Hiya Everybody! I took a REALLY long time getting this part done, but it's finished. For those of you who haven't read my fic before, previous parts can be found at:
http://www.angelfire.com/tx/gilliweb/index.html
I'd like to thank my prereaders for going over this for me, of course, and my sister for finding her copy of my rough draft when I kept losing it.^_^' Anybody who has questions, comments, etc., can reach me at jadzia42@angelfire.com or my old address jadzia42@hotmail.com
Just to let everybody know, this is the last part of the first volume. After this I'm going to be going through my previous chapters and fixing up any mistakes I accidentally left in there. I'll also be working on a sidestory.
C&C, MST's, word of encouragement, etc., would be appreciated!
Now, on to the fic!
Jade Dixon, jadzia42@angelfire.com
http://www.angelfire.com/tx/gilliweb/index.html
Angelfire for your free web-based e-mail. http://www.angelfire.com
-- Attached file included as plaintext by Listar --
-- File: TNR6.txt
The Nerima Returners
Volume One
Part 6- More Surprises Yet To Come
Disclaimer: I don't own these characters, nor do I pretend to. Even if I
did, the army of lawyers that would come after me would make me change my
mind.^_^
Now that the various fiancees had sort of accepted Rana, things had died
down, with only Kuno still chasing her, and even that from far away. The
main reason for this, besides having semi-accepting her as a different
person, was that Rana now thought of herself as a girl, and chasing another
girl would've made them feel uncomfortable. So, instead of chasing her,
they set to work on either unlocking the curse again or reviving her
memory.
Cologne walked up to the door of the Tendo residence and knocked. It was
no surprise to the elderly woman when Kasumi answered it.
"Why, hello, Cologne. How are you today?" she asked, smiling politely at
the shrunken lady.
"Fine, thank-you. Would Rana happen to be home?" Cologne responded, getting
straight to the point.
"Yes, she is! She just got home from Doctor Tofu's with Akane. Would you
like to come in and see her?"
"Yes, if it isn't a problem," came the reply.
***************
"You have ANOTHER method[1] to restore Rana's memory?" asked Akane in
disbelief. She was still a bit disappointed that Doctor Tofu's shiatsu
technique hadn't worked to reactivate the curse.
Cologne decided to ignore the youngest Tendo's skepticism and hobbled on
her stick over to Rana. "With your permission, I'll begin."
Rana had an odd look on her face. One of annoyance and regret. But Cologne didn't get a chance to study it further before the younger girl hid it
behind a sigh. "All right, but it won't work," she told Cologne.
"Don't be so pessimistic, Rana," Akane encourage. "It could work!"
"Let's begin," said Cologne. They were in the dojo and there were two
stools behind Rana and Akane. "Rana, you sit down on the stool to the
right, and Akane, you on the left. I'm going to press certain pressure
points on both of your heads. The one I'll touch on Rana's will make her
receptive to memories, while the one I'll touch on Akane's will allow her
to give impressions of her own memories of Ranma. Therefore, the impressions of Akane's memories should break down the barrier that is preventing Rana from
remembering her past as Ranma, and the lost memories will return." Both Rana and
Akane absorbed this and went to sit on their respective stools.
"Akane, you start thinking about Ranma, preferably good memories as bad
ones may just do more harm than good. Rana, you just sit there. You might
get a bit dizzy, but it will pass," Cologne instructed as she got into her
place behind the two of them. "Ready?" When both girls nodded she touched
the pressure points on each of their heads. As time passed, auras began to
form around Rana, Cologne and Akane; to show that it was working. As the
procedure began to end, the auras died down.
"Well," asked Akane hopefully. "Did it work?"
"No," muttered Rana, a bit angry that Akane wanted her gone so badly. She was only a bit angry because she knew that she only existed due to the loss of
another, and that she would 'technically' still be alive as she would still have
the memories of her time as Rana, but she knew it wouldn't be the same.
Cologne sighed in exasperation. "We've tried more than one technique to
get your memory back. One or two failures I could understand, but five?
There must be something preventing these techniques from working," Cologne
explained.
"I am."
Both Cologne and Akane turned in surprise to look at Rana.
It ended up being Akane who asked the question that was on both of their
minds.
"Why?" Akane was shocked at this simple two word statement. So shocked
that she never even got the instinctive impulse to use violence. She simply
felt betrayed.
Rana looked a bit nervous and bit her lip. She hadn't meant to say that,
but she was tired of going through all of these techniques that she knew
wouldn't work; so when a golden opportunity, such as Cologne's innocent
statement, happened it just slipped out.
"I don't know all of the details, only the ones that were in the tiny
memories I have left." Rana took a deep breath and continued. "While Ranma
was in the coma, he was still aware. He began thinking over his life and
how he wished he could change certain things. Eventually, he got
bored and started experimenting what he could do. After fooling around a bit
he realized that he could block out memories."
Rana paused here, trying to gauge their reactions. While Cologne was
listening intently, it was impossible to tell what she was thinking. Akane
seemed to be at a loss for what to do. She seemed to be enraged, confused
and betrayed all at once and she didn't know how to react. The amnesiac
girl continued her tale, hoping that it wouldn't cost her the small
friendship that she had with Akane.
"He was planning on just blocking out bad memories. I guess one of them
would've been all of his Neko-ken experiences as they must've been horrid,
but I don't remember exactly which memories he wanted to get rid of. As he
tried doing this, he discovered that his bad memories were intertwined with
his good ones. I'm not exactly sure how he did it, but he blocked every
single memory that he had except a certain few."[2]
Rana stopped here, and when it became apparent that she didn't intend on
saying any more, Cologne spoke up. "And what memories were they?"
The young girl looked a bit uncomfortable with the question but answered
anyway. "He let me have memories of performing his attacks, and how he did them, so that I could do them too. He also gave me the basics on how to
maintain, put up and take down the memory block." Rana was about to stop
there, when she realized that Akane might assume a certain little fact from
her little 'speech'. "But I SWEAR I never knew that he was boy, Akane."
This was said while looking at the other girl.
What Rana didn't know was that that was the farthest thing from Akane's
mind. She was feeling anger at Ranma for running away from everything like
that; sadness, knowing that she had probably been part of the cause that
drove Ranma away; betrayal that her friend hadn't told her about all of
this; and a bit of understanding for what the girl must be going through by
telling her this. Only the anger and betrayal showed through though, and
they were directed at a certain young redhead.
"You mean you can bring him back?" hissed Akane. It was one of the things
that stuck out in her mind from Rana's monologue. Right now, she needed
something she could let out her pent up frustration and anger on.
The question was like a slap to Rana's face. "You truly hate me that
much?" It was a rhetorical question that Rana knew would not be answered.
She turned her head to the side and answered Akane's question instead.
"Yes."
Akane barely heard the response though. When she saw the look and Rana's
face after she asked the question her mind reeled. She felt like dirt for
saying something like that to this girl who just wanted to be accepted. Who
had obviously opened up her heart and told them the truth, when she
could've simply let the matter slide with no one knowing the wiser. As Rana
asked her rhetorical question, Akane felt her heart wrench. She no longer
cared about the answer Rana had given as tears began to flow down the
redhead's cheek.
Rana was surprised when she felt Akane's arms wrap around her, drawing her into a comforting hug. That's when she heard Akane's apology.
"I'm so sorry, Rana. I always used to yell at Ranma for being an
insensitive jerk, but it looks like I'm no better. I shouldn't have asked
that. I'm so sorry." Akane was whispering as her own tears began to fall,
as her guilt of this matter, and the sadness of perhaps having pushed Ranma
away, was released.
Rana's quiet tears turned to wracking sobs. "It's not your fault, Akane.
It's Ranma's. I hate him! I hate him for doing this to me, to you, to
Ucchan... to everybody! Why couldn't he deal with his own problems instead of
dumping them on others?"
Akane remained silent, letting the girl rant on, so that she could get it
out of her system. She also didn't know whether to argue on Ranma's behalf
or to agree with Rana. It turns out she didn't have to do either.
As Rana's sobs died down, she began to talk again. "I guess that I don't
truly hate Ranma, so much as I pity him. His life must've been really hard
if he resorted to such a desperate measure. From what you told me, he never
seemed to give up. Why would he do so then? I wish he were a different
person instead of the real me so that I could ask him for answers to my
questions."
"Don't put yourself down. He's not the 'real' you, just another part of
'you'. You're no less real then he was. And you have something in your
favour that he didn't have."
"What's that Akane?" asked Rana in a shaking voice, still feeling spent
from her recent crying.
"You actually think things through. Like right now, after saying all that
bad stuff about Ranma, you thought about it some more and realized what you
truly felt about him. Most people would've left it at their initial
impression, Ranma included. In fact, me included." Akane felt a bit
remorseful at this fact, thinking about how she always thought of Ranma as
a pervert due to her initial meeting with his male form, no matter how many
times he proved he wasn't afterwards.
Rana stepped out of the hug, and looked up at Akane, her eyes still red
from crying, and her face still bearing the tear tracks from not so long
ago. But there was a smile on her face.
"Thank-you, Akane. I really needed that." Rana bit her lip, "I really
thought that you would hate me when you found out."
Once again, Akane felt terrible. "I'm sorry that I made you think that,
Rana. I guess I did get a little cold-hearted in my determination to get
your memory back. I'm so selfish." All of the bad character traits that
Akane had hidden from herself were slamming into her brain and giving her
sudden, but perhaps only temporary, insight onto what she was really
like.[3]
"It's all right, Akane. Well, actually, it's not, but I understand where
you were coming from. It hurts that you wanted me gone, but I know that
wasn't your intent. You wanted Ranma here. It was just that for that to
happen, I would have to go. I want you to promise me something, Akane."
"What? What do you want me to promise you?"
Rana's face was utterly serious. "I want you to promise me that you'll
never go out of your way again to get my memories back. Same goes for you,
Cologne."
Cologne, who had been simply off to the side listening thought about it.
Ranma was technically 'dead', for now any ways, and this wasn't the same
girl that had defeated Shampoo, so the Kiss of Death didn't count either.
And to restore Rana's memories would 'kill' her. How could this work in her
advantage?
"I will promise never to go out of my way to restore your memories, if you will agree to help out the Amazon village of Nijiezu if it needs your
help."
"Nijiezu? What's that?" asked Rana.
"Nijiezu is the village that Shampoo and myself come from."
"Very well. If your village ever needs my fighting skills, I will help
you," Rana told her.
"That's all I ask. And in return I will never go out of my way to cure
your amnesia. I cannot talk for Shampoo or the others though," responded
Cologne.
"I cannot ask you for anymore. How about you Akane?" Rana was relieved
that Cologne agreed and hoped that she would convince Shampoo to follow
suit.
"I... I guess so. I couldn't really do much on my own any ways. So it's not
much of a promise." A thought dawned on Akane. "This also means that we
can't try to unlock your curse anymore too, doesn't it, as that could
revive your memories?"
"Bingo," Rana paused for a moment, "Although, even I don't know why the
curse isn't working. I'm almost positive that that wasn't Ranma's doing."
"Well, as interesting as this conversation is getting, I must be off,"
Cologne said as she started towards the door. "The rush hour is coming and
I mustn't leave Shampoo there all alone for it." Having said her piece, the
ancient amazon left.
An uncomfortable silence descended over the dojo after she left. Neither
Rana nor Akane knew what to say, so they looked around and fidgeted. That's
when Kasumi came in, holding a little black piglet with a black and yellow
bandanna around its neck.
"I found P-chan wondering around in the yard and thought you might like to
see him Akane," said Kasumi, her smile perfectly in its place.
"P-chan!" Akane squealed as she picked up her pet. She hadn't seen him
since the day of the fall...
Kasumi's smile got even brighter, if that's possible, when she saw how
happy her little sister was. She looked up and saw Rana looking at the
piglet with a huge smile on her face and telling Akane how cute he was. 'I
guess the memory technique didn't work..." she thought and _ALMOST_ let her
smile drop. Almost, mind you.
Meanwhile, P-chan AKA Ryouga was thinking along the lines of, 'Has Ranma
gone crazy?' At first he had been happy(sort of) that his rival was still
alive after all of the injuries he went through. But now he wasn't sure
what to think so he listened to what he thought was Ranma rambling on.
"What a cute little, piglet! Did you say his name was P-chan? That's an
adorable name! And where did you get that cute little bandanna for him? It
really contrasts against his skin making him look like the sweetest thing
ever!" Now that the little 'crisis' was over, Rana was back to her usual
bubbly, childish self.
"He had the bandanna when I found him. I have a theory about it actually.
One of Ranma's rivals, Ryouga has the exact same bandanna and neither of
them like Ranma much," Akane began.
'Oh no!' Ryouga thought. 'She knows!'
"My theory is that this used to be Ryouga's traveling companion. I mean it must get lonely, being alone all the time, so he found the pig, gave him
the bandanna, told him a lot about his 'hatred' for Ranma, which the pig
picked up. Unfortunately, he learned Ryouga's habit of getting lost, which
causes him to get lost a lot, too. Then I found him, named him P-chan and started to take care of him. Since Ryouga comes around here a lot, maybe P-chan can sense it so he comes around a lot hoping to find Ryouga. It explains
everything!"[4]
"Wow! That's a neat theory, Akane!" Rana said. "But why don't you ask
Ryouga if it's true?"
"Well, I want to have P-chan with me when I ask him about it, but they
never seem to be in the same place at the same time."
'Whew!' thought Ryouga. 'That was close. Waitaminute, "Ranma's rival?"
Isn't that Ranma right there?'
"Well, I'm going to go do the laundry now. I'll call you when supper's
ready!" Kasumi excused herself politely and went to do the laundry, just
like she said she was going to do.
"Can I hold him, Akane? Puh-lease!"
Akane rolled her eyes. "Okay, but if he bites you it's your own fault!"
"I don't think he'll bite me. I'm to cute to bite!" she said going into
super-deranged form to prove her point.
"Agh! I think I'm getting a cavity! Here hold him!" Akane teased.
"Thanks Akane!" What Akane didn't know was that Rana had more than one
reason why she wanted to hold P-chan. She did want to hold him because he
was so adorable, but it was more than that. Something seemed off about
Akane's 'theory' and she hoped that holding him would show her what it was.
When she tried to hold him, he tried to get away, but that didn't stop her.
She grabbed onto him and held him tightly in her hands until he stopped
struggling. Stroking behind his ears she said, "Now that wasn't so bad, was
it P-chan?"
If Ryouga could've responded, he would've, but he couldn't so he just gave out a little squeal of half-hearted protest. She was rubbing a spot that
had been itching him all day, so he didn't really want to complain too
much.
***************
Cologne had been busy, meanwhile, telling her great-granddaughter, Ukyou
and the Kunos what she had discovered that morning. The whole story with
nothing left out. Of course, that didn't stop most of them from twisting it
to how they wanted it on their own.
Shampoo, who had never truly accepted Rana as she didn't like Ranma's girl side any ways[5], vowed to free her husband from his self-inflicted prison.
Ukyou had listened intently to the entire story, and wasn't sure what to
think at first. Like Akane, she felt a brief moment of betrayal, before she
decided to look at the big picture. The tears Rana had cried a week before
were real enough, and from the sounds of what Cologne said that Rana had
said, Ranma didn't want to come back. Now she knew what to do. She'd
protect the girl from any of the rest who wanted to harm her for what was
outside of her control.
Kuno was ecstatic that the cowardly Saotome had finally shown his true
self to the entire world by hiding away, and at the same time, releasing
his beautiful Pigtail-Girl from his evil spells.
Kodachi thought that there had been a demoness within the curse that had
now taken over her Ranma-sama, and was trying to fool them all with this
amnesia story while she tortured Ranma from within, and that it was her
destiny to destroy it.
When all the others had left, Shampoo went up to her room to retrieve her
bonbori. Mousse saw her and asked what was wrong. Shampoo, still too
distressed over the recent events, quickly filled in Mousse who had been
out of the loophole since The Fall. He decided that if Shampoo was going to
fight this 'Rana'(who was obviously just Ranma trying to fool them all),
then he would fight alongside her.
In short, they were all, once again, heading towards the Tendo Dojo to
'help' the one they loved.
Cologne sighed as she saw all of the reactions. 'At least Kuno and Ukyou
didn't seem to want to kill her,' she thought as she started to take care
of the few after-dinner-rush customers that were around.
***************
Rana and Akane were still in the dojo talking. At the moment they were
talking about Rana's upcoming return to Furinkan High. P-chan was in Rana's
lap, still being petted. That's when Ukyou rushed in.
"Ranchan! Cologne just told us about what happened earlier and I think
some of the others are out for blood!" she panted, out of breath from her
super-fast paced race to the Tendo Dojo from the Nekohanten.
"Who exactly, Ucchan?" asked Rana as she placed P-chan on the floor so she could stand up.
"Shampoo and Kodachi. I think Kuno was actually glad to hear what
happened." She sounded a bit disgusted by the last bit.
"What did you think, Ucchan?" asked Rana. Akane could tell that Ukyou's
response would mean a lot to the redhead.
"I understand that you couldn't help what happened. It doesn't mean I have to like it, but I can't blame you for something that's not your fault. I
did that with Ranma and ended up on a 10 year vendetta, I'm not about to
do the same thing with you." Ukyou had caught her breath by this point, and
said the entire thing, looking straight into Rana's eyes so that the girl
could tell that how serious she was.
"Thank-you Ucchan," Rana said giving a soft smile, and feeling immensely
relieved. Akane gave off a sigh of relief.
"Get out here you wicked witch! Come out and face the Black Rose!" Kodachi yelled from outside of the dojo. She added her customized cackle to the end as well for added effect.
"Away, evil sister, before I smite thee for thinking about laying one of
thy wretched hands on the beautiful Rana! Have at thee!" yelled Kuno,
engaging his sister, totally forgetting he was supposed to give her time to
retreat.
The three humans in the dojo rushed out just in time to see Shampoo and
Mousse rush in. P-chan was discretely picked up by Nabiki who had heard the
commotion and come outside to see what was wrong. She brought him inside to
turn him back into a human so that he could get outside and help with the
fight that she knew was coming(the fight with Kuno and Kodachi didn't count
at the moment as they were always fighting each other).
Ukyou and Akane moved to take out Shampoo, while Rana moved to intercept
Mousse.
Shampoo swung her bonbori quickly at Akane, who ducked, and then used the
momentum to swing it around to hit Ukyou. Ukyou, who hadn't been expecting
the blow, was caught off guard and grunted in pain as she got knocked back a couple of feet. While Shampoo was still recovering from her swing, Akane did a leg sweep and tripped her up. That gave Ukyou enough time to recover and stumble over to Akane.
"Damn is she ever PISSED!" Ukyou muttered.
Meanwhile Rana and Mousse had begun their little dance. Mousse had opened
by launching his chains at Rana, who jumped over them and tried to kick
Mousse in the head. Mousse dodged and rolled away from the redhead. He
launched one of his exploding eggs at her, but she rolled under it, towards
Mousse, and it exploded harmlessly off to the side. She jumped out of her
roll, flipped over Mousse, and kicked him from behind, before he could
blink. He made a short yell as he fell to the ground.
Kodachi had knocked out Kuno, but before she could go to attack Rana,
Ryouga made his way outside and intercepted her. She lashed out at him with
her ribbon, which he grabbed with one of his hands and pulled it out of her
grasp. She took a hoop out of nowhere and swung it towards him. Ryouga
dodged to the side a bit too slow and it clipped off two of his bandannas
as well as a few hairs. He took in a quick breath, having been startled by the close call. The hoop returned to her hand harmlessly.
Nabiki watched all of this from the relative safety of her bedroom window. That's when she saw Kasumi hanging clothes up to dry. It seemed that the
other people in the yard hadn't noticed her, and Kasumi didn't seem to see
them as a threat. Nabiki tried to yell out to both Kasumi and the
participants of the battle of the danger, but none of them heard her
warnings.
The battle was becoming even wilder. Ryouga was throwing around bandannas
like there was no tomorrow, Kodachi was recklessly throwing both gymnastic
pins and hoops around, Mousse was throwing daggers and other assorted
pointy objects towards the general direction of Rana who was dodging full
time now, and Ukyou was beginning to get careless of where she flicked her
mini battle-spatulas. As she watched unable to do anything, Nabiki saw what
she had feared all this time. Ironically, it had been one of the 'good
guy's' weapons that did the damage.
Kasumi cried out as pain shot through her left arm. Her right hand
automatically went to clutch at the pain, but found that there was a
mini-spatula in the way. The second that Kasumi shrieked, the battle came
to a jarring halt. Everyone rushed towards her to make sure she was all
right, especially Ukyou, who felt responsible.
Nabiki jumped out of her window so that she could reach Kasumi quicker.
Just as she pushed of she realized that she was not a high caliber martial
artist and therefore could not land safely on the ground without injuries.
This forced her to call up lessons in magic from when she was a kid.
Thanking Mauduin mentally, she cast the spell she needed.
"Float!" she called out. A small ball of orange light appeared briefly on
her right index finger, and then her descent slowed until she was hovering
just off the ground. Quickly dismissing the spell, she touched down on the
ground and rushed over to Kasumi. Everybody present had noticed and stared
at her as she looked over her older sister's arm.
"Where's Auntie Saotome?" she asked.
"She... she went shopping," replied Akane, somewhat shakily. "Nabiki, did you
just... fly?"
"Yes, I did!" Nabiki snapped back. "With all the weirdness around here I
didn't think any of you would be so phased by me knowing magic," she
muttered, a bit sarcastically.
"Kasumi," she said in a much gentler voice, "I'm going to have to pull
this out," she indicated that spatula. "It's going to hurt a lot." Kasumi
nodded her head as indication for Nabiki to go ahead. She gritted her teeth
to prepare herself. Nabiki grasped the handle firmly, and jerked it back
suddenly. Kasumi once again cried out in pain. Blood began to flow heavily
from her arm. Nabiki tried to staunch it with a cloth she grabbed from
'hammer-space', but the blood soaked on through. Suddenly, her eyes
went blank for just a moment. When it passed she stood up and brought her
hand so that they were several centimeters apart. After a bright flash of
light, she was holding a green, oval rock with the label 'Mauduin' on it.
She lifted the Mauduin over her head and began chanting in the ancient
tongue of the Espers.
"Nacko tsiu chala ko Mauduin aniarev Terra jika tonk," Nabiki chanted. A
beam of light came from Mauduin and struck both Nabiki and Kasumi in the
forehead, then Mauduin disappeared. Kasumi stopped wincing in pain from her
arm, even though the wound was still wounded. In fact, she went over to
Nabiki, who had backed up a bit to give her room.
"Hello, Terra," Nabiki said, smirking a little at the obvious confusion of the others.
"Hello, Nabiki. Did Father give you the information you'll be needing?"
Terra asked.
"Yes, he did. By the way, are you going to let yourself bleed to death or
what?" Nabiki asked pointing towards the still bleeding cut.
Terra looked down at her arm and started. "Oops," she said, a bit
embarrassed, "I didn't notice."[6]
She clasped both of her hands together with the index fingers sticking out and started chanting under her breath. When the magical energies reached
their peak, an orange ball of energy appeared at the end of her index
fingers. "Cure 2!" she called out, and her wound closed, all traces of
blood gone. Everybody in the yard, except Kuno of course, was staring
dumbly at what had just happened, it being too much for their brains to
handle. Nabiki and Terra noticed and sighed in unison. A neat trick if you
know how to do it.
"I guess we have a lot of explaining to do, Nabiki," said Terra.
"You said it," she replied.
***************
Inside the house, Nabiki and Terra began to unravel their tale to the people who were sitting around the table.
"I am Terra, at the moment any ways. Soon, Kasumi and my minds will merge. My friends and myself were fighting an evil man from our world named Kefka. We were losing. As a last ditch effort, I cast a spell that transferred our souls into the bodies of people in this area of your world. We lay, or should I say laid, dormant until it was the proper time for us to come out. That time was now. The fact that Kasumi needed medical attention was simply a coincidence. We all have some magical ability as you've already seen," explained Terra.
"But where does Nabiki fit into all of this?" asked Akane. Terra just
smiled.
"I recruited her to revive us and to learn magic when she was young. I
knew I could trust her. There were other reasons, but I'll wait until my
friends show up so that I only have to explain this once," answered Terra
cryptically.
"Wait a minute, who and where are these friends of yours?" demanded Akane.
"As for who they are, they are my 13 friends who helped me to fight
against Kefka. As for where, I'm not sure, but I do know that they will
come to us."
Rana was a bit confused. "How will they know where we are?" she asked.
Terra looked over to her and smiled. "That's a very good question. You probably noticed that the green rock, Mauduin, that Nabiki was holding has disappeared. It left to go awaken the others. When Mauduin awakens their spirits, he will tell them where we are. It will be up to their hosts to get them here, however."
"Why would they have to rely on their host?" asked Ukyou. "Wouldn't they just take over, like you did with Kasumi?"
"Maybe, maybe not. The level of integration with a host, varies from person to person. I am able to take control of the body because I was the one who cast the spell. The others hosts will probably just hear my friends as a voice in their head," explained Terra.
"I see," said Ukyou. "I suppose we better prepare for their arrival then, shouldn't we?"
"Yes, we should," said Terra. "Let's get to work, then." They all stood up and began to prepare for Terra's friends to arrive.
End of Chapter 6. End of Volume 1.
[1] "You have ANOTHER method[1] to restore Rana's memory?"
I didn't include the previous attempts to restore Rana's memory because
I didn't think them up. You don't need to know what they are so I decided
to just put a reference to them in there.
[2] "I'm not exactly sure how he did it, but he blocked every single memory that he had except a certain few."
Some of you may have noticed this as a reference to Rana's 'angry
thoughts towards Ranma' from chapter 5. About him dumping all of his problems on her.
[3] All of the bad character traits that Akane had hidden from herself were slamming into her brain and giving her sudden, but perhaps only temporary, insight onto what she was really
like.
While Akane may now be able to acknowledge her faults, it will still
take her a while to do so enough to correct them. She's still going to be
the same old Akane for the most part for quite a while yet.
[4] The Ryouga/P-chan Theory of Akane's
I just thought this up as I was writing it, but it makes sense. If
Akane already has a Ryouga/P-chan theory going, she might ignore facts that
could lead to another solution as she believes she already has the correct
one.
[5] Shampoo, who had never truly accepted Rana as she didn't like Ranma's girl side any ways...
Shampoo actually says in the anime that she hates Ranma's girl side.
[6] "I didn't notice."
Terra doesn't notice the injury right away because she's disoriented
from being dormant for the last while and because she's battle hardened and
her wound wasn't life threatening.
Author's Notes: Okay, there may be a few things you're wondering about in this part. One of those things is: Why would Ranma 'run away'(block his memories) now? How come not earlier? Well, none of the other character's know, and that's why it hasn't been revealed. It will be shown eventually, but probably near the end of my fic, and knowing the pace that I write at, that may be a long time coming. If you are absolutely dying to know, you can e-mail me, and I'll tell you, as it isn't really that big of a spoiler. Another thing is: How come Nabiki knows about the Ryouga/P-chan thing? Well... I'm pretty sure it isn't said in the series that she does or doesn't know, so I'm having it so she does know. I'm using the JCIW(Just Cuz I Wanna) method.^_^