Ranma 1/2 Fan Fiction / Sailor Moon Fan Fiction ❯ Reluctant Bet (2nd Labor) ❯ Kasumi has a ball ( Chapter 4 )

[ P - Pre-Teen ]

The Reluctant Bet
Fourth Segment: Kasumi has a ball!


"...and so i'm Ranma, but it's more a job description than i'm THE Ranma. i've visited a few dozen timelines, picked up souveniers and gadgets along the way, and generally gotten the short end of the stick. i'm supposed to play the part of Ranma until the timeline stabilizes enough that it merges with another existing line. Most of those involved want me to follow the script for the mainline, but i think that's pretty much screwed."

Shampoo nodded with a glance towards her pokeball. She loved her Ponyta and could hardly imagine having to give him up.

Nabiki thought about where she had just seen Akane, being pursued by Pepe Le Pew, running at better speeds than Akane had ever managed in Gym. She nodded in agreement, thinking that this probably hadn't happened in whatever the original timeline was. "So what happens to us when this timeline merges with the mainline the way these others want?"

Grey winced, but he wasn't allowed to lie, and she *had* asked. "They'll retro the real Ranma back through the timeline causing the merger to flow backwards. Then the you-that-is-here will merge with the you-that-is-there in another timeline and you'll become one. You won't be aware of any of this happening, and Ranma will just be some martial artist that got engaged to your youngest sister."

"In this other timeline, are we happier?" Kasumi looked a little uncertain. What she really wanted to do was have Ranma call her mother back so they could finish the conversation they'd had before Akane had disconnected the line.

"Uhm, well..." Ranma winced. "Errr... that's kind of a personal call, i guess."

Nabiki frowned. As far as she was concerned, that was a no.

Kasumi frowned. It had sounded like a 'no' to her. The more she thought on it, though, the more it sounded like a definitely not.

"So, what's needed to get this timeline to be like this mainline you refer to?"

"Oh, i've got to be engaged to Akane. Can't stand bullies or any of the rest of the crap she pulls, so i don't know if i can do that." Grey thought for a moment. "You realize that it's been forty years subjectively since i saw the original comics, and that Shampoo having black hair indicates this is a manga timeline and not the anime."

Kasumi filed away that their lives had been made into both a comic book and TV series. She hoped she had gotten some good lines.

"Ryouga comes in, challenges me, renewing a long rivalry. Uhm. There's something about skaters kidnapping Ryouga who turns into Akane's pet pig through a Jusenkyo curse like Genma has. Uhm, then Shampoo shows up, trying to kill Ranma. Later on, Akane gets kidnapped a few times..."

"HAH!" Akane said, entering the house from the backyard. "I heard that! Don't discount me, I'm a martial artist, you know! I'd LIKE to see someone try to kidnap me!" Akane threw a few midair punches.

A voice with a vaguely French accent wafted on the breeze. "Oh, where are you, my little cabbage?"

Akane shuddered and fled up their stairway. Her door could be heard slamming, followed by the sounds of furniture being piled up and moved against the door.

In the silence that followed, one could clearly hear the same psuedo-French voice say something that sounded like. "Ah, she is preparing our love nest! Darling, I love it when you get so aggressive. Mmmmmm mmmmm mmmmm."

"AAHHHHHHHHHHH!" The sounds of furniture being tossed aside, a door opening, someone running down the stairs, and going THROUGH their front door followed the scream.

"M'sier Ranma, I fear that Pepe has failed." The French skunk entered the room, head hung low. "I have not been able to convince le petit femme to make love not war. Oooo LA LA!"

"Pepe, return!"

Shampoo shrieked as the humanoid skunk launched himself. Fortunately a beam from a pokeball interrupted Pepe's attempt to capture an Amazon.

"Maybe i should've used Growlithe or Taz?"

"That was an evil thing to do to my sister," said Nabiki with some amusement and envy. It was better than the thought of she herself being the target of Pepe's affections.

"Oh my." Kasumi looked at the sphere Ranma held and wondered aloud if he had anymore of those.

"Why sure, Kasumi. Three from a regular Pokemon world, two from that crossover timeline with Warner Brothers, and four from a *really* bizarre world." Ranma shrugged. "Or close enough."

Shampoo stood up and proudly drew her own pokeball. "Shampoo show you one Grey Ranma give Shampoo! Ponyta!"

Again the horse appeared. Kasumi was up and inspecting the Ponyta before she was even aware she'd gotten up. "Oh how pretty!"

Nabiki blinked and considered something. "Uhm, you gave Shampoo that horse? Why exactly..."

"i like Shampoo. i was afraid that since this was a dark manga timeline originally, she'd turn out to be an obsessive violent moron with no redeeming qualities like in the later parts of the manga."

"Shampoo really think she not want this timeline to rejoin mainline." Shampoo said in a quiet aside to Kasumi. "Nice girl think about this?"

Kasumi admired the fire horse briefly and nodded, though she was just being polite.

Shampoo took it for something else, however, and smiled. Just killing the obstacle (Grey) was not an option for several reasons. For one thing, even if she could find a way to do it, they might actually replace him with somebody who was competent. At least that's what she told herself.

"So what else have you got?" Nabiki said with some interest. That wasn't greed, after all, it was avarice. Which was greed with class, of course.

"Hmmm?" Ranma put three cueballs similar to Shampoo's out on the table. "Well, i originally had six, which is typical for Trainers. Ponyta got along really well with Shampoo, so i went ahead and gave her his pokeball. i hid one in Ukyo's backpack for her to use. Another one for Sakyo. That leaves Eevee, Squirtle, and Vulpix."

Ranma added two slightly different pokeballs. "Tasmanian Devil and Polecat from the second world."

Four bracelets were pulled from a pocket to be set upon the table. Nabiki saw that a single large gemstone adorned each bracelet and immediately snagged one and examined it with a jeweler's loupe.

"These i got from a strange little world that was kind of like the Pokemon worlds but used *very* different methods and had very different critters. Personally, i wanted to get a Beholder but i heard those are hard to control, or a Pegasus. Instead i got these, and i can't use 'em anyway. Was going to give 'em to some of the Senshi in the last world i visited, but they had their hands full with other stuff."

"Why can't you use them?" Nabiki asked distractedly while examining the opalescent black gem.

"You have to be of the female persuasion," Ranma said with a shrug. "Only a female body can wear it, and only a female soul can command it. Which i guess was why these were left behind when temporal raiders killed the original wielders."

"Oh, how nice," Kasumi exclaimed, placing the white gemmed bracer around her right forearm. It softly clicked into place.

"What they do?" Shampoo examined the bracer with a blue gem for a moment before snapping it into place around her own arm.

Ranma blinked. "Guys? You're putting them on and you don't even know what they do?"

There was a soft click as Nabiki fitted her own into place. "Hmmm. Where's the latch to get them off?"

"ALL RIGHT, RANMA!" Akane looked winded, dirty, scraped up, and thoroughly miffed. "You are going to leave my family ALONE!"

Kasumi considered briefly and pressed the gemstone. A cloud of white smoke poured out in response, forming a vaguely humanoid figure which moaned like a wind.

"Air Elemental," Ranma explained. "Oh, and you might want to try various attacks out. Like, oh, Whirlwind."

"Whirlwind?" Kasumi blinked.

The humanoid cloud changed into a funnel which surrounded Akane and began spinning her around at very high speeds.

"Oh my." Kasumi was astonished, flabbergasted, slightly amused. "How do I tell it to stop?"

The vortex stopped. Akane shot down the hall to crash into her father, who had been spying for the past few minutes.

The smoke elemental moaned again and began changing shape.

"Uhm, what's it doing?"

"Ah, Air Elemental is evolving into Sylph," said Ranma with a nod. "i've heard of this sort of thing but never seen it myself. Like Bahamut turning into Neo-Bahamut. There are three stages. Elemental to Sylph to Djinn. I think. Oh dear."

This last was directed to Kasumi's twin. Except that her hair was not bound, nor was she wearing a stitch of clothing, and she had transparent dragonfly wings extending from her back. Oh, and her eyes were blue. Solid blue without pupil or iris. Well, that and her coloration was a bit off. Sylph made a gentle murmurring noise as she examined herself and looked pleased.

Ranma really should have known better, but was still openly gawking at Sylph. "My goodness, i had no idea that any of them were that close to evolving. i wonder if your two bracers are anywhere near ready to evolve? As they were all worn by people travelling together, they might all be close to the same level..."

"Shampoo find out," Shampoo summoned forth her water elemental and set the animated stick figure to hunt down Akane for a quick fight. After all, it worked for Sylph, right?

"Elements?" Nabiki held her own up. "Blue is water, white is air, the one still on the table is obviously fire. So black is earth?"

Liquid shadow poured out of her gem to form a blob near her feet.

"Shadow, actually."

The sounds of battle briefly occurred somewhere out of sight, before a ball of water rolled back into the living room, with a struggling Akane being held in its grip.

"Ooops, release her," Shampoo commanded. Akane hit the floor with a splut.

"Yyyyyooou..." Akane slowly got up. "I'll get you for this."

"Shadow, hold her." Nabiki commanded. "Akane, calm down, we're just playing around with some new toys."

Akane looked at the warm inky darkness now surrounding her. "LET ME OUT OF HERE!"

The darkness crackled and began to expand.

"Oooo. Shadow is evolving into Nightshade!" Ranma sat back to watch, trying not to let the etchi qualities of a nude Kasumi bother him. "Uhm, Kasumi, you can request your element to be a little less anatomically correct. That way if you use it in public, there won't be problems from mass nosebleeds.

Nabiki looked at her twin, formed of gleaming shadow, whose arms were stretched like taffy to hold her sister in place, and began to think of potential uses for such a thing. Her mind boggled.

"Shampoo want to try again, mine not evolve!"

"THIS IS NOT FAIR! LET GO OF ME!" Akane began forcing the arms away from her. The problem being that they stretched and then snapped back.

"Nightshade, return." Nabiki held up the bracer and was rewarded with the shadowy version of herself flowing into the gem. "I just *may* be able to find a use for this."

"Sylph, would you mind returning to the gem?" Kasumi smiled as her faerie twin merged back into the gem. "Oh how nice."

"So, like in a computer game, they gain experience and can then 'evolve' becoming the next Hit Dice or Level of creature?" Nabiki pondered the stone on the bracer before finding the hidden latch and taking the magical device off.

Ranma thought for a moment. When the timeline was fixed and he left, everything that he'd brought with him into the timeline that wasn't native would instantly be teleported with him. Except for healing potions and the like. Or at least that had happened when he'd done the last job of a similar nature. "Tell you what, Nabiki. You're getting a lot more use out of that than i would, and i don't feel right about staying here without paying you back somehow, so why don't you keep it for now? Same with you, Kasumi."

Nabiki's hands clutched the bracer and she blinked. She could keep this? It was hers? The very thought made her feel... comfortable. Warm.

Kasumi smiled as she admired the silver and lapis of her bracer. It had been *years* since a boy had offered her any sort of gift. She rather liked this.

Shampoo shrugged. If they got to keep theirs, she might as well keep hers.

Akane saw Kasumi blush, Nabiki looking possessive, and decided that this had gone on entirely too long. "Whatever you did to my sisters, you STOP IT!" Akane rushed forward, intent on stomping this "Ranma" into the ground. NOBODY could act that clueless and be for real.

Ranma blinked and scrambled but didn't get away fast enough as a table was lifted and brought down on his head with considerable force. There was a cracking noise.

Shampoo staggered for no immediately discernable reason and began rubbing her temples.

Nabiki frowned at the angle the boy's head was lying at. "Just great, Akane. Just great, you've killed him AGAIN!"

"Oh my. Akane, it is really not polite to kill guests."

Akane stared. "He MADE me do it! And honestly, how frail is he? A mere 35 pound weight being slammed on his head kills him! What a wimp!"

The body was consumed by flames. Ranma reformed in the yard, unfortunately four feet in the air. There was a startled yelp as he fell into the fishpond.

Slogging into the foyer, Ranma announced to no one in particular that he was getting a bath, then into some dry clothes.

Behind him, coccooned in a swirling ball of water, Akane didn't hear.

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

Ranma sat back, luxuriating in a nice hot soak. He knew the drill. First you rinse in the cold water, then you lather up, then you rinse off all the soap still using the cold shower, then a hot soak in the furo. The Japanese were *big* on rituals.

Ranma reflected that this was something he had really wanted for awhile. Never mind the seriousness and difficulty of the mission. In American apartments, particularly the lowrent converted hotel types he had often stayed in, you had a shower stall and frequent changes of temperature in the water. As an incubus, he'd had much the same arrangement. As a cyborg, his sense of touch and temperatures had been dulled considerably.

A good relaxing hot soak, feeling the warmth of the water radiate deep into tired and aching joints, was quite welcome. A moment of peace and tranquility, where one could let go of one's worries for that brief respite and just let that calm enfold you.

The door slammed open. Ranma half-stood, jumping from sheer startlement.

Akane's gaze briefly met his, then travelled downwards and lingered.

"AHHHHH!" Ranma dove into the water and tried to cover himself.

Akane blinked, realizing what she was doing.

"YOU PERVERT!" Ranma tried to reach his shirt that had the pokemon pockets.

"WHO ARE YOU CALLING A PERVERT!" Akane continued covering herself with her towel, sparing only a moment to glare at the boy who had apparently slept with BOTH of sisters. AT THE SAME TIME! "YOU'RE THE PERVERT!"

The sound of running feet and the outer door opened. Akane slowly turned, an expression of looming horror on her face.

"That's the spirit, Akane! Take the initiative!" Soun began crying. Why with this sort of thing, the boy would be begetting heirs off all three of his daughters, and the family legacy would be assured no matter which one he married!

"That's my son! Oh, your mother will be SO PROUD!" Genma began considering having the wife come by. After all, if Ranma acted like this, Nodoka's skewed visions of manliness may well be assuaged even if he WAS a wimp in a fight.

"Oh my!" Kasumi swept past the fathers and Akane, to look in at the person trying to spontaneously master the ninja Art Of Stealth by submerging himself in the tub. "My goodness, things *do* look bigger underwater."

"Blub!" As an asthmatic, Grey had learned a pearl diver technique to help build lung capacity. Now that he was Ranma, he could likely hold his breath a fairly long time. He was certainly giving it a try.

"AHHH!" Akane grabbed her gi and attempted to get dressed and cover herself with a towel simultaneously.

"Hmmmm," hmmmed Nabiki, wondering if Akane would object to these photos. Kuno might die from the resulting nosebleed, though.

"Is OK if Shampoo scrub Ranma's back?"

"Oh my. I think he swallowed a lot of water when you did that, Shampoo."

"Shampoo didn't mean to grab THERE. Though he better hung than boys in village."

"Really? Hmmmm." Nabiki inspected what she could see through the water. "Judging from what I've observed, he *might* be pretty well endowed. We'll have to figure out a way to check that out."

"Oh my. My my my my my MY."

"Package for Mister Tendo, sign here please."

<SHOOM> "Vulpix?! Vulpix!"

"Oh, these are so cute!" Kasumi reached for the next one.

<SHOOM> "Eevee! Eeevee! Eee!"

"Hmmm. That looks interesting, sis. Let me see one!"

<SHOOM> "Squirtle, squirt!"

Akane tied her gi top into place and plucked a sphere from Nabiki's hands. "Watch it, you might let something loose..."

<SHOOM> "Ah, it is le petit young damsel! You have freed me so that we may be reunited! Let us go to the Casbah!"

"AAHHHHHHHHH!" Akane fled. Pepe pursued, the two quickly began a chase scene that went around the tub and then the house at a frantic pace.

"Nobody was at the front door, so I let myself in. Do you have a few moments to talk about life insurance?"

"Hi. We're opening a restaurant two blocks away. Flyer anyone?"

"Bamboo, get your fresh cut bamboo!"

"Just think, Saotome, soon the schools will be united!"

"Vulpix?" The firefox inquired.

"Eevee!" The fox-squirrel indicated he had no idea what was going on.

"Certainly, Tendo! Uhm, what's Kasumi doing with Ranma?"

"Looks like mouth-to-mouth. Hang on, sis, you're doing it wrong, let me show you."

"Nabiki and Kasumi doing it wrong. Shampoo demonstrate!"

"Squirtle. Squirt." The turtle creature began snickering. Humans were so silly!

"Oh, I see, Shampoo. Let me try again."

Ranma came to, and stiffened as he realized that there was a tongue in his mouth that didn't belong to him. He fainted.

Akane ran in, to find an unconscious Ranma molesting Kasumi! "DIE RANMA!"

"Ah my petit little flower."

"EEEEEEK!"

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

"So, my pokemon is a Vulpix?" Kasumi looked at the little fox-critter purring in her lap. "What can she do?"

"Vulpix pix pix!"

"She's been trained in Ember and Tail Whip, Quick Attack, Fire Spin and Flamethrower. i didn't realize you couldn't train a Vulpix in Tackle so i did. i was never able to teach her Confuse Ray." Ranma looked sadly at the two pokemon he had just lost. The pokemon seemed happy, the two girls seemed happy, but it felt like he'd been abandoned again.

"Eee eevee."

Nabiki fought to look unaffected and dignified with a Miyazaki fox-squirrel clone rubbing his cheek against her stomach from his position on her lap. It was a battle she was rapidly losing. "Uhm, and, er, heehee, uhm, mine are?"

"Tackle, Sand Attack, Quick Attack, and Take Down." Ranma frowned. Well, at least he still had Squirtle! Who was currently making the acquaintance of the koi in the backyard pond. He just didn't have the heart to try taking them away when the pokemon were so obviously bonding with the Tendo girls.

"Son, what's this about you being engaged to that Amazon woman?" Soun glared at Ranma threatening to do the demon-head thing again. Even if it hadn't worked the last time.

"Name is Shampoo Jones. American transfer student from Los Angeles. <Howdy, y'all.>" Shampoo tipped her cowboy hat. "Ancient American custom state that..."

"You are NOT American," Genma interrupted, pointing at the woman. "I recognize you from that Amazon Village!"

Shampoo frowned momentarily. "Oh well! Ancient Amazon law. Ranma defeat Shampoo in challenge fight to save stupid panda. Now Shampoo adopt Ranma into Amazon tribe where he be brother to Shampoo!"

Genma paused. "'Brother'?"

Soun stopped in mid-posturing. "'Brother'?"

"And if stupid Panda try to sell Shampoo the way he sell Ranma, Shampoo sell pandaskin rug very very soon." Shampoo drew a sword from somewhere. "Does stupid Pandaman get point?"

"Well, welcome to the family," Soun began crying. "Oh, joy!"

Nabiki considered briefly. She considered the Eevee tickling her tummy and the gemstone bracer currently hidden by the sleeves of her kimono. How to keep her Reality from rejoining with another one? "Well then, it's clear who Ranma's fiancee should be."

"NO! ABSOLUTELY NOT! NO WAY!" Akane snarled at Ranma, prepared to unleash her wrath.

"Why thank you, Nabiki," Kasumi said with a deep blush. "Don't you think we ought to wait a little longer before Ranma is engaged to me? After all we've just met."

"Hah?!" Ranma managed intelligently.

Nabiki thought about just shrugging and letting it go, but no, what if *that* led to this timeline stabilizing! "NO WAY. Ranma is *my* fiance!"

"Hah?!" Ranma managed, going from "Shocked" to "Where The Heck Did This Come From?"

"Nabiki? Kasumi?" Akane said after she'd recovered from her facefault.

"Oh what a joyous day!" Soun began, tears increasing to flood level in volume.

Genma managed to look briefly unhappy as the flood changed him to panda form, then held up a really big sign [Yay. Yippeee. My son needs to be retrained in the martial arts from the ground up, and he's engaged to the two of your daughters who couldn't fight their way out of a paper bag. What about the future of Anything Goes?]

"Indeed, what about it?" Ranma nodded as he assumed a thoughtful look, still not knowing what was going on, but yanking Genma's chain was just *too* tempting. "i know! If i married Nabiki, we would carry on the Anything Goes School Of Financial Arts! Becoming a force to be reckoned with in international trade circles!

"If i were to marry Kasumi, with her skills in cooking we could go with the Anything Goes School Of Domestic Arts! Just think of the possibilities."

Another panda sign was hastily constructed. [I AM. That's why Ranma must marry Akane! The future of Anything Goes Martial Arts depends on it!]

"Oh, I see your point, Saotome." Soun nodded. "Akane and Ranma are engaged! That is my final word on the matter!"

"Eeeeeewww," said Ranma.

"You... you... PERVERT! YOU PLANNED THIS, DIDN'T YOU?!" <CRUNCH>

Nabiki and Kasumi winced.

There was the flare as the dead body of Ranma was consumed, then reformed. "Well, at least it wouldn't be a long marriage. i probably wouldn't get through the ceremony before she killed me, and marriages are only 'until death do us part.'"

"Well, you'd still have to consummate it," offered Genma as a stalling tactic until he could think of a way around that.

"Eeeeeewwwwwww!" Ranma eeeewwed again. "Nasty!"

"WHAT?!" Akane exclaimed with a punch to the boy's head. He blocked, and Akane grabbed the limb and snapped it at the elbow.

"I really can't continue to watch him get killed," Nabiki groaned. "Ranma! At least defend yourself."

"I'm still alive," groaned Ranma, finally looking up at Akane. "Okay, Akane. You WANT a fight? You bloody bedamned have got it!"

"Think you can take me? BRING IT ON!" Akane took a "ready" stance. "Try me without the stupid 'substitute fighter' crap!"

<snik. VSSSSSHHHHT. VUM>

Soun and Genma eyed the lightsaber uncertainly. "Errrr."

"Can't fight without your toys, huh? What a wimp!"

"i *can* fight without tools, but i'm a *lot* better fighting in a civilized manner. Swords, guns, and high energy weapons. Be glad i don't have an ion cannon handy, you flatchested gorilla!"

"HA! You're not even man enough to use what you've got!"

"Oh, i'm sorry. i didn't mean to insult any *gorillas*!"

Nabiki looked back and forth. "Uhm, time out, people try to calm down. It's not worth..."

"OH SHUT UP!" Ranma and Akane chorused, their eyes never leaving each other. If looks could kill there would have been two corpses in the room.

Kasumi winced, having a sudden image of Akane coming apart in neat little one inch slices.

Shampoo got a nice seat out of the way, munching a cracker, having a sudden image of Akane coming apart in neat little one inch slices.

Akane moved forward, beginning a spinning back kick.

Ranma moved forward, the lightsabre swinging over and to the side in such a manner than most likely would block the kick, and remove someone's leg at the same time.

"ENOUGH!" An unfamiliar voice proclaimed.

Ranma vanished. Akane stumbled through the space her opponent had occupied a moment ago.

"Where'd he go?" Akane started looking around. "HAH! The coward! I knew he couldn't face me!"

"Jusenkyo," answered the voice of a woman as she slowly pulled herself out of their television set. "He wasn't being enough of a Ranma."

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