A Ranma ½ fanfict by Tangent

Pre-reading and editing assistance by:

Lord Talon;

Nevrmore;

And some guy named Steve

DISCLAIMER: ‘Ranma ½’ and all characters therein belong to Rumiko Takahashi, Shogagukan, Kitty and Viz Video. This fanfict has been produced for my own enjoyment and to pass on without profit. Other characters that come into play in this fanfict may or may not be pulled from other sources (including other fanficts, RPGs, manga, anime, literature, or possibly even *GASP* American comic books!).

A WORD FROM TANGENT: While Lord Talon has informed me that what I’m about to attempt has been done before, this in no way has dissuaded me from making my own version. For one thing, for better or for worse, in all of my other Ranma fanficts to date, Ranma either has or will end up with Akane. Well, to this I say "Wrong Tendo"

What difference does the weather make? What difference indeed…?

Soun Tendo, a man in his early forties, with a strong, kind face, long black hair and a mustache, read through the morning mail. Among the various letters, packages, and postcards was a postcard that had a message for which he had been waiting for a long time. The postcard showed a scene with a panda, and turning it over, he noticed that it was post marked China. Tears started to come from his eyes as he read the message:

Bringing Ranma home.

On Soun's face were tears of happiness as he said, out loud and low to himself, "They are finally coming here...How I have waited for this day."

He decided to tell his daughters immediately.

Soun called out, "Kasumi! Nabiki! Akane!"

Not getting an immediate response, he went to look for them, first checking the kitchen that was his eldest daughter’s domain. She was indeed there, as she seemed to nearly always be. A brief pang of sorrow revisited his heart as he thought about this last and strongest connection that she had with her mother. He collected himself. Today’s news was to be joyous, not tragic, as his wife’s death had been so many years ago.

"Kasumi!" he exclaimed, happily, managing to expunge his grief, "We are expecting company. Please get ready to prepare some tea for our guests."

"Oh? Who is it that is coming, Father?" Kasumi asked curiously.

"An old friend of mine and his son," explained Soun. "I will explain everything when you, Nabiki, and Akane are all at the table." With that, he left to find his other two daughters.

After a brief search of the rest of the first floor, Soun then went to check the bedrooms on the second floor of their family home, expecting to at least find his middle daughter there. As he had expected, he found Nabiki in her room, reading one of her manga books. Not that he minded. She studied and had good grades, so what she did in her spare time was her own concern.

"Nabiki" he called out to get her attention.

"Yes, Daddy?" Nabiki asked neutrally. Her father rarely interrupted her privacy, and when he did, it wasn’t always with something that she considered worthwhile.

"We are expecting guests today," Soun began again. "An old friend of mine is coming to visit, and he is bringing his son. Please go wait at the table and I will explain everything as soon as everyone is together." With that, he left the room to search for Akane.

[So…he’s going to introduce us to the son of an old friend of his, is he?] Nabiki pondered. Truth to tell, she had been expecting something like this for some time now. Japanese inheritance laws were steep, and it was unlikely that the family would retain the Tendo estate should Soun pass away unless a lot of money was involved…or the one other option that came to her mind happened. A small smile began to form on her lips.

"I can’t find Akane," Soun said, poking his head back into her room.

"I’ll find her, Daddy," Nabiki offered. [Now…what to wear? I know! Just the thing,] she thought. [I’ll change right after I find Akane. She has enough boys after her already, even if she doesn’t like any of them. Just once, I’d like to get a chance!]

Akane was just returning from her run, shouting "Hi! I'm home!" and then ran straight to the dojo, pausing only to throw off her running clothes and change into her practice uniform, as was appropriate for training in the dojo. She set up a quick array of concrete blocks and wood, then preceded to reduce said objects to rubble.

"Ahhhh, good!" she sighed as she relaxed. Then she heard a small click. Turning around, she saw one of her older sisters, Nabiki, putting her camera away.

"There you go again, Akane" she said as she shook her head, arms crossed in front of her. "No wonder all the boys at school think you're strange!"

"Why should I care?" she demanded. "I'm not like you! Not everyone thinks the world revolves around boys, Nabiki!"

"No?" Nabiki replied, placing her hands behind her head, "Then I guess what father has to say to us would be of no interest to you would it?"

Akane turned to look at her, "What are you talking about?"

The sun was shining brightly over the Nerima district. In the Tendo Household, Akane’s voice was raised in protest. "FIANCE?!?"

Soun Tendo looked at Akane, "Yes, the son of a very good friend of mine. His name is Ranma Saotome" he stated. "If one of you were to marry him, and carry on this dojo, then the Tendo family legacy would be assured."

Akane wasn’t taking this well.

"WAIT A MINUTE!" she shouted angrily. "Don’t WE have some say in who we marry?"

"Akane’s correct, Father" Kasume interjected. "We have never even met him."

Mr. Tendo chuckled, "Well now, that is easily fixed!"

SCENE CHANGE: The streets of Nerima…

The sun warmed the street as two figures wandered through Nerima.

"Where are we going again?" demanded a young man wearing Chinese style fighting clothes. He was interrogating an older man wearing an off white gi, glasses, and a bandanna.

"I told you Ranma," the older man explained once again. "We are going to visit an old friend of mine. One that I haven’t seen in a long time."

"You know someone from a long time ago who is still your friend?" the boy asked, incredulous. "I’ll believe that when I see it."

"You will, my boy, you will."

SCENE CHANGE: Back at the Tendo Dojo…

Back at the Tendo residence, Soun continued to explain the situation to his daughters. Nabiki, he noted to himself, appeared to be particularly excited about the prospect, and had even gone as far as to change into a kimono for the occasion. Kasumi, whom he suspected of harboring feelings for Dr. Tofu even if she didn’t seem to be aware of it herself yet, had just come in straight from the kitchen. Akane, on the other hand, was obviously irritated over the whole affair.

"Ranma is returning from a long training journey with his father." Soun paused briefly to sip his tea. "Recently, it seems, they crossed into China."

"Oooh! China!" exclaimed Nabiki, who was definitely warming up to the prospect of getting to know someone who could tell her first hand what other countries were like.

"What’s so great about training in China" commented Akane sulkily. Her recent experience with the now daily fights with the boys at Furinkan High School had left her more than a little fed up with boys for the time being. While she knew that she wasn’t being fair to the boy she hadn’t even met yet, she did not really care at the moment. "It doesn’t mean that he’s any good."

"Is he cute?" inquired Nabiki, ignoring her sister.

"I do hope that he is older than me" commented a worried Kasumi. "Younger men are so…young."

"So, what is he like?" persisted Nabiki.

Soun cleared his throat. "I have no idea," he admitted.

"You have no idea" repeated Nabiki, glaring at her father.

"I’ve never met him" he confessed.

Just then, they heard a commotion at the door. "Aw, Pop, why can’t we go home first?" complained a voice, which obviously belonged to a young man. Could it be them, Soun thought as he got up to greet his guests. Nabiki followed.

"Oooo! It must be Ranma!" Nabiki thought excitedly, not realizing that she had said the thought aloud. Kasumi was happy for her sister, and relieved (although she did not just yet realize why). Akane decided that since Nabiki was so excited about this turn of events, her sister could have him.

"I’ve already told you, Ranma," stated a voice belonging to an older man. "We will be staying here for a while, so you might as well get used to the idea." It was his friend…and his son. Soun joyously greeted them as they came in.

"Saotome, my friend! We’ve been expecting you!" Soun quickly spotted the boy that his friend had been arguing with and concluded: "And you must be Ranma!" He gathered the boy into his arms for a manly embrace.

By this time, all three daughters had gathered to see their guests. Nabiki, noticing that her father seemed disinclined to let the boy go, leaned closer to examine the subject of her father’s attention. Hmmm, Ranma was as fine a specimen as she could ask for, handsome in a vaguely bishonen way. After a quick comparison between the features of the boy and his father, she decided that he must get his looks from his mother’s side of the family. Not that his father was actually ugly. He was okay for an older man, and might have looked more attractive in his younger days, but she doubted that he could have matched his son’s appearance. Nabiki wondered briefly what her own children would look like if she married the boy.

After a moment, Soun herded everyone back into the sitting room. Nabiki sat carefully down almost exactly opposite of Ranma. Akane, glaring at the boy who was about to decide her future, angrily plunked herself down to Nabiki’s left. Kasumi served tea to everyone and then sat down gently on the other side of Nabiki. Genma smiled at this, but Ranma failed to recognize the significance of it all.

"Well, Ranma," Soun began. "These are my daughters. Kasumi, age nineteen, the oldest; Nabiki, age seventeen; and Akane, age sixteen, the youngest. Pick anyone you like and she will be your fiancée." Soun’s beaming smile faltered as he noticed that the boy seemed shocked. After a moment, Ranma massaged his temple with the fingers of his right hand, as if staving off a headache.

"Excuse me for a moment," Ranma said to the Tendos before glaring at his own father. "Is there something that you forgot to tell me, Pop?" His tone was low and dangerous, reflecting a wild temper that Genma had seen all too much of for the past month or so.

"Heh, heh…I guess in the heat of the moment, I forgot to tell you…" Genma was nervous to say the least. After…the incident…Ranma had proved that he was quite formidable when he truly lost his temper. While not as scary as when he was dealing with his…cat problem…he was as easily as scary as his mother was at times. This looked like it was becoming another such time.

"Forgot to tell me…" Ranma stated darkly. "Forgot to tell me, like you forgot to tell me that you couldn’t read Chinese when you decided that Jusenkyo would be a good place to train? Or like when you decided that it was okay to eat the food on that table in Joketsuzoku?"

"But I was starving…" Genma protested.

"STARVING!?!" Ranma shouted, causing his father to back away in fear. "BECAUSE OF YOU, I GOT INTO A FIGHT THAT ENDED UP WITH AN AMAZON SWEARING TO HUNT ME DOWN AND KILL ME, AND ALL YOU CAN SAY IS THAT YOU WERE STARVING!?!" The Tendos stared as an angry blue chi aura manifested itself around Ranma. Genma wanted to make a break for it, but the thought of what his wife would do to him after what he had already done held him back. While it didn’t exactly give him courage, it did balance out his fear with another fear.

"How was I supposed to know that she would give you the kiss of death if you won?" asked Genma, trying his version of reason for the umpteenth time.

"How…?" Ranma’s left eye twitched for a moment, which was all the warning his father received. Genma spotted it, but it didn’t help him in the slightest. Almost faster that the eye could follow, Ranma had stood up, grabbed the front of his father’s gi, and was screaming in his face at the top of his lungs. "GET OUT OF MY LIFE, YOU PANDA, BEFORE YOU DESTROY ANY MORE OF IT!!!" With that, he flung his father into the koi pond in the Tendo’s yard.

Ranma calmed himself down and settled at the table once again. He took a deep breath and timed himself carefully. "Please excuse my unseemly outburst just now, but there are some things that you have a right to know before we decide to uphold the marriage agreement between our clans." Ranma subtly braced himself for the next phrase, hoping that he had predicted his father’s reaction correctly. "And this…" The Tendos facefaulted as a giant panda rose out of the koi pond, grabbed a wash basin, and threw some water at the young man seated before them. In an instant, a kawai redheaded girl replaced him. "…Is one of them."

"Nani?" Soun and Akane stated in surprised stereo.

"Oh my!" exclaimed Kasumi in wonder.

"Well now, this is interesting," stated Nabiki neutrally.

"Perhaps an explanation is in order," Ranma offered.

"This I’ve got to hear," replied Nabiki dryly.

As everyone settled down, Ranma began her tale:

"It all started about three weeks ago, on Mt. Quanjing, in the Bayankala Range, Qinghai Province, China…"

*** FLASHBACK ***

"Here, Sirs, is legendary training ground of accursed springs, Jusenkyo," the guide said with a mix of pride and caution in his voice. He was seldom asked to lead anyone to Jusenkyo, as it was one of the more obscure tourist spots available. Personally, he felt it was some sort of bureaucratic error that the accursed springs were a tourist spot to begin with. Nearly every time he brought someone here, they managed to somehow fall into one of the springs.

"Are you prepared, boy?" asked Genma as he set down his pack. Truth to tell, he was a little disappointed in how this was turning out. While not exactly the same setup, Jusenkyo looked very similar to something he had Ranma do last year. Now where had that been? America…Australia?

Ranma was less than impressed. "Aw…this place don’t look so tough."

"You very strange ones, Sirs" commented the guide, wishing he could speak Japanese more fluently. "This place very dangerous. Nobody use now." [There!] he thought [I’ve actually managed to start my explanation before anyone got ahead of themselves]. "Is more than one hundred springs here, and every one have own tragic legend." The guide was snapped out of his reverie by Genma’s cry.

"Ranma! Follow me!" called out Genma as he leaped to one of the poles. The boy jumped to one of his own and assumed a ready stance.

"Ah! Sirs!" the alarmed guide exclaimed. "What you doing?" [I have got to start earlier on the explanation! Well…At least they paid in advance.]

"I won’t go easy on you" cautioned Genma.

"That’s just the way I like it!" replied Ranma confidently.

"Please, Sirs!" pleaded the guide. "It very bad you fall in spring!" Unfortunately, the two paid no attention to him.

Genma picked a moment at random, and attacked. Ranma, for his part, met Genma in mid-air and knocked him into one of the pools. [Well, that was quick] the boy thought.

"What’s up, Pop?" asked Ranma, pleased to have got the first strike in. "We done already?"

There was quiet. Ranma jumped to a closer pole, concerned. When a panda leaped out of the spring, the event took Ranma completely by surprise. [Well, there goes my holiday bonus] thought the guide. The giant panda took a place on another pole.

"Wha...wha…wha…" stammered Ranma.

"That is Shonmaoniichuan!" shouted the guide, explaining what had happened. "There is very tragic legend of panda that fall in and drown two thousand year ago!" the guide continued as Ranma dodged the panda time and time again

"Well, why didn’t you tell us sooner?!" demanded Ranma. At about that moment, the panda had managed to strike him, knocking him into another spring. Ranma barely felt the change, which he later found out was another aspect of the curse. Only the fact that he was wondering what he would turn into allowed him to notice his first transition into female form. She surfaced, opened her gi to confirm her suspicions, and then screamed. After that, the events became a little hazy in Ranma's memory.

*** END FLASHBACK ***

"After that, I chased Pop around Jusenkyo a few times before I lost track of him," Ranma continued. "You wouldn’t think that a fat panda could move so fast." The panda that had been Genma growlfed at this, but Ranma wasn’t having any of its back talk. "Shut up you, before I decide to sell ya to a zoo or somethin’. I should have let the amazons make a rug out of you, but nooo! I had to save your sorry behind!" Ranma regained control of her temper and calmed down.

"Look, Pop," Ranma continued. "I’m your son," (small twitch) "and I love you," (this time the twitch was from the panda) "but you can be so aggravating at times!" She sighed. "Look…go change back, and I’ll try to calm down and explain things to the Tendos." As the Panda got up to head for the furo (he had been here before, even if it was over a decade ago), a thought occurred to Ranma. "Don’t forget to change back before you use up all the shampoo again. It might not be expensive, but it adds up and we’re guests now!"

Genma paused for a moment, irritated for being treated like a little kid by his own son as well as the fact that he had indeed forgotten about changing back first. He sighed in resignation, then nodded, not willing to provoke his son again at this time.

"Do you really think that you should talk to your father like that?" Kasumi asked once the elder Saotome was gone, echoing her own father’s sentiments.

"Maybe not," Ranma conceded. "But the curse changed him somehow. More than just turning him into a panda when hit with cold water, I mean." She looked into her tea sadly as she continued. "We used to get along fairly well, just two guys, father and son, on the open road, training in the Martial Arts. He used to be a great sensei, and I really respected him, even if he did have the occasional truly stupid idea that would turn my life into hell…" She paused, trying to reign in her anger over certain memories.

"And since the curse?" Nabiki prompted.

"Since the curse, he’s been acting more and more irresponsible, just doing things and not thinking about the consequences, or possibly just ignoring them," Ranma sighed again. "It’s as if he’s forgetting that there are rules that he should go by if he wants to interact with people. He used to only act like that occasionally, but now it’s unusual for him not to do something aggravatingly stupid at least once a week, if not more often. Jusenkyo changed him somehow, and that scares me."

"Take what happened in Joketsuzoku for example," Ranma went on…

The two cursed individuals and their guide approached the village of Joketsuzoku. The Saotomes were currently in their cursed forms, as the lack of readily available hot water and the mercy of the weather dictated. Ranma was still in a wild frenzy of mixed emotions, but she had reigned them in and forced herself to try to find her center. Unfortunately, what she was finding was hunger. While this did distract her from her inner storm of conflicting emotions, it provided an unpleasant reminder of when she had let her hunger rule her the day before. The braided pigtail she now wore in place of simply tying her hair back still felt too new to let her forget that lesson. She would not let her hunger dictate her actions again.

This, however, did not keep her stomach from growling.

"Oh…I’m so hungry…" she complained under her breath. The Panda who was Genma nodded his agreement as he plodded along behind her. The guide said nothing, not having heard enough of the statement to translate it to himself with any accuracy.

After a bit, the three reached the village and were drawn towards the sounds of activity coming from the crowd surrounding two poles in the center of the village. Ranma hoped that the guide would find someone willing to sell them some food there, and indicated her desires to the guide. Genma, unable to speak in panda form, and not wanting to be fed bamboo again (it was okay, but he was beginning to get a little tired of it), spotted something and wandered off.

The guide, after a brief talk with one of the villagers, started to explain to his younger client that nobody was selling anything until after the tournament, but spotted what the panda was doing. "Ah! Sir! What you doing?"

Ranma turned around and groaned as she saw her pandafied father rapidly eating food that had been placed on a table off to the side of the tournament. A fancy, important looking sign that she couldn’t read told her that her father (and possibly the guide and herself) was in a lot of trouble…

"It turned out that the food was the first prize of the tournament," Ranma went on. "The winner, an amazon girl named Shampoo, was pretty mad at us, and demanded the panda as compensation. I think she wanted to make a panda skin rug or somethin’… The guide wasn’t too clear when he translated, and we didn’t get a chance to ask him later." Ranma paused to sip her tea.

Soun reflected on what Ranma was telling them, taking it all in stoically as silent tears began to flow down his cheek. Such a tragic story, and there was a serious chance that the marriage agreement would be canceled. Maybe he could talk Akane into accepting the young Saotome. Unlike his other daughters, she had kept up in her studies in the Tendo Anything Goes School of Martial Arts. She might be willing to do this for the sake of the dojo.

Unfortunately for Soun, Akane had other ideas. She still glared at Ranma, relieved that a way out of the engagement was being offered, but not willing to show it to this…this…pervert. What else could Ranma be? She was really a guy who turned into a girl so of course she had to be taking advantage of it! The hentai probably stared at herself in the mirror or…or…something! Akane fumed on…

Kasumi just listened to the story, feeling compassion for the emotional pain that Ranma and her father must be going through. She wanted to help the Saotomes, particularly the child who sat before them. She had no desire to marry the girl, however, as Ranma was too young for her tastes. Besides, she wouldn’t be able to provide the kind of help that Ranma needed if they were to be married.

"So," Nabiki prompted. "What happened next?" While she had been a little taken aback at first when she found out about Ranma’s curse, she still felt somewhat attracted to the boy who was now a girl. It wasn’t as if Ranma had attempted, even inadvertently, to deceive them after all. The sense of adventure drew her somehow, like a moth to a flame. Her life was calm, ordered, and…well…a little boring, while Ranma’s was…was…chaotic, adventurous, and exciting.

"What else could I do?" Ranma asked rhetorically. "The girl wanted to kill my pop, or at least make him a pet or somethin’ If I didn't do somethin’ quick, the matter would be taken out of my hands, so I did the first thing to come to my mind. I challenged her for the first prize." Ranma sipped her tea again. "I shoulda known that somethin’ was up when she just smirked at me and accepted when the guide translated for her. The two of us took positions on this log that had been suspended between the pillars by ropes. She attacked me with a couple of bonbori, but I just kicked her off the log before she could get a hit in. Next thing I know, she kisses me on the cheek and the guide is screaming somethin’ about some kiss of death."

"Kiss of death?" Soun asked. Despite what Ranma had yelled to her father earlier, Soun had not taken it to be meant as literally true, so he was more than a little surprised.

"Yeah," Ranma explained. "The amazons of Joketsuzoku aren’t real keen on losing to outsiders. The ‘Kiss of Death’ is their little way of expressing their displeasure with such events." The bitterness was evident in her voice, despite her attempts to calm herself. "Would it have been too much to ask for the match to end in mutual respect no matter who won? That’s the way Pop always said it was suppose to work." Ranma’s bitterness had turned into real tears, but she hadn’t noticed. "Too bad it never does…I never get to have any friends…" This last was said with such quiet remorse that even Akane began to feel a little sympathy for the girl (just a little though, and only for the girl-half…the boy-half was still a hentai to her way of thinking).

"Well, I won’t force the issue," Soun started. "But should one of my daughters agree to become engaged to you, you will honor the arrangement?"

"Of course, Tendo-San. They’re all attractive and they seem nice…" Ranma-chan stated, choosing to ignore the fact that Akane was glaring at her with renewed hostility after that statement.

"Well then," began Nabiki, before her father could derail either her plan or Akane’s by trying to hook the two martial artists together out of some sense of obligation or duty. "I’d like to give this engagement a chance." Nabiki smiled dryly at Ranma-chan. "That is…if you’ll have me."

"Umm…ah…yes," Ranma-chan stammered before regaining her bearings. "I mean yes! I will agree to become engaged to you, Nabiki Tendo. I am happy and honored that you will have me!"

"Well then," Soun stated, a little surprised by this turn of events, but not at all unhappy. If Nabiki wanted to marry Ranma, and neither of them seemed to be upset, then all was right with the world regardless of the curse and the other complications. "It’s settled. Ranma, Nabiki is now your fiancée."

END.