Subject: [FFML] [FF] [R.5] Twenty Less Lonely People in the World (Prologue)
From: "Nikholas F. Toledo Zu" <niftol@i-manila.com.ph>
Date: 2/13/1998, 8:57 AM
To: ffml@fanfic.com

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|Mayhem!Mayhem!Mayhem!Mayhem!Mayhem!Mayhem!Mayhem!Mayhem!Mayhem!Mayhem!|
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=> Warning!  This fic contains excessive amounts of sugar!  With 
Valentine's day nearing, every single media in existence has been 
turning out sugar bombs that try to mutate all of us into starry-eyed 
idiots.  Sad to say, they have converted me into their sorry lot.   

=> Although I'm *not* proud to be among the few people who dread the 
coming of February, I am forced, under the pain of insanity, torture, 
slow death, (and lots of other horrible things to graphic to mention), 
to write this fic.  Writing romance stories makes me feel all good 
inside.  <gasp>  It's starting already!  Somebody!  Whack me on the 
head!  <Whack, whack>  Thanks, I needed that.  

=> I'm warning you at this point in time that the fic has a *really 
cheesy ending*.   

=> Also, the plot (actually the ending) is not really my original idea.  
I would like to thank my contributor (who still desires to remain 
nameless) for coming up with the cheesy ending that started the wheels 
turning in my mind to come up with a story to match.  May she (and all 
those other nameless people) find our own cheesy ending sometime in the 
foreseeable future.

=> Some notes on notation.  Things in {curly braces} are author's 
comments within the fic.  Signs and sound effects are in... uh... 
<pointy braces> 

=> The disclaimer is at the end, and the more people I would like to 
thank.   

=> Will somebody whack me so I can start?  Thanks.  
********  

Prologue

	Hiroshi and Daisuke stepped out of the warp zone in two flicks of 
a dime.  They dashed to the nearest window and bid farewell to one of 
the nicest dinners they have had in a long time.  It took a few minutes 
of barfing and doing a lot of awful hacking sounds with their throats 
before they managed to gain a semblance of sanity in their stomachs.  
Daisuke was the first to recover.  "Good gosh, why the heck did you have 
to install a twisted link like that to your site," Daisuke asked the 
short-haired man behind the chair who watched them with unrepressed 
glee.  "What are you, some kind of weirdo who takes an insane pleasure 
in making his guests barf?"
	"Well, it does keep salespersons out," Mayhem replied, grinning.  
"And, no, I don't have an insane pleasure in making people barf.  
However, the guy you passed by on the way here, Switch, you know, the 
guy who looks like Gosunkugi?  Well, he's the one who has the insane 
pleasure of making people barf.  Be careful around his site.  He eats 
those who stay too long in his room."  He gave his swivel chair a whirl.  
"So, what's up?" he asked nonchalantly.
	It was Hiroshi who spoke.  "Well, the sky for one thing," but he 
did look out the window.  "Why did we come there again, Daisuke?" 
	"How the heck could you forget, Hiroshi!"  Daisuke strangled the 
other.  He fainted.  Seeing there was no one else to talk to, he spoke 
to the other seemingly sane person in the room.  "Could you help us?  
We're looking for a place to crash for a while.  Everything's gone to 
hell back at home, today being Valentine's day and all..."  He shuddered 
at the memory.  "Everyone's mad, I tell you, mad!" 
	Immediately, Mayhem came to his aid.  "So everything's getting 
wrecked back there, huh?  Just as I expected."  He slid the swivel over 
to the other side of the room, which was taken over by an extremely 
large and sophisticated computer system.  State of the art was one word, 
monstrous was another.  He removed the "I fell out of a truck sign" and 
began typing on a few keys.  Seconds later, a complex mathematical 
pattern appeared on the screen, complemented with graphs and squiggly 
stuff.
	Daisuke, having a passion for things that looked like they came 
out of a Star Trek movie, looked over Mayhem's shoulder.  "What's that?"  
he asked, for that was all he could say, if he could say anything at 
all.
	Mayhem, insistently finding ways to fuel his largely inflated ego, 
began to speak in a strange language that Daisuke had difficulty 
understanding.  "Well, this here is a mathematical representation of the 
Ranma universe.  I've managed to reduce to mathematical equations the 
characteristics of each of the cast.  The way they interact is 
determined by a set of rules that is defined by the mathematical science 
of psychohistory.  Theoretically, one should be able to project the 
socio-economic situation of the Ranma universe into the past or into the 
future.  But, all I have now is a semi-working model of Nerima.  In 
other words, this here is a fanfic generator, that is, given a certain 
input event, this program could simulate what would happen to each of 
the characters, how they would react and interact with one another.  
Maybe someday, we can find the point in time where all of the characters 
would settle down and reach a state of equilibrium, but this model still 
does not take into account random events such as monsters and stuff like 
that.  I..."  He looked at Daisuke, whose eyes were already spinning.  
"Oh... Sorry 'bout that."
	It took a few cups of ice tea to revive the fallen duo.  After a 
few minutes, Daisuke was once again looking at the computer screen and 
Hiroshi was looking at the posters of Sailor Mercury that adorned 
Mayhem's room.  Mayhem skipped over the description of the process, 
vowing to someday explain it in more simple terms.  "Well, here's a 
graph of a typical situation in Nerima.  That is, the situation at the 
start of each episode or chapter in the manga." 
	Daisuke stammered out a retort, "surely that can't be the *entire* 
model, right?  I mean, you can't really graph what a person feels."
	"No... This is just an simplified version.  If needed, I can 
increase the character resolution, but the statistics that it would show 
would more than fill this small screen.  Watch as I input the date to be 
Valentine's day."  He pressed a few keys and the flashing lights and the 
squiggly lines the computer displayed went haywire, much like a 
caterpillar having a seizure.  After a while, a DON'T PANIC sign 
flashed.  "I guess no explanation is necessary."
	Daisuke tried to stop the headache he was feeling right now.  
"Well, all you did was explain the situation in... uh... terms a lot 
harder to understand."  He thought for a while.  An idea hit him like a 
ton of bricks.  "Well, how the heck can we stop the carnage?  You did 
say that you could simulate what can happen, right.  There could be a 
way, a certain input event that could make it all stop, now.  You could 
find it, right?"
	"Well, to tell you the truth..."  He typed a few keys.  
Immediately, all the flashing lights disappeared and the DON'T PANIC 
sign was replaced with a glowing white sign.  "EQUILIBRIUM REACHED!"  
the computer declared, and added a trumpeting victory sound.
	"Wow!  You mean Ranma and Akane got married..."  Hiroshi appeared 
somewhere behind all of them. 
	"Nice observation, Sherlock," Daisuke sarcastically said.
	"Well, he's wrong," Mayhem swiveled his chair.  He had this 
serious look in his face.  "It wasn't just Akane and Ranma who got 
married - everyone else got married.  What you see before you is the 
fastest way to a settlement of all the characters in the shortest amount 
of time.  One single event that would end all the speculation and 
generate a near-happy ever after, and end the entire Ranma series, 
without any of the major characters getting killed, all in one day.  The 
problem is, it's a pretty cheesy ending."
	"Wow... That's pretty cool," Hiroshi said in a small voice in the 
sudden quiet that descended the room.  "Can you tell us what this..." he 
looked at Daisuke for help, unfortunately, he was looking somewhere else 
"... thing is?"
	"Actually, it's a particular person," Mayhem clicked the mouse on 
the execute button. 
	
8F8F8F8F8F8F8F8F8F8F8F8F8F8F8F8F8F8F8F8F8F8F8F8F8F8F8F8F8F8F8F8F8F8F8F8F  
                 Twenty Less Lonely People in the World
   <otherwise known as Mayhem's Valentine Fic with the Cheesy Ending>  
   By the currently sessile (not senile) Nikholas "Mayhem" F. Toledo  
8F8F8F8F8F8F8F8F8F8F8F8F8F8F8F8F8F8F8F8F8F8F8F8F8F8F8F8F8F8F8F8F8F8F8F8F  

{
 Hiroshi and Daisuke looked at Mayhem with disbelieving eyes.
 "I SAID SESSILE! NOT SENILE!" 
 *BONK*
}
Nikholas F. Toledo Zu @ http://www.geocities.com/Tokyo/Flats/3145/mezza9.html
Vector, Switch, Yebah, Rain Man, goo, Pervert, Scruples, Hollie, NomaD,
Blitz, Gee, Datzo, Jewel, Elf, Radler, Pinball, Mayhem, Chaos, Father, Attar
Fanfiction @ http://www.geocities.com/Tokyo/Flats/3145/fanfics.html
Warp Zone @ http://www.geocities.com/Tokyo/Flats/3145/thirteen.html
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Word from the Laity:  Wipe yer feet!  Bloody 'ell...
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Currently under construction... confessional at the links.
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