Disclaimer: Ranma ½ and its characters and settings belong to Rumiko Takahashi, Shogakukan, Kitty, and Viz Video. Bishoujo Senshi Sailor Moon belongs to Takeuchi Naoko, Koudansha, TV Asahi, and Toei Douga, and DIC.

*Bam-whack-pow…*

The horrific sounds of violence in the Teacher's Lounge could barely be heard all the way over in Rei and Ranma's classroom.

Ranma was STILL fighting to keep from dozing off. Somehow, even being reunited with a long lost friend and experiencing the dark powers of an evil alien from another dimension dispose of the aforementioned long lost friend wasn't enough to keep his attention for very long. Rei glanced at him and sighed, rolling her eyes. She had sneaking suspicions that he had been losing a lot of sleep over his recent inability to defend himself against people who had ki-based attacks.

It was almost enough, Rei mused, to feel sorry for the poor guy. He's had some bad experiences, like the training fiasco with the cats and the gender and clothes-changing curse. She'd almost be horrified if the whole thing wasn't so gosh darn hilarious.

Hilarious, one part of her mind considered, like how it was just so gut-burstingly funny how while she'd been spending her time thinking about how to tease Ranma about everything, she'd forgotten to do the mound of homework that was due in a couple of hours.

Rei took a sudden, sharp breath and scrambled for her bookbag.

While the part-time shrine-maiden-slash-martial-artist thought of ways to deal with her dilemma, Ranma opened one eye a crack and peeked at the lesson being taught, just in case they had gotten to the interesting part yet.

Hotaru-sensei had left a few minutes ago and the teacher of the current class definitely had a touch of… something in his manner. It might have been the way he stood straight as a pole, or perhaps it could have been the very prominent scar that crossed his face. Or it might have been the way he kept staring out of the window, his expression full of melancholy and woe.

Then again, perhaps it was the eyepatch and the skull and crossbones that covered the front of his black outfit, or the way his red-lined cape flapped in the breeze, even though the windows were closed and the air conditioning hadn't been used in months. Whatever the reason, it appeared as though he carried a huge load on his shoulders; a load only he could ever possibly hope to bear.

Bored by the long and monotonous explanation, another student, Hiroshi, slipped out a Kenshin manga from underneath his desk, and started reading. He hunched over it so that no one could see exactly what he was doing, holding a pencil in his right hand to make it look like he was taking notes.

The redheaded man in black finished his lecture, then turned to grab a wineglass off of his desk. He chugged down what remained of the red liquid and, with his long cape flapping dramatically behind him, faced the student body and speared them all with his sharp glare. Spying the sleeping boy beside Rei, he smiled slightly. "Saotome-san? Could you summarize my explanation?"

"Hmm? Wha…?" The pigtailed martial artist bolted upright and stared blankly at his teacher. "Uhhh, could you repeat that, Harlock-sensei?"

Harlock let out a long sigh and looked out of the window again for a few seconds, shaking his head. "Oh, my friends," he whispered to himself, "what a hard life this truly is…" With a sharp turn of his head, the man focused his attention back on Ranma. "Saotome-san, what are the merits of a True Man?"

"Oh," Ranma said. He folded his arms. "Well, being myself a Real, True Man among Men…"

Distracted from her efforts to do some homework in class, Rei tilted her head back and groaned, her mind reflexively shifting back into 'Must Tease Ranma™' mode.

"I know," the pigtailed youth continued, "that a True Man is a great martial artist, the best in the world. I… HE won't back down from ANY challenge," he cracked his knuckles, "he'll learn every technique, every way to beat his enemies, and when he has a son of his own," the boy's voice took on a serious, angry tone, "he WON'T TOSS HIM HALF A BILLION TIMES INTO A PIT OF STARVING CATS!!!"

Suddenly, Rei burst into laughter. "Oh," she said, "yes, I think he would!"

Ranma glared at her. "NO, HE WOULDN'T!"

The girl nodded and tried to calm down. She wasn't doing too good of a job. "Ha ha hah! If a true Man's Man can't handle a little thing like a pit of cats, what makes you think he's be able to handle anything else?"

"Reeeeeeeeeeiiiiiiiiii," Ranma growled at her with his eyes narrowed.

*KA-BATZM!!!* The class, suddenly jarred into full alertness by the loud concussive noise, directed their full attention to Harlock.

Hiroshi looked at the now-charred manga he held. His eyes went from the ashes of the paper, to the smoking hole in his desk, then the one in his in his chair and in the floor. Sweating, the boy looked at Harlock-sensei.

The brooding, dignified man held a large handgun to Hiroshi's forehead. Harlock looked sternly at the delinquent ex-manga-reader, his eye gleaming with an unyielding cold light. "You will pay attention while I teach."

"HAI! HAI!" Hiroshi cried in mortal terror.

"As long as you know that," Harlock whispered in a voice that could punch through steel and devastate entire fleets. He put away his weapon and turned to look at Ranma. "Saotome. Your ideas of the true nature of Man are badly skewed. Pay more attention in the future."

"Errrrrr," Ranma began, "yeah!" He nodded. "Right!" He leaned over to Rei and asked, "Sheesh, are all of the teachers here like this?"

"Like what?" Rei whispered to him out of the side of her mouth.

"Like psychotic killers with guns and magic?"

"You mean they weren't where you went, before coming to Furinkan?"

"Umm, well, sort of," Ranma admitted, cringing at the memory of more than one Junior High instructor. "But aren't there any normal people around here?!"

The raven-haired girl thought for a second. "Well, one of the P.E. teachers isn't so bad. Son-sensei's pretty laid-back." She paused. "Though he does like dying his hair blond a lot when his friends drop by…"

Harlock let out an agonized sigh and stared out the window for another few seconds before finally clearing his throat and placing a fist at his waist. "Tendo-san, could you please explain family values and the proper role of the father in a household?"

Mildly startled, Rei stuttered, "Um— er, the father!" She paused to think of what her father did. "He… mostly lounges around while all of the daughters take care of household responsibilities. He'll work when absolutely necessary, but he avoids it. He also does strange things like enga— er, handles things with other fathers, so I suppose he's more of the diplomat of the family." She smiled hopefully at her teacher.

The guest family values lecturer slowly nodded his approval. "Close— very close."

Rei breathed a sigh of relief. Getting called on in class was such a traumatic thing. Of course, what they did when you didn't turn in homework on time was worse.

The cute little pink-haired girl smiled broadly and raised her hand enthusiastically. "Me! Me! Pick me!"

Terada smiled. His newly transferred student was turning out to be a terrific addition to the class. "Does anyone besides Genma want to give an answer this time?"

Everyone shook their heads in disbelief, shocked by Genma's dazzling performance thus far.

The teacher chuckled softly. "All right, Genko-chan, take it away!"

Li Meiling gasped and her hand suddenly shot up when she recalled the answer, but it was too late: Genma had already half-finished her explanation.

"It was Nobunaga!" the rabbit-eared girl exclaimed with her eyes glistening and bright. "He conquered just about all of Japan! He did it!"

Terada nodded pleasantly. "That's right! And that's— what, eleven questions in a row? Yes, so let's have someone else answer the next one."

Meiling forced a smile— one of those annoyed, marginally angry smiles typically worn by those that had just been bested by a rival.

"Wow, this girl's SMART!" Tomoyo whispered in awe.

Similar surprised murmuring reverberated throughout the entire room. In fact, the only ones not acting impressed were Sakura and Meiling. Sakura had her eyes firmly centered on the cat-faced balloon floating over the pink-haired girl's left shoulder. "It turned into a pencil and now it's back to being a balloon. I'm DEFINITELY going to have to ask Kero-chan about this…"

Meiling's expression became slightly more tainted with jealousy when she noticed how Shaoran kept occasionally glancing back at Genma. "Have to keep an eye on her," she muttered quietly to herself.

Genma sat down and folded her little arms smugly. The test had been a breeze— she'd finished it early, and the history review had been pretty simple, too. In fact, she felt completely refreshed and ready to take on whatever else the teacher had to throw at her.

"All right," Terada-sensei continued, clapping his hands together. "We got the test out of the way, we did the review, and now we can get on with Show and Tell." He had the cheerful and enthusiastic sort of voice that somehow managed to keep all of his students awake and on the edge of their seats in anticipation of his next word. Somehow, this even started to affect Genma. "Who wants to go first?"

Genma's hand instantly shot up, followed by several others scattered throughout the class.

"Hmmm… How about you, Rika-san?"

A demure girl in the front row nodded shyly and started to fish through her bookbag. Something squirmed around inside. In a moment, she produced a blue ferret-like creature with a long bushy tail. "Terada-sensei," Rika began, standing and cradling the animal in her arms, "I want to present to the class my new pet. It's a—" She trailed off and looked down at it, trying to determine what species it belonged to. "Well, it's my new pet."

Rika smiled and held it up for all to see.

Genma hadn't looked up, doodling on a spare sheet of paper in front of her. "Whatever it is, it couldn't outdo Luna-P," she whispered confidently to herself. On a whim, she lifted her gaze toward Rika and her pet.

Rika's animal climbed onto her shoulders, looking around and curiously blinking at everyone. It crawled on top of her head and peered down the rows. Genma's hand went taut and she dropped her pencil. Luna-P puffed back into its balloon form.

Feeling a tingling all over her body, Sakura bolted upright in her chair.

Tomoyo noticed. "Something wrong, Sakura-chan?"

"I'm sensing," the brunette whispered, visibly awed, "Clow Reed's magic!"

Shaoran bristled as well. Meiling kept one eye on him.

Genma's eyes went wide in an expression of sheer terror. Her lips trembled and she pointed a finger at Rika's pet. "Sah-sah-sah," she stuttered, "S-S-S-S-S—"

Tomoyo glanced at Genma and gasped. "Sakura, look at the new girl!"

"What?" Sakura asked, as if being pulled out of a daze. Then she noticed how the pink-haired girl was acting. "Uh oh…"

"S-S-S-S-S-S-S-S-S-S-SSSSSSSSSSQUIRRRRRRRRRREEEEEEEELLLL!!!" Genma screamed in a shrill, high-pitched voice that had everyone covering their ears and yelling in pain.

Rika gasped and stared at her, agape and likely traumatized for life by the outburst. She stumbled backward, nearly falling backward on the front desk.

Its attention attracted by the noise, the four-legged animal tilted its head at Genma then, with a loud squeak, leapt over and latched onto her face.

"AAAAAAAAAAHHH!!!" the adorable little Pink Spore screamed long and loudly, flailing around and knocking over desks and students left and right, not daring to touch the horrible thing clinging to her ears and eyebrows. "GET IT OFF ME! GET IT OFF OF MEEEEEEEEEE!!!"

"Ah, Saotome-san!" Terada-sensei's mouth dropped open and his eyes went wide. He began to move closer in an attempt to remove the animal from the girl's face. Instead, Genma accidentally ran into him, knocking him and Rika to the floor.

"Waaah!" Rika cried. "My squirrel!"

"Do you see how fast she's running, Tomoyo?!" Sakura whispered urgently, standing up and moving away from her desk. "There HAS to be a Clow Card nearby!"

"Genko-chan!" the teacher called out as he struggled onto his knees. "It's harmless! Slow down! STOP— OOOF!"

"AAAAAAAAAAH!!!" Genma inadvertently kicked Terada in the ribs on her third screaming lap around the classroom. Still badly startled, the small, furry blue thing gripped tighter to the girl's face, absolutely refusing to let go. "SQUIRREL! SQUIRREL! SQUIRREL! SQUIIIIIIIIRRRRRRRRRREEEEEEEELLLL!!!"

"What the—?!" Shaoran coughed in disbelief when Genma continued running, barely managing to keep an eye on her as she crashed past him, landing on Meiling.

"Ow— Hey, watch it!" Meiling cried, shoving Genma away.

"WAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHH!!!" Genma continued to wail, prying in vain at the blue quadruped's unyielding grip. With the trained feet of one who had spent years practicing and the enthusiasm of a rodent on anti-depressants, she leapt about the room, toppling desks and students, spilling papers, and generally defying gravity by sprinting across the walls and upside-down on the ceiling.

Finally, the pink-haired child desperately flung herself face-first at the window, attempting to dislodge the offending object.

*KERRASH!!!*

Everyone collectively gasped in deep concern, and several, like Shaoran and Sakura, rushed toward the window. What they saw was almost as shocking as Genma's earlier performance…

The little girl in question had landed in the boughs of a large, leafy tree, right next to the blue creature. She chittered to herself, looking around with a jerky motion, her eyes wide.

After a moment of sitting up on the branch, holding her hands up to her mouth, she squeaked in glee and started bouncing happily from branch to branch to gather nuts and berries.

Usagi glanced anxiously at the clock, waiting in anticipation for the ever-so-rapturously sacred and religious moment when the bell would ring and her safe departure outside for lunch would be ensured.

Unfortunately, that fated time remained approximately an hour away. So, until then, she was stuck in her home economics class, learning how to make a dart on the front of a blouse. Usagi's eyes felt heavy, as did the rest of her skull. After about a minute of listening to the teacher, her face collided with the flat, cold surface of the desk in front of her.

Oh, Akiyama-sensei taught well enough, and had several years' experience in a wide variety of subjects. However, this bespectacled blue-haired lady, who could not have been a day over thirty-four, lately had the tendency to explain the subject matter with dewy eyes and a thick blush in her cheeks.

Usagi had barely managed to stay awake in the previous days of the class, when Akiyama Higure taught sewing with a fire-bred passion seldom seen even in deranged bipolar schizophrenic spider monkeys.

Rumor had it that the teacher had just gotten engaged. Usagi didn't know what the big deal was; from what everyone said, the guy was probably about three and a half feet tall, soft-spoken, and stricken with an advanced case of male pattern baldness.

Nothing particularly special about that, Usagi thought in a cynical stupor of thought. Now, getting engaged to a handsome, assertive, muscular six-foot-tall studmuffin with a full head of hair and the habit of wearing a black tuxedo with a cape and rescuing her all the time— THAT was something to get excited about. In fact, her personal goal was to get married well before her twenty-fifth birthday, and she had complete confidence in her ability to accomplish such a feat.

Sitting next to the blonde was Naru, who, keeping a low profile, slowly shook her friend awake. "Usagi-chan," she whispered urgently, "it's only been two minutes since class started! How could you have fallen asleep already?!"

"Ummgh?" Usagi replied thoughtfully. Her face was the site of a desperate Civil War reenactment, with the Federal forces of gravity and exhaustion firmly pressing down on the side of the South. One eyelid, caught in the battle between the Union and Confederate forces, struggled to hold its position like a good Confederate soldier. Then the Union made a brilliant counterattack at a critical moment, boldly pushing south and winning the war. Slavery to the chains of consciousness was severed all across the girl's brain and unity was restored. "G'night. Usagi sleep now…" She slumped back down onto her arms.

In a different universe, it would be more or less at this time that someone green and seal-like would jump out of the woodwork, hold up a sign, and protest the usage of such a metaphor. Fortunately, for those present, this was not the case in the current dimension.

Naru breathed out a long sigh and focused her attention back toward the teacher, who didn't seem to mind the fact that roughly half the class wasn't heeding her words of wisdom.

It was roughly when Akiyama-sensei opened her mouth to give a discourse on the importance of thimbles when a pillar of flame blasted past her, completely filling the space between the front desk and the faces of the students in the first row.

Too caught up in her own prenuptial bliss to care, the blushing teacher continued to explain the marvels of thimbles— how they prevent finger damage and such. She failed to notice that her voice was being drowned out by the roar of the fire and the noise of the explosions that currently rocked the building.

When that racket calmed down and the fire dissipated, many shocked and surprised cries of Junior High students could finally be heard from throughout the entire building. In total, the noise had been so loud, that it had almost awoken Usagi. Almost.

Naru stood up and shook her friend as the rest of their classmates ran out the door, completely throwing their fire-drill training to the wind in their rush to escape. "USAGI! WAKE UP! THE SCHOOL'S ON FIRE! AND IT'S GONNA BLOW UP!!!"

Usagi cracked open an eye and looked at the brunette. "Hmm? Whad, Naru? Schuulfire?" She took a deep breath and didn't take notice of all the sulfur and brimstone in the air. Finally she laughed and sat back down. "Oh, don't be such a worry-wart, Naru-chan!" she said, waving a hand as if to dismiss the topic. "If the school was on fire, then the fire alarm would go off, and THEN we could worry about what happens next. Thank you, g'night."

Naru clenched her teeth, slapped her forehead, and grabbed Usagi and the teacher, who was still staring dreamily off into space, and dragged them out of the room.

Dodging fireballs and sidestepping explosions, the only fully conscious female in the group bravely assisted the two semi-coherents in their quest to find their way down the steps and outside.

Halfway there, though, the trio ran face-first into a tall, spiky-haired eighth-grader. Usagi drowsily recalled that his name was Andrew— she remembered it because it was such a strange set of syllables. Ryu or Motoki, now THOSE were good boys' names. Anyway, some stray neuron fired in the back of her head and enabled her to bring to mind the fact that he had been acting rather strange and more obsessive than normal, plus he actually spoke good Japanese for the first time in his life earlier that morning.

Of course, Usagi didn't make the connection until she saw that he carried a pair of bubbling flasks of opposite colors and glowed with a thick, red aura. Actually, she might have missed those clues if it weren't for what happened next.

"YES!!!" shouted Andrew in triumph, holding up his strange and unknown chemicals. "I have found the way to create POWER, and now I will use it to destroy all of you MINDLESS simpletons! MWAHA-HA-HAAAAA!!!" A strange, glowing symbol appeared on one of the glass containers.

"He's been taken over by giant cockroaches from outer space!" Usagi hypothesized incorrectly. Suddenly realizing that she had no idea what the word 'hypothesized' meant, she shook her head, which rattled in reply, then righted herself, "Err, I mean, the Dark Kingdom!" She started fumbling around for the Moon Transformation Brooch™. "Now, what were the words to turn this thing on…?"

"Waaah!" Naru fell backwards when the aura around the conceited Caucasian flared up and expanded. The two females behind her also collapsed due to the lack of her support.

Andrew's laugh quickly turned into a frightened yell, and a black shape appeared in the air above him, sucking all of the energy from his charged body.

A malevolent female laugh filled the air. The shadow quickly resolved itself into a pointy-eared, fanged woman with green skin and a labcoat, who had a pair of large beakers strapped to the sides of her arms. The monster cried out something that could only be her name. "CATALYSTOR!!!"

Andrew fell to the ground, his expression blank. A few feet away, the flasks smashed open and spilled out their unknown contents onto the floor.

"Oh no, not again," Naru muttered, rolling her eyes. "Okay, everyone, what do you say we RUN FOR IT?!?" She snatched Akiyama's wrist, pulled her up, and continued running. "Come on, Usagi!"

Usagi looked up in fright at the monster and desperately searched her body for the brooch. Somewhat chagrined with herself, she located the artifact in question firmly situated tied into the bow on the front of her uniform. "Oh! Good, now, if I could only remember… Ah, right!" With a dramatic flair in her voice, she cried, "MUUN PUHRISHUHM POWAH, MAYYY-KUP!"

Youma Catalystor had her back turned when Usagi went through her transformation sequence, which was really too bad, since it would have given her something of an opportunity to strike first and possibly have a shot at winning the battle she didn't know she was about to become involved in.

"Stop right there! You're using a foreign exchange chemistry student's energy to further your evil plans, you enemy of all Junior High students! You won't get away with it!"

In fact, Catalystor had barely gotten done finishing up her triumphant laughter by the time she heard the fateful call that was to become the last thing many of her kind would ever hear…

Dramatic music played and a high-pitched voice said, "For Love and Justice, I am the Beautiful Sailor-Suited Soldier Sailor Moon!" The short-skirted blonde struck several poses. "In the name of the Moon, I'll punish you!"

"Hah!" Catalystor laughed, and aimed her beakered arms at Sailor Moon. "I've heard about you, little girl. Tell me, do you know what happens when you mix a strong acid with a base?"

Caught off guard, Sailor Moon's jaw hung open as she tried to think of a proper response. "Uhhh, no, what happens?"

The youma grinned. "This." Dual streams of noxious chemicals flowed out from her arms, coating every available surface on the walls and the floor.

Sailor Moon panicked and started trying to dodge. "Waaaaaaaaaah!!!" Somehow, she avoided nearly all contact with the fluids.

Literally everything started to foam and froth around the girl. Worried, she gingerly stepped around and put a hand to her mouth, quoting an ancient poet: "Uhhhhhh-uhhhh?!" That poet had been a caveman, and was being chased by a rather large tiger when he composed those words.

Catalystor never lost her malevolent smile as she waved goodbye. "Been nice knowing ya!"

*BLAAAAAAAAAAM!!!*

"WAAAAAAAAAAAH!!!" Sailor Moon flew forward, her clothes, face, and hair marginally blackened by the blast. She rolled to a halt with her back against a concrete support pillar.

Catalystor put her hands on her hips and looked down at the toasted blonde. "Eh? Still alive?" She aimed one bubbling beaker at Sailor Moon. "Not for long. ACID FRENZY!!!"

"WAAAAAH!!!" Sailor Moon screamed, diving out of the way. Just behind her, the spray of ultra-concentrated acid burned halfway through the support. Combined with the collateral damage done by the previous explosions, the ceiling started to crack.

Nevertheless, the youma pressed her attack, pointing the other beaker at her target. "Now I'm gonna getcha!"

*Whoosh-CHING-shnick!* There was a sudden red flash and a long-stemmed rose scraped the edge of Catalystor's full beaker before finally imbedding itself into the floor. The glass cracked in a spider web pattern and stayed for a moment before the entire container shattered, spilling its contents all over her.

"AAAAAH!" Youma Catalystor cried in slow, burning agony as particularly nerve-filled bits of herself melted into a white fizz. "Ow! Ow! Owwww!"

Down the hall, a tall figure wearing a black tuxedo tipped his top hat at the young girl. "You need to learn to act quicker, Sailor Moon," Tuxedo Kamen said with a pleasant smile. "Attack her now!"

Sailor Moon nodded. "Right!" She stood up, brushed herself off, and grabbed her tiara. She pulled it off and held it in her hand, where it turned into a yellow disc of energy. "Muun Tiaraaa… Action!" She flung the charged piece of headgear at the youma.

There were probably less embarrassing ways to die, Catalystor silently mused as the shot hit dead center on her chest, but for the short life of her, she couldn't think of any.

The monster let out a pained yell as she crumbled into dust and vanished as a sudden breeze blew it away.

On the floor, Andrew moaned as his energy slowly returned to his body.

Sailor Moon breathed a sigh of relief when she caught her tiara on its returning arc. She turned to see that Tuxedo Kamen had departed, then gasped when she saw the roof just above her and Andrew start to collapse.

The rather scrawny Warrior for Love and Justice snagged Andrew by the arms and started to run, dragging him out as fast as she could.

A minute later, Usagi had deposited Andrew near the other students who were gathered at safe locations by the fence outside, then she quickly hid and transformed back.

Soon, the principal announced that class would be cancelled for the rest of the day, due to the terrible structural damage to Juuban Junior High. He went on to mention that they should check the news broadcasts later on for updates on what would happen next.

Some students cheered when the possibility was announced that school would be cancelled for a while, then the same ones moaned sadly when the prospect of sending students to other schools on a temporary basis was discussed.

Thus it was that Usagi marched cheerfully toward the arcade, her eyes closed due to her smile being too big, and very neatly and with her typical grace, tripped over Luna on her way.

"Waaah!" Usagi cried, absolutely certain that she had just skinned her knees.

"Ouch," Luna muttered as she stood back up and made sure she had no other injuries. "Usagi, what are you doing out of school? You said you'd have classes until much later."

Usagi explained what had happened.

"Ah, good," Luna beamed, "then we can start to search for our Moon Princess without any further delay!"

"But she's all the way over in Nerima!" Usagi whined, sitting up on her shins. "Can't we do it tomorrow?"

Luna shook her head. "Look, saving our only hope to win against the Dark Kingdom is at least worth another little trip!"

"But I wanted to go to the arcade and play some games and talk with Motoki!"

"You can waste time with your crushes later. This is serious!"

"Awwww, but can't I at least—"

"No!"

It took a while for Luna to convince the girl to go, but in the end, she succeeded. Usagi was so flustered that when the conversation was done, she failed to notice the storm clouds gathering in the sky above.

To Be Continued…

Author's notes: Okay, who wants to see Usagi show up at Furinkan and find her "princess", eh? ^_^

Think we've got enough rabbits in this story yet?

Hopin' to hear from y'all!

Until later…

Benjamin A. Oliver
boliver@email.arizona.edu

Webmaster: Larry F
Last revision: January 7, 2006