Yup. More REALLY, REALLY late C&C...

From: "Brian Payne" <sofaspud@ior.com>
To: <ffml@fanfic.com>
Subject: [FFML][Ranma1/2][New Fanfic] Dangerous Lies - Chapter One
Date: Thu, 25 Feb 1999 00:59:44 -0800

-=sofaspud=-
sofaspud@ior.com

Ranma 1/2: Dangerous Lies
A Ranma 1/2 Fanfiction by Brian Payne

-Chapter One-

  It was a beautiful summer day in Nerima.  The sky was that perfect 

shade of blue, with scattered wispy clouds poking along in the upper 
reaches.  A warm and gentle breeze sighed against the eaves of the 
house, making the chimes twitch but not actually ring.  Cicadas buzzed 
to themselves from the brush as a pair of butterflies flicked past the 
Tendou gates.  Carp in the koi pond flashed and shimmered as they swept 
along, just beneath the surface.  Birds twittered to each other in the 
trees.

  It was a beautiful day.
  But this, as it has already been said, is Nerima.

  "RANMA!  COME OUT AND FIGHT LIKE A MAN!"  Ryouga's bellow echoed 

through the Tendou estate.  Leaves rattled on the trees.  The carp in 
the koi pond fled in terror.  Even the cicadas hushed momentarily.  It 
was a truly impressive shout.

  It went unanswered.

  "Yes, I'm afraid it was, Kasumi.  Is Ranma still here?"  Even as she 

spoke, Nabiki was swiftly gathering her things and hiding breakable 
objects.  A Ranma-vs.-Ryouga clash, while incredibly impressive to watch 
(from a safe distance, of course), was hard on the house.  Almost as bad 
as Akane-vs.-Ranma.  Almost.

Hmmm... I suspect that the R/R fightwould do more damage--the R/A fights 
just happen more frequently inthe house.  R/R fights tendto take out 
large chunks of concrete walls and phone poles, after all.

  Nabiki sighed as she turned away.  <Yep.  Things definitely get 

weird around here.>  Behind her, Genma and Soun continued squabbling 
over the Shogi board as Nabiki slipped upstairs.

Hmmm... I don't know that Nabiki would regard this as a particularly 
"wierd" event.  I mean, if Ryouga were wearing a tutu, or Ranma had left 
a note saying he was giving up fighting forever, as he had realized that 
the wise man uses his mind, not his fists.... Now, THOSE would be wierd.

  Akane apparently hadn't heard.  She remained still, except for the 

idly twirling chopsticks in her hand as she slowly picked up a pickle 
and dropped it, picked up a pickle and dropped it, picked up a pickle 
and - 

  "Akane!  Hello?  Anybody home?"
  Akane yelped in surprise as Nabiki snapped her fingers bare inches 

in front of Akane's eyes.  She clutched her hands to her chest in 
fright, nearly impaling herself with the chopsticks still in her hand.

  Genma deftly snagged Akane's flying pickle from the air with his own 

chopsticks.  "A martial artist has to be prepared for anything, eh 
Tendou?"  He grinned before popping the wayward vegetable into his 
mouth.

  Soun gravely sipped his tea.  "Oh, most definitely, Saotome.  Most 

definitely."

I liked this scene... it had the feel of, "The chaos magnet is gone, but 
the chaos is still here... so let's distribute it a bit more evenly."

  A thundering roar echoed throughout the house as the newly-replaced 

wall came down.  A purple-haired girl on a bike, wheels idly spinning in 
place against Ryouga and the wall on top of him, looked around 
expectantly.  "Nihao, Ranma!" Shampoo exclaimed excitedly.  Her happy 
expression turned to a frown as she looked more carefully at the boy 
beneath her.  "You not Ranma.  Where is husband?"

  "grlggl mmph m HMML!"
  Shampoo frowned again.  "What you say, stupid boy?"
  "Shampoo."
  "GGT UMMPH O MMGH!"
  "You need speak better.  Shampoo not understand."
  "Shampoo!"
  "GGT OMMPH O MMI!"
  Shampoo scowled at Ryouga.  "Shampoo not care what you call her.  

Where is husband?"

  "SHAMPOO!"
  Shampoo blinked.  "What you want?"
  "Ryouga would probably be able to talk better if you weren't on top 

of him."  Nabiki smirked at the Chinese girl.

Again... Ranma's gone, but Takahashiverse rules say that _someone_ has 
to be inconvenienced by Shamp's arrival, so....

  "PREPARE TO DIE, SHAMPOO!"
  "Shampoo kill!"
  "HOLD IT RIGHT THERE!"  While Nabiki didn't have the lung capacity 

Ryouga did, her voice was far more projecting.  Her shout left a ringing 
in the ears of all present.

This...just didn't work for me.  Somehow, I tend to picture Nabiki as 
stopping the action with a well-timed (and often misleading) word, or 
even the "accidental" display of one or more of her photos.

  "OUTSIDE."  Nabiki flung her arm out, finger unerringly pointed at 

the now-demolished wall.  "Oh, and Shampoo," she continued in a normal 
voice, "you _will_ get a bill for the damage this time.  We just 
replaced that wall last week.  I'll send it to the Nekohanten, hmm?"

Now that's more like the Nabiki I picture.

  "Held on - to it - when we sold - the car," Nabiki puffed, unused to 

the exertion.

  The jack was an old type, and used nothing but brute physical force 

to operate the mechanism.  The sort of jack that's the only type 
available when you have to crank up a pickup loaded with logs.  The sort 
of jack that laughs at puny human muscles as it's rusted screws slowly - 
ever so slowly - turn.  A jack... from Hell.

  <Almost there...> Nabiki thought.  <Whew!>

Hmmm.... Two problems: Nabiki is smart/cunning enough to get the fathers 
to do the dirty work--and she's far more likely to actually do so once 
she realizes how tough the job really is.  Second, while you give us an 
idea of the difficulty involved, we don't have a good feel of the time 
frame--Was Ryouga pinned for an hour? Three?  Thirty minutes?

Have the fathers take off before Shamps and Akane step outside--that 
leaves Nabiki as the only one to deal with Ryouga.

--Freemage
   Too far behind in this to think of pithy sayings.

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