Disclaimer: Bishoujo Senshi Sailor Moon belongs to Takeuchi Naoko, Koudansha, TV Asahi, and Toei Douga, and DIC. Oh, My Goddess © Fujishima Kosuke, Kodansha, TBS and KSS films; AnimEigo, Studio Proteus, and Dark Horse Comics. This is used without permission.

This disclaimer also applies to several intellectual properties referred to in the text. Please be guided accordingly.

1996:

"Airen take Shampoo on date!"

"Raaaanmaaa!!!"

"Ranchan, look out!"

"RANMA NO BAKA!!"

And once again a certain pigtailed martial artist flew up into the sky.

"You know, my friend, there is one simple solution to that particular set of relationship problems."

The woman was dressed in a black tank top and tight pair of jeans. A leather jacket was slung over the chair she was sitting on. She was currently addressing a dead man.

"Kill Ranma."

The sounds of martial arts carnage, massive amount of property damage and violent relationships blared out of the television set as the woman with raven hair watched with considering ice-blue eyes. One hand, carelessly lying on her lap, held a remote control; the other hand, dangling a knife coated with dried blood, hung over the chair's side. An air of perfect nonchalance surrounded her, as if everything were completely normal.

Her companion was a slightly pudgy dead man in the chair beside her. Duct-taped arms and legs, plus the rubber-ball gag in his mouth indicated a period of activity before his demise. His shirt was bloody from a slit throat. Glassy eyes peered from his dead face. Strange letters were sliced into his forehead, the blood from them long dry.

"That's what Buddha says," the woman continued as she watched the show. "The thing is, the essential premise of the show is similar to that of a rather obscure Buddhist parable about desire. But in that one, there were seven fiancées, to represent specific desires, etcetera, etcetera. See all of these people unhappy because of Ranma? All of this unhappiness stems from desire — desire for some sort of ephemeral wish for satisfaction. All an illusion, of course. The only solution is to destroy those desires; then everyone would be happy. So all you have to do for everyone to be happy is to kill Ranma. But, alas, commercialism and the romantic notions of this modern age ruin what is supposed to be a tragic tale of morals and the illusion of the world, and turn it into slapstick. Don't you agree?"

The dead man didn't answer.

"Come, come, you aren't totally dead. That's why you have those marks on your forehead. Your essence will not leave until I release your bindings. You're still technically alive, you know. Your body is just dead. You can hear me and see me well enough. How about some action?"

The dead man didn't answer. The young woman just shook her head.

"Yes, I know it must be quite difficult but show at least some willpower. I killed you, damn it! You should have at least some power in that ill-used brain of yours."

The head slowly drooped forward and slumped on the corpse's chest. The woman sighed.

"You're not exactly responsive for a mostly-dead person, are you? Just goes to show the malaise of the modern human soul. That's why I'm doing this, you know. Trying to do you all a favor, and all you care about is that someone's been forced to shuffle off this mortal coil. I mean, do you seriously think about what I'm doing for you? I'm freeing you, you ingrate. Look around you!"

The corpse didn't respond to the woman's harangue as she gestured around the apartment.

"You were in your third decade of life, and this is what you consider the pinnacle of your existence? Living in an imaginary universe populated by drawings in motion? Four-color stories sold for three dollars? You're an overweight, socially inept, slightly delusional borderline sociopath whose only channel for release seems to be found on paper and celluloid. Also the sexual imagery of that last statement isn't a pun. I found your little stash and the box of Kleenex while I was rummaging for a snack."

A look of faint disgust fluttered over the woman's face as she continued.

"And you're angry with me?! I'm doing you a fucking favor! The moment I cut those runes off your forehead, the entire bloody dream is ended and you'll be what you're supposed to be; not pretending, not dreaming, just being. And all I had to do was to slit your fucking throat!"

The statement was punctuated by a lightning slash in the air by the bloody knife.

"You humans can't seem to understand that all of this unpleasantness is for your own good. You mortals try to hunt me down for doing unfortunates like you these favors. I mean, trust me, after awhile, you'll end up thanking me one day. I should know. I'm the future. You'll all end up thanking me.

"Even the white queen will thank me, you know. My big sister's with her now, teaching her the basics. But she doesn't know I'll be the one to give her the final lesson. That the future is like a baby: born with lots of blood and pain."

The woman glanced at the television and watched another Ranma beating. A light laugh exploded from her lips before she continued.

"It's rather appropriate, actually. A kingdom of crystal built on a foundation of bones. The white princess ascends to her queenship with the bringing of death. White is the color of death in the East, isn't it? Soon, the white queen will realize the price of all that her blood seeks.

"The oldest gives her a drink from the well of knowledge. The spirit of the mother guides her hand. But it is me who will give her the drive to reach for the future. It's all rather mythic and legendary, actually."

The woman suddenly cocked her head to one side, as if hearing a distant sound. She smiled as she stood up.

"It seems our little party is about to receive a few gatecrashers. Time to say goodbye."

A quick double slash and the carved runes on the corpse's forehead were erased in a spray of bloody chunks. The woman smiled for a moment, her eyes following something invisible upward.

Moments later, the room was empty with no sound except for Akane shouting:

"RANMA NO BAKA!!!"

Author's notes: One of the secondary, albeit rather cheap, goals of my "Dances Set To The Music of Time" sequence is to have as many crossovers as possible.

Er… Let me rephrase that. As many good, coherent and logical crossovers as possible. I've always been leery of mega-crossovers, since in most, the different sources of the characters don't exactly mesh.

There is a way, of course, of crossing over some series that don't exactly mesh. One of them is what I did with Ranma. He and his friends are totally fictional in the Dance sequence, thus I can throw them in at some very odd times, without them saving the world. ^_^ The other way is totally restructuring them and using the 'off-stage' manipulations that I liked so much with the Wold-Newton crowd.

That's why I proudly present my version of 'Skuld'. My 'Belldandy' can be found in 'Conversations with Starlight' and my 'Urd' can be found in 'The Education of Usagi Tsukino'.

BTW, that little Buddhist folktale is quite real. I read it somewhere back in one of the many forgotten libraries of my youth, during my Hinduphile kick where I devoured everything from the Ramayana to "Gandhi". It was actually more like about the illusions of the world and a close approximation could be made with that of the Korean "Dream of Nine Clouds" and similar works in the East.

Webmaster: Larry F
Last revision: May 21, 2007