Tensai
A Ranma One Half & Slam Dunk Crossover Story
Disclaimer: I do not own Ranma, nor do I own Slam Dunk.
This story takes place at the beginning of the Ranma manga and the year before
the slam dunk manga.
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--------------------Chapter 01
As had become his custom, Ranma reclined upon the slate tile roof of the
Tendo dojo. This afforded the young man a spectacular view of the night sky, and
allowed him to calmly analyse the dilemma he now faced. He was finding it
difficult to adjust to the changes that had occurred in such a short amount of
time.
He had spent the majority of his life in the wilderness with his father,
something that few could really appreciate. Subsequently, Ranma found it very
difficult to relate to anyone of his own age. He had made no secret of this
fact; however the people he was living with certainly didn't seem to care.
The minute the youngest daughter, Akane, caught sight of him the insults would
start, pervert, idiot, no matter what he did, it was never right, though she
certainly wouldn't tell him what the hell he was doing wrong.
It was so frustrating!
The middle daughter was similar in that she seemed to look down upon him, as
though he was beneath her, not worthy of her time, He should not be surprised
though, since from his first few days at school the girl seemed to treat
everyone this way, not that it mattered, she would eventually get her due,
people such as that always did. Finally, the oldest, Kasumi, just seemed to
ignore him.
Thus it could be understood that he found himself feeling very uncomfortable
within the boundaries of this house.
He had decided that he needed to find something to occupy his time in the
afternoons. Normally, he would just practice the martial arts, but that didn't
give him an excuse to leave the house. He was too young to get a job, and wasn't
really one for reading. So, the only option left to him was to join a club at
Furinkan that he thought he could enjoy.
Hopefully, this would provide him with ample opportunity to stay away from the
dojo and its residents, as the only time he would be here would be during the
weekends and after dinner each night. Resolved to this course of action, Ranma
swung down off the edge of the roof and flipped into his room to go to sleep for
the night.
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The next morning he awoke flying through the air, having been thrown out the
window by his stupid panda of a father. After the standard morning spar in which
his father ended up in the pond, and a great breakfast courtesy of Kasumi, Ranma
was off early to school to find out what sort of clubs Furinken high provided to
the student body.
Checking the listing on the main notice board, he found a surprisingly large
amount of choices, although, after seeing the boys after Akane on the first day
that shouldn't be surprising. Mentally checking off all the martial art's clubs,
he scanned those left and immediately two seemed to jump out at him, soccer and
basketball. He could remember seeing the two games occasionally on television
during the training trip and thinking that they looked pretty cool.
Out of the two of them he decided to go with basketball, as it seemed to be the
most physically demanding of the two. After checking where the club meeting was
held he headed off to class for the day.
During gym that afternoon Ranma decided that he should at least know the basics
of the game before confronting the club with his bid to join, so he headed over
to the instructor and asked about the sport.
Only to happy to comply, the teacher, Mr. Nakumura, proceeded to tell him what
he knew about the game. When the teacher brought up the need for shoes, Ranma
grew worried, as he could never afford them. Luckily for him, as soon as he
voiced his concern Mr. Nakumura told him that the club members were provided
with shoes as they had yet to even qualify for participation in the district
tournament.
In the schools entire history!
And thus the money normally used for travel, had been used to pay for shoes and
anything else they wanted. The two of them continued the discussion for the
duration of the class, and Ranma became more and more interested over time.
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After school that afternoon, Ranma made his way over to the gym to introduce
himself to the team. He paused before the entrance, suddenly nervous;
introductions had never gone well for him before, Ryoga, the amazons, the
tendo's, they had all been disasters. Hopefully this one would go smoothly,
firming his resolve, and taking a deep breath, he pushed open the door. And was
surprised, there was only five students in the club, and they all looked older
than him. He had thought that there would be more.
They were standing in a rough semicircle, passing three balls between each
other. Making his way over to the five he introduced himself. "Hi, my name
is Ranma Saotome, and I'm interested in joining the club". Judging by the
groups expressions, unanimously surprised, this was highly unexpected. The
largest of them, a guy ranma thought looked old enough to be a teacher himself,
spoke." I thought you would join one of the martial arts clubs after that
display you put up against Kuno, not that I am one to complain. You are welcome
to join the club, my names Kenji Furosawa, I play centre position on the team as
you can probably tell from my height ", he motions to the others then, and
they introduce themselves as well.
The first was around 6 feet 4 inches tall (195cm), and wore a Chicago bulls
uniform, with dyed blond hair in a crew cut introduces himself as Jin Hanabusa,
power forward.
The second stood 6 feet tall (183cm), had scruffy brown hair and glasses, and
was wearing the school gym uniform introduced himself as Daisuke Tenoh, point
guard.
The third, standing 6 feet 2 inches tall, in an LA lakers uniform, with spiky
black hair introduces himself as Akira Mitsuba, shooting guard.
The fourth and final one stood 6 feet 3 inches tall (192cm), wore a rebel sport
singlet and Reebok shorts, introduced himself as Kyo Hakubi, power forward.
Kenji continued once they were done, "We meet here every afternoon after
class, and stay for a long as we can, this usually ends up at about two hours.
You can stay longer if you want to though." He smirks here, as if he has
some idea of why Ranma would like to join.
Ranma thinks he could come to like this guy, "Thanks, that's great."
Kenji motions him to get on the end of the semi-circle, and they begin to pass
the balls again. "So, do you know anything about the game, or is it still
pretty much a mystery to you?"
Ranma pauses a moment here, to hold the ball in place. "Well you see, I
don't have any knowledge, heh heh, I just thought that it looked pretty
cool."
Kenji laughs at this and says, " Not to worry, none of us are exactly
spectacular, we couldn't even qualify for the regional tournament, and we don't
have a coach, however we'll be happy to show you the basics of the game. We've
got the rest of the year to improve so we can qualify next year "
They finished the passing exercise here, so Kenji took Ranma aside and taught
him all of the rules of the game, Scoring, Timing, Ball In Play, Shot Clock, Out
Of Bounds, Free Throws, Violations, Goaltending, Fouls. All the while showing
Ranma the appropriate areas of the court.
They had finished this after around an hour, so Kenji decided to show him the
basics of dribbling. By the end of the two-hour session Ranma still wasn't
having much luck, despite this he was enjoying the challenge of it.
Kenji motioned Ranma and the others over to him, "That's it for today guys,
I have to be home in an hour to help dad at the restaurant, pack it up."
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As Ranma was walking out the door he noticed someone tap him on the back,
spinning around, he was confronted with a smiling Kenji. Handing Ranma a
basketball Kenji says, "Here, you can have this to practice with, there is
plenty to spare, I also wanted to ask if you would like to come and see a match
with me on Friday, two of the top teams of the interschool league are playing.
Teams we will have to play when we qualify next year".
Excited at finally having some friends Ranma readily agrees, "Sure that
would be great, thanks again for the ball, I'll see you tomorrow."
On his way home Ranma was faced with the dilemma of how he could possibly
practice anywhere at the dojo.
It would be impossible!
He decided to look around the area to see if there was anything available.
Around two blocks from the back of doctor Tofu's office he found a large park
with a basketball court, the garish sign at the entrance proclaimed it Nerima
Park.
Original or what?
Even so, he was just happy to have found a place to train. He decides that since
he doesn't really need to return to the dojo before dinner, two hours away, he
could get in some more practice. He started with the dribbling drill that Kenji
had shown him that afternoon. By now, he could keep the ball under control so
long as he did not move.
After around an hour he could keep control of the ball walking around the court.
Half an hour after that he could keep control while running from one end of the
court to the other around fifty percent of the time. That is, so long as he
didn't try anything fancy, like bouncing it between his legs, the one attempt
had left him flat on his face. Satisfied with his effort for the day, he headed
home to face the inevitable questioning from a group of people he was beginning
to dislike more each day, his father chief amongst them.
After much badgering from Genma and both verbal and physical abuse from Akane he
got up and told them that from now on, this is how things would be. There was
nothing that they could do about it. His father protested of course, but by this
time, that was really all he could do. Ranma had been consistently beating Genma
for three years now.
For the rest of the week, his day's formed into a pattern.
Martial art's practice before breakfast and after dinner, Basketball practice
from the end of school until dinner. Come Friday morning He could perform a
basic dribble flawlessly, whether he was running, walking, standing in place, or
flipping in the air, he could do it without error. Happy with these results,
Ranma arrived at the gym that afternoon eager to see the game between the two
other schools.
Kenji was waiting for him by the entrance, "Good, you're here early, that
gives us an hour to get to the game."
He turned towards the gym entrance then and called out, "Akira, Ranma just
arrived, lets go"
Kenji turned back to face Ranma again, "Akira decided to come along with
us, Ryonan has a player named Sendoh that Akira wants to watch, he's pretty
good, but there are better players, Kainan's Maki for instance."
Akira wouldn't let that stand, he dashes out the door and gets right up in
Kenji's face, "That's not true, Maki is nowhere near as good as Sendoh!"
Ranma tuned the rest of the argument out, only listening long enough to learn
that the teams they were going to see were indeed Kainen and Ryonan. Two of the
top seeds both boasting number one players for the district, apparently the
centre for Ryonan was the tallest in the league, and had solid ball skills to
boot.
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During the one hour train journey both Akira and Kenji were constantly
talking about the two teams set to play tonight, their strengths, weaknesses,
how they had faired in the season so far, and who they most admired from each
team. From their descriptions Ranma was beginning to get excited at the prospect
of seeing these two teams play. He had always learned best by example, and by
the sounds of it, after tonight he should have plenty of new manoeuvres to
practice and eventually refine.
He had expected to be going to just another gym at a high school similar to
Furinkan, that is a hall primarily for school assembly with a basketball court
conveniently marked in the centre of the theatre.
Boy was he wrong!
Today's game was being played at Ryonan High school, said to be the number 4
team in the prefecture, also home to the number one freshman ace, Sendoh Akira.
Admired by the whole team who believe that no matter what, Sendoh will bring
victory to them. The school had a gym exclusively for basketball with multi
level grandstands on both sides of the court.
The place was packed well before game time, and looking around Ranma could not
help but think about what it would be like to play in front of so many people.
It was a good source of determination for improvement.
Suddenly brought out of his thoughts, he hears the signal for the start of the
game.
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The game is intense from the very beginning; some of the ball handling and
passing from Sendoh is magical. And the occasional dunk from each team open's a
slew of new possibilities, it is also becomes clear to him that basketball
requires a high level of skill and concentration, as it requires you to do a lot
of things at once. Keep track of surrounding players, plan your attack, keep
control of the ball, and know the strategy of the team. All these things are
required.
Ranma can also see that while Sendoh may be the best player for Ryonan and they
rely on him, He couldn't do what he does without the support of his team-mates.
Basketball is very much a team game. By halftime he thought he could see the
requisite skills that made a good ball team. Consistent shooting ability, in
both long and short range, supporting play by the team-ates, rebounds, both
offensive and defensive. As far as physical traits required for all this, speed,
stamina and strength by far stood out.
From watching the game it became clear that while his edge in speed over the
competing players wasn't that great, his stamina was miles above. He had no
doubt that he could play the whole game at full intensity and only break a light
sweat. He came to the decision that as his team-mates trained him in the
basketball skills he would train them in both speed and stamina drills, and if
any were interested would even teach them some anything goes.
If their team had the ability to constantly play at 100% they would have a huge
advantage over the others. Similarly with rebounds, lay-ups & dunks the
jumping ability provided through his training gave him a huge advantage. That
would take a ridiculous amount of time to teach, however he though he could get
the lot of them to match the height of Sendoh's jumps by the time the next year
rolls around.
By halftime Ranma thought he had the measure of the majority of moves each
player was using, though the tactics of the teams as a unit still eluded him.
From that time he just enjoyed the game and found that as Akira and Kenji had
told him he did appreciate the game, it was something else, being surrounded by
so many people, all fascinated by what was occurring down on the centre court,
he had never felt so alive, besides when he perfected a new kata or move in the
art. In the end, the score was 92 to 89, Kainen over Ryonan. However, it was
clear that Sendoh was the best player on the court, especially when he turned up
the tempo during the last quarter of the game. Ranma couldn't help but think
what he would be like if he had the stamina to play that way start to finish.
On the way home he had the thought to ask Kenji whether they had anything
comparable to a training manual from the martial arts. Suiting actions to words,
he asked, and found that there were indeed training manuals, and that he was
welcome to borrow them. He also asked about the clothes that all of the players
seemed to wear. To this query they just told him not to worry, they would get
some money from the club and go with him into town to get a set for him after
practice on Monday. Happy with this, they continued their discussion of the game
and upon arriving back in Nerima said goodbye and left. He found he liked the
feeling of having friends; he had never really had that in his life before.
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Turned out that Genma decided that since he was wasting time away from
training during the week, from that point on, they would train all weekend twice
as hard to make up for lost time. Really not caring at this point, Ranma just
went through with it. It's not like Genma could teach him anything new. On the
other hand, his father was the only person of comparable skill that he had met
so far in Nerima, so beggars couldn't be choosers, eh?
Should've known, his father was tired by midday -more like to lazy to continue-,
so after lunch Ranma grabbed his basketball and headed out to the court near
Tofu's. He was surprised to find that there were quite a few people there, as he
had yet to see anyone in the previous days.
No matter, this just gave him more incentive. He had an audience!
He decided that now his dribbling was okay, he should work on his jump shot.
Taking his place at the free throw line, he tried to remember the shooting
action of Sendoh. After a disastrous first few attempts he found that though the
ball was arcing correctly it either went to far or over toward one side.
Puzzling through this he decided it had to be from his shooting action.
His ball doesn't seem to have any backspin after he takes a shot, curious.
Watching the others on the court he saw that as they released the ball at the
apex of their jump shot's, they snapped their wrists. Giving it a try, he
performs the action.
Success!
Continuing this for the next hour it seems he has about a one in ten chance of
getting a basket from the free throw line. Next he began to change position
around the key, he practiced the shot at the various distances until he had
comparable skill from every position. Looking around, he noticed it was almost
dark, a bit shocked that so much time had gone by he took to the roofs, and
arrived home just in time for dinner.
When he came in no one so much as asked him how his day had been, Akane just
glared at him. He received a smirk from Nabiki, and Kasumi with her usual
indifference just informed him that dinner was ready and to take a seat at the
table. Not really paying attention to those around him he ate his dinner in
silence and then went up to his room. He fell asleep once again thinking over
all the manoeuvres he had seen at the match on Friday.
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Sunday proved much the same as Saturday with half the day spent on martial
arts and half on basketball. By the end of the day his accuracy had improved to
about one out of eight, not bad if he says so himself. Satisfied with this he
headed home and decided to watch some television, flicking the set on he changed
the channels until he found an American basketball league match, something he
hadn't seen in years. The teams involved were Chicago and Orlando. Watching this
was even more intense than the game over at Ryonan, however, it seemed to loose
something with you not being there in the thick of it. Oh well, you take what
you can get. After another quiet dinner he went to bed early that night.
After the usual morning routine he was off to school once again. Ranma did not
bother to wait for one of the others, he could do without being yelled at the
whole way to Furinkan, thank you very much. Jumping up on the fence, he starts
running towards Furinkan, wondering how things would turn out that week.
Once in class, to keep his mind off the glaring Akane, he began to listen to his
teachers, he found that while rather boring, it certainly kept him occupied, and
surprisingly, he didn't get in trouble all day!!
Bonus!
Happy with this, he jumped out the classroom window and rushed over to the gym
after school eager to try some of the manoeuvres he saw on Friday night.
Changing into a spare pair of Daisuke's shoes he decides to practice the move
where they jump up next to the hoop and place the ball in the hoop. After a
short warm-up, he dribbles the ball up to the free throw line and jumped, right
over the hoop. This drew a lot of snickers from the rest of the team.
Heh, new problem, now he's gotta practice jumping from different lengths and at
different heights, all being precisely judged to place him near the basket. With
around a half hour of training left he was happy that he had the jumping down,
through using a combination of trial and error, and use of the ability to judge
distance he got from his shooting. Deciding to bring up his thoughts from the
match on Friday, he calls everyone over.
Thinking for a moment he begins, "As you all know Kenji, Akira and I went
to the game on Friday night over at Ryonan. I noticed that the players tired out
very quickly and couldn't understand why, as due to my training I could play all
day long at full intensity and not really notice it. The point being that I
would like to know if you guys would like me to teach you some anything goes,
with focus on endurance and speed drills. This would allow us to play a game
start to finish no worries, something we really require with only six members.
I'll tell you now not to expect immediate results, as that's not how it works.
Anyway, what do you think?"
They all agreed and it was decided that from now on the second half of the group
meetings would be spent on martial arts training. Happy with the decision they
all hit the showers to get cleaned off.
From there, they all made their way over to the business district, to a sporting
goods store. In the basketball section they all start to show him the various
outfits available. After much mucking around, he decided he didn't really feel
like wearing the uniform of another team, as he wanted to make their own team
strong. He ended up getting four sets of Nike basketball uniforms. That is
shorts, shirts, track pants, jackets, and socks. Finding them surprisingly
comfortable, and much less restricting than his current clothing he decided that
that he'd wear these from now on, it's not like anyone would even notice.
Each one of them having bought something, they then went downtown and got
something to eat. Then they just hung around for a while talking about the
upcoming game's in the regional tournament and what they thought of each team in
the competition. During this time, they decided that they would all go to the
next game, Shohoku verses Ryonan as it would give them a chance to see two of
the best centres in the competition, Akagi and Uozumi.
Happy with the afternoon, and not really feeling like dinner, Ranma made his way
home and went to sleep. Little did he know that in just a few days his life was
going to take a rather dramatic turn.
--------------------To be continued.
----Please review.