Rei sighed softly. The sacred fire revealed nothing new to her. On top of her personal problem, the temple was having an issue of its own. Some people who have been visiting the temple had started to disappear. The police had been looking into it, and started to become a nuisance with each new disappearance. Swarming over the temple, asking all kinds of questions. They were not even being subtle about it. ‘Why would we want to kidnap people anyways? If we scare everyone away, our income dries up. I fear people are starting to become too afraid to visit. Where would Grandpa and I be, then?’ Rei worried, for both the temple and her grandfather. ‘Poor grandfather, I know how much this place means to him.’
‘Well, I can’t sit and mope all day. There are things to do and we still have visitors. Maybe we can weather this yet.’ Rei got up from her seat by the fire and left to work about the temple. All she could do was work to try to distract herself from worrying about the temple and Ranma. All she could do was wait for Ranma to awaken again. As she prepared to sweep the temple, bless visitors, and sell charms, she once again noticed a particular bus driver. Shuddering, she thought to herself, ‘He gives me the creeps, for some reason. Good thing Jed started working here recently. Hopefully Ranma will find a way to get away. I’d feel safer with him here.’
When Ranma awoke, she was still in girl form, same as when Genma suckered punch her from behind. ‘Couldn’t he at least changed us back first?’ Ranma found herself being carried in a fireman’s hold over the shoulder of an unwashed panda. Squirming around did not help free her from her father’s vice like grip.
“Leggo y’ ol’ fool!” However, yelling at her father was just as futile. She then heard the sound of approaching footsteps. ‘Lovely, what a sight we must make. Rei will never let me live this one down.’ However, the sound of those footsteps soon changed to receding, then it became obvious her father was racing after them. Pushing herself up on her two arms to take a look, Ranma noticed a frightened crowd of people.
“Quit it, Pops. You’re scaring them spitless.” Rei had been a good influence on how Ranma talks, but she still tended to be colorful with her word choices.
One of the girls asked the man, “Oh my, is this your friend? He has changed a lot, hasn’t he?”
The man responded, “Though I do not know what has happened, we should listen to their story.”
“What a polite greeting for guests who have just arrived,” Rei said as she snorted in disbelief.
“Cut them some slack. I can’t imagine a panda visits them all the time,” Ranma replied as her father set her down in front of the strange man with the mustache.
The man bent over, to be more eye level with Ranma. “You ... wouldn’t be ...”
“Ranma Saotome. Sorry about this,” Ranma said as she snapped her mussed up and damp shirt back into place.
The man suddenly embraced him. “At last, you’ve come!”
A girl behind the man with the mustache chimed in as well. “Oooo, he’s cute.”
It wasn’t long before the family found out Ranma was a girl and the cute-girl taking it as a personal offense that Ranma wasn’t a boy. Everyone was now crowded around mustache-man’s futon as he laid there crying in sorrow.
“Seeing any of this Rei? What a strange family.”
“I’m a little too busy to look. But I don’t think I like them. That one girl is being rude.”
“Do you see a son here? Hmm? Do you?
“Hey, join me in the practice hall? I’m Akane. You want to be friends?”
Ranma nodded and go up to follow. ‘What an awkward scene. Glad to get away.’
“She just met you. What’s with the speaking plainly. She shouldn’t be so familiar with you. Hasn’t her family taught her to speak politely to guests? That family has no discipline.” Ranma could easily sense Rei’s annoyance over the link. However, he chalked it up to stress, as she has been having a rough time lately. “Can I watch? I love to watch you fight. I got some time, nursing a girl with a meatball-head that I ... sorta ... spirit warded.”
“Feel free to use my eyes.”
Ranma stood, staring about the dojo as Akane brought her in.
“You do karate, don’t you?” Akane asked.
“A little,” Ranma answered.
“Phhaw.” Ranma could feel Rei rolling her eyes as she snorted.
Akane smiled at the girl. “Then let’s have a little match, okay?”
“Huh?” Ranma wasn’t expecting that suggestion. She also only half heard Akane as her attention was with Rei. “A little match? Why would she want to fight someone she just met?”
“You can take her. Wallop her one for me,” Rei cheered Ranma on over the link.
Akane mistook Ranma’s silence, as she was busy with Rei, as anxiety. “Just for fun. Don’t worry, I won’t hurt you.”
Ranma shrugged. “If you say so.”
“Sure of herself, isn’t she? Losing will take her down a peg or two.”
“I don’t know, Rei. I wouldn’t feel right going all out in what’s suppose to be a little match.”
Akane wasted little time charging in. However, Ranma jumped, dodged, ducked, and weaved around all of her strikes. Even though Rei was encouraging Ranma to whoop Akane’s ass.
“Not bad – you I mean. Nothing special from her.”
Akane was getting frustrated with missing all the time. “What’s wrong? Swing at me.”
“I Agree, put her on her rear.”
“When she moves fast enough that I have to do more than just dodge, I will. She leaves so many openings, I feel bad taking advantage of any. She was the only nice one in the family.”
Meanwhile, the fight was raging on. Akane kept punching, Ranma kept swaying around them.
“Why am I missing her?” Akane wondered. “Is she reading my moves.”
“If she would only stop telegraphing her strikes, I could take this match more seriously.”
Akane’s eyes narrowed as she firmed her resolve. “This time for real,” she thought to herself.
“Hit her once for me, love!”
Charging in the five steps needed to close in, she unleashed a powerful punch which was perfect in execution but failed to find its target. Instead, Akane managed to punch through the wall. Ranma jumped up and over Akane, landing behind her. Ranma immediately sprung into a side kick aimed at the small of Akane’s back that buried her the rest of the way into the broken wall.
“Well, if she isn’t going to be pulling any punches in a ‘little’ match, why should I?”
“Hehehe,” Akane chuckled as she extracted herself from the wall.
“Heh heh,” Ranma nervously laughed with her.
Akane smiled at Ranma, and did not seem upset at all. Clearing her throat, she said, “*Ahem* You’re pretty good.” Akane adjusted and fixed her gi. “I’m just glad you’re a girl. It’s just ... I’d really hate to lose to a boy.”
“Oh!” Ranma exclaimed.
“Oh sure, that doesn’t sound ominous at all. Ranma, I think it’s time you left that nut-house.”
Meanwhile, Akane left the dojo to finish off her bricks outside.
“You’re not getting jealous, are you?”
Ranma could feel Rei blush. “Yeah, a little. But I also just want to see you, I could use some help, and I don’t want to wait any more for you to come.”
“I couldn’t just run out, could I? And ... wouldn’t someone notice me leaving?”
“Are you a martial artist or aren’t you? You mean to tell me you can’t just sneak out from a bunch of girls?” Rei huffed over the link, feeling stressed and frustrated.
The conversation continued. Ranma was all for packing up and leaving her father, but she was still nervous about doing it. Fortunately, Rei felt just as much like family as her pops did. As the two talked, with the topic shifting from Ranma leaving to what they would do when she gets there, Kasumi found Ranma enjoying the breeze on the engawa.
“Ranma, Wouldn’t you like to take a bath?” A flash of idea from Rei over the link, and Ranma quickly agreed.
He let Kasumi escort him, but as they entered the house, he turned to her to ask, “Can I go get my bag? It has my clean clothes in it.”
“Sure thing.” Kasumi smiled at Ranma as she led her to the backpack.
Soon Ranma was in the bathroom.
“Now’s your chance. Slip out a window and come to the shrine. By the time they notice your missing, you’ll be on a train here.”
Ranma splashed himself with warm water from the furo, changing himself into a guy again. He then opened the window, dropped his pack out of it, and followed behind the pack. Shouldering his backpack, Ranma leaped up to the roofs and sped off.
Nabiki found Akane walking about. “Akane, bath’s ready.”
“Thanks.” Akane nodded to her sister and went to take her bath.
Nabiki went back to talking with Kasumi, and helping her carry the snacks for the fathers. They had just set them down, when their father pointed them out.
“Genma, these are my oldest two. Girls, this is my old friend, Genma. ...Where’s Akane?”
Nabiki replied, having seen Akane last. “She just went to take a bath, father.”
“Oh my, Ranma’s in the bath. I hope Akane doesn’t intrude upon her. That wouldn’t be polite.” Nabiki shrugged in response, uncaring about the situation.
The fathers seemed to be trying to listen to something distant. “I don’t hear anything,” Genma said to Soun.
“Me, neither. Maybe they are getting along already? Your boy works fast, Saotome.”
Genma puffed up in pride. “Takes after his old man, a real lady’s killer.”
“You know what this means?” Soun asked excitedly.
Genma pondered the question for a moment, “That your youngest is easy?”
“No,” Soun replied excitedly. He didn’t seem to notice the aspersion Genma casted upon his daughter. “It means the schools will be joined!”
Both fathers jumped up in joy and hugged in celebration. They both ran off to congratulate the children, forgetting that it is rude to barge in on someone taking a bath.
Genma and Soun threw the door to the furo open and entered while shouting, “Way to go, Ranma!” All they found was Akane soaking in the hot water. Puzzled, they began looking around for Ranma.
Akane, however, was angry and mortified and quickly fled the room. An idea quickly took root in her head, she would drown the old pervert and give her father a good yelling. Rushing outside, she went for a stone lantern, chanting, “I’ll crush his head and drown him in the tub.”
The fathers left the bathroom soon after Akane did, looking sad and lamenting.
“Where could my ungrateful son be hiding? Oh, Ranma, how you dishonor your poor father.”
Nabiki dryly added her two cents. “If you treat her like a son all the time, no wonder Ranma ran off.”
“Oh Genma, you’re boy ran off! We’ll have to get him back.”
Meanwhile, Akane had managed to waddle in carrying a heavy stone lantern, and watched the antics in confusion.
Genma continued his theatrics. “That ungrateful brat. Couldn’t he have just stayed in the tub where he’s suppose to be?”
Soun joined him, both acting like the crown prince of Japan was found missing. “Playing hard to get, no doubt. No matter, we shall send Akane to fetch him as they have gotten along the best. Training in the dojo and taking that bath together.”
Akane’s eye twitched, wondering what world her father was living in.
Genma turned to Kasumi and shook her hand with gusto. “Oh, Akane, what a pretty wife you’ll make. And you cooking is second to none.”
Akane growled.
“That’s not my Akane, Genma, old friend,” Soun pointed out the Genma helpfully.
Turning next to Nabiki, Genma shook her hands. “Good luck finding my wayward son, Akane. You will make a beautiful bride for him.”
Nabiki raised an eyebrow in amusement.
Akane, however, couldn’t stand it any longer. First they practically ignore her in the bathroom, and now it’s like she doesn’t even exist. “I’m standing right here, you idiot.”
Soun nodded in agreement. “Yes, that is Nabiki. Akane is ...” Soun’s eyebrows shot up when he finally got a good look at Akane’s state of undress. “Akane! We have company. You go put some clothes on right now, young lady, and we’ll be having a talk later about your exhibitionist tendencies.”
The resulting scream was heard all the way at Kuno’s mansion.
Ranma was clinging to the top of a rail car, heading as fast as he could to get to the Hikawa shrine. He knew that Rei and her grandfather was having some sort of trouble. Some girl with dumplings on her head had just woken up, and the angry mother of a missing girl was causing some grief, so he understood why Rei was too busy to talk right then. He only hoped he could get there before something bad happened to Rei.
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See other episodes by Errol Peregrinus
(Posted Sat, 17 May 2008 05:55)
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