************************ Nerima district, a calm, pleasant sort of place, a typical example of the traditional Japanese values, and a great place to bring the kids. from the "Nerima travel guide". "You mean you want me to go near that bunch of nuts?!" From the "Tokyo Taxi training manual of approved emergency actions". ********************************************************** Effexor entertainment presents A Prozac production Ranma: Endless Complications Written and directed by Someone who is having far to much fun Ranma 1/2 and the Sandman are not owned by me, but by gum I wish they were! All rights to the characters in this work of fan fiction are owned by their respective copyright holders (Rumiko Takahashi an' Viz (I t'ink) and Neil Gaiman and Vertigo comics.) the situations just happened though Episode One: "Nerima is a hard head zone..." ********************************************************** Nabiki walked out of her room slowly, yawning slightly in the dawn light, beginning her long practised damage appraisal routine. "Lets see - new hole in roof, mallet holes, new gate, call landscaper, new carp for the pond, the table needs replacing and oh, yes, get the plasterer in to fix the impressions in the walls......" In other words , it was a perfectly normal morning after the night before. Others too were slowly starting to wake, although Kuno was at a loss to explain how he'd gone from embracing his pig tailed goddess to being an impact crater at the zoo. Ranma woke on the roof, crawling painfully over to the emergency back support that Kasumi had thoughtfully had installed after the first Happosai incident. These days it was starting to look rather threadbare from all the use it got. Ryoga woke in Akane's bed, yawned and started to look for his clothes. He was lost before he hit the floor, and was soon sharing accomodation with Kuno. "Bwee!" Khu Lon the greatest warier of her generation (no matter what a certain highly perverted ex of hers said) woke and turned on the Mighty Morphing Power Rangers, wondering if there was going to be anything today worth teaching to Son-in-law. The fact that this was a repeat was of little consequence to her - after all the training was just her excuse to veg out for half an hour without having to worry about the craziness that permeated the ward. And, besides, she liked it. *** Ranma was not enjoying how the morning had progressed. He'd been fleeced by Nabiki for the repair work, he still couldn't stand up straight, but that was allright - he had to go to Dr Tofu's anyway for his emergency stomach pumping treatment. He still couldn't understand why Akane insisted that she would cook his breakfast for him... "Stupid Pop, how the heck is having a breakfast made by her supposed to be training? And why does old man Tendo go along with it - I thought he wanted her to marry me, not bury me...." A horribly familiar splash and cry of "Ranma No Baka!" rang out as he realised that his internal monologue was an EXternal monologue. He sighed, and as he flew gracefully into a near-perfect parabolic trajectory decided that he HAD to get a better class of fiancé... or at least less homicidal ones as the would be warrior wives started a melee amongst themselves for his affections. Not that they actually tried to stop his flight of course.... *** Death, sat at the edge of a certain Tendo pond, was not a usual sight even by this wards whacked out standards. She sat there idly running her finger through the still water and relaxed a little, even finally coming to a conclusion that her late brother Dream had reached to hundred years ago. She was bored with her job. It's hard to imagine that a woman who has to collect every life form as it passes out of this mortal realm, from humans to humus, would have two seconds to rub together to feel this way, but ... It was worse than being an Airline Hostess - the pay was worse, the perks were non-existent, the job stank, you never got to make any real friends due to the nature of the duties, and you *never* got to share in the fun. Some days she felt like a glorified swinging door for the afterworlds. There was no two ways about it, even the Endless were subject to ennui and stress burnout. They were still feeling the aftershocks of Destruction's mid-life crisis. Still this latest run looked interesting, a chaotic nexus - capable of creating the sort of mischief that she saw around her was due to end his mortal span by drowning... It was tough luck for the poor guy, but she could REALLY use a good chat with someone right now. It is perhaps fortunate for Ranma that Akane splashed her, since when the distracted Death looked around she saw what appeared to be a redhead girl falling from the roof of the Dojo and falling into the pond after catching herself a sound thump around the ear off the guttering... and not the blackhaired male she was waiting for. Well, Death may be there to take departed onto the next realm, but she didn't kill people, or even allow those she wasn't there for on business to get hurt. It was a pleasant way of trying to buck the rules. So she dragged the girl out of the pond, and waited for the man she was to take to turn up. *** Destiny's realm is composed of paths, the ones taken, the ones voided, the ones that might have been, and the ones that never stood a prayer. It was infinite, and ever-changing, yet Destiny knew the flux of it like the pounding of the heart he didn't have. He was caught up in this metaphor attempting to refine it into a thing of beauty, so he could write it in his diary. NOT the BOOK, but his perfectly written personal diary - the BOOK said that the statement he would make today would be one he would cherish and reflect on for a long time. So it came as a total shock to him when he tripped over his own feet, beaned himself on a bench that hadn't been there five seconds ago, and then stood up into the underside of a tree branch. "+Ouch! I never saw that bloody one coming - EEEEK bloody chair!+" The BOOK was right - it was a statement he was going to spend a lot of time contemplating. It was sort of a pity that as he went hoping off on one leg, he was to busy looking for (and sadly not finding) an aspirin to wonder WHY the paths had chosen to warp themselves into a totally new and unexpected shape around him.... *** Ranma-chan too thought longingly of aspirin, but pushed the thought away with a determined effort, and decided that the headache she had this time was almost a rival to the one she'd gained after Kuno's little booze-up during "Romeo and Juliet". Holding her head slightly, and muttering imprecations about uncute tomboys, the unfairness of the world, and her father's inability to go to the toilet without finding her a new fiancé she sat up, wiping her hair out of her eyes she looked at the woman perched above her face perilously close, and drew the only logical conclusion possible. Dad had REALLY gone all out to find a weird fiancé this time. Still the make-up was kinda cute, and she radiated friendliness through the *seriously* cute gothic look she wore at Kasumi-plus levels. For Death herself the experience was rather unique - having dragged the redhead out of the water, and waited for her to start breathing, she had been about to administer mouth to mouth when said patient had moaned to herslef for a moment, groaned in pain, and gone from half dead to 100% terrified. "Oh Kami-Sama - I don't have to marry ANOTHER one do I?!" wailed Ranma-chan. Death was mightily confused. "Um, isn't it illegal for girls to marry in Japan?" she asked in bewilderment at the apparent fruitloop she had just saved from drowning. Ranma-chan looked own at her chest. She had an out! She wasn't a guy, and so she had a chance to let her down gently before he was booted heavily by the other girls! "Uh, yeah, sorry, right I'm just... heh," laughed a nervous but relieved Ranma-Chan while she desperately strove to find a good excuse. her mouth continued to blather inanities nineteen to the dozen while her mind desperately tried to make use of the precious time she had bought herself. Death for her part couldn't believe it, the girl she had rescued was coming apart at the seams, and all to avoid answering a simple yes-no question... it was just too funny! Laughing she decided that she had a friend for the first time in a ... well no need to go there.... Ranma-chan took a mental breather as she raced to control her errant mouth - it had already gained her a first class trip via hammer airlines, and she had to switch it off quickly or she'd end up with another innazuke! Deciding to roll with the flow, she went on the verbal offensive. "Um, excuse me m'am but why are you here?" she asked, hoping to shift the attention away from herself, and *maybe* get some of the details of this engagement while they were still capable of being arranged away. Death paused in her laughter, and blinked in confusion - how could she put this without scaring off her new friend? "Um, you fell off the roof and were drowning in the pond - I pulled you out and got you breathing again" phew! that should do it! she thought. Ranma-chan, realising the truth of this, paused, but returned to the offensive - the save was nice, but if she let a innazuke lose with that sort of hold on her she'd soon be in even whose trouble with the other three! "I meant the Dojo m'am... Um, what do I call you?" Yes, a name would be good when she released the stress from the latest engagement on the panda... "Um, guess you can call me Telute, and to answer you're question I'm here for Ranma -" she paused at the sudden tension on Ranma-chan's face, but mostly, the way that she had shot straight to her feet in a way that even SHE had thought impossible. Ranma-chan however was inconsolable - it WAS another innazuke! "You're here to marry him aren't you!" she wailed in dispair. Death ran this one through her mind a few times - a way to hide her true identity untill she was ready to reveal it - and a way to be around her new friend for a while - and she could play the sympathy card a little when her 'innazuke' was tragically killed in the same spot that her friend had only just been rescued from! "Um, yes, it was so romantic," think! how did they do this in Japan last time she was on one of her 'mortal days'? Oh yes - the father arranged for the children.... "My parents asked Ranma's father about merging our two houses, and he accepted!" A thought here. "Um, what's your name?" Ranma-chan barely heard, the panda died this time! THREE properly arranged innazuke PLUS Shampoo and the nutcase in the leotard.... "Um, I'm Ranko, pleased to meet you... you'd better come inside, Ranma will be here later on" she said without much conviction. Death jumped to the obvious conclusion - namely that Ranko must be Ranma's sister and that she was upset since her father hadn't arranged a marriage for her. well.. she'd fix that one up - Ranko looked so glum, she just had to make her smile! "I'm sure that your father will arrange a marriage for you too!" she reassured the depressed girl beside her. Girl? She was a young woman but then a perspective that ranged from half an hour after the start of time, to the point where you would lock up on the universe tended to skew her sense of perspective she guessed. Still Ranko was laughing some now... Although it wasn't what you might call SANE laughter. Ranma-chan was just grasping at the irony of D'eaths, 'weird name - sounds a little gaijin', choice of words. Gasping for air she spotted a panda chewing contentedly on a bamboo cane she stalked towards it. "That isn't the problem at all," she explained earnestly, "our useless father has engaged both Ranma *AND MYSELF*..." she trailed off momentarily. Genma winced at what his son was doing to him to make he point that he was playing Ranko again. He also tried to match the face before him against any of his old bar debt marriages "Well... lets just say the useless fat old idiot engaged both of us against our will several times.... Death was stricken - her poor friend! to have such a dishonourable father! putting an arm around 'Ranko' for a friendly hug she tried to explain that it was her fathers fault not hers. However she stopped when she felt the demon head forming behind her. Soun Had Seen The Hug. Soun Was Not Happy. Then Soun saw her face. Death saw Soun's face. Death and Soun both pointed at each other screaming "YOU!" Kasumi popped her head around the door, and admonished the pair - "Please stop pointing - it *is* very rude," she gently chided, before resuming her duties as hostess. "Would you like any tea Miss...?" she trailed off. Soun started to cry. "Waaaaaaaaah you took my wife! please tell me who you have come for!" he bawled as Death sheepishly accepted a cup of tea from Kasumi. "It is not any of you or yours Soun Tendo... and I am sorry for the loss of your wife... but I was gad to be able to let you both say good-bye before she finally passed away." she said sadly. Sound nodded brightly - it wasn't going to be any of his family, so the only person in trouble was Genma, and he was wily enough for any three foxes. He of course was thinking of Ranma as his son-in-law.... Ranma-chan was getting exasperated by the coded talk, so being Ranma, she did what she did best - stuck both feet in his/her mouth and proceeded to dig. "So Um, who are then D'eath? - you aren't really here to marry Ranma are you?" Death caught the sadness at the end of the sentence, and tried to cover up, even as Soun (in an act of speed that made the chestnut fist look like an old ladies tea outing) appeared in his armour and began threatening Mr Panda. Ignoring acts of violence that would have earned long sentences for cruelty to animals in any other ward, she tried to make the loss easier for Ranko, and still remain her friend - in other words, she borrowed Ranko's feet and had a good chew herself. "Well... no, I never was formally engaged to your brother, but your father did promise to marry his firstborn to anyone who could stop him freezing to death when he was 6... and I kind of gave him a blanket... but that's not why I'm here. I'm sorry Ranko - Ranma is going to drown in the pond this morning and I'm here to take him to the next realm." Ranma-chan looked at the clock, then at Death, then at Genma, and then at Nabiki who'd somehow appeared zenlike at the door armed with tape recorder, a camera, and a hit list, plus a series of betting pools for the life spans of prominent politicians (though where THEY came from...) and started to cackle maniacally. "You're here to take Ranma Saotome to the next word?" "Yes." "He's going to die this morning?" "Yes." "How?" "Drowning." "You only take people who's lives are over - you would never kill someone to take them with you?" "Only when Life is over, I never kill." "Do you really want to be married to me?" "HUH?" came the astonished response from the rest of the room. Ranma pointed at the clock on the wall - 1:25pm. Then he poured a kettle of water over his head (how Kasumi always knew to have those ready was a mystery not even Destiny understood) morphing upwards, breasts shrinking, muscles moving... "Sorry about this... Thankyou for saving my life instead of taking it... erm.... *I'm* Ranma Saotome." Death did the predictable thing. With a gentle sigh and a muttered "How the hell am I gonna fix THIS one?!" she fainted. Ranma rubbed a thoughtful hand over his head and turned and looked at Genma, who was still sat in a frozen look of horror. "Now why don't you explain how you engaged me to the grim reaper pops....." Even Kasumi joined in on the beating the hapless panda received. *** At Furinken High: "Where's Ranchan?" "Shampoo no see airen stupid spatula girl...." "Ohh Ranma - you are going to pay! After I cooked this lunch especially for you!" "Aiyaa!" "Well... I guess it DOES explain a lot eh shampoo?" "Come here you two and die!" *** This story was whacked out on the spur of the moment. It seemed like a good idea at the time... but people liked it so much I now have to WRITE the damn thing ^_-. I know there's a few ways I can take this, but mostly it's just a good giggle, since the main story I want to write is going to be a fairly large and personal beastie... Anyway, enjoy, it should be fun for you while I try and squirm my way around to the conclusion I want And I know I've been inconsistent with the chinese contingent's names - but they are Kho Lon and Xian Pu when they think of themselves, and Cologne and Shampoo when the Nerima cast thinks of them. Nice save ne? ^_^ Still, all C&C welcomed, Flames gratefully accepted, money spent on groceries and voodoo dolls blessed and used as good luck charms. For my Friends Zen, who gave me depth when I was trying to avoid my life by skipping over reality. Kaori who kept me sane when I was sliding away. Nikki, just becase. Ja ne! (and re-writen in ten minutes because I had a cople of good ideas in the bath....) 07-04-00