".. giving me a headache.." and ".. pick up.." were audible, though the rest was lost. Still, it was Ranma's voice, yet the timber.. Akane decided to listen, and settled in to hear more, her mind settling into Ready-Mode.
Ready-Mode was unfortunately all too well-suited to not raise a alert for Ranma, especially with the Pigtailed Psychic trying to drill raised defenses from mental spillover into reflex.
It all has to do with Happosai's take on the techniques integrated into the Indiscriminate Grappling/Anything Goes mindset and Art. Mindset, as Happi was very aware that opponents reading *HIM* or his students mostly invalidated the benefits of reading the style of the opponent. Zen Buddhism had the solution, in the concept of 'action without thought', simply reacting to the world's requirements based off what is perceived, not polluting that clarity with second-guessing. That kind of instinctive reaction was put into the training and the Art as a whole.
Incidentally, this, linked with the training to be as emotional and expressive as possible--thus training higher Chi output--resulted in the drawbacks of every Anything Goes user and trainee, from Happi himself on down.
Genma's greed, Soun's camaraderie-turned-dependency and overt emotional ways, Happi's pettiness and lusts, Ranma's ego, Kasumi's obliviousness, Akane's anger, and Nabiki's inability to move past self-interest despite excellent tactical and strategic thinking.. all this comes from strong untrained passions colliding with instinctively avoiding overthinking things. But we digress. Suffice to say, Akane was not actively spiking emotions.. yet.
She listened as Nabiki's voice said "Gee, tha.. lot, Saotome, I can tell you.. real hoot in school. Could you.. one *else* to practice.. ?" through the wall. This sounded funny, but wasn't enough to rescue her with yet. Besides, Nabiki deserved some small grief, in Akane's view.
Akane's next heard snippet was "Now, now, Nabiki-chan, you're too cute to ignore.." followed by "Besides, I'm.. cognizant of reality, including why you wouldn't want.. a Pop like Pops as a.. in-law." That stunner was followed by ".. tell you, free of charge, that ahou is nowhere NEAR a father figure, seeing as I..", which snippets whirled around her mind, as Ranma was concentrating on Nabiki, thus missing the intermittant eavesdropping.
Nabiki's words also had Akane's attention, at least what she could hear of them.. "Ranma, I'm.. of your problems, remember? This isn't some ploy to.. in the hot seat with the Fiancee Front, is it?.. 'Cause if it is.."
She left then to think this thru, missing out on anything that might be said after. By this time, Akane's views on Ranma were flipping about like mad, anyway! She'd always been frustrated, attracted, yet so wary, hell scared of the man, but from the sounds of what she's hearing now, Ranma's been desperately trying to save them all from having Genma for a *ugh* father figure! 'Least that's her take on it.
She couldn't help but murmur to herself as she took off for the Thinking Spot under the bridge, Ranma's usual place for alone-time. It seemed apropos, as she was muttering about him. "Kami.. it makes sense! Ranma.. you let them glomp and bash and cling, you made me mad so often.. But you always stayed close, you fought tooth and nail to never truly drive us away.. You poor soul!" Akane was going into a Romantic Tizzy by this time, dreaming of Ranma wanting love but never daring accept it for fear of saaddling the girl with Genma. It got a trifle stupid, really, but hey--she IS Soun's daughter.
By the time she got done crying and bashing parts of the bridge underside she figured weren't load-bearing, Akane had made up her mind. Ranma was sacrificing his own happiness, over that sack of slime Genma! Time things changed.
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(Posted Thu, 13 Nov 2003 06:10)
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