Please, anyone with good C&C let me know. If it's nothing but "You
Suck!" or "Such and such a scene destroyed the whole fic!" is not C&C,
but simply being rude. I seek to learn, not be beat down.


                    Three Pigtails

                 By Valandar the Red



	Author's notes:
		This is not my first fanfic, but is
pretty darn close. It began as an idea being thrown
around during an evening playing a certain anime
roleplaying game, namely that heroes with pigtails 
seem to be the most powerful in their series. The 
three specifically brought up were Saotome Ranma, 
Shidou Hikaru, and Masaaki Tenchi. Someone discussed
what would happen if the three were brought together to
fight an incredibly powerful foe, and the idea was
born. All the characters in this story are the 
property of their respective creators, including 
those few I put in. Please don't sue me, I have no
money.

	Prologue

	It has been six years since events in Nerima
Prefecture died down. After all, everyone has to grow
up, eventually...except Happosai. Yes, he still causes
problems every so often, going on panty raids and
generally making a nuisance of himself. However, he has
broadened his horizons, and only comes to Nerima about
once a month. Thank Kami for small favors.
	Less than seven years ago, my ex-fiancee,
Saotome Ranma, finally revealed to the world his love
for Tendo Akane, and she immediately reacted...by
fainting. Of course, chaos broke out, and I'm ashamed
to admit that I lost control, myself, but nothing would
sway him. Of all people, Kodachi took it the hardest,
and lost what little sanity she had left. She went to
the Tendo Dojo, and began laying waste. When one of her
spiked clubs accidentally gave Kasumi a glancing blow,
the entire Tendo and Saotome family proceeded to give
her one of the most severe beatings anyone in Nerima
had ever received. The fight spilled out onto the
street, where Ryoga, Shampoo, Mousse, and I were on our
way in. When we heard what she had done, I surprised
myself with the level of anger that rose up. Nobody
hurts Kasumi.
	Nobody.
	She was in the hospital for over six months,
and when she was ready to leave, was not allowed to.
Instead, she was transferred to a psychiatric facility
many miles away, in Misawa. Her brother, Kuno Tatewake,
at first challenged Ranma to a duel, blaming him for
his sister's condition. When Nabiki coldly told him
what Kodachi had done, he retracted the challenge. He
stated that he did not like Ranma, but his sister had
crossed a line that no one in Nerima would consider
crossing. He then issued a different challenge, for the
heart of the pigtailed girl, and Akane. Nabiki
interrupted again, and proceeded to give him
irrefutable evidence of the Jusenkyo curse in action,
and told him just what an idiot he had been. He walked
off, stunned, and wasn't seen again for almost three
months.
	After the attack on Kasumi, Shampoo and I both
came to the conclusion that trying to separate the
couple would only make us like Kodachi, and neither of
us wanted that. We both got drunk at my place one
night, where she confessed that she really liked
Mousse, and her pursuit of Ranma was deliberately over
done, to drive him away, while trying to fool her
great-grandmother into thinking she really wanted him.
She also convinced me that my own obsession with him
was unhealthy, and I should find someone else. She
jokingly suggested Ryoga, but that was shot down
quickly. He had Akari, and the cute little girl loved
him unconditionally. 
	So, I dove headlong into my running my
restaurant. The next year was a fog, but I vaguely
remember Ranma and Akane's wedding, where he took her
name; Ryoga and Akari's wedding; Shampoo and Mousse
leaving, with Cologne sighing as she settled for what
was, in her mind, second best for a husband for her
great grand daughter; and Kuno marrying that
martial-arts cheerleader. Tsubasa stopped coming
around, having found a new fixation, and Konatsu had
left, only telling me that he had family business to
attend to.
	One morning, Ranma came walking in, as he
frequently did. Akane was with him, as she often was,
and they sat down at the counter. That was when I
realized that while I still loved my Ran-chan, he
wasn't the love of my life I thought he was. Funny, it
was because I found myself happy to see Akane that I
understood that. A few minutes later, the three of us
got the shock of our lives.
	Gosunkugi Hikaru, the skinny guy known as
"Voodoo Spike" back in High School because of his
obsession with magic, came walking in, arm in arm with
a very pretty girl. While that, in and of itself, would
be enough to render us speechless, the girl, herself,
was even more surprising. She looked exactly like
Ranko.
	Some of you may not be familiar with the
Jusenkyo curses, or the person known as Ranko. It seems
that, somewhere in China, there is a training grounds
with a thousand cursed springs. Whenever someone falls
in to one of those springs, they gain a curse. From
then on, when splashed with cold water, they take on
the form, and sometimes personality, of whatever or
whoever had drowned in that spring. Hot water reversed
the change, but only until the next time they got wet.
While on a training trip with his father, Ranma had
fallen in one of these springs. Spring of Drowned Girl,
to be exact. And his cursed form was that of a
beautiful, red-haired, perfect-bodied girl. When in
this form, he was often called either Ranma-chan, or
Ranko.
	Gosunkugi noticed our shocked expressions, and
made the introduction. "Kuonji Ukyou, Tendo Akane, and
Tendo Ranma, I'd like to introduce you three to my
fiancee, Shidou Hikaru."
	The girl bowed slightly, and smiled a dazzling
smile. "I'm pleased to meet you. Hikaru has told me so
much about all three of you."
	Ranma recovered his wits first, which was yet
another surprise. "I'm pleased to meet you, too. Um,
just what did he say about us?"
	She looked up, and began counting off her
points on her fingers. "Well, he said you were the
greatest martial artist he had ever heard of, but had
some sort of curse, he wouldn't say what. He also said
that your wife, Akane, was incredibly strong, both in
body, and in her heart, as well as being one of the
prettiest girls in Japan. And that Kuonji Ukyou was one
of the few girls who rivaled Akane for beauty, and also
made the best Okonomiyaki in Japan. He also said that
Akane and Ukyou were two more world-class martial
artists, though not quite to the level you are." She
blinked, and then looked him in the eye. "Yup, that's
about what he told me about you. He also told me some
stories about your adventures, and how much he wishes
he was strong enough to do martial arts, too."
	"Hikaru!" Gosunkugi looked embarrassed.
	"What, Hikaru ?"
	"Whoa, whoa, stop," I said. "That's going to
get extremely confusing around here. We tend to
call...Hikaru... either Gosunkugi, or Gos. And after
what he said about me, I might just call him Gos-chan."
I winked at him, causing him to blush, and then look at
his fiancee.
	Hikaru laughed. "Okay, around you guys, I'll
call him Gos-chan. Now, I'd like to try one of those
okonomiyakis, please."
	Over the course of the day, we demonstrated
Ranma's curse, which explained to her our reaction upon
seeing her. In fact, the only way to tell them apart
was that Hikaru was slightly thinner, and she actually
wore makeup. Not much, just enough to set off those
dazzling eyes of hers. She then told us about her own
adventures, in the world of Cephiro, as a Magic Knight.
She was surprised we believed her from the start, until
we began telling about some of the more outrageous
adventures, including the incident at Phoenix Mountain.
When Akane told about how Ranma had killed Saffron, who
then regenerated into an infant, something clicked in
her eyes. She looked at Ranma, with an expression that
somehow said that she knew how he felt. She spoke up,
quietly, and told the tale of how she, and her friends,
Umi and Fuu, had been forced to kill Princess Emeraude,
Pillar of Cephiro, to save that world. "I, too, have
killed a god," she finished.
	Ranma and Hikaru looked each other in the eye,
and nodded. A wordless message passed between them, and
I think that was when they adopted each other as sister
and brother. The rest of the afternoon was spent with
the five of us sitting around, and laughing about jokes
made at Ranma's expense. That was also when he showed
how much he had matured, as he laughed along with us,
rather than blustering or getting angry. 
	Three weeks later, Gosunkugi began training at
the Tendo Dojo. He would never be in even Kuno's
league, because he started too late, and was never in
the best of shape. However, his improvement in both
health and ability was so great, that within a year
students were flocking to the dojo for the night
classes Ranma taught. He still went to college in the
daytime, at Tokyo University, but really seemed to come
alive in the beginners' classes. However, he had
problems with the number of people signed up for the
intermediate classes, so he did something that
surprised me. He asked Akane and me to help teach those
classes.
	I'm actually glad he did that, because it was
there my life changed. I met a man in the classes,
rather slender and almost beautiful, in a bishounen
way. His voice was an oddly resonant tenor, with as
much grace in his speech as there was in his form. He
was strong and swift, and seemed to know my own moves
as well as I did. I had to admit, I was falling in
love, for only the second time in my life. He was
extremely intelligent, skilled in the Art, and, to my
surprise, could even cook okonomiyaki. He was perfect,
almost too perfect, so I confronted Ranma one day, as
he watched me teach with a smirk on his face.
	Class was over, so I walked up to him. "Well,
Ran-chan, what's so funny?"
	"Actually, I'm wondering how long it's going to
take you."
	"To do what?" I asked.
	"To ask him out. I know you want to. When you
look at him, you have that same look on your face you
used to give me. The one that made me not want to tell
you how I really felt, because I didn't want to hurt
you." His expression grew more serious. "I've seen him
look at you the exact same way, when you were helping
another student. Go for it, Ucchan."
	Akane then walked in behind him, and put her
arms around his waist. "Yeah, Ucchan, go for it." She
had a half-hidden smile on her face, one that instantly
aroused my suspicions. 
	"Alright, 'Kane-chan, what's so funny?" I
mock-growled at her.
	"Mmmmm, oh, nothing," she said. She then
grabbed Ranma's pigtail, and dragged his head down to
her level. He started to protest, until she started
whispering in his ear. His eyes flew open wide, and he
burst out laughing. When she released his pigtail, he
fell to the floor, eyes streaming tears as he struggled
to regain control, to no effect.
	"'Bye, Ucchan," she said, walking out of the
door of the dojo, leaving me more thoroughly confused
than I had been in a long time.
	It was a week later when I finally got up the
nerve to ask him to a movie. It was then that I
realized that the only name I knew him by was Kenchiro.
The date was wonderful, and I just about melted when he
took me in his arms to say goodnight. I just lost all
vestiges of reservation about him at that point and
kissed him. He stiffened for a second, then returned it
with a passion I hardly suspected. We said goodnight,
and I just about floated back to my restaurant.
	The next morning, Gosunkugi and Hikaru came in,
as did Ranma and Akane. The latter two weren't even
trying to hide their knowing smiles when they saw me,
and I couldn't help but blush. Akane spoke up. "Okay,
'Kenchiro', I think that you can let her know now."
	From around the corner, Kenchiro came walking
in. "Ukyou-san, I think the time has come to tell you
the truth. Kenchiro is my name, now, but it wasn't
always. Ranma and Ryoga convinced me to do what I have
done, and helped me become who I am. As to who I was,
well, you used to know me. Arrgh, this isn't coming out
right..."
	What? He knew both Ranma and Ryoga before he
started training at the dojo? Who was he?
	He took a deep breath, and looked me in the
eye. "Ucchan, I am the man who used to be Konatsu."
	Splash! Hikaru stood over me, holding a
half-empty glass of water, smiling with mirth. "Well,
you really took it well. You've been standing in shock
for five minutes!"
	Over the rest of the afternoon, I found out
that Konatsu, Ryoga, Ranma, and Mousse had been getting
together, playing poker, of all things, back around the
time of all the weddings. The Deadly Duo, Ranma and
Ryoga, had convinced Konatsu...err, Kenchiro, to
completely start over. He had his name changed, and
they began teaching him what it meant to be a man.
Surprisingly enough, they didn't concentrate on the
crude things, but on the noble side of the subject.
Honor, courage, and self-respect were their lessons,
especially the last. They helped him find the strength
to stand on his own, while showing him respect from the
start. Wow, ever since those two finally settled their
differences, they really matured. They could be
childish, still, but it was rare, and usually followed
by a sparring session reminiscent of the old days. By
the end of it, however, they are usually rolling on the
floor.
	I'm rambling, aren't I. Anyway, Konatsu had
left shortly after, and burned his women's clothing,
replacing it with  European style Men's wear. He
relaxed his voice, until his true tone shone through,
and stopped shaving, just enough to grow a slight
shadow. When the time was right, he returned, and
captured my heart.
	Now, here I am, two years after marrying him,
holding my firstborn daughter in the hospital. Hikaru
is on a bed just to my left, holding her own daughter.
Her Tabiki is a complete darling, but is nowhere as
beautiful as my Akami. Kenchiro is sitting on the bed,
enraptured by the little life he helped create, and I
think that nothing could ever be so perfect as this.


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