kangr@oxy.edu (Robert Ja Kang) Here's an interesting little story... Standard disclaimers: Not intended to infringe on either Rumiko Takahashi or Katsura Matsura. A work of fiction, for fun. Please don't infringe on my work, though feel free to distribute it (though I can imagine your mom reading the story...) NOTE: VideoGirl video cassettes are real. People really do rent cassettes which contain one-sided discussions. Please keep this in mind. A little caveat: Anticipate everything. Re-read sections that made you think, "wait, did he REALLY PUT THAT IN?!?! You'll have more fun. ______________________________________________ The pitch of night. A house coming into focus. The slamming of a door. A click of a lock. A nervous boy slipping a tape from a plain, brown, paper, bag while looking around nervously. Ranma is making sure he's covered. He slips in the tape, then prepares himself by sitting lotus-position on his futon. Inhale. Exhale. Strong fingers capable of punching holes through wooden boards now fumble nervously with a VCR remote. Ranma presses the "play" button and VOILA! She's there! The Video Girl! "Hi, I'm Amano Ai, Video Girl," says the image on the screen. "Pleased to meet you." Light brown hair which, when she turns this way or that, reveals hints of gunmetal grey; very appealing in its own way. Almond eyes, wide, soft, and empathic, framed in a heart shaped face to die for. What a girl! And that voice...Ranma didn't know what it was, but there was simply SOMETHING about that voice! At the *very least* it was most comforting. And right now, Ranma felt the need for some serious comforting. Even if it came from a pixelated picture on a video screen. And almost by coincidence: "She doesn't understand you? Darn right she doesn't, thought Ranma. Images of a different short haired girl came to his mind, equally cute to the girl on the screen, though THIS girl had dark black hair and somewhat larger eyes. But an image of that same face, with smoldering eyes and thinly compressed lips superimposed itself on the more pleasing image, which rather ruined the effect for Ranma. "Damn tomboy," muttered Ranma. "Don't understand anything about guys. Don't you know, we're different from girls? That we have NEEDS that are different? " Well speaking about needs, right now, Ranma needed a bit more of that wonderful, amazing, voice!!! Ranma wondered why he liked it so much. Maybe because in some weird sense it seemed so familiar...the voice of his On second thought, the concept opened up certain avenues that were, in retrospect, rather disturbing. Ranma might not have been aware of Oedipus Rex, but the whole idea of liking that voice because it reminded him of his mom was just a bit too complex. Ranma decided he liked the voice because it was so comforting. It was, after all, the more safe route. Heck, it was probably true, for that matter. The voice...it was more then simply comforting! Waves of empathy, so tangible, so REAL he could almost feel it enveloped Ranma like a glove. The closest equivelent of that feeling was when Ranma focused his ki for certain difficult martial arts techniques: the feeling of almost LIVING LIVING ambient energy. But the ki effect was a natural physical outcome of certain demanding mediations. The effect from this video girl shouldn't be this powerful, this affecting. After all, she wasn't anything but an image on a television, for cripes sake! Was it NORMAL for him to get such a physical reaction from a VCR tape? Was it right? Ranma considered these deep philosophical points for a second longer, then did what any normal male in his position would. He firmly told the rational part of his mind to shut the hell up. Heck, he had NEEDS, and if this VideoGirl Amano Ai could provide for them, so be it. At this point, Ranma wasn't too picky about his situation. And when the girl on the screen said, "Well, I'll be with you from now on," Ranma was forced to close his eyes; the unearthly sympathy affecting him with the force of a physical blow. Hesitantly, tremblingly, Ranma began to lay down, fingers fumbling at the base of his pants, his eyes still closed. As his body began reclining, Ranma felt something smooshed against his body -the television controller against the small of his back. While the idea of anything long and hard rubbing against his body was something that would normally command his attention, Ranma didn't care at this point.; his body demanded release. As he flopped against his futon, Ranma heard the "click" of the television as he inadvertently hit the power switch. But that was okay. He still had the VideoGirl's image etched in his mind's eye, so the fact that his physical eyes were closed, and the television was off didn't bother him. It was instead a different part of his anatomy that demanded attention. The television had accidentally turned off? Didn't matter. Didn't care. Didn't need the television mage no more. After all, Ranma had the bachelor's best friend at hand. So to speak. A shriek of pure pain snapped Ranma back into the world of reality. Leaping up in the air and landing in a combat crouch, Ranma's now open eyes scanned the room whose only difference from three seconds ago was the girl lying comatose in front of his futon. The girl? The girl. The girl from the video. More beautiful in person then in the confines of the television screen, far more shapely then her image, which was largely confined to her Head and Shoulders (An image of Shampoo flashed before Ranma's eyes, much to his confusion) revealed. Now Ranma knew he wasn't exactly the quickest person on the mental uptake (though he would have killed before revealing it), but having a gorgeous woman pop magically out of a screen was a *GOOD* thing, wasn't it? Wasn't it? Heck, was she even real? Was she real? Hesitantly, with a delicacy unaccustomed to him, Ranma gently extended a finger and prodded the VideoGirl's nose. It felt soft and satisfying. Idly Ranma wondered what other parts of her anatomy would feel soft and satisfying. Ranma considered his options. 1) There was a beautiful girl in his room. 2) That girl did not come by normal means. That meant she was magic. 3) The only beautiful, magic, girls Ranma was aware of were genies who granted wishes. 4) One of Ranma's secret wishes was for a sweet, submissive, girl like the one in the video. 5) That beautiful, magic girl did not have any male kinfolk of which Ranma was aware of. (VERY IMPORTANT, #5 was.) Ranma catalogued what else he knew about magical girls. Zip. This all rather reminded Ranma of an anime he had seen some time ago...in which a nerd received the blandishments of some Norse Goddess. But that had been through a telephone, not a tv, right? Whatever. While that particular OAV had been a real Belldandy of an anime, to Ranma all Japanese animation films were ultimately the same...characters with impossibly huge eyes and sappy love triangles. Nothing relevent to HIS life. (Though he had to admit, that "Maison Ikkoku" series WAS pretty good. What was the creator's name again? Takahashi? Odd...simply mentioning the name gave Ranma the willies.) Still...onto the important stuff. And anime certainly couldn't be important in any rational person's estimation. By contrast, what he had at hand certainly WAS: A copy (?) of VideoGirl Ai. Or was she an original? Copy or original, there was still a beautiful, unconscious, magic girl, in Ranma's room. A girl who had just demonstrated she was vulnerable, willing, and pliable. Where did that leave him? "Aw boy, this is the shits," said Ranma, grinning. ************************* VIDEO GIRL RANMA? "You dumb schmoe, so you accidently turned off the television. No wonder I'm hurtng so bad." Ai rubbed her arm hesitently, making sure everything was in working order. Her delicately girlish arm, though somewhat sore, had not suffered any real damage. Neither (thank goodness) had the rest of her being. Though for some reason Ai could not quite fathom, she felt somewhat less like a girl then before. Something felt... missing...diminished. Well, she would eventually find out what it was that was making her feel that way. Heck, the answer was probably right underneath her nose. Ranma grunted. To his ears, Ai's voice, not nearly as comforting as it was previously (To Ranma) held a hint of accusation. "Say," asked Ai. "Can you get me some water?" Ranma silently handed her a glass of water. "Hello?" Ai waved a hand across his face. "Anyone out there? Why aren't you saying anything?" "Shock." "That's not much of an answer. Accurate, though." Ranma took a couple steps away from her and with silent eyes, began studying her. "Hey, you have any green tea?" "The teapot's in the cabinet above you. Tea's next to it." "Well," said Ai brightly as she bustled about, preparing her tea. "You're just a fountain of words, aren't you?" Ranma silently absorbed that statement then decided he was being insulted. He began to steam up more then the bubbling kettle. The two were in the kitchen, getting snacks and Ranma wasn't exactly in the best of moods. In his room, he had waited patiently for a whole five minutes for the VideoGirl to awaken. Images of activities currently illegal under Japanese law flitted through Ranma's mind. To say he was pumped and ready would be to say he was ready to pump. Considering Ranma's rather macho upbringing and current endocrine gland output, his confusion might be understood when he stood by as the unconscious girl, just before waking up, underwent a certain unusual physical transformation. Where her bosom had been quite impressive before they, in front of Ranma, they began to SHRINK!!! Now Ai-chan's breasts were quite modest...perky really. And while the girl was still marvelously cute, it was now in a tomboyish way, as opposed to her earlier, more voluptuous, beauty. And while Ranma normally thought there was something absolutely irresistable about girls who kinda looked like boys, he was not exactly in the mood for a tomboy right now. (Images of Akane flashed in his head. Akane and something...fat and...meaty...in her hands.) Involuntarily, Ranma shuddered. All things considered, Ranma was in a decidedly depressed state of mind. And coming down from such a previously amazing high, that major a drop was simply not healthy. And with that particular letdown, Ranma was hit with the double whammy of the girl copping an attitude on him. She wasn't soft and submissive...she was brassy and assertive. She was willful. She was... She was another TOMBOY, for crying out loud!!! (And she had whapped him good when he tried to change her into one of Akane's spare bathrobes...for her own comfort, of course. He was doing her a favor, really. And yet she had whapped him! The memory alone was enough to reheat Ranma to a state of powerful frustration.) "I DO NOT NEED THIS!!! WHY DO I GET ALL THE TOMBOYS?!?!? I AM SO TIRE-URK!!!!" Ranma turned around, hand rubbing furiously against the growing bruise on his head. In one hand, Ai was sipping her hot green tea with dainty movements (?!?!). In her other hand, she was carrying a dented spatula. (Ranma got the weirdest feelings of dei ja vu). "You okay now," asked Ai, still sipping. "You were going rather ballistic there. "You HIT ME?!?!? AGAIN?!?!?!??!" Imagine if you will, that most famous television political advertisement from American history where a peaceful scene is suddenly ripped asunder by a mushroom cloud of radioactive material. Then imagine a young boy who has been frustrated by a girl in the morning. Then frustrated by a VideoGirl in the evening. Then frustrated THRICE by a girl. All within 24 hours. If you know anything about the ways of sexually frustrated sixteen year old boys, you know a 100-megaton yield doesn't even come close. "You...you @$*%(!!!!! What is with you? Do you always hit guys?! You said on the tape you were here to comfort me... well if hitting me is the way you comfort, I'd hate to see what happens if you ever want to hit ON me...you are so bad...you %&^$*@...how could I ever have liked your voice...eat at Joe's... who does your hair, it looks like a helmet...you weren't worth that 150 yen rental fee...you $^%@^&..." Ai continued sipping her tea, but also continued to listened avidly. What was this, after all, but a unique opportunity to improve her vocabulary? "...you $*&$*@...and what's more, you're a tomboy too, with those tiny little breasts!!! Heck, you really remind me of a boy!!!" Ranma finished his expository, proud of having done the male race a justice. What was that saying? "Hell hath no fury like..." The words simply don't do the aphorism justice. While most of Ranma's mouthings were only of nominal interest to Ai, his last comment made her gasp. That feeling of loss...of feeling LESS LIKE A FEMALE...Eyes wide, Ai-chan put down the stuff in her hands and clamped them to her chest. Ai-chan's delicate fingers probed her rather reduced bosom, exploring the extent of the loss. The loss was considerable... about as considerable as her bosom had once been. Ai began to get angry. Video Shop Gokurakuu's VideoGirls are fabulous constructions, with hearts of gold and the power to soothe tortured souls, both male and female. But make one mad and you're asking to play with thermonuclear fire. And of her entire body, Ai had liked her breasts the most. With her left hand, Ai grabbed the neck opening of her costume, pulled, and looked down. IT WAS TRUE!!! The evidence was there: her breasts weren't. "You took my breasts!!!" she shouted at the top of her girlish lungs, voice raw with anger, yet somehow quite feminine nonetheless. Ranma, who had bested anyone and everyone who had ever challenged him, found himself flung back by the power of Ai's glare. She didn't touch him, but he felt himself knocked back anyways. Idly he wondered if she could teach him that move, but he had no further chance to think, or protect himself for that matter, when a deluge of kitchen utensils suddenly began raining down on him. Amazingly enough, Ranma knew how disappointed Kasumi would be if he dented any of her utensils, so he didn't try to pulverize them with some superpunch. Instead, he used his energy to redirect the utensils away from him while causing the least damage. Amazing what one thinks of while under attack by angry kitchenware, eh? Ranma WOULD have wondered how Ai had thrown a white porcelein kitchen sink at him (when to the best of his knowledge, the Tendo's didn't HAVE such a sink), but then again he was a bit too busy to think of such things But WE still can, can't we? For that matter, we may wonder just how it is physically possible for the amount of acumulating material on Ranma's side to mass more then the entire contents of the Tendo's kitchen. Images of pocket universes or an animator's overexuberance come to mind. It almost settled down to a rhythm. Ai was impossibly fast in throwing X numbers of kitchen utensils, and Ranma was impossibly fast in deflecting. All in all, it became a rather comforting, pleasantly mindless, physical ritual when Ranma saw the mug containing the remnants of Ai's hot tea -now quite cold- arrowing in with digital accuracy. "Oh shit," he managed to say. before getting whapped again. The rain of utensils stopped. Ai squinted. "Hey," said Ai, surprised. "You're a girl." Now admittedly, Ai-chan was rather surprised at this turn of events. But her mind, able to process more information then a fractal-image videotape, was not about to let the situation go without comment. Suddenly she smiled devilishly and added, "that must mean you're not only a wimpy girlyman, but a **girl at heart too**." Unknowingly, Ai had just pressed one of Ranma-chan's buttons...perhaps the hottest button of all. It was an attack on his male dignity...an absolute affront! With a high-pitched cry, Ranma-chan launched a devastatingly powerful crescent kick that promised annihilation to anything silly enough to be in its way. "You take that back," she shouted at the top of her girlish lungs, voice raw with anger, yet somehow quite feminine nonetheless. Ai-chan backpedaled with all the speed of a VCR on fast-rewind, consequentally robbing Ranma-chan's attack of much of its power. Cloth ripped instead of flesh where Ranma- chan's foot connected with Ai's costume. Still, while Ai-chan avoided the kick itself, the small sonic boom created by the air rushing to fill the space carved through it by Ranma-chan's foot, caused Ai-chan to reel back uncontrollably and fall on her cute duff. "Say," sputtered Ai-Chan. "You sound just like me!" Ranma-chan, about to throw a punch, suddenly stopped. She looked at the VideoGirl closely and then remarked, with some surprise, "you're right." Then she noticed the rent in Ai-chan's leggings, created by the force of his attack. Ranma had noticed her legs before... long and slender, they seemed to go on forever. Now, the shredded material revealed the healthy color of those legs... flushed to the point of glowing with exertion, and slicked shiny with sweat...Ranma-chan's eyes grew. A hint of frilly white panties showed itself and Ranma-chan FREAKED. A trickle of blood came down her nose. Ai, who had seen that look (and reaction) before, prepared herself for what promised to be a unique experience and wondered if this would constitute a "love triangle built for two." "You're having perverted thoughts, aren't you," she remarked. ********************** End, chapter 1