The postal service had acted unusually efficiently, recognising that a letter posted in Tokyo for an address in Tokyo didn’t need routing through Kyoto. The recipient had followed her normal habit and met the postman at the door, and now reread the missive at the small table in her kitchen.
|
Tendo Dojo
Dear Mum,
Nerima Tokyo We finally stoped moving around long enough for me to sit down and write to you. I did start writing a letter to you from the last place we really stopped in China, but Pops draged me away before I finished or posted it. I’ll start with what I was going to put in it anyway. Pops took me to another obscuur training site he didn’t know much about. It’s called ‘Jusenkyo’ and its in the middle of nowhere in the Bayakala mountains. It isn’t as bad as the one that turned out to be a Chinese Army firing range (Pops limps when he thinks noone is looking or if he is fishing for sympathy – the bullet that lodged in my butt finally worked its way close enough to the skin for me to cut it out a couple of weeks ago, not gonna do that again if I don’t have to), at least for me. Pops is being stupid about the results in a really weird way.
The place is a side valley off a minor pass almost noone uses, and its sort of boggy with lots of pools and bamboo growing. You train by balancing on the tops of the poles – of course, Pops had us trying to fight on them. The special thing about the place is it’s actually magic – when you fall in a pool, you get a curse. Pops didn’t know anything about the place other than the name and where it was; turns out he had a guide in Chinese that he still can’t reed. He fell in the Spring of Drowned Panda and whenever he gets wet with cold water he turns into a big panda. I fell in Spring of Drowend Girl – the giude there said here was no efect Well, I paniced a bit and tried to run for the bushes, and Pops chased after me (still a panda), then I realised I was in a totally new body and he had seen me change in the pool so there was no point hiding. I did stop him from pushing me into any of the other pools before we got back to the guide. He said when we get wet with hot water, the curse is cancelled, but only until the next time we get cold water on us. PoPs has been being stupid ever sinse. Well, it’s more of the girl-boy thing, really. The fox-girl shape ‘washed off’, turning me back into a girl, and he’s been insisting that the Girl locked somehow so his ‘son’ is a girl all the time now. So I guess he’s finally realised Ive got a girls’ body but he’s got a really weird idea how I got it. The guide took us to this village nearby called Joketsuzoku, where a tribe of women warriors live, saying that they know lots of stuff about Jusenkyo and might kno how to cure the curses. I could smell he was nervous, like he was lying, I think he wsa told to take people to them if they fell in or something or maybe he wanted somone else to explain to Pops that he was being an idiot. On the way we found out that the Fox curse hadn’t stuck to me either, although Pops turned into panda like the guide said. Pops didn’t like that. They were having some sort of anual martial arts contest when we arrived. Pops wanted to go eat from this bufet table they had set out, but there was a sign by it and I can reed enough Chinese to make out ‘first something’ so I tried to stop him. We had a fight in the middle of the village, and some of their warriors came over to break it up – they all came in to help me, mostly, although they didn’t let go of me after. The guide talked a lot to a couple of really old women, and they asked me a few questions and got hot water for Pops. In the end, they decided to lock Pops up for a few days for spoiling the contest and let me join the feast for stopping him from eating the first prise. Elder Cologne muttered something about not wanting to risk him being good enough to win against her great-grandaughter, for some reeson I didn’t ask.
Elder Cologne had me stay in her house while we were there, and we talked some. She’s their ‘War Mistress’. She did know about Jusenkyo curses not working, and said it was because of my ansestry. Elder Lotion (the ‘Lore Mistress’) said most natural shapeshifters are partly immune to Jusenkyo, the curse breaking with our first natural shapeshift. Lycanthropes can sometimes learn to take the curse form as an extra form in addition to our natural three, but it has to be learned pretty soon after getting cursed and there aren’t any in the tribe now to teach me. They also told me I was Elder Cologne taut me a couple of neat martial arts techniques, and Elder Lotion thought it was really important I know about a whole load of other sorts of shape shifters. She really wanted me to know about wererats, and said they were very dangerous. Tribal law is that they are killed on sight, Im not sure about that. Pops had us come straight to Tokyo after that, even going straight past a couple of training sites I know he had mentioned before, so I figure he did something stupid in the village and was running away. If they send anyone after us, its his fault not mine. I left a half-finished leter in Elder Cologne’s house so they have your adress. He brought us here to Nerima and this stupid idea hes got about me being a guy gets even better because Mr Tendo is his old training partner and they had agreed to marry their kids to ‘join the schools’. Mr Tendo has three daughters and no sons. I ended up ‘engaged’ to Akane, she’s the youngest. At least she blames it on Pops and her father, not me. Akanes alright. She’s a martial artist, not as good as me (no training for the last few years sinse her mother died, she says) and about my age. She’s a bit taller than I am, and stronger. Kasumi is nineteen, she does the cleaning and cooking and stuff. I haven’t figured out if she has any other interests. Shes looking after my underwear for me so Pops doesn’t throw it away again. The middle sister is Nabiki, she’s seventeen and I haven’t figured her out at all. I think she’s pretty smart, both her sisters said she’s good at organising things. Their father is tall and thin, a bit out of shape (he doesn’t run any classes any more) and changes between being all stoyk and noble and being weepy. He buys Pops story completely – none of the girls did for a second. Yesterday morning Pops had me start at the same high school as Akane and Nabiki (I’m in Akane’s calss). Nabiki helped me get my records fixed so they know Im a girl, but Ive still got a boys uniform and no gym cloths. Furinkan is a weird school. Most of the classes are normal, home Ec and Science are the two Ive had so far that are strange. Home Ec is cancelled for a while until they fix the kitchens after the teacher burnt some foreign recipe – the other girls were saying how the flames scorched the ceiling and then she tipped over the pan and spilt the burning oil on the worktop and floor. They also said Akane is teacher’s pet in that class. The Science teacher is weird, Ive never had a teacher break out in maniakle laughter in class before. Im not sure why we were connecting wires to dead frogs, either. The really strange thing at Furinkan is the fight in the front every morning. This idiot called Kuno Tatewaki in Nabiki’s class said he wouldn’t let anyone date Akane unless they beat her in a fight, so half the boys in school try to stop her getting into the school in the morning. Only when she led me to school yesterday, I made some comments and now they’ve decided to beat each other up to prove their manhood to her or something. Nabiki told him about me coming and getting engaged to Akane, and he’s going around telling everyone that ‘Saotome Ranma’ is a ‘dishonourable cowardly cur’ and how he’s going to ‘smite the foul ravisher’ and stuff, and Im really not sure what to do about it because he’s the only person in the whole school who doesn’t know Im a girl. We’ve met, but we weren’t introduced so he doesn’t know that Im ‘Saotome Ranma’ if that makes sense. He was being so rude I hit him almost strait away. Hes a bad looser, he gave Nabiki a challenge note to deliver to me today for a fight on Sunday morning. Akane and her friends invited me to go shopping with them after school on Saturday. Ill get gym cloths, at least. I think Ill have to leave it with Kasumi with my underwear, the school has those stupid bloomers as gym uniform.
Love you |
Nodoka wiped her eyes, feeling slightly foolish for crying, and focussed on the best part of the letter: her child was in Tokyo, and she had the address. She could, at least, visit, and perhaps – hopefully! – bring her little girl back home at last. After all, from the letters, her husband had managed to fulfil the promise he made all those years ago.
Read the comments on this episode
(Posted Sun, 01 Jul 2007 11:59)
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.