Chapter six of Soun and Genma's… Operation Conquer the World!
Soun Tendo looked up at the ceiling of his room and sighed. He was having a bad day, no a bad week, why? His unstoppable penguin army was defeated by a mere hurricane yesterday… Soun sighed again, it was depressing. Looking out his bedroom window he saw that the sky was dark and cloudy, just the weather to suit his mood.
"Well, back to sleep." Soun muttered to himself as he rolled over and tried to go to sleep again… only to be startled by his dog, Storm, bursting into the room and showering Soun with sloppy doggie affection.
"No, Storm, bad dog!" Soun yelled, or tried to as Storm continued using his dreaded Anything Goes Super Sonic Dog-tongue attack.
- - - - - - - - - -
Kasumi looked up as her father descended the stairs and walked into the dining room with Storm happily nipping at his heels. It was good to see that her plan to cheer her father up enough to get out of bed had worked. Kasumi continued to watch her father as he walked past her out into the back porch and… suddenly rushed back in, slamming the backdoor behind him. Kasumi looked up at her father's face and was startled by the feral grin that he wore as he threw back his head and laughed somewhat maniacally.
Kasumi was spared anyone noticing the slight look of concern when Genma Saotome walked by Soun and said something in a low voice that caused Soun to explode, showering the room with blood and gore. Kasumi shook her head, clearing it of the daydream-like vision she'd just had. It really was like father to overreact and blow up like that.
"No, Genma! I will not allow you to use the family dog in one of your training schemes!" Soun shouted at Genma.
Genma put his hands up defensively and replied calmly, "But you just said that you hated 'that brain-dead flea-trap of a mangy animal', right?"
"Yes, Saotome, I did, but I was just a little upset at Storm for licking me like that." Soun explained, taking a deep, calming breath before continuing. "You know I trust you with my life, our plans, and even enough to join our schools together… but there are just some things that I can't allow, and messing with my dog is one of them."
"Fine Soun." Genma said, but there was a gleam in his eye that Soun didn't like. "I'll just have to think of something else."
- - - - - - - - - -
Ranma and Akane raced to school, well Ranma raced, trying to get there before the rain-clouds above decided to break and the torrents of cold water fell down upon the cursed martial artist. He shivered at the thought and ran faster.
School was very much uneventful, until Ranma caught Nabiki selling pictures of his girl-side to Kuno… somehow she even had ones with his fight with Ryoga after his shirt had been destroyed. Needless to say he wasn't happy about the middle Tendo's new method of attracting income, it made him feel dirty… but we're getting ahead of ourselves, here's how Ranma found out:
As Ranma rounded the corner of the school building, we saw Kuno shamelessly handing Nabiki several large bills as he asked her for all the information that she had on the wonderful, delightful, and enchanting Vibrant Pig-tailed Goddess. To which Nabiki pointed to Ranma and said: "All you want to know can be answered by Ranma."
Kuno, enraged by the mere name of 'Ranma', rushed over to the pig-tailed martial artist and screamed "Why? Why must fate torment me so?"
Ranma stared at him and blinked, then he shrugged, "I dunno, maybe it's fun to torment you…"
Kuno looked at him for a moment and then tilted his head in thought, mumbling "Yes, that could be it… for who else but I, Tatewake Kuno, would Fate deign to take such an interest in?"
Ranma was speechless, he felt something that he'd rarely ever felt before. Something evil and alien, something that squirmed in his bowels: empathy. Shaking his head, Ranma tried to bonds the strange bonds before they could form. He had decided on an appropriate taunt to goad the other boy into a fight, but as he opened his mouth the kendoist smacked his palm and interrupted.
"That's right! What do you know about this girl?" Kuno pulled out the photos he'd just purchased and showed them to Ranma… unfortunately, the one that Ranma saw was the worst one, a picture from his fight with Ryoga.
"W-what are you doing with these?" Ranma yelled, his voice almost breaking into a squeal, then lowered two octaves as he growled "Just what were you going to do with these?"
"Well, I was going to take them home and then lovingly place them into a photo-album, then place that book into my shrine, right under the poster I bought from Nabiki Tendo" Kuno began, then continued in a suddenly different, almost tv infomercial announcer-like voice, "Only $19.99 +tax, hurry now while supplies last!" before continuing in his normal voice,"And, alas, when the time of the sunset wouldst draw nigh, then I wouldst sit in betwixt the posters and meditate on the virtues of my two loves, Akane Tendo, and the Pig-tailed goddess!" Kuno exclaimed in a near-religious frenzy, then sighed, then drooled for a moment, and finally snapped out of it by yelling "WHY MUST I ASK ONE SUCH AS YOU, FOUL SAOTOME, OF MY PIGTAILED GODDESS?"
"Because," Ranma started explaining, continuing with all the care and civility he could muster, "You idiot! You saw me transform into her, and transform back! I am her, she is me! Body, soul, everything, it's all me… you deluded moron."
"Indeed foul one, I saw you trade places magically with that fair maiden…" Kuno nodded in understanding, "BUT I HAD NO IDEA THAT YOU WOULD BE SO EVIL AND CRUEL AS TO ENSLAVE HER… YOU… YOU… BLACK HEARTED SORCERER!"
By this time the shouting had attracted many spectators, and Nabiki was already organizing bets for the impending fight, and so it was no surprise when Ranma wound up and let Kuno have a nice right-hook to the face.
That's how the fight started, anyway. And most of it was rather boring, Kuno would strike and Ranma would block, or Ranma would strike and Kuno would block. Sure there were some dodges and flips, the double-twist, from-the-waist, back-flip totally caught Ranma off-guard though, and he barely managed to hold his footing…
in fact, he didn't really recover, as Ranma was watching Kuno he saw a photo flutter out of the Kendoist's uniform. Knowing that he had pictures on him, and that was why they were fighting, Ranma ignored it and focused his attention on Kuno, only to do a double take as he realized it was a picture of Akane.
Ranma quickly snatched the picture out of the air as he barely dodged the attack, "Hey, Kuno, doncha know that Akane'll kill you if she fin…"
CRACK - Ranma was interrupted by the kendoist bringing his bokken down hard squarely on the top of his head. Ranma winced in pain, and several students made the pun about a 'splitting headache', while Kuno stared at his bokken or rather what remained of it, as it had broken in half upon the contact with Ranma's exceptionally hard skull, then he burst into tears and ran home, crying about his prized, genuine "Super Samurai 2000" bokken.
"Ranma!" A female voice called out in a concerned tone, which resolved into Akane's voice as she ran over in, what most assumed to be concern for her fiancee, "Are you okay?"
She looked at Ranma and the bump forming on his head, it didn't look too serious, but then it was a head injury, so she should probably drag him to the doctor's... then she saw, clutched in his hand, a picture of her, in nothing more than a bath towel… "Ranma!" she growled, realizing what must have happened, obviously Ranma was showing off the picture and Kuno was defending her honor, before turning on him and bending most of his joints, and one of his ribs, in directions they weren't meant to go.
Several students winced from the brutality, many more winced because it was determined that Akane had won the Ranma/Kuno fight and had lost all their bets… everyone except Daisuke, who walked happily up to Nabiki to collect the twenty dollar bet that, at ten-thousand-to-one odds, would pay for all of college.
"Always bet on the violent, tom-boy, penguin!" He said to Hiroshi as he passed, not even noticing how close he came to being ripped apart by a savage beast as Akane glared all the malice she could muster at the boy.
– – – – – – – – – –
Akane grumbled as she walked on to the doctor's office, dagging her lump of a fiancee behind her. True, it had been her fault that Ranma was now little more than a moaning ball of human pain and agony, but the idiot had brought it on himself… hadn't he?
Akane shrugged, it didn't matter, she supposed. Then she looked up at the sign on the doctor's door and bellowed "Dr. Tofu! I have a patient for you!"
It was a few minutes before the door opened and a young man wearing glasses and in his mid-twenties opened the door and let her in. "Well, hello Akane! I didn't expect to see you for a while… did you sprain your ankle or something?"
"No…" Akane said, blushing at the doctor's interest in her, true that it was professional interest, but the crush she had on the man thrived on any interest at all. She jerked her thumb over her shoulder to indicate Ranma, "It's this guy here."
Dr. Tofu looked at the tangle of human limbs in front of him and nodded, "You'd better bring it, um, him inside."
After getting everything set up Dr. Tofu turned his attention to Ranma pulling her, pushing there, twisting that, and mumbling to himself the whole time. "This is awful, brutal… almost like some sort of violent monster got a hold of him…"
Akane reeled back as if the doctor had slapped her, tears welling up threatening to burst into a full-fledged cry… That was when Dr. Tofu looked back at her and her awful expression.
"Akane…" Tofu said, realizing that she was deeply hurt, "did you do this?"
Akane poked her two index fingers together embarrassedly, unable to look the doctor in the eye, "Well, Dr. Tofu, I…"
'Yeesh!' Ranma thought, mentally gagging, 'What's with this ridiculous "sweet, innocent girly" act she's putting up?'
Dr. Tofu laughed and slapped his knee, "Akane, you've got to loosen up and not take things so seriously!"
"Doctor Tofu?" Akane asked, wondering what this meant.
"Well, I thought the damage pattern looked familiar…" The doctor pointed at several places, "See that twist there, that one there, and the way his thumb is bent backward, and the way these two fingers are dislocated and tied together."
Akane nodded slowly, then it hit her, Dr. Tofu had been teasing her! She blushed and giggled, remembering what people said, that if a boy teases it's because he's interested. She took that moment to daydream about herself and Dr. Tofu running down a beach. Laughing, giggling and kissing madly. Until a storm-cloud that looked like her dad suddenly appeared and smote Dr. Tofu and scolded her for leaving her true destined love, Ranma. Then the Soun-vision suddenly laughed sheepishly. "Sorry, Pen-Pen, I thought you were Akane for a second."
Akane shuddered, whoever heard of a day-nightmare... daymare… whatever it was it sent shivers of rage down her spine. Her father wold pay! Oh, how he would pay… for an instant Akane thought of cursing him with Jusenkyo, but then realized that she had more of a chance cursing herself instead, and she really did love her dad, really!
Snap! Crack! POP! Whack! Smack! The doctor had become a blur of movement and Ranma a screaming mass of strange, painful sounds that made Akane wince in empathy. The doctor chose this moment to strike up a conversation with Ranma.
"Hey, you're Ranma, aren't you?" The doctor said cheerfully an his patient gave a bloodcurdling, yet affirmative, wail of pain. "I hear you're Akane's fiancee, is that right?"
Dr. Tofu completely missed Akane suddenly blanch and nodded to Ranma's reply: "YeAAAAWWW!"
"I see, I see." The doctor nodded as he popped Ranma's shoulder back into place. "Well, you needen't rush into it, I mean you're still kids!"
"I'm not a kid!" Akane screeched, then calmed, a bit, "Besides, it's not our fault! Our parents decided for us!"
Dr. Tofu nodded, "I see. It makes sense, I mean look at the number of marriage that fail when the two 'lovebirds' choose, I mean, your parents couldn't pick anyone worse, right?" Dr. Tofu chuckled and smacked his knee as if it were an amusing anecdote.
– – – – – – – – – –
Kasumi Tendo scratched her head as she examined a book she'd just found in the back closet. For some reason it looked familiar, and then she remembered. A year ago she'd borrowed the book from doctor Tofu but… Nabiki had told her that she'd taken the book back to Dr. Tofu.
Kasumi scowled, a truly terrifying thing to behold from anyone living under the Tendo roof, Nabiki would get such a tongue-lashing when Kasumi returned home from delivering the book back to Dr. Tofu.
Kasumi's eyes brightened for a moment, she would like to make him a cheesecake as a way of apology, after all the man simply loved cheesecake.
– – – – – – – – – –
"Gyah!" Ranma shouted as soon as the barrage of joint-manipulation lessened, "That hurts, you know!"
"Does it?" Dr. Tofu asked, concern rippling over his face, "It shouldn't…"
Ranma's face brightened as he realized that it didn't hurt. It didn't hurt! "Wow, I don't hurt anymore... that's amazing!"
That's when the phone rang and, since Dr. Tofu was far too polite to brush Ranma's thanks off to answer the telephone, Akane found herself answering it. She heard what the person on the other end said and her eyes went wide with horror, it was a disaster. She was coming. The rival for Dr. Tofu's heart… almost anything else Akane could forgive, anything but that… Akane slammed the phone on the receiver, shattering it, and growled, that witch wold get what was coming to her, but not now, Akane had to plan against this one, she couldn't use only muscle.
"Come on, Ranma!" She grabbed Dr. Tofu's arm and broke for the exit.
"Akane?" The doctor asked, wondering what had gotten into the girl this time. "What's wrong."
"Oh! Dr. Tofu… N-n-nothing's wrong at all." Akane shook her head violently, trying to get the doctor to drop the line of questioning… "Where's Ranma?"
"I think he's still inside." Dr. Tofu said, more than a bit surprised t how quickly Akane had pulled him outside.
Akane didn't have time for this! She looked frantically around trying to decide the best way to grab Ranma and exit the doctor's office without encountering her most-hated rival.
"I said we have to go!" Akane yelled as she rushed back in and grabbed Ranma.
Ranma, for his part, was just finishing a good rousing blink as he wondered what happened to everyone. "Hey! Akane, what happened?"
"WE. HAVE. TO. GO!" Akane loudly enunciated to her reluctant fiancee.
"Why?" Ranma asked, totally oblivious of the growing frantic nature Akane was displaying, especially when Dr. Tofu walked past to take care of all the equipment he'd used on Ranma.
Akane stopped and looked at him, almost crying, "B-b-because there's someone Dr. Tofu likes… and she's coming here."
"What? Really?" Ranma asked, his interest piqued, despite his utter disdain for the normal school-gossip… he looked around to make sure nobody was listening and lowered his voice, "Who?"
Akane opened her mouth, about to speak, when she was interrupted by a knock on the door. "Oh no! That's her!"
"Really?" Ranma couldn't resist satisfying his curiosity and rushed over to open the door dragging Akane behind him. "Let's see who it is!"
Akane's expression was pure horror as the young martial-artist reached for the doorknob, and opened the door, revealing Kasumi.
"Kasumi?" Ranma asked… that was completely unexpected.
"Kasumi." Akane half spat out, as if it were a bad tasting word.
"Kasumi!" Dr. Tofu said as he entered the room to answer the knock.
"Hello Dr. Tofu." The eldest Tendo daughter smiled and held up a book, "I came to return this."
"Oh! So, that's where it went." Dr. Tofu gratefully accepted the book with a warm smile, "Thank you."
"Oh! And doctor…" Kasumi held out another item, a container, "This is for you! I wanted to give it to you because I'm sorry that I kept your book such a long time."
Dr. Tofu and Kasumi were completely oblivious to the fiery electric-gaze of an "evil-eye" that Akane threw in Kasumi's direction. But Ranma was more than a little unnerved by it… you would be too if that same girl had just twisted you into a pretzel.
– – – – – – – – – –
Now an explosion wasn't all that uncommon in this particular section of the city… but the person involved was.
Genma left the smoking shed coughing, it really had been too bad, he'd almost gotten the Class II weaponry stabilized into the chassis. He sighed, or rather would have, if he hadn't been able to upgrade almost all the other systems on the robot. In fact Soun's auto-repair droids should be finished in a few hours, and then he could try again.
Genma shrugged and entered the house to visit the kitchen and make something to eat… for some reason he had a craving for a bacon-duck burger.
– – – – – – – – – –
"K-Ka-Kasumi!" Dr. Tofu's glasses steamed up as he looked at the contents of the container, he danced like there were ants in his pants, or like he'd stepped in cat-poo, only instead of being bad things he had a big, goofy grin plastered to his face.
Akane couldn't stand it any more… and if she blew up at Kasumi here than Dr. Tofu wouldn't like her anymore, she just knew it. So, grabbing Ranma she stormed out of the office.
After leaving, with every step she took, Akane seemed to loose some of her angry energy until she burst into tears. Crying that she could never, ever, never, not-in-a-million-years, ever, be with Dr. Tofu.
Ranma lifted an eyebrow. "Well... why not?"
"Didn't you see?" Akane asked, unable to decide wether to be surprised or angry at Ranma's ignorance. "It's obvious that Dr. Tofu loves my sister… and not me."
"Reeeally Akane?" Ranma asked, a twinkle in his eye warned her that he was up to something, but she either didn't notice it or didn't care.
"Yes, Ranma!" Akane retorted, then sadly added, "Dr. Tofu loves Kasumi."
"I'll say!" Ranma agreed with a sudden cheerfulness that made Akane want to rip out his teeth... slowly, especially when he started to laugh, "I'll say he loves her cheesecake!"
Akane stopped, dead in her tracks. Cheesecake?
– – – – – – – – – –
Soun left the house with Storm firmly on his leash as he exited the building to take Storm on his walk. Soun smiled as Storm did the things he'd always done on their walks, first he happily retrieved the paper for Soun, next peed on Mrs. Yamada cat, one of the nine-thousand the crazy cat-lady kept, then they crossed the street to taunt some of the neighbor's dogs, Sparky in particular today.
Had Soun understood dog-speak he would have been quite interested.
"Hi Sparky, what's up?" Barked Storm.
"Hey Storm! Not a lot on this side of the fence… say did you get those motivator units or that high-grade wiring?" Yipped Sparky.
"Nope… and I can't continue construction of it until I get those materiels." Storm whined in reply.
Sparky wagged his tail as he thought of a great idea to cheer his friend Storm up. "I know what'll make you feel better!"
"What?" Storm tilted his head quizzically.
"Sniff my butt!" Sparky's cheerful and excited reply came.
"Um… no... I don't think that's a good idea." Storm protested and declined the offer.
"Oh, come on! You know you want to!" Sparky encouraged.
"Well…" Storm said indecisively, being swayed by his friend, Sparky could be persuasive in his own ways, "Okay… I suppose I could do it this once."
Well, in hindsight, maybe Soun wouldn't be interested in the dogs's conversation.
Storm stuck his nose through the fence after Sparky turned around and began to do what dogs do… only to be interrupted by Soun's face right there.
"Whatcha got here boy?" Soun gave a sidelong glance to Storm, "Why do dogs sniff each other's butts anyway?" Soun took a couple of sniffs… "That's foul, it's like Hormel chili topped with a month old dairy-shake that someone left on their computer and forgot about…"
Sparky turned around and excitedly yipped, "Wow! He's really good at this game! I just had that stuff!"
Storm tugged on his leash, trying to get Soun to come with him somewhere else. "Come along Soun! You're embarrassing me!" He muttered under his breath.
"Well, I hope that you get that thing built soon Storm!" Sparky yipped at his retreating friend and his human.
– – – – – – – – – –
Akane walked the rest of the way home in a sort of zombie-like state… could it really be that Dr. Tofu was interested in the cheesecake and not Kasumi? Part of her wanted it to be so, that way she would be able to get Dr. Tofu herself, another part of her dreaded the revelation… it could mean that Dr. Tofu was interested in older women! That thought alone was almost worse than thinking that he was attracted to Kasumi rather than her… Akane sighed, could she really have been so blind? Was it really possible? Or was it Ranma teasing her?
Akane growled as she decided that it must be some trick that Ranma was playing on her and was about to jump on the unsuspecting bloke when she was interrupted by Dr. Tofu dancing with his model skeleton?
"What's going on?" Ranma asked in a whisper as he leaned over to Akane.
"That's Betty, Dr. Tofu's skeleton… and he always dances with her like that when he's deliriously happy."
"Oh..." Ranma lifted an eyebrow, "He's... something else."
Akane nodded sadly, "He sure is."
Author's Notes: Okay, here's a new chapter after such a long time! I bet you guys thought I'd dropped this story, right? No such luck... I just couldn't get to the Tofu scene. Also, now the mystery of why dogs smell each other's butts has been revealed and you know that it's a game where they try to guess what the other ate.
As for Dr. Tofu, is he attracted to Kasumi… or does he just have an unhealthy obsession with cheesecake? Only time will tell.
Anyway, I recommend you read "Genma ga kutsushita guujin desu!" by Carrotglace at http://www.fanfiction.net/s/660958/1/, it's highly amusing and I think anyone that likes this crazy story will get a kick out of that crazy story.
SleepingBear - I fixed the two capitalizations I missed. And yes, It is shameful that I didn't notice them.