Ranma 1/2 - THE LONG AND WINDING ROAD
EPISODE ONE: A NEW HOPE

by Zen

Based on characters and situations created by Takahashi Rumiko
Ranma 1/2 and characters copyright Shogakukan, Kitty Animation
Circle, and Takahashi Rumiko.
This story copyright 1996 - James A Bateman



####  ****  ####

It was the middle of November, and Nerima had been quiet.  Winter
had come and buried the town in a heavy silence - the sleepy silence
that the world adopts when muffled by a thick blanket of freshly
fallen snow.  Every night, more snow had fallen - a fluffy wet snow
that lay thick on the ground and erased all traces of the previous
day's activities.

During the days, the snow turned the world into a scene from a
postcard, the ice coating the bare trees making them into intricate
sculptures of fine crystal.  Sunlight passing through the ice cast
rainbow shadows across the pristine landscape.  Traffic noises were
totally absent, and just occasionally could one hear the crunch of
boots through the snow.  The deep quiet of an afternoon was
disturbed only by the playful shouts of children after schools let out,
when the air was thick with snowballs.  The air smelled sharp and
crisp, and all seemed right with the world.

Things that appear too good to be true, often are.

####  ****  ####

"OYAJI!!"

Soun and Genma were in the midst of a game of Shogi when the
shout shattered the silence of the afternoon.  The shoji door to the
Tendous' living area was slammed aside with such force that it
nearly left its tracks.  Ranma stood framed in the opening, a long tear
in his favorite Chinese style shirt, sporting several new bruises and
bandages.  He wore an expression of such ferocity that Kami-sama
himself might have thought twice about taking him on.

To say that Ranma looked angry would have been like saying that
Rally Vincent liked guns a little bit, or that Vogon poetry is of less
than stellar quality.  Soun took one look at Ranma and decided that
he didn't want to be anywhere near Genma for a little while.  He fled
to the relative safety of the next room, and peeked furtively around
the door frame.

Ranma's voice was low and dangerous.  "Oyaji, just what does the
name 'Daitokuji' mean to you?" he asked.

"N... nothing..." Genma started to stammer.  "Should it...?"

"Are you *sure* Oyaji?  You don't remember a little transaction
involving your son and the daughter of the Daitokuji clan?  JUST
WHAT DID YOU SELL ME FOR *THIS* TIME??!" bellowed Ranma.

Soun growled from his hiding place in the next room.  "Saotome!  Not
again!"

"Oh, yes, again!" Ranma answered Soun though his gaze never left his
father.  "But it gets better!  The daughter, Biiko, doesn't *like* boys.  I
was safe from her... until she found out I'm a *girl* half the time!"
Ranma's gaze darkened as he asked his father, "Now just who do you
suppose told her about *that*, ne?  Just what did you get for THAT
piece of information?"

"Err,"  managed Genma, while doing a fair impersonation of Ferengi
Cringe number 417.  [This is the one that means "I seem to have left
my refund slips in my other jacket; excuse me while I go back to
Ferenginar and get them...]

Ranma was having none of it.  He continued advancing on Genma,
murder in his eyes.  "Did you know, Oyaji, that she builds Battle
Mecha for a hobby?  Did you?  Do you know how many of those
things I had to destroy before I could get away?"

The staccato pop of knuckles cracking was, to Genma's ears, not
unlike the bark of a machine pistol.  Ranma launched into a spin kick
that caught his father hard in the side of the head.  Genma was
dazed, but did not go down.  Ranma continued the attack with a
series of kicks that Genma was simply not able to block, even if he
hadn't been too dazed to try.

Ranma shouted, "I... (boot to the head)  AM SICK... (boot to the head)
AND TIRED... (boot to the head)  OF YOU!! (boot to the head)."

The last kick sent Genma down hard, out like a light.  That did not
stop Ranma.  He picked up his father by the front of his gi and shook
him like a rag doll - no mean feat considering that Genma was a head
taller and outmassed his son by a factor of at least three.  "Why are
you always screwing up MY life?!"  he yelled.  "You've ruined
*everything*!"

With those words, Ranma tossed his father out of the house and into
the garden.  Ranma was disappointed to note that when Genma came
down, he crashed through the thin layer of ice on the pond.  "Damn,"
he muttered.

"Nice shot, Ranma-kun,"  said Nabiki coming up behind him.

"I was aiming," Ranma growled, "for the rocks."  He turned, and with
a final glare at Soun in his hiding place, stalked out of the room and
up the stairs.

When the Panda in the Tendou fish pond finally regained his senses
(perhaps it would be more accurate to say regained consciousness),
his survival instincts kicked in and he decided that, for the time
being, that the cold fish pond was the safest place for him to be, and
that he'd better not let his son catch him until the boy had a chance
to cool off.

####  ****  ####

Ranma slammed the door to the guest room and threw himself down
on his futon.  Damn that old man!  It was said that the sins of the
father were visited upon the son unto the fourth generation, but this
was ridiculous.  Things got complicated enough without having to
wonder what or who was waiting around the next corner wanting to
pound him, or to marry him - sometimes both.

Imagine!  A man willing to sell his son's future for a bowl of rice and
a fish! - to arrange a marriage over a single bowl of ramen.  And he
had done it not once, not twice, but the Kami alone knew how many
times.  How many people out there were still searching for Saotome
Ranma with a view towards collecting on one of Genma's promises?
Ranma shuddered, and rolled over to stare at the ceiling.

<So how do I get out of this mess?> Ranma wondered.  <How can I get
all of these people to leave me alone?>  After giving it a lot of
thought, Ranma eventually reached the conclusion that there was
only one way to stop all of them.  <Only trouble with that one is, I'm
kind of fond of living,> he mused.  <Still, there has got to be a way to
at least slow them down.>

But how?  With three iinazuke fighting over him all the time; with
more dropping in and out at the most inconvenient opportunities,
and fruitbats like Kodachi in the equation, was there a solution?  The
situation was not one that inspired a great deal of hope.

<Well,> thought Ranma, <Maybe it'll help if I think of it as a battle
plan.  I can't fight directly - there are too many of them, and I don't
know where all of them are.  Definitely a target-rich environment.
So, if I can't eliminate the fighters, I gotta take out the objective.>

That seemed like a sound strategy, but Ranma was at a loss for an
effective means to implement it.  <Huh.> he thought.  <Looks like the
only way to solve this problem is to go on and marry one of them.
Now *there's* an irony.>  Ranma sighed.  <I'm not ready for marriage
yet!  Still, I have GOT to do something.  I just can't go on like this.
It's driving me crazy!  One way or another, I have to settle this once
and for all.>

Ranma rolled over onto his side.  The wall provided no more
inspiration than the ceiling had.  <If I *were* to marry one of them,
which would it be?  How am I supposed to make a choice like that?
What choices do I really have?>

Kodachi?  A ghost of a laugh echoed through his memory.  Ranma
shuddered.  <I think not.>

Shampoo... Shampoo was beautiful, affectionate, an excellent cook, a
capable fighter...  Indeed, she was everything that a good Amazon
should be.  Ranma suspected that there was a lot more to Shampoo
than met the eye.  People often thought of her as a bimbo because of
the way she talked, but, broken as it was, her Japanese was a hell of
a lot better than his Chinese.  One thing that a martial artist learned
was that you never took anything for granted.  To underestimate
your opponent could be fatal.

On the downside, she had a cruel streak that repelled him when she
let it get the better of her, and a craftiness that rivaled Nabiki's.  She
was a cat person.  Then, of course, there was Cologne.  He had learned
much from the old crone, for which he was grateful, but the thought
of actually becoming a member of her family left him with an
industrial strength case of the willies.  He genuinely liked Shampoo,
but somehow he just could not imagine being married to her.

Then there was Ukyou.  Ucchan was his best friend, and it had taken
her a while to drive it through his thick skull that she wanted to be
more than that.  At first, he just could not imagine thinking of her in
those terms... after all, she was Ucchan; she was his best buddy!  It
had come as enough of a shock that she was a girl.

Once that initial shock had worn off, however, it had dawned on him
that she really was cute.  She was a great cook, and they liked the
same things... and he was comfortable with her.  She accepted him,
curse and all.  When he needed to talk, she had listened... without
trying to knock him into the next week first.

She could be crafty though, just as crafty as Shampoo, in her own
way.  But the thing that stuck in Ranma's mind most about that was
that all of her schemes had at least *tried* to make sure that
everyone got some of what they wanted.  Like that time she had
tried to set Akane and Ryouga up on a date...

And finally, Akane.  Akane was impatient, short tempered and
violent.  She had little in the way of domestic skills; if her cooking
didn't kill you through basic poisoning, it was likely to jump off the
plate and try to throttle you.  She swam like a hammer.  In fact,
there was precious little in that catalog to recommend her.

But, when she wasn't busy being angry, she could be so kind, so
warm and gentle.  When she smiled, she was so cute that it made
Ranma go all gooey inside.  If only she weren't mad so *much* of the
time, and more to the point, mad at *him*.  And lately, things had
been getting worse.  The fights were getting more frequent, and it
was taking her longer to cool down afterwards.  Somehow it seemed
that he always managed to say just the wrong things.

But did Akane even want to marry him?  He knew how Shampoo and
Ukyou felt, but Akane and he had never really talked much.  She was
such a mystery.  Ranma realized with a start that he had no idea how
she *really* felt.  Bloody well about time to find out.

Ranma sighed and got up.  He stretched and gathered his bath things.
No sense waiting.  For better or for worse, the time for decisions had
come.  He would begin by talking to Akane after dinner.

####  ****  ####

That evening, after the dinner things had been cleared away, Ranma
sat off by himself trying to decide how best to approach Akane.  It
was going to be a ticklish matter, and all the more so considering the
mood Akane had been in all night.  More than once he had
considered abandoning the idea to wait for a better time, but he was
not sure that a better time would come, and he had to know.  It had
taken him too long just to work up the nerve to actually do it.

Akane was the one that his father wanted him to marry - and her
father.  It was, he had been told many times, a matter of honour.  But
could honour be served by destroying someone's happiness?  What
was honour without joy?

Could he even live happily with Akane?  Perhaps - she meant a lot
more to him than he would ever admit - but it would have to work
both ways.  If she didn't think that she could be happy with him,
then there was no point in trying to make it work.  Not for the first
time, Ranma regretted the adversarial quality of his relationship
with Akane.  It was not going to make this any easier.  He was going
to have to be extra careful not to antagonize her.

####  ****  ####

Akane sat in her room, pretending to do her homework while she
stewed.  She had not been having a very good day.  She had known it
was going to be bad when she had gotten to school and noticed that
all of her friends were looking at her and whispering amongst
themselves.  That was never a good sign.  She had finally gotten
someone to tell her what it was all about.

Naturally, it had been Ranma's fault.  Yet another iinazuke had
shown up to stake her claim, based on one of Genma's stupid
promises.  A new one turned up every so often and each one had
been weirder than the last.  This newcomer was no exception.

The first thing she did was challenge Ranma to a fight.  Maybe she
was trying to prove her worthiness, or maybe trying to beat the snot
out of someone was just her hentai way of expressing affection;
Akane didn't know, and she didn't much care.  Ranma had come out
to answer her challenge and she had faced him with a small army of
Battle Mecha.  Her opening volley had been fired with a water
cannon.

As Ranma-chan had hauled herself up from that attack, the new girl
had been delighted - she had been *glad* that Ranma had turned
into a girl.  For her part, Ranma-chan had managed to destroy the
Mecha, but that was not to be the end of it.

Ranma's new iinazuke had torn off her own clothing to reveal a
rather daring suit of battle armor and had continued the attack with
an impressive array of high tech weapons.  The battle had raged for
hours before she had run out of ammunition and Ranma-chan had
been able to make her escape.  The collateral damage had been
extensive.  It had been more than Akane could take.  Compared to
this girl, even Kunou Kodachi was the picture of shining sanity.

To make matters worse, Akane had been ambushed on her way
home by Shampoo.  The Chinese Amazon was still set on eliminating
all of her rivals for Ranma's affections, and Akane was at the top of
her list.  After fighting and dodging for almost an hour, the two of
them had ended up in the canal.  Akane booted Shampoo-neko a
good two blocks before heading home herself, bruised, soaked and
shivering.

It was enough to ruin her whole day.  There seemed to be no end to
the trouble and the heartache that Ranma and his father had brought
her.  If only... If only Ranma's dad hadn't...

Akane's musings were interrupted by a knock at the door.  She took
a moment to calm herself before she answered.

####  ****  ####

Ranma knocked softly on the door to Akane's room.  For a moment,
he did not think he was going to get an answer.  Just as he was about
to turn away, Akane called out.  "Come in, it's open."

<Well, this is it...> thought Ranma.  He turned the knob and walked
into the room.  Akane was sitting at her desk with her back to the
door and several books spread out in front of her.  She turned as he
came in.  When she saw who her visitor was, her expression
hardened.  The change was not lost on Ranma.  This was not starting
out as well as he'd hoped, but now he was committed.

"Oh, it's you," she said.  "Don't you think that you've caused me
enough trouble for today?"

No, this was definitely not going to be easy.  <Maybe I should come
back another time...> he thought.  What he said was, "Akane, I...  we
need to talk."

"Talk?" she snarled.  "What could you possibly have to say that
would interest me?"

"Hey!  What are you so mad about?  What'd I do this time?"

"Do?  What did you DO?  What *haven't* you done?"

"I ain't done NOTHIN'!"  No.  He had not come to fight with her.  This
was too important for that.  Ranma made an effort to calm himself,
and sighed.  "You're determined to make this difficult, aren't you?  I
want to talk to you about this iinazuke thing..."

"What *are* you talking about?!  How many times do I have to tell
you, we are *not* engaged!"

That hurt.  Ranma figured that he deserved some of it, but he was
trying so hard to be reasonable.  "Akane - Don't you like me?  Even
just a little?"

"Like you?!  What's to like?  You're arrogant, rude, you make fun of
me all the time, you insult my cooking, you don't think I'm cute, and
to top it all off, you're always running around with other women!
And you want me to *like* you for it?"

"Akane, I..."

"What, you can explain?"  Akane snorted.  "Don't bother!  The *last*
thing that I want to hear right now is another one of your lame
excuses..."

"Lame excuses?"  Ranma shot back hotly.  "They're the truth!  But
you can't be bothered to listen long enough..."

"And what about that Daitokuji girl?"  Akane went on, "What in the
seven hells did you do to her?  It must really have been something
for her to freak out like that..."

Ranma bristled at that last.  "Hey!  There's no way that one can be
my fault!  I never saw that girl before in my life!  Why is it you
always think that these things are *my* fault?!"

"Because they ARE!  Before YOU came along, my life was peaceful!"

"Oi!  That's not entirely fair, you know.  You were fighting all those
guys at school before I ever got here!"

"Yes, but they were the ONLY ones I had to fight.  Now I have to fight
just about everybody!"

Ranma could feel himself losing control again.  This was getting him
nowhere.  Ranma took a breath, willing his voice to be calmer.  "No,
you don't.  If you don't want me, you don't have to fight anyone on
my account."

Akane looked at him coldly.  "And just why would I want you?  Who
could possibly want a hentai freak like you?"

Ranma opened his mouth and promptly stuck his foot in it.  "Lots of
people!  There's Shampoo, Ukyou, Kodachi..."

"Don't forget her brother," added Akane nastily.  "If it hadn't been for
Dad & Uncle Saotome...  I wish I'd never heard of you!"

Ranma was really starting to get angry.  Why was she making this so
hard?  It took all of his determination to keep his temper under
control and to keep from hurling insults back at her.  Couldn't she see
how hard he was trying?  "Do you really feel that way?"  he asked,
his voice tight.

Akane advanced on her tormentor.  "You bet I do!" she screamed.
"For all I care, the others can *have* you!  I wouldn't care if I never
saw you again!"

"That would make you happy, would it?"  asked Ranma.  He couldn't
believe what he was seeing.  He couldn't imagine what he must have
done to make her this angry.  He had not expected this to be easy,
but he had not been prepared for *this*.

"It would make me ecstatic," she growled.

Akane's slap caught Ranma totally off guard.  He felt his face begin to
redden and tasted the familiar metallic tang of blood.  Whatever else
Akane was saying was lost on Ranma as his hearing went off-line.
All he could do was stare at her in dumbfounded silence.

She stood in front of him, her face a twisted mask of rage and hurt.
Ranma tried to summon a mental picture of a smiling Akane - all too
rare a sight anymore - and found that he could not reconcile that
memory with the image that stood before him now.  Ranma blinked,
shocked at the depth of her anger and her pain.

<Is this what I've done to her?> he thought to himself as Akane
ranted on, unheard.  <Am *I* the reason that she's so angry all the
time?  Do I really make her that unhappy?>

Ranma felt something inside him snap - <No!> he screamed silently.
<This is NOT what I wanted.  I never wanted to fight you!  I don't
want to hurt you!  I want to see you smile!  You can be so cute when
you smile!  Why can I never make you smile instead of making you
cry?>

Ranma was jolted painfully out of his reverie as the book that Akane
had thrown at him bounced off the bridge of his nose.  He shook his
head to clear it just in time to be struck by the next volume of the
set.

"Akane...  Please!" he began.

"Baka!" she roared.  "You're not even listening to me!"

Ranma started to back away, trying to dodge the things that she was
throwing at him, and perhaps calm her down.  It wasn't working.

"Akane..."

As Akane ran out of books to throw, her projectiles were getting
larger and heavier.  Ranma tried one last time to get her attention.
"Akane... Please!  I'm sorry..." but she did not appear to hear him.

Ranma abandoned all attempts at discussion at this point, bolted and
ran as Akane's desk chair crashed into the wall behind him.  Ranma
scurried from the dojo, Akane's curses still hammering in his ears,
burning their way into his memory...  [I hate you! - I wish I'd never
met you! - I hate you! - Baka! - I hate you! - Hentai! - I hate you! -
Go off and DIE! - I hate you! - I HATE YOU!!]

Ranma hit an icy spot on the sidewalk and tumbled head over heels
into a snow bank.  He never even noticed the change as she fled into
the night.

####  ****  ####

Akane watched Ranma run from her room through a red haze.  The
nerve of that jerk!  Why couldn't he just leave her alone?  He was
always calling her names - all the time insulting her - causing her
trouble.  Akane closed her eyes and made an effort to quiet the
thundering in her ears.

As her rage cooled, Akane surveyed the wreckage of her room.
Books and other objects were scattered about where they had fallen,
usually after having bounced off of Ranma.  Her desk chair lay in the
hall, and it looked as if one of its legs might be broken.

Akane sighed.  Arguing with Ranma always seemed to bring out the
worst in her, and tonight had been particularly bad.  Maybe she had
been a little harsh with him this time, but she just had not been in a
mood to deal with him, or his questions.  <Funny time for him to be
asking about our engagement,> she thought to herself.  She looked
again in the direction that he had taken.  <Ranma, why do you have
to make things so difficult?>  Sadly, she set about restoring her room
to some form of order.

####  ****  ####

For what must have been the hundredth time, Ranma-chan hit a bad
patch of ice and went down hard.  This time, she did not get up.  She
just couldn't run anymore.  She was tired, and cold, and thoroughly
miserable.  After a time she managed to work her way into a sitting
position leaning against a lamp post.  She was not dressed for the
weather, and she was soaked.  The fabric of her blouse was already
starting to stiffen as it froze.  A breeze blew across her, and she
shivered violently.  She looked around to try and pinpoint her
location.

She was in a commercial district, probably, she thought, still within
ten miles of the dojo.  All of the storefronts around her were dark,
their doors locked, their owners snug and warm in their homes with
their families.  All but one.  Just down the street was what appeared
to be a small bar.  The name "Cha Cha Maru" was in blazing neon
over the entrance.  Whatever it was, it looked open, and most
importantly, it looked warm.

####  ****  ####

Ranma-chan opened the door of the Cha Cha Maru.  It was indeed a
bar; not too large, but not too small either.  There appeared to be a
stage at one end of the main area, but it was vacant, for which
Ranma-chan was grateful.  She was not in the mood for a lot of noise.
She picked a quiet looking booth in a dark corner, and headed for it.
What she needed, she reasoned, was some time to think.

As Ranma-chan slid into the booth, a waitress appeared out of
nowhere, and handed her a menu.  The waitress was also a redhead,
and pretty, and she would have been beautiful if she didn't look so
bored.  Ranma-chan thanked her and started to look at the menu,
mentally matching the prices with the money she had in her pockets.
Fortunately, this place seemed to have pretty reasonable rates.

After a moment the waitress returned to take Ranma-chan's order.
After asking for a large bowl of soup and a pot of hot tea, Ranma-
chan settled back to try and get a handle on the turn that her life
was taking.  No matter what, she decided, it can not go on like this.

####  ****  ####

Akane lay in her bed staring at the ceiling, unable to sleep.  After she
had cleaned up the debris from her fight with Ranma, she had taken
a hot bath to try and work out some of the tension.  It had done
wonders.  She had felt so much better in fact, that she had gone
looking for Ranma so that she could apologize for yelling at him.  She
had been in an awful mood when he had come to talk to her, and she
felt badly for having taken it out on him.

Except that it had something to do with their engagement, she still
didn't know what had prompted the visit; she had been too busy
yelling and throwing things to pay much attention to what Ranma
had been saying.  She had, however, noticed that for once, Ranma
had not been yelling back.  Indeed, he hadn't insulted her so much as
once.  He hadn't even called her uncute!  It had piqued her curiosity.

The only problem had been that when she had gone looking for him,
Ranma was nowhere to be found.  He had not been in his room, or in
the training hall, or even the kitchen.  Akane supposed that he must
have left the dojo after the fight.  She wondered idly where he was
at that moment.  She hoped that he was not too upset.  She had been
kind of hard on him, and said a lot of mean things - things that, for
the most part, she didn't really believe.

Well, she would get her chance, she thought.  The class trip would be
a perfect opportunity to find out what Ranma had wanted, without
having to worry about anyone making things difficult.  Maybe they
could even manage to spend some time together without trying to
kill each other.  That would be a refreshing change.

Akane rolled over and sighed.  It took a while, but sleep finally came.

####  ****  ####