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by Donald McElreath
Disclaimer: Ranma ½ and its characters and settings belong to Rumiko Takahashi, Shogakukan, Kitty, and Viz Video.
Chapter 5
Further Complications
Ryoga Hibiki stood in the nighttime street, protected from the chilling rain by his umbrella. He was staring at a sign across the road from him and wavering in indecision.
Ranma. All I have to do is go in there and get my revenge, then this will be over. He took a half step forward. But SHE’s in there.
Though he hated to admit it, Nabiki Tendo had been right. He'd endangered an innocent in his battle with Ranma, and he felt a measure of guilt over that.
Not enough to give up his hunt, though. Ranma was going to pay for what he'd done. He was just going to have to be more careful about who was around when he got his revenge. He most certainly did not want to face an angry Nabiki Tendo again.
So he stood, waiting in the rain for his opportunity.
A flicker of movement caught his eye, and when he turned a nasty grin grew on his lips. Opportunity had appeared in the form of a well-shaped redhead running through the downpour.
Ranma could never relax on nights like this. It brought back to many memories of a time when he was little. A night he wished he could forget, but knew he never would. As the night progressed he'd grown more and more restless, until finally he'd just had to run to burn off the nervous energy or go nuts. So, with no thought for the rain or the curse, he'd sprinted out on his unplanned tour of Nerima. He hadn't even really noticed the change.
She was now on her way back to the dojo, having released most of her tension. She was looking forward to getting dry, warm, and asleep when her danger sense kicked in. She glanced around to see a shadowed figure charging at her through the rain with an umbrella held above its head.
"Time to meet your end, Ranma!"
Oh. HIM, Ranma thought as she leaped out of the way, landing atop the dojo's boundary wall.
*What are you doing here, Ryoga?* she signed before remembering that the lost boy would not understand her, and growing more frustrated with the idiot as a result.
"There's no one to save you this time, Ranma! This time I will get my revenge!" Ryoga launched himself at his opponent and their fight began once more, with the Tendo's backyard as the battleground.
Akane groaned as she sat up, awakened by a loud noise from outside that wasn't the rain. "What's all that racket outside?"
"Akane? Are you awake?"
She turned to see Kasumi poking her head into the room. Akane blinked for a moment at her sister's unbound hair and nightgown before she remembered the time. Right. Middle of the night.
"It wake you too, Kasumi?"
The youngest Tendo rose, and grabbing her shinai, joined Kasumi in the hall. There she found Nabiki also stepping from her room in her pajamas, with a decidedly bleary look on her face.
"Who's making all that blasted noise?" she grouched, half asleep.
Akane blinked in surprise. It usually took something earth-shattering to wake Nabiki in the middle of the night. "Go back to bed, oneechan. Me and Kasumi with take care of it."
"Like I could sleep with all that noise," Nabiki snorted in reply. Like I was sleeping anyway. Her loss of control earlier that day was really bothering her, and had kept her from her usually deep sleep.
Shrugging, Akane headed downstairs, her shinai held before her and her sisters following behind.
"Do you think it's a burglar?" Kasumi asked as they reached the ground floor.
"It had better not be," Akane growled.
Nabiki grunted. Any burglar who made this much noise while trying to break into her house deserved every bit of pain she was sure her little sister was about to inflict.
They crept up, and as Akane silently slide open the door to the rear porch a crack, they saw a figure backlit by lightning jumping into the air with an umbrella in its hand and a large pack on his back.
"It is a burglar!" Kasumi yelped as she grabbed Nabiki's arm.
"I'll beat his brains out!" Akane moved to go outside when her eldest sister's strong grip landed on her shoulder.
"No!! It's too dangerous!"
"Kasumi…" Akane's surprise and annoyance at her sister turned to surprise and confusion as a heavy object was thrust into her hand.
"Use this instead."
She looked down to realize that Kasumi had handed her their father's heavy stone ashtray. "Huh?" Oh well. He needs to stop smoking anyway.
Ranma evaded another attack from Ryoga and decided she'd had enough of the pig-headed moron. Attacking her in the middle of the night, in the RAIN, waving that damn umbrella around over his head. She nearly missed a block as she wondered why he was still hiding under the umbrella. It wasn't as if a little water was going to hurt him. Unless…
Her thoughts, and the fight, were interrupted by an object bouncing off the back of Ryoga's head, causing him to drop the umbrella. She got one good look at the Lost Boy's panicked face in the light from another thunderbolt before he jumped over the dojo's wall and ran.
Shit!
Nabiki watched from the porch as Akane managed to clear the dojo wall in a single jump, even if just barely, as she took off after Ranma. Why the boy-turned-girl had decided to chase the fleeing burglar was beyond her, much less her hyperactive sister's choice to join him. What had caught her attention, even in her sleep deprived brain, was the Akane had managed, if just barely, to clear the dojo's wall with a single jump. She was going to have to pay better attention to just how much her little sister was improving under Ranma.
But that was something for tomorrow; right now she badly needed to get some sleep. Murmuring reassurances to a worried Kasumi that Akane and Ranma were able to take care of themselves, she headed back upstairs and passed out as soon as her head hit the pillow.
The piglet found himself in an unfamiliar house, not that such was something new for him. He was always finding himself somewhere he hadn't been before. It was dry and it was warm and that would be enough until the rain stopped. Then he would have to find his way out and back to what he needed. He could wait.
Kasumi watched as a soaking-wet Akane stomped back onto the porch, followed by an equally drenched Ranma who was carrying a bundle of clothes and a large backpack. She quickly ran to grab some towels for the pair.
"What happened?" she asked, handing out the towels.
Akane muttered her thanks as she started to dry her long hair. "Ryoga Hibiki happened."
Kasumi frowned slightly in thought. "Ryoga Hibiki? Isn't that the boy that attacked Ranma at school?"
Ranma and Akane both nodded. "Get Ranma to tell you the rest," Akane said, deciding she was about as dry as she was going to get standing there on the porch without taking her pajamas off, and that it was time she head for the furo. "I'm going to take a bath and get warmed up."
Nodding in agreement, Kasumi turned back to Ranma, who quickly mimed for a pad and pen as she started removing her shirt. Understanding instantly, the older girl quickly gathered both items, returning to find Ranma and stripped down to her boxers and tank top as she continued to dry herself. Surprised for a moment, Kasumi paused before remembering that he was a girl right now and not about the reveal more than she should rightly see.
As she sat herself near Ranma, she took notice of the apparent care the cursed boy put into writing the explanation, making sure he didn't miss any details. There would be no repeat of the multiple notes he'd had to write after Ryoga's first appearance. After several minutes the finished note was handed over. She read the note aloud as she went.
'I was out running because I couldn't sleep. When I got back to the dojo, Ryoga attacked me yelling about revenge. We were fighting when something hit Ryoga in the head.
Was that Akane?'
Kasumi met the redhead's gaze for a moment to nod before continuing.
'He dropped his umbrella and from the way he took off I figured he might have a Jusenkyo curse like me. So I went after him, but all I found were his clothes and pack. That's when Akane caught up with me. I explained what I could and we looked around a little, but all we found was a neighbor's dog. Then we headed back here.'
Blushing for a second at the thought of Ryoga without his clothes, Kasumi realized that something made a bit more sense now. Like Ryoga's ability to recognize Ranma's cursed form that first day. It was also possible that he also blamed Ranma for his own curse, whatever it was.
"Do you know what he turns into?"
Ranma shrugged and wrote another note.
I really must learn sign language soon. It will certainly save on paper and pen, Kasumi thought as she took the latest note.
'No idea. Can't be anything too big, though. His clothes weren't ripped.'
Kasumi nodded. She supposed they'd have to keep their eyes open, at least until this Ryoga's full intentions were know. Would he deliberately involve those close to Ranma in his revenge, or even possibly use his cursed form to attack someone?
"Well, I'm heading back to bed." Kasumi rose and head towards the stairs. "Make sure you wait until Akane is finished with her bath before you go to take your own."
Ranma's blush and frantic nodding caused her to smile. She grew more impressed with the good qualities the boy had developed every day. Especially as she became less impressed with his father in the same time.
The rain had stopped some time ago, and the piglet had been trying to find his way out of the house all that time. Unfortunately, he hadn't even been able to find his way out of the room he was in. Getting frustrated, he decided to jump up on the piece of furniture next to him and get a better look around. He made the jump easily and immediately realized he'd landed on a bed. That meant he had to be in a bedroom. Well, that was more than he'd known before.
As he started to look around in an attempt to locate the door, something fell across him and quickly wrapped around him, drawing him against something warm. He squirmed around to see his attacker and froze in terror. He was being held by a beautiful teenaged girl. A girl that had threatened to destroy him earlier that day.
Waiting for death, he realized that she was asleep. The face he'd last seen etched with lines of rage was now peaceful, almost vulnerable and completely beautiful. He also realized he was being held securely enough that he would risk waking her if he tried to get free. He would just have to wait for a chance to get away.
Sleep claimed him before the chance came.
Most mornings, Nabiki spent her first ten minutes or so of consciousness moving on a kind of autopilot without being truly aware of her environment. Normally, this caused no difficulties as everyone was use to it, and didn't try to interact with her until she had fully awoken. This morning would prove different.
Akane passed Nabiki in the hall as her sister staggered her way into the bathroom and blinked in confusion before turning to stare at the now-closed bathroom door. Finally she just shook her head. After all, there was no way her sister had been carrying a piglet into the bath, so she must have just imagined it.
Inside the bathroom, Nabiki moved to the sink to brush her teeth, only then noticing something was getting in the way. Her slowly waking consciousness dimly registered this bit of information and decided a mild acceleration of the waking process was in order. As more brain cells came fully online, she realized that what was getting in the way was that her arms were busy with another task. This caused further confusion that her mind sought to solve by advancing wakefulness another couple steps….Oh, they were holding an object against her chest. Her mind cast back through recent memories and found no mention of an object. Further data was needed. It was warm and there was a slight rhythmic motion against her that hinted at breathing. As this was obviously impossible, her mind took another step towards full consciousness and decided a visual inspection was in order. Getting a firm grip on the unknown item she lifted it up for identification.
"Bwee…"
A piglet stared back at her with frightened eyes. This is not normal, she thought as her mind came to full awareness.
"I obviously carried you in here." She stared into the piglet's eyes. "What I want to know is how the hell I ended up carrying you in the first place?"
The piglet just continued to stare at her in fear.
"Guess you can't answer that, can you?" she muttered. "Look, I'm going to put you down and I don't want you going anywhere until I figure this out."
She set the animal down by the sink and returned to her morning routine. After brushing her teeth and hair, she still hadn't come up with any thing other than the possibility that the creature had somehow found its way into the house during the storm last night, and she'd some how grabbed it up in her exhausted state. It wasn't a likely theory, but it was all she could come up with.
Absentmindedly carrying the piglet, she returned to her room, and sitting the animal on her bed began to strip off her pajamas and pull out her clothes for the day. She did notice, as she slipped on her school shirt, that the animal had turned away from her towards the wall. She blinked once in confusion before shrugging it off before pulling on the rest of her uniform.
"All right, you," she said, once more lifting the piglet up to face her, "I guess you're staying here until I figure out where you belong. Can't have a piglet wondering around Nerima alone."
The assembled Saotomes and Tendos had just finished seating themselves around the breakfast table when Nabiki walked into the room still carrying her new acquaintance. She managed to make it to her seat before anyone noticed the typical morning gathering's extra addition. That someone happened to be Akane.
"Um, Nabiki?"
"What's up, imouto-chan?" Nabiki set the piglet down beside her and gave him a pat on the head in way of letting him know he was to stay put.
"What's with the piglet?"
That got the attention of everybody else. The sight of a perfectly normal-looking Nabiki sitting next to a cute little piglet created varying reactions. Genma looked, blinked once and returned to his food. Ranma blinked, shrugged it off with the thought that Nabiki was a real girl after all, and returned to his food. Soun stared and wondered if something funny had found its way into his morning meal. Akane continued to blink in confusion. Kasumi produced the only audible response.
"Oh my. How cute."
"He must have found his way in here last night during the storm and somehow ended up in my room," Nabiki explained as she reached for her breakfast. "Could you keep an eye on him while I'm at school, Kasumi? At least until I figure out who he belongs to."
"Of course, imouto-chan. It would be my pleasure. Oh, you got a letter yesterday. With all the excitement I forgot to give it to you."
As Kasumi pulled an envelope from her apron pocket and handed it to Nabiki, Soun blinked once and turned his attention back to his paper. Akane finally started eating again and wondered if, between the blow up yesterday and now the thing with the pig, she should start looking for pods under her sister's bed. The piglet simply sat there as he suffered from his own state of confusion and wondered why he wasn't dead yet.
Wondering who would be writing her, Nabiki took the envelope. Not seeing a return address, she tore it open and unfolded the sheet of paper inside.
"Damn."
Nabiki's quiet oath caused everyone except Genma, who continued to stuff his face, to stare at her again.
"Are you okay, oneechan?" Akane swore she'd start checking for pods first chance she got.
"Fine, Akane. Just some unexpected news." How could I have forgotten about this? Controlled complications are one thing — they can even be very profitable — but I'm not going to have much, if any, control over him. Worse, I'm not even sure exactly what he wants, and things have changed since I sent that letter. She completely ignored the small bit of excitement that touched her at the thought of once more seeing what was to become Nerima's newest resident.
Ryoga sat in his piglet body watching Kasumi as she went about making lunch that afternoon. He had managed to keep from getting lost by the simple method of following the eldest Tendo girl around as she went about her chores. She hadn't seemed to mind, telling him about her sisters as she worked. And he'd listened, especially to the parts about Nabiki. It seemed the girl was very different from what he had first thought.
He started to wonder if maybe, just maybe…
Nabiki was not in a good mood behind her usual indifferent mask as she walked to school the next morning. Things had seemed fine after school. She'd reclaimed Mr. Piglet — Kasumi had named the animal, and Nabiki couldn't bring herself to argue with her older sister — and headed to her room to check over the house's books. Finding on problems, she'd opened her desk drawer to inventory her supply of photographs for sale. That's when things had started to go downhill. The drawer had been empty.
That was impossible. Since Ranma's arrival, she never let it empty out completely. Especially since Ranma had been harder to catch in appropriate poses. Suspicious, but not too concerned, she'd unlocked the bottom drawer of her desk where she kept the negatives and film. When that too proved empty, she was less than pleased. It took less than a second to run through the extremely short list of suspects, and she proceeded to stomp downstairs and demand Ranma return her property immediately. The bastard had had the gall to just sit there with a smirk on his face and play innocent. Her little sister had been of absolutely no help, not even able to understand why Nabiki suspected the pigtailed teen.
To top everything off, Mr. Piglet had wandered out of her room while she was busy with her sister's idiot fiancé and had seemingly vanished. For some reason that had Nabiki worried. She was making plans to have a bunch of flyers printed for distribution around town even as she settled into her desk.
Unfortunately for her sense of equilibrium, Nabiki was due for another shock that morning. It came when the teacher called them to order to begin the day.
"Class, I we have a new student joining us today."
The boy who walked into the room quickly sparked the interest of the girls and the envy of the boys. Mildly handsome, with a lean muscular build that filled out his uniform well, he almost seemed to flow rather than walk to the head of the class. His long midnight-black hair was pulled into a simple ponytail, and his bright emerald green eyes swept over his fellow students while he introduced himself.
Nabiki didn't need to listen to discover who her new classmate was. Even though she hadn't seen him in several months, the letters they'd exchanged had let she get to know him fairly well. She didn't need to listen, but she did all the same.
"I'm Keiji Saito. I've just moved here for personal reasons. I practice kenjutsu, kempo, and a few other Arts."
"Very good, Mr. Saito. You can take the seat next to Ms. Tendo."
With a nod, Keiji took his seat, with only a slight grin to show he recognized Nabiki and it disappeared before anyone else saw it. Nabiki maintained her cool and gave no indication of her own. However, she was distracted all the same, and missed the interest Kuno was suddenly paying her friend.
When the lunchbell rang, Nabiki found herself surrounded by almost every girl in class, being asked a swarm of questions about the new student. She saw Keiji flash her a questioning look before leaving the room. Filing that away, she took a second to decide how to handle the mass of hormonal girls from her class.
"Ladies. Ladies! I'll have answers for you tomorrow. Until then you'll just have to be patient."
With that she gathered up her lunch and, unhindered by her classmates, made her way outside. It took her only a second to spot her prey after stepping into the schoolyard.
Time to get some answers of my own.
Contrary to what some students believed, Ranma and Akane didn't always eat lunch together. Ranma had managed to make friends with a couple of the other boys and occasionally ate with them, while Akane would spend time with her own friends.
"Hey, isn't that Nabiki going over to that new boy?"
Akane looked at where Sayuri pointed to see her sister walking towards the new boy in school, her lunch in hand. If she didn't know better, she'd have thought Nabiki was going to share her lunchtime with a boy instead of organizing her betting pools and schemes.
"She's probably just going to suck his wallet dry."
Yuka sighed in disappointment at a gossip topic lost. "You're right. The Ice Queen couldn't be interested in a boy."
Keiji watched as the girl walked towards him out the corner of his eye. He would never understand how they'd become friends. He'd first come to her for business, but somehow they'd become tentative friends. After he left, they'd exchanged letters regularly and he now considered her the best friend he could ever hope for.
"Aren't you going to ruin your reputation coming over here?" he asked as she sat near him without looking up from his food.
"Not at all. There are some girls that have a lot of questions about you."
He looked up at her to see her giving him that grin that said she knew more than everyone. "Oh really? Why's that?"
Nabiki opened her lunch and took a few bites before answering. "Well, you're a handsome, unattached boy, who hasn't shown any interest in my little sister. So this is a fact-finding mission. Have to satisfy the Gossip Brigade's curiosity, after all."
Keiji nodded. That made sense. She could give a reason for having her knowledge and cover her reputation all at once. She would also likely be able to charge extra for the information since she could claim it was first-hand.
"You aren't interested in my little sister, are you?" Nabiki asked, her eyes more guarded than usual.
Keiji sighed and turned his attention back to his lunch. "Always fishing for information, hey, 'Biki? Well, since it is your family we're talking about, I guess you deserve to know. No, I'm not interested in your little sister, or anyone else in your family."
"Then just why did you want me to keep an eye out for Ranma?"
"Well, I found out that his father had ties to yours. I figured they might show up here and took a chance."
"You haven't answered my question, Saito."
He couldn't hide a wince at the ice in Nabiki's voice. "I'm after somebody who is trying to find Ranma."
Nabiki thought about that for a moment before commenting, her voice once more lightly friendly. "Find the target of your target and wait for them to show up. Not bad. And what does this—"
"Saito, I would have words with you!"
The two looked up to see Tatewaki Kuno standing there, once more shining forth as an example of arrogant stupidity.
"Something you wanted, Kuno-baby?"
"My words are not for you, Nabiki Tendo, but for this peasant," Kuno sneered.
The only thing that kept Nabiki from telling Kuno off was seeing Keiji calmly stand to face the jerk. She decided to let him have some fun.
"Did you want to talk to me, or did you want to spew insults?"
Kuno stiffened. "You claim to be a swordsman?"
Nabiki groaned. Kuno-baby's ego rears its ugly head.
"I remember saying something about kenjutsu, so I suppose that does make me a swordsman. What of it?"
"The only true swordsman at this school is I, Tatewaki Kuno." The kendoist fell into an attack stance with his bokken. "Now I shall prove the wrongness of your boast!"
Keiji blinked once before turning to Nabiki. "Is this moron serious?"
"Ignore me at thy own folly!" Kuno screamed as he launched his attack.
Flowing out of the way of the attack, Keiji went on the defensive at first; after all, he didn't have his sword right then.
His technique and form are almost perfect. He dodged several more attacks. It's like he's performing a kata. There's no variation in his moves; it's like he was in a dojo rather than fighting. He really is as big a moron as 'Biki said. Time to end this.
As Kuno started another swing with his weapon his opponent reversed his direction and closed faster than the kendoist could adjust. With a deft twist of his hands Keiji remove the bokken from Kuno's grip and into his own. Then, sliding around the resident idiot with a spin, slammed the weapon into the back of its owner's head with a side slash, rendering him unconscious.
Nabiki stared. She'd known Keiji was good; she'd been around martial artists long enough to tell that just from how he moved, but she hadn't dreamed he was this good. "You never said you were this good," she commented.
Keiji shrugged. "You never asked. Besides, you can't really use this moron as anything to judge by." He threw the bokken atop its owner. "He has a lot to learn about being a swordsman. Challenging some one to a sword duel, then attacking them while they're unarmed."
"Well, Kuno-baby was never very high on the learning curve."
"Guess you're right." He glanced around at several approaching students. "I better get going. I meant what I said, Nabiki."
Things are definitely going to get more interesting around here, Nabiki thought as he walked away.
That afternoon, Keiji paused outside the door to the building where he now worked and lived to think over the day. "Things around here sure are stranger than Nabiki let on. If I've run into this much after only one day, how much more is there? Well, it's almost Saturday, so I should be able to meet 'Biki for lunch or something and find out then. Besides, it's been a while since we did something like that."
He opened the door and stepped into the building's waiting room.
"Good afternoon, Keiji. Ready to go to work?"
"Sure thing, Dr. Tofu."
Mr. Piglet was lost again when he heard some one mention a familiar name. Looking up he saw a boy about his age near by. Unfortunately, he was too far away to catch everything the boy said.
"… Nabiki… only one day… more… Saturday so I should… lunch or something… while since we did something…"
Then he disappeared into a building before Mr. Piglet could get close enough to hear any more.
No! No! No! First that bastard Ranma hurts her, and now this pervert is planning on doing something to her on Saturday! Don't worry, Nabiki, I'll save you!
He charged off on a quest for hot water and his clothes.
To be continued.
Webmaster: Larry F
Last revision:
May 21, 2007
