Miss Furinkan High

Miss Furinkan High

The poster was hung on the corkboard in the hallway. Any other day the entire student population would walk past the board with only a few people even bothering to look at it, let alone sign up for any of the events. This particular poster however, left nothing to chance. It was huge, and the only obvious reason that it wasn’t any bigger was because it wouldn’t have fit onto the corkboard otherwise. An infinite number of lines crowded the bottom half of the poster, prompting people to sign up. The lettering itself was massive as well, big block letters at least six or seven centimeters high across the top, with the details below in smaller type.

MISS FURINKAN HIGH COMPETITION

Ladies! Sign up for the first annual Miss Furinkan High pageant! Find out who is the most beautiful woman at school! Grand Prize of ¥100,000 and an all expenses paid vacation for two to Minakami Lodge with the “Secret Bachelor!” Allure, talent, poise, and beauty all required.

Below this was a list of information in fine print about when and where the pageant would be held, participant requirements, and a list of sponsors. It seemed like someone had gone through a lot of effort to put this on. About the only thing that the poster didn’t reveal was who was the “Secret Bachelor,” a fact which didn’t go unnoticed by the gaggle of girls hanging around the poster.

“I wonder who it is,” said one.

“Of course you do Dummy, otherwise he wouldn’t be a secret bachelor now would he?” replied another.

“I’ll bet it’s Ranma,” said a third.

“No way! He’s already got three fiancées and Kodachi Kuno chasing after him. I’d hardly call that a bachelor.”

“Yeah, but you always hear about how celebrities are ‘eligible bachelors’ when they have millions of women wishing they could be with them. What if Ranma doesn’t really want the attention and this is his way of finding a girl he can actually date?”

“I wouldn’t say he doesn’t like the attention,” said a new voice. All the girls turned to see Akane standing there, a cynical smile she could have only learned from her sister Nabiki on her face as she looked up at Ranma, who was standing next to her.

Ranma scowled at his fiancée, but didn’t rebut the point. “It ain’t me,” he said simply.

One of the girls in the group clung to hope. “Well, the pageant is obviously being put on by the school. Maybe the principal is setting you up again.”

Ranma blinked in surprise at this idea. It certainly had merit. It wouldn’t be the first time Principal Kuno had been a thorn in his side after all. “Excuse me ladies, I have to do something,” he muttered through clenched teeth as he stomped off.

The girls all watched him walk away, some of them watching some of the lower portions of his anatomy, much to Akane’s ire. When he disappeared from view, there was a mad rush to fill in contact information on the poster, which only raised her ire even more.

One of the girls turned to Akane and offered her pen. “Here Akane, you should sign up too. After all, he is your fiancé.”

Akane just sniffed disdainfully. “Why would I want to sign up for a contest to date Ranma?”

“Aww come on, you know you want to,” replied the girl. “Besides, it would be a great way to girl it up like you always want to. Remember Romeo and Juliet?”

Akane hated to admit it, but she had a point. The entire purpose of her wanting to play Juliet was so that she could prove that she was more feminine than most people gave her credit for. Competing in the pageant would certainly do that. On the other hand… “Yeah I remember it. It ended in disaster with three Romeos, two Juliets, and a trip to see ‘China.’” She added finger quotes to the name to emphasize her sarcasm. “I think I’ll sit this one out thank you very much.” She turned off in a huff

It was then that the wall caved in. A figure holding a take out box stood in the debris. “Did Shampoo hear right? Is a contest to date Ranma? Is perfect! Ranma finally see that Shampoo is best woman for him!” She noticed her rival standing off to the side of the group of oddly terrified girls in front of the poster. “Akane make good choice not signing up. She just embarrass herself in swimsuit competition.”

Akane burned with rage, but quickly reigned it in. “Well, you should do fine Shampoo, so long as there isn’t a Japanese test as one of the qualifying rounds.”

Shampoo saw red, but didn’t reply to the insult on her intelligence. Instead she just marched up to the board, stole some hapless girl’s pen, and quickly wrote down her name and phone number. “Shampoo will beat Akane at pageant, and then Ranma will be Shampoo’s!” She picked up her delivery and bounced out the hole she came in, laughing the entire time.

Another pen was shoved in Akane’s face. “Now you have to sign up Akane! You can’t let Shampoo steal your man like that!”

Akane pushed the pen away. “I’m not going to sign up just to compete with Shampoo. I just know that something is going to go way wrong with this whole thing, and I want to be as far away from it as possible. Especially if Ranma is Shanghaied into being the Secret Bachelor against his will.” With that, Akane left a stunned group of girls in her wake as she marched off to class. Of course, her little speech didn’t prevent any of the others from putting down their names.

Weeks passed and the first rehearsal for the pageant arrived. True to her word, Akane never signed up for the escapade she was certain the pageant was going to become. Ranma had tried to track down the principal to “convince” him that he wasn’t going to be the grand prize, but hadn’t been able to find the slippery man for the life of him. Thinking that they’d find him at the rehearsal, Ranma had gone to the school auditorium to search.

The seats were all empty, but the stage was full of activity. And girls in their gym clothes. They were all practicing their various poses, talents, and choreographed dances. Not seeing the principal, Ranma figured that maybe he was backstage. Of course, they weren’t just about to let him go back there to look, not with girls changing their clothes in the dressing room. He felt a ghost of pain run up his spine as he remembered the few times he’d been mistaken for a peeping tom when he was trying to prevent Happosai from doing just that. He’d need a disguise.

One bucket of cold water and a visit to the girl’s locker room later, Ranma was dressed in a shirt and bloomers just like all the rest of the girls. He’d also braided his hair and added a pair of glassless glasses. Certain that his disguise was perfect, Ranma rushed onto the stage and started to pretend to be going through a dance sequence. He was working his way over to the side of the stage, when he bumped into someone.

“Oh! Hey are you alright?” asked the girl. Ranma looked up to apologize, then quickly tried to look away lest he be found out. It was Ukyo. She’d been standing there, twirling a couple of her spatulas like a majorette. Her big spatula was at her feet, and was probably part of the act as well. Despite his turning his head, Ukyo still recognized the face of the girl who ran into her. “Ran-chan?”

“Shhhhh!” Ranma hissed. “I’m in disguise here! Don’t let on that it’s me!”

Confused, but curious, Ukyo nodded and lowered her voice. “What are you doing here?”

“I figured I could find Principal Kuno here. I need to convince him that I’m not going to be the Secret Bachelor for this thing.”

Ukyo frowned thoughtfully. “I haven’t seen him in at least a month. He’s certainly not here.” She paused. “You mean you’re not the Secret Bachelor?”

“Not if I have anything to say about it,” he replied darkly. “But I just know that the principal is going to try to rope me into it somehow.”

Ukyo thought about that for a moment. It certainly seemed like something the elder Kuno would try to pull. On the other hand, if she won, and Ranma wasn’t able to find him… “You know, now that I think about it, I think I saw Principal Kuno going into his secret hiding place over by the pool the other day,” she lied.

“You mean the one with the entrance behind that ridiculous statue of himself?”

“That’s the one.”

“Alright,” Ranma sighed. “That’s as good a place to start looking as any I guess.” Ukyo tried not to laugh as she watched Ranma storm off. Honestly, he looked rather silly walking like a man when he was in that form. She then picked up her spatulas and started to twirl in earnest. She had a lot of work to do before the pageant, and so long as Ranma couldn’t find the principal, then she was going to make sure she won.