Um... Yeah. I don't own the characters.
Nabiki had two passions in life. The first was psychology. The second was philosophy. Money was a distant third, solely a means to an end, a way to pursue her first two loves.
This fact might have surprised a lot of people if they knew.
Most people knew that Nabiki was a keen observer. However, practically everyone failed to see past her cool facade to see the Nabiki that looked out on the world; this Nabiki was philosophical in nature.
You couldn't deal with the factors that motivated people day in, day out, and not take a position on human nature. Hers, of course, was cynical. She had toyed with the idea of becoming a professor in the subject, but she enjoyed the thrill of understanding why a business deal was sealed favorably, why information could be exchanged and extracted unwittingly, or why the strong pounced on the a weakened, vulnerable opponent.
Money had little to do with it. Sure, money was nice, and it never hurt to have ample quantities of it, but in the end, it was just a thing. True power lay in understanding principles behind it.
The funny thing about human psychology is that most of it was subconscious. Very few people realized why they reacted in certain situations, interactions, or influences. Nabiki was self-aware enough to know she was influenced in the same way as anyone else. A carefully crafted advertisement or careful word choice was just as likely to influence her, even if subconsciously.
She was smart enough to know she wasn't immune. However, awareness of these reactions, and the factors that triggered them, was the first step in gaining control over them. If Nabiki had to pick one other thing she loved, it would be control.
It didn't mean she didn't enjoy running social experiments on her own. For her, school was nothing but a social experiment. By dictating the terms in which people interacted with her, she could manipulate small variables in her experiments, deciding what worked, what didn't, and how small changes in behavioral patterns could have a huge impact on a person's mental (and financial) well-being.
Nabiki was an excellent student of human nature. So, her tendency to think about psychology, and the ways to exploit it, made her an astute observer. Her entire industry depended upon being able to obfuscate, anticipate, and manipulate the people around her. She was good at it. The reason? Well, it was simple. Individually, a human being is intelligent, smart, rational, even. Mostly. But in a group? People were sheep.
Sheep followed willingly. Sheep got nervous and reacted. Sheep were scared. Sheep were easily led. Sheep had little to do but eat and exist, curiosity being one of the sole motivating factors in their otherwise bland existence.
Like sheep, people were naturally curious. The fact that most humans had an innate willingness to allow group think to consume the individual think, coupled with an unquenchable desire to know more were powerful tools in her arsenal. Curiosity could be used both as a source of information and a source of control. A curious person ceased to be intelligent as soon as they had to interact with anyone besides themselves.
The urge to conform, and the instinctive reactions so certain stimuli, gave Nabiki subtle levers over her classmates she could use to push, prod, and dupe people into acting the way you wanted. When people believed you had information they desired, if you played your cards right, you could make them reveal the information you sought without having to give anything in exchange.
One, could not, of course, practice manipulating people day in and day out without having facing a moral crisis of some kind. In order to resolve moral crisis, one had to examine morality itself. What was morality?
Nabiki decided long ago that it could be many things at many times. It was a conforming to an "agreed" upon set of conduct that society deemed to be "moral." It was a system, and pattern of behavior, a doctrine that that was used by people to make the individual behave in an expected manner. In the end, for Nabiki, morality was a lever to be used.
Who decided what became the code of conduct deemed to be "moral?" How was it imposed? Did society have a hive mind, and as one agree that such actions are moral, and such are not? Nabiki knew that it was easy to influence people. How would an entire population agree upon a singular moral code? Why did populations accept different moral codes, and why did those codes change, and how? Why does the individual accept a morality imposed upon by the masses? She didn't understand it, but yet, it was simply another tool, another lever to be used.
The problem with morality is that it was flexible, just as the human psyche was flexible. Why was it moral to be chaste and restrict the number of sexual partners in a lifetime? If the goal of life was to procreate, then breeding as often as possible would be the best solution. But society frowned up on such behavior. A lever to be used.
Why was it that it wasn't moral to kill someone, but come wartime, there was no greater moral obligation than to obliterate your enemy as ruthlessly as possible? Unless, of course, that enemy surrendered in a timely fashion, forcing you to adhere to yet a different set of morals, dictating that one could bring no harm to an unarmed combatant who had signaled the desire to surrender his weapons. A lever to be used.
Morality, and its cousins, propriety and manners, had to have evolved from somewhere. Back when humans were still apes dragging their knuckles, morality must have evolved to compensate for something. For Nabiki, morality had an inextricable link to the fact that humans functioned in groups. You were either "in" or "out," but never both. Morality must have evolved as some form of restraint observed only towards the "in" group, as a means of allowing individuals to band together against adversaries.
The profound irony of this is that humanity's noblest achievement — morality — was tied to the complete absence of morality — warfare. Mother Nature found a way of curbing our ruthless desire to shed blood by making people easy to manipulate. By making people sheep.
This was fine. It served her purposes well. Morality was just a tool to keep people from treating their friends in a manner unbecoming. Morality deemed that certain desires, like greed, were bad.
Nabiki understood that concept well.
Nabiki wasn't greedy. If anything, she was the opposite. Her ability to manipulate people stemmed from her original desire to help her family. As she learned, she became entranced; she found it fascinating. The money she earned from her labors went towards her family. She kept very little for herself. But it quickly taught her a crucial lesson; rare was the person who could not be easily manipulated by want in general and greed in particular.
There were few things that could overcome the intangible morality imposed on a person as quickly as greed. If morality came about as a result of our worst instincts, then greed had to be tied to our worst desires. To want. To always want more. To want more than those around you. To be strongest, fastest, or the most attractive. To have it all.
Greed, in its own way, was as powerful as morality. Some believed that Pride was the deadliest vice, the vice from which all other sins arose. Nabiki firmly believed that every other major vice - lust, sloth, wrath, envy, gluttony, and pride, stemmed from greed. Greed was the sin of excess. Greed was the sin of more. The one thing that all humans wanted was always more. To have more. To be more. To feel more. Greed was the singular human quality that no amount of morality could overcome.
You couldn't be proud if you didn't posses a quality that made you feel superior - thus possessing what no one else could. Greed. Lust, a form of greed seeking physical fulfillment. Sloth, the desire to have it all and not have to work for it. Envy, the feeling of wanting what others had. Gluttony? Of course. Wrath? The same.
Just because Nabiki understood the motivating factors of greed didn't mean she was immune to greed. It was the failing she struggled with, just as all humans did. For her, it wasn't about the money, though. It was because enjoyed understanding what motivated people. She desired to be better at it every day, to know to understand a person so thoroughly she could always find the lever to move them.
And thus was born her interest in psychology. She wasn't a philanthropist. Nabiki knew she was motivated by the desire to be in control.
After years of study of human nature, Nabiki arrived at one conclusion.
She laid out the latest sets of photos of Ranma and Akane on the desk in front of Kuno. She gauged his reactions as he examined the photos, looking for the subtle tells to indicate how much he'd pay for this set. She named her price, knowing instantly that he would agree. He slapped down the money without hesitation and scooped up the photos.
Greed was such a powerful motivation.
Philosophically speaking, this suited her just fine.
After all, the only thing as powerful as Mother Nature is Father Greed.
I don't really claim responsibility for this one. I must have typed it while asleep. I have absolutely no idea where this came from. I take that back. I do remember reading a few months ago a fascinating article on the evolution of morality. The article stated that basically, morality evolved only as a mechanism to keep us all from killing each other, as were were less likely to kill members of our tribes back when we were still monkeys.
But, other than that... I had a lunch break, sat down to write an email, and ended up writing this instead. Hmm... It isn't particularly the best piece of work I've done, but I'm happy to call it finished and let you savage it apart.
Oh, and I'm sorry for my little rant on the last chapter of What's in a Name. I was feeling particularly low at the moment I finished that chapter. Thanks to all who review. Please let me know what you would improve, how, and why.
muishiki