The Two Ranmas

Ranma slept soundly as Happosai crept into the room. After the last try with this technique proved to be a disaster, he had decided to try modifying the incense a little; a different spice here, an added pinch of this herb there, and maybe this time, the trick would work. When he last used the Three Thousand Year Old Founding School of Anything Goes Yin-Yang Thank You Mam Personality Splitting Technique, Ranma’s female soul emerged to try and enslave the male body of the young man. After, when he had tried again, it was Genma who had inhaled the smoke, and they had to deal with an angry panda spirit all night. Fortunately, Genma was gone for the evening. No pandas in the forecast.

This time, the Old Bastard was certain that he had it right. The ingredient that had been missing was a few drops of water from The Spring of Drowned Young Girl, and the Spring of Drowned Young Boy mixed together. Tonight, Ranma would have his wish, and so would Happosai. Ranma would be able to be a guy for good, and Happosai would have the girl Ranma for himself.

Lighting the incense, he waited and let the smoke drift into Ranma’s nose. At first, nothing seemed to happen, then a ghostly apparition of the girl Ranma appeared over the young man as he snored blissfully. “Finally!” said the old man, after having to wait a whole eternity of two minutes for it to work. The ghost seemed to hover there for a moment, then became solid suddenly. As solid objects tend to do usually, the girl Ranma suddenly fell, right onto the sleeping male Ranma. Both woke highly surprised.

“What the HELL!? Get the hell OFF me!” he yells at her, shoving her roughly aside.

“Who the hell’s shoving me? What the hell’s going on here?” She yells.

“COME TO HAPPY, RANMA DARLING!!” Happosai yells joyously, this time actually managing to get under her shirt. “Oh what a haul THIS is!”

This produces the typical response and the old man ends up pummeled senseless by about three hundred punches using the Chestnuts Roasting On An Open Fire Technique. The female Ranma then grabs the nearly unconscious Happosai by his throat, growling at him, “And why the fuck did you douse me with cold water, you dirty old bastard?” not bothering to notice that she was completely dry. Turning around, she yells, “And who the fuck are you shoving me…” Then she sees him.

She sees Ranma as a guy.

Her scream is as loud as his as the two of them realize what is before them both. Somehow, the Old Freak had managed to finally separate the two of them!

“OH MY FUCKING GOD!!!” was heard in unison through the Tendo household, waking everyone up, including a few of the neighbors. Soun stepped out of his room wondering what the commotion was all about when he was trampled by the female Ranma running pell-mell to the bath, only to get further stomped by a running male Ranma. Kasume, Nabiki and Akane had the sense to stay out of his way at least as the pair ran buy. They were so shocked by what they saw that they didn’t even think to help their father up. For Akane, the spell was broken finally when Happosai came bounding out of the bedroom shared by father and son Saotome.

“Ranma darling! Come to Hap… ERK!!!” as Happosai is grabbed in mid-bound by a highly pissed off Akane. The surprise is compounded by him getting slammed into the wall repeatedly to the point where the timbers within start to crack.

Akane is furious at having her sleep interrupted by another one of his perverted schemes. “WHAT THE FUCK DID YOU DO THIS TIME YOU FILTHY BASTARD?!? TELL ME NOW!” she screams into his face, about ready to tear him apart. The last thing that she wanted tonight was another one of his tricks causing problems, and that’s exactly what was going on. “WHY THE FUCKING HELL ARE THERE TWO RANMAS?!?” Her voice turning low and deadly, she says, “You had better be able to fix this, or so help me to God, I will gut you like a fish!” The last was delivered with a demonic look less than an inch from his face.

The old man is now officially scared for his life. Never had he seen such rage. “I-I-I’ll change Ranma back! I promise! Just don’t kill me,” he says, knowing that if he fails to do so, his life is most likely to end. All he wanted was to be able to have the girl Ranma for himself, and to be able for the boy Ranma to remain forever a boy. This way, everyone would be happy. He never thought of how it would turn out.

Akane dropped Happosai and the Tendo family all rushed after the two Ramnas, hoping that, somehow, this would all work out, but fearing the worse. When they get to the bath, their worse fears meet them full in the face. There, in the bath was the girl Ranma soaking herself with steaming water hot enough to boil a lobster, while the boy Ranma was pouring ice water over himself, both in an effort to change at the same time, hoping to somehow merge maybe in the process. What made things weirder is that they both were yelping in pain from the hot water, yet shivering at the same time.

“How can this be? The water is feels both hot and cold at the same time!” yelled the boy Ranma at his twin next to him. “What the fuck is goin on?”

“You tell me! I have no clue!” She screams back at him, on the verge of panic.

“Well, think of something!”

“Like what???”

The boy grabs her out of the stream of scalding water and starts dousing her in ice water. “That’s COLD!” they both exclaim, then start yelping in pain as he gets under the showerhead with the hot on full. It becomes apparent to the two of them that what one feels, so does the other. It also appears that the water no longer changes them. It seems that this is permanent, and that everyone was in for a long night. The boy turns off the water and slumps to the floor, with the girl next to him doing the same. They both seem to be in a total state of shock, both saying together, “This can’t be happening to me… this just can’t be…”

Soun and his daughters help the two up and escort them to the dining area to dry off and to hopefully get some answers.

* * * * * *

They had discovered Happosai trying to make a quiet escape when they had gotten to the dining room. Every fiber in him told him that if he did not get away, he would regret not doing so. Unfortunately for him, he was not quick about it. Now he sat, bound to a chair that he could have easily escaped from normally. He knew better though. To do so would probably have meant his demise. Akane sat next to him with a large kitchen knife and a murderous glint in her eyes. On the other side sat Nabiki, sipping tea and appearing calm as can be, although she too was ready to kill. Between Nabiki and the young redhead sat Kasume, offering her support for the confused and scared girl. Across from the redhead sat her twin, just as confused and frightened. Finally, across from the old man sat Soun Tendo. The aura of rage was practically visible around him as he stared at the master of the Anything Goes School of Martial Arts. Happosai had gone too far this time, and he was going to answer for it. “I want the truth from you this time Happosai,” Soun declared softly. “What did you do to Ranma?”

The little man did not look up when he spoke. He could not look them in the eye, knowing that he had crossed a line that had never been crossed. “I thought I had found an answer that would make everyone happy. I thought that by separating the two, Ranma could be a boy for now on, and I could have my girl Ranma. If I had only known it would have turned out like this…”

Unable to check his anger, Soun bellowed, “AND LOOK WHAT HAS HAPPENED!” Normally, he would have never even considered raising his voice at his master that way, but he was beyond fear, his anger was so great. Calming himself, he continued, “You have really made of mess out of things tonight Happosai. Tell me what it is you did.”

“Remember the attempt I made to separate the two Ranmas before? I figured out what went wrong, and was able to make it work this time. I used the Three Thousand Year Old Founding School of Anything Goes Yin-Yang Thank You Mam Personality Splitting Technique, only this time, I changed the incense a bit and added some water from two of the cursed springs to it. That’s what made it work this time,” he said softly, feeling totally defeated. “The problem is, the change is permanent. I know of no way to reverse it.”

With those words, both Ranmas felt their worlds crashing down upon their heads. As if things had not been bad enough beforehand, this only made matters worse. Nothing would ever be normal again. There was no hope unless the pair could somehow merge back. Unfortunately, it seemed that it would be impossible. One thought crosses through both of their heads. Seppuku.

Nabiki set her tea done before speaking. “This is your way of making everyone happy? Making a curse that he had to suffer through worse? It sounds to me more like one of your hair-brained schemes to satisfy your lustful urges. Maybe you should have thought this through more thoroughly before you acted. But, then again, I suppose that thinking would be asking too much from a dirty old man,” she added icily. “Give me one good reason why you should be allowed to continue living here? Or better yet, can you give me a good reason why you should be allowed to live at all?”

During this, no one noticed the heavy footfalls of someone entering the room. When the giant panda form of Genma Saotome entered the room dripping from the rain, all eyes except from the two Ranmas focused on him. The two Ranmas could not bear to look upon the panda, feeling more shame than they had ever felt before. He looked at Happosai bound to the chair, and then at the others. It took but a moment for his mind to register the fact that there was both a boy and a girl Ranma sitting there, and both looked crushed beyond reason. Instantly, he knew who was to blame.

Seeing the rage in his best friend’s eyes, Soun starts to rise. “Genma my friend…”

Before anyone could react, the enraged father grabs Happosai by the throat and lifts him chair and all, slamming him full force against the wall before chucking him across the room. The snapping of bones is almost as loud as Mr. Saotome’s bellow of rage at what has become of his son. The old man falls to the floor still bound to the broken chair, his head dangling limply from his broken neck. The Master of the Anything Goes School of Martial Arts is dead, along with any hope of reversing what he had done to Ranma.

“Well, I never knew how bad the omens I saw were tonight, but I can tell this is pretty bad,” says an old, husky voice. In from the rain steps Cologne. She walks over to the still form of her one-time suitor and kneels beside him. “Goodbye Happy,” she says with a tear in her eye, and then says a short prayer for his departed soul. Standing up, she looks over the people in the room, then asks, “Who wants to tell me what happened, so maybe a way to change poor Ranma back can be found?”

To be continued...