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A Ranma 1/2 Fanfiction
By MrThou
Disclaimer: All these characters are the figment of Rumiko Takahashi's
imagination. Not mine. Any resemblance of these characters to real
people is a figment of the reader's imagination. Thinking that people
actually read disclaimers is a figment of my imagination.
Chapter 2
==========
Murphy's law states: "Anything that can go wrong, will, and at the
worst possible time."
It's not the type of law one can prove scientifically, rather, it is
the type of thing one simply knows, like the fact that no matter how
many Mondays one lives through, they will all mostly be bad, or the fact
that no matter how many times you send that fruitcake as a Christmas
gift, it will always be returned to you the next year(1).
That being said, Murphy's Law has several corollaries, which also
cannot be proven. The one we are looking at right now is this: "Saying
that things can't get any worse invariably means that they will." This
is often known as 'tempting fate', and it is a very dangerous pastime.
A similar (but opposite) corollary is: "Saying that things are going
to get worse makes them get worse." The upshot of all this is that
whether or not you believe something will get worse, it will get worse.
Thus is Murphy's Law upheld.
While Murphy's Law is not true in the strictest sense -- just
because spontaneous combustion would be a particularly wrong thing (at
least in this not-so-humble writer's opinion, but I digress...) doesn't
make it likely to happen -- , it is nonetheless a very good guideline
for planning one's day.
For example, knowing that things will go wrong, and therefore that
one's day will continue to get worse, one can take certain steps to make
sure that the day starts off very well, before Murphy's law has had its
morning cup of coffee.
Ranma did not know what Murphy's Law was. Nor did she know what a
corollary was. She did feel the effects most keenly, however.
Particularly today, a Monday, and her first day at Furinkan High School.
After all, ignorance before the law is no excuse.
----------
One would be tempted to say that things could not get any worse for
Ranma Jokestu(2). The day had started off badly; she'd woken up late and
didn't have time to take a shower or go through her morning stretches.
Then she had forgotten her umbrella. When she arrived at school, she got
into a fight and pulled several muscles because she was not properly
warmed up. Then class had started.
It wasn't her fault that she ended up in the hall. She was sitting
innocently in class, reading her textbook and trying to figure out what
exactly a present participle had to do with the Law of Cosines, and
receiving a copious amount of notes in the process, when the girl beside
her, Akane Tendo, had suddenly slammed her book against her desk and
stood up. She had been sent to the hall, of course, but had also drawn
attention toward Ranma -- and her handful of notes.
And then that whole thing with the water after the bell rang. What
was with that? Was there some kami of water out to get her?
So now here she was, sitting in the nurse's office with Akane and
some boy named Hiroshi -- the one who had slipped and smashed into the
wall -- waiting to have a minor bruise examined, and wondering how
things could get any worse, since obviously -- the way this day had been
going -- they were.
If there was a silver lining to this particularly soggy and dismal
storm cloud(3), it was that she didn't have to sit through second
period.
"Well, that was exciting." Ranma commented.
Her attempt to engage in conversation was ignored by Akane, the
other person in the room currently capable of speech.
There is nothing quite so awkward as trying to start a conversation
with someone who is deliberately ignoring you, or at least not
listening. Actually, there are a good number of things that are more
awkward, most of which involve a boy and a girl, and another boy or girl
coming in who happens to like one of the other two. Still this was a
very awkward situation.
Ranma was very familiar with awkward situations, but not this one in
particular. So she did the only thing she could think of: treat it like
a familiar awkward situation.
----------
(1) Fruitcake return has been widely regarded as one of the best hopes
for perpetual motion, second only to the bad penny. It is such a well
documented phenomenon that the only reason the world isn't powered by
the perpetual movement of fruitcakes is that occasionally one actually
gets eaten, or -- more commonly -- gets lost in transit.
(2) See the previous section on Murphy's Law.
(3) For reasons unknown to Ranma, but known to the reader, she had begun
to think in meteorological metaphors.
----------
When Ranma was fourteen, her father had decided that training at the
zoo with all the dangerous animals would be a good way to sharpen their
skills. It seemed like a reasonably good idea at first, as long as they
avoided the felines. However, like most ideas that are conceived when
one is totally smashed, it really wasn't.
At some point during the fight, Genma Saotome had led them to the
primate exhibit, and after getting in a good strike to the head, ripped
the pants off his child, leaving Ranma half-naked and slightly concussed
in the monkey pen. What this was supposed to accomplish, Ranma still
wasn't quite sure.
So Ranma did the only thing that seemed reasonable: dance around,
throw things, and act like a monkey.
Why Ranma chose to imitate this particular awkward situation remains
a mystery.
----------
One may argue with Ranma's methods, but they could not argue with
her results. It only took two balls of crumpled-up notes to get Akane's
full attention.
"What are you doing?!" she shouted. "It's bad enough that you got my
uniform all wet. Now you start throwing things at me?!"
Ranma stopped dancing. "Just tryin' ta get your attention. Geez,
don't blow a gasket."
"Well if you hadn't..."
"Look, just 'cause I happen ta be new here, doesn't mean you can
blame me. I didn't get your uniform wet." Ranma, too, was a bit
irritated. "If you wanna blame someone, blame the kids who broke the
door. Besides, who dropped the buckets on who?"
That stopped Akane short. "... Just forget it..."
Ranma smiled slightly. "Now you've got it. Water under the bridge,
and all that. Can't do nothin' about it, so don't worry about it."
It was then that Akane made an observation she would make many times
over the coming months. "You're really weird, you know that?"
That set the shorter girl to laughing. "You don't know the half of
it!"
Akane giggled in spite of herself. Ranma was just too difficult to
stay mad at.
"Anyway, maybe you can help me. I been following the trail of two
people. I think I've found one, but I'm still looking for my, uh...
former master, I guess. It looks like you studied with him, if I saw
correctly. Do you know a Genma Saotome?"
"What do you want with Uncle Saotome?" Akane asked suspiciously. "If
he ripped you off, we're not paying for it."
"I take it the old man's left the vicinity, then?"
"He ran away months ago. I don't know where he went."
"Well, it's a start," Ranma said, and shrugged. "Got something more
important ta take care of, anyway."
"Now why don't you answer my question?" Akane asked. "What do you
want with him?"
Ranma leaned forward, and whispered, "That..."
Akane leaned forward, straining to hear. "That?"
"... is a secret!"(4)
Akane fumed.
"Damn! I've always wanted to say that," Ranma laughed. "No,
seriously, like I said in the hall. Come by the clinic after school.
I'll have ta show you some things before I can tell you some things, if
you get what I mean."
Akane didn't, but let it drop, since the nurse chose that moment to
enter.
----------
The two periods after the incident with the water buckets were
pretty bad, and lunchtime was a complete disaster. After that, Ranma's
day went into a bit of a decline, and she decided it was worth detention
just to sleep through the rest of the school day. In defiance of the
spirit of Mondays, and this Monday in particular, however, no one
noticed her snoring, and she got off without further incident.
It was still raining when she left for the clinic. Then, just for a
change, it stopped raining and started to blatter instead.
----------
(4) Ranma is a closet Xellos fan.
==========
Author's notes:
I've decided not to worry a whole lot about chapter length. So this
chapter is a little shorter than the last one, and the next will
probably be a good deal longer, unless I decide to split it up.
So, what's with the monkeys, you may be wondering. To be perfectly
honest, I don't know. It just seemed funny when I wrote it, and three
of my four prereaders thought it was funny, so I decided to leave it in.
Next chapter, Ranma reveals the curse of Jusenkyou to Akane, she
calls him a pervert, and... wait. I'm giving away too much.
If you notice any serious grammatical or spelling errors, or see
something that, no matter how you turn it, refuses to make the slightest
bit of sense, please email me.
Comments welcome, flames forwarded to the nearest terrorist
organization(5). If you're going to rip apart my story, at least be
constructive.
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(5) This is a joke.