[FFML] [Ranma] Purr [Incomplete]

[DB Sommer]

[Writer's note: Yes, this is unfinished, but I had it sitting around for 
ten years, and figured that, in combination with a nasty case of 
writer's block, I ought to post it.]

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Morning mist hung in the air, shielding the surrounding land in a light 
gray haze that diffused, but did not block, the view of the small valley 
before her. The moisture seemed to cling to her, cooling her off, though 
she wasn't hot to begin with. Everything was shaded in varying hues of 
green. Flora flourished everywhere, untouched by the hand of man. Thick 
trees, rich with foliage, formed a canopy over the valley with only a 
lake to that formed a hole in the forest.

Directly below her was the lake, turbulent from the heavy flow of water 
from the tributaries that fed it. Twin streams fell from the cliff she 
stood upon. They streams were closer to tiny rivers thanks to the 
excessive amount of heavy rains from the last four days. While the rains 
had finally stopped, the streams refused to acknowledge it as they 
flowed over the edge and into the dark waters below.

She stood at the edge of the precipice, staring downward into the lake a 
hundred feet below. Black as midnight, the surface reflected nothing, 
not even the diffuse glow of the sun that hung somewhere high overhead. 
Gazing into the distant waters, she came to realize that what appeared 
to be a lake was an elaborate illusion, which only now she was able to 
pierce. It was no simple body of water, but an eternal abyss with only a 
surface made of liquid to hide its true nature. There was no end to it, 
no place for anything to live in its dark recesses. But there was 
something there, for the depths sang in silent notes to her, craving 
her, urging her to enter its embrace and allow it to take all the cares 
and worries from her so that she could be free once again.

A shift in her foot caused a shower of tiny pebbles to slip from their 
precarious hold on the edge and tumble downward, drifting out of sight 
long before they hit the surface of the water. Her eyes were teary, 
whether from emotion or injury she was uncertain. Still she could see 
everything clearly, in spite of the water and mist. She sobbed as the 
abyss sought her out once more, begging her to allow it to caress her, 
to draw her in its loving hold. And as it whispered to her soul, the 
words came at last. “I’m sorry.”

Words were returned, but from behind rather than from below.

“No forgiveness!”

Hands shoved hard into the small of her back and then she was falling. 
The wind blew her hair back as she plummeted ever downward. Above the 
sound of the tumultuous waters, the abyss cried out in rapture that she 
was at last coming to the place that she so richly deserved. She could 
see the surface drawing nearer, and knew that once she hit the water, 
she would never return to light, and that she didn’t want to go yet. She 
did not want to yield all that she was to the darkness. There was too 
much to do. Too much she still had to say. She wanted to live…

So Akane Tendou sat up from her bed and screamed into the night.



Purr

All C+C craved for. You can contact me at:
sommert at consolidated.net

Standard Disclaimer: I don’t own the Ranma ½ characters.

More notes at the end.

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Every wooden step creaked as Akane made her way downstairs to breakfast. 
It was odd how only in her half-exhausted state of mind she noticed 
little things like that. There had also been other things, like her door 
being stiff and needing oiled, as well as the plaster starting to crack 
and peel along the bottom of the wall near the stairs. It was probably 
mostly just a response to whatever stimuli was happening around her, 
since she was so tired she could actually form little in the way of 
cognizant thoughts. What she needed was sleep, but she would not be 
getting it anytime soon.

The sounds of Ranma and his father sparring had motivated her enough to 
get out of bed and at least make in effort to face the upcoming school 
day. It was not as though she had been asleep, but she had been too 
exhausted to do anything other than lie on her back in bed and look at 
the ceiling. After the nightmare, there was no way she was going back to 
sleep that night, or maybe even the next.

It had taken a while before finding the resolve to actually force 
herself into motion, but once she got up she moved quickly. The sounds 
of battle had stopped by the time she finished cleaning herself up and 
dressing. That meant breakfast would be served now. As she made her She 
hoped no one asked why she was the last one at the breakfast table. With 
the way she felt, she was uncertain if she could even manage a coherent 
answer, and there was no sense in troubling any of the others about her 
nightmares.

Ranma looked up the instant she entered the dining room. “You’re a 
little late.” His voce was muffled by the food stuffed in it. He had 
managed to get down another fired egg when he finally took a close look 
at Akane. “Hey, you don’t look too good. Something wrong?”

She noted that this time he had waited until his mouth was empty before 
speaking. “Just a little tired. I had some problems getting to sleep, 
but I’m okay now.”

“Oh.” His stare lingered on her for a moment before he went back to 
eating. As Akane helped herself to some of the remaining food, she 
thought she caught him staring at her a couple of times through his 
bites, but she couldn’t be certain. If they were glances, they were 
lightning fast.

“Your leg looks better. You can hardly notice the limp,” Nabiki said as 
she helped herself to another bowl of rice.

“You gotta be more careful when you work out. Next time wait until I’m 
back from my trip before trying anything hard.” Ranma’s warning sounded 
gruff, but there was an underlying hint of concern, or at least that was 
what Akane thought she might have heard. With Ranma one could never be 
certain.

Akane was interrupted in her thoughts when Nabiki spoke again, this time 
to Ranma. “Well, Saotome. Starting to miss your other fiancee yet?”

“She ain’t my fiancee,” Ranma protested, though with very little force.

“But you did seem concerned about her,” Nabiki said before sipping some 
soup. Her eyes remained above the rim to keep a close eye on Ranma’s 
reaction.

To Akane, it appeared Nabiki’s estimation of Ranma’s concern was on the 
mark. He scowled in thought. “Well, if what Mousse said is right, she’s 
been gone about four days now and no one’s seen her.”

“You mean you actually managed to have a civil conversation with him 
after the way he attacked you?” Nabiki asked. When Mousse came over last 
night and loudly announced he was going to kill Ranma for kidnapping 
Shampoo, Nabiki had decided to spend as much time as she could at a 
friend’s house rather then risk an errant chain hurled her way. By the 
time she had gotten back, it was over and everyone was asleep, meaning 
she had to wait until now to find out what had happened.

“Mousse was here last night?” Akane asked in surprise.

“It was before you got back from the library.” Kasumi replenished the 
supply of rice on the table. “He was very excited when he first came 
over, shouting all sorts of things about Shampoo and Ranma, but he 
calmed down after a while.”

“Once I let him search the entire house so that he knew I wasn’t 
‘holding Shampoo against her will’,” Ranma added. “After that he just 
got kind of depressed started talking. I finally got the whole story 
from him. Assuming he told it right.”

“So what happened?” Nabiki asked, her attention riveted upon Ranma.

“He says about four days ago Shampoo disappeared from the Nekohantan,” 
Ranma began. “He said it was the day they had off. The old ghoul was out 
of town for the day and Mousse had to go out to buy some groceries. When 
he got back, Shampoo was gone. After he put the stuff away, she still 
hadn’t come back so he went looking for her. He didn’t find her, and she 
didn’t come back that night. He went out to look for her again and still 
couldn’t find her. She still hadn’t come back the next day, so when the 
old ghoul returned they looked through her stuff and saw that nothing 
was gone. Since I didn’t get back from that little training trip with 
Pop until yesterday, this was the first time he had a chance to bug me 
about it.”

“Any chance she went back home?” Nabiki asked.

“He said she’d just gone back the week before. Besides, she would have 
taken clothes and stuff and told them she was going like she did the 
last time.”

“She went home? Why?” Nabiki asked.

Ranma shrugged. “I dunno. Mousse said she didn’t tell him either. He 
just figured it was to see family or something. She’s done it before. 
Anyway, after he got over the idea I didn’t kidnap her or something, he 
asked me to keep an eye out for her and to let him know if I see her.”

“Whoa,” Nabiki murmured. “It’s probably not some crazy plan to net you 
then, not if Mousse is asking you for help.”

“Yeah,” Ranma said quietly and looked to the floor. He remained that way 
for only a few seconds before his head shot back up and he looked at 
Akane. “Not that I actually want her around. It’s kind of nice without 
her breaking through walls and stuff.”

It took Akane a moment to realize the comments were directed to her. 
“Oh. Yes. It is.” She returned to picking at her food for a moment 
before loudly announcing. “I’m going to school now.”

“We’ve still got fifteen minutes before we gotta go,” Ranma pointed out.

“I want to get there early. You go whenever you’re ready.” Akane got up 
and left the table without another word. As she headed out of the room, 
she heard Ranma say, just loud enough for her to hear, “I wonder what’s 
gotten into her.”

She simply continued onward.

xxxxxxxxxx

“Hey, Akane! Wait up!”

Akane turned to see Ukyou break out of the crowd leaving school and head 
directly towards her. She was uncertain if she felt up to talking with 
her sometimes friend, sometimes rival, but since she couldn’t come up 
with an acceptable excuse to get away, she allowed Ukyou to draw closer 
until they were only a few feet apart. “What is it?”

Ukyou paused to catch her breath. “You’ve been a hard girl to talk to 
today, sugar.”

Akane found it hard to bite back the ‘That’s because you’re too 
self-absorbed to see I don’t want to talk to you,’ that reflexively came 
to her thoughts. She mentally chided herself just as quickly. It wasn’t 
Ukyou’s fault the day had gone so miserably. For the first time in 
recent memory Akane’s attention had drifted off in class so badly that 
she had ended up having to hold some water pails outside of class. 
Moments later, Ranma was doing the same. It was a nice gesture on his 
part, but even that failed to make her head stop swimming from her lack 
of sleep.

If Ukyou saw the mix of expressions that crossed Akane’s features, she 
gave no indication of it. “I tried talking to you at lunch, but I 
couldn’t find you.”

“I was on the roof. I wanted some fresh air.” Akane hoped Ukyou would 
say what was on her mind. Her head was killing her and it had been 
getting progressively harder to concentrate all day. Even going to the 
roof to be alone had only helped a little bit.

“Odd place to hang out.”

“Would you get to the point?!” Akane at last snapped.

Ukyou backed up a few feet and held up her hands in a warding gesture. 
“Hey, relax. I just wanted to see what you thought about Shampoo’s 
disappearing act.”

Akane’s features tightened. “How’d you find out about it.”

Again it was impossible to say if Ukyou realized the subtle shift or 
not. “Ranchan told me.” She was going to say more, but then a crane, 
bearing yet another large granite statue dedicated to the principal, 
made its way over to the location that they were standing. The workmen 
urged the pair out of the way and Akane tried to take advantage of the 
opportunity to give Ukyou the slip. It was to no avail as Ukyou stayed 
at her side. Akane stopped rather than have the chef tag along like some 
kind of puppy.

Beaming happily at Akane, Ukyou continued as though they had not been 
interrupted. “I think it would be great if we never heard from that 
bimbo again.”

Because it would be one less rival. Akane found herself wondering if 
Ukyou would be just as delighted if she disappeared. After the wedding 
incident, she found it very easy to picture.

Ukyou continued on. “You wonder what might have happened to that bimbo?”

“No.”

“What if some other guy beat her and she did one of those ‘Wo ai ni’s on 
them? I could see Pantyhose doing it. Having to be married to him would 
serve the little hussy right.”

Through gnashing teeth, Akane got out a, “Whatever.”

“Maybe she got trapped as a cat and is in a kennel somewhere.”

“Maybe.” Why wouldn’t Ukyou just shut up and leave her alone?

Ukyou nudged Akane’ shoulder. “C’mon, you have to have some idea.”

“HOW THE HELL WOULD I KNOW WHAT HAPPENED TO HER?!” Akane’s hands 
tightened into fists at her side, and she had to do all but physically 
restrain herself from grabbing Ukyou’s ridiculous spatula and slamming 
it into the chef’s head.

That seemed to get through to Ukyou. This time she backed off slightly. 
“I was just asking. What’s your problem?”

The trembling rage still affected Akane. She took a deep breath and 
tried to calm down. She succeeded, slightly. “I’ve been having trouble 
sleeping. I’m just tired and cranky. I’m sorry I yelled.”

“No problem.” Ukyou gave a cheery smile. One Akane recognized as the 
same automatic kind she used on customers at her restaurant, especially 
to the ones that did nothing but complain to her. The ‘sincerity’ of the 
smile did nothing to lighten Akane’s mood.

It was obvious Ukyou was going to say since more, when she suddenly 
stopped and pointed over Akane’s shoulder. “Look.”

She looked to see where Ukyou was pointing. It was Ranma, a good one 
hundred yards away from where the two of them stood. What was surprising 
was that he appeared to be in deep conversation with, of all people, 
Mousse. Unlike most of their encounters, neither one appeared to be 
agitated, exchanging neither challenges nor insults. The two talked for 
less than a half minute before they hurried off together, leaving the 
school grounds and into the street beyond. Akane lost sight of them the 
instant they passed through the gates.

“I wonder what those two are up to?” Ukyou did not wait for a reply. 
Instead, she headed off immediately in the direction the pair had gone. 
She had not made it more than twenty feet before she realized she was 
walking alone. “Aren’t you the least bit curious to see what that was 
all about?”

Akane’s eyes darted away from where they had followed Ranma and Mousse’s 
departure. “No.”

Ukyou considered that for a moment, then shrugged. “Whatever.”

Akane watched Ukyou half turn away, then stop abruptly and point above 
Akane’s head. “Look out!”

Martial arts instincts took over as Akane’s body tensed for battle, and 
she looked overhead. For the briefest of moments, it seemed that a blur 
ran across one of the cables that held the statue —that had still been 
in the process of being centered properly for its placement— and 
snapped, causing the giant two ton block of granite to shift abruptly. A 
sharp twang filled the air as the suddenly shifting of weight caused a 
second, and then third cable to snap. With most of what had held it up 
now gone, the statue danced in the air for a single moment before it 
began the inevitable downward plunge towards the ground, and the person 
beneath it: Akane.

Death: It was not the first time it loomed before her, wanting to 
shatter her bones into powder and send her brains spilling out her ears.