Jet Moto and Ranma 1/2 are copyright their respective owners and are used
without permission.

=========================================================

	The first thing Ranma was aware of was pain. His head throbbed with his
heartbeat, sending waves of agony from the back of his brain to his face.
His mouth and throat were dry and parched, and his insides felt as though
they'd been through the spin cycle on an industrial dryer.

	Despite his mind and body's ardent protests, he attempted to open his eyes.
The lids grudgingly obliged, the light in the room stabbing his eyes and
cranking the pain in his skull up a few notches.

	"Aw...shit..." he croaked. He knew that he probably looked as bad as he
felt, so he decided not to attempt looking into the mirror. If he had, he
would have noticed Nabiki's face on the little vid-phone on the dresser. The
predatory look on her face probably would have frightened him out of bed.

	"RISE AND SHINE!" her voice blasted. "TIME FOR PRACTICE!" 

	Ranma's hands shot to his ears, his face becoming a mask of agony. The
sudden sound startled him out of bed and right on the floor opposite the
side where the vid-phone sat. Rising to his knees, his bleary eyes focused
on Nabiki's grinning face on the vid-phone's monitor. 

	"Sorry about that, Saotome, but I couldn't resist," she giggled.

	"Ya could've tried," he replied. Ranma rose to his feet, the muscles in his
back aching in retaliation. He heard Nabiki whistle in the fashion most men
used for attractive women. His addled brain then relayed three rather late
facts.

	One: Nabiki was still on the vid-phone.

	Two: He was in an unclothed state.

	Three: She was staring at his ass.

	Ranma hastily snatched a sheet off the bed, covering his modesty with a
blush coloring his cheeks. 

	"Now THAT'S one for the scrapbook..." Nabiki said before cutting the
connection. Grumbling, Ranma set to finding some clean clothes.

============================================================================

	The Holotrainer was, without a doubt, the most expensive piece of equipment
team Ryu-Ken possessed. It was a four-by-four-by-four meter chamber outside
the Tendo house. Ranma stood outside for a few moments, still shaking off
the effects of the hangover. Once he felt he was ready, he entered.

	The inside was rather unimpressive. the jet black walls were covered by a
bright orange grid. In the center was a mock Moto. The fake Moto was
designed to mimic the handling of either a large or small model. 

	Ranma straddled the mockup Moto, gripping the handles and calling for the
program to begin. An image of a stadium appeared almost instantly. The
ersatz sun glared down on the track, as noise from the holographic crowd
filled his ears. Taking his feet off the floor, the training began.

	The Holographic Image Projector was outdated. The HIP could only display so
many objects at one time without flickering and slowing down. The fake Moto
would simulate the feelings of impact if the rider collided with one of the
obstacles on the holographic track. This became evident when Ranma upped the
number of holographic opponents to forty, just to see what it could do.

	At one time, the Holotrainer was top of the line. However, with the decline
of the team and the increases in the price of technology, opportunities to
upgrade the Holotrainer's equipment dried up rather quickly. As such, use of
the machine declined as well. It was still used, but only when access to the
track was unavailable. Like today, for example.

	Ranma's headache was still going strong, though the aspirin was beginning
to take effect. His memories of the previous night were blurry at best.

	He had learned that Ryoga had signed on with a rather prominent player in
the Moto circuits, though the name escaped him. The two had talked of old
times, parties, races, triumphs and tragedies. Vaguely, he recalled someone
carrying him home.

	//Couldn't have been Ryoga.\\ Ranma thought. //God only knows where I'd
have woken up this mornin'.\\

	Having finished yet another simulated lap, Ranma called for the computer to
end the simulation. Training on a simulated track never did much for him,
much less with inferior equipment. He dismounted the false Moto, and exited
through the large double doors on the west side of the chamber.

	On the other side waited Akane, an angry scowl on her face.

	"So, how do you feel?" she asked, as though she knew the answer was terrible.

	"Like I had a railroad spike in my head." Ranma replied.

	"Well, that's what you get for going on an all-night bender, you jerk," she
shouted.

	Ranma bit back a sharp reply. He really didn't feel up to arguing with his
"partner." Instead, he just walked past her.

	He spun around when Akane grabbed his arm. 

	"Listen up," she hissed, "Because I'll only say this once. I don't care if
Daddy bought out your contract, and I don't care HOW good you are. You'd
better straighten up and fly right or you'd best get off this team!"

	"What?"

	"You heard me," Akane replied. "Going out drinking with one of your old
buddies and leaving me and Kasumi to unload the Motos like that!" 

	Ranma attempted to leave, which prompted Akane to tighten her grip. "Don't
you walk away from me, Ranma," she warned. Her face was hard, eyes boring
into his like laser sights. "I don't know what you've been doing before you
came here, but get this through your head. You aren't racing with your
father anymore, so don't expect us to be as lax on you as he was..."

	Akane regretted the words just a second after they escaped her lips.
Ranma's face became hard, his eyes burning. He tossed her hand off his arm,
and glared daggers into her.

	She realized, looking at his rigid, muscular body, that he could easily rip
her apart. Looking into his eyes, she saw that he was roughly two seconds
away from doing just that. 

	"You don't know a damn thing about me," Ranma began, his voice ice cold,
"but my father NEVER went easy on me!" Like a bolt of lightning, his arm
shot out. Akane flinched, but the blow landed on the wall beside her head
like a gunshot. "And he was even worse on Ranko..." 

	"Who," Akane asked, confused. Ranma glared at her for a few seconds more,
but some of the intensity had faded. It was as though the thought of this
"Ranko" had taken him somewhere else. Placing his arm back at his side, he
stalked off down the corridor leading to the house. 

	Akane breathed an audible sigh of relief as he walked away. She pulled
herself off the wall, still a little shaky in her knees.

	//What the hell was THAT about?\\ She cast a glance at the spot his hand
hit the wall, and was surprised to see a rather large crack there.

============================================================================

	The red motorcycle shot out of the gates of the Tendo Moto Training
Complex, and into the remains of Nerima Ward. Hunched atop the screaming
machine, Ranma gunned the throttle and sent the tachometer over into the red.

	The sun was still an hour away from reaching its zenith in the sky, and the
smog was relatively light. The ruined buildings shot past, one
indistinguishable from the other. The wind seemed determined to tear him off
his ride as he guided it through the trash-strewn streets.

	Ranma paid little attention to where he was going, depending on his
reflexes to keep the bike upright. His mind was few years behind his body,
recalling the most painful loss he'd ever suffered...

----------------------------------------------------------------------------

	"I hate these backstreet races." 

	Ranma looked at his sister as she said it, agreeing fully. Not only were
the races illegal, but many racers lost their lives on the bootlegged tracks.

	Ranko was almost a head shorter than her brother Ranma, with a mane of
fiery red hair done in a pig-tail down her back, which was odd for a
Japanese girl. The red-and-black pilot suit she wore accented her ample
clevage and hourglass figure quite well.

	Ranma knelt by the access port of their only Moto, double-checking the
systems governing steering and the magnetic fields. The Moto wasn't a bad
one, being ten years old. The two never did ask their father and manager,
Genma Saotome, where he got it. They knew they'd never get a straight answer
from him.

	The sun was setting, the light catching the methane emissions, and other
chemicals in the air, giving the sky a psychadelic appearance with the green
and purple clouds. The ruined buildings were all that was left of what was
once a place called Shinjuku.

	"So, how's it going down there," Ranko asked, giggling. Ranma shot her a
half-hearted glare. He hated doing mechanical work. The two switched duties
of pilot and mechanic since they only had one Moto. They chalked that up to
their father's incompetence. At one time, they had two, and some rather good
equipment. But, as usual, Genma Saotome pissed it all away. Now, to keep
what little they had, Ranma and Ranko had to race on the back streets of
Japan, ducking the law and less savory characters.

	"GET TO THE LINE," shouted a man in tattered clothes, his hair done in a
multi-colored mohawk. Ranma reluctantly shut the panel.

	"C'mon, Ranma," Ranko said, "You can't luck out all the time."

	"It's not that," he replied, "I just have a bad feeling about this race,
that's all."

	Ranko laughed as she straddled the small Moto. "You're just superstitious,
that's all." She donned her helmet and thumbed the ignition. The Kawasaki
1000 series power plant cycled up to full in seconds, the magnetic field
lifting the Moto up to its full height off the ground, about thirty
centimeters. Flashing a thumbs-up, she eased the machine to what passed for
the starting line.

	Only ten so-called "racers" were competing. They were your standard
cyber-trash; freakish hair, pierced in places they really shouldn't be, one
even had a metal tongue with which he made a lewd gesture to Ranko.

	The race was a rather straight-forward affair. They would charge through
what was left of Shinjuku after the quake of 2002. After clearing the city,
the racers would finish up on the ruined stretch of freeway that connected
Shinjuku to the rest of Tokyo. The starting gun fired, and the racers took
off like bats out of hell.

	[You're doin' fine, sis,] Ranma said over the comm-link. Ranko was already
in second, not far behind the leader.

	[Well, what do ya expect,] Ranko replied. [You're dealin' with the best!] 

	Ranma's face smiled in the small window on her HUD. With almost casual
ease, she whipped the Moto around the wrecks of cars and assorted other
obstacles. In seconds, she was alongside the lead racer.

	She had to admit, this guy had some skill. He was keeping right with her,
matching her move for move. Ahead, the remains of what was probably a
delivery truck lay overturned in the street. Ranko cut to the left, and was
surprised when her rival cut with her.

	//What the....,\\ she thought just before he hit her. Screaming, she
charged toward one of the dilapidated buildings.

	Fortunately, her Moto blasted through the boarded up door without throwing
her. Cutting the throttle, she brought the front of the machine around in a
sharp curve. She gunned the power plant, charging through one of the
windows, clipping some of the brick.

	[You OK,] Ranma shouted. His face and voice radiated worry.

	[I'm OK,] Ranko replied, [But he won't be for long.] Hitting a boost, she
hurtled through the street, catching up to the guy who just tried to off her.

	[Careful, Ranko,] Ranma warned, [You're comin' up on the old freeway real
fast.]

	[I know,] she replied. The freeway was severely damaged in the great
earthquake that rattled Japan's teeth in the second year of the twenty-first
century. Many sections were missing, and those that still stood weren't
overly reliable.

	In seconds, she was on the freeway, dodging the holes. The freeway was
about thirty meters up above more ruined pavement, concrete, and other
assorted types of wreckage. If anyone went over the side, or down one of the
many jagged holes, their chances of survival were practically nil. 

	[Ranko, what are you doin'?] Ranma asked as she began to bob and weave
erratically.

	[I ain't doin' nothin',] she shouted, her voice thick with fear.

	[What're you talkin' about,] Ranma asked, getting a little scared himself.

	In the passenger seat of their equipment van/sometime living quarters,
Ranma sat with a laptop open on the dash before him. The screen showed the
condition of the various parts of the Moto, while a window showed in
real-time a view from a small camera embedded in the nose of the machine.
The image from the camera weaved and jumped randomly and uncontrollably.

	[Ranma,] she said, the fear in her voice becoming terror, [I...I can't
control it!]

	[Your systems show everything's normal on my end,] Ranma shouted, scared
and confused.

	Suddenly, a window on the small screen flashed red, despite the fact that
the window displaying her gagues showed everyhting to be normal. Expanding
it, Ranma saw the condition of Ranko's power plant. A cold lump of fear
settled in his stomach as he saw the display.

	[Ranko, your power plant's about to overheat,] he shouted. [Kill it! Kill
it now!]

	[I'm tryin',] she screamed. Ranko had never sounded so terrified. 

	Everything seemed to be happening at one time to Ranma. The image from the
Moto-cam was spinning wildly, with Ranko's terrified screams shrieking forth
from the laptop. Ranma's gaze fell on the power plant window again, with the
words "CRITICAL DAMAGE" flashing over and over repeatedly. Another window
popped up, this one showing the status of the boost tanks. The remaining one
was flashing red...

	The Moto stopped spinning through space, and exploded in a raging ball of
intensely hot flame. The sound was deep and loud, the freeway and water
below illuminated briefly as though another, yet infinetly smaller, sun had
appeared. Fragments of Moto rained down, with the main fireball colliding
with the hard, unyeilding ground far below.

	The laptop fell from Ranma's numb fingers as the event set in. Ranko...was...

	He couldn't even bring himself to finish the thought. The roaring in his
ears grew louder as the world went black.

----------------------------------------------------------------------------

	One year later, the pain was still fresh. The void stubbornly refused to
fill, no matter what. Over the ten years since the death of his mother,
Ranko had been his closest companion. She was all he had left, his father
nothing but a lazy, drunken slave-driver.

	The over-turned truck came up suddenly. Ranma didn't notice it, being so
lost in thought. When he finally snapped back to reality, the rusted wreck
was dangerously close.

	As fast as he was moving, there was no way he could stop the bike, or even
swerve to avoid the inevitable collision. Instinct took over as Ranma
catapulted himself backward off the bike, landing roughly on the pavement.
The bike charged into the overturned truck, smashing the front end and
bringing the machine to a sudden halt.

	Ranma bounced on the pavement two, three, four times, coming into a roll
along the cracked pavement. His head impacted a fire hydrant hard enough to
crack the nomex helmet. The resulting jolt sent the world spinning for a few
seconds before going dark.

============================================================================

	Tatewaki Kuno walked about the spacious, and extremely well equipped,
garage of team Blue Thunder's headquarters. Along the north wall were
several racks filled with all the tools a mechanic could possibly want. The
west and south walls were lined with parts, brand new and top of the line.
The east wall was bare save for a large roll-up door. Behind the door rested
the team's stock of Motos.

	Needless to say, the team was excessively wealthy.

	One Moto had an access port open, a mechanic in a scarf tending to it. The
mechanic was short, his head coming up to just the seat. 

	Sasuke Sakuragare rolled his eyes, trying to lose himself in the mundane
maintenance he was performing on Kuno's Moto. The master was composing more
of his bad poetry to that Akane Tendo girl. Sasuke had met her once, and she
seemed nice enough, but it was a wonder she didn't pound Kuno more often.

	"Here come ol' flat top he come,
	groovin' up slowly he got,
	Ju-Ju eyeball he got,
	Holy roller he got,
	Hair down to his knee,
	Got to be a joker got to do what he please," Kuno said in his most
theatrical stage voice. Sasuke just rolled his eyes. 

	"He wear no shoeshine he got,
	Toejam football he got,
	Monkey finger he shoot,
	Coca-cola he say,
	I know you, you know me,
	One thing I can tell you is you got to be free,"

	Kuno stopped his poetry reading when he heard Sasuke softly sing,

	"Come together, right now. Over me."

	Kuno stopped, glaring at his mechanic.

	"Sasuke," he shouted. "Dost thou dare to mock my noble verses?" 
	Sasuke jumped at his sudden shout.

	"N-n-no Master Kuno," he stammered, "I was trying to...uh...complement you
on your work!"

	Kuno scratched his chin thoughtfully. "Imitation IS the sincerest form of
flattery, I suppose." he said. "Very well, continue with your ministrations
upon mine noble steed." With that, he walked out of the garage. Once he was
gone, Sasuke whispered,


	"And this is a GOOD day..."

============================================================================

	Kasumi opened the door, taking in the two men behind it.

	"Oh, hello, Mr. Hibiki," she said, giving a small bow.

	"Hello, Kasumi," Ryoga replied. "This is my...chauffeur... Mikado
Sanzenin." He swept a hand toward the tall, handsome man behind him. Mikado
was dressed in what looked to be an Armani three-piece, While Ryoga wore
faded blue jeans and a brown bomber jacket over a white muscle shirt.

	"Oh, please come in," Kasumi said, ever the gracious hostess. The two
entered, removing their shoes and donning the pairs of guest slippers Kasumi
always had available. 

	"It's a pleasure, Kasumi-sama," Mikado said in his smoothest voice. He
strode up to her, giving a deep bow. "Your home's beauty is surpassed only
by yours."

	"Why thank you," Kasumi replied with a smile. "Would you like some tea?"

	"No, thank you, Kasumi," Ryoga replied. "Is Ranma in?"

	"No, he isn't," she answered. "He left a few hours ago. He seemed so upset."

	"Oh," Ryoga asked, concerned. "What about?"

	"He just got pissed off because I told him to get his act together," came
Akane's voice from the next room.

	She wore rather tight-fitting blue jeans and a white T-shirt. Her short bob
of hair shone from the recent washing she gave it. Ryoga's eyes passed over
her a couple of times.

	"No, people have told him worse than that, and he just brushed them off,"
Ryoga said. "It's gotta be something else."

	"Well," Akane replied, "He kinda spaced out after he mentioned someone
named Ranko..." Akane trailed off at the sight of Ryoga's suddenly pale
face. "What?"

	"Oh, damn," he whispered. "I gotta find him!" Ryoga charged off in pursuit
of Ranma.

	"Mr. Hibiki," Kasumi exclaimed, "where are you going?"

	"To find that damned idiot," Ryoga replied.

	"But the front door's that way," she said, pointing in the direction
opposite of the one in which he was moving. Ryoga stopped cold and turned, a
furious blush coloring his face. Too embarrassed to say anything, he just
walked back in the direction Kasumi was still pointing.

	"Who's Ranko," Akane asked.

	"C'mon, I'll tell you on the way," Ryoga replied.

===========================================================================