Brand New Day
A Ranma 1/2 Fanfiction
By Azurite
Chapter 4: Courage

Ranma is (c) Rumiko Takahashi, Viz, Kitty, Fuji, Shounen Sunday, etc. etc. I make no claims to these characters, referred situations, etc. The plot line is the only thing that belongs to me.

Edits: 2/23/06

June. Two months after Akane's initial disappearance.

"Courage consists not in blindly overlooking danger, but in seeing it, and conquering it."

"Well, that doesn't make any sense." Ranma mused.

That night, he was sitting at the counter of Ucchan's Okonomiyaki, pondering over that night's English homework. Miss Hinako had given them a quote from some European philsopher named Richter, and she wanted them to write a paragraph to explain what they thought it meant. Ranma hadn't understood the assignment from the moment he got it, so he easily agreed to sit with Ukyo to see what they could make of it.

At the moment, the aforementioned okonomiyaki chef was busy serving to-go diners their okonomiyaki with a cheery smile and a bit of sweat on her brow. She knew just as well as anyone else that Ranma had only become so studious in the past two weeks to simply take his mind off the fact that Akane was gone.

'It's been a nearly a month now since the search was called off,' Ukyo thought to herself. Ukyo remembered wishing ill on Akane before, but now she regretted ever feeling that way. Now, when her own malicious thoughts became reality, she saw how much the loss of the youngest Tendo truly affected everyone -especially Ranma.

It was odd... he had been wild with worry, then rage, then denial, and now finally, something like a quiet acceptance. One month had passed since the search for Akane stopped-- and two whole months -as of tomorrow, actually- since she'd disappeared. Just... poof. The way Ranma told it, she was just gone. There one day, and then, all her stuff had been packed neatly away the next. It was if she had moved on, and moved out.

'Whatever possessed her to just up and go must have been awfully traumatic... but I guess she and Ranma are still acting before they think... poor Ranma.'

It had been a while since Ukyo dared to call Ranma 'Ranchan'. They'd had a big fight after the whole wedding fiasco, and when they'd finally made up, the tension was high, and then, just three days later, Akane simply vanished. It was dangerous ground with Ranma: one had to be careful about what he or she said, because Ranma's reactions could range from intense rage to perpetual silence. Ukyo couldn't decide which was worse.

"Of course it does, Ranma," Ukyo said, cleaning up the grill in front of Ranma. The pigtailed martial artist looked up, and his navy blue eyes met with Ukyo's brilliant aquamarine ones.

"How so?" He actually seemed to be thinking about the assignment, though it was clear that some things were still beyond his comprehension. Having been raised on the road by his father for ten years had affected him more than anyone could ever know. The Neko-ken and other similar heists -care of Genma- were just the beginning.

"Well, you see, this uh, Richter guy. Yeah, he was saying that it's not courageous to put yourself in dangerous situations, but courageous to recognize them as dangerous before you jump headlong into them, and then... conquer them."

Ranma returned her answer with a blank stare.

"Fine then, Ranma, what is courage?" Ukyo asked, cocking an eyebrow at her fellow martial artist.

Ranma looked thoughtful, and settled his chin into his palm. The minutes ticked by.

Tick. Tick. Tick. Tick.

Ukyo's foot began tapping in time with the clock. Her fingers drummed on her arm, where her other hand rested. Her eyes blinked rhythmically to the monotonous, continuous noise. Or lack thereof.

"RANMA!" Ukyo practically yelled at him, now beyond impatient for an answer.

"I guess... I never really thought about what it is, Ucchan," Ranma finally said, his eyes still directed at the far wall. His eyes seemed a bit vacant, and Ukyo realized he was truly trying to put thought into this.

Taken aback, she thought, 'Is this how hard he has to try to not think about Akane? I mean, I know she meant -means- a lot to him... but so much?'

"Fine, but when someone calls you a coward, why do you know it's not true? Why would you be offended by someone calling you a coward?" Ukyo asked, putting forth another question.

Ranma looked back at her, and then away again to think. This time, his response was faster.

"I don't think 'coward' can ever be a compliment. Doesn't it mean 'one without courage,' or something like that?" Ranma asked quizically. Ukyo nodded, prodding Ranma along. Maybe with some luck, she'd get an idea for her own paper.

"If I was a coward, I'd never fight anyone. Heck, I'd be like... like Gosunkugi."

Ukyo laughed a bit and gestured Ranma to continue. The fact that they knew of a living testament to cowardliness made the situation a bit more light-hearted, but their assignment had yet to be completed.

"He's a coward because he can't stand up for what he believes in, for what he wants and needs to have," Ranma continued, still speaking of Gosunkugi. "So someone who isn't a coward is someone who does stand up for what they want, and what they believe in."

"So what do you believe in, Ranma?" Ukyo asked, continuing the flow of the conversation.

This question stopped Ranma in his thoughts. SCREECH! Ranma's train of thought pulled to a halt and fell right off the track. None-too-eloquently, Ranma uttered a surprised "Huh?"

Suddenly, Ukyo cocked her head. The sky outside began to darken, and in the distance, black storm clouds hovering near them.

"You'd better go, Ranma. Don't want to get wet, do you?" Ukyo smiled and motioned Ranma to the door. She was finished with cleanup, but their own brief discussion had given Ukyo plenty of ideas of what to write for her paper. Miss Hinako allowed for many broad topics, and Ukyo wanted to write about hers before the thought left her. Ranma waved curtly and ran outside, quickly jumping onto the fence as he headed home to the Tendo dojo.

"So what do you believe in, Ranma?"Ucchan's voice echoed in his memory. What a strange question. But it was true. What did he believe in?

A blank sheet of binder paper sat on the living room table as Ranma attempted to think of a narrower topic for his paragraph. It was only allowed to be a single paragraph, and Ranma didn't want points taken off- not when he'd just started doing the work seriously a few weeks ago. He might even be able to bring up his grade more, thanks to...

'Akane.'

Suddenly, it was if she was in the room in front of him, smiling in that cute little way of hers. And of course, whenever he mentioned that fact to her, she was always frozen solid, her face a mix between disbelief and embarassment.

"You're wide open!" Ranma laughed and flicked the girl upside her head. Startled, Akane promptly fell on her bottom and stared angrily up at the newcomer who had tricked her.

Ranma shook his head at the memory. The pencil was in his hand, the paper on the table. And here, out of nowhere, he was thinking of her. Why? For what felt like so long, he'd managed not to think of her, and he thought things were becoming easier because of it...

'I thought wrong.' Ranma sighed and put the pencil down. Once he thought of her, her smile, her laugh, and her cute screnched-up face whenever she pouted, he couldn't take his mind off her. He might as well be in a trance.

"What would Akane say courage is?" Ranma mused aloud. If she couldn't be here to help him herself, maybe she could be his muse in spirit. He never wanted to forget her, as much as he hated to admit it... he felt rather gulity about trying to push her out of his thoughts. Worse, he'd been the one to drive her away in the first place, and then, he'd been unable to find her and bring her back home.

But he imagined that he could hear her voice: "Courage is bravery. Courage is standing up for what you believe in, what you want, and what you need. It's protecting those you love, even if it means your own downfall."

Ranma knew he'd heard some of those words before, but the voice...

"Ranma." Nabiki leaned against the doorframe, peering in at Ranma with a curious expression. Ranma let out a breath that he hadn't known he'd been holding in. So it had been her that had spoken. Not Akane.

"Do you really believe that?" Ranma asked.

"Believe what I just said?" Nabiki asked, sauntering towards him.

"Yeah." Ranma turned back to his blank paper, and wondered what in the world he'd title it. 'Courage'. No. 'What Courage Is'. No again.

"Of course I do. And I know you do too. If there's a word someone can describe you with, it's 'courageous'."

Ranma hadn't been the only one in the Tendo dojo to change since Akane's disappearance. Nabiki had changed too, seeming a bit less obsessed with money than Ranma had ever known her to be. Without fights to make bets on, she no longer had much of a business - not unless the information she had secured money for the dojo, or the reputations of the people within.

Ranma scoffed at her comment. Him, courageous? 'Maybe once uppon a time,' he amended mentally. But not anymore. His source of courage -his only reason to be courageous- was gone. Literally.

"Don't deny it, Ranma. You know that you're courageous. You just need a reason. If it's that paper you're working on, maybe you could explain why it takes more courage to believe in someone than to fight."

Ranma seemed to be inspired by her words, almost as if they were directed at him, and him alone. He nodded fiercely and turned back to his blank sheet of binder paper. It didn't look quite so intimidating now, and even thoughts of Akane wouldn't distract him. They might just help him, instead.

Nabiki smiled a bit and started to leave the room. She was already out in the hallway when Ranma spoke, still hunched over his paper and not looking in her direction.

"Thanks, Nabiki."

"Anytime, Saotome, anytime."

Miss Hinako looked over the stack of papers. She clicked her tongue at some of the messy handwriting, and the poor grammar of others. But prominently on the top of the pile was a surprise.

Miss Hinako looked at the name, and her eyes widened. Ranma Saotome? He had actually done the homework? It was exactly one paragraph long, with a title, the prompt, and everything.

'He... actually did this! No... someone else must have!' Hinako mused, immediately thinking of Ukyo. But the two sets of handwriting were completely different, and even if Ranma had copied... no, this was his all right. Hinako scanned the words, and smiled. Indeed, Ranma had put great thought into his paragraph.

What It Takes

"Courage consists not in blindly overlooking danger, but in seeing it, and conquering it." --Richter

Richter was right when he said that courage involves more than overlooking obvious danger. One has to recognize danger in order to overcome their fears. These fears could be ones the person does not even know they have, like the fear of losing someone. In order to be courageous in the face of such fears, it takes inner strength to believe in yourself and others. It has been said that 'it takes more courage to believe in someone than to fight.' I also agree with this quote, because whoever said it must have known that when you cannot fight, and cannot overcome your fears, someone else will be, and you have to be courageous on their behalf, because they can't always be courageous for their own sake. Courage is hard to find, and harder to achieve for yourself, but it comes to you when you least expect it. With it, you can recognize dangers and your fears, and conquer them.

Hinako blinked. It was a bit crude in some areas, but in others, it seemed eloquent -almost poetic!

'I wonder if I could get him to expand more on this.'

In any case, school was out for the day, so she'd have to wait until tomorrow before asking Ranma about it. She sighed at the stack of papers she had yet to grade. Grabbing her trusty red pen from her desk drawer and a sour apple lollipop, she set off for home.

"So what'd you write about, Ucchan?" Ranma asked, his mouth full of freshly-cooked okonomiyaki. Ukyo let the fresh batter on the griddle sizzle before looking up and replying.

"Well, she said we had to narrow down our topic, right? So I wrote about the kinds of situations that people need to find courage for. Not everyone has courage all the time, you know?" Ukyo kept her eyes trained on the griddle as she continued to cook the okonomiyaki.

"I guess I would know a little something about it. I wasn't all that courageous when I was younger- I couldn't deal with bad situations. So instead I spent my whole youth chasing after you and your dad."

Ranma gulped. He couldn't lay the blame on his dad all the time, but for what he'd done to Ukyo, Ranma really wanted to hurt his stupid louse of a father, Genma. Ukyo had lost so much because of him, and now she was stuck here in Nerima, trying to juggle paying rent and tuition on an okonomiyaki chef's funds.

Even if Ukyo insisted she liked it here in Nerima, and she liked how popular Ucchan's had gotten, Ranma knew that Ukyo regretted at least a little bit of what had happened between them, all those years ago.

"You have courage now, Ucchan. I mean, you could have just left after..." Well, Ranma thought to himself, she could have left whenever she wanted. She only had her own word against Ranma's or Genma's when it came to her claim as a fiancée of Ranma's. Shampoo and Cologne were a bit harder to deal with, citing Amazon laws and traditions, and if Akane really wanted to make a point of staking her claim, she had her whole family to back her.

'Oh man... why'd I have to think of her now?' Ranma's heart ached at the thought of Akane, but this time, he didn't imagine her appearing before him. Still, he still wished she'd just come back.

"I could have left any time I wanted, but my stubbornness just wouldn't let me do it. Besides, if anything, I've certainly had fun the past year or so. And what's more, I've made friends." Ukyo smiled brilliantly, "I've never had the chance to make and keep real friends before. Always on the road..." Ukyo swallowed the lump in her throat and smiled up at Ranma again. "I like Nerima. I like the people, even if they are crazy."

Ranma laughed.

"So, what kinds of situations give a person courage?" Ranma asked, changing the topic back to Ukyo's paper.

"Losing someone," Ukyo said immediately. Her voice and expression both faltered when she saw Ranma's smile drop. She tried to recover her voice and train of thought as she explained. "I mean, when someone dies, for example, there's no way you can get them back. It really takes courage to 'wake up and see the reality' around you... that the person is gone." Ukyo chanced a look at Ranma, and he looked a bit upset. The quiet kind of upset, which, on Ranma, scared Ukyo.

"But there's other kinds of loss, besides death. People get courage when someone moves away... like to college. Or... goes on a long training trip, or..."

Ukyo trailed off. She didn't know if if Ranma was thinking of Akane now, but if he was, then so was she. Everything she said rang true of Akane. Maybe the youngest Tendo didn't believe that she was as courageous as everyone else, and that was why she left. Maybe she hadn't known that anyone believed in her, that others wanted her, needed her, and loved her. If Akane could see how everyone was now...

"Akane had to be the most courageous person I knew," Ukyo whispered, sniffling a bit. She normally didn't get so upset over memories, but it certainly felt like Akane was gone for good. What if Ranma's mother and Mr. Tendo were right- what if Akane was dead? True, it hadn't legally been enough time to declare Akane dead, but that didn't rule out the possibility. Though it was true that Akane could easily take care of herself, how many times had she really left Nerima on her own, anyway? She'd always ended up with someone...

'Even if Akane can take care of herself on her own,' Ukyo thought to herself, 'It's not like the world outside of Nerima is any safer than the world inside.'

"What?" Ranma spoke, his voice hoarse and low.

"She- she really lost everything, and then when she was finally starting to get her life back together again, her life went haywire."

'It's MY fault! I made her run away... I helped to make her wedding a disaster, even though I knew that Ranma and Akane...!'

"Her mom died when she was only six... and then, her dad stopped taking things seriously, and she was left with no one to guide her. Then, when she finally found herself and what she wanted to do with her life, we come along and threw everything off balance..." By now, Ukyo was fighting a losing battle to keep the tears on her lashline in check, and she was having difficulty breathing between all her coughs and gasps.

"I- I believe that she'll come back Ucchan. It's not your fault... it's mine. I couldn't be courageous enough to tell her how I felt, and that I... didn't want to deny that anymore."

'If anything,' Ranma thought, 'it's my fault. She got into that wedding dress, put the rest of her life on hold... for me. All I've ever done was be selfish... always after a cure first, and thinking of everyone else second. She wanted to give me a cure... even if it meant... that'd she'd never have a chance to live out her youth. She'd give it all to me, and I... I took her for granted. Again.'

There she was, lying dead in his arms. He had screamed to the heavens that he wanted her back, that he loved her... and she came back to him. Whatever power was above them, it had given Ranma a second chance, and then... then he had made the phoenomenal mistake of letting her go... again. Ranma had taken his second chance and thrown it away. There was no third chance.

'And when she comes back,' Ranma thought with fierce determination, 'I'm not going to take her for granted ever again. I'm going to ask her to marry me.'

It didn't matter that they were young, or that they lived the craziest lives of anyone in Japan. Maybe the craziness had just gotten to him by this point -and this

"T-That's why you're so courageous, Ranma. Because you keep on believing in her... instead of fighting the fact that she's gone." Ukyo sniffled some more and wiped her red face with a napkin.

"I wish I could be as courageous as you Ranma. But I've already lost the only people that make me want to be brave... everyone except you." Ukyo looked up at Ranma again, a sad smile painting her face.

"So let's stick together and be courageous... until we get them back." Ranma nodded, not fully understanding. But Ukyo was right, he supposed. He did still believe, and would continue believing... because it was all he had left.

Well, that was fun to write! The first quote is, if you didn't notice, attributed to Richter. I don't know if he's actually a European philosopher... heck, maybe he's the guy that invented the earthquake measurment system (Richter scale)... so I dunno. The second quote is from The Vision of Escaflowne, said by Allen Shezar. I don't own that series either.