Hi all.
Here's Chapter 18. Nineteen's about 20% plotted, 10% written. You guys know
how slow I write. *BIG* thanks go to Vincent Seifert, Chris Rowley, Steven
Pirrone, HPackrat, Matthew S, Andrew Burton, Lord Talon, MWhaleK, and, of
course, Rumiko Takahashi. Thanks for keeping me on the track, guys!
Previous chapters (and some bonus fanart!) are now available at:
http://www.furinkan.net/fanfic/clan/
If you have older bookmarks or links, please change them to the new
address. I own the new addy, so it should be going with me from now own.
There is some slight lime content in this chapter...
--------------------------------
THE CLAN
Chapter 18 - Facing Reality
--------------------------------
"Drip, drip, drip!"
Akuji reached into the pocket of his vest and produced a pocket
radio. Smiling, he flipped it on. "Do you mind if I listen to the news
until you're quite done, my dear?"
Not waiting for an answer, he thumbed the volume up.
"And in other news, the body of the young girl found in the
warehouse district has raised more questions about the competency of
the police force. The commisioner has realeased a statement calling
for a national investigation into the serial killings. Police
investigators still have not released the girl's name, but they have
stated that the girl was a student at Umi-no-hoshi junior-high."
"Drip, Drip, Drip! Oh, that's starting to clot again. Shall I
work it around a little for you?"
Again, there was no answer.
"Hmm... It's just not going to bleed any more, I guess. Well, I
thank you, my dear. You've been such a wonderful playmate. And now to
finish..."
Akuji drew another pouch out of his pocket and began to pour
powder into the puddle of blood. After a few seconds, the dark, sooty
flame began to burn.
Hanging by its feet above the puddle, the body of Hinako
Ninomiya was beyond caring.
* * *
Nodoka sighed out loud as she turned the radio off. She massaged
her forehead in frustration. The body of another young girl had been
found in the warehouse district. It was a junior-high school girl,
from the description, but there were not many more details.
No matter what efforts she took, the raveners always seemed to
be one step ahead.
She heard the tell-tale steps of a man behind her. Soun was
sleeping in and Genma was working in the yard with the Hibiki boy.
The man's scent, Nodoka knew when he approached closely enough,
identified him.
"Tofuu-sensei," Nodoka addressed him.
Tofuu nodded and handed her a scrap of paper.
"I looked for references to the 'ravener king' as you asked," he
answered. "I have to be honest when I say that my library has much
more medical information than martial knowledge. I did find this,
however."
Nodoka glanced at the scrap of paper.
"Does it help in any way?" Tofuu asked.
She peered carefully at the writing, studying it intently. Her
eyes narrowed in concentration. Finally, intently, her eyes darted
back to Tofuu.
"I can't read your handwriting," she admitted.
Tofuu sweatdropped. Doctors did tend to develop very
'personalized' writing styles, Tofuu admitted to himself. "Let me read
it to you," he offered.
Nodoka nodded in relief and handed the paper back to him.
Tofuu cleared his throat. "I copied this out of a written
account of a clan war in what's now South Korea. It was a reproduction
of a reproduction of course, but I belive that the original was about
twelve hundred years old. I bought the scroll during a trip to Seoul,
year before last, because it described a certain set of pressure
points. At one time, I *thought* that the battle it narrates was a
work of fiction."
"It may still be," Nodoka cautioned.
"It might," Tofuu agreed, "but there are certain key
similarities. Listen: 'And it came to pass that the Koh family had
allied with an agent of darkness. Nay, the patriarch of family Koh had
bought the service of demons with the blood of a score of his women-
children.
"'Thus did Koh family attack the strongholds of our lord and
seek out our women-children as well. In the night of the third week of
battle did the eldest daughter of our lord sacrifice herself to the
monstrous appetites of the foul ones in hope that her blood would pay
for a reprieve from the fighting.'"
"What a brave and utterly stupid girl," Nodoka commented
agitatedly. "They should have fled if they couldn't beat the raveners.
All she did was sacrifice her life."
"Apparently it was a little worse than that," Tofuu commented.
"It goes on, and it's pretty graphic."
"Go on."
Tofuu nodded and continued to read. "'The next morning did the
patriarch of Koh and the daughter of our lord, given over entirely to
the dark spirit, break the walls of our stronghold. They sought out
the youngest of our lord's subjects, both male and female, and did
horribly sacrifice them to their dark god.'"
"Good lord! What did they do to her?"
Tofuu shrugged.
"'Then did our lord sacrifice his life to give power to the
mystic enchantment wrought by his mage. The enchantment did burn away
at the demonic army but did not kill them and two noblewomen cast a
second enchantment that caused all the armies of Dread Lord Koh to cut
out their bowels with their own swords.'"
"It's like a retelling of Athia's story," Nodoka thought aloud.
The mage and his firestorm to disable the raveners and two vampires
who forced them to kill themselves."
Tofuu nodded. "Now here's the nasty part, and I think it's the
reason why only young girls have been killed this time around. 'Now
when the son of our Lord did inspect the bodies of the fallen, he saw
that the armies of Dread Lord Koh rotted where they fell. In time he
came upon the bodies of Patriarch Koh and his sister. Both evil lord
and subverted daughter had all vestments burned away from them, but
their skin was neither burnt nor was it rotted prematurely as was the
evil army's. The skin of both was ashen with death, but bled streams
of red and black blood from severed necks and bellies.'"
Nodoka stared in revulsion. "It... It implies that the Ravener
Kings are some unholy mix of ravener and man."
"And that 'Ravener *Queens*', however they are created, can draw
the same kind of power from virgin men as the Ravener Kings can draw
from virgin women," Tofuu concluded.
"I would give a king's ransom to find out what happened that
night the princess ran away to sacrifice herself," Nodoka whispered.
Tofuu nodded seriously. "I've got a couple of acquaintances and
contacts who live around the area where I bought this. It will cost a
little bit, but I can start them digging for any local folklore about
the battle. Maybe an accounting has survived, somehow."
"Maybe," Nodoka assented, "But we must not let the events you
spoke of occur again. It would be... disastrous."
* * *
"Father, it has been three weeks since my last confession."
"Go on, Daughter."
"In that time, I have lied once and thought about selling Uncle
Saotome to the zoo."
The priest sighed at some length. "You always have such a
difficult time dealing with Mr. Saotome, Kasumi. Go on, child."
"I have had lustful thoughts about a man and..."
"'And', Kasumi," the priest prompted her through the opaque
screen.
"I... have also... fornicated with that man."
The priest was silent for several minutes. Finally, he spoke.
"Kasumi. Dear, dear, Kasumi. What are we going to do with you?"
"Father?" she asked anxiously. The priest could hear her hands
rustling slightly as they were wrung together in guilt.
"Kasumi," he stated firmly, doing his best to keep a calming
tone. "Thoughts and deeds like what you have committed are probably
the most common confession I hear. I just never expected to hear them
from you."
"I'm sorry, Father." There was genuine sorrow in her voice. The
priest sighed loudly.
"You're human, Kasumi. Temptation of the flesh is part of the
human condition. Do you repent of your fornication?"
"I..."
There were several seconds of silence, and then the sounds of
her hands wringing again.
"Kasumi?"
"I... I cannot, Father. No. I..."
The priest waited in silence.
"I love him, Father. I can't make myself stop loving him, even
if it is a sin!"
Kasumi heard a slight rustling in the other side of the
confessional booth as the priest changed positions. "You're such a
wonderful child, Kasumi," the priest stated with a quiet chuckle.
"Love isn't a sin, Child. You, of all people, should know that, don't
you?"
"Yes, but... but what I feel..."
"Have you ever heard the term 'marriage of the flesh', Kasumi?"
"No, Father," Kasumi said, curiosity replacing guilt in her
voice.
"When Adam and Eve first strode the earth, do you think that
there was a priest handy to conduct the ceremony that wed them?"
"I guess not, Father."
"People today are so casual about it," the priest said. "They
sleep together as if it were a party game and trust in drugs and
technology to prevent the consequences, if they even bother to think
that much about it. Don't you find that shameful, Kasumi?"
"Yes! Yes, Father. I don't think people should behave that way!"
"But you did..."
"I..." Kasumi gulped in hesitation.
"Or did you make love with the man you truly intend to spend the
rest of your life with?"
"Yes, Father!" Kasumi answered with an honest conviction.
"Do you understand the difference? Marriage and intercourse are
really the same thing, when you get right down to it. While both the
west and east have put quite a bit of ceremony on top of it, all a
marriage ceremony really amounts to is a public declaration of...
well..."
"Father?"
"Mating," the priest finished, his voice serious despite the
bluntness of his speech. "Do you understand what I mean, Kasumi?"
"I... I'm not sure. I think... I think that I might."
"For your other sins, then, your penance is twenty 'Hail Mary's
and ten 'Our Father's. For your sin of fornication, I cannot forgive
you unless you truly repent."
"Yes, Father," she acknowledged in disappointment.
"When the time does come, I would be honored if you would
consider me when you decide on a date for the ceremony for your...
*secular* wedding."
Kasumi started in surprise. "Yes, Father!"
"Good girl."
Kasumi gathered herself up and made her way out of the
confessional. Thoughts about the priest's words ran through her mind
as she grabbed her bag from next to the door of the booth. Uncertain
but feeling relieved, she made her way out of the church.
Kasumi paused for a second in the foyer to allow her eyes to
adjust to the bright mid-day light. With her new powers, it took quite
a bit longer now that she had so much more a range of night-vision.
She was beginning to understand why vampires were always shown on TV
to hate the light. It hurt their eyes if they weren't careful!
Outside, Athia was waiting under the shade of an elm tree, its
leaves just beginning to turn gold and brown. She rose gracefully from
the stone bench to join the younger woman.
"Are you done?"
Kasumi nodded cheerfully. "Yes, Athia-san. Thank you for
waiting."
"Your mother was Roman Catholic?" Athia inquired after they had
walked for a few minutes.
Kasumi nodded again, gesturing toward the shopping mall which
they were approaching.
"I must say, I find it surprising. Typically, Catholics are
vampire haters, if they even believe we exist."
"Oh," Kasumi exclaimed. "I'm certain that it's just because they
don't understand that we aren't really monsters."
Athia shook her head slightly at the girl's optimism. "So, you
didn't you ask your priest's forgiveness for becoming a vampire?"
"Hmmm?" Kasumi asked, partially off in thought as they entered
the mall. "Oh, no. Why would I want to do that?"
Athia suppressed a little smile. Maybe... Just maybe, there was
hope for them after all.
* * *
Once the two women returned home from their shopping trip,
Kasumi sought out Akane, who was sitting alone and naked in her room.
The door was standing a few centimeters shy of closed, so Kasumi very
gently knocked on the wood frame.
She could hear, rather than see, the twitch of Akane's wings as
the girl became aware of her immediate presence.
"How are you doing?" Kasumi asked quietly.
Akane turned her head slightly, looking over her wings at her
sister. Kasumi was surprised that the girl's expression wasn't so dark
as she expected it to be. As a matter of fact, there was a slight
glimmer of hope in Akane's otherwise numb-looking face.
"I'm coping. I'm beginning..."
"Akane?"
"I... I think I made a mistake, Kasumi," Akane said quietly, yet
firmly.
Kasumi blinked.
"I... I lied to Ranma. I betrayed him," Akane admitted. "And now
I'm paying the price."
"I'm sorry you feel that way, Akane," Kasumi answered seriously.
"I think that what Aunty gave us was a wonderful gift, even if it can
be inconvenient at times."
Akane nodded. "I think it is, too. It's just... I..."
Doing her best to act like Akane's wings were a normal facet of
her life, Kasumi sat on the bed next to the girl. She lifted her arm
up over the new joints on Akane's back and wrapped it around her
little sister's shoulders.
"Tell me, Akane."
"Even if it was all right for you and Nabiki, it wasn't all
right for me. I messed up big time, and now I'm going to be a freak
for the rest of my life because of it," she blurted out in a defeated
tone.
Kasumi studied the two pairs of feet below her pensively as she
composed her response. Akane was mostly right, she realized. There
were a few things that needed to be said, though.
Kasumi politely cleared her throat and began to speak. "Once
certain things happen, there is no going back. I... I have made some
very serious choices in the last few days. I may regret some of them
in the future, but right now, I am the happiest I have ever been."
"Kasumi?"
"Maybe becoming a vampire was not the right choice for you,
Akane," Kasumi admitted. "But if you spend all your time being upset
about it, you'll never learn to live with it,you'll never learn to be
happy, and... and I don't think you'll ever win Ranma back."
"He hates what I... what *we* are!" Akane countered, anger
replacing numbness in her expression.
"Then you must make him forgive you," Kasumi stated. "And you
must forgive yourself and learn to live with what you've done. I think
that you'll find that one won't work without the other."
Akane blinked, her eyes opening wide in shock.
"I agree with Nabiki," Kasumi changed the subject. "I belive
that you can somehow turn off your wings or hide them. You must learn
how to do so before you can go back to school."
"H-hai..." Akane agreed, dumbfounded.
"Look what I got for you." Kasumi exclaimed happily, her
expression lightening to her normal cheeriness. She pulled out a bag
she had brought in with her and began to rummage around inside it.
Akane looked on in dreadful curiosity.
Kasumi pulled out three rather clingy pieces of fabric. After a
few seconds of straightening, Akane could see that they were workout
leotards.
"I got them when I went shopping with Athia-san," Kasumi
explained. "I think that you can wear them. You can start training
again, and maybe we can find out how to make your wings disappear."
Indeed, the backs were open to the waist on all three leotards.
Kasumi handed one, black with red piping, to her younger sister. Akane
reluctantly examined the outfit. Kasumi noted with some amusement that
the girl's wings were twitching slightly as she thought out the
mechanics of putting the top on.
"Do you like it?" the older girl asked.
"I... I don't know." Akane answered honestly.
"Lunch will be ready in a little while," Kasumi told her. "Why
don't you try it on and come down and eat with the rest of us, all
right?"
* * *
Navigating the house with wings was quite an ordeal.
After digesting Kasumi's suggestion for several minutes, Akane
finally worked herself up to trying on one of the leotards. She could
step into the elastic outfit and pull the sleeves up over her
shoulders, avoiding her wings. After settling on wearing one of the
leotards along with a pair of loose nylon shorts, Akane took the first
few hesitant steps downstairs.
When she wasn't paying attention, the wings tended to swing up
behind her, the tips wrapping around her shoulders. This also clued
Akane in to just how sensitive they were, since she painfully banged
them into the ceiling several times as she descended the staircase.
They also threw off her balance in a way she didn't like.
Tripping slightly, not quite enough to fall, Akane wondered if
her wings would break her fall, or just *break* against the walls of
the narrow hallway.
"Akane-san!" It was Ryouga, surprised that Akane was up and
around. Just around the periphery of Akane's senses, she could
actually *smell* the young man's surprise. There was another odd scent
about him, but she just couldn't place it.
Startled by the sound of his voice, as she was recovering from
her trip, Akane turned her head too rapidly and ended up with a
mouthful of the bluish-black fur on her wings. "Bleh..."
"Hmm," Genma noted impassively as she walked past his running
shoji
game with her father. She did her best to ignore her father's
trembling and Genma's stares.
Ignoring only did her so much good, however, when Soun's
nervousness broke. "OH, MY LITTLE GIRL! MY LITTLE ANGEL! YOU'VE
FINALLY WOKEN UP!!!!" the man bawled, rushing to embrace his
embarrassed daughter.
"Daddy," Akane protested. "You're yelling in my ear!" Akane
hoped that she wasn't blushing.
"Oh. Well. How are the new appendages, daughter?" he asked,
careful to be more quiet.
"It's not like she just went out and bought them." Athia teased.
"Well?" Kasumi seconded her father's question, from her spot by
Athia near the table. "How do they feel?"
"Ahh... They don't hurt." Akane hazarded. "Unless I hit them.
I've done that a few times already."
Nodoka walked in from the kitchen, carrying a rice steamer. For
the first time, Akane noticed the powerful smell of steamed rice and
pickled cabbage. The aromas had been so strong that she had not
realized that they were food at first. Actually, quite a few things
were being confused by her new senses.
Kasumi motioned for her to sit down, so Akane took a spot at the
table across from Ryouga, careful to keep her wings out of the way.
Nodoka dished out rice and cabbage for everyone while Kasumi began to
pour tea.
"Itadakimas..." Akane whispered, diving into her rice.
"Little bites, Akane," Kasumi cautioned. "The flavors can be
overwhelming at first."
Akane nodded, and tried to slow down, but her stomach would have
none of it. She quickly emptied her rice bowl and munched the cabbage
despite its intensely overpowering bitter and sour taste.
"Would you like some more?" Nodoka offered. Heeding Akane's
quick nod, she scooped out some more rice and placed a large pile of
the cabbage on Akane's plate. The new vampire started to make short
work of the food.
Genma, seeing the food disappearing so rapidly, couldn't resist.
His chopsticks snaked out to snatch a slice of cabbage off of Akane's
plate.
"MINE!" Akane growled, popping her chopsticks across Genma's
knuckles. She continued to shovel rice into her mouth.
Genma pulled his hand back and sucked his bruised digits
appreciatively. "Girl's got spirit, Tendou."
Ryouga was staring, Akane noticed. It wasn't enough
embarrassment to keep her from stuffing her mouth with pickled
cabbage.
"It's because you've burned up so much energy in the last few
days," Athia said. "You're so hungry because you're trying to
replenish your body."
Ryouga nodded in acceptance. Her eating wasn't what he was
staring at, however. Akane's wings flexed slightly as she ate and the
new muscles in her chest did... very interesting... things to her
breasts. They were swollen, their outlines clearly visible underneath
the black fabric of her leotard. Having been so intimate with Nabiki's
just the night before, Ryouga found he had very little trouble
visualizing them without the leotard.
That started him thinking about Nabiki's breasts, which led him
to start thinking about *other* parts of Nabiki's body.
He stared into his rice bowl as he ate and did his best not to
have a nosebleed.
"You would probably feel much more satisfied," Athia said,
ignoring the lost boy's plight, "if you were to consume blood. It
would do much to restore your body and your powers."
Akane's chopsticks clattered to the table. All those surrounding
her looked on in concern.
"I'm... I don't think I'm ready for that yet," Akane stated,
wiping a grain of rice off her lips. *I promised Ranma! I won't do
it!* she thought.
"So, girl," Genma asked, "will those wings support your weight?"
Blushing again, but grateful for the change in topic, Akane
shrugged. "I don't know."
"I think you could fly if you trained hard enough, Akane-san,"
Ryouga commented quietly from the other side of the table.
"Uncle Saotome and Ryouga-kun could train Akane!" Kasumi
suggested. "Since Ranma's away, she needs someone to train with. Since
Uncle Saotome has so much experience with vampires, he would be the
best person to work with Akane on her physical skills."
Genma grimaced in distaste. "Surely a girl like Akane
couldn't..."
Five angry growls cut him off. Kasumi continued to smile warmly
in his direction. Genma didn't know which was more disturbing.
"Okay," Genma mumbled after Ryouga's chopsticks turned to dust
in his hands. "We'll probably want to start with balance training to
compensate for her new limbs..."
* * *
"Where Ranma go?" Shampoo demanded angrily.
Ukyou, who had given up all hope of sleeping or actually
studying through study hall, glanced in irritation at the amazon.
Ukyou folded her arms over her chest and leaned back in her seat. She
couldn't help but smirk at the sight of Shampoo in glasses.
"Somethin's big-time wrong with him and the Tendou girls. I
dunno what. I think it might have something to with the monster we
fought. He doesn't usually skip class unless it's important. I mean,
he'll sleep through class at the drop of a hat..."
Shampoo nodded in agreement, removing her spectacles and putting
them in a pocket. She lowered her voice to a whisper. "Shampoo think
violent girl and sisters doing bad black magic. Maybe they put spell
on Shampoo's husband?"
"Whose husband?" Ukyou demanded in ire.
"Dead husband of dead bride," Shampoo snapped out, "if we no be
careful. There too too bad evil in Japan right now. Shampoo take Ranma
home to Amazon village away from monsters and violent girl. Ukyou can
come too if want to get away from monsters. Have to work as Shampoo
servant if you want to go."
"Riiiight... You just keep telling yourself that, China-girl,"
Ukyou snarled.
Shampoo sighed at length. "Shampoo think this bigger than one
husband. Shampoo think if either girl want Ranma, then we both fight
to keep him alive."
Ukyou's expression loosened somewhat. "Well, we've tried working
together before, but this *is* pretty serious. I think you're right. I
think Ranchan's in way over his fool head, and I *don't* think Akane
or Nabiki is doing anything to help. If anybody's gonna save his butt-
-"
"It is girls who care about him," Shampoo said. "Truce, until
monsters gone?"
"Truce," Ukyou agreed. "What about Akane, though?"
"Shampoo already said, 'until monsters gone'."
Ukyou couldn't help but chuckle.
* * *
"There's a crate in the back, Mousse," Cologne informed the
Chinese youth as he was wiping down a table. "Go unload it so that we
have everything ready for the dinner rush."
Mousse ignored her, glancing in the air as if a fly was buzzing
around.
Cologne bapped Mousse in the head once with her staff.
"Hmm?" Mousse glanced in the direction of the hit, not bothering
to stop polishing the table he was working on. "Oh, it's just an old
bulldog. Shampoo! Would you call animal control?"
*WHAM*
Cologne was far less gentle with her staff. Mousse lay on the
floor, twitching and bleeding from one nostril.
"Get to work, slacker!" she commanded.
Grumbling and groaning in pain, Mousse crawled to his feet and
began to make his way toward the back.
Cologne glanced around in irritation as the disrespectful youth
went to unload the crate. She was going to hop back into the kitchen,
but stopped as she heard a light footstep in the shop doorway.
"Muko-dono! Why aren't you in school right now? Shampoo's
waiting for you there, you know."
"Yeah, I noticed," Ranma replied, stepping through the door way.
"'S not important. There's somethin' really nasty going around town
right now, and I was wondering if you knew anything about it?"
"So you're not here to ask my permission to marry Shampoo?"
"As if, ya old ghoul," Ranma snapped back.
"Impertinent!" Cologne sent a chopstick travelling towards the
young man's face at a transsonic clip.
Ranma reached up to block, but his head snapped back anyway as
the chopstick hit. "Now that we got the formalities out of the way,
can we get down to business?" he asked in irritation.
Cologne's eyes narrowed. Ranma was fast, but not so fast that
Cologne could not sense the deception. He was actually trying to make
her believe he had been hit and was just going to live with it in
order to head off a fight!
Well, if Ranma wanted to be serious, then she would be serious
as well. She hopped into a booth and motioned Ranma to join her.
"This concerns the killings, I assume?" Cologne asked.
Ranma nodded. "Yeah. I found out that monsters called 'raveners'
are doing all the killin'. The old fart knew a little about them, and
I thought you might know somethin' too."
Cologne growled. "So the ancient evil is here in Japan," she
noted angrily. "You've actually seen one, I take it?"
"Three," Ranma answered. "An' I know that there's a 'Ravener
King' runnin' around too."
Cologne raised an eyebrow in surprise. "Amazon folklore says
that a single ravener attacked our village over a thousand years ago.
It took the combined might of all our best warriors and sorceresses to
ultimately destroy it. Even then, better than a third of them died."
"Lemme guess. They kept fighting it and cutting it down, but it
wouldn't stay down, right?"
Cologne nodded. "It was ultimately the sages and amazon sorcery
that destroyed it, by casting an illusion over a pit filled with
sharpened stakes. Even though it had already been decapitated,
disemboweled, and drawn and quartered, it finally died when it fell on
the stakes. Amazon lore says that the monsters will only die if they
somehow manage to take their own lives."
"So tell me somethin' I don't know," Ranma complained.
Cologne nodded. The boy was *sharp*. That was Shampoo's chosen
groom, all right.
"They hunt by smell," Cologne continued.
"Yeah, Happosai said so, too."
"Some of the great amazon wise women belive that they are not
truly alive in the same sense we are," Cologne added. "They attack as
a reflex, rather than by instinct or intent. They have no battle aura
or fighting spirit, and are almost invulnerable to ki-attacks."
"That helps, actually," Ranma said gratefully.
"Fire can usually disable one for a short periods. Strong acids
and molten metals such as lead or copper will disable them as well.
Just as soon as it cools down enough, though..."
"That's nasty," Ranma commented. "Anything else? Like the
'Ravener King'. Looks like a real guy, but is actually a ravener."
Cologne shook her head. "I have heard legends and myths of dark
'sorcerers' who could control the raveners to some degree, but if this
'Ravener King' actually exists, I know nothing of it.
"Do they have any relationships to vampires?" Ranma asked
innocently.
Muko-dono was sharp in battle, but he had a way to go with his
social skills. "I take it you've seen vampires, then?"
"Huh? Oh, no. I was just wondering if they might be related
since the raveners seem to crave blood so much," he ad-libbed.
Cologne suppressed a sigh. For all his skill, Ranma could be so
transparent sometimes. "One of the worst sins," she stated, "as
dictated to the first matriarch by the Goddesses, is cannibalism. As a
matter of fact, in our religion, its evil is second only to murder and
rape."
Ranma nodded, non-plussed. "So what's that gotta do with
vampires?"
"You really are dense, aren't you, boy? Vampirism is the same
thing. Vampires drink human blood in a dark rite to fuel their unholy
powers."
Ranma nodded again, understanding slowly dawning across his
face.
"Tribes of vampires have come to our village before on
occasion," Cologne related. "Occasionally to recruit, but usually to
try to trade for our blood."
"I bet you didn't wanna give it to 'em, either, huh?"
Cologne nodded. "In fact, when such a thing happens, the entire
village mobilizes to destroy the monsters. Over the 3000 year history
of the village, we have collected the skulls of over a dozen vampires.
As a matter of fact, since a vampire is so difficult to truly kill,
they're among the most prized of our trophies. Are you thinking of
adding to our collection, Muko-dono?"
Ranma shrugged. "Has anyone ever tried to... *cure* a vampire?"
Ranma asked, doing his best to hide his intention.
"Well, since they have committed one of the three most grievous
sins, a true Amazon would never even attempt to cure one. The
traditional methods for killing them are usually so severe that I
really doubt that--"
Cologne froze, the pieces falling together in her mind. Why
would Ranma want to cure a vampire?
"*ahem*," she coughed. "Old lungs. I do envy the young
sometimes," she chuckled. "Now, as I was saying, the traditional
methods usually involve cutting out the heart and liver and severing
the head of a vampire. I don't think that *curing* one has never
really been discussed."
Ranma sighed. "Well, if you come up with any ideas, let me know,
okay?"
"Of course, Muko-dono! I really doubt you're going to want to
cure any of the beasts."
Ranma shrugged. "Ja," he said, rising from his seat and moving
towards the entrance of the Nekohanten.
As she watched the young man leave, she remembered Shampoo's
statement about 'black magic'. The Tendou girls weren't 'vultures'.
They were blood-drinkers. So close to her son-in-law as well...
"This won't do," Cologne muttered to herself. "This won't do at
all." Now, what to do? Cologne exhaled heavily, estimating Shampoo's
chances of taking out a vampire. If the vampires in question were as
inexperienced as Cologne guessed, her great-granddaughter just *might*
be bringing home a new husband *and* another vampire skull or three to
add to the collection.
* * *
- To Be Continued
* * *
Next time: Akane housesits while the girls are out, Ranma and the Nameless
girl have a chat, and Happosai bumps into an old aquaintance. ^_^
Rather than author's notes or an apology for the delay between chapters,
I'd like to take this opportunity to plug some of my favorite stories by
other authors. I urge you to read them if you haven't already:
'Taming of the Horse' and 'Centaur' by Vincent Seifert
http://www.csus.edu/indiv/s/seifertv/toth/
'Girl Days' and 'The Paragon' by Kenko ('Redheads' is okay, too, but I like
the other two better!)
http://www.ior.com/~sofaspud/ranmafics.html - I'm not sure where or if
'The Paragon' is archived. Robert?
'A Matter of Romantic Chemistry' by Jack Staik and Lady Tesser. Sometimes
their writing tends to piss me off, but I keep coming back to this one. Go
fig.
http://home.earthlink.net/~jstaik1043/rsrf.htm
'Magical Mystery Hibiki Tour' by Jaelle and Orla.
http://homepages.ihug.co.nz/~jaelle/ranmaindex.htm
'An Awakening of Demons' by Kagami
http://www.csus.edu/indiv/s/seifertv/kagami/
'I'm a Boy' and 'Ranma Monogatari' by Bridget Wilde
http://www.psn.net/~wildeman/bridget.htm
'Shinji the Casanova' by Strike Fiss
http://www.geocities.com/Tokyo/9110/eva.html
(God, I wanna write an Eva story, but I always get so depressed when I try...)
Read these stories and then email the authors and tell you how much you
like them, so that they won't stop writing! ^_^
C.
* * *
C. Jones - guilty@furinkan.net
http://www.furinkan.net
* * *
Stop the MPAA now before it's too late. - http://opendvd.org