A long despairing sigh drifted off into black emptiness.

"Protect the timestream," a voice muttered irritably. "Guard the princess. Guide the Senshi." Sailor Pluto, Senshi of Time and guardian of the timegates had long since moved past mere boredom into a state of deep ennui. Though there was little enough to do now, her time had been quite active just after the fall of the Moon Kingdom.

Oh, yes, she had resisted, at first... after all, her orders were to prevent manipulation of the timestream, not to engage in such practices herself. The boredom grew quickly, however, and since she was unable to simply remove herself from the timestream for the necessary period, as she had to watch for manipulation attempts by the numerous enemies of the Moon Kingdom, she was unable to escape it.

Until, that is, she had realized that she was quite capable of observing the possible futures while keeping an eye on the timestream. For a short while it had seemed almost like an entertainment program put on for her amusement. The terrible stress of the fall of the Moon Kingdom had ravaged her emotions and she had walled them off, hiding from the intense pain. With her darker, more painful emotions walled away, she was able to enjoy the lighter side, the humor of what she observed.

After a time though she began to once again empathize with those she was watching, particularly after spending some time observing herself. Oh, to be certain, she was well aware of the terrible hazards in knowing one's own future, but her boredom won that argument in short order. It only took a decade before she succumbed to the temptation to watch herself. Her emotional walls didn't last long after seeing her death in so many interesting ways.

With her defenses down, she began searching the future with a more deliberate intent, focusing on her friends and herself, for the future that held the promise of a long peace without the soul deadening loneliness she felt.

It was not long before she found Crystal Tokyo and she spent several hundred years tweaking, making subtle alterations to the world until the future line of Crystal Tokyo strengthened to the point that it took effort to even see anything other than its glittering spires in the timestream.

Boredom soon caught up with her again, as her attention was no longer needed to ensure the rise of Crystal Tokyo. She only needed the slightest attention on the timestream to detect a threat to that near certain future. She had been cautious and had deliberately avoided depending on her own abilities to reach that goal. Instead, she had designed things such that the stunningly wide array of possible futures remained, but the largest percentage of them by a wide margin led to that future, with but minor variations.

Of course, it did involve the destruction of most of the earth's population during a catastrophic freeze but that was merely a natural ice age with a corresponding rise in sea level. She didn't even have to do anything to make it happen; she merely had to ensure the survival of an appropriate proportion of the population.

That resilience had an unfortunate side-effect; her own growing ennui. Without the need for her constant monitoring and tweaking she had grown steadily more bored.

She had whiled away a few centuries by playing with events in different portions of the world to see how strange a series of events she could cause to happen without affecting the final outcome of the timestream. She had rationalized it as exercising her powers to keep in practice for when her princess reawakened.

For a while she focused on the lives of individuals, taking ordinary people and giving them extraordinary lives. That ended when her last effort, an assassin in feudal Japan, who had possessed a remarkable string of successes, gave up the katana. She had so enjoyed helping him that his incredible depression after the war finally ended hurt her deeply.

For years after she resisted the urge to meddle, but inevitably the boredom overcame her once again. She had then taken up future watching again, observing her princess and the Senshi in Crystal Tokyo in the different possible futures.

This closer look had led to a disturbing revelation. While none of them were truly lonely; they all had each other, after all; very few of the Senshi ever found someone to love, someone to live out their lives with.

As she looked on the relationship Haruka and Michiru had, she felt anew the deep pain of her loneliness. Watching as the Inner Senshi had occasional romances and the intermittent marriage with short-lived humans also brought that pang of loneliness. Even the short relationships they had were more than she and Hotaru, Sailor Saturn, had.

Their reputations were simply too strong; they were never able to find someone who would even try to see beyond their titles.

Briefly Setsuna considered the possiblity of a relationship with Hotaru, akin to what was shared between Haruka and Michiru, but when she explored the possibility in the timeline, she was horrified at the result. They had both had too much darkness in their lives, and though their shared pain created a strong bond, they drew each other down rather than lifting each other up.

"I wish I knew how Haruka and Michiru do it," she sighed. Thinking on that a bit further, she wondered. They were going to become close to a family unit as it was, though it would be some time before Hotaru became capable of that level of participation...

Ignoring the more unsettling implications in favor of the knowledge that in lives of thousands of years, a few years difference could hardly be a long term difficulty, Setsuna explored the possibility. Once again she was disturbed at the result.

They seemed polarized... it never really became more than two-way; though all six relationships progressed, it seemed to cycle; with Haruka's jealousy and Michiru's strong love of Haruka leaving Setsuna and Hotaru to drag each other down until Haruka and Michiru's guilt grew enough to let the two darker girls back into their circle. Angst and depression remained a disturbing constant.

For a time Setsuna despaired, until a thought finally occurred to her. Both she and Hotaru were basically unavailable before the founding of Crystal Tokyo. She would be too busy dealing with threats and watching the timeline, and Hotaru would be too young; neither would have time to search for a lifemate.

Yet, that time was one which held true hope for them both, for it was then that the possibility existed to find someone who would be able to see beyond their titles, for it was then that they had true civilian identities.

Setsuna was immediately cheered by the realization that searching for that potential lifemate now could solve both the problem of her and Hotaru's future happiness and even more importantly, her current ennui.

With an intense feeling of relief, Setsuna settled in to browse the timeline. "Focus on Juuban first," she muttered to herself. Even once she found the perfect target, she and Hotaru would still be limited in their ability to spend time outside of Senshi business, so it would be best if travel was not an issue.

Setsuna had been browsing the timeline, rolling it back and forth over a particular region in time, as she slowly expanded her search, when she came across a curious phenomenon. She was, of course, stopping regularly to observe a given time before moving on. Still, while the timeline was in motion, she was generally moving at a rate greater than a day or a week at a time. At such a rate, buildings were visible but people were little more than a blur.

It came as a surprise, therefore, when while scanning the timeline in the region of the Nerima prefecture, she saw a young man, clearly visible though seemingly transparent, with a brooding look of loneliness and despair that caught her attention. She stopped the scan of the timeline and the boy vanished. She moved more slowly through it and he reappeared on the roof as night fell. She stared at him in slight wonder. Why had he appeared even while the timeline was in such extreme motion?

Though his look of loneliness called to her, telling her that he knew how she felt, she ruthlessly supressed her empathy for the young man. The timegate seemed to be treating him differently and that made him a threat. She had to know why he appeared different in the timestream than a normal mortal.

So she began to watch his life more closely, advancing slowly, an hour at a time. She didn't follow his movements, leaving the view and perspective as it was.

"By the Moon," she said softly, feeling her emotional walls shatter as she finally realized why he had appeared so strangely in the view through the Timegates. It was not due to any strange fluctuation of time around him, nor some unusual power he carried.

It was simply that nearly every day for almost two years he would appear on that roof to sit and stare at the stars. Every night his look haunted her, though at times it was worse than others. It began, the first night he appeared there, with a look of loneliness and betrayal. As time passed the sense of betrayal faded quickly, replaced with a growing despair and hopelessness. By the end, his loneliness seemed to surpass even her own, as if in spite of living in a large city surrounded by people, he was even more utterly alone than she was, as if he had never known friendship, had not even the memory of better times to sustain him.

"He's cute," Setsuna said to the dark emptiness about her, "but he'll pull us down even further. Poor fellow." She thought then of the redheaded girl that showed up occasionally, taking the same spot on the roof. "He ought to get together with her," she said, thinking of the familiar look of pain on her face, then realized that they might actually be together. If their's was a situation like that of her and Hotaru, it could be that being together was holding them down.

Seeing them made her realize that she needed someone happier, someone vibrant, who could lift them both up from their depressions, ease the burden of duty they carried. "Would be nice if they could at least understand our pain, though," she mused. Setsuna had long since given up keeping her thoughts to herself. She needed the sound of her own voice to keep her sane.

She went on, putting the lonely boy from her mind as she broadened her search. She had completed her search of Tokyo and was considering where to look next, when she realized how foolish she was being. "Damnit, I'm worse than Minako's going to be," she muttered. "Just looking for a pretty face. I ought to start with finding someone who'll be able to survive the attacks in Juuban, since we have to find someone within that timeframe. Got to narrow the choices down somehow."

Checking the timeline for that particular time-period, she looked for any powerlevels that were on a par with the scouts. Starting near Tokyo, the first major match she found was atop a mountain in Japan. Watching the battle, she noted the participants as possiblities. She didn't watch long enough to see the change, nor did she recognize the redheaded girl. In motion, she seemed vibrant and full of life, and Setsuna did not connect her to the often bedraggled, always despondent star watcher.

When she came upon the battle with Saffron, she was astounded. Ranma, holding Akane in his arms, became recognizable as the boy she remembered from the rooftop in Nerima. She had just witnessed a most impressive display of skill, and power that rivaled Saturn's. Not as strong as her strongest attack, certainly, but it more than overmatched any of the Senshi's lesser attacks.

Seeing this, she dropped for the moment the other possibilities to focus on the boy. Focusing the timegate to follow him, she reset the gates to his birth and settled back to watch his life. She had time enough to watch several lifetimes worth before the Senshi awakened, though she had not intended to spend so much time on any individual. She wasn't sure she would spend that much time on this boy, either, but he had come to her attention twice now.

A smile grew slowly on her face as she watched his childhood antics. He was certainly an adorable little boy. Her smile faded quickly, as she watched his father sell the toddler, then steal him back. "How could he?" she ranted, "How could any father do such a thing to his son?!"

As she continued watching, she became spellbound by the exuberant child, delighting in his enthusiasm as his father began teaching him his art. She paled in anger when she saw Genma trick his son into placing his handprint on a seppuku contract. "What kind of father are you!?"

She watched in tears as Ranma cried himself to sleep a few nights later, and Genma, ignoring the boy's homesickness, simply hit him for keeping him awake. She marveled when after a few weeks, Ranma managed to put on a cheerful face each day and train with enthusiasm, even as he cried silent tears each night.

So it went, as Setsuna watched, unable to tear herself away, day in and day out, as Ranma grew, though he had not yet been born. With him she laughed and cried. Regularly she raged at Genma, cursing him with the vilest curses she could think of and planning vengeance on him. Whether she chose Ranma or no, she intended to visit hell on that damned excuse of a father.

Still, as she watched them head to China, she pondered on the look she remembered on his face. He looked then as if he had no friends, yet she was certain that he had viewed both Kuonji Ukyou and Hibiki Ryouga as friends.

When he fell into the spring of drowned girl in the valley of sorrow, she fell into shock. It shouldn't have surprised her so much, perhaps, knowing as she did of the Starlights. Shouldn't have, but it did.

When she watched the first meeting at the Tendo's and saw the offer of friendship extended, only to turn into insults and beatings, she understood the look of betrayal that had marred his features that first night on the roof.

When Ryouga and then Ukyou showed up to kill him, she finally understood the look of utter loneliness, of empty despair.

Then she saw him hospitalized again shortly after defeating the immortal Saffron. The family kept it from him, but they could not conceal it from her. She watched as the doctors informed the gathered Saotomes and Tendos that Ranma's heart had been badly strained by his overexertion in defending himself after falling ill from severe food poisoning; no-one having had the grace or decency to admit that he hadn't actually put up a defense against Akane's righteous wrath at his reaction to her food. That it would never be safe for him to practice the art again, a warning that they never passed on to him. Even gentle Kasumi agreed when Nabiki warned that telling him that might put him into shock and cause as much damage to his heart as overexertion would.

Nor could they keep the news from the Amazons. Xian Pu's reaction, while Ranma was still hospitalized, resulted in Akane's death. Before the authorities could respond to the murder, Ranma had been stolen, his memory of his fiancees erased by the shiatsu techniques of the Amazon elder.

Unfortunately for the Amazons, Ranma's memories of his best friend Ucchan had never really connected with the Ucchan who showed and became his fiancee, because her behavior was so completely different from what it had been. When Ukyou came after them and Xian Pu prepared to fight her, a fight that both knew the okynomiyaki chef would not win, he remembered his best friend.

Seeing his best friend from his childhood under a vicious attack, he defended his friend vigorously and though he did not kill Xian Pu, she suffered a broken leg. Kho Lon, who interfered, he slew outright. He used the Hiryuu Shoten Ha against her, a technique that she didn't even try to prevent, knowing it to be useless against one who had mastered it. Ranma knew this, of course, and did not set it up to be fueled by her ki, but by his own, and combined it with his father's Yama-sen-ken techniques. The tornado that formed was laced with vacuum ribbons and the elder survived no more than a few seconds. The strain was too much for his weakened heart, however, and he died even as the tornado did.

Seeing his impassioned defense of one he thought of as a friend, Setsuna swore she would not let it come to pass. She had watched nearly his entire life in realtime; she had spent a little over eighteen years with him, and all pretense of objectivity was long gone.

"I won't let you die," she swore through her tears. "No matter what it takes." It took several minutes before Setsuna realized how such a promise might conflict with her duty.

She wavered for a moment then firmed her resolve. She would find a way to reconcile them, she would find a way to save him that didn't involve the violation of her oaths to Serenity.

She wondered for a moment whether he would be compatible with Hotaru. She would save him regardless, even if she had to take him alone, but did she need to look further to find a lifemate for Hotaru?

"Hmm... he'll meet her at just the right age for a bit of hero-worship, and there's no question that he'll jump to defend her. He's shown that often enough." The more she considered the more reasonable it seemed. He would have grown tired of controlling, violent girls, and a gentle and vulnerable girl like Hotaru should fit well with him. She was actually, as she thought about it, more concerned about herself. "If he sees me as like Nabiki, I'll have lost before I begin..."

It didn't take her long to find the role that would lead to the right path. If she could convince him to accept his curse, he might even be able to make the four-way affair between the Outer Senshi work out. She pictured Haruka's response to the buxom redhead and smirked.

Thinking of that led her thoughts to the actual intended result of her plotting and she felt herself growing warm. She was a bit surprised. It had been more than a thousand years since she had felt true arousal without deliberate stimulation.

In all the time that she had watched him, he had never engaged in sex. Indeed, he had seemed merely nervous about it, even when Xian Pu draped herself on him. His reactions made Akane's cries of pervert seem laughable. The poor boy had never had the standard talk. In spite of the fact that nearly every parent in his time found that talk superfluous when they finally gathered the courage to give it, the one boy that had actually needed it never received it.

Her need rose suddenly as she pictured Ranma looking shy and nervous. She knew that breaking through his barriers of pride would be one of her first tasks but the mental image of a vulnerable and unsure Ranma was more than enough to give her incentive to find a way.

She vanished from the gates, appearing in her sparsely appointed apartment. Glancing about to make sure the maid was not present, she walked quickly to the door and verified that it was locked, then walked with long strides to the bedroom.

The moment she entered the room her hands flew to her blouse. It fluttered to the floor a moment later. She cupped her breasts as she sat on the edge of the soft queen size bed. She kneaded them softly, and moaned.

In her mind's eye, she pictured Ranma-chan, lying on her bed in a plain white cotton bra and white panties, looking the picture of innocence and uncertainty. Groaning at the necessity, one hand left her breasts to unfasten the catch of her skirt, and she lifted her hips to tug it off even as her other hand slipped beneath the cup of her silk bra to rub her nipple.

She kicked her shoes off, then with hurried hands rolled her pantyhose down, wishing that for once she hadn't worn them, her nipples stiff with need, aching to be touched. She pictured Ranma-chan's look of surprise as she tweaked her nipple for the first time and a spot of dampness appeared on her panties.

She lay back on her bed, assuming the position she pictured Ranma-chan in and returned to her fantasy.

---

Ranma's brilliant blue eyes widened as Setsuna's hand cupped her breast, but her eyes remained fixed on Setsuna's firm breasts as they shifted with her motions, hanging freely beneath her. Setsuna rubbed Ranma's breasts through the soft cotton, then stroked the underside with her fingernails. Ranma felt her nipples harden against the cotton and she felt a sudden dampness between her legs. Setsuna deftly unfastened the catch to her bra, and drew the cups aside, revealing Ranma's creamy flesh and dusky nipples. Ranma gasped in surprise when two long fingers took her nipple and rolled it firmly, sending unexpected shocks of sensation deep within her.

---

Setsuna sighed softly as her fingers rolled her stiff nipples, sending delicious waves of excitement through her, her bra lying discarded to the side. One hand moved down to rub her tummy in firm circles, while the other hand rose to her mouth, where she moistened her fingers, as in her fantasy her mouth descended to the dusky rise of Ranma's right nipple.

---

Ranma stiffened with uncertainty as Setsuna shifted lower, and Setsuna placed a calming hand on her firm tummy and rubbed her. Setsuna caught Ranma's sapphire eyes with her own crimson orbs, holding her gaze even as she lowered her head and captured Ranma's nipple in her lips. She licked it, flicked it with her tongue, then put her lips against it and sucked it in. Ranma groaned as a warmth swelled in her belly.

"Oh, Setsuna-chan," she moaned. She arched her back slightly, pushing her breast toward Setsuna, and groaned in pleasure when Setsuna responded with a deep pull.

Setsuna's hand moved lower, brushing the soft red curls at the top of Ranma's mound, and Ranma sighed deeply, then cried out in surprise at the intense sensation that rushed through her as Setsuna's finger brushed the top of Ranma's folds.

Her panties were quickly tugged off, and she spread her legs slightly as Setsuna's fingers brushed lightly across her inner thigh, passing teasingly close to her lips. Setsuna continued her teasing, switching from fingertips, creating a pleasant friction, to fingernails, grazing the skin lightly.

Ranma's breath quickened and shortened, and she panted Setsuna's name. Setsuna licked her fingers and ran one finger down Ranma's outer folds. Ranma's breath caught, and she gasped when Setsuna's finger ran back up the other fold. She moaned, then when Setsuna grazed her fingers across her skin just above her soft red curls, she writhed, the tickling sensation adding to her growing heat.

"Please," she begged, "please..." She didn't know what to ask for, didn't know what she wanted, she just knew that she needed something, needed Setsuna to stop teasing her or she'd go mad.

Setsuna smiled, and spread the smaller girl's folds apart, revealing the swollen inner lips, moist and red, a single glimmering pearl of moisture beaded at the virgin opening. She ran one finger around the inner lips, teasing the opening but not penetrating, and Ranma gasped and sobbed, writhing with a pleasure beyond her expectations.

Setsuna's look turned hungry and lustful as she watched Ranma's hood lift as the small hard center of her pleasure made its appearance. Dipping a finger in Ranma's moisture, she circled the sensitive bud, and Ranma cried out, tears leaking from her eyes as she sobbed in pleasure.

Setsuna dipped her head lower and blew softly across the moistened nub, chilling it. Ranma's hips bucked and, grinning at the opportunity, Setsuna blew again. As Ranma's hips bucked in response, Setsuna slipped her hands beneath her lover, grasping her taut cheeks, kneading them firmly.

She lowered her head still further, taking a deep sniff of Ranma's essence, and feeling her own petals moisten in response to her musky odor.

"Playtime's over," Setsuna said conversationally, grinning at Ranma's cry of surprise. She extended her tongue and gave Ranma's clitoris a hard lick. She was surprised when Ranma's body immediately began to quiver and Ranma screeched. "So quickly?" Setsuna neither let go nor backed off. She slid her tongue over Ranma's clitoris, slipping the nimble tip of her tongue beneath Ranma's sheath, then swirling the tip rapidly around Ranma's erect center. When she felt Ranma begin to subside, she nipped her clitoris lightly, and Ranma screeched again.

Her orgasm was far stronger this time, and she thrashed. Setsuna had a hard time holding on to her but she didn't let up. She clamped her mouth on Ranma's hot hole and licked up the hot, tangy fluid that leaked from her as she convulsed.

---

Setsuna finally slowed, her breathing settling down from its rapid height as she raised her hand from her dripping petals to smell her juices. Still picturing Ranma in her mind, she put her fingers to her mouth, and tasted, then sucked her fingers, wondering what Ranma would taste like.

She slept deeply that night, more restfully than she had since the fall of the Moon Kingdom, and she dreamed of a strong, cute dark-haired boy with a pigtail and a ready smile, a delicate, vulnerable redhead, and matching pairs of deep blue eyes.

Guiding the Future

When Setsuna awoke the next morning, feeling unusually refreshed, it took her a few minutes to remember the conclusion she'd finally come to the previous day. When she did, however, she sobered quickly. She still had to find a way to save Ranma, manage to get him to like her in spite of his experiences with Nabiki, give him an honorable way out of his situation, prepare him for living with multiple women in spite of the horrific experience he would be coming out of, all without violating her oath to Serenity!

Setsuna, her mind still focused on her challenge, gathered up her discarded clothing and took it to the bathroom. After dumping it in the bathroom, she turned on the western style shower and stepped into the warm spray. As she soaped her hands, her mind drifted to her fantasy from the previous night. She shook herself when she felt a sharp tug on her nipple and realized that she had begun caressing her full breasts without even realizing it. Fighting down a blush, she did her best to clear her mind, and completed her bathing with a calculated efficiency.

Turning off the water, she pushed her hands down her body, sending the beads of waters sluicing from her fingers, then stepped from the shower to the bathmat and plucked a towel from where it hung. She dried herself quickly, forcing herself not to linger over certain areas, blushing again at the feel of cloth against her nipples, hardened in spite of her intentions.

Even as she finally stepped through the portal back to the Time Gates, the blush still burned her cheeks. It had been a long time since she had enjoyed a genuine erotic fantasy. She knew better, of course, than to allow her sexual frustration to grow too strong, lest it make her an easy target for an enemies plans, so Setsuna was no stranger to masturbation.

She never lacked for material to raise her excitement before a session, either, as the Time Gates made no allowance for modesty or privacy. She still occasionally enjoyed watching Cleopatra's methods of seduction, while the explorations that led to the authoring of the Kama-Sutra were a constant source of inspiration.

As she settled herself once more into her perpetual guardianship, she began to tackle the challenge she had set herself, feeling excitement growing within her again as she once more had an active role to play. To be sure, she had not been bored while following Ranma's life, or she never would have spent the time on it that she had. Still, it was one thing to be a passive observer, and another entirely to take an active part in affairs once more.

Focusing her will on the Time Gates, she summoned her staff to her hand. In response to her intention, the Garnet Orb on the staff glowed softly to life, and the view in the gates rippled. Much as she wanted to have Ranma for her own, she needed to first see whether she could spare him some of the pain. She had already determined that she would save his life; could she do yet more?

---

Ranma grabbed the sheet of paper from his father, running off with it in delight. Seeing her son running while Genma chased after him, Nodoka smiled, and as Ranma neared her, she reached out and scooped him up. Her smile faded when she saw Genma's face turn pale as she plucked the paper from her son's hand. When she looked at it she understood why.

She set her son down, very slowly, then walked to the mantel and took down the Saotome family honor sword from its resting place. Genma shivered where he stood, wanting to run but knowing that he still had a chance to convince her.

She turned to stare at him, the katana held firmly in her two hands. Her eyes were burning as she glared at him. "You would force me to to raise this against my SON?"

Ranma sat quietly, unsure what to make of the sudden tension between his parents.

"But No-chan," protested Genma, sure he would be able to convince her. After all, she took honor very seriously.

"No!" She snapped at him. "Never! How could you even think of such a thing. To make me...," her eyes filled suddenly with tears at the thought of having to stand by her son as he committed seppuku. Genma quailed at the sight of her tears, but there was steel in her eyes as she locked her gaze on him. "If you demand such a thing from me again," she said, with a quiver in her voice that betrayed the strength of her emotions, "I swear to you, I will commit seppuku myself before I accept such a pact!"

Genma backed down. He never wanted to hurt her and the thought of her dead left him cold.

Ranma grew up without the Neko-ken and many of the more hazardous of his adventures never happened. He still trained with his father but Nodoka prevented most of the worst of his excesses. She failed to prevent Jusenkyou, however. Still, she was there with them on that trip and Genma had no opportunity to attempt an escape. She immediately stopped Genma's plan to go on and train at the nearby Amazon village. When the guide said that he had never heard of anyone being cured, she saw clearly that if the Amazons had a cure, the guide would have known of it.

Though the incident with Xian Pu never occurred, the meeting with the Tendo's went little different. Genma managed to ensure that Nodoka was not present at their first meeting and the curse of Jusenkyou brought rain as they approached the dojo. The course of events was nearly identical to the original timeline except that this time Ranma had never built up the extraordinary recuperative abilities nor the unusual strength that had resulted from Genma's exercises.

Akane brought the heavy table down on Ranma's head, as before, but this time, his neck did not stand the strain. He died soon after.

---

Setsuna shuddered as she realized that disgusting and stupid as Genma was, he had also been right about Nodoka's influence. With her influence, Ranma did not become nearly as powerful as he had the potential to be. Of course, he was mistaken in assuming that it would be her influence on Ranma that would make him weak, when in fact it was her influence on Genma himself that prevented the extreme training methods that had made Ranma so powerful on his original timeline.

The Garnet Orb flared again as she explored a different possibility.

---

Nodoka sighed in happiness as she watched Ranma practicing kendo forms in the backyard. It was too bad that Genma hadn't lived to see his son grow strong. "Ranma," she called out.

"Yes, Mother," he responded, by her side in an instant.

"Before you were born, son, your father made a pledge to unite his school of the art with that of his training partner, Tendo Soun. You were engaged to be married to one of his daughters."

"What?" Master Happosai bounded in from the outside. "Oh, yes, I had forgotten all about that. Well, how about that boy? Tendo's daughters are quite the beauties. Lucky dog!"

Ranma blushed lightly as he thought about what they might look like. He wasn't relying solely on imagination, of course. He was very familiar with the female form from his mother's training, and that of Happosai.

---

Setsuna sighed as she saw Ranma meet the Tendo's for the first time. He was irritated at Akane's initial reaction, accurate though it was, and used Happosai's techniques to increase her libido while suppressing her anger. With no available means of release she had quickly disappeared to seek her own form of relief, leaving Kasumi and Nabiki to his attentions. She was somewhat surprised at the speed with which he seduced them.

"He certainly knows how to please a women in this timeline," Setsuna commented to herself, rubbing the crotch of her Sailor Suit subconsciously, "but if he's already got a harem, why would he come with us? Besides, I don't think we need someone that manipulative. That could turn ugly in a hurry." Setsuna pictured Haruka and Michiru's reaction to some of the techniques that Ranma used and blanched.

"Still... if I make sure he comes out with the right attitude towards us, it might be worthwhile to get him some training under Happosai..."

She shook her head and the Garnet Orb flashed again.

Setsuna examined countless possible futures for Ranma. While she could make minor alterations, it seemed that if she removed more than one of the major events in Ranma's life, he ended up failing to reach a power level that would make him able to comfortably keep up with the Senshi.

She sighed unhappily. "I'm sorry, Ranma," she whispered, "but it seems I have little choice. I want you too much..." She sank to the ground, holding on to the Time Staff for support. "What will he think of me if he learns I could have helped him, could have prevented it all, and didn't, just so that he could be strong enough to love me? Will he hate me?" Tears trickled from her eyes as she considered the possibility that a Ranma with enough power to be her consort might be unable to love her once he knew what she was capable of.

"No! I will not let it end like that," Setsuna said firmly, pushing herself back to her feet. Even as she rose, a thought came to her, an idea that sparked a rapid chain of thought. She needed him to not see her as similar to Nabiki. "I'll find a way," she said softly, eyes shining, "to make him mine without interfering in his life using the timestream. If I can show that I never interfered, he won't see the need to blame me for what went wrong, not as long as I'm helping him resolve it."

Setsuna settled back into a chair that formed from the nothingness of the void that surrounded the gates. "Honor," she mused, and focused on the first of his fiancee's, Akane.

Her eyes darkened as she watched again as Akane treated Ranma as a possession. Roaming over their first meeting again and again, Setsuna came to the disturbing realization that she had just outlawed for herself the best tool she had. The simplest way to make him willing to break the deal with the Tendo's was to remove the initial good feelings he had for Akane.

She had heard some of his private comments later on and knew that Ranma occasionally felt that if he had only been male for their first meeting, it would have turned out far better, or if he had demonstrated the curse right away.

In point of fact, while Setsuna could engineer this, the curse would still put off the older girls, causing them to push the engagement to Akane, and she would treat Ranma just as badly, seeing him as perverted boy. The only difference would be the absence of that first offer of friendship.

She sighed. She'd promised not to interfere in that manner, even if she was the only one who knew of her promise or would know if she broke it. Ranma was at heart an honest person and so being honest with him would be important.

Considering Akane again, she was reminded by the timeline reaching a scene with a large maze that the engagement was between the families and not Akane alone. She needed to neutralize Kasumi and Nabiki as well.

An idea came to her and she briefly returned to her apartment, picking up a notepad and a pen before returning to the Time Gates. As she settled back in her seat, she uncapped the pen and flipped to the first sheet on the notepad. "Saotome Ranma," she wrote at the top. Two lines below she began her list of things to investigate. The first item on the list was "Saotome Clan Head."

The next day, having completed her research into his fiancees, she turned her attention to his curses. She knew he was irritated by his Jusenkyou curse, but she felt sure that a large part of that was because of the pledge to his mother and much of the rest was more due to the reactions of people around him than to the curse itself. It was really a three part curse and Setsuna decided that neutralizing two parts would be enough to placate him.

She turned her attention to the Neko-ken, though it made her ill to watch the training again, as the poor boy was wrapped in fish sausage and thrown to the cats. She steeled herself, focusing all of her formidable will, and watched stone faced-until he finally snapped.

"I wish I didn't have to get rid of it," she said sadly a while later, watching as Neko-Ranma climbed into Akane's lap and lay there purring. "He's so cute like that, but I can't have our consort unable to stand the presence of the Queen's Advisors."

Firming her resolve, she searched backwards through time. It took her several months but she finally traced back the technique to its first users.

She watched, suppressing the churning in her stomach, as a young man was lowered into a pit of cats. Even as she ached to turn her eyes away, she noticed several crucial details. First, the boy seemed far more mature than Ranma had been and she realized that the technique had been developed in a time when people reached maturity at a much younger age. The youth of the victim was far less important than Genma had intimated. Unsurprising, given his poor understanding of it in general.

More interesting to her was the framework the youth had been tied to before being lowered. She noticed also that he was wearing a protective facemask and a cup. The last critical detail was that when he finally snapped and gave his first inhuman yowl, he was immediately pulled from the pit. He was still well tied to the frame though she could see that small metal bars hanging down in front of his hands looked shorter and were cut at strange angles. It must be a means, she decided, for the monitoring monks to see if the candidate had formed the claws or not.

She moved further back in time to where the boy was being given his initial instruction in the technique. To her surprise, one of the first steps was apparently a demonstration, as a Neko-ken master demonstrated the attack style and the claws, slicing through a wrought iron grating brought for the demonstration. The Neko-ken master, though using the techniques she recognized from Ranma, seemed to be in control and aware the entire time.

She realized then that she had been mistaken in assuming that the student's achievement was the end of his training. Moving forward again, she watched as he was put to sleep with a pressure point. He was brought to a circular chamber and left to meditate. It took Setsuna a while to decipher the instructions he was given but once she did, she marveled at the utter simplicity of it.

As she watched, once the boy achieved a state of meditation, a cat was released into the pit through a hidden door. The boy instantly lost his state of calmness and fled the cat, eventually succumbing to the fear. This continued for several days, until finally the boy managed to hold on long enough to consciously reach the Neko-ken. His fear seemed to leave him instantly and he lifted the cat to his lap, purring softly.

Again this was not the end, for the process continued for many days, until he showed no fear when the cat entered, without needing to enter the cat state.

Shortly thereafter he demonstrated the conscious use of the Neko-ken for the watching masters. Setsuna smiled happily. That would certainly prove an incentive for Ranma; conscious use of the Neko-ken and freedom from the fear.

Several days later Setsuna finally sat down before the Gates of Time, the Time Staff gripped firmly in one hand. The Orb flashed once, as Setsuna looked to see how her plan would fare once she put it into action.

What she discovered left her stunned and breathless, but smiling nonetheless. It meant the end of Crystal Tokyo and though her friends among the Senshi on that timeline would never have believed it of her, the end of her millenia long dream didn't bother her in the least.

She had nearly forgotten, all those centuries ago, that the Time Gates could show the future but that she herself, being immune to paradox, was not considered within that future except where she consciously exerted her influence. For her powers could change the flow of time dramatically, and were the Time Gates to constantly show what the future could be given any potential action on her part, it would be impossible to gauge the effect of any particular event on the timeline amidst the wash of possible effects of her own actions.

So when she had searched the futures, she had never seen this possibility, not until she exerted her will upon it. The end of Crystal Tokyo, an idea that once would have sent the Senshi of Time into a frenzy of defensive actions, merely brought a soft smile to her lips. ---

Time passed, as it is wont to do, and Ranma was born. Unable to resist, Setsuna spent nearly as much time watching Ranma's life a second time as she did watching the unawakened Senshi.

When the time came for her first intervention, she reentered the world and brought evidence of certain events and happenings before a judge, using all the skill for manipulation she possessed. She left the court with a wide smile.

The time for the second step came. Setsuna entered a bar and made her way through the smoke and noise to where a man in a dirty white gi sat on a stool drinking sake from a bottle that sat on the bar beside him.

She took a seat and when the bartender asked her pleasure, she ordered a strong drink. Genma glanced to the side at the woman who had just taken a seat a few paces down the bar. She looked wealthy; why was she drinking such strong liquor?

A slow smile crept across his face as he scented money and he slipped from his seat to a seat beside the elegant green haired woman. "You look a bit down," he commented, congratulating himself on his smoothness.

The woman eyed him and for a moment he thought her eyes were red, then he realized she must have been crying. Even better. "Wimps," she muttered.

"Eh?" Genma looked at her askance for a moment before realizing that the comment wasn't addressed to him when she continued.

"They're all wimps," she insisted, knocking back a slug of the hard liquor. "I'll never find a good husband for her."

Genma's grin broadened. Perfect! "Oh? And what are you looking for in a boy, ma'am?"

"Strong," she said, glancing at him again before taking another drink. "A boy with a real backbone, not like all these spineless wimps..."

A few minutes later Setsuna exited the bar, a few thousand yen poorer, one signed contract richer.

Things progressed normally for a time, until the expected arrival of Black Moon Family. Without Sailor Pluto's actions to firm the future, the timeline that resulted in the expulsion of the Black Moon Family from Crystal Tokyo became only one of many possibilities. Without that extra strength, the Setsuna of that time could not send Chibi-Usa back through time, nor did Wiseman's attempts to move through time succeed.

When Chibi-Usa failed to appear on schedule, Setsuna became disturbed. She immediately delved into the time stream. She had grown used to knowing the future of the Senshi without having to watch it all the time, and as yet she had not made any changes that would cause Ranma to come in contact with or affect the Senshi.

What she discovered relieved some fears and heightened others. With Crystal Tokyo no longer the firmest future, due to the absence of her continued efforts at strengthening that timeline, it lacked the solid connection with her time that was needed for the transport of Chibi-Usa, Usagi and Mamoru's daughter, to the past.

Without that use of the Time Gates and the guidance of the Time Key Chibi-Usa carried, Wiseman was unable to transport the Black Moon Family back through time.

Pleasant a realization as it might be to see that the future for the Senshi now included a long stretch of quiet time, it was also disturbing. The quiet time meant that the Senshi were allowed to grow rusty, their skills stagnating. Worse yet, since Chibi-Usa wasn't there, neither was Luna-P, who would have accompanied her. Without Luna-P's influence and in the absence of conflict, the girls would not receive their new transformation pens and communicators, nor achieve their star power transformation.

The thought of the scouts facing the Witches Five and their Daimons without the experience of fighting the Black Moon Family, and without the resulting power increases disturbed Setsuna greatly.

In studying this near future period, Setsuna came to a disturbing realization. In the original timeline, when she had acted to ensure the existence of a single dominant future line, she had created a paradox where, because of the Time Gate's interaction with her self, those events which she had not fully examined, including the Witches Five incident, had created a ripple effect that eventually led to the future Setsuna warning her not to examine the future of those events.

Now, with that future no longer the main line, Setsuna examined the upcoming timeline with more care. What she found shocked her to the core. To be sure, the guidance and instruction she gave the Outer Senshi brought them closer together, but to risk the Silence, to place her Garnet Orb within her own pure Heart Crystal and allow it to be stolen to form the Holy Grail and risk Pharaoh Ninety's entrance into the world, all so that Mistress Nine could be purged from Hotaru and reduce her age... Was it really necessary to allow all that simply to try and give Hotaru a better childhood? Setsuna could, to a degree, understand her own reasons for the act, but surely it was better to ensure that Hotaru had a bright future, than to craft for her a bright childhood that would lead to a lonely future?

Finally the time came. The failed wedding was passed and her chance at Ranma was now or not at all, and Setsuna was beginning to realize that he had become far more important to their future than she had realized. Without his assistance, the Witches Five would be far harder for the Senshi to fight, lacking as they did the power and experience of fighting the Black Moon Family.

More importantly, Chibi-Usa was not present, so her Heart Crystal could not be stolen and absorbed by Mistress Nine, thus giving Sailor Saturn a boost at a critical juncture and preventing Pharaoh Ninety from entering the world.

Her own goal of freeing Ranma from his situation and capturing his heart had suddenly become far more than a mere personal task. It had become vital to the existence of the future, to the survival of her friends and herself. For the first time in millenia, Setsuna Meiou felt uncertainty.

Making the Play

Ranma slowly lowered himself to the ground, leaning his back against a tree. He felt tired, moreso than he had for a long time. It wasn't really a physical tiredness, though he had just escaped another long chase. The chase throughout Nerima, with most of his enemies and fiancees joining in, had become a regular routine.

What he was feeling now was more of an emotional exhaustion. Everyone around him talked about love, constantly claiming that he or they did or did not love someone. No-one ever seemed actually willing or able to tell him what love truly was, however.

He had thought, at Jusendo, when he held Akane in his arms and saw her lying in the peace of death that he loved her. He wasn't sure, he wasn't even certain what love was, much less whether it was what he was feeling. Still, he had known at that moment that he had felt a deep pain at her loss, and thought it might be love.

Now he was not so sure. After realizing that he might actually care for Akane, might even love her, if love was what he thought it might be, he had made a conscious effort to be nicer to her.

In spite of the effort he made to be nice, to avoid insulting her, she still seemed to mallet him at every turn. Twice in the last week she had malleted him before he even saw her and later malleted him when he asked why she had malleted him in the first place. She never did tell him why, and she continued to accuse him of leading on his fiancees and of committing perverted acts with them, even though he had given them the cold shoulder ever since they returned.

He hadn't eaten at Ucchan's or the Nekohanten since their return from Jusendo, but still, every time he returned to the house, she accused him of going to see them.

He had for a time wondered if Nabiki might not be deliberately antagonizing Akane while he was gone. He knew she'd done so before, and with Akane's suspicious and angry nature, Nabiki certainly had little enough difficulty manipulating her. He had considered confronting Nabiki about it, though he had decided it wasn't worth risking. Then he had overheard a conversation between Akane and Nabiki... in which Nabiki had been berating Akane for her actions toward him, and supporting him. That had been a shock and a half and had caused him to revise his opinion of them both.

He was tired of it, tired of the unending suspicion, the constant malleting, the interminable insults. It was really kind of strange... while the others were still chasing him occasionally, they all seemed to have cooled down. Even Mousse and Ryouga were nicer to him now, and their fights were far more like sparring matches than the angry brawls they had been. Of course, he still couldn't resist teasing Ryouga to make him angry. Ryouga was somewhat like Ranma in that respect; both of them were well able to channel their anger into constructive uses and when angered, they fought better, with more skill. Of course, Ryouga also tended to lose perspective at the same time and become a danger to those around him, but at least he could give Ranma a good work out.

The only one who seemed unchanged by the whole affair was Akane. No, that wasn't really right, was it? She's not unchanged, Ranma thought sourly. She's getting worse.

Ranma shook his head, trying once more to clear it of the depression that threatened to overwhelm him. Raising his eyes, he looked around the park. It wasn't the park he usually went to, in Nerima. He wasn't actually sure where he was, though he knew he wasn't in Nerima any longer.

There were a number of people there and his eyes quickly locked on a group of young kids, playing. For a time he watched them and his spirits lifted, as he remembered his youth, playing with Ucchan.

They hadn't just fought, though their fights had been regular and enjoyable. After their morning bout, they had sometimes been allowed to run off and play together. Ranma hadn't had many opportunities to play and he learned a lot from Ucchan. Hide and seek, tag, and other games that he'd never had the chance to play again.

Those had been the good days... before the Neko-ken. "The Neko-ken seemed to change more than just me. Oyaji used to actually smile sometimes, used to tell me I was doing a good job, before that," Ranma thought. "Afterwards, he just said I wasn't doing as badly. As if it was my fault the Neko-ken was such a screwed up technique. Baka oyaji." He shook his head almost angrily.

"Damnit," he muttered, "I'm supposed to be cheering up, not getting all depressed again." He tensed his legs and rocked forward to get clear of the tree, then rose gracefully to his feet. He was thinking about performing a few kata to clear his mind when from his new height he saw someone on the other side of the playing children.

She caught his eye because she had an almost wistful, wishful expression as she watched them, much as he imagined he had had moments before. He paused a moment, studying her, before suddenly tensing as if expecting a mallet and quickly looking away.

He strode away quickly, keeping his head down, but in his mind's eye he saw her still. She looked young, younger than himself, with short dark hair and a pretty though solemn face. She had also been alone, a fact that he really hadn't registered at first.

Lonely, that's what she had looked, lonely and wishing she could be playing like they were. He felt like that a lot and he wondered sometimes why he was so constantly lonely, surrounded by people as he was.

It didn't make sense, but then, so few things did. Girls, including his mother, school, math, the Kunos, the Amazon laws, Ukyou's sudden reversal of intent, so many things made no sense that Ranma had long since given up any hope of figuring them out. Akane . . . Akane most of all.

"Do you want to be friends?"

She had seemed so nice that first day, so open and inviting; the only friendly face he'd seen since long before Jusenkyou. After Jusenkyou he hadn't really expected to see any again. After all, what was he now? A freak.

Ranma kicked at a stone on the path he had made his way to as he remembered that first bout. "She always complains that I don't take her seriously," he thought, "but she didn't take me seriously then either. As if I was automatically supposed to be worse than her. Why would she think that? I had been on a ten year training trip and she knew that, so why would she expect me to not be as good as someone who only trained occasionally and didn't even have an active sensei?"

Two years had passed and he understood her no better now than he had when they first met. Can you really be in love, he wondered, with someone you don't know?

He thought again of that girl he had seen. He wondered if she wanted a friend, a real friend, as much as he did. He would have liked to have gone over and talked to her. Maybe he could have cheered her up. Maybe she could have cheered him up. Maybe he could have played again, as he had so long ago.

But he could not. He could not have friends, could not make friends, especially not with girls. His fiancees were too jealous to allow friends. Any girl near him was instantly a competitor. Not that it was so much better with the guys. He did not have any real friends there, either. They were all too jealous of his luck with the girls. That was something that he really did not understand. Could they not see how miserable the girls made him? Why did they envy that?

He thought of Ucchan again. I wish she had stayed my friend, he thought, feeling a hot, burning sensation in his eyes. He held the tears back, much as he wanted to just let go. Have to be a man, have to be strong, men don't cry. Not even when they lose friends.

Though he found his parent's insistence that Ukyou's engagement simply did not count because they did not want it to count to to be dishonorable, he had to admit that she did not have a true claim. Her dowry had been lost to the Gambling King before Genma ever stole it, so technically, her dowry had not been stolen; at least, not by Genma. That did not change the fact that there had been a verbal agreement and that was all the Tendos had, but the Tendos did have a dowry to offer, while Ucchan did not.

He shook his head sadly. He would never tell her that, of course. No matter how much he wanted to have his best friend back, he could not hurt her like that.

Ranma had some hopes for Shampoo. After Jusendo he felt sure that he could eventually convince Cologne that his defeat of Saffron was sufficient to allow Shampoo to return without losing face for not having brought him back. After all, they could not expect her to be able to kill a god, right? So they would have to accept that he was far enough beyond her that it was no dishonor to fail to capture him. He hoped.

As for Akane, he was growing daily more certain that she hated him. That was one of the reasons he had never taken more direct action to resolve the fiancee situation, even when he found possible honorable ways out. He did not want to force her into a marriage with someone she hated.

He had his head down in thought and so he completely missed seeing the woman standing by the park entrance in a well-tailored suit. Until, of course, he bumped into her, just as a passing car sent a sheet of water his way. Somehow she didn't get splashed at all, though Ranma was of course not that lucky.

"I'm sorry, ma'am. I wasn't looking where I was going."

He looked at the woman he had bumped into and was surprised to realize that she had green hair.

"That's alright," she said with a soft smile. "You look like you have something weighing on your mind right now."

"Well, uhm, yeah, kinda," replied Ranma uncertainly, fidgeting a bit when he realized the woman was looking at him . . . er, her, rather intently.

"You look very healthy, young lady, so I assume it's not a physical problem. Are you an athlete?"

"I'm a martial artist," Ranma said proudly, standing straighter.

"Oh, are you very good?"

"I'm the best," Ranma boasted, earning an arched green eyebrow. "I'm Saotome Ranma of the Saotome branch of Anything Goes Martial Arts," she said, then she blanched suddenly. Damnit, why'd I forget and use my male name?!

"I see," replied the woman, her smile broadening, "I've heard of you."

Ranma groaned inwardly.

"Doctor Ono praised your skill most highly," she continued and Ranma's eyes popped wide.

"You know Doc Tofu?"

"Indeed. He is a colleague of mine, or was, before he moved on."

"You're... you're a doctor?" Ranma sounded skeptical.

She nodded and held out her hand. "I'm Meiou Setsuna. It's a pleasure to meet one of Ono's students."

Ranma shook her hand but still looked uncertain. "How... how'd you know I was one of his students?" Not even Nabiki was aware of Ranma's studies in ujubitsu under Ono Tofu.

"He spoke most highly of you, as I said before," Setsuna responded. She looked around. "Would you like to step over to that cafe, and continue this conversation over a cup of tea? I would very much like to hear some of your stories first hand. Dr. Ono told me many stories but I'm sure there were many details he never learned."

Ranma glanced around nervously. The request had made him realize that she was in fact very attractive and the fact that she looked to be at least ten years older than him would not save him if someone saw them together. Still, the chance to talk to someone who knew Tofu would be nice.

They walked across the street and stepped into a small cafe. Setsuna was surprised when Ranma held her chair for her to sit in. When she cast a questioning gaze on him, he blushed slightly as he pulled up a seat for himself. "Guess Dr. Tofu told you I'm a bit rough on the edges, huh?"

Setsuna satisfied herself with an affirmative nod.

"Yeah, well, I been trying to learn to keep my momma happy, but I can't practice around Nerima, cause Akane always thinks I'm being perverted."

"Akane is your fiancee?" Setsuna looked up as a server came to their table. They ordered tea then she returned her attention to her companion.

"Well, yeah. It was our dads' idea. She's not the only one though."

"So Tofu led me to believe. I have to say I found some of his tales hard to credit... but then, if your father was foolish enough to take you to Jusenkyou it is hard to really put anything past him."

"You... you know about Jusenkyou?"

Setsuna laughed lightly. "Come, Ranma, if Dr. Ono had told me about you without mentioning Jusenkyou, would he not have described you as a man? The fact that I didn't laugh when a girl told me she was the famous Saotome Ranma should have been enough for you to know that I knew about Jusenkyou."

"Oh... yeah, I guess so."

"He... Dr. Ono also told me," Setsuna began, then paused as the server returned with a tray. They waited in silence until the server left. Setsuna took a short drink of the hot tea then cradled the teacup in her hands. "Though I find it hard to believe that anyone could be so stupid as to do it... he told me that your father tried to train you in the Neko-ken?"

Ranma jerked when she said the word "Neko," then nodded. "Yeah, I don't think there's anything stupid he wouldn't do."

"So... he tried to train you in it... surely he didn't succeed?"

"Well, sorta... at first it just made me scared of c..c..c.. them things. He figured if he just kept throwing me in, I'd at least get over being scared of 'em. Instead I snapped. And I still do, if I'm around 'em and can't get away." Ranma's voice was subdued and he was clearly working not to think on it, not to remember the pit.

"Well, Ranma, as you may have guessed, I share a number of interests in common with Ono-san. One of them is ancient martial arts techniques... I have recently come into the possession of a scroll from an archeological site, written in ancient Egyptian. I had a friend translate it for me."

Ranma sat bolt upright. She was sure Setsuna was going to say something about the Neko-ken, after all, that's what had led her to this discussion. Ranko was practically hanging on the edge of her seat, her small hands planted on the table as she waited, hoping desperately.

"Your father wrapped you in some fish product, correct? Then lowered you into a pit of cats?"

"Threw me in, more like." Ranma's visage turned dark as he pictured throwing his father into a pit. I'd like to see how you like it, old man.

Setsuna shook her head for a moment. "That's not right, but it's close. What did he do after you reached a feral state?"

"A what?"

"After you went cat," Setsuna clarified.

"Oh, uhm... nothing, really, he just waited till I woke up. Actually I think he had to chase me down, but he just dropped the whole subject after I woke up."

"The scroll I have describe a process whereby a student is led to experience an extreme feral state and then describes the procedure whereby the attributes of that feral state are made available to the conscious mind and the fears induced by the training erased. He didn't do any of this?"

Ranma's eyes were as wide as they could get and she looked, Setsuna thought, like she was about to hyperventilate.

"You . . . you have the complete technique? You know how to get rid of the fear? Without losing the technique?" There was a fire in her eyes now and Setsuna nodded.

"That's what it seems to describe. I don't know how effective it will be so long after the training, however. It seems to have been intended to be done immediately after the student first came out of the feral state."

"Would... would you help me?" Ranma asked, giving her best kawaii give-me-ice-cream look.

Setsuna paused, as if pondering. "I am generally fairly busy," she commented slowly, then continued before Ranma could respond, "but I would certainly like to see if this scroll's technique works. I would never try such a thing myself, it would be horribly unethical, but you've already been through the worst part. The latter portions don't sound particularly dangerous," she mused.

"You will?" Ranma sounded startled, as if the idea that someone would actually be willing to help, without being bribed or blackmailed, was unknown to her.

Setsuna nodded and pulled a business card out of her purse. "Come to my clinic sometime next week, Ranma, and I'll give you an exam to set a baseline, then we'll go over the scroll together, and you can help plan the procedure. All right?"

"Yes!" shouted Ranma ecstatically, ignoring the surprised looks of the other patrons. She leapt up from her seat and hugged a surprised Setsuna tightly then danced out the door.

Setsuna sat in mild shock. It had been many many years since anyone had touched her in an affectionate manner, and receiving a hug from an excited Ranma, for whom the face-to-face meeting had only strengthened her desire, had affected her more than she expected. Leaving a sufficient amount of yen on the table, Setsuna hurried to the ladies room, where she vanished, reappearing in her apartment.

As soon as she appeared, a knife was in her hand, having been plucked from a hidden pocket in her jacket and a moment later was quivering, embedded in a dart board across the room, right in the center of the black nose of a picture of Genma-panda taped over the dartboard. She collapsed to the floor in tears of anger and sorrow. "I'm so sorry, Ranma," she sobbed, wishing once again, though in vain, that she had been able to spare him the pain of his early life with Genma.

She did nothing about the tightness of her nipples and the moistness in her panties. Aroused as she had been by Ranma's exuberant hug she felt too ashamed and saddened at the part she had played in allowing that travesty of fatherhood to raise him to feel right about taking advantage of the feelings he brought out in her.

She headed to the shower to calm her nerves as she thought about the meeting. It had gone better than she expected. She had expected him to be more skittish and she got the feeling that he was now only concerned about being seen with her because of Akane's physical reaction and not for fear of hurting her feelings. She hoped she was right.

She had not been lying about the scroll; she did in fact have an authentic Egyptian scroll describing the proper means of training a Neko-ken warrior. It was a religious artifact, a scroll that she appropriated from a lost temple to Bast or Bastet, a cat goddess worshipped in Egypt for a time.

Nor was she lying about Dr. Ono, for she had made certain to make his acquaintance. She had not wanted to affect the timeline by giving him new knowledge, so she had avoided contact until after he left Nerima, but if Ranma managed to contact him, he would vouch for her. Setsuna had been well aware of the fact that without her deliberately seeking to force the timeline to one path, the timeline that she had watched for an entire lifetime would not be precisely what occurred, particularly with her minor interferences.

She had been intensely grateful for that foresight when after making Tofu's acquaintance, she had learned that he had left Ranma and Ranma alone the means to contact him.

Stepping out of the stream of warm water, she toweled off then dressed again, in lighter clothing, before stepping to the Time Gates. There she settled in and began to replay the day, watching for signs of Nerimites in the area that she would have to neutralize. She followed Ranma first and she was both surprised and pleased when she saw him pause and watch a girl whom she recognized as Tomoe Hotaru.

"He doesn't know yet," she commented to herself, "but I guess he must have recognized the look of loneliness." For once, it seemed, chance was working with her rather than against her.

Not so for Ranma, however. She caught a young girl who had paused outside their cafe. She had gaped at the scene inside for a minute then pulled out a camera and snapped a shot . . . at just the worst moment. Setsuna was certain that the picture would show Ranma hugging Setsuna tightly, a look of brilliant joy on her face.

"Not good, not good," Setsuna muttered to herself as she sped the flow of time up while following the girl. She cursed softly when she saw the girl stop first at a phone and place a call, then head for a one-hour photo developing shop.

"I'm sorry, Ranma," she sighed, knowing that she was already too late to prevent the information from reaching Nabiki. She had forbidden herself from traveling through time to achieve her goals in this project. She could teleport somewhere to provide an influence at just the right time, but she would not alter time. That she had promised to Ranma and she would not break it, no matter how much it hurt. "I'm so sorry. If I had just come straight here..."

She rolled the timestream back to Ranma's exit from the shop and set it to follow her. "I might as well see how they took it," she sighed to herself. Momentarily she remembered Nabiki's nature and hoped that it might be kept quiet in exchange for money, then she reconsidered. It was one thing when Nabiki knew that the situation was innocent. Here, however, she might very well wonder about Ranma hugging some girl none of them had ever seen. Setsuna knew Nabiki was very protective of her family.

Ranma grinned happily as she leapt from rooftop to rooftop, heading towards Nerima. She felt like singing and probably would have, had she known any appropriate songs. Two stains on her life, two failures had haunted her and now she finally had the opportunity to lay one to rest.

Not only would she finally be free of her debilitating fear, her greatest weakness to those who knew of it, she would gain a new attack. She thought about how she had been described while in the Neko-ken and grinned widely. The only flaw in the technique had been the instinctual behavior and the ease with which the cat could be distracted. With those gone, she would probably be a match even for her father using his secret techniques.

Reaching Nerima, she raced along the drainage canal for a ways before bounding to the fence. She dimly heard Kuno but not being in the mood to play, she simply poured on the speed, glowing softly, and left him behind. She reached the Tendo residence and flipping at the end of her descent, landed lightly in front of the door. She reached out and opened it, then stopped short. Standing in front of her smirking, hand outstretched awaiting yen, was Nabiki.

"What'd ya want?" Ranma asked curiously.

"15,000 yen," replied Nabiki, arching her eyebrow at Ranma.

"What?!" Ranma shrieked, "Why would I... what for?"

Nabiki simply shook her head and gave him a look promising that he would wish he had paid her. Ranma shook her head and brushed past the middle Tendo daughter. She stepped into the living room and caught Nodoka's sharp glare. She glanced down and realized that she was still a girl. Kasumi stepped up beside her with a kettle.

"Uh, thanks, Kasumi," Ranma said, taking the kettle and pouring the hot water on his head. He heard stomping on the stairs and knew Akane was coming down to berate him for some reason or another, not that she seemed to need one, but Nabiki forestalled her.

Just as Akane burst into the room, Nabiki put a hand on her shoulder, halting her progress and drawled out, "So, Saotome, who was that woman you were with at the cafe? And why were you seen embracing her as a girl?"

Ranma winced, which of course everyone took as an admission of guilt.

"Ranma," Akane shouted, "You pervert! How dare you!?"

Soun had jumped to his feet and gone into his demon head. "Ranma! How dare you cheat on your fiancee!"

Genma followed him up. "Boy! You will marry Akane!"

"Who wants to marry that perverted jerk!? He can shrivel up and die for all I care! Go on, Ranma, go play with your hussies!"

Nodoka looked at him sternly, a tinge of disappointment in her gaze. "It's not very manly to hug a girl as a girl, Ranma."

"But . . . but I can explain," protested Ranma, turning towards Akane. As he expected, he was not given the chance. Mallet-sama was already high and it came down hard. She did not stop for some time.

When Ranma awoke, he was lying on his futon, a wet cloth on his forehead. He opened his eyes and saw Kasumi kneeling beside him. She noticed that he was awake and looked at him disapprovingly.

"It really wasn't wise to be seen with another girl, Ranma, especially behaving like that in a public place."

Ranma moved to protest but Kasumi rose and drifted from the room, leaving him to defend himself to empty walls. He felt the bandages on his chest and momentarily considered that he was actually lucky. Since Akane had been so mad at him, at least she had not had any desire to bind his wounds. That always seemed worse than what she was trying to treat.

"It wasn't like that. She was just helping me," he said quietly, knowing no-one was listening, and turned onto his side.

Setsuna stared at him through sorrowful eyes. "I am so sorry I wasn't quicker, Ranma. I'll make it up to you. Somehow."

Beginning of an End

Ranma jerked awake to a splash of cold water and an angry shout. He looked up to see the glaring eyes of his fiancee but gritted his teeth and resisted the urge to insult her. So what if she was uncute, if she was incapable of trust, so what if she constantly leapt to conclusions. He had to give her a chance, give them a chance. After all, what if it was love that he felt on Jusendo? Shouldn't he give love a chance?

She growled angrily at his lack of a response and stalked from the room muttering. He rose from his futon with a sigh, grabbed some clothes, and headed for the bath. He wondered for a moment where his idiot father was then dismissed it from his mind.

If it was important, he would find out soon enough.

When he finally made it to the breafast table, cleaned and ready for school, Akane was there already, glaring at him. He glanced a bit fearfully at his plate but thankfully it looked normal. He sat silently and ate quickly, not wanting to give Akane an excuse to hit him.

She did not speak, settling for a hard glare. Soon they were out of the house and on their way to Furinkan High.

"So, who was she?" Akane ground out through clenched teeth.

Ranma looked down from his position on the fence at his angry fiancee. Somehow, he knew, no matter how he responded it would be taken the wrong way and he would get malleted.

"She's just someone I met in the park," Ranma said. He did not like to admit to weakness and he really did not want to admit that he, Saotome Ranma, man among men, had asked for help.

He felt the flaring of Akane's battle aura and did not even hear her response before registering the mallet impact that sent him flying through the air.

"Oh well, at least she sent me towards the school this time," he muttered. He shifted so that he was facing the direction he was moving. Instantly he began adjusting his trajectory. If he could not shift far enough, he would hit the pool. He wondered for a moment, as he worked to alter his path enough to land on the school roof instead, whether Akane had deliberately aimed for the pool.

Thankfully, he discovered that he had recognized the danger with enough time to spare and he was able to make a soft landing on the school roof. He glanced around and then stopped still as he heard Akane's voice below. She was just about to... yep. Ranma grinned and waved as Kuno sailed past him on a high arc, then sat down.

"She sure is mallet happy today," he muttered. Thinking of the reason for his earlier malleting, the green haired friend of Tofu's, led to thoughts of Tofu as he was preparing to leave. That had been some time ago but his memories of Tofu were still clear.

"You really should reconsider allowing Akane to hit you," Tofu had advised. "I've been watching her for some time and I'm afraid you're just feeding her delusion. She has to know, subconsciously, even if she won't admit it, that she can't hit you unless you allow it. I'm afraid that every time you let her hit you she is seeing it as evidence that you are in fact guilty of whatever imagined offense she is angry about."

Ranma had not been willing to follow Tofu's advice then. He had protested and in the end ignored it. He knew that if he avoided Akane's righteous anger, the fathers would be outraged, Ryouga would blow up at him, and things would simply get worse.

Now though, he was less certain. His father had occasionally shown signs of uncertainty, as if he was no longer so sure of being able to handle Ranma. Soun had not changed, but then, he was not a real threat anyway. Ryouga and his other rivals, on the other hand... well, Kuno might still react badly, but Kuno was never a real challenge anyway. Ranma got the feeling that Ryouga's opinion about Akane and Ranma had been changing, though.

Maybe it was time. "Yeah," he said, smacking his fist into his palm. "She's the only one that hasn't grown up after the whole blow up at Jusendo... everyone else will think twice about pushing me once they realize I'm no longer kowtowing to that uncute tomboy."

Jumping to his feet, Ranma flipped off the edge of the roof. As he fell past the building he took note of his classroom window and smiled. Since it was open, he leapt again as soon as he landed, alighting on the windowsill and slipping into his seat just before Akane entered the room, still angry over Kuno's presence.

She gave Ranma a sharp glare before sitting at her desk and turning her attention away from him. Ukyou entered a few moments later and Ranma noticed the sad look she directed towards him as she headed for her seat. Catching that look made him realize that she and Shampoo both seemed to have finally come to the realization that they had gone too far and that he actually loved Akane, that he had already made his choice. It figured that that realization would come to them just when he was beginning to really question his feelings for Akane.

He shivered suddenly as he realized that the cold shoulder he had been giving Shampoo and Ukyou could backfire badly if they decided they had no chance and the fathers learned of it. He and Akane might be married before they knew what was happening and Ranma was beginning to be seriously worried at the prospect of having to spend the rest of his life with someone who so obviously hated him.

It suddenly hit Ranma that that might explain Akane's recent behavior. If she really did dislike him then the increase in her violence and anger could be explained by her not wanting him. If she did not want to get married, then as he acted nicer, she would have to pick up the slack to prevent the marriage. He slumped slightly in his seat. He had not really wanted to believe it but it made sense; more sense than he had ever made of her behavior before, at any rate.

He drifted through the rest of the classes until lunch. He didn't sleep but he wasn't paying much attention either. He simply kept picturing recent incidents and fitting them into the picture of Akane's genuine dislike for him, hoping to find something that didn't fit. When the bell for lunch rang, he had still not found anything.

Ranma slipped out the window carrying his lunch and dropped to his usual spot by a tree. He watched Akane come out in the company of Yuka and Sayuri. Again she directed a venomous glare in his direction. He sighed and focused on his lunch. It was gone in moments and he turned his attention back to the yard.

He saw Kuno approaching Akane from the practice field, then to one side he noticed Ukyou cooking okynomiyaki on her portable griddle. Ranma slipped his hand into his pocket and pulled out a handful of yen. He had enough.

He stood and made his way quickly to where Ukyou was sitting, hearing Akane yelling at Kuno in the background. He squatted by her, holding out a handful of yen, the full amount she usually charged her lunchtime customers.

"Ranma?" She asked, a bit nervously.

"One shrimp okynomiyaki please, Ucchan," he replied. Her eyes lit up at the name and she immediately poured batter on the griddle, then she looked at the yen in his hand.

"Ranchan, you know," she began.

"No," he replied firmly, "I ain't gonna be like Pops anymore. You're too good a friend to mooch off of."

Not that Ranma had ever really seen the food he got from his fiancees as mooching. After all, they were well aware of the difficulties preventing him from making any real money. He wasn't worried about acting like his father, and didn't really equate his actions with his father's anyway.

It was just the first explanation that popped into his mind, since he could not simply tell her that he was hoping that she would go back to being the friend he had always wanted.

He had not said fiancee, quite deliberately, and he was trying, by changing the way he interacted with Ukyou the chef, to change the way he interacted with Ukyou the girl.

He could not have phrased it so clearly, of course. He simply had the idea that if he treated her the way Hiroshi and Daisuke did, now that she seemed to have accepted that he had not chosen her, even if she might be wrong about his having chosen Akane, she might be willing to be his friend again. Well, a guy could hope, right?

She smiled and sprinkled the ingredients on the okynomiyaki after flipping it then handed it too him.

"Yowch, hot!" He yelped, but ate it quickly. "Mmmm. That was delicious, Ucchan. You really are a great cook."

He saw her eyes widen and felt a strong ki coming towards his rear and grinned inwardly. Time to change the rules of the game . . . "Ranma no Baka!" Akane shouted, swinging her mallet.

A silence fell over the schoolyard, as everyone froze, staring in utter disbelief as Ranma caught Akane's hammer on his palm. He shifted his grip on the head of Akane's hammer slightly and plucked it from her grip. Ranma had stopped Mallet-sama? Ranma had defended himself against Akane?

Ranma closed his fist, crushing the mallet head into splinters. Akane purpled with rage and whipped out an even larger mallet. It met a ki-enhanced fist and exploded into dust.

Still no-one else moved. It just seemed surreal. That could not be Ranma standing there looking at Akane with that silly smirk on his face. Akane seemed at a loss for a response but Ranma let her off the hook by leaping up into the tree and bounding across the yard and back into his classroom.

The unnatural silence and complete stillness lasted until the bell suddenly rang, signaling the end of lunch. Ukyou watched wide-eyed as Akane stormed back into the building. Ranma had defended himself against Akane. He was speaking to her again. She almost drifted off into a fantasy again when her logical mind, having seen a recent return after the events of the wedding finally broke her fantasy for the first time, replayed his words. "You're too good a friend . . ." He had not called her cute, had not called her a fiancee. He had said friend.

For the first time in nearly two years Ukyou's defensiveness of her right to her dreams faltered and for a brief moment she wondered what her Ranchan dreamed of. Why had he paid her for the okynomiyaki, she pondered, as she hurriedly cleaned her griddle and headed back to class. What was he trying to say?

A slow flush crept up her face as she remembered how happy Ranma had seemed when she had first shown up and he had realized who she was. He'd been so happy to see his friend again. She paused in the door to the classroom and took in the looks of disbelief still on most of the students' faces.

Even Akane looked more pensive than angry for once. As Ukyou made her way to her seat, she wondered at that. She had always kind of assumed that if Ranma ever actually failed to defend Akane, it would break her shell and send her fleeing in tears. Why hadn't she run? Why did she look pensive, instead of heartbroken, or angry?

Some distance away in another classroom, two figures sat in brooding thought. Kuno had not actually seen the events, as he had been recovering still from his pummeling at the hands of his fierce tigress. Still the students were saying that Ranma had defended himself against Akane without striking her. He had simply disarmed her and then left. Kuno was currently fighting between two lines of thought. He couldn't decide whether the sorcerous Saotome was upping his control over Akane or releasing her. Should he attack Saotome to punish him, or Akane, now freed of the treacherous Saotome's influence?

Nabiki on the other hand was basically in shock. The only active thought in her mind was a rather strangled "Four... hundred... thousand... yen..."

She had taken a bet just the day before from a student. Four thousand yen placed on Ranma to defend against Akane's mallet instead of merely dodging. She had seen it as easy money, even given the girl 100 to 1 odds. After all, she prided herself on reading people, and she was certain Ranma would never defend himself from Akane. Besides, he had even toned down the insults recently, and avoided doing anything to anger her, so surely he would not suddenly go in the opposite direction. Yet he had, and now she had someone expecting a four hundred thousand yen payout. Nabiki was not having a good day.

She retained enough sense to answer questions when the teacher posed them but aside from that, she remembered little of what happened from lunch to the end of the day. She was still sitting at her desk in a daze when a gentle throat clearing attracted her attention.

She looked up to see the girl who had made the bet. "How?" Nabiki's mind instantly went back to full speed. "How did you know?"

The girl moved slightly and Nabiki's attention was drawn lower, to where the girl was holding out a white envelope. "I didn't," she said. "A lady gave me four thousand yen and told me what bet to make. She said when the bet was won, to give you this. I guess it tells where to send the money, or something."

Nabiki shivered suddenly. Surely . . . surely she had not inadvertently accepted a bet from a cop? Why else would someone have made the bet through a proxy?

She thanked the girl and hurried home, her unease growing. She ignored the situation in the house, though subconsciously the lack of noise raised her feeling of nervousness. She went directly to her room and shut the door behind her. Checking to make certain that there was no-one present, she sat at her desk and looked at the envelope.

A simple white envelope, nothing written on it, no stamps or markings. She verified that it was sealed then slit it open with a letter-opener. Slipping two fingers into the opening, she pulled out a folded sheet of paper.

She unfolded it and began to read. Finishing, she sat still for several long minutes, thinking about what she had read, before cutting the document into small pieces and placing it in a small metal tin. She kept the tin on her desk for a single purpose . . . to dispose of dangerous documents. Nabiki did not trust shredders.

She pulled out a small box of matches and lit the contents of the tin then opened her window. She teased the fire with the metal letter-opener, making sure each bit of paper caught and burned completely, before she cast the crumbled ashes to the wind.

She slid the window shut again and moved back to her desk, where she snagged a pad of paper and a pen. In a precise hand she noted down a list of supplies she would have to obtain. On another sheet, she quickly jotted down a few ideas, to see if any more supplies would be necessary.

Tearing off both sheets, she placed them in her purse and headed downstairs. She poked her head in to the kitchen and saw Kasumi. "I've got to head to a shop and pick up a few things," she advised and at Kasumi's pleasant confirmation, she continued out the door.

As she opened the front gate, she suddenly cursed to herself. Why had she not asked that girl for a description of the woman who had made the bet? Nabiki wondered as she closed the gates behind herself whether the description would have included green hair. "I better ask her tomorrow," she muttered. Could it really be possible for Ranma to have planned this? She would not have believed it of him, he simply did not seem that clever, but then, she had bet at a hundred to one odds that he'd never stop Akane's mallet and she had been wrong about that.

Meanwhile Ranma had discovered just as school let out that word of his actions at lunch had reached the Nekohaunten.

"Nihao, airen!" Shampoo caroled happily as she aimed her bike to land on Ranma. He always made her landings nice and soft. Wham! Ranma cleanly sidestepped the incoming bike and Shampoo hit hard. He was off and running before she or Akane could react and by the time Shampoo recovered from her bruising landing, Ranma was gone from sight.

Once again Ranma had managed to stun just about everyone. Like Akane's mallet, Ranma never seemed to dodge Shampoo's bike. Until now. Of course, Shampoo had not tried to land on him since Jusendo but if he was no longer taking Akane's abuse, then Shampoo was back in the running. Except that she did not seem to be.

Ranma cursed softly as he ran. He had realized for some time that if he started actually avoiding Shampoo's glomps and her bike, she would come to realize that he was avoiding her. He did not want to hurt her and he was afraid of what would happen to her if she gave up. More to the point, he would have expected, before Jusendo, that Cologne would have pushed even harder for stronger methods if Ranma upped his resistance.

Now that Jusendo had happened though, Ranma felt sure that the old ghoul would not want an angry Ranma in the tribe and there was no way he was going to allow his changed attitude to Akane to be interpreted as a license to return to the way things were before Jusendo for the rest of the Nerima crew.

He changed course several times in order to lose pursuit but since he didn't detect anyone following him, he used more speed than he normally permitted himself.

He wanted some time alone to think about how to deal with the repercussions of his act at lunch and so he was headed to the last place he had been able to find some time to sit and think. He found it easily and soon he was again sitting by a tree watching children play.

Unfortunately his mind wasn't cooperating. He wasn't coming up with any good ideas on how to handle the recriminations that would surely follow as soon as he returned to the Tendo home.

After a fruitless quarter of an hour during which he came to no useful conclusions, he decided that he needed to clear his mind. Not really having much experience with meditation, as Genma did not much care for it, Ranma's tool of choice for clearing his mind was kata.

Rising from his spot beneath the tree, he cast about until he found a wide region clear of trees and not currently inhabited by overactive children. He was about to enter into an energetic kata when his mind rebelled. He stopped for a moment. What was wrong? Why shouldn't he do a full out kata here? The answer came to him after a moment's thought. No-one is disturbing you here because no-one knows you. Go all out and they'll make the connection and you'll draw attention.

Satisfied with that logic, Ranma began a ground-based kata.

Punch. Block. Snap kick. Block. Leg sweep and punch combo. Block.

Ranma closed his eyes, allowing the familiar easy motion of his body flowing through the moves to soothe his mind. He lost himself in the pattern of blocks, kicks, punches and combinations.

He focused on his father. His father's arguments were as familiar to him now as were his attacks.

"Boy, how dare you dishonor your fiancee like that!" His father's fists flew in a frontal assault.

"There is no dishonor in self-defence," he protested, batting aside and misdirecting his father's blows.

"You should take your punishment like a man! What are you, a weak girl?" His father taunted him, as he dropped into a low combo ending in a hard, fast sweep that Ranma barely avoided.

"Punishment for what? I haven't done anything wrong!" Ranma objected, narrowly leaping over the leg sweep. He tried to retaliate with a throw but his father deflected it.

"You haven't fulfilled your honor and married her, boy!" He snarled at Ranma.

Ranma banished the mental image of his father. It was pointless, sparring with his father verbally. Genma never responded to direct attack and always evaded responsibility. At the same time he was sneaky and tricky enough that even though Ranma was more than powerful enough to take him out, Ranma still ended up in koi pond as often as not. He fared even less well in their verbal spats.

High kick. Three quick punches. Block. Drop to a squat and throw an upwards kick to the gut. Roll and spring into a high kick to the face with the heel of the right foot.

Ranma didn't even bother trying to think of the others. He had tried but he simply wasn't cut out for this kind of battle. He couldn't beat his own father in a battle of words, even though he knew Genma's every move.

Reversal. Rabbit punches to the kidney. Opponent spins to face. Block high with left arm, block low with right leg. Palm strike.

The image of Nabiki rose up in his mind. How does she do it, he wondered. Even Master Happosai tended to leave her alone. Ranma knew it was because of her blackmail, at least partially. At the same time, she never seemed to actually need to use blackmail to best people with words. You simply couldn't win a confrontation with Nabiki, no matter how skilled you were.

Crane stance into finger strike to the throat. Block and a throw, dropping into a leg sweep as the opponent recovers.

She wasn't the only one, of course. Nodoka seemed to win against Genma every time, even though Ranma was certain that Genma was good enough to escape. He wasn't sure how skilled Nodoka might be with her sword but surely his father's Umi-sen-ken technique would be good enough to allow him to escape?

Strong jump to avoid low kick, leg drop, block strike to groin.

He too tended to give way before her, but he knew that he had reason. He, unlike his father, actually valued his honor. If seppuku was the only honorable thing he could do, he would do it. He had in fact considered it once but it seemed too much like running away. He would not take that path until no other path was left to him. Genma on the other hand seemed to exist to escape responsibility and evade the demands of honor, so why would he fear seppuku? Ranma couldn't figure it out, couldn't see why Genma reacted the way he did to Nodoka and so he set it aside.

Accept a throw, reverse momentum into springing palm strike. Follow up with low kick leading to rising uppercut and a hard elbow to the chest.

There was always Kasumi. Gentle Kasumi, who would never lift a hand against anyone and would certainly never stoop to blackmail, yet when she insisted, everyone obeyed. She too seemed immune to Happosai.

Hook opponent's foot and swing high, releasing but continuing the smooth turn, rotating opponent in the air to bring head into range of full power kick coming off full rotation.

That was not to say there weren't people that he did understand, or at least mostly. He understood why people would give way for Cologne, Happosai, and Hinako-sensei. Sure he stood up to them, at least sometimes, but he understood why others didn't. Fear. Fear was why they backed down, fear of the power the three held, fear of what they could do to someone.

Backward flip to gain distance giving opponent time to rise, following with springing double palm strike and upward flip.

Was it the same with the others? Surely not, surely no one obeyed Kasumi because they were afraid of her. Yet he couldn't get that thought out of his mind. If that was the case, though, then why did he lose to his father? He certainly didn't fear the old man. He knew he could beat him, especially now that he knew the Umi-sen-ken. He wasn't sure he knew all the Yama-sen-ken moves, but he had figured out how to duplicate pretty much everything Kumon Ryu had thrown at him.

Hard punch to the head while inverted, drop hands to back of neck and use momentum to throw.

With Nabiki it was fear, that was clear enough. With Nodoka, well, that too was fear. He wasn't sure what Genma was afraid of but his body language was pretty clear on the fear part. He was definitely afraid of Nodoka. With Ranma, on the other hand, it was not so much fear of Nodoka, nor even really fear of seppuku. There had been a few times when he had actually hoped his mother would insist on it, if only to finally release him from the growing tension he was under. He didn't fear death, at least, he didn't think he did. No, Ranma mused, I don't fear her katana... it's her eyes.

Redirect opponent's momentum during throw with hard shoulder strike lining opponent's chest up with rising foot to slam downward.

He pictured her again in his mind, looking at him with that look of disapproval mingled with disappointment. That was what he feared, that he would be a disappointment to her. He knew that his father was disappointed in him. He had been ever since the whole Neko-ken business, even if it had been the old man's fault.

Dropping neck strike. Endgame. Ranma paused and shuddered as he came back to himself, realizing that somewhere in his thoughts he had drifted from the kata to shadow sparring and just performed a lethal strike.

Am I losing control?

Ranma stood slowly, his breathing still even and steady and relaxed out of his stance. He was startled from his contemplations, eyes snapping open, by the sound of applause from around him.

He saw that in spite of his intention, he had garnered a number of observers, young and old alike, all admiring. He noted that some of the girls' looks were more than admiring; they were hungry and he shivered again.

His eyes caught a look of longing and he was startled by a familiar cut of deep black hair and a sad face.

Training Begins

Hotaru drifted slowly through the park. She tried to keep a smile on her face as she watched the ducks drifting on the pond. Everytime she lifted her gaze and saw children playing though, her smile would fade.

She remembered it well enough, remembered with a painful clarity what a bright child she'd been, how wonderful the world had seemed. She remember playing vigorously. Most of all, she remembered having friends.

That's all that was left now. Memories.

She had no friends. After the accident she had drifted in a dreamless sleep for two long years. Her friends had forgotten her and moved on, made new friends.

After her awakening, she had discovered that the light in her life had dimmed, for her mother was no longer there to brighten her day, and her father, though still affectionate, was ever more caught up in his work.

Worse yet, she had lost the stamina and strength needed to play and run like the other children. It wasn't her fault. Two years without exercise had left her weak. It would probably have eased over time and she would have grown stronger, had she played regularly.

She had not been accepted, especially once she manifested her healing ability. She had been set apart, shunned. She was different, strange, unnatural.

Without the incentive of friends with whom to play, she had not attained the regular exercise that might have rebuilt her strength, nor had her father taken note of her condition and arranged for the therapy that might also have alleviated the strain.

School, physical education particularly, might have aided her in regaining her strength were it not for the last of her ailments; when she over-exerted herself, she would lapse into unconsciousness. Worse yet, occasionally over-exertion would yield a short period of intense pain before the bliss of unconsciousness provided surcease. In any case, she grew quickly exhausted after even mild amounts of physical exercise and given her poor reactions to being pressed to work harder, the teachers had eventually stopped trying to push her to perform.

So she remained weak still and friendless. She sought solace where she could, in the beauty of her lamps, in playing her violin. She did not seek solace in the parks.

She was not here to be consoled. She was drawn here by the activity, by the many things she wished she could take part in; the many things that were denied her. Though she tried to ease that pain by taking pleasure in the natural beauty around her, it was a false effort. Maybe if she had been able to visit the park at night, when the moon and the stars and the deep black evening sky cast a softer, shaded glow over the park, maybe then it would have spoken to her.

As it was, the beauty of nature was but an excuse to her, a way of not having to admit the true reason she was here, to admit her envy of those who possessed still a normal life, who lived in the light she once knew.

Hotaru's attention was caught by high pitched children's voices and she looked up to see two young boys dragging an older man; their father, perhaps. They sounded excited about something and the delight in their voices made Hotaru ache with envy.

She turned away and to her surprise, she saw several older boys heading in the same direction following one boy who was saying "You gotta see this," over and over.

She looked in the direction they were heading and saw a flash of red. Her curiousity aroused, she began following the boys, hanging back enough to not be noticed.

When her progress removed the last tree between her and their goal she stilled, a sense of delight filling her. Beautiful, she thought to herself. A young man wearing a red shirt and black pants was dancing in the open area between the trees.

She noted without really granting them any attention that there were a number of people gathered, watching the boy. She paid them no mind, focused on the boy. He moved with a mix of power and grace that was beautiful in its own right and seemed more delightful still with the poses he was taking and the moves he was making.

She could see that the positions he was taking held some purpose beyond what she could see. After a short time of watching, a gleeful comment from one of the younger observers caught her attention and she considered the dancing boy.

Yes, indeed, now that she had been given the idea, she could see that it was as if he was fighting someone who could not be seen. She had seen fights though, at school and after it and never before had a fight been a thing of beauty to her eyes.

She continued to watch and slowly began to feel as if she could almost see the nonexistent figure he was fighting. It was as if his moves not only attained his position; they also defined the position of his opponent.

She moved a bit closer then felt the hairs on the back of her neck rise as the tone of his movements changed. She could almost feel the anger, see the concentrated rage in his motions now. It called to her more strongly still. "A dance," she whispered. "A dance of death..."

She wasn't sure where the words came from but they fit. The beauty of his motion seemed stronger now and the moves more purposeful, more forceful.

He stilled finally, unmoving, his fist just touching the bent grass and Hotaru realized that if her impression of the opponent's position was correct then his opponent's throat would have just been crushed. Dance of death indeed.

When he stood slowly, facing in her general direction, with his eyes still closed, easing out of his stance, the people around him broke into applause. He jerked as if shot, his eyes snapping wide, gleaming a vivid blue. He glanced around for a moment and then his eyes met hers.

It was only a moment before his eyes moved on but Hotaru felt a thrill run through her. She had seen beyond the mere external beauty of those azure pools. She had seen into his soul and within him there was a void of loneliness as great as that which haunted her.

She stared at him, realizing, now that she could spare attention for his face, that he was remarkably handsome. He was certainly well-built and his performance had spoken for his skill. So why would he be lonely? Hotaru shook her head, sending her hair swirling. She must have imagined it, must have read into his eyes what she wanted to see, or perhaps she'd merely seen herself reflected. Such a man as he could not know loneliness, not as she knew it.

"Hey, mister," one of the younger boys asked in his high piping voice, "can you show me how to do that?"

"That was so cool," his partner agreed.

The boy shook his head and for the first time she noticed that he wore his hair in a pigtail. "I am not licensed to teach," he replied.

At that and with the assumption that he was finished, most of the park-goers returned to their activities. A few boys stayed behind though, as did Hotaru, finding a seat beneath a tree.

The boy ignored the watchers and closed his eyes, beginning again a slow dance. She noticed that it was much simpler than what he had been doing and when some of the boys started trying to mimic his motions, Hotaru began watching him very closely.

She got the idea that he must have chosen a simple beginner's sequence as a way of teaching those who were interested without having to admit to awareness of their learning.

She watched intently though she made no move to mimic him as the boys were doing. Hotaru knew better than to exert herself here at the park and risk being helpless in public.

She watched him for what seemed like hours and it was only the darkening of the sky that finally drew her attention from him. She was deeply startled to realize how much time had passed and quickly fled the park.

Several more hours passed before Ranma finally came to a halt. He had not, as Hotaru had thought, gone to a simpler kata as a way of teaching without admitting it. Indeed, he hadn't given the watchers a second thought after answering their question.

In point of fact Ranma's disinterest in teaching was one of the factors that had led him to resist the marriage for so long. While certainly not the only nor even the largest factor, it did play a role.

Shortly after he met Dr. Tofu, Tofu had told him something. It was a proverb of sorts, a common saying, though much that would seem common to most people was unknown to Ranma. "Those who can, do, those who can't, teach."

Ranma hadn't heard that when he first came to the dojo, of course, but he had observed masters for many years and while he was not often much of one for logic, he was not slow at observation in matters pertaining to his Art.

Masters at dojos, he had learned, became tied to their dojo. The stories the masters told of their training always seemed to be in the past. Never had a master at a dojo told him in excitement of a new technique picked up on a recent training trip. Ranma's mind might not be the swiftest in some matters, but even for him it was easy to see that if they were truly learning new techniques regularly, they would show enthusiasm for the possibility.

So without understanding any of the details of why those masters stayed at their dojos and stopped seeking new techniques and skills, without any comprehension of the logistics, the business issues, and the politics that prevented it, he had understood in his gut that when he opened his dojo, he would cease to advance in the art.

Arriving at Nerima where he was threatened with taking over a dojo, he was immediately faced with an object lesson. Tendo Soun and his father had learned under the same master and had presumably been near in skill. His father had not had a dojo and had been able, sixteen years later, to give his son a reasonable workout. Tendo Soun had a dojo and after sixteen years, had not even managed to teach his daughter to fight competently and had clearly allowed his own training to lapse.

So his shift in style and choice of katas was not predicated on teaching, but on control.

Am I losing control?

That thought had sparked a rising fear within him, a recognition of danger and a premonition of disaster. If he lost control, then given the illogical and irrational behavior of so many of the people around him, it would not be long before he seriously injured someone.

So he had returned to the basics, seeking to calm himself, to find his center once again. He had not noted the passage of time. He lost himself in the ebb and flow of the kata, slowly working his way through the beginner sets.

When he finally returned to awareness of his surroundings, his watchers had gone, including the black haired girl, and the sky had descended into darkness.

"Dangit, I gotta get home, and quick," he muttered, then grinned slowly. It was late . . . very late and on a day when he'd given everyone plenty of reason to think twice about following him and he had reason to try and move quickly.

"Time to try," he said happily. He flared his aura. He had used more ki in that fight with Saffron than he ever had before in his life and while it had taken more out of him than he ever wanted to repeat, after he had recovered, he had discovered that his ki reserves had deepened.

He thought he had enough ki available to try something he'd seen done once. He wasn't quite ready to go all the way but the beginnings of the technique could be used as a good speed boost. If it worked.

He leapt into the air and began his normal progress towards the Tendo home. As he leapt he focused on his aura. Almost instantly he began to spin, sending him off course, slamming into the side of a building.

"Ite!"

Shaking off the impact, he leapt back to the roof. "Ok, that went wrong," he groused but there was no force behind the irritation. His mind was focused on the feel of his aura and in moments he was certain he knew what had gone wrong. Leaping again, he focused his aura and shot forward as if released from a gun.

He shouted in glee as he sped through the air. His aura was spinning about him in two vortexes. It definitely took a bit of concentration to get right, especially because they had to spin in opposite directions. Spin the same direction, or with a single vortex, and he himself would spin out of control, as he had the first time. With two opposing vortices however, he was able to literally pull himself forward through the air.

It required too much concentration and focus to be usable for flight yet, but it was the first step, and it greatly increased his speed. He landed on the Tendo roof in only a few minutes.

Hopping down into the yard, he cast an eye on his window. Closed, of course. Damned old man. Ranma walked around to the front and entered the house. It was later than he had thought, he noted, as he slipped silently through the darkened halls and into his room.

Back in the park where he had been a worried figure stood hidden in the darkness watching with fearful eyes. The figure did not move from the shadows until several fuku-clad girls bounced into the clearing. Finally, Sailor Mercury stepped from the shadows, breathing easier now that she was not alone.

Sailor Mars and Sailor Jupiter had been the closest and answered her call quickly. She had seen no sign of any youma or other unnatural creatures but she was decidedly nervous. It had been an unusually long time since they had had a sighting and she was worried that that simply meant that something really big was coming up.

Jupiter glanced around then gave a disgusted huff when she realized there were no apparent enemies to fight. After so long, she was itching for a good fight.

"So, what's the story, Mercury?" queried the raven haired Mars.

Mercury was focused on her computer, walking about the clearing, now that she was not alone. "There was an immense concentration of life energy here a short while ago," she said.

Mars opened her senses and gasped. "Wow, no kidding."

Mercury glanced at her. "You can sense it?"

"Yeah . . . it's like the atmosphere feels after I do a fire reading, but wow! This is way more intense."

"I'm also getting faint readings of negative energy," Mercury commented. "Not specifically Negaverse, but definitely negative."

"But there's no youma here, or cardian, or anything?" Jupiter sounded unhappy, and Mercury looked up.

"No, there doesn't seem to be. I'm sorry to call you," she said, apologetically, "but I... I was worried about facing something alone. Our experience thus far has indicated that new enemies are significantly harder than the last group we faced each time."

"S'okay," replied Jupiter, grinning, "I understand. I was just hoping there'd be something to pound on."

---

Nabiki rose and glared at her blaring alarm clock before hitting it, shutting off the alarm. She stared at the numerals for several long moments, trying to figure out why on earth she would have set her alarm to get her up fifteen minutes early. Finally it came to her and she leapt from her bed.

She gathered her clothes quickly and raced to the furo, pausing to make sure the occupied sign was not out before putting it out herself.

Exiting from the furo with a pleased sigh a while later, she headed for the living room. Glancing outside she saw Genma and Ranma engaged in their morning spar.

"You're up early," commented Kasumi as she set the place settings at the table.

"Yeah, got some business to take care of," replied Nabiki, eyes on the sparring Saotomes. She stepped up to the open door to the backyard after glancing around to make sure that Akane was not yet up and about. She was worried about how Akane would react to this and didn't want her around to hear about it. "Ranma," she called out. "I need to speak to you. Now."

Ranma jerked in surprise at her call and Genma crowed, "An opening!" A splash a moment later announced Ranma's introduction to the koi pond. A disgruntled onna-Ranma emerged and strode over to the house, pulling off her shirt to squeeze the water out. She eyed Nabiki suspiciously.

"What now, Nabiki?" Ranma's question was laced with suspicion but it was the tired sound to it that caught Nabiki's interest.

She set that consideration aside for the moment, however, as she had more important plans to make. "Don't disappear after school today, Saotome. I need to talk to you when we get back."

Ranma sighed and thought for a moment. "Yeah, alright, sure, I'll be here," she said then brushed past Nabiki and headed for the furo to get a quick shower.

To Ranma's surprise, breakfast passed without any comments regarding his behavior the day before. Hmm, I guess Akane and Nabiki must not have said anything about it. He watched Akane as she ate and was even more surprised to realize that she was not radiating anger. She wasn't looking at him either but still, he would have expected to have fended off another mallet attempt by now.

Glancing at Nabiki he noticed the absence of her usual smirk. She seemed worried about something, though the instant she noticed him looking her way, her face was once again expressionless and unrevealing. She left the table soon after, no doubt heading to the school to deal in her business again.

Setting aside his concerns about the behavior of the Tendos--after all, he had already come to the realization that he didn't understand them--he finished his breakfast in silence and grabbed his pack and lunch. He waited at the door until Akane showed. She seemed surprised to see him but said nothing as he walked with her.

She glanced his way when he took to the fence and sighed. He looked down at her when he heard her sigh but she was looking forward again. She didn't look sad, really, nor angry. He wasn't sure what to think but he refused to let it worry him.

He had more important things to worry about. He had been too tired when he came back the night before but he needed to pick up one of the scrolls he had hidden in the Tendo's attic.

It was one Tofu had given him, describing an ancient meditation technique. Ranma couldn't remember who Tofu had said it came from, but he remembered the description well enough.

"Emotion based ki can be dangerous," Tofu had warned. "To be effective you have to be surfeited with an emotion, to be full of it. That can lead to dangerous consequences. I'm sure you would think Ryouga the perfect example, but in fact, you are as well."

"Once you learned the Mouko Takabisha, you took to using confidence to bolster your battle aura as well, I've noticed."

"But Doc," Ranma protested, "it's not like it's gonna make me suicidal or something, so what's the problem?"

"Actually, Ranma," Tofu said, narrowing his gaze, "it could make you suicidal." He cut off Ranma's disbelieving negation. "Think about it. There are two ways in which one may be suicidal. Depression leads to suicidal tendencies, in which the individual seeks to take his own life. Confidence, on the other hand, leads to over-confidence, to an unconcern about risks that are potentially lethal. It can hamper your judgement."

Ranma considered the doctor's words as he walked beside his fiancee. The scroll he was interested in described a technique that Tofu had said could conceal the user. It had sounded a lot like one of his father's Umi-sen-ken techniques and since Ranma already knew that technique, he had set the scroll aside in favor of other scrolls describing interesting attacks, several of which he had secretly mastered.

Now, though, he was reconsidering his decision. Tofu had recommended the scroll as a counter-balance to Ranma's confidence ki. With his concerns the afternoon before about losing control, Ranma decided it was time to learn the technique of the Void and the Flame.

Kuno was near the gates as usual, awaiting his opportunity to cast his challenge. Ranma did not deign to notice him when he stepped out, spouting his usual nonsense. He simply slipped past him and into the building, leaving Akane to deal with him.

Nabiki growled softly, standing in an upper-story window. Akane pounded Kuno with her usual lack of finesse, so there certainly had been no real harm to Ranma's change of tactics. It wasn't so much what he had done that irritated her, as that she hadn't predicted it.

Why was he changing? More importantly, what did it mean for her family, for Akane? He had stopped taking Akane's mallet blows and Nabiki was worried that it meant he had simply stopped caring. "Oh, Akane," she murmured under her breath, "I hope this doesn't mean what I think it does." One last chance, that was the impression she got.

If his altered behavior after the wedding had been prompted by a recognition of his own feelings, she decided, he would not have suddenly blocked her mallet. No, the only logical explanation was that his niceness after Jusendo was him giving her one last chance for honor's sake.

What about his actually buying lunch from Ukyou yesterday, as well? It had precipitated the mallet incident and that had put it from most people's minds, but Nabiki could not afford to let crucial clues like that slip through her fingers.

It seemed a strange way to make up, Nabiki considered as she took her seat after having watched long enough to be sure that Kuno would make it in under his own power. Surely Ukyou would have been ecstatic just to have him talking to her again.

Furious as Akane had been the last few weeks, Nabiki had kept her eyes open, and knew the truth of Ranma's actions. He had not, in spite of Akane's suspicions, so much as spoken to any of his other fiancee's since the return, until yesterday.

So what could it mean that he was now actually buying his lunch from her? Paying her for what she would gladly have given him for nothing? It certainly wasn't in Ranma's nature, or at least, she would have sworn it wasn't, to refuse free food, yet that was what he had seemingly done.

That it was significant Nabiki was certain. Exactly how, she still hadn't quite figured out.

She looked up as Kuno came in looking little worse for wear from Akane's retaliation. Was her sister slipping? "Hey, Kuno-baby," Nabiki cooed as he took his seat.

He directed a glare at her then immediately softened it. She grinned inside. That soft look meant a soft touch; he wanted something.

"Tell me, Tendo-san, why the foul sorceror fled from my noble challenge this morning?"

Nabiki sighed unhappily. Stupid question, but she didn't have the answer. Not the real reason anyway and definitely not one Kuno would accept. 'Because you bore him,' would probably be close but she didn't sell guesses.

"I don't know," she admitted, "but I can find out. 2000 yen." She held out her hand and Kuno forked over the dosh.

Time passed with remarkable silence, leaving many of the students nervously awaiting the explosion they felt was long overdue. It did not come. At lunch, Ranma again purchased an okynomiyaki from Ukyou, but this time Akane made no protest.

She watched him, which her friends noticed, but there was neither sadness nor anger in her gaze, which confused them enough that they weren't sure whether he was a safe topic to bring up, and therefore avoided it.

Akane stayed after school for some club activity or other, so Ranma went home alone. Shortly after he entered his room, his door opened, and Nabiki beckoned.

He followed her to her room where she shut the door behind him. She pointed to her desk.

"Sit," she ordered.

He did so but cast an irritated gaze at her. "What's this about, Nabiki?" he asked. He wanted to obtain that scroll and start studying it. He certainly did not want to spend time dealing with one of her schemes.

His eyes narrowed a bit as he noticed that she had set up an easel in the corner of her room and resting on it was a pad of poster paper.

"You blocked Akane's mallet yesterday," Nabiki said evenly.

"Yeah, so what," he returned. Why hadn't she said anything about this before, if she was going to complain? He hoped that her easel wasn't for bar charts like he had noticed in one of the magazines she had left in the living room once. They were really boring and he didn't want to listen to another lecture about how much he was hurting her profit.

"I had to pay out a rather substantial debt because of you, Saotome," she continued, watching his reaction rather closely. She was just about certain from his reactions that he was not the one who had orchestrated that bet, in spite of the suspicions she'd had when she had read that sheet of instructions.

"And?" Ranma put as much boredom as he could in his tone.

"You surprised me," she continued. "And as a result of that bet, I have to be your sensei for a while."

Ranma looked at her strangely. "What? You ain't a sensei. You don't even practice the Art."

"Not quite correct, Saotome. I do practice an Art... two of them, actually. You're only here to learn one."

She flipped the blank sheet over top of the easel, exposing the first sheet to Ranma's questioning gaze. His eyes bugged out and he stared at her in disbelief.

She nodded firmly. "Don't fight it Saotome, you don't want to know how far I'll go to make sure you learn this."

Training

When school let out, Hotaru made her way directly to the park where she had seen the pigtailed boy. She walked slowly, keeping her eyes out for the sort of disturbance she'd seen the last time.

After a little more than half an hour, she was forced to concede that he was not present and with a sigh of resignation, she headed to her home.

Entering her house she headed straight for the stairs, then jerked in surprise when Kaori appeared beside her with a tray of cookies. "Have some snacks with your studying, Hotaru-chan," the beautiful redhead said, a pleasant smile on her face belying the dislike, hatred even, burning in her eyes.

Hotaru nodded quickly, grabbing the tray, and hurrying out of Kaori's sight. She could not really complain about her father needing company after her mother's death, but something about Kaori rubbed her the wrong way. She certainly seemed nice enough, yet Hotaru was never comfortable around her.

There was never any outward sign of it, but Hotaru felt that Kaori resented her, maybe even disliked her, because her father loved her. It did not make sense to Hotaru for a beautiful woman like Kaori to be jealous of a weak friendless girl but then, the reactions of the kids at school to her abilities did not make sense either.

In the privacy of her room, Hotaru hurried through her schoolwork. When she finished, she went to her door and locked it. She did not want anyone knowing what she was doing.

She might not feel safe trying to do what that boy did in the park, but there was no reason she could not try in the safety of her own room.

She moved a few lamps to make sure she had enough room, then stood in the center of the room and closed her eyes. After a few moments, the image of the pigtailed boy and his first stance was clear in her mind. Focusing on one limb at a time, Hotaru tried to mimic his positioning. She was not sure why she felt it was so important to match his movements precisely.

Maybe it was simply because he himself had moved with such precision. That, she decided, was part of what made the difference between the ugly fights at school and the beauty of his fighting.

She curled her fist, trying to picture the way he had held it, then slowly punched forward, mimicking his first attack. It certainly wasn't a fast punch; she was trying to move at the speed he had, and though he had moved with impressive speed when she first saw him, the moves she was imitating had been made slowly.

Ten minutes later, she collapsed on the floor, breathing heavily. She couldn't believe how sore she felt just from taking one position after another. Of course, the fact that some of them had involved holding one leg in the air through several positions could easily have had a lot to do with her current state of exhaustion.

As usual, however, the exhaustion did not last long and when it faded, she rose and began again.

---

Ranma glanced again at the sheet. In bold letters it read "Anything Goes Martial Arts Socialization." He turned back to Nabiki. "You can't really mean," he began but she cut him off.

"Give me ten minutes, Ranma, please."

Ranma subsided. Ten minutes was not so much to ask. "Alright, Nabiki. Ten minutes. So what kinda scheme is this?"

Nabiki ignored his ending jibe, turning instead to flip the sheet over. Ranma turned his attention to it. He read the list aloud to himself, wondering what the point was. "Sparring, Fighting, Fighting All Out, Berserk. What's this, Nabiki? I thought you were talking about Soc.. Socialling?"

"Socializing, Ranma," Nabiki corrected. "This is part of it. Tell me, Ranma, you encounter someone, say, Ryouga, or Genma, and start sparring. How do you get them to stop sparring and start fighting?"

"Oh, that's easy, not like I need it for pig-boy, though. Just throw a few insults, or if their skills are low enough, just dodge everything."

"Insults, Ranma, are the equivalent of a slap in Martial Arts Socialization, and frankly, that's the only technique you know." Nabiki pulled out a marker, and drew a line down beside the list of words and put an arrowhead on the bottom, so that the line became an arrow pointing in the direction from sparring to berserk.

"It is a one way attack," she continued, then flipped the page.

Ranma again read the words aloud. "Calm, irritated, angry, berserk. Ends the same."

"Yes," Nabiki replied, "it does. This, Ranma, is a list of social phases that match the fighting phases on the first chart. They are linked, though other factors may prevent the connection."

Ranma looked at her blankly. "Huh?"

Nabiki sighed. "Simple, Ranma, to get a fighter to move from fighting to fighting you all-out, you have to make them angry instead of merely irritated. Make sense?"

"Ok, yeah, so what was the part about factors?" Ranma crossed his fingers, hoping that she wasn't about to launch into a math explanation.

"Factors?" Nabiki was puzzled momentarily. Her eyes lit up as she made the connection. "Ah, yes. Just because someone is mad, does not mean they will be fighting. Moving someone from calm to irritated likewise does not mean they will be attacking you. Not everyone will react that way. However, if they are already sparring, the link is there, and pushing them down this set of stages will likewise move them down the set of fighting stages."

"Uhm... ok, I guess."

"You use the one technique you have very well, Saotome. Happosai, Genma, Akane, Ryouga, with all of them, you never seem to have difficulty getting them fighting mad, right?"

"Yeah." Ranma sat up a little straighter, a prideful grin spreading on his face.

"So why are you at a loss every time our fathers get on your case about things you haven't even done?" Nabiki smirked at him.

"I dunno," Ranma said, sitting back a bit sullenly.

"Ranma, look at it this way. If someone doesn't know how to fight at all, has no experience at it, Daisuke, for example, you could take him out with a single punch, right?"

"Yeah, easy."

"But if they know how to fight, if they have techniques of their own, if they can recognize and respond to your techniques, then it takes more than a single punch to beat them, right?"

"Well, sure. I mean, unless you like attacked from hiding or something. But that wouldn't be honorable."

A feral grin lit Nabiki's features. She'd done it, she'd finally managed to engage that brain that he hid so well. "You can't beat our fathers for two reasons. The first is that they know more techniques than you. The second, is because the one technique you have is useless in that situation. Why is that?"

Ranma looked at her for a minute, then looked at the chart. "It only goes down, but if they get angry, or go berserk, that just makes things worse for me," he groused, thinking of all the beatings he'd taken. It was really rather irritating. After all, he was good enough to not have to take that kind of abuse any more, but if he didn't, they might throw him out and then what would he do?

"Precisely, Saotome. When you fight someone, sometimes your goal is simply to beat them. At other times, you need a different result. For example, we've had a few instances of possession in your time here. Remember when Kasumi was possessed by that Oni?"

Ranma nodded, shivering, then tested his understanding with a question. "So you're saying that it's like when we had to fight Rouge? I didn't really want to hurt her, particularly since the only person she was trying to hurt was Taro, but she was dangerous lobbing all that fire around. So, instead of hurting her, we had to douse her with hot water."

"Precisely," Nabiki said. A wave of relief flooded her as her strategy was vindicated. He really did have a mind if you could just get him to use it.

"So, you're saying you can teach me how to fight our fathers?"

"I can teach you more techniques, yes. There are some that relate to this chart, such as how to calm someone down, to do the reverse of your insults. Then there are techniques that use this scale," Nabiki flipped the chart again, to a page that read "Violently disagree, disagree, dubious, neutral, open-minded, agree, strongly agree."

She waited as Ranma mumbled them to himself, then continued. "Dealing with your fathers involves changing their position on this chart. There are many techniques that are useful here, both with respect to making them agree with a statement you have made, or making them question the position they are taking."

"Position?" Ranma cocked his head to one side. "Is that like a stance? You know, a defensive stance, a neutral stance, or an aggressive stance?"

"Well," considered Nabiki, "I meant a verbal position, a claim they're making, such as 'Ranma cheated on Akane,' but we'll talk about stances as well. A lot of the rules you've learned for stances will probably apply here."

Nabiki looked at her watch. "Alright, Saotome, your ten minutes are up. Are you willing to stick around and learn from me? Or are you going to go out there and let our fathers walk all over you again?"

She was surprised and more than a little shocked to see a shrewd look cross Ranma's face. "Aggressive stance," he said thoughtfully, "are you using that to combat pride?"

Nabiki gaped at him for a moment. "Pride? What do you mean, Saotome?"

"You didn't give me time to answer, you went straight to the attack. You took an aggressive stance, kinda, I dunno, challenging me to make a particular response, like a dare, then before I could respond, you attacked that response, made it look stupid. I figure if you'd waited and I'd said no, you'd'a had a hard fight cause I'd look bad if I backed down. So you hit first."

Nabiki felt like whimpering. This was what she'd given up? All she'd done was give him reason to look at her badinage from the perspective of a fight and he was giving her an analysis worthy of a long time student of her art!

"Yes," she replied. "You are correct in your assessment, Saotome. You are both honorable and proud. At the same time, you lack any particular skill in the attack except the insult, which I have defenses against, therefore you are open to an aggressive assault. Your complete lack of defenses makes a less aggressive stance simply a waste of time, since an aggressive stance will take you out in moments."

"Defenses against insults?"

"Insult me," ordered Nabiki, arching an eyebrow.

"You're a heartless mercenary who'd do anything for a buck," retorted Ranma.

Nabiki collapsed to her knees, staring up at him in shock, her eyes filling with tears. "How... H... How could you say that Ranma?" She sobbed, looking heartbroken and defenseless.

Ranma immediately fell to his knees, wringing his hands, looking chagrined and embarrassed and was about to speak when he suddenly paused, a startled look on his face. A slow smile of comprehension crossed his face.

"You mean... wow! That's... uhm... potent, yeah, that's potent, Nabiki-sensei."

Nabiki smirked as she stood. "You're less gullible than I thought," Nabiki said. Damnit, I've got no choice, but if he's gotten so much out of a few minutes, an hour of this and I'm going to have a devil of a time manipulating him.

Ranma seemed to descend into thought and Nabiki let him. She was curious to see what he would come up with. Finally he looked up. "You didn't have to say anything to do that attack... the real attack was the show of emotion, right?"

"Yes." Nabiki answered short and to the point. She didn't want to explain until she had to. She wanted to see how far he would get without help.

"It is unmanly to show emotion," he muttered, almost to himself, then looked up again. "That's why," he stated firmly.

Nabiki frowned slightly. "That's why what, Ranma?"

"That's why Pops was always harping on my manhood and never crying or showing emotion. They must have made him feel the same way you crying made me feel. He... he deliberately taught me not to use them so he wouldn't have to defend against them. Damn him."

"It's more than just emotions, Ranma. Why didn't he teach you to do anything other than throw insults?"

"So I wouldn't have any defenses against his attacks!" Ranma was excited. He had been trying for some time to figure out why he never seemed to win arguments with his father unless they descended to the level of physical conflict. Now it seemed the answer was in his grasp. He paused, "then why, though... why was he willing to teach me all sorts of physical attacks, but no soc... social ones? Unless... unless they're stronger? Like his forbidden techniques?"

Nabiki's smirk grew. "Think about it, Saotome. You can beat up your father and all these other powerful martial artists, but there is one person you can't touch."

"Kasumi!" Ranma's eyes lit up, and Nabiki smacked her forehead.

I meant me, you jerk, she thought to herself. Outwardly she simply waited for the rest of his thoughts.

"She's like... impervious, like the Bakusai Tenketsu training... words don't touch her. She's... immovable, I guess, on those charts. So then..." Ranma paused, dropping into thought again.

"Then there's you... you're like me, you have a technique for every situation, you're good on offense and defense, and you've got special techniques..."

Nabiki raised an eyebrow. "Special techniques?"

"Blackmail," Ranma replied with a grin. "It's a trump card like my Hiryuu Shoten Ha. You have to lead someone into it, but once you do, bam! They're yours. Defensively you're a lot like my Soul of Ice... hey, that even matches. See, I use the Soul of Ice to chill my aura while insulting them to heat their aura, then I lead them through the move and finish them off. You start out by not caring about the consequences, Ice Queen and all, you get them hot because you find something they don't want anybody knowing. Same thing."

Nabiki felt a slight blush tint her cheeks. He was comparing her skills to his strongest attack! For some reason, the thought that he might actually respect her was appealing. She shook herself. Can't think like that about him, girl, she chastised herself, then turned her attention back to instructing him.

Long after darkness fell at the Tendo home, Ranma stirred in his room. Rising quietly, Ranma pulled a cloth from within his robes using Mousse's Hidden Weapons technique and cloaked himself with it and the Umi-sen-ken.

Moving carefully and as silently as he could, Ranma made his way through the darkened house to the Tendo attic. Carefully shutting the trapdoor, he dropped the Umi-sen-ken and generated a tiny, diffuse ball of ki in his hand to light his way. He carefully shielded the ki ball to keep from awakening any of the ki-sensitive fighters in the house then made his way to his hidden stash of scrolls.

It would have surprised anyone watching but Ranma did not have to rummage through the scrolls nor open any of them to find the one he needed. One of the techniques he had learned from Tofu, though Tofu himself had not been able to do it, was a way to leave a distinctive ki trace on an object. It was meant for a variation on a technique similar to Hidden Weapons, to allow the correct item to be retrieved in the heat of battle without chance of mistake. He used it mark the scrolls, knowing that it was important that he spend as little time as possible here if he wished to keep their location secret, particularly from his greedy fat fool of a father.

Taking one scroll and returning the others, Ranma slipped forth from the house after concealing the scroll in the same place he had secreted the cloth he had used for the Umi-sen-ken.

He moved quietly out of doors then leapt lightly to the rooftop. He glanced at the moon. It was not quite full but it was close and was shedding enough light that reading would not be difficult.

He untied the scroll and unrolled it then settled in to read. A little more than an hour later, he rerolled the scroll, tied it, and stored it away, then began practising the technique.

Some time later he left the roof and returned to his futon. He awakened with a screech as painfully cold water splashed him. For a moment he thought Akane had gotten over her reaction to his behavior at lunch two days ago. A strange sensation on his chest quickly dispelled that thought.

"Hotcha!"

Ranma looked down at the wrinkled old pervert fondling her breasts and struck downward angrily. "Get off, pervert!"

Happosai was gone before her fist hit and back again a moment later. Even as her anger grew a thought tickled at the back of his mind. Not certain why, she acted on the thought and focused on the Soul of Ice. Happosai fondled her for a moment then got a sudden perplexed look on his face and jumped away from her. He looked her up and down. "Still a girl," he muttered.

Ranma just grinned from ear to ear. "What's wrong old man? Not getting anything?"

Happosai purpled with anger. A moment later Ranma crash-landed in the koi pond courtesy of Happosai's pipe. "Respect your master, boy!"

"You ain't my master," retorted Ranma, flipping her pigtail back over her shoulder as she headed back into the house. Aggressive stance, she mused, thinking of Happosai. He's not the only one. Akane, Pops, Ryouga, even Momma, they all lead with aggressive stances. Except that Pops uses a defensive stance with Happosai and Momma.

Seeing his father at the table, Ranma thought about leading off with an aggressive stance. "Genma! What are you doing about resolving all these engagements you made?!" seemed like a good lead off line, though Ranma decided he wasn't ready to use those techniques in that important a battle yet. He wanted to master them first. Ranma thought that Soun would respond by attacking Genma. Thinking of Soun's behavior, he considered. He uses a defensive stance in most situations, switches to an offensive stance when either his family is threatened, or when he has someone's lead to follow.

As he left the house that morning, he watched Akane. She still seemed subdued. Halfway to Furinkan Ranma spied Ryouga heading in their direction though he didn't seem to have noticed them yet.

He glanced again at Akane. Maybe, he thought, just maybe now that I've broken her automatic anger response I can get her to see Ryouga in a different light. If he attacks me, I'll use the new techniques. He always practices his new techniques on me anyway.

Akane looked up in surprise when she heard Ryouga's shout. "Ranma! For what you did to Akane, prepare to die!"

Ranma glanced at Akane. "Hear that, Akane? Ryouga," gotta remember not to insult him, no pig-boy comments, "doesn't think you can defend yourself." There, that should make her think about him for at least a moment or two. He turned his attention to the rapidly approaching martial artist.

"Hey, Ryouga, where the hell were you? Why didn't you show up for the fight you scheduled? Because of you, my father beat me to a bloody pulp before dragging me to China!"

Ryouga growled, his aura flaring. How dare Ranma mock him!

Akane had looked startled at Ranma's first comment and had just begun to grow angry when he had spoken to Ryouga. She paused for a moment, unsure of who to attack. Sure, Ranma shouldn't pick on Ryouga... but... he hadn't insulted Ryouga... and she had never realized that Genma had forced Ranma to leave instead of waiting, though now that she thought about it, she should have realized that Ranma would never walk away from a challenge. And Ryouga was implying that she needed defending. How dare he!

"Ryouga," she shouted, "I can take care of myself! I'm a martial artist too!"

Ryouga paused in his run just as he reached them. He looked at Akane with wide eyes. "Well, of course you can, Akane-san, but he had no right to..."

"And why weren't you there? You picked the time for the fight. You should have made sure and given yourself enough time to get there!"

Ryouga gaped, at a loss. His... his Akane was saying it was his fault, but... but Akari... but Akane... "Ranma!" He howled, "This is all your fault!" He struck out with his umbrella.

Ranma carefully suppressed his smirk, using the scroll's technique, though as yet in a very mild form due to his lack of experience, to appear completely calm. "A true martial artist takes responsiblity for his own actions," he replied, dodging the umbrella easily. "I took responsibility for the effect my actions in China had on you and aided you when you were in danger."

"Yes, but," Ryouga objected, grabbing a bandanna from his head. "Because of you, Akane is mad at me!"

Akane looked at him in surprise. "What? That idiot didn't have anything to do with that!" Ranma wasn't responsible for all the thinking she'd been doing recently, no-way, no-how. That was all her doing.

Ryouga faltered, the bandanna in his hand losing its razor edge. "But, but I..."

"I helped you get to and from school and you repaid me by attacking me for my father's actions, actions I had already received punishment for," Ranma said evenly.

Ryouga stood still, mind racing. He hadn't really been looking for Nerima even. His feud with Saotome should have ended when he saw the extent Ranma was willing to go to save Akane from death, but when he heard that Ranma had defended himself...

"You destroyed her mallet!"

"She tried to hit me without just cause," Ranma said.

Akane's face darkened a bit at that. "You were being perverted!"

"I bought an okynomiyaki. I paid, and I didn't touch her once. What is perverted about that?"

Akane looked a bit chagrined. She had to admit, Ukyou hadn't even been touching him.

"You're always leading those girls on," retorted Ryouga, "why do you do that if not for your perverted pleasures?" Akane's eyes slitted in response to his words.

Ranma sighed. "You would prefer I kill them?"

"What!?"

"If Ukyou does not either take my blood or take me as her husband she will be cast out of her family, made ronin. What will she do then? A fate little better than death for her. How will she run a restaurant without a name? Shampoo failed once, and received a Jusenkyou curse for it. If she fails twice, particularly with Cologne helping her, the shame will be far greater. I expect her punishment to be either death or banishment."

Ranma waited a moment to let this sink in, then addressed Ryouga. "Come on, Ryouga. You haven't been to school for a while. I'm sure they won't mind you sitting in."

Though very pleased at his success with Ryouga and Akane, Ranma did not attempt to employ the techniques again that day. He was wary of overplaying his hand and in fact was concerned that he had gone too far with Ryouga and Akane. Still, he had had the feeling since Jusendo that a peace with Ryouga was finally possible and it felt good to have taken a step towards that.

For the next several days, Ranma continued to take lessons from Nabiki, the Ice Queen. Each night he spent more time studying the scroll and practising the technique. He was careful to hide the evidence of what he learned, though he did discuss his testing of his skills on Akane and Ryouga with Nabiki.

At the same time in nearby Juuban, a young black-haired girl slowly worked on the first beginner's kata of the Saotome School of Anything Goes Martial Arts.

On the fourth morning of his training, as Ranma dressed, a small card caught on the edge of his futon attracted his attention. Picking it up, he considered it for several minutes. Perhaps it was time, he thought, picturing again the elegant green haired lady with the striking red eyes.

Slipping the card in a pocket, he headed to the kitchen. Seeing Kasumi serenely focused on her cooking, he watched her for a few minutes, trying to see if he could discern what made her so impervious. Giving up after a while, he moved on to the living room when he suddenly detected an incoming human missile.

He couldn't detect the water but he guessed well enough that it was on its way and he immediately concentrated his Soul of Ice as strongly as he could on such short notice. A crackling sound followed by a sound like shattering glass brought a smile to his face as he spun around. Happosai avoided the backfist Ranma spun with but didn't continue the attack. Instead he was staring angrily at the pile of ice shards lying on the floor a foot from where Ranma was standing.

Ranma smiled at the old man's displeasure, easing up on the Soul of Ice before he chilled the air too much. It had served its immediate purpose, but holding on to it at a lower level should make Happosai plenty unhappy if he found a different way to soak Ranma.

Happosai finally turned from the melting ice shards, facing Ranma with his aura flaring about him. "Insolent boy, you should respect your Master!"

He whipped out his pipe, but suffering from that several days before, the scroll Ranma was reading, and the thoughts of Tofu it brought, had summoned memories of pushing hands with the good doctor. Though Ranma was no master of Tai Chi, he did understand many of its principles. He was ready for Happosai, and when Happosai's pipe contacted him, Ranma welcomed the ki it contained into emptiness just as one did when pushing hands.

His fist lashed out and smashed the dumbfounded Happosai out into the yard. Ranma followed a moment later and began taunting the old man. A tornado a few moments later signalled the end of the old lecher's depravations for the morning.

As Ranma waited for breakfast, his mind returned to the green-haired lady. He had for the first time ever succeeded in avoiding cold water when it came at him, even though he hadn't managed to actually detect it. Still, that was a lessening of his curse. If he could, if she could help him get rid of his debilitating fear of c-c-cats, then with Nabiki's training he would be much closer to regaining some control over his life.

As soon as breakfast was over he was out of the house, not waiting for any questions about his plans. He didn't want to tell anyone about this. Going for a physical given by a beautiful woman, definitely not the best thing to be letting people know about.

In under an hour he stood before the doors of the clinic whose address was on the card he had. To his surprise and chagrin, the doors were closed and locked. He turned away, about to leave, when a soft voice stopped him. He looked up into a pair of startling red eyes.

Crisis Building

Nabiki watched Akane as she mounted the stairs to her room. She wasn't sure how to feel about what was happening. She had the feeling that things were over between Ranma and Akane, at least from Ranma's side, and for the life of her, she couldn't figure out how Akane was feeling about it, or whether she even realized.

More to the point, she wasn't sure how she herself felt about it. She ought to be angry at Ranma, right? He had hurt her baby sister and she always defended family. Still, Akane certainly hadn't tried to make the relationship work. Even after Ranma brought her back from death, she still didn't let up on him. It made Nabiki wonder whether Akane's protests might have been true.

Kasumi had always seemed to think that there was a genuine spark between them, and that their protestations meant little. Nabiki herself had been a bit more cynical and worked to make sure they didn't get married too soon. At first she had disliked the brash and arrogant jerk as much as Akane professed to, particularly given the way he treated her baby sister.

Still, as time passed, she had been impressed by Ranma's honesty and honor, the way he defended Akane, the fact that in spite of her intimations to Akane, he had never cheated on her.

The most disturbing thing for her was the realization that she would probably be more angry at Ranma for abandoning Akane, however much the girl might have deserved and asked for it, if she herself hadn't begun to develop feelings for him.

He had always been easy on the eyes and Nabiki had kept a number of his pictures for herself. But she had always thought that that was all he was. A dumb jock, with a pretty face and a nice body but a mind that was useless for anything except his Art. To be sure, she was not blind to the skill and adept thinking he displayed during fights, but she had dismissed it as the sort of intelligence an idiot savant displays.

Now that she was beginning to realize just how wrong she was she could finally see how foolish her initial reaction to Ranma's appearance in their home. She was about to go up to her room when she saw Kasumi coming in with the mail.

"Oh my," Kasumi said, looking at one of the envelopes. Nabiki's radar pinged.

"What is it, Kasumi?" she queried, rising quickly to stand by her sister and try to get a look at the envelope.

"A letter for Ranma," Kasumi replied with a worried look. The few times that Ranma had received mail, it had been the prelude to another adventure, be it a challenge from Ryouga, the news of his mother's arrival, or a new fiancee. "Oh dear, I hope it's not a new fiancee."

Nabiki paled. She was fairly sure of Ranma's feelings towards Shampoo and Ukyou, particularly after the failed wedding. Still, he had just given up on Akane, if she read him right. A new fiancee at this point, especially if she were non-violent or worse yet, non-clingy, could be the catalyst for Ranma to finally break out of Genma's control, particularly given what he had been learning from her.

Kasumi continued into the living room, handing Soun the small stack of envelopes. He noticed the one she held back.

"What is that, Kasumi?"

"A letter for Ranma," she replied, not noticing Nabiki's frantic signals to her to stay silent. Nabiki instantly dove for the letter but Genma was faster. He danced away from the table, ripping the letter open.

"Oh my! That was for Ranma, Saotome-san, you really should have allowed him to open it."

Soun looked at Genma curiously. "So what is it, Saotome? Another challenge from that Ryouga boy?"

"Uh, yeah, heh heh," replied Genma, who had become starkly pale when he looked at the paper he held.

"No way," objected Nabiki, "Look at him, Daddy, he's never that nervous about a challenge. I bet it's a new fiancee!" She wasn't kidding, either. She had gotten quite good at reading the elder Saotome and his reaction to the letter had left her little doubt that this was one of his schemes coming home to roost.

Soun stared at Genma in horror. "Saotome! How could you! What of our agreement!?" His anger swelled his visage, until he finally burst into his demon-head technique. "The schools must be joined!"

Nabiki chuckled as she slipped into the hall after snatching the letter from a distracted Genma as he cowered away from the angry Tendo patriarch. She had failed to notice the look of desperate disbelief on the elder Saotome's face. Had she seen it, she would have realized that she was mistaken in how she had read him. Unfolding the letter, she began to read.

Kasumi watched with mild concern as Nabiki read the letter, growing visibly paler. She gasped when Nabiki looked up with a haunted look on her face. "This is not good, Kasumi. Come on, we gotta go talk to Akane."

"Oh my, do you really think Akane will take Ranma having another fiancee well?"

Nabiki sighed. "Alright, we'll hold off on her for the moment. But it doesn't say anything about a fiancee, Kasumi."

"What? Then what is it?"

"Here, have a look." Nabiki handed the letter over and Kasumi frowned slightly as she took it.

She looked over it for a minute then glanced up, her eyes wide. "Nabiki... this looks like a court document!"

"That's right. I... I guess that Ranma must have done this without telling anyone, but... I... I never thought it would go this far! I swear Kasumi, I never thought he would do this!"

"Oh dear," Kasumi murmured, "Father is not going to like this." She gathered the distraught middle Tendo daughter into her embrace, comforting her. Kasumi understood her pain. She had obviously come to realize how truly worthy Ranma was and how ill-advised her many attempts to prevent anything from developing between Akane and Ranma had been. Now she must be thinking that she had helped bring Ranma to this action.

Their father stepped into the hall, a look of desperate hope in his eyes. "Please, Nabiki, tell me it isn't true! Ranma didn't really... He couldn't have, he wouldn't, tell me he didn't do it. It's just another fiancee, isn't it?"

Nabiki lifted her head from her sister's embrace then plucked the paper from Kasumi's grasp and handed it to Soun without saying a word, giving no sign of her thoughts, though the mere fact that she had allowed Kasumi to embrace her spoke of how shaken she was.

Soun took the letter with trembling hands. He glanced at it then dropped it to the floor, collapsing to his knees wailing. "Now the schools will never be joined!"

Genma came into the hallway a moment later, having recovered from his encounter with Soun. He wore a look of deep anger but for the first time in Nabiki's experience, it was a calm anger rather than an angry rage.

"How could he," he ground out, "after all I did for him! How could he betray me like this?"

"More like did to him, Saotome," retorted Nabiki angrily. "He must have felt trapped. Would you prefer he had chosen seppuku?"

Genma paled and he collapsed to his knees beside Soun. "But... but why?"

"You kept claiming that Akane's engagement was the only valid one, Genma, but you never did anything to resolve the others! Ranma is too honorable to ever sully someone else's honor before his own."

Genma looked stricken. "I... I...," he attempted to muster a protest then dropped his face into his hands, looking in that moment years older, as if he were visibly aging before their eyes. "What have I done?"

Soun stood abruptly, a hard look on his face. "Ranma is no longer welcome in this home," he said in a voice that brooked no contradiction. "Nabiki," he said in a softer voice, "please collect Ranma's belongings so that he may leave as quickly as possible once he returns."

He turned to face Genma. "All is not lost, my old friend. Tomorrow morning, you will start training Akane. In her we will join the schools. Surely the Master will see the necessity of doing this."

Nabiki smirked slightly. "Hmmph. I'm surprised you aren't just planning on forcing him to undo what he's done, Genma." In truth she was curious. In the past Genma had been so quick to lay blame on his son and force Ranma to carry Genma's responsibilities as well as his own.

Genma looked up at her, a look of genuine fear on his face. "You were not at Jusendo," he said. He turned away and went back into the living room, his shoulders slumped as if he carried a great weight.

---

Pulling his gaze away from the scarlet eyes which had briefly captured his own, Ranma saw that Setsuna was wearing a dark blue conservative business suit similar to the one that she had worn when he first met her.

He breathed a silent sigh of relief and offered her a small smile as he stepped aside to give her access to the clinic doors. As she withdrew her keys from her purse, Ranma silently gave thanks. Her attire the first time they met meant little unless the meeting had been a deliberately pre-arranged accident, something Ranma wouldn't put past some of his suitors. The fact that in their second meeting she was still dressed conservatively reassured Ranma that she wasn't merely another in his long line of suitors.

She was not the sort of whom he would have thought such a thing, however getting malleted for having been seen with her had made it abundantly clear that his family saw her as a possible fiancee. That fact had forced him to reevaluate her and admit that while she was considerably older than himself, she was quite beautiful. With her lustrous green hair and red eyes, she stood out amongst traditional Japanese nearly as much as his female form, with her red hair and blue eyes.

He followed her into the clinic, idly noting the similiarities between the lobby into which they stepped and the lobby of Dr. Tofu's clinic. He stepped out of his shoes, nudging them into place by the door beside Setsuna's own elegant flats.

He followed her as she walked through the lobby, catching up to walk beside her when she spoke.

"You came earlier than I expected," she commented, "my receptionist won't be in for another hour. Still, that's for the best." She didn't say why it was for the best and Ranma wasn't sure he wanted to ask.

She led him into an examination room. It looked mostly familiar, similar in many ways to the room where Dr. Tofu had so often examined Ranma's injuries. The familiarity of it served to bleed off some of Ranma's nervousness.

She gestured him to a table and he hopped easily to sit upon it while she moved about, opening drawers that she unlocked with small keys from a large keyring and removing small trays full of the various implements of her trade. Picking up a mercury thermometer, she handed it to him.

"Place this under your tongue please, Ranma."

From its resting place on a hook securely fastened to the wall near the sink she took a clipboard; two others like it hung still upon the wall to the left of it.

Unlocking and opening a deep drawer that Ranma saw was full of hanging files, she flipped through the sparse collection and removed a folder. Seeing his interested glance, she smiled softly.

"Medical records for persons scheduled for an examination. My assistant puts them in here a day or two before the exam."

Ranma nodded though it occurred to him to wonder how long his records had waited there and what her assistant might have thought of their prolonged presence there, mostly because he was afraid that any curiousity aroused about him might lead to information getting back to Nabiki.

Setsuna flipped through the folder and removed a few sheets, placing them on the clipboard. Taking a pen she made a few notations on the chart then turned to Ranma, clipboard in hand.

"Strip to your underwear please, Ranma," she requested, deliberately not smiling nor making any attempt to ease his obvious and expected discomfiture. She guessed that he would feel more comfortable if she kept this portion of their relationship stricly professional; at least, for now, though maybe later... Setsuna felt a tingling sensation run through her and forcefully cast those thoughts aside, strengthening her grasp on her professionalism.

She found that air of detachment considerably harder to attain when Ranma nodded and in swift, sure motions removed his shirt and pants, revealing his rock-hard, perfectly-defined muscles. Drawing on the experience of a millenia of suppressing her emotions, Setsuna forced her gaze back to the counter while she fought down the swelling desire that filled her at the sight of him.

Setsuna focused her will as she lifted a stethoscope from the counter, placing it around her neck. When she lifted a blood-pressure cuff from the counter and strode to the table, no hint of her inner fight showed on her face. Her features were set in a calm, serious mask that emphasized her strong focus on her task.

Ranma looked askance at the cuff but made no objection, raising his left arm as she approached, and helping her slide it up to rest on his bicep.

She didn't immediately operate the cuff. In fact, she hadn't intended to put it on him yet but had decided that he might as well get used to it. It certainly wouldn't hurt and it was better than embarrassing him by ignoring his attempt to cooperate.

She held out her hand for the thermometer. Taking it in hand she shook it then held it up. She set it down on a tray to one side before making a notation on the chart she held, then set it aside as well.

"Okay, Ranma," she said, "Now if you could sit here please." She gestured to a chair. Once he was sitting in it she reached beneath it, spinning a lever to lower it until his feet were resting on the floor.

"You know," she commented, "traditionally speaking, the patient is not supposed to have engaged in vigorous exercise for at least half an hour before having their vitals checked. I'm fairly sure from Dr. Tofu's description of your normal mode of travel that you roof-hopped here. So before I continue, I just need to know if that was enough exercise to cause you to sweat or breathe more strongly than you normally do?"

He shook his head and she nodded. "I suspected as much." Grasping Ranma's wrist in her right hand she shifted her fingers until she found the right spot, then pressed lightly on the radial artery with two fingers. Noting that he had a nice regular pulse she glanced at her watch, waiting for the seconds to reach fifteen, since they had already passed zero, then began counting. Stopping at thirty seconds, she continued holding his wrist, remembering her count but subtly turning her attention to his chest, watching his respiration and counting his breaths. Satisfied, she released his wrist and picked the chart back up. Noting down his rhythm and pulse, she commented, "You're bradycardic."

Noting his puzzled and slightly worried glance, she shook her head. "It's nothing to worry about. It just means that compared to an average person your age, your heart beats more slowly. It's a common trait in athletes as a result of the improved conditioning."

Ranma smirked when he realized that she had been commenting on how good he was, forgetting completely the mild worry that had assailed him when she first mentioned it.

Setsuna took hold of the blood pressure cuff and moved it to an inch above his elbow before applying several quick squeezes to the inflation bulb to hold it in place. With a series of fssh sounds the cuff inflated, accompanied by occasional popping noises as the folds in the cuff snapped out. After a few moments a comfortable pressure enveloped his arm.

Placing her hand beneath his elbow she elevated his arm until the top of his elbow was level with his heart and with her other hand, she pressed the release on the chair arm and raised it to support his arm at its new height.

Placing her hand once again on his wrist she pressed lightly with two fingers until she felt the slow beat of his pulse. Grasping the bulb again, she slowly inflated the cuff until she could no longer feel his pulse. Taking a brief note of the gauge's reading to get a rough systolic pressure, she released the bulb long enough to set the stethoscope's arms against her ears.

Holding the stethoscope in one hand, she lightly felt his arm just below the cuff with her fingers until she located the brachial artery then held the stethoscope's diaphragm against his brachial artery. Although the Korotkoff sounds, named for the Russian physician whose 1905 study popularized this means of obtaining blood pressure readings, are low frequency and therefore should be better amplified by the bell of the stethoscope, Setsuna, as with most doctors, preferred to use the diaphragm for this task, as properly placing the bell above the antecubital fold of the inner elbow is a difficult task, and not strictly necessary.

Holding the diaphragm in place with light pressure, Setsuna listened to the distinct snapping sound. It indicated that she was within about fifteen millimeters of mercury of his systolic pressure. Squeezing the bulb with her other hand, she watched the momanometer gauge as it rose steadily, pausing at intervals to listen. With the third squeeze the Korotkoff sounds had ceased. Glancing at the gauge again, she continued squeezing until it reached two hundred millimeters of mercury in case the silence was merely an auscultury gap, a region where the harmonics caused an artificial silence.

Shifting her grip from the bulb to the release valve, Setsuna began releasing the pressure at around five millimeters of mercury at a time. When the sharp snapping sounds recurred, she noted the momanometer gauge's reading, then continued releasing the air from the cuff, listening as the sharp sounds faded into liquid murmurs before hardening into a distinct thumping sound. She released the air more slowly then, paying careful attention as the thumping became muffled then finally ceased. Noting down that final value which should be his diastolic pressure, she then continued releasing the air in five millimeter of mercury increments until she felt confident that there was no gap of silence.

Removing the cuff, she noted the pressures on her chart. Well within the normal range. She was almost surprised that he did not have a high blood pressure considering his daily life but apparently his overall physical conditioning was more than sufficient to counterbalance his emotional difficulties.

"Alright, Ranma," Setsuna said, "that takes care of your vitals. Stand, please." She removed the stethoscope arms from her ears, returning it to its resting place around her neck.

He stood obediently and moved to stand where she indicated. She walked around him comparing his scars to those in the medical record and noting a few new ones. Completing her visual inspection she moved to stand beside him and guided him through a series of range of motion tests. She was impressed by his flexibility and while she knew that he had gone through considerable practice to attain that range of mobility she still felt the need to proceed to passive range of motion tests.

In point of fact the passive tests, involving the doctor manually working the joint through its full range of motion, were generally considered necessary if the patient showed either a particular limitation in the range or an unusually large range of motion. The fact that it meant she got to feel his hard muscles all over had nothing to do with her decision. Really, it didn't.

Setsuna found herself having difficulty keeping her breathing controlled as she tested his joints; the feel of his strong muscles rippling and shifting under his skin was playing havoc with her self-control. Without mentioning the change, Setsuna shifted from merely testing the range of motion of the joint to testing the range and then palpating the joint and surrounding muscle groups. She really should have done this first, she told herself, as she searched for any areas of tenderness or deformity. She had skipped it knowing that with Ranma's unusually fast healing it was highly unlikely that he would have tender regions. Even if he did it would simply indicate that he had received them recently; they would be gone before the day had passed. That logic fell to the strength of her desire.

When she finally removed her hands from his skin, she had difficulty repressing a longing sigh. She did suppress it, in spite of the effort, for she knew that letting Ranma know of her interest at this stage would be counter-productive.

Having already checked the radial and brachial pulses in his left arm, she held her hand out for his right wrist. Verifying that the radial pulse on his right arm was as strong as that on his left, she moved on to the posterior tibial and dorsalis pedis pulses on his right arm, then returned to check the same two on his left arm. As they were both strong, she did not check the popliteal or femoral pulses.

Taking his strong hand in her own slender fingers, she turned it over and gripping his ring finger, she pressed firmly on the fingernail causing it to turn white from loss of blood. Releasing it she counted under her breath. The speed with which it returned to a warm pink gave her no cause for concern but Ranma seemed confused.

"What was that for?"

"It tests how long your capillaries take to refill," she told him. "If it took more than two or three seconds it would have suggested vascular disease, that is, a disease affecting the blood vessels, an arterial blockage, shock, or even heart failure. Not that the latter two are likely possibilities in your case."

"Oh." Ranma settled back feeling slightly disappointed without knowing why. He had gotten a little unnerved during her prolonged examination of his extremities but her clinical explanation reassured him. He was glad she had moved on to something he felt safe asking about. He was decidedly leery of asking any question that might imply that he had recognized an advance as such, being far too familiar with the ability of a fiancee or prospective fiancee to take the slightest hint of encouragement as permission to drop all pretense of subtlety. As Setsuna walked around behind him he suppressed a sigh of relief. I'm simply too used to my fiancees and their behavior, he decided. There was no reason to think such things of the doctor.

Setsuna hyperextended her right middle finger and placed it firmly against his back then flicked her other wrist, striking her right finger sharply with the middle finger of her left hand. She proceeded from side to side, working her way down, avoiding his shoulders and stopping before the small of his back.

Nodding to herself at the symmetry of the sounds she strode around to his front and percussed her way down his chest, again working in a pattern from top to bottom, focusing on the horizontal symmetry.

Stepping to the side she made a note on his chart. Returning to stand behind him she set the stethoscope in her ears and repeated her earlier pattern both back and chest, listening to his lungs. Hearing no adventitious sounds and finding the vesicular, bronchovesicular, tracheal and bronchial sounds at the appropriate levels she once again made a mark on his chart.

Ranma's nervousness had steadily faded and as she proceeded to examine his ears Ranma berated himself silently. "I'm as bad as Akane says, thinking everyone wants that from me." As the exam proceeded through more familiar territory, Ranma's chagrin grew. He could hardly believe that he had allowed himself to believe the doctor had felt that way towards him. Knowing what was coming up, Ranma focused on his thoughts, responding to Setsuna's commands on auto-pilot.

His embarrassment led him to recall a comment that Nabiki had made about his ego. Was it true that he enjoyed the thought of so many beautiful girls wanting him? Ranma wasn't sure. When she had first mentioned it, he had known that she was trying to provoke him and resisted making a comeback. That had, after all, been the point of that particular exercise. The ostensible meaninglessness of the statement, meant only as a training tool, at least theoretically, had not stopped his emotional reaction to it and he had spent some time later thinking about it.

At the time, he had come to the conclusion that all the girls only wanted him as a prize, an object, rather than wanting him from actual desire. Now he was forced to face the idea that his conclusion had simply been a way to escape a more unpleasant conclusion. After all, he had seen no indications whatsoever that Setsuna wanted him as a prize and yet he had thought... that... about her when she had had her hands on him, kneading his muscles.

A startled thought struck him as he thought back to his reaction to her answer. Disappointment? Was he disappointed that she hadn't been attracted to him? More disturbingly, was it because of his ego or because of the attraction he...

"Ranma!"

Setsuna's sharp statement cut through Ranma's querulous thought and he gratefully abandoned it, unwilling to face its implications. Instead he focused on Setsuna. A shiver ran through him when he saw that she was holding out a cup of water to him. He took it from her and looked blankly at her.

"Both forms, Ranma," Setsuna said calmly.

Ranma blanched but nodded. He had been half-hoping that she would forget his curse in spite of knowing that she would not. He lifted the cup and let the water run over his head. She glanced down at her bare breasts and realized with a stifled gasp that her boxers were pooled at her feet. Oh, yeah, she realized, the last thing she'd done was turn her head to the side and cough. Ranma was quite glad she had remembered to abstract her focus; unfortunately, the mere memory of Setsuna's skilled hands there was arousing her now. Ranma flushed as she felt her nipples hardening. She bent down quickly and pulled her boxers back up.

Ranma was relieved when Setsuna gave no sign of having noticed Ranma's obvious arousal. In the absence of comments from the doctor, Ranma tried to convince herself that it was merely the cold. Unfortunately, one of the things she had learned from Nabiki was that lying to oneself made one easy to fool. It didn't hurt that Nabiki had used Kodachi and Kuno as object lessons. The thought of being the same as them had quickly poisoned Ranma against that sort of self-deception and he sighed as he quietly admitted to himself that he was attracted to the green-haired, red-eyed doctor. It actually wasn't that hard to admit, he realized, when he knew it wasn't returned and when admitting it didn't carry with it the threat of imminent marriage, dishonor, and chaos.

Setsuna proceeded through the same tests, even taking Ranma's blood pressure and pulse again, to Ranma's mild surprise. Tofu had never gone that far, at least, not in a single exam. Still it helped to calm her. When Setsuna got to the portion of the exam where she palpated Ranma's joints Ranma's reaction was considerably different.

Having convinced herself that the doctor was not attracted to her nor trying to seduce her she was free from the anxiety that had plagued her the first time Setsuna had done this. Admitting her attraction for the doctor relieved her of another source of tension. Without concern and anxiety to steal her attention, Ranma gave herself over to the doctor's warm hands, reveling in the pleasant sensation of Setsuna's hands working her muscles and joints. In spite of the pleasure Ranma did not feel a strong sense of arousal. Instead, the warm massage induced a peaceful lassitude in her.

It took Ranma several moments to focus again when Setsuna completed the exam but as soon as Setsuna's words penetrated the haze cleared instantly.

"Have you had a breast exam before, Ranma?"

Nerima's Ending

Ranma turned pale and leapt backwards, slamming into the wall by the door to the examination room, one slender arm covering her breasts as she stared with wide, frightened eyes at Setsuna.

Setsuna arched one eyebrow sharply. "I guess I can take that as a no, Ranma?"

Ranma watched nervously as Setsuna sighed then pulled a chair out from near the examination table and sat down, crossing her legs. Ranma wasn't sure what he was more frightened... err, concerned about... No! I will not be like Kuno! I'm frightened, damnit, scared, just like a stupid, silly girl, he berated himself. He wasn't sure if the shiver that ran down his small frame was from his fear or the thought of being like Kuno.

A vague feeling of disgust washed over him as it did almost whenever he considered Kuno while in this form. Much easier to face someone trying to kill him. He forced his mind from Kuno and back to the line it had been on when the thought first hit him. Was he frightened because only perverts like Happosai liked groping his breasts? Or because the thought that she might actually want that from him was battering at his self-control? Or was she afraid that she desired this, that she wanted Setsuna's surprisingly strong hands on her breasts?

No, that couldn't be it, she insisted to herself and to her surprise, she actually believed it. Even as the thought had occurred to her she had sought those feelings of desire that she had remembered but she had not found them.

"Come, sit down, Ranma. I'm not going to do anything to hurt you. We'll just talk, until you're ready," Setsuna offered, her hands folded in her lap in a deliberately non-threatening manner.

Ranma fixed her wide blue eyes on Setsuna's face for several long moments, looking for the signs that she'd seen on Shampoo's face, and Kodachi's. Not finding them, she nodded hesitantly and stepped forward, taking a chair. She placed it on the other side of the table, wanting the comfort of its presence between them as she faced Setsuna's calm mien.

"N..no," she said softly, her voice a bit husky from the strength of her emotions. Without the escape hatch of anger and humour to temper her fear and change it into a more acceptable emotion she found her fear and uncertainty eating at her as her stomach twisted itself in knots. All the attraction she had felt for Setsuna seemed to have fled in the face of her fear.

Setsuna sighed again and Ranma shifted nervously in her seat. She had boxers on so the seat itself wasn't bothering her, but the cold metal was chilling against her shoulders.

"I suppose knowing that this is a perfectly normal part of a young woman's exam is not exactly going to be reassuring to you considering your self-image, Ranma, but it is necessary."

Ranma grasped at the thought. It would have surprised Setsuna to know how genuinely comforting that thought was. Not because it was normal for a girl; though Ranma had to a degree come to accept that he might never find a cure for his curse, he never felt truly comfortable with it. Considering all that had gone wrong in his life because of it, he doubted he ever would. No, his relief was simply because it was normal, because of Setsuna's calmness, her professional attitude. If this truly was a normal part of a feminine exam then that meant he didn't have to deal with the frightening situation of having admitted his attraction to someone who felt a mutual attraction for him.

"You have what appears, so far as the examination I've done shows, a perfectly healthy female body. I won't say normal, since you are in far better physical shape than most young women your age."

Ranma sat up a bit straighter at Setsuna's comment then froze as she realized that the comment and more pertinently her reaction to it was exactly the sort of ego-boosting Nabiki had accused her of seeking from his fiancees.

Forcing his mind away from that line of thought, which he really didn't feel up to facing right now, he countered with his new-found verbal skills.

"If I'm so healthy how come you wanna gimme a...," Ranma blushed slightly when she realized what she'd been about to say, "another exam?"

"As a martial artist, Ranma, you are less likely to experience certain ailments, such as cancer. At least, that would ordinarily be the case. On the other hand, your cells and tissues undergo regular stress from this transformation. If that stress manifests as cancer, which it well might, it could easily be missed simply because your otherwise excellent physique seems to mitigate the need to check for it."

Ranma's eyes glazed over as he tried to parse her last sentence. "Uh... could you..."

Setsuna smiled softly. "Your curse might be a cancer risk," she stated, understanding that he needed more simplification, "If caught early, most cancers are treatable. If not checked for regularly, however, it may have spread too far to cure by the time it is found. Now that you have this curse, you are potentially at twice the risk or more. You have both the risk of prostate cancer as a man and the risk of breast or ovarian cancer as a woman. Furthermore, if a cancer did develop, we have no way of knowing how the change could affect its spread."

"While cancer is less common here than in some other countries, it has been the leading cause of death in Japan since the early 1980s."

Setsuna considered for a moment. "Admittedly, most forms of cancer are much more likely to appear after you reach twenty-five, with the probability rising sharply as you age, however, while cancer in the young is rarer, it is also more often deadly, especially because it is often not caught early enough to be effectively treated due to the lack of regular examinations."

"Technically speaking, the examinations I've done are sufficient for our needs, in terms of giving me a baseline for the... procedure. However, I feel that you should have a full gynecological examination at least once sometime in the near future, even if you are unwilling to do so right now. Perhaps once you find a doctor you can feel comfortable with."

Her words decided him. The very fact that she recommended that he get the examination done even if by someone else clearly indicated that she was suggesting it for professional reasons and though her words held no hint of sadness or reproof he still felt bad that she might think that he was unable to trust her.

"It's okay, Setsuna," Ranma said softly, fumbling her hands nervously and looking down with an embarrased flush. "You can... I mean..." Ranma bit off her words, unsure of how to give permission without sounding, at least to herself, like she was asking for something perverted. Her renewed certainty regarding Setsuna's professionalism left her once again feeling desire for her and the crinkling of her nipples at the thought of the doctor's hands on her caused her blush to deepen as her embarrasment rose. She found herself hoping that the doctor wouldn't react to her obvious arousal or perhaps just put it down to the cold of the metal chair or the room.

"Alright, Ranma. First, I'll tell you what's involved, so you can get used to the idea."

Ranma grew steadily paler through Setsuna's description but when Setsuna finished, Ranma gave a shaky nod then climbed up to sit on the end of the exam table. She sat there trying to hold in her nervousness as Setsuna visually examined her breasts. She tried to focus on the clinical description Setsuna had given of what she was looking for but she simply couldn't help her arousal. She flushed again as her nipples hardened fully under Setsuna's clinical gaze and struggled to resist the desire to cover her breasts with her hands.

"Alright, Ranma, now place your hands on your hips. Good, now roll your shoulders. Again. Now raise, whoa, slowly please. Put your hands back on your hips. Alright, now, slowly, raise your arms above your head. Mmmhmm. Now lean forward and place your hands on your knees."

Feeling nervous and self-conscious Ranma moved as Setsuna directed her. Setsuna's eyes, fixed to her breasts, focused her own attention on them making her aware of each shift and jiggle as she moved.

"Very good, Ranma. So far, everything looks normal," Setsuna reassured her nervous patient. Her effort was largely wasted because her next words raised Ranma's tension level above even where it had been before her reassurances.

"Time to lie back on the table, Ranma."

The words might not seem to be the sort to make someone's fears and expectations run wild but in this case Ranma knew what would come next from the talk Setsuna had had with her before beginning. This was the part where Setsuna would rub her breasts all over, feeling for lumps. Palpating, she called it. Of course, that was the same word she had used for the muscle massage when Ranma had asked about it the second time around. Given that that activity had been thoroughly pleasurable in spite of being on relatively innocuous regions of her body she felt she had good reason to be nervous. "Now, place your right hand behind your head."

Ranma did as asked and once again she could not keep her mind off of the sensation of her flesh shifting and the momentary sway of her breast as it rose up on her chest, pulled upward as her arm moved. Her eyes tracked Setsuna nervously as she approached, coming to stand beside Ranma.

Their eyes met for a moment and Setsuna paused waiting until Ranma gave a jerky uncertain nod. Despite her intentions and putative readiness, Ranma jerked in surprise when she felt Setsuna rest three fingers near the center of her chest. She gasped softly when Setsuna pressed lightly in a circular motion then drew in her breath sharply when Setsuna repeated the motion pressing harder then again harder still.

Setsuna's fingers moved south just a bit before repeated their circuler motion with light pressure. Ranma was a bit more ready when Setsuna applied more pressure but she was still startled when the vaguely pleasant feelings that had been building since Setsuna's fingers first touched her fled at the third and hardest pressure.

Her readiness and her appreciation for the look of focused concentration in Setsuna's red eyes and the air of competence it gave her brought the sensation of pleasure back with the next light caress. Once again it was driven away and Ranma found her curiousity aroused.

Much though he disliked the old freak and frightened as he was by the concept of showing affection, much less sexual desire, for any of his admirers, and without the slightest desire to prove himself manly in the way his mother would prefer, Ranma still understood that the time might come, if he could ever escape the trap his father had woven for him, that he might wish to bring pleasure to a girl he liked. If it was this easy for a girl to lose the mood then by paying attention now he would have a better chance on keeping her interest when the time came.

She didn't notice the faint glimmer of surprise that flickered briefly in Setsuna's crimson eyes when Ranma's face took on a look characteristic of deep focus and concentration.

Her eyes closed as she tried to concentrate on the sensations and so she was taken by surprise when Setsuna's palpations reached her areola and Setsuna's index finger lightly brushed her nipple causing her to gasp in shock as it rose up, firm and ready. Her eyes flew open, unfocused, staring into the distance as she tried to deal with the unexpected flood of sensation.

Ranma felt a tingling deep in the pit of her belly, a feeling akin to the disturbing sensations she had felt when first learning to harness her ki.

Setsuna took Ranma's nipple lightly between her first and second fingers and squeezed gently, watching for any discharge. Ranma gasped explosively, her face turning a deep red as her eyes lost all focus, staring with an unseeing gaze at the ceiling.

She slowly came back to herself as Setsuna moved onward, continuing her palpations. I never realized, Ranma thought in wonder, that it could be that intense. She had been woefully unprepared for the strength of the sensations that had flooded through her at Setsuna's touch.

Her attention was returned to her surroundings when Setsuna's pattern ended just beneath her shoulder and Setsuna spoke. "Alright, you can lower your right arm now, and raise your left arm to the same position."

Ranma shivered as Setsuna's fingers began their deliberate massage of her left breast and she wondered for a moment how she was going to be able to handle the next part of the exam. If Setsuna's hand on her nipple had such a profound effect on her, how could what would come after not have an even greater effect?

The answer came to her immediately and when Setsuna completed the exam and helped her up, Ranma made no complaint as she was given a gown and assisted into it. Setsuna led her from the examination room into another room where the centerpiece was a rather disturbing looking chair covered with strange devices. Some of the clamps put Ranma in the mind of Kodachi's delight in the possibilities of restraint, but she forced the thought from her mind.

Setsuna was mildly surprised by Ranma's willing acquiescence, even when faced with the gynecological examination chair. Ranma did not even wait for Setsuna's request to drop her boxers, and willingly allowed Setsuna to assist her into the chair, placing her feet as directed into the stirrups, thereby opening herself to Setsuna's view.

Setsuna looked at Ranma's face, somewhat concerned that she might be harming her chances with Ranma by pushing her too quickly. When she saw the life fade from Ranma's eyes, she understood. She was not familiar with the technique but she could guess that Ranma had somehow withdrawn his awareness.

She proceeded with the examination as quickly as she could. She prepared a tray of warm water, then placed a cold metal speculum in the tray and waited for it to absorb the heat.

Picking it up, she dried it with a cloth, then laid it against her arm. Feeling no chill, she nodded once, then set it aside and pulled on a single thin rubber glove. With her gloved hand, she reached out and laid her hand upon Ranma's folds. She felt a blush stain her cheeks as she remembered her fantasy and felt a strong desire to lean forward and learn what Ranma tasted like.

Forcing her desire down, she carefully spread Ranma's folds, opening Ranma's tight vaginal passage to view. Looking carefully and inserting a single gloved finger to be sure, she noted without surprise that Ranma's hymen was already gone, doubtless due to her constant physical exertions.

Lifting the speculum in her other hand, she slid it gently within Ranma then carefully opened it. With her face on a level with Ranma's mound, she looked up Ranma's passage and holding the speculum open, she moved it forward until it rested to either side of Ranma's cervix.

Releasing Ranma's folds with her gloved hand, she slowly inserted two fingers. Small as Ranma was, Setsuna was able to reach her cervix and apply upward pressure to it. With her other hand, while still holding up on Ranma's cervix, Setsuna palpated her abdomen, noting the position of Ranma's uterus and ovaries.

Satisfied that there were no obvious signs of problems, she proceeded to use a long swab to collect liquid from Ranma's cervix for a Pap smear.

Examination completed, Setsuna opened the speculum wider to allow Ranma's cervix to pass between without catching, then closed and removed it. Standing, she stripped off the rubber glove and placed it in the second trash can in the room, the one for potentially contaminated materials, before returning to Ranma's side.

Peering into her blank eyes, she shook her lightly by the shoulders. Getting no response, she sat down to wait for Ranma's return. A little less than ten minutes later, Ranma stirred and life returned to her eyes.

Setsuna stepped up and helped Ranma out of the chair. Ranma was quick to grab her boxers and restore them to their rightful place. Setsuna opened the door for her. Ranma turned bright red with embarrassment as she scurried across the hall. Setsuna's receptionist had arrived while Ranma was being examined and Ranma could see her sitting at the desk down the hall. In spite of being covered by the gown she'd been given, Ranma felt exposed and ashamed as she reentered the original examination room.

Pausing above the pile her clothes had made on the floor, she glanced at Setsuna for permission. At Setsuna's nod, Ranma dressed with undue haste then sat at the table and folded her hands. She waited impatiently until Setsuna sat across from her, then fixed her with a wary gaze.

"Well?"

"There were no signs of any problems, Ranma," Setsuna reassured her. "That'll be more certain when the test results come back. You certainly seem fit and I saw nothing to cause concern. I've got your baseline now, so we will have that to compare with once we begin the retraining."

The wariness left Ranma's eyes to be replaced by a fervent excitement. "Can we look at the scroll now, Setsuna-san?"

Setsuna sighed but smiled, and shook her head. "Not yet, Ranma-kun. I have a business to run and my first appointment will soon be here. I should be catching up on paperwork even now. Why don't you go on about your day. I close the clinic at six. Can you meet me here then?"

Ranma nodded, grinning. Standing, she gave a deep bow. "Thank you again, Setsuna-san. I am glad I had the chance to meet you!"

"As am I, Ranma-kun, as am I. At six then."

"Oh, uhm... I kinda, uh, cut school to come here, Setsuna-san, since, uh, most of my... problems... would be busy then. Could I get a note or something, to explain it to my teachers? I don't really feel like getting ki-drained again on top of everything else."

---

Ranma leapt to the roofs the moment he was out of the clinic, wanting to spend as little time as possible in incriminating proximity to the clinic. The longer he could keep its location a secret from the rest of Nerima, the better off he would be.

Once again he practiced the dual vortex technique, rocketing towards Nerima at a considerable velocity. He released the technique just as he entered Nerima, well aware that it was still early morning and any of his enemies might be watching for him.

Continuing in the direction of the school, he ignored the lack of his books and lunch. Ukyou would doubtless be there again for lunch and as for his books, well, though he was getting more out of school these days, it was due to careful observation in line with Nabiki's teachings, and not from the texts nor the lectures they were meant to accompany. The absence of the books would hamper his new knowledge gathering pattern very little. Indeed, the reactions their lack would provoke from his teachers might prove enlightening in itself. Ranma was curious about the effect the Void and the Flame technique would have on Hinako-sensei's ki drain.

Landing lightly on the school fence, he was startled into stillness by the figure sitting on the school steps. Why would Nabiki of all people be at the school's front door?

Dropping easily from the fence he walked towards the school. His unease grew when he recognized his pack resting against the wall beside her. He scuffed his foot against the stone walkway and Nabiki looked up. He shivered when for just an instant he caught of look of fleeting pain in her eyes before they went cold again.

"Ranma," she said softly, as he approached. "I'm..." She looked down. "I'm sorry, if... if I helped force you to this. I..." She reached up and wiped her eye and Ranma's eyes sprang wide as he caught the glint of light off moisture on her hand. Was Nabiki... the Ice Queen... crying?

"All your things are here in your bag, Ranma-san," Nabiki said, a bit stiffly, then stood and turned away. "I'm afraid my father is quite angry, Ranma-san. He does not wish to see you at our home again."

Without waiting for a response, she walked inside the school, leaving Ranma standing dumbfounded before the doors. He glanced at the bag. Force me to this? She must be talking about defending myself from Akane, he thought. I guess Akane finally told them... or someone else did. Shouldn't have expected it to go over easy with them... well, actually, I didn't, I guess I just assumed after nothing happened that first day that it would just blow over. Man was I wrong, or what? I thought sure Tendo-san would engage me to Nabiki or Kasumi if things ever really fell out between Akane and me. Good thing I know Oyaji's Umi-sen-ken techniques, 'cause I gotta get those scrolls out of there, even if Tendo-san doesn't want me around no more.

Sighing, he picked up his pack, noting that it was heavier than usual, and slung it over his shoulder. Entering the school, he made his way quickly to his class.

When he opened the door, he glanced first at Akane, and was surprised to see a brief expression of relief and gratitude there before she looked down to her notes. He crossed the space to the teacher's desk, not waiting for a reprimand, his excuse held out before him.

The sensei took it and looked it over, then nodded. "Acceptable. Take your seat."

Ranma stoutly ignored the murmurs of his curious classmates, realizing too late that having a legitimate excuse was far more unusual for him than causing a disruption. Doubtless his behavior would fuel the rumour mill for some time to come.

He couldn't get his mind of that look on Akane's face, though. It seemed clear enough, in light of his earlier thoughts. She genuinely did not want to marry him. He had recovered enough perspective to not think that her actions, resisting marriage as they were, implied any actual hatred or even dislike for him. They were sufficiently explicable if she even simply liked him but not enough to want to marry him. Her look confirmed that... if she had truly hated him, then she would not be in the least grateful to him for causing her father to break the engagement, however grateful she might feel about the end of the engagement itself. If, on the other hand, she liked him but didn't want to marry him, then her gratitude made sense. He had prevented her from playing her angry role and keeping them apart, but he had, in doing so, broken the engagement and removed the reason for that behavior, and she had shown relief and gratitude. Finally, a Tendo makes sense, he exulted to himself.

When lunch came around, he deftly propelled himself through the window, his pack resting easily against his back. Flipping once, he landed lightly then glanced about the yard for Ukyou. Sighting her, he headed in her direction then slowed as he took in her sorrowful mien. Shaking himself, he resumed his progress, digging in his pants for the money with which to pay her.

Stepping up, he smiled softly in response to her sad gaze. "One extra-large pork special, please, Ucchan" he said, holding out his money. When he said her name, or her nickname rather, she brightened immediately. Taking his money, she immediately poured his batter. Slightly worried that her reaction indicated that she had taken the nickname as an endearment or term of affection implying that he still considered her his fiancee, he accepted the okynomiyaki and said, "Thanks, buddy."

He was surprised when her smile grew wider rather than fading and pondered the meaning as he ate. Could she have somehow believed that he no longer wanted to even be her friend, after what had happened? What had he done that could imply that? He could think of nothing yet he could come up with no other reasonable explanation for her reactions.

After he finished his okynomiyaki he turned back to Ukyou and was startled to find her bowing to him, her griddle already cooled and repacked. "Ranma-san," she said, her voice choked with emotion, "If my actions contributed to your decision and your action, I sincerely apologize." Looking up she took a deep breath, she continued, "My father has agreed, Ranma-san, that your action resolves my blood-debt satisfactorily, but I want you to know, it doesn't change the way I feel about you. If I can only be a friend, I will, I don't want to lose you, but I'll never stop loving you."

Tears flowed down her cheeks as she stared at him for a moment, as he stood in shock. She bowed again, then turned and ran, her face buried in her hand.

"Foul sorcerer! How dare you..." Whatever remonstrance Kuno had prepared was lost as a heavy mallet struck him down.

"Shut up, Kuno!" Akane glared down at him then released her mallet and walked up to stand before the startled pigtailed youth. She smiled softly at him and Ranma caught his breath, that one smile recalling for him all the times he'd thought her cute. She was, that he could freely admit now, to himself at least. It had been a long time since that pleasant expression had been bestowed upon him.

"Ranma-san," Akane began, and Ranma felt a shiver run down his spine. Why was everyone being so respectful towards him all of the sudden? "I apologize for my unreasonable behavior towards you in the past." Akane bowed deeply to him, then rose again. "I hope that we may still be friends... and... I thank you for finding a way out of our parent's foolishness."

Ranma glanced around and noted that all of the students within hearing distance looked about as stunned as he felt as they and he listened to Akane's patently rehearsed speech. Still, the final blow was yet to come.

"Please forgive my family, and especially my sister Nabiki, for any pain that we have caused you. I thank you for the restraint that you showed with myself and my family. Please accept our sincere apologies, Ishida-san."

Ranma's jaw dropped, as did those of the surrounding student population.

A Cold Day

Ranma stared open-mouthed as Akane walked away. He half-raised one hand, about to call out to her to stop so that he could ask what she meant when a stray thought caused him to hold his tongue.

"I know your school focuses on unarmed attacks, Ranma, but you do know how to use weapons, right? Well, if these techniques are your attacks and skills in this form, then knowledge is your weapon. You can achieve many goals without any knowledge, if your skill with words is good enough, but you can achieve much more with less skill if you have knowledge on your side. On the other hand, skill can be turned useless if your opponent has knowledge that you lack. And the worst thing you can do is reveal your lack of knowledge, for that is like showing your enemy your weakness." Nabiki's words returned to his mind.

Maybe I should find out more before I go revealing that I don't know what's going on here. After all, Akane is being nice again, Ukyou seems to have accepted that I just want to be her friend, and she isn't even complaining about her honor anymore. Nabiki apologized to me!

Seeing that a number of students were heading in his direction and that Kuno was beginning to stir, Ranma leapt away, making it to the window of his class in a few powerful jumps. Sitting once more at his desk, he watched Akane and Ukyou as they entered the class a few minutes later. Akane seemed genuinely happy, something he hadn't seen in her in a long time, while Ukyou had cleaned up and no longer looked visibly despondent.

Ranma reminded himself that he still needed to obtain his scrolls from the Tendo's attic before turning his attention to the entering teacher and focusing once more on his lessons.

The instant the final bell rang Ranma had bolted through the window. He touched lightly on the ground and immediately sprang to the outer wall and thence to the roofs. When he realized that he was heading back towards the dojo he pulled to a stop.

I can't go there yet, he decided. I'll have to wait for dark to get my scrolls. I don't wanna face anybody until I've figured out why Akane called me Ishida-san, so...

He was interrupted by the sound of a sweet voice calling for him. "Airen!"

He spun around, dropping into a deceptive ready stance, focusing his senses to find where she was coming from. Even as he noticed her he heard the distinctive ringing of her bicycle bells. She was rocketing down the road balanced on the thin fence top and heading in his direction. She had already seen him, as her call indicated.

For just a moment he considered waiting to see what her reaction to him would be, given how unusual Ukyou and Akane's reactions had been. A half-second later he realized that if somehow he had in fact been removed from the Saotome family register, as Akane's comment had implied, then all the engagements would be off... except for Shampoo's, which had nothing to do with his name and everything to do with him.

"Damn," he muttered, "didn't want to have to use this so soon." In spite of his grousing he wasted no time, spinning away from the onrushing Amazon, engaging his dual counter-spinning auras and blasting away at a velocity that put the Amazon's impressive biking speed to shame.

Shampoo shouted after him then sighed unhappily as she watched him vanish in the distance. "Why airen run from Shampoo?" Continuing her swift passage, she headed back for the Nekohanten. Perhaps her great-grandmother could give her some insight into Ranma's behavior.

---

Cologne looked up as her great-granddaughter entered the store. She looked unhappy and a little angry. Cologne considered the rumour she had heard from the lunch crowd and decided that this was more important than opening on time.

She pogoed over to the door where the closed sign still hung and motioned her heir to sit at a table. "Now, what is this all about, child? Why do you look so down?"

Shampoo sat and looked at her hands for a minute. Looking up, she said, "Airen disowned stupid Panda-man, changed name, but he still run from Shampoo. Shampoo not understand why."

Cologne looked up sharply. "Did you say that son-in-law has changed his name?" This is not good. If he has finally decided to renounce honor, we could all be in trouble.

"That what Sneaky-girl say. His name now Ishida Ranma. That ends all engagements Panda-man made, so why Ranma run from Shampoo?" Shampoo frowned, pouting cutely. "Ranma should be happy to be free to be Shampoo's airen!"

Cologne gave no outward indication of her thoughts but held a steady gaze on her heir. Shampoo sat at the table and she looked at her great-grandmother for several minutes, then sighed deeply. Her shoulders slumped. "Shampoo no understand, great-grandmother. Airen angry about bombs at wedding... Jusendo show Shampoo airen really care for Violent Kitchen-Destroyer. But why he change name and not marry Violent Girl if he love her? If airen not love her, then why he angry at Shampoo?"

"Does he love you?" Cologne eyed her heir sharply. It almost sounded as if Shampoo had opened her eyes...

Shampoo moaned unhappily. Unconsciously she began to rub the web of her left hand between her right thumb and forefinger. "Shampoo no think so anymore, or he not run from Shampoo. Nothing to hold him anymore, no reason to run, unless he not like Shampoo." She looked up and her eyes were filled with pain.

"Shampoo is failure, great-grandmother. Ranma not even like Shampoo as friend anymore, Shampoo think." Her eyes overflowed with slow tears as she stared at her teacher. "Shampoo do everything wrong! Now Shampoo have no friends here and must go back to village without husband, without friends."

She dashed the tears from her eyes, noting that her great-grandmother's expression had not changed. She firmed her face, hiding her pain and suppressing her tears. "Shampoo is Amazon warrior, does not need friends..."

She clenched her hands into fists, her fingernails biting into her palms as she tried to suppress the fear she felt. "H-Honored Elder, Shampoo has failed in her quest. Shampoo is sorry she has shamed her ancestors. Shampoo return to village with Elder, and face her punishment." She rose and walked to the back of the restaurant, her head held high, her stride firm and strong, hiding the pain that her aura laid bare to Cologne's old eyes.

As Shampoo vanished up the stairs, a single tear appeared in Cologne's eye and made its way down her wrinkled cheek before dropping from her face to splash against the floor. "How I wish that were true child, how I wish that were true. We all need friends... at least Jusendo was enough to finally convince you that winning him with trickery would do you little good."

Cologne sighed as she pogoed to stand looking out the front of the restaurant. "I'm sorry it came to this, Ranma." She understood the Japanese far better than did her great-granddaughter, and she knew what it meant that Ranma had forsaken his name.

"I need that boy as an ally even if Shampoo has failed to win him. I wonder if it's too late? He was always so pleasant, so nice in spite of the pressure. I didn't expect this. This changes everything. Ishida... Ishida... where have I heard that before?"

---

Ranma released the aura technique as soon as he was sure he was out of Shampoo's range and paused on a rooftop to rest for a moment. Exhilarating as the speed of the technique was, it was also draining. Still, it wasn't the drain that occasioned his rest, for he could easily have maintained the technique all the way to the park.

Having to flee from Shampoo rather than facing her, even after resolving things with Akane, had drained his confidence. He had been feeling ever more confident with Nabiki's training, the imminence of a cure for the Neko-ken, and his first successful detection and defence of a water based attack since gaining the curse. That had all been reversed over the course of the day, with Nabiki's strange behavior and learning that he had been kicked out of the Tendo home and then the disturbing words of Akane, implying that he had somehow been moved to the Ishida register, a name he could not even recall having heard before.

Ranma started roof-hopping again at a more normal pace, heading for the park, but keeping his senses wide open watching for anyone following him. Just when everything had been going his way, it seemed, something had come along and pulled the stability out of his life. Once again a single day had changed everything, much like that day when he first met the Tendos, and went from a life of constant travel to having a home.

Landing lightly on the brick wall that lined the park, he strolled along the top for a ways before hopping to the ground at a break in the bushes. Moving more slowly, he continued into the park, trying to release his stress and anxiety. While he kept his eyes out for a good place to practice some kata, he practiced the Void and the Flame, feeding the flame with his uncertainties while cloaking himself within the void.

---

Hotaru was having a surprisingly decent day. While the teasing had not really let up, she had taken solace in the fact that she had made it to school without becoming tired along the way. She wasn't even really certain why she had tried so hard to keep doing the exercises everyday.

The dark haired boy had not shown up again, though she continued going to the park every day, just in case. Several times she had wanted to give up on the exhausting exercises, even after she had determined that she was becoming able to do them for longer periods of time.

In the end she had decided that her persistence had to do with grace. That boy had taken fighting, something she had always seen as dark, depressing, dirty, and unpleasant, and made it into an art, graceful, beautiful, and uplifting. She found herself clinging to the hope that if she could just learn how he could make such a dismal thing as fighting seem bright, without taking from it that which made it real, for she remembered still the final killing blow that made her see it as a dance of death, then perhaps she could do the same with her life. Take something which was dismal and depressing, her daily life, and make of it something worth having.

Yes, today was a good day, she thought, right up to the point where she found herself in the park, where she had gone as she went every day, surrounded by a group of boys. She didn't recognize them, they were not her usual tormentors, and the fact that several of them were carrying weapons made it look as if they wanted more than simply to see her cry.

She gasped and turned to run, only to find that they had gotten behind her as well. One of them laughed, cruelly, and she shrieked. Her scream was immediately stifled by a heavy hand against her mouth and her head rang as someone hit her, cursing quietly but forcefully. She shrank back and closed her eyes, knowing that there was nothing more she could do.

A moment later she felt herself lifted and moved with great speed cradled in strong arms, then set down by a tree. She opened her eyes in surprise and saw one of the boys fly past her to impact against a tree. She stared in startled wonder at the group only to see the last of them falling with a thin spray of blood issuing from a cut above his eye.

Standing in the midst of the battered and bruised was a figure she had given up hope of seeing again. "It's you!" she cried out before she could stop herself, and she felt her heart stop when his deep blue eyes fell on her. He was beside her in a flash, so fast that she could hardly believe that he had moved at all, kneeling by her side.

"Are you injured?" He asked in a tender, concerned tone.

"No... They hit me on the head, but not hard," she responded, her voice shaking a bit. She thought of what he might do if he ever spoke to the children at her school. The thought of her being treated the way those punks had been made her feel ill, and it suddenly occurred to her that he might not appreciate her trying to learn from him. He had said he wasn't a teacher. Would he hit her then?

He looked around then scooped her up. "Come on, we can't talk here," he said. She shrieked when he leapt, sailing up and over the trees, and she hugged him tightly, afraid that he would release her and she would fall. Surely a fall from the height of the top of a tree would be enough to kill her... or would it just leave her badly injured and in great pain? She burrowed tighter into his strong embrace, trying to take comfort in the immense power she could feel in his muscles, while trying to avoid remembering the painful blows those muscles had just dealt out.

It was bad enough when he bounced off treetops and then rooftops but when he leapt from the roof of a two story building straight to the street, she could not contain her scream, picturing them both shattered on the sidewalk.

He landed lightly though, so lightly that she felt just the slightest of bumps, then set her down. "Sorry about that, miss. Sometimes I forget that not everyone travels the way I do. I wouldn't let you fall, I do this sort of thing all the time. Anyhow, we can talk here, okay?"

He gestured at the building he had landed in front of and to her surprise when she looked at it it was an ice cream parlor.

---

Ranma heard a shriek and even as he moved swiftly in that direction, responding with the instincts of his training, his father's words in his mind, "A martial artist's first duty is to protect the weak," he showed no outward sign of emotion. Even the satisfaction of knowing that he had managed to retain the meditative technique while responding to the cry of distress was given to the flame, concealed within the void.

Though he was certainly not invisible, nor acting in a manner to avoid attention, as he leapt through the park at high speeds, no-one noticed his passage.

Landing near a group of boys, he recognized their type immediately. He had encountered enough of them on the road, though Nerima was largely clear of them by now. They were punks, boys with an over-inflated opinion of themselves, but not true street toughs. Street toughs lived on the streets and lived by the street's rules. They might not know the forms, but they generally knew how to fight, though not well enough to be a danger for a martial artist of his caliber, as long as he kept his eyes open for dirty tricks.

These boys on the other hand were mostly clean cut school boys, who were probably pampered and deferred to in their regular lives. This was their form of rebellion. They would be lucky if two of them knew the forms of an art, and it was far less likely that any of them had real experience with fighting.

They went after easy prey and did their work by threats and bluffs, and now apparently they had a schoolgirl. The fact that one of them was holding her made him realize right away that they were not merely extorting money and the recognition of their intent would have ignited a cold fury in him... but instead it merely fueled the flame that was already burning within.

None of them detected Ranma's silent entrance into their group. The boy holding the girl fell to a carefully placed ubujitsu strike, though not a painless one by any means. Ranma didn't want to risk the girl's well-being with harsher attacks. As soon as she was free of the falling youth's hands he scooped her up and sped out of the group. They were only just beginning to react to the fall of one of their number, who had not yet quite hit the ground, when Ranma was once more among them.

His force was proportionate to their weaponry. The boy who was wielding a pair of brass knuckles against a defenseless school girl received a crushing kick to the chest that cracked a rib and sent him flying while those who were unarmed received consciousness-stealing blows from a steel-hard fist.

He took down the last of them and stilled then turned his gaze to the girl. To his shock, he recognized her, the lonely eyed dark haired girl that he had seen twice before. In an instant he was by her side soliciting her health.

As she spoke his mind was racing. This was the third time he'd seen her, he had a legitimate reason to speak with her and his fiancee situation finally seemed to be getting closer to a resolution. When she fell silent he made his decision; the chance to get a new friend was worth the risk.

He glanced around. If he was going to try to make a friend, this was hardly the place to do it. It was littered with the bodies of the injured and would probably make her feel uneasy. He said as much then scooped her up before she could protest. She might take it the wrong way, he mused as he leapt, but she seemed too small to hurt him and she certainly hadn't been defending herself strongly against those boys.

She screamed then burrowed into his arms and as he began to allow his focus technique to relax a small smile grew on his face. It felt good to hold someone, cradled protectively in his arms. He had carried a few of his fiancees in this way and it had felt good then too, though it had always carried with it an undercurrent of fear and danger. Now he merely enjoyed the feeling of strength that always came when someone allowed him to protect them. It felt good to be able to use the art for what it had been intended for.

To be certain, he had learned the art for more than just helping people. It was his life, it was his passion, but so few people seemed to understand it the way he did. They could at least understand the protective aspect of it and when people accepted that, it felt as if they were accepting him. She had stopped screaming but she was still holding on to him tightly, silently asking for his protection, and the mere fact that she wasn't shoving him away, loudly declaiming that she could protect herself and needed not his help, against all evidence to the contrary, made him feel warm with acceptance, something he had enjoyed far too little of in his life.

As he leapt, he considered his destination. She was a small girl and younger than he and though he could not consider changing to a girl himself, for she knew nothing of his curse, still he felt that treating her to ice-cream would be the best way both of calming her after her narrow escape and of making her a friend. He knew that ice-cream always made him feel better when he was a girl and though it was not quite as exquisite an experience as a man, he hardly wasted a moment's thought about it being unmanly.

If in fact he had been thrown out and disowned, then he hardly had to worry about his father's notions of the behavior of a man. If his mother complained, he would just point out that he was doing it to win over a girl and she would be happy, even if she would read more into it than he was placing there.

The girl screamed loudly, piercing the silence, when he dropped smoothly from a two story building to land in front of an ice cream parlor. He apologised, being careful to focus on accepting the blame and avoiding any intimation that she had been in the wrong. That was one of the things he had learned from Nabiki; often more control over a situation could be gained from being in a conciliatory position than an aggressive one, if one did not have reason to be conciliatory to begin with, and the other person knew it. She had been very careful to admit up front that it was a wasted tactic if the other party would simply assume guilt, but otherwise it could forestall considerable recriminations. Nabiki had deftly made the point that he should evaluate the probable response and consequences of accepting the blame. If doing so meant having to pay money or accept punishment, then fighting it intelligently might be worthwhile, but if it would merely result in censure, then accepting it up front could often reduce or even eliminate the reproof.

He had not had a chance to try her suggestion before, since as far as he could tell, pretty much every relationship he had in Nerima was of the sort she had described wherein the fault would automatically be ascribed to him, making the technique useless. This, on the other hand, was a situation where he had just committed, as his mother might say, an act of heroism. Recriminations should be in short supply, and punishment still harder to come by, so taking the blame up front should help avoid any hard feelings and increase his chances of coming out of this with a friend and not another rival or enemy.

She looked up at him and nodded slowly. The expression on her face, if he read her rightly, was one of disbelief. He led her inside, opening the door for her, then guided her to a table and sat across from her.

A waitress came by and gave them menus. She tried to flirt with him but he was experienced at appearing oblivious. He did note the mild annoyance in the purple eyes of the young girl though. It did not surprise him; what surprised him was that the annoyance seemed reserved for the waitress and not for him. He was used to being the target of the recriminations, being accused of flirting and womanizing when girls tried to catch his eye. That she did not think that of him gave him a little hope that this might finally be his day.

"Order anything you like," he said, before glancing at his own menu. He kept one eye on the clock. Making a friend would be nice, but he didn't want to miss his appointment with Meiou-san. The chance to cure himself of his greatest fear was one he would not allow to pass him by.

The girl lowered her menu to stare at him for a moment, then she blushed and bowed her head. "I'm terribly sorry, I haven't even thanked you. I'm Tomoe Hotaru. Thank you for saving me, sempai."

Ranma grinned. "Ah, it was nothing, Hotaru-san. I'm Saotome Ranma and I'm pleased ta meetcha."

The girl smiled softly and was about to speak when the waitress returned, earning a glare for her interruption. She left after taking their orders, and Hotaru returned her attention to Ranma. "I saw you once before, Ranma-sempai. You were... I don't know what it is called... you were fighting someone who wasn't there."

"That was a kata," Ranma replied, remembering that day, and the feelings that had been evoked and after the first kata was done, a brief glimpse of lonely purple eyes.

"A kata, then. It... it was beautiful, Ranma-sempai. I've never seen anything like it. I've seen fights at school, but they were always so dirty and ugly. You made it seem so...," Hotaru paused. She'd been about to say graceful, or elegant, but those were feminine terms. Would he be offended? "So meaningful." A dance of death... the words echoed in her mind though she did not say them.

"Yeah," Ranma smirked. "That's why it's called an art. I've been learning it since I could walk." Ranma paused for a moment. He had been about to say "I'm the best," but would that be merely doing what Nabiki had said of him? Was he just seeking out the girls to stroke his ego? But it was true, wasn't it? He had beaten Saffron, for Kami's sake, surely he could be forgiven for claiming to be the best? Still the comparisons to Kuno and Kodachi would not leave his head. "The greatest Kendo champion!" rang in his head in Kuno's declamatory tones. Saying does not make it so, Tofu had said that once. Ranma had felt the same thing the first time Tofu had told him what a nice girl Akane was.

"It is an art intended to be used for defense," Ranma said, but immediately contradictions ran through his mind. Sure that is what his father had always claimed, but the two most powerful sets of moves were based on a thief attacking a house. How could that be construed as defensive? The only place for offensive moves in the art should be in response to the dictum that the best defense is a strong offense.

The waitress returned with their ice-cream and set it before them. Ranma looked at his for a moment. His instincts screamed at him to eat it and quickly, before someone stole it, but his training with Nabiki had already kicked in. At the same time that she had taught him to treat conversation as a fight, she had strongly indicated that there were aspects of it that had to be treated differently. In a fight, he could not afford to second-guess himself and absolutely had to trust his instincts if he were to win.

That same pattern of behavior, translated to verbal skills, had netted him immense amounts of trouble, for it meant speaking without taking time for thought. Nabiki had made it painfully clear that while there were many aspects of life that could be treated as a battle, that particular pattern was of use only in a physical confrontation where a moment's pause could mean the difference between life or death, winning or losing. In almost every other aspect of life, though, pausing for thought gave more advantage, and the well-considered word could do far more good than a hasty one.

Indeed, she had shown him some texts speaking of war and battle tactics, and one of the dictums had disturbed him greatly. "The hasty stroke goes oft astray." They made it plain that even in war and battle, instant decisions should be made only in the heat of battle and the midst of the fight, that in preparing for battle and arranging for the fight, care and caution were far more effective than speed.

With his instincts short-circuited, his mind kicked in. She was small and thin and hardly a danger to his food. No-one else but his father was foolish enough to try to take his food and while he might normally be concerned that an interruption could come at any moment and steal his opportunity, he was now in another district, far from any who knew him, bar one.

For once in his life, Ranma picked up his spoon and ate slowly, savoring the ice-cream, the textures and flavors. The benefit of not startling or disgusting his companion outweighed, in his short balancing of the scales, the risk of not finishing or being interrupted.

Some of the demons actually turned out to be quite good at ice-skating.

Truth Unfolding

Matching his pace to hers so that he didn't need to think about it, Ranma looked up. "So, do you visit that park often?"

It was an unnecessary question, of course. He knew the answer. He had been to the park three times and he himself had not planned the visits in advance. She didn't even know him, so there was no way she could have managed to be there specifically because he was, and yet the three times he had been there, he had seen her. That strongly implied that she went there on a very regular basis.

He did not blush though, nor berate himself for asking such a stupidly obvious question. It was no accident that he asked a question to which he already knew the answer. It was yet another one of Nabiki's rules. If you lead with a question to which you already know the answer than you can get a feel for how open and honest the other person would be with you.

She looked up, smiling softly, and nodded. "Yes, I go there every day after school."

"It's a nice park. Peaceful," Ranma commented. That implicitly gave his reasons for being there and if Nabiki was right then Hotaru would probably respond in a way that would give at least a hint as to her own reasons for being there.

"I suppose," Hotaru said, a little sadly. "Everyone seems to enjoy it." Except you, Ranma thought. I wonder why? Because she's lonely, you baka, he retorted. You saw it in her eyes. She's lonely, and everyone there is happy but her. She probably goes just to watch them, the same way you stop and watch everytime you see a kid with his mother and there ain't no-one around to see you. Funny... I go there to be alone, she goes there because she is alone...

Ranma paused, trying to come up with another question. He could not ask her about friends; if that was the reason she seemed lonely, he would just hurt her. He could ask about her family or school, but he did not want to seem to forward.

Moments later the silence remained, but Ranma realized that it felt comfortable. He could not think of anything else to say that wouldn't end with his foot in his mouth so he stuck with the ice-cream.

Hotaru for her part was afraid that anything she said might lead to her revealing why she had no friends. He had said that his martial arts were for defense. Had he really had a reason to save her, or was it just an opportunity to use his art? She did not want to burst the bubble, to pierce the appearance of friendship that surrounded them.

When she finished her ice cream, she looked up to see Ranma taking his last bite. She smiled shyly, realizing that this was the logical point for their acquaintanceship to end, but hoping that it wouldn't.

Ranma looked up then stood, holding out his hand to her. She took it and stood. "So, how about I take you home? Just in case any of those guys are thinking about revenge?" Ranma cursed his mouth the instant the words left his lips and she paled. Damnit, it had been going so well, why did he have to screw up now?

A moment later he realized that he had not really screwed up, as he walked her home. Sure he had brought back her fear, but that had also given her reason to accept his offer. Even now she was holding tightly to his arm, which gave him a pleasant feeling.

It only took about ten minutes to walk to her home. When she turned back at the door, he responded to an urge and spoke. "Maybe I'll see you again sometime?"

The brilliant smile that won from her left him feeling warm inside. She had not rejected the idea. Did that mean he finally had a friend, a real friend?

He leapt to the rooftops and bounced from roof to roof, taking careful note of the neighborhood's appearance from high up so that he would be able to locate it again.

He made it to the clinic about fifteen minutes before six and took a seat in the lobby. He could see that the receptionist was putting things in order to leave, which matched with Setsuna's comments about meeting after closing. The last appointments had probably stopped coming in at least half an hour earlier, and were now in with the doctor.

---

Nabiki sighed unhappily as she entered the house. She could hear her father in the living room wailing about Ranma's betrayal. She didn't really know what to think about that, but she had seen Ranma's face when Akane had called him Ishida-san and she would give good odds that he had no idea what she was talking about.

Kasumi stepped into the hallway when Nabiki called out to let the houe know she was home. "Did you see Ranma today, Nabiki? Yes, I guess you did, you haven't got his pack with you anymore."

"Yes, I saw him, Kasumi. I... I don't think he did it, Kasumi," Nabiki said, struggling not to let her emotions spill over into her voice. She could hardly believe that she had thought that of him, that she had been so harsh to him that morning, when he did not know anything about it.

"Oh my!"

Nabiki nodded then sighed. "I... I'm going to talk to Akane. She... she deserves to know." And I want to know if she really is that happy about it. I wonder how Ranma felt, being congratulated for something he didn't do. "Is she in her room?"

Kasumi smiled and nodded. "Yes, I believe so."

Nabiki made her way slowly up the stairs, thinking about the past few days. She didn't understand Akane, but Akane's reactions seemed to make it clear that Genma, Soun, and Kasumi's assumption that her protests were groundless was pretty unlikely. She would not have suddenly been happy with Ranma, thanking him politely and asking forgiveness, if she had really been in love with him.

Which made Nabiki feel somewhat less guilty about the feelings she had felt growing during her instruction of Ranma. Unfortunately, those very feelings had led to a feeling of betrayal when she learned what Ranma had done, and resulted in her harsh reaction. Did she have any chance left with him?

Nabiki paused for a moment to collect herself and strengthen her icy mask before knocking on Akane's door just below the crooked duck plate.

"Come in."

Nabiki entered Akane's room. Akane lay on her back on her bed, staring at the ceiling. Nabiki closed the door and walked across the room to sit at Akane's desk.

"I was wrong," she said.

Akane sat up quickly. "You mean... he didn't?"

Nabiki sighed and looked down. "It happened, yes. That hasn't changed. I even checked and verified through the computers at school that his name has been moved to the Ishida registy. But..." She looked up, staring into Akane's face, wondering what her sister really felt. "Ranma didn't know. He didn't do it. All he knows..." Nabiki paused, trying to keep from getting choked up.

"All he knows is he came to school one morning and learned that he was no longer welcome in our home."

"And...," Akane stared at her, eyes wide, "and I... I thanked him..." Moisture glinted in the corners of her eyes, catching Nabiki's attention. So, you do care, at least a bit, she thought with satisfaction and not a little sadness.

"Still... at least he's free now," Akane said, sadly.

"So you do like him, at least a little," noted Nabiki. "I began to wonder at the end there."

Akane stared at her, then looked down at her hands, bunched into tight fists. Tears leaked from the corners of her eyes. "I didn't like him, Nabiki! I loved him!"

Nabiki's eyes grew wide and it was an effort to keep her jaw from dropping. "But... but..."

Akane looked up, anger and guilt warring in her eyes, still dripping tears. "I loved him! After Jusendo... I... I dared to hope. But... he was right. He didn't say it. It was just my hopes, making me think that. I realized after the wedding... it's not fair to him to make him marry someone he dislikes just for honor, especially not after all that damn panda father of his has done to him." She looked down again, her fingers white where they dug into her palms. "He... he deserves to marry for love."

"But... but the last week, all the malleting... he... he was trying to be nice," Nabiki protested.

Akane glared at her. "Do you think I'm blind Nabiki? He was staying away from the others, being nice to me, and all the time, his eyes were sad. He had finally given in, Nabiki! After all this time fighting our fathers, he was finally going to give in to his mother. He was giving honor one last chance. And I realized... I realized that I couldn't do that to him. I couldn't trap him in marriage... if I did... I'd be no better than Shampoo or Ukyou."

It was a chastened and thoughtful Nabiki that sat on her bed that night, staring wistfully at the easel with which she had taught Ranma so much. She had thought at the beginning that Akane's protests had been merely of necessity. Sure, she had occasionally helped derail their father's plans, knowing that the pair weren't ready to get married. She had felt her opinions had been confirmed during the short time that Ranma had been her fiancee. If either had truly disliked the other, they would have had no objections to leaving the situation as it was. Instead, they had both sought to have her return things to the way they were before.

But the last week, watching Akane's behavior, she had revised her opinion, deciding that somewhere along the line, love had soured. Now... could it truly be possible that neither of them had been aware of the other's love? That the protests that had seemed so transparent to her and almost everyone else, had been taken at face value by the two involved?

"Wherever you are now, Ranma... I'm sorry."

---

Ranma blushed hard when his thoughts led him back to the examination Setsuna had given him that morning. He tried to focus on the receptionist to forget those feelings but instead he found that the arousal he was feeling was leading him to evaluate her in a light he normally avoided and he turned away feeling embarrassed and hoping she hadn't noticed.

A few minutes later she walked past on her way out and very openly checked him out, not trying to hide it as her brown eyes traced his muscles. Ranma was still blushing hard when Setsuna entered the room after the receptionist had exited the building.

"Ranma, I'm glad you could make it," she began, but he held up his hand and she stopped.

"Before... before we go on with this, I want to tell you some things that happened to me today, and maybe you can help me figure out what happened. I... it's not really your field, I guess, but Tofu-san was always a big help when I couldn't figure out why people were acting weird."

Setsuna took a seat on the bench beside him and gestured for him to continue. She kept her eyes on him, watching his reactions, and inwardly cursing her busy schedule. If she had just had an opportunity, just five minutes of peace, she would have been able to know what was coming, would have seen it in the Gates of Time. As it was, all she could tell was that something had not gone according to plan.

"Well, when I got to school, Nabiki was waiting there on the steps. She gave me my pack and said that her father had said I wasn't welcome home anymore. I didn't know what was going on, but I guessed they had finally found out that I defended myself from Akane's mallet. Up to that point I thought they already knew."

"Then Akane... Akane apologized for her behavior all this time and for her family's, out there in front of everyone! I didn't know what to think, but I thought it was just because her father had broken the engagement until she called me Ishida-san!"

Setsuna barely restrained a gasp. That's not right, how did this happen? How did I miss it? What else has gone wrong?

"I suspect they think you changed your name, Ranma, effectively disowning your family and breaking all the engagements."

"That makes Akane's behavior make sense... except that I haven't changed my name!"

"Well... it certainly is unusual, but perhaps your mother? Hmm... I think I've heard that name before, hold on just a moment." Setsuna rose and walked over to the receptionist's desk, Ranma following curiously just behind. She opened one of the drawers and flipped through a few documents before sighing and sitting in the receptionist's seat. She reached across the desk and flicked the switch on a power bar.

Ranma watched as she booted the computer and caused it to bring up an address book. A few moments later she was shutting the computer down again. Standing she pulled a piece of paper off of the printer that rested on a stand behind the desk, against a wall, and looked at it.

"I thought so. Ishida Nokomura. He's a lawyer, he's come in a few times." She looked at Ranma for a moment, gauging his reaction. "If you prefer to find out what's going on with your name before we look into the scroll, we could go find this lawyer. He would probably know what to look for, and he does owe me a few favors. Given that he has the same name as... well, there may be a connection there, he might know what we're talking off without having to do any research."

Ranma grinned. "That'd be great, Setsuna-san."

Setsuna lost herself in thought as Ranma followed her out of the clinic. She locked the doors then took a moment to get her bearings, the lawyer's address held tightly in her hands. She led off, saying nothing.

How had this happened? She had been so careful, preparing Ranma for a relationship; she had definitely not intended to push him this fast. Who had arranged this name change? Ishida didn't seem familiar, she did not think it was Nodoka's maiden name.

How would this affect her plans? She wished that she could go to the Gates of Time and find the influence that caused this, but she couldn't leave Ranma to deal with this alone. From what he had said, he no longer had a place to stay.

Ranma sighed as he followed Setsuna. She looked distracted and he wondered if she was annoyed because he had not chosen to work on the scroll first. It had, after all, been excitement over the possibility of verifying the validity of that scroll that had started this whole business. Was he wrong to expect more from her, to think of her as he had thought of Tofu?

Setsuna knew where she was going, so it was not long before they found themselves entering the lobby of an office complex. Ranma was mildly surprised when Setsuna walked past the front desk, not giving it a second glance. He understood when she paused by the elevator, running her finger down a list of names. Several of them were clearly the names of businesses, Ranma realized, which meant that this building must house a number of different companies. The desk at the front of the building must be for deliveries, Ranma mused, or maybe security.

Setsuna pressed the button for the elevator and they waited. Ranma fidgeted nervously. Nabiki had advised gathering information about a topic before facing someone on it, but Ranma could see no other way to get the information he needed other than by asking someone who would know. Setsuna seemed to feel that this man might be able to help him, but Ranma couldn't help but worry that he was headed for trouble. If this was his name now, then this lawyer might be connected to someone who had bought him from Genma, as that was the only way Ranma could think of for his name to have been changed. If that was the case... Ranma shivered.

A tone sounded and the elevator doors opened smoothly. Ranma followed Setsuna into the close quarters, and watched as she pushed the button for the sixth floor. It was the highest number listed so that was the top floor. Did that mean anything? Ranma wondered, but didn't have any knowledge in that arena. He had heard of penthouses but did that apply to office buildings?

The elevator ride was quite short and soon Ranma found himself standing behind Setsuna as she spoke to a receptionist. The door they had passed through had Ishida's name enameled on it, and his name was present again on the wall in the reception area. The walls were paneled with wood and the floor was covered by a thick carpet, a soft brown with gold highlights.

The receptionist's desk was of a heavy dark wood that gleamed in the warm light of the upward pointing lamps that dotted the room. A small tree stood in one corner, covered in large rich green leaves, with a furry trunk. There was a comfortable looking cushioned couch with a gleaming metal frame against the left wall and both beside it and in front of it were set low tables, their surfaces largely hidden by numerous magazines.

Ranma turned his attention to the receptionist, a woman a few years older than him with long black hair gathered in a ponytail. Her eyes were framed by wire-rimmed glasses. With her gaze centered firmly on Setsuna, he could not see the color of her eyes. She seemed to be asking about an appointment and Ranma caught the distinct sense that she did not plan to let them in without one.

Setsuna quietly but firmly, in a tone of quiet confidence that seemed far from Ranma's usual arrogance and yet left one feeling certain that she would have her way, gave their names, insisting that she pass them on to Ishida, that he would see them, even without an appointment.

Ranma half-expected the receptionist to balk, but the confidence in Setsuna's voice had its intended effect. Instead of objecting, she pressed a button on her phone, not touching the receiver, still nestled in its cradle, and stated their names quietly. She seemed surprised when the response came.

"Send them in, Yuki-san."

She looked up and smiled, a smile which did not reach her eyes, and pressed a hidden button. Ranma heard a distinct click from the inner door. "Ishida-san will see you now."

Ishida was stepping around his desk as they entered. As soon as he was fully past the desk, he bowed and introduced himself. Setsuna bowed in return and Ranma followed suit, then examined Ishida as Setsuna made the introductions. Ishida was a strongly built man with a head of closely cropped black hair, wearing a western suit in a light gray. He looked physically strong and seemed healthy, though Ranma did not get the sense that he was a fighter or trained in the art. He had vividly blue eyes that locked onto Ranma as soon as Setsuna mentioned his name. Ranma straightened under Ishida's appraisal, responding as to a challenge.

Ishida gestured to the leather cushioned chairs in front of his desk, waiting as they seated themselves, Ranma to Setsuna's left, then returned to his seat. He listened politely as Setsuna explained Ranma's story, then nodded thoughtfully.

"The courts are generally rather slow, Meiou-san. I suppose it is to be expected that in a situation where swift movement on their part would cause problems that that is when they would suddenly become efficient." He sighed and shook his head sadly, then leaned forward against his desk, meeting Ranma's eyes once more. "Please believe, Ranma-san, it was our intention to contact you before the court papers reached you." He sighed and sat back even as Ranma sat up straighter.

"So you do know something about this?" Ranma leaned forward, eyes shining hopefully.

"I certainly do, Ranma-san. Your mother's father, who, by the way, took his wife's name when he married, which is why your mother was not an Ishida before her marriage, disapproved of Genma, but was unable to dissuade her from marrying him."

He paused, watching the young man who sat across from him. Ranma certainly was taking the insult to his father rather calmly. Perhaps that should not be surprising, if the contract they had found was to be believed. He nodded at this confirmation of their assessment. It looked like Ranma might not have as much objection to their actions as had been feared. Meiou-san looks as inscrutable as ever, he thought, I wonder how she got involved? Probably detailed in the latest surveillance report.

"When he died, he laid a charge on my father, his brother, to watch over Nodoka's children. Unfortunately, Genma vanished shortly thereafter. Several times we almost caught up to him, but every time he seemed to catch wind of us and disappeared again." A slight frown crossed Ishida's face as he remembered the anger and frustration of those early years. The inability of any of the elder Ishida's people to find Saotome Genma had come close to causing a rift in the family. Resentment against the man who made them look like fools was still common among Ishida's operatives.

"After a number of years of pouring money into finding you and failing, my father reduced our efforts to watching the public records and news services." That too had nearly caused a schism.

"When you showed up again at Furinkan, that was only the second reference to you we'd found. My father held us back, afraid that if we moved too quickly, Genma would run again. So we watched." He shook his head, smiling faintly. "It was not easy. More than once I wanted to strangle my cousin for letting that man take you from her." The elder Ishida had literally suffered a heart attack when he was shown video footage of Ranma's curse and Ranma's treatment at the hands of Genma and the Tendos. He had spent nearly three months in the hospital as a result. Ishida had no intentions of letting Ranma find out about that.

"At any rate, he held us back until they tried to force you into marriage." Ranma was surprised at the genuine anger on the man's face. "It wasn't the marriage that actually triggered our activities, but the complete failure of any of the involved parties to even attempt to resolve the situation. It was clear at that point that Genma would never resolve the tangled mess of honor he had created, even when it destroyed his house and nearly cost you your life." Nokomura's voice was filled with disgust for everyone involved.

"After seeing how you handled the situation your father put you in, my father was frankly impressed with how well you managed to turn out in spite of being raised by... by that man." He shook his head then, his face darkening. "I still can't believe that Nodoka was willing to even consider holding you to that contract."

Ranma's eyes clouded. He himself found it painful to think of his mother's willingness to enforce the seppuku contract but he still found himself coming to her defense. "It is a matter of honor," he said sharply.

Ishida nodded, which surprised Ranma. "That's not really the issue there, Ranma. What irritates me," and he sighed once more, a sigh of exasperation, "is that she's trying to hold you accountable for the family honor when the Saotome name and honor has already been irrevocably destroyed by Genma. While most of his acts of dishonor are not known to the general public, nor to the authorities, they are common knowledge among the reputable dojos. And that, of course, is the one venue of greatest importance to your future."

Ranma nodded slowly. While he felt impelled to defend his mother, he was pushed to fight his father's battles far too often. He himself felt deep anger over Genma's trammeling of the family honor, especially in the face of his hypocritical harping on Ranma's honor and Ranma's responsibility to the family honor. Before his lessons with Nabiki, his defense against that anger had been simple, a product of his rearing. He simply didn't think about it. If he thought about the past, he would inevitably grow angry or depressed, so instead, he had attained a relentless focus on the present moment... a focus that had had a number of deleterious effects on his life, but which had kept him sane and happy in an otherwise impossible situation.

"As I was saying, it was after seeing how you handled the aftermath that the decision was made. I am not the one to offer this, but if you ask it, you will receive a formal apology from my father, Ishida Kamado. Unfortunately, in spite of the dishonor your father has brought to the Saotome name, had you renounced your name, given the responsibilities the family has placed on you, you too would have suffered dishonor."

Ishida paused for a moment to collect his thoughts but Ranma said nothing. It seemed to him that Ishida had admitted to changing his name, but then, he had had that impression from the beginning. Hopefully Ishida would soon explain why, and what it meant.

"It was when my father realized that no-one was doing anything to aid you in resolving a situation where the only way that retained honor for all involved was for you to commit seppuku that he finally committed us to acting. He was afraid, I think, that you might eventually choose that route, and chose to prevent it, even at the cost of potentially gaining your enmity."

"My father had, even after finding the first mention of you in the courts... which I'll tell you about later, held onto the hope that if we could just get you back with your mother, she would resolve things by divorcing Genma and bringing you with her... she could have... in my opinion," he continued, his face hardening slightly, "should have, taken the dishonor onto herself, as a recognition and atonement for the mistake she made in marrying him, leaving you free of dishonor."

"There were secondary reasons for our actions and the final decision on what to do was based on that first document from the court." Ishida leaned back, looking thoughtfully at his diploma and licenses in their gilt edged frames on the wall. "You probably aren't aware of this, limited as your upbringing was, but the courts are not generally amenable to interfering in the affairs of samurai families. Questions of honor are not something the courts like to touch, and so they make it quite hard for such issues to be brought to them, and even harder for them to be resolved there."

"Were it not for my father's contacts in the judiciary, we would never have succeeded. As it was, we found a sympathetic judge..." Ishida straightened, glancing at Setsuna, who looked as unperturbed as she had at the beginning of the conversation, before turning his eyes to meet Ranma's once more. "We placed all the evidence of your case before him, and we succeeded in convincing him to have you moved to the Ishida register."

Ranma sat up straight. "So Akane was right!"

Ishida nodded. "We could not ask you. If it had been your decision, then it would mean renouncing your name and being dishonored. Even what we have done would mean dishonor in many circles, but as I said before, most of the masters in the martial arts community in Japan are aware of your situation and will not hold it against you." Ishida smiled softly. "Indeed, I think you'll find a fair amount of respect for the fact that you never once turned on your honor or the honor of your family, in spite of your father's actions."

Ranma looked down, considering what he'd been told, trying to apply Nabiki's lessons. He raised his head finally, glaring defiantly at Ishida. "So... what does your father want from me?" he demanded.

Continued Revelations

Ishida nodded slowly. "You are right to ask that, Ranma, but unfortunately, I cannot tell you. I suspect that he wants more from you than merely the fulfillment of his promise to his brother, but what it is I do not know. All I can tell you at this time is what the Ishida family wants for and from you, at the moment."

Ranma settled back into his chair. No-one had ever done anything for him without asking something in return and Nabiki had assured him that this was a universal truth. Having Ishida acknowledge that there was an ulterior motive, even if he could not, or would not, say what it was, eased his suspicions somewhat. Still he did not wait for Ishida to continue, to explain what the family wanted of him. There was something more important to make clear first.

"Whatever he asks, you know that I will do nothing that is against my honor." As he spoke, Ranma watched Ishida closely, watching his eyes and his face as Nabiki had instructed him, looking for his reaction. He could not accept any help from them if what they might ask for in return should go against his honor.

Ishida's response was free of any of the signals of unease or untruth that Nabiki had taught him and Ranma finally allowed himself to relax. "I am sure that my father would not ask anything of you that would harm your honor. He holds honor too dearly himself."

"So... you said you could tell me what your family wants of me?"

"Of and for you, I said," Ishida replied, emphasizing the for. "The Ishida clan means to see you free of the dishonor your father has bound you with. We intend to see you educated. Where he has kept you ignorant to make you dependent on him, we intend to make you dependent on no-one but yourself." Ishida leaned forward in his chair as if to emphasize his point. "In a more immediate sense, Ranma, we intend to give you a more supportive family experience, a sane education, and the freedom to develop your style of the art into something that can truly be called your own."

Ranma frowned, trying to work through what Ishida had said. "So... you're gonna put me in a different school?"

"As a start, yes," Ishida nodded. "And with your cooperation, we would like to place you in a family unit..."

"A what?" interrupted Ranma.

"We would like you to live with a family. We don't think you should be on your own just yet. We want to put you with a more normal family, let you see what it is like in a home that has a mother and a father. Probably one that has a teenager already, so that they'll be more prepared for you."

"Huh... what about the art bit, what do you mean by that?"

"As I've mentioned already, I believe, the Ishida clan's opinion of Grandmaster Happosai and your father is not very high. However, what you have accomplished has clearly shown the strength of your art. Of course, not all of it comes from your father or Happosai, does it? Several of your techniques seem to have come from the Amazons, and at least one you developed yourself, right?"

"Yeah, the Moko Takabisha, what's your point?"

"We intend to support you in founding your own branch of the Art, free of any direct influence from Happosai or Genma."

"Oh!" Ranma's eyes grew wide as he considered this. One of the constant irritants that had kept him with Genma in spite of his father's unbearable stupidity had been the knowledge that in spite of his skill, there would be little he could do without the support of an established school of the art. To found his own school, if he lost Genma's support, he would probably have to go and become a Master in another school. With the way such schools worked, he would have to start over from the beginning, the skills he already had would mean little. He would have to retrain until he could master their forms without introducing his own variations, as he had been trained to do since he was very young. Now Ishida was basically saying that he could finally reject Genma utterly, and they would support him in founding his own school, giving him the backing he would need within the martial arts community.

As Ranma leaned back in thought, Setsuna sat forward. Perhaps her plan could still be salvaged. "Ishida-san, earlier you spoke of a court document that caused the final decision to be made?"

Ranma looked up. "Yeah, what'd my idiot father do this time?"

Ishida nodded and opened a drawer in his desk. Flipping through the folders within, he finally withdrew one. Setting it on his desk, he opened it and paged through the documents within, before finally removing one and setting it on the desk in front of Setsuna, who picked it up.

"As you can see, Meiou-san, this is little different from the many times Genma sold Ranma. The key difference is that this agreement is a properly drawn up contract, bearing Genma's signature and that of a notary public, which was then filed with the courts. It bears far more legal force than any of his other indiscretions."

Ranma was leaning against the edge of his chair trying to see. He sat back when Setsuna passed the document to him. Glancing at the bottom he saw his father's signature and hanko marking, beside another, unfamiliar hanko. Returning his eyes to the top, he read the document, his eyes popping wide in disbelief.

"He's done some stupid things," Ranma said slowly, "but even I can't believe he'd be this stupid. I mean, he sold me to some people straight out and then stole me back, but all the others were just engagements... I still woulda been a Saotome."

The document which he was examining in disbelief clearly stated that Genma agreed to train his son to become an expert martial artist then transfer him to the Tsukino family register to serve as the protector of their honor.

---

"I don't think that's a good idea, Setsuna-san." Ranma looked at his benefactor dubiously. "I got my tent and all. I can set up in the park easily enough."

"I'm sure you could," Setsuna replied, smiling at the young man walking beside her. "But if the police noticed, you could get in trouble..."

"Ah, that's no big deal," Ranma interrupted, "Ryouga does it all the time."

"Yes, well, in any case, Ranma-kun, it is no trouble. My apartment is more than large enough, and it would be best if you had a chance to wash before we see about getting you transferred. You do want to make a good impression at your new school, don't you?"

"Yeah, whatever," said Ranma dismissively. For all Nabiki's training and Ishida's words, Ranma still held a poor opinion of school.

"Besides which, it might be wise for you to stay close while we work on your fear, until the process is complete. We don't know for sure that the attempt might not make your fear more sensitive for a while. More to the point, if Genma realizes that you did not change your name yourself, he may come looking for you. He is far more likely to find you if you are staying in the open in a park."

Ranma fell silent for several minutes, thinking. He was tempted. Even a couch would be better than sleeping in a tent. Just because he was used to roughing it did not make it a preferable way to live. Being out of view and away from where his friends and rivals would think to look for him would make it far more likely that he would be undisturbed.

Unfortunately, Nabiki had photos of him and Setsuna and she had not sounded very happy with him that morning. He would not put it past her to find out where Setsuna lived and if they came there looking for him, her apartment would probably be trashed.

Although, now that he considered it, would they be looking for him? At first he thought that he might be safe, given their recent behavior towards him. But everything changed today, he mused, I'm not a Saotome anymore, I'm not engaged. I don't know what Shampoo thinks about my disappearing act but it can't be good. Damn! I just don't know enough right now, I don't know how everybody's taking this or even how much they know.

Looking up he realized that they were entering an apartment building. They would be at her door soon, he had to decide now! A brief image of Setsuna walking into the bathroom the way Akane so often did wandered through his mind.

They stopped at her door and Setsuna turned to him. Ranma did not wait for her to speak.

"Well, uh, it's really nice of ya to offer, Setsuna-san, but it wouldn't be safe for you if anybody in Nerima heard of it," he said, speaking quickly. "I'll use a public bathhouse. See ya tomorrow!"

He turned and raced down the hall, leapt down the flight of steps and was gone. Setsuna shook her head slowly, wearing a wry smile, then unlocked her door and walked inside. Closing the door behind her she leaned up against it and sighed deeply. And she had been so looking forward to accidentally walking in on him in the shower! She had not even needed foresight to know that that was practically a foregone conclusion, if she could ever get him into her apartment in the first place.

As Ranma headed towards the park he snapped his fingers in irritated remembrance. Dangit, I forgot to get my scrolls. Briefly he considered leaving them where they were. He reached the park and finding a rougher region within it, as far as possible from the paths and benches that saw regular use, set up his tent. He found to his dismay that the thought of his scrolls falling into his father's hands would not let him rest.

Rising, cursing his father, he looked at his tent for a long moment before springing away. A new tent could readily be purchased when he had the funds but he would not likely find a second source for those scrolls if his father found them.

As he raced across the roofs, he calmed himself, clearing his mind, sending all of his fears and emotions into a flame burning in nothingness. The technique might not be as effective, with his limited mastery, as his father's Umisenken techniques, but he could not take the risk that his father might have countering techniques that he had not shared with his son.

He stopped several houses away and stood unmoving in a shadow, watching. There was a light still coming from the house but he saw no movement. He allowed his eyes to pass slowly over the surrounding houses, looking for any that might be doing as he was, watching from the shadows for him to return to the Tendo home.

He saw no-one and after several minutes of silent watching revealed nothing further he leapt from hiding and crossed the remaining distance in a few great jumps, landing silently on the roof above what had once been his room. In utter silence he crept to the edge of the roof and dropped over, hanging upside down as he had so often done, peering into his own room. The vast furry bulk of his father was visible within but the window was shut.

"Hmmph," Ranma muttered to himself, "Tendo should have been smart enough to get rid of the freeloader once there was no chance of a marriage." Unless he still plans on getting me as a son-in-law. What does it take to get through to these numbskulls? The thought was lacking in it's usual vehemence, more a comment of habit, the typical frustration unfelt for he was still employing the Void and the Flame.

He released the eaves and dropped lightly to the ground before checking out the rest of the windows. The only open window was also the source of light he had noticed. Nabiki.

He paced back and forth on the grass for several minutes before deciding that he would have to take a chance on being able to silence her before she could cry out. With a mental groan given in advance for the pain and embarrassment that seemed certain to follow, he leapt easily and landed lightly upon her windowsill. Praise the Kami, he thought with a sudden grin. Nabiki sat at her desk, head lying on her arms, which lay folded over what could only be one of her ubiquitous ledgers.

Slipping past her he eased her door open. Once in the attic, it was the work of mere moments to collect the scrolls from their hiding place and secure them with Mousse's Hidden Weapons technique. Slipping back out of the attic, he glanced at the stairs and then back at Nabiki's door. In his moment of indecision he heard the sound of a knob turning and with a sudden terrible clarity, he knew the noise came from Akane's room.

He leapt for Nabiki's door, easing it closed just as Akane emerged into the hall, rubbing at her eyes as she walked to the stairs, heading for the kitchen. Ranma spun about and leaned against the door and breathed a great sigh, his eyes closing in relief.

They snapped open again when a short distance away he heard an answering gasp. His eyes met Nabiki's just as she let out a strangled sob and leapt towards him. The sheer improbability of her reaction left him too stunned to mount a defense and so he found himself crushed against the door by a sobbing girl.

He stood stiff with fear, expecting Akane to come roaring in at any moment to pound him, and what excuse could he give? How could he justify defending himself against her when he was here in the room of a young teenage girl, in a home from which he had been thrown out, in the dead of night, with said girl in tears?

He had no clue what had frightened or worried Nabiki so deeply that she would cry. For just an instant he wondered if this were no more, perhaps, than the usual manipulation that lay behind her tears so many times before, when she feigned sniffles to force his hand. Was she so angry with him that she was deliberately throwing him to Akane? Holding him so that he could not flee until Akane would come and she could accuse him of causing her tears?

The cynicism that Nabiki had sought to teach him was not deep-rooted. The incoherence of her sobs and the feel of her shoulders shaking as she pressed against him, drove unfeeling thought from his mind.

Even as Nabiki's sniffles slowed he realized suddenly that his conditioned reaction to Akane had quite abruptly stripped him of his technique, shattering his carefully built emotional void in the merest instant. As soon as he noticed the lapse he fought to calm his breathing and regain his control.

A muffled curse made its way to his ears. Akane had stubbed her toe against a stair on the way up. Looking down at Nabiki, still holding tightly on to him and still audibly sobbing, Ranma felt a strong sense of dread but the technique was once more active and the usual feeling of guilt had no chance to slow him down.

The very instant after the vibrations in the air reached his ear he was out of the window, Nabiki cradled in his arms. His sudden motion shook her out of her unaccustomed breakdown and she stared at him now with wondering eyes. Though no longer completely distraught she had yet to recover her ice queen facade. After believing that she had lost any chance with him she was not about to miss out on a single instant of being cradled in his strong arms, pressed lightly against those hard muscles as they rippled beneath his skin with the force of his leaps.

Her stomach rose into her throat as they fell suddenly, dropping from the roof of a two-story building past the level of the ground to land without the least jolt on the incline of the canal just beside a bridge. Ranma stepped beneath the overhang, near the bottom of the incline, just above the deeper portion of the canal, and carefully set Nabiki down.

She shivered suddenly, feeling keenly the loss of his body warmth as the chill night air blew through her thin nightgown and the cold concrete froze her bare feet. She wrapped her arms about herself, glancing uncertainly at the ground. She would be warmer if she could pull her legs up and wrap her arms about them but she did not feel like having her rear frozen.

Ranma sighed heavily and sat cross-legged on the flat lip at the bottom of the incline. She felt a sudden warmth surround her and glancing at him, saw that he was lightly glowing. Well, angry at her or not, he had just abducted her from her house in the middle of the night. He owed her. With a smirk, she placed herself in his lap before he could protest. To her surprise, he gave no objection.

"Sorry about that, Nabs," he said softly. "I had to get some things that I didn't want Pops to even know existed. Your window was the only open entryway."

Nabiki smirked. "That, Ranma, was deliberate. I expected you a bit earlier, though."

To his credit and truthfully, hers as well, he did not respond, as he could predictably have been expected to, with a "Huh?" or similar clueless response. Instead his brow furrowed for a moment as he looked at her. He shook his head slightly. He could think of no way she could have known, even with the techniques she had taught him, but he did recognize that her statement was what she had classified as a "leading" remark, designed to incite a question. "Always keep them off-balance." He remembered her words and said nothing, not rising to her bait.

Her smile faded slightly and he noticed once more that her eyes were puffy, red, and tear-stained. He reached up and brushed the tear tracks from her cheeks.

She blushed at his touch, startling him, and looked down. "I'm sorry, too, Ranma. I'm sorry for how I acted this morning. I didn't know, not until I saw your reaction to Akane, that you didn't already know. I figured it had to be you that changed your name. I thought you were renouncing them and... it felt like you were rejecting me, too. As if all of my training wasn't worth anything to you."

He shook his head but she put a finger to his lips. "Let me finish, please." He nodded. She had regained her composure, mostly, though she had still not re-erected her shields. "I leapt to a poor conclusion, just the same as everyone here has done to you ever since you arrived, and for that, I'm sorry. I wish I could have done something to stop Daddy's reaction. I did work hard to keep Uncle Genma from passing it off as another fiancee but I'm afraid that after I read the paper I felt betrayed and I..."

She shook her head. "I should go back to the beginning, I suppose. You still don't know what's going on, do you? A letter came for you this morning and Kasumi found it first and mentioned it aloud. I tried to grab it but Genma was too quick."

Ranma laughed softly. "He can move pretty fast for a tub of lard when he wants to."

"Yeah, well... Daddy..."

This time it was Ranma who put a finger to her lips. "s'enough Nabs. I probably know more about it than you."

Nabiki flushed angrily. "You mean you did know?" she hissed. "You did this?!"

"No, no!" Ranma shook his head emphatically, but not as frantically as he once might. "I did what you said, Nabs. I didn't know how to take Akane's reaction so I pulled a page out of Pop's book, the Saotome Secret Technique, and got away from everybody until I figured out what they were talking about."

"I looked up the name and found a lawyer named Ishida. He confirmed that it was the Ishida family. I'm not sure how they did it without the permission of the clan head and all, but somehow they got me moved off the Saotome rolls and onto the Ishida registry."

"You... you actually went out... and found out the cause of all this, knowing nothing more than that something had happened that caused Daddy to kick you out and Akane to call you Ishida?" Nabiki was staring at him in open disbelief. "In under a day?!" Once more she felt the sharp pang of realization, as she had felt it when he first applied his skills in battle to her examples, the deep regret for what she had given up that first day when she had rejected him, pushing him off on her sister.

"There's more. First off, Ishida is apparently the family name of my grandfather on mom's side. Her father took his wife's name. I don't think I ever met my grandfather, at least, not since I was old enough to remember, but he made a deathbed request of his brother, my great-uncle, Kamado, to look after Nodoka's children. He didn't approve of Genma, like that's any great surprise. So now they're trying to fulfill that request by getting me away from Genma and helping me set up my own dojo."

Ranma paused, noticing that Nabiki's eyes had widened appreciably and were once more glistening with tears. "K-Kamado? Ishida Kamado... is your great-uncle?" Ranma nodded once more, irritated that his lessons with Nabiki had never gotten as far as how to stall or prevent tears.

Nabiki felt like slapping herself as soon as the words escaped her mouth. Revealing the effect that name had had on her and why would surely ruin her chance with him, for he would then be unable to believe that she felt anything for him beyond lust for what might come to him. Her tears dried as quickly as they had come.

"And he's going to set you up with a dojo?" She moved on quickly, hoping to make her earlier words seem part of a general pattern of shocked disbelief rather than recognition. A thought struck her and she grinned ruefully. "Must be the first time someone's seen what goes on around here and not blamed you, huh? I can't tell you how sorry I am for that."

Ranma shook his head. "Doesn't matter anymore, Nabiki." He sighed. "I can imagine how Pops took it. I may love him, in spite of everything he did, but there is no way I'm gonna turn my back on a legitimate chance to get out of that mess without destroying my honor, or everyone else's."

"I'm more worried about how your mother might react," Nabiki said, frowning. Nabiki structured her life around controlling her environment and a big part of that was understanding how people ticked. It was something she was genuinely accomplished at. She had misjudged Ranma though, and as for his mother, well, she had no idea what drove Nodoka.

Ranma sighed and looked down. "Yeah, well... I'm no longer in her clan, so the pledge no longer has meaning. Maybe... maybe with that out of the way, she'll be able to be just a mother again. It seems like all honor's ever done for her was get in the way of us being together... maybe now, I'll be able to be with her without always worrying about how she'll take something."

"I don't know, Ranma," Nabiki said sadly. "I'm not sure it will make any difference. After all, she declared you manly a long time ago, but that hasn't kept her from fingering her katana, or trying to get you to be 'manly' with your fiancees."

Ranma's shoulders slumped and he growled softly. "I know. I hope... but I'm not going to let it go on, regardless. Maybe she'll come around on her own, but even if she doesn't... without that contract, I am not going to kowtow to her any more."

Nabiki stared at him in startlement. After all the pain she had seen in him when he was pretending to be Ranko, she had hardly expected such assertiveness against his mother. She did not know how Nokomura's words were echoing in his mind.

"...she could have... in my opinion, should have, taken the dishonor onto herself, as a recognition and atonement for the mistake she made in marrying him, leaving you free of dishonor."

If she truly cared about the family honor, she would force Genma to do something for Ukyou, and pay back all those people he stole from, he thought to himself. It's like she gave up on him a long time ago, but damnit, if she did... how can she not see that the Saotome name has been completely tarnished by him? She is supposed to be my mother, she should have been helping me resolve all this crap, not making it worse. She could have protected me, saved me, instead, she's one of my biggest headaches.

Nabiki noticed that Ranma's expression was darkening and spoke quickly to redirect his emotions. "But at least your fiancee situation is resolved now, right?"

"Not really," he growled again. "There's still Shampoo to deal with, and Cologne. After all, all the 'obstacles' are out of the way now."

Nabiki shook her head. She did not really want to get into a discussion about the Amazons tonight and she was trying to cheer him up, not get him even more down. "You know," she said with a smirk, leaning back against his hard chest. "You still haven't told me what you were doing in my room in the dead of night."

"Yeah I did," he protested, looking down at her. "I told you I had to get some stuff that I didn't want Pop finding out about!"

"True," she said, smirking, "but you know the Umisenken. The Way of the Silent Thief, isn't that what Uncle called it once? You can't tell me that he didn't come up with ways of getting silently into locked houses."

He saw where she was heading and smirked. "Heh. You want me to say I went that way to see you," he said, grinning, "but I wasn't using the Umisenken."

"What? Why not?"

"Come on, Nabs, he made it. How do I know he doesn't have the counter for it? He wouldn't have told me about the Yama if Ryu hadn't shown up, and he didn't want to show me any more of the Umi than he had to. What else has he got hidden? He's probably got techniques designed to handle the Umi... so I used a different one, one I didn't learn from him."

"Tofu?" asked Nabiki.

"Some of them, yeah. Not all."

"Oh."

Ranma shifted a bit beneath her, then suddenly sprang to his feet, sweeping her easily into his arms. She clung to his neck as he leapt from the bank. "Sorry, Nabs, but I got stuff to do tomorrow. Can't stay up all night and you know enough to work with now."

"You better keep in touch," she hissed warningly.

He nodded rather than speaking, though she noticed that even carrying her, his breathing remained steady and even. He came to an abrupt halt on a roof and she looked forward.

The Tendo house was awash in light.

"Damn," he muttered, "they must have noticed." He glanced at Nabiki in her nightgown. There was no way they would believe she had been out for a walk.

Sighing at the necessity, he leapt from the rooftop and landed lightly before the gates of the Tendo home. The gate opened almost instantly and to his surprise, it was Kasumi on the other side, though he could see his father running quickly around the side of the house, obviously having felt his ki. That was hardly surprising and indeed, expected, considering he had kept his aura up, shielding Nabiki from the wind and keeping her warm.

Kasumi smiled warmly at them. "You should have left a note, Nabiki," she said.

Nabiki sputtered and finally got out, "I didn't have a chance!" She glanced nervously at Akane who was running out of the house. Soun rounded the corner behind Genma and he was carrying a naginata.

"Oh, my," Kasumi said, frowning slightly as she redirected her gaze to Ranma, the remainder of the Tendo household looming up threateningly behind her, lending force to her reproachful words, "Ranma-kun, did you abduct my sister?"

Rising Consequences

Ranma was momentarily taken aback, but once more remembered words from Nabiki's training saved him. "When any denial will be taken as proof of guilt, admit to it first, then qualify. It can do no more harm and may throw them off-balance."

"Yes, of course I did," he said stoutly, speaking carefully to keep his sudden anger at the preposterous accusation from someone he had expected to trust him from leading him off-course. "After all, I had to find out why I had been thrown out of the only home I've ever known without reason or explanation!" He glared at Soun and his father, putting all of his remembered pain and anger at Nabiki's words that morning into his gaze.

They gave back and Soun began wailing. Akane, who had by now reached the gate, simply stared at the pair with a pained look, from which Nabiki flinched. Ranma did not notice, his attention focused on Soun and Genma.

"I did not change my name, Tendo-san, but I cannot say, given the speed with which," he let all his pain sound out in his next few words, both to forestall any overswift reaction, and as a deliberate slap in the face at his father, remembering the reason he had deduced for Genma's claim that men did not show emotion, in spite of his own emotional displays, "all of you leapt to conclusions and how easily you believed that I had abandoned my honor, that I any longer bear the least regret that it happened. I did not change my name, but it has been changed." He looked hard at Genma. "I am no longer your son, Saotome Genma, in fulfillment of the deathbed wish of my mother's father."

He set Nabiki down gently then stepped back as Genma moved forward, mouth open to speak. Ranma held up his hand and barked, "No! You will listen, for once in your life. Be silent!" His last words held the force of his ki and stilled his father's advance.

"You left me no way out, old man. You constantly harped on honor... Shut up!" He was shouting now, his emotions too strong to be contained after he finally allowed them release. "You constantly harped on honor, yet you put me in a situation where any action on my part would destroy my honor and the honor of two other families! You did nothing to fix any of it, when you were the only one who could!" Tears were trickling down his cheeks from the force of his emotions, making everyone present gape at him. Saotome Ranma did not cry, yet there was no denying the tears falling from his eyes. "I tell you now, Genma, that I was not far from taking my own life; seppuku was the only option," he took a deep breath and place intense emphasis on his next word, "I had that did not involve destroying someone's honor!"

Genma again moved to speak and again Ranma beat him to the punch. "Shut up! You lost your right to have any say in my life the first time you sold me! Don't get any damned ideas in your head about forcing me back, you damned flea-ridden bastard!" Ranma snarled, "just remember Jusendo. Remember Saffron. I will not be your scapegoat any longer!"

With that, he turned and raced away, engaging his dual vortexes to avoid any possibility of pursuit, tears streaming down his face, ki flickering about his clenched fist. He had to flee, or he would have lost control and attacked Genma then and there. He left behind him a family confused and hurting and stunned by disbelief. Most of all, he left behind a father who had already had the foundations of his world torn from beneath him by the apparent defection and rejection of the son he had raised to be wholly dependent upon him, and who had been shaken to his foundation once more by the discovery that his child had actually been contemplating seppuku.

Genma had never really considered the position he had placed his son in as such a difficult thing, for he himself only paid lipservice to honor. He valued his own life above all else and kept agreements only as it pleased him. The agreement he had made with his wife, on which both his and his son's life were dependent, had not been made with any intent to hold to its terms. That his son might actually be so honorable as to be unable to break an agreement, and actually willing to kill himself before doing so, came as a profound shock to the man who had made a living of selling his own child.

Ranma was exhausted when he finally made it to the park and his small tent and he wasted no time crawling into it and falling asleep. He was, for him, unusually lucky in having released his new technique at the edge of the park. Had he maintained it to his very campsite, he, and not the park's edge, would have been the focus that night of the irritable Sailor Senshi, roused once more from comfortable sleep by the warnings of Mercury's computer.

---

Sailor Mars growled in frustration as she paced beside the wall. She could not fault Mercury for calling them, not when she could feel the strength of the ki lingering in the air, but she hated the uselessness of coming out only to find nothing happening.

Jupiter leaned against a tree, scowling, while Mercury stared at her computer. Sailor Moon yawned vigorously then blushed as she looked around to see if anyone noticed. She was saved from her own embarrassment by Mercury, who looked up just then and snapped her computer closed.

"It came from Nerima," she said. "We got here in time, this time. The trace did not have enough time to degrade."

Jupiter straightened, moving away from the tree. "So what's that mean? How come nothing's happened? So it came from Nerima, but where is it now?"

Mercury shook her head. "I don't know... the trace just... ends. I've pinpointed the other end of it. We might find something there, but it is a considerable distance, well into Nerima."

Mars frowned and shook her head. This was only the second time they had encountered it, but she was worried. "It might be a lure," she said, "or a..."

"A dead lemming?" interjected Venus, nodding. "That makes sense."

"I think you meant red herring," replied Mercury, after a moment's thought during which the other Senshi had simply looked at each other in puzzlement.

"Whatever," responded Venus brightly.

Mars considered the feeling lingering on the air for several minutes, before commenting to Mercury, "Something's missing... there was something else last time."

Mercury studied her computer for a minute before nodding. "There was a trace of negative energy last time; there's not one this time, even though the reading itself is stronger and more recent."

"Does that mean it's not an enemy?" asked Moon hopefully.

"No," Mercury replied, before Mars could insult Moon and begin another argument. "But it might mean that this trace wasn't produced by the same source as the last one."

"Or the trace could be from something that is doing less obvious draining," Mars interjected. "You know, maybe it drew from someplace where there were more negative emotions last time."

Mercury tapped her fingernail against the screen of the Mercury Computer thoughtfully. "That could be it... maybe this park is where they open a portal to take the energy back..."

They discussed the possibility for several minutes before conceding that they would not be able to solve the problem that night, and dispersed. Rei decided she would have to do a fire reading when she got home from school the next day. Maybe she could find out if there was a real threat or not.

At the very least, Mercury had said it would require several more readings before she would be able to predict the next occurrence, if it was any pattern to be used. Maybe a fire reading could give them a hint so they could put an end to this plot sooner.

---

In spite of getting to sleep quite late the night before, Ranma awoke just before dawn. He groaned at that, but knew that he would not be able to get back to sleep. Sleeping late was possible in the Dojo largely because he felt safe there. Not from knowing that he would not be attacked, but from knowing how he would be attacked, and by whom, people he had never considered real threats. Back in the open, without the security of knowing that his father was nearby and would awaken him, he felt more vulnerable than he had in a long time.

Sighing at the necessity, he got up and spent about fifteen minutes stretching, then he returned to his tent. One of the exercises he had yet to try from the scroll of the Void and the Flame was one for a meditative rest. The scroll was old and clearly from a time when being a martial artist meant facing life or death challenges, which had been relatively rare in Ranma's life, for all his enemies' proclamations to the contrary. Those who had taught and learned it had needed to know how to obtain maximum rest for the body and mind, while remaining alert enough to not be killed in their sleep.

Some of Genma's techniques were not so different. Ranma would automatically defend himself in his sleep, awakening only if a threat was beyond his skill. But given Genma's propensity for pleasure, techniques that allowed one to go without sleep or food had never been terribly high on his training priorities. Continuing to function when going without he could handle, but always from a perspective of staying alive and aware long enough to obtain food or a safe place to rest, never doing without as a matter of course.

Drawing the scroll from his weapons-space, Ranma carefully perused the description of the meditative state, then returned the scroll and settled into a cross-legged sitting position. He proceeded to step his way through the meditative guide, letting the mental steps draw him into the proper state of mind. Or rather, he tried to. And failed.

Undeterred at his initial failure, he repeated the mental procedure. After all, he wasn't the most experienced with the soft arts. But he learned quickly.

Apparently not quickly enough. He sighed then tried again. And again. Finally he gave up, opening his eyes with an exasperated growl. The procedures had managed to clear his mind, however, and as soon as his eyes met the rough weave of his tent, he saw the problem. Entering a meditative state allowing an immediate response to danger was rather useless when encumbered by a tight environment that would greatly hamper any attempt at defense.

Rising, and silently congratulating himself on having remembered to stretch first, for he was sure he would have had a terrible crick in his back otherwise, he stepped out of the tent. Pulling his pack out after him, he quickly redressed, then returned his pack. After judging the lay of the clearing, he settled back into a cross-legged position at the spot that gave him the greatest freedom to move in any direction.

The fifth time he tried the mental exercise, he passed without difficulty into the state of meditation required. A little over an hour later, his awareness returned to his surroundings. Again he stretched for several minutes, then began to practice his kata. He found himself missing his father as he proceeded through a number of vigorous kata. Irritating as his father's habit of defenestrating him as a means of awakening him was, he missed having someone to spar with, especially someone who knew his weaknesses, knew where he had a tendency to grow complacent. Even if his father had taught him little while they were at the dojo, and that under duress, he had kept him from relaxing, kept him from losing his edge.

Of course, Ryouga had been good for that as well, but as he had come to see the wisdom in Tofu's advice, at least in part due to Nabiki's tutoring, he had realized how much he had been hurting the lost boy by playing Genma's game with him. Ryouga had been dangerously depressed almost as long as Ranma had known him, but it was only after he had begun to take the Doc's advice about the dangers of emotional ki use seriously that Ranma had finally understood why Ryouga had still been so hostile and so depressed even after he had seemingly given up on Akane, admitting that Ranma was not unworthy of her, and strengthened his suit with Akari.

Now that Ranma could no longer lie to himself, thanks to Nabiki and the nearly instinctual disgust the Kunos' engendered in him, he was unable to hide from his responsibility in helping bring Ryouga to the state he was in. He wasn't sure if he would be able to spar the same way with Ryouga ever again. He had held out some hope that they would finally be able to become real friends, or as close to it as they could become, but after what happened with the Tendos, Ranma was no longer certain that he wanted to. It might be better for him to sever his ties in Nerima completely, though of course, he would have to deal with Shampoo before he could even attempt that.

A sudden chill descended on him and he dropped out of the kata he was in, nearly turning his ankle when he misjudged his landing. He had quite obviously fled from Shampoo, after she had seen him. At the time, he had simply been confused and worried about the odd behavior of his other fiancees, and unwilling to face a Shampoo who might have gotten the idea that she was the only legitimate one left.

What if she had known? What could she think, if she had, but that the only reason for Ranma to change his name, as both of his other fiancees had assumed he had, was to dissolve two of the three engagements. That left hers as the only valid one. She had always claimed to believe that it was only his forced engagements that kept him from accepting her; if she had actually believed them to have been broken by an action on his part, how would she take his flight? That was the second time he had run from her, and she hadn't had a chance to talk to him between or since. If she had decided that she had actually failed, what would she do? There were no longer any 'obstacles' for her to threaten. Nothing stood between them but him.

Ranma's plans for the day suddenly faded into obscurity, wholly overshadowed by his fear for the life of someone he cared for. He might not be willing to marry her, but he didn't want to ruin her life, and he certainly didn't want her to be punished before he had a chance to at least try and parlay his win over Saffron into freedom for her from that damned law.

Moving instantly from the stillness of thought and surprise to moving as fast as the fabric could bear, he tore down his tent and stowed it and his pack. Turning away, he cast a brief prayer to the kami before crouching and springing into the air in a ki-powered leap that took him well above the treetops.

He stalled mentally just as he was about to engage the dual vortexes of his most recent speed technique. There was no way that Cologne, or heck, even Shampoo or Mousse would not notice his approach. He considered his choices as he fell. He did not want to take a chance on Shampoo suffering as a result of his unwillingness to marry her, but at the same time, he was not yet really ready to challenge Cologne, which he expected he might have to do, as a last resort, to free Shampoo from the effects of the law. He wanted the Nekoken accessible before that. It was what had won him his one and only real victory over her, and if he could use it without going insane, use it in concert with all the rest of his techniques, he was confident that he would be able to pull out a believable win.

He knew that no matter how much Cologne did not want her great-granddaughter to suffer, she would still have to give her all in defending her village's laws, or she would lose face and be dishonored. That the Amazons took their own honor nearly as seriously as he took his he had never really doubted, particularly considering that Cologne had cursed her own great-granddaughter for failing to meet the demands of her honor, though their rules of honor did not match his, nor did they seem to respect the cost of what they asked to his own honor. But then, they were not Japanese; did they really understand the costs?

He impacted hard against the ground, creating strong impressions of his feet, as he dropped to his knees to absorb the blow. He shook himself. If he had paid more attention to his fall he would not have ended up damaging the ground. That thought did not hold his attention for more than a moment, however, as he returned to the question of Shampoo.

No matter how much he did not want to see Shampoo hurt, no matter how much it hurt to see any girl crying because of him, he did not want to marry her. His mind shied away from questions of why, no longer willing or able to lie to him about them, but also far from ready to face them. He just did not want to. He would find some other way around their laws.

Right now, he just wanted to make sure that the Amazons had not left Nerima, and that Shampoo was okay. Cloaking himself in the Umisenken, he sought and attained the mental void that would act as a second layer of protection, then bounded into the trees on a straight line course for the Nekohanten.

A smile struck his lips suddenly, as he realized that he had needed to go back to Nerima anyway. He had not really thought about it yesterday, when talking to Setsuna-san, but wouldn't he need to get his records from Furinkan before he could register at his new school? And why had Setsuna mentioned the need to make an impression there when she was trying to get him to stay at her apartment? After all, surely which high school he would be enrolled in in this district would be dependent on what family Ishida-san placed him with? Ranma still was not sure about that, but had decided that his honor demanded that he give Ishida's family a chance, after all they had done for him.

He paused on a rooftop on the edge of Nerima to collect himself and clear his mind, not wanting to be distracted by other thoughts lest he allow one or the other of his techniques to falter while in the view of any of the usual crowd of Nerimans.

Moving much more carefully, he proceeded into the district. He took extra pains to be sure that he did not land loudly, nor dislodge stones or shingles, nor allow the wind about him to whistle by injudicious positioning of his limbs.

In exquisite silence he dropped to a kneeling halt on the roof of a building directly opposite the Nekohanten. There he stopped to once more consider his options. He wanted to know that Shampoo was alright, but in spite of the urgency his sudden realization of her possible danger had lent to his flight, he knew that to bathe the place in his ki to find hers, or to enter the dwelling itself, was liable to alert the old ghoul, if she wasn't watching him already.

He was not so foolish as to assume that this technique of his father's was without flaw and he did not know his new technique well enough to clearly know its limitations. More to the point, he felt sure the old ghoul was not depending on ki and highly trained senses alone to defend her chosen ground. He felt sure, given the fact that her tribe knew of Jusenkyou and even used it as a punishment, and in light of some of his other experiences with them, that Cologne knew considerable magic. There was a fair probability that she had some magical something or other protecting her building. He did not think she knew about the Umisenken, but he also did not know whether it would offer any real protection against magical detection.

So he restrained himself, settling, for the moment, for scanning the building as carefully as he could visually. It did not look closed, nor abandoned, so far as he could tell, but then, they would not have been gone long. Briefly, he tried--after burying his ki in the void to be sure he did not accidentally raise or extend it--opening himself up to the ki emanations in hopes of locating the inhabitants, assuming there still were any. That did little good. He was unable to isolate any of the signatures, though he could feel life all about him.

Sighing unhappily, he settled in to watch, his eyes flickering from the front of the store to the side, searching for signs of movement. He restrained a deep sigh of relief when he saw Mousse briefly pass by the side alley. They were not gone, then. He still would not feel comfortable until he saw Shampoo. While it might vaguely be possible for Cologne to try and leave with Shampoo and force Mousse to stay behind, he could not believe that Mousse would actually do so, rules or no. Still, he couldn't be sure that the old ghoul hadn't used some secret technique or magic on Mousse, maybe that memory altering shampoo or something, so he was not willing to completely trust that Mousse's presence meant Shampoo's safety.

So he continued watching. He did not see the movement, but eventually, when he looked from the alley to the storefront, he saw that the open sign had been flipped. He had not seen Mousse return yet, but he had not been watching the alleyway the entire time, so he could not be certain it was not Mousse, but he felt a bit more hopeful, a bit less worried.

He heard noises from behind the restaurant. He leaned over, watching the alley intently, trying to interpret the sounds. He nearly fell off the roof in relief when Shampoo barrelled around the corner and raced out of the alley on her bike. If she was still making deliveries, which she was--he could recognize the takeout boxes on her bike--then she had obviously not suffered too greatly.

Allowing himself that modicum of relief, but carefully fixing in his memory the knowledge that he needed to consider how his actions affected her if he saw her when he went by the school, and mentally running through possible conversations, Ranma released the Umisenken and the Void and the Flame and began roof-hopping towards the school. He did not notice two large eyes in a heavily seamed face that watched him leave.

"So, son-in-law, you do still care... at least a little. I hope, for Shampoo's sake, you care enough."

---

"Die, Saotome!"

Ranma groaned with disgusted feeling as he sidestepped the incoming knives. He had obviously released the stealth techniques too early. "Good morning, Mousse," he called out, grinning as Mousse faced him, anger surely bright in the eyes hidden behind his thick glasses.

"For making Shampoo cry, I will kill you, Saotome!" Mousse declared. His voice showed none of the fear or concern that Ranma had assumed had been keeping his usual enemies quiet--at least those that had been on Jusendo. Either Mousse had had other reasons for keeping his peace, Ranma realized, or he had recognized the amount of luck involved in Ranma's win, and assumed he could have done as well. Ranma didn't believe it, he knew that he had been spectacularly lucky, but he didn't think anyone else in his position could have done as well, except perhaps for Herb, who was certainly strong enough to go toe to toe with Saffron, and might have had skill enough to find a way past that impossible healing. Mousse? Not a chance. His words hit hard for a different reason though. It wasn't particularly important to Ranma that his enemies fear him. Indeed, he didn't much care for the idea of being feared at all. But that Shampoo had been crying... He was right then, he had hurt her, even if, by their continued and seemingly normal presence here, he concluded that she had not given up on him.

This was good for one thing, though. The Void and the Flame was originally a warrior's art, meant for swordsmen. Against Ryouga it might well turn out a weakness when the fight turned to ki blasts, if it did. With Mousse though... Ranma dodged the chain and slipped through the path of the shuriken, taking the fight up close. Mousse reacted as expected, whipping out two swords. With tight focus, Ranma blurred into the Amaguriken, knocking one of the blades away and diving after it before Mousse could counter-attack. It was close, a risky move that allowed Mousse to come within a hair's breadth of wounding him.

It worked though, and he would have been grinning widely at the practiced ease with which he brought up the void, that which had been hard becoming steadily easier with continual use, were it not for the flame in the void that subsumed that pleasure, leaving him calm and collected, sword in hand.

Mousse gaped at him for a minute before returning to the attack. He growled as he threw himself forward, a sword in each hand. "I did not expect an armed defense from you," he said, sword flashing down, "but it won't save you! You should know better than to take up a weapon against a Master of Hidden Weapons!"

Ranma caught Mousse's sword on his, knocking it away and ripping his sword back to stop Mousse's other sword. He jumped back, sucking in his gut, when Mousse's foot flashed past, the gleam of metal shining from the tip of his shoe.

Ranma growled as he landed, irritated by that reminder that his opponent actually was out to gut him, was not fighting simply for the sake of the art. This was what he had grown tired of, this constant perversion of the art from that of the protector, to a mere tool for the fulfillment of another's base desires. Damn it! It was one thing to be mad at him for making a girl cry. Heck, he was angry with himself for that! But there was no way actually killing him was going to make Shampoo happy, and Mousse had to know that. That would just hurt her worse, but he didn't care, only cared that it would leave him in a position to comfort her and take Ranma's place.

Ranma sighed unhappily, even as he batted away another attack. He was doing it again, rationalizing to himself. He had to face it, or he would be as bad as Kuno. He didn't love Shampoo, at least, he didn't think he did. But he was jealous of her attention, jealous that Mousse was trying to steal her away. She's my friend! Why does she have to stop being that for him to be happy? Why can't she be both our friends? It was as bad as Ryouga, he mused, knocking another weapon out of Mousse's hands, then casually knocking the other boy out completely with the hilt of his sword, lost in thought, his body on auto-pilot.

Without realizing what he was doing, he spun into a kata appropriate for the sword in his hand. It's just like Akane and Ryouga. If I didn't know that he cared for her for real... For a moment he pictured his reaction to Ryouga pursuing Akane solely for the purpose of destroying his happiness, as Ryouga had first proclaimed. He did not notice Mousse stirring, then staring in anger and disbelief at him, as he whirled through his kata apparently without concern for the enemy he had left at his back.

Furinkan

Mousse was not the only person watching Ranma's behavior with curiousity and concern. Cologne had trailed Ranma when he left, hoping to see more that would reassure her about his reasons for watching her restaurant. That he left after seeing Shampoo had been heartening, but she had too little information about so important a matter. She had not suspected that he felt the pressure so keenly as to be willing to give up his name, an act which she, unlike her younger charges, fully understood the consequences of.

She would have said, in her judgment of the boy, that he was the sort who would never give up. That he had apparently defied her understanding of him was cause enough for concern; the implications it held for her heir made it a matter of immediate import.

She watched from a distance as Ranma at first fought with Mousse, showing only slight signs of differences in his usual pattern. He had taken up one of Mousse's weapons, but that was of no great concern. Son-in-law was a very adaptable fighter. Then something that Mousse said seemed to at first anger him, and then send him, in the middle of a fight, into contemplation.

Her eyebrows raised as Ranma seemed to slip into a state of effortless skill, knocking Mousse out with a mere two moves, using an elegant economy of motion, then moved smoothly into sword forms. The odd thing about the situation, which led her to draw nearer for a better view, was that his face did not match the seeming zanshen or no-mind serenity of his body. It was contorted into anger and confusion, passing through state after state as Ranma seemed caught up in his thoughts. To her surprise, she actually saw happiness and, if she was not mistaken, desire pass across his features.

She noted Mousse recovering and rising behind the boy, turning to stare at him in disbelief and building anger. She quickly moved to where she could intervene, but held back. Mousse would very likely attack the boy, angered by his apparent disregard of the threat Mousse posed, an insult the myopic boy would not be able to tolerate, by her judgment.

She was proven correct as Mousse silently recovered the sword Ranma had knocked from his hand, then waited for an appropriate opening in Ranma's kata. Cologne tensed. Mousse lunged forward, sword diving for the hole in Ranma's guard, but Cologne had already relaxed and was shaking her head as she regarded her son-in-law. She had read the tension in his muscles and was unsurprised when his sword casually deflected Mousse's attack.

She darted forward, tapping a shiatsu point on Mousse's back, dropping him again, then looked at Ranma with worried eyes. Contrary to her hope and expectation, not only had he defended himself in spite of his preoccupation, he had also not come out of it. An attack had been made against him with deadly intent, and it was not even deemed important enough to draw conscious attention. She sighed, settling in to watch over him, from a once more hidden vantage point, of course. If anyone else found him in this state, she wanted to be present for his reaction.

She was disappointed in this, however. He came out of his trance-like state by himself a few minutes later, glancing at Mousse and not seeming to notice that he was not in the same position he had lain in when Ranma had first knocked him out. Not that that was necessarily surprising, Cologne considered, since Ranma had apparently already entered the trance before knocking Mousse out in the first place.

---

Akane doesn't seem to want to be my friend, even if I think of her that way. Well, no, I can't really say that. After all, she did apologize. I guess she really did just not want to marry me. But still, she's never shown me the slightest trust; no, that's what she had to do damnit. I just can't decide about her, if I should try to be her friend, or just let her go.

Ryouga... man, I thought after the failed wedding things would finally get better between us. Well, maybe they will now, once he really comes to understand what happened between Akane and me. I guess I just didn't know how to make friends right. He sighed inwardly.

Ukyou. I don't know if she's ever going to forgive me for not marrying her. I wish I could have my friend back, the one I remember. But then, I remember a boy, and she was never a boy, so... did my friend even exist? That doesn't make any sense... of course Ucchan existed... but was she ever actually my friend? Or was she even then wanting more?

Maybe I should just give up on Nerima. I can make new friends. After all, I already got two!

A surge of happiness filled him as he thought of Hotaru. He could not think of a time when he had felt as fulfilled as when he had saved her. No, that was not true. He had felt fulfilled like that before, but... it had never lasted. Everyone he helped around here seemed to turn against him. Kodachi had turned everything into some perverted, twisted dream of romance. Akane was constantly angry with him because she did not think she needed saving, no matter how much she did. Hotaru... she had been happy, then and after.

I want to see her again. And Setsuna...

His thoughts took on a tinge of desire once more, as he thought about the one woman that his mind felt safe feeling that way about. He could safely want her, knowing that it wouldn't end up with him betraying everyone else by bedding her, or getting beat to a pulp when she claimed to be his fiancee, and flaunted his affections. He felt a tremendous freedom when he thought of her. She knew about his curse and his weakness towards cats, and not only did she not try to take advantage of him, or think he was a freak or a pervert, she was actually trying to help him!

When he thought about his two new friends, he could not help wishing he could have had friendships like that with the people he knew in Nerima. But was it too late? He still wasn't that skilled at dealing with people and he did not think that Nabiki was likely to keep training him now that he was not welcome in the Tendo home. He understood why Akane had felt it necessary to always blame everything on him, but it seemed like everyone else in Nerima had picked up the same idea.

Maybe it's fate. Maybe that's why Tendo-san kicked me out, just after I found out that I had friends and a supportive family outside of Nerima.

That final thought reminded him of why he had been in Nerima in the first place, and that Mousse might be waking up at any time. Ranma was somewhat startled to realize that he was engaged in a sword kata, and quickly stilled. He glanced about and saw Mousse lying in a sprawled heap. Oh well, he would wake up soon enough. And unlike Ranma, he did not have a slew of enemies who would be all too happy to take advantage of a moment of weakness.

Ranma shrugged and leapt away, heading for Furinkan.

---

Shampoo pondered her great-grandmother's behavior as she pedaled towards her first stop. Why is she being so nice to me? I failed! I admitted it, finally. She should be packing everything up to go back home, back to the mountains. Shampoo's pleasure at the thought of her home was distinctly marred by her expectations of what would happen when they got there, so she was not exactly disappointed at Cologne's failure to act true to form.

It hit her just as she left her first delivery. Cologne must know something, must have learned something that would put her airen's behavior in a different light! But why had she not told Shampoo about it? Why had she just let her cry herself to sleep? How could she find out? Nabiki! The mercenary would certainly know everything there was to know about Ranma's disavowal of his family.

Shampoo poured on the speed. If she was early with her next two deliveries, she would have time to swing by the school before heading to finish the rest. It was still early, Nabiki would not yet be engaged in class, though she would probably be in her classroom.

---

Ranma landed on the Furinkan's outer wall, noting with some disgust that a large crowd of jocks had gathered near the front doors. His disgust deepened when he noticed Kuno waiting behind a tree. Would they never learn? Briefly he considered doing something about them, disregarding Akane's words about not needing help.

He decided not to though, and jumping down, strode for the doors, ignoring the crowd as they parted before him. He felt the surge of angry ki where Kuno was but ignored it. Kuno did not come out nor attack. Apparently the opportunity to once more ambush his fierce tigress was worth more than gloating over the sorcerer's defeat, or some such excuse. Ranma didn't really care, he would just as soon not deal with the buffoon again.

He felt a qualm of conscience at leaving Akane to them, but he knew it was what she would prefer. Besides, if he did help, they would just scatter, giving up as they had when he first showed up, after he beat Kuno. They were only out there because they thought he had given up his claim on her. He could protect her this once, again, but she would not appreciate it, and the next day, when he did not come again, or as soon as they learned that he was leaving Furinkan for good, they would be at it again.

Besides, there was no question that while she might not be in Ranma's league, she had unquestionably improved from when she had first faced this fight. She could handle them.

He heard the gloating comments of some of the boys as he passed and they realized that he did not intend to interrupt their fun and he smirked. It was more, he realized then, than people simply agreeing with Akane and treating everything as his fault. If they could truly gloat about their imminent victory in spite of having spent time in the nurse's office or, for all he knew, the hospital, from trying to beat Akane, then they were hardly less delusional than Kuno. Yet another reason to get away from Nerima; maybe that sort of stupidity was contagious.

Noticing the looks he was getting from the students in the halls, Ranma concentrated on the Void and the Flame again, irritated with himself for forgetting to hold it. He would have a much easier day of it if no one noticed him, but he just had to go and blatantly walk into the school through the midst of those idiots.

In spite of that mistake, the void did its job. He walked right past Nabiki Tendo without her noticing him. He grinned at that, wondering if she knew about the fight waiting outside and had come down just because she had seen him, or if she was actually unaware of it. Not that he particularly objected to her at the moment, she had been pretty nice for a while now, but still, he had found her habit of popping up at inconvenient times irritating. To walk past her in the open, not invisible, just unnoticed... that was nice.

An instant later he had his back against the wall. "Shampoo? What's she doing here?" he groaned. He had recognized her voice the instant he heard her accosting Nabiki. Wait a minute... I didn't hear anything being broken. What happened to her usual wall-bashing?

He peered around the corner in time to see Shampoo and Nabiki slipping into a locked room, the keys glinting in Nabiki's palm as she turned to close the door. "What the hell is going on?" Ranma felt a sudden fear for Nabiki. If Shampoo had heard about last night... she might have decided that it neatly explained why Ranma had fled from her even though he was technically free of the other engagements.

Once again setting aside his purpose for the moment, he darted out of the building, still holding onto the void. He didn't need to deal with anyone noticing him at the moment. In fact... considering the danger Nabiki might be in, he invoked the Umisenken alongside the Void and the Flame. Moments later he was crouched in the window of the room where Nabiki had taken Shampoo.

To his surprise, there was nothing threatening in Shampoo's manner. If anything, she looked almost... pleading? Pressing his hands tightly against the windowsill to maintain his position, he leaned forward and rested his ear against the cold glass, shivering at the contact.

He could not hear Nabiki clearly but Shampoo's higher sing-song tones carried better.

"You is for sure?"

Any further words she might have spoken and any response that Nabiki might have proffered were drowned out by the sudden chorus of battle cries and pledges of devotion and determination from the front of the school. Ranma sighed, shaking his head, and dropped from the window to make his way back inside. Shampoo had not seemed to be threatening Nabiki nor had Nabiki seemed nervous, so leaving them together seemed safe enough.

Besides, he had other business here, and having them occupied while he went about it was all to the good.

Holding to the void, he passed unnoticed through the halls and into the office, where he dropped the technique and stepped up to the secretary's desk. Somewhat to his surprise, she looked up and smiled on seeing him. "Oh, Saotome, I've been expecting you," she said as she busily flipped through a pile of folders on her desk before pulling one out. "Nabiki mentioned that you might be dropping by to withdraw. Moving in with your mother finally?" She smiled as she proffered the folder, neatly tied with string.

Ranma nodded dumbly, reaching out, but it was snatched away before he even realized the room had garnered another occupant.

"No, no, no keiki gonna be leaving da Big Kahuna's school so easy!"

Ranma groaned as he turned to face the principal. "I thought you were gone, you crazy nut!"

"Heh heh, you think da Big Kahuna not gonna hear about one of his problem keiki trying to get away? You really wanna leave? Fine!" With that, the principal cracked a coconut he held, splashing Ranma with the cold water that had been in it. "Then you can go to school with my little wahine!"

The insane head of Furinkan held the folder up, gripped loosely in the jaws of his ubiquitous shears. Ranma tensed and growled when the water hit her, then shook her head, sending droplets flying. She stared at the folder full of papers, her ticket to freedom. All it would take was one twitch at the wrong moment and they'd be snapped in half. What would she do then?

"Fine," she growled. "We'll see how you do against my lawyers," she snarled, then turned and raced out of the building, furious at him and at herself for not having anticipated his interference. She had been so ready to have to convince them to give her the papers that the secretary's quick action and her mention of Nabiki had made her drop her guard.

Kochou Kuno stared after the fuming redhead doubtfully. "Wahine been taking lessons from Nabiki?" he asked as he dropped the papers back on the secretary's desk. He ignored her irritated glare as he walked bemusedly back into his office.

Ranko stopped in front of the school doors. The grounds beyond were covered with groaning boys, victims of a furious Akane. Kuno, in their midst, was already staggering to his feet. Ranko darted back in the school, wrapping herself in the Umisenken to avoid him. That's just what I don't need right now, she groused silently. Another Kuno. She was staring at the ground, trying to calm her breathing, when Kuno entered the school and passed by her, mumbling something about 'where the mercenary is.' Ranko snorted indelicately. That was right, wasn't it? Kuno was usually dragged inside by Nabiki after she took her cut from his wallet.

Ranko turned suddenly and ran her head into the wall, cracking the tile. "You idiot," she hissed. "You're not bound by promises in the name of Saotome anymore. Just walk in there invisible and take it. There's no loss of honor in avoiding a dishonest challenge anyway."

With that she marched back into the school. She had convinced herself that Kuno had not really made a challenge yet, so her honor was safe in backing down and asking Ishida for help, but now she realized that just as her father's request to not use the Yamasenken and Umisenken no longer bound her, so too was she free of the stricture that a Saotome must accept every challenge. Finally she could ignore the blatantly stupid. It was foolish anyway, in her opinion, to lend credence to pointless or honorless martial arts or artists by honoring their challenges.

Unseen, she entered the office and smirked when she saw that the secretary had apparently taken a walk without having put away the folder yet. She slid up to it and verified the name, Ranma Saotome, before snatching it up and slipping out.

Once beyond the walls of the school she couldn't help but let out a victorious shout. It felt so good to have outwitted that ignorant buffoon. Go to school with his daughter, indeed! Setsuna's face came into her mind as she remembered Setsuna's casual acceptance of her as a man in spite of her rather... intimate... examination of her female form, and for once, she said quietly, "I am a man," and meant it without reservation, in spite of the soft female tones that spoke it.

Papers securely in hand, Ranma wasted no time in getting back to Juuban, though she employed no special techniques, not wanting to take any chances with losing or damaging her records.

She reached the park without incident, and was about to stow the papers in her backpack when she realized that this was an unnecessary risk. Setsuna would most likely be willing to store them for her. That brought to mind Setsuna's comments the night before, about bathing to make a good impression at school. Surely Setsuna would have realized that Ranma couldn't get enrolled until she found out where she would be staying? Not to mention who would be paying for it, though she had the impression that would be taken care of by Ishida-san. Still, he wouldn't be able to do much if she got enrolled at the wrong school.

Ranma briefly considered finding a sentou and bathing before going to Setsuna's, to demonstrate that she had listened to her, but decided against it. The risk of losing the papers, or getting them soaked, or having them stolen if she left them in the backpack, was just too great.

She reached the small clearing where she had left her backpack hidden before she had quite decided what to do or where to go, but as she entered it, the question fled her mind.

She looked around warily. Someone else had been in the clearing, of that she was sure, and unless her senses misled her, it was still being watched. Clearing her mind, she moved closer to the center of the clearing. There, in that tree!

Just as she identified the position of one of the hidden watchers, he dropped out of the tree and took a step toward her. She paid the well-dressed man little attention, concerned with finding the other eyes she could still feel. Then they too stood up and stepped out of the brush to stand behind the first man.

He stepped forward again and then bowed low. Seeing that all three men were nicely dressed and now that she could no longer feel hidden eyes on her, she relaxed slightly, and matched his bow, keeping her eyes on one of the other men to catch any signs of movement.

"Saotome Ranma?" The question was asked in a pleasant voice that belied the somewhat tense situation but nevertheless held a distinct note of uncertainty and disbelief. At the same time, it narrowed down the list of possibilities for her accosters, though not substantially, since anyone in Nerima would know of her curse. Still, she now had a pretty strong suspicion as to whom she faced. At least it wasn't suffixed with "Prepare to die!"

Ranma shook her head violently. "I am a Saotome no longer," she said sharply. "If you have any complaint against the Saotomes, you can take it up with them."

The men relaxed, the man in the middle nodding. "My apologies. Nokomura-san sent me, Ishida-san, to retrieve you. He wishes for you to go somewhere with him today, but first," and here he paused to look her over, "you need to change, bathe, and be dressed appropriately. Nokomura-san asks that you please come with us. We will take you to where you may bathe and prepare before meeting him."

Ranko looked at them uncertainly but before she could speak, the center man had snapped his fingers. The man to his left, her right stepped forward and presented the first man with a sealed scroll, which he then held out to her.

She stepped forward warily and, sensing naught amiss with the scroll, took it before backing away again. She examined the seal, cursing silently to herself for not having looked when in Ishida's office to see with what he sealed his correspondence.

Cracking the wax seal, she unrolled the scroll by feel, keeping her eyes on the three men. Lifting it up to where she could see it and still keep the men in her peripheral vision, she quickly read it. It said basically what the man had, but it added two things. First, it said that she was to go today with Ishida to meet her new family, the Tsukinos. Second, and most importantly, it mentioned Setsuna and the part she had played in their little drama.

Some enemy of herself or the Ishida-ke might have known about the plans of Ishida-san, but they would not be likely to have understood the part Setsuna was playing.

She rerolled the scroll and bowed again to the three men. "Alright," she said, "let's go."

The third man, who had yet to speak or take part, stepped forward now. "You were seen heading to Nerima. Have you obtained your transfer papers from Furinkan?"

Ranko nodded, a bit disturbed at realizing that she was still being watched. Of course, she had known that it was going on since she first talked to Ishida, but hearing such direct and immediate evidence was still startling. Was she really that important to them?

"If you would like, Ishida-san, I will take them for safe-keeping."

She eyed him narrowly. "Why?"

The man laughed. "One of my boys just dropped by Furinkan to get your papers so Ishida could do the transfer. He said they were gone when he got there, though the principal insisted that you had been there and been rebuffed."

She nodded, mollified. If he knew that, then he probably had done just as he said. They were with Ishida. She had no reason to believe Ishida was trying to do her harm, and the fact that they had even tried to recover her papers for her was more help than she had received in a long time, aside from Setsuna.

She pulled out the papers and handed them to the man. They turned and led her through the park to where a grey compact car was parked. She looked at it in mild surprise.

"Expecting a limo?" laughed one man. "Sorry, field work doesn't rate quite so high. And leaving a limo outside a park for hours is not a good way to avoid attention." He pointed at the bike rack atop the car. "You can ride with us, or Ishida said to offer you the rack." He laughed, as if he had made a joke, but Ranko nodded and leapt to the top of the car, one hand catching the rack.

The men shook their heads, laughing, but made no objections as they got in the car, leaving Ranko alone atop the car as they pulled out into the traffic. Ranko's thoughts turned to the words of the scroll as the car steadily made its way through the streets. "Tsukino?" she wondered. "He picked the family that Pop sold me to?" At least there she had been sold not as a husband but to protect. It had to be the same Tsukinos, didn't it? Why had they made such a request in the first place? Who were they, that they needed a great martial artist to guard their honor?

Tsukino

"I still don't understand. Why us? Why my family?" queried Kenji Tsukino, a question echoed by his wife Ikuko.

A paper was slid across the table in response. Kenji lifted it so that he and his wife could both read it. After a moment, they returned their attention to the well-dressed young lawyer sitting across the table. "But we aren't the Tsukino's mentioned here. I never signed this!"

"We are aware of that. Nonetheless, you are members of the same family as the individual who signed this. By coming to live with you and fulfilling the intent of this document, Ranma will be demonstrating that he is not responsible for the changing of his name and that he continues to uphold the honor and duty of his family and clan."

"At the same time, he will be introduced to a more normal family environment. As I explained earlier, he has had an extremely difficult time dealing with the young ladies in his life, due to his father's influence."

"And you think Usagi is an improvement?" questioned Ikuko uncertainly. Though she loved her daughter dearly, she was well aware of her excitable nature. "Surely someone quieter... someone a bit more... hmm..."

"Calm?" interjected Kenji, to which Ikuko nodded.

"Yes, more calm, would be a more suitable choice? I'm afraid my daughter is likely to make quite... quite an impression on this young man."

Kenji sat a bit straighter at that. "You had better not be having any ideas about this Ranma and my daughter!"

Hitomura Ishida shook his head, dislodging a few dark strands of his otherwise perfect hair. "No, I assure you, we intend nothing of the sort. Ranma is not ready for that, as the problems that plagued him in the Tendo home made clear. However, we do feel that your daughter and son will be the perfect antidote and anodyne to his recent experiences. His fiancees' were, while affectionate, at least in most cases, indeed, often over-affectionate, also demanding, untrusting, and manipulative. The worst manipulating your daughter is likely to do is to wheedle him into buying her ice cream."

That won a laugh.

"More to the point, she is very open, very quick to trust, according to her school counselors, befriending people quite easily. She is also enthusiastic, and unwilling to allow someone to ignore her."

"The local high school's best academic student is a quiet individual, as you have suggested. But while Ranma's academic performance is of some concern to us, she would still be a poor choice. Unlike your daughter, she would not seek out interaction with Ranma. Given his ineptitude and generally poor experiences with girls, he would be likely to see this as an ideal state of affairs, and would not make the least attempt to draw her out."

"No, your daughter is exactly what is needed in that respect. Having him take the position of an older brother, combined with his own reticence, should be sufficient shield against the possibility of her taking a romantic interest in him. She is also protective of her friends, and we would hope to engage that protectiveness on Ranma's behalf, to defend him emotionally from the more forceful of the young ladies who might seek his attention. Since she is not a fighter, and given that he is going to be tasked with her well-being, he will finally be forced to deal directly with his suitors."

Kenji stood abruptly, sending his chair clattering to the floor, his face purpling. "Now wait just a minute here! You didn't say anything about putting my daughter in harm's way!"

"No! Of course not! There would be no danger. Even if Ranma failed to respond, your daughter would be safe, though the likelihood of his allowing anything adverse to befall her is extremely minute. He will not be the only one watching out for her. Now that we have found him again, Ranma is one of our top priorities. They will be monitored continuously. Their safety will be far more strongly guaranteed than anyone else in this rather . . . incident-prone area."

Ikuko cast a worried gaze at her husband, and placed her hand on his arm. "You can't say you haven't worried, Kenji. I know I've been worried sick with all these . . . these incidents, and her coming home alone from meeting with those friends of hers. You know how she gets during a storm, what would it be like for her to be near something like one of those . . ."

"Well, yes, I suppose," Kenji gave way grudgingly. "But . . . Well, I'd, no, we'd want to meet him first. Not that we don't trust you, but . . ."

"I quite understand, Tsukino-san. You have as yet no reason to trust me, though I hope I given you no reason to distrust me. I feel confident that when you meet Ranma you'll see things our way."

"Then, too, there is the matter of compensation." Hitomura slid another paper across the table to the uncertain couple. "As this document states, we are willing to fund both Usagi and Shingo's college education if you allow Ranma to live with you as a member of the family until he chooses to leave, or Usagi leaves for college, whichever comes first."

Ikuko turned and caught Kenji's eye. He offered a nearly imperceptible nod and she smiled, turning back to the young lawyer. "So, when do we get to meet Ranma?"

A broad, relieved smile widened Hitomura's mouth. "How does this morning sound?"

---

Ranma valiantly resisted the urge to fiddle with the tie on the uncomfortable western suit he had been dressed in. He knew and understood the importance of this first impression; or at least, he knew and understood its importance to Nokomura-san, and while he was still not entirely certain he understood why they were doing this for him, he had no difficulty recognizing that it felt good to have someone care what became of him, whatever their reason might be.

He also understood that the Tsukino family that Nokomura had chosen was a more modern branch of the family that had made the arrangement with his father, which was why he was not dressed up in a formal kimono. Of course, he mused, I'd likely be just as uncomfortable in one of them. It's not like I've had much experience with kimono either.

As he exited the salon to which the men had taken him, he noticed that the rather utilitarian vehicle they had arrived in was no longer in front of the building. Instead, a sleek black car idled there, a sharply-dressed man standing beside it holding the door open.

Ranma leaned forward slightly, and smiled in greeting when he recognized the car's current occupant, Ishida Nokomura. "Ishida-san," he acknowledged, stopping before the door to bow to the older man. Nokomura waved him in and Ranma slid into the seat. The well-dressed man who had held the door now shut it, and took the driver's seat.

Nokomura looked Ranma over and nodded. "They've done you well, Ranma. You look very smart."

Ranma frowned slightly, remembering how embarrassing it had felt to have several women his mother's age and older fussing over him and commenting on how handsome and strong he was. "I guess so," he equivocated, "but it still feels wrong. It feels . . . like I'm lying to them."

"Ah, but you aren't, Ranma. You are simply making a good first impression. Everything will be explained to them, I assure you."

"Even the curse?" Ranma's stomach clenched and he drew in a deep breath, waiting nervously.

"It would come out eventually. By bringing it up first, which, by the way, has already been done by now," Nokomura glanced at his watch, "we alleviate any concerns about deception. If they cannot handle it, we will find someone who can. And even if the worst happens, you will not need to remain camped out in the park. Though not ideal from my perspective, at least as far as being an appropriate environment for your reintroduction to normality, there will always be a place for you with the Ishida."

Ranma bowed again, as best he could in the car's more limited confines. It was not a limousine, or at least, not a stretch one, in spite of having a driver, and there was not a great deal of space. "Thank you."

He hid his concern as best he could, though he felt certain that the family, if they had been fully informed about his curse, would think him perverted. He had little enough in the way of good experiences with people learning of his curse, since as Nokomura had said, it seemed to be triggered at the most inopportune times, especially when he was around people that did not know about it. In such cases, even when he successfully hid the facts of the curse, the situations it put him in almost invariably contributed to a warped view of him.

Still, he could not see how any normal family would be able to accept his curse, or even believe in it sight unseen. Which meant he could look forward to another dismal session as the family's newest water-toy, until the truth of it finally sank in and they rejected him. He glanced at Nokomura, sitting calmly beside him, and silently wished that the older man had taken him in instead of pawning him off on a normal family.

Nokomura had already known the truth about it and seemed to have accepted it long ago. Furthermore, he came from a family that obviously understood the art, and honor, in a way that seemed to escape so many of the people he had been surrounded by in Nerima. None of his putative friends at school had understood why he had to accept all of his challengers, and the martial artists of the area, while they at least understood that, could never seem to see that he was not the cause of the fighting, much less the author of their personal misfortunes.

Ranma's throat tightened as the car drew to a halt. The house they had stopped at looked perfectly normal to his eyes, much more so than the Tendo home had, at any rate. It seemed no different than the houses that surrounded it, unlike the Tendo home, which was set off by the wall that enclosed its grounds, and the dojo that stood behind it, not to mention the dojo sign out front.

This was clearly not the home of a samurai clan or a dojo of the art, but merely a family dwelling. There was no sign of patching on its walls, nor new grass filling divots in the short lawn, nor even lighter shades of concrete where the walk might have been repaired after a hard landing cracked it. How would they react when his enemies or worse, his fiancees, found him? How could they fail to throw him out after the first time Ryouga or Shampoo made a door in their wall?

---

Ikuko and Kenji Tsukino were standing by the window when the black sedan pulled up. Ikuko reached out and nervously grabbed her husband's hand as the driver's door opened.

The man that exited the vehicle stepped to the back of the car and opened the door. Kenji glanced at his wife as her hand tightened against his. She drew in a sharp breath then released it in a sigh as Kenji glanced back at the car. The man standing up with the aid of the driver was clearly too old to be their new son.

A movement in the door raised both their heartrates. Kenji suppressed a groan as Ikuko crushed his hand and squealed happily. "He's so cute!" she gushed and Kenji nodded.

"You knew he was," he answered her, remembering her earlier reactions.

"Oh, I know," she said, stepping back away from the window as the men approached the front door. "But pictures and video never do anyone real justice. You know that."

An understated knock sounded on the door and Kenji opened the door. "Come in," he said, bowing.

Believing what they had seen was beyond them in spite of everything that had been going on in their area for the past year or more, but the mere idea of it had touched Ikuko's heart as she considered what it would do to a proud young man to be so suddenly turned into a woman.

The stories they had been told of his upbringing under his father only made his plight more poignant. Seeing him for the first time, seeing the nervousness, the almost wistful hope, barely present in his eyes, Ikuko could not help herself. He had barely made it through the door when she had engulfed him in a warm, motherly hug.

Needless to say, this was something of a new experience for Ranma. He had still not yet, even with the training he had been doing, managed to change his reaction to an unexpected hug from a girl. He locked up, at first. As the gentle nature of the warm arms around him sank in he slowly loosened up.

When she finally released him, Ranma could not believe that he had yet to feel the touch of cold water. No-one had accused him of being perverted. Tsukino-san had not attacked him for touching his wife. There was no cry of "freak!" echoing in his ears.

He looked from one person to another, still in a state of disbelief. He finally shook it off when Nokomura stepped forward and introduced him to his new parents, and they to him. They were both smiling at him and confusingly, they both looked like they were proud of him. Proud? Why? They hardly even knew of him, much less knew him.

Nokomura bowed to him and took his leave, then Ikuko took his hand and led him on a tour of the house, telling him about his new little brother and sister. That sent a strange thrill through him. Ever since he had met the Tendos, he had wondered what it would be like to have a sibling. Even so he was bewildered. He had been under the impression that he was coming to meet his prospective family, to see if they would still be willing to consider taking him in after seeing him, and witnessing his freakishness firsthand.

He was both glad that he had not yet been changed, that he had not had to undergone the usual period of toying with his curse, before the pervertedness of it all settled in, and frightened that it was still to come, and that what was being offered would be just as quickly withdrawn when they realized that his curse was real and unavoidable.

He was doubly shocked when Kenji opened the door to what he was told would be his room, and not only were there already posters on the walls--of his own battles, no less--there were clothes in the closet, Chinese silks in his own preferred style. There was no futon; instead, he had a full bed, with a thick quilt patterned with fat pandas fleeing from Chinese dragons, and in the corner was what could only be a punching bag, but in the shape of a fat panda with a small black pig on its head. Ranma could not help it. He collapsed to the floor, laughing uncontrollably.

"Heh. It is rather funny imagery, isn't it?" commented Kenji.

Ikuko nodded, "It really amazed me how fast Ishida-san's men did their work. We only signed the papers just this morning at breakfast."

Ranma stifled his laughter and pulled himself to his feet, looking to his new parents. Kenji grinned back at him. "They left your pack by the door. Why don't you get it and settle in?"

"Lunch will be on the table in about an hour, dear," added Ikuko with a beaming smile.

Ranma nodded and darted down the stairs. He hefted his pack and walked more slowly back up the stairs, bowing slightly to Ikuko and Kenji as they walked down past him. They both had, in his opinion, rather silly grins on their faces, but he could not blame them. He suspected his own grin was a bit silly, but how could he help it? His own room, with a bed, and new clothes, and they had not even asked to see his curse! Could things possibly go any better?

Setting his pack on his bed, he pulled it open and stopped in surprise. Reaching in, he drew out a pair of his pants, neatly folded and sharply pressed. When had they had time to clean the clothes in his pack?

Shaking his head, he continued pulling out his clothes, then halfway through, he stopped, looking at the open door to the closet, where near-carbon copies of his usual clothing hung. He stepped up to the dresser and pulled open the drawers. Sure enough, they were filled with clothes as well, socks, and boxers, and additional shirts.

He put the clothes he had pulled out back in his pack. Chances were good that, as well as things had gone, something would nevertheless go wrong and he would be back out on the street within a few days at the most. Best to leave his bags packed, then. He could wear what Ishida-san had apparently provided, and keep his backpack ready to leave.

He set the pack in the closet, and walked over to the punching bag. His eyes widened as he realized that this was not just some well-chosen piece that happened to share a theme with his life. This was a model of his father and P-chan. There was no mistaking the bandanna around P-chan's neck.

Ranma slid to the floor, staring at the bag in disbelief. There was no way that could have been made so quickly. It must have been around for a while. Indeed, looking closer he could see signs of wear on it. Someone had made this to use themselves. Someone who apparently cared enough about him to feel anger at what these two did to him.

He stood up a bit unsteadily, and sat on the bed, running his fingers over the stitching of the fleeing panda. He grinned, remembering someone's--Nabiki's, maybe--nickname for his mother: the Dragon Lady. She certainly seemed angry enough to breathe fire sometimes. He pictured his father running from his mother as she blew flames at him, and laughed softly against a hitch in his throat.

---

"Lunch is ready!" Ikuko called up the stairs. Ranma looked at his clenched hands as he resisted the urge to race down the stairs.

"Don't blow it now, man. Eat slow, mind your manners, avoid water." Prepared now, he left his room and with outward calm walked down the stairs. In his mind a litany was running. "Genma's not here. No-one is going to steal your food. Genma's not here."

Stepping into the dining room, he looked over the table, noting with some surprise that which he had been before too distracted to take in, that this was not a traditional Japanese table. This was a western table, with chairs around it, rather than cushions on which to kneel.

He noticed that there were only three place settings, and felt momentarily grateful. At least he would not have to face more introductions so soon. He knew they were not far off, though. A daughter and a son, Nokomura had said. The girl was younger than him by around two years, another thing Ranma was not sure about.

None of the various friends, enemies, and fiancees back in Nerima had been substantially younger than himself, aside from Hinako's child form, though even she was in fact older. Her youthful appearance had little relation to her true age.

On the whole, in fact, the thought of a younger girl was comforting, for the only younger girl he really knew at all was Hotaru. He felt a sudden pang of loneliness. Though he knew it had been but a short while, it felt like years since he had seen her last. Everything was happening so fast!

What were the chances that this girl would be as friendly as Hotaru? Not to mention, how friendly would Hotaru herself be when she learned what a freak he was? He felt his stomach clench at the thought as he took his seat, but any unrest his stomach might be feeling was washed away by the smell of the food as Ikuko brought it out.

There was little conversation over the meal, but when they set down their chopsticks, Ranma found his new parents' gaze squarely on him. His nervousness was somewhat eased by the smiles on their faces, particularly the rather affectionate smile that Ikuko was beaming at him, reminding him of Kasumi at her best, but without her obliviousness.

---

Setsuna's hands clenched as she considered the worried look on Ranma's face as he watched the Nekohanten. She saw the way his face cleared when he saw Shampoo and she sighed. "I guess I'm going to have to make sure that all of your former friends, enemies, and fiancees are taken care of, if I want you to be happy. Little that I care for them, it is obvious you would be deeply hurt if they were to be harmed."

Setsuna cursed mildly as she paced before the Gates of Time. So many plans and ideas for how to take revenge for what had been done to her Ranma had now to be given up.

Sitting once more, she pushed the view forward. She did not have an unlimited amount of time to do this viewing in, since she had appointments scheduled after lunch.

Her Time Key, the Garnet Orb glinting malevolently at its head, appeared in her hands when she saw Mousse attack Ranma from behind, not even announcing his attack until after knife blades had already left his hands.

Her anger quickly faded as she watched Ranma defend himself adroitly, making it look like a walk in the park. Recognizing the warmth growing in her, she turned the key to the gate and skipped forward, past the fight. She did not have time to release her tension before her next appointment, and she needed to see how Ranma's day had gone.

She recognized the school when he came upon it and realized why he was there. She slid the view forward a bit again, catching Ranma exiting as a female only to dart back in, and then exiting again with papers. "Excellent," she murmured. "Though I would have been glad to get them for you, it might help you to know that you've made at least some of the decisions along the way on your own."

She had only a little longer to check, so skipped forward, skimming the events rapidly. She felt an unseen burden lighten on her shoulders as Ranma was swamped in Ikuko's hug. She had held some confidence in Nokomura to prepare the Tsukino's, to prime them to accept him, but she knew all too well how quickly events could move out of control around Ranma, and she knew as well that a rejection here would have had grave consequences for Ranma's self-confidence.

With a sigh of relief and happiness, she vanished from the vicinity of the Gates of Time, and reappeared in a locked room in her clinic, her attention already turning to her next appointment.

---

Ranma was waiting for one or the other of his new parents to offer him a glass of cold water. He was sure they must be curious about his curse, and he had steeled himself to the necessity of undergoing another episode of 'playtime' as his new relatives amused themselves with his change. He was therefore entirely unprepared for the subject of the discussion that actually arose.

"Ranma, we've been informed of a certain difficulty you have," Kenji began, and Ranma tensed slightly, knowing what was coming. "Usagi does in fact have a cat. We'll leave it up to you as to whether you are willing to try to simply avoid Luna . . . that's Usagi's cat's name, by the way . . . or if it is necessary, we have agreed to require Usagi to ask one of her friends to take care of Luna while you are here. Either way, you should be aware of Luna, because even if we have her taken in by one of Usagi's friends, she will likely be with her often."

"And I think one of her friends--Minako-chan I believe--also has a cat," Ikuko added.

Ranma shivered when the word was first mentioned, but the emotional control he had prepared for the discussion of his curse helped him maintain his composure when he learned there was a cat in the household. The word itself was no great source of fear, and it actually took a fair bit of exposure, and generally to more than one cat, before he went feral himself, but the thought that he might have been walking within scant feet of a cat without realizing it was taxing on his nerves.

Nonetheless, it was but one cat, two at the most. As long as they kept their distance, he should be okay, and it would give him the chance to monitor his progress once Setsuna began assisting him in resolving his fear. Besides, he did not really want to give his new sister a reason to dislike him right from the start. He had far too much experience with bad first impressions as it was.

"Luna can stay," he said. "As long as Usagi and her friends understand it is serious." He remembered the Tendo girls' reaction when they first learned of it. That experience was one of the few times that he really felt that Kasumi let him down badly, when even after hearing about the training, she had still found it amusing to attach more cats to him.

Ikuko nodded, with a sad smile. "Yes, Ranma, Ishida-san told us about the Tendo's reaction to learning of your . . . difficulty. We will make certain Usagi knows not to try anything of the sort."

Ranma grinned back at her. "I expect he didn't worry too much about the cat being here because he wants me to work on my problem. One or two is not usually a problem, especially if I can get away. The last few times it took a scared or angry cat, digging her claws into me. The time before those was a tiger. As long as Luna doesn't attack me, I'll be okay." He was relieved at having a name to call the little beast. That way he could refer to her without really thinking too closely about what she was.

"Now, about this curse," Kenji spoke up, and Ranma tensed. He felt in that moment all the more keenly what a pleasant experience it had been being in a house with normal people who didn't hate him, or have impossible expectations of him. And now he would find out if he got to keep it, or if this would be just one more good thing in his life destroyed by his father and his curse.

Bunnies and Cats

Usagi blazed through the front door and up the stairs, and was in her room by the time the door closed. Kenji and Ikuko looked at each other, then Ikuko wryly shook her head. "I'll go get her," she told her husband, and headed for the stairs.

Kenji sighed and shook his head. It was just amazing, he mused, how fast and hyper-active Usagi was during the day, considering how impossible a time Ikuko had waking her up in time for school in the mornings.

As he heard a brief conversation occur above him, he considered his memory of Ranma's curse demonstration. Though they had been told about it, and indeed had seen pictures of both his forms, nothing had even come close to actually preparing them for seeing the abrupt and undeniably magical change sweep over their new boarder.

Somehow seeing it with his own eyes brought home to Kenji the real meaning of the stories they had been told about Ranma's home life, and the reactions he had experienced from various people as they had learned of his curse. He shuddered as he imagined experiencing such a change himself, especially as a teenager, when image was everything, and anyone that stood out was excluded by so many.

He was brought out of his remembering by the return of Ikuko down the stairs, followed by Usagi. Her black cat was not with her, and she looked a bit disturbed. Of course, he had no idea, no way of knowing that she was pondering the likelihood of the household's new member being another of the world's enemies that she had been fighting for so long.

He saw only that she looked pensive and far from her usual bright self. "Don't worry, Usagi-chan," Kenji said firmly. "Ranma may have some problems in his life right now, but he is an honorable young man. You will get to meet him soon, but first, we need to explain some things, some of which you will need to keep to yourself, and some of which you will need to convey to your friends. I am sure you will get along just fine." He allowed a small grin to cross his mouth, as he continued in a teasing tone, "After all, he cannot possibly annoy you more than Shingo does, right?"

Usagi laughed as she sat beside him.

---

Ranma sighed as he walked through the park nearest to his new home. He was still having difficulty believing that his new hosts had been so nice about his curse. Neither had called him a pervert or a freak, and they had not even made him change back and forth a hundred times. It was hard to believe everything was going so well, but he was anticipating difficulties shortly.

Kenji had suggested that he might want to step out, and give them some time to explain the new situation to their children. He could certainly picture how that was going to go. He had actually imagined that this might really be happening, that something in his life might not blow up in his face. When he learned that they had not informed their kids, he flashed back to his meeting with the Tendos. Yeah, this was going to fall apart real quick.

Seeing a water feature, a small pond with a tiny island in the center, he veered quickly away, hoping to avoid triggering his curse, only to bump into someone walking along the same path. He certainly would have sensed them and avoided the collision, had they not been carrying a drink.

"Oh, oh, I'm so sorry," the girl cried. Of course, it would be a girl, Ranma groused privately while accepting the girl's apologies. For one frightening moment Ranma was certain the girl was Usagi. She was certainly Japanese, yet had the same ridiculously long blonde hair Usagi had in the photos he had seen of her, though the hairstyle differed. That meant less than nothing, since he expected they probably changed their hairstyles at the drop of a hat.

She was not Usagi however, as she had managed to introduce herself a moment later as Aino Minako. That name was no better, though, as it reminded him of the warning he had been given about Usagi's friend who also had a cat, and Ranma looked nervously about, expecting one of the hideous little demons to pop up and attack him.

Of course, he was equally expecting cries of "Pervert!" but her litany of apology made it clear she had not seen the actual transformation. He would have been horrified to know that the only reason Minako had not seen his transformation was that she had been swept up in a daydream about herself and the handsome hunk she had been watching as he walked through the park.

He was also oblivious to the way Minako kept glancing around, looking and hoping for another glimpse of the hunk, and attributed the frisson of unholy dread that shivered its way up his spine to his fear of cats. That was one of the reasons that Ranma generally liked parks. Not only did the normally afford a bit more interpersonal space than the streets of Tokyo, they also generally had a fair number of dogs about, being walked or playing, and so were less likely to sport a collection of cats than the average alleyway or fencetop.

He, or rather she, had almost extricated herself from the social trap of apology and acceptance when a taller brunette came running up, and she had to wait through an explanation and another round of introductions, this time to Kino Makoto, he once again reluctantly gave the name of Ranko Ishida. It felt strange giving that name, and he almost slipped and used the name Saotome, which would have been insulting to the family that had accepted him.

When she finally managed to convince the girls that no harm had been done, that she was fine and not angry, and was finally watching them walk away, she was left to wonder exactly how it was that she was somehow on the hook for meeting them at some soda and arcade shop the next day.

Not wanting to tempt fate by returning to the house in feminine form, she found a food cart and cadged a glass of water and a skewer of sticky sweet rice balls. Once she was out of sight of the cart, she heated the water with her ki and returned to her male form. He promptly left the park, taking to the rooftops to sit and look at the park and think without the dangerous proximity to all the people walking around with drinks.

Unfortunately for Ranma, he had not been as unobserved in his transformation as he would have preferred. Artemis, the white Moon-cat currently watching him had been keeping an eye on Minako, and he had not been distracted by daydreams. He had observed the boy turn into a girl, though from his perspective it happened when Minako touched him, as though her touch had short-circuited her disguise.

He did not understand the significance of the water that Ranma purchased, or the part it played in his transformation. In th experience of the cat, a handome guy being the recipient of Minako's crush was already likely to end up an enemy. The first transformation could have been Minako inadvertantly purifying a victim, but when Ranma restored the disguise himself, he was instantly elevated to Dark General in Artemis' eyes.

Artemis slid away into the darkness, sighing to himself about the necessity of once more puncturing Minako's dreams. He had wished more than once that she would find someone to be happy with, but so far it seemed fate was against her. It was just lucky that obviously the Dark General had not recognized Sailors Venus and Jupiter. His leap to the rooftop clearly demonstrated that he did not need to transform to be dangerous. Unless, of course, the female to male was his Dark General transformation? Artemis doubted it. So far they had been pretty consistent in being uniformed.

Ranma sat while the sun slid down the sky, staring at the park and contemplating whether he would have a bed that night, or be back in the park sleeping in a tent. It would be normal for his life if Usagi and Shingo both decided they hated him and forced their parents to withdraw their welcome.

Finally he felt he had left it long enough. Usagi and Shingo had surely been home for at least an hour, and more likely for two. Sighing, but resigned to the inevitable, he returned to the Tsukino home. He was a little surprised when he reached the front door without having the curse activated.

He had no opportunity to stare at the door and mope, nor to knock. Ikuko had obviously been watching for his return. She flung the door open before he had quite reached it, and welcomed him in warmly.

Usagi had obviously been listening for his return as well, for she bounded down the stairs, her long pony tails streaming behind her from two little balls of hair on her head where it was gathered and bunched. She burst into a babbling speech as she approached, her face beaming a wide, welcoming smile the equal or better of Ikuko's, and Ranma felt a little stunned at the forceful bubbliness of her personality. She reminded him a little of the steamroller that was the skating princess Azusa Shiratori, though without the kleptomaniac French obsession, thankfully.

Ranma was unprepared for the enthusiastic welcome of a girl who already had her destined love, and so had no jealousy or fear of him or her. She was familiar with magic, something her parents did not know, so she was not freaked out by that aspect either. Best of all, between her age and her destined and committed relationship; on her part whether it was on Mamoru's or not. That he could act as a chaperone, meaning she might get to go on actual, proper date nights was the cherry on top, and where he had thought she might be resentful of having a minder, she was instead babbling delightedly.

He had apparently spent too much time out brooding before returning, so Shingo had been sent to bed without meeting him, which left a bit of lingering concern to color his sleep that night.

When he got up the next morning, he heard Ikuko calling up to Usagi. He got up and dressed quickly. He had understood enough the previous day to have caught that Usagi tended to sleep dangerously late and rush about in the mornings. Trying to bathe in the mornings would be a recipe for certain disaster. Heading downstairs, he found Shingo already up and eating breakfast at the table.

Shingo perked up on seeing Ranma. He was excited about having another boy around, someone who might want to play his video games with him, someone who would not always look down on him and what he liked.

Ranma was prepared for disgust, for envy, or jealousy, but he was not at all prepared for Shingo to call out, "Good morning, older brother!"

Ranma nearly tripped walking into the room at that, and it took him a moment before he managed to recover, and greet his new little brother. As soon as he sat down, Ikuko set a bowl of miso soup, a bowl of rice, and a plate of fish and pickles at his place. Ranma bowed in place in thanks, and saying the traditional before meal acknowledgement, mindful of his manners and his unwillingness to give offense, tucked in.

As he had only half-expected, he was given a bento after finishing, and told that the Ishida would meet him to take him to Juuban Municipal High School to complete his transfer.

He left the house at the same time as Shingo, even as he heard Usagi being yelled at by Ikuko for not getting ready.

Outside, he once again found a compact car waiting for him. He did not wait to be asked, and slid into the back seat. Riding a top the car was one thing when he was a girl and uncomfortable about getting into a small car with several men, but he did not want to make a show of his arrival at school. He had a chance here, and he was determined that when it blew up, at least it would not be because of what he had done.

Still, he fidgeted nervously as they drove, nervous at being in a confined space at the mercy of someone else's skill at driving. He felt more comfortable riding the roof, whether of a car or a train, where he could leap away if danger threatened.

No danger threatened, however, and the ride passed in quiet discussion as the man sitting next to him, told him what they expected to happen. They reached the school in good time. He looked about the campus as they entered, two of the Ishida men accompanying him. He would have preferred to have only one with him, as they would have been less obvious as bodyguards in that case, but as it was they were early enough that there were few about to see him.

There were sufficient students to make it obvious that the school had a uniform, like most Japanese schools as far as he was aware, and he hoped that the Ishida had arranged for him to be exempted from that requirement. Of course, that was not nearly as important to him at the moment as the concern over showering for the physical education classes.

In Furinkan there had been constant attempts at triggering his curse, though they had been somewhat tempered by the obvious degree of his skill, demonstrated when he had taken on a significant portion of the male student body when they were accosting Akane shortly after his arrival.

He did not feel comfortable bringing up the question with his escort, however, not wanting to admit or discuss what he had experience at Furinkan. Setsuna had some idea, he was sure, and she had been in contact with Nokomura-san, so hopefully she would have made some form of arrangement.

Going the process of being enrolled was surprisingly painless, especially surprising to Ranma, who was used to dealing with the insanity that abounded in a school headed by the elder Kunou. There were no exploding pineapples, no strange challenges. He did not even have to defend himself from an unexpected attack.

He did have to demonstrate his curse when the principal questioned the request that apparently Setsuna had previously communicated to them that he be permitted to shower and change privately. He did not escape the requirement to wear a uniform, but the principal did bend enough to agree that his female form would be allowed to wear the male uniform, something that was already done by a few girls in the school, and that he could have the uniform modified to allow him to fight effectively in it, though he was warned against instigating fights on campus.

All in all, it went unexpectedly well, and when Ranma made his way to his new home-room for his first class, he was amazed at the efficiency of both the school and the Ishida, to get him into classes the same day he enrolled, as well as absolutely certain that doom was lurking about.

Nothing ever went this well for him, and he was beyond certain that Shampoo or Ryouga would break through a wall at any moment. His nervousness was noted by the homeroom teacher, Hidetoma Watagawa, but he only directed the new student to introduce himself.

Ranma bowed. "My name is Ishida Ranma, I am a practitioner of the Indiscriminate Grappling School of Martial Arts."

An excited babble rose for a moment before Watagawa brought the class back under control. He looked over the room and directed Ranma to the first open seat at the back of the room. As with most Japanese schools, the seating was assigned, so the students at the back of the room were not those less interested in the class, or less willing to work, as they might often have been in a room where students had their choice of seating.

It was clear to Ranma that this was a more disciplined school than Furinkan High, when no-one attempted to pass him notes or leaned over to whisper. Once Watagawa had shushed them after their reaction to his introduction, everyone had buckled down. This was the mathematics period, as had been obvious from the moment Ranma walked into the room and spied the contents of the black-board, and Ranma struggled to focus and catch up with the where the class was.

The lunch hour brought a lot of excited students by, though unlike Furinkan, they had not rushed him in a mob. Rather, every few minutes another two or three students would come to introduce themselves, and mention the clubs they belonged to, with the various sports, and the karate and kendo clubs' members seeming especially excited to meet him and hint at why their clubs would be the best for him to join.

It also brought another bit of evidence that either the Ishida, or perhaps Setsuna, or even both, had given Ikuko some advice, for when he opened his bento, he found a cute cat face staring back at him, composed of course of the various foods he had been given, in the typical cutesy bento fashion. It startled him for a moment, but he grinned as he ate it, the mere thought of finally being free of his debilitating fear was enough to keep his spirits high.

The afternoon classes passed easily enough, though Ranma continued to struggle to keep awake. He would not embarrass the people who had put their faith in him, and he had gotten a full night's sleep the night before, without an early morning wakeup defenestration, so he was not actually very tired. It was merely the long habit of sleeping during class and the absence of the excitement and entertainment that the constant interruptions at Furinkan had provided that made keeping his eyes open a challenge.

Still, treating it exactly as a challenge, he did make it through the school day without falling asleep once, though by the end of the day, he may have been paying more attention to enhancing his eyesight with ki, and with attempting to memorize his new classmates names, than with the actual class material. He had been helped somewhat by the occasional thrill of certain doom that ran up his spine, focusing his attention and making him certain he was about to be attacked, though nothing came of them. He had taken some notes, certainly more than he was used to taking, and he was surprised that his hand actually felt tired and tight, similar to the tightness in his fists on a day when he had fought nearly the whole day through.

Though he was used to leaving after school as soon as they cleanup had been completed, he found today that he was met again by the two black-suited Ishida men, who guided him back to the school offices, where now, after a full day of classes, he was finally asked to sit and take the various assessment tests and questionnaires that he would have expected to do that morning. The vice-principal, a thin bespectacled man with neatly combed black hair, though Ranma thought he could see where the man had apparently blackened his own scalp to hid that his hair was thinning, explained that they wanted to avoid his being out of school for too long, to keep from forcing him to scramble to catch back up, so they had put him in a track matching the one he had been in at Furinkan. Now, they wanted to evaluate that and decide if he would remain on that track, or if he would do better at a different level.

Ranma cringed inwardly at that, worried that he would be demoted a year and thus embarrass his new name and family, and have to deal with younger students teasing him.

He channeled some ki to his hand to ease the strain of writing all day, and set about writing his assessments.

When he finally left the school that day, it was late enough that he did not feel it worthwhile to try to go to the park to see if Hotaru were around, though he wanted to see her again, to affirm that he really did have a friend. Instead, he allowed the Ishida to drive him back, trying to pay more attention this time to the actual route they were taking, since tomorrow he would need to make it to the school on his own.

---

"Hey, Usagi!" caroled Minako, as the Inner Senshi gathered around the base of their favorite tree for lunch. Usagi ran over to join them, but before she could begin telling them her news, Minako continued.

"And he was just so cute and strong!"

"Was he tall?" Makoto asked eagerly.

Minako shrugged, "Not really tall, but not too short. He was really cute, though!"

Usagi joined in the conversation. She had her Mamoru, sure, but that did not mean that she stopped enjoying looking at cute guys. Ami just listened with quiet interest. The other girls chatting about a cute guy they had spotted somewhere, and who had dibs on him, was nothing new or exciting, and she was still puzzling over the sporadic and so far fruitless warnings she had been receiving of massive energy releases in the parks.

When the fun of discussing the cute guy waned, as Minako had to admit that she had lost sight of him, Usagi was about to jump in with her news, when Makoto jumped in. "Yeah, you lost him when you ran into that poor redheaded girl! That's what you get for walking and hunting for guys instead of looking where you are going!"

Minako huffed. "Well, I was headed towards where he had been, I just lost sight of him when that group of kids ran past, and I'm sure I would have found him in a couple of seconds if I hadn't run into her. Thankfully she was not too mad about it. I think she was about your height, Usagi."

"Short, in other words," Makoto threw out, grinning. Usagi threw her a mock glare.

Finally, she found a gap in the conversation where she could tell them about her new big brother, when the bell rang and they had to hurry back to class.

As soon as classes and their after school clubs were over, she dragged Minako and Makoto to the Crown Arcade to talk, leaving Ami to her cram school classes. Shortly after they arrive, Rei showed up.

Once more Usagi's excitement about her new family situation took a back seat. Even she knew that Sailor business had to take precedent, and Rei had done a fire reading the evening before, to look for the source of the strange readings Ami had been getting, and thus had not been able to meet up with them.

Now she finally got to reveal what she had seen. As she described the way the fire had swirled chaotically before finally settling down and showing her images, Usagi felt her heart clench as she waited on her friend's words.

"It seemed to have shown something when it was swirling, though I could not tell what. Then I saw a strong girl in a Chinese dress-pantsuit combo with purple hair, a cute little kitten with white fur with darker socks and bells and a tall boy with huge glasses in white robes. Then there was a duck, a pot-bellied pig, a wild looking boy with a huge backpack and a wooden umbrella. The thing is, the images started coming faster and faster as it went on, and by the time the wild boy showed up they all started to blur together."

"So we have to watch for Chinese people?" Makoto queried, confused.

Rei shrugged. "I'm not really sure what the Great Fire meant with all the things it showed me. They might be the cause, or they might be people we are being warned about, or they might be the people that can take care of whatever is causing the problem."

"Well, we'll keep an eye out for them!" Usagi was ecstatic that she would finally get to reveal her news. "But now you have to hear what happened when I got home yesterday! I've got a new brother!"

"What?!" Rei demanded, certain this must be some plot. "You never said your mother was pregnant!"

"No, no, not like that. He's just going to be living with us. He's had a really rough time over in Nerima ward, and Mom and Dad are taking him in because of an old honor agreement, so I've got a new big brother!"

"What's he look like?" Minako and Makoto chorused, leaning forward.

"I think he's pretty cute," Usagi grinned at her friends' reactions. "But he's off limits. Part of his trouble over in Nerima was girls fighting over him, so Mom says he's off the market. But that doesn't mean we can't look! And he's a martial artist!"

Rei frowned. "What about your nights, Usagi? What if he follows you?"

Usagi shrugged. "I don't see why it would be a problem. He's not a bad guy." She pouted at Rei.

"But, what if he finds out who you are?"

"He knows about magic already," Usagi defended. She almost mentioned that he was cursed, but remembered in time that Ikuko had said he would not want anyone knowing. "Oh, that reminds me," she continued, looking to Minako. "He is really afraid of cats because of bad things that happened to him as a child. So you need to keep Artemis away from him. I've already spoken to Luna about it."

"Doesn't that seem suspicious?" Rei protested.

Usagi shuddered. "No way, I'd be scared of cats too if I went through that. Mom did not explain everything that happened, but he was thrown into a pit of cats when he was a little boy. She said he had a lot of trauma because of it."

"What? That's terrible!" Minako was tearing up at the thought of someone doing something so cruel to a child. "A pit? Was it dark? But I don't understand why that would make him scared of them."

"Well," Usagi grimaced, not having really wanted to think about this, much less have to explain it. "They had been starved, and he, he was covered in fish sausages."

"But, but then they would have? No way, how could anyone be that cruel?"

Makoto's look was grim, and her hands were fisted. "Who could do such a thing. We should find them and teach them a lesson!"

"Mom didn't say, but if he was a little kid then it was years ago. Rei, maybe the fire could find out?"

"Or if it really happened at all," Rei muttered, but she nodded. "Sure, I'll ask the Great Fire and let you guys know. I guess it won't be tonight though, I won't have time."

Meetings

Not yet posted.