A week ago, I posted a fic called Ghosts. When I was originally
writing it, I wrote mostly in the present tense. Just before posting,
however, I changed that to past tense. In an effort to understand how
to write better, I'm posting the original present-tense version. If
you've got a few minutes, please compare this to the one I posted
first, and let me know what you think. If you can't find the first
post in your FFML mailbox archive, it's at
http://miniarchive.dyndns.org:8080/cgi-bin/MiniArchive.exe?Page=Retrieve+Story&StoryID=155911
Ghosts
A Ranma 1/2 Story
It was going to be different. Everything was going to be different.
Those thoughts are on the forefront of my mind on the last day of my
life, a day which should have come far sooner then it did. I stand in
the Tendou Dojo. It looks a lot different now, compared to when it had
been practically demolished and rebuilt every week. That hadn't
happened for almost twenty years, now. I'm going to change that.
Nobody would bomb the Tokyo Tower, they said. After all, it's
practically a cliche, considering how often it happens in movies and
anime. Which means that nobody was expecting it. The two terrorist
groups who each decided to make a statement certainly hadn't planned
to share their target. In the aftermath, investigators said that it
would have held up if only one of the bombs had gone off. The
accident, the deadly, unplanned combination of the two hadn't been
planned for when they constructed it, and so the Tower came tumbling
down. And everyone died.
Some of them made it to the hospital, of course, and I think even one
or two of them lived, but most people's luck had run out. Even a
super-powered martial artist is next to useless against a rain of
heavy steel and the Anything Goes school works at 10 meters up in the
air, not at 250.
Ranma held on for three days, kept alive only by machines. He wouldn't
have lived much longer anyway, but when Akane died, he decided to go
with her. Not the best way to demonstrate your love, I imagine, but
I'd could hardly say that I'd done better. Their ghosts don't haunt
me. I almost wish they did.
I couldn't tell you where I was when I heard the news. They found me
in a crater in what used to be Fuurinkan High School's athletic
field. It seems that once again I managed to execute the full Shishi
Hokodan. It has tremendous potential power, power which I had only
tapped in the smallest amount during my fights with Ranma. They saw
the flare from the Chinese mainland. I was unconscious for a week,
afterwards.
It had been my directional curse that saved me, that for once in my
life did something good for me. I really don't know how we all ended
up at the tower, except that it must have been Ranma's fault. After
all, the fiancees were all chasing him around there, and of course I
had to be present to protect Akane. Naturally, I failed. I had somehow
gotten to Osaka by the time the bombs detonated. I sometimes wish that
my string of bad luck had been complete.
I don't know when I decided to do something about the bombing,
either. I think it was sometime while I was being treated for the
depression; it gave me a mission in life, which was something the
doctors said was important. If nothing else, it kept me from having to
take drugs for the rest of my life.
If the future is always in motion, then so must be the past. And so,
the past can be changed.
My first thought was for the Nanban Mirror. But no, it was broken, and
dealing with damaged magic is never wise. I found that out the hard
way. The mirror never actually took me anywhere, but it pulled my mind
through the wringer. I think I would have snapped, if I was still in
the condition I was when Ranma had been around.
Cologne had gone back to China; with Ranma, Shampoo, and Mousse dead,
there was nothing to keep her here. Somehow, I found my way to her
village. She had nothing for me. There were other artifacts that were
supposed to be able to grant wishes or transport the user, but they
were all lost, and I'm not exactly the best person to send on a quest.
Nor did Jusenkyo hold anything. To be sure, I got my curse cured, but
I wasn't there for that. I'd hoped that their spirits might somehow be
tied to the pools. Plum, the new Jusenkyo Guide, smashed that hope as
well. Even Akane, with her very own pool, could not be brought back
through the Valley of Sorrows.
For once my ability to get lost came in handy. I wandered through the
world, seeking the knowledge of every culture's mystics. I almost
tried necromancy. I thank whatever gods exist that I didn't. I have
trouble enough without the undead on my hands.
Finally, the wheel came full circle. It came back to the Nanban
Mirror. The mirror was still destroyed, but here's the key: it
existed, whole, at some point in the past. I found a little-used,
little-known technique that can use the power of the mirror to travel
without the mirror actually existing in the current place and time.
Perfect, except for one little thing, the reason it was so
infrequently used. Since the mirror is not actually present, the body
does not actually travel. Only the mind travels, and you become, in
essence, a ghost, or a mass hallucination, and you can never
return. To use the technique, then, you must die.
So I stand in the dojo, making preparations for my death. Kasumi and
Tofu wait nearby. They think I was crazy to do this, and perhaps I am,
but nonetheless they want to help me.
My will is quite short. The only possessions I own are the ones I
carry with me. They will be burned along with my body, and the ashes
scattered over the bombing site. If all goes well, the instructions
will never be carried out, because I'll have changed history and I'll
have no cause to make them.
The spell is simple. A wooden replica of the mirror lies in front of
me. I say a few words of power, and the wooden effigy changes. It's
still wood, but I can see my reflection in it. A tear, a command,
and I am gone.
The sensation is strange. There are the sorts of things that people
say you feel when you die: a disconnectedness, a bright light. But I'm
not moving towards it. It hangs there for a moment, and then I
fall. Time rolls back. Somehow, I see the seasons undo themselves,
people walking backwards through the dojo, in and out, in and out.
It stops. I stand in the dojo for a few minutes, joy filling my heart
at the sight of the patches in the walls and roof. I am here. I am
going to make a difference. I walk out through the closed door.
Ranma is doing his customary early-morning mid-air sparring with his
father. When he sees me, he looks as if he had seen a ghost. His
reaction is justified, since he had. His father takes the opportunity
to dunk Ranma in the pond. As she stands up and gapes at me, I walk
over.
"Ranma, there's something I need to talk to you about."