ADDENDUM TO AUTHORS NOTES:  I really dislike breaking up stories, as I
don't like people reading things I haven't finished.  However, I actually
have finished this one.  As a prequel to another fanfic I'm working on (as
mentioned in the actual Authors Notes), however, I needed to check for
continuity between the two stories.  So far, I've taken care of this much
of it, and the second (and final) part should be coming as soon as I've had
time to make adjustments (I write fast, adjust slow- gimme a week)

The Journey of Soun
by David A. Tatum

Disclaimer:  Ranma 1/2 obviously does not belong to me, but I do ask its
creator, Rumiko Takahashi, and anyone else who owns the copyright on it,
that they not sue me for what I feel is simple tribute to the fabulous
world they have created.  If you do decide to sue me, realize I'm a third
year college student who is a journalism major and a creative writing
minor- so I'm a broke kid with no real prospects for employment....

Authors Notes:  These are annoying, I know, but someone's bound to be
looking for it...
     (1) Thanks to those people who responded to my question on Akane's
mother's name.  I didn't think that it was given, but I wanted to be sure
(I thought it might have been given in the manga, which I haven't seen much
of).  Instead of using any of your suggestions, however, I decided to use a
different name (one which I felt worked better with my idea- 'Kumiko,' the
name most often suggested, doesn't flow with the maiden name I'd already
given her).  
     (2) This is my first released fanfic, (well, I did write a brief
one-draft spamfic, but it was just a joke, and I don't think it counts...)
though I have another I am working on.  This fanfic is sort of a prequel to
it, as two of the characters I introduce here are mildly involved in my
already over-large first attempt (over 50 pages, and just a touch over 1/3
of the way through the story arc... sigh.  I really thought I'd be finished
with it quickly, though- it only took me a weekend to write that much (I
write really quickly- just ask any of my former senior-year high school
classmates who got annoyed when they found out that I hadn't started the
ten page paper in my honors history class until three hours before it was
due, and still wrote it out well enough, while paying attention to (some)
of my lectures, to receive a perfect score).  Despite my inexperience,
don't go easy on me- I should be able to write well, considering I'm
minoring in creative writing...
     (3) This isn't meant to be a dark fic or a sad fic (though I have no
doubt some people will think of it as one), nor is it meant to be a happy
fic or a funny fic.  I'm not a humorist, so I expect to have trouble
keeping all of the people in my fanfics in character as Takahashi wrote
them, and while I try to throw in some humor anyway this is written
seriously.  Nevertheless, considering what I've been seeing on FFML, I
suspect some people will still enjoy this (if you can get past all the
disclaimers and notes)
      (4) Note the inclusion of a character named Desaix (french in origin,
but pronounced the anglicized 'D say ix' instead of 'D Say).  He is a
character I try to include in all of my short stories.  I once annoyed one
of my creative writing teachers with this- he asked me if I ever didn't use
Desaix in a story.  I said yes, when I don't have any people in the story.

Chronological Note (separate for those people who don't like Author's
Notes):  This story starts during the last manga, sometime between the
disaster of the wedding and Ranma and Akane heading off for school (I would
assume that there is a little time in between).

Here we go... Enjoy!
---------------------------------------------

Ranma looked around slowly.  'No wedding anytime soon,' he thought, picking
up one last piece of debris.  He had almost finished cleaning up from the
disaster.  Sighing, he thought 'Probably a good thing.  I don't know how I
feel about Akane, anyway- or any of the other people in my life, for that
matter...'

"Ranma," his father called.  "Come here, boy... Mr. Tendo wants to talk to
you."  Ranma trudged towards the battered dojo his father was standing in
the doorway of, still thinking about what had happened in the wedding.

"What does he want, pop?" Ranma asked.  "I thought he already said all he
wanted to say to Akane and me after the wedding."

Genma bit his lip.  "To Akane, apparently, yes, but to you, no.  And I
don't really know what he wants to say to you- he won't tell me."  Ranma
looked mildly surprised, but nodded, heading into the dojo.  After he
passed through the doorway, Genma closed the door inside, and Ranma heard a
key locking the door.  Ranma, a little disturbed by this, went further into
the dojo, walking up behind Soun, who was kneeling in front of the little
family shrine dedicated to his departed wife.  Ranma's surprise increased
when he say that he wasn't crying as he normally was.

"Mr. Tendo?" Ranma approached the kneeling figure.  Soun turned his head
towards Ranma, a determined look in his bloodshot eyes.  Nodding at Ranma
to indicate that he, too, should kneel in front of the shrine, he closed
his eyes and mouthed some silent prayers before saying anything to Ranma.

"Son, over the past year I have been worried I would have to tell you
something I have long fought to forget.  This is a tale I have not even
told my own daughters, though I should have long ago, and it is a regret
which I hope you will never share.  I am going to tell you about the
journey I went on... to win my wife."  Ranma looked curiously at Soun. 
'He's a very different man than the one I know,' he thought.  'Soun should
be crying by now.  He looks sadder, somehow, but also younger.  Maybe this
is how he was when my father first met him?'

"Like you, Ranma," Soun continued, "I, too, was placed into an arranged
marraige, and like you, I didn't know a thing about it until my father..."

*	*	*	*	*

"Soun, my boy, its unavoidable.  I agreed with his father when you were
BORN that you and his daughter would be married, and there is no way I can
change that!"  Shiro Tendo, Soun's father, shouted at the seventeen year
old teenager.  "If you do not marry her, you not only dishonor me but the
entire Tendo clan!"

"But I've never met her!  I don't know her!  I haven't even seen what she
looks like!" Soun stood up and went into a fighting stance.  "You can't
make me marry someone who I don't want to!"

Shiro smiled slowly.  "Soun, I admit you are a better fighter than I am. 
My fighting skills are long past their prime, and even if they were at
their best, you and your friend Genma have studied the Anything Goes school
much more than I have.  That is why I found some others to take you to meet
your new fiancee, instead.  BOYS!"  Two people appeared from the shadows on
either side of Soun.  One, a one armed foriegn man (most likely an
American) in his thirties wearing black pants, a black t-shirt, and a black
vest, Soun didn't recognize.  The other, a balding young twenty-three year
old wearing a black gi and a silly multi-colored cap, he did.

"GENMA!  What are you doing?  Why are you helping my father in this?"  Soun
backed up so as to force the two people to attack him from the front.

"Soun, my friend, I have dated many girls in my day.  Delightful Taki,
healthy young Atsuko, and now the beautiful and skilled Nadoka have all
dated me on a regular basis, and that in just the last year alone!  In
fact, if I were to list for you all the women I have dated, we would be
here much longer than I plan to be.  But, in all that time, you haven't
ever given a woman a single glance.  You've had the opportunities, but just
let them slip away.  I'm with your father in this, if only for one reason:
you need a girlfriend, bad."  Genma smiled slowly.  Soun frowned, and
turned to the foriegn man.

"And just who are you?" Soun asked.

"I am Major Donavan A. Desaix, U.S. Navy Seals, retired, but call me Dezro-
my callsign before the arm got clipped.  I married here before I was forced
to retire, and I'm just taking this job to pay a few bills while waiting
for my pension to find its way here."  He smiled.  "I'm probably the best
one-armed martial artist around."

"Well, Mr. Dezro, Genma, I don't plan to go on this trip, so just forget
it."  Soun had finally backed all the way out of the dojo, and jumped up on
the roof, and Genma and and Dezro followed.

*	*	*	*	*

"Suffice to say," Soun told Ranma, "I failed to escape from them.  Dezro,
or Dez as we wound up calling him, had enough friends in Tokyo to find out
where I went easily enough, and then figured out where I was going.  They
met me there, tied a rope from my hands to their waists, and pulled me
along to the road out of Tokyo like a prisoner."

"They kidnapped you to take you to your fiancee?  And I thought it was bad
to show up as a girl."  Soun winced, but continued.

"Well, after they got me out of Tokyo, they untied me on the condition I
gave my word that I wouldn't try to escape.  Along the way to my new
fiancee's house, in fact, I was able to convince the others to make a
detour to see a visiting master of the Anything Goes School of Martial
Arts..."

*	*	*	*	*

Soun looked at the sign they were passing, reading "Shikoku, 1/2
Kilometer," as he sullenly marched between Genma and Dez.  'Shikoku...
Shikoku... what was it I heard about Shikoku...."

Remembering, he pointed at the sign and exclaimed "Hey, you two, mind if we
take a little detour through this town?"

Genma looked at the sign as Dez asked "What for?  We still have plenty of
supplies, and I'm not aware of anything of interest in that town."

"I heard an ancient master of the Founding School of Anything Goes Martial
Arts is living there at the moment, and was wondering if I could learn
anything from him.  You might be interested too, being a martial artist
yourself."  Genma nodded, and whispered a few words to Dez.  

After a brief conversation which Soun couldn't hear, during which time Dez
seemed to get more and more frustrated, the two escorts turned and nodded. 
Genma lead the way and Dez followed behind Soun, but that soon changed as
they went through the village towards the building the local residents said
the great master was residing.  Ignoring the discussions of a remarkable
rise in the theft of womens underwear (a topic all three thought was a bit
too delicate for them to involve themselves in), they approached the
doorway.

A man stepped out of the doorway before they got to it, dressed in all red.
 As Dez saw who it was, he ran forward and shouted "Sieroku!  What are you
doing here?!"  Soun and Genma stopped, looking on curiously at their
companion yelling at this stranger.

"Ah, Donavan.  Remember, Sieroku's only my last name.  People who know each
other as well as you and I do should call each other by our first name. 
Nice to see you again," Sieroku said coldly.  "And how is MY wife doing?"

Dez clinched his teeth.  "She is not your wife anymore, Toshi, and hasn't
been for eight years.  The moment her pregnancy made her 'unattractive' to
you, you began having affairs with any woman who would take you, and when
she bore you a son, you divorced her to marry some chinese girl."  Dez
closed his eyes and breathed deeply.  Opening his eyes, he continued "I
picked up the shattered girl you left behind and gave her a life, and I
gave her a son of her own- and my own.  If you think you can really take
her back after your new wife left you for being such a pig, then you have
another thing coming."

Toshi smiled evilly.  "You didn't answer my question.  How is she doing?"

"She and little Ken are doing fine, no thanks to you.  And because of your
stupid challenge, I've begun teaching Ken my style of arts- which you know
is better than yours!"  Soun and Genma continued to look from one to the
other, like spectators at a tennis match.  Niether knew quite how to react
to this.

"Well, perhaps it is, but I have just enrolled my son into Master
Happosai's care for the next ten years- and I'm pretty sure that his style
is better than yours, as he's had several hundred years to perfect it, and
you've been working on your own for, what, ten years?"  Toshi laughed. 
"I'd challenge you to that fight you owe me, but it wouldn't be honorable-
you know I'll never fight a disabled man!"  As he passed by Dez, he
continued laughing, and strode out of sight.

"What was that all about?" Genma asked Dez as he and Soun strode towards
him.

*	*	*	*	*

"It turns out," Soun said, "That this Toshi person challenged Dez shortly
after he found out that his ex-wife had re-married.  Toshi was easily
defeated, but kept turning up to challenge the poor guy quite often, even
after Ken, Dez's son, was born.  By that point, Ken was six, and Dez had
been training him since he was four.  Toshi, upon finding Dez's arm had
been lost in the line of duty, decided earlier that the only way the two
could ever settle their differences, since he didn't feel it was
'honorable' to fight a one armed man, was to have their children fight in
the future.  We first met Master Happosai then, and he promised to train us
when he was done with Toshi's son-"

"Why did you agree to let that Nannichuan-thieving pervert train you,
anyhow?  And what does any of this have to do with anything?" Ranma asked
bitterly.

"Well, at the time, we had no idea how evil the master truly was, and by
the time we found out, it was too late- he was forcing us to become his
students, but he really wasn't as important to what my life was like then
as Toshi and Dez were.  You'll see why I'm bringing up this conflict
soon... where was I?"

"Happosai promised to train you after he was finished with his commitment
to Toshi's son."

Soun nodded.  "Thank you.  Anyway, after Dez had his little argument with
Toshi, he and Genma pulled me along, still complaining bitterly, to meet my
fiance, Keiko..."

*	*	*	*	*

"...Takahashi. I'm here to meet Keiko Takahashi."  Soun repeated weakly.

"And who are you?" the woman at the door asked.  Soun opened his mouth, but
no words came out.  He was quite pale, and looked like he might faint at
any moment.

"He is Soun Tendo, Mrs. Takahashi," Genma supplied, smiling teasingly at
his friend.

"He's Keiko's new fiancee," Dez added confidently.  Mrs. Takahashi looked
from Genma to Dez, and then back to Soun, and smilled.

"Ah, we've been expecting you.  You and your... friends are welcome to come
inside and wait for her in my study."  The woman led them into a room
filled with papers, and left to get Keiko.  Soun's nervousness increased. 
'I really hope I loke this girl,' he thought to himself.  'I didn't really
want this engagement, but if my father wants it, and this family wants it,
and the girl wants it, and my friends want it, I guess I'll go through with
it... its a matter of honor.  I sure hope she's cute...'  Soun tried to
amuse himself by looking at some of the papers lining the walls- half-drawn
manga-quality pictures, short pieces of dialog, jokes, plot outlines, a
sheet entitled 'The Real Couples,' with names of men and women matched up
to each other, a few with question marks or side notes.  All the papers
were signed "R. Takahashi," and as far as Soun knew the only person in the
family with an R in the name was Keiko's mother...

"Where is the kitchen in this place?" Genma was saying.  "I'm starved."

Soun shook himself out of his stupor.  Turning towards the door, he said
"I'll go ask if they can give us something to eat."  He opened the door and
went out.  Looking down the hall either way and seeing no-one, he turned to
his left and stopped at the nearest door he saw.  He knocked on it and
opened.

"EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEK!" Screamed the naked young woman standing there, with
Mrs. Takahashi holding her clothes in front of her.  "PERVERT!"  Reaching
behind her and forming a Mallet of Chi (Author's note:  HA!  I DEFY
CONVENTION!  I REFUSE TO USE HAMMERSPACE (tm)) and smashing Soun over the
head.

As Soun blacked out, he heard Mrs. Takahashi saying demurely "Now, Keiko,
that's no way to treat your fiancee, is it?"

END OF PART ONE...
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
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                 dtatum@capaccess.org
                     desaix@sysnet.net
http://www.geocities.com/Athens/Acropolis/7872