The Nerima Perspective : The Lost Riders

Modified a bit, to improve it over the original version. There were some things I didn’t like, and some things that irritated people, so I’ve cleaned it up and changed the writing a bit. I’ve also altered some of the original plot points, to match the plan I’ve been developing for this.

Besides, when I’d first written it, I’d hadn’t read any of the manga, but I’m through about a third of it now, so I might be able to do it better, now that I have some knowledge of the series and the timeline. So, If you liked my first attempt, you should like this more, and if you didn’t, you might like it now.

I don’t own Ranma, someone else does. Other stuff might be mentioned that’s copyrighted,
I don’t own that either.
It’s all just a bit if fun anyway.

Like all of my fanfiction this fic is brought to you by the consumption of excessive amounts of Uncle Arthur’s finest.

I...I

I’ve never watched the Ranma ½ animé series, I’ll admit that. I’ve never even read the manga, but I still know more about the series than anyone has a right to. Never mind it doesn’t even exist here.

Where is here?

You’d never believe me if I told you.

My first contact with Ranma ½ was a review I’d gotten for a fanfiction I’d once written.

“Please don’t let this go down the path of so many bad Ranma fics.” It said.

I was intrigued.

‘What is a “Ranma”?’ I asked myself. I researched as best I could, but the lack of availability of the Manga or animé in my home country made this difficult, but I could read some of the Fanfiction, at least to gain a basic understanding.

After a few days I felt content that I at least knew what a Ranma was, to the point were I could reference the series as part of a humorous interlude, but, aside from a few scanlations of the first volume of the manga, and the article on Wikipedia, I didn’t know much beyond the potential effects of cold water.

One night, a bit later than normal, I’d just finished running a Finite Element Analysis on the tensional reaction of a piece of mild steel when placed under a stress of 1.5Gn at an ambient temperature of 300 degrees Kelvin, while raining.

Ah, the boring life of an engineering student. The life which I called my own.

As you can probably tell from the above paragraph, I was a very boring, dull, ordinary, blunt, uninteresting person. From my blue eyes to my brown hair to the slight growth of stubble under my chin where I missed with the razor that morning, everything about me screamed ordinary.

Except for one thing.

When I rode a motorcycle, I rode like the Toecutter. Especially when my pride was challenged.

“Riding the old tank again?” Mike, an old friend, teased as we both dressed in our riding gear, which for me consisted of a pair of waterproof black armoured cordura trousers, some heavy duty size 13 enduro boots, also waterproof, a black armoured cordura jacket with white trim, a large dark green rucksack, some winter gloves and a black Caberg helmet with a flip up face.

“Better than your ‘Dullsville’.” I countered.

“That thing’s just a slow old German tank, with no power and loads of weight!”

“Like your Dullsville? My K100 would smash it.” I said, my pride screaming for me to defend it.

“Prove it!”

“You’re on!”

My philosophy on riding was a simple one.

“Wide open until you see God, then brake.”

I justified this by saying it was only a problem if I ever saw Saint Peter.

If I lived, which was most likely, then everything worked out, and I got one hell of a buzz. If I died, then I’d be too dead to care. Either way I figured I didn’t have to worry.

But back to this particular night.

It was raining heavily, not unusual in my home country, especially in January, but I was wearing some pretty heavy riding gear, which kept the rain off and me nice and warm.

I swung a leg over my faithful steed, a blue 1984 K100RT that I didn’t even have a license for, and that was nearly three years older than me. It didn’t matter, it was still in running order, despite a slight electrical problem. And it would easily smash a new 700 Dullsville.

I put the keys in the ignition and flicked the red kill switch into the centre ‘run’ position. Pushing the green starter button, I was surprise to be greeted by a loud click as the headlights died.

“Not again.” I groaned, before slapping the side of the tank hard to dislodge the stuck relay.

“Hah! Unreliable too!” Mike shouted as his Honda whirred clinically.

The lights flickered back on and I pushed the starter button again. The 1000cc engine roared to life, blowing some blue smoke from the exhaust for a moment. With the idling engine now warming my lower leg I got ready for my first street race.

“The blue thunder of my K100.” I gave a thumbs up. “Will strike you down.” A well timed bolt of lightning arced across the sky, followed by a long rolling rumble of thunder.

Apprehension twisted a knot in my stomach as I rode slowly to the start line, a set of traffic lights across the Ballymun road.

“On green.” I pointed to the red light.

“Right.” Mike nodded.

We both stared at the light, waiting for it to change. My right hand twitched on the throttle, revving the engine loudly. An old lady shielded her ears from the racket.

‘I’ve got more capacity, more power, more skill.’ I grinned

Above me, the light changed to green.

Fractions of a second later my fingers released the clutch, allowing power to be transmitted from the crankshaft, through the gearbox, along the final driveshaft, through the rear tyre and down onto the road.

“There’s NO WAY I can lose!” I yelled as my bike shot forward underneath me.

Someone, somewhere beyond space and time took notice.

The road we had chosen was long and straight so I kept accelerating through second, third, fourth, and fifth. There was no sixth on a K100RT. It didn’t matter, since I was soon doing over a hundred mph.

Mike’s silver Dullsville was only a few yards behind. Being lighter it was able to keep up, despite having less power.

I shot down the road like a maniac, making overtakes that would make Valentino Rossi think twice. Mike followed right behind, ducking and weaving between surprised and slow moving car drivers in their metal cages.

As my speed rose above 130, the streetlights became two long blurs of light, cars flashing past in an instant and I began to pull yards on Mike, my extra power now beginning to pay extra dividend as speeds rose to a dangerous level.

“I WIN!” I yelled back to him, taking my attention from the road ahead for a second.

Feeling satisfied I returned my attention to the road ahead, just in time to see a white Mitsubishi Lancer Evo pull out in front of me from a side road.

“Mitsubishi Lancer….” I said, stunned as the drivers door came perilously close. With hindsight, I should’ve at least tried braking at that point, it might’ve been helpful.

Instead, I screwed my eyes shut, and braced for the crunching impact. To my surprise, there was only a loud bang, a distant shatter of glass, a rush of cold air, something hitting me in the head, followed by a sharp pain in my neck, a red flash and darkness.

“Societies laws usually take care of bad people, Murphy’s law takes care of good ones.” someone once said while discussing death. My last thought was “Idiots take care of themselves.”

I...I

There was a flash of blinding light as I opened my eyes again.

Slowly pulling myself to my feet , I was surprised to find I was unhurt. My helmet was missing as well. It hand landed in the…grass…beside me. What was I doing in a field? Last time I’d checked I was in the middle of a city.

Why was my bike standing undamaged beside me on its sidestand? Last time I’d checked It had ploughed into the drivers door of a car.

Why was there a bald, old looking man with a long grey beard and an open book standing beside me?

‘Oh.’ The realisation hit me like a train. Which I know from personal experience hurts.

“Jesus Christ!” I shouted, taking a vain oath.

“No actually.” The old man answered with a strong English accent. “But I am a good friend of his.”

I thought for a second.

“Judas?” I hadn’t really paid attention at mass, preferring to fall asleep for half an hour every Sunday, but I remembered hearing about those two kissing somewhere near the end of the story.

The old man facevaulted.

Picking himself up and dusting his long white robe off for a second, he took a few deep breaths to calm himself.

“No actually. My name is Saint Peter.” He introduced himself.

‘Oh crap.” I paled as reality struck,

“That means…” I started, still getting over the shock.

“You’re dead.” he finished for me, with an odd, cheerful smile.

I looked around, at the verdant green fields, dry stone walls and bouncing spring lambs. A gentle sweet breeze pulled at my jacket, and a bee floated dreamily past, diligently carrying his cargo.

“Then, where am I?” I asked, curious, and a little nervous now. “Is this heaven?”

“Oh hell no.” he shook his head. “But this isn’t hell either.” he quickly reassured me, seeing my terrified expression.

“Then where?”

“Purgatory.” he answered. “The waiting room for the soul.”

“Oh, seems nice.” I commented off hand, still getting over the fact that I was currently deceased.

“Well, you try and say that after a few centuries here.” he remarked.

“I suppose.”

I’d always wondered what the main attraction of Heaven was supposed to be. After all, if you got to spend eternity doing the thing you most enjoyed, wouldn’t it begin to seem a little monotonous after two hundred years?

“Anyway, down to business.” he drew a large, business like clipboard from behind him, and a silver pen.

“What business?” I enquired.

“Well.” he tapped his pen on his clipboard. “The method of your passing has caused quite a stir up above.” he explained, suddenly switching to a serious, almost ominous tone of voice. “On the one hand, you were a person of good heart, for the most part. But on the other, careless actions born of the sin of pride resulted in the untimely death of two of Gods children.

“Em…” I looked around, “I was the only one in the crash.” I told him, a little shakily.

“The driver of the car you hit doing a ton thirty.” he answered tersely.

‘Oh’ My mind froze for a moment.

“But, but.” I stammered, suddenly fearful that I’d be damned for eternity because of some dim witted driver. “It was his fault, he pulled out in front of me.” I pointed at my chest.

“It was YOU, who caused the accident.” he towered over me, his voice now a deep roar. “YOU who committed the sin of pride.” I shrunk back from him. “And YOU who will have to deal with the consequences.”

I backed off, my mind already able to smell the burning brimstone of hell.

“Anyway.” he cleared his throat, returning to normal size. “Our Lord has decided to give you a choice. You can die now and face your final judgement.” he shook his head slightly, indicating that the result mightn’t be too favourable. “Or you can be ‘transferred’ to an alternate universe.”

“Transferred? Sounds cool.” Relief stained my voice. Anything would be better than the alternative.

“Yes.” he grinned like the devil. “You will be sent to a universe that you have some familiarity with, but only enough to allow you to get by.”

“Has the world been chosen?” I asked, now curious.

“Yes.” he nodded, “But I should warn you, the laws of physics which apply are a little different to what you’re used to. Injury healing will be quicker and you might find that you have certain new abilities.” He tapped his mysterious pen on his clipboard. “But you will have to wary of certain random events and coincidences which may take place.”

“I’ll do it.” I said with a grin. That sounded cool. It was definitely more interesting than sitting at a computer designing newer, more efficient forks for a living.

“Good.” He nodded again, “Then accelerate your bike up to a speed of 100 miles per hour in a straight line to go through.”

I nodded and swung my leg over my bike, not knowing what exactly to expect. It fired up first time and settled into a steady idle, the lambs running terrified to the horizon.

I turned to St. Peter, who was, by now holding a green flag.

“Three!” He shouted as I revved the engine.

“Two.” I clicked into first gear.

“One.” A grin appeared as my fingers twitched on the clutch lever.

“GO!” he dropped his flag as I shot forward, skidding and spraying him with churned up dirt. I accelerated through the gears, quickly approaching the magic three digits. As I did, the instruments began to spark and blue fire spread from the tips of the handlebars. Lightning arced in front of me as the green field began to blur past. There was an explosion of white light that blinded me, forcing me to close my eyes.

I...I

Opening my eyes quickly, a violent jolt through the bars, followed by a finger numbing vibration told me that I was on a rough gravel road. My mind took a second to register what was going on, but it wasn’t long before I noticed that I was travelling at high velocity down a gravel path, on a collision course with a deep pool of water.

“Crap! Not again!” I squawked, as I began to skid sideways, trying desperately to stop before going in. The last thing I wanted was death after only a few seconds of rebirth.

There was a loud splash as I was flung deep into the water, sinking under the weight of all the gear I was wearing. A few bubbles rose from my mouth as I fell into the blackness. I thrashed, trying to right myself in the water, scrambling for the surface. Relieved, my head broke the surface after what seemed like an eternity, allowing fresh air to enter my lungs. My feet found the bottom of the pool and I waded to the edge, before stepping into the shallows, the water only coming up to my knees at this point.

My riding gear hung loose and heavy, dripping wet with water. I felt…strange, sick to my stomach with my clothing hanging funny and my boots feeling loose and oversized on my feet. Everything felt too large for me, with me seeming shorter, but not by much.

Beside me, I could hear my bike hissing in another pool, some water boiling as it splashed on the hot engine, which had stalled after drowning in the water.

In front of me was a stunned man, wearing the uniform of the army of the Peoples Republic of China. He was holding an umbrella over his head, protecting himself from the shower of displaced water my high speed arrival had created.

There was a few moments of awkward silence, both of us not sure what had just happened.

“Um…Hi.” I said, water dripping from my hand as I gave a slight wave

The man still looked like he’d been stuck by lightning.

“Japanese?” He questioned with a strong Chinese accent.

“No, Irish actually.” I corrected, confused why he would think I was Japanese.

He seemed puzzled for a second, wondering why I might be confused. “Ah, I see, Like Enya. You still speak Japanese though?”

“Um…Yeah” I nodded, wondering when I’d learned Japanese, or why I hadn’t notice I was speaking it. I was also a little annoyed that the only ambassador for my country was an annoying neo-Celtic mystical warbler.

“My Japanese not so good. But understandable.” he said.

Meanwhile, I was beginning to wonder how I got to China, or where in China I was.

“Where am I?” I asked, looking around at the pools of water surrounding me. It was beautiful, with the evening sun rolling low in the valley, throwing long shadows across the pools, highlighting the short bamboo posts into relief. A few were in the pool I was standing in, but most had been knocked over by my arrival.

A sign drifted past, written in Chinese characters. I couldn’t read them.

Again the guide seemed puzzled, after all how could I not know where I was?. “Jusenkyo training site.” he answered.

‘Why does that sound familiar?’ I wondered.

“You okay?” He asked, noticing the look of increasing bewilderment on my face.

I nodded.

“Honoured sir fall into cursed spring of ” the guide explained. I thought I heard him call it a “Granny Chang.” or something like that.

“Huh?” I looked at him curiously.

“Jusenkyo site of many cursed springs, each with tragic story of something that drown in them.”

‘Oh Shit, It can’t be.’

I knew enough about Ranma to know what a Jusenkyo curse was. I looked down at my reflection shimmering in the water.

“Oh Shit.” I said softly, the reflection rushing up to meet me, before I fell into darkness.

For a moment, I thought I could hear St. Peter laughing at me.

I...I

Later, I’d regained consciousness in the guides hut.

I sat at the small wooden table while he boiled a kettle of water. It was a small hut, but not uncomfortably so and the guide was a kind old man. My bike was parked outside, still dripping water from whatever Spring it had crashed into.

‘I’ll never do something that stupid again.’ I promised myself, just like the last time. ‘At least there are plenty of worse places than the Ranmaverse,’ I told myself, ‘I could’ve ended up somewhere like Galaxy Express 3-9 or The Legend of the Overfiend or worst of all ,

…Pokémon.’ I shuddered at the thought of a shocking electric yellow rat-thing constantly electrocuting me, and the terrible repetitiveness of that series, using the same three plotlines over and over again.

There was one question left in my life, that I could think of anyway.

‘What do I do now?’

I couldn’t go home, since I was already dead there, or living or something. Whatever I was I was definitely confused. I poked my cursed form for a second, feeling mixture of curiosity, and giddy tickles. Poking myself reminded me of another question about my new life that I needed to ask.

“What spring was it?” As if I really needed to be told anyway.

“Sir very honoured. Sir first one to fall in spring.” The guide took the steaming kettle off the flame, to allow it to cool slightly so it wouldn’t scald me.

“Hmmm” I didn’t feel very honoured. I felt sick as I realised that had just happened to me only happened in bad fanfics, written by strange people who couldn’t think of an original idea to save their lives.

“Is Spring of Drowned Annoying Bitch.” The guide told me.

“Really?” I wondered if it was a joke to lift my spirits, since the guide had pulled me from the spring I’d been making Shinji Ikari look like Mister Sunshine. Well, somewhere in Ireland my cold dead corpse was being literally shovelled up off of a main road, how happy would you be?

“Very tragic story. Annoying Bitch fall in spring six months ago and almost drown.” The guide explained.

“What’s so tragic about that?” I asked, a little curious now.

“Bitch only almost drown.” The guide said, grinning. I’m not sure if that was meant as a joke either but I snorted in amusement anyway. “Well, hot water ready now. Should reverse curse easily.” the guide reassured me.

“Alright.” I closed my eyes and allowed him to pour the hot water over my shoulders. I shivered for a moment as the curse drew the energy from the hot water and opened my eyes.

The surprised look on the guides face told me something had gone wrong.

“What is it?” I asked, a little unnerved. If he was an expert and he was nervous, how should I have felt?

“It not worked.” He explained with a puzzled look on his face.

“WHAT?” I shouted. “You mean I’m stuck like this!” I pointed to my stomach, Jusenkyo curses are cured by hot water, even I knew that and the fact that it hadn’t worked was disturbing me a lot. I didn’t want to be stuck like that for the rest of my life, although seeing as it was St. Peter who sent me on a collision course with the spring in the first place it wouldn’t surprise me if he’d came up with the idea of a permanent curse just to mess with my head.

“Not a problem,” the guide reassured me, staying as calm as possible. “Water just need be hotter sometimes.” he put the kettle back on the flame, allowing it to heat up until it began to boil again.

I suddenly became very nervous, faster healing rate or not, I didn’t want to be scalded and horrifically burned.

“Emmm no.” I backed away. “Can’t you use…em…Spring of Drowned Man to cure the curse instead.” It had to exist, after all there was several hundred springs that I could see at least.

“No sir, Spring of Drowned Man damaged by oil from honoured sirs motorcycle.” The guide answered, showing more than a little displeasure as he did.

“Oh…” I sweatdropped.

“Will take at least year to be clean. maybe more.” The guide brought the steaming kettle to my arm.

“Hey, are you sure there’s no other way?” I backed against the wall, but there was no escape.

“No, only cure for now.”

“YYYEEEEOOOOOWWWW!” I cried, the shrill voice of my cursed form cracking a window. He poured the searing hot water over my arm as my insides twisted, turned and re-arranged themselves to match my natural form. I felt like throwing up for a moment. Part of me thought it was just his revenge for damaging his beloved springs, but he didn’t seem like that sort of person.

“There, now young sir is cured.” The guide smiled, while I cradled my blistered right arm.

“Thanks.” I bit through the pain of my steaming arm.

I was surprised though, to find that my clothes still didn’t fit right, my boots being much to large and everything still hanging loose from me. I put my hands in my pockets and looked around at the sparsely decorated cabin. There was a small mirror which showed a face that looked like a younger version of mine, but again with a slight Asian edge, which explained why he’d thought I was Japanese. I swallowed slightly as I realised that some of the changes caused by the spring were permanent. I was stuck as a teenager, about fifteen years old.

“Why am I still this young?” I asked, looking at my now dark brown eyes. They had been a grey-blue before.

“You not always this young?” The guide enquired. I just shook my head, a little nervous.

“Maybe spring also damaged by crash.” The guide theorised. “But some springs different, maybe just normal for that one.”

“Could be worse.” I said, taking a few calming breaths, after all, the curse itself could’ve been permanent, and at least I got to remain human. Riding my bike and suddenly turning into a dog while it was raining would be very inconvenient, and painful.

“Sir is taking very well.” The guide commented. “People usual go crazy when discover curse.”

“Mine isn’t too bad, I think. There are worse curses aren’t there?” I could remember one about a Panda, and there had to be worse than that. “Like spring of drowned ugly bitch.?” I joked. At least I had a good looking cursed form.

The guide snorted a slight laugh. “Sir must sign visitor book”, the guide gestured towards a red hardback book with the Chinese flag on it. “Place name, curse and date here.” he showed me where to write. Most of the names were written in Chinese characters, which I couldn’t read, and the lists read from the top down.

I cautiously wrote my name, using the paintbrush and ink provided. “Spring of Drowned annoying bitch.” placed in the correct column. But I didn’t know the date.

1992/01/31 the guide entered for me. I’d been sent back at least thirteen years, in addition to everything else. I would’ve been only five at the time, so I couldn’t just go back to my family. St. Peter had thought of everything.

“There, done. You need wait for special travel documents from Government though.” he said “Need for travel in cursed body, so not arrested.”

A lot of bureaucracy was needed to obtain a special Jusenkyo passport, since I had no other identification except for a water damaged drivers license that was almost completely illegible. But, when it arrived I could safely and legally travel around China without a guide.

But there was still the question, ‘What do I do next?” I had no home to go to, no family and only some very wet Euro notes. I’d have to find a cure for my curse, that much I knew, but where could I find it and, more importantly, how do I get there?

Of course, the title of the series was Ranma ½. The title character was Ranma Saotome. He would be cursed at Jusenkyo.

Hopefully I could just stay in Jusenkyo until Ranma arrived.

I...I...End of Chapter 1...I...I

Anyway, I hope the changes I've made have helped improve this fic. Any opinions, questions, comments or suggestions, feel free to contact me.

I won’t strictly stick to one fiancée pairing over another, so no RxA, RxS, RxU, or even R/R (yuck). Fics that stick to one single pairing over another bug me, but that’s really more of an EVA fic thing.

Slán Libh.
-Dartz IRL-