Diana was sure she'd been more miserable before in her life, but it couldn't have been by much. At least this time, it was (mostly) by her own choice. Still, she was tired, she was cold, and she was wet; really wet. Heavy, matted fur and a steady trickle of veritable ice water down her spine, wet.
What's worse, she couldn't even lie down and curl up to conserve warmth. She'd found that out when the rain first started and a puddle had formed in her makeshift nest on top of the pack. And so she sat up to let most of the water run off instead. Sitting in a small puddle is better than lying in a large one, after all.
And so, this bedraggled little cat sat, with her head down and her shoulders hunched, casting an irritable gaze around at the thick, heavy drizzle that collected on everything. She had gotten into the habit of talking to Ranma, whether he was listening or not, to take her mind off of the water running down her back and into her eyes, and dripping off of her whiskers. Speaking of Ranma, she might as well try to get him talking again. She turned a sullen glower to the back of his head.
"Doesn't this bother you at all?" And this was a genuine question, not just an attempt at conversation. In her mind, the absolute worst thing about this experience was that he didn't seem to mind at all. He had to be as cold and wet as she was, yet he continued at his easy jogging pace as if unaware of his soggy circumstances.
"Hmm?" came his distracted reponse. Diana was suprised, despite herself. He had been all but ignoring her for the past hour. Still, if he was paying attention again she'd make it count.
"This rain! And how come you've been ignoring me?"
"I ain't ignoring nothing! You just talk to yourself a lot." This all delivered in that same distracted manner. (Though becoming noticable less so.)
"I do not talk to myself!" She just talked to people whether she expected a response or not; there was a difference. "Anyway, I wanted to know how you can stand this!" She gestured with a paw, incidentally flicking some water onto his neck.
"Mmm." She thought he was going to ignore her again when he answered: "This ain't so bad... I've seen worse." He reached up and squeezed a bit water out of his pigtail. "'Sides... at least I ain't turning inta..." He trailed off and slowed to a walk for a dozen or so steps. Diana figured his eyes went vacant for a moment as well.
"What?" She hoped he could remember more this time. He just turned his head and look at her from the corner of his eye. "Turning into what?" He just shook his head.
"Don't know..." For the next few minutes, the only sound was the 'splish' of his feet hitting the wet ground and both gathered their thoughts. "I got a question." The abruptness of Ranma's declaration almost startled her.
"What?" She listened attentively for a few moments and became irritated when he didn't ask immediately. She was just opening her mouth when he spoke:
"How did you know... well, what you did?"
"Could you, maybe, be a little less vague." She pushed her annoyance aside. She had long since learned that he was less than eloquent.
Remarkably, he seemed to pick up on her mood. "Sorry... I mean... when you said my princess..." He stopped there, wondering how he could make it any more clear without knowing more.
"Oh..." She got a measure of satisfaction when she heard him sigh in (she hoped) relief. "You honestly want to know?" He made an impatient gesture with his head, so she continued. "Truthfully, I don't know. I wasn't even the first choice to carry out this, uh, 'mission.' I really only know what she- I was told."
Ranma turned his head to the side again. "'She?'"
"Er... sorry, can't say." She hoped he would just let it go at that.
"Huh, why not?" So much for hoping. She didn't want to lie to him, but maybe she could throw him a bone without revealing too much.
"We-ell..." she lilted, "what do you know about time travel?"
"Oh, you're from the future or somethin'?" She was speechless at that. "And you're here to make sure somethin' happens the way you need it to, but ya can't let me know too much, right?" His grasp of the situation amazed her. And his casual acceptance of the unusual showed itself again. Her temper frayed and snapped. "How can you just shrug this sort of thing off?!" At hearing how shrill her voice had gotten, she reined in her temper and continued. "I mean, a lot of people would laugh and call it nonsense! Anyone would be at least skeptical and want proof!" Her temper started to get away from her again and she stood with her front paws on his head. "Most people would think you were insane if you told them you were a time-traveler, or had memories of a alternate future," she winced; she hadn't meant to let that one slip. She scrambled to continue and maybe gloss over that blunder, "or, or, or talked to CATS!" She settled back onto the pack and waited pensively for him to say something.
For his part, he had slowed to a stop halfway through her tirade. He stood, considering his clenching fist until she finished, the he said, seriously, "I ain't most people..." Diana nodded, unsurprised at his statement. "And you're makin' it seem like ya don't want me to believe you." She had to consider that. "The rain's stopped, wanna go somewhere'n dry off?" Her head jerked up, she was incredulous at the subject change as well as surprised that she hadn't noticed before. She couldn't let that go, however:
"Ranma! Don't you-"
"Diana..." His voice was still serious, frighteningly so, "it's not that I don't think it's weird, it's just that... I seen too much not to at least keep an open mind. You wouldn't believe some of the crap I've had ta deal with. I mean, I even..." his voice went distant and trailed off. "God! This is so..." he pressed the heels of his hands into his eyes briefly, "I swear I remember this stuff an' I try ta think about it an' it's... god... it's just gone..." To her, his voice conveyed disgruntlement, frustration, and, somehow... grief.
Diana was unsure how to help him at this point, so she figured they should just take things one at a time. She climbed off of his pack and slid down his chest, forcing him to catch her. She peered up at his face and met his somewhat surprised gaze. "Ranma, let's just go, huh? Getting dry is a good idea..."
He heaved a great sigh and nodded, "yeah... yeah, OK. There should be a coffee house or somethin' still open."
Diana draped herself along his forearm and settled in. She should have done this sooner; it's much warmer here than on the pack. "Good. The sooner the better." Ranma just tightened his hold on here a little and picked up the pace.
Though they resolved to worry about certain issues later, neither could keep them completely out of mind. And the silent run just gave both more time to brood on it.
"Damnit."
Diana agreed with that sentiment wholeheartedly.
******************************************************************
Setsuna watched the exchange as she had watched since the start of the entire debacle, and would continue watching until circumstances where more secure. Diana had almost told him too much, but she didn't dare bring her back yet. It would have to wait until she got Ranma to Hotaru. She put a hand to her head. If she got him to Hotaru. The sound of paper crinkling drew her attention elsewhere for a moment.
"Small La-" She cut off at Usa's glower, "I mean, Usagi, what are you doing?"
"Shouldn't you be paying more attention to the assignment?" She asked, too innocently.
"It doesn't need my complete and total attention every second. Diana's doing fine for the moment." She plucked the magazine from Usagi's hands and smiled a little in amusement at what she saw. "Weren't you saying not too long ago, and I quote: 'He doesn't look like much now, does he?' Where did you get this?"
Usa pouted, "he's still cute, even if he still doesn't-"
Setsuna cut her off, "Yes, I know, but he's not for you, so get any thoughts like that out of your head right now." She held up the magazine, "Beside which, this is exactly why we sent Diana instead of you."
Usa's pout upgraded to a sulk, "I thought it was because she was from the 'original' future..."
Setsuna's mouth compressed into a thin line as she turned back to the Gate. She let the magazine fade into nothing and thought:
"Small Lady is getting too smart for anyone's good, much less her own..."
Read the comments on this episode
(Posted Sun, 23 Mar 2003 09:49)
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.