It was evening, and Ranma was sitting on the Tendos’ roof, watching the sun go down and the stars light up, as was his wont when he wanted to put a cap on an eventful day. There was a fairly brisk breeze flowing, which added to the calming atmosphere of the situation.
I’d say that went… reasonably well, I suppose.
Yeah—except for that whole “secret identity” thing. She does have a point, ya know. She’s gotta have a private life.
Hey, I gave her that mask.
That thing? It’s pretty much a pair of oversized glasses! It won’t disguise her features at all!
It will when she puts it on and the magic kicks in.
It’s magic?
Uh-huh. It was designed for use during masquerades on Venus. Basically, it has a disguising effect that should help keep people from recognizing Minako.
Well, why didn’t ya tell her that? I’m sure it woulda taken care of some of her concerns.
Well, it’s not that simple, Ranma. That mask is really little more than a party favor, and as such the disguise magic isn’t very strong at all. While it should prevent people from making the connection based on her physical appearance or the sound of her voice, her personality, mannerisms, and speech patterns can very easily give her away. That was the idea behind a masquerade, after all—to see if you could identify the other guests based solely on their personalities. Of course, one also had to take into account that all of the guests were doing their best to not be identified, and that they did so by temporarily adopting another persona.
An’ that’s what ya want Minako ta do, right?
Right.
Okay… so what happens now?
Artemis would have answered, had Ranma’s ears not picked up the footsteps of someone else arriving on the roof—though this person had used a ladder to reach that height, as opposed to a ki-enhanced jump.
“Who’s there?”
“It’s just me—I saw you hop up here and was a bit curious, that’s all.”
“Huh? Oh, it’s you, Nabiki. It aint much—just watchin’ the sky, that’s all.”
Nabiki walked over to the martial artist and sat down next to him, allowing him to grow comfortable with her presence before she made her move. “I’m not entirely sure why you seem to think that you can just clamber onto the roof of someone else’s home, but the view certainly is nice up here, eh, Ranma? Or should I say, Artemis?”
“Wh… What’re ya talkin’ about?”
“I’m talking about that little white cat form of yours… the one that’s apparently capable of human speech.”
“Um… I, uh…”
“I must say, the way you re-introduced yourself to my little sister was rather unique. Or do you give all the girls you meet the ability to magically summon schoolgirl uniforms?”
“Um— well— ah— you see— I, uh— what I mean is…”
“Are you going to answer my question, or are you just going to keep rambling until I go away? Because if it’s the second one it’s not going to work.”
Ranma sighed. Somehow, he knew that there were going to be problems. “Alright… how much did ya see?”
“Considering that I followed you out to the dojo as soon as I saw you heading there alone, pretty much everything, from you having a split personality to Minako’s rather revealing transformation into a magical girl,” Nabiki responded with an accusatory look.
“Well, then ya know what’s goin’ on… an’ all that magic type stuff that Artemis did should be proof enough that he ain’t some figment of my imagination. So, uh… why’re ya lookin’ at me like that?”
“You certainly got an eyeful of my sister when she was spinning around in that light show.”
“Uh, yeah… so?”
“So, how do I know this wasn’t some scheme to get to see a naked fourteen-year-old?”
“What?! No! No way! I mean, ya heard what Artemis said, right? She’s the only one who can do this.”
“Uh-huh. And how do I know that’s true? How do I know you couldn’t have easily picked a consenting adult, like Kasumi, and given her the same spiel?”
“Um, well…” Ranma was really getting nervous. What do we do, Artemis?
I… I don’t know, Ranma. I don’t think there’s really any way to prove it. Not to someone like Nabiki, anyway.
Maybe Pluto could—
Hell no. I don’t want anything to do with her if I can help it. Besides, if she was going to clear things up, she’d already be here.
Nabiki looked on as the seated martial artist subtly changed his facial expressions, as though he were responding to someone else’s conversation. People who pursued her type of “extracurricular activities” generally found skills like that to be quite helpful. Either he’s a really good actor, or this “Artemis” is the real deal. She decided to speak up again. “Hello? Are you going to answer the question or not?”
Ranma snapped out of his—well, it wasn’t exactly a trance, but his mind had clearly not been focused on the physical world. He sighed again before responding, “Ya know what? I can’t prove it. There’s absolutely no way you can be positive that I ain’t some wacko pervert tryin’ ta take advantage of yer sister. But think of it this way: do ya really think I’d ask a fourteen-year-old ta risk her life she wasn’t the only one who could do the job? And believe me, somebody’s gotta do this.”
“So she is going to be risking her life?”
“Uh-huh. Artemis made that pretty clear, right?”
“No.”
“He didn’t make it clear?”
“I wasn’t answering your question, I was delivering my verdict. There’s no way in hell I’m going to let Minako risk her life for some stupid cat.”
Hey!
Ranma ignored his friend’s reaction and tried to change Nabiki’s mind. “Look… I’m serious… there’s a lotta bad things out there, an’ pretty soon, they’re gonna be comin’ after us.”
“So you enlisted Minako to be your bodyguard?”
“No! When I say ‘us,’ I don’t mean like me an’ Artemis—I mean me, you, yer family, yer neighbors, everybody! These things just wanna bring the world ta its knees and rule over everything.” Seeing that this was having little effect, Ranma tried a different approach. “Look, ya see that?” he asked as he pointed towards a particularly bright point of light.
“That bright looking star? What about it?”
“It ain’t a star. It’s Venus, an’ it’s where Minako should be rulin’ right now.”
“What?”
“Long ago, Venus was one of the most densely populated planets in the Solar System—imagine if every piece of land on Earth was as crowded as Tokyo and ya might get some idea of what I mean. But aside from the overcrowding, it was a pretty nice place; the economy was good, crime was reasonably low, and tourism was great, on account of Venus’ nightlife. And it was all overseen by the Queen of Venus an’ her advisors, who in turn answered ta Queen Serenity, who lived on the moon. Now, I don’t know everythin’ about how it all worked, ’cuz Artemis’ memories are a little fuzzy, but apparently, people lived longer back then, so that meant ya could actually train members of a royal family on how ta be a good ruler, an’ whenever the monarch died, they usually gave the Crown ta the most qualified heir in the next generation. Anyway, I’m pretty sure that Minako— I mean, the person Minako was, woulda been next in line. But that doesn’t matter. What I do know is that she was chosen ta be one of the Sailor Senshi—a squad of magical girls, one from each planet’s aristocracy, who were charged with the protection of the rest of us.”
You’re giving her way too much information….
White, if we don’t get Nabiki on our side now, our mission is pretty much toast. We gotta keep this as secret as possible. No way is Mr. Tendo the kinda guy who’ll let his daughter do somethin’ like this.
I hope you’re right.
Regardless of whether she believed the story or not, Nabiki seemed to find it interesting. “So, what happened?”
“Well, a whole buncha enemies from an alternate universe swooped in. Musta been someone big helpin’ ’em, though, ’cuz everyone got taken by surprise. There was a whole buncha battles, but it wasn’t enough—an’ as a result, now only Earth is inhabited, which is apparently the only planet that didn’t need magic ta support its ecosystem. But that don’t mean the bad guys won, either.”
“What do you mean?”
“Apparently, Queen Serenity’s last act was ta temporarily seal away the nasties, an’ send the souls of all the Senshi forward in time, so they could be reincarnated an’ be ready ta fight again.”
“I see… and this ‘Artemis’ character?”
“I actually ain’t too sure—Artemis just remembers wakin’ up, basically. Anyway, now we gotta find the reincarnation of Serenity’s daughter, or somethin’ like that, ’cuz she’s got this powerful artifact with her—not ta mention she apparently wasn’t too shabby when it came ta magic.” Ranma tried again to reassure Nabiki of the validity of his statements. “Look, I know it all sounds crazy, but ya gotta believe me. Serenity’s seal has probably disintegrated by now—they’re probably out there right now. An’ if Minako can’t do this, we don’t have a chance.”
Nabiki’s features seemed to soften a bit, but she was still clearly hesitant.
“Look, I ain’t gonna force her ta do nuthin’. If she does do this, it’ll be by her choice. If she wants ta quit, there’s really not that much I can do ta stop her. I might pressure her a bit, try ta persuade her ta see things from my point of view, but anything more than that would just be wrong.”
Nabiki still wasn’t sure what to do. Ranma had presented an argument that was very compelling—on an emotional level, anyway. She couldn’t deny that the talking cat she’d seen had a drastically different personality from Ranma, but it didn’t seem like an act, either. And while she would have been inclined to dismiss his story out of hand, the fact was that the existence of magic had been repeatedly confirmed that evening. And his reassurances that Minako wouldn’t be made to do anything she didn’t want to do would allay most of her fears. Still, it was her sister….
“Let me talk to Minako about it. If she really wants to do this, I won’t stand in your way.”
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(Posted Tue, 03 Oct 2006 04:41)
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