Chapter Twelve
Because the curses that Ranma, Genma, and Shampoo had in this reality were different than the ones Akane had been so familiar with, Akane was prepared for the possibility that Ryoga's curse had been different too. Part of her wondered if he even got cursed this time around or if Ranma still knocked him over the cliff while chasing Genma. Now she was getting her answer.
The thing that emerged from the water was large and bulky, and appeared to be one four legs. 'Did he get the panda curse?' Akane asked herself, the water briefly obstructing all but the obvious shape. But the water fell off him and revealed Ryoga's alternate form.
"A cow?" Akane asked herself, seeing a bovine wearing Ryoga's headband. "You fell in the Spring of Drowned Cow?"
Ryoga stepped out of the fountain and made what was probably the cow version of a growl. It intimidated no one.
If anything Shampoo started laughing. "Not just cow, girl cow."
"What do you mean?" Akane asked. Taking a closer look at Ryoga, she noticed the udder almost hidden from view. And while Akane wasn't an expert on animals, she did know that only female bovines had udders. "Wow, Spring of Drowned Female Cow?"
Ryoga looked annoyed and Ranma didn't know whether to be amused or annoyed as well. "Ryoga, you think you've got it bad? Try this on for size." He suddenly switched to his female form.
"Wait Airen!" Shampoo warned before she switched to her fox form and came up to her now-female fiancee.
"Huh?" Ranma asked, just seconds before the crowd from Furinkan showed up. 'Ah, now I get it. Wouldn't have been good for them to see my centaur form.'
"Hey, where'd that cow come from?" Sayuri asked.
"I don't know. It was here when I came." Akane lied. "Maybe if we leave it alone its owner will come back for it."
Ryoga made angry grunts when crowded by the students and they took the hint to keep their distance. The lost boy then tried to charge at Ranma, which of course to everyone else looked like a cow trying to trample a girl.
"Get out of the way!" A girl shouted to Ranma.
The young Saotome was confident in her strength, but not as much in her female form and she didn't want to find out right now. Grabbing Shampoo she jumped over the charging Ryoga, landing a kick on the top of his bovine head in an effort to knock him out. It didn't seem to work, and the cow slowed down and turned around ready to try this again.
Having no reason to doubt the circumstances of her own strength, Akane chose this moment to pull out her trusty mallet and slam it in Ryoga's face before he could gain speed. She didn't make the cow go flying over the moon like the child's poem says, but it did tip over like people visiting farms try to make them do sometimes. On his side, Ryoga struggled to get back on his feet, or hooves, and Akane leaned down, looking like she was pinning the head while she whispered to him.
"Listen to me Ryoga Hibiki. If you don't want me to sell you to a farm in Kobe you will calm down and give up this fight. I am not even close to kidding."
"Where's Ranma and Ryoga?" A male student asked, clearing the area for them.
"Not sure. I think they went that way." Ranma answered, pointing in a random direction.
"Great, now we'll never know for sure who won." The same student mumbled.
Nabiki suddenly got a great idea. "Alright everyone, due to the disappearance of the fighters all bets are considered void and will be returned as normal. No one wins and no one loses." 'I may not profit from this, but at least I won't go bankrupt. And that's victory enough under the circumstances.'
Ranma stepped up and put her hands around her mouth to amplify her voice. "Hey everyone! Nabiki rigged the match! She gave Ryoga pills to boost his strength! I saw it with my own eyes!"
The students looked aghast to hear this while Nabiki's associates were worried about being found out. Nabiki just lightly glared at the redhead. "You can't prove anything."
"Then empty your pockets. All of you. Prove me wrong." Ranma countered.
Nabiki looked a little worried. 'Oh crap, I still have the bottle on me. Sure they were only placebos I gave Ryoga, but if I'm caught I'll lose my reputation completely.' She then got a desperate idea, and pointing away from herself. "Hey, I think I see them over there." Everyone quickly looked where she was pointing, even Ranma and Akane just to see what she was really pointing at, and during the brief moment no one's eyes were on her Nabiki took the 'vitamin' bottle out of her pocket and chucked it away from her.
"I don't see anything." A student said, and everyone looked back at Nabiki.
"Must have been some shadows then." Nabiki said as she emptied her now evidence-free pockets. "See? I got nothing on me. I did not tamper with the fight."
"Ranma, did she really do that?" Akane whispered to the redhead who nodded. Akane then looked back at her sister. "Mark my words Nabiki, you will regret what you did."
Nabiki narrowed her eyes. 'She's probably bluffing, but my sister's never actually threatened me before. I better keep my guard around her and Ranma for a while.' "Everyone will get their money back and better luck next time. As for the cow, let's just leave it here. I'm sure someone will come and claim it."
Not wanting to be picked up by some random person who'd send him to a slaughterhouse, Ryoga decided to get out of there and ran down a street. No one bothered to chase after him.
Ranma looked at Akane. "By the way Akane, some guys were talking about getting rid of me so they could have you."
Akane frowned. "I guess some of the Hentai Horde just changed approaches this time around. Any idea who they were?"
"There were five of them, and they didn't say who they were or anything, but they had mallets that made the ground blow up."
Akane couldn't place any names or faces to that description, and she knew in her vision no one else did anything during Ranma and Ryoga's first fight so she wasn't given an answer from there. "I don't know anyone like that, but we'll find them and make sure they don't try anything like that again."
"It's her! The demon I told you all about!" Kuno shouted once he saw the female Ranma.
Instead of the reaction he expected, which was everyone taking arms against her, the crowd looked annoyed. "Yeah right man, you said the same thing about the Chinese girl in Ranma's class. Why should we believe you?" One of the students asked skeptically.
"I'll prove it." Kuno said, brandishing his bokken then charging at Ranma. Akane stepped in and hit him extra-hard with her mallet, sending him flying and hopefully far enough to land in the next district.
"That idiot. It was bad enough when he made all those boys assault me, now he does this? I'm this close to transferring schools because of him." Akane vented. 'And knowing what's to come at Furinkan later, transferring doesn't sound like such a bad idea right now. But for now, I need to think up a way to get Nabiki to stay out of Ranma's business. Maybe Shampoo could help me if she's still got some Amazon tricks up her sleeve.'
That night Nabiki was sleeping peacefully, dreaming of swimming in money like she once saw a Disney character do when she was a child. She sure was happy, until suddenly the money started to feel a little damp.
Nabiki began to wake up but the damp feeling didn't go away. 'What the...?'
'Click'
Now more aware, Nabiki turned towards her door where she saw Shampoo with fox features grinning and holding a camera. "Gotcha."
"What are you-?" Nabiki started but felt something she knew she shouldn't. Her blanket had been removed exposing her, fortunately she was wearing pajamas, but her waist was visibly wet as were her sheets. And with her desk lamp on it was an obvious site. "What the hell? How did I...?"
"Shampoo use pressure points on you. One warning Mercenary Girl, no get involved in Airen's business. Or else all school see photos."
"You're blackmailing me?" Nabiki asked, not sure if she should be more shocked or offended.
Shampoo managed to look quite predatorial in her grin right then. "How like taste own medicine?"
Now Nabiki was glaring. "Give me the camera and negative and you'll get to walk away in one piece."
Shampoo did not look the least bit daunted. "What can you do to Shampoo?" She then left the room triumphantly.
'Oh, it is on now bitch.' Nabiki thought before getting to her closet and dresser only to find her night clothes and underwear had been completely cleared out. And later she would find the place where they kept the spare sheets was empty too.
The next day it was rather rainy, so Ranma and Shampoo stayed inside and only went out with umbrellas that had been bought for them by Akane and Cologne. Throughout the day little happened, but Akane did notice that her sister was in a particularly foul mood and brought it up around the others at lunch time.
"Oh that?" Shampoo asked. "Oh it nothing. Shampoo just torment Mercenary Girl last night."
"You did what?" Ranma and Akane asked in tandem.
Shampoo nodded. "I make Akane's sister embarrass herself and get proof. If she try something we no like, we show school photos. She not only one that has camera."
Akane was a bit humored by the irony of this, but for the most part she was worried. "You better be careful Shampoo. Nabiki can be quite vindictive when she wants to be and I've never seen anyone one-up her in a way she didn't bounce back from. If you're not careful, you could be in big trouble."
Shampoo just shrugged it off and took a bite of her lunch, which was a simple sandwich with orange slices on the side today. "Shampoo prepared for trouble. All martial artists are."
Ranma nodded, but Akane looked apprehensive. 'Strange, they're both so certain they can handle anything Nabiki throws at them.' "Tell me something, are you confident that you can handle anything Nabiki throws at you, or confident that since she's not a martial artist she's not a threat?"
"Shampoo know she not need be martial artist to be threat. But Shampoo trained for more than just martial artist opponents. Sometimes you face opponent that fight without fist or sword, but with tricks."
"Well, yeah my sister couldn't ever hope to beat the crap out of you, but she can make you miserable if she wants. One time in my vision she was competing with a cheapskate over who could create the largest bill and stick the other with it, I swear the fear I felt watching that physically hurt." Akane mentioned.
Shampoo just shrugged. "Good luck doing that to me. Great-grandmother have tricks too."
The day went by but Nabiki had yet to make a move. When school ended the rain had yet to cease. Of course only two students minded. Technically three, but Akane couldn't to the same degree Ranma and Shampoo did.
At the entrance though the two ignored it and pulled out their umbrellas from their lockers. Shampoo opened hers ahead of time and quickly noticed something. Her umbrella had thin cuts in it, ones that would surely leak and drip water on her in a matter of seconds.
"Airen?" Shampoo called.
"Yeah?" Ranma replied.
"Is you umbrella good?"
"Why wouldn't it?"
Shampoo showed him her problem by sticking a finger thru her own. "Shampoo's no good now."
"Here, you can share mine." He offered.
Shampoo perked. "Really?" She had been told that to the Japanese only couples shared umbrellas.
He nodded. "Can't let you get wet now can I?"
"Umm Ranma, maybe you should check your own umbrella first?" Akane offered, finding herself strangely not bothered by the thought of these two sharing an umbrella. By now it was clear Shampoo was no threat to her own relationship with Ranma, so Akane found herself not really minding the Chinese girl anymore.
Ranma opened his umbrella and inspected it. "Hey, mine has cuts too."
Curious, Akane checked her own. "So does mine." A flash of realization hit her. "Nabiki, it has to be Nabiki."
"Great, we either wait for the rain to stop or transform in front of everyone." Ranma groaned.
"And I bet even if we can go out there dry Nabiki's waiting to get you two wet still." Akane thought out loud.
"So what do we do?" Ranma asked.
Akane thought it over and got a sneaky idea. "Simple. We just don't go out front."
The two martial artists quickly got the implication, and with satisfied grins of their own went away from the front of the school and to the roof. Stepping out into the rain they all got wet and the first levels of their curses triggered, with Ranma becoming a girl and Shampoo becoming a fox-girl. Ignoring that, Ranma grabbed Akane and she and Shampoo roof-hopped away from the school before Nabiki could trap them.
Akane was marveled at experiencing this form of transportation. She could only remember one time Ranma took her roof-hopping in her dream, and ironically it was the time she had lost her memory to Shampoo's 411 shampoo. And during that experience she was terrified.
Right now she was enjoying the ride. Sure, she would prefer it was drier and Ranma was more masculine, but it was still fun. And she was amazed that despite how sleek the roofs had to be because of the rain neither Ranma or Shampoo faltered in their landings or jumps. It was like to them slippery simply did not exist.
In no time at all they reached the Tendo home. When they got there though they saw something unexpected. Not dangerous or odd, just unexpected. They saw a small dog scratching at the door, whining and hoping someone would let it in out of the way. Judging by the mud on it, it probably had been out here for a while or had rummaged for some food in the trash but found none.
"Dog?" Shampoo asked, getting behind Ranma. Her fox instincts didn't care much for an animal often trained to hunt her down.
Akane came up to it. "Maybe it belongs to one of the neighbors. It wouldn't be the first time one came by." The dog saw Akane and just stared at her. Not being an expert on animals, Akane wasn't sure what breed it was, but it looked like a miniature breed of what she knew as a collie. "Here dog, here boy, or girl." The youngest Tendo called gently, offering her hand out. The dog rolled its eyes but came up to her, allowing Akane to see a collar on it. "There's a tag. It says..." She stopped, her eyes wide.
"It says what?" Ranma asked.
Akane looked at the redhead. "Saotome."
No one said a word, just exchanged looks between each other and the canine. "That dog has my name on it?" Ranma asked.
"That's what it says Ranma." Akane said, but before she could read the rest of the inscription aloud, the dog got out of her reach and tried to jump on Ranma, unable to get above her knees due to its size.
Shampoo yelped and jumped onto the wall enclosure, hoping the dog wouldn't reach her. "What dog want?"
"I don't know." Ranma said, trying to get the dog off her. "Down! Sit! Stay!" The dog stopped pawing at her and barked, then actually gestured to the door. "You want in?" Ranma asked, and to her surprise the dog nodded. "Umm... Akane, did anyone in your dream have a dog curse?"
"What? No. There was girl, panda, cat, pig, duck, and minotaur-thing, but no one turned into a dog. You think this dog is a person?"
"All I know is no ordinary dog nods to a question." Ranma said, then looked back at the dog. "Does the word Jusenkyo mean anything to you?" The dog barked and nodded. "We got a cursed victim here."
Feeling better, Shampoo got down off the wall. "But who?"
"Let's find out." Akane offered, opening the door. The dog went in ahead of them all and shook itself dry, sending mud and water everywhere. "Bad dog!" Akane quickly scolded, but the dog just ignored her.
"Kasumi won't like this." Ranma commented, looking at the mess.
The statement reminded Akane of something that had been bothering her. In her vision Kasumi had done all of the housework except for some reconstruction when needed, and in truth she had been doing the majority of it even before Akane's dream. While her vision made her feel bad about her neglect of Ranma, Akane had come to realize he wasn't the only one she was blind to. Kasumi deserved a chance to have a better life too, and this time Akane would get the residents to help out. Heck maybe this would get Soun out of his funk better and Nabiki would have to take a break from some of her projects.
"I doubt she's here otherwise she would have let the dog in." Akane said, wiping some wet hair off her face. "Ranma, you take the dog to the furo. Shampoo, can you help me clean this?"
They nodded and Ranma led the dog that bore his name for some reason. She opened the door after ensuring the Occupied sign wasn't up, and even knocked to be extra sure. No response, so she went in. As expected, it was empty, but in the Tendo house you couldn't be sure until you were there.
Ranma turned on the water for the furo and adjusted the temperature for warm enough to change but not too warm to be comfortable in. "Any moment now you'll be normal again." She said to the waiting dog.
Soon the furo was full enough and the dog dove in. Only then did Ranma realize she forgot two important details, that she had no idea what the gender of this person was and the fact they didn't have any clothes to wear once human.
Too late to correct the mistake, a human emerged from the water. It was a girl with long flowing black hair with a moss-green tint to it, cut almost exactly like Shampoo's but maybe longer and with no buns on the scalp. She looked the same age as Kasumi, maybe a year older, though with her being in the tub it was hard to tell how tall she was. Her eyes were red-orange, and her apparent breasts were like Kasumi's too but a little bit smaller than Kasumi but bigger than Nabiki.
Ranma backed away in shock. "Who are you?"
"I'm Haruna Saotome. Now please tell me, where is my cousin Ranma Saotome?"
(Q)Which anime and character does Ryoga's new curse remind you of? Get a cyber-cookie if you guess right.
(Q) Which anime was the inspiration for Haruna Saotome? Get a second cyber-cookie as well. Don't worry, they taste as good as they sound.