Quantum Destinies
A Ranma 1/2 Fanfic
By Jurai Knight (
sthesken@earthlink.net)
Ranma 1/2 and its characters are owned by Rumiko Takahashi. This story
is inspired by her works and the stories from some of my fellow fanfic
authors. Among these are D.B. Sommer's "Shampoo 1/2", Jim Bader's "A
Very Scary Thought -AKA- Nabiki 1/2", and John Biles' Elseworlds series.
All C&C is welcome.
Other chapters of this story may be found at these websites, or you can
email the author for them:
The Quantum Destinies Homepage
http://members.xoom.com/jurai_knight/qd.html
Azatlan has given Quantum Destinies a home at:
http://www2.50megs.com/azatlan/Quantum-Destinies/qd.html
Blood Blade has put it on his webpage at:
http://www.geocities.com/Tokyo/Towers/5920/stories.html
What has gone before in this story (or at least what will help you
understand what is going on):
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, through a device of his invention, is now possessed of the
skills and memories of a martial artist version of himself. That same
device has also given the Nabiki of this timeline an accidental copy of
the skills and memories from an alternate version of herself, one who
went on the ten-year training journey with Genma instead of Ranma.
Nabiki, irritated at her recent loss to Ranma, has begun scheming for
her rematch against him. Professor Saotome has also begun adjusting to
what may be a long stay in the alternate timeline he is trapped in while
his counterpart continues to trouble Ranma's personal life. Kodachi
reveals the truth about herself to an astonished Ranma and an annoyed
Nabiki. Finally, Ukyou meets up with her aunt and has a date with
Ranma.
The list of worlds reoccurring in this chapter:
Earth 0.000,0.000 - The world of Scholar Ranma (Baseline cluster)
Earth +1.612,+1.509 - The world of Shampoo 1/2 (Ranma 1/2 cluster)
xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Chapter 12 - Fiancée Follies
***** Earth 0.000,0.000
Ayaka Kisaragi set down the tray she was holding, upon which rested a
warmed container of sake and a single small cup, onto the table next to
her couch. She paused and adjusted her kimono, scratching idly at an
itch on her side as she picked up her notebook and flipped through it to
the proper page. Holding the open notebook in front of her, she flopped
down on the couch, the thick cushions embracing her softly. She picked
up the receiver on her telephone with her free hand and punched in a
quick series of numbers. It was answered on the other end before the
conclusion of the second ring.
"Report."
Ayaka Kisaragi frowned slightly at Director Kasuga's perfunctory tone of
voice coming over the telephone as she began to speak. "Only two
notable things have occurred so far this week, sir. First, Ranma
Saotome, one of the individuals you instructed me to keep tabs on, was
involved in several altercations, including some sort of grudge match
with one of the older female cadets here at the Academy. Coincidentally
enough, his opponent was Nabiki Tendou."
That statement was followed by a brief grunt of acknowledgement heard
over the phone.
"It was a very close fight," continued Ayaka, "both of them showing
extraordinarily high levels of skill, but Ranma won in the end. I am in
the process of obtaining a copy of a video shot during the match, one
that I feel you might find most interesting."
"Possibly," said Director Kasuga on the other end. "Please continue."
Ayaka flipped to another page of her notebook. "Ranma has also recently
lost his access to a private lab space given to him by the Dean. I have
no knowledge of the project he was working on. Shall I break in and
investigate?"
"Negative," said Director Kasuga. "The Science Ministry examined the
proposal he originally submitted for his project and found his notions
for a method for contacting 'parallel Earths' interesting but unlikely
to ever be made workable. They politely informed me that they had only
allowed it out of respect for his father's reputation and since the
costs were relatively small. Now that even his father has withdrawn his
support, that ends young Saotome's foolishness, so his little science
project could have no bearing on determining the identity of the crux
individual we seek. We are continuing to update our readings on the
emanations from that region of the city, but powerful forces are now
converging within the Pattern, hindering our efforts. I want you to
continue to concentrate your investigations on our list of suspects, and
those they come into regular contact with."
"I understand," said Ayaka neutrally.
"Carry on," said Director Kasuga gruffly. "I have the utmost faith in
your abilities to investigate this matter."
"Sir?" Ayaka said quickly.
"Yes? What is it, Kisaragi?"
"I want you to know that I appreciate your faith in me, in giving me
this assignment," said Ayaka sincerely. "I know my actions in the past
have been less than exemplary-"
"Such as your predilection for getting drunk and laid every few days,
you mean, Kisaragi?" Director Kasuga interrupted dryly. "Why else do
you think we removed you from your position here at the Institute as
advisor to the Miko Task Force? Despite your impressive spiritual
powers, and your unmatched record as a Ghost Sweeper, your personal life
was a rather poor example to those impressionable young girls. All of
them look up to you, after all. Still, if you do well in this assignment
and keep yourself under control, I'll see what can be done about
reinstating you."
"Thank you, sir."
"Personally, Kisaragi, my advice to you would be to get a steady
boyfriend that you can keep for longer than a month. After all, you're
not getting any younger."
Ayaka felt like someone had just stabbed her.
"I understand that all of your former squadmates from your own training
group have gotten married by now."
The assassin brought a friend.
"Yes, sir," said Ayaka numbly. I need a drink, she thought.
"Carry on, Kisaragi."
Ayaka heard the phone being hung up on the other end, and then she did
the same while she ran a hand back through her red hair. A few moments
later, the stereo in her small apartment flicked on at a touch of her
finger upon its remote. Half listening to the driving beat of the music
playing, she picked up the bottle of warmed sake and poured herself a
cup.
Before Ayaka could drink it down, the doorbell rang. She walked over to
the door and opened it up. Three female figures stood outside in the
hallway. One of the women gave a wry look at the redhead.
"Drinking alone is a sure sign of alcoholism," said Yui Ikari teasingly
with a smile, before swiftly pushing past Ayaka to lead the other two
young women with her into the apartment. She was dressed in a snug
black minidress and matching pumps. "If you're going to drink, you're
coming out with us and doing it right."
"But I don't want to go out tonight," protested Ayaka, even as she was
already appearing to weaken at the thought.
"We'll do karaoke," said Yui with a broader grin, seeing her oldest
friend's resistance crumbling. She knew quite well that Ayaka could not
resist doing karaoke.
The two off-duty Peaceforcers with Yui, Natsumi Tsujimoto and Miyuki
Kobayakawa, each took hold of one of Ayaka's arms and half-carried the
weakly protesting woman into the bedroom to help her get ready for a
night on the town. Instead of their usual uniforms of black cloth and
leather with gray piping, the two women wore stylish outfits that were
not quite as daring as what Yui was wearing, but not far too behind it
either.
While waiting for the Institute operative to change into something more
appropriate for bar-hopping, Yui picked up the cup of sake that had been
left on the table. "Here's to getting you to have some serious fun
tonight, Ayaka," she murmured with a smile, before swallowing the drink.
Since Keiichi was unavailable tonight, Yui planned to enjoy herself with
a serious girl's night out on the town with her best friends. As the
music played on in the background, she waited for the fourth member of
their little posse to get ready for some serious fun. Ayaka was quite
obviously still stressing over her brand new assignment, so it was up to
the three of them to get the leggy redhead's mind off things.
After all, thought Yui with a grin, they had to keep living up to their
reputation as the 'Fearsome Foursome' of the Security Directorate.
******************************
The clash of steel was loud in Tatewaki's ears as he engaged the
nameless samurai warrior before him. He felt the jolt in his arms as
his weapon struck solidly against lacquered armor plate, instead of
between them to bite into the flesh of his opponent. He ducked under
his opponent's counterstrike, lashing out at the same moment with a
rising stroke to the lower ribcage region, only to be denied his goal
once again as the warrior deflected his blade.
My timing is off, else I would already be victorious, Tatewaki thought
grimly as his foe forced him back a step at a time with a sequence of
lightning-fast strikes. He fended off the armored figure, weaving a net
of steel before himself as he tried to figure out how to emerge
victorious. Anger at being forced back step by step filled him, and he
cried out, "But I shall not fall!"
In silence, Lord Daishou Kunou closely watched his son's motions as he
engaged his phantom opponent. The muscular, older nobleman was dressed
in a fine silk kimono and hakama-style pants, a worn bokken held in one
hand. He absently tapped it against his knee as he watched his son's
pathetic efforts. He gave the impression of having just stepped out of
an elder age, when men of honor fought and died with steel in their
hands and fire in their eyes. His face was grim and unforgiving.
In contrast, Tatewaki was dressed in a suit of silvery material overlaid
by a bluish metal that acted as force-feedback simulators, his head
covered by a light helmet of plastics and silicates. Once the suit was
activated, it fed to Tatewaki the sensation of being in a life or death
battle from the Middle Ages, thus gauging his combat effectiveness. All
that was missing was the smells of this illusionary field of battle to
make it complete. Even so, it was easy for him to forget himself in the
splendor and realism of the sights and sounds.
Lord Kunou was less than pleased at Tatewaki's performance. In fact, he
was almost furious to see his own son losing to a computer program so
badly.
That boy must be slacking off on his training, Lord Kunou angrily
concluded as he ceased tapping his wooden weapon against his leg. He
gripped the handle tightly, briefly remembering his own days of youth.
He's slower than he can be, and far too flashy in his attacks. When I
was fifteen, two years younger than he is now, I could've beaten someone
of his skill level. Damn it! It looks like my uncle has failed me. He
probably spends more time spinning stories for the boy and guzzling
sake, rather than forging my son into the great warrior he could be.
Tatewaki even sounds like that foolish old man. As he studied
Tatewaki's moves closely, his mouth twisted deeper into a frown.
Tatewaki dodged backwards, barely avoiding the blow that would have
opened his ribcage if it had been real. His blade slashed down at his
foe's arm, exposed for a fraction of a second by the strike, and he was
rewarded to see his own blade shear through the cloth and armor to sever
the limb at the elbow. Simulated blood and gore surged from the wound
as his opponent staggered back, and Tatewaki finished it off with a
reverse stroke that cleanly removed the illusory sparring dummy's head
at the neck. The body stumbled back a pace and then fell over, the head
vanishing off to one side. The young nobleman stared impassively at the
bleeding corpse in the seconds before it vanished.
"Simulation completed at level twelve," said a computer-generated female
voice in Tatewaki's ears as the scene around him faded away. "Time
taken for completion: four minutes, fifty-two seconds. Best time for
completion: one minute, twelve seconds."
Tatewaki removed the simsuit's helmet from his head, blinking at the
unexpected sight of his father seated to one side of the training mat.
This does not bode well, he thought.
"Father," greeted Tatewaki respectfully. He set the helmet upon the
rack along with his weapon, quickly running a hand back through his
sweat-dampened hair. He received not a single acknowledging word from
his sire for his greeting, only a cool-eyed gaze. Grimacing, Tatewaki
prepared himself for what was surely to come.
"You play at being a warrior, my son," said Lord Kunou quietly.
Tatewaki growled inwardly, but held his peace.
"Years of training come to this, you nearly losing a fight to an
opponent made of electronic smoke and mirrors," Lord Kunou continued,
apparently unaware of his son's fists tightening at his sides. "Your
sensei has failed to awaken the Kunou warrior spirit within you. If he
had, you would be all but unbeatable." He shook his head, a little
sadly. "Young Ranma Saotome defeated you with his bare hands, several
times, over the past few days, I am told."
Tatewaki somehow held his temper before his father, but he seethed
inside with a fresh surge of desire to seek out and avenge the indignity
of his defeats. Seeing his father looking so disappointed with him was
agonizing. Ranma Saotome, the young nobleman thought grimly, how I have
come to loathe the mention of thy name. I will overcome you, for the
sake of my reputation, for the honor of my beloved sister, and for my
own desires to see you groveling at my feet. Oh, how you will beg for
mercy when I am finished with you, Saotome. My eventual victory will
taste all the sweeter when you do.
"I will be taking over your training from now on," said Lord Kunou, a
touch more kindly than his previous words had been. "The Kunou School
of Long Blade Fighting deserves far better than what you show of its
skills so far. I fear I have let matters of politics distract me from
taking a more personal hand in your training before now, but I wonder if
it might not be too late."
"Father?" said Tatewaki, his face puzzled.
Lord Kunou stood up, lifting his bokken to rest it upon his right
shoulder. He stared severely at his son and said, "For centuries, the
Kunou Family has produced champion duelists, feared for our skill with
the sword. Your former sensei has failed to take you as far in your
training as he should have." He paused, lowering his voice in a
menacing manner. "However, I am certain that I can find new ways to
motivate you."
Seeing the fierce look in his father's eyes, Tatewaki felt a brief
moment of hesitation before his usual bluster returned. Bah! Let this
old fool do his worst. I am the quintessential and most noble example
of the perfect warrior, feared and respected by my fellow men, loved by
all women.
"I see doubt as to the status of my skills in your eyes, my son," said
Lord Kunou with a wolfish smile. "Would you care to test them?"
"Aye, Father, I do indeed," said Tatewaki boldly. He grabbed his bokken
from the rack, never taking his eyes off his father. He would show his
father to doubt his inestimable skills.
"Excellent," said Lord Kunou mildly. "I could use a light workout.
Though, I really doubt you'll give me one." He took hold of his own
weapon with both hands and charged across the floor with cold purpose in
his eyes.
Within seconds, it was over. Tatewaki stood stunned, his bokken lying
on the floor several meters from where he stood. The wooden blade held
in his father's hands rested, poised at his throat. The cold look in
his father's eyes had shifted to one of disappointment.
"I see that I have a great deal of work ahead of me," said Lord Kunou
calmly. "Pick up your weapon, and we shall try it again."
Such speed and skill he has, Tatewaki marveled as he moved aside and
bent to pick up his bokken. He rushed his father and lasted ten seconds
longer before he was disarmed once more.
"Better," said Lord Kunou. "But not good enough yet, not by a long
shot. However, I think there is a faint glimmering of hope for you.
With my aid, I know you'll be a far better fighter than you ever dared
dream."
Tatewaki looked up, his eyes shining with renewed energy as his fist
locked around the haft of his weapon as he said, "Now I know that the
gods smile upon me. That most lowly and wretched of curs, Ranma
Saotome, shall fall to me and my blade, and then the lovely Akane
Tendou's heart shall yield to me. She shall see that I am the ultimate
warrior, the only man worthy of her." He broke into a gale of maniacal
laughter following his rant, one that was abruptly stopped short by the
application of his father's weapon to his skull, quite hard.
"That hurt, you know," grumbled Tatewaki, rubbing the lump growing on
the top of his head. A moment later, a second lump had joined the
first. The young nobleman growled.
"Enough of this foolishness, my son," said Lord Kunou calmly. Even
though he had raised his son to show a certain independence of thought,
a necessity for a future Lord of a Noble House, there were still limits
to his tolerance. "I have no time to waste on you if you continue on in
such a fashion. Now, recite for me the philosophy of our School."
Caught off-guard by the question, Tatewaki almost earned a third lump on
his head before he quickly spoke. "The sword and the body must be as
one."
"Continue," said Lord Kunou.
Feeling new confidence at the glimmer in his father's gaze, the young
nobleman cleared his throat once and said, "Wielding a sword should be
as natural as being alive, to embrace the sword that lives within every
true warrior. The stances are its walk, the rhythm of the swing its
speech, and honor is the breath and blood of the sword."
"Very good, my son," said Lord Kunou with a touch more warmth in his
voice than was present before. "There is hope for you yet. I see that
my uncle may have taught you something after all." He swung the blade
of his bokken around a few times, before smiling and asking, "Do you
wish to see one of the special techniques I plan to teach you, once you
have mastered the basics to my satisfaction?"
Tatewaki nodded, still looking a bit out of sorts.
"Behold," intoned Lord Kunou solemnly, "a technique handed down from our
forefathers, the Blade of a Hundred Strikes." He turned to face the
wall nearest to him as his hands blurred into motion, his weapon swiftly
thrusting forward again and again, dozens of times in only seconds.
The wall began to buckle from the air pressure alone generated by the
strikes, the wood and stone reacting as if caught by the focused force
of a hurricane. With a last shattering wrench, a two meter wide hole
was ripped through the wall, scattering chunks of stone and shards of
wood out across the grass outside.
Tatewaki was impressed, to say the least. He quickly covered it by
coughing into his fist once. "Impressive, Father. Most impressive,
indeed."
"I want your promise to obey me without question in exchange for my
teaching you, my son," said Lord Kunou, a gleam in his eyes. I have
such plans for your future, Tatewaki, the older man thought. Not to
mention what your mother has in mind for you. The latter thought
brought a very faint feeling of sympathy for his son. The girl his
mother had picked for the boy had a rather formidable reputation.
"I swear I shall obey you, Father," said Tatewaki sincerely, still
thinking about how this new technique would let him finally strike down
Ranma Saotome. He could feel victory hovering near to his grasp.
"Excellent," said Lord Kunou jovially. "Tomorrow evening young Ranma
and his family will dine with us in the main hall. You will be on your
best behavior while they are here. Genma Saotome is an old friend of
mine from my youth, and I am pleased to see that he raised his son to be
such a fine warrior. When we last saw one another, I did not expect him
to ever do so, but I see that the fire of his own warrior heritage could
not be denied forever."
Tatewaki blinked. This was surprising and unwelcome news to him, but
his honor required him to bear his discomfort stoically. "You have my
word, Father," said Tatewaki, bowing low for several moments before
straightening. "I will act in the proper manner." His thoughts went
otherwise. But once you have taught me this technique, then the foul
wretch Saotome shall be brought low at last!
"See that you do, my son. See that you do. For now, continue on with
your practice." He dryly added, "you need it."
The elder Kunou left, leaving an angry young man behind.
"Father was a little bit harsh with you, I think," observed Kodachi as
she gracefully stepped into the training hall, having witnessed the
entire exchange that had just taken place from a position half-hidden in
one of the room's many entryways. She was presently dressed in one of
her casual kimonos, this one in green silk with a phoenix across the
back in golden thread. Her feet were shod in a pair of house slippers
in black.
"What brings thee into my presence, my dear sister?" Tatewaki asked a
little curtly. "Hast thou come to rub my face in tomorrow night's
farce, perchance?"
Kodachi grimaced, but then she remembered her purpose in coming to speak
with her brother privately. "I wished to speak with you about your new
dalliance, Nabiki Tendou. The two of you were quite close, I saw."
Tatewaki blinked, then snorted, "Nabiki Tendou, a dalliance? I think
not. What interest would I have in a woman of such mercenary morals?
My interest is solely in her younger sister, the most fair and high-
spirited Akane."
Kodachi grimaced inwardly at the mention of the younger Tendou girl, but
her face remained pleasant. "Oh, really? I would think that you might
enjoy the challenge of breaking through that mercenary shell that Nabiki
Tendou projects. She was obviously showing some interest in you."
"But of course," said Tatewaki grandly. "Am I not the heir to the Kunou
name? Am I not the undefeated Academy-level kendo champion throughout
the Empire? Women throw themselves at my feet daily. What matter is
it, if an ill-mannered gentlewoman with delusions of grandeur finds me
attractive? Of course she is attracted to me as any moth is to the
flame. However, she has no respect for those who are her superiors and
speaks and acts out of turn. I have no interest in such a dalliance."
"How little you know of women, brother dearest," said Kodachi with false
charm.
"What? Enlighten me," said Tatewaki, sounding curious.
"It is obvious that her seeking money from you is simply a ploy to bask
in your noble presence," said Kodachi, striving hard to keep up a
straight face. "Not to mention that winning Nabiki Tendou's heart would
make things easier to win the heart of her sister."
As the memory of both Nabiki's beauty and her strange, yet beguiling,
presence resurfaced, he found himself intrigued by the prospect of
bedding sisters. One whose quick wit and tongue paralleled his own,
while the other's sheer physicality was in and of itself sexual. He
knew, without a shadow of a doubt, that he must have them both for his
mistresses. He realized it would be beneath his station to marry
either, yet having them at hand at his whim excited him.
Tatewaki rushed over to his sister's side in the blink of an eye. He
leaned in and said, "Thou hast my undivided attention, dear sister."
Deal with this, Nabiki Tendou, thought the young noblewoman with a
smile. And with you distracted from the field of play, there will be no
further impediments on my path to winning the heart of Ranma Saotome.
******************************
"I'm home!"
Ukyou pushed the front door to the restaurant closed behind her with a
happy little sigh. A soundless motion in the air was her only alert to
the attack that suddenly came, surprising and swift. Parrying the first
strike quickly with a bare hand, Ukyou quickly made out the face of her
assailant, her Aunt Yumi. The older woman began striking quickly with
her battle spatula, but this wasn't anything out of the ordinary
compared to how Ukyou's life had been spent with her grandfather. What
followed was a ten-minute long duel of flashing battle spatulas, fist
strikes, and kicks, ending when her aunt managed to disarm her with a
blow to her wrists. Seconds later, Ukyou was knocked senseless by a
combination of punches and nerve strikes. Then, after being woken up
with a bucket of cold water in the face, Yumi had handed her a towel and
a fresh cup of hot tea and then settled herself into one of the chairs
to talk. Her manner was more like that of a big sister than a woman who
was her mother's age.
Yumi listened with interest as Ukyou described her time spent with
Ranma, and occasionally a wistful smile would cross the older woman's
face. When asked about it, Yumi took the time to relate some tales
taken from her own youth, much of that having been spent on the road
from the time she was fourteen or so. Ranma apparently reminded her of
one or two of the young men that she had met during that time of her
life, although he did not seem to be nearly as brash and egotistical.
"He struck me as being a pretty nice boy, Niece," Yumi said in between
sips of her tea. "I think you could do a lot worse than trying to
capture that Saotome lad's heart."
"Do you really think so, Aunt Yumi?" Ukyou asked, her face feeling quite
warm.
"Take it from a more experienced woman," said Yumi. "That kid's got a
lot of potential, if he settles down with the right woman."
"Well, we've just had one date," Ukyou said with an even deeper blush,
beginning to twiddle her fingers nervously underneath the table.
Although it had been her first real date, especially since she never
considered the dates with other girls that her grandfather had tricked
her or forced her to go on 'to make a man out of you, boy' to have
counted. Despite dressing and acting like a boy for most of her life,
Ukyou did not ever consider herself to be 'that way' in her likes. She
still wasn't sure about the idea of marriage in general, but Ranma was
pretty easy to get along with. And she did feel quite attracted to him.
"Just take things one day at a time, Ukyou," Yumi said, smiling. "I'm
sure that everything will work out just fine for you."
"I'll try, Auntie." She then studied the tea remnants in the bottom of
her cup, feeling her embarrassment level soar.
"Your father dropped by while you were gone," said Yumi suddenly. "He
was on his way back to his hotel, and he just wanted to see how you were
getting along with me. I told him you were out on a date with Ranma.
His reaction was, well, interesting. I think it was because he had been
drinking."
"What happened?" Ukyou asked, wondering if her father was all right.
"I don't really know how to say this except straight out," said Yumi,
looking Ukyou squarely in the eyes. "Ukyou dear, it seems that you're
_already_ engaged to marry Ranma Saotome, and neither of you were to be
told about it until later."
Ukyou couldn't remember much of anything that took place over the next
several minutes. After a time, she looked up from the table and asked,
in a stunned voice, "Wh-why didn't they tell us?"
"It seems your father and Mister Saotome made a solemn, albeit most
likely drunken, vow to keep you both in the dark," said Yumi, her facial
expression speaking volumes on what she thought of keeping such a thing
a secret from her niece. "It was only by luck that your father blurted
the rest of the story out to me, after I 'persuaded' him a bit."
"Oh," said Ukyou, not sure what to say at that point.
"Ranma was apparently more skittish about the idea of an arranged
marriage than you were, Niece," Yumi said, a gentle smile on her broad
face. "I'm only telling you what I learned because I think it's an
asinine thing to keep hidden from you, and him. That being said, I want
you to promise me that you won't tell Ranma about the engagement until
you feel it's the right thing to do. If I read him right, then he seems
the type to be resistant to the idea of being forced into anything."
"Stupid old man," Ukyou suddenly grumbled. "My father has got to be the
biggest jerk on the face of the planet. How could he make a deal like
this behind my back?"
"Just don't take it out on Ranma," Yumi said. "You did like how things
went on your date with him, didn't you?"
"Well, yeah. He's a great guy to hang around with."
"Then let yourself be friends with him," said Yumi, kicking her legs up
to rest on a nearby chair as she slouched comfortably where she sat. "I
can tell that you like Ranma a lot, so just relax and enjoy being around
him. Let the whole marriage thing take a back seat while you two get to
know each other."
"Won't he be mad when he finally learns the truth?"
"Maybe," admitted Yumi. "But I think even a few days being kept in the
dark will give him a chance to get used to having you around." She
grinned, her voice having dropped into a teasing tone.
Ukyou blushed again at being reminded of her engagement.
Yumi's grin faded into a more serious, yet supportive look. "Don't
worry, kid. You and Ranma are going to have a lot of years ahead of you
together. Be glad. Since a good-looking boy like Ranma didn't seem to
have any girls hanging around him, or mention any to you, then it's a
reasonable bet that you won't need to worry about any rivals for his
affections. Believe me, I know what that's like."
"Okay, Auntie."
"Now get to bed," Yumi suddenly snarled insincerely. "You thought your
time in the mountains with that wily old man was tough? Starting
tomorrow, I'm going to be twice as tough!"
After retreating to her room with a laugh, Ukyou found that she could
not sleep, so she contented herself by resting in her bed and studying
the disparate shadows. They flowed across the ceiling as the wind moved
the branches of a tree that was partially blocking the light from the
streetlamp outside. Her hands supported her head as she watched the
irregular movements of the patches of darkness, and her eyes tracked the
motions, instinctively watching them for anything out of the ordinary.
It was a necessary survival instinct to have in a ninja clan, after all.
She closed her eyes, trusting in her keenly trained senses to alert her,
even from sleep, if anyone entered her room by stealth. Years spent
with her grandfather had trained Ukyou to go from a sound sleep to fully
alert and combat ready in less than two seconds.
At least my training won't be in any danger of slacking off, Ukyou
thought, letting each muscle in her body relax. And Ranma's certainly
easier to get along with than I thought he would be. She slipped her
hands free from behind her head and began doing one of her kuji-kiri
exercises, the gestures helping her concentrate. Ukyou had always done
her best thinking when it was quiet and dark, and right now she felt the
need to do some serious thinking about what she planned to do about her
new situation, especially in light of what her aunt had learned from her
father.
Ranma Saotome. Ukyou tasted the feel of his name in her mind like a
perfectly-done okonomiyaki. There was something undeniably attractive
about him. Ukyou didn't consider herself to be the type of girl to get
all giddy about a guy, but Ranma was quickly finding himself a special
spot in her thoughts.
The young ninja smiled as she recalled her date with Ranma a few hours
earlier. In her memories, a rosy glow coated each event from the
evening, and a sense of happiness filled her thoughts. She was already
looking forward to spending more time with him.
Ukyou Saotome, she thought, finding the feel of it to be good.
Ranma Kuonji. That thought felt pretty good as well.
Then, the import of what she was doing hit Ukyou all of a sudden, and
she sat bolt upright in bed, her eyes wide open. "What the hell am I
doing?" she whispered to the room.
The shadows on the walls and ceiling did not offer any response to her
question; they simply continued in their random motion.
After a time, Ukyou relaxed, bopping herself in the forehead with a
fist. Idiot, she thought with a sudden smile. One date and you fall
for the guy? What's gotten into your head, Ukyou? She flopped back
down onto the bed, staring at the ceiling once again, her brow drooping
in thought as she contemplated that question. However, the slight smile
on her face had not gone away, and she eventually drifted off to sleep
thinking fondly about a certain pigtailed young man.
******************************
Mikado Sanzenin relaxed in his bed, idly running a hand along the
exposed flank of the girl sleeping next to him as she sighed in her
sleep. Her Blackhall uniform was casually scattered across the floor,
even as his own was folded neatly over his desk chair. She was an
attractive conquest for him, a first-year cadet at Whitehall's sister
Academy, with long, chestnut-colored hair and a very sensual frame. But
now that he had taken his pleasure from her, he was already bored with
her. He sighed softly. It was always that way for him. The thrill was
in the chase, not in the inevitable conquest. But then, no girl he had
ever set his sights on was ever able to resist him for long. Except for
the ones that slapped him or kneed him in the groin. But they were all
lesbians anyway, so they didn't count, he reassured himself.
At least that abominable plot to wed me to that simpering Shiratori girl
is over and done with, Mikado thought gratefully. While it was true
that she was attractive enough for his tastes, her personality left much
to be desired. Personally, Mikado suspected that she had been dropped
on her head a few times when she was a baby, but nobody had ever asked
his opinion of the matter before his parents had tried to ram an
engagement to the girl down his throat.
It had all been a result of politics, in the end. The Shiratori Family
had money to burn, being the nineteenth richest family in the entire
Empire, but they lacked political status. Mikado's father had seen that
as an opportunity to infuse the Sanzenin's coffers with needed yen,
apparently to try and take advantage of some production contracts for
the Imperial Army that the Emperor was shopping around to the various
Families. However, when the Emperor awarded the contracts to the
Daitokuji Family, that had combined with Mikado's own reticence to end
the matter. So now he was still a free man, at least for another year
or two.
A vision of the woman he truly desired floated across his mind's eye, a
pristine virgin whom he was certain pined for the touch of a man.
Kodachi Kunou, the sister of his best friend, the secret passion that
had haunted his nights since he first met her. Even when he was in the
midst of copulation with one of his conquests, she was still on his
mind, the only woman he felt would truly complete him. He knew they
were destined for each other.
Even as Kodachi's face filled his mind's eye, he continued casually
stroking the soft skin of the girl still sleeping next to him. He heard
her breathing becoming soft moans as his fingers idly played along her
body.
Long ago, Mikado had decided to only bed young ladies of the nobility,
for the thought of becoming intimate with a girl of merely common
lineage filled him with faint disgust. Smiling, he recalled his last
meeting with Kodachi with fondness. He would enjoy breaking down her
timidly innocent resistance, until she finally cried aloud his name in
rapture when he took his pleasure from her in bed.
It is only a matter of time, dear Kodachi, thought Mikado. I almost
cannot wait to be able to grant you my special favor and taste of your
lips, as well as your other charms. He was hoping to save her for the
last. After all, he was drawing near to his goal, to bed one hundred
girls before he reached his seventeenth birthday. Each one so far had
been more lovely than the last, many of them untouched virgins before
receiving his attentions.
Despite her obvious reluctance at our initial meeting, thought Mikado,
flexing the hand her touch had briefly impaired, Nabiki Tendou would
make a very fine addition to the ranks of my conquests. She was a
little older than he was, but she also had an attractive worldliness in
her manner that he knew he could use to break her resistance to his
charms if need be. His sources informed him that she was infatuated
with money, so if necessary he was willing to buy her favors. After
all, the method of seducing a woman did not matter to him, and money was
an easily-obtained commodity for one of his high-born status. Still, if
she continued to refuse him, then he would assume she was a lesbian and
move on. Nabiki was lovely, but he was also running out of time to
reach his goals. He only needed a few more.
Then, after fulfilling his dreams of manly conquest, Mikado would turn
his attentions to she who he saw as being his finest and sweetest coup,
the innocent and pristine Kodachi Kunou. Ah, fair, unspoiled Kodachi,
he thought, a mixture of fondness and lust coloring his thoughts. You
will be my greatest victory when I finally take you to my bed. Taking
my pleasure from your womanhood will complete me. And nothing will keep
me from that goal. Anyone that tries, I will simply eliminate from my
path.
Feeling his lusts stirred by thoughts of his goal finally coming within
reach, he changed the motions of his hands upon the girl sleeping next
to him. Feeling her body responding to his touch as he brought her back
to wakefulness for another round of activity, Mikado pretended that it
was the one, true love of his life, Kodachi Kunou, who was in bed with
him. Rolling atop the unnamed girl, he proceeded to do that which he so
fiercely desired to do to the object of his passions, even as the girl
gasped out his name in carnal pleasure.
******************************
The redheaded girl leaped over her opponent's kick with a graceful
movement, the cloth of her light yellow gi rustling, as her head and
feet briefly reversed their orientation in midair. Her fists snapped
out twice with quick punches, but both blows were skillfully blocked by
the boy she was dueling with. Completing the side leap a moment later,
she agilely landed, balanced on the balls of her feet, her arm whipping
into position to deflect the roundhouse kick aimed at her face. She
grinned, her catlike ears poised in the direction of her opponent as he
unleashed several more rapid-fire punches and kicks, each one dodged or
blocked by the catgirl with great skill.
Kinnousuke Kashuou broke off his furious assault for a moment to
reassess his opponent, giving Tiger a chance to counter-attack. His
eyes glowed with excitement as he parried and dodged each of her quick
strikes, enjoying the use of the level of skill that he steadfastly kept
hidden at the Imperial Academy. A weapon known can be planned for and
dealt with, but a surprise could be lethal if saved for just the right
moment; one of his family's mottoes. The Kashuou School of Martial Arts
was just such a weapon, its abilities hidden from outsiders' sight and
knowledge unless absolutely needed. It was for this reason why he
preferred to let the three catgirls enforce his desires, such as when
they forcibly enlisted the aid of his former subordinates, the Wolf
Pack.
As the two combatants traded the initiative back and forth, the other
two catgirls watched from the sidelines. Lynx rubbed a towel across the
back of her neck and across the half-open front of her gi, smiling at
having been picked first to spar with her beloved. Now she was looking
forward to a long, hot bath to relax and unwind in. She giggled a bit
at the sight of how Panther looked.
"What's so funny?" growled Panther.
"Oh, nothing," giggled Lynx, enjoying the annoyed look that passed
across Panther's face. The sight of the proud and mighty Panther, the
largest and most muscular of the three catgirls, sitting there with a
black eye and a split lip from sparring with Kinnousuke was very amusing
to her.
"You didn't do much better," said Panther, poking Lynx in a spot on her
side where a deep bruise lay. She was rewarded with a muffled yelp from
the other catgirl. "Serves you right."
The two glared at each other for a moment, before each harrumphed and
pointedly ignored the other. Both of them went back to watching the
current match going on.
Ordinarily, it would be true that Tiger, let alone either of the other
two catgirls, would have been unable to even raise a hand to harm
Kinnousuke. Their standard-issue personality programming quite strongly
prohibited them from even contemplating violence against their owner, a
necessary safety feature given their formidable strength and skill.
However, a short time after the trio had entered into his service,
Kinnousuke had taken the liberty of disabling those particular
overrides, finding a certain thrill in having a level of wildness left
in his living toys. All it had taken was him speaking a certain
sequence of command words that would not normally ever be spoken
together in a sentence, and their absolute prohibition against harming
him had been nullified. Should he ever choose to do so, he could
reactivate it in a single moment, with a single word. But as they were
now, it allowed any of the three catgirls to spar with him like this.
Fortunately for Kinnousuke, none of them could ever bring themselves to
seriously harm him, a result of more deeply ingrained personality
programming.
For his part, Kinnousuke greatly enjoyed using the trio as sparring
partners. It was a thrill he indulged himself in on a fairly regular
basis, one that would have made his father totally apoplectic had he
known. There was something enticing to him about proving his manhood
this way, putting his strength and skills to the test like this. Now
knowing that Nabiki Tendou was as formidable a fighter as he had
suspected from seeing her sister in action, only hiding it like he had
hidden his own skills, he was looking forward to being the one to
utterly dominate her. Conversely, he was also still a little puzzled as
to how Ranma Saotome had managed to hide such fighting skills as he had
recently demonstrated, such as in the schoolyard fight with Nabiki. It
was a puzzle that intrigued him.
Tiger began a series of retreating backflips away from Kinnousuke when
he renewed his assault, the blows from his fists and feet striking even
faster than before. Before reaching the edge of the mat, her body came
down into a crouching position, and she speedily swept his leg out from
under him. She sprang over him as he fell, and one foot lashed out
while she was still in midair to deal him a bruising blow to his ribs.
She landed close to the center of the mat, her green eyes watching him
closely.
"Nice move, Tiger," said Kinnousuke quietly, standing up with a tight
smile on his face. Sweat dripped down his face, and he knew that he was
nearing the end of his physical reserves. He held an arm across his
injured ribs, even as he began raising his chi within himself. When the
redheaded catgirl came at him, they engaged in a furious assault upon
each other as control of the match passed back and forth between them.
New strength flooded his limbs as his adrenal glands answered the call
of his chi, temporarily increasing his speed and power. He was gambling
it all on one last sequence of attacks.
Tiger felt Kinnousuke's fist slip past her defenses despite her best
efforts, and she barely managed to roll with it when it struck her in
the stomach. An elbow strike cracked across her face, taking advantage
of the brief hesitation in her movements. Her defenses buckled as his
kicks and punches seemed to be everywhere at once, before they finally
crumbled away under his relentless assault. She started to fall to her
knees, and she took one last uppercut into her face, knocking her
sprawling backwards. Stars filled her vision for several moments.
"I yield, Kinnousuke-sama," said Tiger with a tired smile, rubbing her
sore jaw. She was as amazed as she always was that he was able to fight
all three of them in sequence, after brief rest breaks, and still emerge
victorious each time. But feeling his strength overwhelming hers always
made Tiger feel weak in the knees. She held out a hand and smiled with
delight when he helped her up.
"A good workout, girls," said Kinnousuke with a smile, taking the clean
towel held out for him by Lynx. He wiped his face, feeling the trio of
warm bodies near him. When he pulled the towel free, he saw all three
catgirls smiling at him.
"Kinnousuke-sama was in excellent form today," said Lynx in a very
appreciative tone, her eyes shining with love. She ignored the angry
looks that Tiger was giving her from behind their mutual beloved.
"Our master is a man among men," said Panther, casually shoving her way
past Tiger to be the one standing closest to him. "He deserves to have
his cares soothed away with a good massage." Of the three of them,
Panther was the most skilled at shiatsu-style massage.
"Why would he want to spend time with an overmuscled ape when he can
have more fun with me?" asked Tiger, moving Panther out of the way with
a subtle jiu-jitsu move.
Kinnousuke chuckled as Lynx got into what quickly became a three-way
shoving and wrestling match for the honor of receiving his attentions.
He smiled and enjoyed the sight.
******************************
Ranma woke up gradually, from a deep sleep, through a light doze, and
finally to full wakefulness. Blinking, he rubbed his nose between his
thumb and forefinger and listened to the wind blowing outside. The
house was quiet, and he glanced over at his clock to see what time it
was. The digital readout changed to '4:46 AM' as he watched it. He now
felt wide awake, even though there was still over an hour before he had
to get up.
"Terrific," he whispered with a sigh. Rolling onto his side, his eyes
fell upon his computer system. Since he was awake, he might as well try
to take care of some of his work that he had been neglecting. It was
piling up on him again, like it often did when he became totally
immersed in one or two projects like his current life had led him to.
Slipping on a warm robe and house slippers against the pre-dawn chill,
Ranma sat down at his computer system. His hand flipped on the main
power switch, and he waited while it booted up. As he watched the
system run through its startup routine and bring up the main graphic
interface, he thought about some of the newer systems already on the
market. The eight gigahertz processor chips were now out from several
of the Empire's competing computer manufacturers, so perhaps it was time
for him to start thinking about an upgrade again. After all, it had
been over six months since he had purchased this one, and it wouldn't do
to let it get too far behind the technology curve.
Ranma clicked on a particular icon on the main workspace, starting up
his word processing software. The screen quickly lit up with a new
workspace window, and he then opened up the specific file he needed,
after entering the decryption key. From his years working with some of
the computer and system security experts he had known, his own personal
security had become quite important to him. So in his spare time he had
written up an encryption algorithm for his personal datafiles, protected
by a nonsense phrase that he had picked out at random. With the fake
Genma walking around in his world, he was grateful for his foresight.
One of these encrypted files of his was now open, one that he had been
neglecting of late, his private journal.
******************************
*FROM THE PERSONAL JOURNAL OF RANMA SAOTOME
It has been almost two weeks since my initial full immersion experiment
was run, and I still sometimes wonder how deeply it might have affected
me. I have already recorded more completely my initial impressions of
the results from that first day of experimentation, with the full
capabilities of the quantum neural resonator having been unleashed upon
my cerebral cortex, so I won't repeat myself here.
Something changed in me that day, I admit, but I feel it was more like I
was added upon rather than having something taken away from me. I used
to indulge myself in so many interests of the mind, but few of them have
lately held much interest for me. The work on my project has taken on a
new level of focus, especially since rescuing my real father (not to
mention getting rid of that other Genma Saotome, the parasite, before he
can do any real damage to my life) has now taken on paramount
importance. I miss having my father to talk with.
Among the many accomplishments in my life, I have looked upon the heart
of the atom through an electron microscope, studied the birth and death
of stars and galaxies, beaten world-ranked Grandmasters of Chess and Go,
spent years learning at the feet of a multitude of learned men, and made
my own contributions to the halls of academia. I once learned how to
play the piano to concert-level quality. I spent a single summer
memorizing all of Shakespeare's plays, as well as many other famous
works of Western culture, just to see if I could. Now, other than my
current project and my newfound interest in martial arts, nothing else
really seems to matter. Life is funny sometimes, isn't it?
I can honestly say that I do not regret what I have gained from these
recent experiences, especially in the new fighting skills I now have.
Using them and finally being able to put Akane Tendou in her place was a
great relief for me. Admittedly, it was an exercise in naked animal
aggression being given free reign on my part, but it was, well, fun too.
But she's gone from my life now, and since she's left for another
school, I am sure she will find fresh targets for her aggressive
tendencies. I am finally free of them. I am sure that Furinkan will
suit her far better than the Imperial Academy ever did.
It is just as well. The last thing I need right now is more women in my
life. I have my hands full enough right now with Ukyou Kuonji, Nabiki
Tendou, and Kodachi Kunou. Three women who have become involved in my
life in some weird parody of events from those other worlds, but in this
life, the meetings were engineered by my own mother, in her eager
attempt to arrange a marriage for me.
It's strange how the same people keep popping up in the lives of myself
and my analogs, as time and again they gather together one way or
another. Can there be such a thing as fate or destiny? My father, that
is, my 'real' father, once taught me that a man makes his own fate in
his life, but I am starting to wonder about that now. Hopefully, I can
use the experiences of my counterparts as guideposts, so that I can try
to avoid the traps and pitfalls of their lives.
My analogs. During the early course of my experiments, I've walked in
the shoes of three counterparts from that strange region of parallel
worlds where they defined themselves exclusively as 'martial artists' in
their lives. One was taken on a training journey from Hell with another
version of the fat bastard currently living in my house and managed to
get himself romantically entangled with Akane, Ukyou, Kodachi, and also
Shampoo. He somehow manages to keep them all at arm's length while he
figures out what to do, even though deep in his heart I'm sure he's
fallen in love with Akane. I wonder how long he can keep the girls
juggled before he's forced to make a decision, or it all explodes in his
face? Ah well, I have enough problems of my own to worry about without
having to worry about his too.
But then there's the second version of me. He's in the world where my
father is now trapped, while I get to deal with his shifty martial
artist version of Genma Saotome, an idiot without a single shred of
honor or any common sense as far as I can tell. The sooner I can return
him to that other world and forget I ever saw it, the better it's going
to be for me. That analog of mine now only has one girl to contend with
at present, Shampoo, all thanks to the efforts of me and my father. He
might be the luckiest one of the three, but time will tell.
I hope my father is all right.
The third one disturbs me on some deep level, for some reason. He
stayed at home while Nabiki Tendou, of all people, went on the training
journey from Hell instead, but that one I see as having his own major
troubles. He's been all but emasculated when it comes to how he deals
with the women in his life, at least in my eyes, and I'm sure my other
quantum brothers would agree. He defers to his version of Nabiki, since
she seems to have taken the starring role in the events of that world.
The fact that she's cursed to turn into a boy makes me wonder if there
is some factor going on in the timelines that I should be more aware of,
but what that might be, I could not say, not precisely. It is also odd
how the same people keep dealing with the same people, like variations
on some weird sort of theme.
But getting back to that other Ranma, with that Nabiki's curse, and the
way the relationships have formed up, he's practically irrelevant to
things. Nabiki's male form has impregnated the Shampoo analog of that
world, so why could it not do the same thing for Ukyou if necessary?
That Nabiki can't bear that Ranma's children, not with the curse active
within her, so unless they do surrogate parenthood, I don't see how the
Saotome and Tendou bloodlines could ever truly be joined.
I feel sorry for him, in a way. Looking at that life from the outside,
I just find it to be, for lack of a better term, a very scary thought to
think of one of my own counterparts having ended up like that, nothing
more than a lowly sidekick to a girl.
Despite what my own timeline's version of Nabiki might think, that is
most certainly not going to happen to
_me_. I don't know what's going
on in her head, but if a certain Miss Tendou wants that sort of
relationship from me, then she can simply forget it. My father may have
raised me to view men and women as equals, which is why I can fight a
girl with my full strength as I could another guy, unlike most of my
counterparts, but I am likewise never going to accept a submissive role
in any relationship with a girl. Not that I plan on ever having a
relationship, besides a purely professional one, with Nabiki Tendou.
I'm attracted to her, as I am to the other girls, but I can't let myself
fall in love with any of them. I don't want to trigger the traps that
lie there, though it may already be too late.
I still find myself occasionally slipping into the poor grammar skills
of my benighted counterparts in my speech, a result obviously from their
vastly poorer levels of education having been written into my brain, but
that annoying tendency has been fading slowly as time goes on.
Luckily, my new motor skills show no signs of fading away. The
ingrained agility and martial arts skills borrowed from my counterparts
continue to grow within me, and each day I seem to get a little bit
better. Where they devoted their entire lives to learning these skills,
I spent the same time developing my mind and expanding my knowledge. So
now, in addition to my own abilities, I can fight. I wish the fact that
I enjoy it so much would worry me more, but it doesn't really.
After this week is finally over, hopefully having managed to dodge all
of my prospective arranged marriages, I can devote myself to solving the
matter of restoring my father to his proper body, and sending that
twisted parody of the man I have come to love and respect back where he
belongs. Once I can do that, then the worst of my problems will be
behind me.
After all, I'm not cursed, and it's not as if I have a bunch of people
looking to fight with me all the time. Well, Nabiki may prove to be a
handful at times, but Kunou and Mikado aren't any trouble. And it's not
as if I have Ryouga Hibiki coming to town looking to fight me. If he
even exists in this timeline, he won't have any reason to want to take a
swing at me. Kind of a shame really, though. Maybe in this world, we
could be friends.
******************************
Ranma saved the journal entry, encrypted it, and then closed down the
word processor.
"Let's see what's going on in the world," he muttered. Ranma opened up
his connection to the datanet and logged into his main electronic mail
account. He waited while his system checked for new mail. It had been
a few days since he last checked it, but he hoped that it wasn't too
full.
"You have new mail," came a female voice from the speakers. Ranma had
the volume turned down, so he could just barely hear it. He watched as
his system began to download his email. He sighed at the number of
messages displayed on the screen when that procedure was completed. He
knew it had been a mistake to let it go for more than a day or two at
the most, especially since he was on several mailing lists from the
various universities and academic groups around the globe.
*263 NEW MESSAGES AVAILABLE. READ NOW?
"I might as well," Ranma muttered with a slight amount of dismay at the
sheer volume of message traffic he would now have to slog through. He
began scrolling through the entries, finding most of them to be junk, or
juvenile arguments about things that he had no real interest in.
Eventually, Ranma finished off his email and looked at the clock on his
desk. It read '5:31 AM' now. He realized that now was as good a time
as any to begin his research into discovering how he could get his
father back safely. The first step is to begin by gathering data on
that other world, he thought as he pulled out the datadisk from his
bookbag, the one containing all of the coordinate and other data from
each of his uses of the resonator. He slipped the disk into the drive
bay and started up his home system's copy of the analysis software.
"Now to see where the divergence point took place," Ranma muttered.
"That might give me something to start with."
*QUANTUM COORDINATE FILE #0000013 LOADING INTO MEMORY... PLEASE STAND
BY...
*FILE LOADED... FILE #0000013. DETAILS?
Ranma typed out "YES" for a response, and the screen began to print out
more information on the file.
*FILE #0000013 - QUANTUM DIVERGENCE POINT OCCURRED:
3,852 YEARS
8 MONTHS
18 DAYS
14 HOURS
12 MINUTES
47 SECONDS AGO.
The time counter kept ticking upwards as Ranma sat and stared at the
numbers in puzzlement. That world was virtually identical to the first
one I visited in that region, he thought as he looked out his window at
the stars fading with dawn's imminent arrival. So the change wasn't
simply in the near-term alteration of events that surrounded Shampoo's
presence in that Ranma's life. Something else happened a long time ago,
and yet the present-day world remained relatively identical.
Ranma shook his head, a chuckle bubbling up from deep within him.
"Ranma Saotome, you are an egomaniacal fool," he thought out loud. "I
can't believe I believed that the changes somehow centered on me, on my
life in that cluster of timelines. Five hundred years or even five
thousand years ago, either way it doesn't bring me one step closer to
getting my father home." He knew he should have known better, but he
had assumed that all the worlds in a cluster diverged from each other
relatively recently. Of course, in the cosmological scheme of things,
even four thousand years was a drop in the bucket when compared against
the immensity of the history of the universe. Ranma sighed at his own
stupidity. "Maybe the idiocy inherent in a depressing number of my
analogs has affected me more than I thought," he muttered.
Stretching out a kink in his neck by rolling it from side to side, Ranma
was discouraged at this turn of events. Figuring that some early
morning exercise must be what he needed to clear his thoughts, he
quickly got dressed and eased the window to his room open.
Leaping from his open window, he landed on the wall encircling the
grounds of his house, near the tree that sat at one end of the small koi
pond. He eyed the cold water as the wind rustled the water's surface.
The half-full setting moon was low in the sky, already beginning to show
a hint of dawn. Even so, Ranma could just barely make out a few small
lights on the darkened surface of the moon, scattered signs of mankind's
presence on its sister orb in the form of mining colonies. The largest
ones were French, but there were several smaller ones that represented
the other powers of the world, including a few by Japan. Maybe someday
I'll go into space like that other analog of mine did, he thought with a
brief grin, before dropping his eyes from the heavens.
With a quick sprint to build up speed, Ranma took to the neighbor's
rooftop in a single bounding leap. He ran across the roof without
making much sound, feeling the muscles in his legs already beginning to
loosen up as he catapulted his body into the air once again, sailing
across the gap between this building and the next. He disappeared into
the distance, as if trying to outrun all of his troubles.
******************************
"Excuse me, can you tell me where Tokyo is?" Ryouga asked, shifting the
weight of his pack on his back. He smiled in a friendly manner, but his
smile was starting to look a little travelworn around the edges after
only a few days on the road. His fiery need for vengeance was stoked a
little brighter and hotter with each mile that passed beneath his feet.
The sooner he found Ukyou Kuonji and savagely crushed him once and for
all for awakening such strong feelings of attraction for another boy,
the better. This was all that damn Ukyou's fault!
"Tokyo?" asked the old farmer in surprise. "But this here is Settsu
Province, just outside Kobe. You're nowhere near Tokyo, boy! Can't you
read a map?"
Ryouga grimaced, and his hatred for Ukyou Kuonji grew another degree
hotter. Just you wait, Ukyou, he thought with a growl. You'll pay for
making me have to suffer so, tracking you down for my vengeance!
"Why don't you take one of the trains?" asked the old farmer. "I'm sure
you could find one going to Tokyo from Kobe. The station's just down
that road." The old man pointed off to the west. "All you have to do
is turn left at the fork over there."
"Thank you," said Ryouga, bowing slightly in gratitude. He headed off
down the road following the direction the farmer was pointing and
promptly turned right at the fork.
"There's something not right about that boy," the old man muttered as he
scratched his head. "Oh well, we're on an island. He'll reach Tokyo
one way or the other, sooner or later."
******************************
Lord Kunou removed his sunglasses as he stepped inside the dimly lit
establishment. It was an abnormally warm day for spring, so the sudden
coolness of the small tavern was a welcome refreshment. He shifted the
paired swords riding at his waist casually as he placed his dark glasses
in an inner pocket, his garb reflecting the traditional one of centuries
past for a samurai nobleman. It was an affectation of his that lulled
his more modern-dressed peers at court to think that he was hopelessly
mired in the past, and few of them even carried the weapons allowed for
their station. He inhaled briefly through his nose. The scent of sake
was pungent upon the air, bringing back memories of his youthful days
long past. The sounds of quiet conversation and clinking ceramic cups
filling the air, and soft shamisen music emanated from several hidden
speakers.
The tavern's owner greeted him at the door, a painted woman seeking to
retain her long past youth. Her breath was redolent with the odors of
tobacco and alcohol. "Welcome, noble lord," she said with a bow, her
eyes taking in the richly appointed clothes and fine weapons at his
waist. She became even more obsequious at the thought of such a one
joining her humble clientele, if even for a single afternoon. "To what
might I owe the honor of this visit?"
"I am meeting a friend here, good madam," said Lord Kunou quietly. "Do
you know the name of Genma Saotome?"
The woman's eyes glinted as she smiled. That name belonged to one of
her new, favorite customers. She bowed and summoned an attractive young
woman to her side, dressed in a slinky cheongsam-style dress slit high
up one thigh. The outspoken Akemi Roppongi was her most popular
hostess, but nothing was too good for customers who looked able to spend
a lot of money.
"Akemi here will take you to Saotome-san's private area, Milord," said
the woman, bowing low once more. She turned to the young woman,
catching her eyeing Lord Kunou with a subtly calculating look on her
face. "See that this noble lord and his companion receive only our
finest at their table."
"Yes, Ma'am," said Akemi, bowing deeply before leading Lord Kunou to the
back portion of the tavern. She knelt, sliding back a partition made of
light wood and heavy paper, what was once a pure white now a pale yellow
with age and old varnish.
Genma looked up when he heard the partition open, and he smiled at the
sight of Lord Kunou standing there. This will be all too easy, he
thought with a smile, setting down his cup of sake. He patted the
pocket containing the engagement agreement, pleased that he was able to
find such documentation readily available at a local office supply
house. He had even taken the liberty of writing down the names of the
soon to be engaged, happy couple.
"Greetings, Kunou-sama," said Genma with a slight smile, turning aside
from the table and bowing. "It was good of you to meet me on such short
notice."
"It is good to see you again, Saotome-san," said Lord Kunou as he
stepped past the partition, taking one last sidelong look at the young
hostess. He settled himself at the opposite end of the small table,
removing his swords and setting them near at hand on his left side. "I
do confess to being puzzled at your sudden invitation though. Still, it
is good to see you again, old friend."
"I feel the same," said Genma. "You are looking well."
"A little older and slower than when last we met, but I am still in
adequate shape," said Lord Kunou with a sudden chuckle. He flipped over
and held up the empty sake cup, and Genma was quick to pour him a drink.
They exchanged pleasantries as the number of empty sake bottles grew
larger in number. Genma was grateful that he had been training for the
past several days to raise his capacity for consumption. Even so, he
was hard-pressed at first to ensure that Lord Kunou drank more than he
did. Although things became much easier as the amount of sake consumed
by the nobleman began far exceeding his own.
"Your son defeated my son," said Lord Kunou softly, staring a bit
glassy-eyed at his current cup of sake. "Despite the many faults my son
has, Ranma is a fine warrior to have done so. He would be most welcome
to wed my little Kodachi, old friend." A single burp escaped his lips.
"I have worried about her so, that she would find a good husband. So
many of these 'proud sons of the nobility' are really nothing more than
dishonorable savages in fine clothes. She needs someone to protect her,
my innocent little Kodachi."
"I understand completely, old friend," said Genma, feeling the world
taking on a rosy glow. He nodded, but then it felt like his head might
fall off, so he stopped. He pulled out the contract with a broad smile.
Soun Tendou had the right idea, he thought pleasantly. Why bother the
boy or Nodoka with the details? This should be an agreement between
fathers.
"An engagement contract?" said Lord Kunou, eyeing the paper with
interest. A smile broke out across his face, and he wiped away a single
tear. "I am relieved, old friend. More relieved than you know." The
Sanzenin family had suddenly begun pushing for him to engage Kodachi to
their son, something to do with the recent collapse of the agreement
between their family and the Shiratori family. Personally, he thought
the boy Mikado was a little pustule on the backside of the Empire, and
the rest of the boy's family wasn't much better. So engaging Kodachi to
Ranma so easily would come as a gift from the kami, and Lord Kunou was
never one to question good fortune. Before Genma could say a thing, the
contract was signed and stamped with Lord Kunou's mark.
Genma was a little overwhelmed, made doubly so due to the amount of
alcohol he had been consuming, but he shrugged, signed, and stamped the
document as well. Now I just have to keep things a secret for a few
more days. If things here act anything like they do back home, this
will all blow up in the boy's face at the worst possible time. After
that, I'm sure that the little punk will be kept busy trying to handle
things, and it will keep him occupied while I prepare myself to train
him as he should be. A month or two, and I'm sure that I'll have this
body up to a level that can deal with him.
Genma folded the contract and put it away before picking up his cup of
sake. He knew it would not be difficult to persuade Lord Kunou to hide
the truth of this engagement from the couple. When it finally did
explode in Ranma's face as Genma hoped, then he knew there would be some
excellent training opportunities, especially in dealing with three angry
young women. Those three girls will keep him off balance for me, he
thought with a smile.
"Here's to a new beginning, old friend," said Genma cheerily. "To the
joining together of our two families." And to getting my hands on the
fat dowry that a nobleman's daughter surely has.
******************************
(to be continued in 11B)