Ranma 1/2 Fan Fiction ❯ Phoenix ❯ Homework Assignment ( Chapter 5 )

See Chapter 1 for Disclaimer

Ranma sat down in front of her husband's computer, not really knowing what to write. She had a creative writing assignment in her English class, and creativity wasn't exactly her strong point, except when it came to the Art. It didn't help her that the Roman keys made her nervous. It also didn't help that her husband was on alert status for the weekend, and couldn't help her. "Aw hell, might as well tell my life story." She chuckled to herself, as she began to hunt and peck her way across the keyboard. "I doubt anyone is going to believe me anyway."

* * *

My name's Reiko Sakai, and I'm a martial artist. I'm also married to the oldest lieutenant in one of the fighter squadrons at Misawa Airbase. I've been training under my father for ten years straight. Unfortunately, he's a better sensei than father; and his training methods, while unorthodox and border on the deplorable and highly dangerous, especially for the student, are highly effective.

Some of my father's techniques included having me be chased by timber wolves to teach me to run faster; tying me to the back of a freight train to raise my endurance; teaching me to get around quicker, and I actually enjoy and use that particular skill; leaving me to fend for myself in the woods while he'd be in town getting drunk and stuffing his face to teach me how to survive; oh, he'd sometimes forget to pull his punches when we'd spar, especially if he were drunk. He'd turn anything into training-even eating. I think he did that just to feed his fat belly.

There was one technique though that really takes the cake, though. When I was six, my father "found" a technique manual for the Neko-ken, or "Cat Fist". It's this supposedly unbeatable technique, but there's a draw back. To learn the technique, the student (that was me) must be tied up with fish products and thrown into a pit of cats, starved for three to four days. The student then either learns it by reverting to a cat-like state, or dies.

The problem with the Neko-ken is that it's been banned for generations, because it drives the student insane. The student, should they survive, tends to be trapped in a feral cat-like state, or develops such an intense fear of cats that by being surrounded by them triggers the technique.

Of course, I didn't learn it the first time, so Pops threw me in several more times, with different fish products. I finally learned it; and now I can't stand to be around cats for any extended amount of time. If I am, the fear becomes so intense that I black out, and I'll revert to the cat-like state. I found this out after spending some time with Amazons in the hinterlands of China.

The other thing Pops did was a never-ending search for the perfect training grounds for our school. I guess I should mention our school of martial arts. It's called Musabetsu Kakutou Sakai-ryu, and there are very few practitioners of the school. Loosely translated the name means "Indiscriminate Grappling" or "Anything Goes". What that means is that when we get into a challenge, we learn and then use our opponent's attacks against them. Our school also uses taunts to enrage our opponent and make them loose their focus. Another thing our school specializes in is aerial combat. We can launch into the air and fight as comfortably as if we are on the ground; from a standing start I can leap 20-30 feet into the air. Pops was great for teaching how to enrage someone; he'd do it to me multiple times when we'd spar, call me weak and girly. There is one other thing I guess I should mention. I wasn't always a girl; in fact when we started the training trip and for most of the trip, I was a boy.

Like I said earlier, Pop's was always looking for the perfect training grounds. We wandered all over the world training with martial arts masters, learning their techniques. Well, our wandering took us into China, and deep into the hinterlands of that nation, to the Cursed Training Grounds of Jusenkyo. When we arrived, the one hundred or so springs were shrouded in a mist that made them seem less ominous than they actually are. Pops and I jumped on to a bamboo stake located in different pool, launched into the air and began sparring.

The PRC provides a guide at the Springs to warn visitors against the dangers of falling into one. He started babbling in pidgin Japanese about the dangers when I knocked my old man into one. He had just started saying something about the Spring of Drowned Panda when my father, now in his cursed form of a giant panda leapt out of the pool. I was so shocked, that Pops got in a clean shot in. I flew back, twisted around, and grabbed on to a bamboo pole in a different pool.

The pole snapped, and in I fell with a splash. I surfaced and felt different. Looking down, I saw what happened. Well, hell yeah, I was in shock and passed out. Next thing I know, I'm in the Guide's hut. The Guide looked at me with an apologetic look on his face. "Sorry, Mr. Customer," the Guide said, "you fall into Spring of Drowned Girl. The reverse of hot water does not work; the curse is permanent."

At that point, I screamed, and ran out of the hut. I ran for most of the day and that night until I collapsed from exhaustion. For the second time in as many days, I woke up to an unfamiliar ceiling, but this time surrounded by women. I would have made some sort of comment, or tried to fight my way out, not that I liked fighting women. This old troll pogoed up to my cot and looked at me. I tried to sit up, but the local healer wouldn't let me, until she felt I was ready to. She spoke first in Mandarin. When I indicated I didn't understand her, she switched to Japanese. "You should consider yourself lucky, young lady, that our patrol found you and not the Musk. They have no compunctions about turning you into one of their breeding stock." I shuddered on the cot, I was still a guy inside, and that sort of thing frightened the piss out of me. Yeah, Pops tried to make me a "man amongst men" by teaching me Anything Goes Hentai Martial Arts when I was 15 at a Bangkok brothel did make me lose my virginity, and it was fun, but I didn't learn any techniques from it. At the time, because of my condition, I really didn't appreciate what I had learned in Bangkok happening to me. Oh yeah, Pops got caught by the Thai police and thrown in jail for prostitution, since money changed hands. The girls of the Bangkok Chicken Ranch adopted me until Oyaji was released on his own recognizance. Of course, we weren't supposed to leave the country, but we did. I think there's an international warrant out for his arrest. "What's you're name, child," the old troll asked me.

"R-Reiko Sakai," I replied, a little hesitantly. All these feelings and different sensations, and whatnot had my system on permanent overload.

"Hm…what were you doing on the trail up from Jusenkyo?"

I sighed, and began my tale of woe. Of how my father took me away from my home when I was 6 on a ten-year training trip, the techniques I was taught, of the places we've trained at. I finished with our "adventure" yesterday at Jusenkyo, and how I wound up as a girl.

The Elder turned and said something in Mandarin. I guess it was an order, because the guards in my hut turned and left, but the healer remained. She then looked back at me, regarding me almost as a cat does the canary. "I am Kuh Lon, an Elder of the Joketsuzoku Amazons. I know all about Jusenkyo, child, particularly the Spring that you had the misfortune of falling in. Balm, here," she gestured to the healer, "is one of those unfortunates that fell in. She was a doctor, and was adopted into our tribe. Many of our warriors and non-warriors were cursed in that particular spring. If you are willing, Reiko, I will petition the Council to adopt you into our tribe."

"I…I'll think about it," I told her, as I lay back on the cot. To be perfectly honest, I didn't know what to expect. I was a girl-the creature my panda of a father told me was weak-being offered a membership into a tribe of women warriors.

Balm looked at me. "Your ki reserves are still extremely low. You need to rest, young one. I will have some food and drink brought it." I nodded and closed my eyes…

Only to be poked what seemed like a minute later. A young Amazon with lavender hair was standing by my bed, a tray loaded with food in her hands. "Ranma want food, yes?" She asked in broken, pidgin Japanese. I nodded and she set the tray down. Taking up the chopsticks, I began to devour my food at Sakai speed. Well, that was until I noticed my father wasn't there trying to steal my food.

I may have said it earlier, but I'll state it again. My old man turned anything into a training exercise-even eating. If I wasn't fast enough, he'd steal food out from under my nose. It taught me how to be faster, and improved my hand and eye coordination, but I usually wound up tasting my food after I'd eaten it.

And this training was apparent on the young Amazon's face while I was eating. With a sheepish grin, I apologized. "Sorry…"

"Xian Pu."

"Shampoo."

"No, Xian Pu."

"Shampoo." I grinned at her, because I couldn't get the pronunciation of her name in Mandarin down. Shampoo saw my smile and started laughing. I guess they say laughter is the best medicine, because when I started laughing, I began to feel a lot better.

I spent close to a year, something like nine or ten months, with the Amazons, and it was probably the best thing that happened to me until recently. I told Cologne that I wanted to be just an honorary member, not a full member. I explained to her that I still had family in Japan, and wasn't ready to give it up yet. The Elder understood, and in a brief ceremony calling upon their goddesses, I became an honorary Amazon and a near-sister to Shampoo, mainly because I got the somewhat lonely Amazon warrior to lighten up, and look at things from a different perspective. Heck, I didn't even know I was going to be named her near-sister; it came as a surprise when Shampoo gave me the Kiss of Sisterhood. But it's nice that I have a sister that I can talk to, even if it is just writing back and forth. I wonder how she handled Mu Tsu.

The time was well spent after the ceremony. They taught me, not only their particular brand of martial arts, but also who I had become. But at the same time, some of the more rigid Amazons, some who still thought that I was a guy underneath my appearance, tried making me do menial labor, more appropriate to a slave. Apparently to them, my status as an honorary Amazon wasn't worth camel spit.

Which was something else that annoyed me-the way men were treated. But there was no way I could change a system like that, and even Cologne, the most liberal of the Elders when it came to males, would be unable to affect a change in the status quo, so there would be nothing changed. Some of the more liberal, I guess would be the best word I can use, Amazons, particularly those that were cursed liked me, treated the males with a little more respect. I tried my hardest to keep an even keel and not piss of those Elders that wanted Cologne to suffer a loss of face.

Balm became my mentor in a number of things-especially when it came to that time of the month. I was freaking out when the bleeding started; I had no idea about a menstrual cycle, or periods. She calmed me down, told me what to do, and gave me, in better detail than my old man, a lesson in sex ed. Sure, I learned a lot at that brothel in Bangkok, especially after Pops was in jail, but that was as a guy. For a girl, it was different. I still get a little queasy when I remember Balm's training.

Not only was she my mentor, but Balm also became an almost surrogate mother to me. There were nights that I couldn't sleep, especially right after I was cursed. Pops raised me to be a man among, and the shock to my ego was too much for me to handle. I would cry throughout the night, and Balm would be there to comfort me; let me cry myself out on her shoulder. She would tell me that she went through the same emotional turmoil that I was going through. I put a brave front up during the day, but nights were when I could let my emotions out, when Balm and I were alone in the hut we shared. Slowly, though, Balm got me to express myself, and my emotions to the outside world.

Like I said, it was time well spent, so it was difficult when I left to go home. I wanted to find my mother, to talk to her. At the time, I didn't know about the seppuku contract I supposedly signed when I was 6. Kuh Lon arranged for a passport and visa through the Japanese Embassy, since Pops and I swam across the Sea of Japan

I ran into Mom near one of the malls in the Juban district of Tokyo. I didn't know how to approach her, but I eventually did. It was hard for the both of us to admit that I was once her son. But I wasn't happy with what her decision was.

Sitting in the food court, she showed me the contract that my father and I signed and told me that I two choices for failing to be a man amongst men-appease family honor and commit seppuku, or be disowned and expelled from the Sakai clan. Very harsh decisions for me to make, but my family has a samurai lineage that goes back to the Tokugawa era, so honor is everything to my family.

I told my mother that I'm too young to die; that I had a full life to live ahead of me. "Very well," she told me. "Then my son is truly dead to me. Good day, madam." With that, she stood and walked out of the food court.

I left Tokyo and wandered around the country until early December. It was hard for me during that time to find food, let alone work. The various Shinto shrines and temples that dotted the countryside provided me food and shelter for work at the shrine. It wasn't the best of arrangements-there were times that I had to leave in the middle of the night because the priest was a pervert, and I didn't want my body violated.

When Pops and I were on our training trip, we lived off the land. But we at least had a tent. When I left the Joketsuzoku, I didn't exactly have a tent with me, but Kuh Lon had provided enough funds for me to make it to the nearest city with a Japanese consulate, so that I could retrieve my passport and visa, and to arrange for transportation back to Tokyo. But not enough for much camping equipment.

By the time I reached Misawa, I'd taken to living under bridges, in culverts, abandoned buildings, basically someplace that I could get overhead cover to avoid getting raped. So I was getting sick. By the time the first snows hit northern Japan, I wasn't feeling all that well. Heck, I was probably getting pneumonia, I wasn't feeling all that well anymore. I'd taken to living in the doorway of the old building just off base.

My husband found me in the doorway, ready to give up the ghost. I was feverish, coughing up green stuff, I wasn't thinking right. But when he helped me out, he did it out of concern for my well-being. It was like he was a knight in shining armor out of a cheesy romance novel or shoujo anime. I apparently passed out, and the next thing I know, I'm warm, lying in a bed. That threw me for a loop. I opened my eyes, and the first sight that greeted me was a B-29 being attacked by an A6M. I closed them and reopened them. It turned out that my husband was a model builder. I was in an unfamiliar room, naked. I was about to scream like there was no tomorrow, when something told me I should just double check. Warm? Yes. Dry? Definitely.

I woke my savior up, using a little known Amazon technique-yelling in his ear. We talked for a while; I explained why I was in the dire situation that I was. He made an offer that I really couldn't refuse. Although, there was still that little bit of male sitting in the back of my head, I protested, stating I was still a guy.

Patiently, he explained the situation, based on what I had told him. And I realized that I should have remembered that, since I'd been like this for over a year at this point. I still held on to the foolish notion that some how I could regain my lost masculinity. A part of my mind, the one that Balm and Kuh Lon grew and nurtured, was reminding me that the curse was permanent; that I couldn't regain what the lone permanent spring that doesn't kill the recipient of the curse, like Nissanniichuan, the Spring of Drowned Nissan Pathfinder*.

We spent that first day together shopping, stopping at the…he called it the chow hall, but it was more like a cafeteria that what I expected a chow hall to look like, for lunch first. As I showered when we got back to his quarters, I finally made the decision to let my past life die in the Springs; that it was time for me to embrace the woman that I was. Now, I wasn't gay or anything when I was a guy. Heck, the girls at Chicken Ranch were quite impressed with my stamina, and a couple of the girls who were Japanese gave me the nickname of "ran ma". But it's just that I've spent the past year as a girl. Balm explained to me that different hormones and chemistry would cause me to become more female over time. She even explained a bit of her history to me; that she had a successful practice in the Nerima ward of Tokyo, as a chiropractor and general practitioner, along with a few esoteric specializations in acupuncture and moxibustion, until she left the ward to find her center. Which was how she wound up cursed by Jusenkyo, and continued to practice her medical arts for the Amazons. That was three years ago, and two years ago, Balm married Da Ger, a promising apprentice under the village wordsmith Ra Zor.

When I got out of the shower and dressed, the Lieutenant asked me to marry him. He was so cute as he did it on bended knee, waffling as he made his speech. For a man almost twice my age, he sure is easily flustered. But I love him anyway.

We had a quick wedding; I got my new identity and put my past behind me. Except for my martial arts. That's something I'll never give up. And now I have an added surprise for my darling husband. He wanted to learn my family martial arts, so I started him out with a series of beginning katas. Well, I sort of pushed him a little too far, and wore him out. So while he was recuperating in the tub, we…well I won't go into that, but suffice to say in about eight months, we're going to have a new member to the family. And I could care less if I don't meet my mother's expectations about me being a "man amongst men"; I'm going to be a mother.