Enter a New Ryoga

Ukyo was pacing her living room, waiting. Ryoga had been scheduled to start the following Monday. They had done everything they had planned to do to prepare for his first day of school. They got him his school uniform, his "additional" clothes, worked through several possibly thousand scenarios of his talking to girls and what to say when he came across them, his stance, his walk, his smile, his hair, and on and on and on. They practiced and prepared so many times that Ukyo found that she was more exhausted than the time she had to cater to 3 large tourist bus full of old timers, who had accidentally took a wrong turn and found themselves in front of her restaurant.

"Where in the world is that jackass!" she grumbled under her breath as she continued pacing. Today, like most days she was wearing her male school uniform just so she could walk and talk with Ryoga without bringing too much attention to herself when with the lost boy.

He came running in, huffing, his hair unruly and the buttons on the dark gray school uniform not aligning with its respective slots. "Sorry, I'm" huff, huff, "late. I couldn't find your place. I," huff, "got lost."

She rolled her eyes and pulled him to her. She unbuttoned the bottom 3 buttons that were misaligned, re-buttoned them correctly, and took a comb to his hair, running her fingers through them afterward to give a purposefully unruly look. "We're going to be late," she grumbled but didn't scold him, instead grabbing his hand and started running toward the school.

"Whew! We made it!" said Ukyo, grinning. They had just missed the closing gates and were headed toward their class with all the nearly late comers or those who were merely lounging around, waiting for classes to start. She looked behind her and saw the lost boy's nervous gaze.

"Hey," she whispered, "there's no need to be nervous, okay?" She squeezed the hand she was holding but suddenly let go, realizing that she was in school grounds and she was dressed like a boy. While most of her classmates knew she was a girl, that didn't mean the whole school knew. She didn't want to start rumors that the new potential eligible bachelor of the school was gay. Plus even if she had been wearing the female uniform, she mused a second later, she didn't want there to be rumors that she and Ryoga were dating.

"Follow me," she said as she placed a hand on Ryoga's shoulder, ensuring that he did not wander away and suddenly find himself in the girl's locker room.

So busy was she going through all the things she needed to remember that she nearly missed the quiet "thank you" that came from his lips.

...

"Hey Uchan!" came a voice that Ukyo immediately recognized. A large smile formed on her lips as she pushed Ryoga into their homeroom classroom. She immediately spotted the pig tailed boy cross-legged sitting on Akane's desk, which was surrounded by several other students, and walked over to them.

"Hey guys!" she said, smiling widely.

Ukyo watched as Ranma leaned back to look behind her. "Hey, who's the new guy?"

Ukyo turned to see Ryoga staring at the ceiling near the door where she left him. She rushed forward and took his arm, dragging him to the group. Immediately, she noticed the girls staring at him then smiling and giggling. The guys were silent, just staring.

"Ranchan, you can't tell me that you don't recognize your own friend."

"Huh?" Ranma scratched his head and looked back at the guy standing next to Ukyo. He did look familiar. "Hey aren't you that guy that hands out taiyaki on offft!"

A fist shot out and hit Ranma square in the face.

"Hey! What'd ya do that for?!" yelled Ranma, jumping off Akane's desk as the onlookers watched, eyes wide.

Ryoga stood with his face turned slightly away from Ranma, his nose just a little bit upturned.

"Wait!" Ranma gazed at the guy, his eyes narrowing, "Pig-boy?!"

"What? Ryoga?" came Akane's voice.

Ryoga's eyes widened as he slowly turned to face her. He hadn't seen her there. "A-Akane." There was a sharp pinch on his thigh. "Uh, hi Akane," he said, finishing the greeting off smoothly.

Just as Akane was about to respond, Ranma's foot came out of nowhere, about to strike Ryoga's jaw when a large spatula diverted his attempt.

"What'd you do that for?!" he yelled, turning to Ukyo.

Ukyo was smiling. "No fighting in class, Ranchan."

"Uh, right." He turned to Ryoga, grinning, "What are you doing here anyway, P-chan?"

Grr. Pinch. "Well if you have to know Ranma, I'm here to study."

"You? Study?" Ranma burst out into laughter. Ryoga's hands formed into fists, the veins on his arms twitching when he felt yet again another pinch on his leg.

Ryoga shrugged, seeing Ukyo smile approvingly from the corner of his eyes and slowly walked to an empty desk where he dropped the bag that he had carefully placed across his shoulder to make it look like it was carelessly done.

Ranma's mouth was wide open and Akane too was watching Ryoga as if she had never seen him before in her life.

"Not polite to stare, Ranma honey," said Ukyo as she grinned, moving toward the desk right in front of Ryoga's.

"Teacher's coming!" said a boy that Ryoga surmised was the male class president and the students stood as a short woman with glasses, who looked to be about 50, entered the room.

"Good Morning class," she said with a voice deep for a woman's.

"Good Morning!" rang the class in response.

"Oh good, I see our new student is already here," she said, indicating to Ryoga. "If you could come up here and introduce yourself, young man."

Ryoga stood and felt his legs trembling.

"Remember what we practiced!" hissed Ukyo as he passed her and he nodded almost imperceptibly back.

Right, his inner voice said. Remember, a class full of genderless blots, no wait of blobs, no of genderful blots. Wait no! He felt his eyes widen as he found himself only a few steps away from the front of the class. Gender blobs, gender blots. Genderless—. He found himself standing in front of the class, the eyes of 20+ students staring back at him. A bead of sweat started to form at his temple. I can't fail this! If I fail this then I fail at all chances with being with Akane.

"Ryoga?" came the teacher's voice.

Right. Blobs, no, Ukyos! His voice came out the deep, stable and mature tone that he and Ukyo had worked on in the past 5 days. "My name is Ryoga Hibiki. I've started here after a long absence from school. It's a pleasure to make your acquaintance." He bowed slightly, only his neck and upper shoulders falling a few inches before he stood back up.

"Fantastic, dear!" said the teacher, enthusiastically patting Ryoga on the back. "If you guys have any questions for Ryoga, don't hesitate to go up to him and chat a bit. Eimi, if you could be so kind as to show Ryoga around the school today." A Ukyo with large dark purple hair in the front of the class nodded.

She must be the female president, Ryoga noted, remembering what Ukyo had told her about the roles of the class presidents.

Ryoga made his way back to his seat but not without first noticing an even more incredulous look coming from pig-tailed boy. Ryoga felt an involuntary tug of his lips.

...

Ukyo had made it so that on their first day, Ryoga would not be anywhere without her at least 3 feet within his radius. Things were, surprisingly for once, going smoothly. Everyone was talking about the new boy. Ukyo herself had heard several comments, indicating that their plan was working.

"Who's that new guy? He's so dreamy!"

"Have you seen the new kid? He's so pensive! I've never seen someone look so sad and dark and he's so tall!"

"The new guy has such soulful eyes! I wonder if he has a girlfriend?"

Ryoga had, for once, been doing exactly what they had spent the previous days practicing. He was mostly quiet, stoic, distant but nice when spoken to. He kept his words short but polite. From afar, he looked like a guy that was bothered by nothing.

But of course, Ukyo knew this was not true. The reason she kept a 3ft radius around him was so that she could swoop in as soon as she saw his legs tremble or his eyes widen and pinch him, albeit a little roughly, on his thigh. She was sure there would be some bruising by the end of the day.

Ukyo had been heading over to the gym, passing two boys deep in conversation.

"I heard he beat some guy into a pulp at his old school and that's why he was transferred here. The guy he beat up is still in a coma." Ukyo rolled her eyes, seriously when did the crazy rumors start. Then she stopped in her tracks, oh no, if these types of crazy rumors were going around school that meant only one thing, there would be challenges. Every time a new tough guy entered the school, the school crazies, jocks, bad boys, wrestling team, kendo team, etc. were either going to jump him or issue a challenge one by one. It was almost tradition.

Not that she was worried about Ryoga. She knew he was a good fighter and could handle the guys at her school really well but they had never gone over scenarios like these in their training. What if he forgot himself while fighting and made a fool out of himself or what if he brought down the whole school with his goliath strength?

Ukyo started running, sudden realization dawning on her. Oh no, the gym!