Slayer's 1/2 Part 1

Slayers 1/2 (Part 1)

*****

The group awoke in a soft bed of pine needles in a deep forest. Brush was the first to awaken. She felt several VERY POWERFUL magic sources around the area, but it's didn't feel quite right, as if they had been transported to another world.

She quickly roused Alex, then the rest of the group.

"I think we're in trouble here. Any suggestions?" She was looking at Alex and Silk for ideas. She all of a sudden felt her own powers growing exponentially.

Silk was frowning down at her feet. "Well, it isn't the spirit realm, nor any of the hells I've been to, and I don't know about you, but I feel like some of my weaker abilities are suddenly very strong... Elemental stuff I can't normally touch. A lot of VERY Strong magic in this place." she pulled out her sword and whispered something. It flared with a blinding light until Silk snapped something curselike in Chinese, and the sword dimmed it's glow obligingly, leaving the whole group with falselights dancing around them for a few moments.

"Well, at least the magic we use works, if much more strongly than before."

"Meow?" That was the first thing Alex thought to say. He felt very...odd. Not in a bad way, though. He just felt the urge to go and find some catnip and a pizza, though. He shook his head to clear it. "Ok, now that's weird. I can't feel Zuberi separately from myself. Weird. And I feel like I could level a small island right now with a ki-blast, like oh say, Australia. Very strange."

Alex got up and began to move around a bit. It became very obvious to Silk and Brush that Alex wasn't moving quite normally. He was far more graceful than normal. It fact, it was almost...catlike.

Silk walked over to Alex and grabbed his chin in one hand, pulled down his face so she could look into his eyes. They were not their usual brown, but tinted heavily with gold, though he wasn't powered up. She frowned at that, touched his head again, eyes kind of crossed for a moment.

"Hmmmm... your cursed form has it's own personality, right? well, it looks like that personality isn't so separate anymore." she shrugged, "I could do something about it, but it would take several days and leave both of us a drained as newborn kittens. Maybe after we figure out where we are..." she said apologetically. Leaving Alex to adjust to his new persona, she went to check the rest of the party.

"Rinse, Ulysses... are you two okay?" Rinse was in a bush covered with leaves. His feet poked out from the shrubbery as he replied to Silk. "Uh...R-rinse ok!" He started to get up from his position, brushing off the few leaves that had stuck to his attire. However, he failed to notice that up from behind him was an appendage that he normally didn't have. It wagged in the air as Rinse got up.

Silk had a shocked look on her face as Rinse got up. "Um.. What wrong Silk Chan?" She pointed to the direction behind Rinse. ".....YAAAAAAA?!?!?! T-T-Tail!?!?" Rinse said as he jumped up in shock. He had a tail of a cat. He put his hands to his head and found two cat ears instead of his usual human ears. He started to sob like a child. "J-Jusenkyou Curse... t-take over R-Rinse now!" he cried as he looked at his reflection in a nearby puddle of water.

Brush went over to Rinse and held him in her arms. "Now now, Rinse, it'll be OK, you'll see. We'll get you changed back to normal as soon as we can. But in the meantime, be strong like a true Amazon." She hugged him tight, like a mother to her child.

It was at about that point that Master Happosai awoke. He could feel the Magic of this world all around him. His Chi abilities and Magical abilities seemed to scream out to him. He was one with the world. he couldn't help but feel that something was missing. Happosai looked down at his body and realized what it was.

Not only was his perversion missing but so was his manhood... That Damn Jusenkyou water that Silk hit him with when they fought Darth Maul.. It came back.. turning the diminutive master into a young Female version of himself!!!!

"ARRRRGGGGGHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!"

Happosai screamed in Horror. "The Jusenkyou curse is back!! This place counteracted the spring of drowned man!!! WAAAHHH!!!!"

*******

Silk almost laughed as she wapped the whining woman with a wok. "Relax you idiot. it won't kill you." she said as she looked down at the wailing one. Then she noticed something odd about her aura, "Hey, Y-You've lost your perversion!" The Young 'girl' glowered. Silk smiled. "Will wonders never cease?" she said as she looked at Ulysses.

"You ok?" she asked, offering him a hand up. Happosai froze at that point.. she sensed something in the woods.. several something's in fact.. they weren't alone. "Guys.. we got company!!"

Looking quickly about the entire group soon discovered that they were surrounded by evil looking bandits. "Look what we got here boys!" The one eyed bandit leader beamed. " Give us all your gold and we just might let you live."

"LET us live? Really?" Alex quickly looked over the group of bandits, finding them to be just a common bunch of thugs, no magic or other special abilities. Satisfied with his scan, he sent the group a telepathic message and brought his shield up. --Well, we're going to need some of this world's money and some information. Looks like we just found a source of both.-- Alex cracked his knuckles.

"Somehow, I think you losers are out of your league." Alex quickly pounced on the leader with the speed of the Neko-ken, then slammed him into the ground headfirst, dazing him.

"Remember, guys, we don't want them damaged TOO badly. We're going to need info." Alex hit a paralysis point on the leader and quickly moved to his next target. Alex took the fifty some odd bandits by surprise. but they weren't going to be stopped they out numbered the group by too much. As they moved to attack everyone.. two of the bandits noticed Happi.

"is that her?" The first bandit spoke astonished.."She's short, Long red hair and a bad temper!" "Nope" The other responded " Lina Inverse has small boobs, her's are too big!"

"Why you sawed off little!..." Happosai growled as she prepared to attack the duo.

"Who HAS LITTLE BOOBS!!!!" A new voice shouted from the sidelines. Happi looked up at the same time as the two bandits.

"OH SHIT!!! " The Two shouted "It's Lina Inverse!" the were promptly quieted by a fireball that also managed to singe Happi.

"Looks like your friends could use some help, Little one." Lina smiled down at Happi, "I like you .. it's not often that I meet someone shorter than me."

"Thanks " was Happi' s only response as she and Lina attacked the rest of the bandits.

"Hey! I want some of these guys too! Quit hogging all the targets!" Brush decided she wasn't going to be left out. "Lightning Blast!!" Blast of lightning began to rain down on the bandits, but only striking with enough voltage to knock them out.

"Rinse, you look like you need some stress relief. Go work a few of these guys over. You'll feel better."

Rinse picked up a large fallen dead tree and started batting them into the sky, still wiping tears away and mumbling something about cat ears and curses.

Silk ducked the swinging tree trunk, shuddering as she felt her braid flip from one side of her neck to the other with the passing wind. "Rinse!" she yelled as she smashed yet another Bandit into unconsciousness with a precisely place iron fan, "Careful with that thing!" she footswept a large saber wielding hooligan, sending him flying into Alex's waiting DoubleSuplex.

He grabbed the next thief she sent his way and slammed him into one of his compatriots, then proceeded to him as a club to send Silk's 'pitches' of pickpockets sailing into the tops of the pine trees. Lina and Happosai teamed up, one using fireballs the other Happo-fire bursts. Between the two of them they were incinerating half of the bandits working toward the main party.

A voice resounded over the ambush site, The voice a cute 12 year old girl dressed all in white. She was standing on one of the tree branches, looking down on the group quite heroically.

"You evil bad guys!, The Champions of justice shall fight you till the end!" She gave the victory sign and jumped down into the melee below. her aim and balance were a little off as she fell flat on her rump right in front of Rinse.. and under the approaching sword of a bandit.

Rinse quickly batted the bandit away from the young girl. After throwing the tree trunk aside he offered a hand to the young girl. "G-girl ok n-now?" he stuttered as he tried to brush off any signs of his crying.

Amelia quickly got to her feet..just a little stunned about the turn of events. She looked right into Rinse's eyes..her own suddenly turning super-kawaii.

"oh thank you kind sir..You saved my life." She smiled sweetly.."Your a real cutie."

Rinse turned beet red as he smiled and chuckled nervously. "Ehehe.. uh.. t-thank you m-miss. ehehe.. heh" His cat ears wiggling in the air as a large sweatdrop formed on his head.

In the meantime, Alex was finishing off the last of the bandits, with Silk and Brush's help. As soon as the last one dropped, he was dashing around, removing all the gold coins he could find on them. He said over his shoulder, "C'mon, you guys. We're going to need some cash for supplies and such. And we may want to get some local clothing as well."

Lina saw several of the bandit's coin purses floating in mid-air, collecting in a neat pile at Alex's feet.

Silk was methodically stripping the bandits of their valuables, armor, and weapons, piling the various plates and mail, swords, maces, bows, arrows, knives, halberds, and other weapons in series of neat rows on one side of the clearing, the bandits in a far less orderly heap on the other. Noticing Rinse's problem, she called him over, "Hey, Rin-kun. I think this set would fit you really well." she said, holding up a smallish set of light armor.

Rinse was busy talking with the young girl to notice the situation around him. "Hm?...Oh! Thanks Silk Chan!" He nervously smiled and bowed to the young girl excusing himself to see what Silk had for him. "Um.. i-is ok if Steal from Bandits, Silk Chan?"

He asked as he fitted the various equipment. Lina was inwardly celebrating yet another victory when she noticed what was happening to all the treasure. "Hey!!" She yelled toward Alex, "What are you doing with all of that? I blew most of 'em up!"

Before Alex could answer he heard a loud fiery "Whump" behind him, as two more charred bandits flew back into the clearing. A tall beautiful scantily clad black hared woman walked seductively into the clearing.

"You Missed two Lina.. Your getting slow HOHOHOHOHOHOHOHOHOH" She laughed in a very Kodachi like manner. Then she spotted Alex and stopped laughing all together.

"Oh ho! What do we have here.. What a handsome little devil you are!"

"NAGA!!!" Lina yelled back with a forming fireball in her hand. "I am not getting slow.. and I saw him first!!"

Amelia jumped in between the two women. "Miss Lina..Miss Naga Please no fighting, we still have to rescue Mr. Gourry!"

Alex who wasn't paying much attention to the two women at the time, due to the fact that he was checking the bandits for gear he could use, heard Amelia's comment. He dropped the Bandit Leader on his butt after taking all of his valuables.

"We got pulled here to help rescue someone? Outstanding." Alex then went about looking over the bandits, finally taking some plate armor from one bandit and two large double-blade war axes from a pair of others. After testing the weight of them (and impressing the crowd with his strength, considering both were meant to be two-handed weapons,) he strapped them to his back.

He then said, "You girls gonna be able to use any of this stuff?" Silk looked up from where she was piecing the Bandit's capes and armor pieces together into an improvised bandoleer for the heap of throwing knives and stars she'd managed to scrounge,

"What does it look like?" she motioned at the knives, Naginata, cloak, compass and other varied equipage she'd appropriated. "So, who's this that needs rescuing?"

Naga interrupted for a moment, "We're rescuing Lina's boyfriend!" Lina slapped a hand across Naga's mouth.

"he's not my boyfriend.. he's my bodyguard and I can't let him rot away!"

"Ahem.." Happosai cleared his throat "We weren't summoned here to rescue anyone.. we're here for a different reason...but helping Miss Inverse will help us."

Brush looked up at Happosai as she was taking some leather armor and a shortsword from one of the smaller bandits. "What do you know about why we're here?" Then the comments Lina and Naga made registered in her mind.

"Ummm...who are you talking about? One of them, right?" She thumbed towards Rinse and Ulysses, already developing a sinking feeling in her heart. --Can't take that boy anywhere without some woman going ga-ga over him. You'd think sex appeal was a super power for him.-

Naga stared at Brush for a second, almost seriously, she then started laughing mirthfully. "Ohohoho!!! Definitely not those two, I definitely mean that handsome devil right there!!" pointing at Alex. "besides," she continued he tirade, "I'm pretty sure that Amelia likes the one with the cute cat's ears,,hohohohohohohoh!!"

Of course both Amelia and Lina are blushing terribly at the moment. Naga did a good job of embarrassing both. Amelia was more in shock just kind of glancing at Rinse.. of course Lina acted predictably by fireballing Naga.

Happosai glanced at the two fighting women then back toward Brush and Silk. She whispered to the two of them. "I'll tell you why we're here later.. once we're out of Lina's earshot." Silk frowned at the Juusenkyo cursed former pervert.

"It had better be good," she whispered menacingly, "because I tire of these 'training exercises' of yours, old man."

she wrapped her hand around the hilt of her sword, then walked over to talk to Alex. "I have some Instant Nannichuan water you may want to use if it starts to rain." she said, pressing the packets into his hand. "Magic may be common here, but I doubt curses like yours are. It would attract to much attention to have you switching back and forth a lot." she looked into his eyes, which were still weirdly gold and metallic, "Besides, this party is catty enough already."

Before Alex could move or reply, it started to rain. But oddly enough, he didn't change. His eyes began to glow even brighter, however. "Ok," Alex said quietly so only he and Silk can hear, "let me get this one straight. Water isn't changing me, I've got the enhanced senses from Zuberi and I've got a really strong urge to find some catnip. This place is weird."

Alex thought about his curse for a second. "Well, if water isn't causing a change, what will?" An idea came to Alex. "Brush, could you come here for a sec? I'd like you to do something." Then she reached their location, he continued. "Could you look at my curse? Water isn't changing me, and I'd like to know what will. Don't want any unexpected surprises."

Then Alex got a whiff of the females in the area and their elevated pheromone counts. --Oh boy, this is going to be one LONG trip,-- he thought to himself.

Then, just because Murphy's Law decided to kick in, Alex began to have strong romantic feelings for...Brush?!?! He pulled Brush closer to himself, with Silk on his other side. "Well, we should get out of the rain."

With that said, a warm aura covered the trio, keeping them warm and dry. Brush blinked a bit at Alex's sudden change in behavior. But after less than a split-second of thought, she decided to go with the flow as Alex put his arm around her waist. --Hmm. Maybe this is like Ranma's Neko-Ken, where his animal side is telling his true feelings.-

Grinning to herself, she took care of Alex's request. "It seems the trigger is your strong emotion now. Looks like you'll have to curb that temper of yours if you don't want to change, for starters." She stuck her tongue out at Naga as she leaned into Alex. "Mine."

Silk's face betrayed her startlement at Alex's unusual behavior for only an instant, before it turned to an emotionless mask and she slipped out from under his arm. --If that's how he wants it.-- she thought to herself as she turned away, pulling on her acquired cloak and putting up the hood.

"Well, where do we go from here?"

Naga growled softly.. getting angrier by the second. She pulled her arm back, preparing to incinerate the annoying little girl. Amelia jumped in the way restraining Naga's spell. "Please Miss Naga.. These people are gonna help us find Mr. Gourry, you can't incinerate them!!" Amelia begged.

Naga, of course could never say no to Amelia. "Okay.. I'll behave" She glared at Lina "that goes for you too, Lina."

Lina for her part was too confused to figure out what was going on. Her strong feelings for Gourry were getting confused with her attraction to Alex.

Happosai-Chan shook her head in frustration. This was by far the strangest group she had ever worked with. That's when Happosai-Chan made the mistake of looking into Alex's eyes. His now enhanced pheromones even affected Happosai in his female form. Happi-chan jumped up onto Alex's shoulder and kind of pushed Brush away.

"Age has it's privileges, girl."

Alex yelled, "GAAAAHHH!!!" He slipped away from Happi-chan in a blur, stopping next to Naga and Ulysses. He noticed that he hadn't moved or said much the entire time. He waved his hand in front of him.

"Hello? Anyone home?" Everyone looked at Ulysses. Alex was right... Ulysses was so quiet. "Huh... Oh? Sorry guys. I was trying to make contact with my parents but I couldn't." He turned to Lina Inverse. "I'm afraid I won't be able to help you find your friend. I must find some answers about this place. Is anyone interested in going my way?"

Happosai-Chan sighed to herself, knowing that the entire story would have to come out now. "Ahem, that flat chested girl right there is our answer, Ulysses."

"WHO ARE YA CALLIN FLAT CHESTED!!!" Lina interrupted preparing to cast a fireball.

"calm, down!" Happi-Chan shot back "It seems that you were all duped into coming here by the Dark Carnival a strange group that I was once a part of." Happosai-Chan paused for a second, temporarily lost in her memories. "

We're to prevent Lina from opening a portal that will bring the Dark carnival here." Happosai-Chan's voice became deadly serious. "If we fail this world will cease to exist very quickly."

"WHAT??!!" Lina, Amelia, and Naga shouted at the same time. Silk wasn't even surprised by this revelation. What this said about her, she cared not to speculate. The healer reached out and lifted Ha-Chan by the back of her neck.

The action didn't have quite the same effect as it did in his usual form, but Silk was still enough taller than Happette to pull it off. "Tell us more about this Dark Carnival, Happi. Now."

Happi-chan squirmed a little in Silk's grasp but didn't struggle enough to be released. She was still depressed over her change in form and the reappearance of the Dark Carnival. "well,the Dark Carnival is a group of extra-planar creatures, supernatural, living and undead."

Happi-Chan's voice quavered revealing a fear that she hadn't felt in a long long time. " No one knows who they truly work for. Their attracted to evil and wickedry and they destroy it quite effectively. It wasn't until years after I started working with them that I realized their true goal. The destruction of the world."

Happi looked at every member of the group in turn. No one could mistake the look of fear in her eyes. " There are 6 signs of the coming of the end, Five have already appeared on earth. They sent us here to prevent the first sign from appearing here. perhaps, if we get back we'll have to fight them on our world too.

Alex raised an eyebrow. "So you're basically saying we're here to prevent the Apocalypse on this world, and then we'll have to deal with these guys on our own world? How are we going to do this?" Alex held his head in his hands for a moment, then spoke again. "You say you used to work with them? Well, what kind of tactical data do you have? Strengths, weaknesses, vulnerabilities, anything you know that will help us. Perhaps we can stop them from showing up on our world too. Or at least make it easier to beat them."

Happi-chan gave Alex an exasperated look before jumping up and bopping him on the head. "That's not important!! We won't be fighting the carnival here.. we're gonna prevent it from happening.. All we gotta do Is stick with the Flat chested girl and prevent HER from opening the portal. Very simple."

Lina grabbed Happi and lifted her up by her collar. "WHO ARE YOU CALLING FLAT CHESTED LITTLE WOMAN??!!!"

"Well, when you have to measure up to the likes of myself and Naga over there, your just gonna look that way."

As Happi was going off on his tirade, Amelia inched closer to Rinse. Rinse just smiled at Amelia obliviously, as the older people argued. "Rinse guarantee Rinse's friends can help Amelia and friends out!" He said as his ears wiggled in the air.

Amelia grinned from ear to ear, "Really, you will help us? " She grabbed Rinse in a 'heroic' hug. " your so sweet.. now if we can just get our groups to quit arguing."

Brush looked at the group and said, "Well, if this is so important, shouldn't we get going? I thought we had to rescue her boyfriend." pointing at Lina. "By the way, just who or what are we rescuing him from?"

"HE'S NOT MY BOYFRIEND!!!" Lina shouted emphatically " He's my protector. He was taken by Zasz the Lord of Shadows.. he wants me for something."

Lina's bowed her head almost overcome by emotions her memories of Gourry were bringing on.

Naga shrugged. "Denial. First sign of a crush. Well, I say we get after this guy and rescue Gourry." Naga then grabbed the nearby Alex and pulled him close to her, giving him a good view of her cleavage. "Besides, with such a group of obviously skilled," she began to run her fingers down Alex's head to the base of his braid, "strong," she pulled him down to her eye level, "warriors, it'll be a snap to rescue your boyfriend. So why don't you leave this one to me?" She then kissed Alex full on the lips.

Brush was less than pleased at this development. "Lips off, bimbo! Blue Elemental Blast!" A blast of wind and water knocked Naga off of Alex, into Silk.

"LOOK HERE YOU BIG BREASTED BIMBO!!!" Happi-Chan shouted while pulling out a Happo-fire-burst " You can't have him!!!" She tossed the burst onto Naga while Silk was still struggling to get away.

Silk was more than a little startled to have this egotistical, insane Kodachian-laugh, obviously hormone happy sorceress suddenly fly into her, and was less than happy about the Firebomb she saw following. "Hey, leave me out of this stupid fight!" she yelled. Using Naga as a shield she smothered out the Happo-daikarin before it could go off and hurt anyone else.

Hauling the now crispied ice sorceress to her feet, Silk growled, "Now you listen to me... Brush, Lina, Naga." she shook the still dazed woman until she seemed to snap out of it, then shoved her away. "Listen, if we're going to rescue this Gourry person, you can't be fighting over Alex the whole way there. Or even if you think you can, I'm already tired of it. So keep your damn hormones under control or I'll do it for you." Silk's tone was pure irritation and barely constrained violence. "So, if you want to fight, get it over with now. I'm going to see if I can find a spring or creek where we can get some water for our water bottles. I'll be back in an hour." with that she turned and walked out of the clearing, disappearing into the pine trees, a bag full of water bottles and waterskins on her back and her sword at her waist.

Happi-Chan looked at her feet guiltily. She couldn't explain what her problem was, Enhanced Pheromones aside she shouldn't react like that. that's when Happi realized that this place had a strange effect on Jusenkyou curses and her effect was to be a woman while she was here. No amount of training could prepare her to control her surging female hormones. Happi was determined to do his best.

"Ahem," Happi-Chan cleared her throat "Silk's right.. we need to save Gourry not fight amongst ourselves. Alex I apologize for fighting over you.. and Naga I apologize for blowing you up. Let's team up and finish this." Ulysses looked a bit bored about this situation and decided to leave the place for a while. "Before something else happens, I'll meditate this situation. Perhaps, I can find some answers." After those words, Ulysses vanished into the shades of the trees.

Moments later Ulysses was meditating in a small copse of trees. He thought were turned inward as he tried to figure out the strange feeling this world was giving him. Unknown to Ulysses he was being observed by Shadowmaster Zasz.

Ulysses turned and noticed an armored warrior standing nearby. He was dressed in blue armor with a black cloak. He had a full visored helmet covering his face and a glowing sword of light in his hands. A small cloaked form was standing on the warrior's shoulders.

"Take that one first, Warrior! Let's see if the off-worlders are any good.!"

With that the warrior sprung panther-like at the startled Ulysses. Who was not as startled as he appeared to be. He recognized the enslaved warrior and his master for what the truly were. Uttering a few words of power he broke the hold Zasz had over the warrior.

Zasz was not too happy about the situation. He and the warrior teleported away so he could repair the damage Ulysses did to his control.

Silk stalked out of the clearing, the fire in her eyes quickly fading as she walked for several minutes amoungst the ancient pines. --You'd think Alex was the last man on earth, the way they're fighting over him. I felt the increased pheremones, but they're all martial artists or magicians. They should have more control than that. Now they're going to fight all the way to this Zasz person's castle.

The healer heard the sounds of a stream rushing and headed towards it, filling the group's canteen and several waterskins from the babbling watercourse.

Zelgadis Greyweres was irritated. He'd gone through all that trouble to scout a clear path ahead of them, then Lina and the others had gone off and blown large craters in the landscape, completely giving their position away to anyone with eyes and ears. Not that he minded scouting, anything to get away from Naga's abominable laugh and Amelia's persistent justice speeches, but he hated to see his efforts wasted.

It would be hard to say who felt the presence of the other first, but Silk stopped filling her water bottle and Zelgadis put his hand to the hilt of his sword. They stared at each other across the creek for a long time.

Zelgadis noted the girls outlandish outfit even beneath her new armour and the strange containers she was filling, and that her aura was strong with healing and natural magics. Silk stared fascinated at the blue rock flecked skin of the man assessing her, noting the professional way he wore his sword, and the aura of power around him.

"Who are you?" the Chimera asked brusquely.

"Silk, a stranger transported to this land by an unknown magic. Who are you?"

"I don't have to tell you that."

"Then shall we go out seperate ways?" Silk asked reasonably, not wanting to anger this formidable stranger.

"Perhaps."

"Are you be any chance friends with a short, underdeveloped sorceress named Lina Inverse, whom we just met a few minutes ago in a fight against bandits?"

Zel stared at the healer for a moment, then nodded. "Come, if you know Lina then we are allies."

"That is good, for I'd hate for us to be enemies because of a shared aquaintance." Silk smiled slowly, testing the man's composure.

"Not long ago that might have been the case." the chimera told her shortly as the started towards the clearing once again. "You're timing is good, at least."

"Into every life a LITTLE luck must fall." They walked in silence for a moment, then Silk asked, "And what is your name?"

"My name is Zelgadis."

Slayers 1/2 part 2