Metro-anime sent this to me to forward to you. We both hope
you enjoy them as much as I have. For anyone who doesn't
know A Soldier's Duty is located on his page on
http://www.fanfiction.net/
which is down tonight.

these were omake from A Soldier's Duty, thought that your
friends over on
the new FFML might get a chuckle. Or might not.


OMAKE OMAKE OMAKE OMAKE OMAKE

"...he's not the WORST father, but you'd have to make an
effort to find a
worse one."

Toltiir raised an eyebrow, which wasn't that obvious on a
cat. "So you think
you could do a better job than him?"

"Not only yes, but Hell Yes," responded the youth.

The cat waved a paw and the youth vanished. "Fine. 'Put your
money where
your mouth is' or something to that effect."

--------

A phone rang in the main office of the Rival Relief Office.

The person in charge of the desk picked it up, trying not to
show her
inexperience with such things.

"Rival Relief Office. Your problem is our business. Errr, or
something like
that. This is Sasami! Can I help you?"

Sasami listened for a few moments, then tried to suppress a
giggle. She
failed. "Oh my. So you're currently *Genma's* replacement? I
can see where
that would be stressful. Uh huh. Yes, I agree, if your wife
found out she
*would* be rather upset that you were engaged to Ranma's
mother."

Sasami rolled her eyes and smirked. "Oh. Married? Oh dear.
Leapt in right
during the ceremony, eh? Nodoka Saotome? What's going on in
the background
anyway? Oh. Locked yourself in there? She's trying to batter
in the door,
huh? Well, those *are* husbandly duties."

Sasami giggled at the sounds of breaking wood in the
background. "I'll let
people know you need some help with this one. Nah, just Bast
and Mambo Jack.
Yes, I *am* aware he's the god of (ahem) male endurance.
With Nodoka,
that'll help her get over Genma."

Sasami held the phone away from her head briefly. "Now, now.
Try to enjoy
it. You've been saying you could use a vacation."

----------

Sixteen years later:

Tatewaki Kuno stood at the back of the crowd, awaiting his
turn.

A boy he'd never seen before came walking down the street,
cracking the
knuckles of one hand, then the other. Kuno dismissed the
peasant after a
moment, obviously of no consequnce.

The crowd had not yet firmed its position, Akane wasn't
expected just yet.
There was plenty of room for the boy to pass their ranks.

Instead the boy stood in front of the gates and looked them
over with cold
eyes. "Excuse me. Do any of you remember a girl about 5'4",
bow in her hair
who was a new transfer student last week?"

There were a few puzzled looks and a number of winces. She'd
been as cute as
Akane, and so (quite naturally) they'd attacked her so that
they could date
her. Same principle right?

"I see you do, she's a friend of mine. In case any of you
are interested,
she's out of the hospital and will be attending another
school now." The boy
stretched his shoulder slightly. "She's a very nice girl,
and will probably
forgive you. I, on the other hand..."

Without any other warning at all, the boy blurred and
started punching and
kicking. Unlike with Akane's battles, there were cracks and
pops and audible
crunches. Members of the Sumo Team went flying. A member of
the dance club
went down clutching his throat. Arms were broken, legs were
broken, joints
were dislocated.

Nabiki, watching from the second floor, noticed something.
Each opponent
ended up with a different injury. Even when an arm was
broken, this boy
broke it in a different area from one target to the next.
When the boy
shattered Hiroshi's leg, the boy screamed like a wounded
rabbit. When
Daisuke's leg was bent backwards, Daisuke just fainted.

Flicking bits of gore from his hands, the boy looked around.
"Now where's
this Shooting Fart kendoist and the bitch that started this
mess?"

"You dare to speak of the Blue Thunder in such a manner,
peasant?" Kuno
stepped forward, and if he noticed the mewling piles of
those classmates who
weren't mercifully unconscious, he didn't show it. "I am
Tatewaki Kuno,
rising star of the kendo world, the Blue Thunder of Furinkan
High School!
Your superior in breeding, skill, and manners."

The boy simply cracked his knuckles again. "Ranma Saotome.
Heir to the
Saotome School of Anything Goes Martial Arts. Any last
words?"

Tatewaki Kuno began his forms. "The words you will take with
you, foolish
one, is that none can better the supreme skill of Tatewaki
Kuno. I am URK!"

Ranma had blurred again, and had buried his fist into
Tatewaki Kuno's
stomach. Kuno curled up and was flying backwards when Ranma
moved again at
that blurring speed. A punch to the jaw straightened Kuno
up, and a sweeping
kick changed Kuno's trajectory again to throw him sideways
into a tree. The
tree cracked in half from the impact. Kuno didn't get up.

Ranma stepped over and grabbed Kuno's bokken, then snapped
it in half
casually. "Now where's this bitch Akane who can't settle her
own fights?"

Akane looked up from the school gates where she'd been
looking over the
carnage. "Eh?"

Ranma began walking towards her. "Akane Tendo, I presume? A
friend of mine
got hurt because you can't seem to just say no to these
guys. Apparently you
even encourage this shit."

Akane went into a combat stance, eyes slitted. "These idiots
can't take no
for an answer! Stay out of my fight and my business if you
know what's good
for yaaaghhH!"

Again Ranma had blurred. Now he slowly retracted his hand
from where he'd
bloodied Akane's nose. "Sorry. I didn't quite catch that.
You were saying
that you're going to resolve this little problem before
anyone else gets
hurt, right?"

Akane stared at the trail of blood that stained her hands
after she'd
checked her face. "You? You hit me! You aaaaaa!"

Akane had tried to hit the boy. He'd grabbed that arm and
casually snapped
it before stepping away again.

"Miss Tendo. Fix these problems. Or I'll be back and this
will look quite
tame."

---------

"End simulation," said Serafita with a wince.

"Well, 'what if Ares had raised Ranma' is clearly a case of
someone worse
than Genma at being a parent," admitted Celeste. "You win."

"I'm not so sure," interrupted Rikard. "Ranma raised by Ares
has superior
fighting skills, doesn't blow things off, and is
considerably more
intelligent. You'll note that he fought to avenge a friend,
nobody died, but
they all got an 'eye for an eye' regarding that payback.
While he still has
some rough edges, rather like Phoenix Ikki from 'Saint
Saeya', he even gave
his opponents warning before he started crushing them.
Brutal, perhaps, but
efficient. It's quite likely that this will stop the Horde,
though neither
Kuno nor Akane are likely to permanently alter their
behavior."

Celeste checked something and nodded. "You're right about
the Horde. They
drop Akane, stating that someone now must defeat Ranma to
date Akane since
he managed to beat both Kuno and Akane. Kuno goes after
Ranma for revenge.
Ranma admits to being a black sorcerer and starts playing
around with the
trappings, he isn't of course, but enjoys screwing with
Tatewaki's head.
Hmmm. No Jusenkyo curse. No Amazons. Though he does run into
serious
problems with the Tong later on."

"Could be worse," agreed Serafita.

=================
OMAKEOMAKEOMAKEOMAKEOMAKE

Yet another Ranma opening you've never seen:
What If Ranma Was Not Brain Damaged?

Akane glared at the BOY. Kasumi and Nabiki merely looked
concerned. A girl
dragged in by a panda had requested that she use the bath
real quick, Akane
had walked in to see if this girl Ranma had needed
something, seen a boy,
and pretty much everything had gone to pot.

"So you see, I can't marry nobody with a curse like this.
Gettin' a cure is
the first thing I need ta do," said Ranma reasonably, trying
to hold back
all the levels of thoroughly pissed off he was feeling over
recent events.

"Well, while you were playing around in the tub," said
Genma, slapping Soun
on the back, "Soun and me decided. You will marry Akane!"

"WHAT?! ME? WHY SHOULD I MARRY THIS PERVERT?!" Akane
alternated glaring at
this *pervert* and shooting glares at her Father.

Ranma pursed his lips and didn't say anything for a moment.

"Ah, they're a perfect couple already!" Soun laughed.

Ranma closed his eyes and stood. When he opened his eyes, he
seemed to have
a blue glow flitting about him.

"PERVERT! YOU THINK I'M GOING ALONG WITH THIS, YOU'RE
CRAZY!" In Akane's
mind the fact that Ranma wasn't arguing meant that he had
accepted this
insane plan.

"That's it. Oyaji." Ranma said this quietly and it almost
went unheard
between Akane continuing to rant, and the two fathers making
wedding plans.
"That. Is. It."

This got a little bit more attention because Ranma's fist
came down and
smashed the table into tiny little pieces at the point of
impact.

Ranma held up one finger, shaking and his face a mask of
anger. "Leaving
home and mother." A second finger joined the first. "Leaving
my best friend
Ucchan behind." Third finger. "That pushing down the cliff
crap." Fourth
finger. "That pit of cats." Thumb spread before the hand
became a fist and
knuckles popped from how tight it immediately went. "That
damn boys reform
school." Finger from the other hand. "All the times you made
me steal."
Second finger. "All the times you stole my food or other
lame training
exercises." Third finger. "SWIMMING the Sea Of Japan to get
to China."
Fourth finger. "JUSENKYO!" Thumb joined fingers into a
second fist. "AMAZON
VILLAGE!" Ranma growled as he stood there, shaking. "Now you
want me to get
married to SOME PISSED OFF LITTLE DYKE?!"

Akane blinked for a moment until the insult registered.
"HEY!"

"Father knows best Ranma. Honor demands that you..."

"ARRRGGGHHHH!" Ranma gritted his teeth hard enough that his
jaw ached. "Yet
another of your little schemes. O-ya-ji. I *will* do the
honorable thing.
AFTER I commit patricide I will do what I need to do."

"That's right, you'll marry..." Genma's voice trailed off.
Had Ranma said
what he thought Ranma had said. "Excuse me?"

"Son, you shouldn't joke about these things." Soun said,
laughing again.

"DIE OYAJI!" Ranma launched himself. He wasn't holding back,
he wasn't
sparring, he wasn't trying to fight at the level of his
opponent, he wasn't
concerned about what collateral damage might be incurred by
the Tendo home.
They'd gone along with this, therefore they were as guilty
as that damn
panda.

"hey, uhm," Nabiki was a little shaken. That wall needed to
be replaced now.
Oh and that boy was in the process of trying *literally* to
kill his father.
"Wait a minute..."

Akane tried to get involved. Ranma spared a moment of his
attention to kick
the girl in the gut hard enough that she wouldn't be able to
breathe for
awhile. His father counterattacked in that breather. Ranma
renewed his own
assault.

Genma was a formidable martial artist in his own right. It
took nearly
fifteen minutes for him to die.

After that, Soun was much less insistent that Ranma marry a
Tendo.

And so it was actually a happy ending, in that Akane got
what she originally
wanted.

**i got this from reading a story (Ranma Ichibunnoni) which
started out
promising but quickly deteriorated into an uncursed Ranma
being stuck
immediately engaged to Akane and then getting into that rut.
i've only read
two chapters and it doesn't look to break out of the usual
forced
relationships. *sigh*

============

omake

"Yeesh, that Ranma fella sure got a passle of problems," the
stranger in the
hooded robes said in an obviously fake accent, looking at
the Well from a
distance.

The long neck craning out of the mists was the why.
Currently no one was
allowed near the Well Of Mimir, after a minor imp had thrown
one of Bast's
favorite cats into a Ranma timeline.

"Not all the time," said the dragon. "It's just that the
more chaotic and
strange timelines are the ones that get the most attention.
Some are
relatively peaceful."

"A peaceful Ranma timeline?" The robed mortal said it as if
the entire
concept was alien.

"Relatively," repeated the dragon. "Observe."

------

The pudgy man in threadbare clothing ran up to the ledge.
"RAN! Get back
here! This is not over by a long shot! Listen to your
father, boy!"

Ran rolled his eyes in mid-leap, landing lightly in the
saddle and reaching
for his thick gloves. "Get off that noise, old man! You know
the old saying
as well as I do."

Gen yelled and waved his fist at his wayward son. "You get
down here! You
have greater responsibilities than to go joyriding across
the continent!"

Ran waved at his father, only using one finger. "Don't care
for any more of
your schemes, old man, no matter what it is. Just came by to
say goodbye,
and now we're out of time. 'Dragonriders must fly when
Thread is in the
sky!'"

With that, his green dragon lifted off and went Between. Now
was not the
time for yet another idiot scheme from his father. Nor time
for that old
rivalry with Ryo from Fort Hold, nor the curious
relationship between
himself and that other green rider Uccha, or even that
friendly young Healer
he'd met from Honshu - Kasumi. No, now was the time to fly
and fight Thread.

This would probably be one of the last Threadfalls, but even
then - why
return back to his father's care when the old man was
definitely persona non
grata in three Holds? He'd had enough of that, and Ran was
making a name for
himself - not interested any longer in trying to redeem his
father's.

Nope. Thread was falling, and he was the rider of the green
dragon Akane.
Now was the time to fly.

--------

"You see," said the dragon. "Same spirit, same soul, many of
the same
elements. However, the Pern dragonrider Ran is much more at
peace."

"Boring," countered the stranger. "And it's a darkline.
Ranma doesn't end up
with a HUMAN Akane, after all."

"If that's your definition of a darkline, yes." The dragon
sighed. "As to
the boring part, admittedly it doesn't feature
gender-changing curses, and
until the Abominators injure that Healer friend of his, he
isn't nearly as
violent. An adventure is someone else having a hard time,
after all. No, the
life and times of Ran of Honshu doesn't feature quite the
same flavor of
insanity you might expect. There is still conflict,
however."

"I don't even consider that a Ranma timeline. No Kodachi or
Tatewaki Kuno.
You can't consider it a Ranma timeline if he doesn't get
cursed and isn't an
obnoxious jerk."

The dragon considered the odds of just tail lashing this
fellow out of the
area. Would he get in trouble, or wouldn't he? "Well, if
*those* are your
only objections."

-------

"Stupid old man. Ya just had to steal food from THEM!" Ranma
knelt by the
gravesite. "Ya never could think past yer belly, could'ja?
Now look at
what's goin' on. They cursed you to lose weight, so you
could eat all you
want but never digest anythin'. We almost made it back to
civilization
though. Don't know if the docs could'a done something but we
almost made it.

"Of course, they cursed me as well, damn 'em. Said that
bein' the son of a
thief and a thief myself, I needed a new life. And that
cause I wasn't manly
by THEIR standards, that I ought to be 'un' manned." Ranma
looked down at
her hands. "Accordin' to THEM, I'll get more 'girly' the
longer I'm like
this. The only cure from what they were sayin' is for me to
act manly by
THEIR standards. And then if I do something 'unmanly' like
insult someone,
steal, or hit someone 'without just cause' - then I'm back
to bein' a girl.
And if I've really screwed up, they said I'll get even more
girlish,
whatever *that* means."

Ranma looked down at the hastily dug grave. She wouldn't
cry, it wasn't
manly. THEY had a largely stoic warrior culture, similar to
samurai in some
respects. Well she'd beat this thing. She'd *be* a samurai
and beat the
curse, then she'd go back and beat the snot out of that old
witch doctor.

-------

"Where's the Kunos, the Tendos, the Chardins, the Golden
Pair?" The robed
mortal was demanding of the dragon. "What makes this a real
Ranma timeline?"

"There's your curse. He meets the Kunos, does a formal
challenge of
Tatewaki, defeats him *in Kendo*, and thereby earns Kuno's
enmity. He never
gets involved with the Tendos, the Chardins, Happosai, the
Golden Pair, or
those because his father never told him about the Tendo
arrangement." The
dragon gestured and the view changed. "See. He starts to
lose some of his
bad habits and we see less and less of the redhaired girl.
Flavors kind of
'Ruroni Kenshin' but not bad overall."

"Not a comedy, more a character study." Holding both thumbs
down, the robed
man made a disgusted noise. "If Akane doesn't get Ranma,
it's not a real
Ranma story. And none of these wimpy Akane stories either,
no fair
exchanging Akane and Kasumi's personalities. Remember: Akane
always wins and
is never wrong."

"Gotcha."

--------

The blue haired girl in the blue and white sailor seifuku
backed up against
a wall, shaking her head. "No, please..."

The teenage girl raised her cane. "That's enough! Freeze
card, your power be
confined!"

"Noooooooo!" Sailor Mercury screamed, her body dissolving
into white mist
which quickly resolidified in a different form.

Akane held up the Freeze card - engraved with the image of a
sleeping Sailor
Mercury. "All right, *another* easy capture. Maybe the next
one..."

--------

"What the HECK was THAT?!"

The dragon blinked down. "Akane learned the ways of magic,
and approached it
with the same fine attention to detail she uses in cooking,
as well as the
same obstinate manner she insists on using in trying to
breathe water in
order to swim. So she follows the instructions in some old
scrolls by a guy
named Clow Reed where he was making notes on how he created
a Key Of Clow."

"Ranma is the FIGHT Card?!"

"She got some details wrong," the dragon said. "Her first
capture was
unintentional. She turned her eldest sister into the Cooking
Card. She also
hasn't found a way to permanently release anyone, though she
currently
thinks that if she's defeated, her cards will be released.
So far nobody's
managed."

"But that's..."

"Tatewaki became the Sword Card, Kodachi is the Ribbon Card,
Genma escaped
after seeing his son turned into a playing card, Kasumi is
the Cooking Card.
Nabiki panicked on finding out that little sister's playing
at magic was for
real and Kasumi was now just a card in a deck. She shouldn't
have told Akane
she was going to try and stop her. So Nabiki ended up the
Sneak Card.
Akane's been challenging youma, the Sailor Senshi,
Devilhunters, and anyone
else she thinks she has a chance of defeating her."

"But..."

"She's never wrong, she's never been defeated. Of course, at
this point
she's gone off the deep end. Usual obsessiveness level,
don't you think?
She's got Ranma. Hmmm. Looks like she just got Sailor
Mars/Fire Card too.
Racking up quite a score, isn't she?"

"NO! NO! NO!"

The dragon snorted a cloud of frost. "Okay, if *that* didn't
work, then how
about this one?" Upbeat and brassy theme music began to
play.

---------

"Yo, Pops, are you sure about this?" Ranma pulled the car up
to the front
curb, eyeing the place. "Well, it's fairly sizable for
Tokyo, but it's kinda
declasse too."

Genma wasn't sure how far he could press this stranger. If
only he hadn't
lost Ranma all those years ago. Now, reunited when the boy
had dropped by to
say hello because it was his 16th Birthday, the Ranma he was
facing was
almost entirely different from the child he'd wanted to
raise as a socially
inept, dependent, martial artist.

Ranma opened his door, stretching out as he uncramped
himself. "So, what
kinda treasures are in this place, ya been kinda vague so
far."

"Uhm, *great* treasures. You'll see," Genma said, heading
for the front door
at full speed.

Ranma stared for a moment, then shrugged with a smirk.
Tapping a cufflink,
he spoke quietly into it. "Y'all there?"

Curiously enough, two voices emanated from the cufflink a
moment later. "Am
listening." "Hai, Ranchan!"

Ranma's smirk deepened a little bit and he twisted the
cufflink to "Transmit
Only." Just in case the old man was selling him out.

The interior of the house wasn't as bad as the outside.
Kinda homey,
actually. At the doorway, Ranma turned and thumbed a remote
at his car. The
door shut and the alarm system bleeped. Just in case.

Then some human water fountain tried to grab him.

--------

"Hey, I didn't mean to hit him that hard, he kinda startled
me." Ranma
spread his hands as if to say "what else could I do?"

Akane glared. Not only was she (or one of her sisters)
supposed to be
engaged to this BOY, he had just used some underhanded
sneaky manuever to
knock her dad out!

"So, uhm, Ranma?" Nabiki decided to cut to the heart of the
matter. She
thought he was fairly cute, his clothes were fairly
expensive, and that
watch certainly was. Was he rich, or wasn't he?

"Yeah?" Ranma looked the place over and decided that if
these people had a
treasure, it would have to be a secret because their
security was
nonexistent.

Soun awoke, groaning. "What hit me?"

"Sorry about that," Ranma said. "You startled me. Not a
healthy thing to do.
So, Pops, you wanna go ahead and tell me where the treasure
is?"

"You will marry one of Soun's daughters. Who are, after all,
treasures."
Genma tried to look solemn and all-knowing from his position
behind the
table.

Ranma stared for a moment, then chuckled. "Yeah right. Ya
had me goin' there
for a minute. Now come on, ya been telling me about some
great treasure I
was supposed to inherit..."

"That would be the Tendo Dojo, after you've married one of
my little girls.
This is Kasumi, she's 19. Nabiki is 17, and Akane is 16.
Pick which one
you'd like and she'll be your new bride."

Ranma's smile slowly evaporated. "Ya gotta be kidding me?
Why would I even
*want* a dojo?"

That question seemed to catch Soun AND his daughters off
guard. "B-because
it's a matter of honor. You MUST marry one of my daughters
and carry on the
School of Anything Goes Martial Arts."

Ranma scratched his head. "Well, if it's Anything Goes, I've
already got it,
and a dojo would just kinda be superfluous to that kinda
style wouldn't it?"

"GENMA?!" Soun rounded on his old friend for an explanation.

"Errr, six years ago, I, uhm." Genma began sweating heavily
as he tried to
cover himself.

"Six years ago he sold me to some guy to pay off his
bartab," Ranma said
smoothly. "The guy he sold me to tried to use me in a scam,
then leave me
off with some police. 'Cept I didn't want to be left behind.
Food was
better, and this guy happened to have tricks that Pops here
couldn't pull
off if his life depended on it. So I stuck around, applied
the old 'anything
goes means *anything* can be martial arts training' schtick,
and trained
with this guy and his gang for awhile. At age 16, I
seperated from my
sensei, and last I heard he was going into retirement. At
least if Zenigata
will let him."

"Errr, so. That's nice? Which daughter did you say you'll
take?" Soun glared
at his friend's son. There were only three answers he was
prepared to
accept.

Ranma shrugged and stood up. "Don't see any reason to
remain. By selling me,
Pops essentially sold me out of the clan. Far as I'm
concerned, the guy he
sold me to is my new clan. So it's not Ranma Saotome no
more. It's Ranma
Lupin, adopted son of Arsene Lupin III."

"Lupin?!" Kasumi blinked in astonishment, having read of the
masterthief's
exploits.

"Lupin?" Nabiki mused that over and considered that this
might be a *very*
good match.

"Lupin?" Akane said. Well, he couldn't be much of a martial
artist then.
Waitaminute, that meant that this Ranma was an international
thief too!
Therefore it was the duty of a true martial artist to
apprehend him. "Well,
I'll just call the police. Stay there and I won't have to
hurt you."

Ranma's smirk returned. "Just try."

"Watch me!" Akane said confidently.

*SPLASH!*

"Wow, good aim!" Nabiki said after a moment. "Dead center in
the koi pond."

Ranma straightened his vest. "Hey, if it's worth doing, it's
worth doing
with class."

---------

"No, this is STILL wrong! Akane never makes mistakes! She's
perfect and
unsullied. Sweet and demure. Even tempered and gentle and
trustworthy! She's
a perfect virgin goddess!"

"Which Akane are we talking about... ?!" The dragon lunged
forward, snagged
the cloak, and tugged it away. "AHA! i thought so!"

"Hey! That's mine! Give it back!"

"Got lost again, eh, Ryouga?"

===========

Ranma has Kittens, an omake

"Uhnnnn," Ranma slowly struggled back to consciousness.
"Stupid old man,
hitting me from behind like that! What ya do that for,
anyway?"

"Because if I told you what was waiting for you here, you'd
have left the
country," Genma said from nearby.

Ranma looked around. There was his father and some other guy
about the same
age. "Yeah, and what the blazes was the reason we needed to
get here
anyway?"

"There is a matter of old honor, an agreement between
families," began
Genma.

"Cut to the chase scene old man! What the hell is so damn
important it has
to be done *now?*"

"Many years ago, we served a terrible Master. Who did
something horrible to
my wife, a threat he made to use magic against her unless
she gave in to his
demands. She did not. He followed through."

Ranma settled down slightly. Vengeance he could understand.
Magic could be
like the curse, so maybe it had a bearing after all and
wasn't just another
stupid idea of his father. "Yeah, yeah, so why me and why
now?"

"You just turned sixteen," pointed out Genma.

Ranma nodded. Okay, but all that meant was that he had just
fallen into a
legal twilight zone. He wasn't supposed to drink sake, or
drive, or do a lot
of other things. "So what was this curse? She didn't turn
into a panda with
cold water, did she?"

"Worse," said Soun, looking into his tea. Then the
waterfalls began as Soun
Tendo lost it.

Genma cleared his throat. "She died, Ranma. The Master
attempted a spell
that would turn her into his 'pet' - but it was not
completely successful.
He never *did* get that curse right."

"BWaaaaaaah," continued Soun.

"Originally, we were going to have you marry one of Soun's
daughters," began
Genma.

"WHAT?!" Ranma found himself standing and glaring at his
father.

"Unfortunately, that isn't possible," finished Genma,
raising an eyebrow and
meeting Ranma's gaze.

"Oh." Ranma sat back down, now feeling bad about his
outburst.

"Ohhh! Poor Kimiko!" Soun said between wordless wailing.
"Not only to die
but have her humanity stolen!"

"Something like a Jusenkyo curse?" Ranma asked his father.

"No turning back to normal with hot water," said Genma
solemnly.

"Kasumi, Nabiki, Akane. My three daughters. They were born
after the
Master..."

"His three daughters are not legally human. Therefore you
can't marry them."
Genma evidently regretted it. "Almost but not quite. So you
can go search
for a cure, but after you adopt them as pets."

"WHAT?!" Ranma found himself standing again. "What kinda
agreement is..."

"Oh myaow! This is Ranma?"

"Nyaa! He's pretty cute!"

"Yeah, mya, maybe this could work out."

Ranma stood paralyzed and slowly turned towards the
interruption. One girl
was wearing a frilly apron. Another was wearing a pair of
shorts and a tight
top. The third was wearing a gi.

They were catgirls.

"Ca-ca-ca-ca-ca-ca-CAT!"

Three sets of ears went flat as their new owner went racing
through a door
without benefit of opening it.

"Well, *that* didn't work out," summed up Nabiki.

"We ought to give chase," suggested Akane, who'd seen this
in an American
cartoon about a French skunk.

"That's the ticket, don't let him get away," encouraged
Soun.

Genma shook his head. If he'd only read the last page of
that manual... Oh
well. It wasn't his fault after all.

Meanwhile, somewhere not far away, three kittens cornered
Ranma Saotome. It
was when he started to meow that things got really weird.

=========


Continuing with Unusual Beginnings:

---------

Soun was flabbergasted. He'd gotten a postcard from Genma
stating simply:
  Need help. Be there soon. Genma.

Then a *panda* of all things had shown up at his front door,
looked around,
then headed for the furo. This had been followed by Genma at
last appearing,
though without Ranma despite their old agreement. A
demonstration and
explanation of Jusenkyo had occurred, but now Soun could
hold his tearful
question back any longer.

"But what about your son, Saotome? What about our pledge to
join the two
families?"

"I'm rather curious myself," said Nabiki from her position
at the crowded
table.

Genma went into his most solemn expression. "The trouble
started when we
visited a village of Chinese Amazons."

"'Chinese Amazons'? Get real," snorted Akane. Personally she
was glad there
was no boy to show up, though she'd never admit she was
actually curious
about this anyway.

"Yes, and while Ranma is supremely confident in his martial
arts skills,"
Genma paused to scarf four rice balls and take a gulp of hot
tea, "I was
certain to undercut his confidence in everything else in
life. To make him
more tractable and easily dominated by one of your daughters
for the
marriage."

"Good thinking, Saotome," agreed Soun, not noticing the
frowns appearing on
two of his daughters' faces.

Genma nodded. "Unfortunately, even with my sabotage of his
friends and
social life, making sure he grew up so ready for a friend
that he would be
truly desperate for any kindness your daughters could show
him, something
unexpected occurred at that village."

----------

Shampoo smiled confidently. She'd just given the Kiss Of
Death. The Guide
was panicked and explaining to this interloper what she'd
just done. Now,
would this Outsider show herself worthy of joining the tribe
by courageously
standing her ground, or would she be revealed as a coward by
fleeing - and
therefore worthy only of contempt?

Uh oh. Why was the Outsider girl looking all sparkly-eyed
like that? What
was with the drifting sakura petals and pink light? Judging
from the happy
oblivious look on the girl's face, Shampoo made a wild guess
that this girl
hadn't even heard one word the Jusenkyo Guide had said. What
was with all
the roses in the background? This wasn't the flower
festival!

*GLOMP! SNUGGLE! KISS!*

Shampoo's eyebrows attempted to rise past her hairline. She
was being
kissed?! A light kiss, almost identical to the Kiss Of Death
she'd just
given. Now the girl's blue sparkly eyes were brimming over
with tears and
she was staring right into Shampoo's eyes. Waitaminute, this
was NOT how
this was supposed to go!

*HUG!*

Shampoo considered fainting. The girl was saying something
in that odd
language and hugging her so hard that Shampoo felt ribs
creaking. "AHHHHH!
SOMEBODY PLEASE TELL THIS GIRL WHAT I JUST DID!"

A gentle, inexperienced, hesitant, kiss to the lips was
Shampoo's answer.
Then this girl laid her head on Shampoo's shoulder and said
something else
in their odd language, almost drowsily.

"Uhm? Excuse me?" Shampoo started trying to get herself
free, without
success.

Cologne pogosticked up. If the girl had run, she would have
been deemed a
coward. Shampoo would have been dishonored, then have to
chase after the
girl and humiliate her. Death actually wasn't the usual way
for things to
go, but the Amazons had to keep up appearances. If she had
stood her ground,
ready for a fight, she would have gotten a feast and party
as she became a
member of the tribe. THIS didn't quite fit.

"Help! Great Grandmother! This pervert..." Shampoo began to
choke. The girl
was responding to Shampoo's attempts to free herself by
practically grafting
herself on.

Cologne listened to the barely audible muttering. Shampoo
had seen through
the curse? This girl had been alone for a long time except
for a "stupid
father" and...

Cologne listened further to the barely coherent rambling,
then fixed her
gaze upon a panda who had snuck back to the feast table and
had begun
scarfing food rapidly.

A severely underconfident young lady, who had never had
friends, never known
family, never had any fun or home she could call her own?
And a PIT OF
CATS?!

Cologne encapsulated the girl's rambling into a shorter
form. An abused
child? One who had been recklessly endangered by her father?
Never allowed
to know her mother? No friends?

The disgust and annoyance focussed on the Outsider changed
to looks of
sympathy.

Cologne's staff flicked out. Curses had been mentioned. THAT
was the
Jusenkyo Guide. A cup of hot tea from one onlooker was
launched. A panda
turned into an overweight man.

"Kill the panda!" "Abusive fathers must die!" "Let me slash
his ears off!"

Shampoo had fainted, otherwise she would have volunteered.
If nothing else
just to get away from the hydraulic press that was this
girl's hug.

--------

"It is a matter of family honor, RANMA'S family honor,"
insisted Genma. "You
know how much weight giri has in Japan..."

Cologne nodded. "Certainly it would be best not to inflict
any further
dishonor on the poor child."

Genma let out a deep breath of relief. "Fine then. We'll
just be going."

"Oh? What exactly is this 'we' you are referring to?"

Genma froze again. "But you just said..."

The wrinkled old crone smiled. "Genma Saotome, upon
interviewing with you
and young Ranma, it has been determined that you are a
loathsome,
dishonorable, pathetic, lazy, small time thief and  large
time glutton."

"HEY!" Genma disagreed with this assessment. He wasn't
loathsome!

"The only reason you haven't been sold to the Beijing Zoo is
because it was
felt that losing even a miserable excuse for a family member
like you would
have negative effects on your child's precarious mental
health." If Lilac's
glare was any hotter Genma would have combusted. "Abused
children,
particularly abused women, have often been adopted by the
tribe."

"...but Ranma is a boy..." Genma squeaked, being surrounded
by a large
number of really old women whom he knew (from three attempts
to rescue Ranma
and flee the village) could severely kick his butt whether
he was in panda
form or human.

"Yes, we know." Cologne sat back, considering whether to
make just one tiny
movement. One little signal that would have this person
mailed home in a
zip-loc pouch. The one quart variety. No. A pity. But no.
"One who has been
adopted into the tribe." Though this really upset Mousse. It
was quite
strange that Mousse simply could not seem to grasp that
Ranma and Shampoo
were *friends* now. Siblings by adoption. Though on seeing
what Ranma looked
like as a boy, and what could have been her husband, Shampoo
had managed to
dent a support post when she had beat her head against it.
Still, Cologne
thought it was all *mainly* sorted out.

"Therefore, *your* family role is secondary - if existent at
all." Lilac was
an earthy sort of Healer, and a dirty old woman, and a lot
of things. Child
abuse was one of those things that caused her to put aside
the Healer's role
temporarily.

"So you can leave and put things aright back in your
homeland. Meanwhile,
Ranma can spend time here with his new sister and try to
recover from having
you as a father," Cologne pronounced.

"Why should I agree to something so ridiculous?" Genma
huffed at the old
woman.

"It gets you out of our village, and alive," pointed out
Cologne.

Genma considered the old women briefly. Survival was a good
thing, but
greed... "Throw in dinner and it's a deal."

-------

"Saotome, how could you?!" Soun groaned, though well
remembering how easily
Genma would cave at the offer of food.

"All is not lost, Tendo. If your three daughters travel to
the Amazon
village, we can present Ranma this as an obligation of
honor. They will
*have* to let Ranma go so that he can marry one of your
daughters, and the
marriage can take place on the spot!"

"Good thinking, Saotome!" Soun smiled and turned to his
daughters. "You see,
girls, he's... Where did they go?"

==========


"An Ultimate Technique?"

Genma nodded to Soun. "Yes. I had considered the Catfist,
supposedly an
unbeatable technique which allowed the practitioner to fight
with feline
agility and speed."

Akane frowned, unsuccessfully hiding her jealousy at the
thought of learning
a special manuever like that.

"Unfortunately," Genma continued, "the next page not only
described the idea
of training someone in that technique as a moron, but
pointed out that the
technique is easily defeated by using indirect methods such
as throwing a
cat toy out."

"Ah, I see," Soun nodded wisely.

"I considered training Ranma in 'Hyuri's Fury' -
transforming him into an
unstoppable berserker," continued Genma again. "However,
that technique also
 has its flaws." Genma didn't state that his main reason for
not teaching
that technique to Ranma was that most likely Ranma would be
guilty of
patricide eventually. Which would seriously put a crimp in
his father's
plans of living a comfortable and indolent retirement.

"I see," repeated Soun.

"There were many 'Ultimate Techniques' that I considered
teaching Ranma.
Many were 'Instant Kill' methods like the Hokuto Shin Ken or
Shiva's Touch.
The problem with those was that I couldn't find the current
practitioners of
such techniques, much less uncover anything better than a
first hand account
of having seen the results of the technique."

Soun nodded. This *still* didn't explain why Ranma was not
present.

"There were evasion techniques like the Instantaneous
Teleport and the
Shadowleap, but those evaded me as well. There were hints
and rumors of
methods to awaken one's full chi potential, the power of
magic, or psychic
talents within a disciple." Genma sighed deeply and tried to
look stoic and
dignified.

Kasumi thought that Genma looked constipated and made a note
to get some
high fiber foods.

"I tracked down rumors of strange and esoteric martial arts
manuevers. The
'Hadoken', 'Limbic Kai', 'Drop Dead Gorgeous', 'Soul Fist',
'Sarcophogus
Surprise', and many others. Some I was able to have Ranma
learn, and add to
the boy's arsenal. We travelled to Tibet and India where he
studied under
masters of chi."

Soun interrupted eagerly. "Wait a moment. Did you learn
these methods
yourself?"

"Uhm, no, actually. All of the various sensei refused to
show me the secret
of their craft, and one of them used some manuever on Ranma
so that he would
only reveal those secrets to a worthy heir."

Nabiki snorted. Well, from what she had seen so far of her
father's friend,
she could see why some martial arts master would be
reluctant to show Genma
their secrets. Ranma though must be pretty special or at
least promising for
them to confide in his son.

"So did you succeed in teaching him an Ultimate Technique?"
Soun pressed.

"Well, that would depend on what you mean by an Ultimate
Technique..."
hedged Genma.

"An Ultimate Technique, also called a Combo, a Hissatsu
Waza, a Finishing
Move, or a Special Manuever, is either a single manuever
which bypasses the
target's defenses, or (more often) is actually a set of
related moves which
are a next stage in martial arts," recited Kasumi with her
eyes closed. She
read a lot. "They are as advanced above a regular martial
art such as judo
as a judo master is above an untrained person. Often the
Ultimate Technique
carries a price - either in difficulty in acquiring the
technique, pain and
suffering in learning the technique, special bloodlines or
ceremonies to
even begin learning the technique, mental instability or
insanity caused by
the technique, demonic or divine possession, quests, an Epic
Fate, or some
other great hardship which is laid upon the practitioner's
karma."

Everyone spent a moment staring at Kasumi as she finished.

"Yes, well," Genma began.

There was a knocking at the front door. Nabiki brightened
immediately and
began running towards it. This could be Ranma at last.

"Hello, are... you... Ranma?!" Nabiki stared at the tall,
muscular, handsome
boy. No, not handsome. He was drop dead gorgeous!

The boy sighed deeply, reached down to the fallen girl, and
used a pressure
point manuever to restart her heart. "Yeah, I'm Ranma
Saotome. Sorry about
this."

=======

Display: Chronos' Bet Entry
SimLine: RN-MK-201310

"...recently they crossed into China," said Soun.

"Wow! China!" Nabiki exclaimed. China was neat!

"What's so great about China?" Akane said with a hmph. The
Chinese weren't
so hot. If they were, they'd be Japanese.

"Is he cute?" Nabiki said with a grin. Cute would earn her
overlooking a lot
of little problems with the situation.

"I don't know about this, father. Aren't we too young?"
Kasumi, the ever
practical one, fretted. Just her luck it would turn out to
be some old man.

"What kind of boy *is* this Ranma?" Nabiki and Kasumi
chorused while Akane
played with one of her toys.

"Don't have a clue," laughed Soun. "No idea."

"'No idea'," said Nabiki, disbelievingly.

"I've never met him," admitted Soun.

A few moments later, a panda had brought a young girl in and
set her before
the four Tendos. However, Akane's reaction was a lot more
positive.

"Wai wai, panda! Wai wai, a panda! Giddyup, Panda-san!"

Such as straddling the panda's neck with her legs while
repeatedly hitting
the panda with a plastic shovel. Which lasted until the
stranger girl got
tired of all this, went into the kitchen, returned with a
kettle of hot
water and doused the panda.

"Okay, Pop, what the heck were you thinking when you came up
with *this*
plan?" Ranma wanted to know.

Tendo looked at the panda-turned-man. "Uhm, Saotome, can you
explain this?"

"What about you Tendo?!" Genma gestured at the three girls.

"After we talked, well," Soun shrugged. "Kimiko and I
decided to wait on
having children. Ranma, these are my three daughters.
Kasumi, she's
fourteen. Nabiki, she's twelve. Akane, she's ten. Pick
anyone you like.
She'll be your new fiancee."

"He's a hottie," proclaimed Kasumi, not really knowing what
the term meant.

"He's a girl?" Nabiki reached up and squeezed. Felt like a
girl.

"Please don't do that," Ranma groaned. He couldn't believe
this. Well at
least marriageable age in Tokyo was 16. He had at least two
years to find a
way out of this.

"Okay, then *she's* a hottie," declared Kasumi, glomping on
and emitting
serious cuteness rays.

Akane scowled up at Ranma. "You better not try to be my
Mommy!"

Ranma scowled as the littlest Tendo started kicking him in
the shins. "I'm a
guy damnit."

One demonstration of Jusenkyo curses later.

"NEAT!" Nabiki said, a glass of hot water and a glass of
cold water in each
hand. "I wonder what would happen if I hit you with both at
the same time,
would you be a boy and a girl?"

"I'm not instant ramen, you know," grumbled Ranma.

Kasumi splashed water around in the bowl as she tried to
make tea.

-----click-------

"Ranma, you, you," Ryouga looked at the little girl hiding
behind Ranma,
"you *pedophile!*"

"Hey, it ain't like that! Our fathers came up with this
weird idea!" Ranma
stopped abruptly. "What's a pedophile?"

Nabiki sighed. "Later, Ranma. Fight now, expository dialogue
later."

"Oh. Right."

Kasumi stalked forward. "You big meanie!"

"Excuse me?" Ryouga found himself backing up before this
girl's wrath.

"Stop picking on my Ranma!" Kasumi stood under five feet.
She somehow
managed to loom over the taller Ryouga.

"Uhm, Kasumi, this is my fight." Ranma gave a helpless look
towards Ryouga.

Ryouga misinterpreted that look. "So Ranma, you hide behind
helpless little
girls!"

Akane twitched and stalked forward. "HEY! Who are you
calling helpless?!"

"Uhm," Ryouga hedged. "Well, it's nothing personal. I mean
you're just a
little kid..."

Akane twitched some more. "KID?! KID! You're saying I'm some
weak little
girl?!"

Ryouga put his hand down on the ten year old's head as she
windmilled her
arms in an attempt to hit him. "Uhm. Shouldn't you be
playing with your
dollies or something?"

At that moment Akane filed Ryouga under "people whose butt I
will kick when
I get older".

Ranma shrugged. Maybe he could run into Ryouga somewhere
away from the kids.
They tended to steal any scenes they were in.

----click----

Herb groaned. "And I would have gotten away with it, if it
weren't for those
meddling kids."

Akane stuck her tongue out and pulled back one eyelid.
"Beeeeee DAH!"

"I don't wanna pose," Ranma said, sulking.

Kasumi reached into her pack. "Would you do it for a
Ranma-snack?"

=============


omakeomakeomakeomake

once again with an attempt to radically depart from the
standard "Meet The
Tendos" opening. Reworking of an earlier attempt.

TAKE TWO: KITTENS OMAKE

Soun nodded to himself as his three daughters dutifully
gathered. He
schooled himself to try and restrain himself from getting
too emotional at
this moment. When they were finally settled down, he merely
produced the
postcard. "Ranma is coming."

*snatch!*

Akane stared at the card now in Nabiki's hands. "He's
coming?!" *bounce
bounce bounce*

"Oh, thank goodness," Kasumi said, wiping away tears. "I'm
not getting any
younger, you know."

"Finally! Thank the kami!" Nabiki made a note to visit a
temple and light
some incense. Ever practical, Nabiki shot a glance at her
father. "You'll
deal with that father of his?"

Soun nodded, a gleam entering his eyes. Bonds of friendship
forged through
mutual suffering was one thing, but to harm HIS little
girls... Soun Tendo
might be a blubbering weenie but he was a blubbering weenie
who had his
limits.

Kidnapping his little girls so they could be thrown into a
pit with some
other girls and starved  so that Genma could try and teach
his son some lame
martial arts manuever had not sat well with Soun Tendo.
Nope.

Nabiki was mumbling with an eerie light in her eyes. "...and
I will pet him
and pat him and love him and squeeze him and rub his tummy
and..."

Kasumi was listening to Nabiki and nodding. Sounded like a
game plan. Akane
merely continued to bounce around like Tigger.

A commotion out front served to penetrate Soun's reverie.

"That must be them!" Akane squealed, rushing for the door.

*THWAM* *THWAM* *TRAMPLE* *TRAMPLE*

A panda groaned from the ground where it had been knocked
down, then run
over. A redhaired girl moaned likewise from the same
treatment.

"Where is he?" Kasumi asked, feeling *very* disappointed.
"Oh... poor
Ranma... I'm sure he hasn't been eating well. I..." *sniff*
*sniff*

Akane stopped prowling the compound as well and began
sniffing. "That
scent!"

Nabiki, with the sharpest senses, dropped next to the girl
and began
sniffing her. "Smells like Ranma - but the hormones are
different."

"oooooo." The redhead propped herself up and tried to focus
on the fuzzy
shape sniffing at her. "Nabiki?! I..."

Nabiki was joined by her two sisters who continued to sniff.
After the girl
passed out again, a decision was reached.

-----------

Ranma awoke and shot to the ceiling in a single motion.

Nabiki looked up at where Ranma was clinging to the ceiling.
"Nyaa. I told
you not to groom him *there*, Akane."

Akane merely smiled and licked her lips.

Kasumi merely crouched down and prepared to spring.

"Hey, waitaminute, I..." Ranma managed before three catgirls
pounced on him
and commenced cuddling.

Soun watched for a few moments, wiping tears from his eyes.
"That's the way!
Don't take no for an answer. Ah, you do your father proud!"

"What are they doing, Tendo?" Genma mumbled from where his
head had been
imbedded in the ceiling.

"Well, Saotome, you know how the Master cast that spell on
my wife - turning
her into a semihuman animal? And how my daughters are
fortunately more human
than Kimiko ended up, but are still catgirls?"

More mumbling from Genma that sounded like an agreement.
After all, it had
been that cute lil' catgirl Ukyo who had thrown the martial
arts training
manual in that canal. With the ink wet and pages stuck
together, Genma had
needed to rely on educated guesses as to the contents.

"Well, legally, they can't marry Ranma," said Soun in a sad
voice. "Not in
Japan, anyway. Yet. However, he *can* adopt them as his pets
and if children
develop it will prove that they *are* human. Tails and ears
and fur and
claws not withstanding."

"mmmmmf!" Genma protested.

"By the way, Saotome, I just made a few calls." Soun smiled
at how well his
daughters were getting along with Ranma. There may be new
kits on the way
before long, at least if Akane had *her* say in the matter.
Such a perverted
little kitty she was.

"Calls?" Genma said, still trying to get his head out of the
ceiling.

"Yes. When you rounded up all those daughters of victims of
Happosai's
'sexpet curse' experiments to use that pit of catgirls, you
certainly made
an impression on them and their families. Did it work, by
the way?"

"Uhmm. No. Not really," said Genma from his position.
"Instead of being
starved for three days and then attacking my son to get the
fish sausages
tied to his body, they instead apparently took the sausages
off and cuddled
with him to get warm and due to some odd affectionate
instinct. I tried
everything, Tendo. Fish paste, salmon cakes, catnip. I
starved them for
almost a week once. They didn't attack him. They *bonded*
with him. It got
so that he was begging to be thrown into the pit just so he
'could feed the
kitties'. Shameful. What a worthless son!"

"And then, when they tried to escape *with* Ranma, you beat
them down," said
Soun, eyeing his friend as if the overweight man was a
pinata and the
shinnai in his hands would be used to break it open.

"I *had* to, Tendo! It was for the sake of The Art!" Genma
paused in his
efforts to work himself free. "Errr. Waitaminute. What phone
calls?"

"Oh, that cute lil kitten Ukyo works nearby," said Soun
casually. "Then
there's those girls from Juuban. Though I don't expect those
girls from that
village of warrior catgirls (Nekojoketsuzoku?) to arrive
here for quite some
time yet."

*DING DONG!*

Genma froze as the front doorbell rang. Then, on hearing an
angry feminine
voice, finally managed to rip his head free of the ceiling.
He had to reach
up to pull his glasses out, and the sight that was then
revealed was *not*
very comforting.

There was the lionlike Katsumi, err, Kasumi. Pleasant little
smile on her
face while she looked on. There was the housecatlike Nabiki,
eyes narrowed
and gleaming. There was the tiger-striped Akane, teeth
gleaming and claws
extended.

There was also a number of other girls: some catgirls, a
foxgirl, a pair of
bunnygirls, a mousegirl, and a few other types. All looking
very very
peeved.

Soun sighed and cleared out of the way. "Comfort yourself
with this,
Saotome. My daughters and your son will likely get along
very well. And what
they do to you is only practice for when and if the Master
ever returns.
Girls? Try to clean up after you're done."

"Tendo?" Genma blinked as his old buddy Soun walked off
without a backwards
glance. He couldn't actually be...

Somehow Genma *knew* that the Crouch of the Wild Tiger
wasn't going to get
him out of this.

------click------

Kuno stood before the gates of the school. Here were the two
abominations,
joined by their sister this time! Clearly this could not be
tolerated.

"Hold, thou mockeries of humanity! The noble Tatewaki Kuno
defends this
institution from thy influence! The Blue Thunder of Furinkan
High shall not
tolerate thy presence in the hallowed halls of learning.
Animals such as
yourselves need only learn obediance to thy master, and the
great Blue
Thunder doth think that only he can put thee in thy proper
place."

"Geez, is this guy fond of hearing himself talk or what?"
Ranma frowned as
he noticed how the girls had cringed at this guy's
posturing. What had this
moron done to them?

"You there!" Kuno pointed his bokken at the boy standing
with the catgirls.
"How dare you address these subhumans so familiarly. Only by
being properly
owned by myself can their fate be salvaged!"

"Huh? Oh, I'm Ranma Saotome. Anything Goes School of Martial
Arts. And
well..."

Akane saw the chance for mischief and to distance herself
from Kuno. Just
because she *was* a fierce tigress didn't mean she wanted to
have Kuno keep
up with this stuff. "He's staying with us. And he's my
little Ranma-chan!"
*GLOMP!* *SNUGGLE!* *PURRRRRRRRR!*

"Hey! Waitaminute!" Ranma protested but it was too late. "I
never agreed
to..."

*GLOMP!* *GLOMP!*

Steam practically shot out of Kuno's ears as he saw the
three catgirls
hugging themselves to this interloper. "You... you... FIEND!
I SHALL SMITE
THEE!"

Three cats looked up as one, letting go of Ranma.

*SLICE!* *BITE!* *SLASH!*

Kuno was still staring at the nub of his bokken, his clothes
falling
shredded around him, while Kasumi delicately cleaned the
blood from her
mouth where she'd bitten his arm. "ouch..."

Akane grabbed the front of Kuno's hakama and dragged his
head down to eye
level with her. Her ears were back, her teeth were bared,
her eyes narrowed,
and her claws were fully extended. She didn't look happy, in
other words.
"Kuno. How *dare* you threaten my Ranma!"

"...but I wanted to be the one to defeat him in a casual yet
aggravating
manner," sulked Ranma.

Akane glared deeply into Kuno's eyes. "You threaten my Ranma
again and
you'll regret it."

"...*our* Ranma," corrected Nabiki. She was the neko ninja,
after all. Akane
would likely hurt Kuno, whereas Nabiki could be very clever
in her means of
vengeance.

Kuno broke out of the hold, leaving Akane clutching a torn
piece of cloth in
her hand. "I shall not tolerate this! I..."

"Hurrrrr?! Someone's threatening *my* Ranchan?" Cute little
kitten Ukyo's
eyes were slits as she stalked forward, having just arrived,
transfer papers
getting tucked into her bookbag.

"Morons is for killing," suggested Shampoo, stalking forward
with Ukyo.

"Morons is for killing?" Ukyo said speculatively.

"It has a ring to it," agreed Akane.

"Morons is for killing," mused Nabiki, picturing t-shirts
with the logo.
Hmmm.

Kuno pulled a spare bokken out of nowhere. "Know that you
face the
undefeated Blue Thunder. I shall prove my prowess and free
thee of this
unwanted ownership. Then we may..."

Battle auras flared. Claws were extended. Tatewaki Kuno got
hurt.

Ranma sulked some more. "...but *I* wanted to fight..."

Meanwhile, Akane (acting on ancient instincts) was currently
digging a nice
big hole to drag the school's unconscious star kendoist in.

It was instinct, of course. Not planned at all. Nope. Akane
was a nice kitty
after all. The others joining in was also likely just
instinct.

Right?
--------------


-----------
"Darn it. Forget the transformation pens and
 cutesy attacks. It's a life-or-death struggle,
 I want a 'Venus High Calibre Cannon'."
    -Minako Aino, "A Soldier's Duty"


http://metroanime.home.mindspring.com
http://www.geocities.com/mamoru_tengoku
http://www.geocities.com/studio_vanir
metroanime@mindspring.com





	     .---Anime/Manga Fanfiction Mailing List----.
             | Administrators - ffml-admins@anifics.com |
             | Unsubscribing - ffml-request@anifics.com |
             |     Put 'unsubscribe' in the subject     |
             `---- http://ffml.anifics.com/faq.txt -----'