Ah, public C&C.

First of all, David, this is excellent.  This is quickly turning into
my favorite AltReal (tm) fanfic of all time.

Mine as well... or at least one of the noted among the pantheon.

Wonderful prose, and a breathtaking view into a woman struggling to
hold on to sanity.

I was almost ready to nail you for Kodachi turning to her drugs at the first
sign of panic... but then you followed it up with her observation that these
were NOT normal circumstances for convalescence, an observation which I
heartily agree with.

Minor nits:

Ah, yes...

You're injecting very un-Ranmaverse-like realism by having Ranma
bruise himself and Kuno break his arm.  That's fine, of course, and I
approve of such realism.  However, *if* your version of the Ranmaverse
would make such injuries likely, then Ranma and Kuno shouldn't jump
out the third story window like they did, IMO.

Of course, in the arc where Kodachi was introduced, she put a few people in
casts (or at least slings and splints) and Akane turned her ankle to the
point of unusability from an odd landing on the dojo floor. *shrug* It's
perfectly reasonable for Ranma to get bruised on impact... unless he's been
doing some Bakusai Tenketsu training on the side. The Ranmaverse actually
starts out, all things considered, fairly realistically... Ranma gets
injured fighting Kuno, among other things. Although Kuno's arm snapping is a
bit much... perhaps it merely pops out of joint. I don't THINK Kodachi would
be able to diagnose a broken arm just by sight, (then again, considering
what she used to do, it might be possible) but she'd definitely be able to
see that her brother's arm was moving a bit oddly. It's entirely possible
that some of Kodachi's older tricks involved falls from that height (say, a
greased high bar or some such) and she might be expecting certain things to
happen based on the consequences of said tricks.

But this is just idle speculation on my part.

Also, I think the "I wish he'd broken his neck" line was a bit too
cruel.  I know you're trying to show the worst side of the Tendo
sisters to Kodachi so that she can come away with a one-sided view,
but the "broken neck" line was just a little over the top, especially
since Kuno's lying there with a broken arm.  Something better would be
"he got what he deserved" or something like that; it would be okay for
Akane to think that a broken arm was punishment enough for the way
he's been coming on to her.  Again, my opinion only.

One of the unique characteristics of Akane Tendo is that she can stay angry.
In the past - what, half-hour or so? - she's been late for class and
publicly admonished, things that haven't happened to her in a while, and
Kuno's basically told the entire school (or at least broken the secret) that
Akane Tendo, confirmed boy-hater, is engaged. Consider the rumors that could
start up about this, and the incessant barrage of questions from her
friends, and the societal pressure to marry someone who hasn't had much
chance yet to prove himself much more than a perverted jerk. This is Akane
Tendo in full-blown rage, and people in full-blown rage tend to say extreme
things. And to later feel awful about them when the rage subsides.

The rest of this was very good, and I very much liked the
Ranma/Kodachi by-play.  It'll be quite interesting to see where you go
with this.

Amen to that. The story is very well told from Kodachi's viewpoint, and it
will be interesting to see, among other things, what happens when the
pig-tailed girl shows up for the first time...

--G. Falconar