Story: Fudge Bunnies

When it comes to fighting styles, you'd be hard pressed to find a pair more directly and obviously mirroring one another than Ranma Saotome and Ryoga Hibiki. The former: speed, agility, skill and finesse. The latter: raw power, stamina, durability and fury. Now that's not to say that Ranma was as weak as a rabbit, or that Ryoga was as slow as a tortoise. In point of fact, both might be considered superhuman in all of these areas. This was not a commentary on their physical abilities so much as it was how they tended to use them.

Case in point.

Ryoga threw a haymaker that would have ended most fights right there. The onlookers could barely see it, and they all lacked the danger sense a trained martial artist has. Regardless, they all ducked, and so did Ranma. But he did more than that. He dashed underneath Ryoga's guard and clobbered him in the breadbasket. This, too, would have normally ended a fight and unlike Ryoga's this attack had actually hit full force.

The lost boy didn't so much as flinch. Instead he brought his elbow down, aiming it for the back of Ranma's head. Ranma, in turn, rolled away - but a gust of air from the attack still struck him in the back, bowling him over a little further than he had intended.

Off to the side was a wide-hipped girl wearing a bunnygirl outfit, bouncing on alternating feet and kicking the other high up in the air while fistpumping with a pair of flashy pompoms.

"That's right, Ranma, you can't win!" the girl cheered in time to her dance. "Soon you'll have your face shoved in!"

Now, at first glance Ranma had all the makings of your stereotypical dumb jock. He loved to fight, loved to show off, didn't have the greatest grades and didn't care particularly much. He let his mouth run away from him, was cocky, arrogant, and this is starting to read like a list of criticisms more than anything else so let's get back to the point. Namely, that he actually did think things through despite the stereotype. The problem he had was, simply put, that the only time his thinking process resulted in a net positive for him was in the middle of a fight.

And he was thinking here very, very quickly. He'd heard about martial arts cheerleading from Mariko. Ultimately it served two purposes: Discourage your opponent and encourage your ally.

"He's so handsome, he's strong, my Ryoga does no wrong!"

Ranma could sense it. His own fighting spirit was diminishing whenever she did a cheer criticising him, and every time she cheered for this Ryoga guy, his shot up. Ugh, where did she find a monster like him at such short notice?

"Oh, wait!" Ranma said in a sudden moment of clarity. "Ryoga Hibiki? The lost boy? Man, it's been a while! How have you been? Not seen you since middle school."

<b>"DIE!"</b> Ryoga yelled, dashing forward with fist aimed right for Ranma's face and boy that was coming in fast.

"Same old for you?" Ranma asked, suddenly leapfrogging into the air above Ryoga, twisting in midair and landing on Hibiki's back in a single flowing move. "Wish I could say the same, buddy, you wouldn't believe the things I've been through."

Hitting Ryoga wasn't working. He'd become a hell of a lot tougher since Ranma had last crossed paths with him, but it probably didn't help that little miss hypnotic bunny psycho over there was messing with their battle spirits. On that basis there was only one chance of ending this fight: choking Ryoga out. Ranma had his arm across Hibiki's throat, with his other arm bracing the hold. His legs were scissoring Ryoga's torso, and yes Ranma knew already exactly how precarious his position was. The second Ryoga tried leaping back he'd slip away and let his own strength hurt him against the ground.

"Ranma, Ranma, one last hope," the irritating cheerleader taunted, spinning her pompoms around each other in a menacing way. "Ranma, Ranma, such a dope!"

And then, Ryoga just... Powered out of it. It was like being hit by an invisible truck, Ranma couldn't hold onto him and was sent flying back, rolling across the ground until he was staring up at the sky. A monster! He was a total monster! Even if Ranma fled and tried to think of something, it wouldn't matter. That girl was making Ryoga stronger and stronger with each passing moment, while Ranma's confidence was completely shaken.

This is the true horror of martial arts cheerleading. At last, Ranma had the basis for total understanding of what Mariko meant whenever she said that cheesy phrase.

"So you think you've won? Well, want to bet? Ranma has not L-O-S-T yet!"

That voice! Ranma sprang up and looked around. Mariko, twirling a baton triumphantly overhead. Already, Ranma felt a surge of strength returning to him. He kipped up and stared down Ryoga. Suddenly the lost boy didn't seem so frightening. Heh. Mariko hadn't even done much of anything yet and Ranma could still feel his confidence returning.

Tomiko growled at Mariko, who smirked back at her rival. "So you've finally come to play," Tomiko jeered. "But you'll soon lose anyway!"

Mariko tossed the baton into the air, twirled around and caught it with its other hand, without dropping even the slightest bit of rotation speed. "Such a pretty rhyming scheme, but you'll only win in your dreams. Your cheering skill, I think you'll find, is found just in your fat behind!"

"Better a fat butt than a fat head!" Tomiko snarled, stomping the ground so hard it made it look like she was doing bunny-hops in place. "I'll have you lose this time instead! Ryoga's strong and Ryoga's fast, so he'll kick your best friend's -"

"Classy cheer, but still too slow. Your cheer won't beat - Akane Tendo's!"

Ranma fell back over face first into the dirt. "What?" he yelled, pushing himself up. Ranma turned around and, true enough, Akane was standing there with a determined glower on her face and a cheerleader's uniform on her body. It looked completely ridiculous on her honestly. Sure, the tight leotard made it quite obvious that she wasn't nearly as flat chested as he'd been saying, and sure, it made it quite obvious that her stomach didn't have an ounce of fat, and that her hips were much better proportioned to her body than he thought. Sure, that short and frilly skirt did flatter her thighs, and sure, her legs were... Much longer... Smoother looking than he...

"What are you doing?!" Ranma yelled. He leaped across to Mariko and got right into her face, with a wildly manic expression. "You're having an uncute novice cheer me on in a fight like this?!"

His pigtail was sharply grabbed, forcing him to look into a face that, from this perspective, looked like it was smiling due to a well-known optical illusion. "Who are you calling uncute?!" Akane asked, nay, demanded.

"If it looks like a duck and quacks like a duck, then it's probably a clueless tomboy pretending to be a cheerleader!"

Fist, meet face. Back of head, meet knee. Compared to Ryoga's near hits even that felt like a gentle breeze, so Ranma just popped right up and gave Mariko the old stinkeye.

"Don't L-O-O-K at me like that," Mariko said, grinning way too much for comfort. "The truth is, I see a lot of potential in Akane. I mean a L-O-T! She'll be a phenomenal cheerleader one day."

"One day is not today," Ranma observed.

"True!" Mariko said, then stopped spinning her baton to point it directly at Ranma's face. "That's why I'm throwing her in the deep end! That way she'll learn how to swim quicker!"

"Oh!" Akane gasped. "Is that how you learn? No wonder I keep getting it wrong, I've only gone into the shallow end..."

"Ahem!" Tomiko yelled. "Ignoring us, are you? Ryoga, crush them!"

The brainwashed lost boy roared and grabbed his umbrella, leaping into the fray once again. Crap! Ranma shoved the girls out of the way and turned to meet his opponent. He might actually die here, what was Mariko thinking having a boring dumpy clumsy chick like Akane cheer him on at a time like -

"Ranma, Ranma, he's our man! If he can't win then no one can!"

Oh. Oh, lord. That was so... Cheesy and obvious, Ranma actually felt his stomach turn a little. "Are you even trying?!" he yelled at her in absolute frustration, lashing out with his fist for nothing more than an outlet and certainly not as an actual attack.

He struck the umbrella, which was heavily weighted to the point it could crumble concrete and leave a medium-sized crater. The umbrella shattered, and Ranma didn't even notice.

"Of course I'm trying, stupid jerk!" Akane chanted, thrusting out her pompoms more like she was punching an invisible enemy over and over again than cheering. "Watch me make cheerleading work!"

Ryoga's hand lunged out and grabbed Ranma by the collar, but Ranma was barely paying attention. "Ugh, call that a routine?" he gagged, turning around to face her and, in the process, accidentally hooking Ryoga under the arm and judo tossing him to the ground. "I've seen six puppies stuck in a trenchcoat give a more encouraging dance!"

"Bullshit!" Tomiko yelled, staring in disbelief at her downed champion. "That doesn't even - What?! How is he - How are they doing that?!"

And Mariko was off to the side smirking to herself. Yep. No question of it. She'd struck gold. Her first day and she'd already invented her own school of cheerleading martial arts: Victory by frustration! It made her wonder though, what would Akane Tendo call this unique technique? That was something they'd have to discuss later on... Once the two lovebirds finished crushing Ryoga.

1. Ranma and Akane continue to argue, somehow making Ranma stronger and faster out of sheer annoyance.
2. Ranma works out what's going on, and the technique stops working because he thinks she's doing it deliberately.
3. Ryoga and Tomiko turn the tables some other way, prompting Mariko to take her rival out personally.
4. Back in the present, a fudge bunny is eaten.
5. Something else