Did you ever wonder where Takahashi got the inspiration for this? Well, I've watched a couple of immigration interviews before, and let me tell you, you hear the weirdest stuff. I just imagine that something like this happened...

"Ranma Saotome, please come to window 3."

Ranma clutched his packet of papers and stood up, following the signs to the designated window. He opened the door to the booth, and stepped inside. He barely paid attention to the posters covering the walls, choosing instead to concentrate on the officer behind the glass partition in front of him. The officer was busy flipping through a stack of papers bound in a plain manila folder with a numbered sticker bearing a barcode on one side. He flipped from page to page, taking notes on a computer and didn't even bother to look at Ranma when he came in the booth.

There was nothing really to do in the booth, and no chair to sit on. Instead, Ranma concentrated on watching the man look at his application. He was Caucasian, mildly overweight, balding, had horrible acne scars, had bad posture and reeked of cigarettes, even through the glass. He completely ignored Ranma, intent instead on flipping back and forth between the three inch thick bundle of papers and the computer screen. Every once in a while, the man pulled a piece of paper out of the application, looked at it closely for a couple of minutes, and then stuffed it back in the folder and made notes on his computer.

The sound of rustling papers filled the booth as Ranma stood patiently waiting to be acknowledged. With nothing better to do, Ranma looked at the people scurrying around behind the glass, carrying folders and boxes to destinations unknown. After what felt like an eternity, the officer looked up and squinted. "Ranma Saotome?"

"Yes."

The officer held up a bunch of papers to the glass. "I need you to sign at the X's, here, here," he flipped to the next page, "here, and here. Print your name in the Roman alpabet on the last line here, where indicated." Not bothering to explain what he was about to sign, the papers were pushed through small intake tray under to window without ceremony. Ranma took the papers and flipped through the package until he got to the first X.

"Excuse me?" He asked.

"What?" The officer didn't look at him as he made notes in his computer.

"Do you have a pen?" Ranma asked.

The officer rolled his eyes and dropped a pen into the tray. Ranma began flipping through the pages and signing. When he was done, he pushed the papers back through the tray, along with the pen. The officer grabbed them quickly, verified the signatures were in the right place, and then signed the last page. A few stamps were put on the last page.

"All right, Mr. Saotome, I need you to swear an oath." The officer stated. "Raise your right hand." Ranma did as instructed. "Okay, is everything on your application true and complete?"

Ranma nodded.

"I need a verbal answer, please."

"Yes." Ranma said.

"Okay, thanks. Next I need to get your finger prints. Place the fingertips of your left hand on the scanner like in the picture here." The officer tapped on the glass next to a small illuminated box. Ranma looked at the picture and placed his fingertips on the clear plastic portion of the machine as instructed.

The machine gave a sad sounding beep, and the man behind the glass frowned. "Did you burn your hand, or something?"

Ranma nodded. "Yeah, lots of times."

"Can you hold your fingertips up to the glass, please?" Ranma did as instructed. The officer grumbled behind the window. "Let's try the right hand, now. Right hand, same procedure. Please put it on the scanner."

Again, the officer frowned when Ranma put his hand on there. The machine gave the same sad sounding beep.

"You burnt both hands?"

Ranma shrugged. "Yeah – I was trying to learn a technique."

"What kind of technique?" asked the officer.

"A martial arts technique – you pull chestnuts out of a burning fire with your hands. It's a speed drill."

"Yeah, well, your fingerprints are a mess," said the officer. "Was it worth it?"

"The life of a martial artist is fraught with peril."

"Yeah, well your application's in peril as well. Alright, Mr. Tough Guy, your thumbs next." The officer ordered. Ranma placed his thumbs on the scanner. Again, the machine beeped. The officer shook his head, clicked on his mouse a number of times, entered a few more notes into the computer, and then the finally looked directly at Ranma.

"Alright, Mr. Saotome. I'm going to ask you a bunch of questions – answer them truthfully, as you are currently under oath. What do you do for work?"

"I'm a martial artist and stunt double." Ranma said.

The officer took some notes while looking at his paperwork. "Okay, who's Akane Tendo?"

"My fiancée."

"When did you get engaged?"

"About twenty-eight years ago."

"Twenty-eight years?!?"

"Yeah – it was an arranged marriage. It was arranged at birth between our parents."

"So when did you first meet your fiancée?"

"Which one?" Ranma asked.

The officer looked back at Ranma. "Which one what?"

"Which fiancée are you talking about?" Ranma asked.

"You have multiple fiancées?"

Ranma shrugged. "I did. Well, I guess I still might, if you consider Xian Pu, although she's more of a self-proclaimed nutcase…"

The officer pulled his gaze away from the computer screen and looked at Ranma. "You're aware that under INA Section 212(a)(10)(A) that polygamy is renders you ineligible for immigration, right?"

"Hey, I didn't ask for it, you know."

The officer made a few notes. "How did that work out? I mean, how do you get multiple fiancées, anyway?"

"They were arranged by my old man. He engaged me to a bunch of families – at least three or four that I know about. I was engaged to the Tendos when I was born, the Kuonji's when I was six, and the Amazons up and decided to make me a fiancée on their own. They have some crazy-ass laws back in China, so I had nothing to do with that one. Well, not much, anyway…"

The officer made more notes in his computer. "When did you first me Akane Tendo, then?"

"Oh, I guess about twelve years ago."

"Twelve years?" asked the officer.

"We were both sixteen at the time and in high school. We weren't really ready to get married at that time, and plus, I had these other fiancées too, so we couldn't really get hitched. You can blame my old man for the whole mess."

The officer held up a hand and then typed furiously. "Genma Saotome, right?"

"Yeah."

"And these were arranged marriages?"

"Yeah. Like I said. My old man did it all. I didn't really have much of a say."

"Are you still engaged or married to any of these others?" asked the officer.

"It took me a while, but I managed to get out of all the engagements but the one with the Tendos." Ranma shrugged. "Once I did that, we figured that since we liked each other and all, we'd give it a go."

The officer nodded, his body language conveying skepticism. "So why did you wait twelve years to decide to get married?"

Ranma stared at the man like he was stupid. "I just said I couldn't get married to Akane till I figured out how to get rid of the other girls, didn't I?"

"Wait…" the officer looked away from his computer screen. "Are you telling me you just managed to get out of your other engagements?"

Ranma grinned. "Yeah." Ranma looked at his watch. "I've been a free man for about… six hours, now."

The consular officer looked at the file on his desk. "This application's been pending for nearly SIX YEARS and you're telling me that you're only just now engaged to a single woman?"

"Yeap! It worked out perfectly. Once Akane got her job in America as a stunt woman in Hollywood, it was perfect opportunity. She put in for this visa. Ukyou got pregnant recently, so she couldn't really honor the contract any more. And since the Amazon's illegal in the country anyway, she'd have a harder time getting past immigration in the U.S. Plus, her claim ain't really legal, anyway, so if she decides to give me trouble, we could get her deported, or at least a restraining order."

"Who's Ukyou?"

"Oh," said Ranma, "She's the second fiancée. Ukyou Kuonji. But she got knocked up by her boyfriend, so now she's got to marry him. Works out for them both, though." Ranma scratched his head. "But now they're trying to figure out who gets to wear the wedding dress. Ukyou wants to be the bride, but she's far enough along now that it'd show if she wore a Western style dress. Since Konatsu looks just as good in a dress anyway, if Ukyou wears the tux nobody would think twice."

The officer blinked. "Wait. What?"

"They're both cross-dressers," Ranma explained.

"Oh."

Ranma pointed to the thick file. "There's a picture of us in there. In the group shot – Ukyou's the one that looks like a man with the big-ass spatula strapped to her back, and her boyfriend's the one that looks like the cute kunoichi."

"Huh." Ranma grunted "Now that their getting married I guess that makes them affianced, huh? Seems weird to be saying that about Ukyou and not referring to myself…" he trailed off as he mused.

The officer dug out the photo and looked at it closely. It was picture of Ranma with all the various fiancées – real, self-proclaimed, or otherwise – all posed for a picture. Everyone looked grumpy and hardly anyone was looking at the camera.

The officer pointed at Ukyou in the photo. "This her?"

"Yeap." Ranma nodded.

The officer grunted. "Wouldn't have guessed she's a girl."

Ranma shrugged. "Yeah, but she has a terrific rack once she takes off the bindings."

The officer simply shook his head. "Okay, whatever. Who are the other people in the photo?" He held the photo up to the glass and pointed to a purple-haired woman hanging off of Ranma's left arm. "Is this Akane?"

"Naw, that's Xian Pu."

"Xian Pu?" The officer made some notes in his computer. "Who's she?"

"Oh, she's the Amazon that's illegal here in the country - one of the other fiancées."

"How does that work?" The officer asked.

"She's crazy." Ranma shrugged. "I beat her up one day, and according to her law she's got to marry me. I certainly didn't ask her to try and marry me and I don't want to marry her. But she's been following me ever since. I mean, even her great-grandmother's given up, but Xian Pu's just won't give up."

"Have you gone to the local authorities about this?"

"Yeah, but you try and get the Nerima Police to do anything about it. They're too terrified of her, and plus, they don't want to ruin the free ramen at the Neko Hanten." Ranma said. "But it's okay. I'm pretty sure that Mousse will be able to finally get her to admit her feelings for him once I'm out of the picture."

"Mousse?"

Ranma pointed at the picture. "He's the guy in the robes."

The officer pointed to someone. "This guy?"

"No." Ranma shook his head. "That's Kuno. Mousse's the guy on the opposite side of the picture, in white with the coke-bottle glasses."

The officer typed furiously at his computer. "So this Mousse, guy – is he, like this Amazon's boyfriend?"

"No, not really." Ranma shook his head. "He's more like an assassin. He's been trying to kill me now for about eleven years to win Xian Pu's heart. Hasn't really come close, but I think that he's finally strong enough to beat Xian Pu in a fair fight."

The officer balked. "Wait, this guy's been trying to kill you?"

Ranma nodded. "Yeah, but so have half the other people in the photo, as well."

"Which ones have been trying to kill you?" The officer held up the photo.

"Let's see…" Ranma looked at the photo. "I guess it depends on when you're talking about. I guess at some point, every single person in that photo's been trying to kill me at one point or another."

"Wait." The officer held up his hand. "This is too confusing. I'm going to go through the photo, and you tell me who the people are and their relationship to you."

"Alright."

The officer pointed to Mousse. "Mousse, right?"

Ranma nodded. The officer's finger slid over one, to the next person in the photo.

"Ryoga."

"And he is?"

"Arch-rival? Friend?" Ranma shrugged. "He's only tried to kill me a couple of times, which means he's okay in my book. We don't always get along, but at least he's there to help out when it counts."

"This guy?"

"Oh, that's Kuno-kocho. Principle of my high school."

"Why's he in the photo?" asked the officer.

"We didn't want him in it, but he popped up when right as we pushed the shutter. He was trying to cut Kuno's hair."

"Wait, I thought you said his name was Kuno."

"It is. The guy in the blue with the wooden sword's his son. He was trying to cut his hair." Ranma said.

"Was he trying to kill you, too?"

"The younger Kuno was, yeah. The older one just wanted to cut my hair."

The officer put the photo down and took a few notes. He picked the photo up after a few minutes. "Okay, this girl?"

"Oh, that's a man. That's Konatsu – Ukyou's boyfriend."

"The cross-dresser?"

"Yeah," Ranma confirmed.

The consular officer scrubbed his face and muttered about cigarettes. "And this woman?"

"That's my mother." Ranma said. "By the time this photo was taken, she had stopped trying to kill me."

"Your mother wanted to kill you too?"

Ranma shrugged. "Well, I did make a pledge to commit seppuku if I failed to be a man amongst men. But then, I was five at the time I made the pledge, and eventually she agreed to tear it up. It only took a couple of years, though."

"And this guy?"

"My dad. He's the one that made all the arranged marriages." Ranma said.

The officer pointed at the next person.

"Mr. Tendo. Akane's dad." Ranma replied in response.

"So this girl in the pony-tail is your fiancée, then?"

"No, that's Kuno's sister, Kodachi. She's just another stalker and self-proclaimed fiancée."

"Self-proclaimed?"

Ranma shrugged. "What can I say? I drive women wild."

"So," sighed the consular officer, "where is your fiancée in this picture?"

"Oh, she ain't in it," replied Ranma. "See, it was originally gonna be a photo of me and her alone, but then the others showed up, and they started fighting with each other, and Akane got pissed off and left before the photo could be taken. That's why we're all so grumpy looking in the photo. I'm mad cause that was going to be the first photo with me 'n Akane alone, and then all those nut jobs had to come ruin it."

"When was this photo taken?"

Ranma scratched his chin. "I think… about 3 months ago?"

"You're telling me that you don't have a single photo with your fiancée, Akane Tendo, and you've been engaged for twelve years?"

Ranma nodded. "Yeah. You can understand why I was pissed, right?"

"Can you tell me how you and your fiancée met?"

"Which one?"

The officer sighed. "Akane Tendo, please."

"Well…"

The officer put down the photo, finished typing his notes, and told Ranma to wait there. He pushed back from his desk and went to find his co-worker.

"Yo, Rumiko. You'll never believe the shit this guy over here is telling me…"

-AN