Nabiki looked over at Ranma with a frown. “Is she coming?”
“She’ll be here,” Ranma affirmed. The two of them were on the street just outside the Tendos’ outer wall, packed and ready to go. Nabiki was genuinely impressed by Ranma’s frugal packing; they each had a single canteen, a bedroll, a small kettle, two changes of clothes, a mess kit, and various small tools such as a lighter, a sturdy knife, and a few cans of preserved food. Ranma’s pack was a bit bigger because he was also carrying both their tents.
Akane showed up, finally, accompanied by loud clanking noises. Ranma and Nabiki sighed once she finally came into sight. “Akane,” Nabiki asked, “what do you have in there?”
Akane blinked. “Not much. A few pots, some good firewood, plates and such, a thermos of tea, and a week of clothes and food. Oh, and my camping stuff. Where’s your packs?”
Nabiki silently turned around to let Akane see the pack not even half the size of Akane’s monster.
“Nabiki, you can’t last a week in the wilderness with just that!” Akane cried.
“Yes she can,” Ranma said smoothly. Akane would end up with a valuable lesson in survival at this rate. “We ain’t gonna be movin’ around much an’ it’s only an hour ta the city if we get inta trouble.” He looked Akane over and decided that her mistake wasn’t going to put her in danger, although by the end of the day she’d regret not asking for help. “Time to move out. We’re headed to tha mountains. Akane, set the pace.”
Akane frowned. “But Nabiki can’t keep up with us.”
Ranma smiled and looked to Nabiki. “Fine, then Nabiki, set the pace.”
Nabiki smiled back, feeling Ranma’s expectations. “Not a problem…”
Unseen by the trio, an imp took note of their exodus from the warded home. Its master would want to hear of this.
Gosunkugi’s perpetually bad mood worsened. “Make trouble for Saotome, frustrate Nabiki, and keep demons out of it. How the hell am I supposed to do that?” he asked the walls for the hundredth time. The litter of a dozen failed and half-finished plans littered his room. He picked one of them up and scanned it over. “Dammit, how do you deal with a jock without using demons?” He picked up another one. “Not when he has hot water at the nearest faucet.” Another. “Well this has a chance since that weird spell on him is gone.” Another. “Not with Tendo’s wards.”
Gosunkugi was in the middle of berating the limits placed on him when an imp entered his window. “Report,” he snapped.
“The cursed and his consort are leaving the city.”
“So?” Gosunkugi asked. “By the time we can prepare anything they’d be back in those wards. Incompetent wretch.”
“They had supplies for a week-long trip. Perhaps longer.”
Gosunkugi blinked twice and smiled cruelly. “Well, doesn’t that change things?” he mused, looking at a few plans he had rejected only moments before. “Go, follow them. Do not be seen, not even by the succubus. Tell me where they stop.”
“As you wish, master,” the imp replied, and then it was gone.
Gosunkugi smiled. He had learned from his mistakes and had properly broken his new minions, extracting proper servitude from them. It was only a matter of time until he mastered the skill, and then he would be one step closer to freedom. And then he would make Nabiki pay for bringing a classed demon down on his head. But for now, making her life difficult would have to do.
Ranma grunted slightly as he helped Nabiki climb over the rock. From Nabiki’s perspective, the most studly Ranma had hauled her up the meter-tall cliff in a way that demonstrated the delicious musculature that earned him the aforementioned studliness. Ranma turned his back to the rise and continued on his way. “Come on Akane, keep up!” he called.
Akane raised her head just enough to glare at Ranma before the sweat beading on her forehead dripped into her eyes. Wincing at yet another source of hurt in her body, she grabbed the dirt shelf and forced herself up it. She ended up lying face down on the rock, breathing heavily, too tired even to roll over and get the weight of her pack off her.
Nabiki stopped and found a rock to sit on while she regarded her little sister. They’d hiked further than she’d thought they would get in just one day and were clearly adding altitude as well as distance over the past hour. She was breathing heavily, she had what Ranma called a good sweat built up, and her legs had the burning sensation of just a little too much exercise. Even so, she wasn’t remotely as worn out as Akane. She should probably ask Ranma to stop-
“Okay,” Ranma called. “We’re stopping here for the night. Nabiki, can you set up the tents?”
Nabiki looked at Ranma in surprise while Akane just groaned in relief. “We’re stopping here?”
Ranma pointed to a clear patch a few meters beyond the ridge they’d just climbed. “We’re still in familiar territory. Pops an’ me use this spot ta stock up on water an’ such. There’s a stream just past those trees that don’t got a lotta stuff in it, but we still gotta boil it. I can take carea that while you set up the tents here.”
Akane turned her head to look at Ranma. “If we’re stopping, why did we have to climb that ledge?”
“Well sometimes that sorta thing means shelter, but ya saw the pattern on the rock? That means water goes by there. That stream I mentioned, it floods a bit when it rains an’ the extra runs right there. If we’d camped there, we coulda got very wet.”
Akane accepted that with a grunt and rolled so her pack wasn’t crushing her into the dirt. Her everything hurt, but she was beginning to remember to be grateful that Ranma called a halt. Smug pervert’s probably just as tired as I am, no more tired! she thought out. She glared at Ranma when she saw that he hadn’t even broken a sweat.
Ranma’s back was to Akane at that point and he was rummaging in his pack. He pulled out a small kettle and a metal bowl. It took him a few minutes of work but he cleared a patch of the rock cliff of branches and leaves and anything else flammable, then put the metal bowl there and filled it with the crude kindling. “I’ll go fill the kettle from the stream, then I’ll bring it back ta boil until it’s safe,” he told Akane. “How are ya doin?”
Akane reached for her pack. “I…I brought water,” she groaned.
Ranma nodded. “Figured. How much?”
“Ten liters, about,” Akane said.
Ranma shook his head and sighed. “Akane, do ya know how much that weighs?” Ranma didn’t, but he knew water was heavy so it was a lot. “An how long did ya expect that ta last with heavy trainin’?”
Akane shucked her pack and sat up slowly. “Well, how much did you bring?”
Ranma showed her his canteen. “Right here. Good for a day of easy hikin’.”
Akane blinked. “But…training?”
“That’s why ya train near a stream or somethin’,” Ranma explained. “Boil the water for a few seconds ta clean it an’ ya got all the water ya need.”
Akane looked back over her pack. “I guess I didn’t think about that,” she said.
Ranma nodded. “Mountain trainin’ means takin’ only what ya need. Now, what say we use soma yer water tonight to make it easier on ya tomorrow?”
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(Posted Tue, 15 Mar 2011 01:44)
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