Ranma 1/2 Fan Fiction / Dragon Ball/Z/GT Fan Fiction ❯ Ranma T ❯ Ranma's Secret ( Chapter 2 )

[ P - Pre-Teen ]

Disclaimer: All characters and concepts in this story are owned and copyrighted
by their respective creators. They DO NOT belong to me. I'm just using them in
this story I wrote for fun.

<text> is spoken in Chinese
text is animal signs, for cursed people
*text* is thoughts
~text~ is sounds/actions

Ranma T
By Trooper1023

Chapter 2: Ranma's Secret
________________________________________________________________ ____

"He... he's... got... a TAIL!" Akane stuttered.

Several moments of silence followed. Then the largish man with the bandanna
over his head cleared his throat.

"My apologies for this whole incident. I am Genma Saotome, and as you know,
this is my son Ranma."

Nabiki interrupted before Genma could continue. "Um... excuse me, but where is
that panda that was here earlier?" Genma sighed theatrically, while Ranma
rolled his eyes and headed back into the furo for his cloths. Akane went up to
her room and came back down in a bathrobe, still very rattled that their new
guest had, of all things, a tail.

Genma got into his 'story-telling position', which would look genuine to
anyone who had known Genma for less than ten minutes. "It started during the
final leg of our training trip through China. Ranma and I were to train at one
last area before we began the journey back home. Unfortunately, training at
this last area turned out to be a mistake. The place was called 'Jusenkyo'."

"'Pools of Sorrow'?" Nabiki asked.

"Indeed, that is a fitting name for the cursed training ground..."
---------------------------FLASHBACK------------------------ -----------
-----------------------------START------------------------- ------------
It seemed like any other morning of their ten-year training trip when it began.
Genma swatted his son out of his sleeping bag, and they sparred for a while.
Then, after a quick breakfast, Genma dropped the bomb.

"Son, we are almost finished with your training. After today, we are going
home."

They had been walking when his father spoke, and Ranma tripped and did a
classic face-plant. He scrambled back to his feet and shot his father a look
before speaking. "Seriously? I thought this trip would never end! All right!
We headed back right now?"

"No, son. First, we have one last stop to make... a legendary training
ground."

"Huh? What's so special about this training ground?"

"You'll see, my boy. It's known as... Jusenkyo."
____________________________________________________________ ________

Several hours later the two cleared the woods, and looked out over a
sheltered valley. Many pools of water were scattered around, and bamboo poles
where sticking out from them.

"Hey! This place isn't as bad as I thought it might be." Ranma commented as
he set down his pack next to his father's. "Not nearly as bad as some of the
OTHER training you've put me through!" He added as he glared at Genma.

The fat martial artist shuddered as he remembered a certain incident involving
fish sausages and lots of cats. He admitted that training his son in THAT
technique had not been a good idea. Putting those thoughts aside, he leapt to
a perch on one of the poles. "Let's not dwell on the past, boy. Now follow
me!"

Ranma followed suit as he took up a position opposite to his father. They
then began leaping about, trading blows while maintaining their balance. Just
then, a tubby Guide appeared from his hut. "Here sirs! We come to famous
training ground of Cursed Springs..." The Guide's eyes bugged out when he saw
two people hopping from pole to pole, attacking each other; he started
yelling for their attention. "No sirs! Very bad you fall in springs!"

It wasn't long before one of them took a tumble. Genma found himself dropping
into a pool after a kick from his son slipped through his defenses. As he
made a big splash, Ranma landed on a pole to the right. Behind him was a
spring that was small and seemed extremely old. The rocks on its banks were
covered in moss and several of its poles were all but rotted through.

Just as Ranma landed on his perch, a huge panda erupted from the pool Genma
had fallen into. "What the!" Ranma gaped at the animal. His mind barely
registered the Guide's words about a panda drowning in that spring two
thousand years ago, when it suddenly leapt forward. The panda's attacks
easily passed through Ranma's startled defenses and knocked him backward into
the spring behind him.

~SPLASH~

Ranma came up sputtering. He ignored the tingling sensation in his body,
grabbed the side of the pool, and hauled himself out. Oddly, he caught his
foot on the edge of the pool and fell flat on his face. "OOF!" *Since when
was I clumsy like that? And how come my cloths feel tighter? A single dunking
wouldn't make 'em shrink that much.* Then he heard the Guide's voice behind
him.

"Young sir, you fall into Spring of Drowned Alien! You turn into "Saiyajin",
Saiyajin form very much like real form."

"Eh? What's a saiyajin?" Ranma asked, not noticing that the Guide had
retreated to his hut. He spun around and looked down onto the surface of the
pool. His reflection stared back up at him... sort of. There were
differences. The first thing Ranma noticed was his hair. Instead of the soft,
fine hair that he was used to seeing, he now had very coarse, spiky hair that
stood out at various angles in large clumps. His pigtail was the same way;
the unbraided hair at the end had divided itself into spikes, as if trying to
separate itself. Next he noticed his chest, shoulders and arms. Looking down,
he saw that he was bigger than he remembered. *Whoa! All of a sudden, I'm all
muscular... Hey, I bet I'm a lot stronger now!* Then he realized his eyes
were different too; instead of the familiar cobalt blue, his eyes were now
black orbs, seemingly without pupils. *Weird.* He stood up, and noticed that
he had gained quite a few inches of height. Taking one last glance at his new
look, Ranma saw something that made him freeze. Waving around behind him,
covered with soft, brown fur ... was a tail. "ARGH!!! WHAT THE HELL IS
THAT!?!"

"Growf?" Ranma-saiya spun around. Behind him was the same panda that had
knocked him into the spring standing there, looking at him as if to ask
'What's your problem?' Then the Guide reappeared, with a kettle in one hand
and an old book in the other.

"Good sirs, no trouble see? Hot water change back to normal!" The Guide
poured the steaming water over the panda, and Ranma-saiya's eyes bulged as
the panda morphed into the familiar shape of his father.

"What the hell! Dad?"

"My hands! I'm human again!" Genma jumped up and started dancing around.
Ranma-saiya fumed.

"CHIKUSO!! WHAT ABOUT ME?!" Genma stopped to look at his son quizzically.
"Dad... I've got a TAIL!!" Ranma-saiya practically shrieked. He spun around
and presented the tail to his father, who fainted dead away. The Guide made
the wise choice of interrupting then.

"Sir, listen good sir! Son change with hot water, just like you sir." He
walked up to Ranma-saiya and dumped the rest of the kettle's contents over
the boy's head. He felt a tingling all over his body, and suddenly his hair
was hanging down in his face again. Twisting around, he looked down at his
backside to see... nothing. No tail. Straightening out, he noticed that his
cloths were semi-lose again. Ranma pulled up a sleeve and saw at once that
his arm was once again slim and taut.

"Great! Back to normal!"

"Ah... no sir, not quite right." Genma woke up fast when he heard that. Both
Saotomes looked at the Guide suspiciously. "You see hot water cure curse, but
it only temporary. Cold water change you back." As if to demonstrate, it
began raining, and both changed to their cursed forms. Ranma-saiya turned an
icy glare on his father, and the panda pulled a sign out of nowhere and held
it up.

Ah... hehe... easy son, it's not that bad...

Ranma-saiya growled angrily. "Oyaji this is all your fault! I'm gonna kill
you!" He started towards his cursed father, cracking his knuckles. Genma-
panda turned and fled. "Oh no you don't!" the boy-turned-saiyajin yelled, and
was about to follow when he felt a hand on his shoulder. He turned to see the
Guide with the book open.

"Young sir, a word of warning. Book of Jusenkyo Curses says important thing
about Spring of Drowned Saiyajin." He pointed at a boxed-in area on one page
and began to read. "It say: 'To those who fall into the Spring of Drowned
Saiyajin, there is both an advantage and danger to your new form. The
advantage: the saiyajin form is similar to human form, and the tail can be
manipulated like a third arm. Wrapping the tail around the waist of the
person is an effective method of concealment. Also, the saiyajin body is
substantially stronger than a human body of similar age and development. The
danger: if cursed person has his/her tail intact (if cut off, it will re-grow
after several months to a year), the person must NEVER look at the full moon.
Doing so is EXTREMELY dangerous to those nearby, as the cursed person will
transform further and enter a berserker-like state. While looking at the full
moon in normal form may not have the same effect, it is not recommended since
there is the risk that the person will change forms suddenly.' You understand
warning young sir?"

Ranma-saiya nodded. "No looking at the full moon... transform further... go
berserk... OK, I got it. Thanks a lot!" Ranma-saiya then took off after his
father. The Guide sweatdropped as he heard yelling, several loud thumps, and
a big splash in the direction the two latest victims of Jusenkyo had
disappeared. About ten minutes later, he noticed a little black piglet with a
yellow-and-black striped bandanna around its neck come walking toward his
hut.
---------------------------FLASHBACK---------------------- -------------
------------------------------END------------------------ --------------

"...Ranma and I each fell into a cursed spring. The panda you saw earlier was
actually myself, in my cursed form."

"NANI?!?" Nabiki and Akane screamed at once. "Are we supposed to believe
that?" Nabiki asked incredulously.

Genma sighed theatrically. "Cold water activates the curse." He emptied a cup of
water over his head and promptly turned into a giant panda.

Akane groaned and put a hand to her head. "I think I feel faint right now..."

Soun abruptly poured water from a kettle over the panda's head. "But, when
doused with hot water, you return to human form..."

Genma, human again and slightly singed, said, "Well, it needn't be quite THAT
hot." Then he burst into fake-looking tears. "Oh, how could such a horrible
thing befall us!"

Suddenly, Nabiki stood. "Now hold on a second. You said you AND Ranma got
curses." Genma nodded, tears still on his face. "Ok, so what's Ranma's
'curse'?"

Akane began to look sick. *Not only does he have a tail, but he turns into
some ANIMAL when hit with cold water too!?! EEWWW!!!*

Genma opened his mouth to speak, but it wasn't his voice that answered.
"You were lookin' at it earlier." Everyone whirled and was greeted by the
sight of... another boy in 'Ranma's' cloths. Nabiki did notice a striking
resemblance between this boy and 'Ranma', and she noticed the differences as
well. The boy standing in front of her was shorter and not as muscled as
'Ranma'; his build was much more lithe, like a dancer, but stronger than one.
His eyes were deep blue-gray, and his hair, also braided into a pigtail, was
soft and fine, not spiky. Rather than the aura of raw power 'Ranma' had, this
boy moved with a kind of charisma and confidence. Also, he lacked a tail.
"Before any of you ask, I'M Ranma Saotome. Again, sorry about all this."
________________________________________________________________ ____

Akane shook her head back and forth, dizzy as she was. "Whoa, wait one second!
If you're Ranma, who was that other guy..." She never had to finish her
sentence, because Genma picked up another cup of water from the table and
tossed it at Ranma.

The pigtailed boy sputtered in surprise as he changed. His height shot up
about four inches and he gained muscle, pulling his clothing tight against his
body. The tail reappeared and curled around his waist. Ranma-saiya shook some
water from his spiky hair and said, "That 'other guy'... was ME."

A few moments of silence followed, as this new bit of information was
digested. Then Nabiki broke the quiet and asked, "Ok... so what IS your
'cursed form'?"

"The Jusenkyo Guide labeled the pool I fell into the 'Spring of Drowned
Saiyajin.' And whatever a 'saiyajin' is, I kinda like being one. This form is
stronger, faster, and has better reflexes than my normal form." Ranma-saiya
tossed a heated glare at his father as he finished, a look that said *Don't tell
them what ELSE we know about 'saiyajins', yet.* Genma started to sweat. Lucky
for him, Soun interrupted, looking at the transformed teenager.

"Oh... so when you are doused with cold water, you become a... 'saiyajin'...
but hot water turns you back to normal!" Again Soun moved in with the kettle,
but Ranma-saiya dodged the water.

"Hot water, not BOILING!" he yelped. "My saiyajin form might be stronger than
normal, but it ain't invulnerable!"

"No sweat," Soun said with a grin, forgetting the kettle and patting Ranma on
the shoulder. "Your 'problem' isn't so terrible after all!"

"Huh?"

"Let me introduce you to my daughters. Here is Kasumi, nineteen..." He waved
at the one with long brown hair and a serene expression. "...And Nabiki,
seventeen..." Next was the girl with straight brown hair in a bowl-cut; she
had on a shrewd, businessperson-like expression. "...And Akane, sixteen." The
last girl introduced was QUITE angry, and snappishly turned her head away from
him, her long blue-black hair following. "Pick one, and she will be your
fiancee."

"..."
_____________________________________ _______________________________

"..." Ranma-saiya just stood there for a moment, stunned motionless. The three
girls started to sweat-drop as Ranma-saiya's blank face then twisted in anger.
*So THIS is what Akane was referring to when she said she wouldn't marry me!*
"Oyaji..." he growled dangerously. Genma had scarcely enough time to realize
just HOW pissed Ranma-saiya was before a heavy fist sent him flying out an
open window and into the koi pond.

Kasumi didn't know what to do. To her, Ranma seemed fairly mature, though
rough around the edges, as punching his father out the window had
demonstrated. But she didn't know if taking the engagement would interfere
with her duties to the household. She also didn't want to take the opportunity
from her sisters, who she thought were more deserving than herself.

Nabiki didn't know what to do either. While she knew that Ranma (in either
form) could net her quite a fortune in the picture department, she also knew
that taking a fiancÈe would wreck her 'Ice Queen' image at school. *Although
having him there to play bodyguard/intimidator, especially with those special
effects he's displaying right now [1], would be advantageous...*

Akane paled as she watched a dark blue shimmering in the air appear around
Ranma-saiya. *Is... that... a... BATTLE AURA?! Kami-sama... I can FEEL it!
When Dad told me about Martial Arts masters jumping thirty feet up in the air
and glowing with ki, I thought they were just old stories, made to inspire me
to be a better martial artist! But if Ranma can project a battle aura like
THAT, no wonder he beat me so easily! Ohhh, it's so not fair! Why can HE while
I CAn't... Wait a second! Could I? Maybe... maybe if I got Ranma to teach
me... maybe I could get as good as he is! YES, I could, I can, I WILL!... But
how do I get him to teach me... ACK! I'd have to be his fiancÈe, right? The
whole school would be shocked... but I want that, don't I? I mean, wouldn't it
get Kuno off my back? And when the 'Hentai Brigade' saw how good a fighter
Ranma is, wouldn't they back off too? Yea, it could-* "ERK!" Akane gagged,
then coughed quietly. Her two sisters glanced at her, then went back to their
own thoughts, as did she. *THERE'S NO WAY IT COULD WORK! HE'S A FREAK FOR
KAMI-SAMA'S SAKE! Or is he...? ARGH! Why can't I figure this out?! Ok, one:
he's a freak... or maybe not. It's a curse right? So wouldn't that mean he's
not a freak, just cursed to LOOK like a freak of nature... a 'saiyajin'? Oh,
this is so confusing! Maybe I'll just wait and reserve judgment on the freak
part. Now, two: he's a pervert, he stared at my body when I... walked into the
furo without checking the door for an 'occupied' sign first? GAH! Wouldn't
that make ME the pervert?!?......... Aw, forget it. This is just too much for
me to handle right now.*

Genma-panda hauled himself upright and REALLY began to sweat when he saw his
son standing next to the pond. He knew a normal battle aura pulsed and glowed
softly; the fiercely shimmering aura his son was putting out was ANYTHING but
normal!

"...I can't believe you. First, how do you expect me to start making plans
with someone when I've only just met them? Second, how do you expect THEM-" He
indicated the three Tendo girls, "-to start making plans when they've only
just met ME?"

Inside the house, Soun, Kasumi, Nabiki, and Akane were watching the backyard
face-off. Nabiki blinked when Ranma made his second point. *Wow! He's got a
pretty good head on his shoulders.*

Akane noticed as well. *He... he's defending our right to choose who we marry,
not just his own... Maybe, just maybe, Ranma Saotome isn't like all those
other boys at school.*
______________________________________________________________ ______

Ranma-saiya was about to give his father a beating worse than the one he'd
given after Jusenkyo when someone spoke. "Ranma? I've given it some
thought... and I've decided that, if you accept the engagement, I will too."

Kasumi turned to look at her sister, surprised. "Oh my!"

Nabiki whirled, gaping. "I don't believe it! My little boy-hating sister... is
voluntarily engaging herself to one!"

Soun started waterworks #391. "WAAAH!! MY LITTLE BABY GIRL IS GETTING
MARRIED!!"

Genma-panda stood straighter and produced a sign. Then it's decided: Ranma
shall marry Akane. Together, they shall inherit the dojo and carry on the
Anything Goes School of Martial Arts.

Ranma-saiya's battle aura died down abruptly, and he turned. "Akane, I don't
want to be forced into anything, for your sake as well as for mine..."

Akane looked down at her feet, embarrassed. "It's ok. When you defended our
right to choose alongside your own, you kind of made up my mind... that you're
not like most of the boys that I know."

"Are you sure... I mean, we barely know each other! Besides, I kinda don't
want to be engaged to you..."

Akane's head snapped up. "What are you saying!? Am I not good enough for
you?!"

"GAH! No, no, that's not what I meant!" Ranma-saiya jumped back a step when
Akane glared at him. "It's just that I don't want to be... um..."

"Well?"

Ranma-saiya scratched the back of his head with one hand. "Um... well, I uh...
don't want to, ah..." Akane finally hit the boiling point.

"WELL!?! WHAT'S WRONG WITH BEING ENGAGED TO ME?!?"

Ranma-saiya toppled over backward as the force of Akane's yell hit him. He
shot back up to his feet and spun around to leave. "You just proved my point
you violent tomboy! Sheesh! I don't know why I even considered-"

"RANMA NO BAKA!!!" ~WHAM!~

Akane looked down at Ranma-saiya where he lay, hands out Takahashi-style,
imbedded in the floor of the house and dropped the table she had used to flatten
her offender. "Humph!"

Genma, human again with the application of some hot water, shook his head and
frowned. "Now THAT he had coming!"
______________________________________________________________ ______

That night...

Ranma-saiya came to face down on a futon. He started to open his eyes.
"Mm...?"

Kasumi exclaimed, "Ah! He's awake!"

"Oooohh..." Ranma-saiya reached back and rubbed his head where he'd been hit.

"Are you okay?" Kasumi asked. "Don't think too badly of Akane. She's really a
very sweet girl. She's just gets rather violent sometimes."

Nabiki gave her sister an odd look. "Oh, good, Kasumi. That makes LOTS of
sense." *Hmm... It seems that Ranma has a bit of a loose tongue. If Akane
can't handle it, I guess it'll be up to me to accept the engagement. Yea, he
WILL be really useful, I just gotta figure out how to get him to
co-operate...*

In the furo...

Akane was fuming away as she washed. *'...don't want to be engaged to you',
eh? Why that... that... that... that BOY! And I thought he WASN'T a jerk!* She
poured another bucket of water over herself. *Chikuso! And I wanted him to
help me with my martial arts training...*

At the same moment, in the outer area of the furo...

Ranma-saiya peeled off his shirt and pants. *Itamu! It still smarts! What kind
of girl is she anyway?* He grabbed a towel off the stack and reached to open
the screen...

...which slid open on its own, leaving Ranma-saiya face-to-face with a rapidly
angering Akane.

"Uh... uh... uh-"

"Why you... you... you..."
_______________________________________________________________ _____

The quiet Nermia nighttime. Houses with lights off. Birds and other living
things settling down for the night. Ah, such a wonderful thing.
Unfortunately...

"...PERVERT!!!" ~POW~

...it never, ever lasts.
________________________________________________________________ ____

Genma sat on the back porch. He glanced over at his son and said, "So she's
got spunk. That just makes a fiancÈe cuter."

Ranma, a BIG red welt covering the entire left side of his face, growled back,
"'Cute' is NOT the word."

Nabiki sat in the main hall. She glanced over at her sister and said, "But
didn't you walk in on him before that? It's okay, you're even with him."

Akane, completely red-faced, snarled back, "'Okay' is NOT the word."

To be continued...
__________________________________________________________ __________

Next time: Arrival At Furinkan!

[1] Here, Nabiki is referring to the battle aura that Ranma-saiya is putting
out. For it's appearance, think of how the air shimmers around a heat source,
then give the shimmering effect a bluish glow, and you have Ranma-saiya's
battle aura.

Author's Notes:

Ok people, a few HUGE changes to the manga storyline here. Yes, I know Akane
is out-of-character for a period of time, because I did that deliberately,
with reason. In the manga, Ranma was presented to Akane first as a girl
without a friend, then as a boy in exactly the wrong place (at exactly the
wrong time), then as a boy that TURNS INTO a girl, with an ego problem and a
runaway mouth. This presentation of Ranma gives Akane absolutely no evidence
that he is any different than the weak (from her perspective), hormonally
driven boys at school.

There are two key differences here. One difference is Kasumi and Nabiki's
responses to Ranma's curse. Kasumi doesn't think that Ranma's curse makes him
any less human, so she doesn't immediately reject the engagement. Nabiki is
ignoring the tail and thinking about the other "parts" of Ranma's cursed form,
so she doesn't immediately reject the engagement. And because Akane doesn't
instantly have the engagement dumped on her, she has the time to think, and
doesn't instantly reject it either.

The other difference is what I believe would turn Akane's thoughts around,
at least for a while. In the manga, Ranma does nothing more than show that
he's good at dodging during his little match with Akane, and doesn't show even
a fraction of his true skill until the next morning when he spars with his
father. And by that time, Akane has already convinced herself that Ranma won
by cheating, and ignores his performance completely. Here, however, Ranma
shows undeniable proof that he's an incredible martial artist. When Akane saw
Ranma project a battle aura, she was seeing a level of Martial Arts that she
KNEW she's never achieved (even if Ranma didn't do it consciously). Even more
convincing is the fact that Akane had always thought that battle auras were a
part of the old Martial Arts legends, a part that she believed was IMPOSSIBLE
to realize in the "real world". The shock of seeing the impossible done was
enough to make Akane understand just how good a martial artist Ranma is, and
since Ranma's mouth hadn't gotten the opportunity to get away from him yet,
she wasn't all that adverse to Ranma training her.

Though the peace didn't last, since Ranma's mouth DID get ahead of him
eventually. And Akane DID take it the wrong way, and bashed him for it. Her
current opinion of him is a total jerk and somewhat of a pervert. However, she
still knows that he could teach her a lot, and she is considering asking him
to train her... if he stops being a jerk/pervert. But do you think that's
really going to happen (at least in her opinion)?

If you STILL think Akane is too OOC, tell me why, 'cause I want to hear.

Update: 8/6/01

I added a bit of internal commentary from Nabiki. I figure her threat of
competition with get Akane to accept the engagement.

Updated last: 2/8/02

Moved Jusenkyou scene from prologue (now unnessessary) into this chapter.

C&C to: bjhaberman@prodigy.net
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