Neko by Mark Doherty (mdoherty@mailbox.uq.edu.au) Chapter 5: Yin/Yang/Yatai, my problems with Ranma. Characters are the property of Takahashi Rumiko. I deserve to be thrown in the spring of drowned ferret for even thinking of using them. Please don't sue me, I am but a poor and penniless student. C&C's are welcome, wanted and not wasted on me. My conventions explained: - The suffix -kun is used to denote a character's cursed male form. No suffix indicates that the person isn't in their cursed form. If someone turns up with a girl curse, they'll get the -chan suffix. Animal curses are denoted by the name of the animal as a suffix. After a couple of times, animal suffixes will probably usually be shortened to the first letter. For example, Henry-Mockingbird, or Henry-M after the first couple of times the name is used in a scene. - Just to be REALLY annoying, a cat curse will be denoted by a -Neko suffix. So, Ralf-Neko for example. - <> Denotes Chinese. - [] Denotes thoughts. - ** Is animal speak when used without quotes, and is sound effects within quotes. For example: *Hello.* the duck quacked. And: "*sigh*" she sighed. - {} Are Panda signs. A yatai is a wheeled travelling grill. Hmm, think of it as a hotdog stand for okonomiyaki and other sorts of quickly prepared grillable food, although that's probably not the best example I could use. Oh, and okonomiyaki can be thought of as Japanese pizza, although that's not 100% accurate either. Try it and see, it's one of those foods that most either love or hate. "Cruel, but composed and bland, Dumb, inscrutable and grand, So Tiberius might have sat, Had Tiberius been a cat." - Poor Matthias by Matthew Arnold. ********************* Like the blood kiss of a vampire, sunset drenched the sky of Nerima in several shades of red. Parents called their children indoors for dinner, chores, or for whatever other reasons. Street lights flickered, before they slowly bathed the lanes in their luminescence. A dog padded down a street, looking for its home. At the dojo of the Tendo residence, however, such inconsequential happenings were ignored. Ukyou stalked into the small dojo, with Ranma cautiously following her. Once they were both in the small training building, with the door shut behind them, Ukyou faced Ranma. "What's the deal Saotome?" Ukyou asked. "What do you mean?" Ranma replied. "Who are you anyway?" "Oh come on." Ukyou snarled. "You don't remember dear old Ukyou? Ucchan? Your best friend when we were young? The one you ran out on, so long ago?" She pulled her combat spatula out of its holster and gave it a couple of test swings. "The one who has lost so much because of you." Ranma blinked. "Ucchan? Uc... wait, I remember! You were that kid at the yatai! How are ya doing?" "Oh, I'll be doing just fine." Ukyou said in a low voice as she raised her spatula to a ready position. "After I punish..." she swung her spatula at Ranma, who dodged it easily, "...you for..." another swing, another miss, "...leaving me behind!" Two more swings, both of which Ranma sidestepped. "Come on Ucchan..." Ranma said as he watched his childhood friend warily. "What's the matter with you? What are ya talking about?" "Talking about!?" Ukyou screamed. She hefted her spatula and began a set of wide sweeps at Ranma, never letting up. "Damn you!!!" Swing, dodge. "Damn you Ranma!!!" Swing, swing, both dodged. "Damn. You. For LEAVING ME!!!" Swing and miss. "DAMN YOU FOR MAKING ME GIVE UP SO MUCH OF MYSELF!" Swing after swing after swing after swing. Ranma narrowed his eyes as the combat spatula got closer and closer to snagging him. "I don't know what your problem is, Ucchan." he said as he kept dodging. "But you need to..." he chose his moment and grabbed past the blade of the spatula to the handle, in the middle of one of Ukyou's swings. Using Ukyou's momentum, he threw the spatula around "...CALM DOWN!" With Ranma's momentum behind her spatula, Ukyou was thrown across the room. With a thud, Ukyou slammed head first against the dojo wall. Her eyes closed as she slid down the wall, unconscious. "Ucchan?" Ranma asked cautiously. [Damn. Why did he have to keep attacking me like that?] As Ukyou slid down the wall, her shirt, caught by the friction, slid up and up until it was over her shoulders, revealing her bound chest. "U...Ucchan?" Ranma breathed. ********************* Oh so long ago... A very young Ukyou looked up at her taciturn father. Her father was a grim man and his bushy beard and thick eyebrows, along with his large frame, didn't help give him a pleasant demeanour. Still, Ukyou loved him. He was her father, how could she not? "Watch carefully now." Ukyou's father said in a deep, gruff voice as he poured some okonomiyaki mix onto the yatai's grill. The young Ukyou, who could not be more than six or seven years old, looked on in fascination as her father calmly, expertly cooked the okonomiyaki batter. "Remember not to leave it too long." her father said as he skilfully flipped the okonomiyaki over on the grill. Ukyou nodded, a serious expression on her face. "And be sure to..." her father paused as both he and Ukyou realised that the okonomiyaki he had been cooking had disappeared. Her father turned and looked at the dwindling figure of a small gi-clad boy. In the boy's hand was the almost cooked okonomiyaki. "Go stop him Ukyou." Ukyou's father said calmly. Ukyou nodded, a determined expression on her face. She drew her two mini spatulas that had been a prized birthday gift from her parents. Ukyou wielded them like daggers, since she was still pretty small. The young chef ran off after the small thief as her father calmly looked on. She could not fail in front of her father. A few minutes later... Ukyou trudged back to her family's yatai, her shoulders drooped in defeat. She had managed to catch up with the young thief, only to be easily defeated by the boy in the resulting scuffle. Her father looked at her as she walked up. "Did you punish him?" he asked. Ukyou slowly, hesitantly shook her head as she looked down at the ground, scuffing at the dirt with one of her toes. When her father didn't say anything, she looked up and saw the silent disapproval in his eyes. Ukyou felt the shame of her failure as she looked at her father and vowed to herself to never disappoint him again. The next day... Ukyou felt like crying. She was lying in the dirt, her mini spatulas lying nearby. "You ok?" the young thief, who had stolen from her family's yatai again and had beaten her again when she made chase, asked as he looked at the young chef. "You're not gonna cry are ya?" "No. Course I'm not." Ukyou said. "Good." the other kid said. "Pop always said only sissies cry. Bye bye!" he added, before he ran off. Ukyou blinked, before she pushed herself off the ground. She walked back to the yatai, suffered her father's silent disapproval for a while, before she hesitantly asked "Dad... could you help me practice fighting?" Her father smiled, although only slightly. "Making sure in case he comes back again, eh?" Ukyou nodded. "I can't let him steal from us." she said. The following day... Ukyou grimaced as she brushed the dirt off her child sized okonomiyaki chef's clothes. "Hey, ya did good today." the young thief said from nearby, grinning as he ran a hand through his black hair. "You're ok at this stuff." Ukyou blinked, never expecting a compliment from her enemy. She had trained so hard yesterday, in preparation for this fight. And she had lost, yet again. But now it didn't feel so bad, for some reason. "Gotta go, Pop'll kill me if I'm gone long." the thief said as he ran off, waving back at her. "See ya tomorrow." he shouted. Ukyou hesitated, before she waved back. "Tomorrow?" she said as she narrowed her eyes. "Fine, I'll get you tomorrow." Some days passed... Ukyou spat out some dirt as she raised her head. The boy thief looked on from nearby. "Ya wanna play something else?" the boy asked. "Just for a change?" Ukyou glared at the young boy, who was looking at her with an inane grin on his face. Couldn't he realise that this wasn't a game? "Sorry." she said. "I gotta go work." The thief nodded, before he bounded away. The next day... Ukyou looked around as her father finished scraping down the grill. The day had passed and the thief had never shown up. She found herself... missing the young boy. "Come on Ukyou." her father said as he started to wheel the yatai away. "It's time to go home." Ukyou looked around once more, sighed and then followed him. A couple of days later... Ukyou blinked as she recognised the young boy who was barrelling towards her. It was him! He'd come back! And... she blinked again as she realised that he'd just stolen the okonomiyaki she'd been making. "Well, go stop him." her father urged from where he stood nearby. Ukyou nodded and raced off. Out of her father's presence, a small, secretive smile lit her lips. Today she was going to beat this thief. And if she didn't, then she was at least going to get his name. Some weeks on... "Nahahaha! Stop it!" Ukyou giggled as the young thief tickled her. "Stop it Ranchan! Wahahaha!" "Gonna admit defeat yet Ucchan?" the boy asked, grinning as he kept tickling her. "Ok, ok!" Ukyou laughed. "You win!" "Ranma, it's time to go, son!" an older voice rang out from nearby. The boy sighed, before looking down at the young Ukyou. "Gotta go." He hesitated, before he said "Ucchan... Pop said we were leaving soon." Ukyou looked at her enemy turned friend. "L... leaving?" she whispered. The young Ranma nodded. Ukyou stared after the boy as he ran off, her face pale at the thought of him leaving. Then she seemed to gather herself. Her face grew determined and she walked off to find her father and ask him something. The next day... Ukyou's father sat on a crate, facing Genma, who was also sitting on a crate. "You want to engage your daughter to my son?" Genma asked. The okonomiyaki chef nodded his head. "Surprisingly, it was my daughter's idea. She's got quite the crush on your boy and he seems to feel the same way about her." Genma sighed. "I'm sorry, but Ranma's already promised to another." "What a shame." Ukyou's father noted. "Especially since I was going to offer my yatai as a dowry." Genma's head shot up. "But then, aren't promises meant to be broken?" he asked. "I agree to an engagement between my son and your daughter." Later that day... Ukyou walked along happily, almost bouncing at the joy of knowing that Ranma's father had agreed to the engagement. Now it didn't matter that Ranma was going because she would be going with him. She blinked as her father's yatai rattled past her. It was being pulled by Genma and Ranma was sitting on top of the roof of the cart. Ranma waved to her as he rattled by. "Bye bye Ucchan!" Ranma bubbled. Ukyou looked at the dwindling cart before the cold, hard truth of what she was seeing hit her. They were leaving. Without her. And after they had promised to take her with them. "No." she whispered, before she broke into a run, following the cart. Ranma continued to wave to his friend as he kept yelling "Bye Ucchan, bye bye!" "Ranchan!!!" Ukyou shouted as she chased the yatai, waving her arms in an attempt to get them to slow down or stop. Tears started to flow from her eyes as she realised that the yatai was pulling away. "You said you'd take me with you!" Ranma blinked. He couldn't hear Ukyou over the whirring of the yatai's wheels, so he thought she was shouting goodbye. "Bye Ucchan!" Ukyou kept running after the yatai until finally her young body couldn't take it anymore and collapsed. She lay there, crying, as the yatai rapidly disappeared over a rise. "Don't leave me." she whispered, far too late to be heard. Time passed... With a deafening roar, the foamy waters of the turbulent sea crashed against the rocks of a remote beach. There was a sharp staccato of sizzles as water from the waves hit a portable grill that was set up near the sea's edge. Ukyou snarled as she practised her Art, the Kuonji Art, the Art that had served her family so well, the Art that combined cooking with martial arts, the Art that would... Her hands blurred as she twirled her mini spatulas over the grill. Her mind and body were one, focussed on the training she knew she needed, needed for her revenge. Training in the Kuonji Art, the Art that would gain her the vengeance she so wanted, so desperately needed. She... no. No longer a she, for to continue being female after the pain of such rejection was too much. _He_ had given up _his_ femininity, renouncing _his_ gender so that it could never hurt _him_ again. In the eyes of the world, let it be said that Kuonji Ukyou was, for now and evermore, a man. He continued his difficult, taxing training as the waves slammed against the rocks he stood on, ignoring all in his driving focus. Vengeance. Vengeance would be... his. No matter how long it took. About three months ago... Akane leaned over the bow of the boat as she stared out at the monotonous features of the sea. She blinked as Ukyou joined her in leaning on the boat's side. "There's something about the sea." Ukyou noted as she looked out at the water. "Its always called out to me. I even used to train next to the sea, when I was younger. Its rage seemed to mirror my own, after Ranma..." she trailed off, seemingly unwilling to continue. "I don't want to pry into your personal business..." Akane said, "...but just what happened between you and Ranma?" Ukyou clenched the wooden rail she had been leaning on. "I... he..." "You don't have to tell me if you don't want to." Akane said when she saw Ukyou struggling to speak. "It's alright." Ukyou sighed. "Thank you." They leant there for a while, before Akane looked at her companion. "So..." she said, "...you're a martial artist? What style do you study?" "My families' specialist style." Ukyou replied as she turned to look at Akane. "Why?" "I'm a martial artist myself." Akane said. "In fact, I'm the heir to my father's school. I was hoping you knew kempo, or something similar, so that we could spar. It'd help make this trip go faster." Ukyou smiled as she thought about sparring. She had left her combat spatula in the very small room the captain had given her. "Well, Kempo's not my thing but I can still fight unarmed opponents. I'll need to get my weapon." "Weapon?" Akane asked. Then she remembered that ridiculously huge spatula Ukyou had been carrying on the short trip between Kyoto and Osaka. "You don't mean that spatula is a weapon!?" Ukyou nodded. "Well, it's a bit too large for normal everyday cooking." she replied. She pushed herself off the rail and said "It'll be good to get in some practice. I don't want to be rusty when we catch up with Ranma. Just so you know, I don't go easy on girls though." She started walking towards her cabin, before she turned and added "I'm not that sort of guy." before she walked off to get her weapon. Akane looked at the departing cook. "Good." she said to herself. "Because if you'd gone easy you would have regretted it even more than you're going to." She smiled as she started limbering her muscles for a sparring match. The only workout she'd been getting recently had been in group fighting. A good old one-on-one session was just what she needed... About a week on... Akane looked on as Ukyou cooked them both an okonomiyaki lunch over that travel griddle he seemed to be able to pull out of nowhere. He was certainly a good cook, she realised with a small twinge of jealousy. She had always wanted to cook but being in the same house as Kasumi had always acted as a mental stop sign. Whenever she had thought about cooking in her own house, she would think of Kasumi's cooking and insecurity would take over, ensuring that she didn't try. The reactions of her Home Ec teacher to her food attempts hadn't helped her willingness to experiment either. But out here, in the wilds of China, it just didn't seem fair to be letting Ukyou cook every meal. She wanted to pull her own weight. So when night arrived and they set up camp after an exhausting day of travel, Akane looked at Ukyou and said "Why don't I cook dinner? You should take a break." Ukyou blinked, before she smiled. "Sure." she said. "I'm a bit tired anyway." she admitted. "So it would be nice to take a break. Thank you." Akane smiled in response as she started preparing the food. Ukyou walked off to a nearby stream to take a bath, so she was (unfortunately) not there to stop Akane from making some fundamental cooking mistakes. By chance, Ukyou returned from her bath just as Akane started serving the food. Ukyou hid a huge yawn as she sat down near Akane. "Sorry." Ukyou apologised. "I really am tired tonight. I think I'll go to bed as soon as I've finished eating." Akane nodded, she was feeling a bit tired herself. Still, the achievement of creating her first true meal, with no aid from anyone else what's more, had given her a bit of an adrenaline rush, so she was far more awake than Ukyou. "Here you go." Akane said as she handed Ukyou a plate full of... well, something. Maybe it was food, maybe it wasn't. It was too hard to tell. Ukyou dubiously looked at the dish for a moment before she mentally shrugged and used her chopsticks to take a portion. She was just too tired at the moment to care what the food looked like. Akane looked on, her heart beating faster in anxiety, as Ukyou placed the food in her mouth. There was a pause. Akane almost gulped, waiting for a comment from her friend. Then Ukyou fainted, the plate she was holding clattering to the ground. "Ukyou?" Akane asked. "Ukyou?" she shook Ukyou and, when the okonomiyaki chef didn't respond, Akane sighed. "I guess he _really_ was tired." she said to herself. "I'll have to ask him what he thought of my dinner in the morning." A few days later... Akane shook her head. "Thank you, but no. I don't want to buy a duck." Ukyou looked on as Akane did her best to ask an old lady whether she had seen Ranma. It didn't help that neither of the teenagers knew much Chinese, beyond some of the simpler words. It was probably as much luck as anything else if they happened to be going in the right direction. "Saotome? Ranma? Genma?" Akane tried, hoping that the old woman would know one of the names. The old woman looked at the young girl for a moment, before offering her a pig trotter. Ukyou sighed. "Maybe she can point us out to those places Ranma was supposed to be going to." she suggested to Akane. Akane nodded. "Maybe you're right." she said. She pulled an oft-folded piece of paper out of her pocket and opened it. She looked at the contents for a moment and hummed to herself. "Let's see... the only place left is Jusenkyo." The old lady dropped the pig trotter she had been holding. She began speaking rapidly, gesturing in a North Easterly direction as she shook her head. "Looks like we hit the jackpot." Ukyou said as she stared in the direction that the old woman was pointing to. "She seems very excited." Akane said worriedly as the old lady grabbed her shirt sleeve. The old woman shook her head and said some more words. "Maybe she's just glad to be of help." Ukyou suggested. She pointed in the direction that the old woman had pointed, looked at the old lady and said "Jusenkyo?" just to make sure. The woman looked at Ukyou for a few moments, her hand still on Akane's sleeve, before she sighed and nodded. She seemed to deflate as she took her hand off Akane's sleeve. Akane looked at the old woman. "She seems really disturbed about something." Ukyou nodded. "But what can we do about it? We don't speak the language well enough to figure it out. Maybe she's just lonely and doesn't want us to leave." Akane sighed. "Maybe." she said. She looked at the foodstuffs the woman was selling before she picked out a brace of small birds. She handed the old lady some money and looked guiltily at Ukyou. "Well, I had to buy something." she said defensively. Ukyou nodded. "I agree." "Besides, it's my turn to cook tonight." Akane added as the two teenagers left the old woman. Ukyou paled. "Really, you don't have to cook." she said. "I mean, I'm a professional cook. I enjoy cooking. You should leave it to me. Please." Akane shook her head. "That wouldn't be fair on you Ukyou. Besides, I never really cooked before this trip." [No, really?] Ukyou thought as she felt a little queasy at the thought of Akane's cooking. "And I'd like to get as much practice as possible." Akane continued. Ukyou sighed. "Alright. But if you want to improve, how about I show you how to do it. Give you a few tips." Akane looked at her friend. "Are you saying that my cooking's bad?" "I just thought you wouldn't mind some tips on how to cook." Ukyou said defensively. "I mean, I do make a living from cooking and you don't seem to mind when I show you potential problems in your fighting style." Akane sighed. "I'm sorry, you're right. It's just that I don't want to get it wrong. I'd..." she paused and blushed slightly, "I'd like it if you taught me how to cook." Ukyou smiled. Perhaps she could divert this one disaster, at least. "I'd be glad to teach you..." she replied as they walked off. Behind them, the old lady watched despondently as the two teenagers walked off. she said sadly. The old woman sighed, before she pocketed the money Akane had left her. Then she started shouting out her wares, much as she had done so before Akane had interrupted her. Not too many days later... The small campfire snapped and popped as it spread its dim light over the surrounding area. Akane-kun sat on his sleeping bag, looking across the fire at a sleeping Ukyou-kun. For the moment at least, they were stuck in their recently acquired cursed forms, since their water stocks were at critical level. Luckily they would reach a village tomorrow. Hopefully their reception would be different to the last village they had visited. Who could believe those Amazons would... Akane-kun looked at his travelling companion. It was fascinating to see what the curse did to Ukyou-kun's body. In his true form, Ukyou-kun looked very bishonen, almost androgynous. But in his cursed form his male features seemed to shine through. His stronger cheek line, his slightly larger frame, his muscles that rippled when he used his combat spatula... Akane-kun blushed. Then he noticed that Ukyou-kun was twitching and tossing slightly in his sleep. [He must be dreaming.] Akane-kun thought as he looked at the cook. Ukyou-kun mumbled something in his sleep as he started to shake his head, caught in whatever dream it was he was having. Akane-kun, curious about what Ukyou-kun was saying, stood and walked over to his travelling companion. He crouched down and listened to Ukyou's whispered words. "Ranchan..." Ukyou said softly. Akane-kun raised an eyebrow. [Ranchan?] he thought. "Don't go." Ukyou-kun continued. "Don't leave me... jackass. Ranchan... Ranma... please don't leave me..." Akane-kun blinked. Ranma had left Ukyou behind? Just what did Ranma do to Ukyou anyway? It must have been pretty incredible to give Ukyou such a drive to find Ranma. But Ukyou had never told Akane the reasons behind his need to find Ranma and Akane respected Ukyou's desire for privacy. After all, Akane hadn't told Ukyou the full reasons for why she was after Ranma either. It was just too private. Maybe once they'd been friends for a bit longer they could tell each other. "Don't leave me..." Ukyou-kun whispered again. Akane-kun hesitated, before he lowered his head and kissed Ukyou-kun on the forehead. He moved his mouth over Ukyou's left ear, and whispered "I won't leave you." Ukyou-kun slowly quieted down as the dream left him. Satisfied, Akane-kun stood and walked over to his sleeping bag. He looked down at his male form for a moment and shuddered slightly. "I just hope this village has better customs than the last one." he whispered to himself. "I really want to have the time to have a hot bath." Akane-kun lay down and, despite the discomfort of his relatively new form, was soon asleep. ********************* Ranma looked down at his childhood friend with genuine concern. She'd been knocked pretty hard on the head, she could be hurt badly. She... it just didn't make sense. Ukyou was a girl? Maybe she was cursed, like his father. He looked hesitantly at Ukyou's bandaged chest, before he reached down to replace the shirt. Ukyou groaned as the pain of consciousness hit her. She opened her eyes, to see Ranma's hand on her shirt. Her eyes flared, just as Ranma saw she was awake and he realised just how what he was doing could be taken. "Uh... wait. It's not what you thi..." Ranma managed before Ukyou slapped him. "Hentai." Ukyou snarled as she pulled her ragged shirt down around her. Ranma looked at Ukyou for a moment before he picked up a nearby kettle and doused the spatula girl with hot water. Where the kettle had come from was a mystery. Perhaps Kasumi, using Ninja Stealth Techniques, had snuck in and put the kettle there while no-one was looking(and everyone else was listening to Akane tell her tale of going to China). Perhaps. Ukyou winced as the hot water splashed over her. Right now, she was feeling too woozy to do much more. She looked at Ranma as he looked at her. "Baka." she said. "I'm not in my cursed form." she added tiredly. "You... you're a girl?" Ranma asked disbelievingly. "What do you think?" Ukyou asked. "Come off it Ranma, you always knew I was a girl. You had to, it was so obvious." "Obvious!? We were six years old when we last saw each other!" Ranma protested. "How was I supposed to know you were a girl?" He thought about it for a few seconds, before he continued. "I don't remember you ever telling me. And you were dressed up as a guy just before! How was I supposed to know!?" "You had to know." Ukyou hissed. She grabbed Ranma's shirtfront and pulled his face nearer to hers. "You had to!" Ranma didn't answer. He didn't have to. Ukyou looked into his eyes and saw the truth there. She weakly let go of his shirt and slumped against the wall. "Why did you leave me?" Ukyou asked after an uncomfortable silence. "Leave you?" Ranma asked. "What, you mean back when we were young? I think it was because my Pop wanted to go on another training trip." "You were supposed to take me with you." Ukyou said. "Damn you, I wasn't supposed to be left behind." "Why would you have come with us?" Ranma asked. Ever since he'd come to in the bath in this place, he seemed to have been kept in perpetual puzzlement. And most of it was because of this girl in front of him. A childhood friend comes out of nowhere, attacks him and turns out to be a girl. It was, to say the least, confusing. "You had to know." Ukyou hissed. The foundations of her life were falling out from underneath her. How could Ranma not know? Ranma shook his head. "Ucchan... tell me, what's wrong? Why are you so angry?" Ukyou looked at him. It had to be a trick, he had to be faking this. He knew... didn't he? Ranma blinked, waiting for her to respond. Ukyou felt her life crumbling around her. He didn't know. "When we were young, your father and mine engaged us." "What!?" Ranma shouted. "My father gave our family yatai as my dowry. As a symbol of the pact." Ukyou said. "The yatai..." Ranma began, before he smacked his fist into his other hand. "Now I remember. I wondered what we were doing with your yatai, but Pop never explained it to me. At least, I don't remember him explaining..." he trailed off as he tried hard to remember. "And then you and your father ran out on that engagement." Ukyou continued relentlessly after Ranma stopped talking. "I gave up my femininity, dressed as a boy. I trained, trained for so long so that I could get you when I eventually found you." She grimaced as she felt her head. "Obviously didn't train enough." "Hey, you were good." Ranma said, trying to make the obviously depressed spatula girl feel better. The ghost of a smile crept across Ukyou's face as she remembered Ranma saying something similar, so long ago. "Then I met Akane." she continued, needing to tell her story. "She didn't tell me until recently, but she's the Tendo who's engaged to you. She was coming after you and when I found out, I joined her. It was a desperate act, but I had to find you. I had to..." Ranma sat down next to Ukyou as he waited for her to continue. "I had to get my revenge, for what you and your father did to me." Ukyou finally said. "And so I went with Akane to China, hoping to catch up with you. We never did. But we did go to Jusenkyo." "Oh no. You didn't..." Ranma said as he remembered that Ukyou had said that she wasn't in her cursed form when he had splashed her with hot water. Not that she wasn't cursed. "We fell in." Ukyou confirmed. "Both of us, in the nanniichuan. The Spring of Drowned Boy." She looked at Ranma. "I've lost so much. Akane's lost so much." She sighed, before she told him an abbreviated version of her life and her trip to China. "Thanks to you," she concluded, "I swore I would never love another man." "Why?" Ranma asked simply. "What do you mean why!?" Ukyou growled as she stood and reached for her nearby combat spatula. Ranma stood and looked at her. "I mean, why would you do that?" Ranma asked. "A cute girl like you'd find it easy to get a guy." Ukyou stopped groping for her spatula and looked at him. "What?" she said simply. "I said..." Ranma began before the dojo door opened and Akane stepped in. "Hello." Akane said, almost surprised to see that the two teenagers were still in one piece. If Ukyou'd managed to patch things up with Ranma, then he was certainly being mature about it... "Hello." Ranma said hesitantly. "Hello Akane." Ukyou said. "So, did you tell your dad?" Akane nodded. "I managed to escape long enough to come out here and tell you that dinner's ready." she said as she looked appraisingly at Ranma. "So, what have you two been doing?" she asked. Ukyou sent a pleading glance to Ranma before she turned to Akane. "We were just having a man to man talk, that's all." Ranma, who had caught Ukyou's glance, looked puzzled for a second before he said "Uh... yeah, I guess so. A man to man talk." Ukyou nodded, before she said "We'll be there for dinner in a minute." Akane nodded before she left. Ukyou turned to Ranma. "You can't tell her I'm a girl." she said. "She doesn't know?" Ranma asked. "I thought you were her friend." "I _am_ her friend." Ukyou said. "So I don't want her to know the truth. We relied on each other a lot after some of the stuff in China. How do you think she'd feel if she found out that everything she thought about me was a lie? I know what it feels like to have your world ripped away from you. I don't want it happening to her." Ranma looked at her for a few moments before he nodded solemnly. "Alright, since we're friends from way back, I promise I'll help you keep it a secret." Ukyou sighed in relief. Maybe Ranma was not the monster that she had convinced herself he was. "Thanks... Ranchan." she said as they both walked out of the dojo. Ranma grinned. "Don't mention it, Ucchan." ***************************************************************************** ***************************************************************************** Well, that's the end of Chapter 5. Please tell me what you think. Pretty, pretty please. With sugar on top. Well, two serious chapters in a row, eh? And I think Chapter 6 will be similar to this one, focussing on Ranma. But that was always the plan for Neko, to have a mixture of serious and comedic chapters, each one ensuring that the story doesn't balance too far in either direction. Chapter 7 will probably be mostly comedic, to balance it back from the serious side and so forth. Let's hope it works, eh? Till next time.