[Ranma][FanFic] Mistaken Identity ch.4

[HARIJUBAL]

Author's Preword: Before I get started, I want to thank my
pre-readers. Sorry
that I haven't gotten to you before now, and you know who you are,
even if I
don't (sorry, my memory for names is absolutely horrid. I'm not even
sure what
my parents names are).

[Insert Disclaimer Plug]
[Disclaimer Plug inserted]
Ranma 1/2 is by Rumiko Takahashi.
Saotome Yuri is by me.

CHAPTER FOUR: Lots of flashbacks, and perhaps an origin or two.

The families Saotome and Tendo sat in the dining room. It was
evening, a
dark, muggy night. The tension, while not high, was present, leaving
all
slightly tense; except for Kasumi, who never saw any reason to worry.
The only
Saotome that was not in their cursed form was Yuri, who was looking
forward to
not having to live a lie (I am a WOMAN! Give me frilly dresses! I
want a
parfait! I have a MALLET, so don't piss me off! Ahem . . . sorry).
"So, you're Ranma, then?" asked Nabiki, trying to move the
conversation along
by stating the obvious. She often had to do this, and felt pretty put
upon.
So, when she did say it, she said it in as flat a way as possible.
Sometimes,
it just doesn't pay to be the one without tact.
"Yes, that is who I am," said Ranma in a stilted, polite manner.
She was
acting very much the proper lady after somehow changing into a kimono
(with
pastel overtones and a floral pattern), that drew many an odd look
from those
that did not know her, and a carefully hidden disgusted look from one
who did.

"Ah, yeah. And the guy that we thought was Ranma is actually
your sister?"
said Nabiki, once again hating to state the obvious, yet doing so
anyway.
"That is correct, yes."
"So, the question is then: Why?"
"Ah. That is something that I would like to know as well. I
believe that the
best person to answer that is Father. Father?" said Ranma as she
looked towards
her father.
"Mareeruruyru," said Genma. The sign he held however made a bit
more sense (I
know what you're thinking: Sense? From Genma? Now I know that this
is an
alternate universe). It read, 'Don't look at me, I'm just a panda.
Feed me.'
"Oh hohohohohohohohohohoho," laughed Ranma softly behind her
hand. Akane and
Yuri freaked slightly while getting Kodachi flashbacks. "That really
is quite
amusing, Father. Now, how about that explanation?" Nothing changed
about her,
but her eyes started glinting slightly. It could have been the light;
it could
have been her some of her ki coming out; but whatever it was, it gave
Ranma a
menacing look to her, though her face still had the same pleasant
expression as
before. Genma poured some hot water onto his head from a kettle. He
composed
himself as best he could and soon launched into his explanation.
"Ahem, yes, well. Um, where to begin. Ah!" exclaimed Genma as
he hit his
fist into his open palm. He grabbed the handle to the kettle once
more and
turned to Ranma. Ranma faced her father, still smiling, and her eyes
twinkled
once more. Genma put down the kettle and faced his audience. "Yes,
well. The
beginning is always a good place to start. [No one laughed.] It all
began when
Yuri and I went to China . . ."
* *
*
"HAH-CHE!" Yuri went, her nose as red as her hair and her eyes
not much
better. God, she hated her father. Stupid cheapskate, why couldn't
he just
pay for passage on the ship? After all, they had enough money, but
NO! they
had to stow away, and when they got found, they were dumped in the
middle of
the bloody sea! She sniffled once more, trying to stop the flow of
something
from her nose. As soon as she felt better, she'd kill him. Slowly,
and with a
very blunt stick. Heh . . . sniffle . . . snort.
"Stiff upper lip, girl; stiff upper lip," Genma said as he
pounded on her back
in a hearty manner. Ah, this was the life. No stifling, soul sucking
domesticity for him, no sir! Free and on the road, that was the true
secret to

happiness, at least for him. Oh, and someone to tort- . . . train.
He looked
at Yuri with a certain measure of pride in his eyes. Here she was,
far from
home, ill beyond all other illnesses that she had suffered in her soft
life,
and already she was planning to kill him. Ah, it really was true,
fatherly
pride is a heady feeling. Genma raised his fist high above his head
and shook
it slightly, tears flowing from his eyes.
Yuri sniffled and coughed for a few seconds before she sighed.
There he goes,
she thought, striking that stupid 'Machismo' pose of his. How can
this moron
be my father? He's not even paying any attention to me. Whoa! Heh
heh heh.
He's not paying any attention to me. I'd better not laugh out loud,
or he
might suspect something. Mwah ha ha.
Yuri looked around and picked up a convenient log. She picked
it up and swung
it backhand towards her father's head. Naturally, it did not connect.
Genma
had, a split second before it hit, ducked under the swinging log and
came up
inside the arch of her swing. He took out one of his wooden paddles
and
whacked her upside the head.
"Too slow, girl, much too slow. If you're going to ambush
someone, you have
to be quick and quiet. You have the silent strike down, but you're
concentrating so much on keeping it unseen that you're making it too
easy to
dodge when it is seen out of the corner of the eyes." He then took
out one of
his scrolls and started reading from it. It took a very long time.
At night, Yuri stared at the top of her tent, thinking. She
stared, idly
following an odd stream of thought that began with her father (the
jerk) and
ended with a bowl of cherries (boy, would they had been good right
about then).
If she were feeling particularly Freudian, she probably would have
been quite
ill; but since she didn't know much about Freud, she didn't and she
wasn't.
The nights of the wilds of China, so close to the greatest of mountain
ranges
this side of the ocean surfaces were peaceful, a peace during which a
soul
cannot help but reflect and be honest about oneself. It was as if the
absence
of noise created a vacuum that could only be filled by angsty,
introspective
psychological self-diagnosis. Yuri enjoyed that peace, if it could
have been
called enjoyed.
She stopped and got up from her sleeping bag and went to her pack,
rooting
through its contents.
After taking out most of the items found therein, she had located what
she was
looking for: a photograph. It was a picture of a boy, around
fourteen, with a
shocked expression on his face and his arms crossed in front of it; it
was a
picture of her brother Ranma. More than those jerks at school, more
than
anyone in the world, she hated her brother. And feared him, of
course. And
that was what made it so damned . . . inconvenient. Every time she
got around
him, she started crying like some sort of milksop. And she could feel
it, feel
her utter hatred towards him, just under the surface of her fear,
knowing that
if she could just stop being so damned frightened, that if she could
use that
hatred, that she could once and for all . . . what? What could she
do? Kill
him? Oh, that thought was sweet, so sweet, to rid the world of the
blight that
was Ranma. But . . . despite all that mother and even Father said,
she knew
that they still . . . loved that cold-heated, treacherous,
schizophrenic
bastard. He didn't love them, even before the argument; he was still
playacting as he always does. But did she hate him enough to kill
him? The
answer, of course, was yes. That was why she agreed to go train with
father in
the first place, so that she could be good enough to wipe that smug
smirk off
his face. But . . . but . . . did she hate him enough to kill mother
and
father? Because that was what would happen if she did follow through
with her
desire to smash in his face and grind his ribs into his spine! God,
how she
hated him. And god, how she hated herself.
Yuri tried to stop the tears, telling herself that it would make
her weaker,
take away her resolve. But sometimes the soul knows better than the
mind when
the right time it was to cry, and it was that time now. She cried
herself to
sleep, her illness and her moment of bitterness gone and forgotten the
next
morning. Amazing what a good cry could do for one's constitution.
They walked on, trekking through the wilds of China, stopping
occasionally at
an interesting training ground. Some highlights were the Pits of
Mortal
Danger, the Mountains of Extreme Peril, the Cairn of Falling Rocks,
and the
Plain of Large Rats.
"What the hell is the matter with you, Pop? Do you have some
sort of death
wish, is that it?" Yuri asked her father, incredulously staring at the
training
ground. This place had the fortune (good or bad depending on your
point of
view) to be called 'The Cave of Sharp Things.' It lived up to its
name. There
were some very sharp things in there. Very large, and quite numerous,
in point
of fact. Some were scythes that were swinging on pendulums that would
have
given Poe torturous wet dreams hanging from the ceiling. Some were
just
particularly jagged stalactites and stalagmites. It was filled with
pits,
blind turns, and lots of really, really sharp things that would give
you a nick
just by thinking of briefly glancing at them.
Genma was in heaven. Yuri was in hell.
"What do you mean, girl? This place is perfect!" Genma
enthused.
"Perfect? This is the sort of place that Nazis go into and only
their head
ever come out of!"
"Exactly. A challenge!"
"Oh, god. You do want to kill yourself. Well count me out! I
don't want to
die in a cave with badly rusted sword sticking out of my sternum.
It'd cramp
my style." Sure she wanted to train, but this wasn't training, this
was
damnation.
"If you truly want to learn the Anything-Goes style, you must
endure
masochistic, near suicidal, breakdown inducing, torturous training.
It is all
that and more that makes a true man out of you!" Once again, Genma
struck his
machismo pose.
"I'm not a man, I'm a girl," Yuri replied blandly.
"You know perfectly well what I meant."
" . . . Yeah, I do. Damn it. Oh, well. Come on, Pop, let's
get going.
Death is getting pretty impatient, I'll bet," Yuri said sardonically,
joining
her father in the cave's mouth.
"That's my girl! But really, you have to have a better
attitude. Confidence,
confidence is the key, girl. Without it, even the best-trained
martial artist
can be defeated," Genma stated sagely. Then he leapt into the dark
cave with a
whoop of delight.
"God, you must be crazy. And I must even crazier," she said,
mostly to
herself. Then she shouted as she followed her father, "Hey, you
stupid old
man! You forgot the torch!"
Several hours later found them on the other side of the caves,
cut, bruised,
and dead tired, but not in slices.
"Oh . . . huh . . . my . . . huh . . . god. I . . . can't . . .
huh . . .
believe . . . that . . . we're . . . alive," Yuri gasped, trying to
get some
air into her tortured lungs, each breath that she tried to take
burning a track
down her chest.
"That's what made it fun," Genma said cheerfully. Yuri looked
at him
balefully, then collapsed on the ground, her eyes making spirals.
"So, where to next, Pop? Are we going to go training inside an
active
volcano? Or how about we fall off a mountain and try to climb back up
using
only our teeth?"
"Have you been reading my training manual?"
Yuri would have cried, but, as tired as she was, she merely went
to sleep.
On the road to Jusenkyo, they walked. Weary from months of
constant training,
Yuri's resolve had wavered enough for her to beat a promise out of her
father
that Jusenkyo would be the last place they trained in.
And also on the road to Jusenkyo, they encountered someone that
they never
thought they would meet ever again, especially not in the wilds of
China.
It began thusly:
"Tired. So tired. Hungry . . . I'm so hungry," Went Yuri's
litany of
complaints.
"Be quiet, girl. I'm hungry as well, but you don't see me
complaining, do
you?" Genma chided his daughter. His stomach growled its anger at not
being
full once again, as did Yuri's.
"Hungry, tired, hungry, tired, hungry, kill you all, pretty
butterflies,
hungry, death to the pigs, tired," replied Yuri, delirious from two
days of no
food and constant walking.
"I could really go for some rice. And fish. Rice, and fish.
Rice, fish, and
some pickles. And sukiyaki. Rice, fish, pickles, and sukiyaki."
Genma then
went on to list everything that he wanted to eat. It was quite a long
list.
They were so engrossed in their little worlds of food and
complaints that they
didn't even hear the sound of a motor, nor did they hear the bleating
of a
horn, nor did they hear the rapidly approaching sounds of vociferous
cursing.
"///Hey! Get out of the road, you morons! Get out of the way!
Get away! Oh,
shit!\\\" shouted the driver of the motorcycle. He swerved around
them and
ran the motorcycle right into a ditch on the side of the road. Yuri
and Genma
stopped and stared, numbed to the world by their lack of nourishment.
The
young man, who had jumped off the last minute, quickly dusted himself
off and
walked angrily towards them.
"///Hey, you idiot! What the hell's the matter with . . .\\\
Pop?" said the
young man, his demeanor that of one who is extremely surprised.
"What?" Genma replied, his stupor broken.
"Pop? What the hell are you doing here?"
"Young man, why are you calling me 'Pop'?" asked Genma, though
he had a
sneaking suspicion as to the answer, as did Yuri. Genma thanked the
Gods,
while Yuri cursed them quite soundly inside her own head. "Ranma, is
that you,
boy?"
"Oh . . . my . . . goddess. I don't believe this. I do not
believe this!"
Ranma, for that was who it was (who did you expect, Bugs Bunny?),
said, not
believing this. "What in the hells are you doing here?"
"Training. What are you doing here, boy?" asked Genma, though
he truly didn't
want to know. Inside, Genma was dancing a Miposian dance of joy.
Everything
was coming up aces for him. Now that he had found his son, he could
now follow
through with his and Soun's plan. Happy day!
"The same. So, Pop where are you . . . Pop? Hello, Pop? Hey!"

Yuri stared at Ranma trying to knock their father out of his
trance. A swirl
of emotions, most of them very dark, swelled up in her. Her world had
become a
bleak and depressing place. Her rage, a primitive, childish thing
that lied in
a dark corner of her mind, overwhelmed her. Her face darkened
slightly with
blood, as she slowly walked towards her brother, her intent not
acknowledged
consciously, yet in that same apish corner, she knew that what she
intended to
do, the consequences be damned. And then, Ranma turned. He looked at
her, and
with that look, the rage was washed under a wave of fear. She didn't
know why,
after all, she would later tell herself, he didn't look particularly
threatening. He looked bemused, and a little chagrined, most likely
from the
odd coincidence of meeting family so far from home. And yet . . . and
yet, she
did. Later, when she had the time to think, she would try to remember
why,
just as she always did whenever she left his presence, why did she
fear him?
She knew why she hated, but why did she fear? Was it irrational? Was
it . . .
insane? No, if she thought that, if she doubted her own sanity, then
did that
not mean that she was sane? Paradox, and yet another reason to hate .
. . and
fear Ranma. For what he made her feel, for making her lose herself
when he was
there, and hate herself after he was gone. For that moment however,
it didn't
matter. All that did was that he was staring at her, and she was
scared.
Confidence, she told herself, confidence would work. And if it
didn't,
blustering would.
"Hello, big brother," she said bitingly, hoping that sarcasm
would hide the
quiver that she knew was present in her voice. "It's been a long
time. What
has it been, two years, three? You don't call, you don't write. If I
didn't
know any better, I'd say that you didn't like us. But . . . I do know
better,
don't I?"
"Hello, little sister. Yes, it has been a while. I didn't have
time. Yes,
you do. Are you done giving me the third degree?" he returned just as
sarcastically.
"No," she said. They let it go at that.
They stopped near the road for the night and made camp. Genma
insisted that
Ranma join them in their training trip. Of course, he quickly went
on, if
Ranma was going to travel with them, then it was only fair that he
share any
supplies that he had. While Ranma looked on in horror, Genma and Yuri
quickly
went through his victuals, leaving only a small bag of rice.
"Hey! That was my week's supply!" Ranma yelled as he
desperately shook his
food pack, trying to see if they had left something besides the rice
in their
feeding frenzy.
"Now, now, Ranma. You really must learn how to share. After
all, is it not a
martial artist's duty to feed the hungry?" Genma asked in that
quasi-sage-like
manner.
"No!" Ranma yelled, now staring at his pack mournfully.
"Well . . . whatever, then. Say, aren't you a little young to
drink this?"
Genma asked, holding up a flask.
"Hey! Not my vodka!" Ranma yelled as he jumped towards his
father. They soon
were grappling over the flask of alcohol, getting in a sip every now
and then.
Soon it was turning into a drunken arts match, or would have been if
they were
any good at it.
Yuri was, however, sitting in her tent, enjoying the feel of a
full stomach
and putting one over on evil incarnate, as she called her brother.
She put on
earphones that were connected to a c.d. player, trying to drown out
the sounds
of horrible singing coming outside. Apparently, both father and son
were happy
drunks. She went to sleep muttering, 'this is a Walther PP 9mm, this
is a Colt
Peacemaker . . .'
And so they walked on, Ranma putting along in his motorcycle
while Genma and
Yuri walked beside him, once in a while looking at him in envy. Once
in a
while, one of them would make a comment about how weak he must be to
need to
ride. Ranma would merely smile smugly and not respond beyond that.
Then, they arrived.
"Well, here we are. Jusenkyo! Ah, can't you smell it?" Genma
asked as he
breathed deeply.
"What, the compost?" Yuri responded.
"No, the smell of mortal danger, the smell of terror and
screaming deaths, the
smell of fun!" Genma waxed.
"Nope. All I smell is the compost."
The fog, that had covered the valley in the pre-dawn, cleared,
to reveal
Jusenkyo fully to the group. All of the springs had at least one
bamboo pole
sticking out of it, or more, depending on the size of the spring. For
they
ranged from the length of two footballs fields to little more than a
mincing
step.
"Huh. Doesn't look too tough. Guess this one will be a
cakewalk . . . not
like the last one," Yuri comment, feeling the happiest since Ranma had
joined
them. Finally, a training ground that didn't have traps, pits, or
scything
blades that hungered for blood.
They walked down the path to the pools, and soon encountered a
stout man in a
rather aged party uniform.
"Hallo, sirs," he said in accented Japanese. "Welcome to famous
training
ground of the cursed springs, Jusenkyo. I be your Guide for this
journey,
yes?"
"Yeah, sure, whatever. Hey, is that bamboo rotten?" asked Genma
as he peered
closely at the poles.
"Oh, no, sirs, they be very brand new, yes?" the guide assured
him quickly.
"Oh. Damn, I was hoping that the poles were so rotten, that it
would have
taken great skill to stay atop one and not break it," Genma said, much
to his
disappointment and his daughter's disgust.
"Oh, did I say that they were new? I meant those, over there,
no, there, yes,
those. Those be new, yes? Planning to replace, yes? Yes," the guide
said
quickly, remembering the old adage about customers.
"Oh, good," Genma said as he gleefully rubbed his hands
together. Yuri sighed
and tried to will away her headache. Ranma grimaced slightly, and
tried to
find a place to hide. Genma paid the guide, and he allowed them
access to the
pools, after giving a rather hurried and cryptic warning. The guide
then went
inside a cottage, muttering about some sort of fruit and how much
trouble they
cause. "Well, you two, how about you go spar. I want to see how you
measure
up between the two of you."
"Yeah, sure. You just don't want to fight me 'cause you know
that I'll kick
you sorry behind," Yuri said derisively. However, she would like a
chance to
kick Ranma's head in. If she could, that is. But he is very good.
Maybe even
better than she was. Oh, boy.
Ranma and Yuri jumped onto the two closest poles, landing
lightly so as to not
break it. Ranma sat cross-legged on the pole, eyes closed and with a
smug grin
pasted on, his whole body screaming arrogance.
Yuri's fear disappeared, to be replaced by a slow-burning anger.
Her eyes
narrowed, she looked at Ranma, hearing his unspoken statement quite
clearly.
'You can't beat me. I'm better than you could ever be, in every way,
and you
can never catch up. You can never beat me, because I've already won.
Beedah.'
It hit every one of her emotional soft points, making her feel
vulnerable, and
pissing her off. She snarled in an animalistic way in her rage and
leapt at
him, her hands outstretched like claws.
At the same later as before, when she was feeling particularly
introspective
(it was yet another one of those quiet nights), she lamented at the
unfairness
of it all. In the stories, when a person was filled with righteous
fury and
goes . . . goes . . . berserk, they at least had the fortune to have a
red mist
cover their eyes during its duration. Or, at the least, a blank spot
in their
minds, or at the very least, a sort of emotional detachment, like the
memories
were from a television program seen a month ago. But no, when she
went . . .
berserk, she had to remember everything in very fine detail. It just
wasn't
fair.
Ranma, momentarily surprised by Yuri's demeanor, left himself
wide open to her
attack, if it could be called such, primal as it was. She was not
trying to
incapacitate him, or even beat him to a bloody pulp. She was trying
to shred
him, to chew him up, to crush him. She was not a martial artist, but,
rather,
a tornado with sharp claws and teeth, and with enough arms to give
even the
most enthusiastic Hindu god a run for his money in the superfluous
limbs
division.
Ranma tried to push her away, but she did not move. When he
punched her in
the jaw, she did not flinch; she just kept on screaming her rage. For
the
first time, he was starting to get a bit nervous about a fight. A bit
. . .
not much . . . after all, he was the best there was at what he did . .
. right.
He hit a pressure point on her arm, rendering it useless, if only for
a little
while. It gave him enough time to leap to a different pole, and
prepare
himself for his sister.
Genma looked at the brawl with increasing horror. It was not
looking good,
not good at all. His daughter had gone insane, his son was badly
injured, and
it looked like they were going to keep on fighting until one of them
went down,
perhaps permanently. Coming to a quick decision, he leapt in between
them,
trying to use his own body to block their blows from each other.
They were in midair, high above the forest of dead bamboo poles,
Yuri clawing
away furiously, Ranma trying to hit one vital point on her body after
another,
and Genma trying to block both them, with his hands and arms, if he
could, but
mostly with his body. They stayed their for quite a while, but
eventually
gravity had her way. They plummeted to the pools, still in the
tangle. They
all fell, each into a different and quite close set of pools.
Ranma waded quickly to the surface, breathing heavily. He felt
quite odd, but
dismissed it as wooziness from blood loss. Speaking of which, he had
to get to
his first aid kit and try to staunch the blood. When he made it to
dry land,
he rested for a bit, intending to rest just enough, trying to catch
his breath.

Suddenly, he heard a deep roar of anger, coming towards him
quickly. It was a
boy, about his own age and looking quite familiar, in an also familiar
state,
leaping from a bamboo pole and coming at him, his hands outstretched
like
claws. Not even thinking about it, Ranma angled his legs and, using
the boy's
own momentum, tossed him hard into the ground. Ranma then noticed
something
odd. It had been in his peripheral vision for some time, but only now
did he
truly notice it. It was his chest. His chest was substantially . . .
larger
than it had been before. He stopped to listen to his own breathing;
yes, it
too was different, higher, on a different octave. He opened up his
ruined,
bloody shirt and stared. Oh, dear.
Ranma fainted.
Genma climbed out of the pool. He felt quite heavy, and for
some reason, he
had on a fur coat. Odd, that. When he reached shore, he found an odd
sight
awaiting him. Yuri had, somehow and for some reason, on Ranma's
clothes and
was on the ground with some very nasty looking wounds on his sides.
Ranma,
again somehow and for some reason, had on Yuri's rather small gi and
was
unconscious. His body had made quite an impact crater when he had
landed.
Quite odd, that.
Oh, ah.
He went over to the packs and rummaged through its contents,
trying to find
the first aid kit. Even stranger was that somehow, he had gotten
furry gloves,
complete with claws. They were quite thick looking, yet thin enough
for him to
feel through them. He tried to get them off, but they seemed to be
sewn onto
the coat. Well, time enough for that later. He finally found the kit
and went
to his daughter's side. When he got close enough, he found that the
girl on
the ground wasn't his daughter. Oh, there was an amazing likeness;
enough for
them to be considered sisters, if not twins. Yet, there was a
different
demeanor about her, even asleep. Much like the one that Ranma gave
off, come
to think of it. Yet another odd little occurrence, in a day filled
with odd
occurrences. Oh, well, she was wounded quite seriously, if not life
threateningly, so he might as well help.
Thinking pure thoughts, and briefly flashing back to his old
master, he
quickly bound the odd girl's wounds. It helped that she looked
amazingly like
his daughter.
"Oh, too bad, you fall into Shanmaoniichuan, spring of drowned
panda. There
very tragic story of panda what drowned in spring . . . um . . . long
n'go.
Now, whoever fall into spring, take body of panda," said the guide,
popping out
of nowhere, carrying a wooden sign that read 'Shanmoaniichuan.'
"Graaaaaahhhhh!" went Genma. He paused and said again, "Grah?"

He looked at himself. What he had earlier dismissed as rather
odd gloves were
in fact his hands. Panda hands, to be sure, but his hands as well.
That meant
that . . . and that the girl was possibly . . . His suspicions were
soon
confirmed as the guide said over the girl's body pretty much what he
had said
to Genma, only instead of spring of drowned panda, he said 'spring of
drowned
girl.' Then he went over to the boy whom Genma had assumed was his
son, and
said 'hot-water spring of drowned boy.'
"Grah, grah grah grah," said Genma, trying to ask if there was
any cure, but
he sounded as if he was gargling with a fur ball. After a few tries,
he
finally gave up, and settled for writing on one of his wooden paddles.
"Is
there any cure?" it read.
"Oh, no, Mr. Customer, sir. At least, not here, yes? Maybe,
maybe somewhere
not here, but not here, yes? Nanniichuan could be cure, but that be
before,
yes?"
"Before?" Genma's sign said, trying to take his mind off his
curse by asking
about local history. Besides, maybe there could be a clue to a cure.

"Oh, there be great explosion on very mysterious mountain many
years ago.
Very hot for many months, yes? And then some of the pools turn into
hot-water,
yes?"
"And that should matter?"
"Oh, yes, Mr. Customer. Before, cursed men dive into
Nanniichuan to be cured.
Some be, some come out worse. But now not even that work, because .
. . well,
see, yes?" went the guide, as he took a kettle of hot water from
behind his
back and poured it over Genma's head. Genma immediately turned back
into a
man, for which he was very grateful. "Hot water turn you back to man,
but cold
water turn you to panda, yes? See? hot water pool no work for cure.
Not even
cooled hot water from pool, yes?"
"Oh. Oh, well. Thanks for the explanation." Well, nothing for
it, really.
Genma wasn't the sort to overly worry about things until later,
usually when it
was biting him upon the bottom. Not that he wouldn't chase after
every
possible cure, but, on the other hand, it didn't bother him all that
much.
Maybe his wife would even think it was cute. Nothing for it, really,
but to
grin and bear it. Or maybe that was 'grit and bear it.' Well,
certainly not
'go on a murderous rampage, feel better, then bear it.' Although that
was
looking mightily good right then.
Yuri shook her head, trying to clear her headache. She looked
around her,
trying to figure out how she got herself into such a large Yuri-shaped
hole in
the ground. Then she remembered. Then she felt lower than the hole
she was
in. How could she loose control so much? How could she try to tear
off
Ranma's arms, gnaw on them and stuff them back inside a gaping hole in
his
stomach? Oh, sure, it was a warming thought, but nice people like her
didn't
try to do that sort of thing, even to the devil incarnate. Then she
focused on
the later bits. Why the hell did she try to kill that girl, and why
did she
look so much like herself. And why was she convinced that she was
Ranma. And
why did her