Stretching awake the next morning, Ranma stared up at the unfamiliar ceiling. It wasn't the first time he'd slept in a bed, or slept in a girl's room before.
It was the first time the owner of that room had ended up sleeping on the floor.
From the way she insisted that he had to take her bed, Ranma was beginning to suspect the girl was taking the whole slave thing seriously. As she obviously still despised him, it had to be a matter of honor and pride to her.
Not that he was going to claim to understand girls anytime soon.
Hearing her finally get up and crawl over to turn off her bedside alarm, Ranma flashed the sleepy girl a grin.
She growled at him in response.
Shrugging it off, he instead asked a question. "So, do you train in the mornings?"
Looking suspicious, she turned towards him before answering. "Yeah. So what of it?"
He in turn continued to ignore her negative attitude concerning him. "So, are we going to have to bathe together? I'm pretty sure you get in a shower at least before going to school. I'd just like to know when."
Frowning slightly, Akane felt most of her fire leave her. "Uh, yeah. I'm supposed to wash your back and take care of you. We've got about an hour before bath then breakfast."
Sliding out of bed, Ranma nodded happily at all the time they had to get in some training.
Then he surprised Akane by not only helping her stand, but the way he kept his hands on her afterwards. Slightly wearied by all of her worrying, Akane instead just waited for the groping to commence.
Instead he spoke up cheerfully after examining her pajama clad form. "Alright now, for you training this morning, I'm gonna teach you how to dance."
Staring wide-eyed while he placed her right hand on his lower back while holding her left out, the absurdity of it broke through her shock. "Dance? How the hell is that training?"
Trying to lead Akane around the room, but being impeded by her constant stumbling, he mildly spoke up. "Well, you got power but no finesse. Also you're gonna have to learn to read my body to figure out how to move, just like reading an opponent in a fight. I'm the one leading, and you're following, so you have to look at my face, which means you can't watch my feet. Obviously you're gonna have to learn how I move and how to read me if you wanna avoid stepping on my toes or tangling us up."
Giving it a few more minutes of stumbling effort, Akane eventually got upset at her constant failure. "This isn't working, the floor's all cluttered! This is stupid!"
Moderately surprised that there wasn't much anger actually directed at him, Ranma shifted his grip, cupping her rear firmly with one hand to get her attention. With her staring at him wide-eyed, he continued lecturing his student. "Getting upset won't help. You need to relax and follow my lead. If you're having trouble concentrating, maybe I should see if taking your clothes off might make you a bit more 'sensitive' to my movements."
Gulping hard, Akane stared at Ranma while posing herself to continue dancing.
Thirty minutes later, Ranma marveled at how eager his student became with the proper motivation. She had ended up stripping down to her panties before getting it right. Then she had eventually got to put her pajamas back on. After that, she was definitely paying attention and following his lead as if her life depended on it.
Satisfied that she had the basics down, he lead her out her door, and the pair waltzed together down the hallway.
The stairs were tricky, but Ranma was willing to take it slow, so they went up and down the stairs a few times. After three round trips, Akane was starting to move naturally over such uneven but regular ground.
Feeling the time was right to move on, Ranma led his partner down the stairs and into the family room. This new venue offered new obstacles in the form of a table in the middle, cushions on the floor, and Kasumi making trips into the room to see what was happening.
In the corner near the veranda sat Soun and a panda, attempting to play shogi. The panda was angrily waving around sign which read 'There is no such thing as Martial Arts Tango boy!'.
Passing near that corner, Ranma twirled Akane around, her blind backwards kick catching the panda squarely on the brow. Hearing the panda tumble out of the house, Akane looked away momentarily to see the results of her successful attack.
After Ranma took a firm grip on her rear once again, she looked back at him startled, then blushed at having been distracted into losing her concentration.
Coming down the stairs, Nabiki saw her tomboy sister blushing and doing the tango and promptly walked into the wall, finally reaching full painful wakefulness.
Curious to see what was for breakfast, Ranma waltzed right into the kitchen. Giving Akane a moment to catch her breath, he instead took a surprised Kasumi for a spin. Her fun was short-lived however as Ranma quickly returned to switch partners for Akane as soon as she got her breath back. It wasn't that he didn't like dancing with Kasumi, but he wanted to keep Akane from opening her mouth and getting herself further into trouble.
Since the kitchen had a back door leading out of the house, Ranma led his student outside to get a little fresh air and sunshine.
Getting along like a pair of friends, the two girls headed for the bath. Both were damp, but in fairly good humor.
Of course, one was in better humor than the other, as Akane teased her red-headed friend. Of course it was Ranma's fault as she'd insisted they keep dancing despite the short rain shower.
In Ranma's opinion, twenty minutes should have been long enough for Akane to adjust to Ranma's different stature in female form.
She hadn't, but Ranma wasn't going to gripe about it. Akane had made progress, and that was good.
Akane's relaxed mood though evaporated as soon as they were naked in the changed room. Glancing at Ranma, she was immediately reminded that Ranma was no where close to being a normal innocent girl. Suddenly very self conscious of her nudity, Akane attempted to cover herself using only her bath cloth.
Ranma for her part completely ignored her 'friend's' change in demeanor, instead heading into the bath to take a seat on the bath stool. "Do you want me to get your back afterwards?"
Hesitantly entering the bath now that Ranma had her back turned towards her, Akane reluctantly answered, "Ah no, I'll be fine. You can just soak after your scrub."
Taking it in stride as Akane started on her back while Ranma started with her arms, the red-head absently spoke up. "You mind washing my hair? It's been a while since I've undone my braid to wash it all."
Trying to get it over with, Akane was just glad it was still fairly innocent. "Ah yeah, sure."
After a few moments of awkward silence, the red-head sighed and relaxed. "Ah, that feels good."
That of course had the effect of causing Akane to stop immediately, withdrawing her hands from the red-head's back.
Idly humming to herself, the red-head shrugged her shoulders and grasped her braid. "Ah, too bad, it was nice. When you wash my hair, go quickly."
Not really understanding, but complying anyways, the black-haired girl grabbed the shampoo. As the red-head undid her braid, retrieving a golden thread, Akane set about washing her hair as quickly as possible. Whatever the reason, Akane wanted to get this over with as quickly as possible as well.
She couldn't shake the feeling that something was odd about Ranma's hair, as if there was more and more of it. When she used the rinse bucket to wash the suds from her hair, she stared as the red mane of hair went down to the floor in a waterfall of water.
"Once more, I don't want any suds in my braid."
Shrugging, Akane dumped another bucket of water over the red-head's hair. This time her hair pooled on the floor. Before Akane could contemplate this new strangeness, Ranma was working her hands through her hair, recreating her braid. After braiding a foot of it, she pulled it over her shoulder to work the rest of it in front of her.
Once it was tied off, the red-head flicked it back over her shoulder, the thick braid slapping against the floor behind her. Now that it was braided once again, Akane was certain something was up. Not only was the braid four times longer, it was four times thicker.
Standing up, Ranma modestly covered her groin with her bath cloth, keeping her head turned from Akane as she stood to enter the bath. Pausing and letting Akane see that her red bangs went down to her hips now, Ranma spoke up. "Sometimes life just isn't fair. Just one thing after another."
Staring in confusion, Akane watched as Ranma stepped into the bath and his long hair floated momentarily in the water. "What was that about? Your hair grew longer."
Relaxing in the hot water, Ranma leaned back with his eyes closed. "Just another mishap. On the way back from China, I ate some Dragon Whisker soup. It doesn't do anything to a girl, but to a guy it makes his hair grow with only a dragon whisker being capable of sealing it. Of course, as screwed up as I am, even in girl form I'm part guy, so it just grows slower then."
In the midst of quickly washing herself so she could get to the relative safety of the tub, Akane felt a pang of sympathy. "Oh."
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(Posted Fri, 11 Aug 2006 19:07)
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