Waters Under Earth

A Ranma 1/2 Fanfic by Alan Harnum - harnums@hotmail.com

All Ranma characters are the property of Rumiko Takahashi, first
published by Shogakukan in Japan and brought over to North
America by Viz Communications.

Homepage at:  http://www.geocities.com/Tokyo/Bay/9758

Gosh.  Twenty-five chapters.  How did this story ever end up getting
so big, anyway?

As usual, any commentary is very much welcomed.

Chapter 25 : What Rose in Darkness [1 of 3]

     "I have told you not to call any more."
     
     Mousse paused as he walked by the door to the sitting room
on his way towards the stairs in the Kuno house.  Kuno's voice
sounded calm, but there was an undertone of deep anger to it.

     "For the last time, I will not sell to you.  Under any
circumstances."

     There was a moment of silence.  Mousse stood in the long
corridor of the hallway, realizing he was eavesdropping, but
somehow unable to continue walking.
     
     "Are you threatening me?" he heard Kuno say, his tone
disbelieving.     
     
     Again, a silence, and then the sound of the phone slamming
down into the cradle.  "Damnable woman, why doesn't she get the
message?"

     Not wanting to intrude, Mousse began to walk towards the
stairs again.  Kodachi had gone to bed several hours ago, and he
had passed his time, as he had for most of the last few days, in
the expansive library the house possessed.  The weariness finally
upon him, though, he was now making his way towards the guest
room provided for him.

     Hearing footsteps, he paused as Kuno walked out into the
passageway, a look of intense irritation on his face that shifted
into a smooth mask as soon as he saw Mousse.  

     He nodded.  "Good evening."
     
     "Evening," Mousse said, nodding in return.  He was still
uncertain about Kodachi's older brother; he seemed far less
thick-skulled in private than previous evidence had shown.  Like
his sister, there was an aloofness to him much of the time; not
truly arrogance or unfriendliness, but simply the sense that he
was beyond or outside most normal concerns.  

     "My sister is asleep?" 
     
     "Yeah," Mousse replied.  Kodachi seemed to sleep a lot, and
the few times he had talked to her, it had been much like 
speaking to someone in the midst of a dream.

     "Her behaviour startles me," Kuno said softly.  "She is not
as she was."

     "People change," Mousse answered, even more softly.  
     
     The slightest smile traced Kuno's face for a moment.  "Aye.
That they do."

     He stared past Mousse's shoulder, as if at something only he
could see.  "You leave tomorrow afternoon.  I have arranged it."

     Mousse nodded.  Kuno had told him that he and Kodachi would
leave for China as soon as arrangements could be made.  The
announcement was sudden, but not unexpected.

     He leaned back against the wall and folded his arms, looking
at Kuno appraisingly.  "You are different from what I had
expected."

     "I will admit that I am perhaps more inspiring of awe once
one grows to know me," the older boy said seriously.  There was
no glint of humour in his eyes, no smile on his lips.

     Mousse remembered Kuno sitting across from him, discussing
in that calm, cool voice of the murder of his own mother, 
detached as if it had had no effect upon him.  And he remembered
all the times before when he had watched Kuno play the buffoon.

     He could not reconcile those two things, no matter how much
he tried.  He stared at Kuno intently through the thick frames of
his glasses, studying him, probing the eyes with his own.

     Kuno stared back.  His eyes held no hint of what lay below
the surface.  "Does something trouble you, my friend?"

     Finally, Mousse shook his head and turned to go.  "Nothing."
     
     Kuno's hand upon his shoulder stayed him.  "Wait."
     
     He looked back.  "Yes?"
     
     Kuno smiled at him, a faint smile.  "I cannot give you the
answers to your suspicions.  But you deserve some hint, for what
you do for my sister."

     "I require nothing," Mousse murmured softly, embarrassed at
the topic.  "You have been more than generous in giving me a
place to stay and paying for my passage home."

     Kuno went on as if he had not spoken.  "All the world's a
stage, and all the men and women merely players.  They have their
exits and their entrances, and one man in his time plays many
parts."

     He paused for a moment.  "One of the wisest and finest men
that the world has ever seen wrote that.  He saw that truth lay 
as much in unreality as it does in reality, and stated it in such 
a way that any could grasp it who cared to try."

     Mousse looked at him in silence, confused.
     
     "Think of it," Kuno said softly.  "To an outside observer, 
what goes on upon the stage can seem as real as what goes on
beyond it.  An actor may know that he acts, but one who watches
him may not know.  We go through life changing ourselves, how we
speak, how we behave, how we think; we do not even realize that 
we are actors all of us, for we cannot see the stage nor the 
audience."

     He swept out a hand.  There was a strange look in his eyes,
intense and almost frightening.  "Once you realize that truth is 
nothing but another deception, it becomes easy.  Nothing is
beyond you then."

     "Is everything false, then?" Mousse murmured softly.
     
     "There are different kinds of falseness," Kuno replied,
barely a whisper.  "All that we call lies contain fragments of
the truth, and what we call truth bears shreds of lies.  It is a
matter of degrees."

     He smiled, then, and turned away, as if conversation were
finished.  Indeed, Mousse had no questions that he knew how to 
ask, as he watched Kuno walk away from him, a few murmured words
drifting back, as if the older man spoke them aloud without truly
realizing that he did.

     "I will preserve myself; and am bethought..."
     
     Mousse watched until he turned round a darkened corner, and
then began to walk up the stairs, shaking his head slowly from
side to side.

**********

     Genzo Shimaju was feeling lucky, and ever-so-slightly
inebriated.  He hadn't meant to drink as much as he had, but,
then again, he hadn't intended to meet such pretty young women
when he went out for a drink with his partner, Yoshiji.

     Genzo and Yoshiji were pilots for a small charter plane 
company that catered to the wealthy.  They flew their clients
anywhere, on short notice, and in great comfort.  Tomorrow, they
had a flight out, one of the strangest Genzo had yet seen.  They
were taking two passengers out to an isolated, out-of-the-way
airstrip that lay near a tiny town within a hundred miles of the
China-Tibet border.  

     The Chinese were usually very restrictive with their 
airspace, but in the five or so years he'd been working at the 
job, Genzo had realized that money was the greatest opener of
doors for anything, no matter what ideology the government might
claim to possess.

     He glanced over at the young woman he currently had his arm
around, watching the play of the flashing lights from the bar 
they passed across her slim face.  Her eyes were liquid and dark,
swimming with bright pinpoints of light.

     She smiled at him, and said something that he couldn't quite
hear over the mild buzzing in his head.  Out of the open door of
a bar, the slurred voice of a salarymen belted out karaoke to a
throbbing beat.  

     What was her name again?  He couldn't remember.  Miho, or 
was that her friend, the long-haired beauty currently giggling 
and leaning her head against his co-pilot's shoulder as they
walked down the crowded streets?

     "Our apartment is this way," she said again, and smiled at
him, teeth white and straight.  There were streaks of dull red
dyed throughout her shoulder-length hair; a silver hoop glimmered
enticingly in each ear.

     Genzo stumbled slightly over a tilt in the sidewalk, and the
girl steadied him, surprisingly strong for her size.  "Careful."
     
     He nodded.  "Thanks."
     
     Next to them, Yoshiji laughed, a little too loudly for the
tastes of the passing people, who looked at them slightly 
disapprovingly and continued on their way, faces and clothing
scarred with the lights of restaurants and bars.

     "What's your name again?" he asked the girl next to him.
     
     "Noriko," she said, and laughed, a clear tone like a bell.
Her eyes sparkled like deep pools.

     The night was still young, only a little after the dinner
hour.  Genzo tightened his arm slightly around Noriko, and kept
on walking, subtly guided by the motions of her lithe body 
against his.

     They turned a corner, and then another, getting a little
further away from the hustle and bustle of the crowds in the main
areas.  In time, they came to a long street block of tall, modern 
apartment buildings.  The hum of night traffic, cars and people, 
was still all around them.  

     Noriko opened the door to the lobby with her key, and the
four of them stood, chattering and laughing, as they waited for
the elevator to descend.  

     A sharp ping and a light indicated its arrival, and they
walked in as metal doors opened, leaving behind the spacious,
plant-filled lobby.

     As the elevator rose into the upper reaches of the building,
he could see Yoshiji was already kissing the other girl, leaning
over her as she pressed back against the wall, her slender hands
twined around his neck.

     He glanced over to Noriko, and soon found her lips on his.
He gently put his hands on her shoulders, feeling a pleasant
warmth spread throughout his whole body at the intimacy of the
contact.  Her left hip, clad in a dark skirt, brushed against 
his, and a spark seemed to jump between them.

     The elevator opened to the floor they wanted, and the group
made their way down the narrow, tall hallway, making fleeting
contact again and again as they did.  

     Rounding a corner, Genzo saw the face of an old woman
peering out from a barely-cracked door, wrinkled and brown as old
leather.  The door closed as they passed it, a soft sound like a
sigh.

     At the door to the girl's apartment, the other girl, who he
was fairly sure was Miho, fumbled her keys in the lock and 
giggled as Yoshiji stood behind her, a hand lifting up her hair,
his lips whispering against her neck.

     You shouldn't be here, a tiny part of Genzo's mind 
whispered.  You have a flight tomorrow, and you need to rest, 
and you've only just met this girl.

     That part, however, was very small next to the alcohol and 
the aching desire he felt, primal and animal.  His eye could not
help following the curves of Noriko's body, until he found his
gaze drawn to her beautiful dark eyes.

     She said something.  He laughed.  The door to the apartment
clicked open, and the four of them stumbled inside, one of the
girls turning on a light and revealing a tastefully decorated
living room, a couch and two chairs arrayed around a coffee table
piled with magazines and books.

     He and Yoshiji were seated on the couch by the laughing
girls, who departed the room for the nominal purpose of making
coffee.  Genzo felt he could really use some coffee now; he was
feeling slightly dizzy from what he'd drunk in the bar where he
and Yoshiji had met the girls.

     His friend's face swam before him.  "Some luck tonight, eh
Genzo?"

     Genzo laughed.  "Yeah," he muttered.  "Guess so."
     
     The sound of soft footsteps made them raise their heads.  
The girls walked back into the room, with another woman clad in a
silky robe of dark grey.  Opaque black glasses covered her eyes,
and her black hair was held back with a single long silver pin, 
the point glimmering sharply in the lights from the ceiling.

     "Who are you?" Genzo asked, confused, looking at the woman.
His eyes fell to her hands, and at the sight of them, wrinkled
and so out of place against the smooth, unlined skin of her face,
a feeling of terrible wrongness began to fall over him.

     "This is our sister," Noriko said reassuringly.  She 
smiled.  How white her teeth were, Genzo realized.

     "Our eldest sister," Miho said, and smiled as well, almost
predatory.

     "Yoko," the third woman said softly, settling back into a
chair as the two girls sat down on the couch.  Genzo found it
crowded with four of them, his body pressed against Noriko's, but
he did not mind in the least.  The sense of wrongness was
beginning to be overwhelmed by lust, though some small part of
him was still frantically screaming a warning from somewhere deep
and dark.

     Noriko's lips pressed softly against the side of his mouth.
He reached out and softly stroked her side, moving his hand up as
he did.  

     "Hold them," he heard Yoko say, from somewhere beyond the
lightless void of desire that he was currently swimming in.

     And Noriko's hands clamped hard around his head, tilted it
forward to stare at Yoko as she stood, the robe she wore 
whispering, gathering darkness in the folds.

     He tried to speak, but his tongue seemed a thick, fat thing,
like a worm, no longer a part of him.  Colours seemed to swim 
into each other, the dark of Yoko's hair, the pale smoothness of
her skin, the white wall behind her, wickerwork of the chair she
had sat in.

     Yoko put a hand to her glasses, and raised the other 
languidly to the air.  She waved it lazily, as if dismissing
something not worth her time.

     Every light in the room went out, but just before they did,
the last thing Genzo saw were her eyes.     
     
**********

     Kuno stepped into the spacious kitchen, flipping the switch
on the wall as he did.  The darkness broke immediately; light 
gleamed across cool tile and polished wood, reflected in window 
glass and the burnished metal of cooking pots, and split across 
the edges of the shining blades arrayed in the knife rack on the 
wall.  

     The smooth wooden floor was cool under his feet as he walked
to the sink and opened the cupboard above it.  He gazed up at the
rows of bottles, their fanciful labels.  All of them were almost
entirely full.  They had been here since his father had left, his
mind finally gone completely.

     He grabbed a bottle at random, uncaring of the contents, and
a small glass.  Uncapping it, he poured amber liquid into the
delicate shape of the glass, then returned the bottle to the
shelf and closed the cupboard.

     He lifted the glass between a finger and a thumb, turned it
from side to side, watching the light trapped within it.  Then he
poured it down the sink, rinsed the glass twice, and took a long
drink of water.  The faintest tinge of the liquor still clung to
the inside of the glass, flavouring the water just slightly
beyond the normal purity of the taste.

     He put the glass on the tiled counter, and sat down heavily
at the kitchen table.  He wasn't sleeping well these days, ever
since Kodachi had begun to change.

     He placed his hands flat on the table, palms up, and studied
his fingers intently.  They were long and powerful, callused from
daily hours of gripping a sword.  A few beads of water from when
he'd rinsed the glass still clung to them, and he wiped them off
against the pleated folds of his hakima.

     The phone on the kitchen wall rang.  
     
     Kuno stood quickly from the chair and answered it before it
could disturb the sleeping members of the household.  Familiar
rage was already growing in him; he knew who it would be.  
"Hello?"
     
     "Tatewaki?"
     
     It was not.  That did not make the rage die.
     
     "I told you never to speak to me again."
     
     "Tatewaki, please..."
     
     "Never."
     
     "Tatewaki, you have to sell to her--"
     
     "Stay out of my affairs."
     
     He slammed the phone down.  His hands, usually so steady,
shook; his body shook in time, a trembling that ran throughout
his very being.  

     "Damn you, old man," he whispered, sinking down to his knees
and resting his forehead against the cool tiles at the edge of
the counter, fighting back unwanted tears, cracks in the mask.  
"Damn you to hell."
     
     The phone rang again a few moments later.  He rose and
picked it up, disconnected the call with his finger, and left the
handset off the hook on the counter, the faint sound of the
dialtone ringing in his ears long after he had left the kitchen.

**********

     A light spatter of rain was dotting the tarmac of the 
airport the next day, a few thin tendrils of mist clinging to the 
late afternoon air, muting the sun behind the drifting grey 
clouds.
     
     Mousse stood under the sheltering cover of an umbrella,      
near the bottom of the metal steps leading up into the small 
private aircraft.  Further away, much larger plane rested on the 
runways in preparation for taking off, and the tall shape of the 
control tower rose against the pale skyline.

     Nearby, Kodachi was making her farewells to her brother.
Rain had spotted Kuno's dark blue hakima black in places, as he
stood looking down at his younger sister.

     "...and be sure to feed Midorigame," Mousse heard her say.
     
     Kuno nodded.  "Aye."
     
     Kodachi nodded as well, dark ponytail bobbing, slightly damp
with glistening rain.  "I won't be gone long, brother.  Only as
long as I need."

     Kuno reached out and put a hand on his sister's shoulder.
Mousse looked away, staring at the ground and listening to the
drops of rain spattering on the canvas shell of his umbrella.

     "As long as that may be," he heard Kuno say softly.
     
     "When I return, things will be better," Kodachi replied, her
voice mingling with the sound of the rain falling.  "I promise
you that."

     "So long you as you return.  That will be enough."
     
     There was a silence.  Mousse looked up to see the two of
them embracing, Kuno stiffly returning a hug that Kodachi
appeared to have initiated.  He turned his head away again,
embarrassed, feeling he had somehow interrupted something.

     A moment later, he felt a touch at his elbow.  A glance up
locked his eyes with Kodachi's.  

     She smiled at him.  "Shall we go now?"
     
     He nodded slowly.  To his surprise, she slipped her arm
through his, and they walked beside each other up the metal
stairs, footsteps resounding on the thin structure.

     Conscious of the feel of her body close to his, Mousse
stared straight ahead as they went up towards the door that led
into the interior of the plane.  He still did not fully
understand what was there between him and Kodachi, but there was
something, some sense of connection that went deeper than it
should have.

     Mousse carefully folded the umbrella as they stepped inside.
The pilot, a thin, tall man, closed the heavy metal door behind 
them and nodded a greeting.

     "Welcome aboard," he said, bowing slightly, his eyes hidden
behind dark sunglasses.  "I hope you shall have a pleasant 
flight."
     
     He opened the door to the cockpit, exposing an interior
filled with the flashing lights of instrument panels and two
seats.  In one of them, a stocky man with a wide grin, also
wearing dark sunglasses, waved a greeting.  

     "I'm Genzo Shimaju," the pilot said.  "My co-pilot is 
Yoshiji Hatoshi."

     Kodachi slipped her arm from his and nodded.  "Good 
afternoon, captain," she said in a slightly brittle voice, a
trace of formality slipping in.

     The pilot didn't seem to notice, and indicated the curtained
passage that led into the back of the plane.  "The passenger area
is through there.  Whatever's in the fridge or the bar is yours
for the taking.  If you've got any questions, feel free to come
up to the cockpit."

     He took a step towards the cockpit, then paused, his hand on
the doorframe.  "You'll need to be strapped into your seats for
take-off, but after that, you can unbuckle.  It's going to be a
long flight, so you might want to sleep if you can."

     "Thank you," Kodachi said quietly.  "You may go now."
     
     The pilot nodded, stepped into the cockpit, and closed the
door behind him with a click.  Mousse glanced to Kodachi.  "Is
everything alright?"
     
     She nodded stiffly and stepped by him, pushing the curtain
out of the way and letting it fall into place behind her.  
Mousse's face quirked in a frown for a moment, and then he
followed her through.  

     The passenger area beyond the curtain was luxurious, the
front of the interior of the small plane taken up by a half-dozen
wide and comfortable seats in three rows of two, and the back 
part containing a table with four bolted-down chairs, a small 
fridge, and a wooden cabinet with a marble top.

     Kodachi was already taking a seat and belting herself in,
and Mousse, after an impressed glance around the cabin, sat down
next to her.  "Are you sure you're okay?"

     She glared at him, dark eyes narrowing.  "What concern is
that of yours?  You are a guide, not a nurse."

     Mousse blinked, and then looked away, leaning back into the
plush comfort of the seat.  "Sorry."

     He heard Kodachi draw an inhalation of breath.  "No.  I am
sorry.  I should not speak to you in such a way."

     She sighed.  "I feel sometimes as if my life now is an
awakening from some long nightmare, the lingering memories of
which are still with me."

     On the ceiling overhead, a light flashed on, and the voice
of Captain Shimaju came from the speakers.  "Fasten your
seatbelts, please.  We'll be taking off shortly."

     Mousse silently examined his seatbelt for a moment, and then
managed to figure out how it fastened.  Finished with that, he
glanced to Kodachi.  "A nightmare?"

     She shrugged her slender shoulders.  "I cannot explain it
any better than that.  It is as if I was in the throes of some
dark dream, and am only now awakened to the light of day.  I 
feel...  different these days.  As if... as if there is something 
awaiting me, something that will make everything right."

     "At Jusenkyou?"
     
     She frowned slightly.  Mousse felt the plane begin to roll
into motion.  "Perhaps."

     Out the window, he could see Kuno walking towards the
airport building, a tiny figure at this distance, striding 
through the falling rain.  

     It had rained the night Shampoo had left.
     
     The thought was unwanted and unneeded, and he viciously
shoved it away.  "Your brother..."

     He trailed off, not knowing how to ask, not knowing even
what it was he wanted to ask.  

     Kodachi smiled slowly, as if she somehow understood.  "He
has played the buffoon well, has he not?"  

     With the tiniest of jolts, the plane's wheel left the
ground, and it rose into the air.  "Too well, perhaps.  Any mask
may become indistinguishable from your face, if it is worn long
enough."

     She closed her eyes.  Her smile faded, and she was silent.
Rain spattered in thin drops on the windows of the plane, leaving
streaking trails on the glass.

     Mousse sighed, and gripped the arms of his seat.  He was
slightly wary of flying in a plane; he trusted his own wings, but
was not so sure about these ones.  "And what if you don't find
what you're looking for where we're going?"

     "I will," Kodachi answered softly, eyes still closed, and
with the utmost conviction.  "I have dreamed it."

     And all dreamers wake in the end, Mousse thought silently,
and all dreams are dreamt only to be broken.  A sudden sadness
fell over him, and he took off his glasses and tucked them away
into the depths of his robes, not wanting to look at Kodachi's
serene face, or at the rain marking the windows.

     "Such dreams," Kodachi murmured.  "There is a woman, and an
ocean, so vast that it shall encompass all things in beauty, and
the beckoning, the gathering of all things, the end of pain, oh,
such love... such a great, great love..."

     She went quiet then, her breathing soft as she slipped away
into sleep.  Mousse closed his eyes, but could not find the same,
no matter how much he might have desired it.
     
**********

[Continued in section 2]


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