Disclaimer: Ranma ½ and its characters and settings belong to Rumiko Takahashi, Shogakukan, Kitty, and Viz Video. This story based on the anime, not the manga.

Chapter 4: After the Rain Has Fallen

Akane's breath slid easily in and out of her lungs, a slower rhythm than the beat her legs pounded against the sidewalk. She breathed in the Sunday morning air, pleasantly cool and refreshing against the light sweat raised by her jog. These were one of the few stretches of quiet time the youngest Tendo had, and she usually enjoyed them quite a bit.

Today's run had proved less enjoyable than some, but Akane wasn't complaining; she was still in a better mood than had been usual lately. She thought back over the various good things that had happened in the past few days. Best of all was the fact that Ranma hadn't gone crawling back to Shampoo, nor had the Amazon come by the Tendo home to press her suit and herself on him again. Then there was the inspiration Akane had had, to get Nabiki to acquire more waterproof soap for Ranma and Ryoga, a plan to which her older sister had agreed the day before yesterday. Then again there was the fact that Ranma had showed enough sense not to go back to school yesterday. Akane still felt a little surprised when she thought about it; she had fully expected him to go charging back to face Kuno, completely ignoring how doing so would be asking for disaster.

Of course, it appeared that the reason he'd refrained was so he could do a different stupid thing, and go out flying when Dr. Tofu had declared him too injured to attend school. When Akane had gotten home from the Saturday half-day of classes and heard the news from Kasumi, she had been more worried than she'd ever admit. But Ranma had eventually winged his way home, safe and sound even if he was stiff, sore, and weary from the exertion. So even though it had been a stupid thing to do, there apparently hadn't been any permanent consequences. Which certainly wouldn't have been the case if he had gone back to Furinkan and been splashed in full view of everybody.

There was another reason Akane was happy and relieved — the outcome of the fight between Ranma and Ryoga. On Friday, after the two had disappeared over the rooftops, she had stomped back home and unleashed all her aggravation on various unfortunate training dummies and sets of bricks. The anger at being left behind unable to follow them, as well as at herself for the stupid indecision that had held her frozen silent and missing any chance to intervene, had taken quite a while to work out. And once she'd done so, Akane realized her mistake. Once the anger was gone, there was nothing left to distract her from fear and uncertainty. Not just one, but both of the boys fighting had a terrible handicap, and that meant the chances were either doubled or four times greater (she wasn't quite sure which, that was one mathematical principal she'd never mastered) that a mistake would leave someone terribly hurt or worse.

But it hadn't happened. As it turned out, keeping silent and letting everything proceed as it did had been the right thing to do, which was an enormous relief to Akane. Ranma had been pummeled to submission, battered to unconsciousness, but that was all. Ryoga hadn't even been hurt, from what details she'd been able to get from Dr. Tofu. He'd helped Ranma home the evening before last, and stayed behind to discuss things after Ranma limped off toward his room. Akane had been able to get a good bit of the story from him before Kasumi showed up and left the good doctor more debilitated than the patient he'd so recently treated.

Akane let her thoughts shift away from Ranma to Ryoga. She was glad that he hadn't won by triggering Ranma's curse, although truth be told she would have been very surprised if he had. It would have been much easier to credit Ranma with resorting to such means to secure the win. He hadn't either, and that also made her feel happy. The youngest Tendo found herself hoping that this fight would have cleared the air between the two rivals, at least somewhat. In all honesty, somewhere along the line she'd found herself forced to admit that Ranma had a point, and that she shouldn't blame him nearly as much as she did Shampoo for inflicting that curse on Ryoga. Part of Akane still felt like the blame should be split fifty/fifty, but by now the majority of her was considering seventy-five/twenty-five a more reasonable conclusion. And since it wasn't nearly as much Ranma's fault as Shampoo's, maybe this victory would be enough to work out the worst of whatever resentment Ryoga felt for Ranma over this.

'I hope so,' she thought to herself, feeling a sudden dimming of her mood. 'Poor Ryoga. How is he going to cope with this anyway? It's different for Ranma. He has a home, a place to live and people to look out for him. Ryoga doesn't have any of that. I'd help him if I could, but he gets lost so often it almost isn't even possible. It wouldn't surprise me if he hasn't even showed up again by the time Ranma's worked his way through both bars of soap I asked Nabiki to get for him. I better make sure she knows not to let Ranma know there's another two bars waiting for Ryoga. It'd be terrible if it was already gone by the time he finally finds his way back here.'

Akane's mood continued to darken with each step she took, leaving behind the happiness and satisfaction she'd felt only moments before and sliding quickly into sadness and melancholy. 'It just isn't fair. Ryoga's a nice guy, probably the nicest one I know, and life just keeps on dumping on him. It isn't enough that he spends so much time lost. Now he gets stuck with a horrible curse like that, turning into something small and weak and defenseless. All because Shampoo didn't want him to have an advantage over Ranma!'

That last thought should have sparked a comfortable rising surge of anger. Instead, it felt like the spark winked out before it could ignite, swallowed up in the ever-increasing levels of sadness. 'Why does it have to be like this…? Why can't there be a way to make things right…?' As the feeling of burden grew, Akane stumbled to a stop, seating herself on a convenient bench. It felt like the weight of the entire world was pressing on her. Sitting brought no relief, either; if anything, the oppressive sensation just continued to build.

And then, with an earsplitting crack, it lessened noticeably.

The shock was enough to bring her to her feet and whirl her around. There was a wall there, a wall with a locked gate in it a little ways down the street. Akane hurried to this and looked through the gap, finding that the wall enclosed an abandoned lot. Inside she could see the remains of a long-ruined building, probably one that been destroyed in her father's youth (perhaps even by him, if the few stories he'd told were true, and Nerima really always had been a proving ground for crazy high-powered martial arts battles).

Of much more importance to her, though, was the sight of the lot's lone occupant. He was standing only a few feet away from her, head downcast, shoulders slumped, radiating such misery that Akane didn't hesitate a moment before breaking the lock on the gate and hurrying through it. "Ryoga?" she said tentatively as she came up behind him. "What's wrong?"

On another day, the Lost Boy might have jumped, spun around, laughed nervously, and stuttered a reply with half-frozen vocal chords. Here and now, he just turned slowly and deliberately. "Akane," he murmured on catching sight of her. "So I'm still in Nerima. Or back in Nerima. Or something like that."

"What's wrong?" Akane repeated, her concern and worry for him replacing her mysterious early sadness. "Why are you so down? You beat Ranma, right? Shouldn't you be a little happy about that?"

"That's right. I did." He said it with no trace of satisfaction at all. "Want to see how?"

"Um… okay," Akane replied hesitantly, already at a loss for words. Why was Ryoga reacting like this? More importantly, how was she supposed to handle the situation?

"It goes like this." Ryoga turned thirty degrees away from her and got down on one knee, placing his hands on the ground and staring forward to a point all the way on the other side of the lot, targeting a chunk of broken concrete about the size of Genma's cursed form. Akane stared in awe as the ground beneath it suddenly slurped the thing down, swallowing ninety-five percent of it in what seemed like the blink of an eye.

Her sense of wonder faded swiftly, though, and she could feel her concern and worry for him beginning to fade as well, buried under another rising wave of sorrow. As Ryoga straightened up the feeling increased, leaving Akane trembling and weak and on the verge of tears. Then his hands snapped forward, chi coalescing between then and shooting out. The Shi Shi Hokodan impacted the ground right before the submerged iceberg of concrete. Immediately the earth shattered with a roar and disgorged a cloud of dust, rubble, and debris, leaving nothing of his original target larger than fist-sized chunks.

"Two new moves for the price of one," Ryoga muttered, not bothering to turn back and look at her. "The Graveyard Shift makes the earth open its mouth like the grave, to swallow something whole. Cut it off before you've actually got your target all the way under and hit it with a Shi Shi Hokodan, and the chi of the two attacks blows up a whole lot better than the Bakusai Tenketsu ever could. I think I'll call the combo Chain of Despair."

"Ryoga." About a minute back, Akane had finally figured something out. Ryoga's most powerful chi ability was based on depression, and he was apparently feeling it strongly enough to radiate it outward. That was why she had been feeling such inexplicable sadness. It had lessened once again after the release of Ryoga's chi blast, but it hadn't disappeared entirely. Still, her fear was strong enough to displace this reduced level of sorrow. "Why are you hurting like this? You beat Ranma! You're supposed to be happy right now!"

"Should I be? What good did it do?" Ryoga turned to face her, moving as if the effort required was almost more than the remains of his strength could bear. "So I beat him. So what? It was so easy, it didn't mean anything. I could do it again, no problem at all. What would be the point?"

"What do you mean?" Akane asked, disbelief obvious in her voice and her eyes. "Maybe it was more Shampoo's fault, but Ranma still deserves some of the blame for getting you this curse. You challenged him because of that, and you beat him better than almost anyone ever has! Didn't you do that to make up for getting cursed?"

Ryoga just shrugged. "Ranma said it wasn't permanent after all. That the water Shampoo used would wear off in a few more days." Later, he would realize that that had been a truly stupid admission. But at the moment such clarity of foresight was beyond him.

The shock from this statement was so great that for a moment Akane couldn't think, speak, or even sense the oppressive sorrow that pervaded the air. 'But… that's… why would she… why wouldn't he…?' As if deciding that some mysteries were too profound to be solved, and that it was better not to waste time trying, Akane pushed all consideration of this unbelievable revelation out of her mind. "But even so. How can you say it doesn't matter that you beat him?" she asked, returning to her previous track. "It matters to me!"

"It does?" Ryoga said quietly. "I'm sorry, Akane."

"Sorry for what? Ryoga, I'm glad you won!"

Akane had spoken the words with no idea that they would serve as powerfully as they did. Like a shot from a cannon, the communication screamed through the air and smashed a hole in the despair surrounding Ryoga. That emotion was certainly not banished, but for the first time in more than a day he was able to feel something else reasonably strongly: surprise. "Y-you are?" he stammered.

"Mm-hm." Akane nodded her head firmly. "You deserved to win! You've worked so hard trying to get better, and you never descend to the kind of cheap tricks he uses sometimes." The words tumbled forth, spilling out from behind a door she usually kept locked and barred. "I get so sick of the way he always wins, time after time, no matter what. No matter what he has to do to win, either. And it just makes it worse that I can't ever wish for Mousse or Kuno or somebody like that to put one over on him! They might really hurt him, or even kill him! But you're better than that, Ryoga. I know I can trust you not to do more than just beat him. That's another reason I'm glad you did."

"Do you really think so?" The words emerged as not much more than a whisper. Now Ryoga could feel a veritable hurricane of emotions, all struggling with each other. Confusion, hope, remorse, regret, happiness, tenderness, fear, and of course the sorrow from before. Already that one was increasing again, as memories from the fight and after surged out of the dark corners of his mind. "But… but Akane… I could have killed him. I didn't mean to, I deliberately chose not to! The Graveyard Shift was meant to use to kill, not just pin someone, but I promised myself I'd never, ever do that. But I didn't know what would happen when I combined it with the Shi Shi Hokodan! If I'd used the normal form instead of the Perfect one, it might have been enough to kill Ranma anyway!"

"W-what?" Akane gasped.

"That's right." The despair was rising again, winning the battle for Ryoga's psyche. "The blast from the ground isn't nearly as powerful when I set it off with the Perfect Shi Shi Hokodan. I think it's because the second move overpowers the first, or something. That was what I did to beat Ranma, but that was the first time I ever combined the moves and I didn't even know there'd be an explosion. If I'd just used the normal version, I could have killed him by accident after all."

Akane's brow wrinkled. "Oh. So what?"

Once again, shock battered its way through Ryoga's malaise. "What did you say?"

"Well, really, why are you letting that bother you so much?" the youngest Tendo counter-queried. Considering the number of times she'd seen highly skilled fighters do their deliberate, futile best to wreak permanent harm on Ranma, it just didn't seem all that important to hear Ryoga angsting about a harmless mistake he wouldn't ever repeat. Honestly, her friend was too sensitive for his own good. If only he could donate some of his excess to Ranma or something. "I mean, that didn't happen, and you didn't mean for it to happen, and now that you know you'll never actually do that. The reason you're practicing here is to make sure you know what's safe and what isn't, right?"

"Um, yeah, that's right…"

She smiled at him. "So why are you letting that get you down? Ryoga, the future is more important than the past, but they're both way more important than an accident that could have happened and didn't."

"M-maybe you're right…." But after all, it was thoughts of both the past and the future that were the real source of Ryoga's depression. What might have happened in the fight with Ranma wasn't a truly significant source of pain; it was just the one that he'd thought safest to tell her. After what Ranma had forced him to see, there was no way he could go back to being P-chan in the future once Shampoo's trick wore off, and it would be even worse to tell Akane of what he'd done in the past. Whatever wrong he'd done to her through his masquerade, at least he hadn't hurt her consciously — either in his conscious awareness or hers. But if Akane ever learned the true identity of her pet, that would change. And that he absolutely could not bear.

"So, are you feeling better now?" Akane asked anxiously. To her eyes, it looked like he'd made a little improvement, but nowhere near enough yet.

"I…." He wanted to reassure her, to make her feel better, but here and now the lie stuck in his throat. Ryoga just looked at her helplessly for a moment, then gulped, and said, "Akane, I… I just don't know…."

'Oh, Ryoga. Why isn't this working?' Akane thought, anxiety rising a bit higher. 'There's no good reason for him to be feeling this bad.' She considered things for a few seconds, before the obvious answer hit her. Ryoga had been using the Shi Shi Hokodan just now, and she had actually been able to feel the depression from it from twenty feet away and on the other side of a wall. That had never happened before. It must be that he had been overusing the move, and it was starting to feed back the despair into him and the area around him.

Her voice firm with conviction, Akane said, "Then maybe you'd better not use the Shi Shi Hokodan again for awhile. I think it's starting to really get you down, Ryoga. You don't want to be depressed all the time, do you?"

"I don't want to be lost all the time either, wandering around with no idea where I am or where anybody is who knows my name," Ryoga said quietly. 'I don't want to have hurt you or taken advantage of you or be even less worthy of you than Kuno.' "But that's how it is. The Shi Shi Hokodan doesn't make me depressed; I use it because I already am."

"Then why can I feel it so strongly now, when I never have before?" Akane challenged.

"Huh? Feel it?" Ryoga gave her a look of surprise, which gradually shifted into thoughtfulness and then concentration. Suddenly the oppressive sensation was gone, and the only clue Akane had remaining to Ryoga's state of mind was the look in his eyes. "I'm sorry, Akane, I didn't realize you were. It's not the Shi Shi Hokodan. It's part of the Graveyard Shift, a trick for extending my aura pretty far out away from me."

Despite all the time he'd spent around Akane, and the various intimate confessions he'd heard from her, Ryoga never had quite grasped the depth of her ability to run with a first impression. 'Whatever,' she thought to herself. 'He's probably just using the aura thing to block me from feeling it now so I don't hurt too.' Aloud, she said, "Please, Ryoga. Do it for me. I… I hate seeing you hurt like this… it hurts me too…."

"Really?" Ryoga whispered.

"Yes, really!" Akane said emphatically. "Ryoga, I know you don't get to come by as often as you want to. I know you hate how you get lost so often. I do too. But even if you can't be here all the time, you're still my friend. A good, important friend. You do know that, right?" she asked anxiously, memories resurfacing of the confused state of affairs that had been Ranma's first clash with Ryoga's Perfect Shi Shi Hokodan. Ryoga had wanted to have fuel for the fires of depression, and to that end he had asked her to tell him that she hated him. Akane had certainly not been able to say it convincingly, but even the lackluster performance she had managed had been enough to drop her friend into the depths of despair. Surely that must mean he valued her friendship at least as much as she did his!

Ryoga, meanwhile, was standing stock still, plunged into the deepest maelstrom of confused emotions yet. He'd hurt her, the one he'd never wanted to hurt… but she didn't know about it… he wasn't worthy of her… he had helped her before… and if not him, who would…? she still did care about him… she thought he was an important friend….

He closed his eyes, perhaps hoping the darkness behind them would be less confusing than Akane's caring, concerned stare. But it was just as tumultuous there — no, even more so! His thoughts were screaming in circles like a banshee conga line, whirling around and around with no sense or resolution in sight.

'Why does everything have to be so hard?' he thought feebly. 'Being P-chan was wrong… but there was some good in the bad too, just like I told Ranma… why couldn't it have been the good without the bad? What would that have meant anyway?'

Ranma's main rival wasn't as prone to sudden flashes of brilliant insight as was the pigtailed boy. But Ryoga experienced one now, a sudden burst of understanding that in that moment he was sure was the most important one he'd ever had in his life. It seemed to blossom forth out of a dozen thoughts combined: Akane's words about the future being more important than the past, the bitter accusations Ranma had hurled at him two days ago, the desperate consideration he'd given to the matter since then, his futile wish that he could have had the good aspects of being P-chan without the bad, the cold inescapable awareness that Akane deserved better than him… all of these together lent him strength for the epiphany.

'I can still be her friend. I should still be her friend. She said it herself, I'm important to her. If I do what I was planning, leave and never come back, it would hurt her. And that's the last thing I ever want to do.' Despite the season of the year and the general stillness of the air, it felt like a cold, bracing wind was swirling around him. Things would be different. They had to be different. But he didn't have to lose everything he had left. It wouldn't be right to let go, because that wasn't the right thing for Akane. She needed someone who would really be there for her, would care more for her than for himself, would listen to her and support her and value her as much as she deserved to be valued. He couldn't do any of that as P-chan anymore… but if he didn't stay, if he wasn't there for her as much as he could be, if he didn't tell her just how important her friendship was to him, he'd be failing her far worse than he had before. He'd be hurting her with his eyes wide open. And that was unacceptable.

He took one more deep breath, his eyes still closed. Something else was unacceptable as well, which was funny, because less than a week ago he'd have said letting go of it was unthinkable. He remembered the times when he'd thought about Akane, called out to the stars as if speaking to her, declared to the world that if she ever said to him that she didn't love him, that her heart was for someone else, then his own heart of glass would shatter forever. All those memories seemed so distant now, and so unimportant.

Strange, how everything was so much simpler now. He loved her. But he didn't deserve her. He didn't deserve her friendship, but she didn't deserve to have a friend abandon her. It all worked out to a very simple principle: he was going to be her friend, and nothing else.

Just for a second, he felt an unexpectedly strong pang of resistance to this idea, the old dreams trying to struggle back to life. They were quickly buried in a tide of furious anger. How dare any part of him keep on like this! Those desires, that aching belief that the care Akane showed her friend and her pet ought to mean she'd someday love him as a man — that was just the sort of thing that had led him to crawl as P-chan into her bed! To do the very things Ranma had so painfully hurled back in his face, the failures his rival had illuminated once it was too late for Ryoga to walk away from them on his own!

The anger went as quickly as it had come, a brief intense flash that had burned out that last stubborn remnant of the old him. Once before, Akane had told him she didn't hate him after all, had done it in the middle of the battle in which he'd tried to use his Perfect Shi Shi Hokodan to put the final seal on his victory over Ranma. Hearing those words from her had shattered his depression, but she'd immediately followed them up with the reassurance that he was a good friend. Hearing that that was how she saw him — as a friend, and nothing more — had sent him plunging back down to the nadir of despair.

But here and now, that message from her felt like rain on ground too long parched and broken and desolate.

Ryoga's eyes opened. This time, the look in them was nothing painful for Akane to see. "Akane… thank you," he said, swallowing a lump in his throat. "Hearing that… it really does make me feel better. You're a good friend too, and a good person. Probably the best of both that I know."

"Oh… I'm sure that's not true," Akane said diffidently. "I'm really glad to hear you say it, though. But do promise me not to use the Shi Shi Hokodan again soon, okay?"

"I promise, Akane." An easy enough promise to make. She'd said it hurt her if he was depressed, and he had to be depressed to use the move in the first place. And although there was certainly enough stuff in his past to make depression easy to come by, he would do as she had suggested and keep his eyes on the future instead.

And speaking of the future… Ryoga's eyes widened suddenly. It seemed as if whatever jolt of enlightenment had sped his brain up to unusual heights of brilliance hadn't worn off yet, because he suddenly saw something else very important. Akane now knew to expect his falcon curse to wear off soon. Before the most recent changes she'd never had a reason to think of him in combination with Jusenkyo, which had to help explain why she'd never suspected the truth about P-chan. But that wasn't true any longer, and if Akane should see him panic as he dodged incoming cold water when he was supposed to be free and clear of the temporary curse, she might start thinking along a track that would really hurt her if she went too far down it.

What could he do? There was only one solution — fly to Jusenkyo while he still had the wings to do it, locate the Spring of Drowned Falcon, and immerse himself in it for real. The Spring of Drowned Man would be even better, except that without wings it would surely take much longer, unacceptably longer, to get back to Akane. This way when the curse never wore off Akane would think Shampoo had been wrong about that happening, or Ranma had lied when he said it, or something like that.

"Ryoga…." Akane said hesitantly. She'd been silent for the last couple of minutes, brooding about something. Ryoga hadn't noticed, as he had been too busy considering the implications of his epiphany. But she was ready now to talk about it. "I've been thinking about something, and it doesn't make any sense. Ranma told you that Shampoo just gave you a curse that'll wear off in a few days, right?" He nodded, a little nervous as to where she might be going with this. "Well, why would she? What would be the point? It doesn't do any good at all, and it doesn't fit with what you told me. You know, that she cursed you in the first place because she didn't want you to have an advantage over Ranma."

Ryoga held back a sigh and a grimace as he remembered the morning when she had been introduced to that idea. 'Dammit, I should have thought it through better. Maybe there's some things I can't tell her, but I shouldn't ever lie to her. And I didn't even stop to think about it then… No, I shouldn't beat myself up about it now. That's no different from the other stuff I used to pull, and that's the old me. The future, and being Akane's friend, not the past and how I failed her — that's what I've got to focus on.' "I… I don't know, Akane," he answered. That, at least, was true; he had no idea how giving him a temporary curse would fit in with what Shampoo had really said, back when she'd first "offered" it to him.

"I don't know either! Don't know why she would even bother doing that, if it was just for a few days. I can sure see her giving you a real one so you wouldn't be so much stronger than her precious 'Airen', but what good would that little bit of time do?" More confused than ever, Akane sought further clarification. "What exactly did Ranma say? Could it have been a mistake? Are you sure you heard him right?"

"I don't know about a mistake, but I know what I heard. He yelled loud enough for me to hear him clearly over the Perfect Shi Shi Hokodan."

Akane blinked, as a vision of memory danced through her head. "Say that again."

"Say what?"

"Are you telling me he told you that at the very end? When the Perfect Shi Shi Hokodan was coming down?! Ryoga, were you standing close enough to be affected too?"

"Yeah, but you know the move doesn't affect me. Well, by itself it doesn't," Ryoga corrected. "I got thrown clear when the ground exploded, but the chi just washed past me."

'Why am I the only one who sees things clearly around here?!' Akane silently exclaimed. Taking a deep breath for calmness, she explained. "Ryoga, don't you remember what happened before? Ranma figured that out too, and he said some stuff to make you even more depressed. That jerk said he'd been taking advantage of me, and of course that was going to hurt one of my good friends even worse. But then at the last minute he let you know he was lying through his teeth, and hearing that made you happy again. And so you took the full blow just like he did, or even worse since you weren't ready for it. Don't you see? He had to be trying to do the same thing again this time!"

Ryoga stood like a statue, frozen motionless with yet another great shock. "I… I don't believe it… you're right… you have to be…."

"Of course I'm right," Akane growled. "It's just what that jerk always does, pulling any cheap trick he can think of to get the win, not even caring about how far he has to go to do it. You must have known it too, Ryoga, that's why you weren't any happier when you heard him say it, or afterward. You must have known in the back of your mind that it wasn't true."

"That… that honorless scumbag…." A battleaura, starting out small but quickly growing, sprang to life around Ryoga. "I'm gonna kick his butt all the way to the gates of hell and back! How dare he do this!"

"Just don't use the Shi Shi Hokodan, okay?" Akane said, concern rising again. "And don't do anything that could get either of you hurt in your cursed forms."

"Right, right, sure." Ryoga took a deep breath, then let loose a cry that felt long overdue. "RANMA! PREPARE TO DIE!!"

Akane watched with little to no surprise as he dashed away in a straight line for his backpack, grabbed it up and swung it into place without breaking his stride, and continued to accelerate. Not even bothering to alter his course to use the gate, the Lost Boy instead barreled through the wall and kept going in that same straight line — a line one hundred and sixty-three degrees away from the path that would have led him back toward her home. "Well, okay, see you later then," she said with a snort, a shake of the head, and a small smile. At least some things didn't change.

The morning sunlight glinted in Ranma's eyes and burnished his shirt a deep fiery red. His pigtail whipped and crackled in the breeze as he spun through a kata. Normally he would perform those inside the dojo, and save the outdoor practice for sparring with his father. But Genma had been gone these past eleven days, and although Ranma wasn't about to admit missing the old man, he could at least concede that it felt good to be training out here. Even if there was a nagging sense of anticipation, a feeling in the back of his mind that any minute now a furry arm would grab him from behind and sling him toward the koi pond.

He finished his current pattern and stopped to rest, regarding that body of water with veiled eyes. 'Wonder what the old man's gonna say about this,' he mused. 'Knowing him, he'll probably just squawk his fool head off without even thinking things through. That's Pop all right — go for the knee-jerk reaction no matter how much better it'd be to stop and think things through a bit.'

Ranma smiled as he contemplated this. He was looking forward to it, anticipating with a good deal of pleasure the shock and discomfiture that Genma was sure to experience. The more his father blustered and complained, the more fun it was going to be. 'Guess I just didn't handle it right with Akane,' he mused. 'She's still an idiot for not even listening when I explained it, but at least that gave me an idea of what not to do with Pop. I'll let him yell and raise a ruckus, and once he finally gets the first shock out of his system, then I'll remind him about Mom.'

It was a thought that had never been very far from Ranma's mind of late — that he had finally gotten back on the right side of the promise his father had saddled him with so long ago. Nodoka could meet her son at last without any risk of disappointment, no chance of finding out that the man-among-men she'd dreamed of was half the time only as manly as a tomboy could be. She would never learn the truth of "Ranko Tendo", would never be forced to face the fear and failure that her son and husband had endured. The Saotome family would finally be able to come back together once Genma made his way back to the Tendo home.

Ranma's eyes widened and he smacked his fist into his palm in sudden realization. Suddenly it was a lot easier to admit that yes, he really was feeling anxious for his father to return.

'Hope it won't be too much longer,' he thought. 'Man, don't it just figure that the old freak would pick the worst possible time to pull something like this. We could have gone to see Mom already if Pop hadn't been dragged off on that stupid training trip. Yeah, right, like there's really gonna be any training going on.' He could count on the fingers of one foot the number of times he'd seen Happosai work to improve his father's skills, or Soun's, or… come to think of it, the only real memories he could bring to mind were of the old lech powering up Ranma's own opponents. 'Sure hope that's not what this is all about,' Ranma thought dubiously. 'Pop better not come back knowing how to do the Demon Head.'

Hopefully this trip would just be another of the jaunts that his father had described to him a few months back. Genma had been drunk enough to talk freely about a topic that he usually avoided like the plague, and Ranma had been annoyed enough at Happosai to listen in the hopes that more information might help him better fight the ancient lecher. It had been revealing, in a way, but it hadn't exactly been information that helped him with any of his day-to-day struggles. Well, that wasn't quite true; some of the mental pictures that Genma's tales had painted were at least funny enough to reduce his stress level.

And Ranma supposed it was a little gratifying, to understand the difference between Happosai's training methods and his father's. Genma had made his share of boneheaded mistakes, but throughout it all he had been there guiding Ranma directly, and deliberately seeking out the new sources of knowledge that would help his son grow in the Art. Happosai's philosophy seemed to be more along "do-it-yourself" lines, where his part as the Master was to put the pupils into situations where they would have to bust their own butts trying to come up with new strengths and tricks. That might even be a decent training method if you didn't have anything specific left to teach your pupil… but considering the number of special techniques the old freak knew and his disciples didn't, Ranma supposed Happosai was just expressing his lazy, sadistic side.

Deciding he'd had enough of a rest break, Ranma chose a new kata and whipped into motion. For the next twenty minutes he glided around the yard, bounced from the ground to the wall to the roof, and generally put forth a performance that would leave special effects technicians with their mouths gaping open. He ended with a flurry of midair punches and kicks, his trajectory taking him from the far side of the yard to the near, passing directly over the koi pond. He settled down on the porch and regarded that body of water with a smug smile. "You ain't got much left in the way of bad news, have ya?" he jeered.

The koi jumped into the air and fell back beneath the water. The spray from its splash shone like jewels in the morning light. Ranma just grinned at the pleasant spectacle; he was much too far away for the water to hit him, and even if it had, the random transformations just weren't that irritating anymore. "Nope. You got nothing left to hold over my head."

"Talking to yourself, Saotome?" This was Nabiki, speaking from the other side of the doorway that led into the house. "Why don't you do something useful, like coming inside and getting cleaned up and ready for breakfast?"

Ranma just shrugged. "Don't feel like it just yet. It's not like anybody's waiting on me. Akane's the one who ain't back from jogging."

"Still, wouldn't it be better to only have to wait on one person to get ready instead of two?" Nabiki prodded. "You're a Saotome, aren't you? That means you're always supposed to be eager for your next meal."

"Hey, don't lump me in with Pop like that!" Ranma protested, completely and utterly without justification. On seeing Nabiki roll her eyes, he continued, "Besides, I already went flying earlier this morning and caught a couple of pigeons. Kasumi's breakfast can wait."

Nabiki made a truly disgusted face. "Ranma, that is barbaric even for you."

He smirked back at her. "You know something, Nabiki? You're kinda gullible in the morning."

"Oh, so that was just a joke, was it?" Nabiki's eyes narrowed ever so slightly, but that was the only evidence she allowed herself to show of her reaction. 'I'll get you for that, Ranma. Just you wait.' Then she shoved those thoughts to the back burner, as she sensed an opportunity more important than planning minor payback — namely, the chance to gather additional information. "Wouldn't surprise me if you really had, ahem, stooped to that level." She watched in a total lack of surprise as the pun flew well over Ranma's head. "Just how far does being in that shape go? Do you have instincts like that?"

"Eh, not really," Ranma said. "I mean, yeah, there was one day when I spent a long time flying, and got pretty hungry cause I'd skipped lunch. I kinda had the thought in the back of my mind, but I never actually did it. Come on, Nabiki, you gotta know I was kidding; Kasumi's cooking is way better than something like that."

"Of course it is. I was just curious as to how much of a role your falcon instincts play, as opposed to your usual intellect."

He shrugged. "I'm the same guy no matter what shape I'm in. Jusenkyo lets me know how to use the body, it don't reduce me to that level for real."

"Hmm," Nabiki responded, her tone dubious enough to ruffle Ranma's feathers. He frowned, but before he could say anything, she replied, "That's all well and good, Saotome, but there's at least one issue of basic biology that concerns me. That ought to concern you too."

"What's that?" he asked warily. Biology wasn't as bad as some subjects, but anything over a certain level of academia was nothing he wanted to think about now.

"Oh, nothing really," Nabiki murmured. "Just some harmless speculation on my part."

When Nabiki started out with something ominous and then beat around the bush instead of saying what she meant, it could only mean one thing. "In case you forgot, you took the last of my allowance yesterday," Ranma stated. "I ain't gonna have anything else to pay you until Pop gets back."

"What the heck, I suppose even I can give a freebie once in awhile." Especially when giving the information in question worked directly toward an important goal. "Are you aware of how female animals' fertility cycles work, Saotome? It's the same principle for almost all animals, including peregrine falcons."

"Huh?"

Noting Ranma's eyes were already beginning to glaze over, Nabiki stepped up the pace and intensity of her explanation. "When the time is right, a female will go into heat. That means she's fertile, ready to get pregnant. She signals this by giving off pheromones, special chemicals that drive the males of the species wild when they smell them. It's Nature's own Love Potion Number Nine, Ranma — and I hope for your sake that you're as good at resisting your cursed form's instincts as you say."

This, he hadn't expected. Now that she mentioned it, Ranma did remember learning that particular lesson at Furinkan. It had stuck in his mind better than most because he hadn't been able to decide whether animals had it better or worse than he did. He'd never expected to possibly have a chance to find out firsthand.

The pigtailed teen chewed his lip in anxious thought. Then, brightening, he said, "But hang on, Nabiki. If that was gonna happen with me and Shampoo, there's no way she also would've cursed Ryoga."

"Oh?" Nabiki countered with a raised eyebrow. "No way she would curse Ryoga, who's almost never around and who she could just dodge once or twice until he got lost again?"

Ranma's own brow wrinkled in concentration. "But ain't that going against what you were suggesting in the first place? If it was just instinct, she wouldn't think to dodge him. And now that you mention it, wouldn't this kind of stuff have been a problem for her back when she had the, uh, her old curse? That can't be how it is."

'Damn, this isn't going well,' Nabiki thought, keeping her true emotions off her face. Ranma shouldn't be thinking it through to such an extent, and he sure shouldn't be giving Shampoo the benefit of the doubt. Had something else changed recently when she wasn't aware? Blast it all, she needed more information! Maybe she should look into bugging the house and dojo for real.

Before Nabiki could decide what to say or do next, the rear gate swung open and Akane passed through. "Hey, Akane, glad you made it back," Ranma called, rising to his feet. "Nabiki's so hungry she ain't even thinking straight. Let's get some breakfast."

"Let's not yet," Akane snapped, striding over toward him with her hands balled into fists at her sides. "Let's talk about the fight between you and Ryoga."

Ranma frowned, not having even the slightest inclination to remember that debacle. He vaguely noticed Nabiki scurrying away deeper into the house, and half turned to follow her. Breakfast sounded a lot better than this. "How about not," he retorted. "I ain't in the mood to think about Ryoga beating me with a cheap trick."

"Cheap trick?! Oh, that's great coming from you! I ran into him while I was jogging just now, and I got the whole story. You jerk, did you even think about how cruel you were being to him? Telling him that it wasn't a permanent curse after all, lying to him just so you could beat him! And it didn't even work!"

"Look, that's between me and him," Ranma snapped after recovering from his flinch, all the angrier and more defensive because he knew that for once Akane was completely right. She'd chewed him out many times in the past, but always there was some crucial bit of information she was missing or something she'd originally misunderstood and refused to reconsider. Situations like that were par for the course, but here and now Ranma was discovering that being castigated by an Akane who he knew was truly in the right was much less pleasant. He'd never expected her words could resonate so strongly and painfully with his own conscience.

Forcibly reminding himself that even if she was right it wasn't her place to be doing this, he continued, "Just drop it, Akane. Unless you can tell me where he is right now, so I can go see him, I don't want to hear anything about this."

"Well, that's just too bad, Ranma! You're going to hear it anyway!"

"Excuse me, sis." Nabiki's cool, dry, clipped tones somehow managed to cut through Akane's tirade. Both Ranma and Akane turned, to see the middle Tendo standing only a few feet away and holding a nondescript brown paper parcel. "Ranma and I were in the middle of an important discussion."

Ranma blinked. "We were?"

Nabiki sighed. "Yes, Ranma, although apparently you weren't paying enough attention to realize it."

"Nabiki, this is important too!" Akane protested.

'I'm sure Shampoo would agree,' Nabiki thought acidly. 'I'm sure she'd just love for me to keep silent and let you rake him over the coals some more. Screw that, little sister, I'm not letting your temper and shortsightedness shoot us all in the foot.' Nabiki just hoped that the ploy she was about to execute would be enough to derail this mistake-in-the-making. "As important as a care package from the Cat Café? I think not," she quipped, then handed the parcel to Ranma. "This came in the mail for you, Saotome. Unfortunately, there was a bit of an accident involving the koi pond."

Ranma took the offering, turning it over in his hands and noting that whatever the accident had been, it had apparently involved enough contact with water to make the ink run to complete illegibility. He shot one disparaging glance toward the pond, muttering, "That's low even for you," under his breath. Opening up the package, he extracted several sheets of paper — noting without any surprise that they, too, couldn't be read — and two bars of replacement waterproof soap.

"Well? What does it say?" Akane wanted to know.

"It got too wet. I can't read a word of it." Ranma shrugged. "Eh, it's probably just the same basic stuff Shampoo told me yesterday."

"What did you say?" the youngest Tendo replied, in a tone caught somewhere between a gasp, a choke, and a snarl.

Ranma steeled himself, knowing that the admission wasn't going to go over well, but determined to say it anyway. "I met up with Shampoo while I was flying yesterday. She told me about why she'd said the water was only good for a couple of days; it was cause she really had believed that was how much time we had, just for a different reason." He decided not to bother with the full-fledged explanation, figuring it was a pretty safe bet that Akane didn't want to hear it. "She also told me she'd already sent me this letter with more soap, all that she had left except for one bar for herself." The Amazon had been a little odd when talking about the letter, rather coy and hesitant… maybe even shy, if such an adjective could be applied to the girl who thought nothing of jumping into the bathtub with him. He wondered if there had been anything else of significance in the letter. Oh well, whatever it was, it couldn't be as important as the explanation she'd already given him.

Neither Ranma nor Akane noticed it, but just for a moment, Nabiki lost her fabled composure. A scowl darker than anything Ranma had ever seen from Akane covered her face as she furiously processed this revelation. Apparently it had been a mistake to choose this moment to pass along the package; the soap should have been Akane's cue to reveal that she had ordered twice that much, and the watermarked letter should have just muddied the waters further, not led to such damnable news as this. So Ranma had met up with Shampoo yesterday? So he had apparently already forgiven her? So her hard work in obliterating the contents of that letter had all been wasted? What was she supposed to do now?

Akane, meanwhile, was teetering somewhere between furious anger and tears. It wasn't ever going to end, was it? Ranma was never going to change… the most he'd ever do would be to give Shampoo the cold shoulder for a few days and then he'd go back to being just as big a pervert with her as ever….

Her eyes, which had widened and then slammed shut at Ranma's communication, opened again. Most of her body trembled with the effort to control herself, but her hand was rock-steady as it shot out and grabbed one bar of soap from her fiancé.

"What was that for?!" he demanded.

"For Ryoga, you idiot!" Akane spat back. "He shouldn't have to suffer like this just because you and Shampoo are a couple of heartless jerks! If it wasn't for Kuno getting this idea to splash you, I wouldn't even let you keep one bar!"

Two days ago, Akane had stood frozen, unable to decide what to do as events swirled around and past her. Here and now, it was her sister's turn. Nabiki felt nothing but a cold frozen lump of queasiness in the wake of Akane's declaration, knowing with sick certainty that her sister was making a mistake, but unable to find any shred of inspiration on how to begin damage control. All she could do was remain still and watch events unfold before her, feeling the sensation of powerlessness that she loathed above all others.

Ranma, meanwhile, was holding motionless as well, although in his case it was due to shock and rising anger. Him, heartless? After all he'd done for her and for everybody, how hard he'd tried and how much he'd sacrificed in doing the best he could? No forgiveness for the mistakes he'd made and no credit for the good he'd done?

She wouldn't let him keep a bar?!

He opened his mouth, ready to tell Akane exactly what he thought of her ultimatum and her attitude. But then a scene came rising out of recent memory, one cold enough to bank the fires of his anger. He seemed again to see Ryoga's despairing face, heard the determination and sorrow in his voice as he demanded that his rival start treating Akane better. It was enough to draw Ranma back from his first furious impulsive response.

Here and now he wasn't wrong, Akane was. But that didn't change the fact that Ranma had gone way too far when he faced Ryoga last time, that he owed the Lost Boy. 'Maybe I can pay a little of that debt now,' he thought grimly. Taking a deep breath and focusing all his will, Ranma swallowed his anger, leaving only the intensity behind. He would speak civilly and carefully to Akane, letting her know what was what without being hard on her at all.

Akane blinked and gasped as her hands were suddenly empty, her fingers buzzing and stinging. She hadn't even seen Ranma move, but suddenly both bars were back in his possession. "Ranma—!" she started.

"No, you listen to me." Ranma spoke the words as calmly as he ever had, satisfied that there was no hint of anger in his tone, and more than satisfied that the strength of it seemed to have gotten through to Akane. The hot flush of fury was already draining out of her expression. "You're right that one of these bars is goin' to Ryoga. But it's my decision to make and it's my job to give it to him. Not yours, not either one of those. You understand me? Shampoo gave the soap to me, and I was the one who screwed things up with Ryoga. That means it's my responsibility to fix it. I don't need you telling me what to do and I sure don't need you trying to take matters into your own hands. Okay?"

Akane swayed like a reed in the wind, fighting a horrible feeling of emptiness inside. Not again! She'd promised herself she wouldn't fold like this again! But she could feel it happening, could see it right before her very eyes. She didn't want to be someone who would give way under pressure like this! Damn it all, she'd even been making some progress recently! But here and now, staring helplessly at the fire of pure force burning in Ranma's eyes, it was as if that had all been a dream. Why was this so much harder to stand up to than anger from him would have been? Gathering all the strength she could muster, she protested, "But, Ranma…."

"But nothing!" he declared. "Akane, this is my business. I gotta be the one to make it right. It wouldn't be right for you to get involved. Do you understand?"

Knowing that she would hate herself for it later, but unable to manage any other response, Akane nodded her head, turned, and walked inside.

'This is pretty strange,' Ranma mused as he sat at his desk awaiting the arrival of the teacher. 'Today's been a lot more peaceful than I expected.' It was the first school day of the week, his first day back at Furinkan since the interrupted battle with Tatewaki Kuno. He and Akane had arrived at school to find no sign of the kendoist. Ranma had been surprised at this, as he was fully expecting to have to dodge an aqueous assault in order to make it inside the building. Failing at that, he'd at least expected Kuno to show up for lunch, but the hour came and went with no sign of the Blue Thunder. 'Maybe he's waiting till after class because that's what he did last time and he's too stubborn to change tactics. Or then again, maybe he's out sick. Considering how disappointed he must've been on Friday, and then Saturday when I wasn't here, he could've shot his mouth off once too often around Kodachi about what he was gonna do to me.'

Ranma paused to fight off a minor case of the chills. 'Ain't like I want to waste time fighting him this afternoon, but it'd be better than that alternative. Kodachi really mad at someone, mad enough to really get creative in punishing them… I'd be okay with that for Happosai, and maybe Panty—' he cut himself off with a mental snicker, 'that is, Rebel Leader Taro, but it's not something I'd wish on Tatewaki 'Mostly Harmless' Kuno.' At least not now, with his girl form nothing but an unpleasant memory.

Still, it would be nice if Kuno didn't challenge him this afternoon. Ranma didn't want to hang around Furinkan too long. 'Akane didn't get into anything like the kind of snit I expected today. It's Ucchan's first day back, she's making sure I know she missed me and wished she hadn't had to be gone that long on the family visit, she even whips up some okonomiyaki for my lunch — and Akane just stays calm and quiet throughout it all. That's way luckier than I usually get.' But he didn't want to push his luck even further, and so Ranma had not said anything yet to his oldest friend about the recent changes in his life, hadn't brought up the sore subject while Akane was in earshot. He'd made plans with Ukyo in a private moment to go to her place this afternoon, which was when he would break the news. Of course, that plan required Akane to be elsewhere at the time, which really meant he needed to get after school while the getting was good, take advantage of her having joined that silly club and make tracks before she caught up to him.

On the other hand, it grated against his pride to run from a fight, especially a fight with Kuno. And there was the fact that the plan he'd made for dealing with Tatewaki's latest and greatest inspiration required him to have one real fight with the kendoist. He intended to spend one challenge doing just what he'd told Kuno he would do, dodging the best his opponent could throw at him with no outside interference. Then, when Kuno inevitably tried again on the next day, Ranma would give a dramatic speech about just how deluded the Blue Thunder really was to think this would melt him down to nothing — and stand there and take the splashing full on.

The key, of course, was the soap that had accompanied Shampoo's ill-fated letter. He hadn't used it today, since he was going to need to demonstrate the change to Ukyo. And before he put that part of the plan into action, he really needed to talk to Shampoo again and find out if she knew exactly how long the soap's protection lasted after a single application. It would be easy enough to be waterproofed when he arrived at school, but from the few times he'd used the soap so far he couldn't be certain its magic would last the whole day. No, the shield would need to be refreshed at some point. It would be a lot easier to pull off everything if he could just soap up after gym class and still be good at the end of the day, rather than trying to get in a quick lathering right before he left the building.

But, Ranma reminded himself, those were thoughts for another day. The only question for today was, 'Assuming Kuno is here and planning to challenge me after school, should I skip out with Ucchan too quick for him to catch us? Or should I take the time to get that first, dry fight out of the way?'

"Hey, Ranma honey. What's the deal with Akane?"

Ranma blinked, focusing on reality around him instead of his thoughts. Ukyo had left the classroom when Akane and the last teacher did, but she was back now. "What'd you say, Ucchan?"

"I asked what the deal was with Akane. I was on my way back from the ladies' room just now, and I saw her out the window in front of Furinkan. There was some kind of cart thing full of buckets of water, and she was ripping it to pieces." Ukyo's brow wrinkled. "It was violent even for her. Don't tell me she finally lost it while I was gone?"

Feeling less ambivalent about this round of interference than the last, he replied, "Nah. That stuff she was destroying belonged to Kuno."

Ranma had meant to go into more detail, but at this the chef relaxed noticeably. "Oh. Say no more."

There wasn't much time to say anything else anyway, as at that moment their final teacher of the day arrived. Ranma shot a quick whisper to Ukyo reminding her that he wanted to get to her restaurant as quickly as possible after school, then concentrated on making it through the last hour of boredom.

Ukyo, who had missed class for two weeks and would have been far better off paying strict attention to the sensei, spent that hour running his words back through her mind and blushing at the connotations.

"So how've you been these past coupla weeks?" Ranma asked. He and Ukyo had made it back to her place without incident, and the two of them were seated next to the long counter where the customers watched her work her magic. It was time now to break the biggest news of the year to her. He just hoped the method he'd chosen would work better this time than it had before. Back when he'd first told Akane and her sisters, he'd led up to the news gradually and deliberately, choosing what he'd thought was a good pace as he built his case step-by-step. That seemed like a much better thing to do with a friend than just dropping the bombshell straight out.

His efforts had apparently been wasted as far as Akane was concerned, but hopefully Ucchan would be better. And so Ranma once again did his best to gently lead up to the news. "Anything cool, new, and interesting happen for you? Did ya solve any huge problems while you were gone?"

"Um, Ranchan, this was just a Kuonji clan get-together. I wouldn't even have gone, at least not for the whole time, if they wouldn't have thought skipping out was a crime against humanity. I never would have heard the end of it. Might even have had some of the relatives decide to come on over and set up shop here in town, to keep a closer eye on me." Ukyo grimaced at the thought. That was not something she wanted to happen until she'd made a bit more progress with her fiancé (i.e. buried the competition and walked off into the sunset with his arm around her shoulders). "Trust me, family reunions aren't that exciting or life-changing."

Ranma gave a long series of coughs, amidst which could be made out the words, "Nodoka Saotome."

"Don't even joke about that!" the chef exclaimed, not wanting any reminder of the threat hanging over Ranma's head if he ever revealed himself to his mother. "A seppuku promise is not the kind of excitement or life-change I want to think about!"

"Yeah, me neither," Ranma said with a huge grin.

"Huh? What's with the smile, Ranma honey?" Ukyo asked, puzzled. He didn't talk about his mother with her very often, but each time he had his mood had been much sadder and more pained than this. A possible solution presented itself, and before she could tell herself not to get her hopes up too far the chef blurted, "Did you meet her for real while I was gone, and get off the hook?!"

"Nope, not yet. But soon," he promised.

"But soon?" she echoed. "What about the curse?"

"Oh, yeah. That." Ranma's smile only widened. "Tell me something, Ucchan. If you had to have a Jusenkyo curse, what kind would you get? Don't just pick outta the springs you know about, imagine that if it exists there's a spring for it. What curse would you be okay with?"

Ukyo was more confused than ever at the turn the conversation had taken, but that didn't really impede her from answering. "That's something I had thought about before. Gave it a good bit of thought actually. I'm pretty sure that if I had to have a Jusenkyo curse, and assuming there is such a thing, I'd take a dip in the Spring of Drowned Wolf."

"Why's that, exactly? What do ya like about that form?"

"Well, for starters, I absolutely wouldn't want any spring that messed with my head." Like the Spring of Drowned Priest that he'd told her about, from that time the Jusenkyo Preservation Society had come after the various Nerima curse victims. "And I'd hate to be helpless in my other form. With that curse I'd be a big bad predator that nobody in their right mind would mess with. It's close enough to a dog that people wouldn't freak out or call animal control if I acted harmless, but it's not close enough that anybody would see me as something to put on the menu at their restaurant.

"But the real reason was for you, Ranma honey."

Ranma blinked. "Huh?"

"Think about it, Sugar." Ukyo's eyes twinkled merrily. "If I had to have a curse, it might as well be one that would make it only natural for me to chase a certain other type of animal away. A certain furry little, evil little animal that you really don't like getting close to." She was referring to one cat in particular, but Ukyo didn't see any need to be that specific.

"Heh. Thanks for the thought," he said with a grin. 'And thanks for talking around it like that instead of naming them straight out.' "So, you would've picked your curse based on it working for me, huh? No thoughts of you getting a guy curse to kinda match the one Jusenkyo stuck me with?"

"Not on your life," the chef said decisively. "I spent too much time as it is pretending I was a boy. That's not who I am, and it damn sure isn't who I want to be. Er, the guy's uniform I wear to Furinkan notwithstanding."

"Like I'm gonna say anything about somebody wearing what they're comfortable with instead of stickin' to the rules." Realizing that the conversation was drifting off subject, Ranma reeled it back in. "Did you know that Shampoo and Cologne got back from that trip to China? They came back just a coupla days after you left."

Ukyo blinked. She had just been about to bring up the issue of his mother again; where the heck had this new subject change come from? "No, I didn't know, although I kind of suspected we wouldn't be lucky enough for them to stay away much longer. Why does it matter?"

"Cause of where they went in China, and what they did. You asked me why I'm not scared ta meet with Mom anymore? You wanna know why I asked you about Jusenkyo curses that wouldn't be so bad after all?" Ranma paused for just a second, then continued. "Shampoo got rid of her old curse back at Jusenkyo. She turns into a falcon now. And she brought back water from that spring and let me use it too."

Ukyo met his words with silence, and a stare as blank as parchment. Ranma let the silence stretch for awhile, sure that his oldest friend would have something to say in response. Eventually, though, beginning to get a little worried, he asked, "Ucchan? You okay?"

"A-are you serious?!" the chef managed to gasp.

Ranma nodded. "Yeah. No more 'Ranko Tendo', no more curvy little redheaded body spitting in the face of that 'man among men' promise. Nothing for Mom to be disappointed about, nothing for me to be scared of."

'Wish I could say the same.' The thought whispered through Ukyo's mind, weaving through the echoes that still resounded from two previous sentences. Ranma had said it so casually, that he wasn't the only one who'd taken on this new curse, that it was a package deal for him and Shampoo. How could this happen?! It was wrong, so completely and utterly wrong that the Amazon got to share something so private and intimate with Ranma!

And the thought was very, very frightening too. Ukyo took a deep breath and managed to push most of that emotion aside for now. "I… I think… Ranma, this is more of a shock than I was ready for… I was only gone for two weeks! And things change this much in that little bit of time?!" Realizing that she hadn't achieved as good a grip on her emotions as she'd first thought, Ukyo took another couple of deep breaths. "Can… can you show me this new curse?"

"Okay, yeah, sure," Ranma replied, a little nervously too. While not a terrible reaction, Ukyo so far had not taken this as well as he'd hoped. Maybe it would get better once she got past her initial shock. Best to move on toward that point as quickly as possible.

He'd brought along a modified hot water dispenser, twin to the one currently set up in the Tendo dojo. He fished this out of his pack now, walked over to the sink, filled it up and began the heating cycle. "This is rigged so I can use it myself in my cursed form. I brought it here so I'd have another safe place to change back to a guy when I need to. Uh, if that's all right with you." He set it down a few feet away on the floor, then returned to the sink and ran a little cold water into a cup. "Don't freak out on me now, Ucchan," he requested, then threw the cup's contents in his face.

Ukyo continued to stare as her fiancé shrunk down to a sleek bundle of feathers half-hidden by the clothing that he no longer really wore. She watched as Ranma slipped out of the shirt and peered up at her, craning his head in what one distant corner of her mind labeled a very cute gesture. He then gave a hop, skip, and flap that brought him up to the long counter next to her. She hesitated a moment longer, then reached out and gingerly ran one fingertip down his back. 'Less painful than pinching myself, and just as conclusive I guess. This really isn't a dream.'

Ranma was still studying her intently, Ukyo noted, surprised at how much human expression she could make out in her transformed fiancé's feathered face. He gave a cheep that clearly sounded both questioning and a little worried. 'But then, considering how Akane must've taken this news and the kind of stuff she has to have said about it, I suppose it's only natural he'd be a little concerned right now. Even if Ranchan might not think of it by himself, what it means for him to get the same curse as Shampoo, Akane has to have pointed it out. He's gotta know the Shampoo half of this wouldn't be good news for any of us.'

Once again Ukyo reached out to stroke the transformed teen. This time she used her entire hand, moving slowly and gently, but deliberately enough that Ranma would know she wasn't angry at him. She looked him in the eyes, blanked all thoughts of Shampoo from her mind while focusing on what Ranma had said this meant for him, and managed a smile. At this, Ranma closed his eyes and sagged a little, evidencing clear relief as the tension leaked away.

As a result, he really wasn't prepared for the heated water that cascaded down on him.

The next several seconds would form some of Ukyo's more vivid memories. Later, the chef would berate herself for not thinking things through, for forgetting that although she'd switched her fiancé between forms many times in the past, there were certain critical differences now. But she never would be able to scrape up a true sense of remorse over the mishap.

Once his pants were safely back in place, Ranma was at least able to manage coherent thought. 'What was that I said to Shampoo? Oh, yeah, 'You only got yourself to blame if Ucchan decides to grab these same kinda opportunities you've been having so much fun with.' Jeez, I was more right than I knew,' he grumbled to himself as he fastened the ties on his shirt. 'But this is partly my own fault too. Shoulda been as prepared as I was when I explained everything to the Tendos. I shouldn't've just assumed she'd understand I was gonna use the hot water myself to change back after she left the room and it was safe.'

He risked a glance back at Ukyo. Her blush was slowly fading, but still was one of the most impressive he'd ever seen. Ranma wondered what it must have looked like in its first full flush. He'd been a little too busy scrambling to recover to take note of Ukyo's face; the most attention he'd been able to spare her was to make sure she wasn't going for her mega-spatula. He'd been on the receiving end of that a few times in the past when he'd embarrassed her, but evidently this time he was going to get a break.

"S-so, Ranma honey!" Ukyo said. The words managed to be as bright and cheerful as she'd wanted, but she failed utterly to achieve "carefree". "You said you brought that hot water gizmo over to leave here, in case you needed to fly by and change back? That's nice."

"Yeah, so if you could find a safer place for it than the middle of the common room, I'd appreciate it."

"Will do, Sugar." Of course, the small size of her building meant that if Ranma said the dining area was out, that pretty much just left the bedroom. "Hey, you'll need to leave some clothes over here too, right? So you'd have something to change back into." No sooner had the words escaped Ukyo's mouth than she gave herself a mental smack upside the head. 'Idiot! You didn't need to remind him of that! It wouldn't have hurt anything to let him make that particular mistake once. You jackass, it's supposed to be Akane that says the first thing that pops into her mind without thinking it through at all!'

"Thanks for the reminder, Ucchan," Ranma said, unintentionally rubbing salt in her wounds. "I'll sneak a shirt and pair of pants over here as soon as I can do it without getting caught."

"Without getting caught, huh? You mean you don't want Akane knowing you're moving some of your stuff over to my place," Ukyo noted sagely. "Yeah, I guess I can see how painful that might be."

"Well, let's just say I don't need things to get any more stressful around there than they already have been," Ranma muttered. "I suppose you can guess that she ain't taking most of this too well." He hesitated for a moment, weighing his options, then continued, "What about you? I'm sure it was a big surprise to hear all of this. You gettin' over the first shock now?"

Ukyo gave him a hooded stare. "I don't think that's what you really meant to ask, Ranchan. I think you meant, am I going to throw a hissy fit about this. Am I right?"

"I dunno. Are you?" Ranma asked, grinning ever so faintly. If Ukyo had so much as glanced over to the wall where her battle spatula was standing, he probably wouldn't have been so sanguine about the question. But as it was, her tone and her expression were enough to put him back toward his ease.

The chef grimaced at the wordplay. "Let me ask you another question. Ranma… how do you feel about this curse? Forget the stuff about your mom for a minute, because that doesn't apply for what I'm asking. If Shampoo went to Jusenkyo, then she could have brought back an honest-to-gosh cure for you. She didn't do that, all she did was give you the chance to take the same new curse she had. So tell me how you feel about turning into a bird when you get splashed now."

Ranma took a deep breath, marshaled his thoughts, and did just that. "If Jusenkyo was here in Japan instead of buried in the middle of China, if it was easy for us to get to, I'd tell all you guys that you ought to give it a try too. Bein' able to fly… Ucchan, it's just not something I can describe for real. It's better than words can say, so much excitement and freedom, nothing to tie you down, nothing to limit you or say, 'this is the only choice you can make'… I… I'd rather have this than a cure. At least for now, with everything still so new and exciting. Shampoo did the right thing, bringing this back instead of a cure."

He even surprised himself a little when he spoke those words. It was the first time he'd stated this so plainly, whether to someone else or to himself. Of course, two days ago when he and Shampoo flew together he'd learned that a cure hadn't even been an option, since she had believed it was vital to keep her activities a secret from Cologne. It had been all she could do to get her hands on water from the same spring she had used. Finding and acquiring Nannichuan had simply been a shot that was not on the board.

He didn't think Ukyo particularly wanted to hear that much detail about the Amazons' actions, though. "And if I ever change my mind about it, I can fly back to Jusenkyo and get cured in my own good time. Prob'ly wouldn't take more than a couple of days to get there."

"Although getting back might be a bit of a pain," Ukyo replied. Mentally, she added, 'Seems like that applies in more ways than one. Damn you, Shampoo! How could you snag such a huge advantage, manage to make such a big change around here in such a short time?!' The chef fought down a strong urge to find whichever heads of her family had been responsible for the timing of this reunion and flatten them with their own spatulas.

"So… I told you how nice this all works out for me, how glad I am for what's happened. What about you? What do you think?" Ranma asked, a bit hesitantly. He wasn't sure, but it almost felt like he'd sensed the beginnings of a battle aura around Ukyo for a second there.

"I…." Ukyo paused for a long moment, then sighed. "Since you're this happy about the change and it means such good things for you, then I'm happy too. Happy for you, that is," she clarified. "You cannot possibly expect me to be happy for Shampoo."

The sun was beginning to ride low in the sky, its color deepening into orange away from the yellow of day. Traffic on the streets was picking up, the tide of pedestrians rising as the first wave of people finished their day's work and left for home. A gentle east wind was blowing, carrying the delicious scent of Cologne's special seven-flavor ramen from the box on Shampoo's handlebars back to her nose.

The hairs on the back of her neck were standing on end, as she stared at the endpoint of her journey.

As it turned out, the address for this particular delivery order was a vacant lot. Such places were much more common in Nerima than in Tokyo as a whole; Shampoo had even heard a rumor once that the town council deliberately kept certain lots undeveloped, so that there were places for martial artists to brawl while doing minimal property damage. Whether or not that was true, the Amazon knew one thing for certain: every time she'd been summoned to a deserted place like this for a ramen delivery, it had turned out to be a trap. And frankly the lavender-haired girl was getting a little tired of it.

She was still too far away to make out much detail, plus the property wall of the occupied house next door blocked her view of nearly half of the lot. Her eyes narrowed, and she pulled three items from storage. The bonbori she gripped in either hand as she strode forward to confront whoever had decided to challenge Amazon might. The small pouch of cold water was slung at her side, where it could be quickly smashed if she found retreat the better option than facing whoever… or whatever… was waiting for her.

After securing her bike against a bench, and leaving the ramen behind for now, Shampoo stalked cautiously forward. She set her path in a long arc that brought her around into the empty portion of the lot that she'd been able to see at first. Sure enough, in the remainder that had originally been hidden from her stood a lean, tautly-muscled figure scowling darkly at her.

"Oh, is just you. Hello, Spatula Girl," Shampoo said after breathing a sigh of relief. While it had been nice to be rescued by Ranma from the Ghost Cat, that whole episode had been a little hairier than she wanted to repeat. "Shampoo understand why you get tired of okonomiyaki and want something better, but why you place order to get way out here? Too ashamed to let customers know you want better food?"

"Cut the crap!" Ukyo snarled, her hands tightening around her battle spatula. "I think you know damn well why I'm here!"

"Hmm, let Shampoo think. Airen probably tell you about what he and me now share, and you—" Belatedly, Shampoo's mouth clicked shut, trapping the remainder of the sentence. She had been going to say "And you want to pitch fit about it" and go on to inform Ukyo that the Japanese girl would only feel worse after pushing too far and getting flattened like one of her own okonomiyaki.

It had slipped her mind at first that she had very specific instructions from Cologne on how to handle this confrontation.

Making a face and heaving a sigh, Shampoo returned her bonbori to storage. "Okay, you have something to say? Talk."

Ukyo blinked, knocked off-balance just for a second by this unexpected shift in attitude. She regained her focus almost immediately, though. "I want to know where you think you get off doing something like that with Ranma honey," she declared. "Ranchan may be too innocent to think it through, but I know better. No matter how much he says he likes his new form, that doesn't say anything about what you were thinking. If you really cared about him and what he wanted, instead of just chaining him to you, you would've brought back Falcon water and Drowned Guy water and let him pick for himself!"

Shampoo shrugged. "Was not an option. And Shampoo tell him that if he want, she guide him to Jusenkyo for real cure. Not to mention curse Ranma now have would let him go there on own."

'That's just what Ranma honey said to me earlier! Dammit, just how much has she been messing with his head?!' "What do you mean, not an option?" Ukyo demanded.

"Is none your business," Shampoo replied curtly. "Any more than is your business to say Shampoo could not share this with Airen."

"Keep your claws out of him, Shampoo! I damn well do have the right to object, when some Chinese floozy tries to move in on my fiancé!"

The Amazon's eyes narrowed. "You mean, Shampoo cannot do something nice for Ranma, because is Shampoo doing it? Way too late to say that, stupid. Even before this I already do more for him than you and Akane put together — more nice thing, anyway." Realizing that she was failing miserably to follow Cologne's "advice", Shampoo forced her hackles down. "Look, we not going anywhere other than usual, and is time to get past that." Although she knew very well that Ukyo wouldn't agree with the changes that she intended to replace the status quo. "We fight right now, nothing get changed. So Shampoo going to ask you for serious talking. What you feel for Ranma? What you want with him? Um… what are your hopes and dreams and plans for the future?" she asked, quoting Cologne directly for the conclusive question.

"W-what?" Ukyo spluttered, once again caught off-balance. Could Shampoo possibly be acting any more out-of-character?

"Was simple questions, Shampoo thought," the Amazon challenged. "You need example? I love Ranma, whole heart. I ready to spend whole life with him, walk down beside him always, learn from him and teach new things to him, bring his children into the world when time is right. Would do that tonight if he ask — well, would start it," she amended. If there was anything in Amazon lore that would really allow her to bring a child into the world in the space of one night, Shampoo wasn't sure she wanted to know.

"Didn't hear anything in there about chaining him down to the life of an Amazon male," Ukyo growled. "If you think Ranma honey's just gonna roll over and be a slave for anyone, you've got another think coming!"

"Stupid, where you get that?" Shampoo demanded. "Stupid Japanese think because Amazons is m… ma… um… matriarchal, that mans is slave? What that say about womans in Japan? Is maybe real reason Spatula Girl dress like Spatula Boy?"

The girl in question gripped the utensil in question a bit tighter, raising it into a more threatening position. "I'm talking about Mousse, and the way you and the old woman walk over him like a doormat!"

Shampoo just sighed. "If you have see enough to say that, then you have also see enough to know Mousse throw him down in front of Shampoo to be walk on." Her tone sharpened, and she continued, "Have also seen him act without honor, defy Matriarch — whole leader of Amazon tribe! — and not get more than mild punishment! All this time we let him stay even though he break law, make trouble with Airen, go his own way no thought of what Shampoo or Great-Grandmother want! And you say Mousse is slave?! Always thought you have at least half a brain more than Akane, but now Shampoo not so sure."

Noting that Ukyo was speechless with anger, Shampoo seized the opportunity to continue. "Seem like you like Akane Tendo in other way too. You going to answer question Shampoo ask or not?"

"Fine, dammit!" Ukyo hollered. "I LOVE HIM!!" As if the force of her exclamation had carried away most of her anger, the chef quieted down and assumed a less battle-ready stance. "I love him," she repeated softly, finding that for whatever reason, in this moment the admissions were coming much easier than they usually did. "I know I want to spend the rest of my life with him. Share everything with him, the good times and the bad. Raise a family, grow old together."

"Specifics, Spatula Girl. So far you just echo some of what Shampoo say."

"You want specifics? I'll give you specifics," Ukyo retorted. "I put my restaurant on the line for him, when he was going up against the Gambling King. I was ready to lose it and be left with just him and me to make our way in the world with nothing but an okonomiyaki cart. And when that jackass Happosai sealed Ranchan's strength, I was ready to stand behind him there too. He'd be no good to the Tendos, who just want him to take over their stupid dojo, and considering how much effort your granny put into helping him I guess he wouldn't have been much of an Amazon trophy husband either. But it didn't make any difference to me, I would've been just as happy to have him like that for the rest of my life. For better or for worse."

Keeping quiet through the latter half of that had been quite a struggle for Shampoo, especially the utterly infuriating "trophy husband" remark, but she had done so anyway. She had hoped that Ukyo would be a little more specific about one particular aspect of her hopes and dreams, would give her the opening Shampoo wanted. Apparently it was not to be, though. The Amazon settled for forcing the issue rather than waiting until her opponent set herself up. "Back up little bit. You talk about him and you go out in world 'with nothing but okonomiyaki cart'. That not happen, so where you see future now? Those dreams have Ranma and kids beside you in restaurant?"

"Uh, yeah," Ukyo said, her tone making it clear that she didn't understand why Shampoo had even thought it necessary to ask the question. "That is kinda what I meant when I said share everything with him, you know."

Just like Cologne had explained to her. "Just like Shampoo thought." The Amazon could no longer suppress her sneer. "Spatula Girl think he be happy with little house in suburb, two and one-half kids, day job in restaurant? Where you fit in Ranma love for fighting and learning in there?"

"Oh, that's rich coming from you!" Ukyo exclaimed, feeling the quiet moment of honest contemplation shatter. "You want to drag him back to the boonies of China, whether or not he wants it!"

"Is too much to ask you not turn off brain while we have this talk?" Shampoo wanted to know. "If we want to drag him back, Great-Grandmother would have do! That not plan, never was, never will be!" Her eyes narrowed. "Will be what Ranma want when he and Shampoo come together for good and forever."

"I've got news for you, Shampoo. Just because you say it doesn't make it so!"

"Back at own self! You think you best person for him?! Shampoo hope so, hope you care that much for him at least. But you is wrong. Is Shampoo who match best to Ranma, is Amazons who have to offer what he really do want from life! Genma have raise him to be someone who not fit at all in normal Japanese life, but Amazon way is perfect for him!"

"Not on your life, Miss Kitty. Er, ahem, Miss Kitty-Hawk. Go dream your fantasies somewhere else. And while you're at it quit trying to make all of Ranchan's decisions for him!"

"<Well, Great-Grandmother, this was a total waste of time,>" Shampoo muttered disgustedly. "<I knew she wouldn't listen to something she didn't want to hear, no matter how true it is.>" Switching back to Japanese, she retorted, "You is one living in dream world! Ranma already beginning to see, really beginning to understand what Shampoo know all along. Is me who love him most, who is best match for him, is me who can give him life he want and deserve! Ranma has been husband by Amazon law for long time now, but by this time next year he be husband by own laws too!"

"Enough," Ukyo spat, bringing her combat spatula into guard position and moving toward Shampoo. "I shouldn't've wasted my time. I knew from the start that this is what it would take to get it through your thick skull."

Shampoo made a wordless sound of menace and disgust, and pulled out her own tools of destruction. "You not catch me without weapons this time, Spatula Girl. And Airen not around to see me beat up his oldest nothing-but-friend. You start this, Shampoo finish it."

"Shut up and fight!" With that cry, Ukyo increased her pace from a stalk to a dash. Shampoo braced herself to meet the initial attack, catching it on one bonbori. Ukyo took advantage of the round shape of the mace by twisting her spatula, sending its blade sliding around the arc toward Shampoo again. The Amazon was forced to employ her second weapon, forming a scissors-style cross that trapped Ukyo's attack.

The Amazon grinned nastily, braced herself, and took a powerful step forward. Ukyo blanched as she was pushed back by the sheer force of the move, reminded unpleasantly once again of the vast gulf that existed between her and the Chinese girl in terms of pure physical strength.

But of course, skill and speed could more than make up that gap. Ukyo altered her grip on the spatula with her right hand, shifting so that she could brace it along the length of her arm. This gave her the leverage she needed to hold it one-handed against Shampoo's strength for one critical instant. In that instant her left hand whipped from her main weapon to the bandoleer that held her alternates, grabbing a single mini-spatula and throwing it directly toward Shampoo's elbow.

The direction of the incoming attack forced Shampoo to disengage and skip backwards to one side. Just as quickly she reversed the direction, charging in again toward Ukyo. The chef backpedaled, deflecting the bonbori blows with the flat of her own weapon, allowing the energy Shampoo was expending to push her backward while she spent just enough of her own reserves to maintain control. 'It'd be damn satisfying to finally outlast the witch,' she thought between parries.

Unfortunately, it quickly became apparent to Ukyo that Shampoo wasn't going to let that kind of endurance decide the course of battle. The Chinese girl's blows were coming harder and harder. She wasn't increasing the tempo of her attacks, in fact it seemed to Ukyo as if their speed had decreased slightly, but Shampoo was using much more force behind each blow. Ukyo quickly realized that if this continued, she was going to be in trouble. Constantly deflecting so many powerful blows was beginning to take a harsh toll on her own hands and forearms — and if even one strike slipped through her guard and landed squarely, it was going to put her down and out of the fight.

Accordingly, she switched tactics. Instead of letting Shampoo's force push her backward to conserve her own strength, the chef quickly jumped backward, darted to one side, then drove in from an angle. The next few minutes saw a very impressive struggle as the two girls surged back and forth, defensive and offensive roles switching between them over and over. Their weapons clanged and crashed together, filling the air with clamor and the occasional spark struck from the contact.

The stalemate ended as one of those sparks happened to fly toward Shampoo's face. She blinked, jerking back, and the rhythm of her offense was broken. Ukyo had a split second to decide how to take advantage of the opening. She could have jumped backward, gotten enough distance to make the attack feasible, and launched a flight of mini-spatulas. But the chef instead opted to make one decisive attack with her trusty main weapon, slamming it forward and knocking Shampoo's right-hand bonbori clean out of her grasp.

Only too late did the Amazon's smirk register.

Ukyo had an instant to realize what she'd done, a heartbeat to understand what it meant that she'd maneuvered her combat spatula to its current position. Just enough time to brace herself in the best defense she could summon, subconsciously pouring as much chi into her weapon as instinct, natural talent, and a total lack of that kind of training could manage.

And then Shampoo's other bonbori screamed in, a strike made with as much power as the Amazon's off-hand could bring to bear, smashing forward with Ukyo's weapon, not her person, as the target. This blow wasn't deflected, but blocked squarely — and the force involved left Ukyo's forearms aching, her wrists screaming, and her hands numb and unresponsive, completely unable to maintain their grip on her combat spatula.

Even as it spun from her grasp Ukyo was frantically retreating, dashing away and hopping the wall that separated their battleground from the house next door. Shampoo hesitated, uncertain despite her earlier proclamation as to whether it would really be a good idea to follow her opponent and finish the battle decisively. Finally she decided to let Ukyo make the call herself. The lavender-haired girl retrieved her fallen bonbori, gave the chef's own lost weapon a precision kick that sent it shooting out of the lot, across the street, and underneath a mailbox, then called out, "Ready or not, here I come!" If Ukyo had kept on running, she wouldn't have been within range to hear the cry. And if the chef were still nearby, ready to resume battle, well, who was Shampoo to deny her what she deserved?

The Amazon strode forward along the path Ukyo had taken, save that instead of jumping the wall, she smashed her way through it. As the last of the stone fell away from her and left the path clear, she saw that Ukyo had indeed chosen not to run. And that she was no longer unarmed.

It was Shampoo's turn to receive a terrible shock, and an attack that left her unable to hold her weapons.

Ukyo switched off the hose, staring grimly down at the furiously skreeling pink-and-purple falcon struggling in the clothes that had been form-fitting a second ago. "Take that, you Amazon bitch. I never used your old curse against you because of how Ranma honey feels about cats. I wouldn't do that to him. But now… you're fair game." Shampoo just screamed all the louder, her furious efforts to extricate herself only tangling the material worse. Ukyo shook her head and took her leave, picking up the pace ever so slightly when she heard behind her the sound of cloth beginning to tear. 'Kind of a two-edged sword,' the chef grumbled. 'If I change her like that, she's a lot less powerful, but there's not much I can do to defend myself afterward without seriously risking hurting or killing her. Even with how things are now, that's going way too far. Maybe I should start carrying a net with me or something.'

It was Tuesday afternoon, and the streets of Nerima were filled with students making their way to various after-school destinations. As always, the boys and girls of Furinkan High were particularly glad this time had come, since for most of them it meant an escape from the craziness that choked their school like crabgrass in the lawn of life. Even those students for whom "home" was stranger than "school" were usually thankful to see the end of the day.

"That was some pretty impressive dodging, Ranma," Akane said quietly. "I guess you were right after all."

"Course I was," he replied with a satisfied smirk. "Told ya I could deal with the best Kuno could come up with on my own. Man, was he frustrated or what?"

"He sure didn't have a good time this afternoon." True to her word, given yesterday evening at her fiancé's request, Akane hadn't interfered today in Kuno's challenge to Ranma. True to his word, Ranma had dodged everything the kendoist threw at him. Watching the battle had been unpleasant, but Akane had done it anyway, stood at the window and stared down with her stomach clenching in knots at each arcing stream of water. Even though Akane had gotten him to use the waterproof soap before this fight, it had still been all too easy for her to imagine its protection failing at a critical moment. No other "cure" had worked properly for Ranma, after all. But whether or not the soap's magic was still in effect, Ranma hadn't needed its power to remain bone dry. Not until all of Kuno's buckets were empty had he administered the knockout blow.

"Hey, it's Kuno. By now he'll have woken back up and hallucinated his way into thinking it was at least a draw, or prob'ly that he forced me to run away." Ranma shook his head. "The guy's stubborn even for this town, and that's saying something. I just hope tomorrow will be enough to get it through to him."

She hoped so too, but considering how so many of Ranma's plans had turned out in the past, Akane felt compelled to say, "It probably won't be enough, Ranma. Make sure you use the soap on Thursday too, because no matter what happens tomorrow he probably won't give up that quickly."

"Yeah, all right," Ranma replied. "But jeez, I'd like to think even Kuno wouldn't be dense enough to keep thinking a bucket full of water would melt me down ta nothing after he's seen it not work at all."

"I wonder how he came up with the idea," Akane murmured. "It doesn't seem like Kuno to watch gaijin movies. He's more like somebody who'd reject anything that wasn't one hundred percent pure Japanese."

Ranma shrugged. "He probably saw it before he got all whacked out on his samurai trip, and it took him this long to remember."

"Maybe so." Akane fell silent as they made the final turn onto the street which held the Tendo residence. A minute later both teens had passed through the outer gate, stepped out of their shoes, and entered the house. "We're home," Akane called out.

"Oh, Akane! My precious little girl! It's so good to see you again!"

The youngest Tendo blinked, gasped, and would have stepped backward in surprise, except that her father already had her in a hug. "D-Dad? You and Mr. Saotome are back now?" she asked. "What about Grandfather Happosai?"

A reflexive full-body shudder shook Soun out of the embrace. He stepped back, recovered his composure with visible effort, then said, "The Master decided to extend his own travels awhile longer. There were several sites he wanted to visit, but he decided he would enjoy them more without us dragging along at his heels."

"He didn't mind it too much whenever a brawl got big enough to destroy the bar it happened in," Genma said grimly. The elder Saotome had followed more slowly in the wake of his friend's frantic rush. "But when that brothel got torn apart—"

"Excuse me?!" Akane interjected with a mixture of rage and disbelief. "Dad, did Mr. Saotome just say you were at a… a… one of those places?!"

"Akane, it wasn't our fault! It was the Master, you know how he is! Well, no, you've never experienced anything like his full terror, but at least you should have an idea. We had no choice!"

"And anyway, what part of 'the place got torn apart in a brawl' wasn't clear?" Genma asked sourly. "You can rest assured, Akane, if the Master takes your father and me someplace, it's not so that anyone other than him can have fun. We hadn't even been there two minutes before he'd stirred up a firestorm that we were expected to put out or lead away. And when we couldn't manage it, he kicked the both of us halfway back to Nerima. Considering that we were on another island at the time…." Genma fought off his own shudder. "But all things considered, it was worth it. May the Master enjoy himself now that he's not burdened with us."

"Yes, may he enjoy himself so much we won't see him again for a year," Soun said fervently, knowing deep in his heart that it wouldn't be twelve months before Happosai returned. Still, a man could dream, couldn't he? Or better yet, take his mind off such unpleasant matters to focus on better things? "It's so good to be home. So good to see you again, Ranma and Akane, the two of you coming in together just like a real couple."

"So good to be away from angry salarymen and furious women," Genma sighed, completely overriding his son's reflexive protest and not even noticing Akane's uncharacteristic silence. "So good to be back here, where if anyone comes raging after me it'll be because of something I did of my own free will."

Ranma snorted. "Yeah, and where you've got me to push forward to deal with those people for ya." Then he gave an evil grin. "And where Mom could come by at any time. As a matter of fact, I think she's due for a visit tomorrow."

It was a measure of Genma's fatigue that he didn't immediately splash himself and hold up a sign relating to cuddly pandas and their cuteness and innocence. "One damn thing after another," he muttered bitterly. "All right, son, why don't you and I go on a short but real training trip?"

"How's it real if we're just goin' so you can keep hiding from Mom?"

"Because we'd be doing real training, of course. Don't ask such foolish questions, just go pack." Genma sighed. After what had happened last time, he was in no mood to risk staying around in disguise while his wife visited. Hitting the road again with Ranma would be much better than "Mr. Panda" being forced to eat the result of Akane's failed culinary endeavors. "Meanwhile, I'm going to enjoy at least one hot bath before we go."

"Nah. I've got a better idea, old man." Ranma had no idea why there was a bucket full of water sitting conveniently there in the Tendo entryway, but such things turned up so often around here that he didn't even think it worth wondering about anymore. "I gotta confess, I actually meant we would want to see Mom." And with that he gave the bucket one swift kick, upending it and sending its contents flying through the air to drench him.

Genma stared in awe for one trembling second, then blurred as he shot forward and grabbed his untransformed son by the arms. "You're cured? You're cured! How did you do it? How long ago did it happen? How soon can we hold the wedding?!"

"Idiot," muttered Akane. Not having her own Jusenkyo curse, she had barely been able to avoid the water that her thoughtless fiancé had sent flying and which was now lying in an inconvenient puddle right in the middle of the floor of her home. Louder, loud enough to bulldoze over Soun's and Genma's joyous cries of impending matrimony, she said, "Did you forget something, Ranma? Something about soap, I think?"

"Yeah, yeah, wait here and keep them from tryin' to tie up our whole future while I'm gone," he replied. The pigtailed teen hurried off to the bathroom, ran a little hot water into the tub, and sat down beside it to scrub and soak with cold water. Once the remaining protection of the waterproof soap was washed away, he changed back, dried off, filled one bath bucket with cold water and another with hot, and headed for the living room.

Soun and Genma were seated there waiting for him, though Akane was nowhere to be seen. The two fathers were looking remarkably composed and quiet, certainly more so than Ranma had expected. He set down the two buckets, considering how to begin. Before he could say anything, Soun spoke up.

"Son, Akane tells me that despite appearances, you haven't been cured. She said it was just waterproof soap. And she, she also…." The Tendo patriarch's mustaches drooped, his eyes moistened, his shoulders slumped, and his lower lip began to tremble. "She said she didn't want to hear anything about wedding plans for this weekend."

'Jeez, like it's ever not been like that? Like she and I both haven't said that kinda stuff since day one?' Ranma thought disgustedly. Before he could say any of this out loud, Soun reclaimed the floor.

"WHAT HAVE YOU DONE TO MY LITTLE GIRL?!" The demonic chi-projection filled the entirety of the living room, and blasted every thought not related to sheer terror right out of Ranma's mind.

Rescue came from a very unlikely quarter. "Tendo, give it a rest!" Genma barked, his tone authoritative enough that sheer surprise disrupted Soun's technique. The demon head shifted from outrage to blankness for one instant, and then it was gone. Breathing a silent prayer of thanks that this tactic had worked, rather than drawing Soun's ire from his son to himself, Genma turned his attention to Ranma. "Akane said things had changed, but that was all she told us. And you said something earlier about the two of us deliberately going to see Nodoka." Despite the fact that he hadn't moved his head at all, suddenly light flashed across Genma's glasses, obscuring his eyes as he made his next pronouncement. "I seriously hope that wasn't just some kind of joke, boy."

Ranma spared a moment to wonder whether his old man was deliberately trying to look like Gendo Ikari, and, if so, what that would say about his character. "Heh. No joke, Pop. Like Akane said, things really have changed around here. For the better. Now — let's try this again." And with that he gave another kick, upending one bath bucket and sending its cold water contents flying over him.

"Would you stop making more work for Kasumi?!" Akane screeched from somewhere in the back yard, proving that even if she wasn't present in the room she was still watching the proceedings.

"~Give it a rest, tomboy!~" Ranma reflexively screeched right back as he slipped out of his shirt. The motion was coming pretty easily by now, at least as long as he had been expecting and was ready for the transformation. Once he was free of the garment he took a few steps forward, fluffed water out of his feathers, and focused his attention on the two older men. Both were staring at him with jaws gaping and eyes opened wide.

Acting on a mercurial impulse, Ranma took to the air and zipped around the room a couple of times. At one point he did a swift swooping feint toward his father, feeling slight disappointment that the old man didn't even flinch. Then again, he was probably too shell-shocked for that much response just now.

Deciding that this was as good a point as any to change back — in fact, he probably needed to get it over with before Nabiki and her camera should make it back from school — Ranma swooped down and made a perfect one-point landing in the basin of hot water, his right leg stretched down, his left still cocked upward in the flight position. There was a blur as feathers morphed to flesh, a creak of wood suddenly supporting much more weight, and a splash as his increasing mass displaced some of the water in the bucket.

Then, as he put his left foot down and stepped out in the direction of his clothes, and Kasumi stepped into the room carrying a tray with tea and cookies, there was a gasp and a crash, a hastily-uttered curse, a scream of "PERVERT! How dare you flash Kasumi like that!!", and the slamming of the dojo door so hard the wood splintered.

Ranma continued cursing in the privacy of his own mind as he quickly donned his clothes. "Kasumi, I'm real sorry about that, but next time could ya call out, 'Would anyone like some tea?' or something?" he asked plaintively. "You know, give me a little warning?

"Oh… oh my… I'm sorry too, Ranma," the eldest Tendo daughter said. Quickly and efficiently, Kasumi cleaned up the mess she'd made of the tea, mopped up the rest of the spilled water, and retreated to the safety of her kitchen.

Her departure left a rather awkward silence. After a couple of false starts, Ranma ended it. "Okay, you guys saw that I finally managed to get rid of the stupid girl curse. Pop, that's what I meant when I said we can go see Mom now. We don't haveta worry anymore about that stupid promise a certain furry beach ball made about me being a 'man among men'."

"And you think turning into a bird fits in with that?" Genma queried, finding the beginnings of coherent thought and speech.

"You better believe I do!" Ranma looked his father dead in the eye. "A man among men, that's what someone promised he'd turn me into. What's that supposed to mean, exactly? I know it sure doesn't mean somebody who has ta spend half his time as a girl. So what does Mom want? Well?"

Genma's mouth gaped open and closed several times while he tried to get his mind into a sufficiently high gear. At last, speaking rather hesitantly, he replied, "She wants a strong, honorable, upstanding son, a man who's enough of a man to lead and inspire those who are less fortunate, less able, less manly than him."

Yeah, that was the impression he'd gotten as well, during his masquerades as "Ranko Tendo". "Well, that sounds like it fits really well with this curse!" Ranma declared. "It's just like Doc Tofu said when I talked with him about all this. People have been dreaming about flying and wanting to fly for real ever since there've been people and birds and dreams. And now… I can. And it's every bit as good as anybody ever guessed it would be. How's that for a man among men, huh, Pop? I reached out and grabbed hold of that dream that everybody else had to just look at and wish for!"

"It… it sounds like it might be…." Genma gulped a couple of times, then, speaking in tones not far above a whisper, continued, "Sounds like it might be music to Nodoka's ears. Boy… I think you're right. You really are!" Color and vitality flooded into his face, and a broad smile curved across his lips. "You've really gotten rid of the old curse for good? How did you do it, anyway?"

"Oh, yeah." Feeling a bit of the wind fade out of his sails, Ranma admitted, "You know Shampoo and her granny went to China awhile ago? They got back just a day after you guys left with the freak."

Soun snorted, interrupting Ranma's explanation. "You mean, when he dragged us away from the loving embrace of our family."

"Yeah, whatever. Anyway, while they were in China Shampoo changed out her old curse for a falcon body, and she brought back water from that spring for me." Ranma paused, pinned both men with a fierce stare, then lowered his voice. "Brought back more water than she needed for just me, as it turned out. So I asked her to give a dose to Ryoga too. That jerk came by a while back, showed everyone the new curse, said how Shampoo did it to him against his will, and told Akane it was because she hadn't wanted him to be stronger than me. It's a bunch of bull, but Akane believes it, she's basically already gotten over that particular temper tantrum, so you probably oughta just go along with it too."

Both men blinked as they processed these revelations. The dramatic flush of good humor had faded from Genma's face, leaving him looking more thoughtful than anything else, though a really good observer might also have detected something closely related to worry.

Soun, on the other hand, was more straightforward. Ranma had noted and wondered just why the Tendo patriarch was looking disappointed, but he wasn't left to wonder long. "Son, I'm glad you finally decided to take action there, but I'll confess I was hoping for something different. Something a little more along the lines of telling Akane how you really feel, rather than just shoving Ryoga out of the way and keeping up this tired old act."

In the interests of not ripping the household harmony to hell and gone, Ranma opted not to respond to that little statement with any of a dozen particularly biting remarks. 'Just remember your old man ain't the only one who had Happosai screwing around with his moral compass for years,' the pigtailed teen reminded himself. 'Ain't any good to try to get through to Mr. Tendo anyway. If he can say something like that, then he's too old to change, too stubborn to try, and too blind to even see why he might want to. But… but I guess I oughta keep in mind that it took me a real long time to start making some real changes, and the whole thing only started when someone else did first and offered me a chance to get in on the action.'

Feeling less judgmental and more sorrowful now toward the man who'd let Ryoga crawl into the bed of his own daughter — the daughter he was determined to see married to Ranma — the Saotome heir spoke up. "None of that stuff is anywhere near as important as Pop and me finally going back to Mom. How about it, old man? You feel recovered enough to make one more trip tonight? Or should we wait until tomorrow to go over to her place?"

"Ranma…" Genma spoke very hesitantly indeed. "I don't know… we need to think this through some more…."

"What the hell is there to think through?!" his son demanded. "I've been waiting and waiting for you to get back, so you can tell me where Mom lives! I think I'm being pretty darn considerate to wait even until tomorrow just so you can recover from Happosai kicking you around for a change instead of me!"

"Look, it's not that simple!" The pieces were tumbling into place more quickly now, as Genma's precision-tuned survival instinct kicked into high gear. "Yes, Ranma, I believe you're right. Your mother probably won't be anything other than proud of you, even with the curse you've got now. At the absolute outside she might possibly want you to get rid of it, which I suppose would be easy enough to do. She certainly wouldn't call in the penalty for anything you have to show her now.

"But it's different for me. Or have you forgotten I've still got my curse?" Genma growled. "Have you forgotten all the times Nodoka saw 'Ranko' playing with 'Mr. Panda', especially when the two of them had obviously just gotten wet? What do you think will happen if we do go back to her like this, and my own curse inevitably gets triggered?"

"Fine, then just tell me where she lives and I'll go by myself!"

"And you'll tell her what?" Genma wanted to know. "Where am I supposed to be in this picture? How do you explain that it's just you and not me going back to her? And after you've done it, what are you going to do then?"

"I… I'll just spend some time with her, and then tell her I've got to get back to you for more training…." Even to Ranma's ears it sounded lame.

Genma's snort rattled the windowpanes. "You don't seriously believe you'll be able to do that, do you boy? She's been waiting so long for both of us. You'll never be able to hurt her like that, to drag yourself away again. I couldn't do it, and that means there's no way in the world you'll be able to. If I thought we could get away with just visits, I'd have gotten my hands on some of that waterproof soap Ryoga had that one time and taken you to meet her right away."

The thought of Nodoka, so near and yet so far, brought a sudden, strong pang to Genma's heart. If she could be brought back into his and Ranma's lives, everything would be wonderful. He could get reacquainted with the wife he'd missed, Ranma could spend time with the mother he'd never really known, and she could have everything she'd dreamed of for so long. All his and Ranma's hard work and sacrifices would finally pay off. For a moment he lost himself in the glorious vision, one which, though still tantalizingly far off, seemed closer than it had in a long time: Genma and Nodoka together again, Nodoka smiling tenderly and telling him how wise he'd been to chart such a difficult but ultimately rewarding course. Ranma and Akane, happy together, raising children of their own. Ranma running the Tendo dojo, lifting it out of obscurity to prominence and then dominance in the world of martial arts, supporting the elder generations of both families in the comfort they deserved.

"Then what do you sug