Then suddenly, out of nowhere!
= = =
Disclaimer: Sh, don’t fight it. Now we’ll be together forever, just you and me. Only you and me.
The students of Furinkan High school watched with bated breath as the two stared each other down. They all had a great idea of the strength of Tatewaki Kuno, but the newcomer… Now there was a mystery! He had taken down the winner of the last five days with all the ease of swatting a fly. Only one fact remained obvious. This would surely be one of the most epic rumbles they’d have the privilege to be anywhere near.
Some of the more intelligent students took a few steps back, while even more intelligent students ran straight inside the building.
“Taking bets, folks! Come on, who wants to bet on Ranma Saotome, Akane’s mysterious fiance versus Tatewaki Kuno, captain of the kendo club!”
Ranma chuckled. “So! You’re the real big dog in the yard?”
Kuno tilted his head. “If you are attempting to impress me, it might be best to knock down someone that had not just concluded a fight.”
“Another invitation? So generous.”
“You may make the first move anytime you like,” Kuno replied. “As challenger, it would not be right for me to initiate combat.”
Ranma shrugged and the next most of the observers knew was the sound of flesh meeting wood echoing throughout the yard. Only three of them saw the entirety of what had transpired in the blink of an eye, but the others were momentarily confused.
It had started when Ranma had sent a soul shattering blow towards Kuno’s chest, intending to knock all the air out of his lungs. Before he struck the target, Kuno’s arms twisted around and all Ranma’s fist met was a particularly resilient bokken. He changed targets faster than politicians change their minds and swung for the jaw, only to be blocked once again by a deft flick of the wrist. He stepped back, and tried a feint kick–pretending to aim low, only to strike high–and once again the blow was blocked with no wasted movement.
Where most would be frustrated, Ranma smiled.
“Not bad,” Kuno admitted. “But not nearly good enough. If you are to date Akane Tendo, you shall have to do much better.”
Before Ranma could retort Kuno was already on the assault. His bokken thrust forward with the force of a freight train carrying a thunderbolt, but Ranma’s speed was nothing to underestimate either. The strike went wide when the pigtailed boy spun on his right foot, but he wasn’t done yet. He used the momentum of the spin to deliver a roundhouse kick to the head that would make a meteor strike seem rather lame by comparison. Rather than the satisfying sound of his opponent’s jaw shattering like glass, instead he had to contend with the rather less satisfying sound of wood being struck. Hard. But not breaking it.
“Akane may be my fiancee,” Ranma said with the smile spreading even further up his face. “But you’re my new best friend.”
Kuno’s eyes narrowed in concentration, before he lashed out at the air in front of him. The blow missed Ranma once again, but the massive alteration in air pressure did not. He was hurled back first into the wall leaving an indentation an inch thick where he struck. His body slumped forward, landing face first onto the ground.
And off to the side, Akane stood watching the fight serenely with the only sign of motion the slight ruffling of her skirt.
“A stronger adversary than most,” Kuno proclaimed, sheathing his boken. He made to turn away and walk inside, apparently satisfied from this duel. He stopped upon hearing a most peculiar noise, as did many of the others present in the courtyard.
Those that heard it first thought Ranma was moaning in pain, but first impressions are quite often misleading. He was not in pain. He was not unconscious. In fact, when he pulled himself up from the ground, chuckling all the while they could see quite plainly that he wasn’t even hurt.
“I disagree! You’re not bad at all,” Ranma said between laughs. “But I do think we should stop playing around and take this seriously.”
All attention was on the two combatants and so nobody saw the manic twinkle in Akane’s eye.
Kuno drew his boken once again. “More resilient than you seem,” he observed. Very well. Now you shall feel the full might of-”
Ranma was already moving. A leap into the air prompting Kuno to let fly another wall of air pressure, but he had underestimated the distance his opponent intended to leap. Ranma grinned as he descended upon his opponent. Kuno struck for the neck in an attempt to knock Ranma out, end this fight here and now. It struck, Ranma’s head reflexively jerked a little to the side and to Kuno’s mounting horror he managed to smile even wider.
This proved enough of a distraction. Ranma seized his wrist and in the next second Kuno was staring up at the sky. He dared not linger there, and pushed himself to his feet, spinning around to locate his enemy.
“Where… Where did he-?” Had he fled? No, he did not seem the sort to abandon battle so easily!
“Looking for me?” said a voice from behind him, and the next sensation Kuno had was a bit of a learning experience when Ranma’s arms flew underneath his and rested neatly upon the back of Kuno’s neck. The fingers interlocked, and Kuno felt his chin being forcibly introduced to his chest.
Ah! he thought, So this is what a full nelson feels like when properly applied.
He gasped for air and found that little answered the call. Worse yet, Ranma applied greater pressure and leverage still by leaping upon Kuno’s back and wrapping his legs around the kendoist’s waist. In this position it was only a matter of time before he would pass out from oxygen deprivation. Akane’s fiance had bested him in single combat in front of the entire school. All that he had fought for may now come to naught.
In the immortal words of the bard: Screw. That.
Kuno staggered to his feet but he could feel his face growing red. He staggered backwards, arms flailing in the limited radius the hold allowed. There was little other recourse to be taken, and so Kuno backed up against the wall and slumped against it.
Then he took a step forwards and leaped back with every single bit of strength he could manage. The dent that Ranma had left in the wall grew an inch deeper, but if anything the hold only became tighter.
The next step and leap was more difficult than the previous one. It seemed to require more concentration, more of his strength. But he would not give up so easily. His noble quest could not be overcome in this manner! Not so soon! He threw back with images of a smiling Akane Tendo in his eyes, and through the mists forming through the pain he could see her watching the fight. So innocent, so angelic…
It was enough to spur him on a little more. Her presence was all it took to keep him awake, keep this fight alive. Again and again, too often for him to count he threw himself backwards into the wall. He would not fall here. He would not!
“What’s the matter Kuno?” Ranma whispered in his ear. “Don’t you like playing games? I guess we could fight for real the next time you hit on my fiancee, if you’d like.”
Kuno let loose an inarticulate scream and stumbled to his knees. No! Not like this! Rise to your feet, you weakling! Finish this! Finish him! He felt something cold and damp strike his cheek–was he crying? Yes. He must be crying. Manly tears that served as a reminder of what would be lost if he did not prevail. Manly tears struck his head. Oh. Never mind. It was just a spot of light rain.
Without any further warning the pressure on the back of his neck abated and Kuno witnessed a large black and white object bouncing off into the school. Apparently carrying Ranma Saotome with it. He was nowhere to be found and all the other students looked a little confused by what had just transpired.
Kuno rose to his feet, dusted himself down, composed himself and cleared his throat before addressing the student body. “This fight… is a clear draw! Saotome and I shall have to ensure we have a rematch at some future date. Only then can we properly ascertain your worth!”
He gripped the back of his neck then. First, he needed to find an ice pack.
====
A shadowy figure lurked within the school grounds, stalking carefully but quickly towards a storage room in the back. He paused for breath, leaning against a wall–keeping up with them had been a lot harder than expected. So quick! And not much time either. He could feel its approach, crawling to its victim with the usual inevitable sinister intent. Not today. Not if he had anything to say about this. If he was lucky, if he had been fast enough there was the slightest chance it had not bewitched the poor boy already, taken his heart and his soul just like all the others.
If he was lucky. Fortune had not been on his side so far no matter how hard he struggled.
There was an almighty clatter from the storage room. The sound spurred him on, and he threw the door open to find Saotome dusting off his hands and looking down at a panda which had been–for whatever reason–tied up like a piñata with metal rods bent around his hands.
“Thanks for the hot water old man,” Ranma said. “You just rest up there as thanks, okay? Now!”
The slightly damp pigtailed boy blurred, and was suddenly resting his hands upon the shadowy figure’s back as though greeting a long lost friend. “Can I help you with something, mister? You seem a little lost!”
“I was more concerned over whether I could help you. We don’t have much time. My name is Hikaru Gosunkugi, and you are in terrible danger.”
“Tell me more,” Ranma said. If Gosunkugi could have seen the glint in Ranma’s eyes, he’d have run screaming for the hills.
“How long have you known Akane Tendo?”
“We only met yesterday. Our fathers are best buddies, and figured it might be fun to try out an arranged marriage. I didn’t much care for the idea at first, but Akane convinced me otherwise.”
That was not a good sign, but it wasn’t quite enough. He had to be sure, had to be certain. Was Ranma under her spell or wasn’t he?
“Please… tell me about Akane. What do you think of her?”
“Oh, she’s great fun! I’ve never met a girl quite like her. She’s pretty and perfect and charming and-”
Gosunkugi’s shoulders slumped in defeat. He’d been too late. This poor boy, he was just another mindless toy to be played with and broken… by it. That thing masquerading as a girl had claimed another victim.
“-As violent as a warzone and as strong as a tank. Why do you ask?” Ranma’s brow furrowed, and the grip on Gosunkugi’s shoulder was beginning to grow uncomfortable for reasons nothing to do with personal space. “You’re not thinking of asking her out or anything, are you?”
“No! No, I swear!” the idea, the very conception of dating that thing was akin to dating a rabid bear in his eyes. You could take it to any restaurant you wanted, but the only thing on the menu was pain with a side ordering of suffering. “But… You need to understand, she’s not as sweet as she might first appear!”
Ranma’s grip was released, and Gosunkugi stumbled forward. Good, first step established. Now if he was lucky… If he was lucky he might be able to finally save them all!
“I tried to show this to Kuno,” Gosunkugi sighed, withdrawing a thick book from his bag. “He looked it all over, handed it back and then made that stupid proclamation at the start of the year. He’s been bewitched, just like the rest of them.”
“What is this?” Ranma asked. He took the book and started to flip through it, his eyes widening with each turned page.
“It’s a scrapbook,” Gosunkugi said. “I’ve been keeping a close eye on Akane’s violent tendencies for quite some time.” He sighed and rubbed at his eyes, which were marked with dark rings underneath. Marks that came from many sleepless nights due to the nightmares… The horrors he’d seen. The horror he was living. The waiting, the endless waiting for the day that Akane would notice what he was doing and–ah!
“Oh, I remember that!” Akane said, peering over Ranma’s shoulder. “Thank you so much, Hikaru! This will make a wonderful engagement gift. So thoughtful of you.”
He was able to say “… Don’t think anything of it,” right before passing out, but that was all he could manage.
====
On the third floor of the school building, there was a particular classroom which was bustling with activity. The students had crowded around one desk in particular, pushing and yelling and biting for the opportunity to reach one girl in particular for the opportunity to give her money. Each of them wanted to be the first to get the answer to the question of the hour, the ponderance playing upon their lips. In the middle of the crowd, Nabiki sat still and stared up at the ceiling as though she didn’t really care.
Let them tire themselves out. Let them come to her one at a time. Wait until their curiosity builds and builds to its highest point, and only then answer that dogged question:
“Tell me everything you know about Ranma Saotome.”
Ah. She should have expected that. A boy had pushed his way through the crowd, and didn’t seem at all willing to take no for an answer. The remaining students slunk off, cowed by the determination radiating off Tatewaki Kuno whose quest for an answer would not be abated.
Nabiki rested one elbow on the desk and turned her palm upwards. It was weighted down by several bills moments later. Boy may be an idiot, but it seems he understood her well enough by now. She pocketed the money and started talking, being careful regarding who could hear her.
“My father is an old training partner of his father’s. They apparently agreed to some arranged marriage deal some time ago, but we’d never met the boy before yesterday.”
“And he chose Akane,” Kuno slowly said.
“Actually, she was rather insistent that she marry him.”
Kuno’s eyes narrowed, not in anger but concentration. “I see. How did the rest of the family react to this?”
Well now. That was not a question she’d been expecting. She turned her palm up again, and blinked in mild surprise at the even larger stack of notes lying there moments later. Kuno was not half assing this. He wanted to know and wanted to know yesterday.
“I thought it was highly amusing, of course. Father was so… overwhelmed by the news that he seems to be lost in a fantasy world these days, daydreaming about the happy future Ranma and his daughter have together.”
“And Kasumi?” Kuno leaned forward urgently. “How did she take it?”
Kasumi? Why the special interest in- “You’re not thinking of two timing my sister, are you?”
“I would never dare. She is a misunderstood angel with enough to deal with as it is without some boy breaking her heart. What pray tell is so funny?”
“Nothing, nothing!” Nabiki hid her mouth with her hand. “Ah! Kasumi tried to take the engagement for herself, but Akane was quite insistent.”
“I see… Thank you. That was most illuminating” Kuno said. He stroked his chin in thought, then turned and walked over to his own desk while mumbling something under his breath. The only thing Nabiki could catch was “She must have done that to protect… yes… that makes sense… such selflessness!” before he noticed he was mumbling to himself and stopped.
“I must go speak with Saotome,” with that he departed the classroom.
Nabiki rolled her eyes. The poor boy seemed to have some weird notion in his head that Akane had accepted the engagement to ensure Kasumi didn’t have to deal with it. Honestly. They were all alike, everyone at school! None of them. Not a one understood exactly who Akane Tendo really was on the inside. She showed them a mask and they all thought it was too pretty to be faked, and so they bought it. Hook. Line. Sinker. Not that Nabiki would correct them. It was far too profitable.
===
It was the truest test of any man to determine which of his duties must carry more weight. This fresh development was unexpected. Dangerous. On the one hand, there was the duties he held to his school. On the other Tatewaki Kuno had to consider the needs of Akane Tendo. This Ranma Saotome had no idea of who or what he was dealing with and must be taught the appropriate lessons of respect. Which meant that he had no other recourse!
“I must duel Ranma Saotome immediately, and test the depths of his power!” he declared as he hurried his way downstairs to the the second floor with bokken in hand.
It did not take him long to locate the pair standing outside of Akane’s classroom, staring at one another with linked arms and buckets in their hands. How appropriate it seemed to confront him here and now in this manner! The sight of their linked arms spurred him to move even faster, faster down the corridor until without a drop of hesitation he swung down upon Ranma with all his strength and might. Now he would see with this strike if he had what it took!
Saotome passed with flying colours by leaping closer still towards Akane Tendo, the wooden blade missing him by inches and tearing a massive gash in the wall behind him.
“Saotome,” Kuno said, attempting to carefully choose his words as he spoke. “It is time we finish our duel.”
“Oh wow!” Saotome said. “So I get here, watch a bunch of dudes violently beat the hell out of each other and knock the fuck out of a boxing prodigy before the captain of the Kendo Club comes after me, and he loves fighting me so much that he decides to ditch class to finish what we started! I haven’t even been here an hour and this is the Best. School. Ever.”
The windows separating the classroom from the corridor hurled open and all the students within stared out with bated breath.
“Kuno’s gonna fight Akane’s fiance!” someone whispered at the back.
“This is gonna be the fight of the year!” whispered someone else.
“What the hell are you guys doing so close, do you want to die?!” yelled another student standing much further back than the rest.
Before the fight could even start Akane imposed herself between the two. “I know you boys can’t wait to fight, but I think you should take it outside.”
“Outside?” Ranma asked.
Akane smiled. “This hallway’s too narrow for you to cut loose and the teachers might get in the way, we can’t have any of that.”
“See, that’s why I love you,” Ranma said, kissing her gently on the forehead. “Come on Kuno, I know just the place we can settle this.”
What happened next was a little too fast for even Kuno to properly witness, but he did get a very strong impression that his sleeve had been grabbed and his feet kicked out under him. Which would rather explain why he was crashing through a window and falling down towards the school pool at a worryingly accelerated rate. Even though it was water this belly flop was going to sting like a complete and utter bit-
Son of a bitch that stings!
“Hey Kuno wait for me! Oh, dammit! A swimming pool!”
Another body landed in the pool even as Kuno scrambled for the surface. It was an indistinct figure obscured by the water but he could make out a variety of traits. Dark hair, pigtail. Red shirt, black trousers.
Well. At least that made identifying who it was much easier. The figure swam up towards the surface and Kuno descended upon him with the intention of putting a stop to this here and now! Hah! Perhaps Saotome was not so tough as he had first expected! For now it seemed that Akane would have to wait a little longer for a more suitable suitor. One with strength. One with conviction. One with-
Breasts?
He gave an experimental squeeze. Yes. That was probably breasts. Probably. He’d never actually felt them before and had no real frame of reference, but a modicum of common sense dictated that he was squeezing some breasts at this particular moment. It occurred to him a second later that common sense also said he should probably have let go before her hands reached back to painfully hold onto his ears.
“Let go!” a female voice yelled. Her arms flipped forward, and Kuno was hurled through the air yet again. This time his destination was a fair bit harder, though his fall was rather less distance. Though anyone that can tell you would certainly agree that performing a forward roll in mid air from a swimming pool onto the floor outside the pool was at best disorienting and at worst concussion inducing. Which was why Kuno was waving his fingers in front of his face just to be on the safe side. The back of his head had a rather nasty collision with the pool edge, and he could have sworn he heard something crack.
Oh, that was just the concrete. Nevermind.
Ranma hauled herself out of the pool, naturally dripping water from head to toe, and shook as much water as she could out of her hair. “Surprised? I certainly hope so.”
What was this? Who was this girl? Was she Saotome’s sister? In those similar clothes? He didn’t really have much time to ponder this further because he was jumping to his feet and parrying a savage attack from the girl. It was like fending off machine gun fire, except that he would probably prefer being hit by the bullets than these punches.
“Yes! Yes! Yes! You don’t slack for a minute do you?!” Ranma asked over her barrage before she narrowly sidestepped a counter thrust from Kuno that tore open her shirt.
“Of course not,” Kuno said before spinning and slashing at Ranma before she could attack his open back. “When one does battle with Akane Tendo, one must hone their skill at all opportunities! There is no room for slacking! No room for error!”
He fell upon the pigtailed girl with a mighty vertical swing that lesser men wouldn’t have been able to see. Ranma caught it between her hands just inches above her head.
“I’ll be sure to keep that in mind,” she said in the process of–impossibly–wrenching the bokken from his hands. “And now with no sword-!”
She aimed to punch him in the chest, but he caught her hand. “Huh?”
“Were you not paying attention?” Kuno asked.
Ranma attempted to kick Kuno, but he caught her foot and tossed her into the air, spinning.
“I said that one must hone their skill at all opportunities!”
“Oh my God…” Ranma said as she went flying. “… I think I might be a little gay for this guy.”
Recovering, she fell and landed on a tree branch in a crouch, staring down and grinning at Kuno like a starving wolf facing a stubborn and determined buck. Kuno reached up and caught his bokken as it fell back to him, before pointing it at her.
“I would know the name of someone that fights with such determination and skill! Who are you?”
“His name is Ranma Saotome,” the voice of Akane Tendo said from behind him, which was rarely ever a good direction to hear that voice from. No, scratch that. It was never a good direction to hear that voice from. “Ranma, catch!”
Which is when a kettle flew past Kuno, which would be only another in the list of inexplicable things to happen to him today. With another closely following, when the pigtailed girl plucked the kettle from the sky and emptied the contents over her own head resulting in–huh, what?!
“You’re a man!” Kuno could hardly believe it. “But, but you’re a man!”
“He really, really is,” Akane sighed. Kuno chose to ignore this for the time being to focus on the mysterious sex changer that was engaged to her.
“How?” He demanded.
“I’ll give you the short of it: I got cursed to turn into a girl while in China, the end.” He properly threw himself at Kuno. “Now where were?!”
His flying kick was stopped by Kuno’s bokken but Newton’s third law demanded with its usual irresistible will that someone keep moving, and so Kuno went flying backwards and skipped like a stone across the ground before he hit the school’s wall, creating a spider’s web of cracks that appeared on the other side of the meter thick wall.
“Oh yeah, that’s right. I was about to give you a colonoscopy with my foot.”
Kuno shook the bleariness out of the corner of his vision and stared up at the man descending upon him like a soaring eagle. Another rain of blows came that made what was done by the pool seem like a spring mist as compared to a monsoon. He needed every inch, every drop, every measurement of skill he could conceive to parry these blows. And even though he was able to do so it seemed not to matter at all. That momentum had to go somewhere. That force and impact had to go somewhere. It sure as hell wasn’t going into Saotome. The phrase “a matter of time” seemed quite appropriate all of a sudden, but Kuno would be damned if he gave up so easily!
So he reached down deep. Deeper than he’d ever reached, tapping into a well he didn’t even know existed. Reserves that should not have been possible for him to reach into! And Kuno rose to his feet feeling like hell. “I… Fight… On!”
Saotome smirked. “Glad to hear it! It would’ve been a shame to end it this way!”
Kuno snorted in an adrenaline infused fury and lunged forward. He had to know. He had to know one way or the other! He had to drive them both to the very brink of their will, until they were both driving on fumes alone! The arc of the blade swung down with enough fury to split the very air itself-
And then the wall behind him exploded with tremendous force, sending both Kuno and Ranma hurtling back into the swimming pool. As bricks and chunks of concrete sprayed in every direction, Akane watched both Kuno and Ranma splash down spectacularly before looking back to the wall and the cause of its sudden explosive loss of structural integrity.
Standing in the gaping hole in the wall was a girl her age with long purple hair, red eyes, and dressed like she came straight out of a Wuxia Flick. The girl looked around with a hawkish gaze, before she noticed Akane staring at her. Almost immediately she began saying stuff in Chinese that flew right over Akane’s head until the word Ranma popped up in it.
“Ranma?”
The Chinese girl quickly nodded, before Ranma and Kuno climbed out of the pool, drawing her gaze. Upon seeing the Chinese girl, Ranma actually showed sign of discomfort, her eyes growing wide. “S-Shampoo?”
Akane looked from Ranma to the girl. “Shampoo?”
Shampoo gasped as she realized that she had finally found her, the girl that had so swiftly, violently, and thoroughly defeated her back in China. Her hands clenched into fists, and then unclenched before she placed them over her blushing cheeks. Swooning, she gave Ranma a positively lovesick stare before she lewdly moaned a single word:
“Airen~!”
= = =
*A natural disaster warning siren begins to blare*
TFF YANDERE VS. YANDERE ADVISORY WARNING! TWO YANDERE HAVE BEEN SIGHTED WITHIN VISUAL RANGE OF A COMMON LOVE-INTEREST. A YANDERE VS. YANDERE CONFRONTATION IS IMMINENT. SEEK UNDERGROUND SHELTER IMMEDIATELY. THIS IS NOT A TEST.
