Dr.
Strangelouvre
Cause 8:
Ranma
on the Recent Past
---------
He’s crying on my shoulder, and his mucus dribbles down the front of his face
and globs off in big pools into my shirt. He squeezes me so tight, God, I could
swear he’s gonna crack a vertebra.
“I didn’t mean to Ranma, honest to God, man!”
I can remember a time Ryoga was this close up to me he left me a sobbing mess,
now the roles are reversed, but it still sucks to be me. I can feel the
tears-n-snot soup he’s currently secreting running through the fabric of my
shirt onto my shoulder.
“Hug me, Ranma. Embrace me! I need that at least.”
Embrace this. My fist clenches up, my hand goes in the air, and then serenity.
Tranquility takes me over. Noitaru just stabbed in the back of the shoulder.
“Seratonin point! B.F. Skinner School special attack. How did that make you
feel?”
My hand goes limp, drops down and my brain is at ease. The psychiatric approach
to problem solving is usually to dope someone up with drugs. In this case
Noitaru is using his brain-fucking martial-arts to keep me in a state of lulled
bliss, using my own endorphins against me. Cause and effect. My vision has
blurred, I’m high as a kite, and no matter how much the logical part of my
brain wants to be mad the constant supply of neronal happy-sauce just won’t let
me.
This all started a week ago. In fact, it’s been a long time so I can’t help but
give the gory details for this most recent week in my history. It all started
when I changed the fate of my entire life by not going home. The turn I took,
well it brought me face to face with Ryoga.
“We have to talk Ranma.”
Like hell we do. This idiot tried to rape my girl half. My next move was going
to be to bash the bridge of his nose into his forehead, but something happened
that made me stop. A cloth was pushed over my face and some kind of chemical
was squeezed out over my mouth. One wiff was like someone poking my brain with
wooden dowels through my nose.
Cause and effect. Hit me with ether and I'm out like a light.
Next thing I know I'm coming around mumbling no problem. No problem. It's OK.
There is this gigantic grayish blob trying to suck me inside of its body cavity
like something out of a microscope slide.
The grayish blob crushes my torso, and I can see yellow and black bits of gunk
floating around inside of it. It speaks to me in a mumbled tone, like someone
stuck wax then cotton then more wax in my ear.
“Forgive, me Ranma. I don't hate you but I must become a man.”
The gray mass sucks me in and crushes my body some more squeezing my ribs and
gusts together like an accordion.
No, Mr. Amoeba-thing. Don't eat me.
I blink again and the image gets a little clearer. Upon reflection this is
entirely embarrassing. I blink and shake my head. Now everything becomes clear.
Ryoga is the microbe trying to suck me in, and Noitaru is at his side, tapping
my shoulder, back, face, just about anywhere that he can get my brain to numb
itself into submission.
“He's awake, now Ryoga, really let it out.”
“Ranma?” He grabs my head, and drags it down so we're looking face to face. His
smile goes from ear to ear, with his jagged fangs jutting out like stalagmites
of elation and his eyes shrink-wrapped in tears.
All my senses seem to be coming
back to me in a Testing, testing one-two-three kind of way. The imaginary
blocks in my ears, and over my eyes are completely gone. My conscious mind is
ussured back into reality, and into my enemies loving arms. How do you feel?
I feel great.
Joy.
Rapture.
Bliss.
How should I feel?
Rage.
Kill.
Destroy.
Ryoga must die.
The problem with the brain is that it's something physically real. If you poke
it in a certain place, or squirt it with some kind of drug you can change
everything.
Can't eat tofu?
Poke.
Now you can.
Can't write a poem?
Squirt.
Now you can.
Don't like Ryoga?
Poke. Poke. Poke. Poke. Poke.
Repeat.
Anyway the whole session went on like that. My-drugged up head couldn't muster
enough anger to kick the shit out of the kid, so one might argue that we
actually made headway. That was Thursday last. Eventually we all got situated,
and I agreed to do this little meeting thing once a day for a little while.
That should at least help the poor bastard level his surging emotions enough to
keep us from killing each other.
The daily one one-on-ones actually get pretty interesting. We do Alexandrean
yoga, and Hibikis hums are like jagged sheet-metal scraped across a blackboard.
The last four times this hasn't been much of a bother, since I was too busy
feeling the lower half of my body go numb.
We do trust exercises. Standing up we hold hands and lean back as far as we
can. If we let go-well I'll just cut to the chase, we always let go. Thump.
Cause and effect, flat on our backs. It's called gravity.
Sunday was interesting. Noitaru had us doused and we had to explore the virtues
of our respective cursed forms. We sat there, I as the busty bombshell redhead
I never wanted to be and Ryoga the pig on a mat in the park staring at each
other. This went on for a long time. Joggers would pass by, then they would
return, and there we were; chick, pig and shrink all sitting about, staring at
one another. It couldn't last forever so I finally said that Ryoga the pig is
not as obnoxious as Ryoga the human.
“Very good Ranma.” Noitaru said. “Ryoga?”
The little black pig motioned with his front hoof at Noitaru. The shrink
complied by laying out an ink well, and a sheet of paper on the ground. The pig
dipped his snout into the ink and traced out lines on the paper. When he was
all done, Mr. P. dipped his hoof into the ink, and stamped it out on the bottom
corner.
Noitaru handed me the paper.
“I'm glad to see you've both made such great headway in this short period of
time. We'll meet again here, at the same time.”
I stood up smiling, looking at the paper. Teeth clenched tight enough to crunch
gravel. I turned and walked away.
“When Ranma is a girl, he is very cute.” Then the little black hoof-print.
You'd look cute over diced pineapple, frikker. Anyway, I couldn't worry about
that. I had to get over to Kuno's house. YES, I'm still being trained to learn
French bread-fuu, and YES, Kodachi is still teaching me. I'm not ready to give
up until I do some serious damage to Strangelouvre. That pussy-prodding hack is
all mine. What better way for him to be defeated than by the person with the
heart of a man, and occasionally the body of a woman? This situation doesn't
smell of irony, it bleeds.
Anyway it was Sunday, the same day that I got P-suke's little love letter That
I arrive for training and Kodachi leads me into the den, and stands over the
phone.
“Well, my dear, someone has to challenge Dr. Strangelouvre, and it might as
well be you. Simply call him, and it will be challenge enough. Formal letters
are completely useless on the good doctor.”
I assumed I should just tell him Ranma Saotome wants a rematch, right?
“Precisely my dear.”
So I made the call.
“Dr. Strangelouvre, gynecological clinic, Rei speaking. May I help you?”
I need to speak to Dr. Strangelouvre please.
“May I ask who is calling.”
I adjusted my voice. I'm Akane Tendo.
That was by far the worst impression, ever.
“I beg your pardon?”
Right now my biological level is saying: Look at me I'm a girl with testicles,
I'm a bad impression, someone stop me.
I muttered well, that is I uh-before Kodachi grabbed the phone out of my hand.
“Kodachi Kuno wishes to speak with him.”
She handed the phone back to me.
“Why darling Ranma keeps an annoying girl like you around I'll never
understand.”
I got ready to snap my fingers. I said if Ranma could be rid of me, he would do
it just like, and I snapped, that.
“Another thing he and I have in common.”
I go back to the phone. I'm on hold.
Billie Jean is not my lover. She's just a girl who claim-
“Mon amour pour vous brűle comme le soleil au-dessus de la mer.
Mon amour pour vous lames au-dessus et au delŕ de moi comme des nuages d'orage.
Mon amour pour vous, deviendra-t-ce une tempęte pour nous consommer deux?”
What the fuck?
“Who ees thees?”
I'm just calling to tell you that I want a rematch.
“AI Baig youar pardaun Madame, I deu naut fait my paishenns.”
Of course not. Ranma Saotome had me call you to tell you he wants a rematch.
“Ze gutlais swien, he couuld naut tawk to moi himesailf?”
Look, If Strangelouvre wants Ranma to call him that can be arranged. However,
he thinks this should be sufficient. Will you agree to fight?
“Naut unlaiss it ees made moar eenteresteeng. Eef he vaus to never use martial
arts again if he loses, zen I wuuld be veary anxiuus.”
And if Ranma wins?
“Zen I weel nevair aggan bozer ze madame Kodachi. He cain haer aal to
heemsailf.”
My gut clenched. At that moment I realized what this was all about. Oh, God.
Deal, I say. Consider it done.
“In woan week at zee park, neun. Oui?”
Oui. He'll be there
“Nau, eef yule escuse moi, zere is a 37-year oald in coald stiirups I maust
attend teau.”
My spine shivered and I hung up the phone. How could anyone not want to beat
the crap out of this guy? I turned to Kodachi and told her that if Ranma beats
him, Strangelouvre will be gone for good.
“Well, you're useful for something dear. What else do you do besides running
errands for dearest Ranma?”
I grabbed her by the collar and brought her face right up to mine. I kick ass.
“Really, dear?" Then she laughed. "Well, let's see, shall we?”
I'm a lot better at French bread-fuu than I used to be, now. The essence is in
the chi. The battle aura that you produce can be extended into the object you
hold. If you can do it right, then the object you hold can be defended by your
own aura. It's not extremely effective, so combined with aura projection you
have to learn to focus it as well as use different hand motions to attack with
studier parts of the bread. I know it sounds crazy, but trust me, it works.
For the whole week I busted ass to get the tricks of the trade down, and it's
paying off.
Thursday, the day that Ryoga wept a slime-hole into my shirt, Kodachi and I did
battle She came at me with a full-thrust, fencer style. I blocked that with a
side-swipe from the but of the bread. Still in swordsman mode, the girl swipes
at my head. A quick duck, and I try to slam the bread home on her heel, she has
to back flip to avoid me.
“Not bad, Red.”
I nod.
“Now we need to discuss a problem.”
Problem? I shouted, that was a perfect attack.
“No no no, dear. The problem is with Ranma. You tell me he is learning and I
just trust you? No. Tomorrow I will not let you into my house, understand? I
want to see what Ranma has learned. So only he can come here. Understood?”
I told her that he'd only could come if there are no dirty tricks. No paralysis
powder, gymnastic weapons, strikes from brothers, no attacking sharks or
alligators. He'll come here, and Kodachi will spar with him just like she
sparred with me. Agreed?
“Indubitably, my dear.”
So I agreed. It was Thursday then. The next day would change my life.
Oh yeah, Akane.
I haven't spoken much to Akane in the last week. What's there to say? She was a
lie to me from the start. What she really is is something I couldn't want any
less. But for your sake I'll tell you that every time I went out to meet with
Ryoga, then spar with Kodachi she always had some word for me, she waited for
me out by the gate each time. Before I left on Thursday she said to me:
“Ranma, I really want to have a talk with you. Allot has changed too fast. So
please, when you come home, Just be with me for a little while, and hear me
out.”
Sounds nice doesn't it? Rewind to Wednesday when she said this:
“Ranma, we should talk.”
Rewind to Tuesday:
“Talk to me later, Ranma.”
Back to Monday:
“See you later Ranma.”
Sunday:
“You leaving?”
Saturday:
“Get lost, Jerk.”
Friday:
“You had better have something to say to me, you ass.”
Now, let's look all the way back to Thursday, the day on which, just as she
promised, she locked the gate, and I had to find someplace else to go.
Authors notes:
OK, no more school, which kept me from writing, but at the same time, I'm
pretty sure everyone who once followed the fic is out of the loop on it now. I
don't think anybody really cares if this gets written or not, nobody except me,
so I guess I better finish it. I love to win a “most bizzare fic” award, so if
there are any out there, somebody make sure I get nominated.
The real inspiration for polishing this off was when I went to see “The Matrix:
Reloaded” and for a brief moment on screen, before me was an arrogant, French
dingus going on about “Cause and effect.” All I can say is that it was a thing
that made me go Hmmm. 2 seconds later I knew I had to write more Strangelouvre.
Whether a coincidence, message from God or indication that the Wachowski bros.
like my work (HAHAHAHAHA, right) I knew I had to write more.
Further notes: For the hell of it I added direct quotes from “Fight Club” and
“Survivor” Both books are © Chuck Palahniuk, and don't fuck with him, he'll
kick your ass.
“Billie Jean” is a Michael Jackson song. I don't know who owns the rights, I
don't own them that's for sure. I just used it as an excerpt, please don't sue
me. Don't show this to him, or he'll climb up a tree, and sue me while claiming
he never saw a plastic surgeon.
Ranma ˝ is owned by Rumiko Takahashi. Don't show this to her, or she'll have a
heart attack, or try to have me killed or something.