of Emily, she placed herself between her and the advancing creatures. "Back off," she said simply to the enemies in front of her. Even the others somewhat recoiled at her tone of voice.
The leader merely laughed again, it's fellow creatures laughing along this time with a chattering of teeth. "Don't you learn the first time?" He raised his whip to strike Laura as he did Emily, then stopped short.
A blue aura came off of the short-haired girl.
At first, the aura was only visible as a thin outline of her figure, as if a blue-colored string had traced the contours of her body. Then, as Laura continued to stare down the horrid monsters in front of her, the aura became thicker around her, surrounding her in a nimbus of blue light which clung to her body. For the merest of seconds, the aura's light could be seen swirling around her like a rippling pool, and then it seemed to descend down her body, bleeding off of her. The aura moved down her neck, past her waist, over her legs and into the ground. Laura sensed some unearthly power flowing through her, and it filled her with a strange sense of exultation and excitement. Pointing at the creatures, she said two words.
"You're finished."
The blue aura exploded from the ground below her, shattering the concrete she stood on to reveal the brown earth. The aura had manifested itself in a tall blue column of light which seemed to surround Laura and place her at it's center. As the creatures began to recoil in fear and loathing, a long, thin, pinprick of light appeared above the blue column of light surrounding Laura. It moved, and grew wider, gaining shape and substance before the surprised eyes of friend and foe alike, until it coalesced into the figure of a human...a human male wearing Chinese-style clothes and a pigtail.
The figure which floated above Laura was Ranma Saotome, as determined as Laura was, with the look of the fight in his blue eyes.
Laura then heard a voice in her head, a voice she knew to be Ranma's. It was ceremonial, formal. It said, ^I am you. You are me. I can help you.^ Then, the voice became suddenly commanding, losing all formality. ^Laura! Just listen to me and you can do it!^ Laura sensed the knowledge of something entering her head. Moving instinctively, and as one, Laura and the spirit image of Ranma both moved toward the creatures in one motion. The words came into Saotome Laura's head as she attacked the first creature nearest her , yelling "Kachu Tenshin Amaguriken!" in sync with the inner voice of Ranma that had entered her. Seemingly unaware of anything but her target, Laura's fists flew at the creature in front of her , her attack becoming a blur of flailing arms and hands before the eyes of those watching her. Above her, the image of Ranma performed the same motions, perfectly in sync with Laura's.
The creature being attacked snarled, this time not in glee but in pain. As it was assaulted by the rain of punches that Laura was throwing, it futilely put up its thin arms to shield itself from the attack. Large marks appeared on the creature's skin, and it bled green blood. As Laura threw one final punch to the creature's face, finishing the attack, the creature screamed as it flew through the air, becoming insubstantial before it hit the ground and winking out of existence.
The remaining creatures stepped back from the short-haired girl standing before them with the column of blue light surrounding her. But the leader doggedly whipped them forward. "Finish her! She is one, you are many. She will die under your claws and teeth. Attack!" growled the leader creature. The creatures who remained lumbered forward at the leader's harsh words, obviously fearing the whip of their leader more than the force in front of them. Laura braced for the attack, ready to use her power again.
But then, Walski was there. Having leapt to the attack as soon as the creatures began to advance, he charged at them. The Marine began to emit his own blue aura as he faced the creatures, standing next to Laura. As his aura bled off of him and then rose up to surround him in a column of light similar to Laura's, a wooden sword materialized in his hand. Taking a hold of it, he held the bokken out in front of the creatures. He grinned. The image of Tatewaki Kunou, the Blue Thunder of Furinkan High, blazed above him as he spoke. "Let's try this again, shall we? I think I'm ready this time." Pausing briefly, as if hearing some unheard instruction, he then took a battle stance similar to that of a kendoist's. The spirit of Kunou seemed to look grimly at the enemy as his stance was mirrored by Walski's own.
The same creature that had caught his weapon before leapt at the Marine, meaning to break his weapon a second time and then kill him. Laura leapt back as the creature bounded toward her, and then lauched itself at Walski, intending to slip past the bokken that Walski had to get at him with its acidic claws. However, the creature had no such luck this time. Walski's grin turned into a serious look as his blue column of light seemed to flare up. Leaning forward, he shouted "Twin Blue Thunder Slash!", slicing the air in front of him in an X with his sword at the moment the creature reached him. The creature moaned in pain as two deep scars appeared on it's front. Falling silently to the ground, it too disappeared into nothingness.
As a third creature lunged, it too screamed in pain as an opened umbrella whizzed around and laid open the creature's gut. It groaned as it bled and fell back, disappearing. The umbrella moved back around, as if by magic, and came back to Rex, whose own blue column had appeared, and glowed with unearthly fire. His look of determination was a reflection of the stare of the spirit-like Ryouga Hibiki just above him. He held the umbrella again, preparing to throw it again.
The fourth of the creatures slinked around to the quiet Lori, who had silently watched in amazement as her friends battled the strange creatures and won. She backed away tentatively as the reature's face split in a wide grin, the hiss of its' throat only outdone by the hissing of the floor as the acid that dripped from its claws burned away the floor. It swiped once, and Lori jumped back, horrified. As it advanced again for a second strike, Lori gave out a scream and held her hands out in a warding-off gesture. "Get _away_!" said Lori as the creature's claw reared back, poised, and then swiped down to strike...
An invisible shield.
The shield had suddenly formed in front of the creature, around Lori. She opened her eyes and found that a blue column of light surrounded her from head to toe, and also encompassed by some invisible barrier that she unknowingly had created. She also felt and heard a presence in her mind, the source of the power which she was currently using. The presence was saying something, and as Lori strained to hear it, she made out the words. It seemed to be speaking to the creature, who was howling as it raked its claws over the shield in impotent fury.
^Oh my...you are the aggressive one, aren't you? Be nice, now....^ Lori blinked, recognizing , without ever having heard it before, the voice of Kasumi Tendo.
The creature continued to beat its fists against the shield as Lori was calmly wrapped in her reverie. Bradster had in the meantime seen that Lori was being attacked. Throwing caution to the wind, he charged the creature headlong, feeling something building inside of him. Unaware that a blue nimbus surrounded him and had exploded into a column of light as he ran, he reached the creature in a couple of strides and instinctively lashed out at it with his fist, yelling something he could not hear over the roar of his aura. The creature, taken completely by surprise, never had a chance. Bradster's fist blurred forward and caught the fanged beast on the side of the face, sending it flying through the hole made by the wall leading to the next room. Its surprised shout suddenly cut off as a sickening crunch was heard. Bradster looked at his hands, which were outstretched curiously. In his hands he held a swan-shaped potty. He blinked and drew his hands back. The object disappeared.
The lead creature watched in horrified surprise as the humans who he thought would be easy to destroy had instead dispatched his entire fighting force. Its fear grew as the humans turned toward him, the only remaining creature left in the room. Recoiling from the blue auras of light surrounding each of them and the grim-looking images hovering above them, it growled once, and then turned, running from the room. Its feet could be heard flapping on the debris-filled floor as it fled.
The group relaxed as the creature retreated. Almost at the same time, the blue columns they had created and the images that floated above them shrunk and disappeared down into the earth, bleeding back into the ground they were standing on. Standing in different places in the room, they looked at each other in silence.
Walski was the first to speak. "Errr...ok..." he began nervously, his hand going behind his head, the bokken having somehow disappeared from him. "Anyone mind explaining to me what in the hell that just was..?"
Rex was staring at the umbrella in his hands in disbelief. "Man...I thought that that was going to be the proverbial last act, the closing of the curtain....I thought that we would be like once-offs...never to be seen again...how....?"
Laura looked around at her friends. "This has got to be that power that Rijk was talking about......could this have been....Persona?"
"You are correct," a new voice echoed. The group looked toward the source of the sound.
To Persona Ranma, Chapter 4, part 2
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