Waters Under Earth

A Ranma 1/2 Fanfic by Alan Harnum 
-harnums@thekeep.org
-harnums@hotmail.com (old/backup)

All Ranma characters are the property of Rumiko Takahashi, first
published by Shogakukan in Japan and brought over to North
America by Viz Communications.

Waters Under Earth at Transpacific Fanfiction:  
http://www.humbug.org.au/~wendigo/transp.html
http://users.ev1.net/~adina/shrines2/fanfics.html

Chapter 4 : The Motive of the Deed

     "We home, great-grandmother," Shampoo called as she slid the
door open with the edge of her foot and came into the restaurant,
a paper bag of groceries under each arm.  Mousse followed behind
her, staggering slightly under the heavy load of two bags under
each arm.

     There was no answer.  Shampoo put the grocery bags on a
nearby table and tossed her hair behind her head before calling
out again.  "We no able to find mandrake root at grocery store,
so we go to herbalist, but..."

     "She's gone out, Shampoo," Mousse said quietly from behind
her as he put his bags next to hers.

     Shampoo sniffed and looked back at him.  "You no know what
you talk about.  Great-grandmother just not hear us."

     "The old ghoul hears like a bat," Mousse said, taking off
his glasses and cleaning them against the sleeve of his robe.
"If she was here, she'd be down here by now."

     "Great-grandmother!" Shampoo called again, before shrugging
and acquiescing to Mousse's suggestion.  Cologne didn't often go
out during the day, but it wasn't an unknown thing.

     "Since Cologne's gone out, would you like to-" Mousse began.

     "No," Shampoo said, starting towards the back area of the
restaurant where the stairs to the second floor were located.
"Go and unload groceries, Mousse."

     "Aren't you going to help?"

     Shampoo didn't even respond.  Behind her, she heard Mousse
give a gentle sigh, but she didn't look back.  She heard the
crinkle of paper bags and the soft sliding of his feet across the
floor as he headed for the kitchen, but she was already heading
up the stairs.  They creaked slightly under her footsteps, as she
walked up to where the three of them had their rooms.  The
building, even the second floor, always smelled vaguely of herbs
and spices, the drifting scent of all the cooking done during the
day lingering on.

     She was past Cologne's room by a few steps before she
realized the door was open.  She frowned.

     "Great-grandmother never leave door open," she said quietly
to herself, stepping back and glancing inside.  After a moment of
hesitation, she stepped into the room.  The door was open, after
all.

     She frowned, sweeping her eyes across the open closet and
the bed, the desk and the discarded robe on the floor with the
wooden staff laid across it.

     Her eye picked up on the last object, and she took a step
forward and knelt down by it, feeling a cold pit open up in her
stomach and spread ice water through her arms and legs.

     The robe was the one her great-grandmother had been wearing
this morning.  Now it was in a heap, like a discarded cocoon of
heavy green fabric.

     That was not disturbing in itself, for it was the staff that
truly made her feel afraid.  An ancient piece of wood that her
great-grandmother had carried with her for all the time she'd
known her, serving alternately as walking stick, perch, reaching
tool, weapon and crutch.  It had always seemed a part of the old
woman, something inseparable.

     And now it lay abandoned, as if she no longer needed it.

     There was something very, very wrong.

**********

     "Miss Kuonji?"

     "Hmm?"

     "School's been over for an hour now for students.  You can
go home if you want."

     "I know."

     Hinako-sensei looked at the sad-faced girl for a moment,
then settled down beside her against the bank of shoe cubbies.
"Are you feeling okay?" the child asked, drawing her knees up to
her chest and hugging her arms around them as she peered at Ukyou
with wide brown eyes.  "Do you have the flu?"

     "No.  I'm okay," Ukyou said after a moment.

     "Okay!" Hinako said as she hopped back up.  "Well, you
should leave soon.  Wouldn't want to get locked in, would you?"

     "Guess not," Ukyou said as if she'd just realized it
herself.

     "Don't forget to do your homework!  Have a nice weekend!"
the teacher said as she skipped off.  When she turned a corner in
the hall and vanished from sight, Ukyou finally rose up and
adjusted the positioning of the spatula across her back.  It felt
as if it weighed a thousand pounds.

     Sighing, she trudged through the mostly-empty hallways until
she reached the front doors of the school, and from there stepped
out into the courtyard of Furinkan.  The waters of the early
morning rain still puddled in places, and overhead hung gray
clouds that promised still more downpour.  

     There wasn't much else to do but go back home, she realized
with a kind of dull acceptance.  Back to the restaurant, back to
Konatsu and his slight, feminine presence and gentle affections.

     She walked towards the open gates that led out onto the
streets of Nerima, and imagined as the sun hit her face that
perhaps she could still taste his lips on hers, though it had
been over four hours ago.  That the kiss had been by her efforts
alone was not the important thing to her mind.  That it had
lasted less than a second before Ranma pushed her away in shock
was not so important either.

     Only the memory.  One last thing to cling to.  Because she
had to cling to something.

     "Hey," someone said to her as she walked out the gate, and
it was so like how Ranma had greeted her a few hours earlier that
a small part of her thought for a moment it was him, and then she
realized the voice was wrong.

     "Hey Ryoga," she said, turning to look at the boy where he
leaned against the stone wall with the Furinkan name plate on it.
His arms were crossed over his chest, and the look on his face
was like that of a soldier who had just realized the true horror
of war.

     He stepped towards her, with the easy grace that belied his
build and marked him as a fighter.  His shoulders seemed to hunch
slightly under the weight of his huge pack, although she'd seen
him carry it many times before as if it were a feather.

     The red bamboo umbrella was nowhere to be seen.  Noticing
its absence reminded her of what it had almost been used for this
afternoon, and she felt a cold anger rising in her towards Ryoga.

     "Where's that one-ton parasol you carry around?" she asked,
regretting the words as soon as they left her mouth.

     Ryoga's face looked haggard, bathed in shadows from where he
stood near the wall.  "I'm not sure.  I think I dropped it when
Ranma and I got drained.  I... I don't think I want it back
anyway."

     Ukyou inclined her head slowly to one side.  "Why not?"

     "I think it's a part of me I'd like to leave behind," Ryoga
said slowly.  "Something... I don't think I need any more."

     "You nearly killed him," Ukyou said.

     "Yeah," Ryoga said, and while there was no joy in it, there
was no guilt either, just a calm, mute acceptance of a fact he'd
realized long ago.

     "Shouldn't you be kicking yourself and moaning about the
next time?" Ukyou said, taking a step forward so that she stood
only a few feet from him.

     "No," Ryoga said.  "No, I don't think there's going to be a
next time for Ranma and I."

     Ukyou slowly nodded, and felt her anger begin to slip away.
"I'm... glad to hear that."

     "I wish I knew if I was," Ryoga said cryptically.

     "So you're giving up on Akane?"

     Ryoga closed his eyes, and tilted his head back to look at
the sun, still able to see the light despite blindness.  "I don't
know.  I know that I should, and yet..."

     His left hand came up and traced the side of his chest over
the heart.  "This knows only itself."

     "What about that other girl Ranma mentioned?" Ukyou said.
"Akari?"

     Ryoga nodded slowly, his eyes opening again.  "Yes?"

     "Do you love her?"

     Ryoga blushed and mumbled something, then started to walk
past her.  Ukyou reached out and grabbed his arm.  "Ryoga?"

     "It's not your business," Ryoga said hotly.

     "No, it isn't," Ukyou said, dropping her hand from his
sleeve.  "Forget I said anything in the first place."

     She drew a long, shuddering breath and walked quickly past
him.  Before she'd taken more than two steps, his hand was on her
shoulder, with that same gentle but impossible to resist grip
that he'd used to stop her from slapping Ranma again earlier this
afternoon, that same steel-soft strength that he'd moved her out
of his way with when she'd tried to stop them fighting.

     "Uh... wait... uhh..." Ryoga said, his hesitant voice an
utter contrast to the strong surety of his grip.  "You really
want to know?"

     "Maybe," Ukyou said, not turning to look at him.

     "Why?"

     "Just wanted to know if it's really possible for someone to
be in love with two people," Ukyou said quietly.

     "What is love?" Ryoga said musingly.

     "I wish I knew," Ukyou said with a small laugh, turning her
head back to look at his face.  There was a wistful expression on
it, and sadness in his eyes.

     "I do love Akari, I guess," Ryoga said after a few moments.
"I love her because she's beautiful, and kind, and devoted, and
because she loves me, and because I know she deserves my love."

     One side of his mouth quirked in a strange half-smile.  "I
suppose I love her, if that's what love is.  But it's not the
same way I love Akane.  Akane is beautiful, and she is kind,
but... I don't love her because of all those things."

     His hand left her shoulder, and again went to touch his
heart through the rough cloth of his black, sleeveless shirt.  "I
love Akane because I love her.  I... can't say anything other
than that.  Loving her... it makes me feel a greater person than
what I would be without loving her.  I..."

     He trailed off.  "Ukyou, are you..."

     "Yeah," Ukyou said, wiping at her eyes.

     "I'm sorry," Ryoga said.  "I'm really, I didn't mean to..."

     "It's not your fault," Ukyou said.  "You... do you know
where they went?"

     Ryoga shook his head.  "I didn't want to."

     "I saw them out the window," Ukyou said quietly.  "While I
was sitting next to your bed.  You'd fallen asleep after Akane
left..."

     She sucked in a breath.  "They were holding hands."

     Ryoga's eyes slowly, slowly closed.  "I see."

     When they opened again, there was something gone from them.
Ryoga's mouth was set into a straight line, and his hand dropped
from being held over his heart to falling at his side like the
broken limb of a tree.

     "Come on," Ukyou said finally.  "Let's go have some
okonomiyaki.  My treat."

     Ryoga slowly nodded, because something that was not in her
eyes matched something that was not in his.

**********

     Happosai was feeling particularly good today.  Perhaps it
was the sun, or the air, or how full his sack of underwear felt.
Perhaps it was the large crowd of pretty schoolgirls in track
uniforms chasing him through the streets, as he dodged and wove
through the crowds of the late afternoon.

     The fun of collecting wasn't just in the possession; it was
in the acquisition, the anticipation, the categorization, and, of
course, the inevitable pursuit by those to whom his new treasures
had belonged to.

     Still, he sure felt a lot better than he usually did.  He
hadn't been this fast or agile in years.  He wasn't really sure
what it was.

     And then suddenly he knew.  All his energy today had been
going towards this moment.  Finding her.  The grey cloak
accentuated rather than concealed her figure, which, to his
experienced eye, was quite perfect.  The face that occasionally
flashed from between the folds of the hood was very beautiful as
well, but he wasn't too concerned with faces these days.

     She was carrying what looked like a rake over her shoulder,
and that and her odd dress should have made her stand out among
the conservative Japanese crowds, but there was something in the
way she moved, a kind of humble grace, that made no one give her
more than a second glance.  Even he was having trouble keeping an
eye on her.  It was an obvious mark of a martial artist.  Funny,
he vaguely remembered a girl with a rake from somewhere long ago.
Probably a story he'd heard.

     "SWEETO!" he said, casting thoughts aside and springing from
the rooftop he'd been resting on for a moment towards the woman
walking through the crowd.

     He never even saw her move.  There seemed to be no interval
between when the rake was resting casually on her shoulder and
when its sharpened tines were a hair's breadth from his neck.  

     Her other hand had gone from straight-arming him with a flat
palm under the chin to gripping him by the collar in the space of
less than a second.

     The five razor-edged blades at the head of the rake
glittered in the sunlight.  "Hello, Happi," the woman said.  The
hood fell back, and he realized whose face this was.

     "Cologne?" he whispered disbelievingly.

     "You've never listened to me before," Cologne said, in a
voice that was becoming as familiar as yesterday, although he had
not heard it in decades.  "And I doubt you will now.  But the
best thing you could do now is get very, very far away from
here."

     Happosai licked his lips, the sight of Cologne as she had
been in her younger days momentarily stunning him out of any
thoughts of lechery.  The rake was also rather persuasive towards
that.

     "I don't suppose I could have a quick grope for old times
sake?" he finally said, giving her his best smile.

     Cologne's impossibly young face twisted in a combination of
revulsion and pity, and she flung him away from her.

     Directly into the large mob of angry schoolgirls.  Leaving
him to their not-so-tender ministrations, she strode off quickly
into the crowd.

     "You always did have a habit of showing up exactly when you
weren't needed, Happi," he heard her voice say amidst the sound
of fists and feet pounding on him.  There was kind of weary
sadness in it.

**********

     "Welcome home, Ranma, Akane," Kasumi said as the two of them
stepped through the broad gate and into the walled confines of
the house and dojo.  Akane's older sister was at work on one of
the shrubs lining the walkway to the front door with a pair of
small shears.  Her hair was pinned back into a bun, and the tips
of her fingers were tinged a pale green.

     "Hey Kasumi," Akane said.  Kasumi was looking at them, an
odd, knowing smile on her face, and they realized they were still
holding hands.  Akane yanked her hand free with so much force
Ranma winced as her nails dug into his skin.

     "How was school?" Kasumi said, making a few precise clips
with the shears.  Green shoots and small branches littered the
ground around her feet like drops of emerald rain.

     "It was okay," Ranma said after a moment.  "Ryoga's back in
town."

     "How nice," Kasumi said as she worked.  The clippings were
piling up around her feet like sand at a beach.  "I hope he'll
stop by."

     Ranma sighed and walked towards the front door, Akane
following behind him.  "Nabiki said she had some business to
take care of," Akane informed her sister as they passed by.

     "How nice," Kasumi said, beginning to hum softly to herself
as they opened the door of the house and stepped inside.

     The two of them passed through the entrance hall, past the
hallway that led to the dojo, and then by the open door of the
kitchen and into the dining room that faced off into the
backyard.  Soun and Genma were seated at the table, the go board
between them and a small pot of tea on the edge of the table.
Both were silent, contemplating their respective positions with
the seriousness of military commanders.

     "Welcome home, son," Genma said without looking up.

     "Hello, Akane," Soun said, also without looking up.

     Ranma and Akane glanced nervously at each other, then gave
each other trembling, hesitant smiles.  Their hands touched, for
just a moment, and then they knelt and sat down at the table with
their fathers.

     "Hey pop, where's mom?" Ranma asked.

     "I'm here," Nodoka said, stepping out of the kitchen.  She
looked at Akane and Ranma, kneeling close to each other at the
table, and a small smile appeared on her face for a moment.  She
sat down, facing across from them.  "Is there something you want,
Ranma?"

     "Akane and I have come to you about my decision," Ranma
said, trying to keep his voice level, but feeling as if his body
would start to tremble at any moment.  The two of them had
discussed what they would say on the way home, in nervous,
hesitant tones that had still rang with the sincerity of the
words.

     Nodoka's smile lit her face.  "Yes?  You have discussed it
with Akane?"

     Akane nodded silently.

     "I am very impressed, my son," Nodoka said.  Ranma flushed
slightly and looked away from his mother's eyes.

     "Thank you, mother," he said.

     "What have you decided, son?" Genma said, but in his voice
there was some hint he already knew the answer.

     Ranma opened his mouth to speak.  The silence in the room,
the staring presence of the three adults, and even Akane's silent
support at his side seemed to press down upon him and try to
stifle his words, but he began to call them forth anyway.

     And then Kasumi's scream shattered that silence, irrevocably
and forever.  It became a broken thing that would never be 
recovered whole.

     They were all up and running in a second, Ranma in the lead.
He felt the fire begin to pulse in the back of his head again,
but this time there was little ice behind it.

     He turned the corner into the entrance room of the house,
and took in the sight, aghast.  The front door was shattered from
its frame, lying on the floor in splinters in a pattern that
inexplicably reminded him of the results of Kasumi's work on the
shrub outside.

     And in the centre of the remains of the front door lay
Kasumi, not moving and with blood running down the side of her
head.  The bun of her hair had come undone, and it spread over
half her face like a shadow.  It looked as if someone had picked
her up and thrown her through the door with enough force to
shatter it.

     Somehow, he didn't see her at first, and when he did it was
almost as if she emerged from the wall itself, until he realized
she had just been standing so still and giving off no sense of
her presence that she had been nearly invisible.

     "Hello, son-in-law," the slim, petite woman in the gray
cloak and green robe said.  The words were familiar, but the face
certainly wasn't.  Neither was most everything else about the
woman, from the large, razor-tined rake she held against one
shoulder to the dark hair pinned up at the back of her head.

     Only the eyes were similar, because in that young face they
were impossibly old and depthless.  But there was something there
that had never been in Cologne's eyes before, if this young,
beautiful woman was Cologne.  There was a hint, a twitch,
something about the way her eyes would not seem to find focus.

     There was madness there.

     "Cologne?" he whispered.

     "Who else?" Cologne said, and laughed slightly.  She looked
down at Kasumi.  "A pity she got in my way."

     There was ice in his head now, mingling with the fire.

     "KASUMI!" Soun screeched as he came around the corner, and
took in the sight of his eldest daughter injured upon the floor
and the strange woman standing over her.  With a cry of pure
rage, he flung himself forward.

     "Mr. Tendo-" was all Ranma had time to say.  Cologne barely
even seemed to move; there was only a blur as the rake came up,
and Ranma couldn't tell whether the head or the haft hit Soun, or
how many hits Cologne landed on him.  But the man flew back and
slammed into the wall, crumpling bonelessly to the floor without
a sound.  His gi was torn in places from the force of the blows.

     "Now, we shall settle the matter of this marriage to Shampoo
once and for all," Cologne said.  "There is a final option,
son-in-law, one that I never mentioned to you before."

     Ranma's body shifted, as the ice began to grow, and then the
ice retreated as Cologne angled the rake down and pointed the
razor-edged tines at Kasumi's throat.  "Don't make my hand slip,
son-in-law."

     "Why does she keep on calling you..." Akane whispered behind
him, but that question died as she realized the answer.

     "Get away from her," Ranma growled.

     "As you wish, son-in-law," Cologne said with a grim smile
that looked somehow too old on her face.

     Her body shifted...

     Blurred...

     Ranma stepped in front of Akane, and let himself begin to
fall within the embrace of the ice, let it lance through his
limbs and brain...

     Something flashed past him, and he heard his father scream.

     He turned, slowly, agonizingly slowly, for the world was
nearly frozen for him.

     His father was a twitching heap on the floor, his limbs
splayed out and locked into twisted positions.

     Cologne had her arm around his mother's neck from behind,
encircling it like a noose and cradling the other woman's chin in
the crook of her elbow.  She was shorter than his mother, and was
forcing Nodoka to half-kneel in front of her.  The rake was held
in her other hand, tines an inch away from his mother's throat.

     "I would have grabbed the girl," Cologne said in an
impossibly cold voice, cold as the ice inside his head.  "But
that would have been far too predictable, and she has a way of
messing things up and escaping."

     "Cologne... why are you..." Ranma whispered.  Seeing his
mother, so terrified she could not even speak, the fire and the
ice in his head were gone, consumed beneath his own feelings of
helplessness.

     "You ask me why?" Cologne hissed.  "You dare to ask me why,
boy?  You have disgraced my chosen heir before her tribe, held
her up to ridicule, and used her for your own ends so many times
that I have lost count.  In return for her sincere love and her
help in the many pathetic situations you find yourself in through
your own foolish nature, you have scorned her and treated her
like a tool for your own ends.  I have been patient enough,
son-in-law.  The time comes that we end this."

     "GET OUT OF HERE!" Akane screamed at Cologne.  "You... you!
You come into my house, hurt my father, and Kasumi, who's never
hurt another person in her life, and you... you..."

     "Shut up, girl," Cologne said lazily.  "You would not last
five seconds in the Joketsuzoku.  The training we put our
children through when they are old enough to walk would eat you
alive.  Your weakness sickens me.  You pretend to be a warrior,
but when trouble comes you do little more than wait to be rescued
by your fiancee.  Speak to me when you have learned the true
meaning of what it is to be a warrior."

     "That's not true," Akane whispered.  "I..."

     "Cologne," Ranma said slowly, watching a bead of sweat fall
down his mother's pale, trembling face.  "Cologne, why?  You have
always..."

     "I have always waited for you to allow my great-grandaughter
to go back home," Cologne said.  "All that I have done for you
has been towards those ends.  I do not know what she sees in you;
Happosai in his youth was ten times the man you are.  You are an
arrogant, foolish boy who happens to have a kind of idiot-savant
relationship with martial arts and making women fall for you
despite your flaws."

     Ranma sucked in a breath.  "Cologne, let my mother go."

     "This is the final option," Cologne said, ignoring Ranma's
words.  "The option in our laws for a man who truly does not wish
to marry a Joketsuzoku woman."

     "What?" Ranma said.

     "Ranma, don't-" Akane said.

     "She has my mother, Akane," Ranma said, and his voice was
low and dangerous.

     "You will fight a duel with the oldest member of the woman's
family," Cologne said.  "This duel is to defeat by surrender,
unconsciousness, or death.  I do not care which of the three you
choose; I would as soon have that child free of you as I would
have you marry her."

     "I ain't obeyin' your stupid Amazon laws!" Ranma said,
momentarily losing the calm edge of control.  "Let my mother go!"

     "You will obey them, on the honour of your family, small as
it is, and on whatever honour you yourself hold, though I find
that to be even smaller," Cologne said.  "Or she will die."

     There was madness in Cologne's eyes, but it was a powerful
kind of madness.  Ranma felt as if he might weep.

     "If you somehow manage to defeat me, then you will be freed
of all obligation to Shampoo, and she will go back to the tribe
in disgrace, as will I," Cologne said.  "But if I defeat you and
you still live, then you will marry her and come back to the
village with us."

     "I won't-"

     "Then your mother will die."

     "Ranma, you have to."

     Those last were Akane's words, and Ranma slowly nodded his
head with acceptance.  "Yes.  I agree."

     Cologne nodded, a pleased look creeping onto her beautiful,
cold face.  "Well done."

     "Let my mother go," he said again.

     Cologne laughed.  "I think not, son-in-law.  I know all the
excuses you might use.  A promise sworn under duress; the laws
and customs of filthy outsiders that are not useful to honourable
people such as yourselves.  I believe I will get to know your
mother for the next while."

     "LET HER GO!"

     "Shut up, boy," Cologne said, and she brought the rake close
enough that the tines touched his mother's face without cutting.

     Akane put a hand on his arm, and he realized for the first
time that he was crying, in total silence.  "Ranma... she's
holding all the cards here."

     "You're right, girl," Cologne said.  "Son-in-law, do you
remember the mountain where I showed your friend the Breaking
Point technique?"

     "Yes," Ranma said, licking his lips, which felt very, very
dry.

     "You will come there before the sun sets tomorrow," Cologne
said.  "I will be waiting with your mother.  If you come later,
you will find her dead.  When you arrive, we will fight a duel
with the conditions I have outlined.  If you attempt to trick me,
you will fail, and she will die.  Bring whomever you wish; I will
want many witnesses to this."

     Ranma nodded slowly.  "Yes."

     Cologne looked at him, cold old eyes in that young,
beautiful face.  "One more thing.  My great-grandaughter knows
nothing of either what I do or even of this branch of our laws.
Whatever harm you may think to do to her in my place, know that I
will do unto your mother twice that.  And if you think to bargain
her life for your mother's, know this.  If she dies, I will visit
such vengeance upon you as you have never seen before.  I will
kill your parents, I will kill your friends, I will kill those
women who seek your love.  I will kill and I will not stop
killing until all you know is dead, and then I will leave you
alive to know what you have brought about."

     "I wouldn't hurt Shampoo," Ranma said.  "This ain't her
style.  I didn't think it was yours either."

     Cologne looked at him and laughed sardonically.  "After
you've lived as long as I have, son-in-law, you'll realize that
you often have to change your style if you're to do what must be
done."

     Cologne stepped forward, still gripping his mother and
holding the weapon to her face.  "We are leaving now.  If you try
to follow us, she will die.  And I will know if you follow me."

     "Mom," Ranma said.  "Mom, I'm sorry, I should have..."

     He squeezed his eyes shut against hot tears.  "Mom, I love
you."

     "I love you, Ranma," his mother said in a weak voice, as the
two of them passed by.  They were the first words she'd spoken
since this nightmare had begun only a few minutes ago.

     Cologne paused at shattered frame of the door and looked
down at Kasumi.  "A pressure point.  The blood is dye.  Your
father's paralysis will fade in a few hours, Ranma.  Your father,
Akane, is simply unconscious."

     She pressed two fingers into his mother's neck, and his
mother slumped unconscious in her grip as if her bones had turned
to jelly.  "Tomorrow before sunset.  Do you understand,
son-in-law?"

     Ranma realized he had his arm around Akane, and that she was
sobbing against his shirt.  "I understand."

     Then Cologne stepped out the door, and he saw the forms of
the two of them blur and vanish from sight.  If he concentrated,
he could just see them walking away out of the gate in the large
stone wall for a second before they vanished again from view.

**********

     Kima strained to follow the flickering black shape ahead of
her.  She had no idea how the raven was moving so fast; Shiso's
wings didn't even seem to flap quickly enough to keep him aloft,
and yet she was barely keeping up with him.

     One second she seemed to be right behind the bird; in the
next, it was as if he were a hundred feet ahead.  Occasionally his
wings seemed to flap in reverse, and he would actually be behind
her for a moment before pulling ahead again.

     It was extremely disconcerting, and with having to fly this
high to avoid being seen, rather nauseating.  The Japanese
countryside rushed by below in a dizzying swirl of green and
brown, with the occasional town or village to break the monotony.
She glanced nervously at the sky, wary as always when flying of
rain; this high up, a small shower would mean certain death.  The
clouds seemed huge this high up, thick grey streamers laden with
moisture.  There was the scent in the air of a storm brewing.

     The air rushed past her face, ruffled her hair and stung her
eyes slightly.  She had on her standard flying uniform; the white
one-piece suit left her legs and arms bare and bore only the
minimum decoration required for a woman of her station.  Her
sword was strapped to her hip, bumping occasionally against her
leg as she shifted her direction of flight slightly.

     Up ahead, Shiso suddenly tucked his wings and plunged
downwards, a black arrow aimed at the ground.  She bent at the
waist in the air, stretching out legs and arms to cut wind
resistance, and dived after him, folding her wings behind her as
she did.

     The ground fell towards her, a rocky, hilly area filled with
a few scattered forests.  At the base of the largest hill, almost
a small mountain, a town could be seen.

     The wind screamed by her in a sharp caress as the earth
approached closer.  At this speed, her vision was blurring and
time seemed to slow down.

     White wings unfolded, fanned out to the air in a sweep of
feathered grace, and she shot upright for a moment as her fall
stopped, swooping back up for a few dozen feet before her
momentum slowed and she drifted down towards the ground like a
leaf, booted feet touching down lightly on the rocky landscape.
Shiso called to her from a tree in his raucous, croaking voice.
She turned and began to walk towards him, carefully patting her
hair back into place with one hand.

     "This is the place?" she asked, looking around at the area.
There was a single tall tree growing in the centre of this rocky
plain, with a forest off to one side.  Shiso was perched on one
of the tree's outstretching branches, carefully grooming his
black feathers with his beak.  He looked up at her and nodded.
He seemed like an unusually intelligent bird, even for one of the
ones that inhabited Phoenix Mountain.  Those birds who lived
amongst the people served as messengers and spies for the
mountain in return for their life there.  Shiso apparently
belonged to Samofere, as much as an independent bird such as a
raven could belong to anyone.

     Kima leaned back against tree and crossed her arms over her
chest.  The bark was rough against her wings.  "I guess we'd best
get hidden in the forest."

     "Good idea," the bird croaked.

     Kima looked back at him.  "Didn't know you could talk."

     "Never asked," Shiso said, hopping down from the branch to
stand on the ground beside her.  "Know plan?"

     Kima nodded, a trace of a frown on her features.  "I do not
like it."

     "Don't have to," Shiso.  "Just to follow it."

     Kima nodded again.  "I know.  I..." she said, before
trailing off into silence for a few moments, standing there
against the tree with the raven perched on an outstretched branch
above her head.

     "Let's go," she said abruptly, pushing herself off from
leaning against the tree.  "We'll find a cave or something to
wait in."

     Shiso flapped off the ground and flew lazily ahead of her as
she walked.  "You ready do this?" he called back to her.

     "I should hope so," Kima said slowly with a sigh.  "As ready
as I can hope to be."

     "Child of Phoenix Mountain," someone said, and it took her a
moment to realize that it was still Shiso speaking, because there
was something in the voice that had not been there before.  The
voice of the bird before had been that of a bird that had learned
the rudiments of human speech, with a croaking accent and a harsh
rasp to it, and the words strung together in the wrong ways.

     This voice was very different indeed.  "Do you know why you
do this thing?"

     Kima paused in her walking and closed her eyes for a moment;
they had entered the forest now, and the ground beneath her feet
was thin soil rather than the bare rock of before, and the few
hardy but straggly trees blocked out some of the sun and dappled
shadows on the earth.  "Why?"

     "Yes, why?" the raven asked, and his voice was old and wise.

     She opened her eyes, and was speechless for a moment.  Shiso
hovered before her, wings spread out to the sides and not moving,
though he still hung in mid-air before her.  Her eyes traced the
fluid lines of his beak, until they met his eyes, and saw that
they were like dark, liquid portals into oceans deeper than any
on the earth.

     "Why?"

     "Because I do not want my people to die," Kima heard herself
whisper from very far away.  "Because my people are dying, and
because I have seen the true secret heart of Jusenkyou, and I
have seen the secret heart of myself, and I know that he is our
only hope."

     The raven was before her like an ebon icon, and his eyes
were as old as the first night of the world.  "He shall bring
rain to the deserts, and he shall bring fire to the people.  He
will fight, as he has done before, as he will do again, as he has
always done, and all who have known the touch of the waters shall
fight beside him, for to the valley of the waters shall come the
dark, and only he shall be able to stand against it in the end."

     "I know," she heard herself say.

     Then everything snapped back to normal, and for a moment
there was a blurring in front of her eyes as if she was moving
incredibly quickly, and then all was as it had been, and Shiso
was perched a few feet ahead of her on the branch of the tree.

     "What..."

     "Come, hurry," the bird croaked.  Kima shook her head to
clear it, and followed after him a moment later as his dark wings
carried him flapping through the spaces between trees.

**********

     Kneeling by his paralysed father on the floor of the dining
room, Ranma glanced across to Akane.  She was adjusting the
position of the pillow under her father's head, an unreadable
expression on her face.  Soun was unconscious, and had a lump on
his forehead the size of a small egg.  Kasumi wasn't awake
either, but careful examination had shown Cologne's words to be
true; she was only asleep, and what had looked like blood had
turned out to be a thick red paste that smiled slightly of fruit.

     "Well," Akane said, seeing him glance at her.  "What now?"

     "We wait for Dr. Tofu to show up," Ranma said.  "And then we
go to the Nekohanten."

     "What?"

     "We find out if Shampoo knows anything about this."

     "Cologne said-"

     "Cologne's gone crazy, or that's not Cologne," Ranma said.
"Either one, we can't trust what she says."

     "But she said if you hurt Shampoo..."

     "I'm not gonna hurt Shampoo," Ranma said in a controlled
voice.  "I just wanna talk to her."

     "Do you think Cologne would really hurt your mother?"

     Ranma sighed.  "I don't want to think she would.  But we
don't know what she's capable of in the state she's in.  Hell, we
don't even know if that's really her... Last I remember, Cologne
was a wrinkled little thing that not even Happosai woulda
touched..."

     "You're going to fight her, aren't you?"

     "I gotta," Ranma said.  "You were right, Akane.  She's
holding all the cards here."

     "Ranma, you saw her move.  Or maybe you did.  I didn't.
Ranma, you couldn't beat her when she was old, what makes you
think you can beat her when she's young?"

     "Whether I can beat her or not doesn't matter," Ranma said
wearily.  "What matters is that she has my mother and she's
crazy, and if I don't fight her my mother is going to die."

     Akane slowly nodded and closed her eyes.  "If you lose, will
you..."

     "If I lose, I'll be dead," Ranma said.  "Because as long as
there's breath left in my body, I'm gonna be fighting her."

     "NO!" Akane said, and there were tears in her eyes.  "Don't
you dare!  If... if... if it comes down to it, I want you to
surrender to her.  Marry Shampoo, go to China, whatever you want,
but don't you dare... don't you dare..."

     She was across the room before he could have any response,
and her arms were around his waist and she was crying on his
shoulder, as she had this morning, when they both had said they
wanted to keep the engagement, and this horror had been very,
very far away.  He put his arms around her and held her tightly
to him, for despair was upon him like a weight, and he needed to
cling to something.

     They stayed that way for a long time, and finally Akane
whispered words that he barely heard.  "Don't you dare die on me,
you jerk, or I'll never forgive you."

     "I'm not gonna die on you, Akane," Ranma said, words
fighting past the lump in his throat.  "I promise."

     Her head came off his shoulder, leaving his shirt wet with
tears, and she held him even tighter as if she would not ever let
him go, and pressed her cheek to his, mingling their tears
together into one stream.  "I know."

     "What happened?" someone said.  The two broke apart,
blushing furiously and trying to look away from each other and
Dr. Tofu at the same time.

     "Kasumi," the older man said in a shocked voice, kneeling
down beside the still girl on the floor.  "Who..."

     "Cologne," Ranma said tightly.

     "Shampoo's great-grandmother?" Tofu said in a numb voice,
carefully holding his slightly trembling fingers to Kasumi's
neck.

     "Yeah," Ranma said.

     "Why?" Tofu said.

     "I wish I knew," Ranma said wearily, rising up from the
floor.  "Doc, can you take care of them?  Me an' Akane gotta go
to the Nekohanten."

     "Are you sure that's a good idea?" Tofu said as he pressed a
point on Kasumi's neck.  His words were calm, but his face was
tight.  There was something in his eyes very much like fury.

     "No, I'm not," Ranma said.

     "Maybe you should wait until I can-" Tofu began.

     Ranma cut him off.  "There's no time."

     "What about Ukyou?" Akane said.  "I'm sure she'd come with
us."

     Ranma nodded reluctantly.  "Yeah.  Maybe she would.  I wish
we could find Ryoga..."

     "Maybe we will," Akane said with strained hopefulness.
"He's got a way of showing up when we really need him."

     Ranma nodded and weakly smiled.  "Okay.  Let's go to
Ukyou's, then hit the Nekohanten."

     "Good luck," Tofu said.

     The two of them walked out, through the remains of the
shattered front door, which seemed to be in better shape than a
lot of other things today.

**********

     Ryoga sighed and rested his chin in the palms of his hands,
his elbows on the wooden counter bordering the sizzling grill of
Ukyou's restaurant.  His backpack lay against the stool next to
him.  The smell of okonomiyaki was in the air, and it was making
him feel slightly nauseous in the state he was in.

     "You haven't touched your food, Ryoga," Ukyou said gently
from where she stood across from him, carefully working on the
preparation of an okonomiyaki.

     Ryoga glanced down at the food on his plate, with no more
than two bites taken out of it.  "I'm sorry, Ukyou.  It's really
good, it's just I'm not..."

     He shook his head.  "Nothing."

     He carefully picked up his knife and fork, sawed off a piece
of okonomiyaki and popped it into his mouth with a weak grin.  It
tasted like sawdust.

     "What's wrong?" Ukyou said.  "You still feeling down?"

     "Aren't you?" Ryoga said quietly.  "How can you be so..."

     "What's the point of moping around?" Ukyou said with false
cheer.  "Might as well make the best of it."

     Her hand trembled, and the okonomiyaki on the end of the
spatula slid off and folded over slightly, already beginning to
scorch.  "Oops."

     She flipped it into the garbage in one smooth motion, and
then yelped as the side of her hand hit the grill.  The spatula
fell from her fingers and clattered on the floor.

     "Are you all right?" Ryoga said, rising up slightly from his
stool.

     "I'll get the first-aid kit," a soft voice said from behind
Ryoga.  He glanced back to see a pretty girl in a kimono, her
hair tied up into a high ponytail.  He started slightly; he
hadn't even heard her approach.

     "It's okay, Konatsu," Ukyou said, putting her hand to her
mouth and sucking on the small red mark.  "It's nothing."

     "Are you sure, Ukyou?" Konatsu said quietly.  "It doesn't
hurt, does it?"

     "I'm fine," Ukyou said.  "Can you go see how we're doing for
supplies?  Do we need anything?"

     "Of course," Konatsu said, backing silently away.  Ryoga
watched her go for a moment, then turned back to Ukyou.

     "Who's that?"

     "My... waitress," Ukyou said after a moment, a strange smile
on her face.

     "I didn't know you had a waitress," Ryoga said.

     "He started working for me a little while ago.  A few weeks
before you guys went to China," Ukyou said.

     Ryoga blinked.  "Uhh... did you say..."

     "Yeah, he," Ukyou said with a nod.

     "Is he like... Ranma?" Ryoga said.

     Ukyou shook her head.  "No... he's just... that's the way he
is."

     Ryoga's face twisted into a grimace.  "That's..."

     "That's who he is," Ukyou said, cutting Ryoga off.  "He's
had a hard life, and..."

     "We're a little low on soba, Ukyou," Konatsu said from a few
feet away.  As before, Ryoga hadn't even heard him approach.
Neither had Ukyou, apparently, because her face went slightly
red.

     "That's okay.  I'll get some tomorrow," Ukyou said.  "I
don't think we're going to be opening today anyway."

     Konatsu nodded and glided away into the small kitchen of the
restaurant, out of their view.

     "Martial artist, huh?" Ryoga said after a moment.

     Ukyou blinked.  "How can you tell?"

     "The way he moves," Ryoga said.  "Is he good?"

     Ukyou nodded.  "Very."

     "That's what I thought," Ryoga said.  "You don't move that
quietly without some kind of training."

     He realized he'd eaten all of his okonomiyaki, and it had
tasted good.  He smiled slightly at Ukyou.  "Thanks for the
food."

     "You feelin' a little better, sugar?" Ukyou asked.

     He nodded, and half-closed his eyes.  "Just a little."

     The door to the restaurant slid open, cutting off their
conversation.

     "I'm sorry, we're..." Ukyou began, but the words died in her
throat when Ranma and Akane stepped through the door.

     "How dare you come in here?" she snapped, coming out from
behind the counter and grabbing her big spatula where it hung on
the wall.  "You think you can waltz right into my restaurant as
if nothing's happened?  Well, you've got another..."

     "Ucchan, please," Ranma said wearily.  His face was tired.
"We need to talk to you and Ryoga."

     "I think we did all the talking we needed to do," Ukyou said
in a tight voice.  "Why don't you get out?"

     Ryoga put his hand on her elbow.  "Ukyou, let him talk."

     Ranma gave a grateful look to Ryoga.  "Thanks, man."

     Akane looked at Ryoga and Ukyou.  "Whatever happened this
afternoon... please, just hear us out.  This is important."

     "All right," Ukyou said.  Her grip on her spatula relaxed
slightly.  "Talk."

     Ranma and Akane stood nervously, not saying anything.  They
looked out of breath, as if they'd run all the way here.

     Ukyou sighed, and consciously forced herself to relax.  "Sit
down and tell us what's going on?"

     After a moment's hesitation, the two did, taking seats at
the counter, with Akane sitting between Ryoga and Ranma.  Ukyou
went back behind the counter and turned off the grill, still
keeping her spatula held loosely in one hand.

     "Cologne's got my mother," Ranma said, closing his eyes and
gulping.  "I have to fight her before the sun sets tomorrow, or
she says she's going to kill her."

     "What?" Ukyou said disbelievingly.  "Your mother..."

     "We think it's Cologne," Akane said.  "She said she was, but
she looks... different.  Much, much younger.  A little older than
us, maybe.  And..."

     "She's crazy, I think," Ranma said, taking over from Akane.
"Whether this is Cologne or not, she's crazy.  And my mother's in
a lot of danger."

     "How did this happen?" Ryoga asked quietly.

     Ranma explained quickly, having to stop occasionally to take
long, shuddering breaths.  When he was finished, Ryoga stood up
and clenched his fist.

     "I'm with you," he growled.  "It's our duty to help your
mother, Ranma.  What do you want us to do?"

     Ukyou nodded in agreement.  "We'll both do whatever we can
to help."

     Ranma smiled with relief.  "Thank you.  We'll... first of
all we'll go to the Nekohanten.  I wanna talk to Shampoo and
Mousse."

     "That Shampoo..." Ukyou snarled, gripping the handle of her
weapon.  "She..."

     "Cologne said she didn't have anything to do with it," Ranma
said.  "And until I know exactly what she knows, she's our
friend, not our enemy.  Everybody got that?"

     There was slow agreement among them.  "And after we talk to
them?" Ukyou said finally.

     Ranma sighed.  "I dunno.  Guess we'll just wait and see.
But the way things are now, it looks like I'm gonna have to fight
her."

     Ryoga's face tightened.  "Ranma, that old woman..."

     "I know," Ranma said.  "Dammit, I know.  I know she's got a
century of experience over me, and she's better than ever now
that she's got her youth back.  But what else can I do?  She's
got my..."

     He sucked in a deep breath.  "She's got my mother, Ryoga."

     "I'm sorry, Ranma," Ryoga said.  "I really am."

     "Thanks, buddy," Ranma said.

     "Do you want me to watch the restaurant or come with you?"
Konatsu said softly to Ukyou, having appeared behind her a few
seconds ago.

     "You watch the place.  We'll come back after we go to the
Nekohanten," Ukyou said, grabbing up her bandolier of spatulas
from where it lay under the counter and strapping it on.

     "I guess we'd better get going," Akane said.  She reached
out and touched the back of Ranma's hand.  "Come on, Ranma."

     Nodding his head, Ranma stood up from the stool and bowed
his head.  "Ucchan... Ryoga... thank you."

     "It is nothing," Ryoga said softly.  The four of them
stepped out the door of the restaurant into the streets, and
began to make their way towards the Nekohanten.

**********

     "Shampoo, what's wrong?" Mousse asked quietly, coming up
behind her in the kitchen as she bent over the sink and worked at
scrubbing a pot.

     "Nothing wrong," she said, redoubling her efforts even
though the pot was already clean of grime.

     "It's about the ghoul, isn't it?" Mousse said sharply,
putting his hands on her shoulders.  "Shampoo, if this is some
plan that's gone wrong, tell me..."

     Shampoo calmly slid her shoulders free of his grip, took a
step to the side, and threw the lukewarm water from another pot
over him.  His robes collapsed into a wet tangle, a surprised 
quacking emerging from them.  "Shut up!  You no know what you 
talk about, Mousse."

     There was doubt in her words though, because she was still
seeing the image of Cologne's discarded staff, laid across her
empty robes on the bedroom floor.  Where had her
great-grandmother gone?

     Mousse struggled free of his sodden clothing and shook water
off his feathers, barely missing hitting her with the droplets.

     "You want me transform to?" she said sharply, aiming a
half-hearted kick at him that he avoided with a flap of wings and
a displeased quack.  He landed on the counter of the sink and
began fumbling the taps with his bill until he got the hot water
running.  Shampoo turned away and took a few steps across to the
stone counter where a pile of green onions lay, the string that
had bundled them lying in a tangled knot beside them.  She began
to chop them rhthymically with a knife as she heard the clunk of
someone's head hitting the underside of a shelf, and a male voice
swearing in Chinese.

     Then there was a rustle of cloth and the clank of metal
hitting against metal, and she heard soft footsteps coming across
the floor of the kitchen.  "Shampoo, I only want to help you..."

     She whirled and pointed the kitchen knife at him.  "You only
want help yourself to me.  I no want to talk about this, Mousse."

     "What's going on?" Mousse said.  "This is about Cologne
being in her room for three days, isn't it?  What was she doing
in there, Shampoo?"

     "I NOT KNOW!" Shampoo shouted, surprised at her own
frustration.  "I NOT KNOW WHAT SHE DOING IN THERE!  SHE NOT TELL
ME!"

     Mousse blanched and took a few steps back.  "I'm sorry,
Shampoo.  I..."

     She drew a long breath and got control of herself.  "I
all right  It's just..."

     There was the sound of the front door banging open, and then
an old voice cried out.  "Cologne!  It's me!  Now that you're
young again, there's ever so much fun we can have..."

     Shampoo's face went pale and she rushed out into the dining
room.  "What you doing here?" she shouted at Happosai, who stood
scratching his head by the open door.

     He glanced up at her and slid the door closed behind him.
"Eh, dear Shampoo, have you seen your great-grandmother?  She's
sure gotten a lot younger all of a sudden.  Reminds me of my
youth..."

     He sighed and sniffled slightly.  "So many memories... you
two look a lot alike, you know.  Let me weep into your bosom, my
dear, for this old man grows melancholy..."

     Shampoo broke a chair over his head without much effect
beyond stopping him from leaping to grope her.  "What you
talking about?"

     "My dear little Cologne's young again," Happosai said with a
happy smile as he rubbed the lump on top of his head.  "So now
I've come back to start up our wild love affair, since she's no
longer so old and wrinkled."

     "You see great-grandmother?" Shampoo said.

     "Maybe, maybe not," Happosai said craftily.  "What's in it
for me?"

     "You get to walk out of here with all your bones in the same
places they were when you came in," Mousse said softly as he
glided up to stand beside Shampoo.  "Shampoo asked you a
question, old man.  You would do well to answer it."

     Happosai smiled, and his eyes narrowed.  "I go easy on
women, boy.  You, I have no objection to pounding into a thin
paste.  Now where's my dear Cologne?"

     "We not know," Shampoo said with a sigh.  "That's why we ask
you."

     The door suddenly banged open again.  Ranma, Akane, Ukyou
and Ryoga stood there.

     Shampoo slowly realized that all four were looking at her.
Akane and Ukyou were casting accusing glances at her, and even
Ryoga looked a little wary.

     Ranma, however, was worse than all three put together.  His
face was utterly blank of any expression, as were his eyes.  "Hi
Shampoo?  Is Cologne here?"

     Shampoo licked her lips nervously, and unconsciously took a
step closer to Mousse.  "No.  You see her in last few hours,
Ranma?"

     The slow, weary smile that spread across Ranma's face made
it look even worse than his previous emotionless facade had.  "In
a manner of speaking."

**********

     Nodoka Saotome slowly came awake, her first conscious
feeling the heat of a fire on her face, and the sound of wood
crackling.  One cheek was against cold, rocky ground, and her
hands appeared to be tied behind her back.

     The only movement she was capable of seemed to be opening
and closing her eyes, and not even speech was possible.  She
tried to force her body to move, but it didn't seem to want to
respond.  She still had feeling throughout her body, but it was
as if she had been separated from it somehow.

     It all came back to her in a flash, the attack upon the
house by the strange young woman who claimed to be the
great-grandmother of one of the girls interested in her son.
She wondered how long it had been.  Quite a few hours, obviously,
because what she could see of the sky overhead was dark.  There
were more stars than you saw in the city, so they must be out in
the country somewhere.

     After the recollection came the fear, the memory of what the
woman had said.  Not only for herself, but for her son.  The
woman was crazy, quite obviously.  There was no telling what she
might do.

     She felt a hot wetness on her cheeks, and realized she was
crying.  She was frightened, of what might happen when her son
came tomorrow.  She knew he would come; he was a good boy, and an
honourable man, although he'd inherited in smaller quantities
some of the flaws of his father.

     She knew he would come, and she knew that that was exactly
what this woman wanted.  There had been a madness in her eyes, a
hatred, but not directed towards her.  Towards her son, as she
spoke those venomous words toward him.

     She became aware of another sound beyond the crackle of the
fire, and the night animals, and her own quiet sobbing.  It was
someone else, sitting nearby.  They were saying something, so
softly she nearly didn't hear them.

     "Not because it is easy," the voice said.  "Or because I am
cruel, or because I wish him harm.  I must do this... I must do
this... I must... I must..."

     There was a sound that might have been a sob, or a laugh.
"Because it must be done."

     Then another sound, a long shuddering breath.  The same
voice again, though choked this time by grief barely held in
check.  "It must be done.  Oh, may all that is good forgive me,
it must be done."

     Then there was only silence, the crackle of flames and
chirping cicadas, small creatures scuttling through grass.
Nodoka closed her eyes, and surprised herself by falling asleep
almost immediately.

**********

     "Shampoo, are you sure there's nothing I can do to-"

     "NO!"

     Mousse recoiled as Shampoo slammed the door of her room
closed with a bang.  He sighed and reached up to brush back his
dark hair, before he slid his hated glasses into place over his
eyes in preparation to find his own room for the night.

     As he was turning to leave, he heard the door slide open
behind him, more softly than it had closed.  "Mousse?"

     He glanced back to see Shampoo standing behind the half-open
door, hesitation written in the slender lines of her face and the
dark definitions of her eyes.  "Yes, Shampoo?" he said, a
tremulous note of eagerness in his voice.

     "Is not your fault.  I... just want be alone for a while,"
Shampoo said slowly.

     Mousse nodded, and reached up to play nervously with the arm
of his glasses.  "You know you don't have to be alone if you
don't want to.  I'll always be..."

     Shampoo's face hardened.  "You never understand, will you?"

     "Shampoo..."

     "Go sleep, Mousse.  We need be ready leave tomorrow to get
Ranma's mother back."

     "Why is Cologne doing this, Shampoo?  I know you didn't..."

     The door slid softly closed, removing Shampoo from his sight
again.  Mousse gave another heavy sigh, and his shoulders slumped
in defeat.  Ranma and everyone else had left a few hours ago.
Their stay had been very short, to tell the truth.  None of the
four had seemed eager to spend much time discussing anything, and
not even Shampoo seemed to want Ranma to stay longer than he had
to.

     But the end result was that tomorrow morning, he was for
some reason setting off to bear witness to whatever duel was
going to take place between Ranma and Cologne.

     Troubled, he walked down the hallway to his small, sparse
room that faced out into the back alley of the restaurant.  He
had only his bed, and a dresser for his clothes.  He wanted and
needed nothing else.

     Except that which he could not have.

     He looked out the small, dusty-paned window and sighed
deeply.  Outside, as evening fell, the grey of the back streets 
of the city seemed even more dull, as if some facade were 
stripping back with the fall of night.  Clouds were drifting 
across the sky, the promise of a storm within them.

     He thought it would break tomorrow.  Tomorrow, there was
going to be a change, despite what any of them might wish.

**********
     
     He could not find the ice, no matter how hard he tried.

     In the dojo, Ranma sought the ice as desperately as a man in
a desert seeks an oasis, for he longed to lose himself within the
cold embrace of it and forget.  But the ice escaped him, though
sometimes it was like a figure glimpsed out of the corner of his
eye, but gone when he turned to look at it.  The fire pulsed
inside his head, but he let it, for it had been only amidst that
burning pain that so far he had found the ice.

     They were leaving in the morning, he and Akane and his
father, Shampoo and Mousse and Ukyou and Ryoga.  They had to go
out to the mountain where he and his father had trained all those
months ago, where Cologne had showed Ryoga the breaking point.
He knew he had to sleep, but he couldn't bring himself to do it.
Sleep meant uncertainty, half-formed remembrances of things he'd
never done, glimpses into oceans of his mind so deep that he
could not see their bottoms.

     Akane had been watching him for some time before he became
aware of her presence, because he'd been forcing himself to focus
completely on the rapid movements of his own body.

     "Ranma, you have to get some sleep," she said softly from
where she leaned against the wall of the dojo.  "We've got to
leave tomorrow morning for the country, and you... you need to
rest."

     "I'm not tired yet," Ranma said, turning his back on her and
flowing smoothly through half a dozen forms in the space of a few
seconds.  "You should sleep if you can, Akane.  I'll go to bed
when I'm ready."

     "Do you... do you think you can beat her?"

     He stopped moving and glanced back at her.  "Of course."

     "Damn it, Ranma!" Akane snapped, striding forward to stand
near him.  "Why do you have to be so cocky?  You've lost before,
to people a lot less skilled than Cologne."

     "But I always win in the end," Ranma said.

     Akane reached out and grabbed him by the shoulders.
"There's no second chance here, Ranma.  Don't you see that?
Can't you understand that when the sun sets tomorrow, you're
either going to have to marry Shampoo or you'll be... you'll
be..."

     He put his hands gently on her wrists.  "Or I'll be free,
Akane.  I..."

     He sighed.  "Why does it have to be so damn hard?  Isn't
there any middle ground, anything at all?  You heard what Shampoo
said; it's likely she'll be exiled from the village if she goes
back without me as her husband.  She..."

     "But it's not your fault," Akane said, letting her hands
drop from his shoulders.  She tangled her fingers in his and
stood in front of him, looking up at him with dark eyes.  The
open space of the dojo seemed a small, confining thing upon the
two of them in that moment.  "They're her laws, not yours.  She
can always..."

     "But don't you see?" Ranma said.  "It is... All this time,
it's been my fault.  Ukyou, Shampoo, Kodachi... it's all been my
fault.  If me and pop hadn't eaten the prize in China, I wouldn't
have had to fight her in the first place.  Maybe if I'd just
shown them I wasn't really a girl, something could have worked
out.  Maybe if I hadn't lied to her the first time she came here,
things might have been better."

     He pulled his hands free from hers, tore his gaze away from
her eyes and turned his back on her, hands clenching themselves
into fists at his sides.  "But I ran.  I ran away, like my father
did with Ukyou, like he's done for everything in his life."

     His shoulders slumped and he hung his head.  "I'm no better
than my old man.  If anything, I'm worse.  I've got to do this,
Akane.  Not even because of my mother.  I've got to make things
right, or else what does any of it mean?  What does it matter if
I can beat up everyone in the world if I have no honour?  I'm no
better than a thug off the streets."

     Her arms came around him from behind, encircling his chest
and holding him tightly, one hand gripping the other wrist as she
pressed against him from behind.  The soft warmth of her body was
almost enough to drown the pain of the fire in his head, and he
felt the heat of her tears against his shoulder.  "You're more
than that.  I know you are... I..."

     He put his hands over hers and bowed his head to the side,
feeling the softness of her hair against his cheek.  "Maybe I am.
But I've got to prove... I've got to prove I can do something
right for once."

     "But what about us?" Akane whispered.

     "What about us?"

     He felt her stiffen slightly.  "Is that all you can say?
After all that's happened today?"

     Ranma closed his eyes, almost able to see the fires dancing
before him.  "Especially after all that's happened today.  And
all that's going to happen tomorrow."

     "But I... how I feel... doesn't that mean anything?"

     "More than everything else," Ranma said soothingly, still
resting his head on hers.  "More than anything.  But... what can
we say, Akane?  What can I say to you that I know isn't going to
be a lie by tomorrow?"

     "Do you really think you can beat her?" Akane asked him
again.  He thought more carefully this time before answering.

     "Maybe.  If I'm lucky.  I was thinking about using Shampoo
to go into Neko-ken, but I'm sure Cologne's prepared for that.
The only thing I can hope for is to tap this thing inside me,
the..."

     He trailed off, not wanting to call it the ice, even though
that was what he thought of it as.  "If I can get that part of me
to come out like it did against Kuno and Ryoga, I might have a
chance.  Otherwise..."

     "Promise me something," Akane murmured, tears silently
leaking onto his shoulder.

     "What?"

     "Promise me you'll surrender to her if it looks like you
can't beat her," Akane said.  "She... we know she's crazy, Ranma.
I... I don't want to see you hurt, even if it means..."

     She trailed off, and hugged him even tighter with a long
sigh.  "Promise me."

     "I promise," Ranma said, hoping it was one promise he would
at last be able to keep.  "Akane, I..."

     "Don't say anything more," Akane whispered.  "Please, don't
say anything more.  Just... let me have this for a while.  We
don't need to say anything more."

     And, Ranma slowly realized, they didn't.  He turned around
in her arms and held her to him, for as long as both of them
needed.  There were no more words said in those few long minutes,
because the words that might be there to be said were as heavy as
all the world to them, and they could both feel the weight upon
their souls.

     They sank down, eventually, still holding each other, to the
wooden floor of the dojo, Akane's head resting against his chest
and the beat of his heart echoing in her ears.  Not even quite
realizing it, they fell asleep there, holding each other, with
such a bizarrely innocent quality to it that neither of them felt
embarrassed at all.

     And outside, the moon swung higher into the sky, and the
storm clouds drifted on the night breeze, and the world went
spinning on without any care for the two of them.

**********

     The storm broke that night, and the rain of this morning
had been but the prelude to this storm.  Water poured down in
almost solid sheets upon the earth, and the earth drank thirstily
of the waters of the sky, and drew them down within itself into
the waters under earth.  Thunder rolled like the voices of
warring gods, and lightning stabbed the sky in white-burning
spears upon the cape of night.

     But there was another storm in the air that night.  A
building one still, one that had been building for a very long
time, that would build still for a time before it let loose the
full fury of its power upon the land.

     That storm was coming soon, though, for the elements that
would drive it on were slowly coming together, gathering
themselves in preparation.  Who had sown this storm, and who
would reap the consequences was yet to be seen, but the storm was
coming, because it had been building for far too long to be
stopped.

     And the storm of this night was unto that building storm
what sleep was unto death.