Chapter 1: Something's Different at the Tendo's
I stretched as he prepared to get to work on the next chapter of Anti-Shadow Ranma, when he suddenly sensed three presences behind him. As he turned around he saw the three Ranma's from his current stories, all but the one from Dragonstar ½ in their cursed form.
Me: Hey guys what are you doing here?
Reyvateil Ranma: Hey Kithrin me and anti have a bone to pick with you about what you did to us.
I gulp nervously and flick my eyes to dragonstar's Ranma (DS Ranma).
DS Ranma: I'm ticked because you had my next chapter done on paper for nearly six months, and you tried killing my story.
I looked at the three of them and took a deep breath before yelling: Saotome final attack!
The three look at the dust cloud I left when I used the attack for a second before dashing off after me.
Me: Hope you enjoy the story while I try and lose these guys.
On a wet dreary day two figures walked down a street after a brief rain shower, in a ward of Tokyo called Nerima.
To all appearances the two figures were soaked to the bone. One of the figures was wearing a red silk shirt witch clung to her obviously feminine curves and a less clingy, but no less wet black kung-fu pants. She was walking with an irritated expression on her pretty face, but other than her expression, wet clothes, and hair showed no sign that she noticed being soaked. She was lugging around a large backpack and duffle bag, both of which looked like they weighed over fifty kilos'. Curiously there seemed to be something different about her feet, but it was something that most people would seem to have a hard time putting their finger on.
Next to the feminine figure walked an apparently nervous panda on its hind legs. In contrast to it's companion it seemed miserable. The panda waved around a sign that said, 'C'mon boy we need to get to the Tendos'.' Meanwhile the panda was thinking, I hope we can keep her calm when she finds out about the engagement.
The two stopped in front of a gate to the yard of a house. The girl looked at the sign about challenges, and emulated a sigh. "Pops are we challenging this dojo?" she asked. She then poured hot water on him from a heated flask that she convinced her father to buy, so that they could talk after he gets wet.
"No this place belongs to an old friend. We are meeting him due to an arrangement before you were born," Genma replied nervously.
Her eyes narrowed as she caught the nervousness in his voice, but she let it pass.
Genma entered the gate and knocked on door to the house, and soon several pairs of feet could be heard running toward the door. The door flew open and a man in a grey gi swept Genma up in a hug with a cry of, "Genma!"
"You're embarrassing us dad," a young woman with short brown hair said.
Soun let go of Genma, and turned toward Ranma. "And this must be Ranma," he said before sweeping her up in a hug. Soun stopped as he realized that hard curves that have no business being on a boy were pressing into him. Soun pushed Ranma away and looked at him closely, unable to figure out what was wrong.
The short haired girl walked over to Ranma and looked at her with a critical eye, grabbed her chest to confirm her suspicion, and said, "Congratulations dad you engaged us to a girl."
"A Girl?" Soun said right before his eyes rolled up and fell unconscious.
--------Five minutes later inside the house.--------
Soun's eyes slowly open o find himself surrounded by his daughters except Kasumi, Ranma, and Genma.
"Some fiancée dad, he's a she," Nabiki said, as she grabbed Ranma's chest for emphasis.
"Let go," Ranma growled out dangerously, which made Nabiki do so with a shocked look toward the pigtailed weapon.
"GENMA HOW DARE YOU DECEIVE ME! YOU SAID YOU HAD A SON!" Soun yelled, while going straight to his demon head attack on his old friend.
Kasumi, who was coming in to talk to Ranma with a disturbed look on her face, paused at the door at seeing her father in full demon head.
"Wait Soun, I can explain!" Genma replied while sweating buckets.
"Allow me, pops," Ranma said. "Two months ago we trained at a place called Jusenkyo. The stupid old man over there took us there even though he couldn't read the guide. Well long story short, if you fall into any spring you become cursed to turn into whatever drowned in the spring last when hit with cold water, and hot water reverses the effect. Pop's curse works like that, but something seemed to go wrong when I fell in making it so that water doesn't affect me, and I can change at will as long as I follow certain rules. Due to those rules I must spend a minimum of twelve hours a day in my cursed form."
Kasumi interrupted, with her expression even more disturbed by the story, her father's response, "Ranma, could I talk with you?"
"Okay… umm who are you?" Ranma replied, while she stood up, and started to follow her into the hall.
"My name is Kasumi," Kasumi said as she lead the pigtailed android to where the packs were left.
Ranma immediately saw that the duffle was ripped, which let the rusted hulk within show. "I can explain," she said nervously.
"What could your excuse be for letting her get into this condition? It's practically criminal to let such an advanced piece of technology to get this bad." Kasumi scolded her with a glare.
Hope bloomed in Ranma's heart as she asked, "Could you help me repair her? I've been trying ever since I found her in the spring I fell in, and have been trying to do so." Ranma emulated a sigh, and continued, "I have been unable to do much, because I don't know much about electronics, lack all but basic tools, and almost no knowledge of machines."
Kasumi's eyes lost their edge, and turned gentle as she replied, "I can try. Could you bring the packs and her upstairs? The packs can be dropped in the first door on the right, and after that I'll lead you to my room. We can start after that."
Ranma nodded, picked up both packs, and dashed heavily up the stairs. After a few minutes she rushed back down stairs and gently covered the damaged android with the remains of the duffle bag and picked her up.
Kasumi led Ranma to her room, opened the door, and motioned him to lay the broken form on the ground. As Ranma started to gently unwrap and set the damaged weapon on the ground Kasumi started to rummage around under her bed. In a few seconds a hidden compartment was opened up, and she then dragged two large toolboxes from within. Once the toolboxes were out she dived back underneath her bed and came out with a set of cloths.
"Ranma, could you step out for a bit? I heard that you were cursed, so I'm assuming you were male first, and I would like some privacy to change," Kasumi asked.
Ranma nodded, and walked out the door. I wonder what pop's is up to? With that thought he walked to the top of the stairs. As soon as he arrived he heard a shout from downstairs.
"I'm not marring that pervert!" an angry voice declared loudly.
"Father Ranma is obviously more a girl than a boy, do you actually care about our reputations?" a calmer, but still angry voice asked.
The sound of crying and blubbering carried up the stairs even clearer and louder than the voices.
"Where is that ungrateful boy?" Genma's voice demanded.
Then someone spoke from behind Ranma, "you can come in now, Ranma."
Ranma turned around to see Kasumi, dressed not in her house dress, but instead a durable set of pink coveralls, that clung just tightly enough to show off her figure, with a hand sewn pair of linked gears, one gold and one silver, over her heart, and around her waist was a leather tool belt. The coverall was covered in enough grease stains that showed that they have been well used, besides the stains the coveralls where immaculately clean. Her expression also seemed to change from demure pseudo housewife to confident mechanic.
"I thought you wanted my help, Ranma?" Kasumi asked with a smile. She then turned around and headed back to her room.
Ranma shook her head which removed an irritating, 'Does not compute,' message from her eyes, and replied, "Sorry," before following her back to her room.
As Ranma arrived in the room, she saw the android lying down with an assortment of tools and electronic devices surrounding her.
Ranma felt overwhelmed as she always did when she pondered the repair job ahead of her, and the various tools and devices surrounding the damaged android compounded the feeling greatly. She closed her eyes for a second while she wished could take a deep breath to steady her nerves, and opened them again before asking, "Where do we start?"
"Damage assessment, if we don't know what's broke we can't fix it," Kasumi replied.
"I did a bit of that with my limited skills. All limbs over seventy to ninety percent of both the outer covering and the internal parts rusted almost through, while the outer head and torso areas are about the same the internal parts look good to my eye, if a bit dirty in places," Ranma explained.
Kasumi blinked at the assessment briefly before recovering, and replying, "Well then, let's start with the head and torso as they have the least corrosion, and should be easier to determine what we need to do to repair them, and if what you say about the limbs is true then we will probably need to pretty much replace them wholesale anyway." She then picked up a 'weapon' in each hand, put one in her mouth, and 'attacked' the rusty hulk on the floor. In less than five minutes the limbs were detached, the coverings on the head and torso were off, and the mechanical guts exposed.
Ranma's eyes were wide as she watched the whirlwind of activity that was Kasumi. Her hand suddenly snapped out and prevented Kasumi from touching something on the chest of the dismantled android. "I don't think you're supposed to touch that Kas-chan," Ranma said.
Kasumi blinked at both the comment and nickname, but nodded anyway. She then took a clean soft cloth from her toolbox, removed the component with it, and handed it to Ranma. "Clean this for me will you?" she asked.
Ranma nodded, and carefully started cleaning off the gunk that accumulated on the component due to it being partially outside of the chest area while in the pool of water. After the crud was removed a opal-like component was revealed. The component was Identical to the silvery gemlike component on her chest. Ranma shook her head at the proof that she was the same as the rusted body on the floor and took out a second cloth from one of Kasumi's toolboxes and wrapped the component in it.
Meanwhile Kasumi was perplexed; all the components of both the head and chest seemed solid. The only component that seemed to have a problem was the one that she handed off to Ranma to clean. Her eyes turned toward the place that the component had rested. She turned toward Ranma, and said, "Please hand me the component that you cleaned, Ranma." She pulled on a pair of nylon gloves before taking the cloth from Ranma, and unfolding it. "Pretty," she muttered before placing it back where it belonged. "Hmm, nothing happened."
Ranma remembered the text that showed up when she awoke in the spring, and hesitantly spoke, "Umm, the generator, and/or batteries might be dead…"
Kasumi frowned at Ranma before replying, "I thought you said that you didn't know how to repair her?"
"I don't some of my info comes from my curse, such as the component I said not to touch. I guessed the generator, and batteries from other info that I acquired from the curse. The actual mechanical and electrical work is far beyond me," Ranma hastily replied.
Kasumi's frown vanished, and was about to reply, when a knock sounded at the door. A voice spoke out after the knock, "Kasumi? Ranma? Our fathers want to talk to you."
"We'll be right down," Kasumi replied. After she heard Nabiki walk away she turned toward Ranma and said, "Help me hide her before you go."
Ranma nodded, and quickly took a small tarp from a toolbox, set all the pieces of the disassembled robot on it, and gently wrapped it up. She then slid the package she created under the bed, carefully to avoid blocking the hidden panels.
After the rusty robot was safely stored, Ranma jumped out of Kasumi's window to get back to ground level.
Kasumi smiled at Ranma's antics before cleaning up her tools, changing back to her normal outfit, and hid her tools and coveralls under her bed in the secret compartment. She paused to make sure that the compartment and tarp were hidden before exiting the room in the normal manner.
End Chapter
Me: Leave me alone! Would you prefer I do the same crosses as everyone else?
Reyvateil Ranma: *Gasp* you could *gasp* at least *wheeze* have given me a stronger form *feints*
Me: One down hope I can keep running long enough for the other two to calm down. Hmm, I think I can get rid of DS Ranma by typing up his next chapter. See you next time!
Anti-Ranma & DS Ranma: There he is, GET HIM!
The three run off toward the sunset leaving Reyvateil Ranma laying unconscious before Mir comes in and drags her off.
