Chapter 1: An Unknown Martial Art
Ranma was angry at his father once again. Right now, he, or rather she at the moment, was chasing the panda in question through the streets of a small town. One strange thing about this town was that almost everyone there was some kind of anthropomorphic animal. Normally, this would bring attention to any outsiders, but Ranma had seen stranger things on the so-called training trips with his father.
Genma ran frantically through the streets, knocking over anything that could possibly stop his rampaging son/daughter. He was starting to run out of things to throw, and Ranma was gaining! However, up ahead was a dojo. Perhaps he could hide there or find something to give him an upper hand.
Just after Genma had run inside, another panda was coming out of the kitchen with a greenish belt around its waist and a salt pretzel in… paw. Upon seeing another panda, he went into a kind of shock and did something that nobody who knew him ever thought he would do… He dropped his pretzel. The other panda (Genma) looked at him and jumped on the pretzel, sliding through the doorway into the kitchen.
It was at that time that Ranma burst through the door. He didn't even care to notice the differences between his father's panda form and the panda before him. After all, what were the chances of finding another panda in a dojo? He immediately jumped straight at his target with a look in his eyes akin to a death glare.
Right before Ranma's fist connected, the Panda raised an arm and yelled out "FOO-FIELD!" At those words, a blue energy dome surrounded the panda. Ranma smacked into this and fell to the ground with a shocked look. When did his father learn how to do that?!
The panda dropped the force field and glared at the young martial artist. "Just what is the meaning of you attacking me like that?!" Ranma continued to stare. After a moment of staring, he heard a door opening and looked past the panda to see his father holding a half-eaten pretzel trying to sneak out the back door. This shook him back to reality and a look of rage came over his face. He lunged forward again, this time trying to get past this panda to get at the human-turned-panda on the other side. The panda, however, assumed this was an attempt to attack him and decided to use one of the martial forms of Woo-Foo. He grew his hands into large paws capable of holding him and swung them towards the young human. "PAWS OF POWER!"
The blow knocked Ranma backwards, slamming him into the wall. He stood back up, only to be alerted by his danger sense, narrowly avoiding what appeared to be a flaming bamboo boomerang. The boomerang bounced off of the wall and flew back to the thrower's hands. Standing in the doorway were two rabbits. The girl had pink fur and was dressed in a kind of gi with a pink bow tied around the base of her ears. Her paws were surrounded in a blue aura of pure energy. The boy looked the same, except he was blue and was holding the boomerang which had almost hit Ranma, though it was no longer on fire. The boomerang then transformed into a bamboo sword as the girl began to levitate.
"You better have a good reason for attacking Master Yo," the pink rabbit said.
Ranma looked between her and the panda for a moment before realizing that this was the master that she was referring to. "Look, I know this looks bad, but—"
"No excuses!" The blue one yelled before jumping into the air and came down with his sword heading right towards Ranma. Next thing he knew, the sword was glowing blue and had transformed into a bouquet of flowers. The blue rabbit landed in front of Ranma and turned around to face the other rabbit. "What was that for, Yin?"
The pink rabbit, apparently named Yin, just shrugged and pointed to Master Yo, who was holding out a glowing hand.
"Why don't you think before you act, Yang! She was trying to tell you why it looked like she was attacking me, but you let your impatience get the better of you!" He then turned to Ranma. "Now, miss, would you please tell me what you are doing in my dojo and why you are attacking me."
Ranma took offense at being called miss, and got mad at him. "First off, I ain't a girl! I'm a guy, damn it! Second, I wasn't trying to attack you! I was trying to kill a stupid panda that ran in here!"
Yin levitated down next to Master Yo. "But, I thought you were the last panda alive."
"So did I."
"Well, he's not really a panda, just like I'm not really a girl. Get me some hot water and I'll explain, but it's a pretty long story."
After a cup of hot water had levitated out into the room, Ranma quickly grabbed it and poured it over himself, reverting back to his male form.
"What in the world is going on here?!" Yang yelled.
"Well, it all goes back to Jusenkyo. Deep within China, in the Bayankala Mountain Range of the Qinghai province, there is a spring full of thousands of springs. Each spring has a curse that makes it so that if you fall in, then you take on the form of whatever creature originally drowned in that spring. My father saw it in a pamphlet and was able to translate the words 'training ground'. He didn't understand a word of Chinese, but that was good enough for him to drag me all over China looking for it."
"What happened?" Yin asked.
"We found it. When we got there, the guide tried to warn us about the danger, but we didn't listen and started fighting above the springs. We each fell into a different spring. I fell into the spring of drowned girl, while my father fell into the spring of drowned panda. When we got out, I was angry that I chased him for hours. Then the guide told us that hot water reverses the curse, but cold water activates it again."
Ranma finally calmed down after telling the entire story for perhaps the first time since it happened. His hosts, however, were showing anger and disgust for Genma and empathy for Ranma's hardships.
Master Yo then asked a simple question that nobody was prepared for. "Would you like to stay here and train with us?"
All three responded with a simultaneous "Huh?"
"You said that you're a martial artist and I could tell from our fight that you have great skill. I would like to train you in the mystical ways of Woo-Foo."
"Well, if you're offering, then of course! I aim to be the best and, in order to do that, I need to know every fighting style I can learn. I would be honored to learn under you, Master Yo."
"Okay then. Your training will begin tomorrow. For now, I want you two to help Ranma go retrieve his things and get settled in while I go get another salt pretzel. Ranma's father stole it from me when he came in here. FOO-PORTATE!" He then disappeared from the room in a ball of energy.
"Well Ranma, let's go get your things. Where's your campsite?
Ranma pointed in the direction that he had come into town. "It was over that—Whoa!"
Yin had formed a foo-field around them and had started flying them in the direction that he had indicated. Within a few minutes, they were landing in the clearing. There were a couple of sleeping bags laying on the ground and a burnt out fire in the center. Ranma walked over to one of the bags and took out some money, then grabbed the other bag, which appeared to be his.
"Alright, that's all of my things."
"That little bag is all you brought?" Yin asked.
"It's all that I own. I've been traveling since I was old enough to walk, so I don't really have many possessions."
"Well, let's go back to the dojo. After we finish with training tomorrow, we'll take you to the store to get a few things." Yin then surrounded them in another foo-field, but instead of flying back… "FOO-PORTATE!"
They reappeared in Yin and Yang's bedroom which had a dirty pile of clothing sitting on Yang's side of the room, while Yin's side was spotlessly clean.
"Here we are! Home, sweet home. You can just put your stuff down on the far end of the room." Ranma did so and spread out the sleeping bag on the floor. It was late, so Ranma was about to go to sleep, when Yin stopped him. "TRANS-FOO-MATE!" A blue field engulfed Ranma's sleeping bag and changed it into a bed, similar to the ones Yin and Yang had, but with a red color scheme. The three fighters then went to sleep. After all, they had a hard day of training ahead of them.