In recent weeks, it had seemed as though Nabiki had been spending quite a few evenings away from home. Akane didn’t have any idea what it was about, though she did know that her sister had their father’s approval (of course, given Nabiki’s tendencies, it was entirely possible that what she had received approval for and what she was doing were two entirely different things). However, there was little doubt in Akane’s mind that these extracurricular activities, whatever they were, centered around the acquisition and retention of material wealth. Well, unless Nabiki was pulling a Nodoka on her family, that is.
Still, even taking the middle Tendo’s reputation for emotional distance into account, Akane still managed to find herself flabbergasted at her sister’s reaction to Ranma’s latest misadventure: “Huh, I bet he was mad.”
Quite frankly, after the rather detailed description of the incident that she’d provided, Akane was expecting a little more than a nonchalant six-word sentence in reply. “That’s it?!”
“Should there be more?”
“Ranma’s mother has been deceiving him for months!”
“And he was trying to do the same for months.”
“He’s being railroaded into doing something he has no interest in doing!”
“Unfortunate, yes, but hardly out of the ordinary where Ranma is concerned.”
“His mother is trying to take control of his life with no regard for his personal feelings whatsoever.”
“And this is different from everyone else he knows... how?”
“She wants him to make a career out of doing something that goes completely against his self-image.”
“Ah, I suppose that is a new spin on things, isn’t it?” Nabiki then turned her attention back to her ledgers.
The conversation paused for a few seconds, before Akane’s rapidly growing irritation started it up again. “Well?”
Her sister rolled her eyes as she was made to divert her attention from her personal finances again. “Well, what?”
“Aren’t you going to react to the ‘new spin on things?’“
“Why?”
“Because this whole thing is insane, even by Nerima’s standards!”
“Not really. Ranma gets pushed into doing potentially embarrassing things all the time—and I ought to know, seeing as how those embarrassing things tend to generate a treasure trove of wagers.”
“I can’t believe you aren’t unnerved by this. I mean, I know you’re unflappable, but this is ridiculous.”
“Of course it’s ridiculous. Everything around Ranma is ridiculous—or haven’t you been paying attention for the last year or so?”
“But... but it doesn’t make sense! Why would Auntie Nodoka make Ranma sign a suicide pact when she expected him to fail?”
“Who says she expected him to fail?”
“Well, she wanted him to become a man amongst men, right? He can’t do that as a magical girl.”
“Unless, of course, she believed that a ‘man amongst men’ would be someone so secure in his masculinity that taking on a job like this wouldn’t be any trouble at all.”
“Well, yeah... wait, what?”
“It would explain why she waited until now to make the suggestion. Even though she said the conditions of the contract were fulfilled, it wasn’t until recently that there was any evidence that Ranma’s self-image had that level of security.”
Akane seemed confused by this suggestion. “But... where would she get an idea like that?”
Nabiki couldn’t resist a smirk as she answered, “I seem to remember a certain fiancée of Ranma’s telling her family that he said he’d accepted that his girl side was a part of who he was, and that maybe it was never a curse to be cured to begin with.”
This earned a scowl in response. “If you’re referring to what he said after Jusendo, he only said that because the springs were flooded and he couldn’t get cured.”
“Nevertheless, he did say it, and that’s more than enough reason for Nodoka to think her plan would work.”
“But that taking things way out of context!”
Nabiki responded to her sister’s indignation with a loud guffaw. “Akane, I hardly think you’re in any position to judge others for taking Ranma out of context.”
“I... I’ve been getting better about it.”
“Uh-huh... so what happened last Tuesday?”
That Nabiki would bring up that subject was obviously far from Akane’s expectations, given her decidedly lackluster response: “Look, I had no way of knowing that he was in a Martial Arts Burlesque competition, okay?”
“Other than calmly asking him what was going on? Before serving him a knuckle sandwich?”
“So I have problems giving him the benefit of a doubt. Old habits die hard, okay? That still doesn’t make it any less wrong for his mother to pull this on him based on some offhand comment he made.”
“Maybe not, but there’s not much anyone can do about it. Taking that boy out of context is the engine that drives life in Nerima forward.”
Akane’s eyes narrowed. “That’s a really lame metaphor, Nabiki. Besides, Mishima’s behind plenty of craziness around here.”
“You’re missing the point, sis.”
“And that is?”
“That Nodoka, did, in fact, have reason to think Ranma wouldn’t have any problem being a magical girl. The fact that the reason isn’t very good is utterly insignificant,” Nabiki ended with a smug, self-satisfied look on her face.
“Uh huh,” Akane replied skeptically. “So, out of curiosity, just how much money do you stand to make if Ranma goes through with this?”
Nabiki flashed her standard up-to-no-good smile. “You have no idea.”
See other episodes by Kwakerjak
(Posted Tue, 19 Aug 2008 04:53)
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.