The Courtship(s) of Kuonji Ukyo

Disclaimer: Ranma 1/2 and the characters associated with it belong to Rumiko Takahashi and whomever she has sold the rights to. Any characters you don't recognize belong to me, for whatever that's worth. This work of fanfiction is not intended for monetary gain, but was written just for the fun of it.

Author's Note: This story begins five years after the epilog to "Children of the Heart". So if you haven't read that, then this story might not make too much sense. Ranma and company are now 25 years old. Figure everyone else's age from there.

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Chapter 1: Defining the Moment and Other Stuff

Kuonji Ritsuko leapt out of bed with the enthusiasm that only a little girl having her fifth birthday can possess. She hurriedly dressed and was soon racing down the hallway to her mother's room. It was going to be a very special day.

Later on, there would be a party with presents, food, presents, games, presents, fights and presents. She'd get to play with her sister (half-sister some said, but Ritsuko knew better), brother (half-brother, although she didn't argue that one) and what she referred to as 'sorta-cousins'. (Ritsuko's definition of 'family' would have shocked the average genealogist. But then, so would her family.)

But there was something else that she felt was even more important. She was five now. It was finally the day that Mama would teach her to make okonomiyaki.

"Mama-san! Mama-san! Get up! Get up!" Ritsuko cried as she burst through the door to her mother's bedroom.

Ukyo forced her eyes open far enough to glance at the alarm clock. She suspected it lied by displaying 7:03 AM. She'd stayed longer than intended at the dojo the night before. Getting ready for tournament season was always a pain. But the sheer expectation showing in Ritsuko's face was more than enough to banish any tiredness Ukyo felt.

"Happy Birthday sprout. How old are you now?"

Ritsuko directed an 'adults are weird' look at her mother. But then, she wasn't old enough to understand sarcasm or rhetorical questions. She eventually said, "Five."

"Hmm... Five... Five... There was something I was supposed to do when you turned five. What was it?"

"You know," Ritsuko said with a little girl giggle.

"Give you a bath?"

"No," the young girl answered while shaking her head.

"Give you a hug?" Ukyo asked, holding out her arms hopefully.

"No," Ritsuko replied as she leapt into her mother's embrace.

"Sure it wasn't a hug? You give pretty good hugs." Ukyo felt her daughter squeeze harder. "Wait! I remember. When you turn five, I'm supposed to teach you how to make rice balls!"

"Mama-san!" Ritsuko wailed impatiently. Aunt Kasumi had taught her rice balls months ago.

"Takoyaki? Ramen? Wait a second, those can't be right. Hmm... Don't I run a restaurant of some sort?" Her daughter frowned unamusedly, refusing to rise to the bait. "Oh, you're no fun anymore," Ukyo said in a mocking tone.

"Will you teach me like Grampa taught you?"

"Well... I learned on your Grampa Kuonji's yattai sweetie. But I think since we've got a real kitchen handy, we'll use that instead," Ukyo informed her daughter who nodded in response.

Since the restaurant was closed for the day, Ukyo felt she had enough time to explain everything that went into making a very basic okonomiyaki. Her daughter was a very fast learner, just like her father and half-sister.

"Now honey, you're not going to make okonomiyaki right away. First we're going to fry some eggs for breakfast and work our way up from there," Ukyo explained.

"Mama-san," Ritsuko complained, "I see you an' Aunt Kasumi an' Aunt Joji an' Uncle 'Natsu an' Grammy Sa'tome an' everybody cook all the time. I'm not a baby." Ukyo knew it was not a coincidence that 'Aunt Akane' had been left off that list. Ritsuko was only five as of that morning, but she was old enough to know that Akane's cooking wasn't nearly as good as the people she had named.

Ukyo knew what the problem was. Her daughter wanted to start at the top without demonstrating mastery of the basics. Which in her opinion was still one of Akane's major problems with cooking. In order to demonstrate this point, she decided to give her daughter enough rope to hang herself. "Well, I still want two eggs over easy for breakfast pumpkin. But since you're a big girl, you can make them."

Ritsuko didn't say anything, but instead got to work. Plates were taken from the cupboard, eggs and butter removed from the refrigerator, and a few miscellaneous utensils were gathered. A small section of the grill was turned on. Ritsuko washed her hands before using a spatula to place a pat of butter on the cooking surface.

Once the butter melted came the hard part. Five year old hands simply weren't large enough to crack eggs the way adults could. But she managed well enough, flicking an errant piece of eggshell into the trash before it could become a problem. At the proper time, Ritsuko flipped the eggs. Moments later, she made the transfer of eggs from grill to plate with a smooth motion that looked practiced to her mother's eyes.

"Well squirt, if I didn't know better, I'd say you've done this before," Ukyo observed coolly as she took the plate from her daughter. Ukyo had made it perfectly clear to Ritsuko's many would be teachers that her daughter was not allowed to work with a live grill unless Ukyo was present.

"Daddy said to make it a kata."

"That does sound like your father."

-----

Tendo Ranma rolled out of the bed he shared with his wife. Not that Akane was actually there. Since their marriage six years earlier, Ranma had discovered that his wife simply needed less sleep than he did. By the time Ranma finished his morning routine, Akane had already been up long enough to run five kilometers, clean up, start breakfast, wake Ranko and Kenichi and greet her father as he arrived to teach the first class of the morning. (Of course, in emergencies, which were still far too frequent for his taste, sleep became the luxury it had been during his formative years.)

As he entered the dining room, Ranma could smell miso soup cooking in the kitchen, hear the 'Ki-ya's' of students from the dojo, see his son Kenichi coloring a picture of a dinosaur and feel the tackle-hug that was his daughter Ranko's normal form of greeting.

"How's my girl?" Ranma asked of the small red-head that was doing her level best to force the air out of her father's lungs.

"I hit Grampa Tendo when we was sparrin'", Ranko said proudly as she squeezed harder.

Ranma glanced over at his wife and son, who both nodded affirmatively.

"Dad was on his knees and defending with only one hand," Akane stated as she set the table.

"Really?" Ranma observed cynically as he pried himself loose from his daughter. "Well Ranko-chan, from now on he uses both hands. Got it?"

"Uh huh," his daughter replied.

With that, Ranma set Ranko down and turned his attention towards his son. Once again, to his disappointment, he didn't feel the spark of connection with Kenichi that he did with his daughter. There was no question that he loved his son and was loved by him in return. But there just seemed to be something... off... in their relationship.

Ranma complimented his son's artistic effort before sitting at the head of the chabudai. "Anything on the schedule today besides Ritsuko's birthday party?" Ranma asked his wife as she served a breakfast of miso soup with rice.

"The Iron Duke and his men are due before lunchtime," Akane replied.

"Besides them."

"I don't th-"

Akane's response was interrupted by the challenge bell. Ranko and Kenichi both scrambled away from the table and raced to the dojo proper. Challenges could be just as much fun as a visit from one of Daddy's friends.

-----

Mu Tzu, or Mousse as his name was pronounced locally, walked unhurriedly through the warm September sunshine toward Nerima. At one time, he had lived in the building that was his destination. Once, Ukyo's As You Like It had been the Cat Cafe. He'd lived there for over a year in it's previous incarnation. But it had never felt like home.

'Home' had always been an elusive concept for Mousse. His near-blindness kept the Joketzu village from feeling like home during his formative years. Elder Cologne, rest her soul, had not made his stay at the Cat Cafe a picnic. When she'd kicked him out to keep Shampoo from killing him in a jealous fit over getting his Jusenkyo curse cured, it hadn't helped. But it was Shampoo's pronouncement of exile the day Cologne died that guaranteed 'home' would not be in China for Mousse. Life since then had provided many things, but never a feeling of 'home'.

Crossing the unmarked border between Toshima and Nerima, Mousse made an effort to banish depressing thoughts from his mind. It wasn't difficult. There were positive things that had happened over the years. His curse was long gone. Decent ophthalmic care (and two surgeries) had improved his eyesight immeasurably. Certainly not last or least, he liked being "Uncle Mousse" to an ever growing number of children.

That list was getting fairly lengthy. There was Ritsuko, Ranko and Kenichi. Plus Kasumi and Tofu's girls Kin and Chizu and finally, all five of Ryoga and Akari's kids. Being called "Uncle Mousse" by the younger students at the Tendo/Saotome School of Martial Arts wasn't quite the same, but still felt good.

Mousse ran through a mental checklist of the magic tricks he planned to perform at Ritsuko's party as he walked. When that review was complete, his attention was drawn by a sight that would have been considered odd anywhere other than Nerima. A handsome, dark haired man in his mid-twenties was carrying a forklift load of lumber and other building supplies on his muscular shoulders. The burden didn't seem to be bothering him much.

"Oi! Ranma! Let me give you a hand with that," Mousse called as he hurried over.

With a shrug, Ranma propelled his load into the air, spun a quick 180 degrees and recaught everything without difficulty. Like many things he did, it was showy, but effective. "Hey Mousse. You walkin' to Ritsuko's party?"

Mousse gestured wide enough to take in half of Japan. "Look around. Why take the subway on a beautiful day like this?" Eight years ago, that statement would have tempted Fate. Fortunately, Fate had found other things to do with her time.

"Glad you decided to come," Ranma said. With somewhat more than a minimum of showmanship, the two divided the load and proceeded toward the Tendo/Saotome dojo at a brisk walk.

"I take it you had another 'messy' challenge," Mousse observed.

"Yeah," Ranma admitted. "It's like a rule or sumthin'. The weird ones show up whenever, but the ones that really wreck the place only show up when we're gettin' ready for tournament season."

"Maybe that is not a coincidence," Mousse stated using his 'Inscrutable Chinese' voice.

"Oh c'mon," Ranma snorted in response. "Even I'm not that paranoid."

"Perhaps you should be. It might have saved you some grief back in the old days."

Ranma grunted in acknowledgement and glanced at his watch. "We better get a move on. I got another challenger due any minute."

-----

The Iron Duke glanced around to make sure no one was looking before removing his iron mask long enough to wipe the perspiration off his face with a fold of his cape. If his men noticed the break in protocol, none were stupid enough to say anything about it. As dramatic and awe inspiring as it was, on sunny days his armor did tend to get a bit warm.

He and his men had already circled the compound to get to the challenger's entrance. The Tendo/Saotome School of Martial Arts was quite, almost unreasonably, strict about challenges. If you rang the bell and made a proper entrance, Tendo or his designates would fight under whatever rules you proposed. Any other way, you were fair game to be taken out via any method by anyone who happened to be there at the time. The fact those methods tended be as painful as they were diverse quickly taught most challengers to 'play fair'.

The Iron Duke strode to the bell rope and heaved mightily. He was rewarded, not with a loud ring, but with a short length of rope at his feet. Not to be deterred by this setback, the Duke strode forward and knocked upon the door with his iron clad fist. Once and for all, he would prove that he, and not Tendo Ranma, was the undisputed champion of Anything Goes Martial Arts Needlepoint.

Akane, looking somewhat disheveled, pulled open the door. Behind her, the Duke could see numerous large holes in the dojo's walls. One corner of the building sagged, indicating hidden structural damage. Debris was scattered throughout the yard, but was being gathered into piles by Kenichi. (Ranko having reluctantly gone to school.)

"I take it that I'm going to have to reschedule Saotome-san?" the Iron Duke asked politely in his flawless Japanese.

"If it wouldn't be too much trouble. It will take us a few days to put the dojo back in order," Akane explained.

"Pardon any rudeness in my inquiry, but what happened?"

"We had a challenge from Slavko Marakovic, Master of Anything Goes Martial Arts Bell Ringing," Akane explained as she ushered the Duke and his men into the Tendo/Saotome compound. "It was very noisy and surprisingly messy."

"They did all this damage fighting with bells?" the Duke asked incredulously. His detractors could say what they like about Martial Arts Needlepoint, but at least there wasn't much collateral damage involved.

Akane held her hands up a bit more than shoulder width apart. "Really big bells. Marakovic tried to grab the challenge bell as a trophy. I haven't had a chance to put it back up yet."

"I see... And your husband?"

"After it was over, Ranma went to the lumberyard to pick up repair supplies."

"Hmm... Very well. Would next Saturday be acceptable?"

Akane shook her head negatively. "Next Friday would be better. We've got student evaluations all next weekend to get ready for tournament season."

"Next Friday it is then," the Duke stated agreeably. "Since they are already here, I'll have my men clean up the mess." With a wave of his hand, he set his minions into motion.

"That will be a great help. Thank you very much. May I get you some tea?" Akane asked.

With a flourish, the Duke pulled a thermos from under his cape. "No thanks, brought my own." He'd drunk Akane's tea before.

'One tiny little mistake and they never let you live it down,' Akane angrily thought to herself. She was a woman who tried her best. It wasn't like she was a professional chef.

-----

Ukyo glanced into the bathroom to gauge the progress of Ritsuko's post okonomiyaki making lesson bath. Her daughter insisted that she was old enough to bathe herself and Ukyo agreed. But that didn't mean she wouldn't pop in long enough to check things anyway. Ritsuko noticed her mother's presence and stuck out her tongue. Ukyo responded by sticking out her own tongue, putting her right thumb to her nose and wiggling her fingers. Ritsuko giggled and Ukyo, satisfied that her daughter was fine, left the bathroom and headed downstairs.

Normally, the lunch rush would have been well underway at that point. Fortunately, the 'Closed for Private Party' sign kept all but a few illiterate souls... er, hungry customers away. Instead of a loud and lively crowd eating okonomiyaki cooked by her, Kasumi, Konatsu, or Joji (in order of proficiency), the place was unnaturally silent.

Ukyo drank in the silence that she knew would not last. She didn't know if she enjoyed the quiet or if it bothered her. The combined demands of motherhood and business left too little quiet in her life to make decisions about. 'Maybe things will settle down when Ritsuko starts school next March,' Ukyo thought.

Further introspection was prevented by a knock on the door. Ukyo glanced through a window and saw that despite the fact the party wouldn't start for hours, the first guest had arrived. Ukyo put on a smile she wasn't sure she felt and opened the door for Saotome Nodoka.