Neon Genesis Evangelion Fan Fiction / Ah My Goddess Fan Fiction / Ranma 1/2 Fan Fiction / Sailor Moon Fan Fiction ❯ Why Sailor Pluto Hates The Bet ❯ Episode 1: Here's Ayana^H^H^H^H^HRanma ( Chapter 1 )

Ranma 1/2: WHY SAILOR PLUTO HATES THE BET

by P.H. Wise

key:

< > indicates English speech

" " indicates Japanese speech

. o O ( ) indicates thoughts (sometimes)

Episode 1: Here's Ayana^H^H^H^H^HRanma

Ranma arrives in Nerima! But what does Queen Beryl have to do with all of this? And who is the mysterious Giovannite!?

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

A girl and a panda, fighting in the rain

A panda and a girl, fighting in the rain

We've seen this sight before, yes indeed.

We are not at all unfamiliar with this scene.

Punch-block-kick-dodge-dodge-sweep-stomp-kick-jump-block-punch- block-

jump-kick-punch.

niar eht ni gnithgif ,adnap a dna lrig A

niar eht ni gnithgif ,lrig a dna adnap A

Backwards, forwards, and yes, even with our eyes closed.

ia cthulhu ry'leh ftaughn... *coughs* oh wait, I'm getting ahead of myself. My apologies. Now, where was I? Ah yes, the girl and the panda. We've all seen it before, yes. A red-haired, blue-eyed girl with a pigtail. Or a black-haired, blue-eyed girl with a pigtail, depending on who you ask. Of COURSE she doesn't REALLY have red hair, right? That would be too weird, and people would comment, right?

Well, this IS Nerima...

We may have seen this before; the residents of Nerima, however, have not. At least not in this particular timeline. Perhaps they MIGHT have seen it the last time the wheel of time hit this point, but surely by now the tale of the events have faded to legend, and legend has faded to myth, and things which ought not to have been forgotten have been lost.

Girl.

Panda.

Rain.

Punch-block-kick-block-jump-kick-block-kick-turn-walk-away-grab -sign-whack-over-head.

Ouch.

If you will pay more than a cursory glance to this oh so familiar scene, you will see that there are... differences. This particular girl does not have the red hair and blue eyes that we have come to expect from this sort of thing. No indeed, this girl seems the reverse image of the one we are used to seeing. Blue hair tied back in a pig-tail, blood-red eyes, and pale skin. She's wearing the standard Chinese clothes - red silk shirt, black pants, black slippers. Nothing else seems different about her. Red eyes. Blue hair. Curious.

Sometimes change comes slowly. Sometimes all at once. Yet this

change comes more often than not as the result of a grand design. The

wheel weaves as the wheel wills, it is said, and woe be it to any

mortal who attempts to stand in its way. What we see as something new

is really something decided upon long ago. What we think is our own

free will is really only the most recent event in the chain of

causality and/or fate, the will of God, and occasionally yesterday's oatmeal. You've heard this before, right? Let me tell you a secret.

Put your ear right up to your monitor as I whisper it to you: The wheel

weaves as the wheel wills, it's true, but sometimes you just have to

thumb your nose at the wheel, rip the web of the ages asunder, hack

into the Yggdrasil system, change things however you damn well please

and then laugh like a maniac as you shout out from the rooftops, "How's

THAT for Calvanistic Determinism!"

It all begins that fateful day, far away, where a girl and a

panda were fighting in the rain.

******* At the Tendo residence *******

A beginning is a very delicate time; very much the time for

taking the most delicate care to ensure that the balances are correct.

If you're closer to tick, everyone dies and the Shadows will rule the

universe for ever and a day. If you're closer to tock, the lawyers will

nail your ass for plagiarism, claiming that you lifted large portions

of your text directly from Dune and Babylon 5.

High on the mountain known as Fuji, a wind began to blow.

The wind was not the beginning, for there are neither beginnings nor

endings on the wheel of time (except for THE beginning, if it exists,

but let's not go into that. Trying to think of a time before eternity

will only make your head hurt). But it was a beginning. The wind blew

down the mountain, over the hikers who were climbing its snowy face,

down across the plains, through the city of Tokyo, and into the yard of

the home that belonged to the Tendo family, stirring gentle ripples in

the koi pond that graced the area. Oh, right, I ripped Wheel of

Time, too. We can't forget that, now can we? But I digress.

Tendo Soun sat looking at that very koi pond, a small post-card

held his hands. No, you didn't read that wrong. The post card was actually holding Soun's hands. It was most likely an evil possessed post card bent on draining his energy for the greater glory of the Negaverse (an American worker's union for Youma, Cardians, Droids, Phages and what not). All possession an energy draining aside, Soun was having some small difficulty at that moment. Tears were streaming from his eyes as he attempted quite unsuccessfully to control his emotions. Perhaps he could be excused for this: all his hopes and dreams for the future were on the verge of being fulfilled. Soon, the Tendo legacy would be secure. The key to it all was what the post-card heralded. And what was written on that all important post-card?

'Ranma o tsurete iku Chugoku ni te Saotome dayo-n.'

For those of us who don't know Japanese, that would be, 'Hi.

Bringing Ranma from China. Saotome.'

"R-Ranma? Coming here?" asked the emotionally overwhelmed Tendo

patriarch. He glanced at the post card, turned it around to see the

panda on the other side, then flipped it back to the side holding the

text. It was still there. This was no illusion. "Oh, how I've waited

for this day!" he cried, barely able to contain his enthusiasm. He

rushed off straight away to find his daughters to tell them the

wonderful news. Unfortunately, that was when the exhaustion from having all his energy drained by the evil possessed post card kicked in. Without taking more than a step or two towards where he thought his daughters would be, Soun fainted.

"Nabiki!" Kasumi called upon discovering her unconscious father.
"Mmn?" Nabiki responded, poking her head out of her room.

"Father has fainted again. Can you get Akane while I check if he has a fever or not?"

And so it was that, despite the incident with the life-sucking post card, Tendo Akane was found in the dojo by her sister Nabiki, who walked in just in time to see Akane smash a cinder-block with her bare hands.

********

*** A short time later ***

"FIANCÉ?"

Rain fell gently outside as the Tendo family met to discuss the issue.

"Yes. The son of a very good friend of mine. The son's name is Ranma Saotome. If one of you three girls were to marry him and carry on this training center, then the Tendo family legacy would be secure."

"Wait a minute!" said Akane, growing angry. "Don't we have some say in who we marry?"

"Akane's right, Daddy," said Kasumi, "We've never even MET Ranma."

Soun laughed. "That's easily fixed."

"Is he cute?" asked Nabiki.

"How old is he?" asked Kasumi. "Younger men bore me. What kind of guy is Ranma?"

"No idea." Soun replied.

"No idea?" Nabiki echoed, not entirely believing that she had heard her father correctly.

"I've never met him."

A few minutes later, their relative peace (read: VERY relative, pun unashamedly intended) was shattered by the cry of a young voice that bore no small resemblance to Hayashibara Megumi trying to speak like a young man. "LEGGO, Y'OL' FOOL!" cried Hayashibara Megumi - or so

Nabiki thought it was. She was already thinking of ways she could capitalize off of having such a well known Seiyuu visit their dojo when

a panda burst into the room carrying a small squirming (and kicking) bundle. "Hey! Yo! You're scaring 'em spitless!" yelled the bundle

(who, for the terminally brain-dead [or for those who have never heard

of Ranma 1/2] was actually a person being carried on the panda's shoulder).

"Daddy..." Kasumi began, "THIS... is your FRIEND?"

Soun shook his head vigorously.

"Oh," said Nabiki, who was quite disappointed when it became obvious that neither the panda nor the squirming bundle was Hayashibara Megumi. "So this panda just decided to visit then! Happens all the time!"

Without further delay, the panda deposited its squirming passenger on the ground in front of the rather nonplused Tendo family. On the plus side, said passenger was cute. On the minus side (or perhaps also on the plus side, depending on who you asked), said passenger was quite obviously female, and a very odd looking one at that. Clad in an oversized red silk Chinese style shirt and a pair of equally oversized black silk pants, with pale white skin, blood-red eyes, and blue hair tied back in a pigtail, the girl was... well, probably going to fit right in. This was Nerima, after all.

"You wouldn't be..." Soun said, trailing off. He couldn't bring himself to complete the question.

The girl looked at him without emotion. "I'm Saotome Ranma," she said.

The universe held its breath with the expectation of something more... but nothing came. There was no 'sorry about this.' Only

Ranma. Not sorry. She's Ranma Saotome. She's sorry about this.

That's the way it goes, right? Not this time, apparently.

Meanwhile, in the deeper levels of hell, Lucifer glared out at the frozen landscape around him. Up until several minutes earlier, everything as far as the eye could see had been a lake of fire in which the souls of the damned dwelt in eternal torment. Unfortunately for Luci-chan, it seemed that a certain two alumni of the University of Washington had finally engaged in sexual intercourse. As a result, the souls of the damned, instead of writhing in agony, were building snowmen and having snowball fights.

'When I find out who forgot to keep the rate of expansion equal to the rate of soul influx,' Lucifer thought, feeling downright surly, 'there will be Hell to pay.'

Soun fainted immediately, though I cannot say whether it was on account of Ranma's failure to give his cliched apology, or from the fact that the aforementioned alumni of the University of Washington had finally been proven wrong in regards to the theorized exothermic nature of Hell.

Back at the Tendo-ke, the next few events, alas, went more or less as one would expect them to. You all know the words, so feel free to sing along.

~"You want to be friends? Let's fight in the dojo!".

Charge. Punch. Jump. Kick. Splits-in-midair.

Punch. Lean. Kick. Lean.

"This time for real!"

Charge. Punch. Jump. CRACK!! Flip. Tap. Laugh.

"I'm glad you're a girl. I'd hate to lose to a boy."

The Chorus joins in: "She's glad you're a girl! She'd hate to lose to a boy! Yes she'd hate to lose to a boy! Oh she'd haaaaaaaaate yes she'd haaaaaaate, yes she'd hate she'd hate hate hate to lose to a BOY!!!"

"Kasumi? Who's that old guy?"

"Got me, Imouto-chan"
"Wouldn't you like to take a bath, Ranma?"

"No. It's OK."

"No it's not. You must be all sweaty from your workout!"

The door opens.

Black-haired pig-tailed boy sees girl.

Girl sees boy.

Black-haired pig-tailed boy sees girl.

Girl sees boy.

The door opens, yes.

The door opens and both boy and girl are naked.

Boy and girl are naked.
"PERVERT!"

The Chorus joins in again: "PERVERT, PERVERT, PERVERT, Akane cries! Pervert, Pervert, pervert, Akane cries! See the fury arise! See the snakes that she rears, how they hiss in the air! And the sparkles that flash in her eyes, and the spar - - - - - kles, the sparkles that flash in her eyes!"~

This, of course, brings us to our final cadence, which goes from V7/V to I64 V I with the Soprano line singing the tonic on the final note! Everyone cheer! Let's hear it for Perfect Authentic Cadences!

and then...
"I'm Saotome Ranma."

But he's not sorry about this.

And with that, Akane dropped the stone statue that she had been about to clobber the pervert with.

"Daddy, why are you friends with them?" Kasumi asked as the family and their guests discussed the situation. The Tendos were definitely not impressed by their gender and species changing guests.

"They weren't like this before!" Soun insisted. "Not before they went to China... and undertook that terrifying training exercise!"

"Ah yes," said the panda. Wait, no, it was Genma. Wait, it WAS the panda, but he had used hot water to transform back to his true form; that of a fat and balding martial artist in a ratty Gi with a bandanna tied over his head in an effort to hide his baldness, otherwise known as Genma Saotome, Ranma's father. "It was two fateful weeks ago..."

*** FLASHBACK ***

*Mt Quanjing, Bayankala range, Qinghai province, China*

"Here sir. Is legendary "training ground of accursed springs."

That was the guide, who was dressed in green and wearing a cap with a red star in the center.

"Are you prepared, Ranma?" Genma asked his son. Both were clad in gis that seemed somewhat the worse for wear, and both wore backpacks. They stood at the edge of a valley filled with countless pools of water, each with several bamboo poles sticking up out of them

at regular intervals.

"This place isn't so impressive." said Ranma as he and his father placed their backpacks on the ground.

"You is very strange one, no?" said the guide. "This place very dangerous. Nobody use now. Is more than one hundred spring here, and every one have own tragic legend!"

They ignored the guide. The guide was not suprised by this, of course. People rarely listened to him. Still, he was hoping that maybe someday at least ONE person might listen to him. He was also hoping to win the lottery someday. Neither were likely.

"Ranma, follow me!" Genma cried as he leaped from the ground up to one of the poles.

Ranma was right behind him.

"Ah! Sir! What you doing? Very bad if you fall in spring!"

The two exchanged blows, leaping from pole to pole in an impressive display of martial arts skill. For a moment the guide dared to hope that maybe they were skilled enough to avoid taking the plunge... but there was no such luck. Ranma flipped over one of his father's kicks and delivered a kick of his own to the back of the old man's head. Down he went into the pool below them.

"Gotcha." said Ranma as he landed gracefully on the top of one of the bamboo poles.

For a long moment, nothing happened. And then... a panda leaped from the spring that Ranma's father had fallen into. Apparently he was not aware of the change that he had undergone, as he continued to fight as if nothing had happened. Understandably, Ranma was somewhat nonplused by the fact that his father had fallen into the pool and a panda wearing a gi came out. He expressed his confusion quite eloquently, all things considered. "Wha~? Wha~? Wha~?" he asked, pointing at the figure of the panda, an expression of outright disbelief on his face.

"That is 'Spring of Drowned Panda!' the guide yelled, "There is tragic legend, very tragic, of panda who drown there two thousand ear ago! Now whoever fall in that spring... take body of panda!"

Ranma gaped at the guide, completely not comprehending what was being said to him. That sort of thing didn't happen!

But the panda, alas, did not wait for Ranma to return his attention to the fight. It leaped at the young pig-tailed boy, and with

a quick swipe of its paws, sent him flying towards another spring.

Ranma went under with a tremendous splash.

"Oh no!" cried the guide, "Not Ayanami-nichuan! The spring of sealed Demon-Queen! There is very tragic legend, very tragic, of demon-queen who destroy kingdom of the moon ten thousand year ago today! All die, but Moon-Queen seal Demon-Queen in spring! Now whoever fall in that spring..." the guide thought about it for a moment, and then just shrugged. "I no know what happen to whoever fall in THAT spring. No one ever fall in it before."

Ranma surfaced. Ranma became aware of his new body. Blue hair.

Red eyes. Pale skin. Breasts.

"UAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH!" she screamed, rather like Shinji did when he laid eyes on the shattered remains of Eva02 in the End of

Evangelion.

You know, hearing Shinji scream like that was perhaps my favorite moment in that entire movie. If only he could have suffered more. Better yet, if only he could have died horribly. I would have had him killed off by the soldiers sent in by Seele. Preferably earlier, actually. I would then have had Asuka's Eva go berserk and wipe the floor with those other Evas, tearing them limb from limb and saving the world (and thwarting the evil plans of a man named Anno). By the way, you shouldn't read the preceeding paragraph if you haven't seen the End of Evangelion yet. Now where was I... ah yes. Ranma was screaming.

As she screamed the water began to boil. Her red eyes took on an unearthly glow as she floated into the air. "POP!" she shouted angrily, "You've screwed me over for the last time!"

Genma wasn't sure how his son had learned how to do such things, but he knew when it was time to run away. He took off like a rocket.

"GET BACK HERE, POP, SO I CAN KILL YOU!" Ranma shrieked, her voice taking on a resonance that shook the very earth beneath her feet...

*END FLASHBACK*

"And after he fell into what the guide identified as the Spring of Drowned Girl, Ranma fainted like a sissy! After that, we set out for Japan, having completed our training trip."

"What? He turned into a girl and then you just went home?" Nabiki asked, somehow doubting that things would have ended like that.

Ranma glared at Genma.

Genma swallowed and glanced nervously at the boy beside him. "Um, yep. That's exactly what happened."

"The legendary training ground of accursed springs." said Soun, looking dreadfully serious and filling his words with a pretentious sense of grave importance, "Its true horror has always been shrouded in mystery. But now..."

"Feh." said Ranma, "Whaddya mean, 'true horror?'" He grabbed his father by the gi. "Yo, old man, what's the big idea draggin' me to a place like that, anyway?"

Genma promptly threw his son into the koi pond. "You sound like a woman!" he proclaimed, "Were you not prepared to give your life for the sake of your training?"

"My life, yes." said Onna-Ranma, grabbing a bucket and filling it with water from the pond, which she promptly threw at Genma. Instant panda. "My MANHOOD is another story!"

From there, the scene degenerated into violence.

*******

Within a dark throne room, a queen gazed into the crystal ball set before her throne, attended by nearly a hundred courtiers and assorted servants. The ball was mounted on a scepter which floated in the air in front of her, making impressive 'wooomWOOOMwooomWOOOM' noises as it bobbed ever so slightly up and down, much like the noise of the warp core of the Starship Enterprise, which will not be appearing in this story (hopefully). The queen had strange features - pointed ears, small horn-like protrusions on her shoulders, and claw-like fingernails. Her hair was long and red, and she was clad in a very slinky dress. Her hands were steepled in front of her face, concealing her facial expressions as she peered out at her court.

"Giovannite, I command you to appear before me!" she proclaimed.

The man in question appeared before his queen in a swirl of light. He was fairly young, maybe 16 or so, and has short blonde hair parted in the center. He, unlike the queen, was not clad in a slinky dress, for which I think we can all breathe a sigh of relief. Rather, he was clad in a rather tasteless gray uniform that bore a suspicious resemblance to the male uniform of the Japanese school system, save that its buttons went diagonally down the side from the middle and ended about mid-torso instead of going straight up and down the middle of the coat.

"I come as you have commanded, Queen Beryl." he said.

"Giovannite, I have a mission for you. I have felt the stirrings of the demon-queen. The time is nearly upon us to let loose the 16 youma upon the world! To prepare for this, I want you to go to earth - to Tokyo, of course - to gather the energy that we will need to let loose the demon-queen."

Giovannite bowed deeply. "Of course my queen. And if I might say so, you are looking especially radiant tonight. I would be most grateful if you would allow me to taste of thine lips ere I go..." He moved closer to her, and despite the fact that he was standing and she sitting, she was still taller than him. Looking directly into her eyes, he moved forward... and was blasted backwards by a tremendous wave of force.

"You weren't trying to add ME to the list of women that you've kissed, were you? Explain yourself, Giovannite, or I shall destroy you where you stand," said Queen Beryl, who had not moved her hands from the position of being steepled in front of her face.

"Of course I wasn't trying to do THAT! Um, I was... uh... just trying to demonstrate my plan! Uh... er... humans put a great deal of energy into the idea of kissing! I'm going to harvest it! And it shall involve... um... ice-skating and mortal combat.. uh, yeah. That's it!"

Queen Beryl looked at Giovannite thoughtfully. Her hands were steepled in front of her face. "Interesting plan, Giovannite. I look forward to seeing the fruit of your success - the kissing energy of countless hapless humans!"

"Hai, Queen Beryl!" said Giovannite as he vanished in a swirl of light, unable to quite believe that she had bought it. On the downside, this meant that he now had to actually carry it out... which wasn't quite so good. Oh well. Perhaps he could start at Furinkan high school. He was fairly sure that one of the other generals attended school there, so perhaps he could enlist some aid from them.

Yeah, right.

As Giovannite vanished, Queen Beryl smirked. `Always give them just enough rope to hang themselves with, that's my motto.' It was then that she began to laugh (and quite lucidly, thank you very much).

*******

Back at the Tendo home, alas, things had not gone well.

Akane had been chosen to be Ranma's fiancee, and was not pleased with this arrangement, nor was she pleased with the fact that Ranma had walked in on her in the bath. After she called Ranma a pervert for having seen her in the nude. Ranma pointed out that Akane walked in on 'him.' Akane then replied that it's different when a girl sees a boy.

That was when Ranma demonstrated another amazing ability, beyond even his martial arts and his curse: the ability to, no matter how awkward the angle or how impossible it may seem, send his foot directly into his mouth. "It's no big deal for me to see a naked girl. I mean, I've seen myself plenty of times, right? And I'm better built to boot."

Table, Ranma. Ranma, table. Douzo yuroshiku!

*SMASHSMASHSMASHSMASH*

From beneath the table that Akane had so rudely introduced her

to, Onna-Ranma twitched slightly, her pinkie and forefinger extended in

Takahashi pose number 36.

"Oh, don't mind Akane," said Kasumi as Ranma awoke later that evening, a cheerful smile on her face, "She's really a very sweet girl. She's just a violent maniac."

Ranma shook her head incredulously, looking at Kasumi as if she'd sprouted a third eye (*ominous thunder booms in the background*). "Um... right."

--=- END EPISODE ONE -=--

SAILOR SAYS!

"Today on Why Sailor Pluto Hates The Bet, we learned that girl-type Ranma has blue hair and red eyes! We also learned that Akane likes to hit people with large objects (though they usually deserve it). But what exciting adventures await our hero/heroine? Is Giovannite REALLY going to try to harvest *KISSING* energy!? Stay right there, and I'll show you!"

Next: When Moon-cats Attack!

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

Yay! I got the obligatory `meeting with the Tendos' episode out of the way! With that taken care of, I can actually start on what I had in mind when I thought this thing up! :p

Comments? Criticisms? Do you like it? Love it? Hate it? Let me know!

Let's keep it civil, please. Flames will be laughed at. MSTies will

also be laughed at, but in an entirely different manner than flames. 8)

stillwell_phw@hotmail.com

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