Title: Every End, A New Beginning
Author: S. Mark Gunther
Part: 1/?
Summary: From batchelor to father; the ultimate reality trip.
Pairing: None yet.
Warnings: Language.
Disclaimer: This is Rumiko Takahashi's series. All I do is merely butcher 
it. All praise should go to her and all shame should go to me.
Archive: To anyone who asks.

---
"I only have but one regret in my life: That I was not able to do everything 
over. Life needs a reset button."

-- CrimsonX

I write, therefore I am.
I sing, therefore I am.
I desire, therefore I am.

"...Presence of people not for me,
Well I must remain in tune forever,
My love is music...
...I will marry melody..."


_________________________________________________________________
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-- Attached file included as plaintext by Ecartis --
-- File: EEANB.txt

Every End, A New Beginning
By S. Mark Gunther

     I guess it's my fault that she left. As much as I'd like to think it 
wasn't, as much as my friends here would love me to forget that it even 
might have been, I still know it's my fault she left. And it's tough to deal 
with. It's even tougher that I'm still here and thriving. It's tougher still 
that she declaimed that she would never love anyone else again, especially 
someone as silly and as childish as I.

     Normally people drive others away by being there too much. Overstepping 
their boundaries. Becoming jealous. You know, the little things like that. I 
drove her away by not supporting her when she needed someone to hold her. 
For once in my life, I just couldn't bring myself to do it. And she 
responded by leaving. She convinced that old monkey that it was time to go 
and the biddy took the bait. And just like that, I was losing the one thing 
I had always wanted.

     Sometimes dreams merely die. Mine always seemed to crash and burn.

     She did have the right idea, however. She left when she knew she was 
licked. She left when it was all over. She left when her honor had been 
extinguished. I, being the dishonorable bastard that I am, couldn't go back. 
And I didn't want to. Not without her honor and not without my arm around 
her. It was just too much to ask for her, the idea that she could love me in 
time. Hell, she was going to have all she could deal with when she got back 
home.

     And so I watched her leave. I watched her leave and she barely said 
goodbye. The old crone even said more to me then she did. And for that, I 
was able to give Cologne my highest respect again as a person. She at least 
acknowledged that I was far too good for her great-granddaughter. Or far too 
stupid. Whichever came first. She tried to make it sound stern and serious 
but the smile in her eyes and the sad look on her face told me more then 
ever. So it made it a lot easier to know I was going to stay here, alone, 
nearly penniless and without any marketable skills. Nothing that is, except 
my kitchen skills.

     At first I thought it strange that she turned over more and more of the 
cooking duties to me as time passed on. She passed it off by trying more and 
more arcane schemes with Shampoo to gain Ranma's hand in marriage. But soon 
she spent more time then normal with me. Her droning voice in my ear and the 
feeling of her cane against my back kept me learning but it was the subtly 
serious look in her eyes that teetered me on the edge. It both unnerved and 
delighted me that she was teaching and retouching me the skills I learned as 
a boy. But as I watched her and my love leave, I figured it out.

     The old biddy was setting me up for when she'd leave. She knew I 
couldn't and wouldn't come back to the village so she made sure I had the 
skills I would need to get a decent job here and start over. Her final words 
rang in my ears as I walked back to the Nekohanten to pack my things: 
"You're on your own now. Get a job, get over my great-granddaughter and make 
something out of yourself."

     The bitter rasp in her voice stung as I realized that she had 
jettisoned me in a hostile sea called Japan. And yet, as I went for my first 
job interview I knew I could do all right for myself. The chef looked me up 
and down, insulted me at my first demonstration attempt and then marveled as 
I corrected the mistake better then he could. I knew I had suckered him in 
just right. The job was mine and with it came respect and diligent study 
through work.

     I found the joy in work again. I felt good coming off of a shift at 
work. It was painful losing her and painful getting over here but everyone 
else in the kitchen I worked in had dealt with it. It made it easier to deal 
when I immersed myself in my work. Scrambling to pay my bills, making my 
money stretch further then I thought it could, all of it made me stronger 
inside. The iron in my backbone became tempered steel as the days and the 
months passed. I could deal.

     And it also made the times when I couldn't deal so much more able to be 
weathered. The long nights I spent alone walking the streets seemed almost 
therapeutic. I cursed the sky, the gods, my poor luck, and my bad eyesight, 
everything in sight. I cried in bushes and drank with salary workers in 
corner bars. I did the things only older men do and I hadn't even passed my 
18th birthday. So when the morning came when I realized that I didn't miss 
Shampoo anymore, that I didn't care if she lived or died, had children or 
remained frigid and barren, I turned a cartwheel and cried like a little 
girl. Tears of joy.

     Years passed. I went to college and got a diploma in Chinese history. 
Ranma and Akane got married and moved to Kyoto to escape the Nerima 
whirlpool that had formed around them. The shotgun elopement they had was so 
sudden and so downright unexpected that it threw everyone for a loop. 
Everyone except me, for I was Ranma's best man. By that time he and I had 
buried the hatchet and were nearly best friends. Soon I realized just how 
much pain was in this young man and I helped him mature and grow as I had to 
on my own. I found myself looking down the barrel of my post teenage life 
with more hope and optimism then ever before. By 23 I was happy and looking 
forward to going forward.

     Then she had to go and die. That bitch. That silly cunt had to go off 
and be little miss hero for the village. Apparently she had shacked up with 
some male who already had a fianc�e and got pregnant by him. While I was 
exorcising her demons from my life, she was bringing another life into the 
world. Her neck was broken as she confronted the woman for whom her child's 
father was involved with. She died to save her own shaky honor and the honor 
of her child and now that child was coming to me. The amazons did not want 
her, her biological father did not want her and so I became her father, 
pursuant to the suggestion of Cologne.

     I'm not ready to become a father. Shit, I barely am able to take care 
of myself from day to day! Sure I dress well, work hard, maintain a tidy and 
well-kept house but my internal life is a fly by night, no strings attached 
kind of life. A child, and an impressionable tomboy at that, would cramp my 
young male life. And yet...hearing that she was my former love's child made 
me thaw the part of my heart I had frozen over. It hurt to remember all the 
pain I had put myself through and yet knowing I was going to carry on her 
legacy was not the worst thing in my mind to deal with.

     She's coming today. My life changes today. Oh fuck I'm not ready...

***

     Mousse stared at the busy runway and sighed. He didn't know what the 
little girl would look like, what she'd act like, how she'd react to now 
being the ward of a man who only loved her mother. His hand shivered 
slightly as he looked at the people coming off the plane.

     "Feeling nervous, Mousse?" Nabiki said softly, her hand intertwined 
with his and adorned with a small diamond ring.

     "Yup."

     "I could imagine."

     "But that's all you can do. Imagine. I have to live this." A sigh 
escaped his lips as he noticed the last passengers coming off the plane.

     "Sure. But I have to help you with this. I mean, you did ask me out and 
became engaged to me and whatnot," Nabiki said glibly as she gripped 
Mousse's big hand in hers. As much as she liked to tease him, her heart 
melted for him as she gazed up at his reaction. She had fallen deeply in 
love with the Chinese male after he had graduated from college. Now, she was 
going to hopefully marry the man who had convinced her to give up trying to 
be 'little miss mess cleaner' and deal with her own pain. She knew that his 
heart ached and cracked and she longed to make it all better for him.

     "I know..." Suddenly, Mousse let go of Nabiki's hand and ran forward. A 
small girl, with a large cardboard nametag pinned to her shirt emerged from 
the tunnel being lead by a woman who looked very similar to Mousse. With a 
cry and a run, the two similar looking people embraced and smiled broadly. 
"I didn't think you'd come, Ai Xiado..."

     "Sure I'd come, Muu. You're my brother. And you're about to become a 
father. I wouldn't miss this for the world," Eyeshadow said with a broad 
smile. She handed Mousse the small suitcase and looked down at the girl with 
a smile. "Mousse, this is Po Xian."

     "You look like my daddy," Po said shyly as she looked up at the man who 
was to become her new father.

     "I do?" Mousse replied softly. Po shook her head affirmatively and  
hugged Eyeshadow's legs tightly.

     "Goodbye auntie..." Po said with a twinge of emotion in her young 
voice.

     "Goodbye little one. I'll be sure to come visit you as soon as I can." 
Eyeshadow looked into Mousse's eyes and smiled. "Are you ready to take her 
Mousse? I need to go and catch a plane."

     "Yes. I'll write you as soon as I get settled in with Po." Mousse 
smiled and clapped his sister on the shoulder as she walked off. Po waved 
and looked at the retreating form of her auntie as she disappeared. Then she 
looked up at Mousse with a childish smile on her face.

     "Are we going home now?"

     "Yes, Po. We're going to your new home." Mousse took Po's hand in his 
and walked down to where Nabiki stood waiting for them. As he walked to his 
fianc�e, Mousse couldn't help but feel like he was a child again, holding 
Shampoo's childish hand in his youthful fingers. Only now he was honoring 
her memory by bringing up her child as best he could.

---

Notes and Omake: Ok, normally I don't do author notes anymore because of how 
much I prefer for my stories to speak for themselves but I think this one 
needs an explanation. I was waiting up for my psycho mother to come 
downstairs and wash the carpet so we could move in a sofa and this fic came 
to me as I read Gendou Knepper's stellar work. I'm posting this as a spamfic 
but I'd like feedback on this because as much as this is a spamfic I think 
it has good quality. If you people think something good is behind this, I'll 
rewrite it and fatten it up. So you could call this a draft but considering 
how much people ignore my work I might leave it as is and go on with my 
other work. Thank you for reading this far.



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