Akane was almost finished dusting the last of the shelves in the attic, reaching towards the top shelf, her hand brushed against something hard and accidentally knocked it off. A small chest hit the floor with a loud thud, sending its contents all over the clean floor. "Damn!" Akane muttered as she noticed the new mess. Kneeling down, Akane started to cleaning the mess. "Hmm, what's this?" she muttered when her hand brushed across a few scrolls. Opening the first one, she saw that it was over one hundred years old. "This looks like it's talking about house hold accounts. Not very interestingI hope there's one with a new martial arts technique on it," she said as she put that one back into the chest before she reached for another. Unrolling it, Akane glanced at the writing and saw that it was a letter to the lord of the house. Disappointed that it wasn't a new technique, she quickly put it in the chest. Just as she was about to stand up, she spotted a book that looked extremely old. "Oh, I wonder what this has in it?" Akane said, reaching for the tome, she picked it up and inspected the cover. There was nothing special about it that she could see, except that it was bound with a leather cover.
Akane was curious about the book since all of the old books that she knew about were only found in museums. It was kind of hard to see what the tome contained because she was holding it face down. Akane turned it over to see what was on the cover. She gasped in surprise when she saw two family crests burned into the leather. One crest she recognized as her own and the other looked to be Ranma's. "Why would Ranma's crest be on this book with my family's?" Akane muttered while trying to open the tome to see what it contained, only to find that it was locked. Glancing around, Akane looked to see if the key had fallen out of the chest along with the scrolls. Akane search around every box and in every available space that it could have bounced behind, but she couldn't find anything. She was just about to put the book away when she heard Nabiki calling her.
"Akane! You better hurry up and take your bath now before Auntie Noduka gets here! You've only got one hour left!" Nabiki yelled from below the attic stairs.
"Ok! Nabiki? Is the bath ready?" Akane called down to her sister as she neared the stairs.
"Yes, the bath is ready and I think Ranma might be using it at the moment," Nabiki replied.
"Hey, you're not trying to get me to walk in on him this time. What gives onne-chan?" Akane asked as she made her way down the attic stairs, the book in one hand and the other gripping the rail.
"Father wants everything to be perfect for Auntie's visit. So he told me earlier today before breakfast, that he didn't want any fighting before Auntie arrived. Don't worry, I found another way to make some money. I'm running errands around the house giving messages to everyone. I've got to go now. Bye, see you at dinner," Nabiki said while grinning happily before she waved and walked back to her room to tally her earnings.
Shrugging, Akane made her way towards her room to pick up a change of clothes before heading to the bathroom. Glancing at the door for the occupied sign and noticing that it wasn't there, Akane sighed in relief, opened the door and entered the changing room. Stripping, Akane grabbed a huge fluffy towel just in case Ranma had forgotten to put the sign out and was still in the fuiro, walked into the wash room and quickly began scrubbing. The noise of the fuiro doors sliding open was the only warning she had before she heard the sound of Ranma's voice.
"ACK! AAkane! I...I...it's not my fault! I...I...," Ranma stammered as he saw the form of a dripping naked Akane. His eyes opened wide like a deer caught in the headlights of a car. No matter how hard he tried he couldn't seem to avert his gaze. Unconsciously, he took in every inch of bare skin, cataloging each feature before moving on up to the next. Gulping, he continued to try to explain when Akane interrupted him.
Akane ground her teeth in anger as she glanced over her shoulder to see Ranma standing there with a towel around his waist. Deciding that she would not kill him today because they were going to have visitors she suppressed the urge to smash him with her mallet and said in a deceptively sweet tone of voice. "Ranma, I'm not going to hit you today. But, please remember that you have to put the sign out when you're going to take a bath!" Akane yelled as she calmly picked up a bucket of freezing cold water, whirled around and threw its contents over the pig tailed boy changing him into a her. Then she grabbed her towel, covering herself up, and rushed past him into the fuiro.
"Ahhhh! That's cold!" Ranma-chan yelled when the water hit. She vaguely noticed Akane rush by her with the towel barely covering her front, Ranma winced as she heard the fuiro doors slam. "I'm glad that Akane didn't hit me today," Ranma thought to herself then glanced back towards the fuiro doors and grinned as the picture of a naked Akane covered in nothing but soap and water entered her mind. Ranma felt a funny tingling sensation on her upper lip and swiped at it. Glancing at her hand she noticed that there was blood on it. Walking over the sink she filled a cup with hot water and changed back before glancing into the mirror. "I bet she doesn't know why I never put that sign out, and I hope she never finds out. Because if she knew that I did it on purpose just to see her naked, she'd kill me!" he thought while a silly grin appeared. Quickly, he gave the doors one last glance before grabbing a washcloth and cleaning up. "You better hurry up Akane before my mom gets here!" he yelled before he left the bathroom to get dressed.
"I'll be out in a minute," she called back just before she heard the bathroom door open and close, signaling that he had left. Knowing that she didn't have too much time left, Akane quickly immersed herself in the hot water for five minutes and then stepped out, dried off, and entered the changing room to dress. Once she finished putting on her favorite outfit of shorts and a t-shirt, she grabbed the book and hurried down the stairs.
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"Nabiki?" Soun called out to his middle daughter as he searched
the house.
"Yeah daddy? she replied.
"Kasumi asked me to ask you to help with Akane and Ranma's surprise birthday dinner. Since we're using Mrs. Saotome's visit as a cover up," Soun said.
"Alright daddy, I'll help Kasumi," Nabiki said then held out her hand expectantly.
"How much?" Soun questioned, as he was familiar with the routine.
"Fifteen hundred yen," Nabiki replied.
Reaching into his pocket Soun collected the correct amount and handed it over without blinking. Then, he left to find Ranma and possibly distract him for as long as he could while Kasumi set out the surprise dinner. "I'm so proud of you.sniff, sniff. My little girl will never be poor!" Soun muttered to himself as he walked back into the den.
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