Ranma awoke with a start. He was momentarily disoriented and it took several
moments for him to become familiar with his surroundings. Looking around, he
realized he was in some kind of barn and that it was night out. All he could see
was hay. To his surprise, he also saw a young girl sleeping peacefully right
next to him, snuggled against him.
  When he sat up, he realized that his hands and legs were binded by ropes.
  "Yeah right," he smirked, "As if rope's gonna work on me,"
  His muscles flexed slightly as he tried to break the rope that was tied around
his wrists. To his surprise, he didn't break it.
  "What the? I didn't break 'em," he said. He tried against and noticed that the
rope seemed to glow as he put more and more strain against it. After a minute,
he gave up.
  He looked down toward the young girl sleeping next to him. It was the same
girl that he had met earlier. What the hell was she doing sleeping next to him. 
  He nudged her with his knee, "Hey, wake up,"
  Lina stirred, "No, lemme alone. I'm all pooped out,"
  "Hey, wake up," he said a bit louded, saying it into her ear.
  Lina awoke with a start. When she opened her eyes, she noticed a looming
firgure. In her shock, she slapped Ranma in the face, sending him flying bodily
into one corner of the barn.
  Quickly getting to her feet, her heart racing, "W-what the hell didja do that
for?!"
  "M-me?!" Ranma said, leaning against the barn wall to get to his feet, "You're
the one that was snuggled against me!"
  "M-me?! I-I was not!!!" she stammered. There was no way that could had
happened. She had laid down to sleep on the other haystack after having waited
over three hours for Ranma to wake up and finally realizing that he was not
going to anytime soon. She recalled having ben uncomfortable sleeping on that
haystack until she had found something soft to rest her head against.
  "Yes you were!!!" Ranma said, "You were using my thigh as a damn pillow!!"
  "No!! I was not!!!" Lina said. That couldn't possibly be!! It couldn't!! 
  "Is that why I'm tied up? Because you were taking advantage of me while I was
unconsious?" Ranma asked, gasping, "God, I feel so violated. What did you do
with my body?"
  "I-I did n-nothing!!!" she spat, "Nothing!!!"
  "Why am I tied up?"
  "Because I tied you up, that's why," Lina said, "I want answers,"
  "Answers to what?"
  "Answers to some questions I have," she said, "Like how on earth you survived
my fireball like that? Or how I found you only unconsious after I used my Dragon
Slave spell? Or where the heck you came from?"
  Ranma shrugged his shoulders, "I'd like to know myself on how the heck I got
here," He found that his wrists were aching from the rope rubbing against his
skin, "Will you please lettme go? I don't like being tied up like this,"
  "Too bad," Lina smirked, "Besides, what can you do about it?"
  Ranma gritted his teeth, "Lettme the hell go!"
  "No," she said, crossing her arms over the front of her chest.
  "Fine, then I'll hafta break outta them,"
  "I doubt that's possible," she smirked, "I've enchanted those ropes. There's
no way you can break through them, not unless I dispell the enchantment, which I
have no intention of doing,"
  "Well see," Ranma's muscles strained as he tried to break through the rope.
The rope glowed red from the strain.
  "My my," Lina's eyes widened in amusement, "You must be really strong for the
rope to be turning red like that. That means you have more strength than the
average person. The color of the rope gauges how much strain its holding back,"
  The rope then turned oranage, then yellow, then green.
  "Damn," Lina found herself saying to herself. Not even monsters five times
larger than the noremal human possessed that much strength.
  The rope continued to turn color. It turn, blue, then violet, and then finally
white.
  "H-holy shit!" she commented.
  A moment later, the rope broke. The tattered remains of the rope flew toward
either end of the barn. With his hands free, Ranma reached forward and grabbed
hold of the rope binding his legs. He gave it a good yank before the rope broke.
He had a much easier time breaking it because he had used his back muscles to
yank, not his shoulders like he had been before when the rope was tied around
his wrists.
  Ranma quickly got up to his feet, towering over the petite Lina. The top of
Lina's head barefly reached up to his collar bone. He extended his hand forward
where the tattered rope was still in his hand, "These are yours as I believe,"
  "H-h-how did you?"
  It took a moment for Lina to discern what had happened. She quickly took a
leap back away from Ranma pulled her sword from her scabbard. She would had used
a fireball, but she didn't want to destroy the barn she and Ranma were in
because she owed the farmer for allowing her to sleep there that night.
  Ranma looked at the sword and sighed, "Look, I don't wanna fight,"
  Lina smirked, "Sorry, but you chose the wrong person to peep on,"
  "I wasn't peeping on you!!!" he shouted, "Why the hell would I want to peep on
some flat-chested chick like you anyway?!"
  "Why you!!!" Lina swung her sword skillfully at Ranma's head. To her surprise,
Ranma caught the blade between his middle and index finger. When she tried to
pull the blade back toward her, she found herself unable, as if she had stuck
her sword into a solid stone that refused to release its grip on her sword.
  "Little girls like yourself shouldn't play with sharp objects," Ranma
commented. He flicked his wrist and the blade broke cleanly off from its hilt,
causing Lina to fall backwards and onto her backside. 
  She quickly rolled back up to her feet, glaring at Ranma, "How dare you break
my sword!!! That was my favorite sword!!!"
  Ranma quickly turned around when he heard something from one of the dark
corners of the barn, "W-w-what the h-h-hell was t-that?!"
  Lina heard nothing, "What? I hear nothing," 
  She remained cautious, not expecting to fall for another ruse like she had
earlier.
  From out of the corner of the barn emerged a tiny cat, a mouse in its mouth.
It was typical that a barn like this had a cat since there would be mice around.
  Lina heard a heart wrenching scream and turned just in time to see Ranma jump
straight toward her with lightning speed just moments before everything went
black, just as she realized she had fallen for yet another one of Ranma's ruse.
   Lina was knocked unconsious.
  
  Lina awoke with a start, "What? W-where am I?"
  "You're at an inn," came a voice. 
  When Lina turned to face it, she caught sight of Ranma.
  "You!!!" she said, quickly sitting upright. To her surprise, she realized that
she couldn't, that both her arms and legs were tied to the bedposts at the
corners of the bed she was lying on, "Hey!! What's going on here?! Release
me!!!"
  Ranma smirked, "No,"
  "You'll be real sorry if you don't!" she snapped, "Do you know who you're
dealing with?!"
  Ranma sat down next to Lina and leaned down near her, his face coming within
inches of hers, making her very aware of that as he said, "I dunno. But whoever
you are, you dunno who you're dealin' with either?"
  "Well, I'm not worried," Lina smirked, "I can break out of these in no
problem," 
  She closed her eyes and said a chant. A moment later, the ropes broke. 
  "Oh shit!" Ranma muttered, the blood draining from his face, "Damn, who the
hell are you?!"
  He quickly made a run for the window just as Lina shot a fireball right at
him, ducking just in time as the projectile sailed right over his head and other
the window, destroying the building across the street. 
  When Ranma stood up and looked out the window, his eyes widened as he turned
around, pointing out the window, "Jeez, you just blew up that building across
the street! Have you no remorse of the damage you cause? You're psycho!"
  "Fireball!!" Lina shouted as she shot one right at Ranma, only to have it
ducked and shoot right out the window, destorying yet another building.
  "Quit it!!! You're gonna hurt someone!!!" Ranma said.
  "Yeah, you!!! That's what I intend to do!!!" Lina said, readying herself to
release another fireball.
  Just before Lina released yet another fireball, someone began pounding on the
door to the room, "Hey, quit making so much noise in there!!! People are trying
to sleep!!!"
  Ranma walked over to the door and opened it. He gave a weak smile and said,
"I'm sorry, but you know how us newlyweds are,"
  "Well, don't let it happen again," came the voice, "There are children in this
building. If you're gonna go around having sex, do it quietly. Jeez," 
  A moment later, footsteps could be heard walking away from the door. 
  Ranma closed the door behind him and let out a sigh, "Jeez, what a night,"
  "Newlyweds?! Why do you go and say something like that?!" Lina shouted,
blushing red, her heart racing, "Now all the people in this building will think
we were having......y'know!"
  Ranma waved a hand and said, "Hey, I had to say something. I had to tell the
inn keeper that you were my wife because this was the only room left in the town
and it was for couples only,"
  "You what?!" Lina gasped.
  "Hey, I had to say something!"
  The door flew open and in entered a burly man, "No more warnings!! Either you
shut up or get the hell outta here!!"
  Ranma turned to face the burly man, "Hey, can't you see me and my wife are
arguing? Get the hell away from me!!" Although Ranma never acted like this, it
was excuseable because he was under a lot of tension and wasn't even all that
aware of what the heck he was doing right now anyway.
  Lina gave Ranma a keen look and had to admire that Ranma had the courage to
say something like that to a man twice his size. It was also obvious that Ranma
was unarmed yet didn't seem to be one bit worried about that. She then noticed
that Ranma had said she was his wife.
  "I ain't his wife!!!" she spoke out.
  "I don't care if she's yer girlfriend, your mistress, or even your sister,"
the burly man said, "If you don't shut up, I'm gonna kick ya out, and I mean
it,"
  "Don't threaten me," Ranma sneered.
  "Oh yeah?"
  "Yeah," he said.
  The burly man reached a hand forward and grabbed Ranma by his shirt collar. A
moment later, the man was sent flying bodily out the room via the door, slamming
into the hallway wall by a well placed open hand strike.
  Lina was shocked at the speed of Ranma's strike. She hadn't even seen it. One
second the man had his hand on Ranma's shirt collar. The next second, Ranma's
hand was extended forward in an open hand strike and the man sent flying
backwards. She had never seen someone so fast before.
  Ranma closed the door behind him and turned toward Lina, "Truce?"
  Lina looked at Ranma.
  "No.....Fireball!!!"
  

Man.....at this rate....maybe I SHOULD make this the sixth installment.....




-OneShot
Jeffrey Keith Wong
Author of Ranma's girls, 
The least one can do, and
the 'just won't die' series.
http://www.li.net/~jeffwong/index.htm