Old Habits Die Hard [Beetle, Ranma]

Shakkahō… Shakkahō… Shakkahō…

Maybe Ranma had lost it at some point. It was constant practice outside, day and night, shooting red fireballs into the sky until he could see the flaring Reishi dissipate into the air. He’d gotten… obsessed, somewhat. Hinamori-sensei’s advice with getting used to skipping incantations when casting Hadō spells… it was magical to him.

Maybe it was just so euphoric to actually see progress in one of the Zankensoki… his Zanpakutō had been grumpy as always – hard to tell, it never made a sound – and he did enjoy its abilities… but creativity only got so far. And as Noharu said, those echoing words resonating in his skull-

1/4th Shinigami. He panicked, worried for himself, and desperately tried now to cover his bases. Hohō? He quite frankly was below average on that, still, but listen – not all Shinigami could just excel at everything! Cut him some slack!

Kidō was the way to go, for now. He just didn’t want to waste any more of his sore breath shouting for Hōkamaru to make any reply to him. And because he saw actual progress in practicing chantless spells – spells he’d already gotten used to prior, such as the good-old powerful Shakkahō – he was… for the lack of a better term… hooked.

So should you be a Squad 8 Shinigami hanging out at the barracks, Ranma would be found throughout the evening and even nighttime shooting into the sky, marveled by the red lights. Life was going great, if you ignored the veins in his eyes. Since Ranny had made the recommendation, Ranma could only wish for now…

And the whole Seat situation only drove him to cast even more Shakkahō’s into the sky! The sun had set, already!

”Shakka-huh?”

His shot of muse had driven him to stay up this late, but it was a double-edged sword. His erratic chants were spoken out loud, waking up one of his squadmates as he was bound to do. Fuck.

“I-Wh-Wha-I can’t sleep just yet, I-I-I-I j-just gotta… Shakka you my Hō… s-see? I trained all day yesterday for this,” he revealed to her with a tired, dry voice as he held a Shakkahō in his hands – an orb of bright, red fire, ready to be launched at whatever. “It’s like a b-bouncy ball now – wanna p-play football with it? Shak-k-ka goal… w-wait, what’s the clock, again? It’s not that dark outside.”

His eyes had been blinded by so many up-close Shakkahō’s that it still appeared bright to him. “Why ya sleeping already, ya silly squirrel? The night’s still…”

It could almost be heard. The giant bell rang, and Ranma hit that deep sleep immediately, gracefully hitting the ground like a handkerchief. And just like that, he owed Beetle a lot tomorrow.

Heh… Ranma had everything figured o-

*BONK*

Sheep… there were a bunch of sheep running around the grass field now. He couldn’t count them, though, they were running at neck-breaking speeds. Some of them were running into each other. Haha, weird sheep… why was he seeing sheep all of a sudden? Ranma turned his face around, his neck spun, he didn’t recognize this place…

Did he fall asleep? Nah, couldn’t be – he could shoot some more Shakkahō into the sky here, and thus that was his next actions.

…

There was a small hole on his roof, right above his bed. The sight alerted him to draw himself out of his room, flicker his eyes around, and wonder what on earth just fucking happened. He was… getting a few side-eyes, most of which he hadn’t a fraction of a clue as to why they’d send those to begin with. Oh, that tall guy over there? Yeah, Ranma once accidently hit the window to his room… with a Shakkahō, yes.

He was trying to see if he could make it arc like a boomerang! He said sorry like a thousand times!

“… Shakk-ing to think I have issues…”

*Thud*

Oh shit. Ranma wasn’t exactly the tallest dude around, but he didn’t have to turn his head to know whose steps were headed his way – he managed to piss her off again. Hallelujah… his weathered, content face sort of just gave in to fate, looking straight forward as Beetle climbed up to his bed and gave him that bonk he thoroughly deserved. That bonk was from all of them, in heart…

“Sowwy.”

He slowly rolled his eyes straight up to gaze at the hole he made, sort of wanting to hide under his blanket to avoid any further scolding. But today just wasn’t his day. “… But- wait, wait, wait, before you bonk me again – I really need you to listen to this… since I managed to fire a Hadō in my sleep… that… that speaks volumes about the fruits of my training!”

…

…

Hōkamaru's thoughts:

The heavy silence from those still slowly waking up spoke volumes to him. Ranma caved in under the pressure and lowered his head apologetically. “I-I’ll take a break, right right… it’s like dumb things attract towards m- wait, no, that sounds dumb… oh fuck…”

Did everything he said sound weird? “I’m not… I’m not that dumb, am I?”

”Probably… like, once or twice, maybe,” he pondered. Then again, he never really came upon a foe who could put him to sleep, so… shit. It was a situational move – and Ranma wasn’t big on situational shit. Why plan for every possible scenario ever?! He’d played himself! FUCK!

At least, she understood. Ranma was trying his best… as chaotic as that best was, it expressed his current sheer interest in the demonic ways. Who wouldn’t want to improve in what they were interested in?! He knew full well that he’d likely, probably never get much faster with his Hohō, so he’d have to dabble in other areas to compensate! Thing was, Ranma was the type of person who could come up with ridiculous ideas to feed his encouragement… which led to days like this one.

“*grump* N-Not like I haven’t already been on everyone’s radar…” he tried to play it off as an achievement of some sort, but his squadmates had dealt with his antics for too long. Ranny wasn’t particularly any big fan of his enigmatic nature either, so his promotion was still on hold until he could convince her otherwise! And Captain Rose?!

… Fuck knows?

“Wait, what do you mean bi- dOOF,” Ranma was going to ask, since the answer to his starting salary having been so abhorring-ly low was about to be revealed. His curiosity was thrown aside- nay, more like slapped aside when Beetle felt the need to chop him on the head again! “Wh- What do you mean language?! Have you heard our 3rd Seat?”

“Seat immunity,” another Shinigami felt like commenting from right below.

“Oh… damn, I ought to get a Seat myself- wait a minute! Are you Seated?” he asked, his curious index finger poking Beetle’s cute, pokable pokey cheek, pouted up from the core of his very existence.