Reflections of Shampoo:
By Ryan Anderson

This is a short story based on Coutuva's Ranma fanfics. 
It's just a small side story giving Shampoo some 
introspection time and it serves as a lead into the next 
chapter.

This takes place during "One Good Turn", and I can't 
really sum up what's happened up until this point, 'cause 
just summing it up would take longer than the whole of 
the text. Anyway, suffice to say,  please read Coutuva's 
fics first, or this won't make any sense. (besides, 
"Mysteries of the Mind" and all those are *damn* good 
stories! ;)


---

Shan pu stood poised and ready in the center of the living 
room, her breath coming in ragged gasps.  Perspiration 
glistened on her nude form as she once more focused her 
mind, preparing to run through one of her more dangerous 
katas.

She was pushing herself recklessly today, she knew, but 
for some reason she felt she had to... She needed to 
reaffirm her mastery over at least one thing in this 
life, a life that seemed one unending chain of missed 
opportunities and failures.  With ruthless determination, 
she pushed her tired body into the complicated form, 
feeling her worries and problems begin to ebb away with 
the rhythm and flow of each precise movement. 

And as her body began to move almost without thought 
through the form, battering an unseen opponent into 
senselessness, her mind began doing the same thing to the 
problems that seemed to riddle her life....

Lately there had only been one thing one her mind: 
loneliness.  It had been with her for some time, she knew, 
but it was only recently, after coming to live with Ailen 
and Kikyo that she fully realized what it was that had 
been missing from her life... love. 

She thought she knew what love was, once upon a time, 
but nothing she knew compared to what Kikyo and Hitomi 
seemed to share.  There was a bond between them that 
seemed so deep, it was almost unreal.

And Shampoo craved it more than anything else in the 
world. 

When had *anyone* ever felt that way for her? She knew she 
had never felt such a true emotion for anyone else... Her 
parents had always been well... parents. She supposed she 
loved them, but it wasn't the same kind of love.  Once, 
she cared a great deal for her great-grandmother, and 
she felt the interest the elder had taken in her life had 
been proof that she cared for her as well, but it still 
didn't hold a candle to the casual intimacy that Kikyo 
and Hitomi shared. 

Then, of course, there was Mousse.

Throughout her life, Mousse had constantly and rather 
loudly proclaimed his love for her, and yet... when had he 
ever shown it to be genuine? To her eyes, he had no idea 
what love meant... He seemed to treat it like a prize to 
be won, but compared to what Hitomi and Kikyo displayed 
on a daily basis, it seemed that all Mousse wanted was her 
body. Not once had he ever tried to engage her in a real 
conversation, or tried to understand what she was 
feeling... He always seemed to assume that she was totally 
transparent, and the only way there could be any sort 
of deeper meaning to her actions was if she complimented 
him in some round about way. In short, he just didn't get 
it.

Well, that short list just about summed up all the people 
who ever seemed to care for her, but what about the people 
she cared about?

She'd already covered her parents, and there was really 
only one other major person in her life, at least until 
recently, Ranma. Ailen would have never, probably could 
have never, returned her feelings for him, she could see 
that now. What he and Akane shared was probably just as 
pure and as wonderful as what Hitomi had with Kikyo. And 
yet... Had she ever really truly loved him? Many of the 
things that were wrong with her and Mousse's relationship 
had been wrong with her and Ranma's relationship as well... 
At first, she probably *had* only been interested in him 
for his body... She still remembered fondly her dreams of 
him holding her in his arms... and yet, in the years she 
had known him, hounded him, and otherwise annoyed him, her 
want of his sex had turned into something more... 
gradually her chasing after him had become less and less a 
way to get him to marry her, and more a way to get his 
attention, a desperate attempt to get him to at least look 
in her direction, and an excuse for her to be near him.

Was that love? That she had desperately wanted him to pay 
attention to her? Perhaps... but the fact still remained 
that whether it was or not, that opportunity was long 
gone.  His love for Akane was far stronger than anything 
she'd ever even considered. She'd finally been forced to 
accept that when they got married, but it hadn't made it 
hurt any less when she'd realized what it meant... that he 
would *never* reach out to her, never be anything more 
than a "friend"....

Friend... might as well be a curse word... and while she 
was on the subject of friends, she might as well be 
honest with herself. There were two more people in this 
world she loved....

Hitomi... Once her Ailen and now.... what? Hitomi was 
almost the exact opposite of the man she had loved, and 
yet... in some ways, they were still very similar. Small 
things Hitomi did without even thinking about it that 
would just remind Shan pu so strongly of him... but Hitomi 
was much, much more than just a pale shadow of a lost 
love. In the months since she'd been living with her, Shan 
pu had come to appreciate Hitomi in a way she'd never even 
begun to with Ranma... With Hitomi she had a friend, but 
more than that Hitomi was a wonderful person always with a 
ready smile that seemed to melt her insides in a way that 
she'd never experienced before. The child like manner in 
which Hitomi viewed the world seemed so simple and easy 
compared to the complicated mass that Shan pu's life had 
become, and just being around the girl seemed to lift the 
weight from her shoulders.

And finally there was Kikyo... where to begin? The girl 
was positively the most unusual person that Shan pu 
knew, but she seemed to feel things with such intense 
emotion and such passion that it swept Shan pu up in 
the feeling, and dragged her along for the ride. Her eyes 
seemed endless, both having experienced boundless pain and 
anguish for choosing to live a life so far from the 
mainstream, but also so full of love and hope....

Shan pu felt privileged just to know them both. But 
knowing them just made the pain that much worse... because 
she was their "friend"... and only their friend... They 
would both reach out to her, and help her with any problem 
she could ever have... except this one. They would 
never return her love for them, never reach out and touch 
her with the same familiar loving gestures which passed 
between them so easily. Shan pu was sure they were totally 
unaware of her feelings for them, and yet daily she hoped 
they'd notice, say something, anything to relieve her 
loneliness... 

But they had each other, and they were content.  Shan pu 
was just in the way here, taking up space in the vain 
hope that something might still happen, and that she could 
find love with these two extraordinary women. 
And yet it was hopeless. All her life Shan pu seemed to 
fight hopeless battles, hanging on, causing herself just 
that much more pain when the battle was already lost. 

With a cry of anguish, Shan pu forced herself even faster 
through the complicated kata, becoming a blur of motions. 
No matter how fast she moved it didn't seem good enough, 
she was still too slow... "Pathetic..." the word seemed to 
echo through her mind as she pushed herself harder still, 
even though her muscles screamed out in protest of the 
pace.

Was that all she was? A pathetic excuse for a martial 
artist who no one could love? It certainly seemed like it. 
Why *should* anyone care for her? All she had to offer were 
backwards ideas about feminism and a fair amount martial 
arts skill... She didn't have Hitomi's friendly smile, or 
Kikyo's boundless eyes... It seemed no matter what she did, 
it was never any good. She didn't have Ranma's heroism, or 
even Ukyo's ability to listen. Why should anyone want her 
anyway?

A tear mixed in with the sweat dripping off of her as the 
weight of the world seemed to push in around her. She was 
worthless, unwanted, unloved... And then, as if to add 
insult to injury, she tripped. It wasn't a big misstep, but 
after the grueling workout she'd given herself, she wasn't 
able to catch herself before landing in a heap on the 
floor.

For a long moment she just lay there, her depression 
pinning her to the spot. Then with a long drawn out sob, 
she began to weep in earnest. 

She had no idea how long she laid there, but slowly her 
sobs began to subside as the scornful voice of her pride 
once more forced her to choke them back. She might have 
been away from the amazons for ages now, but deep down that 
heart of pride in oneself still beat, and it looked on her 
current state of depression with scorn and disgust.

Was she truly so far gone that she would give in to her 
depression so thoroughly? A voice in her mind seemed to 
ask... So what if all that was true?  So what if she was 
unwanted and unloved? She was still an amazon warrior. 

Shan pu couldn't help but give herself a wry smile at that. 
Some amazon she was... yet still, it made her feel better. 
Maybe she was worthless, but it didn't matter. She didn't 
matter... she could still make others happy, even if it 
seemed she could never be. When Kikyo and Hitomi got home, 
they'd find her with a ready smile, ready to be their 
friend for all she was worth... And as long as they still 
wanted her around, she was still good for something....

---

WAI!
gosh, its been awhile hasn't it folks? ;) I haven't posted anything new
for eons it seems! Well, this is just the first of several fics I'll be
posting over the next month or so.. I'm still going to be writing rather
slowly, because school and RL is tkaing far more of my time than I
expected...which also explains why I haven't written much at all over the
last three months.

And on that note, I'd like to appologize to everone for taking so long to
get back to my fics, I haven't abondoned *any* of them, really!! And I
really must thank you all for the several polite(well, most of them were
polite.. only a few deaththreats) requests that I get off my a$$ and get
back to writing...

I am getting back into writing rather gradually however, starting off with
a few small side story fics (I've been doing a tons of pre-reading, and
I've got a couple of little side stories saved up inspired by the fics
I've been helping on) and then getting to a few fics that I started
writing last year and forgot about, that I've unearthed and decided
deserve another try... and then, yes, for all of you that have written,
I *WILL* be posting the next chapter of Love's Labor Lost, and after that,
that next Purple Haired Destiny (though whether I'm going to continue
with the second part of chapter 3, or start chapter 3 completely over
again is kinda up in the air at the moment). I know that everyone's
anxious for the next PHD chapter, but I just don't feel up to writing it
just yet after not writing for so long.. I want to make sure I do that
series justice. but rest assured, it *will* get continued.

Now, a few notes about this fic...
I've been pre-reading for Coutuva since he started this series of his back
with "Mysteries of the Mind" (which, if you haven't read, I *HIGHLY*
recommend you do, I'll give the web page you can find it at at the bottom)
and when he finished his last chapter, i was rather.. inpsired... by the
hints he was dropping about Shampoo. He had promised me that he would be
focusing a bit more about her in the next chapter (which will be released
soon, he assures me) but I couldn't wait, I just sat down and started
writing and this is the result. Well, I sent it to him, just to get his
reaction, not expecting it to go anywhere, but it turned out that he
really liked it, and in fact *wanted* me to post it. So here it is,
officialy ratiffied by him and everything, as the lead in to the next
chapter... i hope you enjoyed it, thanks for reading!

I *LOVE* C&C, of any sort, so please write me! flame me, praise me,
whatever, just let me know what you think! you can find all of Coutuva's
fics at: http://waters-edge.home.ml.org or you can email coutuva at:

Main Address: coutuva@vecdev.com
Backup Address: coutuva@hotmail.com

--



Ryan Anderson          
-Shampoo's Avatar!
andersor@cs.colorado.edu
http://ucsu.colorado.edu/~andersor/fanfic/fanfic.html
http://ucsu.colorado.edu/~andersor/tenchi/ryoko.html