As the pair silently packed away their camp Genma told his son to stay close.
“I don’t want to lose you, Ranma,” he explained when he saw the questioning look on the child’s face.
“Ok Poppa,” Ranma said happily. For the first time in a while he had gotten to sleep in, rather then get the wet sponge wake up call.
The pair of martial artists marched in step as they made their way to Nerima and on to the Tendo Dojo.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
After an hour, Ranma was starting to show the effects of the pace, and so he was breathing hard to keep up with his father.
“I think a drink is in order, don’t you, son?” Genma asked Ranma.
“Yes poppa,” Ranma agreed. He was hoping that his father would give him juice instead of water as had been the case for the last few weeks.
The pair walked hand in hand to the nearest vending machine, where Genma searched for his coin pouch. When he retrieved enough currency, Genma told his son to choose a flavour.
Ranma happily chose orange while Genma opted for Calpis water.
Halfway through their drinks, Ranma turned to his father. “Poppa, how much further is it to Nerima?”
“I’m not entirely sure, son,” Genma replied. “I’ll ask someone.”
Genma turned to find a policeman walking past them. Managing to hide his inherently untrustworthy nature, he asked him how far away he was from his destination.
“The Tendo Dojo? It’s easy to get to, but it’ll take a while,” the policeman answered. “It’s the Tobo-Nerima stop on the Tobo Tojo line. If you head down that road and turn left at the Shinohara plant, the station is about 500 metres further on. You’ll have to transfer from a station in Tokyo. I don’t know which one off the top of my head, I’m sorry.”
“That’s ok, I can’t expect you to know the complexities of our great railway network,” Genma said with a smile.
“Thank you, Mister Policeman,” Ranma said when he had finished his drink.
“That’s quite all right, young man,” the uniformed officer replied before bowing and leaving.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
That afternoon, Reiko Tendo answered the knock at the front door to her house.
“Can I help you?” she asked the gi clad pair standing in front of her. Then the identity of one of her guests dawned on her. “What brings you here, Saotome-kun?”
“I’m here to speak with you and Soun,” Genma said with a bow.
Reiko was a bit suspicious of Genma’s motives. “About what?”
Genma lifted his son up to Mrs. Tendo’s eye level. “The future.”
Reiko blinked at the response. “Ok. Come right this way, I’ll get Soun.”
A few minutes later, the grown up Tendos and Saotome were sitting around the table in the common room. Genma, in an act of consideration that Soun thought was a bit out of character, sent the children outside to play.
Genma apologised for the unannounced visit. “The reason I’m here is, I almost made a huge mistake with Ranma’s training. And it made me realise that if I pass on before Ranma is ready, he’ll have nowhere to go.”
“What about Nodoka?” Reiko asked. “Wouldn’t she be more suited to raising your son?”
“You don’t know about Nodoka?”
(Posted Sun, 23 Oct 2005 11:51)
Questions? Problems? Suggestions?
Send a mail to addventure@bast-enterprises.de
or use the contact form.
らんま1/2 © Rumiko Takahashi
All other series and their characters are © by their respective creators or owners. No claims of ownership of these characters are implied by the authors of this Addventure, or should be inferred.
The Anime Addventure is a non-profit site.