Disclaimer: I don't own Ranma 1/2 or any of the characters in Ranma
1/2, I am just playing with them.
By the pool of the Drowned Sensei, part one
by
John-Martin Lotz
The steps up to the Tendo Dojo were miles high
and tens of miles long, there was a spotlight
at the top shining on me, a crowd of millions was
watching me and I knew that there was gallows
at the top. I smiled to myself as the vision
of a bad historical film popped into my head.
This was Nermia Ward, in twentieth century Japan,
and I was under some kind of weird curse. Shaking
my head to clear it of the images, I walked up
the few steps that separated the real dojo from
the street and me from the young woman who had
been standing by the door watching my wool
gathering.
"May I help you?"
"Yes . . . Is there a man, I mean boy, I mean girl
. . . person named Ranma here?"
The young women wiped her hands on her apron, and
tossed her long hair away from her face, studied me,
smiled at me, then asked in a quiet voice the last
question that I expected to hear, "Excuse me, but
are you engaged to Ranma."
"Engaged?" My voice raised about an octave, then I
calmed, "NO."
"One more question, Do you want to challenge
Ranma or Akane?"
I took a step back, the first question hadn't
been the last question I had expected -- this
one surely was, I had no idea how meeting this
Ranma person would be, but this was NOT it!!
Still I had to know the answers to my questions.
"No, not that either, There is something we
share, and it leads me to believe that there may
well be more that we share."
"Ranma NO BAKA, hit me. Please just try and hit me."
"Slow and clumsy tomboy, Nyah"
I looked at the sign advising challengers to
bloody hand to hand combat to go around to
the back gate and raised my eyebrow at the
young women, "My god, she's serious. What
have I gotten myself into?"
"Ranma, you have a guest." she called out to
the combatants, who came to a halt looking at
me
She looked at me as I reviewed our conversation.
"I apologize for not giving my name earlier, I am
Kiratso Tomoe "
She bowed, "Tendo Kasumi, and this is my sister
Akane, and this is Ranma" indicating the dark
haired girl and the red headed one I was seeking I
n turn.
I handed Kasumi the bag containing a bottle of scotch
I had brought, then studied Ranma -- who was, in turn,
studying me, "You wanted to
see me."
I sighed and reached into my handbag, "It's easier
to show then describe." I pulled out two thermoses
of water, one hot and
the other cold.
"Jusenkyo," he breathed, as the steam rose off the
water in the hot thermos.
Yes, he was the one. I poured the cold water over my
head. and . . . changed. In that other form I looked
up into Ranma's eyes and started to smile. That smile
froze, just like her eyes as she breathed, "You Bastard."
She screamed again, "You." and dove
at me.
I didn't think, I didn't have the time. I just reacted.
Before I has fully aware he was attacking me, I found m
myself first in a courtyard, then 30 feet in the air,
slapping Ranma backwards into a Koi pond.
"Oh my." I heard Kasumi say as she handed me the hot
thermos and I reverted to my real self. Just about
then Ranma struggled out of the water and headed toward
me. Next I found Kasumi between us. "Ranma, stop!."
Ranma halted and she handed him the rest of my thermos,
which she had grabbed from me.
I cinched my disarrayed kimono tighter as Kisumi
continued, "Ranma, 'hot' water changed her into a girl,
'cold' changed her into that man."
Ranma, now male, put down the rest of the hot water and
gaped, and I had to ask, "Ranma, whose body is this,
Obviously you know it."
He looked half ready to hit and half to cry as he said,
"My father's and it's dead." He spun away from Kisumi
and stalked off.
Before He got two steps, he halted and not facing me
he started talking. "I lost control, I apologize.
You see, last time I saw that body, I buried it."
I could see Akane, hands over her mouth, collapse
against a man who hurried out of the main part of
the house. Another girl hurried up, no doubt drawn
by the noise of the short fight.
"How did you trace me here?" he asked.
"With all due respect, tracking a stacked, red
headed, martial artist across China to Japan is
not really all that hard."
He snorted at that.
"Actually, the crazy guy who pulled me out of
the pool told me that the person whose body
I at times wear was accompanied by a young man
who fell into the pool of the drowned young girl.
He described both forms to me."
He snorted again, presumably at my attempt at delicacy.
"Please, how is it that this body is so good at
fighting. It reacts before I can think. it also is
not very popular."
Everyone was staring at me, mostly and Ranma, some, as
I continued. "I spent a lot of time during these past
three months in this body. It a lot safer being a man
than a girl if you are crossing China alone."
The other girl who had shown up, didn't ask the
obvious, why a lone girl was in back country of
China. I would have hated to start off lying to them
too early.
Instead, picking up the discarded bag with the bottle
of Scotch, she peered inside, quirked an eyebrow, and
asked, "Not popular?"
"Yeah, the Abbot of the Wudong Monastery threw a
dead cat at me."
Ranma shuddered.
"And a number of shop owners demanded payment. I worked
some of it off and the rest, I'll send them."
Now he was definitely smiling, "How many of them
collapsed of the shock?"
There was a brief pause, then, "When I buried my father,
there was a post card in his pocket, addressed here.
Tendo-san said I was to marry one of daughters. Do
you know anything about it?"
I shook my head.
"No, I seem to have some of the reflexes that your
father had, none of the memories."
end part one
jml
John-Martin Lotz, MCP
johnl@tomatoweb.com