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Ranma 1/2: A Matter of Romantic Chemistry - pt. 13
By Lady Tesser and Jack Staik
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Tofu looked over the unconscious Jiro Hibiki, examined him
with a variety of means (both mundane and mystical), and
prescribed his treatment;
"Throw him in the canal."
"I beg your pardon?" his father Ichiro said.
"His other form has regenerative properties - and we lack
the room to keep him here in that state."
There was a bit of disagreement over who would get the honor
(he may have been related by blood to several people in the
room, but he was still a jerk, and tossing him in the canal
appealed to them), but finally Ichiro tossed him out the
window.
The bulk of the Nerima Wrecking Crew was in the lobby of
Tofu's clinic, and six were very nervous; Ranma and Ranko
Saotome, and their mother Nodoka; Nabiki Tendo; Ryoga
Hibiki; and the reason for their nervousness ... Ichiro
Hibiki.
Tofu put his hand on Ranko's shoulder. "Perhaps all of you
would like to use my office?"
They nodded. "Arigato," Ichiro said quietly.
As they filed back, Akane took a few steps forward. Ranma
looked back at her and held out his hand. Akane lit up with
a smile and came up besides him, her hand fitting into his.
Whatever awaited, they would be together for it. Nothing
else mattered.
* * * * * * * * * *
Nodoka settled in the chair in front of the desk while
Ichiro took the other next to her. Akane, Ranma, and Ranko
sat in a row on the doctor's desk while Nabiki leaned
against the door, arms folded in protective stance. Ryoga
sat quietly on the floor, looking up at his father.
They looked at each other. Nodoka noting that Ranma held
Akane's hand and Ranko linked her arm through her brother's
arm. She smiled nervously, remembering being called 'mother'
by the girl - er, boy - whatever. Still ...
"Where shall we begin?" Ichiro asked.
Ranma bit his lip, then replied, "How about the beginning?
Who are Ko-Chan's and my real parents?"
Nodoka blushed, touching the handle of the katana at her
side. Ranko felt her brother tense and she squeezed him in
protection.
"I think we really should begin with this," his mother
answered. "Leading to the man I should not have allowed to
claim you as his son."
"Good start, Auntie Nodoka," Akane stated. "This is all
Genma's fault!"
"It's nobody's fault, Oneechan," Ranko added softly. "It
just happened."
"Why couldn't you tell me, Ko-chan?" Ranma asked. "I want to
know what happened to Mom to drive her into *his* arms."
She turned to him, seeing her own face in his. "It's a long
story, Niichan."
"And none of it's pretty," their mother added.
He shrugged, wrapping an arm around Akane and pulling her
closer to him. "Go ahead. I have to know this."
"A moment," Nabiki interrupted. "Ichiro, would you consent
to a genetic testing with the rest of us to straighten this
mess out of who's who?"
"Biki!" Ranko scolded her sharply. "Wait a minute before - "
"I have to know!" Nabiki cried. "I don't want to be known as
'Nabiki Hibiki'!"
Akane tried to suppress her giggles. "I wondered why Mama
named you that."
"Shut up, Imouto-chan. Please, Ichiro! Much as I like you, I
have my reasons for not wanting to be related to you."
Ranko and Ranma blinked for several seconds. "Gee," the
brother said. "All this time, we didn't want to related to
*our* father, either. Our *alleged* father."
"Stupid panda!" his sister growled.
"And a disgrace to humanity!" Akane added.
Ichiro turned to Nabiki, nodding sadly. "As you wish, young
lady. Though I'd be honored to have you as my daughter."
"You have enough already, Ichiro-otosan," Ranko reminded
him. "If not by blood, then by marriage, I believe. Mother?
Could you tell Niichan of what lead to our birth?"
Nodoka smiled gently, wiping her eyes. "It began while Genma
was on a training mission ... "
* * * * * * * * * *
The Creature turned human lay silently on a hospital bed,
still restrained by the Bridle of Anubis. Its thoughts
revolved around the fight, seeing the flaws in his dealings
with the little creatures. The Warden was close, it could
smell the yeti scent. But it could do nothing about it.
The sorcerer was healing it. Speaking softly and pressing
certain points on its human body to decrease the pain and
speed its recovery.
It wondered what they planned to do with it. The bridle had
to come off. Soon.
Then they will all die.
* * * * * * * * * *
In Jiro's room, Kasumi sat silently in lotus position, deep
in meditation.
It had bothered her since that afternoon. Oh, she wasn't
upset that he kissed her or that she enjoyed it, and that
their behavior was so scandalously indecent as to make a
monk blush. None of that. Yet, it was what she said to
Hibiki-otosan concerning said boy and herself.
It had surprised her, these words. They weren't anything her
carefully-built sweet-yet-simple Kasumi persona would say.
These were words that a woman confident of the future would
say.
But *was* she?
She was aware that having the gift of their mother's Sight
sometimes entered her subconscious without her knowing and
guided her word or actions against what she thought was the
proper response. It used to alarm her. Later, it turned out
to make less trouble and work for her.
She was a shoulder to cry on and a healer, nothing more.
That was her intention with Ichiro's son. To heal him, to
let him speak and cry and rage without being ignored or
laughed at or pitied. She felt his pain ... and offered to
heal him, to help him find himself ... she had no intention
of falling in love with him ...
But she had. Their loneliness, though different, reminded
them that they would always be alone. It had gotten to the
point in which she almost believed she *was* the sweet and
simple girl persona, the obedient daughter and shy older
sister.
<But what of Doctor Tofu?> a voice from inside asked.
No, he never felt right. He never told her he loved her,
always dithered about it, acted like a complete idiot
whenever she was around. She accepted it as a crush, and
gently ignored it. Anyone that had asked, she only replied
that she felt pity for him. He had to be more emotionally
mature for her, not react like he had a glop of sticky rice
in his head.
<So why Jiro?> the voice asked.
Why Jiro indeed? Was it just the loneliness? The need to be
needed and loved in return? Someone who is strong and
brilliant and needs the gentle touch of a woman's love to
make him human?
She felt the vision slip silently into her head. She once
read a book by a singer-storyteller that described visions
as bubbles floating around to be picked up and 'popped' into
someone's head. She admitted it felt like it at times.
The vision was of Jiro, a little older, holding a baby in
his arms. The newborn was sleeping as he stared at it in awe
and pride. <His baby? Who is the mother?> She hung onto the
vision, holding her breath. She watched him move to the bed
where the mother lay, her dark unbound hair spread over the
pillows.
The vision wavered, and she clung her consciousness tighter
onto it. Her focus shifted to the hospital bracelet the
mother wore, and she caught two words before the vision
faded from her Third Eye.
She felt back on the floor, breathing hard, running the
image through her mind again and again and again.
The bracelet had read 'Kasumi Hibiki'.
* * * * * * * * * *
"Tadaima!" Soun called out as he entered the house.
No one appeared to be in. Not even Kasumi - although she had
left some cold cuts and some sake on the kitchen table.
The dining room was a wreck, and the back porch was
shredded. It looked like a ki-blast of some sort.
"The boy is back!" he wailed. "At last our houses will be
united!"
A panda trudged in through the hole in the wall. Ignoring
the wailing Soun, he went to the kitchen. A minute later,
Genma came back and put some fresh sake before his old
partner.
Soun stopped crying, grabbed up the sake, and drank it.
"No sign of my ingrate son," Genma said, "and I got cheated
out of a duck dinner, too."
"He's been here!" Soun said, pointing to the wrecked back
porch.
Genma looked over the damage. "Yes, this was my boy."
"And Nodoka's been here almost constantly!" Soun cried in
joy.
"Yes!" Genma cheered. "She's probably marched them off at
swordpoint to get married already!"
"Then the money comes flooding in!" Soun cheered.
The two fathers danced around tossing confetti.
* * * * * * * * * *
Akane and Ranma, and even Ryoga, felt some pity for Nodoka
after hearing her tale of a 'shotgun' marriage, just seven
months before giving birth, and the lonliness and misery
afterwards as Genma spent her dowry before Ranma's birth,
reducing them to near-poverty.
Nodoka wept openly when she told of being disinherited by
her father while she stayed with Genma, trapped by honor to
stay in her loveless marriage.
"Disinherited?" Nabiki asked. "But you were provided for as
part of Ranma's inheritance."
"What inheritance?" Nodoka asked.
"The Hitoshi Matsuhara Trust, which Ranma inherits on his
twenty-fifth birthday ... or when he marries."
"Who's Hitoshi Matsuhara?" Ranma asked. "And why would he
leave anything to me?"
"He was my father," Nodoka answered. "Your grandfather."
"And he left his money to you, in order to keep Genma's
hands off of it," Nabiki said. "And he and Daddy have been
planning to steal it for years."
"Nabiki-chan," Nodoka said. "My husband has done many ...
questionable things -"
Ranma and Ranko began coughing, said coughing sounding
suspiciously like 'bullshit-bullshit-bullshit'.
"- but I doubt he would steal Ranma's inheritance!"
"He'd wrap him in fish and throw him into a pit of cats,"
Akane commented. "The bastard would do anything!"
"Now that's a bit extreme, Akane-chan," Nodoka commented.
"Actually, Mom," Ranma volunteered, "he *did* do that - when
I was five."
Nodoka's eyes widened in shock. "Wh-why would he do such a
thing?"
"It's the training method for the neko-ken," Ichiro
explained, "a legendary and supposedly invincible martial
arts technique. But no one's survived the training to master
it in generations."
Ranma and Ranko raised their hands. "Meet two," they said
together.
"And there were ... 'complications' concerning the after-
effects," Ranko added.
Nodoka had to sit down in shock.
"Um - Oneechan?" Akane asked. "I can't imagine Daddy
stealing from us. After all, a few thousand yen or even a
million -"
"Try thirteen trillion," Nabiki said.
"YEEK!" Ranko cried.
"That's a lot," Ranma understated. (Money meant little to
him, and he had little idea of its value.)
"Wow," Ryoga commented. (He had a better idea of the value
of money, but he was medicated.)
Akane shook her head. <Daddy *would* steal that much! Heck,
*I* might steal *that* much!>
"Ranma ... Ranko ... " Nodoka said quietly. "Forgive me ...
please ..." She began crying softly.
Ranko looked at the despairing woman before her. Was this
the monster she'd hated all this time? Or was that just
something she wanted to see? She should be grinning in
triumph now - the woman who had hurt her and her Ranma
broken before her. But the sight didn't make her feel
triumphant.
Both siblings slipped off the desk and knelt on each side of
her, wrapping their arms around her. She held their arms,
sobbing gently as they held her.
"Mom, you didn't know," Ranma replied. "It's okay. Really."
"I forgive you, mother," Ranko added. "Please forgive me."
"One thing remains," she sniffed, holding up the katana. Her
children released her and moved back as she stood up and
slowly unwrapped the blade. Akane moved to Ranma's side as
Nodoka approached the desk, holding the sword high above her
head.
She swung the flat side of the blade down, shattering the
weapon in two. She turned with the handle in her hand,
gazing at her children, seeing both pride and humility
balanced in their twin faces, echoes of her and Ichiro's
faces. She threw the handle to the floor and stated, "I no
longer hold the seppuku pledge, for it was never your real
father who made me honor it. Can you truly forgive this
mother's mistakes?"
Ranma and Ranko looked at each other. "She did apologize,
Ko-chan."
"That was all I asked. What of you?"
He looked at Ichiro. "I don't know this old man that well,
but I can live with it."
"Dad's an okay guy," Ryoga piped up. "But it looks like
we'll be finding brothers and sisters all over the country
now."
The twins turned back to each other and grinned, then pulled
their mother between them, holding her close.
"Forgiven," Ranko said.
Ranma looked over at his Akane and waved her over. Holding
all three, mother, sister, and lover, he felt complete for
the first time in his life.
"Hey, Ryoga!" Ranma said. "Think you can stand having me as
a brother?"
"It's the thought of having Nabiki as a *sister* that scares
me!"
Ryoga hardly felt it when Nabiki broke a chair over his
head.
* * * * * * * * * *
Akari stomped through the night, ignoring the rain, scimitar
still in hand.
While the Rage Essence had run out of her system during the
pursuit of Mousse-oshidori, she was still in a very nasty
mood.
Her usual method of handling nasty moods (ignoring them and
shoving them down inside herself) wasn't working anymore. It
was as if a cork holding in years of anger and resentment
had popped out, allowing the black tide of emotion to spill
on everything.
"Ryoga you bastard," she snarled as she approached the
clinic, "I'm gonna *cut it off*!! Not that you were very
good with it in the first place! 'I guess I'm just tired,
Akari-chan' - I got your 'tired' right here!
"You - then my bastard grandfather and his trying to run my
whole damn life from his sick bed! 'Sick bed' - HA! He's as
strong as a horse! He's just lazy! We'll see how 'sick' he
is when I start walloping him with an axe handle!"
She noticed the sign over the street - 'Neko-han-ten'.
"But first," she growled, "A certain braless slut's gonna
learn a lesson about *man-stealing*!
Kicking in the glass front door, she stomped in, ready to
kick ass.
Cologne, still half-asleep and not having her contacts in,
took her out in two seconds and pogoed back to bed.
* * * * * * * * * *
"Ow!"
"Stop being a baby, Niichan."
Ranma stuck his finger in his mouth, soothing the pain of
the blood sampler that was applied on his finger. Ranko
slipped the few droplets of his blood into a vial as the
doctor had taught her.
"Ko-chan?"
"Hmm?"
"How did Nabiki find out about our grandfather's will?"
She chuckled, "Money was attached to it. You know she has a
nose for *that*."
"Yeah. So, what does it mean?"
"It means that you get a whole bunch of money when you get
married to Akane-chan. From what I understand, our
grandfather was a crotchety old bastard that only had a
fondness for mother and you. He must have either known about
Ichiro-otosan or believed you'd turn out better than Genma,
because he left *everything* to you."
"Me?" he asked, confused. "But you're my sister. You'd get
something, too, right?"
She shrugged, taking his finger away from his mouth and
wiping it with an alcohol pad. "You can probably alter it to
that once you marry. I think we should leave Nabiki to take
care of that, since she knows money better than the rest of
us."
"As long as she gets a cut," he squeezed her hand.
"Of course, Niichan," she confirmed, smiling. She locked to
his eyes and asked, "Are you really okay with Ichiro being
our father?"
"Not like I have a choice, right?" He rubbed his thumb over
the back of her hand. "I knew Mom wasn't happy with Oyaji -
I mean, Genma. Now I know why. What made you change your
mind about Mom?"
She said nothing for a moment, brushing his hair to the
side. "I think it was because I realized that I felt
horrible for hating her. If I truly hated her, I wouldn't be
bothered by it, but I was. She was trying, in her back-
assward way, to make things right, and I was being thick-
headed about it."
"Gee, where'd you get that from?"
"Hush, Niichan. So, I just talked it out, hearing myself
explain it to Ono. It just boiled down to wanting my mother,
even if she were wrong in some things. Then, I saw how
shocked she was when she found out about the Neko-ken ... at
some level, I assumed that she had *known* about all those
horrors we've been through. She just proved she didn't. I
was wrong, Niichan, I was wrong."
He nodded, wiping her tears with his fingers. "Listen,
Imouto-chan, life's too short to be hating anyone. I've
learned loving is more important. Nothing's perfect, but
it's the way it is for some reason or other. Just go on with
your life and try to keep the black stuff out of your soul."
"Who said that?"
"I did. I learned it from my first real friend and lover.
You, little sister."
She smiled, wiping her eyes with the back of her hand.
"Well, we're not Saotomes, darling. Not by blood, anyhow."
"I still want to marry Akane, though, arranged marriage or
not."
"You will. Nothing is going to stop it." She grinned,
kissing his cheek. "Now, what are we going to do about the
Old Bastards stealing our inheritance?"
Ranma grinned, his eyebrow dipping low in evil thought.
"Something I always wanted to do ... "
* * * * * * * * * *
It was late when the rain ceased and the various people left
the clinic and back to their homes after blood samples were
taken. Ryoga allowed Shampoo to take him to meet with the
Old Ghoul and Chibi-Happi, soon to be given an Amazon name
at last.
Nodoka and Ichiro made their way to her house, while Nabiki
accompanied Akane and Ranma to pick up the magic mirror,
then home to the Tendo Dojo.
Doctor Tofu touched Ranko's sleeve, stopping her from
following her family out.
"Yes, Ono?" she asked.
He cleared his throat, blushing gently. "I - I ... um, I
wish this was easier to say ... "
She blushed, lowering her eyes. "I should apologize ... "
"No, no one should apologize ... " he stated, lifting her
chin up with a finger. "Ko-chan, these past few days have
been the most terrifying and, yet, the most wonderful time
of my life."
"Nani?" she looked up at him.
"I've led a ... lonely life, Ko-Chan. I've had my studies,
my patients, some ... occasional excitement, but not much
else." He took her hand. "When we kissed -"
"Ono, please -" she pleaded, panic in her expression and
voice.
"Ko-chan - when we kissed ... it was *right*! It was
supposed to be! I can *feel* it!"
"But - you - I - I'm just a silly girl!" <Not even that, a
freak of magic!>
"I'm just a lonely man. Perhaps it's just an infatuation
with a beautiful and intelligent younger woman ... but I
want to try. Please."
"But - what if - we get hurt? I *want* to, but I don't want
to hurt you." She looked down sheepishly. <I don't want to
get hurt, either.>
"I'm willing to risk it, if you'll let me."
She was more scared than she had been before. She wanted to
tell him to stop it, she wanted to run and hide.
She looked in his eyes, finding him as scared as she was ...
The second kiss was different from the first. The first had
been pure animal energy. This one was warmer, fuller.
When the kiss broke, Ranko and Ono gazed at each other,
trying to memorize every detail of each other's faces.
"We'll go slowly," he said. "I won't pressure you."
She nodded. "Okay. Slowly."
Ranko didn't go home that night.