Disclaimer: All characters mentioned herein are the property of
Takahashi Rumiko and are used without permission on a solely
non-profit basis. All rights reserved to her and her authorized
licensees.

This is the followup to 'At The Movies' but it is a prequel to that
story. Both are part of an alternate timeline and do not strictly
adhere to either Manga or Anime canon.

C-C and MST-ies are welcomed and appreciated either publicly
or privately.

Note: '...Cats and Dogs' takes place within the first two months
of Ranma's stay at the Tendou Dojo.

What went on before: The fight began and, once it appeared that
Kunou was in trouble, Gosunkugi started his rain spell, only to
have it spiral out of control due to unforseen events.

Part 4

	Standing again, Kunou could taste the blood in his mouth.
Running his tongue over the area that once held his tooth, he
added it to the list of things Saotome would answer for when he
delivered the cur's righteous punishment. With his left hand,
Kunou reached into his robes and pulled out another Bokken. The
Captain of the Kendo Team swung it back and forth, getting used
to the new weapon. Satisfied, he glanced for a moment at the sky.
Seeing the stormclouds quickly forming to the west and rolling
over the field, Kunou smiled confidently letting the crowd see the
blood in his mouth, staining previously gleaming white teeth.
	The crowd, first distracted by the fight, then Kunou's blood,
and finally, busy watching his display of prowess with the new
bokken, failed to notice the clouds or the sudden chill in the air.
>From the way Kunou was swinging the other bokken in his left hand
and the smile on his face, they were convinced that he was as good,
if not better, using his left hand.
	Unfortunately, Ranma was also watching the now left-handed
swordsman and he knew better.
	Squinting because he knew it was getting darker on the field
and also aware of the looming clouds, Ranma looked at Kunou's
left-handed technique and ignored the blood on his teeth. While
Kunou was still exceptional using his left, it wasn't the equal to his
right. In the transition, Kunou had lost some control and precision.
	Also, he knew that by only using one shoulder and one
arm Kunou could no longer put his entire body into the swing, which
cost him power. To Kunou detriment, it was getting colder and he
would soon start to lose sensation in his weakened arm, reducing
his flexibility even further.
	To Ranma, even these problems were not the worst of it for
Kunou. The lack of his right hand and, by extension, that arm, in
the use of the bokken forced his stance open, limiting the defensive
options available. Ranma, already having a speed advantage, knew
that his challenger was definitely not going to be fast enough to stop
him now.
	Meanwhile, Kunou had had enough and charged towards
Ranma, his Bokken thrust out like a knight's saber. Seeing this
and taking note of the rain clouds, he decided to finish Kunou off
quickly. A frown on his face, his eyes narrowed, fists clenched at
his sides, Ranma was the picture of determination.Totally still,
except for one split second when his eyes wandered and he looked
down to the ground, the Anything-Goes Martial Artist let Kunou close
in. When Kunou was no more than five feet away, Ranma's right
leg kicked out and suddenly one of the pieces of Kunou's original
bokken flew into the air, headed straight for his opponent's right
eye.
	Kunou's instincts took over as he moved his head left,
out of the path of the splintered wood. It sailed by harmlessly,
exactly as Ranma had planned. Kunou, distracted by the
threat of the flying bokken fragment, took his attention off of
Ranma and missed his foe taking a step forward to the left.
	Turning his body to the side, Ranma slid down into
Kunou and took his legs right out from under him, like a
baserunner trying to break up a double play in a baseball
game.
	As Kunou was falling, Ranma lashed out with a quick
elbow into the back of his head, driving it forward. Kunou's head
hit the ground with an audible thud, and didn't stir. Almost still,
his only movements the occasional twitch in his extremities.
	Ranma finished his slide and, turning around, saw
Kunou on the ground. Taking advantage, he moved quickly to his
adversary's side. With one foot, he stepped on his left arm and
used the other to kick the bokken away. It slid away and stopped
at Nabiki's feet, nearly twenty yards away. Ranma then grabbed
the Blue Thunder from behind by his tattered robes and  pulled
him up. Turning Kunou around, Ranma looked at him. He was
disgusted with what he saw.
	Kunou was barely conscious. His face was swollen
and bruised, the blood now gushing from his mouth. His hair was
matted to his head from a combination of sweat, dirt and
leaves. Strangely, despite the mess and the beating he had
taken, Kunou had an odd, small smile on his face. His
breathing was shallow, but steady. The only sounds he made
were mumblings about Akane and his 'Osage no Onna'. It was
clear at this point that Ranma was the only thing holding Kunou
up.
	Ranma just stared at this for a moment and then
 dropped him. Looking down at Kunou lying in a heap at his feet,
Ranma opened his mouth as if he were going to say something
but reconsidered. He turned away and made eye contact with
Ukyou, who was standing just off to the side of the crowd. She
smiled and gave him a thumbs-up sign. He nodded and started
walking to her, ready to go to 'Ucchan's'.
	Until it happened.
	Feeling the first raindrop hit his nose, 'Damn', he
thought, 'Looks like it's gonna rain. I'll have to get some hot
water when we get to 'Ucchan's and --'.
	Suddenly a scream rang out.
	Ranma didn't get a chance to finish his thought. On
instinct he turned quickly to his left, towards where he had
heard the noise. There, he saw it was one of the younger school
girls that was responsible. It wasn't clear why she was yelling,
but whatever it was had her terrified. Ranma, turned back to
Ukyou and pointed at the girl, letting her know what was going
on. "Uc-chan! I'll be right there!" he shouted over the din and
the wind.
	He was walking towards the girl, trying to find out what
was wrong, when the storm started. Quickly the rain was pouring
down, lightning visible almost immediately. The thunder was
loud even for a Nerima storm. Ranma stopped when the first
sheet of rain hit him. His curse was triggered and in a split
second the change was complete. Ranma-kun became Ranko-chan.
Ranko resumed walking towards the girl. Surrounding her was
pandemonium; the entire fieldwas in chaos. Everyone was
running away, trampling each other trying to get out of the
rain .
	All at once, everyone began screaming like the younger
girl and Ranko started to hear a strange buzzing noise; like the
sound from an angry beehive, a very CLOSE angry beehive.
	Immediately she noticed that the buzzing was closer than
ever. Ranko could almost touch the girl, and indeed was reaching
out to her, when suddenly something fell in front of her. At first
she couldn't make out the object on the ground because of it's
dark color in the nightlike playground. She stopped and bent down
to look at it, when suddenly the thing's eyes opened and it jumped
back. Taking a closer look, Ranko's eyes widened and she
screamed.
	It was a cat, a very large, very irritated, black cat.
It's slitted bright yellow eyes, an angry contrast to the
wallowing gloom on the field. The cat's eyes seemed to be a
glowing yellow against the backdrop of it's otherwise pitch black
face. The effect served to frighten Ranko even more. She
panicked and started to back away. She wasn't concentrating on
where she was going and stumbled on something, falling to the
ground.
	Now flat on her back, Ranko groaned miserably. She
tried to sit up, feeling something vibrating underneath her. Ranko
scrambled to get out from on top of whatever was under her.
Shivering, Ranko's teeth chattered from the cold as she looked
down.
	She saw another cat, identical to the first. Striking
yellow eyes, black fur. Its most distinctive feature was its
tail. White at the edge, it stuck out against it's otherwise
black coat.
	At that point Ranko was drowning in her fear. Her heart
was beating wildly in her chest and the blood was rushing to
her face. Soon it was red enough to match her hair. Turning
away from this newest terror, Ranko was scrambling on all fours
to get away. She managed to get a few feet away until she was
driven back down into the ground. Something had hit her hard in
the back.
	 Dazed, Ranko started to claw her way back up when a
burning pain hit her in her lower back. A sharp MEOW rang out.
Ranko slammed her eyes shut and started shaking madly, as she
would if being electrocuted. Screaming, she desperately tried to
get that thing off her back. In response the cat dug it's claws
deeper into Ranko, this time trying to gain purchase on an
unstable terrain. Tired of the game, the cat released its claws and
quickly jumped away, running into the crowd.
	Feeling the weight off her back, Ranko stopped screaming.
Her eyes were still closed so her visual world was reduced to
nothing more than different shades of black. Lying on the wet
ground Ranko couldn't feel anything except for the pulsating fire
in her back. By then Ranko couldn't even hear anything. What
was left of the crowd, the rain, even the cats still on the playground,
was drowned out by the sound of her blood pounding in her ears as
it rushed through her head. To Ranko it sounded like what she
imagined a herd of wild elephants would be like. It was as if the
drum section of a cheering squad had taken up residence between
her ears.  For a second Ranko just listened to this sound. Even
though it was loud, the sound was constant and the consistency
of it's rhythm soothed to her.
	Thinking of the young girl whose wail started this
nightmare, Ranko forced her attention away from the comforting
sound and willed herself to stop shaking. Catching her breath, she
opened up one eye and didn't see a cat. Taking this as a sign that
maybe, just maybe, this horror movie she had stumbled into was
finally over, she opened up her other eye.
	 'O.K. Still no c-, c-, c-, none of them, here. They gotta
be gone by now, they hate the rain just like I do.'
	Sighing, she put her arms under her and pushed herself
up. On her feet, Ranko had one hand behind her back gently
massaging the area raked by the cat. The other was on her
forehead, trying to keep the rain out of her eyes. Ranko
blinked once and focused in on the area around her, looking for
the girl.
	The field looked like it had gone through a war,
the ground nothing more than mud. Patches of what was once
grass sat in clumps, ripped away by the other students as they
ran to escape the storm. The raindrops hitting the large puddles
already on the ground and the howling keen of the wind were the
only sounds Ranko could hear.
	She searched the fieldonce more and noticed that
the cats seemed to be gone. Ranko was grateful for that and, for a
moment, her spirits rose. Then she remembered Ukyou who was
supposed to wait for her. Concerned, Ranko started searching
again. She was about to call out for Ukyou when she saw her on
the soccer field, holding her combat spatula over her head as a
crude umbrella. She was wandering around in the storm, shouting.
It looked as if she were searching for Ranko.
	Ranko was beside herself in relief. The reality of the
situation hit her and she had to fight not to laugh. The irony of her
looking for Ukyou while Ukyou was looking for her in this mess was
nearly too much for Ranko at that point.
	'Neither one of us has enough sense to get out of the
rain!' concluded Ranko. Too far away to hear what Ukyou was
saying over the storm, she started walking towards her. Waving
her arms in the air, Ranko tried to get her attention.
	Ranko, closing in on Ukyou, was under the last tree
bordering the field when Ukyou finally saw her and waved back.
Quickly, her eyes flew open and she started shouting at Ranko.
Ranko couldn't hear her over the storm, though, and continued
walking.
	Running towards Ranko, Ukyou was motioning with her
arms out, trying to tell her to stay away from the tree. Just as
Ukyou had feared, a lightning bolt hit the ground between them,
not two feet away from chef. She was thrown back and hit the
ground hard.
	At the same time, in the tree above Ranko, a cat jumped
at the sound of the lightning and lost it's footing. Falling out
of the tree, the cat cried out in fear. Luckily, it managed to
break it's fall, landing right in Ranko's out-stretched hands.
	Ranko meanwhile, saw the cat falling and her mind went
blank. She couldn't force her feet to move her out of the way. As
the cat fell, Ranko's eyes flashed open. Her pupils, even in the
night-like playground, contracted to nothing more than pinpoints.
Ranko was like a doe caught frozen in the headlights of a
speeding car as it was rushing at her. The moment the cat finally
landed in Ranko's hands, that car ran her down.

End Part 4

In Part Five: Ukyou tries to help her fiance and best friend.