by Ellen Kuhfeld » Tue Dec 19, 2017 10:41 am
I took up a writing challenge one time, to assemble my three-entity "dream team" from anime and manga. There were various levels of challenge they might have to meet, and I picked the easiest. The challenger told me I'd failed the challenge, an outcry arose, and another judge ruled I had successfully met it. Haven't tried a challenge since. I'm rather fond of the story/scenario. And I combined elements of all three challenges. What the hey - here it is!
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The Easy Challenge:
A few weeks before your team shows up, news reports start coming out of a remote part of the world about a person who can work miracles (heal the lame and infirm, feed multidutes, make U.S. beer drinkable, etc.). This person has started to attract a small-but-fierce group of worshippers who would do anything to protect him.
The day after your team arrives, this miracle-worker turns up on your doorstep, asking you to hide him. He never claimed to be a god, and just wants to be left alone. However, the lead item on the evening news is an interview with the cult's leader, where he swears "vengeance and death upon the infidels who have stolen our messiah away from us", and announces that the cult has managed to get their hands on some Soviet-era weapons - he doesn't say whether that's a crate of AK-47s or a nuke.
The mission is to get all three members of your team to agree on a single course of action to deal with the situation, and quickly – you don't want the fanatics to start a shooting-war.
Good luck to you, brave soldiers.
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I'd like to try Team Versatility for the easy challenge, please:
Saotome Ranma, from a period where he's relatively comfortable with his curse and quite capable of using kawaii when necessary.
Ryo-Oh-Ki from near the end of the first Tenchi OVA.
Ba-chan from I My Me! Strawberry Eggs, with her motorcycle mecha.
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Team Versatility is staying at my place – we have a daybed for Ba-chan, Ranma is used to sleeping on the floor, Ryo-oh-ki can probably find a few good places to hang out. Ba-chan, having heard of Ranma’s problem with cats, has outfitted Ryo-oh-ki with a decorative voice-modulator collar so she sounds like a squirrel or whatever – anything but a cat. That, with the long ears and puffball tail, should keep Ranma safe from even the fringes of the Neko-ken. Since we once were SCA, we can handle strange visitors from another reality crashing about the house.
Miracle-workers are another matter, but after he convinces us he’s not a Jehovah’s Witness, we let him in. His name, for the sake of convenience, is Q.
Ba-chan takes charge after hearing Q’s story. While her past is a mystery, it seems likely she was some kind of secret agent, who still dabbles in such matters as entertainment in her retirement. This kind of situation is something she’s used to.
With a miracle-worker on tap, there’s no problem enlisting Ranma and Ryo-oh-ki. The cabbit is seduced by enough carrots to feed the multitudes, while Ranma is willing to go along after being told that in the future, he will miraculously be able to eat and enjoy Akane’s cooking. (We won’t touch the major plot element of the curse.)
Combining newspaper, television and internet data with ground-truth from the miracle worker, Ba-chan knows the likely locations of both cult and weapons. Ryo-oh-ki, in spaceship form, can use her sensors to pin things down precisely. (Ranma, Ba-chan and Q are aboard.)
Ryo-oh-ki beams Ranma-kun into the camp of the cult, and Q does a minor miracle to convince the cultists that not only has Ranma been there all along, he is one of the boldest and strongest of believers among them – a true Man among Men.
Ryo-oh-ki then sets Q and Ba-chan down unobtrusively outside of camp, and transforms back to a cabbit. Q gives Ba-chan a set of formal robes befitting an ancient and noble Elder. They go into the camp of the cult, with Ryo-oh-ki sitting on Ba-chan’s shoulder. Q proclaims he is back with important news, and calls the cult members together for a great feast.
The great feast is held. Multitudes are fed, and American beer flows freely to the delight of all. At the climax of the feast, Q stands up to speak; and miraculously, all are able to hear and see him well. Ba-chan is at his side, with a kawaii cabbit on her shoulder. Ranma-kun is in the midst of the crowd, piles of used dishes before him; his neighbors stare at him in awe of the heroic eating they have seen.
“I have been away from you,” he begins, “conferring with the Elder Lulu of the distant planet Joketsuzoku. They have a great famine there, and pestilence as well. Their stores of unobtanium are depleted, and terrible threads fall from the skies. Earth, with all its problems, is a Paradise next to their plight. I must go to save them.
“But I cannot forget the time I have spent in your glorious company, and so I would take one of you with me to be my companion in this mission. Saotome Ranma, come forth!”
Ranma arrives at the head table, and stands proudly with Q and Ba-chan.
“Carry out my mission as best you can,” Q continues. “Feed the poor, and comfort the sick; and try to convince American brewers to do a better job. And now,” (he holds a large glass of cold beer aloft; it transforms into the purest and clearest of sparkling waters) “I shall perform my last miracle among you. Saotome Ranma, you shall be my closest of companions.” (He pours water over Ranma.) “You shall be my most favored concubine.”
Ranma-chan moulds herself against Q’s side, and gives the cult a kawaii flutter of the eyelashes. Ba-chan throws Ryo-oh-ki into the air, where she changes to her spaceship form. She beams Q, Ranma, and Ba-chan aboard and leaves, heading straight up. The cultists stare at the place where Q and Ranma had been, then at one another. As one, the men place their hands in such a way as to protect their manhoods.
Once out of sight, Ryo-oh-ki heads in a leisurely manner towards my place. During the trip, Ba-chan advises Q to go to the Mayo Clinic (where some miracles are expected, and there’s a team used to dealing with them) and confine his endeavours to healing the sick.
As they land, Ba-chan notices her motorcycle is gone. In the distance we hear a scream of surprise as a motorcycle thief pushes the wrong button and it turns into a mecha, followd by metallic crashings as he proves he doesn’t know how to drive a mecha. Ba-chan departs in that direction in a great rush, waving her revolver, while Ranma-chan holds the back of her head with one hand and Ryo-oh-ki mews enticingly at Q, hoping for more carrots. (During all those transformations, the voice modulator has been lost.)
“C .. c … c … CAT!” Ranma-chan shrieks as she hears the “mew”, and runs wildly into the distance. Q creates carrots. Ryo-oh-ki eats carrots. I go inside, and catch up on my reading. The world saved, things return to normal.