Hello, readers, and the morbidly curious. Before you get panicked, no, this isn't the Jonabee version of Weebee's vault, and no, we're not going to retire old fics here when we get tired of them. What this fic is for is to showcase any random ideas we have, and see what your oppinions are, to avoid creating a huge number of one chapter wonders like Weebee's got on his fanfic page.

Given that we are even more active at coming up with random, wierd ideas than either of us alone, we felt that you should see some of them.

Please take these fics with a grain of salt. Many of them were probably written on a caffine high or in an hour of lobbing ideas back and fourth like particularely volitile hand grenades, but don't hesitate to tell us if they suck, or if we've achieved awesomness by accident.

Also, about athor's notes? Don't expect spell checking on those. What do you want? We're evil.

Without further rambling, other than the rambling at the end of the chapter, there'll be plenty of that, we present the first idea. The untitled Daria crossover of DOOM!

*Crack-A-Thoom!*

It was only a few days after the failed wedding and Tatewaki was spending the lovely, sunny day facing off against a tree, not moving as he waited for his adversary to make the first strike. That horrid event, mere days before, had shaken his stolid resolve. Verily, he had prevented the foul sorcerer Saotome from cementing his vile grasp upon his fierce tigress, but there had been several close calls when one of the guests had stumbled into his just strike, causing him to stop it abruptly. He doubted his father would object to that one girl's haircut, but such things were not to be discussed.

In any event, his normal means would no longer be adequate, as the insidious Saotome drew innocents protectively around himself like moths around a flame. As such, he, the Blue Thunder of Furinkin High, would need to devise a new method of attack. But what would the Heavens find most righteous?

Out of the corner of his eye, he saw a leafy movement. "I strike!" he valiantly declared, slashing at the shrubbery.

"Why is my Tachi-chan so upset that he attacks da Big Kahuna for no reason? " the mad growth demanded, and the young kendoist quickly realized that it was his deranged father's rather... disturbing head ornament.

"Whilst I do not wish to discuss the will of the Heavens with one such as you," Kuno began, "I fear that I have reached an impasse in my quest."

"And what is the Big Kahuna's Tachi-chan tryin ta do?" the crazed father asked. Tatewaki acknowledged that, while he was most assuredly not suitable for raising one such as Saotome, Kocho Kuno was still a father, with the occasional paternal urge.

"Tis a thing most worrisome," the noble samurai in training admitted. "I wish to rid the land of the blighted presence of that accursed fiend Saotome. Mine own sword has been found unreliable in battle. Even one such as I cannot predict the movements of every plebeian watching my great conquest over evil."

"I see," the elder Kuno replied, stroking his palm tree in thought. "Give yo Daddy a little time, and the Saotome boy will be out of ya hair. The Big Kahuna'll be taken care of dat keiki in da mornin."

HR.

"All right, what's this all about?" Ranma demanded, as he casually leaned out of the way of yet another desperate lunging strike from the principal's clippers, causing the older man to tear up a strip of bark off of one of the large palm trees that he'd taken to keeping in his office.

"Ah, good question from such a bad keiki, dat is," the elder Kuno said, straightening and tucking his weapon into a pocket on the front of his usual loud Hawaiian shirt. "I been noticin," he said, turning and walking to a hammock that had been strung up between his desk and the window sill, "dat you been absent a lot dees past few weeks, yeah? I been tinkin, why would dat be?"

Ranma frowned, at the moment, he really didn't want to talk about the events ofPhoenixMountain, especially to this lunatic. "Is there somethin you're gettin at?" he demanded, irritably.

"Be patient, little one," the palm-tree haired man rebuked, bringing a finger up and waggling it at his student, before reaching into his hammock to retrieve a sheaf of documents. "Now, me be checkin, and da big Kahuna be tinkin dat you like movin 'round. You always travelin wit your fadda. Me be tinkin dat you gotta be doin dat, or ya start slackin off in your studies an' bein a bad keiki."

The pigtailed boy shrugged uncomfortably. To tell the truth, the old man was right, in some respects. He had been feeling the urge to put on his pack and go hunting for some new style to master ever since a few months after entering the Tendo home, but he'd usually assuaged that with weekend trips into the martial artist infested back streets of Nerima. "Look, I checked my grades. I ain't failing, even with the trip I took," he said, seriously.

"Yeah, but I be wantin all my little boys and girls to be happy, 'so dat dey obey da school rules and not be delinquants," Kuno replied. "So... I took da liberty 'o arrangin for a little trip for you in the exchange program."

"You what?" Ranma asked, deadpan.

"No need ta tank me. You be goin ta de greatUnited StatesofAmericafor a li'l trip. I be wantin ta send you to de islands, but I couldn't swing it, I'm afraid," the Hawaiian loon proclaimed, raising two thumbs in a victory sign.

"Look, that's, er, nice," the pigtailed martial artist started, wondering precisely what coconuts for brains' newest plan to make the students miserable was, "but..."

"No need ta be thankin me, keiki, da Big Kahuna be happy to help.. Now, how's about you surf off back ta your class, yeah?"

"Surf off..." Ranma said, just as the principal pulled a leaver next to the hammock, and a large stream of water came flowing out of a hatch in the ceiling, tossing the Jusenkyo cursed figure through the door and out into the hallway. By the time the redhead managed to cough most of the stuff out of her lungs, Principal Kuno had vanished.

HR.

"Twenty-five thousand yen?" Ranma grumbled, as he looked into the window of a small house, the last one on the list that Nabiki had given him to check out. Given that he only had a hundred thousand total, and he hadn't gotten the documentation through that would allow him to work, paying that much per week probably wouldn't work. He sighed. "Great," he muttered. "Guess I should find a spot to set up the tent."

Walking down the street and searching for the nearest park, the pigtailed martial artist frowned. "I've only been here a day, 'n I'm already irritated," he grumbled. He'd already had to fork over five thousand yen for a single night in a hotel room, and the principal, for all of his 'infinite wisdom,' hadn't bothered to set him up with a place to stay, and it was getting late.

"Stupid Kuno, stupid school," he muttered. Nabiki, for once in her life, had actually decided to be helpful and tried to find a way to keep him from being sent here, but unfortunately a year and a half at Furinkan had done its damage, and he was looked upon with something like horror by every other school in the Tokyo area.

Given that, his mother had decided that going to America would be better for him than having to move to Osaka or something. For a moment, he smiled as he recalled the beating he'd given the coconut headed principal after he'd finally realized that he had no way out, but his attention was drawn away from that thought as he saw a large expanse of green before him. He nodded. The place looked perfect. It was a wide, open place for practice, and beyond it was a large, grey-black bulk that looked like the high school.

For all he knew, it was the sports field, but he could probably clear away his camp site before anyone wanted to use it, and he was tired from the flight over the ocean and the long walk afterward. Unslinging his backpack, he untied the small bundle that contained his one-man tent, and began setting it up. Crawling in and settling down on the futon, he looked up into the roof of the tent and smiled. He had to admit that camping out again did feel kind of good, and when he got completely set up, he could go hunting for martial artists on weekends.

He'd heard something about United States Marines being pretty tough, and wondered if there was a base nearby as he drifted off.

HR.

As the body fell towards him, Ranma reacted instinctively, bringing his feet up to catch the incoming projectile in mid-back. Pushing up rapidly, he sent it into the air, and it slammed into the ground a few feet from the entrance of the tent. "Guh?" the pigtailed martial artist muttered, raising one hand to rub the sleep from his eyes, and wondering what was going on.

Something had just been thrown at him, this he knew, but he wasn't sure what it was. Looking up, he noticed that the support poles at the top of the tent had been badly mangled, and some cloudy grey light was poking through a hole ripped in the material. "Crap," he muttered in Japanese, rolling sideways and poking his head out of the door flap to look into pain clouded eyes.

"Owie," the owner of said eyes groaned, as Ranma blinked at him.

"You the guy who fell on my tent?" he asked casually, trying to keep the accent out of his voice as best he could, and failing miserably.

"Mmhmm," the other said, still quite obviously in a great deal of pain. Ranma sighed, re-entering his tent for just long enough to get changed into the only set of spare clothes he'd brought, and exiting to note that several people were now standing around looking at him in astonishment.

"Dude, who sets up a tent on a football field?" one asked, scratching the top of his head.

"Yeah, he doesn't look like Mr. DeMartino," another boy, this one with darker skin, commented.

"Didn't know you guys'd be playin at," Ranma began before looking towards the sun for a moment, "seven in the mornin."

"My legs feel all tingly," the boy Ranma had launched earlier commented.

"Yeah," the dark skinned boy replied. "Our school has always been very committed to sports. We practice several hours every day. Oh, and I'm Mack. You must be new here. I'll show you to the Principal's office." Ranma shrugged and figured it couldn't be worse than trying to find it himself.

"Hey, Mack Daddy," the prone figure called out. "We still have practice to finish, right?"

"No, Kevin. I think we're done for the morning," came Mack's exasperated reply. "I'll be sure to let the nurse know you're out here. And don't call me that." Turning back to the new student, Mack said, "Sorry, I didn't catch your name."

"I'm Ranma Saotome," the Japanese boy responded. He watched for a second as the other football players went to the other half of the field and continued their practice, leaving Kevin stranded on the ground. "Should you just be leaving him like that?"

"He'll be fine," Mack replied. "It shouldn't take too long for me to get you to the office, and the nurse is the next door over."

With a shrug, Ranma knelt down and quickly and efficiently repacked his bag, leaving the tent closer to the top than he normally would so that he could repair it later. Once everything was away, the martial artist said, "Lead on, then."

HR.

Margret Manson looked over her glasses at the student before her, feverishly taking notes on the clipboard that she held, incidentally in the trademark illegible scrawl of anyone remotely associated with the medical profession.

"Now, Mr. Soutomie," the woman began, as she noted the boy's rather odd dress sense, "can you tell me again what you see there?" She gestured down to an image on the table, which showed the outline of two people, the one who looked female raising her hand in front of the male one's face.

The martial artist sighed, from where he was sitting across the table, his fist propping up his chin. "Two people, a guy 'n a girl," he said, appearing as though his boredom was about to stop his breathing.

"All right," the woman said, "what do you think is going on in the image, Mr. Soutomei?"

The martial artist scowled irritably at the second mangling of his name in less than a minute, but then turned his eyes to the image, taking note of the hand on the woman's hip, and the outstretched hand. "She's probably yellin at him for something," he offered. "Probably thinks he was doing somethin perverted and is about to smack 'im across the face. Of course, he probably didn't do anything. ...at least, I don't see a Bokkuto, so he probably didn't do anything."

"I see," the psychologist said, and then flipped the paper with the image on it over. "And this?"

The black outline on the other side of the page was what looked like a four legged animal, with a thin tail curling out the back, and triangular ears. Ranma flinched back at the sight of it, as though he had been burnt. "... that?" he asked, nervously.

Mrs. Manson adjusted her glasses. "Yes, that."

"It's a furry hellbeast come to tear out my soul and eat the still warm carcass whole, before which it'll probably play with the intestines like string," he said, matter-of-factly.

"I... see," the woman said slowly, before grabbing the paper and quickly slipping it into her labcoat. "Well, I think that's all we need for now, thank you."

Ranma sighed in relief and turned to exit the room, while the psychologist held up the questionnaire he'd filled out before the live interview. "Water based?" she muttered, confused.

HR.

Ranma sighed in relief as he exited the rather claustrophobic little room where he'd taken the psychological exam, entering a scene of rapidly bustling students, rushing to the second class of the morning.

Consulting the little temporary schedule he'd been given, until his 'skills' could be fully assessed,' he noted that he had a history class on the second floor, and headed for the room listed, hoping that the school was laid out at least somewhat like Furinkan.

Unfortunately, the hope wasn't precisely realized, as he found that the letter and number based system he was used to had been replaced with a strange three digit room identification code, and he'd had to ask directions five times by the time he made it to Mr. DeMartino's history class.

"Now class," he heard as he pushed open the door to the room as quietly as he could, "We were SUPPOSED to have two new students TODAY, but ONE of them decided not to SHOW up this morning," a rather harsh sounding male voice blasted out at him, the odd emphasis put on some of the words making it somewhat hard to understand.

"Um, sir?" he asked, deciding to be polite for once since it was pretty much his fault that he was late. "Sorry I'm late."

"Ah, the prodigal student RETURNS," the man said, though as he turned towards the Japanese martial artist, one eye seemed to bulge out of his head. "And what in HELL are you wearing, BOY?"

"Uh," Ranma said, looking confused as he checked his clothing. At the moment he was fully dressed, and the clothes, his old Chinese military uniform, were gender appropriate. "Didn't know this school had a dress code," he offered hesitantly, looking into the room to note that the closest things to 'uniforms' there were a girl in a cheerleader's outfit and the guy he'd kicked earlier, who was still wearing his football uniform.

"Dress code?" the teacher asked. "Dress code? Do you have ANY idea what you're wearing? That UNIFORM is completely and totally disrespectful to the FREEDOM of the United States! It's a SYMBOL of the Chinese military. You're a TRAITOR to our GREAT nation!"

"Oh, that," Ranma said, shrugging and flicking his pigtail. "Y'know I'm not an American, right?"

The man stopped for a moment, his eyes bulging again, and Ranma could swear that he saw a vain inside one of them throbbing. "That's not the POINT!" he sputtered.

"'N besides," Ranma continued, ignoring the man's last statement, "you got no idea how I found these clothes."

"And precisely HOW would the way you obtained those make them any LESS of an insult?" DeMartino demanded, stomping back to his desk, as his students watched the exchange between him and the new arrival with some fascination.

The martial artist fidgeted for a moment, and then mumbled something.

"Speak up!" DeMartino demanded.

"I... kinda stole them from a Chinese army patrol while running from a psychotic amazon with a broadsword," Ranma said, as quickly as he could.

"OH, well that's different, THEN," the teacher said, before a contemplative expression entered his features. "And you know Janet BERCH?"

"Huh?" the martial artist asked, blinking stupidly.

"Never mind. Just ANSWER one question. When did the current GOVERNMENT overthrow the former Chinese government?" the history teacher barked.

"Well, the encirclement campaign started in 1927, but the real war took place from 1946 to 1950, and the government only declared everything under control in 1991," Ranma replied, glad that he was being asked about military history, something he actually was reasonably good at.

"Not entirely ACCURATE, but better than most of these MEAT HEADS could do," the teacher nodded. "Take your seat, MR. Saotome. Now, since I've already asked ONE of our new students a question on his first day, let's get back on TOPIC with the next one. Ms. Morgendorfer, please CONCISELY and unemotionally define the concept of manifest DESTINY for the class!"

Ranma didn't pay much attention as a rather scarily monotone voice emitted from a seat near the middle of the class, rattling off the answer, as he selected his seat in the back, near the football player. "Hey, you all right?" he asked, a little worried for the other boy's lower back.

"Oh yeah!" the football pad wearing boy exclaimed. "I only have a few shooting pains in my leg now!"

"Mr. THOMPSON, is there something you would like to SHARE with the rest of the CLASS?" Mr. DeMartino asked.

"Oh, no, I'm fine," Thompson said cheerfully, waving casually.

DeMartino sighed explosively, before turning back to the brown haired girl with the monotone voice. "Do you SEE what I have to DEAL with?" he asked, his eyeball bulging again. "Now you understand why I CHERISH anyone with more than two BRAIN CELLS to rub together. Now, let's MOVE on with this class."

Ranma leaned back in his seat, ready to listen for at least a little while before passing out. After all, he'd actually gotten a good night's sleep the night before.

HR.

"So, how are our little ducklings?" Ms. Li asked, seated behind her heavy, wooden desk.

Mrs. Manson shuffled through her files for a moment before setting them down. "They actually did better than I expected," the psychologist confided. "I was afraid it would be like the last testing, where almost everyone failed the evaluation. Luckily, we only had two problem children today. One is a Dara Morgendorfer, and the other is a Ranma Soutomie. The former merely has a case of low self-esteem. Mr. Soutomie, on the other hand, has a host of problems that should have him transferred to a different school at the very least."

"I see," Ms. Li said, a little nervously. "Exactly how bad is he?"

"Quite frankly, I'm not sure," the psychologist admitted. "He obviously has low self esteem. For instance, when asked 'what are your feelings when something goes wrong?' he answered 'it was either my fault or someone is going to blame me anyways.'" Taking a breath, she continued, " And then there was that part with hell beasts trying to take his soul. I think he may be susceptible to any cult that approaches him."

"I see. Unfortunately, we still have to accept him, despite the glaring reasons we shouldn't," Ms. Li said through gritted teeth. "We were given $50,000 to take him in. Most of it's already been invested into a new wing for the school, as well as a few new classes. If we get rid of Saotome, the money goes with him. Now, I need those reports to say that he only has low self-esteem. That we can accept. Any form of true psychosis cannot be found."

"Ma'am, you know that I ethically cannot change my records and..."

"One of those classes is Psychology," the principal stated.

"... I must have made a mistake while evaluating his test," Mrs. Manson concluded. "I'll just go fix that. Though there is still one thing that confuses me." Pulling out the questionaire and pointing to a specific line, she asked, "How can his sex be water based?"

"Yes, that," Ms. Li began. "That has been explained to me, in part by his former principal. It's apparently a medical condition."

"You're joking, right?" the psychologist all but pleaded. "What kind of medical condition can cause water to do that?"

"I don't know, and I expect that I would rather not know, but that is irrelevant at the moment. Right now, I have two phone calls to make. Knowing a dismissal when she heard one, Mrs. Manson turned and left, the soon-to-be-doctored report in hand.

Dialing an unusually long number into the phone, the principal winced as the digital display informed her of the long distance charges from hell. Waiting for the phone on the other end of the line to ring several times, she finally heard it picked up, before a kind sounding female voice announced "Moshi moshi, Tendo Kei."

"God damn it," the black haired woman grumbled, staring at the handset for a few seconds, before lowering it to the cradle.

As it clicked down, a faint voice could be heard from the other end. "Oh, you speak English? I'm sorry, this is Kasumi Tendo, how may I hel..." Click.

HR.

"First time I've ever been attacked by flying soda cans," Ranma muttered, rubbing the side of his face, where a visible lump was forming.

"Oh man, dude, I'm sorry about that," Kevin said, coming in behind the martial artist, carrying a can of coke. "I just dropped it, I didn't know you were under there."

Ranma shrugged, and allowed the football player to come up beside him, before plucking the pop out of his hand. "It's okay," he said, "I've been hit harder than that, but the soda's mine."

Kevin shrugged. "Fair enough," he agreed. As the pigtailed boy walked off, flipping the can in his hand and turning it into more and more of a ticking time bomb, he didn't notice Britney, the cheerleader from history class the day before, walking up to Kevin and hugging him happily, babbling something high pitched and mostly lost to the high speed at which she was doing the babbling.

Unfortunately, he also didn't notice Ms. Li, as she walked up behind him, and cleared her throat. "Mr. Saotome," she said, irritably, causing Ranma to jump a few feet, sending the can into the air.

At about this point, the poor abused piece of aluminum had already been dropped from the school's bleachers by Kevin, through the top of Ranma's tent, where it had destroyed the patch he'd put on the hole the football player had made the day before, and hit the Japanese boy's rather thick skull.

Coupled with the flipping it had just taken, the metal finally decided that it had had quite enough of this garbage, thank you very much, and split along one of the dents on its side. sending foamy, sticky, and most importantly cold liquid into Ranma's face.

The redhead groaned, peeling some of her hair from her eyes, and turned slowly to face the principal, who had managed, somehow, to avoid getting any of the stuff on her own immaculate grey suit.

"Ah, yes, Mr. Saotome," she said, blinking at the rapid physical transformation, but rolling forward over it as though it hadn't happened. "Do you know you don't have a phone?"

"Um, I live in a tent," the student returned, as though it was obvious.

"Oh, well, that will have to change soon. It's far too hard to get a hold of you," the dark haired woman complained. "We've gotten your psychological test results back, as well as your grade transcripts from Furinkan. According to the grade curves from the Japanese system to ours, you can stay in the classes you're in now, but I'm afraid you'll have to take a supplementary course on self-esteem."

"Self... what?" Ranma asked, rolling the unfamiliar word around in her head. It hadn't been in the base level English that she'd learned in the Japanese military bases, and Hinako-sensei had been more interested in making sure he knew the English names of all of the Sailor Senshi than bothering with complex words in the language.

"You know, self-image," the principal asked, slightly discomforted at the blank look she was being given.

"So... you wanna take pictures of me?" Ranma tried, frowning. "I can just give you some of the ones Nabiki took, if you want."

"Look, I'm not trained to explain it," the older woman explained patiently, "just please see Mr. O'Neill in room 116 after class, all right?"

"Okay, if it's important," Ranma shrugged, and started turning from the principal, before the other caught her arm.

"Oh, and here, take this," she extended a small card with 'hall pass' written across the top. "Clean yourself up before first period, all right?"

Ranma nodded, grateful for the opportunity to change back to normal form, as she headed for the nearest men's washroom, ignoring the red haired boy who stared at her in astonishment as she entered. He was in the middle of making an odd growling sound, when the martial artist splashed herself with hot water, and the noise died a horrible, painful death in his throat.

HR.

"Esteem... a teen. They don't really rhyme, do they? The sounds don't quite mesh," the brown haired teacher said from where he was sitting, straddling his chair. "And that, in fact, is often the case when it comes to a teen and esteem. The two just don't seem to go together."

Ranma, who had been trying to pay attention, he really had, was having trouble understanding what exactly esteem was. It wasn't as though the teacher had bothered defining it at all. Slumping down a little further in his seat, he glanced around while hoping to find out what this class was actually supposed to be about.

He looked over to his right where that monotone girl from his history class was sitting, doodling in her notebook. It took a little effort, but he managed to unobtrusively angle himself enough to see what she had been drawing. Thus, everyone was already looking at him when he started snickering at the cheese headed man. Throughout this all, no pause was given to the lecture.

"But we are here to begin realizing your actuality" Mr. O'Neill was continuing. The girl next to him stopped her doodling and raised her hand.

When the lecturing, if it could be called such, continued, the girl waved her hand a little more before presumably getting rather fed up. "Excuse me," she said, with no response. "Excuse me," she said more strongly. "I have a question."

"I'm sorry," the teacher tried. "Question and answer time is later."

"But I want to know what 'recognizing your actuality' means," Daria tried, and Ranma nodded in wholehearted agreement.

Mr. O'Neill was beginning to sweat a little. "It means... look, just let me get through this part, okay? Then there'll be a video!"

The girl sitting behind Daria leaned over and, in a gravelly whisper, confided, "He doesn't know what it means. He just has the whole thing memorized. Just enjoy the nice man's soothing voice."

"How am I supposed to follow him if I can't tell what he's talking about?" Daria asked.

"You too?" Ranma cut in. "I thought it was just the language barrier."

"Oh?" the girl asked.

"I'm still getting used to English," Ranma admitted.

"Ah. Don't worry about it. I'll fill you in later," the girl continued. "I've taken the class six times, so I know what I'm talking about."

With the plans of action established, Ranma and the two girls allowed themselves to be lulled into a slight doze.

HR.

"Okay, so what's going on?" Ranma asked, as he, the gravely voiced girl and the monotone girl exited the 'self-esteem' lecture. "He sounded sorta like this Buddhist monk I met a while back, but he was more twitchy than enlightened."

"I think Mr. O'Neill might have seen a monk on TV. Once, for a few seconds, while half asleep," the black haired girl offered.

"So, all he does is regurgitate the same speech every few months?" the brown haired girl, who Ranma had heard identified as 'Morgendorfer' by Mr. DeMartino in the class the day before, asked.

"Yup," the black haired girl replied. "And we just sit there and let it flow like water in one ear and out the other. A beautiful experience, really. Kinda zen."

"Right, like what's the sound of one idiot talking to himself?" Morgendorfer asked, deadpan.

The black haired girl chuckled. "Yeah, kinda like that. So, you two are new, right? Most of the time they don't send regular students to join our little corner of purgatory. I'm Jane, by the way."

"I dunno, I've been around for about sixteen years, the paint's been pealing for a while," Morgendorfer contributed. "and it's Daria. or, 'that kid with the glasses.' I've got other names, but I'd have to kill you."

Ranma was about to complete the introductions, when the three stepped out from the school's front entrance, and he walked into a sheet of falling rain. "Damn it," she muttered, irritably.

"Hmm, weather man was wrong again," Daria observed.

"You do know that a guy just turned into a girl right in front of us, right?" Jane commented, looking at both of her companions rather warily.

"I was vaguely aware of that, yes," Daria replied, "but I never pass up a chance to criticize the Weather Channel. Smug bastards."

"You're taking this well," Ranma noted, looking at Daria just as strangely as Jane had before.

"You watch Sick Sad World long enough, nothing surprises you," Daria contributed.

"Hey, you think we can call this one in?" Jane speculated.

"I'm standin right here, ya know," Ranma objected indignantly.

"Besides, do you really think it can surpass the cattle branding and farmer abduction story?" Daria asked.

"So, yeah, what's this class all about?" Ranma said, deciding that if the others weren't going to make a big deal of the curse, she wasn't going to look a gift horse in the mouth.

"Oh, yeah, O'Neill wants all of us to feel good about ourselves," Jane said, waving her hands in the air. "To tell the truth, having no self-esteem makes me feel special." she shrugged. "What can I say?"

"Wait, so all he wants is for us to be confident?" Ranma asked, her eyebrow twitching. "I spent an hour and a half listening to English words I couldn't understand because they think I'm not confident enough?"

"She seems upset," Daria observed.

"Is she glowing?" Jane continued. "You know, she's catching up to those abducted farmers by the minute."

"Yeah, but I prefer my weirdness obviously fake," Daria disagreed. "More of a sense of security that way." Quirking an eyebrow behind her thick rimmed glasses, she asked, "So why are you glowing?"

"I use ego as a power source for energy attacks!" Ranma shouted, shaking her fist at the sky. "I need a confidence building course like I need another fiancee!"

"Another fiancee?" Daria asked. "So, is that one E or two?"

"Huh?"

"Male or Female," Jane clarified, seeing Ranma's incomprehension.

"They'd better be female," Ranma growled, cracking her knuckles.

"Okay, so it's either male or lesbian," Jane observed, jotting a note down in a small notebook she'd pulled from her pocket.

"My money's on lesbian," Daria retorted. "I think her body'd put that cheerleader in our class to shame. Not, of course, that I care or anything and that I'm building a steady but slow acting stream of resentment that will eventually and inevitably result in a psychotic break and the shooting up of the school district."

"Huh?" This time, it was both Jane and Ranma who made this perplexed noise.

"Oh, nothing," Daria said.

"And it's male, turned into a girl 'cuz of a curse," Ranma grumbled.

"Some curse," Jane said, looking up to the sky. "Any chance I could get a little cursing over here?"

"Doesn't work if you're already what the spring would turn you into," the martial artist explained.

"Yeah, but I'm not a super-model, so it's all good," Jane said with a smirk.

Ranma's eyebrow twitched. "Why am I walking with you guys again?"

"Because you wanted to know what O'Neill was talking about," Daria reminded her.

"Yeah, that was pretty stupid, now that I think about it," Ranma grumbled. "So, what do we gotta put up with for this class?"

"Well, first there's the lectures, then there's the role playing, then they split the guys and girls into separate rooms, and..." Jane stopped for a moment, a speculative look growing on her face. "What room would she be put in, do you think?" she asked, jerking a thumb at Ranma.

"I'm a guy, damn it," the redhead grumbled.

"Shhh, not now, the adults are talking," Jane said, shaking her head.

"You know, most people would say it's a bad idea to taunt people who can glow without falling down dead from radiation poisoning," Daria observed casually.

"Yeah, but my survival instinct's always been a little rusty," Jane admitted.

"You'd fit right in back home," Ranma said, as the three turned the corner onto Daria's street.

"Hey, come to think of it, where are we going?" Jane asked, looking around.

"Home," Daria stated, matter-of-factly.

"Funny, my house looked different this morning," Jane shrugged.

"Yeah, 'n if this is my tent I've really moved up in the..." Ranma started, before her face went pale. "Crap! It's been rainin and my tent's still got a hole in the roof!"

"Well, you could try the under-pass a few blocks from the school," Daria suggested, getting a thankful nod from Ranma.

"Wait, she lives in a tent?" Jane asked, but the martial artist was already dashing away.

"You know he, or she, didn't actually give us its name," Daria commented, as Ranma leapt onto a nearby roof.

"So, Spiderman?" Jane asked, speculatively.

"Maybe one of those clones," Daria shrugged.

HR. END HERE.

The historical accuracy of Ranma's responce i confined to five minutes on Wikipedia, and is therefore probably wrong. We'll do better if we actuallly publish.