It was odd to view one's own memories second-hand, and seemingly from far away. That was only part of his preoccupation at the moment. The other part, or more strictly, another part was that he was looking at a second set of memories and experiences.
Ranma stared at himself in the mirror. School had ended for the day, but he hadn't yet gone home. He would leave in a few minutes.
It was odd to look at yourself and see something different than what you had seen before. He was used to it, from his curse...but this was new. As far as he could tell, not much had changed from the swap. The body was his own, as was the face; the uniform was revolting though, and he wondered if he could get away with not wearing it. His hair still hung in a pigtail, but it was a dark blue now, where it had been black; his eyes were a similar color. It didn't look quite right, but it was familiar enough for it not to need work.
This whole situation would take some getting used to. He was Ranma Saotome. He was Koukin Shuyu. He was both. He was neither.
He was Ranma Shuyu. That was the only thing that fit, and it was what he remembered. Multiple lives were integrating, slowly.
He could remember all of his old experiences. Jusenkyou. Getting engaged, and not wanting it at all. Fight after fight after fight. Some fights stuck out well. Tarou. Herb. Ryu Kumon. Saffron.
Saffron. Damn everything all to hell.
At least his body was his own, as far as he could tell. He would take some time integrating his “old” techniques into his “new” body as much as he could. The tornado and his variations would have to wait. It wasn't easy to practice.
His ki felt pretty much the same, though his emotions did not. Koukin Shuyu's dominant emotion seemed to be a reluctant nervousness, and there was also a lot of pessimism. He would throw all of that out the window.
He had a new start, which did not feel like an old start. He looked at the white bead hanging from his left ear. He cataloged everything he knew about these beads. White was a D-rank. Green was an E-rank. Hakufu's bead was green. That wouldn't last long.
C-rank was bronze. B-rank was silver. A-rank was gold.
There were a few E-ranks at Nanyo. There were plenty of D-ranks, most of the school in fact; no one wanted to be E-rank if they could help it but most people were not inherently skilled or powerful and so could not rise easily. Most people stopped at D-rank if they rose at all.
A fair number of people had bronze beads. They were in the middle. Better than most, but little more than cannon fodder against those with real power.
A handful of people at Nanyo were B-rank, and they were held in awe. Gakushu was one. So was Saji Genpou. He knew there were others but he'd only met those two personally.
He did not know if anyone at Nanyo possessed a gold bead, and he did not know anyone who did. They were out there, at other schools, and he'd heard some names, but names without a face and a memory to go with them were little better than useless trivia.
The ranks were based mostly on your fight record. Who you had beaten. Koukin Shuyu had been D-rank because he didn't like to fight. He would if forced, but he shied away from it ordinarily. Training was fine; but using power against another person...not so much, unless there was no choice.
Ranma Saotome would not have been D-rank. B-rank at minimum, maybe A-rank. Or something better than A-rank. It would come up specifically for him. It wasn't arrogance. It was confidence. And memory of defeating enormously powerful opponents, even if only by using their own power against them, but there wasn't anything wrong with that! A win was a win.
Ranma Shuyu had inherited the old white bead. That wouldn't last long either. He had a feeling he would be forced up to bronze...and then to silver...maybe even to gold...and not in very much time if he wanted to protect Hakufu. He would protect her because she was family. There was nothing fated about it. It was just fact. It was what was done.
Fate could go hang.
He left the bathroom and started looking for his cousin.
The train ride and then the walk home were as he remembered, and done in relative quiet. He'd thought a couple times about some things to say to his “new” cousin, but couldn't fit the words together, so he didn't try. It was not like Ranma Saotome, but it was something like Koukin Shuyu, so it became the action of Ranma Shuyu. In the end they made it all the way back to the largish, traditionally-styled home on the large wooded lot without him having said a word.
Fate, he found, was not so easy to elude: along with his “new” cousin had come his “new” aunt, who was too much like Hakufu to guess that anyone else had raised his cousin, and he knew there hadn't been anyone else anyway. Hakufu's father was long dead; his own parents were absent. His mother, he didn't remember at all, couldn't even think of a face to go with the idea; and his father had left more than a year ago, just after he'd started at Nanyo Academy, in fact.
There had been an impromptu celebration of their arrival, with sake. He had carefully avoided actually drinking any. Hakufu had no such reservations, and had fallen asleep...or perhaps passed out...drunk. Aunt Goei...well, he'd avoided looking at her for a reason.
And now he found himself in the bath. He had hoped that the curse had not come along with him, but he was disappointed to find that it had. At least the hot water of the bath had restored him instantly, just as it should. He hoped he would not have to explain it to anyone, but he knew that hope was probably futile.
The doorway slid open just then, and in walked Hakufu, clearly still drunk. She did not seem to be aware of his presence, and slipped out of her dress and panties with apparently no compunction. Now naked, she stepped into the bath without washing off first.
Hakufu fell asleep almost immediately. He leaned back and stared at the ceiling, feeling a strange sort of pressure on him, and having no desire to understand what the pressure was.
He finished his bath, toweled off, and returned to his room for clothes. He then went to the living room to clean up from the “celebration”, only to find that it was already done. Aunt Goei was sitting seiza in the center of the room, her simple dark blue kimono back on properly.
“Ranma”, she said, without turning to look at him, “come sit near me.”
He started to do so. “How did you know it was me,” he asked, by way of starting a conversation.
The reply came in a warm voice. “My daughter is in the bath, asleep. It could be no one else.” A few moments passed. “There are also senses. I'm not without some tricks of my own.”
He remembered that this was definitely the case.
“Still,” and he realized she was still talking, “you've become very powerful yourself. I can tell you're much more powerful than your father ever was.”
He smiled. This, he liked hearing.
“Has it been very hard without him?” She looked at him, concern written on her face.
He shook his head. “Not really, Aunt Goei. I have school, and training, and father was never around much anyway.” It stunned him that this was the truth.
His aunt nodded, eyes closed. “Yes, my brother liked to work. Family was a secondary concern at best. It surprises me that he left, but then farming is a lot of work, just not contractual.” A reluctant smile crossed her face. “And please, just call me auntie.”
He nodded. “Auntie...why did you and Hakufu come here? It's not that you're not welcome, but, it's sudden, that's all.”
She sighed. “My daughter has a destiny, whether I want it for her or not. You do too, whether you like it or not. She has to conquer the country. You...I suspect, need someone to protect. If I can bring those two causes together, maybe I can save her and you both.” She shook her head. “We're all a mess, aren't we? My husband is dead, your mother is dead, your father is absent but was hardly around to begin with. But maybe we can fix something and still have it work.” She smiled, and it was a sad kind of smile.
She shook her head, and slowly rose. He did so also, believing the conversation over. “You'd best go to bed, nephew. You have school tomorrow. I'll get my daughter out of the bath.” He nodded.
“And also,” she continued in a sly voice, “when you want to make my daughter a woman, let me know so that I can be somewhere else that night.”
He stared at her, a horrified expression on his face, but had no response for a comment like that. It seemed that even in a new life he was not free from overly interfering parents.
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(Posted Tue, 16 Sep 2008 14:31)
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