Ranma 1/2 Fan Fiction / Sailor Moon Fan Fiction ❯ Reluctant Bet (2nd Labor) ❯ prologue ( Prologue )
[ P - Pre-Teen ]
By: Metroanime 
Anime/Manga: Ranma 1/2 Fan Fiction / Sailor Moon Fan Fiction | Genre(s): Comedy / Fantasy / Sci-fi | Type: The Bet | Uploaded On: 10.02.2002 | Pages: 2 | Words: 1.5K | Visits: 2.1K | Status: Completed
Anime/Manga: Ranma 1/2 Fan Fiction / Sailor Moon Fan Fiction | Genre(s): Comedy / Fantasy / Sci-fi | Type: The Bet | Uploaded On: 10.02.2002 | Pages: 2 | Words: 1.5K | Visits: 2.1K | Status: Completed
4/1/00
NOTE: Several times i was accused of writing an SI (this was especially nasty with Future Tense and King Of Fighters) based on the Perfect Ranma (not sure which fic this was supposed to be)
So... here we go with something that is just meant to be a momentary amusement where i actually do what i've been accused of.
uhm. this is even less seriously written as a fic and more an attempt to have fun by bending the traditional SI conventions. however, as some ideas presented here have not (to my knowledge) been done, and could be interesting in a fic of their own, they are presented.
--------------------
Prologue: A Reluctant Bet
---------------------
Asgard
If one visited Heaven, one would find it was divided into sections. This was partly because one person's Heaven was another's Hell (or at least irritating), partly because the various Faith systems that had developed were the "blind men and the elephant" but were represented anyway, but mainly because it was sufficiently big that there was no reason not to.
In a section known as Asgard, there was a magnificent citadel wherein was housed the "Goddess Relief Office", which could access Yggdrasil directly and which made use of the Ultimate Force to grant wishes to their clients - mortals of a pure heart. A building of crystal and silver that fit into the splendor of its environment perfectly. The employees were all powerful goddesses, and those that weren't beautiful were at least attractive. Its scope was the Universe.
Not far away was its nominal rival, in an equally magnificent set of towering buildings, the Earth Assistance Hotline. It shared resources with its rival agency including the Ultimate Force. Which had both gods and goddesses, all powerful and quite attractive. Its scope was the Earth, though humans of other planets also fell into their purvue.
Turning one's attention from the gleaming streets linking these shining buildings, one would be hard pressed to notice the dingy alleyway two streets down. One could quite easily mistake it as a shadow, flanked on one side by a heavenly ice cream parlor called "The Heart Of Darkest Chocolate" and the other side by a place known as "The Gods Gym" even those who noticed it tended to discount it. The alley led to a rundown little place that was often described as a "hole in the wall" or "grungy little rathole" by those who even knew of its existence. Where a neon sign with two letters that refused to light up (the v and the f for those curious, and the lack of funds to pay for repairs) proclaimed this the "Rival Relief Office." A place that attempted to fix problems and grant requests to the needy, though they had to make use of something with the unflattering name of the "Barely Adequate Force." As the amount of magical energy from the BAF was often not adequate without a *lot* of tweaking or stealing from other sources, it wasn't terribly accurate.
Where the beautiful and powerful worked at the GRO and the EAH, the RRO was staffed by a different sort. The most powerful individual was a scruffy god of male potency known as Mambo Jack (Third Class, Limited) and the most beautiful was a fairly cute if airheaded goddess named Kitchiri (any resemblence to a Galaxy Police Officer named Mihoshi was purely accidental.)
But then, even in Heaven, someone's got to do the scutwork. It's just rarely as bad as cleaning toilets in an anchor store or any of a large number of other things that a certain frequently-depressed human turned quite-reluctant incubus turned largely-complacent combat cyborg had done before a mischievous being had decided to get involved.
And as he was a relatively powerless, non-beautiful, being who had done worse jobs, his complaints were mainly the venting of displeasure at a situation he couldn't affect anyway.
And not too far from his place of work, in a Hall Of Judgement, that very individual (despised by many, liked by a few, and actively hated by a powerful few) was getting the latest in a long string of assignments that seemed calculated for maximum annoyance.
"NO! Nononononono!"
"Look what happened to the first of your Twelve Labors," chided Eris, idly tossing her golden apple up and catching it. "You screwed up the Test. You screwed up the Makeup Test. You didn't do well at all. Be grateful to your betters that we simply didn't ship you off to Hades' domain."
Hades shrugged silently. He was inclined to give the poor fellow a break himself, and there was always a need for skilled bricklayers.
"You not only failed to reconcile the correct couple, you violated rules against interfering in a major war between Good and Evil without permission." Ares frowned at the pathetic little mortal.
Grey grumbled slightly but acknowledged the point. "But why... this?! It's so cliche!"
Belldandy rose from her position. "May I speak?"
"The chair recognizes Belldandy of the Goddess Relief Office," Apollo smiled.
"Grey-san got Keichi-san past his reluctance to fulfill Japanese tradition and ask Father for formal permission to court me. Doesn't that count for something?" Belldandy looked hopeful. Keiichi, at her side, blushed and nodded. He'd been a bit reluctant to proceed past a certain point without addressing that condition, but approaching the Almighty on such a matter had intimidated him a bit.
"It may be that being dumped by Miya, among others, devoured by flayworms, mindwiped, turned into an inhuman looking cyborg, and spending the entire Quest being reduced to ineffectual comic relief had some influence on his behavior." Urd spoke up from her position. As far as Urd was concerned, just getting Keichi to propose to Belldandy seemed to qualify as a Herculean labor. That those two were now openly mutually affectionate, Urd felt that she *owed* daemon-boy a favor.
"Doesn't make any difference." Apollo winced at the Miya reference though. The Chinese Amazon had dumped Grey to join Apollo's groupies with little more than a friendly wink. "Look, three planewalking heroes went in and manipulated one of the Bet timelines. You remember Hephaestus' entry? Ranma became a sabretooth? Went on to marry Shampoo and adventure across the world, eventually settling in Canada? Well, they 'corrected' it so that Ranma never received psychiatric help.
"Unfortunately, instead of their intent - returning the timeline to the original course where Ranma and Akane were turned by Tatewaki Kuno's wish into his personal loveslaves, they neglected a secondary ripple. And freezing this timeline is out of the question, there's been too much manipulation and damage for such heavyhanded measures. So look at what the prediction program states will happen:"
----------------------
"I can't believe it," Nabiki said with a smirk before the paralyzed Ranma. "The great Ranma afraid of a little kitty-cat?" She placed a few more on him to observe this phenonema.
"You're not afraid of these kitties, are you?" Kasumi held two extremely ugly cats and walked up to Ranma as tear tracks formed on the martial artist's cheeks. "They're so cute!"
"Eeeeee," Ranma managed, shaking and rolling his eyes.
Genma stopped and scrutinized Ranma as Soun held up another cat. Years on the road, and before that with Happosai, had given Genma a certain danger sense.
"Here's another!" Soun placed the cat on Ranma's head.
"Mrow?" came a noise out of Ranma's throat.
"This is so fun," said Nabiki, making a lapse in judgement that she would regret for years thereafter. "Let's see how many he can hold!"
The Cat came out. Enemies surrounded him. Enemies who hated him. Enemies who teased him. Enemies who wanted only to taunt and tease and humiliate and hurt him. He reacted completely in character for a feral cat.
-----------------------
"The part of Akane played by Lucy Van Pelt," quipped Edema in drow sign language.
"When isn't it?" snickered Mambo Jack aloud.
"Ahem," said Apollo with a glare, not getting the reference.
Belldandy and Kasumi9 didn't notice, too busy flinching at the violence erupting in the simulation.
"Well, it's unusual to see Ranma strike back against people torturing him, I'll grant that," Ares said. "More surprising, they survive. Though nobody ever quite forgives Ranma after the way he treats 'two rival tomcats' and three 'uppity female cats' even though he has no clue as to what happened. He's institutionalized, and it all becomes Ranma's fault as no one is advocating his position."
"Wasn't it a temporary line?" Urd asked, recovering from the scene first. After all, it was just a simulation.
"It was up until the line was destabilized by this secondary intervention," Apollo's voice was appropriately dry. "Toltiir, for all his faults, *is* sufficiently good at these things that he can contain problems. Now it shows signs of stabilizing as a particularly dark and unpleasant timeline."
"So, cutting through it all you want me to take the place of Ranma from just prior to Jusenkyo until the timeline is stable. Once everything is stable enough, and Ranma's been prepped, you can stick him back in and retro it." Grey sighed. "Fine, is this my Second Labor?"
NOTE: Several times i was accused of writing an SI (this was especially nasty with Future Tense and King Of Fighters) based on the Perfect Ranma (not sure which fic this was supposed to be)
So... here we go with something that is just meant to be a momentary amusement where i actually do what i've been accused of.
uhm. this is even less seriously written as a fic and more an attempt to have fun by bending the traditional SI conventions. however, as some ideas presented here have not (to my knowledge) been done, and could be interesting in a fic of their own, they are presented.
--------------------
Prologue: A Reluctant Bet
---------------------
Asgard
If one visited Heaven, one would find it was divided into sections. This was partly because one person's Heaven was another's Hell (or at least irritating), partly because the various Faith systems that had developed were the "blind men and the elephant" but were represented anyway, but mainly because it was sufficiently big that there was no reason not to.
In a section known as Asgard, there was a magnificent citadel wherein was housed the "Goddess Relief Office", which could access Yggdrasil directly and which made use of the Ultimate Force to grant wishes to their clients - mortals of a pure heart. A building of crystal and silver that fit into the splendor of its environment perfectly. The employees were all powerful goddesses, and those that weren't beautiful were at least attractive. Its scope was the Universe.
Not far away was its nominal rival, in an equally magnificent set of towering buildings, the Earth Assistance Hotline. It shared resources with its rival agency including the Ultimate Force. Which had both gods and goddesses, all powerful and quite attractive. Its scope was the Earth, though humans of other planets also fell into their purvue.
Turning one's attention from the gleaming streets linking these shining buildings, one would be hard pressed to notice the dingy alleyway two streets down. One could quite easily mistake it as a shadow, flanked on one side by a heavenly ice cream parlor called "The Heart Of Darkest Chocolate" and the other side by a place known as "The Gods Gym" even those who noticed it tended to discount it. The alley led to a rundown little place that was often described as a "hole in the wall" or "grungy little rathole" by those who even knew of its existence. Where a neon sign with two letters that refused to light up (the v and the f for those curious, and the lack of funds to pay for repairs) proclaimed this the "Rival Relief Office." A place that attempted to fix problems and grant requests to the needy, though they had to make use of something with the unflattering name of the "Barely Adequate Force." As the amount of magical energy from the BAF was often not adequate without a *lot* of tweaking or stealing from other sources, it wasn't terribly accurate.
Where the beautiful and powerful worked at the GRO and the EAH, the RRO was staffed by a different sort. The most powerful individual was a scruffy god of male potency known as Mambo Jack (Third Class, Limited) and the most beautiful was a fairly cute if airheaded goddess named Kitchiri (any resemblence to a Galaxy Police Officer named Mihoshi was purely accidental.)
But then, even in Heaven, someone's got to do the scutwork. It's just rarely as bad as cleaning toilets in an anchor store or any of a large number of other things that a certain frequently-depressed human turned quite-reluctant incubus turned largely-complacent combat cyborg had done before a mischievous being had decided to get involved.
And as he was a relatively powerless, non-beautiful, being who had done worse jobs, his complaints were mainly the venting of displeasure at a situation he couldn't affect anyway.
And not too far from his place of work, in a Hall Of Judgement, that very individual (despised by many, liked by a few, and actively hated by a powerful few) was getting the latest in a long string of assignments that seemed calculated for maximum annoyance.
"NO! Nononononono!"
"Look what happened to the first of your Twelve Labors," chided Eris, idly tossing her golden apple up and catching it. "You screwed up the Test. You screwed up the Makeup Test. You didn't do well at all. Be grateful to your betters that we simply didn't ship you off to Hades' domain."
Hades shrugged silently. He was inclined to give the poor fellow a break himself, and there was always a need for skilled bricklayers.
"You not only failed to reconcile the correct couple, you violated rules against interfering in a major war between Good and Evil without permission." Ares frowned at the pathetic little mortal.
Grey grumbled slightly but acknowledged the point. "But why... this?! It's so cliche!"
Belldandy rose from her position. "May I speak?"
"The chair recognizes Belldandy of the Goddess Relief Office," Apollo smiled.
"Grey-san got Keichi-san past his reluctance to fulfill Japanese tradition and ask Father for formal permission to court me. Doesn't that count for something?" Belldandy looked hopeful. Keiichi, at her side, blushed and nodded. He'd been a bit reluctant to proceed past a certain point without addressing that condition, but approaching the Almighty on such a matter had intimidated him a bit.
"It may be that being dumped by Miya, among others, devoured by flayworms, mindwiped, turned into an inhuman looking cyborg, and spending the entire Quest being reduced to ineffectual comic relief had some influence on his behavior." Urd spoke up from her position. As far as Urd was concerned, just getting Keichi to propose to Belldandy seemed to qualify as a Herculean labor. That those two were now openly mutually affectionate, Urd felt that she *owed* daemon-boy a favor.
"Doesn't make any difference." Apollo winced at the Miya reference though. The Chinese Amazon had dumped Grey to join Apollo's groupies with little more than a friendly wink. "Look, three planewalking heroes went in and manipulated one of the Bet timelines. You remember Hephaestus' entry? Ranma became a sabretooth? Went on to marry Shampoo and adventure across the world, eventually settling in Canada? Well, they 'corrected' it so that Ranma never received psychiatric help.
"Unfortunately, instead of their intent - returning the timeline to the original course where Ranma and Akane were turned by Tatewaki Kuno's wish into his personal loveslaves, they neglected a secondary ripple. And freezing this timeline is out of the question, there's been too much manipulation and damage for such heavyhanded measures. So look at what the prediction program states will happen:"
----------------------
"I can't believe it," Nabiki said with a smirk before the paralyzed Ranma. "The great Ranma afraid of a little kitty-cat?" She placed a few more on him to observe this phenonema.
"You're not afraid of these kitties, are you?" Kasumi held two extremely ugly cats and walked up to Ranma as tear tracks formed on the martial artist's cheeks. "They're so cute!"
"Eeeeee," Ranma managed, shaking and rolling his eyes.
Genma stopped and scrutinized Ranma as Soun held up another cat. Years on the road, and before that with Happosai, had given Genma a certain danger sense.
"Here's another!" Soun placed the cat on Ranma's head.
"Mrow?" came a noise out of Ranma's throat.
"This is so fun," said Nabiki, making a lapse in judgement that she would regret for years thereafter. "Let's see how many he can hold!"
The Cat came out. Enemies surrounded him. Enemies who hated him. Enemies who teased him. Enemies who wanted only to taunt and tease and humiliate and hurt him. He reacted completely in character for a feral cat.
-----------------------
"The part of Akane played by Lucy Van Pelt," quipped Edema in drow sign language.
"When isn't it?" snickered Mambo Jack aloud.
"Ahem," said Apollo with a glare, not getting the reference.
Belldandy and Kasumi9 didn't notice, too busy flinching at the violence erupting in the simulation.
"Well, it's unusual to see Ranma strike back against people torturing him, I'll grant that," Ares said. "More surprising, they survive. Though nobody ever quite forgives Ranma after the way he treats 'two rival tomcats' and three 'uppity female cats' even though he has no clue as to what happened. He's institutionalized, and it all becomes Ranma's fault as no one is advocating his position."
"Wasn't it a temporary line?" Urd asked, recovering from the scene first. After all, it was just a simulation.
"It was up until the line was destabilized by this secondary intervention," Apollo's voice was appropriately dry. "Toltiir, for all his faults, *is* sufficiently good at these things that he can contain problems. Now it shows signs of stabilizing as a particularly dark and unpleasant timeline."
"So, cutting through it all you want me to take the place of Ranma from just prior to Jusenkyo until the timeline is stable. Once everything is stable enough, and Ranma's been prepped, you can stick him back in and retro it." Grey sighed. "Fine, is this my Second Labor?"