I got to finish this after all. I really surprised myself, this section
only took about half and hour to write too! I guess I should never
underestimate the fevered brain of a writer when the mood takes him :)
As mentioned earlier, this is the beginning of what will hopefully be
many episodes of a new serial dealing with Toraneko Mouko, my new
character in the Ranma universe. If you haven't seen the "pilot" for
this yet, titled simply Toraneko, you should probably check that out
first.
The tone for this episode is a bit different than the "pilot." For one
thing, this chapter is not told from Mouko's point of view. Some of the
later episodes will be, but I thought that Mouko's first foray into
human society would be more interesting from a more neutral point of
view. Of course, Mouko has no idea of what human conventions are, and
she often says or does the most outrageous things, simply because she
doesn't know any better! :)
C&C on either the public or private channel is welcome. And don't
forget to check out my sketch of Toraneko Mouko! It's at:
http://www.geocities.com/Area51/Dimension/2329/mouko.jpg
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Akane looked up from her books again with annoyance. Somebody kept
pacing up and down in front of her room, and was making it nearly
impossible to study. Telling herself that she was going to react
calmly, no matter what happened, she slowly walked over to her bedroom
door and opened it. It was Ranma.
"What is it, Ranma?" she asked. She was surprised to find a brief mask
of fear on his face when he saw her, but he quickly cleared it.
"Can I come in, Akane? I want to talk to you for a minute."
"Sure!" she said, intrigued by this rare event. "What's bugging ya'?"
Ranma slowly walked in, looking at the ground, but his head shot up at
these words. "What makes you think something's bugging me?"
"Don't be so sensitive! I could hear you walking back and forth right
outside the door, you know."
"Oh." Ranma's eyes dropped again, and he seemed unsure of what to say
or do next. "Y'know, Akane, I've never told you this before but...well,
y'know, I don't really think...um..." Akane just nodded, waiting to see
what Ranma was trying to get out. He angrily forced himself to look up
and into her eyes.
"The thing is, I know I'm not always very nice to you, but I don't
really think you're that bad."
Akane raised an eyebrow. She was sure Ranma was trying to say
something nice, but it wasn't coming out too well. "Not that bad?
What's that supposed to mean?"
Ranma rushed in to finish. "No, what I mean is...well...sometimes I'm
kinda glad you're my fiancee. And, well...I was hoping I could take you
out to dinner tonight so we can talk. Y'know, get to know each other
better, try to understand one another, like fiancee's should." Suddenly
embarassed again, Ranma dropped his eyes. He didn't get to see the
tears that started to form in Akane's eyes. She knew Ranma well enough
to know he was doing something really difficult. She wondered what had
sparked him to try something like this. Maybe his mother had talked to
him about how a man treated his fiancee. Whatever the reason, she was
so incredibly happy that he had come. She opened her mouth to tell him
she'd be glad to go with him, if he'd just give her a minute to change.
"Hello, Ranma-friend. Remember Mouko?" Akane closed her mouth when
she heard this new voice. There, sitting in her window was one of the
most strikingly beautiful girls she had ever seen. She had flaming
orange hair that flowed all the way down her back. Her ice-blue eyes
were merry, but Akane couldn't repress a shudder when she looked into
them, as if she was looking at an vicious predator. Her tanned body was
taut and well defined. And almost completey naked. She was clothed
only in a few tiny scraps of leather that could barely be considered
modest by even the loosest standards.
To Akane's consternation, the girl leaped into the room and knocked
Ranma to the floor. Akane jumped up, eager to find an opening to help
out, but found that both Ranma and the girl were laughing as they
wrestled. The two reminded her of two oversized kittens with their
rough-house playing.
"Raaannmaa!" she said, trying very hard to control her voice. "Do you
mind introducing your �friend' here?" Ranma sat up quickly. Akane
noted that the strange girl made no effort to remove herself from his
lap, or to stop holding him around the neck. Instead, she calmly gazed
at Akane with those cold eyes while a girlish smile danced on her lips.
"Sure, Akane, this is Toraneko Mouko. I met her in China, but I
haven't seen her since. She has...ah...an interesting story. I'll tell
you later. Mouko, this is Tendo Akane, my fiancee."
"What's a fiancee?" she asked in an incredibly sweet and innocent
sounding voice. Akane glared daggers at her.
"It means," she told her impatiently, "that _we're_ going to get
married. So I hope you're not another suitor showing up out of the
blue!"
"Oh. What is married?"
Akane rolled her eyes. She wasn't buying any of this Little Miss
Innocent stuff, but Ranma answered the question without batting an eye.
"It's when two people, a man and a woman, live together, y'know to raise
a family and all."
"Oh. So she is your mate?"
"NO!" shouted Ranma, his face turning red. "Ah, I mean no. We are
engaged to become mates."
The girl pursed her brow in confusion. "I do not understand. Do you
two mate or not?"
"No, and I wouldn't want to either..."
"WHAT'S WRONG WITH ME THAT YOU WOULDNT!?!"
"I mean, I wouldn't want to until we're married!" Ranma said with a
worried glance at Akane. "People don't generally mate until they are
married." Ranma loosened his collar. Akane couldn't remember ever
seeing him blush so heavily before.
"Oh. How, odd!" Mouko said. Smiling again, she leapt up out of
Ranma's lap. "Where is Panda-friend? I must say hi to him!" Mouko
bounded out the door before waiting for an answer.
"My, isn't she energetic? She sure is cute, Ranma, wherever did you
find this one?"
Ranma pulled himself off the floor. "Look, Akane, it's not what you
think. Mouko is like my little sister."
"Ranma, you don't have a little sister!" Before they could really get
into their argument, they heard a startled yell from Akane's father.
Ranma and Akane hurried out of the room to find out what happened.
Mouko was wrestling with Genma in his panda form, while Soun stood back
confused and close to tears. Nabiki and Kasumi had come out of their
rooms, so everyone was there.
"Ranma!" called out Soun. "This wild girl is trying to kill your
father!"
Ranma raised his hands trying to calm the fragile man. "No, she's not,
she's just playing, see?" They all looked, and sure enough, the girl
and Genma both appeared to be laughing. "That's Mouko, a really old
friend of ours. We met her at Jusenkyo. She's not really a girl."
Nabiki scoffed. "Not a girl? Then what, pray tell, is she?"
"I told you we met her at Jusenkyo, didn't I? She has the same curse
that I do, so she turns into a girl. She's really a tiger, though."
Everyone backed away slightly.
"A t-t-tiger?" asked Soun. "Is she dangerous?"
"Not really," replied Ranma. "I mean, I guess she could be, but she's
mostly pretty nice. She likes Pop and I at any rate. We found her
there, and the funny thing was, she was getting more intelligent as a
girl. We taught her to talk, and stuff, and then one day we didn't see
her anymore. We came back to Japan not too long after that anyway, and
we thought we'd never see her again. But for a while, she was like my
little sister."
Mouko bounded up, breathless with excitement. "Ranma-friend, this is
your mate's family?"
"She's not my mate! And yes, this is her family."
"Then they shall be like mine, too!" Mouko smiled. "They don't need to
fear anything from me!"
Soun starting crying with joy. "I have another daughter!" he wailed.
Kasumi came up and shook Mouko's hand. "Welcome to our home, Mouko.
If you don't mind my asking, what did you come to Japan for?"
Mouko sighed a bit and sat down crosslegged on the floor. "I was
lonely, I guess. Funny, I never got lonely as a tiger. I spend so much
time as a person that I start to think differently, I suppose. I
remembered Ranma-friend telling me he came from a place called Nerima,
so I came to find him. I think I feel lonely because it is the mating
season. I came to take a human mate."
"What?! You came to get hitched?" Ranma cried out. "Why didn't you
tell me?"
"What do you mean, Ranma-friend," she said, leaping up to jump into his
arms again. "I did tell you!"
"I mean before," Ranma answered, disentangling himself from her grasp.
He sure didn't want Akane to get the wrong idea about their
relationship. "But, uh, why did you have to come all the way to Japan
to find a man?"
"Because I need your help, Ranma-friend. I do not know how such things
are done among people. You will teach me, just as you taught me to talk
and dress like a person." Akane looked at her tiny leather outfit and
wondered if that had been Ranma's idea too. Pervert!
"Oh!" Mouko cried out suddenly. "I almost forgot! I'm hungry, and I
left my food outside!" The tireless tiger-girl ran out the door in a
rush.
Nabiki walked over to Ranma and Akane. "Pretty close there, Ranma.
You almost found yourself with another fiancee!"
"No, Nabiki, we're not like that at all! I told you, she's like my
little sister!"
Nabiki still smiled. "You don't have a little sister, Ranma."
"That's what I told him!" Akane added.
Mouko walked back into the house with a goat under her arm. It looked
like it had been recently killed; it's neck flopping over in an
unnatural angle. Mouko sat down on the floor with her catch, and her
claws popped out of her hands. With a deft swipe, she cut through the
creature's hide and pulled out a bloody chunk of meat.
"Anybody else want some?" she asked before taking a bite out of the
still quivering flesh. The Tendos all looked aghast, and managed to
weakly shake their heads.
"Amazing!" whispered Nabiki. "She can even make _that_ look cute!"
"Oh my..." said Kasumi. "Doesn't that look like the neighbor's goat?"
Ranma felt a sinking in his stomach. "Mouko, where did you get that
goat, anyway?"
Mouko swallowed her bite before answering. "It was standing there
right outside. Stupidest animal I ever saw. It didn't even try to run
from me!"
"Mouko, that was our neighbor's goat!" cried Ranma. "You can't just
kill it!"
"How could it be the neighbor's goat? It was still alive!"
Ranma slapped his hand over his forehead. "People can own animals
while they're still alive! Just trust me on that one, OK?"
Mouko daintily raised an eyebrow at Ranma. "Whatever you say,
Ranma-friend. But it still doesn't make any sense to me."
Everyone jumped as there was a sudden pounding on the door. "Tendo
Soun!" came the neighbor's voice from outside. "Come out here, Tendo
Soun! What have you done with my goat?" Soun choose that moment to
conveniently faint.
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That's the end of part 1. I think there will be four or five parts to
"Out of the Jungle." After that, I can start another episode :)
Joshua Dyal
j-dyal@geocities.com
http://www.geocities.com/TimesSquare/Arcade/1958/
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