Even more stuff to send raw.  #@$@%@#! classes.  ^_^

I would like to thank Joseph Sutedja for the idea of the scene at
Jusenkyo in "Ukyo's Tale"... hope I don't spoil it for ya (seemed
to have forgotten that tip-of-the-hat when I posted it... way back
when...)!  C&C very welcome.

What's gone on:  
Assuming that Cologne was in the village when Shampoo got 
beaten by Ranma, and took measures to capture the martial 
artist, he ends up with many more wives than he ever imagined.  

Also, Ukyo has come looking for Ranma in China, and found more 
than she wanted to... apparently, Ranma's an Amazon, now.  What
about that letter then...?

Oh, yeah.  The idea of the following set-up came to me and Vector
for Mousse while we were discussing "Kurama 1/2" which I still
haven't read.

The next chapters I hope to crank out... sometime soon.  

---------------------------------

One Man's Dream is Another's Undoing
by Nikholas "Switch" F. Toledo
Characters based upon designs in Ranma 1/2 by Rumiko Takahashi
No discredit or disfavor is intended upon anyone.

Mousse's Misery

	"Why?!"  the grief-stricken mother shouted at the balding father.  
"He's no more than an infant!"
	The father covered his bald spot.  "For the sake of our family's 
heritage, we must go on this... training trip."  
	The baby gurgled in his arms, wanting to join in his parents' 
discussion, but was not sure how.
	The mother was in tears, arms reaching for the father and son.  
"He's too young."  She harriedly tugged at the fabric of her kimono, 
revealing a breast.  "He hasn't even stopped breast-feeding yet."
	The man's eyes bulged out.  The baby happily chirped, recognition 
evident.  The man did "hush!  hush!" gestures to calm her, or maybe so 
that he wouldn't be tempted to stay, even for a while.  "Now's a good 
time to start.  Besides, it's so that he can be a man among men that he's 
destined to be."
	The mother's tear-soaked eyes grew in focus.  "... man among 
men..."
	A jerk stopped the two males' surreptitious departure.  She turned 
him to face her.  "Promise me!"
	The man was relieved that he was not to receive a pounding.  A 
promise, after all, could be made, or broken.  "What?"
	She knelt in front of him.  "That when you come back..."
	The young boy gazed into the eyes of the one he loved.  He took the 
opportunity to speak his first word:  "Ma... ma... Mama."
	There was a silence.
	The mother's eyes lit up.  "M... my, my son..."
	She stood, planning to take him in her arms.  
	The baby took the movement to be a sign for a reward for his 
efforts to catch their attention.
	The father looked down, and "Erk!"ed.
	The mother, with her nose suckled by her son, said, "when you get 
back, get him some prescription glasses, will you?"

	"Winner up!"
	The man smiled.  At this rate, he'll be able to leave with a 
sufficient amount of money to travel Asia in luxury by the end of the 
night.  His bifocaled toddler sat on his lap and craned his neck to see 
the dealer dole out five cards to each player.
	He deliberately picked up the cards, one by one, under the 
purveyance of his son.
	A jack of diamonds.
	A king of diamonds.
	A queen of spades.  He set this between the first two cards.
	A seven of hearts.  He wrinkled his nose at this one, and set it to 
the leftmost position.
	A seven of diamonds.
	He glanced at his cards.  A pair.  Possible flush.  Possible 
straight.
	He smiled even more.  Nudging his son, his thumb pushed the queen 
lower than the other four cards.
	On cue, the toddler took another card from his small shirt, and 
slid it in front of the queen and into the hand.
	He looked at his revised hand:  the queen was now a six of spades.  
He gave glances across the table to his opponents;  none of them had 
noticed the altercation.  He glanced down:  the toddler looked up at him 
through glass-lens, and the queen had mysteriously disappeared.
	He tossed the two non-diamonds to the dealer.  They returned 
changed.
	A nine of diamonds, and the ten of hearts.  Another exchange of 
cards returned the queen for the seven.
	After cleaning out that self-same hand, his son tugged at his 
beard.  The child knew that this irritated him to no end, and did this 
for only one reason.
	He raked in the chips, and said to those on the table, "if you 
gentlemen will excuse me... my son wants to sleep."  He rose, carrying 
the child over his shoulder, cupping the chips in his hat.
	"You, dear boy, have no sense of timing," he chided the sleeping 
child.  He chose his route to the exchange cashier.
	A feeling alerted him to a shortish old man who was smoking a pipe.  
He was leaning against a large pot, with a fern that hid him well from 
sight.  "Psst..."
	Nothing a doting old man in a casino could do?  he asked himself, 
with some concern.  Nothing was what it appeared to be, especially in a 
casino.  He almost walked on, if it wasn't for a very familiar card.
	A seven of diamonds.
	That stopped him in his tracks.  He turned and kneeled in front of 
the midget in brown.
	"I take it you think you're clever," the ancient smoker breathed, 
making smoke rings.
	"Not as clever as you, master," he stressed.  As much as he didn't 
want to be in anyone's debt, he had his chain pulled.
	"There, there," the old man grated.  "I'm a senile old goat.  I 
easily forget things."  With a flick of the wrist, the card disappeared.
	"What do you want?"  He indicated the chips.  "The cash?"  He 
thought again.  "The boy?  Are you some gnome, exchanging my kin for 
gold?"
	"You greedy fool.  You would do it, too, wouldn't you?"  He stopped 
to puff once more.  "No, I want to help you get the treasures."
	Was there something he was supposed to know here?  "What 
treasures?"
	"Oh... nothing big."  He puffed again.  "Mostly magical trinkets, 
and jewelry."
	"What makes you think that I'd want stuff like that?"
	"You'd stoop as low as stealing candy from a baby, as long as you 
could use your particular 'skills'," he commented.  "Who knows?  Maybe 
you could grab their land and make a casino."
	"'Their land'?"
	The old man stared into his eyes for the first time in their 
conversation.  "'They' being the Amazons of China.  Legends have it that 
they're the strongest people in the mainland, and amassed a fortune in 
battles."  His eyes glinted.
	"Legends?"  He knew there was a hitch.  "Sorry, master.  I have 
more real pursuits to follow."
	"Ah... but it is true.  And there is a simple way to get it all."

	Shampoo was crying out as loud as she could.
	"Hush, child!"  The figure approached.  "The princess of the tribe 
must not be such a crybaby!"
	Shampoo's wails continued unabated.
	"So be it!"  The figure receded, then returned with a bottle.  She 
was hefted, then rocked in the figure's arms.
	Cologne sighed.  There were only so many years left in her.  The 
child she held in her arms would most likely hold the tribe in decades to 
come.
	She brought Shampoo outside the house, in time to see oncoming 
figures in the distance.
	"This, sir," the guide said, "is Joketsuzuko, village of Chinese 
Amazon womans."
	He seems to be fattening up, noted Cologne.  Those jokers at the 
Jusenkyo Preservation Society must be paying him well, seeming that 
nobody's been there except the Musk Dynasty emperor, and that's been 
three decades since.
	"Greetings, wise mother."  The blonde-haired foreigner bowed before 
her, giving her the sight of a toddler sleeping on his back.  "We are 
foreigners who wish to reside in the confines of your great village."
	"Greetings, traveler."  It isn't often that one gets visitors from 
the lands across the seas fluent in the language.  "Would you mind if we 
would talk in here?"  She pointed with her staff to the door she just 
came out of.  "It is rare that the village should be visited by one from 
so far with such a handle on the language.  I have been looking for news 
of the outside."  She felt, rather than heard, the bottle fall, and 
turned before she could begin caterwauling again;  it would not do well 
to show weakness to anyone not of the tribe.  She covered the infant's 
mouth, and beckoned her guests inside.

	"It is not uncommon to marry into the tribe," noted Cologne, "but, 
not to put too fine a point on it, we Amazons have our standards."
	"What?"  Her guest, though well-within the bounds of politeness, 
was able to show some acerbity;  he tempered it with a layer of good 
humor.  "We outsiders would taint the noble bloodline..."
	"Not at all."  Cologne took the bite out of her next words.  "Truth 
to be told, I myself married an outsider."
	"I see."  He turned, looking over to the crib, where both baby girl 
and baby boy slept together.  "They make a good couple, ne?"
	Cologne smoked her pipe.

	"Where is it?"
	Cologne hopped about on her staff.  At the start of one hop, she 
stopped short.  "What is it, child?"
	The outsider's son peered through his lenses with a serious 
expression.  Pulling a hand from within his loose tunic top, he produced 
a patch.  She gagged before she could cover her mouth;  luckily, she 
recovered quickly.
	"How did you get your hands on that?"  She took the 'girl-away' 
potion from the toddler's hands.  No sooner had she put the patch away 
(i. e. safe from prying little girl's hands) when she spied Shampoo 
tiptoeing her way in from the outside.  She was trying to hold on to 
something which clearly was squirming.  The young boy still had his back 
turned to her.
	At a few paces, he turned.  Too late though:  she had reached into 
his tunic and deposited her cargo.  She stepped back as the initial shock 
hit him.
	The little bulge that was in her hands started to hop about in his 
garb.  If she actually hadn't done this to him several times over 
already, he might have shrieked like he did the first time.  She never 
made him forget that.
	He put his hand back in, covering the smaller hopping bulge.  He 
slowly pulled his hand out.  He threw his hand open at a spellbound 
Shampoo.
	She "ack"ed as a rain on leaves fell on her face.  In an instant, 
the other toddler closed in on her and whipped his other hand up.
	An purple chrysanthemum was in it.  Or supposed to be in it.  
Instead, the frog leapt out from it.
	Unfortunately, he hadn't known.  Neither had she.  Response was a 
swift kick, which threw the spectacles from off the three-year-old's 
face.
	Cologne clicked her tongue and shook her head.  One would wonder 
what the boy's father taught him.
	Unbeknownst to the three, the father in question surveyed the 
scene, all the while cuffing a bracelet with three round pills studded 
into it.

	The guide complained to himself that he was gaining weight, because 
each meal he ate could be of any single meat on the face of the earth.  
Also, because he wasn't walking as often as he could.  So, that day, he 
decided to start on a diet.  This was the day he started to smoke.
	Also, he noticed that the Japanese man handing a bracelet to a 
wizened old figure with a baby, which he was bathing in... spring of 
drowned yeti-riding-bull-carrying-crane-and-snake?  He shouted them off;  
what a scary man that baby would grow into, though.
	It was only later when he considered that he should have just 
dipped the child in 'nannichuan'.  He promised not to make that mistake 
again.

	Shampoo ran crying in the waiting arms of Cologne.  "Great-
grandmother!"
	She, of course, knew what was to happen.
	He stepped in with a swagger, with the tight-cropped blonde beard 
jutting strong under his chin.  The flat-pointed hat squared his face 
off, which held a sneer.  He held a single sheet of paper high.
	"I," he said, "own your village."
	She held the sobbing five-year-old to her chest.  "Your paper means 
nothing."
	"Oh?"  He had a gleam in his eyes.  "Your little princess has just 
written over her complete inheritance to me."
	He and the young Amazon were completely surprised when she laughed, 
a terribly taunting laugh.  It toned down to a menacing chuckle.  "Fool!  
The ruling line has no ownership over the village!"
	His veneer of overwhelming confidence faltered in an instant.  
"But... but... I won it from her..."
	Her eyes narrowed.  "Won it from her?"  She glanced at her heir.
	"At a game of cards..."
	Her spine stiffened.  "An Amazon defeated by an outsider male must 
marry the outsider."
	They both fell silent, broken only with sharp sobs;  she, 
contemplative - he, tentative.
	At last, she spoke.  "However, if the defeated Amazon should defeat 
the outsider... the marriage is annulled, if she pleases."
	He felt, rather than saw, the presences keeping him within the 
confines of the cottage.  "What do I get if I win again?"
	"Your free passage.  And a light reprimand."
	"And if I lose..."
	She paused.  "You leave.  Without your son."
	"My son?"  The only thing he had brought with him, when he first 
came here years ago.  He had no choice;  he started shuffling, and sat on 
a table.
	He motioned Shampoo to join him, but she was held back by her 
ancestor.  "The wager involved a position which was not hers.  I will 
play."

	Mousse had since owed the Joketsuzuko Amazons much:  his name, 
which was the only one he had ever known;  his training in the arts of 
hidden weapons, which the old woman had seen to since almost the day his 
father left him;  and, his heritage, as he was treated as one of their 
own.  However, as equal as law was, he was not to recieve all that he 
wanted.  There were few others that became Amazons, and fewer still that 
were as respected as he.  And yet, the only goal in life that he had - 
the one reason that he had trained to be strong enough for - slipped 
through his fingers one day.
	And yet, the man who had stolen his precious Shampoo from him was 
the reason why he was on his way to Jusenkyo.  He went on this errand, as 
it was, because of no sense of debt, but out of a man to man agreement, 
and, maybe, just maybe, because forces greater than him have once again 
showed their interest in him.
	The guide was there waiting for him and, as he became visible, the 
pudgy man hurriedly entered his cabin.  As he pulled into the path, a 
shorter, brown-haired individual came to meet him.
	"You must be Mousse," the person said, shaking his hand firmly.  
"Ranma said that you would be prompt."
	"I am.  I take it that the arrangements have been made."
	The man, as Ranma informed him his friend was, nodded.  "Our 
contact in Tokyo has confirmed the accomodations."  Two airline tickets 
were shown.
	"Then, we leave."

	Only the guide noticed a distinctly purple-haired individual who 
was apparently spying on them.  This person left in the general direction 
of the Amazon village much soon after the okonomiyaki chef and the Amazon 
man with the glasses left.

---------------------------------

Sorry, Gary, I didn't really think that it was normal...

Next up:  Akane's Story

"Ack!  Oop!"
		- flavor text, "Meltdown"
		  Ani-mayhem Set 2
		  ... or Bill the Cat
		  "Bloom County" by Berke Breathed

Switch
Nikholas F. Toledo Zu @ http://www.geocities.com/Tokyo/Flats/3145/mezza9.html
Vector, Switch, Yebah, Don Juan, goo, Pervert, Scruples, Hollie, NomaD,
Blitz, Gee, Datzo, Jewel, Elf, Radler, Pinball, Mayhem
Fanfiction @ http://www.geocities.com/Tokyo/Flats/3145/fanfics.html
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Word from the Laity:  Wipe yer feet!  Bloody 'ell...
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Currently under construction... confessional at the links.
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