As he ran, in his hand his Ki Rod appeared and slowly shifted in shape and color to an emerald katana. Somehow, he knew that a sword would be the best in the situation that he was headed towards, despite the fact that he was indifferent at best when it came to weapons training. He also felt that there should have been a different hilt nestled in his broad palm, but he just couldn’t quite place why he felt that way.

"AKANE!" He bellowed as he raced, darting down side passages and up tunnels that he didn’t quite know how he knew.

***********

Ranma’s bellow echoed dimly into the hollow globe of a room that held Akane and her mysterious companion in a wildly flickering grasp of a fierce pyre. Akane heard but barely. And yet that distantly stalwart voice wrapped its powerful wings protectively about her heart as its owner raced ever closer to where she stood.

The very sound of his desperate voice soaring to her ears sent her heart thrilling. He was coming. Tears poured down her streaked face as she realized that he hadn’t abandoned her. That he wouldn’t ever abandon her.

"Ranma!" she called back, though her voice sounded weak even to her ears.

She felt so incredibly weak and helpless. It wasn’t something she was used to feeling. She had always felt that there was something she could do, no matter what happened. She could always help somehow. Even when she was mummified by contact with the key during the battle with Saffron she had been able to defend Ranma.

Now, however, she couldn’t do anything. She couldn’t call him to her. And perhaps worst of all, she couldn’t run to him. Her knees felt watery and no matter how fiercely she shoved against the sturdy limbs that held her tight, she could not escape the man’s embrace.

It was like her worst fears from when Ranma first appeared come hurtling back to her anew. And they were all true. Here was a man who could defeat her in combat, and unlike Ranma he held no computations against using that strength against a girl.

When she looked timidly up into his face, her fears were confirmed all too well. Gone was the gentle expression of a parent that had drawn her to him at first. That which replaced it was more dreadful than anything she had seen so far.

A lecherous smirk dominated his features so like Ranma’s. His dark eyes, not at all like the clear sapphire she so loved with Ranma, were narrowed with evil intent. She let out a thin whimper of terror as she began pummeling his chest ineffectively with her small fists in yet another attempt at escape.

"Why do you seek to run, little one?" he asked, his once sweet voice having tumbled into a darker, more sinister realm. He laughed menacingly at her feeble attempts at evasion. "You know you desire this."

Then his head darted down like a eagle descending on its pray and captured her terrified scream with his mouth as he locked his lips about hers. She struggled and pounded against him with all of her strength, but he just laughed. She couldn’t help but feel betrayed, even though she knew it was not Ranma.

His dark laughter and a gout of guttering flame precluded their decent to the slick surface of the ground covered in gleaming coals. She cried out in pain as she felt the searing heat of the coals burning through the thick wool of her red sweater into her back and ravaging the bare skin of her legs under her denim skirt. Her hair crackled and popped nauseatingly as it caught fire.

He smirked down at her tear-stained face and drug a callused hand through the coals beside her head. Holding the coals up where she could just barely see them through the coals, he slowly allowed them to trickle through his fingers to strike the ground beside her head and bounce back up to strike at her cheeks, leaving streaks of flesh glistening with burned tissue.

"Enjoying yourself yet, little one?" He smirked at her maliciously.

Then he swooped down upon her yet again, stealing her breath away from her. One thick palm groped lustfully at her breasts through her sweater even as his other hand slipped under her skirt and squeezed hard at a place that no one had ever touched before. Tears bubbled anew from her eyes, boiling with the extreme heat and evaporating into steam before they could escape.

She screamed for Ranma with every ounce of her mind. She begged with to come and save her. To destroy this beast that sought to steal her most precious belonging.

***********

Nearly a mile away, Ranma suddenly found the strength and energy to burst into another madcap dash down a straightaway. He had great endurance and physical stamina, but the past few weeks had taken a lot out of him without allowing him to recoup the losses. Racing through miles of twisting tunnels was beginning to wear heavily upon him.

Yet he felt an inexplicable force driving him on. He had to reach Akane. Before it was too late.

‘Too late for what?’ he wondered, even as he poured on another burst of energy, drawing strength from some unknown fount of power.

He didn’t know the answer but he kept pouring on the speed. Soon he was going far to fast to have time to think about anything else except control of his direction.

***********

Akane curled into a fetal ball on her side in the coals, her clothing in tatters. She no longer felt the pain of their searing heat. A much more fierce pain invaded every cell of her being. And that pain began with a agonizing wave emanating from the place between her legs.

She sobbed with the pain, even as her attacker stood braced above her staring down at her from under black bangs that still reminded her of Ranma. She curled away from that still lustful gaze to the very extent of her being. Even though her muscles screamed at her for taking that action.

Ranma. She longed for him to come and take her away. And yet, at the same time, she didn’t want him to see her. Didn’t want him to know what had happened.

She cried even harder at her confusion. She didn’t know what she wanted anymore. It just hurt so bad.

However, she also didn’t want to see him at all. She was absolutely terrified that somehow the sight of Ranma would always bring back the horror and pain that this man had brought her. The way they looked so alike frightened her.

She didn’t want to think that Ranma, her gentle knight, could be like that man. She didn’t want to believe that he could be so rough with her. Not when he was always so gentle and caring.

Maybe he was crude in speech and rough around the edges, but that was a part of who Ranma was. And maybe he did insult her, which hurt her feelings more than she wanted to admit, but he never abandoned her. Never turned his back on her.

Except now. Now she was afraid that that was exactly what he would do. She wasn’t pure now. Nodoka would never accept her as a wife for her proud man among men son. She was unbelievably terrified that he would acquiesce to his mother’s demands and set her aside.

She didn’t want to be set aside. Not now. She just wanted him to hold her in his arms like he had done after battling with Saffron and tell her that everything would be alright. But she didn’t want to be near him either. And that hurt more than anything.

The thought that she wouldn’t ever be able to stand the touch of the man that she so dearly wanted to be with for the rest of her life, the man she... she loved. That brought pains that didn’t have anything to do with the physical agony that yet wracked her body. She knew that nothing would ever be the same after what had happened.

Yet, she didn’t want his pity. She didn’t want him to treat her like an invalid. She just wanted him. Though she didn’t want him. She was so confused.

And the man that loomed over head leered down at her and burst into a new bout of laughter as tears begin trickling down her face again.

***********

Rapidly closing the distance between himself and her, Ranma noticed suddenly that there was something wet upon his cheeks and his vision was blurred. He recognized the signs, even as he dashed away the marks with his arm. They were tears and he was crying.

He didn’t cry much. He was a man among men after all. Things had to be terribly wrong to cause him to loose it like that.

The last time he had felt tears upon his cheeks was when he had held Akane so tenderly in his arms immediately after the fight with Saffron. He had tried so hard. And yet, to all appearances, he had failed her.

He had cried then. And no one had held it against him. He had thought, he had honestly believed that Akane had died, and it was all his fault. Because he was too slow. Because he hadn’t fought well enough. His fault.

Then she had opened her eyes and smiled upon him. And he was brought back to earth with the gentle touch of her fingers upon his cheek.

Yet, now he was crying again. And that brought fear to the heart that had never known fear before. For he knew that the only thing that could bring him to tears was Akane. And for her to be in that much pain and trouble, he knew that it was his fault again.

He had left Nerima. He had left her. And yet, she was still in danger. And it was all his fault

"AKANE!" he screamed, as he raced down the final tunnel that would lead him invariably to the door where she waited.

***********

AUTHOR’S NOTE: If you’re wondering, I’m rating this higher than I would normally. It’s getting into rather adult themes now, don’t you think? And don’t worry, there will be confrontation soon.

Oh. I was listening to Triumph for this chapter. Does anyone think that this chapter is better than Part Nine?