Paul M. Arezina wrote:

Ah, public C&C.

First of all, David, this is excellent.  This is quickly turning into
my favorite AltReal (tm) fanfic of all time.

Mine as well... or at least one of the noted among the pantheon.

Thank you.
 

Wonderful prose, and a breathtaking view into a woman struggling to
hold on to sanity.

I was almost ready to nail you for Kodachi turning to her drugs at the first
sign of panic... but then you followed it up with her observation that these
were NOT normal circumstances for convalescence, an observation which I
heartily agree with.

She didn't really NEED the drugs right at that moment, she just got,
well, panicky.

Minor nits:

Ah, yes...

You're injecting very un-Ranmaverse-like realism by having Ranma
bruise himself and Kuno break his arm.  That's fine, of course, and I
approve of such realism.  However, *if* your version of the Ranmaverse
would make such injuries likely, then Ranma and Kuno shouldn't jump
out the third story window like they did, IMO.

My interpretation of the original was that Ranma had simply forgotten
that it was a three-story building, and that the pool saved him from
possible injury as well as changing him.

Of course, in the arc where Kodachi was introduced, she put a few people in
casts (or at least slings and splints) and Akane turned her ankle to the
point of unusability from an odd landing on the dojo floor. *shrug* It's
perfectly reasonable for Ranma to get bruised on impact... unless he's been
doing some Bakusai Tenketsu training on the side. The Ranmaverse actually
starts out, all things considered, fairly realistically...

In any case, Ranma isn't seriously hurt here, just a bit stunned.  Kuno,
on the other hand, had a bad landing as well as a long fall.

Ranma gets
injured fighting Kuno, among other things. Although Kuno's arm snapping is a
bit much... perhaps it merely pops out of joint. I don't THINK Kodachi would
be able to diagnose a broken arm just by sight, (then again, considering
what she used to do, it might be possible) but she'd definitely be able to
see that her brother's arm was moving a bit oddly. 

I might change "broken in at least two places" to "badly broken" so
Kodachi can put away her X-ray specs, but I need to keep the fracture.

(Didn't someone once say Kuno didn't deserve a break?)

It's entirely possible
that some of Kodachi's older tricks involved falls from that height (say, a
greased high bar or some such) and she might be expecting certain things to
happen based on the consequences of said tricks.

The tricky part is getting the girl to use the greased three-story high
bar in the first place.

Also, I think the "I wish he'd broken his neck" line was a bit too
cruel.  I know you're trying to show the worst side of the Tendo
sisters to Kodachi so that she can come away with a one-sided view,

That's part of it, but Kodachi is also coloring her perceptions to fit
her ideas.  She's much more of an instigator than she realizes.

but the "broken neck" line was just a little over the top, especially
since Kuno's lying there with a broken arm.  Something better would be
"he got what he deserved" or something like that; it would be okay for
Akane to think that a broken arm was punishment enough for the way
he's been coming on to her.  Again, my opinion only.

The first thing to go when you're mad is your sense of where the top is.
 

The story is very well told from Kodachi's viewpoint, and it
will be interesting to see, among other things, what happens when the
pig-tailed girl shows up for the first time...

Would you be terribly disappointed if Kuno never got a chance to meet
the pig-tailed girl?

-- David

PS:  Kodachi's going to be getting a new pet eventually.  Does anyone
know the Japanese for "Black Cat?"