Ranma 1/2:  Bet: Apprentice Option, part a
 It was pointed out to me (by Rick Robinson) that 
instead of two divergences (Angel 1/2 and Devil 1/2)
that there should be FOUR divergences from Hel's little 
manipulation. One, the demon in the pool. (Devil 1/2) 
The second option, the angel in the pool. (Angel 1/2).
Three, neither in the pool. Four, both in the pool (which
was the Fourth Option released a little while ago.)
setting and major char by Rumiko Takahashi
add'l char & situations by way too many people.
 y'know who y'all are, so just take a bow, would'ya?
webpage: http://metroanime.home.mindspring.com/
---------------------------
 Hel was unhappy. Hel had a tendency to take
this out on anyone in the vicinity. Unlike Toltiir, Hel was
neither particularly inventive or possessed of a sense of
humor.

 A Demon First Class, seeing an ancient enemy,
decided to get away from his mistress and go off into battle.
He wasn't aware that the whole thing was a setup, or that
Hel was manipulating events.

 Not in imitation of the Bet, but to see what could
be done to hurry off some of those alternate timelines into
darkness, destruction, and death.

 Hel _really_ hated happy endings. 
------------------------------------------------------
 The battle had become a ritual, but all rituals had
a beginning and they had an end.

 Every day the two had met and fought over the
Cursed Springs for weeks now. Every day the two had pulled
back to lick their wounds and return the next day.

 They both knew this was the last such time they
would do so. Others of their kind had come, to witness, to see
that if they were going to engage in this fight that they would
settle it once and for all TODAY.

 Asuralle made her peace with the Almighty and
spread her wings.

 Across the Valley of Jusenkyo, Amon snarled, spat
and spread his wings.

 Within the Valley, two martial arts disregarded the
portly Guide and leapt to the top of bamboo poles.
----------------------------------------
 "I won't go easy on you," growled the father to his son.

 "That's how I want..." Ranma stopped. The hair on the
back of his neck was rising and his instincts were screaming DANGER!

 His father prepared to leap, then cocked his head, getting
a similar premonition.

 "Oh sirs, very bad you fall in Spring!"

 "Pops? What the heck?" Ranma's eyes swept all around.
"Something's really really wrong here."

 "I feel it too, boy." Genma growled. That chill was as if 
the Master himself was present. No, even worse, though if you'd 
asked Genma a minute ago he would have sworn that the idea of
something more evil than his old sensei was laughable.

 Lightning flared and struck and a battle commenced
overhead.

 "WHAT THE HELL!?!?" Ranma almost fell from the top
of his pole as Something Wicked this way flew. It was at LEAST 
fourteen feet tall, covered in black greasy-looking fur, batlike wings,
spurlike growths rearing back on its head, and reddish eyes that
briefly met his and said "not only are you a tiny little puking worm,
when I get done here I'll come back and devour you and you'll die
in agony over the next century."

 Genma met the same gaze and knew that his old Master
was a perverted sick little b*stard but he was looking at Evil right
now. He desperately tried to remember those Forbidden Techniques,
because if that Thing came back he'd need everything he had and 
Genma knew that it still probably wouldn't be enough.

 Something else shot past the two and in every way
the two could perceive, it was the Opposite of what they had just
seen. 

 There was a scream of "oh no, not again" and the Guide
went racing towards his hut. He didn't mind a religious experience,
so long as it didn't involve personal danger or meeting the beings
in question.

 It's quite one thing to profess a belief in a god or gods,
quite another when you find out that you may have an appoinment
with said beings for later that same day.

 Black fire slammed into a cliff wall, spreading cracks all
through the surface.

 Lightning flared and shot from the ground towards the
sky.

 "RANMA! LOOK OUT!" Genma leapt, his concern for
his son for once overwhelming his own self-preservation instinct.
It was his finest moment in a life filled with mistakes. Given time to
think about it, he might not have done it.

 Genma took a blast of the same black flame and knew he
was dead before he had finished falling.

 "NOOOOOOOO!" His father had been an annoyance,
a harsh taskmaster, and had thousands of faults. But he was still
his father, Ranma jumped down to where his father had hit the 
ground, not realizing how close he had just come to turning into
a panda.

 The battle waged above continued to increase in scope.
Chi blasts met darkness. Hellfire met light. Serpents of black energies
formed and wrestled with serpentine golden forms.

 The large black-furred figure smashed the smaller glowing
one down towards the ground like a volleyball being spiked. 

 The feathered one spared a moment. "Mortal, leave this
place, the pools are dangerous. My opponent more so."

 Ranma blinked. That hadn't been Japanese but he'd 
understood it anyway. "No shit."

 "Don't be talking to my lunch," Amon growled, diving past
Asuralle to land on Ranma's father.

 "HEY!" Ranma leapt away, landing in the waters of a pool
a moment later.

 Amon's claws ripped into the corpse beneath him. He'd
sensed some tiny amount of power here, and any advantage was to
be seized in this fight.

 Ranma's legs wrapped around a thick throat and began
squeezing, while his hands came up and popped the demon's ears,
reasoning correctly that the creature's thick fur would tend to blunt
more typical blows.

 Ranma was ripped free and thrown the length of the 
valley. He had a chance to look up and see the massive fireball 
heading his way when a shape dropped down in front of it and
stopped the burst. 

 The angel dropped to the ground and wasn't moving.
Ranma looked from the downed angel to the limping ,approaching,
demon, and gathered himself. He'd die doing it, but he could at 
least get a couple of good hits in.

 Asuralle waited until Amon was closer then formed
her sword the last time and thrust it home, even as a clawed 
hand slashed deep into her chest.

 The demon seemed to smile briefly, then collapsed.
The angel looked up at Ranma. "Told you to stay away from
the pools." Blood trailing from her mouth, she tried to smile.
"Could be worse. Sorry about your father, but he's made up for
a lot by saving you... Tell Bell..."

 Ranma looked at the corpse he was kneeling at,
watching it dissolve, glancing up to see the demon likewise
dissolving. Where the angel seemed to convert to glowing 
dust motes that whisked away on the breeze, the demon was
simply turning an opaque black and collapsing in on itself.

 "Well, that's it." A man faded into existence nearby.
"Those two just HAD to keep going at it."

 "What?"

 The man brushed his hair back away from his
face and regarded Ranma. "Well, you're involved now. Might as
well take care of Asuralle's last request."

 "Huh?"

 "Though I'll have to warn a few people off, or did
you realize that the pool you jumped in had turned you into a
girl?"

 "WHAT?!?" Ranma looked down and realized that
she had WAY too many things on her mind at the moment to
not notice that.

 "C'mon, we'll get you that training."

 "Training?" Ranma repeated, his mind having gone
into overload.

 "Yeah, you were on a training mission right? C'mon,
we can at least get you dry clothes."
--------------------------------------------------
 It had taken a couple of years, but Ranma finally had
Yggdrasil access. He owed Skuld a favor for getting it for him.
The first thing he did was check his own file.

 "Let's see. I was SUPPOSED to go to some Amazon
Village, defeat their champion, run away, get engaged to some
girl named Akane in some mutually abusive relationship that
dragged on for two years, meet some girl named Kodachi who'd
fall into an obsessive disorder centered on me, meet my...
Ucchan's a GIRL?! How many fiancees?" Ranma blinked over
at his friend of the past year. "Did you read this?"

 Skuld nodded. "All of this was kinda invalidated
the moment that fight broke out while you were at the Springs.
Yeah, makes for interesting reading, especially when you
consider the various alternate timelines. I kinda prefer this 
one over here where you marry one of the Sailor Senshi."

 "But this was my timeline, and then it split off."
Ranma continued to read the file. "Oh man, how could I be
stupid enough to do THAT?! Geez."

 "Hurry up, will ya? You know this is strictly
forbidden. Who knows what your sensei would do to you
if he found you like that."

 "Hey, compared to my old man, Tyr ain't nearly
so bad. Oh no, I do WHAT?! And then this Happosai guy
drinks the water? And after all that we get a messy divorce
in two years and never speak to each other except in the 
settlement. Oh man, I screw up everybody's life, don't I?" 
Ranma finished scanning the stack. "So..."

 "So when you go back to the mortal plane in
a couple of days..."

 "Hey, they ain't gonna do any of that memory
sealing crap, are they?"

 "I don't kn..." Skuld vanished in midword.

 "Uh oh." Ranma managed before he also
vanished.

 The terminal shut itself off.
--------------------------------
 "This sucks," said Earth Trainee Ranma, 
looking over the tournament, still sore about the demotion
from Devil Hunter Trainee.

 "You're telling me?" Earth Trainee Skuld frowned. 
The technology here was strictly 1500s as far as she could
tell at first glance. 

 "Might as well get it over with." Ranma walked up 
to the girl who was just having a hand raised by the judge.
"<Pardon me, is your name Shampoo?>"

 The girl blinked. "<Who are you, outsider, who
knows of me? Have you come to congratulate me on my
victory?>"

 "<No. I'm _REALLY_ sorry about this.>" Ranma
said this clearly enough to reach most of the listening crowd,
then spoke louder to be certain. "<I CHALLENGE YOU, BY
THE ANCIENT RITES OF COMBAT AND CONQUEST.>"

 "<WHAT?!?>" Shampoo frowned. "<You want
to get beaten, is that it? Well, get on the log, I'm not so tired
I can't beat you up in front of your girlfriend.>"

 Ranma jumped up onto one end of the log. "<She's
just a friend who stuck her head out for me, and now has to
share my sentence. That's all.>"

 The judge's hand dropped. Shampoo started across
the log, intent on a quick victory though she wanted to find
out more about this strange person who knew so much of their
language and customs.

 Ranma disappeared, reappearing inside her reach
with an uppercut Shampoo never saw coming.

 "C'mon, Skuld," Ranma flipped off the log and gestured
to his companion. "We've got to go to this place in Nerima now."

 "Nerima?" Cologne said with a blink. Her gaze turned
back towards Shampoo, who was still looking at the birdies. Well, 
THIS was unusual. 
-----------------------------------------

 "Hey Skuld, how does this sound?

 "Dear Ucchan, I have just learned of two things that
you have known for years. First, that my little buddy Ucchan 
isn't a boy. Second, that my father stole your dowry. My father
is beyond your vengeance. I, on the other hand, will try to find
a way to make reparations. I cannot replace the years spent in
pursuit of vengeance, nor can I produce the yattai.

 "I will find some way of making it up to you as best
as I can. I expect to have a permanent address soon in Nerima, 
and will be able to find a way to pull in some income at that point.
I will contact you again as soon as I have resolved the next debt
that my father has left me.

 "Please forgive me. You deserve so much better in your
life than to waste it in pursuit of vengeance. Ranma Saotome."

 "Not too bad. You KNOW she'll come to Nerima and
hunt you down."

 "Yeah, but we can at least get it over with sooner that
way." Ranma paused. "I'm sending off similar letters to Mister
Daikokuji, Mister Natsume, and Mister Kino. Oh yeah, and that
postcard to Mister Tendo."

 Skuld came over to the table and started reading.
"Hmmm. Simple and to the point. You're giving 'em a couple
of days warning, I see."

 "Yup," Ranma held up a sticker he'd gotten from
a photo booth. "Even sending a picture of myself so that
they know what their father's trying to get them into."

 "Good." Skuld smiled. "Hey, we'll get through
this yet."
----------------------------------------
 "ENGAGED!?" Akane glared at her father.

 "Can I see that postcard?" Nabiki noted that the
scene was completely unfamiliar to her. A gruff looking 
individual with a halberd standing in front of a rainbow so
clear that it looked almost solid.

 "Hmmm," Nabiki hmmed. "Dear Mister Tendo,
Greetings. My name is Ranma Saotome and I recently 
learned of the honor agreement between our two families.
As this is a matter of honor, I am coming there to meet
with you regarding of this. I do hope that you will keep
an open mind about this whole thing as it appears my
late father had made other arrangements as well. I am
bringing a friend with me who has been temporarily exiled
from her own people that I met on my training journey."

 Nabiki looked over the two-view photosticker
that was on the postcard. "Hey, he looks kinda cute."

 "Let me see, Nabiki." Kasumi looked over the
photo. "My, he doesn't look that young does he?"

 "He definitely works out, look at those pecs."
Nabiki grinned.

 "I hate boys." Akane mentioned, just in case
anyone was listening. Still, her gaze DID linger a bit on
the photo.

 "Oh, Nabiki, you really shouldn't be..." Kasumi
looked over the standing and closeup photos and tried to
make out the details from the tiny shot. "Uhmmm. You
shouldn't be looking at things like that..."

 "Wipe your chin, big sister," Nabiki teased. "This
guy is ready to be inducted to the National Hunkdom League.
I'd guess he's about eighteen, works out on a regular basis.
Daddy- you said that his father had been training him in the
martial arts all his life?"

 At her father's nod, Nabiki continued. "Those
clothes are a bit odd but look really well made. So he's 
well-traveled, able to make odd bucks while on the road,
guy quite obviously ain't starving. His handwriting is
very precise, and he don't sound boring at all. Therefore,
I will sacrifice so much of my freedom by being the one
to get engaged to Hunkma, I mean Ranma."

 "Better you than me," said Akane, eyeing
the photo and not sounding nearly as certain as she
had earlier.

 Kasumi frowned slightly. "Nabiki, don't you
think we ought to meet him first? And what of this friend
he's bringing with him?"

 "We'll just have to see about that," Soun
Tendo said, an ominous tone creeping into his voice.
-------------------------------------------
 Kasumi stopped sweeping as her sisters came
into the house. "Nabiki, who's that young man standing by the
gate?"

 "Hmmm? Oh, Kuno-baby?" Nabiki shrugged and
let Akane go past her and into the house. "Well...today he
paid me for information about why his 'dear Akane' was so
overwrought today. He got up to 500yen before I started 
giving him details."

 "Oh, I suppose that I can go grocery shopping
later, then."

 Nabiki nodded. "Anyway, so eventually we got
to the heart of the matter. The Tendos and the Saotomes and
their deal to unite the two families. Well, Kuno goes absolutely
frothing-at-the-mouth berserk. He's SO sure that this guy is 
going to come and choose Akane and that she'll be forced to
go off and marry. Forsaking her true love. Him."

 "Oh. Then we ought to warn Ranma not to choose
Akane."

 "Akane doesn't love Kuno. She can't really stand
the guy. Anyway, Kuno's there to stand guard over 'his Akane'
until such time as Saotome shows up. Then, of course, Kuno
plans on defeating the fiend that seeks Akane's hand."

 "Oh dear."

 "Anyway, Kuno didn't buy what time Ranma would
show up, so he's gonna be there all night and all day tomorrow.
I figure he'll be dead on his feet when Ranma does arrive."

 "Oh." Kasumi resumed sweeping.

 Nabiki glanced back at the waiting Kuno, up at the
heavens, and went inside. Tomorrow showed every sign of being
a LONG day.
-----------------------------------------
 There had been a time when Ranma would have disdained
using a weapon in combat.

 Then his sensei, a guy named Tyr Grimjaws, had told him
about goblin spiders and about the Midgard Serpent, and about a lot
of other noxious things. Things that you wanted as far away from your
flesh as you could possibly get.

 So Ranma had learned weapons. Not for every fight, to be
sure. Tyr had taught him the longsword and the warhammer. Susano,
the katana and the wakizashi- the daisho of the samurai. He'd already
known how to use the staff and the horse-spear, nunchakus and sai.
In female form she'd learned the spearwork of the valkyrie, the bow 
from some humorless girl named Artemis, and the halberd and naginata
from some woman named Hoshime.

 This brought Ranma to his "greeting the morning" kata.
Today was an exercise using a weapon he still hadn't quite mastered,
the kusari-gama. Not an elegant or a silent weapon, that much was
sure. Not that he couldn't do the basics, but if he got caught by a 
dozen swordsmen in a bamboo grove he'd drop the weapon and 
fall back on dodging.

 "Aw c'mon, Ranma, it ain't even dawn yet," grumbled 
Skuld from their room. "Can't you practice the sword or your unarmed
stuff today?"

 "That's what you say every time, Skuld." Ranma
relented though, and began going into exercises that were silent.

 "You could've at least used your manriki-gusari. That
only makes noise when you want it to," Skuld stopped speaking
in order to produce a long and drawn-out yawn.

 "It's an enchanted weapon. Too easy to get dependent
on those." Ranma frowned as he realized he was quoting his teacher.
"Then somebody slaps you with a 'Neutralize Magic' and it throws 
you off."

 Skuld grumbled a little, preparing to go back to her futon,
when something crossed her mind. "Hey, today's the day, ain't it?"

 "Yes, Skuld. Today we meet the Tendos." Ranma began
to blur as he used a pattern of moves he'd learned from Raideen.
Too bad he couldn't do the lightning stuff, that had been cool. Well,
at least not yet. He wasn't completely willing to admit defeat on those
special manuevers.

 "Oh man. 'Yes, Skuld, today we meet the Tendos.' C'mon,
Ranma! I mean, you've got this whole fiancee thing coming down on
your head now, don't you go bottling it up like ol' Grimjaws."

 Ranma swept through the set of strikes and moves that
Raideen had shown him, shifting into a set of manuevers that he'd
studied while sparring with Susano.

 "At least tell me which one you like the most. C'mon,
remember, I'm the goddess of the future and I can absolutely say
with confidence that not all of them turn out as badly as some of
them do."

 Ranma sighed and dropped from his stance. "Skuld,
why don't YOU tell ME something. Why aren't you unhappier with
this? I mean, I got you kicked outta Heaven for cryin' out loud."

 "It's only temporary." Skuld looked wistful. "Besides,
that remark about my big sister proved to be dead on. Never told
you about that did I? You said it looked like my sister was gonna
go visit her boyfriend. Never woulda occurred to me if you hadn't
said something."

 "Well, it was kinda obvious. Eros had said something
to me about some kid named Usagi, and I noticed your sister had
the same look in her eyes as the girl that Eros was watching." Ranma
sighed and started doing situps.

 "Yeah, well, Belldandy has been monitoring a mortal
for years. When I found out about it, I checked the records. She's
been watching this guy since they were kids!" Skuld pouted. "He's
not good enough for MY sister. Not nearly enough. But she's gonna
grant his wish, and she's already put in for consideration to have 
HER wish- which will modify his wish so she gets to be his girlfriend."

 "Sounds like it wouldn't be too difficult."

 "Yeah, but it plays awfully close to some rules. Makes me
nervous that Belle is gonna do it. Urd I can picture doing something
like that, but Belldandy?" Skuld sighed. "Anyway the prediction 
program I ran said there was a 97% chance they'd end up living here
in this mortal city. So, I'm away from my sister, but when she comes 
down I'll be here already."

 "So who's covering the Yggdrasil duties? Urd?"

 "Nah, you made some friends over in the Greek quarter.
Clotho and Lachesis will take turns and you know how Hephaestus
was when you talked it over with Urd about letting him learn the
systems so she could go meet with Bacchus."

 "Ah," Ranma finished a set of situps and went on to
start one-handed pushups. "Skuld? You've got a prediction
program?"

 "Yeah?" Skuld sat back and wondered when that
Keiichi guy would make his wish.

 "Who would I make the happiest? Who needs me
the most? Who SHOULD I marry?"

 "Hmmm?" Skuld considered and whipped her notebook
computer out. "Letsee. If I hook it into a subetheric modem link and
access Yggdrasil.com, and run a minimalist query it should give me
some quick results." Skuld secret technique: sonicspeed typing. 

 "Ah-hah!" Skuld exclaimed. "I am such a...genius?"

 "What you get?" Ranma stopped his pushups and
started getting up.

 Skuld snapped the notebook shut. "Still have to work
out some parameters. Probably need to get a full workup instead of
just addressing the online data from Yggdrasil. I'll work on it when
I get a chance."

 "Oh," Ranma returned to the exercises.

 Skuld sighed in relief, then cracked open her notebook
to look at the results again. This couldn't be right.

	Could it?
-------------------------------------------------
clip to part b   APPRENTICE OPTION