Kurumi "Tendou" vs. Shampoo

The Setting:

At night, deep within a forest, which oddly enough, was in the middle of a Nerima district park, Natsume and Kurumi sat around their camp fire. It looked as though they had just cooked a meal of some sort around the fire, and eaten it, but it obviously wasn't very much food.

Natsume unrolled her sleeping mat, and looked over to her sister. The younger of the two orphans was sitting by the fire still, her hand resting on her stomach and a pained look on her face. Natsume said quietly, "There's no more food, Kurumi. A true martial artist never allows something like hunger to distract her. Think of this as training, and do your best to ignore it."

Kurumi nodded, and unrolled her own sleeping mat. An hour passed, and Kurumi was still wide awake, and still very hungry. She sat up, tied her hair ribbon in place, and started to walk away from the camp. Natsume suddenly woke up, hearing the movement, and looked over to her sister. She said, "You're going to get food, aren't you?" Sighing, she said, "Just remember, no more stealing from people, okay?"

The younger sister turned, and nodded to Natsume before leaving the campsite. After a few minutes, she was out of the forest, and walking down one of Nerima's side streets.

In the Nekoanten, Mousse was almost through with the closing of the shop, while Cologne watched him work and critisized every little mistake he made. Cologne was in the middle of pointing out small specks of dirt with her cane and saying, "You missed a spot.", when the phone rang. She hopped off, saying to herself, "I wonder who it could be at this hour..."

Answering the phone, Cologne said, "Nekohanten..."

The voice on the other end replied rather quietly, "Hello... I'd like to order a bowl of deluxe ramen please."

"We don't deliver at this time of night. You'll have to call back tomorrow..."

The voice interrupted her, saying, "Please, I'll pay double the price, and I'll even throw in a generous tip! I need the ramen right now for a magic spell.... Er, I mean, I'm having trouble sleeping."

Cologne rolled her eyes. The kitchen had yet to be shut down, so she decided there would be no harm in filling the order. She asked the person on the other side of the line, "Who are you, and what is your address?"

The voice answered, "Hikaru Gosunkugi..." and he proceeded to give an address.

A few minutes later, Shampoo was riding on her bike through the side streets of Nerima. She grumbled as she thought to herself, <Why do I have to go riding around this late at night? I was just about to go to bed. I'm going to beat the guy who ordered this over the head with the delivery box.>

Kurumi, who was sitting on top of a wall along the street, saw Shampoo approaching. She thought to herself, "Food... But Natsume said I couldn't steal. Well, I guess that leaves me with only one choice..." She jumped off of the wall and right onto the road in front of Shampoo.

The Amazon was able to stop her bike well in time to avoid crashing with the younger girl. She said, "What you doing, crazy person?"

Kurumi turned to face her, and said, "I challenge you for whatever you have in that delivery box!" She hoped she'd be able to convince her sister later that this wasn't technically stealing.

Shampoo stepped off of her bike, leaning it against a nearby lamp post, and said, "Is very silly challenge.. but challenge nevertheless. Shampoo accept, for pride of Joketsuzoku." The Amazon took a fighting stance as she regarded her opponent. She wondered if this girl wearing a sailor style school uniform dress was even a martial artist, but decided not to make any assumptions. She didn't have her bonbori with her at the moment, but it didn't matter. The other girl, after all, was unarmed.

Kurumi took a rather lazy looking stance, typical of an Anything-Goes martial artist. It gave her opponent the illusion that she was relaxed and unprepared for battle. It was much easier to steal food from unprepared opponents, but Kurumi was a competent martial artist... She was prepared to do whatever she had to.

Commentary:

Hitman25

Kurumi is going to kick the snot out of Shampoo.  Hey, she did the same with Ranma once didn't she?  And while she has her weapon, Shampoo doesn't.  Shampoo will need to rely on close combat, but she'll have a hard time trying to get close enough to land an attack.

Starphoenix

Come on. This should be somewhat easy. Though I haven't actually seen Kurumi, I know she's good. After all, she did beat Ranma... but that was with Natsume. Fighting alone, Shampoo can take advantage of Kurumi's handicap of usually having a partner. Another thing, Kurumi seems more of the one shot type anime only characters, Shampoo is in both the anime and manga. This would mean Shampoo is seen more and thus more skills of hers are shown. Also, Shampoo can perform special maneuvers without another person. Kurumi doesn't seem to have this ability. So to sum it up, Shampoo will be handing out two arse whoopings: One to Kurumi, and one to Gosungkugi.

Stephen Schlueter

Natsume and Kurumi are quite the team. But apart they aren't much. In fact, the majority of their ability comes from their one ultimate attack. In a match against Kodachi or Akane the seperation probably wouldn't make much difference. But Shampoo? I think not. Shampoo is almost a match for Ranma, which Kurumi alone, is not. On the other hand Kurumi is fighting for food. And she's already robbed Shampoo blind on a delivery run once. Alas, then she used lightning attacks and didn't make her presence well known and her only obstacle was Mousse. She's gone to a lot of trouble to set this up and I hate to see her lose but this is Shampoo! I guess it'll probably be close since Shampoo isn't delivering to Ranma and won't be fighting as hard, but still....

Maxfield Stanton

Both foes have faced an 'untrained' Akane one-on-one. Both were able to defeat her without any difficulty whatsoever. Things appear fairly even on this basis. I think the difference will be Kurumi's weapon. Shampoo's greatest asset of strength won't do her any good against Kurumi's speed with the long weapon. The Amazon's famed low endurance will catch up with her when she recieves ki burn after ki burn. If this isn't enough, then how about the fact that female Ranma was able to easily defeat Shampoo (in one blow, no less) at the beginning of the series, while he had to train his girl side extensively before he could best Kurumi.

Spanner

Considering that Shampoo doesn't have her usual weapons, and Kurumi does, this fight will certainly be a lot closer than one might expect. Both fighters have trained their entire lives. However, Shampoo has spent her entire life being trained by Cologne, and this is a big advantage. Kurumi has a definite reach advantage with her ribbon, but I just don't think it'll be enough. Victory will go to Shampoo.

The Fight:

Shampoo remained still, watching her opponent. She still wasn't sure how serious the other girl was about challenging her, and if she were to back down without a fight, then she'd be able to complete her delivery and go back home without any trouble.

Of course, in the life of any Nerima martial artist, things were never quite that convenient. Kurumi suddenly rushed at the Amazon, and threw a punch. It was all Shampoo could do to quickly throw herself to the side, barely avoiding the blow. She had definately not expected an opponent who was this quick on her toes.

Before Shampoo could scold herself for expecting a weak opponent, she was forced to leap high to avoid a sweeping kick. While in the air, the Amazon threw a quick counter kick, but Kurumi easily blocked it. The two fighters separated, but Kurumi just rushed right back in, throwing another punch. Shampoo blocked, and grabbed ahold of her opponent's arm. The young orphan quickly broke free of the hold, but Shampoo used her moment of distraction to land a hard knee strike to the stomach, quickly followed by a punch to the sternum. Kurumi stumbled back, and fell to a crouch.

It didn't seem as though this fight was about anything in particular, Shampoo thought, but she'd been challenged, so there was no getting around it. She decided it would be best to end it quickly, so even before her opponent could rise to her feet again, the Amazon was charging.

Kurumi smiled inwardly for a moment. One of the better techniques that her "father" had taught her so many years ago was to give the illusion of unreadiness or defenselessness until the last moment... When Shampoo had almost closed to striking distance, Kurumi stood up, and in a swift motion, pulled her ribbon free from her hair. She lashed out, and wrapped it around the Amazon before she could even react.

Shampoo was picked up off of her feet as Kurumi gave the ribbon a sharp tug, and was soon slammed into the nearby concrete wall that stood at the side of the street. The riboon came free as Kurumi fnished her throw, and Shampoo quickly recovered, turning to face her opponent again in a fighting stance. Strangely, the Amazon felt not only the pain of hitting the wall, but it seemed that she had been burnt slightly where the ribbon had been wrapped around her.

The young orphan took to the offensive once Shampoo had recovered, whipping out with her ribbon again. She no longer had the advantage of surprise, though, and the Amazon just leapt to the side. Without her bonbouri, however, Shampoo would need to get in very close to deal out a little bit of punishment. As she tried to advance, Kurumi just lashed out again, and hopped back, keeping herself at a safe distance.

Kurumi feinted a ribbon strike, and Shampoo started to dodge to one side. The your orphan smiled inwardly again, and lashed out at where Shampoo was going to dodge to. However, the Amazon's dodge had been a feint as well, and as the ribbon missed its mark, she was quickly charging in at her opponent. As she closed in to striking distance, however, she suddenly felt the ribbon wrapping itself around her again. She kicked out and hit Kurumi in the side, but it wasn't enough to stop the younger girl from tossing her off into the wall again.

Shampoo got to her feet again with difficulty, thinking to herself, <She uses that ribbon of hers just like Kodachi does... Except for some reason, its very hot and leaves burns. How can I stop her from using it...?> She looked around for a moment, and then took a few steps off to the side.

The younger girl didn't know exactly what to make of Shampoo's new strategy, but she figured it was just an attempt to throw her off. She lashed out with her ribbon again, charging it with her hot ki. Shampoo quickly jumped to the side, and then started charging at her opponent. As Shampoo suspected, when Kurumi tried to change the ribbon's course of flight, it got tangled around a telephone pole that she had dodged behind. As the younger girl struggled to free the weapon, the Amazon closed in and punched her a few times in the gut before picking her up by the neck and tossing her to the ground some distance away.

Kurumi got to her feet, and sized up her situation. She was no longer armed with her weapon, so she had lost her advantage of reach. She looked over to the delivery box full of ramen, which was now much closer to her than it was to Shampoo, and thought about simply taking it and running... But Natsume had told her not to steal any more. She wouldn't make her sister ashamed of her. She stood up and got into her fighting stance again, not looking to be in the greatest shape.

Shampoo looked at her as if to say, "Why are you still fighting?" However, Shampoo still considered this a serious challenge, and saw no reason to stop fighting. That was just the way the Joketsuzoku did things. She rushed in and threw a kick at Kurumi's chin, which was dodged. Kurumi tried to counter with a kick of her own, but Shampoo caught her leg, and threw her by it onto the hard ground.

Kurumi groaned as she laid there on the ground, almost unconscious from the jarring impact. Shampoo just stood there, watching her opponent. The fight wasn't going so badly that she would attack her adversary while she was down. As Kurumi slowly rose to her feet, she readied herself, however. Instead of taking a fighting stance, however, Kurumi just bowed, and said, "I'm sorry... I concede." She grabbed her ribbon from the ground, tied it back into her hair, and ran off back toward her forest camp. However hungry she might have been, she knew Natsume would not want her getting seriously hurt for any reason.

Shampoo seemed puzzled by her opponent's sudden flight, but she did feel relieved. She looked over to her delivery bike with it's ramen, and sighed. She still had to deliver the food, despite the fight she'd just been in.

When she finally arrived at the address, Gosunkugi was sitting on the front stairs, looking rather depressed. Shampoo said in an annoyed voice, "Here is ramen. Please pay now."

Hikaru sighed, and said, "It's too late now... my magic spell won't work any more. I don't want the ramen." In his sadness, he failed to notice the bright battle aura gathering around Shampoo after being told that he didn't want the food after all. From all corners of the Nerima district, his screams of pain were soon heard.

The Results:

Shampoo: 11

Kurumi "Tendou": 4

Thanks to everyone who voted in the match. As you all already know, the door is still open for anyone who wants to guest-write a battle here. If that's not your cup of tea, you may always send in your suggestions to alton@masterpiece.com and I'll see what I can do. Bai bai!