46
Little China Girl
volume four : it's all in the reflexes
The peace and quiet of a beautiful spring morning in the Amazon Village was broken by raised voices and the concussion of wood on flesh. "You are SO uncuuuuuuute!" shouted Ranma as he arced through the sky over the village. In the small courtyard behind Cologne's home, a large, solid manor house befitting a ruling Matriarch, Akane stood heaving in rage. Around her, a crowd of amazon teens drawn to the commotion stood in awe and glee. In Mandarin, they chatted in excitement over the implications of this strange, one-shot battle. Those who understood Japanese had been translating the exchange of insults that evolved through the course of Ranma and Akane's misunderstanding. The translators could not grasp the concept of "tomboy" so the best they could make of Ranma's favorite insult was that Ranma accused Akane of being a boy. The rest of his usual character assassinations of Akane pointed out a long list of decidedly unfeminine traits that most of the amazons found themselves agreeing with. If Ranma had known he had the support of an entire community on his views about Akane, he would have laughed his fool head off--or Akane would have knocked it off for him.
Not surprisingly, Ranma had become the focus of interest among the amazon youth. Unlike the other two "reborn" amazons, Ranma was a male. On his first day in the village, he had been introduced to the village as an honorary woman. It had been a long time since that had happened, but Ranma was the only one who was the victim of a Nanniichuan curse. It astounded all of the amazons that he had not been punished for getting himself locked in male form, especially when it was learned that he had refused the cure to the Chisuiiton when Herb offered it to him. Eventually, word had gotten out that Ranma, Ranko and Fa Shen were attempting to master their curses using the teachings of the original Shokei Fist. Still, a man who received all the honors and respect of a woman warrior was a novelty for the younger generation.
"What are you all looking at!?" Akane roared, when she noticed her audience.
"You defeated Ranma," one of them replied in awe.
"Yeah, well, the jerk was asking for it!" she fumed.
This started another commotion, as her comment was interpreted to mean that Ranma had baited Akane into challenging him. They had all seen amazon maidens do the same exact thing to trap a desirable outsider male. It was unusual to see this ploy used by a man, but Akane WAS an outsider, and obviously a man at heart, as far as Ranma was concerned. Whatever Ranma's reasons for remaining male were, he certainly was demonstrating that he was a woman warrior at heart!
Assuming that all the discussion meant the crowd sympathized with her, Akane calmed down. "I guess I better go see if the jerk is alright," she sighed, stalking off in the direction she had kicked her fiancé. After a few steps, she realized that everyone was following her. She paused to look at them in confusion, but they stopped a pace behind her and waited. Shrugging, she turned and resumed her march. They fell in step, giving Akane a very odd feeling of doom. Fa Shen and Ranko stood in the now empty courtyard and stared at each other. They had both understood the commentary from the audience, but they had been so stunned by their conclusions they had been left behind. By unspoken agreement, they bolted after the crowd. Ranko raced ahead to warn Ranma, as Fa Shen sprinted up to Akane to explain what the crowd was expecting.
"They think WHAT!?" Akane exploded, after Fa Shen whispered in her ear.
"Keep it down!" Fa Shen hissed, urging Akane to put more distance between them and the crowd. "They think you just defeated Ranma in combat, Akane. With Ranma making all those remarks, they think he thinks you're a guy… well, on the inside, you know. That's why they're all following you. They want to see Ranma give you the kiss of marriage."
"That's ridiculous! I'm not marrying Ranma!" Akane almost yelled. Fa Shen just looked at her unmoved. Akane blushed, "I mean, not yet. Maybe not ever. There is the engagement, but it's not like he's chosen between me and Ukyo. I'm certainly not going to marry him over something stupid like this. And what do you mean, they think I'm a guy!? Have they even looked at Ukyo! There's a girl who really does act like a boy!"
"Calm down, Akane. I'm just warning you. Ranko's going to talk to Ranma, so… You might wanna maybe find something else to do for a while. Away from Ranma," Fa Shen suggested.
As Akane continued to storm along in silence, Fa Shen found herself worrying. There was something she was missing, she was sure of it. No one could miss the fact that Akane was upset. While Ranma's "insult" seemed to be the logical cause, the fact that Akane was still doggedly tracking Ranma down suggested otherwise. Where the fight itself brought up memories of the days before Fa Shen emerged, back then Akane would normally have gone out of her way to avoid Ranma and sulk. Fa Shen wracked her brain trying to think of something to explain why Akane was stubbornly ignoring her warning.
The answer came when Akane glanced up ahead and the defiant mask fell for a second, revealing concern and guilt. Fa Shen narrowed her eyes suspiciously for an instant. In spite of the anger that simmered on the surface, Akane was genuinely worried, the amazon girl decided. With that observation, everything clicked into place. Akane had been badly shaken by the events of the preceding weeks, as she watched the Ranma she knew come apart at the seams and evolve into Ranko. As disturbing as that must have been for Akane, being confronted with the fact that the cursed teen and his/her reflections were in mortal peril--could actually die as a result of being split up by the mirror--left the tempestuous tomboy gravely subdued. Apparently, Akane had not completely gotten over the shock of realizing that Ranma could be hurt, or the fear that she could seriously hurt him.
Fa Shen placed a hand on the other girl's arm to call her attention, giving her a look that said she knew what Akane was thinking. With an assuring expression and a firm tone, she asserted, "Trust me, Ranma's fine." Fa Shen squeezed Akane's arm gently, giving a reassuring smile to discourage any protest. Akane gazed back into her eyes pensively, gradually relaxing as Fa Shen projected her confidence in Ranma's well being. "I'm sure he isn't even scratched. He's probably happy that you're back to normal even."
"What's that supposed to mean?" Akane scowled faintly.
"Well, that is the first time in a while that you've lost your temper with him. Don't forget I know exactly what things were like before the mirror mishap," Fa Shen's smile evolved into a smirk. Honestly, that was a massive understatement. She had completely assimilated the memories of Copy-Ranma the night she woke up, and the two fusions with Ranma and Ranko had only strengthened and reinforced them. Of course, the memories were not so bad compared to the emotions that were attached to them. It took significant effort to keep the mere memory of those feelings from influencing her, when Fa Shen dealt with Akane. Especially when she called upon the memories of her siblings to understand Akane's behavior.
"I…" Akane started, then looked away to hide a flash of pain. In a more controlled voice, she continued, "That's right, you can remember being Ranma. I guess that sort of slipped my mind."
Fa Shen bit her lip, suddenly remembering her reaction to waking up in the male reflection. She remembered where her struggle with Ranma's emotions had started. As soon as Akane caught on to what had happened, she had stared into Fa Shen's eyes desperate to know what happened to the young man she had finally come to terms with. Fa Shen had been unable to acknowledge the boy's feelings for Akane, and crushed the girl's heart with a shake of the head and a pathetic apology. Even though the feelings themselves had diminished after the second day, Fa Shen still felt guilt over it. Clearing her throat, she tried to brush past Akane's wordless accusation and elaborated on her observation. "Right. Well, we all sort of… noticed it…" she waved a hand helplessly, studying Akane out of the corner of her eye. "You started to act… different when things started to fall apart, but now, you're more like your old self," Fa Shen tried to explain.
"And that's his excuse for being such a jerk!?" Akane demanded in disgust. Returning to her initial outrage was more comfortable than dwelling on the cruel reminder Fa Shen had given her of the night she lost Ranma for the second time.
"Are you so sure he was just being mean?" Fa Shen smiled, thinking that Akane had provoked the morning's scene on purpose. It seemed obvious to her, now, that Akane had worked herself up to confront Ranma about their relationship. So much had happened in such a short period of time, no one had really been able to sort any of it out. The last couple of days had given everyone a chance to recover from their recent ordeals. There had really only been one thing missing, to convince everyone that things had gone back to normal. A fight--and what better way to provoke one than by exercising her unique culinary genius?
"What?" Akane jerked her head around in surprise, staring at Fa Shen as if unable to believe she could question that Ranma was at fault.
"It's not like you don't know how people react to your cooking," Fa Shen smiled impishly. Fa Shen could remember the way Akane had tested Copy-Ranma, reluctant to believe he was really "Ranma" until they got into a fight. It seemed reasonable she would try the same thing with the current Ranma. Cooking breakfast had been guaranteed to provoke him, Fa Shen noted wryly. Then she frowned. Actually, her cooking was no near as disturbing as the fact that Akane was so fiercely determined to make people EAT it! Before Akane could decide how to respond to her question, she rushed to distract her, "But that's not really the point. It's the thought that counts, right? I mean, you did hear him say how happy he was that you cooked breakfast for him. Didn't you? And he really did appreciate the effort. He just…"
"He refused to eat any of it! He always refuses to even taste it before rejecting it! He was being a complete and total jerk!" Akane huffed, finally taking a detour from the path to veer away from where Ranma landed. "I got up early and slaved over the stove for hours just to make sure I got it right this time."
Fa Shen sighed. The immediate disaster was averted, but she had opened the door to another problem. A problem Ranma had often wished someone would be brave enough to address, and it looked like it was falling to her to handle it. "I am sure you really tried, Akane. Still, you do remember what he asked you first, don't you?" Akane looked at her blankly. Fa Shen stopped and turned to face the other girl. "Akane, he was being very nice, he was being very patient, and he politely asked you how it tasted…"
"And I told him to try it and find out!" Akane interrupted in irritation.
Fa Shen shook her head, "You said, 'I don't know. Why don't you to tell me.' Don't you get it, Akane?" But as Akane frowned in an effort to think, Fa Shen concluded it was necessary to spell it out. "You were mad that he even asked, but the point is, you never tasted it, did you?"
"I made it for him…"
"You're not listening. You're the cook. You're supposed to taste the food before you serve it to other people," Fa Shen lectured as calmly as she could. "Even if you're the greatest chef in the world, there's always the chance that the ingredients got mixed up or something has gone bad. How many times has Ranma asked you if you bother to taste your cooking before you serve it? Do you think he's making fun of you when he does that?"
"He… he's always insulting me. He thinks I can't do anything right. He assumes I'm a bad cook!" Akane protested, with tears beginning to well up.
"Akane," Fa Shen looked at her sadly, "you ARE a bad cook."
Akane jerked as if she had stepped on a live wire. A switch in her head flipped from self-pity to rage, and the air around her began to grow thick and hot, presaging the manifestation of her battle aura. Fa Shen was actually startled for an instant, as it hit her that Akane was TOO angry. Her reaction was too extreme even for someone confronted by an unpleasant truth. In the time it took to blink, she recognized the possibility that Akane had been seriously unhinged by the ordeals of the past few weeks. Where Akane had never had much control over her temper, she was teetering on the brink of being controlled BY her temper. Which left Fa Shen only one option, as she slapped her palm flat against Akane's chest, sending a flood of chi through her body. The technique was the equivalent of shock therapy. To Akane, if felt like a cold, ocean wave crashing over a roaring bonfire. She gasped as her anger was extinguished, too stunned to try and reclaim it.
"You are also a bad martial artist, a rock in the water, a pathetic seamstress, a terrible judge of character, an unreasonable, prejudiced and opinionated bitch, and the most ill-tempered person I've met outside of Ryouga," Fa Shen criticized a bit more harshly, getting in the extra blows while Akane was reeling. It was cruel, but the point was to confront her with her flaws openly. To hit her with all the criticism she feared while she was not blinded by anger. Then, she took a deep breath and smiled. She proceeded to point out the girl's strong points just as firmly, "On the other hand, you're an intelligent, compassionate, and loyal friend, an excellent actress, an incredible athlete, you're inhumanly strong and determined, you never let the idea that you can't do something stop you from trying, and you are one of the most forgiving people I know outside of Ranma."
Akane blinked, speechless.
"But for right now, let's just focus on the part about cooking," Fa Shen suggested playfully. The stern glint in her eye did not fade, however, as Fa Shen continued in more consoling tones, "The fact that you care so much, that you try so hard to please others, really counts. But, you focus too much on the end result--the ideal in your head--that you deny the fact that you haven't got a clue how to really get there. You can't just decide that you are going to be a wonderful cook and make delicious food everyone will praise. You have to actually learn how to cook."
"But I know how to cook," Akane protested weakly. Her head was reeling from the unexpected shift Fa Shen had made from peer to sensei. It was the first time in at least a decade that anyone had dared to discipline her. It was the first time she could think of that anyone had ever commanded her respect. In spite of that, she still managed to dispute, "I've watched Kasumi cook thousands of times, and I even watched my mother cook before she died."
Fa Shen sighed and asked, "Did you understand what you were seeing?"
"Huh?" Akane intoned, with another blank look.
"I can see we're gonna have to start from scratch," Fa Shen demurred.
Ranko finally spotted where Ranma had crashed through the canopy of trees and raced in to warn him. Not too surprisingly, Ranma was hanging upside down about four meters above the ground, dangling from a branch that had snagged his pant's leg, and grumbling about Akane. Once again, Ranko suffered the odd feeling of dislocation that came as a result of living his life for almost a year. With a laugh, she announced her presence, "You know, if Pops hadn't dragged me to that mansion, I'd be the one hanging upside down from a tree somewhere and bitchin' up a storm. I can't say I miss it, but… it actually seems pretty funny when you look at it from the outside, Ranma." It should not have qualified as sympathy, but Ranko was the one person who would know what a consolation her remark was to him in that moment. Ranma sighed and stopped complaining, while nodding in response. He bent double, stretching one hand up to grasp the branch, while the other untangled his pant's leg. Once he was free, he ricocheted from branch to branch until he was down at Ranko's level on the forest floor.
"Sure you don't miss it," he grinned.
Ranko's smirk faded. She was supposed to be the one who had him all figured out. Not the other way around. Shrugging and brushing the comment off, she commented, "At least she starting to act like you really are you."
"You mean, she's treatin' me like she used to treat you," he corrected. There were weird feelings on both sides. About Akane. About Ryouga. It was particularly weird having someone to talk to who did not need to ask how he felt. Weirder to know that he could not hide those feelings from her either. He was still trying to decide if they were really her feelings.
Ranko sighed, "It's not like that. I mean, I think she's finally getting it, that you are the real thing. I was just a bad copy."
Ranma grunted and rubbed the back of his head. They'd had this conversation before. Even with more and more of Fa Shen's memories coming to her, Ranko was still more of a female version of Ranma than a blending of him and Fa Shen. Even Ranma had begun to pick up flashes of the drowned girl's life, and the problem was that so much of it was like his own. For Ranko, it had to seem like she had been born and grown up with the curse, sometimes a boy, sometimes a girl, but always devoted to the art, traveling from place to place, spending more time in the wilderness than around other people. The people she, or rather Fa Shen, had known, were all long dead. Also, she had never lived as Fa Shen, not like she had believed she was Ranma for almost eleven months. With the revelation about Ranma's first sex change, there was the added incentive to believe that she was the one who was supposed to have been born in the first place.
"Forget that for a moment," Ranko suddenly interrupted, remembering why she had tracked him down. "We have a problem. Or, you have a problem, really."
"Like that's anything new," Ranma rolled his eyes. Taking a deep breath, he prompted, "Okay, whatever it is, lay it on me." He thought that by now he was ready for anything. Ranko immediately proved him wrong. She quickly spelled out the amazons' reaction to his fight with Akane. In abject disbelief, he shouted, "They WHAT!?"
"I don't think 'tomboy' translates well in amazon culture. They think you think Akane's a man, in spirit, and that you provoked her into a marriage battle," Ranko summarized. "They're on their way here to see you give Akane a kiss of marriage."
"No way! Uhn uh! There's no way I'm gonna marry that flat-chested, thick-legged, mallet-wielding, macho tomboy!" he ranted, stomping around in a circle. Coming around to see Ranko standing, arms crossed, tapping her foot while she glared at him, he quickly backpedaled. "I mean, they've got it all wrong. I can't marry Akane right now. I have to figure out what to do about Ukyo first."
"That's why I am here, you idiot," Ranko fretted. She looked around to confirm that they were not about to be overrun with amazons. "Look, the important thing is, you need to avoid Akane for a while. I don't know if we can make anyone understand about you and Akane fighting. It's not like you have to do it, since you can't actually challenge her, and she--hopefully--isn't going to challenge you…"
"If she challenged me to a real fight, there's no way she'd beat me," Ranma interrupted.
Ranko punched him and glared, "Don't interrupt me. You should know how it works, Ranma. I almost had to marry Shampoo 'cuz I accidentally knocked her out. Akane's an outsider, an' that means she's qualified for the kiss of marriage about a thousand times over."
"But I'm a guy. It doesn't work like that for amazon males. I checked," he protested. He averted his eyes uncomfortably, as he recalled the reason why he had checked. The only thing standing between Ranma and a consummated marriage to Ryouga was his masculine identity. Besides Ranko, of course. While he no longer felt the same passion for the lost boy he had on the night they made love, he certainly remembered it. He could not find another moment in his life where he had felt that free, that happy, that loved. He remembered it vividly enough to know that part of him wanted to be Ranko--to be what Ranko was, a female version of himself. That remained the hardest part of reclaiming his identity as Ranma, knowing the true price he paid to be the manly martial artist. It was almost funny how that bothered him more than the burden of his engagements to Akane and Ukyo. How was he supposed to choose between the two girls, honestly, when part of him ached to be one of them?
"Whoa, hold on," Ranko waved her hands. "IF you were a guy born here, and some outsider girl beat you up, then no, you wouldn't hafta marry her. That doesn't help you though. First of all, you weren't born an amazon. Second, you aren't really a guy as far as anyone here is concerned."
Ranma scowled in irritation and frustration. "Do you think I really care what anyone here really thinks?" he demanded tersely. Shoving his hands into his pockets, he restrained the impulse to point out the real flaw in Ranko's argument. "I AM a GUY damn it!" he shouted, adding silently, plaintively, 'I have to be. Ranma Saotome is a MAN.'
Ranko stared at him. While she expected Ranma to cling to his manhood, it frustrated her that he was missing the point. Grabbing him by his shirt and shaking him, she shouted, "Do you remember that whole 'honorary woman' thing you went through when we got here? You're just lucky they don't know about Ryu and Taro!"
"Hey, that was all you," Ranma retorted. "You should be worried about that, not me."
"That's not the point! If a guy DOES manage to knock you out…" she let that hang. So much depended on Ranko taking responsibility for the events of the past year, including her relationship with Ryouga. But it was hard, even with the pooling of experiences and emotions, to be certain. In a very private corner of her mind, the way Ranma's fight with Akane was being interpreted by the villagers was threatening. She did not want to admit it. She did not even want to think about it, but instinctively she recognized the same thing Ranma did, and silently preyed no one would see it. But that was not possible if the amazons were forced to consider the very thing she was trying to warn Ranma of. What would have been a routine fight between Ranma and Akane back in Nerima was a complete disaster here and now.
Ranma stared at her for a long moment. 'Is she being deliberately stupid?' he asked himself in shock. 'She can't possibly have forgotten about me and Ryouga.' For a moment he itched to remind her exactly where he and the lost boy stood, under the letter of amazon law. But he could not forget that she felt the full impact of his night with Ryouga. She still felt the passion he could only remember. He just could not threaten to take away from her what he should not even want in the first place. Finally he shook his head, taking refuge in stubborn denial, "No way. You can't be serious. I don't care how much fun it is to have sex as a girl, I ain't marryin' no guy!"
"Do you think any normal amazon girl is all that crazy about getting knocked out and dragged off by some strange guy? Even if she hates her 'husband' the law is the law, and the tribe forces her to claim him and drag him home. If it happened to you," she emphasized, "you'd have no choice. You would be allowed to get him cursed, but you'd still have to marry him."
"That is so messed up!" he growled. The whole argument was pointing directly at the situation with Ryouga. For all Ranko presented it as a warning, the fact was everything she was describing had already come to pass. What good was it to be warned now, well after the fact? Ranma tensed then shook himself violently. He jerked his mind out of its defensive patterns, as he reminded himself pointedly that Ranko was far from stupid. There had never been a chance for warning. The deed was done before the danger had even reared its head. The only hope Ranma or Ranko had was for the elders to overlook the truth or never know it. That was the only sensible plan of action, and the only strategy they could hope to employ. Since Ranko had to know that too, maybe she was not simply pointing out the obvious. Taking a controlled breath, he crossed his arms and went back to the original warning, "What does this have to do with Akane? I don't care how macho she is, when you get right down to it, she really is a girl."
"And a cute one at that," Ranko sighed fondly. Until the words escaped her lips, Ranko had not realized that part of her mind was still side tracked by thoughts of her former relationship with Akane. Ranko had never really let go of her feelings for Akane, even though she had given up any hope of realizing those feelings with the other girl. It was sort of ironic, actually. The same day Akane and Ryouga had become official rivals for Ranma, Ranko had become the one possessed with all the passions the reflections felt for either of them. Naturally, that simply resulted in Ranko being as torn and conflicted about Akane and Ryouga as Ranma was. With a wistful sigh, she joked half seriously, "Maybe you should just kiss her and get the marriage over with, and I can trip Ryouga, and this whole fiancée mess would finally be sorted out."
"Stop that and answer the question," Ranma snapped.
"Don't be so grouchy," Ranko retorted unhappily. She hugged herself a bit self consciously, not quite meeting his eyes. From the way he was looking at her, he was a bit appalled by her "suggestion" and perhaps even a little disturbed. It suddenly struck her that his doubts were so similar to hers. Neither of them could entirely let go of the one the other was "engaged" to. "I would have married her, and we both know it. I can't just… stop," Ranko confessed softly, causing the red-haired boy to twitch.
"You have Ryouga," Ranma shot back, with obvious pain in his voice.
"God, it sucks to be us," Ranko moaned. Ranma gave her a level look. That was all it took, to establish that they understood each other--even in the ways they wished they did not. 'At this rate, we're never going to really talk about any of this,' Ranko grumbled to herself. Shrugging, she returned to the point, answering Ranma's question. "If this idea of Akane having a 'man's spirit' catches on, it would be just as reasonable for the council to declare her an 'honorary man' so that the laws for men can apply to her. And be careful, I've already heard remarks of that sort about Ukyo. They took one look at her and decided she was WRONG."
Ranma groaned. "Tell me about it. I had to keep her from killing some of the villagers when she found out that, instead of 'lending a friendly hand' she was being given 'men's work'. You know how Ukyo is, she's happy to make new friends by cooking and helping out, but once she started to get ordered around, she snapped. Luckily, she didn't defeat anyone before I showed up. Some of those girls looked eager to give her a kiss of death," he shuddered in memory.
"What!?" Ranko fumed.
"It's okay," Ranma waved a hand. "Fa Shen showed up and declared her bond of friendship with Ukyo. Since that makes her an official ally of the tribe, she's immune to the kiss of death."
"Thank God!" Ranko breathed.
Ranma kicked at the dirt and thought for a moment. Ranko let him think, shifting her attention to scan the woods around them, wondering why the crowd had not pounced on them already. She hoped that meant Fa Shen had diverted Akane.
"Alright," Ranma announced. "I guess I'll stay outta Akane's way for a while. I really should be focusing on mastering my curse, anyway."
Ranko blinked and looked at him. "That's right. We were supposed to start that today, weren't we?" She fidgeted in place. Ranma and Fa Shen had gotten in a big argument on the way to the village, as Fa Shen explained why it would not be possible for them to master their curses. All three of them had ended up with reversed curses that made it possible for them to be locked in their normal forms. The problem was, the best technique for mastering a curse required the initiate be locked in their cursed form, using the impulse to assert their normal forms as the impetus to gain control over the transformation magic. The other techniques involved keeping the curse unlocked and trying to overcome the hot and cold water triggers that controlled the transformations.
"Well, the rest of us have to catch up with you. You're already half way there," he reminded her. When Prince Herb had found out that Ranko was uncursed, he had used the chisuiiton to prevent her from getting a Nanniichuan curse, since he had planned on claiming one of triplets for a bride. If Ranma had not gone into the trap mirror, Herb would have done the same to him. When Fa Shen met Herb to get the lock Shampoo put on her taken off, so she could get a Nyanniichuan curse, Ranko had tried to steal the Kaisuifuu. Lime and Mint thwarted her, playing pickle with the kettle and Ranko while Fa Shen and Herb fought their duel over the cursed springs. The two battles crossed paths, and Fa Shen was able to intercept the kettle and send it to Ranko, who had fallen in the Nanniichuan trying to keep Fa Shen from landing in it. Ranko tripped and missed the catch, so the kettle landed in the pool with her. It heated the water and exposed Ranko to the hot Nanniichuan water. As a result, Ranko ended up with a hot water curse and a built in locking mechanism. Ranko could lock herself in female form at will, in cold water, or unlock her male form at will, in hot water.
"What I've got isn't mastery, Ranma. I still need hot and cold water to change," Ranko pointed out ruefully. With a sigh, she reminded herself that she was in the same position as Fa Shen. She did have a much stronger affinity for her male form, but she did not know if it was truly equal to her female form. "Besides, I certainly can't do what you and Fa Shen can do. Even if Fa Shen is right, and we can't master our curses the traditional way, the two of you could easily switch places and then you wouldn't have reversed curses to worry about anymore."
Ranma gaped at her in surprise.
Ranko stared at him. "What!? You can't honestly tell me you didn't think of that!"
Ranma shook his head sheepishly. As Ranko glared at him, Ranma sighed, "Come on, Ranko. The whole point of mastering our curses was so we wouldn't have any need to switch places. Being able to change into a girl is nice, but it's not worth having the curse controlled by water and while I don't mind havin' to have sex in order to change, it's not exactly convenient. Also, what I'd want to be a girl for, I can't use Fa Shen's body to do."
Ranko shook her head. The legacy of the Mirror of Broken Souls was weird and perverse, but there had been another element to it, besides how it allowed Ranma and Fa Shen to trade bodies. They had to have sex together to trigger the swap, but the sex itself opened a channel into their shared soul that Ranko could draw power directly from. This was the very thing that had brought her from the brink of death back to full strength, after awakening Ranma and Fa Shen almost killed her. It was a secret weapon that outclassed anything the trio had seen or could imagine, and at some point Ranko was going to have to learn how to master it. Happosai had not been joking when he claimed that sexual energy was too powerful to handle. If Ranko had not figured out how to reign Ranma and Fa Shen in, to control the flow of power, she would have been burnt to dust in minutes. "I'm not exactly in any hurry for you two to have sex again," Ranko pointed out, archly. "The second time was not so bad, but the first time… Well, you know. If we ever needed proof that we're all the same person, you can't ask for anything better than that. But, if it will help you guys master your curses, I'm willing to face it again, Ranma."
Ranma frowned. He was aware of the awesome power Ranko confronted in their little circuit, but this was the first time she had indicated that it intimidated her in any way. He had thought the notion of sharing the whole experience had just weirded her out. "Is there something you didn't tell us, Ranko?"
"I thought you would have figured it out on your own," she evaded, looking away.
"Ranko…"
"It's okay, Ranma. It's just… It's so much power, I simply can't afford to make any mistakes. There's only two options. Either I master it completely, which I can't do alone, or I never use it at all. It's no big deal if it's just you two trading places, but if it was in a fight…" she stopped. In a voice of overwhelming apprehension, she wondered, "What would I have to be fighting to need that much power in order to win? A Kami? A demon? Is there really anything that powerful out there?"
Ranma felt sweat begin to bead his scalp. "Okay. THAT is a scary thought."
After a long silence, Ranko cleared her throat, "Well, it looks like Fa Shen diverted Akane. They should have found us by now if they were still looking."
A little later in the morning, Ranko finally tracked Fa Shen down in the kitchen of Cologne's home. Because of the planned adoption of Nodoka and her children, Cologne had taken them all in. To repay this hospitality, Akane had volunteered AGAIN to destroy her kitchen. Somewhere, Shampoo was having kittens. Ranko winced immediately at the thought--for several reasons. "Not literally. Please, God, not literally," she plead to the heavens. With her luck though, if such a thing ever did happen, the little beasts would take after Shampoo and spend all their time plotting to ambush her and drape themselves all over her. That brought on a shuddering fit that dropped Ranko to her knees. As if that were not enough, her mind decided to demonstrated even greater depths of perversity, trying to picture how such a thing might come to pass. "Gyaah! I don't even want to meet the c-c-cat that could defeat her in combat! Brrr!" The question was, would Shampoo still have to give 'him' the kiss of marriage? "Stopit! Stopit! Stopit! I'm not THAT desperate to avoid marryin' her!" She began to beat at her head, trying to drive these horrifying thoughts out of her mind.
"Ranchan? What the hell are you talking about, and, why are you hitting yourself on the head?" Ukyo asked in startled confusion. After an hour of trying to help Fa Shen teach Akane to cook, she had been grateful for her favorite red-head's interruption. It would be so much more pleasant, however, if she was not acting crazy at the same time.
Ranko was too busy pummeling herself to take in her best friend's question. "Hee, hee… Kittens… No! Bad! Wrong! Wrong-Bad-Wrong! BadbadbadWRONG!" Just as she was about to start pounding her head in the wall, Fa Shen stepped up and poked her in the back of her head. For a second, Ranko's head was empty of all thought, then her brain started up again with that whole train of thought derailed. With a gasp of relief, she glomped her twin and cried, "Oh! Thankyouthankyouthankyou! God, I love you! Don't ever change!"
Akane, having come forward to stand shoulder to shoulder by Ukyo, gaped in confusion at Ranko's strange behavior. The two former fiancées unconsciously responded to Ranko's impassioned declaration with ill grins, clenched fists warping or breaking the utensils in their hands, while their eyes twitched ominously. "Ranko…" they growled.
Ranko stiffened and pulled away from Fa Shen. After a rush of nervous laughter, she rubbed the back of her head and blurted, "What?"
"What was that all about?" Fa Shen asked.
"Huh?" Ranko blinked, but in her attempt to answer the question, she got herself started again. "Akane. Kitchen. Aaaah! Shampoo's gonna h-ha-haa haa haa HAAA! K-k-k-KITTENS! Kyaaaaaa! G-g-get'emoff! Get'emoff! Mother!" Fa Shen stared at her, and then slapped her face. Ranko blinked and rubbed her cheek. Meeting her twin's eyes, she blushed, "Thanks."
"You know, that almost made sense to me. That can't be a good thing," Fa Shen commented.
"Trust me, you don't wanna know…" Ranko shuddered.
Fa Shen nodded thoughtfully. She turned to Ukyo, "Mother should be back soon. Do you think you can handle this until she gets here, Ukyo?" Ukyo bit her lip and glanced between Akane and the chaos in progress. If two competent cooks had not been able to prevent what had already happened, she dreaded to think what she was getting herself into. In spite of that, she nodded. Fa Shen smiled and patted the other girl's arm in relief, "Thanks. I'm gonna get Ranko out of here before she flips out."
"Again," Ukyo had to add.
"Uh, actually, I just came to remind you about your training with Ranma," Ranko perked up. Fa Shen stared at her. Smiling, Ranko prodded, "You completely forgot, didn't you?"
"Training?" Akane asked, immediately interested.
"Special training, Akane," Ranko quickly cut in. "We're supposed to be mastering our curses."
Akane's face fell.
Ukyo gave them a thoughtful look. Clearing her throat, she asked, "So, uh… if that works out… Are you still going to…? You know." Her eyes flickered out the window to where a large, crypt-like stone vault contained Ranko's gift to Ukyo and Ranma's gift to his father.
Ranko contained her groan. With a clipped nod, she replied, "The cask is still safe. If we work out a sure way to master a curse, you can try it. Just remember, Ranma and I won't allow it if you only wanna do this for us." She did not need to hear Ukyo's reply. She had heard the same thing a hundred times before she had convinced her friend to wait.
"I've already told you, with you or without you, Ukyo Kuonji is still, legally, a boy."
Ranko nodded. In case she dared to forget how stubborn her friend could be, she reminded herself that Ukyo spent almost a decade of her life devoted to the pursuit of Ranma and Genma, training herself to take revenge on them for destroying her future as a woman. Ranma was the only one who could give that back to her, but because of Ranko, she was willing to throw it away completely. The moral of the story was, one word of encouragement had the power to destroy the person it was given to. Or was that, no good deed went unpunished?
Fa Shen sensed the life going out of Ranko, and quickly shuffled her outside. Once out of earshot, she consoled, "It's not your fault, Ranko. Your father and hers did this to her. Getting cursed won't kill her. Well, at least not that curse. Stop blaming yourself for 'making her want it'."
"It's not that simple, Fa Shen," Ranko complained.
"Nothing ever is," she responded sagely. "Now, where's Ranma, and what's the big rush?"
"He's right here," Ranko pulled out the infamous compact and showed it to Fa Shen. That stopped the other girl cold. No other prompting was needed for her to understand what it meant, if she was expected to meet Ranma in the perfect privacy offered by the trap mirror. It was inevitable that, from there, she would combine that prospect with the Shokei Fist training, and grasp the entire scheme.
"You're kidding," she stated in a flat voice.
"It fixes the reversed curse problem, doesn't it?" Ranko challenged. When Fa Shen said nothing, she added, "Look. At the very least, we can see if the technique you already trained for will actually work. It's not like it's a permanent trade, just an experiment."
Fa Shen nodded. Loaning her body to Ranma did not bother her in the least, but giving it to him, or letting him use it however he desired, had been another thing altogether. Taking a deep breath, she met Ranko's eyes. "What about you?"
"You mean, what am I going to do while you two are busy?" she grinned. Fa Shen blushed and nodded. "Well, first thing, we are going to find a nice, isolated practice area where I won't be disturbed. Then, you go in with Ranma. Once the circuit is open, I'll be experimenting to see if I can actually control that power enough to fight with it." The best aspect of integrating Fa Shen's memories, was that it had boosted Ranko's experience with ki manipulation techniques by a decade. If there was anything she could use all that power for, she had all the tools she needed to harness it.
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