2

I'm five years ago and three thousand miles away

Back in junior high, Ryoga's class did a group project about surviving on a deserted island.

The class was put into teams of four, and they had to come up with their guide to survival and eventual rescue. The team with the best plan of action would be free from cleaning duty the rest of the week.

Everyone had the basics down: water, food, shelter. A couple of kids had learned how to start fires during camping trips with their families. One student came from a fishing family and could explain the fastest and most efficient way to clean a fish while preserving as much of its flesh as possible.

For most, the concept of being stranded on a deserted island was a wildly hypothetical scenario that would most likely never happen to anyone in that room.

But for Ryoga, the probability of him defying those odds was not such a stretch.

His parents had done all they could to prepare him. They themselves both afflicted with horrible senses of direction, they knew it would pass on to their son. And during their lives, they had come up with strategies which would ensure they could live relatively normal lives and survive in case of emergencies much like the one presented as a fun classroom activity to kill an afternoon.

Winding up on an uninhabited island was no mere far-fetched fantasy for the Hibiki clan. It was practically an inevitability.

Ryoga knew every survivalist tactic inside and out, and that bountiful knowledge earned his team first place in that friendly classroom contest, and a glorious week off from cleaning duties.

Which nobody in his team was happier about than the second-best survivalist in their group of four.

Ryoga can still remember the conversation had after class that day, during his walk home from school.

It was easy enough to let the mind wander as he went about the tedious tasks of procuring decent shelter and collecting drinking water. Along with top-notch survivalist skills, Ryoga had also always had an incredibly vivid imagination.

Soon enough, he was no longer eighteen and collecting rainwater in an old coconut husk in the middle of who-knows-where. He was fourteen again, back in Japan, walking home from school…

"Man, I'm so glad I'm not back there clappin' chalk dust outta erasers with the rest'a those schmucks right now."

The buttons on Ranma's ill-fitting gakuran, which was too tight in the shoulders and too short in the sleeves, was already fully undone before the two boys had even passed through the threshold of the school's front gates.

There was only a threadbare tank-top beneath Ranma's jacket, instead of the required white dress shirt that Ryoga currently wore under his own uniform, still neatly buttoned right up to the collar. Ryoga waited until they had turned the corner before he reached up and popped the top button open, opening the collar up slightly.

Ryoga was in slightly better spirits than usual after that group assignment. He'd really gotten to show off his skills, and it impressed both his classmates and his teacher. Usually everyone thought he was a witless twit who couldn't tell which way was up, but today he had proved them all wrong. Not even his routine escort back to his house, which was usually something he greatly dreaded, could deflate the swell of pride he felt in this moment.

"Maybe now you'll think twice about trying to steal my lunch," Ryoga said as his nose pointed smugly into the air, "You always wind up getting stuck with the worst chores, too, considering how often you disturb the class. When you think about it, you do twice as much of the cleaning, so that would mean you'd owe me two weeks of no bread-stealing."

Ranma rolled his eyes. "Fat chance," he grumbled, "a guys' gotta eat. Y'know, a bad winner ain't no better than a sore loser. Might actually be worse. If the chicks find out you're an arrogant prick you'll never land a date."

The corner of Ryoga's mouth twitched slightly, but he managed to keep the smirk on his lips firmly in place. "Well, there aren't any girls at our school, for one thing," he bit out, "And secondly, you of all people would know all about being a bad winner, Saotome."

Ranma dismissed him with a wave of his hand. "You're just a crybaby. Besides, I'm goin' easy on you. Not like you're a martial artist. Just a chump that makes for an easy meal an' who's a tad more entertainin' to rile up than the others."

Alright, good mood gone. Ryoga's crooked smirk had quickly dropped down into a scowl.

"Yeah, well, maybe you should take me on for real sometime," he groused, glaring down at the pavement.

"You talkin' to your shoes over there?"

"I said you should fight me for real!"

Ryoga shot his glowering eyes over at Ranma, who had popped his own open wide in surprise at the sudden outburst. Then, they quickly crinkled up with mirth before Ranma let out a bark of a laugh.

"Hah! In your dreams. You're about a hundred years too early to think you could actually go toe-to-toe with me."

Ryoga's glare shifted into an annoyed squint. "And you think I'm the arrogant prick?"

"You were gloating, and ya got nothin' to back it up, no braggin' rights. So what if you can start a fire and build shelters outta leaves, big deal. I can do all that too, and I'd reckon a hell of a lot better'n you."

Leave it to Ranma to be the only one out of their class to remain unimpressed after Ryoga's triumphs of the day.

Ryoga squinted even harder, his lips pursing like he'd just shoved a lemon wedge into his mouth rind and all. "Oh, yeah? Well, how about you try it for real sometime and then come tell me how much better you think you are."

"I have, stupid," Ranma shot back, "you get to take a break from survivin', goin' back to that nice house of yours. Me, I'm roughin' it all the time. Done nothin' but survive since before I could even crawl. Never stay in one place too long, never knowin' where the next meal would be comin' from. That's how it's always been, and how it's always gonna be for me. That's what it means to be a martial artist. It's like my old man says, the life of a martial artist is fraught with perils. That's why I know you're not one, and that you ain't never gonna be one. You're never gonna catch up with me."

Ryoga came to an abrupt stop, and whirled around to face Ranma, his shoulders nearly touching the bottom of his ears as his whole body flared up with fury, like a cornered stray dog trying to make itself look bigger. Ranma had come to a stop as well, but simply watched Ryoga with a deadpan expression.

"I will beat you one day, Saotome!" Ryoga hollered, his hands clenched into hard fists at his sides as he trembled with rage. "You mark my words, I am going to be a martial artist, and the day will come where I am going to kick your ass so hard you'll be begging me for mercy!"

It was Ranma's turn to squint at Ryoga.

"Better watch yourself," Ranma muttered coolly. He folded his arms slowly across his chest as he stared Ryoga down. "It's startin' to sound like you're actually tryin' to challenge me."

"Glad you finally figured it out, moron!"

Ranma's expression grew even icier. "You really wanna do this?" he asked, and his tone had suddenly taken on a far more serious quality that Ryoga had never heard from the bread-stealing boy before.

Ryoga's determined scowl faltered for a moment, temporarily caught off guard. He had been expecting Ranma to laugh him off, to dismiss him like he always did.

"My pops told me it don't matter who issues it; that a challenge is a challenge," Ranma explained, "And that it's the duty of a martial artist to accept any and all challenges. It's the warrior's code."

Ranma unfolded his arms and reached out his hand toward Ryoga.

"If you ain't just blowin' hot air here, then I gotta respect that code. I'll take you on, no holds barred. But only if ya mean it."

Ryoga reached his own hand out quickly, but Ranma was quicker, pulling away before Ryoga could take his hand. Ryoga gave Ranma an affronted stare, thinking for an instant that Ranma had been pulling his leg after all. But Ranma's face hadn't broken out into a grin, his expression was still uncharacteristically solemn.

"I'm warnin' you, if we do this, I ain't holdin' back." Ranma told him, "I'm gonna come at ya with everythin' I got. This is a real duel, y'hear? I don't care if you're a weakling. If you're really gonna be dumb enough to challenge me, then I got no problem takin' you down."

Ranma offered his hand again, and Ryoga kept his eyes on Ranma's as he clasped it firmly with zero hesitation.

"I accept," Ryoga said stonily, "but I'll be the one taking you down."

Ranma let out a scoff, and his firm expression finally broke into a smirk.

He gave Ryoga's hand a tight squeeze, so hard Ryoga felt several of the joints in his fingers pop.

"Saturday. Meet in the vacant lot, the one behind your house." Ranma said, "And we'll settle this once and for all."

And the rest, of course, was history.

Practically ancient history, at this point. The bread feud was long over and done with, and that duel they'd never had in that vacant lot was made up for a hundred times over. And it was thanks to that rivalry that Ryoga was able to become as strong as he was today. Even more capable of survival than he'd been as a precocious fourteen-year-old.

Ryoga swiped at the sweat that had gathered at his brow before stepping back to assess his work.

He'd fashioned himself a shelter constructed from branches and large palm leaves. The rains had cleared up once again, and there was now a sizable fire going. There were a few small fish skewered onto twigs circling the crackling flames.

"Let's see you do that, Ranma." Ryoga said to himself.

Ryoga stepped over to the nearby rock which was holding a halved coconut husk filled with rainwater, and took a long gulp.

This island was not about to get the better of him. He was a survivor, and more than that, he was a martial artist.

His life was fraught with perils.

This was just another day for him. Just another opportunity to make himself even stronger. He would overcome this, just as he had every hardship that had been thrown his way before.

This was just another test from the universe, which had always relished in tormenting him. And he wouldn't give it the satisfaction of wallowing at his misfortune this time. If there was anything he'd learned over the years, it was to roll with the punches, both figurative and literal. Usually literal.

He was going to survive. He was going to get off this island. He was going to get back home, and he wouldn't need luck to do it, either. He would rely on the skills in his arsenal, and his strength. That at least he knew he could count on. He sure as hell hadn't gotten to where he was in life by being lucky, after all.

Luck hadn't put him on this hunk of sand and coral, and it damned well wouldn't get him off it, either.

The only thing that could do that, was himself.

The only question was how.

The first thing Ryoga had considered was simply just picking a cast-off point and starting to swim again.

There were a few reasons why he had eventually decided against it.

He couldn't just start swimming out into the open ocean. Even his body would eventually give out to exhaustion if he never found anywhere to stop to rest. Being stranded on land where there were at least a few sources of food and water was far better than being out at sea with nothing but endless ocean in all directions and nothing to do but tread water until his limbs gave out.

And even if he could go for days at a time swimming in open water with no food or water, just getting off the island in the first place posed its own list of challenges.

Even with all his strength and endurance, his body was still mere flesh and bone. The island was surrounded by coral reefs. And if the gash in the heel of his foot was anything to go by, then Ryoga certainly wasn't eager for a wave to overpower him and knock him into a particularly nasty cluster of razor sharp polyps. If he came out of it injured, it would be mildly inconvenient, especially if an arm or leg was banged up enough to be out of commission. It had been annoying enough already trying to secure shelter and collect food and water with the bottom of his foot cut by a stray chunk of coral.

Worst case scenario was he got battered against the reefs so badly that all he'd be good for was fish food as he bled out in the water.

So, that was out.

This was a lot like when he'd gone to the grocery store with his parents when he was a toddler. He was always told that if he lost sight of them that staying put was the safest thing to do. Help would come to him.

So, that's what he would do.

The best thing to do was to stay where he was, keep up his strength, and try and signal for some help.

Maybe he was close to a trade route, and would eventually spot a passing container ship or something. So far it had been tricky to spot anything out on the water. Summer storms kept rolling through, casting the sky into dark gray and making an already hazy horizon all the blurrier. The upside was that this meant there had been plenty of rainwater to collect, so his time so far had been spent focusing on that rather than playing lookout for passing ships.

Patience was the name of the game here. It had only been two days, and Ryoga needed to be prepared to be here for at least a few weeks. And being able to spot a ship himself didn't exactly matter—what was more important was that whoever was out there could see him.

He had tried to get several signal fires going along the beach, but the rains just kept coming.

He wasn't about to get annoyed by that, because rain meant fresh water he didn't have to figure out how to boil over a fire when all he'd been able to construct containers out of so far were coconut husks. So when the rains put out the fires and masked the smoke, Ryoga busied himself collecting water instead.

Straying too far from where he had set up all of his water-filled coconut halves and his shelter made him uneasy, considering he didn't have the wherewithal to recall where he had set up camp, much less how to get back to it.

Perhaps it would be a good idea to have several bases of operations across the expanse of the island, so he could move about freely and still be within reach of gathered resources and a place to be protected from the elements at a moment's notice. Something to look into.

The one good thing about being trapped on a deserted island—and Ryoga is a little surprised that he of all people could find a silver lining in this—was that he couldn't really get himself quite as lost as usual.

The island was mainly flat terrain, a smattering of trees were the tallest structures. There were no cliffs, no caves, no dense forests.

A little extra vegetation would have been nice for a different variety of tree fruit that wasn't papayas and coconuts, but at least the ocean was chock full of plenty of different kinds of fish, and the reefs no doubt teeming with crustaceans if he took the time to explore them thoroughly enough.

And time was something he had plenty of.

Time was also something he thought of often, just as much as home.

It had taken time to travel across the Bayankala Mountains. It had taken time to reach the ocean. Especially when he had done a majority of the journey on foot, so he wouldn't need to keep dipping into his funds. And it had taken time to swim for as long as he had before the storm had struck.

It had been five months since he'd left Japan, found a cure, and started the journey back home. Nearly half of a year already.

How much longer would he be gone?

He wonders what time had done to what waited for him back home. It always seemed like Nerima would never change, that it was the one thing time never seemed to touch. Maybe not the places, but certainly the people.

But it had seemed like there was a sort of precipice forming when he had left. The failed wedding had put things into motion that hadn't been before. A part of him almost wishes he'd stayed around to watch how it all went down. That part of him was also the part which missed his friends.

That truly was the worst of it. A pang of hunger in his gut, a parched throat, an open wound he can't keep the sand out of…none of that compared to the feeling of being alone, to the hollow ache that loneliness carved out of him.

One would think Ryoga was more used to that feeling than any other, that over time he would have just learned to accept it as much a part of him as one of his limbs.

And perhaps he would have, if he had remained alone forever, like he always thought he would.

But now he had people he wanted to get back to. He had friends, a girl who was as crazy about him as he was about her…

He wanted to see their faces, to hear their voices. What he wouldn't give for just a speck of the chaos that Nerima always had to offer. Ryoga doesn't imagine things have changed all that much in a year and six months. Ranma probably hadn't gotten the suitor situation in check, knowing him. Which meant that things with Akane were still in limbo. He was probably still pissing her off all the time, too, the jerk.

Ryoga would be sure to knock some sense into him if they still hadn't managed to tie the knot by the time Ryoga made it home. Although if those two weren't married when Ryoga got back, that would mean he could at least attend the wedding properly that time. He could bring Akari, and the two of them could get all dressed up. He'd never seen Akari in formal wear before, the thought of it is enough to get his heart hammering…

Ker-snap!

…Whoops. The tree branch he'd been trying to sharpen with a flat, sharp rock had broken in two. Guess he'd been holding it a bit too tight.

Sometimes his imagination was a little too vivid.

Ryoga let out a wistful sigh as the lovely vision of Akari in a gorgeous dress vanished from his mind like a popped bubble.

He rose to his feet and tramped through the sand in search of another good branch to use for a fishing spear.