Quantum Destinies
A Ranma Fanfic
By Steven Thesken (jurai-knight@home.com)
This is purely a work of fanfiction done for fun, so please read and
enjoy. Comments and Criticisms are always welcome. It helps me to
know what is working, and what I need to work on to improve my
writing. Flames are ejected into an appropriate receptacle.
This idea occurred to me after I finished the science-fiction novel
"Paths to Otherwhere" by James P. Hogan, a great book by an author I
have long liked.
Ranma and all other associated characters are owned by Kitty and the
ever-creative Rumiko Takahashi. This is primarily a Ranma fanfic,
but I will be bringing in characters from other series for added color.
They will mainly be used for lesser roles or villains. Any new
characters are the property of the author.
Version 1.0 of this story may be found on a few places on the Web
since I first began writing it, or you may email the author for them:
Cursed One's Anime Fanfiction
http://members.xoom.com/Cursed_One/fanfic.html
Gorlando's Tribute to Ranma 1/2
http://home.one.net/~gorlando/Anime/ranma/index.html
Nostradamus Vault of Anime Fanfics
http://Nyx.Webjump.com/
Author's Note: Thoughts will be bracketed by a * on each end. Any
speech other than Japanese will be bracketed by < and >.
Chapter One contains a brief explanation of some of the terminology
and pseudo-science used.
The list of reoccurring worlds to be familiar with:
Earth #0001-001 - The world of Scholar Ranma (Imperial Earth)
What has gone before in this story....
On a parallel Earth that diverged from the standard Ranma timeline
over five hundred years ago, the Empire of Japan rules almost half the
world and has done so for almost a century. A young scientist named
Ranma Saotome returned to Japan to study at the Imperial Academy.
There he met Akane and Nabiki Tendou, who were studying at the
Academy to become members of the Imperial Security Directorate.
Ranma constructed a device that enabled him to mentally link himself
with alternate versions of himself on other timelines, and his first link
was with a young martial artist. The link copied martial Ranma's
skills into the scholarly Ranma, and he used those skills to fight
several opponents, including Akane Tendou, earning her interest in
him. Meanwhile, Kodachi Kunou escaped from an Earth being torn
apart by civil war by transferring her mind to this one. Kodachi
sought out Ranma, who was a friend in her old life, but ran away at
the last moment in tears, confused at her feelings. Her older brother
saw this and assumed Ranma to have seduced and cast aside his
innocent sister. Nabiki gave him Ranma's name, hoping to use Kunou
to force a wedge between any possible interest between Ranma and
Akane. Ranma visited several more versions of himself, including a
counterpart who was born female. Now, both Akane Tendou and
Kodachi Kunou have Ranma cornered in his lab...
Chapter 4 � Romances, Rivalries, and Revelations
***** Earth #0001-001
Kodachi shifted her weight slightly from one foot to the other as she
tried to maintain a projection of outward calm. Inside, she felt as if
several rather large butterflies were beating against the walls of her
stomach. To ease her nervousness, she shifted her attention onto
Akane Tendou. The other girl had turned her back on her to make
some sort of threatening gesture to Ranma, but Kodachi couldn't quite
tell what was going on from her current position.
*What is Akane Tendou doing down here?* Kodachi wondered.
*She never paid any attention to the other Ranma.* A brief memory
of all of the bullying that Akane had done to all of the male cadets in
Kodachi's original timeline surfaced in her mind. Her grip tightened
slightly on the leather handle of her bookbag, the knuckles whitening.
The urge to protect Ranma from Akane Tendou's depredations was
growing within her. *Is she bullying poor Ranma for some reason?*
*How did I get myself into this mess?* Ranma thought, trying to
make sense of his present situation. Akane Tendou was still holding
onto his chair in a way that prevented him from making an easy
escape. Fragments of the solid oak armrest sifted down from
underneath her hand, and her fist continued to hover menacingly
beneath his nose. He hadn't realized before quite how strong she was.
He managed to gather his thoughts to a degree when her gaze shifted
back to stare at the new arrival in his lab.
Glaring at the intruder with a cold-eyed stare, Akane inspected the
girl for any possible threats. She noticed Kodachi's Blackhall uniform,
and a slight sneer curled her lip. *What is some pampered noble girl
doing here at the Imperial Academy? A martial artist like Ranma
couldn't possibly find any interest in some soft piece of fluff like her.
Maybe I should just scare her off, and then Ranma and I could get
back to our... business.* Narrowing her eyes slightly, she projected a
greater level of menace.
As Kodachi and Akane continued their unspoken duel, Ranma
found himself caught by Kodachi's unexpected beauty. To Ranma's
eyes, her hair done up in a single ponytail and tied with a dark blue
ribbon, Kodachi simply continued to stand there pleasantly, her black
leather bookbag resting against her thigh in a demure pose. Ranma
noticed that Kodachi kept glancing at Akane now and then, but he was
still slightly mesmerized by the sight of her and expected her to break
out in a chilling laugh at any moment.
To Akane's view, an entirely different Kodachi suddenly appeared,
not as soft or yielding as her initial impression. Her eyes answered
Akane's challenging look, and an invisible spark of lightning seemed
to leap between the two with a promise of brutal mayhem in the
immediate future. Their gazes locked upon each other, both girls mere
moments away from attacking each other, each somehow recognizing
a rival almost instantly without a single word being spoken between
them. A faint blue glow of battle aura slowly rose around them both.
Ranma suddenly sneezed loudly.
Surprised, Akane turned towards him, breaking the contest of wills
between the two girls. With the break in tension provided by Ranma,
the two undetected battle auras quickly dissipated. She suddenly
seemed to realize what her position might look like to a stranger, and
it brought a brief blush to her cheeks as she suddenly felt strangely
embarrassed. Akane quickly maneuvered herself over to stand next to
Ranma, her stance mirroring Kodachi's demure pose. That done, she
went back to glaring at Kodachi with her previous level of menace, but
the other girl was now ignoring her.
Kodachi raised one eyebrow as she briefly changed her smile to a
smirk at Akane, before restoring her previous pleasant expression to
her face as she turned to look at Ranma. She stood there with her
arms clasped behind her, unconsciously straightening and showing her
figure off to great effect. "Oh, I'm just so embarrassed at my lack of
manners," she said sincerely, feeling the giant butterflies increasing in
number as she looked into Ranma's eyes. Kodachi didn't remember
them being so blue, so handsome, so warm.... She blinked, lowering
her gaze demurely to look at the floor. "I haven't introduced myself.
My name is Kodachi Kunou, Saotome-san."
*Well, she seems to be normal enough,* thought Ranma with a
small amount of surprise. The image of the laughing psychotic
dressed in gymnastic garb in his memories was not matching up at all
with the pleasant-looking girl standing before him so shyly. He slowly
stood up from his chair. There was a subtle undertone to the air as he
focused his attention on Kodachi, like hearing a beautiful but half-
heard melody, a very relaxing sensation; quite unlike the intense
attractive sensations that Akane Tendou induced in him, but similar in
a way as well.
"Yes, umm, it's very nice to meet you, Lady Kunou," said Ranma
softly. He walked forward, slowly closing the short distance between
them, and then bowed politely to Kodachi. She gracefully returned the
bow, unconsciously lowering her head a fraction of an inch further
down than propriety demanded in a greeting for one of her higher
station, an unspoken form of compliment to him. Ranma didn't really
notice, due to his own high levels of nervousness, and the ten years
that he had spent away from Japanese society dulling him to such
subtle nuances.
Akane noticed, and her eyes narrowed even more. *How dare that
pampered bitch?!* she thought, barely managing to restrain her
growing rage at Kodachi. All of her instincts were screaming at her
that this was a rival for Ranma's affections, but she wasn't quite sure
why. It was only a feeling from deep inside her. A tightening of her
lips occurred, one that neither Kodachi nor Ranma noticed. Akane
continued standing at parade rest at her current position and
attempting to look casual, but the attempt was foredoomed to failure
due to her building irritation at the young aristocrat.
"You mentioned something about helping me with my work, Lady
Kunou?" asked Ranma, keeping his tone polite. He felt a somewhat
surprising level of attraction to the young noblewoman. It was
keeping all of his nerves on edge, especially since he kept finding
himself expecting her to call him 'Ranma-sama' at any moment. He
briefly noticed the look on Akane's face, one that seemed to him to be
promising record amounts of pain for him if he dared to laugh at her
discomfort. He didn't realize that the expression might not be directed
at him.
"I have been following your achievements in the sciences for several
months now, Saotome-san," said Kodachi, continuing to ply him with
her pleasant smile. "Your name is quite well-known to me, ever since
I came across some of your recent published works. I discovered by
accident that you were back in Japan, and I thought it would be very
educational to assist you in your current work. I asked for permission
to see you, and Dean Fuyutsuki allowed me to come down to meet you,
Saotome-san. He thought you wouldn't mind some help with your
project."
"My project?" wondered Ranma out loud. He couldn't recall that
the Dean had ever even set foot in his lab since that first day. Ranma
briefly noticed that Akane was muttering something under her breath,
but he decided to ignore her for his own peace of mind.
The Dean was always able to procure the equipment and materials
that Ranma had needed for his project, that was one of the reasons
why he came to the Academy in the first place. Most of the Resonator
was composed of relatively standard components when it came to its
circuitry, only requiring a few unique pieces that Ranma had been
forced to fabricate from scratch. Chief among these specially-built
components was the quantum flux coil, the heart of the Resonator. It
simply wasn't something that a person could walk into a neighborhood
electronics store and walk out with. It required a number of rare
earths as part of its composition, all of them mixed into the proper
ratios. Creating it had been the single most challenging thing that
Ranma had done in his life so far.
"Yes," said Kodachi with a nod. "Dean Fuyutsuki felt that I could
learn much from you." She set her bag down on the table and settled
herself on the couch near where his equipment was assembled, before
crossing her legs. "I'm sure that you could teach me," she shyly
glanced down at her hands folded in her lap before looking back at
Ranma with a coquettish smile. "Many things. Don't you agree?" As
she asked this question, an extra sparkle gleamed in her eyes. That
unexpected look froze Ranma's thoughts dead in their tracks, while
Akane made soft strangling sounds behind him.
"Ummm," Ranma adroitly murmured, as he swallowed down a
throat suddenly gone dry. Pulling himself together enough to at least
speak, he nervously said, "That is to say..."
Flashing Akane a look of triumph, Kodachi thought to herself as
she smiled, *He's so cute!* She quickly returned her gaze to Ranma,
looking as if she waited for him to speak the wisdom of the heavens.
Her butterflies were fading a bit, now that she saw that Ranma was
feeling just as shy as she was. *I can't believe that I never noticed that
about his counterpart before. Well, I don't intend to make the same
mistakes twice. I'm going to make you mine, Ranma Saotome. I don't
care what my brother thinks about that, and as for Akane Tendou,*
she very briefly flicked a condescending glance at the gray-uniformed
girl, her brow furrowing with distaste. *She had better not think about
getting in my way either."
Over at the position where she was casually standing in a modified
parade rest stance, Akane continued glaring at the cozy-looking pair,
grumbling deep in her throat. She did not care in the slightest for the
very warm looks that Kodachi was giving to her Ranma. The goofy
looks that Ranma was giving back to Kodachi charmed her even less.
*What's with him?* Akane thought with a frown. *Hasn't he ever had
a girl smile at him before?*
Akane's eyes suddenly opened wide as she realized what was going
on with Ranma, and a playful smile suddenly appeared on her lips.
*So... the great Ranma Saotome is shy with girls, eh? No wonder he's
been so resistant to me.* The tactics for a plan that was sure to win
Ranma's heart began to form in Akane's mind. She nodded to herself
as the beginnings took form, pausing only to glare briefly at her new
and unexpected rival.
*How dare that pampered weakling of a noblewoman even dare to
think of laying claim to a real man like my Ranma,* Akane thought,
as she added in a few extra touches to her plan to remove the other girl
from the picture. Kodachi's feeble story about wanting to help Ranma
in his work was such an obvious fabrication to Akane. *I need to talk
to Nabiki first to set it up. I'm sure that she'll help me deal with this
annoying little princess, Kodachi Kunou.*
Ranma coughed softly into his fist. The room seemed to be getting
a little too warm for his comfort, especially if he kept looking at the
still-smiling Kodachi. She was gently bobbing her foot demurely up
and down as she waited for him to speak. Kodachi had positioned the
hem of her skirt so that Ranma could readily see her trimly muscular
calves, but her knees and thighs were covered as was proper for a
young lady of her stature.
The slight motions of Kodachi's foot created a quite surprisingly
powerful curiosity in Ranma's mind about the appearance of the rest of
her legs, let alone the totality of what he was certain was a quite
athletic body, currently hidden beneath her tailored uniform. The
thought of Kodachi's counterpart's toned gymnast body from his new
memories, combined with the much more pleasing personality of the
aristocratic and gentle girl currently seated before him, was proving to
be an intense distraction. Ranma wasn't sure what he would do if this
version of Kodachi turned out to be a dancer or a gymnast as well.
*At least she's not a fighter,* he thought with relief.
Looking over at Akane wasn't helping matters either. Ranma knew
full well the emotions that Akane was able to generate in him lately, if
he allowed himself to feel them. Interpreting her lethal-looking gaze
through his memories of the other Akane made him feel distinctly
uncomfortable. Since he was between the two girls, he assumed that
Akane's ire was directed at him, not Kodachi. Ranma forced his eyes
back to Kodachi and focused on her face.
"Your offer to help me with my research project is very flattering,
Lady Kunou, but quite unexpected," said Ranma suddenly. He needed
to put some distance between himself and the two girls. The combined
level of the attractive feelings that they were causing in him was very
quickly becoming quite overwhelming. "Please excuse me for a few
moments."
Akane watched Ranma move across the laboratory, her gaze held
firmly at a point somewhere below his beltline as she watched his
backside walk away from her. A coquettish smile was on her face as
she suddenly found herself unexpectedly wondering about doing many
different things with Ranma other than just fighting with him. This
surprised her, as she had never really thought such things about any
boy before, since they had all shown themselves to be so weak, until
Ranma had proven otherwise to her.
Akane briefly flicked her gaze back to the very irritating presence of
Kodachi Kunou. A brief but rather pleasant fantasy of beating the
other girl within an inch of her life, before sending her back to the rest
of her useless aristocrat peers, filled her thoughts. It brought a happy
sparkle to Akane's eyes as she turned her attention back at Ranma.
Kodachi followed Ranma's movements with her eyes and softly
sighed at his unexpected poise. She couldn't recall the other Ranma
ever moving with such unconsciously graceful movements. If
anything, Ranma seemed to be...
Kodachi's thoughts stalled briefly as she suddenly studied him more
carefully. *He's a martial artist,* she quickly realized with surprise,
her ability at recognizing such things still so new to her that she
forgave herself for not noticing it before. *He appears to have had
many years of training too.*
The realization that Ranma knew how to fight added an exciting
new dimension to her feelings, which surprised Kodachi. She found
herself suddenly curious to see how good he might be, so perhaps it
was just as well that her brother wanted to fight Ranma. Kodachi
knew that Ranma's body must be in at least fair shape if the training
that she had seen his counterpart undergoing was any indication. She
felt a brief blush cross her face at the direction that her thoughts were
heading. Well brought up young ladies of noble families were taught
not to think about unattached men the way that she found herself
thinking about Ranma. It just wasn't proper, but she couldn't help
herself.
Kodachi's gaze drifted back over to Akane Tendou, who was now
studying Ranma with a look of possessiveness that did not please the
young noblewoman at all. A brief fantasy of pounding Akane into the
ground, like she had been doing to Asuka Saginomiya now for several
weeks, brought a smirk to her face. Her thoughts were filled with a
high level of confidence. *You've more than met your match in me,
Akane Tendou. I know that I can put you down with little difficulty if
it came to a fight between us.*
Kodachi looked over at the uncovered equipment on the table, a
bright smile appearing on her face as she instantly recognized a
completed Resonator unit when she saw one. *So this Ranma has
completed one too.* A brief suspicion came into her mind. *Has this
Ranma encountered a martial artist counterpart in his explorations?
That might explain how he looks to have had years of training in his
movements, unless this timeline diverged even further back than I
originally thought. Perhaps my life didn't change as much, but his life
did.* She turned to watch Ranma some more, heaving another soft
sigh at the sight of him.
Unaware of the intense scrutiny that he was undergoing from the
two girls during his simple walk across his lab, Ranma went over to
the small sink in the corner. His thoughts were slightly confused.
*What am I going to do? I don't know if it's such a good idea to bring
in someone else to witness what I'm doing down here. Kodachi seems
normal enough, but there's something making me feel nervous around
her. I wish that I could figure out what it was.*
Ranma looked into the mirror, a brief illusion of himself looking
like his martial artist counterpart suddenly appeared in the glass. He
closed his eyes for a few moments. *You're worrying over nothing,
Ranma,* he thought, attempting to calm himself. *That other reality
has no bearing whatsoever on this life. In this life, you don't have any
enemies or romantic rivals looking to beat you up, and you're not
engaged to a bunch of violent girls either. Don't start panicking unless
Shampoo and Ukyou show up, if they even exist in this world. Focus
on your work and don't let unfounded worries distract you.* Ranma
opened his eyes, feeling a little more relaxed now.
After picking up the large mug resting on the shelf above the faucet,
Ranma slowly rinsed it out. When he was done, he filled it to the brim
with some cold water from the tap, and then slowly raised it to his lips.
Swallowing deeply, Ranma drained the mug in four large swallows.
He looked back, somehow fearing the worst, and saw Akane giving
him another one of her coquettish smiles that was a rather disturbing
counterpoint to Kodachi's flatly admiring look. He noticed them both
briefly exchanging much less friendly looks with each other and
suspected that they weren't the first ones that they had been giving
each other while his back was turned.
*Okay, maybe my concerns weren't entirely unfounded,* thought
Ranma with an internal grimace. *Let's see... I have two attractive
young women in my lab, and both of them aren't making any motions
to leave. But at least they seem to be behaving themselves. So what
do I do now?*
For a moment, Ranma tried to imagine what Ranko would feel if
Kaneda was able to best her, hoping to gain some inspiration as to
how to act. An uncomfortable feeling came over him as he imagined
what her reaction would be to someone as smart or smarter than she is.
*Uh-oh,* he realized, breaking out into a sweat as he looked at the two
girls, feeling even more uncertain than he had before.
*I'm not accomplishing anything here like this,* Akane thought
with a frown. *Ranma is going to be mine, but first I have to deal
with this Kodachi Kunou.*
"I'll talk to you later, Ranma," said Akane suddenly, as she strode to
the open door. "Don't forget that we have a date."
"Hey! I never agreed to nothing!" Ranma shouted at her as Akane
was about to walk out the door. "And I'm not fighting you, ever!"
Pausing in the doorframe and turning for a moment, Akane smiled
at him with a strange glint in her eyes. "Ranma, you kidder, I expect
you to meet me at 4:00 p.m. today, just like always. See you!" She
had briefly debated attacking Ranma right then and there to have the
fight that she craved with him, but things could easily get complicated
with the added annoyance of Kodachi present.
A moment later, Akane was gone. Ranma's thoughts were black as
he stared at the empty doorway. *First she always bullied me, since I
never fought back. Then, when I suddenly gained the ability to fight
back, she cheerfully beat me black and blue. I stupidly went all noble
and helped her out in a fight, and it didn't appear to make the slightest
difference to her. Even after that, she still apparently won't leave me
alone until I break her jaw or something.* Ranma sighed.
"So that was Akane Tendou," said Kodachi from his right. "She
seems to be a woman of very great passions." Ranma noticed that she
had drawn near to him, but he didn't even remember hearing her stand
up from the couch. He casually moved a little ways away from her,
trying hard not to be too obvious about it.
"Yeah, I suppose," murmured Ranma, as he turned to look over at
Kodachi. He caught a whiff of the very delicate perfume that she was
wearing and started to step closer to her before he stopped himself. He
recalled that Akane and Nabiki both wore a similar fragrance, but he
could not remember ever smelling it before. It smelled very nice to
him. *Must be some new brand,* he finally decided.
Ranma studied Kodachi and then shrugged his shoulders. A
woman in his life was a distraction that he didn't feel that he needed
right now, and he thought that he could have been misinterpreting her
body language anyway. Ranma didn't really understand girls, despite
his brief time spent as Ranko, and he wasn't too proud to concede that
one small point of ignorance. He considered it to be about the only
blind spot of knowledge in his life, but now he found himself seriously
considering exploiting his newfound method of learning about girls
and their mysterious ways.
"So, would you like my help with your project?" Kodachi asked
him, rocking lightly on the balls of her feet. Her voice had dropped
into a more seductive-sounding undertone, and her hands were clasped
behind her back as she smiled at him. The position accentuated her
bosom and the lines of her body, to Ranma's discomfort. "I very much
wish to learn all that you can teach me about... quantum mechanics."
Kodachi looked him in the eyes with a hooded gaze. "To be honest, I
was expecting someone quite different, based on your papers, perhaps
more formal. In person you're much more charming."
Ranma felt his ego swell. "That's a very flattering thing for you to
say, Lady Kunou. I... uhh... thanks."
"Please," interrupted Kodachi, "call me Kodachi. There is no need
for you to stand on formality with me." She smiled encouragingly at
him.
"Umm... all right, Kodachi it is." He found himself smiling back at
her. "You can call me Ranma then, I guess." He reached up and
absently scratched at the back of his head with his right hand, looking
very nervous, and Kodachi had to control herself from acting on a
sudden desire to tug on his pigtail. The right look from his blue eyes
would have had her blushing again, she was certain of it.
"It is nice to meet you, Ranma," said Kodachi. "You are certainly
nothing like any of the men that I meet from Whitehall." Her sudden
forwardness left her feeling uncertain. "Not that I ever meet any
men... uhh... never mind."
The last thing that Kodachi wanted to discuss with Ranma was her
overly-protective older brother. *A brother who wants Akane
Tendou,* she suddenly realized. *All I need do is figure out a way to
focus all of Tatewaki's attentions exclusively on Akane, and I will have
managed to eliminate two stumbling blocks at once. She will keep my
lonely brother busy, and that will also eliminate Akane Tendou as a
threat to my destined path of happiness with Ranma. It's PERFECT!*
"So how long have you been interested in science?" asked Ranma,
seeing that as a far safer topic than dating and relationships. "I have
heard that Blackhall Academy has some of the better instructors for
their science program."
"Oh, I've loved science since I was a little girl," gushed Kodachi,
hoping that she wasn't overplaying her hand. Her skirt swayed gently
with her movements. "I think my mother was the one who started my
interest on that path. She's a botanist."
"A botanist?" asked Ranma, surprised. A sudden image of black
roses swept over him, and he mentally smacked himself to dispel it.
"Oh, yes," replied Kodachi, smiling. "Mother was even brought in
to work in the Emperor's private botanical gardens last year, due to her
expertise with rare plant life. The Emperor had a very rare breed of
orchid that was refusing to bloom, and my mother managed to coax it
into life." Ranma nodded at the explanation, inwardly feeling rather
relieved.
"I see," Ranma said, still nodding. "Do you share your mother's
interests in the biological sciences?" Ranma took a subtle half-step
back, the subtle smell of Kodachi's perfume from so close was
becoming distracting once again, but Kodachi maintained their
nearness, moving forward a half step as well. She continued to smile
at Ranma, and he felt that the room seemed to be getting a little bit
warmer again.
"I helped her grub around in the dirt with her little plants, but it
didn't really hold much interest for me for a career," replied Kodachi,
totally misreading Ranma's interest in her botanical pursuits. "I grow
some flowers at our estate for relaxation, but it's only a hobby with
me." She moved another half-step closer to Ranma, her hands still
clasped behind her back demurely, and he absently ran a finger under
the edge of his collar to loosen it a little. His back was now pressed
against the workbench, trapping him.
"Well, umm, how about if I think about it?" asked Ranma, noting by
the clock on the wall that he was coming up on his training time with
Sensei Takami. "The assisting part, I mean." He suddenly reached
down to pick up her bag, and pressed it into her arms. "I've got to
finish doing some straightening up right now. I have to go to a special
training class in just a few more minutes."
"What?" asked a slightly bewildered Kodachi. She started to protest
as he guided her gently to the door. "But I-I wanted to talk with you
some more about what you're working on." She was still protesting as
Ranma shoved her gently outside the door.
"I said that I'd think about it," said Ranma nervously. "I promise
that I'll talk to you tomorrow. Come back in the morning. It would be
a lot more convenient for me than right now. I don't really have time
to discuss it at the moment. Bye now." He spoke in a rush, before he
lost his nerve completely. Kodachi still had her mouth open to say
something when he closed the door on her. Ranma slid the deadbolt
home with a sigh, and leaned his head against the door.
*I couldn't seem to concentrate with her looking at me like that, and
also there was that perfume that she was wearing...* thought Ranma
with a shrug of his shoulders, as he went over and shut down all of his
equipment. He flipped off the main power bar, not noticing from his
position the warnings that had printed across the screen from Akane's
earlier fiddling with various switches. *I really don't need any sort of
distractions right now. I have to focus on my work.*
Heedless of any problems, Ranma covered the equipment with a
tarp and began gathering his things. He was looking forward to his
training class today. *Today I really start to throw myself into my
training,* he thought excitedly. *There's going to be a new Ranma
Saotome soon. I can just feel it. Today is the first day of changes in
my life.*
******************************
Outside of the lab door, Kodachi paused with her hands resting on
her hips, a little irritated at Ranma's abruptness with her. *He didn't
have to be so rude,* she thought, feeling rather cross with him. *But
he told me to come back tomorrow morning.* Her expression changed
back into a wistful smile. Planning to do exactly that, she turned away
from the locked door. *I hope that Father and Mother don't object too
strongly to my transfer. That would make things... complicated.*
Kodachi slowly walked down the hallway to the stairs, away from
the door to Ranma's lab. She knew that she had pushed the issue a
little too hard and paid the price, apparently even scaring Ranma a
little with her forwardness. She heaved a dramatic sigh, a mild frown
appearing on her lips.
*Perhaps it is just as well that I not talk to him until tomorrow
morning,* she thought with a brave attempt at a smile. *I'll leave him
alone for today, since trying to talk with him again right now would
just be counter-productive. I need to earn his trust first, since I
certainly never expected him to be so shy. His counterpart never
seemed to feel shy with me, but then he just treated me as a lab
partner, not as a woman.*
Kodachi heaved another sigh as she walked. *I never expected him
to feel afraid of anything, let alone me,* she thought as her face fell
into an even deeper frown. *It was probably due to that girl Akane
Tendou's presence. She must know that she's entirely unsuitable for
someone gentle and kind like Ranma, the vicious, little, barbarian
peasant girl. Ranma needs someone nicer and more feminine, but
mixed with just the proper amount of spirit. Someone like... me.*
Kodachi was so preoccupied with her thoughts that she didn't notice
that she wasn't alone.
"Didn't have any luck with him?" asked Akane smugly, stepping out
of the shadows at the end of the corridor. "I just thought I'd wait and
see how things went between you and Ranma." She blocked Kodachi's
path, her jaw set with determination, and her arms folded across her
chest. Inside, Akane exulted at the thought of the beating that she
planned to give to the other girl.
"I do not see how my time spent with Ranma Saotome should be
any concern of yours, Miss Tendou," Kodachi replied in a very stiff
tone of voice. She started to walk past Akane, her head held high.
*The nerve of the little cow,* Kodachi thought with annoyance.
"I'm making it my concern, Lady Kunou," said Akane coldly. She
looked up as Kodachi started walking past, grabbed the aristocrat girl
by one shoulder and shoved her hard against the wall. Akane released
her hold immediately and placed her right palm flat against the wall,
before she leaned in slightly in a menacing posture. She smiled in a
very unpleasant way. "I have a prior claim on Ranma Saotome, and
there is no way that some rich, spoiled, debutante witch like you is
ever going to interfere with that. Do I make myself clear?"
"Quite clear, Miss Tendou," replied Kodachi in cool tones, her chin
held up. "However, I fear that I must... decline your advice though.
Please do be good enough to stand aside and let me pass now. You
wouldn't like it very much if you forced me to... remove you from my
path." Kodachi started to move to one side, and Akane's other hand
smacked flat against the wall, mirroring the position of the first. The
two girls stood in a silent tableau for several moments.
*So, the little debutante witch is going to defy me?* Akane thought
with a mirthless smile, yet strangely pleased all the same. The mere
presence of the other girl was irritating to her, like an itch at the back
of her mind. A vision of the brutal beating that she was going to give
to Kodachi, or to any other girl that ever dared to come between her
and Ranma, floated across her mind. Akane felt her breath coming a
little faster as she let the familiar rage build inside her. *No little
piece of soft fluff from the nobility is going to stand between me and
my happiness!*
*This ill-mannered, loathsome peasant is actually threatening me!*
thought Kodachi with a great deal of surprise. She narrowed her eyes
slightly as she met Akane's own cold gaze, and she felt her heartbeat
increase as her body prepared itself for savage combat. Kodachi could
not see how some barbaric and crude commoner, as she thought of the
other girl standing before her, was ever going to keep her away from
Ranma. *You just don't stand a chance against me, Akane Tendou.
So it looks like I get the pleasure of beating some manners into you!*
"So what are you two girls still doing around?" asked Ranma's voice
suddenly from behind Akane. Neither girl had even heard him leave
his lab and approach them, they were so focused on each other. He
feared that he already knew the answer, from witnessing the tableau
that had been taking place, but he desperately hoped that he was
wrong.
Akane instantly sprang aside from Kodachi, a blush filling her
cheeks. She smiled at Ranma, her eyes downcast and her thoughts
confused. "Oh!" she exclaimed, feeling strangely and rather suddenly
embarrassed at Ranma seeing her in such a position. "We were just...
chatting... getting to know each other." Akane gave a brief, warning
glare in Kodachi's direction.
Kodachi felt her heart skip a beat at Ranma's sudden appearance,
but she quickly took advantage of Akane's distraction to slip away
from the other girl. It was getting to be time for her to head home as it
was, so fighting with Akane could wait until the morning. Kodachi
locked eyes with Akane for a brief instant, another invisible bolt of
lightning passing between them, before she turned her attention to
Ranma, standing there in his uniform and holding his bookbag on his
shoulder.
"That's right, Ranma," said Kodachi evenly. "She and I were just
discussing something, but it wasn't anything very important. Shall we
pick this up again in the morning, Miss Tendou?" Another look of
challenge was given and answered between the two girls once more,
despite the smiles on both of their faces. Ranma didn't appear to
notice anything out of all this.
"Why... yes," said Akane, looking somewhat distracted. "Lady
Kunou and I are going to meet tomorrow and have some... girl talk.
I'm sure that we'll have a lot to talk about." Akane had another brief
but satisfying vision of pulping Kodachi's face with her fists, and her
smile turned cold when her gaze swiveled to Kodachi. Her right hand
balled into a fist as she struggled to hold her anger in check in front of
Ranma.
"I'll see both of you tomorrow then," said Kodachi as she bowed to
Ranma. She gave Akane the look a noble would give a commoner as
she waits for the peasant to bow. After a quick glance at Ranma,
Akane bowed, her fists clenched at her side, receiving a very slight
lowering of the head from Kodachi in return. An evil smile briefly
crossed Kodachi's face as she looked at Akane, but her expression was
far more pleasant when she gave a look Ranma's way. "Until then,
Ranma, Miss Tendou. Adieu."
"Uhh, later," said Ranma uncertainly. He watched Kodachi leave
with a faintly wistful expression. Akane noticed, and a dark scowl
appeared on her face.
*Just you wait until tomorrow, Kodachi Kunou,* thought Akane
with a great deal of malice directed at the young noblewoman. *I
intend to show you how wrong you are to even think to mess with
me.* She noticed Ranma heading away from her towards the stairs
and hurried after him.
"Wait up, Ranma!" she shouted after him. "Let me walk you to the
locker rooms!" Ranma didn�t feel like running away from Akane, so
he let her draw up even with him.
"I thought you had somewhere else to be?" remarked Ranma. He
kept his distance from Akane as best that he could, ignoring the few
looks that he was getting from the remaining cadets on the campus at
seeing the two of them together.
"Well, I just have to meet Nabiki to walk home with her," said
Akane. "You're heading the right way, and I don't mind spending
some more time with you." Akane smiled cutely at him, and it was
disturbingly familiar to Ranma how much it was like the way that the
other Akane smiled at the martial artist Ranma sometimes.
*I wonder what her reaction would be if I called her an uncute
tomboy?* Ranma found himself briefly wondering. *Maybe if I make
her mad enough at me, then she'll go away.* After considering it at
some length during the walk, and watching the vaguely possessive way
that Akane walked next to him, he doubted it. *I'm going to have to
watch my words carefully, but that shouldn't be a problem for a genius
of my caliber.* A smile crossed his face.
******************************
*Where is that little idiot?* Nabiki thought, tapping one foot on the
ground in mild impatience. The idiot in question was less than a
minute from earning Nabiki's wrath. He was a new addition to her
organization this year, a form of experiment to see how one of his kind
worked out in it.
"I'm here, Miss Tendou," said a soft voice from behind her. Nabiki
felt her heart jump into her throat at the unexpected voice behind her.
She covered it, when she recognized the voice, by whirling around to
gaze in an imperious manner at the very person that she was waiting
for. She managed to hide her surprise beneath one of her usual cool
looks.
"You're... almost late, Gosunkugi-kun," said Nabiki in chilly tones,
a mild expression of her displeasure. In ten seconds he would have
been late. "It is not a good habit to form. I expect my operatives to be
a little early to each assigned meeting time. And what's the big idea of
sneaking up on me like that?"
Hikaru Gosunkugi shrugged his slight shoulders. Nabiki was again
amazed that someone of such weak physical ability was attending the
Imperial Academy, especially wearing the gray uniform of a Security
cadet. However, pinned on his collar was a small black symbol, and
the reason for his presence at the Academy. Even Nabiki felt a slight
thrill of fear while looking at it, the unmistakable sign for possibly the
most feared and secretive arm of the Security Directorate, PsiDiv.
Since the Empire first became aware of their existence several
decades ago, Espers, as they were commonly called, became a very
useful addition to the Security Directorate. From the time that they
were first employed until very recently, Espers normally attended their
own small Academy that was considered to be an adjunct to the main
Imperial Academy. However, this year the higher-ups in the Security
Directorate felt that such a training policy was fostering an insular
mentality among the Espers, and a new idea was being tried out to
change that. So Gosunkugi and one other Esper now attended classes
at the Imperial Academy in an attempt to try and learn how to fit in
better among their future peers in the Directorate.
Gosunkugi's compatriot and sempai was named Kyousuke Kasuga,
and he was in Nabiki's homeroom class. He was a shyly distant sort,
but actually fairly personable in his own way. Kyousuke was not
nearly as inherently spooky as little Gosunkugi could be most times.
His Esper abilities were mainly psychokinetic in nature, and he was
also reported to be able to teleport great distances, though he never
had demonstrated such abilities around Nabiki. He and Yohko Mano,
Nabiki's second in command, were currently exploring a relationship
with each other that had lasted for a couple of months now.
Nabiki preferred to keep her distance from the couple whenever
they were together. For some strange reason, putting the currentmost
generation of Devil Hunter and an Esper together in a relationship
seemed to attract more than a fair share of oddities around them. The
last thing that Nabiki needed in her life right now was the type of zany
strangeness that those two endured. Yohko alone could be bad enough
to be around at times, but adding an Esper to the mix was just "Asking
For It."
Yohko was currently a little upset with Kyousuke. The Esper boy
had apparently showed an interest in another girl that he saw dancing
in a club while he was out on a date with Yohko. The Devil Hunter
hadn't spoken to him for two days since their date, despite a strong
attempt by Kasuga to patch things up between them. Personally,
Nabiki doubted that Yohko had anything to worry about when it came
to losing her man to some tough-talking streetpunk girl in a leather
jacket like Madoka Ayukawa.
Gosunkugi, on the other hand, was a relatively low-level Esper, and
his abilities were limited to more non-violent things: a fairly capable
avoidance screen that would cause most people to ignore his presence,
and some minor mind reading ability. There were severe limitations
on his powers though. A person possessing a decently high level of
awareness would be able to sense him, despite his avoidance screen.
For example, most times Nabiki was able to, unless she let herself be
distracted.
Gosunkugi's telepathy was very limited unless he was able to make
contact, and even then he couldn't probe very deeply. So far, Nabiki
simply considered him to be an occasionally useful stooge and also
sometimes a spy, but she kept these thoughts to herself. Luckily, her
Security training in resisting telepathic probes was sufficient to resist
if Gosunkugi ever tried his feeble skills on her. He had also developed
an amusing crush on Akane which made him easier to work with for
Nabiki, and he worked cheap for that reason.
"What do you have to report to me, Gosunkugi-kun?" asked Nabiki.
"And make it fast. I'm meeting my sister Akane here shortly."
*Akane-chan,* thought Gosunkugi with a slight sigh, as he
remembered his love goddess. He didn't let himself dwell on her
beauty and charms for long though. For some reason, that tended to
irritate Nabiki, and he far preferred to stay on the middle Tendou
daughter's good side. Akane Tendou was the reason why he put up
with Nabiki's moods and demands, as the Tendou sisters were
frequently together.
After he made his report to Nabiki, Gosunkugi was going to begin
his personal investigation of these dreadful rumors that he had been
recently hearing about his love goddess pursuing a relationship with
that stuck-up newcomer named Ranma Saotome. If they turned out to
be true, then he planned to do something dreadful to the pigtailed
scholar, but he wasn't quite sure what presently. If necessary, he was
planning to do some research on the matter. There was a rather large
multitude of books on magic that had been entrusted to PsiDiv's
Academy, and Gosunkugi might be able to talk one of the apprentice
magic-users into helping him. After all, someone like Saotome just
didn't deserve to have a vibrant woman like Akane Tendou; her ability
to beat people up in a fight always left Gosunkugi breathless whenever
he saw it.
"There is nothing further yet to report on the identity of your rival,"
said Gosunkugi as he bowed slightly. "He has managed to keep
himself cloaked sufficiently well by acting only through his four
chosen intermediaries, so I am still unable to discover his identity. I
don't dare try and probe them from up close, and their minds are too...
impenetrable for me to get a face from them at range." He had an
expression of distaste on his face.
"Whoever he is, he's a canny sort," acknowledged Nabiki with a
frustrated wave of her hand. "Continue to monitor his four cronies.
Perhaps we'll get lucky, one of them will make a mistake, and I'll
finally learn their leader's true identity." Nabiki had been working to
narrow the list of possibilities from among her fellow Security cadets
with only a fair amount of luck. She still had some twenty names left.
The matter of Nabiki's mystery competitor was beginning to annoy
her. At first, it had given her a new thrill to her life to have someone
daring to compete with her on her own level, master strategist to
master strategist. The attacks on her own person, and on Akane as
well recently, were taking things just a little too far though. Nabiki
wanted to find this person, and his continuing ability to evade her
substantial information network, even with the aid of people such as
Gosunkugi, Mano, and her own little sister helping her, was getting on
her nerves. For all she knew now, it could have been someone like
Ranma Saotome pulling the strings from the shadows.
*Wait a moment,* Nabiki thought, rather surprised at the direction
that her thoughts were suddenly taking. *My new rival didn't begin
making waves until shortly after Saotome's arrival. Also, Ranma had
been rather convenient in the time of his appearance to save Akane
yesterday, and he was not touched even once. There is also the matter
of his 'new' martial arts skills. Could he be the mystery genius behind
the attacks on my organization?* Nabiki shook her head, but the
nagging thought that Ranma Saotome was hiding something from her
would not go away.
"Do you require me for anything more, Miss Tendou?" Gosunkugi
quietly asked, his hand fiddling slightly with the gloss black PsiDiv
pin on his uniform collar. Nabiki waved him away, and the spooky
little teen faded back into the shadows and vanished.
*Just what are you hiding, Ranma Saotome?* thought Nabiki, as
she looked up at the cloudy sky. *I intend to find out.*
******************************
Ranma went through his stretching exercises, striving hard to
improve his limberness. He knew that that was a real weakness with
him, his muscles and tendons were not conditioned for the range of
motions that he needed to be able to do if he wished to call himself a
martial artist of an equivalent caliber to his quantum counterpart. His
limberness was coming along though, and at a surprisingly rapid pace
which astounded him even more than it did the Coach.
Ranma's newfound physicality was a source of great pride, adding
even more to an already impressive ego from his various intellectual
accomplishments. He was truly becoming the Imperial ideal for its
Citizens. Ranma anticipated the day when he considered himself a
physical match for his quantum counterpart.
That day did not seem to be as far away from him as he once would
have thought. His muscle strength and his body's conditioning were
very steadily improving, and at a roughly similar pace to his agility
and limberness. The annoying thing to him was that using the other
Ranma's martial arts skills in his own body still made him feel like a
rusty martial artist, and he suspected that it would for some time yet to
come. He knew that there was so much more that he was capable of,
but he possessed no doubts that he would achieve greatness someday.
Once Ranma finished his stretching exercises, he hopped up onto
his feet and took off for the running track at a sprinting pace. When
he got there, Dean Fuyutsuki was standing there, and Sensei Takami
was not around. The older man was smiling at him as Ranma came
running up.
"Hello, Ranma," greeted the Dean. "Sensei Takami invited me here
to see how you were progressing. You don't mind if I watch a little of
your training today, do you?"
"Huh?" said Ranma, surprised. "No, that's all right, sir."
"SAOTOME!" screamed Takami, spotting Ranma over near the
bleachers but not seeing the Dean. "HURRY IT UP! I WANT TO
SEE YOU DONE WITH FIVE KILOMETERS A.S.A.P.! YOU
WERE THE ONE WHO WANTED THIS TO BE HARDER!"
When he got closer, Takami noticed the Dean standing there and
bowed, before speaking in a much quieter voice. "I didn't see you
there, Sir."
"Quite all right, Sensei Takami," said the Dean, returning the bow
and then waving his hand to one side. "Pretend that I'm not even
here."
"Yes, Sir," replied Takami. He noticed Ranma still standing there
and scowled. "ARE YOU WAITING FOR A BUS, CADET?! GET
YOUR ASS IN GEAR! MOVE IT!!"
Ranma snapped into motion and went tearing off down the track at
full speed.
"He certainly seems more physically fit than when he first arrived,
Sensei Takami," observed the Dean as he watched Ranma with a fairly
dispassionate expression, like the pigtailed scholar was a lab animal in
an experiment of his. "You've done an impressive job with the boy."
"Well, I can't take all the credit, Sir," said Takami. "Ranma has
managed to surpass all of my expectations. I've never seen such a high
ability to adapt and improve to such a rigorous level of training before,
nor such a natural talent at physical performance as he has, other than
perhaps the two Tendou girls. The boy's simply a marvel to train."
"Indeed," remarked Fuyutsuki. "But this morning you mentioned a
new approach that you wanted to try in his training regimen?"
"Yes, Sir," said Takami, removing his cap and scratching at the
back of his skull. "Especially after what I saw him achieve during the
regular class today."
"Oh?" asked Fuyutsuki in an interested tone. "What happened
today?"
"Ranma managed to match the record for a first year cadet doing a
five kilometer run," said Takami. "But I don't think that he would
have been able to do it without the challenge from Akane Tendou.
She broke ranks from the class and managed to goad Ranma to a faster
pace for several kilometers. I think if I was allowed to make some
adjustments to their training schedules, then I could use this rivalry to
make them even better."
"What do you propose, Sensei Takami?" asked the Dean, while he
watched Ranma running around the track.
"Currently, Ranma's schedule is to have his regular physical
training class, then a free period, then this extra training?" asked
Takami. The Dean nodded. "And Akane Tendou has her Imperial
History class at the same time as Ranma's free period? I want to
change his schedule and Akane Tendou's then. I want her to train
with Ranma during a three hour special class overseen by myself and
Sensei Fujinami, after they finish their scholastic studies."
"An interesting notion," said the Dean, nodding approvingly. "You
want to intensify their martial arts training then?" Sensei Fujinami
was the most capable martial arts Master on campus, with a Seventh
Dan rating in Shorinji Kempo and an Eighth in Shotokan Karate.
"I suspect that of the two of them, Ranma truly has the potential to
be a Grandmaster inside of him, and I think I can turn their rivalry to
good use for that," said Takami. "The boy's expressed an interest in
improving his fighting skills, and I want to give him a chance to do
just that. You watched the tape of his fight with Akane Tendou?"
"Yes," acknowledged the Dean. "The camera angle was a little off,
but from what I could see I was quite impressed with his skills. I had
always thought that Akane Tendou was impressive, but Ranma shows
clear signs of eventually outdoing her completely."
"He was beating the Tendou girl in that match," said Takami with a
bewildered look. "And I don't know how his skills improved so much
so quickly, for the life of me. Only one day earlier Akane Tendou was
mopping the training mat with Ranma Saotome's face, and now this?
It was totally uncanny, like I was watching a different person fighting
entirely. He was using moves that I've never seen before."
"Nor have I," said the Dean with a ghost of a smile on his face. "It's
a pretty puzzle though, isn't it?"
"You could say that," said Takami. "Myself, I just find it to be
damn spooky, but I find myself liking the boy. He so earnestly wants
to improve himself, and ever since yesterday it's been like something
lit a fire underneath him. Perhaps all of the beatings that he suffered
at the young Tendou girl's hands before yesterday forced some sort of
breakthrough in Ranma. He's a pretty proud kid."
"What of the older Tendou girl?" asked Fuyutsuki. "Do you see
much potential in her?"
"Nabiki Tendou," said Takami slowly, as if tasting the name in his
thoughts. He nodded a moment later. "Yes, that might be a good idea
as well. Nabiki has arguably more potential than her sister, I think,
but that girl doesn't try nearly as hard as she could. I can't seem to
find a way to motivate her to reach for excellence, but I know that she
could outdo her sister if she only found reason to try."
"I agree," said the Dean. He had been a little disappointed with
Nabiki's slower development; it was throwing his schedule off. *There
is also the added benefit of seeing the three children interacting in
such close proximity for such a great length of time,* he thought with
an inner smile. *Under such stressful conditions as training of this
intensive level, Ranma should develop a bond with one or the other of
the Tendou girls. Then it would be time to discuss Ranma's future
with Genma. Ranma must be mated to one or more of the girls from
Project Eve within the year if the master schedule is to be maintained.
I have such plans for the boy and his future offspring.*
"So I have your permission to change each of their study schedules,
starting tomorrow?" asked Takami. "I think this will be just what both
Tendou girls need. For example, I think I can force a breakthrough on
Nabiki Tendou if I force her to train alongside Ranma. She does have
a competitive streak, but it's quieter than Akane's. If I set her against
Saotome, then I can push her further along the same path that Ranma
is following."
"You have my permission, Sensei Takami," said Fuyutsuki with a
smile. "By the way, you never mentioned your opinion of Akane."
"Akane is a different story," replied Takami, nodding thoughtfully.
"She was actually stagnating in her training before Ranma's match
with her," said Takami. "However, his new abilities have also sparked
a new fire in her. She is apparently determined to match Ranma every
step of the way as he improves. Strange as it may sound, I think she's
smitten with the boy. I never noticed it before, since she always
treated him with such tremendous contempt, at least she did up until
after their match yesterday."
*Akane Tendou and Ranma Saotome, a couple?* wondered the
Dean. *This is quite interesting. I wonder if she has had a chance to
meet the Kunou girl? I would almost suspect the gentle hand of Fate
in action to bring her here, especially as she was seeking to meet
Ranma. Most curious indeed.*
"I will be interested in seeing the results of this change, Takami,"
said Fuyutsuki calmly, a fatherly smile on his face now as he watched
Ranma running. *I have such plans for you, Ranma. A glorious new
day is dawning for the Empire, heralded by you and the other children
like you. What wonders will you and the others bring forth? It is still
hard for me to believe that the day fast approaches.*
******************************
During the walk home, Nabiki was silent as she contemplated the
mystery of Ranma Saotome. *One day he's a nothing, and the next he
turns into a martial arts wonder. There's something that I'm missing
here, but what?*
Akane, walking along beside her, wore a smile on her face as she
thought about Ranma. It was only dimmed slightly as she tried to
figure out why, now that Ranma had finally revealed his true warrior
self to her, did a rival for him appear out of nowhere? *That damn
Kodachi Kunou,* thought Akane darkly. *How dare she show up and
try to steal Ranma away from me?!*
Memories of the aristocrat girl set Akane's teeth on edge, and she
found herself looking forward to the fight tomorrow. *She probably
won't even show up, knowing that I intend to rearrange her delicate
features,* she thought confidently. *A pampered noblewoman like
that won't be much of a challenge for me, but once I send her back to
her worthless peers then I can devote all of my attentions to Ranma.*
Nabiki heard Akane sigh once more, and she could tell by the
wistful smile on her sister's face that it was over Ranma. *Ranma,
Ranma, Ranma... what is it about you that's changed? And what is it
that you're hiding down in that laboratory of yours?* Nabiki paused
for a moment, and Akane walked on ahead for a few paces before
turning to look back.
*Ranma's lab,* thought Nabiki. *Some of the answers are probably
there.*
"What's wrong, Nabiki?" asked Akane, studying her sister.
"I just remembered something that I forgot to take care of back at
the Academy," said Nabiki calmly, her thoughts far from her sister
right now.
"Do you want me to come with you?" asked Akane, recalling the
recent attacks on herself and her sister.
"No, I'll be fine," replied Nabiki with a confident smile. "I don't
think it will take very long. You go on ahead. I'll be home in a little
while."
"Okay, Nabiki," said Akane, waving good-bye as she turned around
and continued on her way. "I'll see you at dinner."
Nabiki turned around, her thoughts already on the task ahead of
her. She patted the pocket that contained her mini-camera and set of
lockpicks. *I'm probably imagining things about Ranma,* she thought
with a cool smile. *But I am curious about what he's been doing down
there for all these weeks.*
An ominous rumble of thunder rolled across the skies as she hurried
back to the Academy buildings. Nabiki paid it no mind, quite used to
the strange weather patterns that Nerima always seemed to have.
******************************
Ranma paused between sets of sit-ups and allowed his body to hang
from the boots that held his feet vertically in midair. Sweat dripped
off of his face and fell to the wooden floor a foot beneath his forehead.
He turned his head to see a bright flash of lightning race across the sky
outside.
"What's the holdup, Saotome?" asked Takami, coming over nearer
to him with his usual clipboard in hand. "You still have another fifty
sit-ups to do before you're done." He loudly whacked Ranma across
his stomach muscles with the clipboard. "No slacking off. You
wanted hell, and I'm going to give it to you!"
"Yes, Sensei!" shouted Ranma, as he started another set of sit-ups,
his stomach muscles objecting to the activity. He focused his attention
on his efforts, ignoring everything else.
******************************
Assistant Director Soun Tendou sat in his office in the heart of the
Security Directorate, and he was only able to keep a smile off of his
face by sheer discipline, now that his plans were close to fruition. He
studied the middle-aged woman seated in his office with a critical eye.
To put his plans into motion, for dealing with the matter of Ranma
Saotome, was going to require meticulous care to make everything
seem like a perfectly natural set of occurrences. Luckily, the main
plan itself was relatively simple.
Soun had spent a great deal of time in researching all of the finest
matchmaking agencies in the Empire as the first part of his plan. A
fortunate discovery for him during this research was coming across
Otsu Mitsuma, a pleasant-looking middle-aged lady who was a former
operative for the Directorate many years ago, before she decided to get
married and have a family. Otsu currently worked part-time at one of
the best agencies as a matchmaking advisor, perfect for his needs. She
was amenable to the assignment, even confessing to Soun that she
missed the thrill of field work.
The bug that one of Soun's operatives had managed to place within
the Saotome home a week before Ranma's return back to Japan gave
him all of the information that he needed on dealing with the decision
maker in the family, Nodoka Saotome. She was apparently the real
strength in the Saotome household, and she was the one who would
make the final decision on the girl that Ranma was going to marry.
Soun smiled in his thoughts at learning of Genma Saotome's meek
acquiescence to his wife's decision to pursue a search for a bride for
Ranma. Soun had never been that meek with his own wife, Kimiko
(God bless her soul) when she was still alive, even though she had
been a combat veteran of many savage campaigns during her time
with the Imperial Special Forces.
Soun still remembered the day that he had first met Kimiko, the
woman who was to be his wife. He, a young agent newly assigned to
the Security Directorate with a promising future ahead of him, had
been wearing his best dress uniform and feeling more than a little bit
worried upon meeting the young woman that had been chosen by his
parents to be his new bride. He had been sitting in the front room of
his parents home when his blushing fianc�e and her family had
arrived.
His parents had escorted the Nakakami's into the front room, a
smiling older couple, and a frowning girl his own age who was
wearing a military dress uniform, a patch from the Imperial Special
Forces proudly displayed on one shoulder beneath her rank insignia.
She had been a junior grade Lieutenant then, and she had not been
quite the blushing innocent that Soun had been hoping for. And even
now, he could still remember that first look that she gave him.
He had thought that she was going to kill him, from the glare that
she gave him when their eyes first met, as if she blamed him for the
whole situation. After such a terrifying first look, Soun remembered
finding himself regretting that he was unarmed. He had known that
she came from a proud warrior family, but he hadn't expected to feel
afraid of the woman who was to be his wife.
Both sets of parents had chosen to withdraw at that time, to let the
new couple get to know each other. Kimiko had stared at the floor.
Soun had quickly found his own spot to stare at and joined her in the
activity. It was a moment heavy with tension.
Soun wasn't ashamed to admit, in the privacy of his own memories,
that he had sat there petrified in fright from the looks that Kimiko had
been giving him. She had sat there with her hands clenched in her
lap, her knees together, only looking at him occasionally. She did
have a faint coloring on her cheeks, but it was offset by the almost
murderous gaze in her eyes.
He still had yet to meet a woman who was as beautiful and deadly
as Kimiko. She was also the only woman he had ever loved. The
terror he felt at their first meeting only added to the spice that was
their passion.
"So we are going to be married," Kimiko had said softly as an
opening salvo in their first conversation, a rough edge to her very
feminine voice.
"Yes," Soun had said, feeling more uncomfortable by the minute.
He had turned to look at Kimiko once more, only a brief glance, and
had seen her studying him. "What?"
"You don't have to keep looking at me like I'm going to bite you or
something," she had said in irritation. "I'll have you know that I'm a
very nice girl underneath this uniform."
Soun didn't really remember what he had said in response, but the
next thing he had known was the feel of her hands on his jacket as she
had bodily picked him up and shoved him against the wall. She had
gazed into his eyes with fury burning in hers.
"Look buddy," Kimiko had growled at him. "You treat me with
respect, or I'll rip both of your arms off and beat you with them! If I
say that I'm a nice girl, then you damn well better believe it! I may be
a soldier, but I'm also a woman. You're going to be my husband, so
you're going to have to deal with those two things. Are we clear?"
"Quite clear, Kimiko-san," Soun remembered himself saying. "You
can put me back down on the ground now. Please?"
She had laughed at that as she had put him back down, but instead
of feeling irritated that smile and laugh had captured his heart. He
had even complimented her on that when his feet touched back down
to the ground.
It had been a beginning for them.
Soun's memories flashed forward over the events that soon after
followed in their lives together: their courtship, a surprisingly long
and drawn out one filled with more complications than he cared to
remember; their eventual marriage a year later, and how nervous that
he had been; the birth of their eldest daughter, Kasumi; the births of
the other two daughters that Kimiko had given to him, first Nabiki and
then Akane; the happy years that had followed as the former warrior
explored being a mother; and finally, the emptiness left behind when
her vibrancy was stilled forever by cancer. He had thrown himself into
his work to deal with the pain, seeing her face in all of the three girls.
He had loved his daughters as best that he could, but it was so very
easy to use his duty to hide from the pain.
During Kimiko's all-too-brief time as their mother, all of their
daughters had benefited from her passing on her combat skills, but
only Akane had really taken to the martial arts like a warrior born.
Their mother's death had left a hole in the household, but Soun was
able to see her every time that he looked at Akane. She was looking
more and more to be every inch the fighter that her mother had been.
However, Akane was not the girl that he hoped to match with young
Saotome, oh no, that honor was reserved for Nabiki. Akane, as much
as Soun loved her as a daughter, was not Nabiki's equal in his heart.
The middle Tendou daughter reminded Soun most of himself at that
age, ambitious and full of promise. Her skills as a Security operative
at gathering information and organizing people were truly impressive
to Soun, and he had chosen to reward her with the finest match that he
could find. So he had chosen the best for her in a husband, someone
who could keep up with her quick wit, and that someone was Ranma
Saotome.
Akane, on the other hand, needed a husband who was more suited
to her personality and even stronger in combat than she was, and
Ranma was more scholar than warrior. She would eat a boy like
Ranma alive, since he would be unable to stand against her strength.
Akane, though she tried hard to please him, was totally ill-suited in
temperament to become a member of the Directorate, and Soun feared
that she would only embarrass the family reputation for excellence if
she continued in her attempts to be a Security operative. The qualities
that would have enabled her to be a fine soldier of the Empire in the
Special Forces would only hinder her effectiveness as a future Security
operative. It required a subtler touch than Akane was capable of.
Soon, however, Nabiki would be engaged to the man that he had
chosen for her, and Soun would be able to turn all of his attentions to
Akane's future next. There were several choices for his youngest
daughter that he was going to explore once the matter of Nabiki and
Ranma was finally settled. He had also even sounded out some of his
contacts among the Defense Directorate at obtaining a place for Akane
in the military. The Tendou Clan had served under both Directorates
over the years, admittedly favoring the Security Directorate, so Soun
was not anticipating any difficulties in getting Akane transferred. He
was certain that his youngest daughter would earn numerous honors
fighting for the Empire.
"Director Tendou?" intruded a gentle voice into his thoughts. Soun
looked up and cursed himself for allowing himself to drift off into a
state of inattention like that. It did not befit the image that he had of
himself. He folded his hands in front of him on his desk.
"My apologies, Mrs. Mitsuma," said Soun sincerely. "I have been
listening to your report with great interest. My thoughts simply drifted
the last few moments. I trust that you understand the extreme level of
importance for this assignment to the future of the Empire?"
"I don't quite see how arranging a marriage could be that important,
but I will do all in my power to arrange for your daughter Nabiki to be
engaged to Ranma Saotome," Otsu said pleasantly. "You are paying
me enough to do so, after all. I have reviewed his file extensively, and
I believe that I can sell Nabiki quite easily to Mrs. Saotome."
"It's very important that my name not ever be mentioned in this
transaction as anything but the father of the bride-to-be," cautioned
Soun. "It is also quite vital that you not appear to be too eager about
Nabiki, just enough that suspicions will not be raised. Do you have
the throwaway candidates' files that I selected for you?"
"Oh my, yes," chuckled Otsu. She pulled out a couple of manila file
folders and set them on Soun's desk. She picked one back up and
waved it around. "Wherever did you find this girl? According to her
file, she's been rejected in over two dozen different bridal candidate
selections for all sorts of reasons in the last year alone, including
beating up a few of the potential grooms. Admittedly, her family
background criteria will fit the profile that you gave me, but the girl
herself... ehn. According to Ranma's personality profile and hers,
they'll be like oil and water, totally incompatible."
Otsu pointed at a section of one of the pages and said, "Take this for
example... Does she really dress up as a boy sometimes?"
"Amusingly enough, yes," said Soun with a chuckle. "I understand
that the Kuonji's are getting quite desperate to wed their only daughter
off. She has apparently rejected all of the local boys, a few of them
rather violently. I have it on very good authority that the Kuonji Clan
is one of, if not the finest of the remaining true Ninja clans left in the
Empire, and Ukyou Kuonji is supposed to be next in line to inherit the
leadership of her Clan... provided that she can find a husband."
"Ah, I see," said Otsu. "But why the dressing as a boy part? That I
don't quite understand."
"Blame her senile great-grandfather for that one," said Soun with
another chuckle. "While the parents managed the day to day affairs of
the Kuonji Clan and taking care of the family shrine in the Koga
mountain area, Ukyou was being raised and trained as a Ninja by her
great-grandfather back up in the mountains, learning her Clan's Ninja
lore. Unfortunately for Ukyou, the old fool, for some strange reason,
apparently became convinced early on that Ukyou was a boy, and he
raised her as one for years. Her parents didn't learn this until a little
less than a year ago, but the damage was done. I'm told that her
mother about had a heart attack at meeting her 'son' at that time."
"Does Ukyou know that she's female?" asked Otsu, her brown eyes
widening a little at the tragic tale.
"Oh, she does," admitted Soun. "However, according to one of her
psychological profiles, the problem is that she simply isn't aware of the
proper ways to act as a girl, so she tends to be rather... male in her
attitudes. But she also wishes to be a real girl, so there is quite a bit of
fascinating gender confusion going on. Ukyou is quite an interesting
psychological study, as well as being a formidable martial artist by all
accounts."
"Oh my," said Otsu with a smile. "Her first meeting with Ranma
will be rather interesting."
"To say the least," said Soun, handing the file back to Otsu. "That's
why she's one of the throwaway candidates for Ranma. Her family
background is an excellent match, but I very much doubt that Nodoka
Saotome would look with much favor on having someone like Ukyou
for a daughter-in-law. Despite her samurai family background and
warrior training, a traditional woman like Nodoka would surely find
Ukyou... flawed. The girl is totally unsuitable, but her flaws will make
Nabiki shine by comparison."
"And the other one?" asked Otsu, picking up the other file folder.
"Ahh, the other side of the equation," said Soun. "I picked this
name myself from a stack that one of the bridal services gave one of
my contacts. Perfectly unsuitable for entirely different reasons than
the first."
"Kodachi Kunou?" asked Otsu, her eyes widening a little. "How
could you possibly expect me to suggest such a match? The girl is a
daughter of one of the Minor Families. Her family registry is filled
with blue-blooded nobility. Ranma Saotome, while he does descend
from samurai stock, would never be acceptable to the Kunou Family
patriarch unless he was a great warrior of some sort as well."
"And if he was that, he would have no interest in a timid mouse like
Kodachi Kunou," said Soun in a scornful tone of voice. "According to
her file, the girl is typical of an overbred daughter of nobility and has
done everything that she was ever told to do. She had an opportunity
to attend the Imperial Academy extended to her, but she instead chose
to attend Blackhall Academy, at her mother's insistence."
"She is quite lovely," said Otsu, doubt in her voice. "The boy might
be taken by her looks."
"My daughter Nabiki can easily outshine a spoiled aristocrat like
Kodachi Kunou," said Soun proudly. "The Kunou girl was chosen to
show the opposite end of the scale from Ukyou Kuonji, a girl without
much spirit despite an impressive family background. Between the
two of them, Nabiki will shine forth like a star in the heavens. After
all, my daughter comes from a good family with excellent connections
for a boy like Ranma. Play your part and nothing will go wrong with
the arrangements."
"You have my word, Tendou-san, that I will follow all of your
instructions to the letter," said Otsu with a smile. "Your daughter
Nabiki will be pledged to Ranma Saotome as you desire. Nothing will
stand in the way of that."
"Excellent, dear woman," said Soun with a smile. "I am counting
on you."
******************************
"What sort of game are you playing, Soun Tendou?" wondered
Ninomiya Hinako in the privacy of her office. She had heard that
Soun Tendou was speaking with a former Directorate operative in his
office, a woman who works in one of the matchmaking bureaus.
The intercom on her desk suddenly buzzed. "Director Hinako?"
asked a voice over it, her new assistant, a young woman named Yui
Ikari.
"Yes, Yui?" Hinako replied. "What is it?"
"I have the reports that you were asking for from the Ministry of
Science," said Yui over the intercom. "Oh, and I have also heard that
Director Tendou is finished with his meeting with Otsu Mitsuma."
"Excellent," said Hinako. "Bring in those reports, and then you can
go home, Yui. You've done enough for one day."
"Yes, Ma'am," said Yui over the intercom. "I'm on my way."
Outside, at her desk, Yui Ikari gathered up the files on her desk that
Director Hinako wanted. So late in the day, there were few people
around. She was looking forward to a quiet evening at home with her
cat, perhaps relaxing in the bath with a romance novel.
Yui walked the short distance from her desk to Hinako's office door
and gently knocked before opening it. *I swear... Director Hinako
needs to get a boyfriend,* she muttered in her thoughts. *Not that my
life is any great shakes socially, but all this obsessing that she does
over Soun Tendou and his activities can't be good for her.*
Director Hinako looked up from her obsessively tidy desk, in the
middle of making notes on a pad of paper. "You can set those there,
Yui," she said, pointing at a spot near her right elbow on the desk.
Hinako went back to making cryptic notes on the paper that she was
writing upon.
"Yes, Ma'am," Yui replied, setting the stack of folders on the desk
at the appointed place. "Are you sure that you won't be needing me for
anything more this evening?"
"Positive," said Hinako, looking up with a smile. "Go on home and
have a good evening, Yui. You've done enough, and tomorrow is
another day."
"Thank you, Ma'am. Goodnight." Yui turned to go.
"Oh, by the way, how is everything going with you and your new
boyfriend?" asked Hinako, looking at Yui with a smile. "I noticed that
you had a new picture on your desk. Things didn't work out with you
and Captain Rokubungi?"
"Oh, we had a parting of the ways about a month ago," said Yui
with a brave attempt at a smile. *May you rot in the lowest and hottest
corner of hell, Gendou, for cheating on me!* Yui thought behind the
fake smile. "He accepted a new assignment in one of the northern
Chinese prefectures, and that was the last that I've heard from him."
"He was a little old for you, I suppose," acknowledged Hinako. "So
who is your new one?"
"Keiichi?" said Yui, a genuine smile on her face now. "Oh, he's just
a good friend right now, but who knows what the future holds? He's
one of the design engineers at Mishima, making better vehicles for the
Empire and all that. He and I met while I was out with Miyuki and
Natsumi after work several weeks ago. He's really very sweet, and I
like him a lot."
"He obviously makes you happy," noted Hinako, smiling gently at
the younger woman. "Take it from a woman who knows, Yui. If you
find a man who makes you happy, then grab on and don't let anyone
take him from you."
"Yes, Ma'am, but he's just a friend." Yui suddenly looked at the
floor, and a faint blush crossed her cheeks.
"I see," said Hinako, in an amused tone of voice. "Well, you give
my best to your 'friend' when you see him next, Yui. Now go on. Get
out of this place for the night." Hinako pointed at the door with one
finger. "I'll see you in the morning."
"Yes, Ma'am," said Yui, and she left, closing the door behind her.
Behind her, Hinako set the pad on the desk and rubbed her eyes.
*Hopefully, these files will explain what interest that Soun Tendou
could have in Ranma Saotome. They were certainly buried deeply
enough in the Science Ministry's archives.*
She pulled one of the files to her, and read what was written on the
cover. *Ranma Saotome, Project Adam, file number three-two-five-
six. What in the sacred name of the Emperor is Project Adam?* She
flipped the file open, revealing a small sheaf of papers and a surprising
addition: a single, silvery compact disk in a plastic sleeve. She pulled
it out and turned it over in her hands. There was nothing written on
it, save for the same file number as was on the file folder.
Hinako set it aside, and read through the papers. Much of what was
in them appeared to be concerned with a physical given to one subject,
named Ranma Saotome, age five, over a decade ago. *Hmm... a fairly
complete set of tests done, both physical and mental, including a full
genetic analysis. No abnormalities or defects determined... somewhat
above-average both physiologically and neurologically... a basically
normal and healthy boy. Deemed suitable for induction into Project
Adam... whatever that is. So why all the interest in Ranma on Soun's
part?*
The silvery compact disk caught her eye, and she slipped it out of
the plastic sleeve. Holding it up in her hands, the disk's surface
reflected the light from the lamp on her desk. *Perhaps the answers
are in here,* she thought as she slipped the disk into the proper slot in
the front of her computer. She waited, somewhat impatiently, as the
system read the information on the disk.
A moment later, a terse message appeared on her computer screen,
and she looked at it, rather unsurprised.
*ENCRYPTION PROTOCOLS ACTIVE. INPUT PASSWORD:
*Bastards,* she thought, without much anger. It was about what
she would have expected at this point. She tried a few times with
some sample passwords that she thought might work, but they came
back with negative responses. *Ah well, I have some of the best
decryption software that the Security Directorate has available. I
should have no difficulties cracking this.*
Hinako tapped away at a few keys, connecting her personal system
to one of the Shinohara-manufactured mainframes in the basement.
She left the disk in the drive and let the software start up. After a few
moments, it came back with an analysis of the encryption.
*FILES SEALED BY IMPERIAL EDICT... FURTHER USE OF
DIRECTORATE DECRYPTION ALGORITHMS IS EXPRESSLY
FORBIDDEN WITHOUT ROYAL AUTHORIZATION � INPUT
AUTHORIZATION CODE:
Sitting back in her chair, Director Hinako stared at the lines printed
on her monitor in puzzlement. *What is it about Project Adam that
could be of such sensitivity, or so secret, that it requires an Imperial
Edict Seal to protect it from Security Directorate investigation?* She
pulled out a small 5-yen coin from one pocket and began playing with
it, rolling it back and forth between her fingers. It was a nervous
gesture of hers that she had had for years.
*There's more to this than meets the eye,* Hinako decided after
several long moments. She stood up and watched the rain falling
outside her window against the darkening sky. The coin in her hands
rested between her index and middle fingers, and she brought her
palm up to focus on the small hole in the center of the coin. She
flipped the coin into the air and snatched it back up with the same
hand. *I was just curious before, but now I'm even more determined
than ever to know the answers. What secret do you hold, Ranma
Saotome?*
******************************
Nabiki managed to make it into the main Academy building before
the rain really began coming down. She shook off her umbrella and
set it in the rack by the main door. The evening cleaning staff could
be heard working in the building, and the sounds of electric cleaning
equipment were humming in the distance. Nabiki smiled when she
saw that no one appeared to notice her arrival.
Off to her right was the entrance to the stairs, and Nabiki quietly
opened the door and closed it behind her. The lights were on in the
hallway, for which she was grateful. She had a flashlight on her, but
she preferred to save its batteries for when she might need them. No
sounds came up from below, so it looked like she would not have to
worry about anyone disturbing her little bit of burglary.
Room five was locked, and Nabiki eyed it with an unhappy look.
Lockpicking was not one of her better skills, but she had to give it a try
to get through the door. She pulled out the small zippered case that
her father had given her for a birthday present. She eyed the lock
again and pulled out a couple of items.
"Seems like a standard Academy door lock," she murmured softly to
herself. She knelt down next to the door and inserted a pick and probe
gently into the lock. She tapped a button on the side of her watch until
the digital readout changed to stopwatch mode. Nabiki took a deep
breath and let it out.
Nabiki tapped the stopwatch, setting the chronometer into motion,
and it began counting off fractions of a second. She began fiddling
with the lockpick, her tongue wedged between her lips on the left side
of her mouth. *Come on, Nabiki, you can do this.*
Down at the other end of the corridor, Nabiki heard a few of the
cleaning staff descending down the stairs.
*Work the lock,* she thought, slightly frantic. *Don't think about
getting caught. Just work the lock.*
The final tumbler clicked into place, and she turned the probe with
a grateful sigh, hearing the deadbolt lock slide open. She pulled out
her pick and probe with a smile, absently tapping her finger to stop the
counting of the stopwatch. She opened the door quietly and quickly
slipped inside Ranma's lab a moment later.
Nabiki closed the door behind her with a confident grin and set her
bookbag down on the floor to one side of the door. She very gently
slid the deadbolt shut, mere moments before she heard a hand test the
door. The lock rattling sounded very loud in the quiet of the room. A
moment later she heard the footsteps passing on.
Nabiki let out a sigh of relief. She flipped on her flashlight and let
the beam move about the room. *There's something fun about doing
this sort of thing,* she thought with a smile. She pointed the narrow
flashlight beam at her watch. *Not bad, fifty-two seconds. Daddy
raised me up to be a proper investigator, not to mention a pretty good
thief.*
Nabiki found the light switch and turned on the power, flipping her
small flashlight off as the fluorescent bulbs flickered into life. She
eyed the contents of Ranma's lab dispassionately for a moment as she
let her gaze sweep around the room. Her eyes settled on the cloth-
covered table on one side of the room next to a rather ugly-looking
couch. *What have you been working on down here, Ranma-kun?*
Nabiki flipped off the cloth covering the table and its contents, and
eyed the small collection of equipment sitting there neatly. A small
computer monitor sat next to a power bar and a keyboard, both of them
connected to a gray case. A thick wire ran to a headset of some sort,
with several prongs on it running down to several small, flat, black
metal plates. It all looked rather anti-climactic. Nabiki had been half-
expecting to see something much more impressive.
Curious, she flipped on the main power bar and let the equipment
warm up. The screen immediately began printing out an intriguing
series of self-test messages.
*SELF-CHECK COMPLETE
*ALL LOGIC COMPONENTS ARE FUNCTIONING WITHIN THE
DESIGNATED PARAMETERS
*QUANTUM FLUX COIL IS FUNCTIONING WITHIN THE
DESIGNATED PARAMETERS
*NEURAL INDUCTION SENSORS ARE FUNCTIONING WITHIN
THE DESIGNATED PARAMETERS
*SYSTEM HAS 11 QUANTUM COORDINATES STORED IN
STABLE MEMORY
*TIME DURATION OF RECENT TEST RUN: 30.00 MINUTES
*SCAN FOR NEW COORDINATES:
The cursor paused at this point as it awaited some form of input. A
sense of amazement and wonder filled Nabiki at that moment.
*Quantum flux coil?* Nabiki thought as she looked over the case in
the middle. She turned the headset over in her hands, suspecting that
it was most likely the "neural induction sensors" that the one system
message referred to. *Quantum coordinates? What could Ranma be
playing with down here?* Her curiosity level was peaking from all of
the mysterious-purposed hardware and arcane phrases.
"Let's see what happens if I type 'yes' there," she muttered with a
smile. She typed the word in and hit the return key.
*SELECT QUANTUM BAND FOR SCAN: RANDOM
The word 'RANDOM' was blinking, so Nabiki just hit return, not
knowing what else to do.
*SET CYCLE INTO ACTIVE MODE: YES
Again, the input word was blinking, so Nabiki tapped the return key
once again.
*SET TIME DURATION FOR TEST:
Nabiki carefully typed in '30.00 MINUTES' and tapped the return
key once more, taking her cue from the report of the length of the most
recent test run.
*WAITING FOR SIGNAL FROM NEURAL INTERLINK HEADSET
That was it, no further input requests. *Well, what do I do now to
get this thing to show me what it does?* Nabiki wondered. She eyed
the headset resting in her lap and the couch behind her. *I guess
Ranma wears this and lays down on the couch....*
Nabiki, carrying the headset in one hand, sat down on the edge of
the couch so that she could see the screen. She put the headset on her
skull and waited to see what happened. *I feel silly doing this,* she
thought with a sardonic grin. There was a vaguely pleasant hum that
felt as if it was within her brain, and she started to remove the headset
when she noticed that a computer generated voice was speaking. On
the screen a pair of sine waves suddenly appeared and slowly began
moving into convergence.
The computer spoke in gentle tones, its artificial voice repeating
over and over for several seconds the same word, "Searching...
Searching... Searching...."
Suddenly, it said, "Quantum signature match found. Activating
cycle." Nabiki felt a moment of nothingness, and her body suddenly
flopped back as if she'd been poleaxed and sprawled partway across
the couch, her eyes closed as if in sleep. One arm fell off the edge of
the couch and rested on the cool concrete floor.
The timer began to count down.
******************************
***** Earth #0016-496
There was a brief and mildly disturbing moment of dislocation, of
non-existence of self, and then Nabiki suddenly found herself in
another place, one that she did not immediately recognize. It was
early evening, but the skies were clear, instead of raining as she
distinctly remembered it doing outside only a few minutes before. She
was outside, somewhere in Tokyo it looked like. However, she had no
idea what had just happened to her, and the skyline looked... different.
*I... what? Where am I?* Nabiki thought in confusion, and her
brain felt slightly fuzzy, almost like it was wrapped in soft cotton. The
feeling faded quickly, allowing her thoughts to clear. *Okay, Nabiki,
calm down and take stock.*
Nabiki stood where she was and blinked her eyes as she adjusted to
her new surroundings. Mere moments after her return to awareness,
and possibly even more surprising and disturbing to her, a confusing
stream of mental images suddenly seemed to fill her mind over the
course of a single moment. It was a kaleidoscopic torrent of memories,
an entire lifetime of experiences shoved into her awareness all at once.
The unutterable rush of the experience totally overwhelmed her for
that moment. It took her a few moments afterwards to realize that
someone was speaking to her.
"Nabiki?" asked a familiar, male voice, concerned. "Are you okay?"
Nabiki looked over and was startled to see a very familiar-looking
young man standing next to her, dressed in an outfit of Chinese-style
clothes. She recognized his face instantly and couldn't help staring for
a moment. It was Ranma Saotome... yet it somehow also wasn't him.
Seeing something that was so very familiar to her, and yet knowing
with absolute certainty that it wasn't in the same breath, was a bit
disturbing to her. However, it was not nearly as surprising as the
thought that suddenly popped into her head when she looked at him.
*Ranma is my fianc�,* Nabiki instantly realized, then wondered
why that thought would come to her like that. He was looking at her
with a worried expression on his face, and she felt a strange warmth
from deep inside her at seeing his obvious concern. She smiled back
at him pleasantly, and it felt right to do.
"I'm fine... Ranma-kun," Nabiki said calmly. "I guess I was just lost
in thought." He nodded, apparently accepting her explanation at face
value. Her years of practice at hiding her feelings kept her from
showing the quivery nervousness that she was feeling at this new and
unexpected experience. Everything around her felt completely
familiar to her, and yet it wasn't at the same time. *So where am I?*
she found herself wondering.
*Nerima, near the Tendou Dojo,* came a sudden thought to Nabiki,
one that wasn't really in words and just seemed to come from the back
of her brain, but she was suddenly fully aware of where she was. She
nodded contentedly at the name for a moment, then she paused and
cocked her head in confusion. *Tendou... Dojo?*
Nabiki suddenly realized that she wasn't wearing her Academy
uniform and looked down at herself. She saw that she herself was also
dressed in Chinese-style clothes similar to Ranma's, but it was not a
surprise, for some reason. Nabiki casually raised her right hand up to
stroke the silky material of the shirt and caught a glimpse of her hand.
It was her hand, and yet it wasn't. Fascinated by that simple thing, she
studied it for a moment and noticed the calluses on them, somewhat
thicker than the ones that she expected to see on her own hands.
*These are the hands of a heavily-trained fighter,* she realized in
an instant. Nabiki noticed her reflection in a plate glass window next
to her and looked at herself, noting the braid at the back of her hair,
longer than she normally wore it. *A warrior's braid.* She then
wondered how she knew to call it that.
Behind her, Ranma stared at his fianc�e and was not sure what to
make of Nabiki's sudden change in mood. She was checking herself
over as if she was seeing herself for the first time, and that was just
plain strange to Ranma. He decided not to press the issue though. If
Nabiki wanted him to know what was going on, then she would tell
him.
Suddenly, a new mass of memories became clear to Nabiki, rising
unbidden into her awareness around a single, central realization. *I
am Nabiki Tendou, the Heir to the Anything-Goes School of Martial
Arts.* Random other memories came to her, associated with that one
central thought, and it was like the stories she had heard people tell of
seeing their lives flashing before their eyes before they died. Slowly,
over several moments, many of the memories slowly sorted themselves
out in her mind, and they were immensely fascinating to her.
Up until less than two months ago, she had been on a ten-year long
training journey with Genma Saotome, Ranma's father, learning and
improving her now formidable skills in the martial arts. A new torrent
of memories sped through Nabiki's mind, too quickly for her to really
grasp onto anything firmly. So many people had been met over that
time, places seen, and various fighting techniques learned. It was like
seeing herself as the heroine of a martial arts action movie series, and
it was both terrifying and wonderful. Nabiki felt an unexpected joy fill
her upon embracing these new memories, as if they filled an empty
place within herself that she had not even known existed until that one
shining moment of revelation.
One of the more terrifying memories centered around falling into a
pool of water during some sort of martial arts training exercise, one of
many in a mysterious valley located in China, and a name for the place
popped into Nabiki's awareness. *Jusenkyou?* The name of the place
conjured up another powerful image for her, of a handsome young
man dressed as she herself was in the reflection. She tried to follow
that thought, to learn who this young man was, but it seemed to hover
ever so tantalizingly out of reach.
Nabiki turned back to face the reflection of herself in the plate glass
window. She noticed Ranma's face also being reflected in the glass,
and he was simply staring at her with a confused look. She turned to
look at him, and he stared expectantly at her.
"I'm going to take a walk by myself, Ranchan," she said, and his
look of confusion reappeared. "Don't worry. I won't be long. I just
have to check on something." A sudden impulse came to her. "Don't
let your old man eat my share of dinner, okay?"
That seemed to reassure him, and he smiled at her. "Sure thing,
Nabiki. How long you think you're gonna be? I can let Kasumi
know."
"I should be back in a half hour," said Nabiki, shrugging her
shoulders. The longer she was here, the less it felt like a dream and
the more it felt like real life. There was a quality to dreams that was
simply not present, and that left her with the inescapable conclusion
that she was really here, wherever here was. Looking at Ranma kept
filling her with strange new feelings that she was unused to, and she
wasn't sure what to do if she saw her family until she had figured out
what was going on. So she waved at Ranma and jogged off down the
street, needing some time to think and reason out what had happened.
Ranma watched Nabiki run off, and then shook his head. *If there's
anyone in this city who doesn't need a chaperone, it's her,* he thought
with a smile. Turning his feet back towards home, Ranma walked in
the opposite direction from the way Nabiki had gone.
Nabiki never remembered feeling so alive before, as she did while
she ran down the street, recognizing places and streets that were a
mixture of both similar and very different from the Nerima that she
had known for her entire life. On an impulse, she almost effortlessly
bounded to the top of a wall without thinking about it, gracefully
landing a moment after her feet had left the ground. She suddenly
laughed at the sky, feeling a new sense of freedom in herself, and a
new confidence.
*I'm not dreaming,* Nabiki firmly decided. She knew from her
own experience that dreams had their own tone, and this felt too "real"
to be a dream. So she focused on what she did know about what was
going on around her. *One, I activated Ranma's device in his lab.
Two, I found myself here, with my mind filled with memories of new
experiences that I never lived. Three, wherever here is, I'm a martial
artist of great skill. Four, Ranma's device referred to a component
within itself called a quantum flux coil.* Nabiki sat down on the top
of the wall.
"So what does this all add up to, Tendou?" she muttered softly to
herself as she studied the stars beginning to emerge in the evening sky.
"It either adds up to one strange dream that you're having in Ranma's
lab, or this is all somehow very real. And you've already determined
to your own satisfaction that this isn't a dream. So if this is real..."
Nabiki suddenly snapped her fingers.
"If this is real, then this is how Ranma developed his new skills
overnight," she concluded, talking softly to herself. "Somehow, in
some way, this is me, only in another life. A life where I did all of
these things that are in my new memories now." Nabiki held up her
hand and made a fist.
"Let's see what this other me is capable of," she said with a grin as
she leaped from the top of the wall to a nearby rooftop.
The next several minutes were filled with a laughing Nabiki leaping
and running from rooftop to rooftop across Nerima. Her fists and feet
lashed out at a thousand phantom opponents as she tested the body
that she now wore to its limits. It was an exciting and wondrous
feeling, and she marveled at the flow and grace of each motion of her
body. She knew that she was the preeminent martial artist among her
peers here, and every movement of her body proved it to herself.
Nabiki stopped on a random rooftop and went through a swift kata
of blocks and strikes, feeling the perfection of every movement as she
jumped and dodged. She smiled broadly as her hands wove through
the graceful motions of the various Shaolin Kung Fu styles, her body
filled with unbelievable agility and power. As she moved in a random
way through the martial arts lore that this body knew in every fiber of
its being, Nabiki felt something deep inside of her change, but she was
not sure what it was. She paused at the end, feeling her breath coming
a little quicker.
*Oh, Ranma,* Nabiki thought with a smile, bringing her right fist
around to hover before her body, palm upright. *To invent something
like this. You truly are a genius, and that must be why I love you so.*
That unexpected thought brought her movements to a stumbling
halt, and she was still standing there looking confused when the world
went away around her. Nabiki felt a moment of dislocation.
******************************
Nabiki looked around in surprise. *Where did Ranma go?* she
wondered as she lowered her hands from the combat stance that she
found herself in. *Did I get into a fight with someone? What just
happened here?*
Feeling a rumbling of hunger from her stomach, Nabiki decided
that eating was more important right now than dealing with her
confusion. She leaped to the next rooftop and began heading home.
******************************
***** Earth #0001-001
"Recall complete," said a soft voice in the background. Nabiki
slowly opened her eyes and simply stared at the plain cement ceiling
over her head, broken only by faint cracks, conduits, and the
fluorescent lights. She suddenly became aware of her back muscles
complaining slightly from the awkward position that they were in, and
she shifted around to a more comfortable one, raising her arm up off
the cold concrete floor.
*That was simply incredible,* thought Nabiki as she sat up slowly.
Her thoughts felt a little bit strange, as if her awareness was divided
among two very similar thought patterns, but the feeling quickly went
away. Nabiki absently squeezed her right shoulder with her left hand,
and she had a faint grimace on her face as she noted the lesser amount
of muscle on herself with some dismay. She already missed having
the lithely well-sculpted musculature of her body in that other life. *I
need to work myself into better shape. Correction... I will work myself
into better shape. I always thought I was in excellent condition, but
that other body was even more so.*
Nabiki took a moment to stare at the Resonator, humming lightly to
itself with power. She had come here expecting to find the answers to
her questions about Ranma, and instead she found herself with more
questions than before. *Ranma... your secret is even more amazing
than anything that I was expecting. How did you ever come up with
something like this?*
Nabiki suddenly smiled. *Like it or not, Saotome, you have a new
partner in your endeavors. There is no way that I'm going to walk
away from this, now that I've seen what I've seen. You owe me an
explanation now.* She lifted the headset off her skull and allowed it
to rest in her lap. Memories from that other life hovered in her mind
like fireflies, refusing to settle where she could examine them more
closely.
Standing up, Nabiki set the headset back where she found it and
noted the new text printed on the screen.
*TEST RUN COMPLETE... FILE #0000012 ADDED TO STABLE
MEMORY. DETAILS?
"Sure, why not?" muttered Nabiki. She typed out 'YES' and hit the
return key, finding herself almost breathless to see what would come
up next. She wasn't disappointed when the screen began to print out
more information on the new file that she had just unintentionally
created.
*FILE #0000012 - QUANTUM DIVERGENCE POINT OCCURRED:
510 YEARS
10 MONTHS
15 DAYS
9 HOURS
35 MINUTES
31 SECONDS AGO.
*Oh... my... God,* Nabiki slowly thought as she sat there in stunned
silence. The count of seconds continued to rise as she watched it. *I
was right. It wasn't a dream. It wasn't an imaginary world. It was
real, and I was there, living and breathing inside another version of...
myself.*
Nabiki looked at her hand, curling it into a fist and opening it back
up several times. *I was a fighter... a martial artist. How simply...
amazing.* Nabiki looked at the Resonator and a sly smile came onto
her face. *You and I definitely need to talk, Ranma-kun.*
Not knowing if there was any special way of turning the device off,
Nabiki simply shut down the power at the main switch. The device
died, locking shut once again the doorway between dimensions that it
offered. Nabiki had the odd sensation of the memories from that other
life fading into the background noise of her own thoughts, as if her
mind was soaking them up like a sponge. It was not unpleasant, and it
made her feel strangely more complete as a person.
Since she planned to talk to Ranma in the morning anyway, she did
not make any real attempts to hide her presence. Nabiki put the
headset back where she found it and covered over the equipment with
the tarp. She gazed at the covered table with a smile, and she felt an
eagerness fill her to see what other mysteries were hidden across that
gauntlet that she had just crossed and returned from. But that could
wait until tomorrow, after she confronted Ranma with her knowledge
of his secret.
Nabiki snapped on her flashlight a moment before turning off the
fluorescent lights. She picked up her bookbag and listened at the door
to see if she heard any activity in the hallway beyond. Hearing
nothing, Nabiki slid open the deadbolt and slipped out of Ranma's lab
into the darkened hallway.
She slipped the tiny flashlight between her teeth as she pulled out
her set of lockpicks and went to work relocking the door. She didn't
even bother timing herself this time.
******************************
"The Boss was pretty mad at us for yesterday, wasn't he Akio?"
asked Kena, as he pulled a cold can of beer from the street vending
machine with a grimace. "I thought he was going to kill you for lying
to him like that."
"Somehow it just seemed to be a better idea than telling him that
you and I got our butts whipped by Saotome," said Akio. "He made us
both look like fools!"
"You at least had more warning than I did," said Kena stiffly. He
gently rubbed at his bandage currently itching his nose, wincing at the
pain. "The little punk caught me by surprise, and he broke my damn
nose! You got any idea how embarrassing that is?"
"Yeah, but Anji's gonna fix him good," said Akio with an evil
smirk. "Whatever he leaves behind, you and I can have fun with."
"Sounds good," agreed Kena, tipping his head back and drinking
from the can of beer. When he lowered his face back down, a smile
suddenly lit up his features as he saw what was coming their way on
the other side of the street. He nodded once with his chin. "Looks like
our luck is improving today already. See who's coming?"
Akio turned to look and smiled wickedly. Nabiki Tendou was
walking on the other side of the street past them... alone. He slipped
his chain out of his pocket as Kena tossed his half-empty can into the
alley behind him where it landed with a thunk against some trash
bags.
"No bodyguard, and out alone like this," smirked Akio. "Care to
have a little fun with the bitch?"
"Sure," agreed Kena with smile, pulling one of his balisong knives
out and flipping it open. "I'm going to enjoy seeing the high-and-
mighty Nabiki Tendou bleeding. Maybe it'll make my nose hurt a
little less."
Over on the other side of the street, Nabiki walked along with a
bemused look on her face. She was still thinking about that other life
and was not really paying attention to her surroundings very well, but
a sudden quivering at the back of her neck caused her to leave off from
her thoughts and stop.
In front of her stepped Akio and Kena, wicked smiles on their faces.
Nabiki suddenly realized that she was alone on the street with the two
fighters, and that she didn't have Akane or Yohko around to defend
her. *This is bad,* she thought, frowning, as she started to back up
slowly away from the two street punks.
"Evening, Miss Tendou," drawled Kena as he drew out a second
knife. "A pretty thing like yourself should be careful, out alone on a
darkened street. Maybe my buddy and me here could escort you?"
Kena nudged Akio with an elbow and chuckled.
"Yeah," chuckled Akio, flipping the weighted end of his chain in a
lazy circle around his hand. "Never know what sort of things could
happen to a cute girl like yourself."
Nabiki turned and ran. The two punks squawked for a moment in
surprise at seeing her getting away and chased after her. They called
out all manner of threats and catcalls at her as they ran close behind
her, slowly gaining.
Nabiki ducked down an alleyway in an attempt to lose the armed
pair, but they followed right on her heels. *This is what I get for
depending on others to do my fighting for me,* she thought angrily at
herself.
"Running's just...gonna... make it... harder... on ya... when we catch
ya," gasped Kena as he managed to close the range a little more. He
never knew that the middle Tendou daughter could run so fast, and it
only added to his anger. Akio just panted along right beside him
without speaking, saving his breath for running.
Nabiki turned a corner and suddenly found herself facing a dead-
end alleyway. Seeing her trapped when they came around the corner,
Akio and Kena slowed to a walk and grinned at her. Nabiki backed
away from the pair slowly. *Damn it! If I could just fight like my
other self, I'd wipe the alleyway with these two idiots!*
At a nod from Akio, Kena came in with a low chuckle and faked a
swing at Nabiki. "Gonna make you bleed a little first, Nabiki, before
Akio and I have some real fun with you. Ain't nobody gonna be
saving you here. You're all ours." He swung once more at Nabiki,
and she blocked with her bookbag.
Suddenly, Nabiki felt like something clicked into place within her,
and a cool smile appeared on her face. She ducked under Kena's
outstretched arm on his next swing, blocking his knife thrust with the
bookbag held in her left hand, and she dropped split-legged to the
pavement. Her right fist fired up lightning-quick, with all the strength
that she had in her arm, and impacted solidly a little off-center from
his groin area.
Kena coughed hard, then gave off a soft whimper of pain and
staggered back from Nabiki, dropping his knives and clutching at
himself. Akio immediately paused in his approach, and the fun that
he had planned for this girl had suddenly turned serious. *That idiot
Kena must've been caught by surprise,* he thought with a shake of his
head. *Everybody knows that Nabiki Tendou doesn't fight; she has
others do her fighting for her.*
Nabiki gracefully flipped herself back to her feet and took up a
combat stance, tossing her bookbag to one side. She smiled coyly at
Akio and made a come-hither gesture with her right hand towards a
suddenly uncertain Akio. "Here I am, chain boy," she called out in a
mocking tone. "Come and get some."
"Kill the bitch!" squeaked Kena, as he leaned against a wall and
regained his breath. "Show her that she's way out of her league!"
"That's right," said Nabiki softly, batting her eyelashes. "Show me
how big and strong you are. After all, I'm only a weak and helpless
girl." Her fear was gone, replaced by a sense of anticipation as her
heart rate sped up and her breathing deepened. Nabiki felt totally in
control of the situation, and the knowledge of over a dozen disabling
moves quickly flashed across her thoughts as she gazed at Akio and
his current stance. But she wanted this to last.
Lashing out with his chain, Akio missed when Nabiki stepped
aside, and her mocking grin was firmly fixed on her face. She leaped
into the air, feeling a strange energy adding strength to her legs, her
body doing a quick somersault in midair, and she landed easily on her
feet on the other side of Akio. Her thoughts focused on the fight, she
never even thought to question how she was able to do that. Her left
fist lashed out in a backhanded punch that snapped the chain-wielding
boy's head to the side, and she followed it up with an uppercut from
her right fist.
Akio flew up and crashed back down to the ground in the alleyway,
stunned, and Nabiki turned around to see Kena coming at her with a
snarl of anger. His silvery blade darted around her body in a rapid
series of strikes almost too fast for the eye to follow. With her
newfound grace, Nabiki dodged around the razor-sharp blade, keeping
her skin well away from the edge.
"Nobody does what you did to me and lives, Tendou!" snarled Kena
in a much higher octave than usual. Pure adrenaline was helping him
ignore the pain as he savagely attacked Nabiki with elbow strikes,
punches, stabs with his blade, and an occasional kick. Like a ghost,
Nabiki flowed around them all, dodging most, and parrying those she
was unable to dodge.
"Looks like your friend is ready to play some more," noted Nabiki
with another sardonic grin as she spotted Akio trying to attack her on
her blindside. She ducked under the chain, parried another one of
Kena's strikes, and then tossed him headlong into the other boy as
hard as she could. Nabiki heard a satisfying crunching sound as
Kena's nose broke for the second time in as many days against Akio's
forehead.
"You're supposed to fall down at this point," said Nabiki calmly as
she saw that Akio still remained standing, leaving Kena to flop around
on the ground and scream with pain as he clutched at his twice-broken
nose. Nabiki coolly drove her foot across Kena face in an attempt to
shut him up. The abused blade fighter's eyes rolled back up into his
skull as he went unconscious.
Akio managed to loop his chain around Nabiki's neck in that brief
moment of inattention on her part, and yanked on it, pulling her in,
while he launched a savage kick into her gut. Nabiki managed to leap
over the kick, using her newfound momentum to continue up and
forward, driving her knee up into Akio's chin. There was the sound of
a bone-crunching impact, and Akio's head snapped back as a bright
spray of crimson fluid, and a few small chunks of teeth, flew up out of
his mouth, narrowly missing Nabiki's clothes.
As Akio collapsed to the ground, nearly unconscious, Nabiki landed
gently on one foot and immediately pivoted herself around in a tight
spin that freed her neck from the chain. The movement also slammed
her raised foot against Kena's backside in a solid kick as the knife-
wielder struggled to stand back up. Nabiki coolly watched Kena's face
impact against the brick wall, led by his forehead, and he slowly slid
down it a moment later.
Soft groans emerged from the two barely conscious members of the
Wolf Pack as Nabiki dropped back down into a ready stance. She
suddenly became aware of what she had just done, and a strange glint
appeared in her eyes as she surveyed the results of her efforts. A few
light bruises were on her neck and arms from the chain's impacts, but
she was otherwise mostly unharmed. A heady feeling of excitement at
her victory filled her as she gazed down at her two former attackers.
*Now I guess I know what Akane always talked about,* Nabiki
thought with a wry smile. *There is something fun about fighting, at
least when you know what you're doing.* Nabiki flexed her hand and
made a few practice punches, and they felt pretty good to her, as if she
had done them for years. Nabiki chuckled softly. *Won't Ranma be
surprised when he sees what I can do now, too. Maybe I should do
like Akane and challenge him to a fight....* She smiled at that
thought, picturing the look on Ranma's face. *I wonder if I could beat
him?*
Setting that thought aside for the moment, Nabiki straightened her
uniform up slowly and dusted herself off while gazing in a mildly
contemptuous manner at Kena, before she bent down and grabbed
Akio by the front of his uniform. She judged him to be the less
damaged of the pair, and a better recipient for the message that she
was about to give him. Akio's eyes focused on her face too slowly for
her tastes, and she smacked him about his cheeks until he did. Blood
dribbled in a thick stream from his mouth as he gazed at her with fear
written in his eyes.
"Listen up, you little wretch!" Nabiki snarled into his face. "I want
you to pass on a message for me. You tell your punk-ass boss that I'm
getting tired of these attacks on me and my people. If he doesn't stop,
then I'm going to come down on him like the wrath of God, no matter
how well he tries to hide from me. Don't you ever forget this, I run the
Academy." She pulled Akio's face a little closer to her. "You tell him
to close up shop. Our little competition is now over... and I've won."
Nabiki let the beaten Akio fall back to the pavement without any
further thought and went over to her bookbag. She picked it up and
dusted it off casually, before slinging it over her shoulder. She glared
at the two boys lying in the alleyway, filled with confidence at her
newfound skills, and walked off into the gathering darkness. She
vanished from Akio's sight a few moments later when she turned and
went around the corner.
*First Saotome kicks our asses, and now Nabiki Tendou does the
same?* thought Akio with a groan of pain, suddenly spitting one of his
teeth out whole. *Damn bitch... I'm gonna get her for this! Both her
and Saotome die for this!* Akio looked at his tooth, shining wetly
with his blood as it sat on the ground near him. He let his body slump
down against the pavement, his vision blurring, since it hurt too much
to try and stand. One clear thought filled his mind shortly before he
fell unconscious. *Damn... The Boss ain't gonna like this...*
******************************
Dinnertime around the Kunou Family table was always a very quiet
affair, and tonight was no exception. Kodachi sipped delicately at her
miso soup, appreciating the mild flavors, even as her eyes shifted from
watching her father to her mother and back again. Her parents were
seated at the extreme ends of the long table, while she and Tatewaki
sat across from each other in the middle. No one spoke. Her parents
thought speech disturbed the dignity of a family meal.
Across from her, her brother ate his soup quietly, the bruises on his
face much diminished from how they appeared at lunchtime. His eyes
met hers once, and a neutral expression was on his face, before he
returned his attention to his meal. The house would have to begin
burning down around him before her brother would break the sacred
quiet of the evening meal.
From her position, Kensaiko Kunou, the mother of the Kunou
siblings, noticed that her only daughter appeared agitated over
something. She was a beautiful, regal sort of woman, much as
Kodachi would probably look with another twenty years added to her
age. Kensaiko Kunou enjoyed her position as Lady of the Kunou
household, and she loved both of her children dearly. However, lately
Kodachi was beginning to worry her so.
"Dachi-chan," said Kensaiko, breaking with tradition and causing
her daughter to almost jump from her chair in surprise. Down at the
other end of the table, her husband raised his eyes to look with surprise
at his wife but said nothing.
"Yes, Mother?" answered Kodachi. Across from her, Tatewaki
continued to eat his soup, mirroring his father doing the same at the
end of the table.
"You appear restive, child," said Kensaiko gently. "I fear that it is
disturbing your meal. Tell your mother what is wrong." Her gentle
tones had the ring of steel behind them.
"Well, I suppose that it might as well be said here," said Kodachi
quietly. The two Kunou men continued to ignore the conversation
between the two women. "I spoke with the Dean of the Imperial
Academy today, and he is willing to accept me as a transfer student."
Both of the Kunou men stopped eating and stared at her.
"Oh my," said Kensaiko hesitantly. "Why ever would you want to
do that? I thought that you were happy at Blackhall. Why would you
want to leave your own kind to associate with such riffraff as populate
that... place?" She dabbed at her lips with a napkin, as the servants
emerged to replace the soup bowls with the next course.
"She does it for the sake of a vile cad," said Tatewaki in low tones.
"I told you to have nothing further to do with him, and you defied me!
Your own brother!"
"Manners, my son," chided Kensaiko. Tatewaki immediately
bowed his head to his mother and refrained from speaking further for
the moment. His father said nothing, only began eating his rice and
fish quietly, and he ignored Tatewaki when his son looked to him for
support. "What is this about a young man, Dachi-chan? Have you
taken a lover?"
"Mother!" said Kodachi, her cheeks flaming with embarrassment.
"It is not like that at all! I am simply not happy among my so-called
peers. Plus, the Imperial Academy offers much more challenging
coursework in the sciences."
"But what of this young man that your brother spoke so adamantly
about?" asked her mother with a gentle smile. "Does he have a
name?"
Kodachi muttered something too soft to be heard, her cheeks still
continuing to burn bright red.
"His name is Ranma Saotome, Mother," said Tatewaki with a
grimace of distaste. "He has apparently seduced my sister with words
of cunning and deceit. A base corrupter of an innocent virgin he is!"
"Brother dear!" shouted Kodachi, wishing that she was near enough
to kick him in the shins for his words. "Desist in this name-calling, I
implore you!"
"Did he not bring you to tears by his mere presence only yesterday,
my dear sister?" Their mother turned her gaze to Tatewaki and he
quickly continued. "I bore witness to her tears myself, Mother. She
waited outside the gates to that place, hiding herself behind a tree
when the villain emerged. She started to approach him, but broke and
ran in tears at the last moment. I have sworn myself to smite the vile
wretch for his crime!"
"Good for you, my son," said his father unexpectedly from the other
end of the table. Tatewaki turned his head to stare at his father, and
he would not have been more shocked if one of the statuary had chosen
that moment to speak. "I entrust you with the sacred task of proving
the worth of this Saotome boy. If he can overcome you, then I shall
consider allowing him to court your sister."
"WHAT?!" shouted Tatewaki, echoed by the two women a moment
later.
"I am familiar with the Saotome name for reasons that do not
concern you, my son," said the Kunou family patriarch with a grim
look. "If this boy can defeat you, then he is welcome to pay court to
your sister. I shall say no more on this matter." With that, he went
back to eating.
Tatewaki sat there with a stunned expression, mirrored by one on
Kodachi's face.
"I will allow you to transfer, Dachi-chan," said Kensaiko with a
thoughtful tone to her voice. Tatewaki made strangling sounds from
his position at the table, but Kodachi looked to her mother with a
smile that lit up the room and then turned to look at her brother in
triumph.
"Perhaps you should transfer as well, brother dear," said Kodachi in
a saccharine-sweet tone of voice. "It would allow you to be near your
new love, Akane Tendou."
Their father raised his eyes again for a moment, but did not speak.
Their mother, on the other hand, was a different story.
"My son, is this true?" she asked, a suspicious look upon her face.
"I had thought you interested in that Saginomiya girl, the one with the
flower fetish. She seemed eminently suitable for you, and her family is
excellent. What sort of background do the Tendou's hail from?"
"A noble background, I assure you," said Tatewaki, attempting to
soothe his mother. "After speaking with her elder sister and being
informed that the Tendou's were of noble blood, I checked on that
myself. They are of landless samurai background and have served as
Squires to several Lords over the centuries."
"Soun Tendou's daughter?" asked the elder Kunou, looking up once
more from his meal. When his son nodded, he appeared satisfied over
something and returned to eating. Tatewaki stared at his father for a
moment before returning his attentions to his mother.
"I shall... tentatively allow you to pay court to this Akane girl, my
son," said Kensaiko. "However, if you choose to pursue it beyond
making her your mistress, then I must require that you bring her
before me that I may determine her suitability as a future Lady of the
manor."
"Of course, Mother," said Tatewaki fervently. "I would not even
dream of doing otherwise." He returned to his meal, visions of his
new love filling his mind.
Across from him, Kodachi looked both pleased and concerned. *I
hope that you do no harm to Ranma Saotome, brother dear, for your
sake.* She went back to eating, and the table reverted to silence.
******************************
Nabiki collapsed into her bed after finishing dinner with her sister
and doing her homework. *This has been such a strange day,* she
thought with a faint smile. Nabiki lifted her hand above her face and
studied at it for a long moment, her memories suddenly filled with
thoughts of her mother, and the great warrior that she had been. Ever
since her mother's death, the diligent training routines that Nabiki had
once followed so religiously had faded off over the years. Her physical
training at the Academy had compensated for the years of slacking off
to a large degree, but not nearly to the capabilities of her other life.
Nabiki now knew that she had been coasting for too long, only
doing the minimum required of her to pass, and she decided that that
was now going to change. *I've let myself sit in Akane's shadow when
it came to the physical things for too long. I see now that I'm more
than capable of outdoing little sister when it comes to combat. And
thanks to Ranchan's little toy, I've gotten ten years of martial arts skill
training.*
The last thing that Nabiki realized before sleep claimed her was to
question the change in how she referred to Ranma. *When did I start
to call him Ranchan?*
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX
Special thanks goes out to Jim Bader for his kind permission to borrow
from Nabiki 1/2 (A Very Scary Thought) for Earth #0016-496.
My heartfelt thanks goes out to all of my usual pre-readers for all of
their comments and suggestions. A special thanks goes out to D.B.
Sommer and Michael Allen for their very detailed help with grammar
and plotting.