"Then what?" said Ranma. "If you're going to keep asking for a price, I'll get more lewd."
Nanoha took two deep breaths, muttered something to herself, and looked up to see him walking off. "Hey, don't leave!"
"Alright," said Ranma. He turned back and put out his hand. "Take off your shirt and hand it to me." Ranma watched Nanoha redden and back away despite herself. "Too much? I could pay that, personally. Must be different for girls."
Nanoha's twitching made him want to poke her more, but Ranma restrained himself. He wanted to make her angry, but if anger overwhelmed her pride, she'd really take off her shirt. That would be terrible.
"What do you want with it?" said Nanoha, probably to stall for time to think.
Ranma worded his response carefully. "Nothing especially wholesome."
Nanoha clenched up her body and forced herself to stop shaking. "I didn't know," she said with a calmness Ranma hadn't expected, "that you were such a pervert."
"Ouch," said Ranma without a blink. "I've been called a perv. I better watch out."
"Why else would you want my shirt? You just want to see my chest!"
Ranma eyebrows flew upward. "You have one?"
His surprise must've sounded genuine, because Nanoha's fists tightened. "Yes I do!"
"Prove it."
"I will!"
Ranma felt his eyes bug out as Nanoha reached for the bottom of her shirt and pulled it over her navel.
Only the call of gulls broke the early morning silence.
Nanoha lowered her shirt in defeat. "Why didn't you back off?!"
"You choose to take the price," said Ranma, then he sighed in relief. "Wimped out though, which means no blackmail material for me, but I don't get struck blind either. Let's leave it there."
Nanoha grabbed her hair in frustration. "Principal Konoe said you would be nice to girls. How can you be so ungentlemanly?"
Now she questioned one of his life principles? Ranma frowned. "I'm nicer than I have to be."
"If you were nice, you wouldn't be treating me this way."
Ranma wordlessly pointed to where Nanoha kicked his shin.
"I'm sorry," said Nanoha with no apology in her voice. "Besides, it's when others treat you badly that niceness means the most, right?"
Ranma's frown deepened. "True. And how should I demonstrate niceness towards girls, since you're so smart?"
"Teach me," said Nanoha in triumph.
"No. Teaching you is not a kindness."
He could feel his frown deepening even more, but if Nanoha noticed, she didn't let it bother her. "Yes it does."
"No, it doesn't. My view counts."
Nanoha crossed her arms. "If you're trying to be nice, you're not doing much of a job."
"You're stupid."
The two of them glared at each other.
"If you have my support," said Nanoha later that morning as she followed Ranma to school, "I can get the council to back you. Otherwise, you won't have any pull with anybody."
Ranma turned and yelled, "Will you go away?!"
Nanoha continued to energetically ignore Ranma's irritation.
"I don't want your support," said Ranma. "You work for Konoe, so you're not on my side."
"Yes I am." Nanoha pointed to the red patch on her shoulder. "It's my duty to preserve the peace, and if you're improving the school then being on your side is my job."
Is she saying that all they needed was the same goal? Ranma spoke slowly and with much emphasis: "You're an idiot!"
Ranma turned and walked toward school again. Why did Old Man Konoe tell this girl where he lived? How would he have any privacy?
"Stop muttering," said Nanoha from right next to him. "It's creepy."
Case in point.
"Maybe if you're creeped out," said Ranma, "you'll go away."
"I'm not that easy to—"
"You almost took off your shirt right in front of me. How not easy are you?"
The bruise Takamichi put on Ranma's cheek was already healing, but still sensitive enough to feel Nanoha's burning glare. "I can't believe you actually asked for that," she said.
"I didn't get out of bed planning it."
"And what if I did take off my shirt?"
"Then today would be the first of many days in which I greet you with 'Nanoha, you whore'."
He waited for a kick to his shin, or maybe a knapsack to his head. To his puzzlement, Nanoha's only response was a flat, "You're sick."
"I'm also not teaching you. Profit!"
Nanoha gave an exasperated huff, but she didn't press the point.
As they approached the school gate, Ranma heard a commotion more and more clearly, and as the courtyard came into view he saw what the crowd there did: a two-person-deep pile of kids punching, biting, and yelling their heads off.
"My day continues."
Ranma ignored Nanoha's dark look and walked into the courtyard, where bystanders saw him and backed off, no doubt expecting the unholy ass-kicking he promised for crap like this. Ranma didn't want to beat anybody up, though.
Okay, maybe a little.
He strode up to the pile and kicked off the top row of kids—some with red arm patches—onto the courtyard concrete. When the kids saw him, they stopped fighting immediately, and Ranma noticed they all stood quite focused on him. "I'm guessing," Ranma said to the green-haired girl from the bottom of the pile, "that you were waiting for me."
Green stared at him. "You mean you're Ranma Saotome?! You're the guy everybody's been talking about? The one who got in a fight with Takahata? You lied to me!"
Ranma invested a whole second of thought into his reply. "I do that."
"Move," said the boy from the pile's bottom who had been fighting Green. He shoved her aside and walked up into Ranma's face.
Ranma looked at the unfamiliar boy, who was a bit scruffy but not much injured despite brawling with Green. Maybe she didn't bring weapons today. Ranma watched Green recover from the boy's push, but she said nothing.
"Hey!" said the boy. "I'm talking to you!"
"Did you have to shove a girl," asked Ranma, "just to talk to me? Couldn't you walk around her?"
"Shut up," said the boy. "I'm only here to tell you that the student committee won't work with you, even though you have support from Mahora's private schools."
Ranma noted the red patch on the boy's shoulder. Bravado and rudeness he could overlook, but not obstruction from the whole student council. "Why not cooperate? It'll hurt less."
"Because even if you told everybody not to fight, you're new here. You know nothing about this school. More than that, you're violent, and nobody trusts you to make things better."
He didn't care about the student council's trust, and he didn't care for their opposition or their attitude. "Your council has to disappear, then."
Before the boy could answer, Nanoha jumped unwelcome into Ranma's business as if she didn't learn the lesson last time. "Stop! Stop! You don't need to go that far!"
Ranma looked at Nanoha, which she took as permission to contribute. She turned to the boy. "Don't worry about Saotome. I'm keeping an eye on him and making sure he doesn't do anything bad."
"Why are you doing that?" said the boy in clear suspicion.
"I was hired to guard him by Konoemon Konoe."
The boy snorted at that name. "The student council is empowered by this school. We don't take orders from outsiders, and we don't need anybody to watch Saotome, because he's not going to do whatever he likes anyway. You're one of us, Takamachi. Whatever you've got going with the people from the private schools, drop it."
Ranma had a bad feeling. It would be great if Nanoha bent under peer pressure, but—
Nanoha frowned. "I can't do that. I've already accepted this job because I think it'll work out, and I stand by that decision."
—he didn't think so.
The boy looked taken aback by Nanoha's reply, and considered a moment before saying, "Fine then, you're out of the disciplinary subcommittee."
The other red-patched kids murmured quietly at the news, and Ranma groaned.
Nanoha took a deep breath, and Ranma wondered if she was already prepared for this. He was puzzled enough that she didn't start crying immediately.
He was close enough to see Nanoha tremble, but instead of speaking, she put a hand on her red shoulder patch. For a second Ranma thought she would pull it off—not a good move, since it looked securely stitched on—but all she did was cover it with her fingers.
The boy narrowed his eyes at this gesture, then shifted his gaze to Ranma. "You better prepare yourself, Saotome."
"If you want to attack him," yelled Nanoha to everyone's surprise as she stepped in front of Ranma, "you'll have to go through me first!"
It was an amusing paradox. People will get used to a condescending jerk, but if that jerk smiles and hums and acts cheerful, they soil themselves.
Ranma smiled and hummed and cheerfully cut white construction paper into confetti bits, while his classmates stared at him as if he was cutting confetti bits from fresh baby skin.
Ah well, people avoided him. What else was new?
The final bell beeped. Ranma gathered up his handiwork, and with a busy afternoon on his mind, he jogged through the school, arriving at the second floor just in time to catch Nanoha leaving her homeroom. Nanoha stopped in surprise, which gave Ranma the pause he needed to take out his handkerchief and go for her face.
Nanoha batted his hand away like it was an attack, but she lacked the energy to fend him off before he wiped her eyes.
"It's been a whole day," said Ranma. "Brighten up."
Nanoha glowered at him with reddened eyes. Even though she didn't bawl this morning in front of all those people, Ranma could only imagine how much she did in private. "What are you so cheery about?" she said.
Ranma smiled wide. "I'm very happy. You stood by me even though you lost new friends and whatever you've gained this week."
"This morning you told me to go away, but now you're happy I'm sticking with you?"
"Happiness is mysterious."
"If you were happy I'm around," asked Nanoha with an exasperated look, "why did you ask them to take me back?"
"Why didn't you?" said Ranma. He folded up his handkerchief and put it back into his pocket. "Well, I'm sure you had reasons, but I wanted to try. And when it didn't work, I had an excuse to punch that guy in the neck."
"What do you want?" said Nanoha angrily. "Did you come to gloat? About how I didn't betray the committee, but they dumped me?"
Ranma shook his head. "You don't need that right now."
"Yeah, you're so sensitive about other people's feelings."
"It comes, it goes."
"What do you want?" said Nanoha again.
Okay, he could see she was focused. Ranma tried another way to distract her. "I want you to take me to the teachers' room."
Nanoha gave him a weird look. "You don't know where it is?"
"Sure I do. I want you to take me."
"Why? To waste my time?"
"You're going to hang around," said Ranma as he smiled. "Why not be useful?"
Nanoha couldn't refuse. They arrived at the first floor teachers' office, and Ranma barged in without a greeting.
Among the aisles of paper-covered desks, a few teachers stopped talking and stared. They must all know him, because they didn't protest his presence. That speeds things.
Ranma walked across the room, scanning the desks and cabinets until he reached the windows at the end of the aisle. They opened towards the sports field, where some kids stood smoking. Ranma watched those kids for a moment, then focused on the white-painted windowsill and ran his hand over window lock.
Abruptly, he turned around and fixed the teachers in his gaze. "Where do you people keep records of student behavior?"
None of the teachers answered.
Ranma sighed, and walked back across the room and out the door.
"What was that?" said Nanoha as soon as he entered the hallway again.
"I'm hungry," said Ranma with no sign he heard Nanoha's question. "Didn't have lunch today. You want to get something to eat?"
Nanoha's eyes narrowed. "No. No, not really."
Ranma turned and looked at the girl for a very long second, and Nanoha managed the first two letters of "why are you grinning" before Ranma's left hand clamped onto her arm.
"Wh—"
Ranma's left hand clamped onto her arm, and he began walking down the hall toward the school exit. "It's a good thing I'm not sensitive about other people's feelings," he said as he dragged Nanoha like a stubborn mule. "It's so easy to ignore you."
"Let go of me!"
Nanoha's struggles were hard, but Ranma's grip was harder. "Don't shout. You'll make a scene."
"I said I don't want to go with you!"
"I don't give a damn. Besides, what would you do with your afternoon anyway?"
The students in the hall averted their eyes as he continued to advance, and Nanoha was too embarrassed to resist for long.
Nanoha had a very angry face, and Ranma distracted himself with the coffee shop menu instead of meeting her eyes. He rolled a 500-yen coin back and forth across the fingers of his right hand, but that was less about looking nonchalant and more about exercising his knuckles. They still hurt.
Once again, Nanoha asked, "What do you want?"
"I think," said Ranma without looking at her, "I'll try this strawberry-lemon parfait."
He could almost hear a nerve snap.
"That's not what I meant!"
"I know," said Ranma, which just made Nanoha crack even more.
"Didn't you say you'd be busy today?" said Nanoha after the nervous glances from other customers all turned away.
"Oh, don't you worry. This won't take long." Ranma turned back to the pictures on the menu. "Parfait does looks nice nice. What do you think?"
When Nanoha didn't answer, he looked up. The girl's glare was still unpleasant. "Parfait," Nanoha said when he met her eyes at last, "is too girly for you."
Ranma chuckled, and he continued chuckling until Nanoha said, "I don't know what you're laughing at, but I didn't say anything so funny."
"No," said Ranma. "That's the sort of thing easy people worry about." When Nanoha's glare deepened, he realized what he said and quickly amended himself. "Wait, not easy people. I mean it's what people used to ease worry about."
"Used to ease? I don't remember having much ease since starting school with you. Are you making fun of me?"
"I'm not," said Ranma. "I'm just reminded that your perspective is different."
Nanoha looked like she wanted to question him, but the waiter arrived first. "What would you like to order?" said the man.
"Item number three will do it for me," said Ranma as he pointed to the parfait on the menu, and turned to Nanoha. "You?"
Nanoha eyed the menu. "Dorayaki, please."
"Really?" said Ranma. "You can get something better than that. I'll treat you."
Suspicion flared in Nanoha's eyes. "You're being weirdly generous."
"Konoe'll give me extra cash to pay for a girl."
Nanoha considered that, then turned to the waiter. "A slice of vanilla cream cake." The waiter left with their order and Ranma sat back with a grin that Nanoha didn't like. "What's the look for?"
Ranma rolled his 500-yen coin over his fingers and pondered how Nanoha was shaping into a materialistic woman, but he couldn't say that out loud.
"If you're not answering me, I'm leaving."
"I won't stop you," said Ranma just a little mock-sadly. "But if you leave, I'll eat all your food."
Nanoha didn't go, though she grumbled a bit as she watched him fiddling with his coin.
"Do you have to do that?" she said after a minute's wait.
"It's important," said Ranma. Then he leaned in and loudly whispered, "It's magic!"
Nanoha voice was deadpan. "Magic."
Ranma placed the coin onto the tabletop and both hands flat on the table, covering the coin with his right hand. He rubbed that palm over the coin, then with fingers still extended, he lifted both hands.
The tabletop was empty.
Ranma curled both hands into fists, then planted his elbows on the table with fists held up and knuckles forward. "Guess which hand."
"You palmed it," said Nanoha, and pointed to his right hand.
"On the right track," said Ranma as he opened his left hand instead. "But didn't pull into the station."
Nanoha blinked at the 500-yen coin that fell onto the table.
"Ha!" said a new voice. "I see through that trick. You're holding two coins!"
Ranma looked up at Green's smirking face and opened his right hand, sending a tiny snowfall of white confetti onto the table.
Green gaped, which gave Ranma a little satisfaction. He blew the rest of the paper off his hand, wondering if he should've cut them smaller.
"You're Mion Sonozaki," said Nanoha to the interloper, and Ranma resigned himself to losing Nanoha's interest. "Why are you here?"
Green—
Ranma hurriedly replaced her label with her name.
—Mion recovered her thoughts in a snap. She leaned over the table and grabbed Nanoha by the shoulders. "Are you okay?"
"Yes?" said Nanoha in confusion.
Mion smiled and let go. "Great. Those council guys are assholes like that."
Ah, Ranma remembered. Mion witnessed Nanoha's dismissal this morning. Weapons dealing aside, she seemed the nice sort.
Ranma looked Mion over. Nice sort aside, she was carrying a gun on a shoulder holster. It was a plastic toy, but... Mion gave mixed signals.
Mion turned to Ranma, but before she could speak, Ranma asked, "Want something to eat? I'll treat."
"Err, no. I want to beat you up for lying to me."
Ranma grimaced. "I lied for you too. Call it even?"
Mion's hand went to her holster, and without any warning she pointed the gun at Ranma's chest and pulled the trigger.
The gun released a slight puff and launched a small metal ball from the barrel, which bounced off Ranma's jacket with a glassy plink.
"Plink?" said Mion in the following silence. She stared at Ranma's face. "Hmm, y—"
She got no further before Nanoha grabbed her by the back of the head.
Ranma flinched from the sound Mion made slamming into the table. He flinched again when Mion twisted free and threw Nanoha into the next table. Nanoha stood up with livid eyes focused on Mion and grabbed the table knife nearby.
Wow. Okay. That devolved fast.
Should he do something?
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(Posted Sat, 01 Aug 2009 00:07)
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