[Ranma/Xover][FanFic] The Bet- Reluctant Bet segment 4 (repost)
Gregg Sharp
parts of Gregg's fic and truncated many, many lines. Hence, this is a
repost of the Reluctant Bet fic.]
The Reluctant Bet
Fourth Segment: Kasumi has a ball!
"...and so i'm Ranma, but it's more a job description than
i'm THE Ranma. i've visited a few dozen timelines, picked up
souveniers and gadgets along the way, and generally gotten
the short end of the stick. i'm supposed to play the part of
Ranma until the timeline stabilizes enough that it merges
with another existing line. Most of those involved want me
to follow the script for the mainline, but i think that's
pretty much screwed."
Shampoo nodded with a glance towards her pokeball. She
loved her Ponyta and could hardly imagine having to give him
up.
Nabiki thought about where she had just seen Akane, being
pursued by Pepe Le Pew, running at better speeds than Akane
had ever managed in Gym. She nodded in agreement, thinking
that this probably hadn't happened in whatever the original
timeline was. "So what happens to us when this timeline
merges with the mainline the way these others want?"
Grey winced, but he wasn't allowed to lie, and she *had*
asked. "They'll retro the real Ranma back through the
timeline causing the merger to flow backwards. Then the
you-that-is-here will merge with the you-that-is-there in
another timeline and you'll become one. You won't be aware
of any of this happening, and Ranma will just be some
martial artist that got engaged to your youngest sister."
"In this other timeline, are we happier?" Kasumi looked a
little uncertain. What she really wanted to do was have
Ranma call her mother back so they could finish the
conversation they'd had before Akane had disconnected the
line.
"Uhm, well..." Ranma winced. "Errr... that's kind of a
personal call, i guess."
Nabiki frowned. As far as she was concerned, that was a no.
Kasumi frowned. It had sounded like a 'no' to her. The more
she thought on it, though, the more it sounded like a
definitely not.
"So, what's needed to get this timeline to be like this
mainline you refer to?"
"Oh, i've got to be engaged to Akane. Can't stand bullies
or any of the rest of the crap she pulls, so i don't know if
i can do that." Grey thought for a moment. "You realize that
it's been forty years subjectively since i saw the original
comics, and that Shampoo having black hair indicates this is
a manga timeline and not the anime."
Kasumi filed away that their lives had been made into both
a comic book and TV series. She hoped she had gotten some
good lines.
"Ryouga comes in, challenges me, renewing a long rivalry.
Uhm. There's something about skaters kidnapping Ryouga who
turns into Akane's pet pig through a Jusenkyo curse like
Genma has. Uhm, then Shampoo shows up, trying to kill Ranma.
Later on, Akane gets kidnapped a few times..."
"HAH!" Akane said, entering the house from the backyard. "I
heard that! Don't discount me, I'm a martial artist, you
know! I'd LIKE to see someone try to kidnap me!" Akane threw
a few midair punches.
A voice with a vaguely French accent wafted on the breeze.
"Oh, where are you, my little cabbage?"
Akane shuddered and fled up their stairway. Her door could
be heard slamming, followed by the sounds of furniture being
piled up and moved against the door.
In the silence that followed, one could clearly hear the
same psuedo-French voice say something that sounded like.
"Ah, she is preparing our love nest! Darling, I love it when
you get so aggressive. Mmmmmm mmmmm mmmmm."
"AAHHHHHHHHHHH!" The sounds of furniture being tossed
aside, a door opening, someone running down the stairs, and
going THROUGH their front door followed the scream.
"M'sier Ranma, I fear that Pepe has failed." The French
skunk entered the room, head hung low. "I have not been able
to convince le petit femme to make love not war. Oooo LA
LA!"
"Pepe, return!"
Shampoo shrieked as the humanoid skunk launched himself.
Fortunately a beam from a pokeball interrupted Pepe's
attempt to capture an Amazon.
"Maybe i should've used Growlithe or Taz?"
"That was an evil thing to do to my sister," said Nabiki
with some amusement and envy. It was better than the thought
of she herself being the target of Pepe's affections.
"Oh my." Kasumi looked at the sphere Ranma held and
wondered aloud if he had anymore of those.
"Why sure, Kasumi. Three from a regular Pokemon world, two
from that crossover timeline with Warner Brothers, and four
from a *really* bizarre world." Ranma shrugged. "Or close
enough."
Shampoo stood up and proudly drew her own pokeball.
"Shampoo show you one Grey Ranma give Shampoo! Ponyta!"
Again the horse appeared. Kasumi was up and inspecting the
Ponyta before she was even aware she'd gotten up. "Oh how
pretty!"
Nabiki blinked and considered something. "Uhm, you gave
Shampoo that horse? Why exactly..."
"i like Shampoo. i was afraid that since this was a dark
manga timeline originally, she'd turn out to be an obsessive
violent moron with no redeeming qualities like in the later
parts of the manga."
"Shampoo really think she not want this timeline to rejoin
mainline." Shampoo said in a quiet aside to Kasumi. "Nice
girl think about this?"
Kasumi admired the fire horse briefly and nodded, though
she was just being polite.
Shampoo took it for something else, however, and smiled.
Just killing the obstacle (Grey) was not an option for
several reasons. For one thing, even if she could find a way
to do it, they might actually replace him with somebody who
was competent. At least that's what she told herself.
"So what else have you got?" Nabiki said with some
interest. That wasn't greed, after all, it was avarice.
Which was greed with class, of course.
"Hmmm?" Ranma put three cueballs similar to Shampoo's out
on the table. "Well, i originally had six, which is typical
for Trainers. Ponyta got along really well with Shampoo, so
i went ahead and gave her his pokeball. i hid one in Ukyo's
backpack for her to use. Another one for Sakyo. That leaves
Eevee, Squirtle, and Vulpix."
Ranma added two slightly different pokeballs. "Tasmanian
Devil and Polecat from the second world."
Four bracelets were pulled from a pocket to be set upon the
table. Nabiki saw that a single large gemstone adorned each
bracelet and immediately snagged one and examined it with a
jeweler's loupe.
"These i got from a strange little world that was kind of
like the Pokemon worlds but used *very* different methods
and had very different critters. Personally, i wanted to get
a Beholder but i heard those are hard to control, or a
Pegasus. Instead i got these, and i can't use 'em anyway.
Was going to give 'em to some of the Senshi in the last
world i visited, but they had their hands full with other
stuff."
"Why can't you use them?" Nabiki asked distractedly while
examining the opalescent black gem.
"You have to be of the female persuasion," Ranma said with
a shrug. "Only a female body can wear it, and only a female
soul can command it. Which i guess was why these were left
behind when temporal raiders killed the original wielders."
"Oh, how nice," Kasumi exclaimed, placing the white gemmed
bracer around her right forearm. It softly clicked into
place.
"What they do?" Shampoo examined the bracer with a blue gem
for a moment before snapping it into place around her own
arm.
Ranma blinked. "Guys? You're putting them on and you don't
even know what they do?"
There was a soft click as Nabiki fitted her own into place.
"Hmmm. Where's the latch to get them off?"
"ALL RIGHT, RANMA!" Akane looked winded, dirty, scraped up,
and thoroughly miffed. "You are going to leave my family
ALONE!"
Kasumi considered briefly and pressed the gemstone. A cloud
of white smoke poured out in response, forming a vaguely
humanoid figure which moaned like a wind.
"Air Elemental," Ranma explained. "Oh, and you might want
to try various attacks out. Like, oh, Whirlwind."
"Whirlwind?" Kasumi blinked.
The humanoid cloud changed into a funnel which surrounded
Akane and began spinning her around at very high speeds.
"Oh my." Kasumi was astonished, flabbergasted, slightly
amused. "How do I tell it to stop?"
The vortex stopped. Akane shot down the hall to crash into
her father, who had been spying for the past few minutes.
The smoke elemental moaned again and began changing shape.
"Uhm, what's it doing?"
"Ah, Air Elemental is evolving into Sylph," said Ranma with
a nod. "i've heard of this sort of thing but never seen it
myself. Like Bahamut turning into Neo-Bahamut. There are
three stages. Elemental to Sylph to Djinn. I think. Oh
dear."
This last was directed to Kasumi's twin. Except that her
hair was not bound, nor was she wearing a stitch of
clothing, and she had transparent dragonfly wings extending
from her back. Oh, and her eyes were blue. Solid blue
without pupil or iris. Well, that and her coloration was a
bit off. Sylph made a gentle murmurring noise as she
examined herself and looked pleased.
Ranma really should have known better, but was still openly
gawking at Sylph. "My goodness, i had no idea that any of
them were that close to evolving. i wonder if your two
bracers are anywhere near ready to evolve? As they were all
worn by people travelling together, they might all be close
to the same level..."
"Shampoo find out," Shampoo summoned forth her water
elemental and set the animated stick figure to hunt down
Akane for a quick fight. After all, it worked for Sylph,
right?
"Elements?" Nabiki held her own up. "Blue is water, white
is air, the one still on the table is obviously fire. So
black is earth?"
Liquid shadow poured out of her gem to form a blob near her
feet.
"Shadow, actually."
The sounds of battle briefly occurred somewhere out of
sight, before a ball of water rolled back into the living
room, with a struggling Akane being held in its grip.
"Ooops, release her," Shampoo commanded. Akane hit the
floor with a splut.
"Yyyyyooou..." Akane slowly got up. "I'll get you for
this."
"Shadow, hold her." Nabiki commanded. "Akane, calm down,
we're just playing around with some new toys."
Akane looked at the warm inky darkness now surrounding her.
"LET ME OUT OF HERE!"
The darkness crackled and began to expand.
"Oooo. Shadow is evolving into Nightshade!" Ranma sat back
to watch, trying not to let the etchi qualities of a nude
Kasumi bother him. "Uhm, Kasumi, you can request your
element to be a little less anatomically correct. That way
if you use it in public, there won't be problems from mass
nosebleeds.
Nabiki looked at her twin, formed of gleaming shadow, whose
arms were stretched like taffy to hold her sister in place,
and began to think of potential uses for such a thing. Her
mind boggled.
"Shampoo want to try again, mine not evolve!"
"THIS IS NOT FAIR! LET GO OF ME!" Akane began forcing the
arms away from her. The problem being that they stretched
and then snapped back.
"Nightshade, return." Nabiki held up the bracer and was
rewarded with the shadowy version of herself flowing into
the gem. "I just *may* be able to find a use for this."
"Sylph, would you mind returning to the gem?" Kasumi smiled
as her faerie twin merged back into the gem. "Oh how nice."
"So, like in a computer game, they gain experience and can
then 'evolve' becoming the next Hit Dice or Level of
creature?" Nabiki pondered the stone on the bracer before
finding the hidden latch and taking the magical device off.
Ranma thought for a moment. When the timeline was fixed and
he left, everything that he'd brought with him into the
timeline that wasn't native would instantly be teleported
with him. Except for healing potions and the like. Or at
least that had happened when he'd done the last job of a
similar nature. "Tell you what, Nabiki. You're getting a lot
more use out of that than i would, and i don't feel right
about staying here without paying you back somehow, so why
don't you keep it for now? Same with you, Kasumi."
Nabiki's hands clutched the bracer and she blinked. She
could keep this? It was hers? The very thought made her
feel... comfortable. Warm.
Kasumi smiled as she admired the silver and lapis of her
bracer. It had been *years* since a boy had offered her any
sort of gift. She rather liked this.
Shampoo shrugged. If they got to keep theirs, she might as
well keep hers.
Akane saw Kasumi blush, Nabiki looking possessive, and
decided that this had gone on entirely too long. "Whatever
you did to my sisters, you STOP IT!" Akane rushed forward,
intent on stomping this "Ranma" into the ground. NOBODY
could act that clueless and be for real.
Ranma blinked and scrambled but didn't get away fast enough
as a table was lifted and brought down on his head with
considerable force. There was a cracking noise.
Shampoo staggered for no immediately discernable reason and
began rubbing her temples.
Nabiki frowned at the angle the boy's head was lying at.
"Just great, Akane. Just great, you've killed him AGAIN!"
"Oh my. Akane, it is really not polite to kill guests."
Akane stared. "He MADE me do it! And honestly, how frail is
he? A mere 35 pound weight being slammed on his head kills
him! What a wimp!"
The body was consumed by flames. Ranma reformed in the
yard, unfortunately four feet in the air. There was a
startled yelp as he fell into the fishpond.
Slogging into the foyer, Ranma announced to no one in
particular that he was getting a bath, then into some dry
clothes.
Behind him, coccooned in a swirling ball of water, Akane
didn't hear.
-----------------
Ranma sat back, luxuriating in a nice hot soak. He knew the
drill. First you rinse in the cold water, then you lather
up, then you rinse off all the soap still using the cold
shower, then a hot soak in the furo. The Japanese were *big*
on rituals.
Ranma reflected that this was something he had really
wanted for awhile. Never mind the seriousness and difficulty
of the mission. In American apartments, particularly the
lowrent converted hotel types he had often stayed in, you
had a shower stall and frequent changes of temperature in
the water. As an incubus, he'd had much the same
arrangement. As a cyborg, his sense of touch and
temperatures had been dulled considerably.
A good relaxing hot soak, feeling the warmth of the water
radiate deep into tired and aching joints, was quite
welcome. A moment of peace and tranquility, where one could
let go of one's worries for that brief respite and just let
that calm enfold you.
The door slammed open. Ranma half-stood, jumping from sheer
startlement.
Akane's gaze briefly met his, then travelled downwards and
lingered.
"AHHHHH!" Ranma dove into the water and tried to cover
himself.
Akane blinked, realizing what she was doing.
"YOU PERVERT!" Ranma tried to reach his shirt that had the
pokemon pockets.
"WHO ARE YOU CALLING A PERVERT!" Akane continued covering
herself with her towel, sparing only a moment to glare at
the boy who had apparently slept with BOTH of sisters. AT
THE SAME TIME! "YOU'RE THE PERVERT!"
The sound of running feet and the outer door opened. Akane
slowly turned, an expression of looming horror on her face.
"That's the spirit, Akane! Take the initiative!" Soun began
crying. Why with this sort of thing, the boy would be
begetting heirs off all three of his daughters, and the
family legacy would be assured no matter which one he
married!
"That's my son! Oh, your mother will be SO PROUD!" Genma
began considering having the wife come by. After all, if
Ranma acted like this, Nodoka's skewed visions of manliness
may well be assuaged even if he WAS a wimp in a fight.
"Oh my!" Kasumi swept past the fathers and Akane, to look
in at the person trying to spontaneously master the ninja
Art Of Stealth by submerging himself in the tub. "My
goodness, things *do* look bigger underwater."
"Blub!" As an asthmatic, Grey had learned a pearl diver
technique to help build lung capacity. Now that he was
Ranma, he could likely hold his breath a fairly long time.
He was certainly giving it a try.
"AHHH!" Akane grabbed her gi and attempted to get dressed
and cover herself with a towel simultaneously.
"Hmmmm," hmmmed Nabiki, wondering if Akane would object to
these photos. Kuno might die from the resulting nosebleed,
though.
"Is OK if Shampoo scrub Ranma's back?"
"Oh my. I think he swallowed a lot of water when you did
that, Shampoo."
"Shampoo didn't mean to grab THERE. Though he better hung
than boys in village."
"Really? Hmmmm." Nabiki inspected what she could see
through the water. "Judging from what I've observed, he
*might* be pretty well endowed. We'll have to figure out a
way to check that out."
"Oh my. My my my my my MY."
"Package for Mister Tendo, sign here please."
<SHOOM> "Vulpix?! Vulpix!"
"Oh, these are so cute!" Kasumi reached for the next one.
<SHOOM> "Eevee! Eeevee! Eee!"
"Hmmm. That looks interesting, sis. Let me see one!"
<SHOOM> "Squirtle, squirt!"
Akane tied her gi top into place and plucked a sphere from
Nabiki's hands. "Watch it, you might let something loose..."
<SHOOM> "Ah, it is le petit young damsel! You have freed me
so that we may be reunited! Let us go to the Casbah!"
"AAHHHHHHHHH!" Akane fled. Pepe pursued, the two quickly
began a chase scene that went around the tub and then the
house at a frantic pace.
"Nobody was at the front door, so I let myself in. Do you
have a few moments to talk about life insurance?"
"Hi. We're opening a restaurant two blocks away. Flyer
anyone?"
"Bamboo, get your fresh cut bamboo!"
"Just think, Saotome, soon the schools will be united!"
"Vulpix?" The firefox inquired.
"Eevee!" The fox-squirrel indicated he had no idea what was
going on.
"Certainly, Tendo! Uhm, what's Kasumi doing with Ranma?"
"Looks like mouth-to-mouth. Hang on, sis, you're doing it
wrong, let me show you."
"Nabiki and Kasumi doing it wrong. Shampoo demonstrate!"
"Squirtle. Squirt." The turtle creature began snickering.
Humans were so silly!
"Oh, I see, Shampoo. Let me try again."
Ranma came to, and stiffened as he realized that there was
a tongue in his mouth that didn't belong to him. He fainted.
Akane ran in, to find an unconscious Ranma molesting
Kasumi! "DIE RANMA!"
"Ah my petit little flower."
-------------------
"So, my pokemon is a Vulpix?" Kasumi looked at the little
fox-critter purring in her lap. "What can she do?"
"Vulpix pix pix!"
"She's been trained in Ember and Tail Whip, Quick Attack,
Fire Spin and Flamethrower. i didn't realize you couldn't
train a Vulpix in Tackle so i did. i was never able to teach
her Confuse Ray." Ranma looked sadly at the two pokemon he
had just lost. The pokemon seemed happy, the two girls
seemed happy, but it felt like he'd been abandoned again.
"Eee eevee."
Nabiki fought to look unaffected and dignified with a
Miyazaki fox-squirrel clone rubbing his cheek against her
stomach from his position on her lap. It was a battle she
was rapidly losing. "Uhm, and, er, heehee, uhm, mine are?"
"Tackle, Sand Attack, Quick Attack, and Take Down." Ranma
frowned. Well, at least he still had Squirtle! Who was
currently making the acquaintance of the koi in the backyard
pond. He just didn't have the heart to try taking them away
when the pokemon were so obviously bonding with the Tendo
girls.
"Son, what's this about you being engaged to that Amazon
woman?" Soun glared at Ranma threatening to do the
demon-head thing again. Even if it hadn't worked the last
time.
"Name is Shampoo Jones. American transfer student from Los
Angeles. <Howdy, y'all.>" Shampoo tipped her cowboy hat.
"Ancient American custom state that..."
"You are NOT American," Genma interrupted, pointing at the
woman. "I recognize you from that Amazon Village!"
Shampoo frowned momentarily. "Oh well! Ancient Amazon law.
Ranma defeat Shampoo in challenge fight to save stupid
panda. Now Shampoo adopt Ranma into Amazon tribe where he be
brother to Shampoo!"
Genma paused. "'Brother'?"
Soun stopped in mid-posturing. "'Brother'?"
"And if stupid Panda try to sell Shampoo the way he sell
Ranma, Shampoo sell pandaskin rug very very soon." Shampoo
drew a sword from somewhere. "Does stupid Pandaman get
point?"
"Well, welcome to the family," Soun began crying. "Oh,
joy!"
Nabiki considered briefly. She considered the Eevee
tickling her tummy and the gemstone bracer currently hidden
by the sleeves of her kimono. How to keep her Reality from
rejoining with another one? "Well then, it's clear who
Ranma's fiancee should be."
"NO! ABSOLUTELY NOT! NO WAY!" Akane snarled at Ranma,
prepared to unleash her wrath.
"Why thank you, Nabiki," Kasumi said with a deep blush.
"Don't you think we ought to wait a little longer before
Ranma is engaged to me? After all we've just met."
"Hah?!" Ranma managed intelligently.
Nabiki thought about just shrugging and letting it go, but
no, what if *that* led to this timeline stabilizing! "NO
WAY. Ranma is *my* fiance!"
"Hah?!" Ranma managed, going from "Shocked" to "Where The
Heck Did This Come From?"
"Nabiki? Kasumi?" Akane said after she'd recovered from her
facefault.
"Oh what a joyous day!" Soun began, tears increasing to
flood level in volume.
Genma managed to look briefly unhappy as the flood changed
him to panda form, then held up a really big sign [Yay.
Yippeee. My son needs to be retrained in the martial arts
from the ground up, and he's engaged to the two of your
daughters who couldn't fight their way out of a paper bag.
What about the future of Anything Goes?]
"Indeed, what about it?" Ranma nodded as he assumed a
thoughtful look, still not knowing what was going on, but
yanking Genma's chain was just *too* tempting. "i know! If i
married Nabiki, we would carry on the Anything Goes School
Of Financial Arts! Becoming a force to be reckoned with in
international trade circles!
"If i were to marry Kasumi, with her skills in cooking we
could go with the Anything Goes School Of Domestic Arts!
Just think of the possibilities."
Another panda sign was hastily constructed. [I AM. That's
why Ranma must marry Akane! The future of Anything Goes
Martial Arts depends on it!]
"Oh, I see your point, Saotome." Soun nodded. "Akane and
Ranma are engaged! That is my final word on the matter!"
"Eeeeeewww," said Ranma.
"You... you... PERVERT! YOU PLANNED THIS, DIDN'T YOU?!"
<CRUNCH>
Nabiki and Kasumi winced.
There was the flare as the dead body of Ranma was consumed,
then reformed. "Well, at least it wouldn't be a long
marriage. i probably wouldn't get through the ceremony
before she killed me, and marriages are only 'until death do
us part.'"
"Well, you'd still have to consummate it," offered Genma as
a stalling tactic until he could think of a way around that.
"Eeeeeewwwwwww!" Ranma eeeewwed again. "Nasty!"
"WHAT?!" Akane exclaimed with a punch to the boy's head. He
blocked, and Akane grabbed the limb and snapped it at the
elbow.
"I really can't continue to watch him get killed," Nabiki
groaned. "Ranma! At least defend yourself."
"I'm still alive," groaned Ranma, finally looking up at
Akane. "Okay, Akane. You WANT a fight? You bloody bedamned
have got it!"
"Think you can take me? BRING IT ON!" Akane took a "ready"
stance. "Try me without the stupid 'substitute fighter'
crap!"
<snik. VSSSSSHHHHT. VUM>
Soun and Genma eyed the lightsaber uncertainly. "Errrr."
"Can't fight without your toys, huh? What a wimp!"
"i *can* fight without tools, but i'm a *lot* better
fighting in a civilized manner. Swords, guns, and high
energy weapons. Be glad i don't have an ion cannon handy,
you flatchested gorilla!"
"HA! You're not even man enough to use what you've got!"
"Oh, i'm sorry. i didn't mean to insult any *gorillas*!"
Nabiki looked back and forth. "Uhm, time out, people try to
calm down. It's not worth..."
"OH SHUT UP!" Ranma and Akane chorused, their eyes never
leaving each other. If looks could kill there would have
been two corpses in the room.
Kasumi winced, having a sudden image of Akane coming apart
in neat little one inch slices.
Shampoo got a nice seat out of the way, munching a cracker,
having a sudden image of Akane coming apart in neat little
one inch slices.
Akane moved forward, beginning a spinning back kick.
Ranma moved forward, the lightsabre swinging over and to
the side in such a manner than most likely would block the
kick, and remove someone's leg at the same time.
"ENOUGH!" An unfamiliar voice proclaimed.
Ranma vanished. Akane stumbled through the space her
opponent had occupied a moment ago.
"Where'd he go?" Akane started looking around. "HAH! The
coward! I knew he couldn't face me!"
"Jusenkyo," answered the voice of a woman as she slowly
pulled herself out of their television set. "He wasn't being
enough of a Ranma."