Most of the characters in the following story are copyright of their
prospective owners. No attempt to profit from them is attempted, and
it is only meant for the free enjoyment of its readers. Please enjoy
the story and e-mail me your honest opinion. Thank you.


Love blooms in the strangest of situations, and Ranma Saotome's life
is proof of that. A year before thirteen-year old Ranma's fated trip
to China, his father had to leave him behind for a time. This is the
story of his experience in that time, the people he met, the life he
saved and his brief experience with love.

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*A Ranma 1/2 & Sailor Moon Fanfiction: My Love's Flame*
*******************************************************
by Ryan Erik



               Chapter One: A Turbulent New Friendship


    With his shoulders slumped and his eyes downcast, the teenager
followed his father's lead. His brow was covered with sweat on that
hot Tuesday afternoon, having backpacked through Tokyo for almost
eight hours. His shoulders ached from the weight of the pack slung
over his back. His father constantly berated him for tugging along so
many things, but they were all his earthly possessions, including most
of their cooking wear and supplies. A glare upon the lighter pack over
his father's shoulders showed his contempt for the man's lack of
sensibility. Training was what the bald old man called it.

    "Training my ass," Saotome Ranma muttered under his breath,
adjusting the knot on his black belt.

    "What was that, boy?" Saotome Genma asked, still leading their way
through the Tokyo streets.

    The fumes and exhaust were really beginning to make Ranma a little
nauseous, though he would never admit that weakness. Why did his
father persist in dragging him all across of Japan, when there were
plenty of nice places they could train in, with the same proficiency?

    "I asked where we were headed, Pop," Ranma replied to his father.

    The old man snorted and sped his pace. When they turned to a very
busy street, he stopped and waited for Ranma to catch up.

    "Now listen up, Ranma," Genma insisted, putting his hands on his
son's shoulders.

    "Huh? What's here?" Looking around, Ranma only saw a line of
boutiques and other shops. Traffic was blocked on either side of the
road, allowing pedestrians to freely travel about the many
establishments. The majority of the customers consisted of girls still
dressed in their school uniforms, carrying bags of clothes and other
recently purchased items.

    "Shut up and pay attention," he growled, staring at his son
seriously. Under his breath, he whispered to Ranma, "It's time for
some stealth training, boy!" Motioning with his arms to the crowd
behind him, he grinned at his son. "You know what to do. Here, give me
your backpack." Releasing Ranma shoulders, he crossed his arms.

    Confused, Ranma began to slip the said pack off his shoulders. As
he was removing the strap from his right arm, he suddenly glared at
his father. "What do you mean, stealth training? You better not mean
stealing!"

    Snatching the heavy backpack from Ranma, Genma slapped his free
hand to his son's mouth. "Hush boy, you'll draw attention to us."
Wryly staring at his father, Ranma only shook his head and took the
hand off his mouth.

    "I don't think so, Pops," Ranma said, standing his ground. "What
happened to the money you borrowed from your old friend...what's his
name?"

    Taking a step back, Genma faked a toothy smile and waved his hand.
"It was...Asukai-san! Yes, Asukai. My good friend Asukai could not
lend as much as I had told you he did, so we need to compensate!"
Genma looked around and regained his ground. "You do want to eat
tonight, don't you boy?

    Gritting his teeth, Ranma closed his eyes. "You said it was
'Kitamura-san' two days ago, pop! You didn't borrow money from anyone,
did you?"

    The look Genma gave his son easily read, 'Who, me?'

    "And what did you do with the money, father?" Ranma demanded,
stressing his proper vocabulary. "Gamble it away, again?"

    "Heh heh," the man nervously laughed. Beginning to hold the pack
between himself and his son, Genma shook his head vigorously. "Of
course not! We did eat well the past few days, didn't we? I spoil you
too much as it is, but I felt you deserved it after all your hard
training."

    "Whatever," Ranma dismissed, used to the routine, but sick of
having to bail the two of them out with such means as his father
suggested. "I'm still not going to go and pick some stranger's pockets
because of your dirty habits."

    Fuming at his son's refusal, Genma narrowed his eyes. "You will
get us some money now, or you will regret it, boy!" Putting Ranma
between himself and the pedestrians on the busy cross street, he used
his son's backpack as a weapon, shoving him headlong into the people.

    Disoriented for a second at the speed of his father's surprise
attack, Ranma fell backwards in an attempt to regain his balance.
Fortunately, he struck something, enabling him to do just that.
Unfortunately, that something was a person.

    A girl cried out in surprise as Ranma inadvertently sent her
sprawling onto the sidewalk.

    Ranma turned to see a teenage girl with long dark hair, spread-
eagle on the sidewalk, her bags scattered over the concrete. She wore
a white school uniform with a beige collar and miniskirt, and a red
bow. Ranma did not recognize the school; though he did not know which
district of Tokyo he was in at the moment either. She could not have
been any older than fifteen or sixteen, but he really did not know for
certain.

    "I'm so sorry," he told her. The expression of surprise faded from
the girl's face as Ranma bowed in apology, quickly transforming into
anger. When Ranma offered his hand to help her up, she brushed it
aside and pushed herself to her feet, taking a moment to fix her
ruffled, long raven-black hair.

    He knelt and gathered her bags, while the girl fumed. Luckily the
mangas that had spilled from one of her bags were encased in plastic,
and the clothes from the other seemed clean. He carefully placed the
items into the proper bags as neatly as he could, and then offered
them to the girl, who quickly snatched them from his hand.

    "I really am sorry," Ranma told her again, keeping his head bowed.

    "Yeah, I bet," she said, checking her bags. "You really should be
more careful."

    Ranma looked up and half-smiled in embarrassment, noticing that
she was staring at him. Though she still scowled, the tilt of her
eyebrows and the red lips made her look very attractive, in a
dangerous sort of way. Swaying in the cool breeze, the tips of her
shiny, black hair dangled past then ends of her skirt. It was her eyes
that caught his attention the most, though. They stared back at him
perplexed, as if she was trying to solve some math problem that might
have been written on his forehead.

    "I will be," he assured her, shoving his hands in his pockets
nervously. His concentration wandered, and he turned his head, looking
over his shoulder in an attempt to locate his father. The old man was
nowhere to be seen. Frowning, he turned back to the girl.

    "Is something the matter?" she asked, taking a tiny step forward.

    "No, nothing," he said, faintly distracted. Trying to remember
just where he had agreed to meet his father should they become
separated, Ranma hummed in thought.

    "I'm Hino Rei," the girl said, introducing herself with a
respectful bow.

    "Saotome Ranma," he reciprocated with a bow. When he straightened
himself, he sighed. They stood before each other in a moment of uneasy
silence. She stared at her sidewalk, while he struggled to think of
something to say. Of course, nothing came to mind.

    "Well, I'd better get going, so I'll see ya later," he told her,
flashing a smile. He missed her look as he turned, taking off in the
other direction. Standing too near her made it really hard for him to
think for some reason.

    Doing a quick scan for his father, Ranma scowled. Genma had
officially ditched him, having disappeared down one street or another.
He figured that if he wandered enough, he would eventually remember
their meeting place.



    Rei watched Ranma's back as he departed, making his way down the
street. The moment she had caught his stare after his second apology,
she felt a lump build in her chest and butterflies buzzing in her
stomach. Everything from that point to the moment he left blurred
over. Had she not gathered her wits, she might have stood there the
rest of the day, gawking like a little girl.

    "Hey wait!" she yelled in hopes to stop him, but he was already
gone. She grumbled, shaking her head as she turned around and
continued on her route home.

    It was already past three-thirty in the afternoon, and she was
supposed to have been back at the temple over a half-hour ago. Her
Grandfather was leaving to meet an old friend of his in an hour, and
it would take her that much time just to walk home. She supposed she
would have to take a bus.

    "I shouldn't have let myself get carried away shopping," she said,
scorning herself. With a wistful sigh, she walked down the street
towards the nearest bus stop, a few away, trying to get the boy out of
her head. She did not know what she would have done had she been able
to stop him, but her imagination had plenty of fantastic answers.

    Observing the people around her as she casually left the
marketplace behind, Rei shifted both of her bags and her purse around
her left arm, and then started combing her hair with her hand. Dark,
light, tall, short, the people varied, but she simply could not get
Ranma out of her head. From top to bottom, he looked like someone
right out of a manga, and appeared to be her age, too. His passionate
blue-gray eyes shined with intelligence, and that smile...God, she was
still trying to get past that one.

    Ignoring her responsibilities for a moment, Rei found a seat at a
local cafe and dropped her bags. Fishing through the mangas she had
just bought, she found one in particular, removed its cover and
flipped to the centerfold. The picture was of a male martial artist in
a black gi, wearing a red belt around his waist. His ruffled black
hair somewhat matched Ranma's, as did the intense eyes. He stood
against a plane of random streaks of neon green, facing an unknown
destiny--unknown to those who had not read ahead like she had, anyway.

    After drooling over the picture for a few more moments, she
stuffed the manga back in its protective plastic, then gathered her
bags and continued on her way home, depressed as she could be for
letting another dream fade away.

                          *       *       *

    "What kept you, young lady?" Grandfather Hino demanded, glaring up
at his granddaughter, who had just strolled into the Cherry Hill
temple's courtyard. She looked at him with feigned innocence, though
he could see the shopping bags she hid behind her back. He frowned,
and turned his head indignantly. "I was supposed to meet an old friend
a half-hour ago!"

    "Sorry," Rei apologized, bowing her head. "I lost track of time.
It won't happen again." She looked up at him, obviously gauging his
mood.

    Putting his hands on his hips, he scolded her. "If I had a yen for
every time you said that, and then repeated your mistake, I'd be a
rich man! Oh well, there is a lot of work for you to do. Sweep the
courtyard, clean your bedroom and make sure that you clean the dishes.
You forgot to do them yesterday."

    "It was your turn, yesterday," she protested, matching his
reprimanding tone. "If I'm not mistaken, you also were supposed to
sweep the courtyard today!"

    The old man chuckled to himself, shaking his head. He could never
pull anything off on his perceptive, and much too stubborn
granddaughter. "Ahh, but I left that for you because of your
tardiness." He then stuck his tongue out at her and raced towards the
gate.



    Rei watched her grandfather jovially flee her wrath, fuming over
how much work he had left her. The dishes were never much of a chore,
since only the two of them lived in the Cherry Hill Temple, a humble
devotion to the Shinto religion, although they did occasionally have a
guest or two. On the other hand, sweeping the courtyard was much more
work than it sounded to be. It was quite a large area concrete area
surrounding the temple that tended to be covered by more leaves than
the trees that shed them. It would take her the rest of the day, if he
had not swept any, as she suspected.

    "Baka," she muttered under her breath, walking towards the temple,
which had multiple sections, including their lodgings. She stomped up
the steps, longingly looking over her shoulder as her grandfather left
the compound, leaving her alone to her chores and homework.

                          *       *       *


    The lead tip of her pencil cleanly snapped off the base and fell
onto her the page of math homework she had been working on, scattering
bits all over. A few choice swear words slipped out of Rei's mouth as
she gritted her teeth in frustration. Of all the most useless pieces
of information in the entire spectrum of mathematics, what good could
algebra possibly do for her? She did not plan on becoming a
mathematician or a scientist, so who bloody well cared about it? The
formula she had painstakingly followed led her in loops around the
answer, which she had copied from the back of the book. Even after
four times, she still could not get within five freaking hundred
digits of it!

    "It all becomes clear with practice," Asawa-sensei had told her in
class earlier that day. "Try hard and you will understand, Hino-san."

    "Not likely," Rei hissed as a late response to her teacher's
statement.

    Her books were scattered about the floor of her room, all opened
to various pages she had been studying, or had tried to study. As
smart as she knew she was, taking all of it in at once was no easy
task. Algebra especially took all of her attention, and some. It was
not like she could not handle it, but sometimes she wished someone
would do her homework for her.

    She tried to concentrate on her homework, but something caught her
attention. The small lamp in her room only illuminated enough light
for her to see her books in the far corner of her room. The waxing
moon provided enough light for the rest of her room, so she had slid
open the door and let it shine in through the window across from her
room.

    Summer had just ended, replaced by the autumn, but its warm
breezes had yet to cool. Tonight was especially warm, leaving her in
shorts and a baggy blouse, so when a shiver shot up her spine, she
looked up in wonder. The courtyard of the shrine laid empty before
her,