Chapter 6

When Ranma finished eating, she excused herself so she could have her own turn getting cleaned up. Between the obvious need to perform the aforementioned task, and Mousse and Ryoga providing an adequate distraction when they made an appearance, her leave-taking was either unnoticed or unchallenged. While Akane had seemed ready to say something when she stood up, she didn't say or do anything that would have hindered her as she made her way out of the room.

After she entered the changing room and closed the door behind her, she paused to take in the silence and privacy of the room for a moment. It came as a welcome relief, now that she didn't have to worry about fielding questions; that, and not having to deal with how she felt among the others, because the secrets that she kept to herself made her feel out of place. It hadn't been hard to deal with, per se: she just didn't like the circumstances of the situation in general. If not for the fact that she could become an uncursed man at any time, if she so desired, she would have likely been feeling a whole lot more negative about things.

Since her clothes were rather worn and torn, to the point where they couldn't be salvaged with a needle and thread, she didn't spare a thought for them as they were tossed into a trash bin instead of the hamper. Of course, as long as she was a succubus, she could create whatever clothing she could imagine, which was why she hadn't bothered to bring a change of attire with her.

Once she was in the furoba, the first thing that she did was stand before the large mirror that was set on the wall behind the faucets. After taking in her image as it was, which she had grown familiar with since being cursed, she released her human disguise and assumed the form that would be natural for her until she decided otherwise. It was the first time that she had been able to get a good look at herself as a succubus, and she noticed — right away — how closely she resembled her mother in appearance. The similarities were uncanny, really.

She remembered when she had seen her cursed form in a mirror for the first time, and how she had felt then was very similar to how she felt now. Despite having a new body, she didn't really get the impression that it belonged to a stranger, that it wasn't herself. There was a sense of wrongness, because it was a change from the usual, but that intellectual side of herself was at odds with the emotional side, which felt even more comfortable with her being a succubus than it had with the human girl that she had once turned into. Which wasn't surprising, considering how she had been a succubus at the very core of her being all along.

She'd almost forgotten how many of her "problems" with being a girl had begun when she had been cursed, rather than being something that had developed over time. The lack of discomfort that she'd had with her female body, along with the feminine behavior that seemed to come naturally to her, had been something that she had begun to suppress within the first few weeks of arriving at her current home. All that her intellectual side had needed was a good enough excuse, and she didn't like being considered a pervert or freak, or being perceived as doing something strange or wrong. Before that, she'd had no qualms about lounging around the house as a girl, even when access to hot water was only seconds away. She could even fail to notice when she was changed by cold water, while being suitably distracted, because nothing felt off despite the differences between her male and female bodies.

While the male image that she had tried to project was not an outright lie, and very much like the person that she had been before being cursed, her horizons had been expanded on that fateful day at Jusenkyo: she had become more than just a man. However much she may have protested about being anything but the manliest of men, she had been unable to stop her feminine nature from expressing itself through her new body completely, which had instinctively recognized said body as a proper conduit. It was little wonder why she had failed to maintain her male image time and time again, when it was so easy to be, dress or act like a girl if given an excuse — and, sometimes, not even that much was needed.

Would things change when she became a human man through and through? She didn't know. Right then, she couldn't say for certain if she would miss that feminine side of herself or not. All that she knew — for sure — was that she had been born and raised as a man, and that she couldn't imagine herself being a woman and living as one in some typical fashion or another. When she came right down to it, however, the world that she was familiar with — which she wished to fit within even as she stood out — was not the kind where she could be accepted as both a man and a woman; to be accepted and successful, she would have to stick with one, and she was pretty sure about which one she would choose.

Before she could turn her attention away from the mirror, and perform what she had come into the furoba to do, she stilled in surprise and dread when she heard the door to the room slide open. Looking over her reflection's shoulder, she saw something that she had hoped to avoid: Akane standing in the doorway, staring at her in open-mouthed shock.

She turned around slowly, in order to face her fiancée, as her mind raced with ideas on how to handle the situation. Unfortunately, ad-libbing wasn't exactly her forte, and it hardly ever helped whenever she was emotionally stressed at the same time. Since she didn't want Akane to jump to her own conclusion and run with it, or otherwise assume control of the dialogue, she fell back on familiar territory in order to take the initiative and give herself some more time to think of something.

"Wh-what do you think you're doing?" She demanded, which — she quickly realized — sounded stupid to her even as she was saying it.

The expression on Akane's face flashed past confusion and went straight to anger. "What am I doing? Here I am, worrying about you, and you're trying to hide something like, like..." When she couldn't find the right word to describe what she was seeing, she gestured toward her fiancé and said, "this from me."

"Gee," Ranma couldn't help replying in a sarcastic tone, as she crossed her arms, "I wonder why?"

With her arms akimbo, Akane glared back and said, "Yeah, I wonder why?"

They faced off against each other for a time, defiantly, with the silence occasionally broken by the faint drops of moisture that fell into the furo from the ceiling. Eventually, however, Ranma caved: she didn't really have anything to gain from remaining silent, now that her secret had been discovered. Trying to explain herself had the potential to make things worse, but so did leaving things as they were.

Ranma looked away and grumbled, "I didn't think you'd understand, okay?"

With a sigh of exasperation, Akane lowered her arms and relaxed her posture before she said, "Come on; I think I deserve more credit than that." In response to her fiancé's look of skepticism, she added, "How is this any stranger than what Pantyhose Taro turns into? Especially now that he has octopus tentacles coming out of his back?"

"That's not really the issue," Ranma replied, as she resigned herself to the explanation that she would have to give. Besides, if she couldn't tell Akane, then who could she tell? Frankly, her predicament was beginning to eat away at her, and she would feel a lot better if she could share what was going on and get another person's perspective on the matter. Akane wasn't an ideal choice, all things said, but her support and counsel would mean so much more to her than what others could offer. "Look; let me get cleaned up, and then I'll tell you what's going on. Okay?"

Akane frowned a little at the delay, suspecting the possibility that it might just be a ruse so her fiancé could run off instead of giving her an explanation, but she decided to make a compromise. "...Fine. I'll wait for you outside, then."

After Akane left the room and closed the door behind her, Ranma simply sighed and shook her head before she reassumed her human form and got ready to cleanse herself. It was just like Akane to not trust her completely... Well, she did try to keep a secret from her, but still.

"...A succubus?" Akane questioned, who thought it sounded familiar but couldn't quite place how.

She and Ranma had decided to hold their conversation in her room, since there really wasn't an ideal place on the premises to talk without being eavesdropped on, and neither were keen to seek out another place at that hour because of the conclusions that certain people would jump to if they noticed their absence. Ranma still had some misgivings about the location, but felt that she wouldn't have any trouble minding the door and window, and figured that it wouldn't hurt if Nabiki heard anything through the wall.

"Yeah," Ranma reaffirmed, from where she sat on the bed, with her hands tucked between her crossed legs. "It's a, uh... Well, demon, I guess."

Akane looked at her fiancé oddly, and leaned a bit forward in her desk chair. "You 'guess?'"

With a slight, nervous smile, since she wanted it to sound less bad than it might otherwise be taken, Ranma decided to give a bit of a spin to the explanation that she had received from her mother. "Well, you see, succubi are descended from angels that had been cast out of Heaven."

"Why were they cast out of Heaven?" Akane asked, out of genuine curiosity.

Ranma absently scratched the side of her face as she tried to remember exactly what her mother had told her. "Because of gender inequality." Noting the slow rise of Akane's eyebrows, she continued. "It was a long time ago, so no one seems to know much of the specifics of what happened, but there was a revolt. When that failed, the surviving angels — now fallen — began to specialize in ways of fighting men, and over time their bodies and nature adopted to them."

Akane considered what she had learned for a second, before she thoughtfully posed, "So, are you saying that a succubus' talent and purpose is to defeat men?"

"I guess?" Ranma replied, with a shrug of her shoulders. "I mean, I don't feel compelled to do anything to any guy I see, but what I'm capable of seems to be effective enough..." Seeing the smirk that had appeared on her fiancée's face, she was prompted to ask, "What?"

Said fiancée crossed her arms and stated, "It just seems a bit ironic for this to happen to a womanizing pervert, that's all."

"I'm not a womanizing pervert," Ranma replied irritably, before Akane's cocked eyebrow made her repeat, "I'm not!"

Akane frowned a little and gave the other girl a half-lidded stare. "Says the guy who chased after Shampoo when she no longer seemed to like him."

"Oh, come on," Ranma complained, who was pretty sure that Akane knew the reason for her behavior, which she was too embarrassed to admit aloud. "That's not why I did that..."

"Whatever," Akane replied, with a roll of her eyes, and thought it prudent to get back on track instead of digging up more of their past. She studiously ignored the pout that her response had inspired. "Anyway: you're a succubus. How did that happen? And is that why you're still a girl?"

Ranma nodded her head a bit glumly. "Yeah. Unsurprisingly, they're a female-only race." Then, to address the first question, she said, "And I'm a succubus because of the way my mother made me."

Akane found the wording of that last part strange, so she asked, "'Made' you?"

With a sigh, Ranma told her that she had been delivered into existence via parthenogenesis, and tried to explain — to the best of her ability — what she understood of the process. Before she could be asked if she was a succubus for good, she also mentioned that there was a process, called transmigration, that would allow her to become both human and male again, and that her mother was willing to do that for her.

Understandably confused by that last part, Akane asked, "Why are you still a succubus, then?"

That was a bit more difficult for Ranma to explain, but only because some of it was of a personal nature. Still, she decided to share the kind of relationship that she had with her mother, in part because she hoped that Akane might have something illuminating to say about it. No such illumination occurred, but she was glad to have a sympathetic ear. Despite the fact that her mother was a demon, her fiancée was willing to hope — as she did — that her mother acted out of maternal love, rather than as a demon with an evil scheme.

Then she told her the other reason for why she remained a succubus, which required mentioning — and explaining — her mother's business... and why said mother had recommended that she do the job instead of allowing the demons to do it — well, other demons, technically speaking.

Akane gaped at her incredulously. It was a lot to take in, though, so she addressed the most relevant part. "Seriously? She's giving you the choice to do that to the sailor senshi?"

Ranma shrugged her shoulders helplessly. "I know, right? I really don't know what to do..."

Akane worried her bottom lip, as she seriously considered withdrawing the optimism that she had expressed toward Ranma's mother. A mother shouldn't mistreat or misuse their child, but this one was a demon — after all — and could be capable of doing such a thing, and this supposed dilemma with the sailor senshi didn't sit right with her one bit. The sailor senshi were well-known heroes, and there was nothing that she knew about them to suspect any wrongdoing on their part, while her fiancé's mother was a demon whose child had only learned about her very recently, and ran a business that more or less treated humans like livestock being prepared for the slaughterhouse. How she should feel about that seemed obvious, and yet...

As far as she could tell, becoming a demon didn't seem to have changed Ranma in any noticeable way, personality-wise, much less in any way that she would expect from something evil. Her fiancé had never been all that great of an actor, in her opinion, and she didn't expect a change in race to make a difference in that area either. So, she concluded — wished, if she were to be honest — that it was possible for a demon to be capable of more than just evil, and she especially hoped that that was the case between mother and child.

If only there was a way to find out...

After something occurred to her, she finally asked, "How long do you have to make a decision?"

"Not long," Ranma replied, whose shoulders slumped. "She said that she has stalled the process for a while already, so..."

Akane nodded her head. Not just in response to what Ranma had said, but in deciding what she was going to do. She could only hope that she would have the opportunity to do it in secret.

The next morning found Ranma running late for school, who was rather grumpy about having to race the bell. Her mood was also being impacted negatively by the fact that it had been snowing since last night, so her fastest route to her destination, via a straight line across the rooftops, would be asking for too much trouble if she used it. On top of that, she hadn't gotten enough rest, or had enough time to pick up more than a snack for breakfast while on her way out the door. It didn't help that she had forgotten about her cell phone until after she had left the house, but she figured that she wouldn't need it on hand for anything just yet... Probably.

Above all, she regretted looking into one of Nabiki's dreams last night. It had seemed so simple to find out that Nabiki had seen her pupils turn white when she had drained her father at the table, so she had approached the sating of her curiosity a bit cockily when she desired to see what her mother had done to cause Nabiki to behave around her the way that she now did. She should have expected the possibility of what she had seen, knowing what she did about succubi, but it had been her mother and she had never shown herself to be the vulgar sort while in her presence.

So, when she saw her mother in the middle of doing that with Nabiki, and getting the impression that it was one of the middle Tendo's favorite parts, she had been too shocked to do more than watch for far longer than she would have liked. While she understood that neither had actually done it, she simply couldn't unsee it, and it had felt real enough to Nabiki. It was little wonder why the other girl was skittish around her, since she looked so much like her mother: not because of fear, disgust or anything like that, but because she entertained thoughts of making her dream experience real and had mixed feeling about it.

Apparently, seeing that dream had affected her as much as she had feared, and had — in turn — inspired disturbing dreams. She had expected at least some control over her own dreams, but such a skill required being conscious, not unconscious. By the time she could do anything about them, they were already ending because they disconcerted her enough to rouse her to wakefulness. As a result, she hadn't gotten a lot of sleep, and had ended up sleeping in late because of how heavily she slept once her mind gave her a break.

Between those thoughts, her mood and seeing her destination ahead, she didn't pay as much attention as she normally would have when she leapt over the open gate that could have closed on her at any second, and was distracted further with relief when the bell sounded just as soon as she had crossed onto the premises. By the time she made her landing, however, an unconscious part of her mind was trying to tell the conscious part that something had been odd about said landing.

The mystery was quickly solved when she heard a familiar voice behind her. "Ranma, that was cold..."

Upon turning around, she saw Hiroshi and Daisuke, who were... giving her looks of disapproval while they stood next to a young girl who had fallen face-first into the snow. Said girl — or what could be seen of her — couldn't have been any older than twelve or thirteen, and had long, brown hair. She wore a yellow, long-sleeved sweater, and before long she would discover the stretchy, black dress beneath it.

She rubbed the back of her head in embarrassment. "Oh, um... Oops?"

Since she felt bad about bouncing off of the young girl's head, it didn't really take much in the way of convincing to place her on her back and carry her to her destination. Said destination just happened to be the principal's office, though it wasn't so much an office as it was a cabana that was raised off of the ground via the palm trees that served as its four corners.

Said office was located on the school roof, and its black curtains were drawn shut on all four sides. Without worrying about manners and such, she climbed the short ladder, pushed aside the curtain, and entered the "office" proper. After a single step, she stopped and watched as the principal knelt before a chair while he talked to a teddy bear.

She had arrived just in time for her to hear him say, "So, you got just one mission here... To crush Saotome Ranma!"

She proceeded to plant her foot against the back of his head. "Hey. I brought the transfer student."

After the principal recovered from the blow and saw her with the girl on her back, as if being greeted with a kick to the back of the head wasn't out of the ordinary, he curiously asked, "Who?"

The person in question just happened to wake up at that time, quickly took stock of the situation, then glared down at the red pigtail that she had seen just before she had been knocked unconscious. "How dare you step on me!" She proceeded to pummel Ranma on the head, who took her lumps since she was guilty of the crime. "Take that! And that!"

Once the girl was satisfied with the delivery of her punishment, she slipped off of her back and raised her hand as she proudly greeted the principal with, "Mister principal, that's one I've conquered!"

"Say wha...?" The principal responded, who was genuinely confused, before he pointed at the young girl and asked, "And who are you?"

With a cute show of light modesty, the girl placed her index finger on her chin and stated, "I'm the new homeroom teacher for first year, class F: Ninomiya Hinako."

Those words visibly shocked the principal, who grasped the sides of his head with dismay and collapsed, his plan seemingly dashed after all of the effort that he had put into transferring the new teacher to his school. How could a little girl conquer delinquents in three schools, after all? He must have heard wrong.

While Ranma didn't know her new homeroom teacher by any reputation, she'd heard enough to know that she had been sent to deal with her. She didn't really know how that was supposed to be accomplished, but she was aware that looks could be deceiving — more now than ever. Still, she wasn't all that concerned, since she wasn't about to assault a little girl — preemptively or otherwise — until she knew what she was dealing with.

So, when her new homeroom teacher asked her if she could take her to her classroom, she casually cast her thumb toward the nearest curtain and said, "This way."

The trip there was uneventful, and her new homeroom teacher had everyone take their seats as she wrote her name on the blackboard. She went to her assigned desk next to Akane, who seemed to be as bemused by the little girl's appearance as everyone else. Said fiancée spared her an acknowledging glance as she took her seat, but she failed to notice the look out of the corner of her eye afterward, which was not the casual sort and lingered longer than necessary.

When their new teacher finished writing her name, she turned to the class with a smile and perkily said, "I am a very, very strict teacher! If you're a bad little boy or girl, you'll get in big trouble!"

"Yes, Ninomiya-sensei," a number of the class acknowledged.

Not knowing what to think of this development, Akane made an idle comment. "For a teacher, she sure is... youthful."

"Yeah..." Ranma absently replied, who was wondering what to expect from their new teacher, if anything.

Before homeroom could begin in earnest, a commotion was heard outside; and a familiar one at that, if the demands coming from the female voices were any indication. A number of the class got up from their seats and went to the balcony, and Ranma, Akane and Ukyo joined them, although — among them — only Ranma expected herself to do something about what was going on outside, since she was the only one who could really contend with Happosai.

"Not again..." Akane said with a measure of exasperation, once her eyes confirmed what her ears had heard.

"That old geezer..." Ranma muttered, as she prepared to leap off of the balcony.

Before she could, Hinako arrived on the scene and loudly declared, "Ho! A delinquent," before she jumped off of the balcony herself. "You, there! Stop this instant!"

In the heat of the moment, Ranma forgot that her new teacher had been sent to "crush" her, and only saw a little girl jumping from the third floor. Fortunately, with her focus on catching her teacher, Happosai didn't notice her descent until it was too late, when she landed on his head at the same time as she caught her quarry. After she was a safe distance away from Happosai, she deposited her catch and watched as a group of girls from her school took back their bloomers and proceeded to beat the prone figure of the old man to a pulp.

After they were done and walking away, Happosai struggled to pick himself up. "C-curse you, Ranma... Always in the way... Stopping me from enjoying life..." The air around him began to roil with energy, as his anger began to rise. "Today... You have gone too far!"

"Uh-oh," Ranma thought, who noticed the build-up of energy. "He's really mad this time..."

She wasn't sure what Hinako was capable of, and couldn't trust the principal to know how much to aim for in order to take care of her, but what she did know — for certain — was that Happosai was one of the strongest individuals that she knew of, and he could be quite troublesome and/or dangerous when he was angry. He definitely wasn't the type of person that she wanted to put the girl in the line of fire of, in order to find out how tough she was.

So, she gently shoved her teacher further behind her, got between her and Happosai, then said, "Stay back, teach! I'll protect you!"

"Oh!" Her teacher voiced, as if taking offense, and pushed her way back to her side. "Disciplining bad boys is a teacher's job!"

She shoved her away again, only to be challenged once more, and she ended up holding the girl at bay while said girl struggled to get past her. Happosai was on his feet by then, and she knew that the time to act was nigh spent, so she jostled her teacher enough to still her movements, just long enough for her to catch her attention with the seriousness of her gaze.

"Do you really understand what you're getting involved with?" She demanded.

For the first time, the look in her teacher's eyes, along with her demeanor, suggested a maturity that belied her age. "Of course. Just leave it to me."

Deciding that her teacher's fearless behavior could be the result of experience and confidence, rather than childish recklessness, she released her hold on her. While she could probably take care of Happosai herself without much of a problem, now that she was a succubus, she didn't want that detail to be public knowledge. Akane — and Nabiki, to an extent — was one thing, but she really didn't want to find out how others might react if just any kind of person could hear about it.

Still, if it was necessary, she would risk revealing her secret if her teacher appeared to be in trouble. Said teacher hadn't done anything worthy of earning her dislike yet, and seemed pretty honest and dedicated as a teacher, so there wasn't any good reason to allow something ill to befall her.

"Ranma!" Happosai bellowed, before he sent his massive battle aura at her, which took the form of his own head. "You will pay!"

She glanced up at the balcony, seeing and hearing everyone's alarm and worry, but she refocused her attention on her teacher, who had run several steps ahead of her and now stood between her and the approaching battle aura. She watched carefully as her teacher took out a five-yen coin and aimed it at the attack, at which point she shouted, "Happō goen satsu!"

Much to her surprise, as well as those watching: not only did she deal with the attack, but she had also managed to suck Happosai dry of his energy. In addition to that, she had become — for whatever reason — a beautiful woman in the process. It made her wonder if she was some kind of succubus. At that point, she wouldn't be surprised if that turned out to be the case.

However, what really got her attention was what her teacher said as she ground her foot upon Happosai's head: "Have you had enough, you naughty boy? You have glimpsed the ultimate secret technique... of the Anything-Goes school."

That was her school, and a technique reminiscent of a succubus' innate ability. What did that mean?