The halls Nabiki's current room was located were cool, dark and dry but for the stink of sweat and blood that pervaded the atmosphere and jarred through her brain. Her body was aflame with pain and her mind was flooded with confusion as she sat curled up in a corner of the bare room, struggling to focus her mind past the plethora of uncomfortable sensations.
Shadows obscured her features, but the flickering light in the buried chambers showed that she was not, physically, exactly what she had been before. She seemed darker, with unevenly toned muscle under the tattered remains of her travelling robes.
The scratching sound of movement in the halls caused her to perk up and stare at the entrance to her room. Slowly a tall figure came into view, bearing a tray of meats that she could now smell in the stagnant unmoving air. She shook, trembled even as the tray was set down and slowly pushed into her room.
Nabiki watched as the tray was pushed further into the room and, as the figure's hand came within inches of the door, she lurched to her feet and slammed into the bars, baring her teeth and reaching out with her arm at the figure, dried blood still caked around the healed marks on her right arm as a twisted hand tried to grab her target.
The figure jumped back a almost as quickly, hand slowly reaching for the hilt at his side.
Nabiki snarled a few seconds longer, hands clawing out for several seconds. Then the frenetic motion stopped and slowly, shakily, the young priestess pulled her fingers into a fist and deliberately pulled her hand back into the cell.
"How long," she asked in a hoarse, growling voice.
"It's been five days," the man said.
The girl slammed her hand into the bars, which shook violently at the powerful blow and even the man who'd brought her food felt the urge to step back further away from her.
"I have things to do!" the Metallium priestess snarled at her visitor. "Xellos has a job for me. The country…my family needs me to do this."
"You've survived, won, the battle of soul then," Thabian said simply. "But your mind and body are still in conflict. We warned you about this Lady Nabiki."
The priestess gave a wordless roar that filled the confines of her cell and slammed her hands into the bars before stumbling back and collapsing into a heavily-breathing and fever-drenched ball in the corner of the cell.
Thabian looked on the woman worriedly, she seemed to be getting a hold mentally, but the change was tearing her apart physically. Still the man was surprised that Soul was the first battle the girl won rather than the second. With most of her mindset, it was one of the more dangerous fields of conflict in the change.
****
As Ryouga and Ukyou walked up to the city gates, the guards at the wall widened their eyes and grimaced a little, focused on the celestial in his human form. Ukyou gave a side-long glance at the man she was traveling with and then looked to the guards.
"Is this Nerima?" she asked as she came close to the guards.
"That's right, Ruruoni," the guards said. "Are you travelling with Hibiki?"
"They're familiar with you, Sugar," Ukyou said rather irritably. "What'd he do?"
"It wasn't my fault?" Ryouga protested. "It wa…"
"So, what did he do?" Ukyou asked, holding out a hand to interrupt Ryouga.
"He started a duel with one of the residents," the guard said. "Innocents were involved, no serious injuries, but…"
"Who'd he duel with?" Ukyou asked.
"An adventurer that's settled here, Ranma Saotome," the guard said staring at Ryouga.
"Ranma Saotome?" Ukyou asked, emphasizing the name. "Lots of scars…probably male, black hair?"
"Well, black hair, yeah," the guard said. "But he only has the two scars that Ryouga gave him. And why 'probably' male?"
Ukyou wasn't listening to that last question as she turned give Ryouga an accusing stare.
"You don't understand, he's…" Ryouga was interrupted again as Ukyou cut a hand across her throat and then looked back to the guards.
"Can you point me out to the local temples?" Ukyou asked. "I'll be keeping an eye on this one."
"There's the Tendo Monastery," the guard said. "Nabiki Tendo has left the city on business, but the other sisters are there, I think, and they are priestesses of Ryoko and Belldandy."
"St Hebereke is a Juraian temple in the area, with Kodachi Kuno as the priestess," the other guard noted. "Other than that, there are minor chapels with acolytes, but no other spell-empowered priests around."
"Where can I find the Tendo Monastery then?" Ukyou asked, waiting for the directions.
"But he's a fie…" Ryouga tried to protest.
"Ryouga you're trying my patience," Ukyou snapped.
"What patience?" the wandering celestial asked.
The ruruoni gave the celestial a narrowed eyed glare as the guards gave the directions.
They were soon walking through the streets heading for the Tendo Monastery. Ukyou looked about, biting her lip. If the child was here, then Ryuu would be coming here soon as well. She shivered at the thought of this peaceful looking city coming under the shadow of Shi-Shio through her cousin.
The Tendo Monastery was easy to find, especially with the directions, as it was one of four major buildings in the city. Ukyou was dismayed to note, however, that the Monastery did not seem very well manned. She'd hoped for a few monks or at least some warriors.
"This city isn't well defended," she noted quietly. "Even with four fortifications."
"There are a lot of warriors here," Ryouga said. "Just not here."
"There's no unity here," Ukyou noted. "If Ryuu comes here, there's nobody that can stop him."
"Which reminds me," Ryouga asked. "What is going on here? What is your quest?"
Ukyou paused outside the gate of the Tendo Monastery and looked about to see that nobody was listening.
"There is a child," she said quietly. "A very special child. I was supposed to find her guardian and escort them to the Kamiya temple. Unfortunately, someone got there first."
"And this child?" Ryouga asked.
"Is like you," Ukyou said. "The child of my Lord and Lady."
Ryouga stared at her in surprise and shock.
"Excuse me," a calm voice asked. "Might I help you? Oh, Ryouga! Welcome back. Who is that with you?"
The two turned to see Kasumi Tendo standing there, obviously in the process of starting to maintain the wards around the Monastery. She looked at them with a Verdandi smile.
"Oh, hello Kasumi," Ryouga said. "This is Ukyou of Kamiya Temple. She's needing to speak to you and Akane."
"Lady Kasumi," Ukyou said bowing.
"Oh," Kasumi said, bowing in return. "I'm afraid Akane is not in the Monastery any longer. She and Ranma have both moved to the Kuno Manse."
She pointed toward the other end of town.
"What, why?" Ryouga asked.
"There were several reasons," Kasumi said. "But among them is the responsibility Lady Kodachi has to maintain her family's lands with her brother now in exile."
"But what does that have to do with Ranma and Akane?" Ryouga demanded suspiciously.
Kasumi hesitated a moment and looked on Ryouga.
"Perhaps I should speak with the ruruoni first," Kasumi noted, looking toward Ukyou. "What did you come for, Lady Ukyou?"
"The Tenken is coming here," Ukyou said.
Kasumi's smile vanished and a serious expression came over her face.
"Give me a moment," Kasumi said, lifting her ritual bag. "I must put these away for now. Please come in and have some refreshment, I'm sure your journey has been tiring."
The Verdandi waved them in and walked into the estate, the smallest of the four fortifications Ukyou had noted earlier. The ruruoni looked about and noted that the training grounds were well kept but mostly unused, as she had suspected. This place had no monastic disciples.
"Father," Kasumi noted. "I have to go visit Akane and the others."
"Hmm," Soun called back as he appeared ahead of them in one of the passageways. "Oh, Ryouga. You're back. In broad daylight this time."
Ukyou turned to look at Ryouga and arched an eyebrow as Kasumi vanished into the back of the living area of the monastery
"Don't look at me like that," Ryouga said. "I don't always find the place I'm looking for in daylight."
"What's going on, Tendo?" a voice asked. Ukyou recognized that voice and narrowed her eyes darkly. "Is that fool back to challenge my boy?"
A large fat human appeared in the passageway ahead and Ukyou had to fight to keep her hands off the sakaba. She couldn't help but recognize the man of course.
"Hello, Saotome," Ukyou said coldly, hands clasped closed at her side. "Are you still torturing your kid?"
Genma turned to look at the speaker and frowned in confusion.
"Do I know you?" he asked, staring forward at the ruruoni in her red kimono and black hakama.
Slowly another image came to mind, a young Kumon guard wielding a strange flat weapon similar to a two-handed axe. The hair was longer, the weapon had changed, as well as her clothes. In addition, the guard he previously knew had been a man from all Genma could tell, and this girl certainly wasn't.
"Didn't you try to kidnap my boy once?" Genma asked.
"You call it kidnap, I call it rescue," Ukyou responded.
"Are you related to the Kuonji family?" he asked.
"I'm all that's left of it," Ukyou hissed coldly, hands inching toward her sword.
Ahead of them, Kasumi came into view obviously ready for a walk across the city for the Kuno manse.
"I'll speak to you later, Saotome," Ukyou promised. "I have more important things to do right now."
"What's the matter?" Ryouga asked as Kasumi came up to where they were.
"Genma Saotome created the powers and techniques that destroyed Kumon," Ukyou said darkly.
Everyone turned to look at the man in near shock.
"I'm not responsible for their misuse," Genma huffed.
"I'm not here for you. I have other things to deal with," Ukyou said. "Namely Ryuu of Kumon, Shi-Shio's Tenken and master of your Yamasenken."
Genma flinched as he heard that list of titles.
"That's right, Master Saotome," she said harshly. "The monster you helped make is coming here."
"Well," Kasumi said, a bit embarrassed. "Let's get started on this, it might take some time to get to the Kuno Manse."
Glaring at Genma, Ukyou only slowly turned about and started walking out of the Tendo Monastery, with Kasumi taking the lead fairly quickly. Ryouga almost lingered behind too long, staring at Genma in disgust, but a call from Ukyou turned him about quickly enough to see the dwindling figures of the two women and catch up to them before he could get lost.
"This is not good timing," Kasumi said. "Ranma and Kodachi have both had very close calls of late. And Lady Kodachi might not be in a condition to involve herself directly in any sort of defense."
"Akane is fine?" Ryouga asked suddenly.
"Why, yes," Kasumi said. "You sound surprised."
"I had a…feeling," Ryouga said hesitantly. "Was she in battle two weeks ago?"
"Oh, no," Kasumi said. "That was the night Ranma was attacked. Akane was only involved in the healing afterward."
Ryouga stopped again, surprised and confused.
Had it been Ranma that almost died when he felt his quest on the verge of failing? That couldn't be, the fiend was his obstacle, not the subject of his quest.
He noticed the women walking off without him and moved forward to catch up.
****
As Ranma came down from the roof of the Kuno Manse, he heard voices drifting through the building.
"You…you married him?!" Ryouga's voice carried easily up into the upper levels of the stone building and Ranma frowned. "Both of you?!"
What was the pig doing here?
A frown growing on his face, Ranma walked to the edge of the stairwell and dropped the three stories down to the ground. He saw Ryouga in the dining room pacing about and yelling as Kodachi and Kasumi sat at the high table and ate what looked like okonomiyaki quietly. Akane had her arms folded across her chest and Ranma could tell that she was barely hanging on to her temper even with out seeing her face.
"Of course we both married him," Kodachi said. "He's a very desirable man."
"But, you don't know what he is," Ryouga protested.
He frowned and felt a headache developing as he walked into the dining room, hoping that no structural damage would be done to his wife's home on the account of his being there.
"This is not the matter we came to discuss," Kasumi reminded Ryouga firmly, if gently. "Oh, hello, Ranma."
She smiled and waved to the martial artist as he came into the room.
"Thought you were still training, Ranma," Akane said before turning around to her husband and giving him a firm kiss that surprised Ranma enough to forget about his irritation with Ryouga.
When she let go, she gave him an encouraging smile before turning a somewhat victorious expression toward Ryouga that Ranma wasn't quite sure he had actually seen.
Kodachi however, had picked up on the expression and remembering her husband's dual gender, she put together two and two fairly quickly and was up and moving to Ranma's side to give him a similar kiss and level a firm "mine", or perhaps "ours", look at Ryouga.
And in Kodachi's case there was a little bit of "you missed out on me" in the attitude as well.
"Welcome to the party, Ranma-darling," Kodachi said with her wicked little smile as she looked back to him.
Kasumi blushed and looked away to give the married trio a bit of privacy and noted the look of confusion on Ryouga's face with a bit of pitying realization that the other warrior had no idea that he was ever even in the running, or that there was ever something there to run for.
Ranma, himself, looked from each of his wives to the other and realized, between his telepathic ability and other things that they had each just given a stay away message to the celestial. Embarrassment crept in and kept him from staying irritated.
"Okay," a new voice said. "We've got the testosterone and estrogen ownership statements out of the way. We have other things to talk about."
A tray clattered lightly on the table next to Ranma and his wives as a ruruoni in the normal red and black kimono and hakama walked past them. The ruruoni's aura was familiar, especially in the company of okonomiyaki. He glanced down at the dish and saw another okonomiyaki with the words "Congratulations Ranchan" written on it.
"Ukyou-niisan?" he asked, looking up.
The ruruoni turned about and Ranma saw, as if she hadn't aged at all, the familiar face that he'd previously seen dressed in a tight, thick leather armor and wilderness cloak. The woman moved forward and looked Ranma over carefully.
"Pop told me you're dead," Ranma said.
"I turned out to be tougher than he thought," Ukyou said, resisting the urge to say that it was Genma that had nearly killed her. "You grew up good-looking, imp. If I was just meeting you now, I'd almost be tempted."
Ranma's wives gave her a narrowed eyed look and Ukyou smirked.
"But to me you're still just the imp I pulled out of trouble eight years back," she noted. "Good to see the marks healed, I was worried about that, after your father took you back."
"Someone healed them," Ranma said, eyes flicking toward Ryouga.
"Kaoru bless whoever did that," Ukyou said.
"Just how do you know this woman, Ranma-darling?" Kodachi asked.
"I'd like to know too," Akane said, arms crossed.
"She took care of me for month after my…cat-accident," Ranma said.
"Accident?" Ukyou said in a doubtful tone of voice that raised alarm bells with the others in the room. "Did you accidentally bind your wings, arms and legs? Anyway, we have another problem other than abusive parents."
"What's that?" Ranma asked.
"You don't have to get involved in this Ranchan," Ukyou said sharply. "I'm here to talk to the Priestesses of the city, one of whom is apparently also the head noble currently."
"Are you kidding?" Ranma asked. "If there's a problem I'm not going to sit around and let it happen. And you aren't expecting me to, otherwise you wouldn't have waited for me to be here before talking about it. Besides…"
"Besides what?" Ukyou asked noting the return of Ranma's embarrassed face.
"I think Lina sees me as a representative, sort of…" Ranma said.
"You! She choose you as a bandit-killer!" Ukyou said in disbelief.
"Yeah, she's irritating that way," Ranma said. "Umm, what's up then?"
"Shi-Shio is sending the Tenken here," Kasumi interrupted, not wanting to let the discussion side track again. "I asked Ukyou to wait until we were all here to give more information."
"Why does he have to be here?" Ryouga asked. "He's Akuma-spa…"
The celestial stopped as every eye turned to face him with more than a little anger at the term he'd been about to use.
"Here's the deal," Ukyou said, reluctantly. "I'm telling you all this because if Ryuu comes here alone or otherwise, the city is in danger."
"What's he coming here for?" Akane asked.
"The child of Kenshin and Kaoru," Ukyou said simply.
Everyone stared in shock at the information Ukyou had just given them. Even when minor powers had children, they had…interesting lives, as Ryouga and Ranma demonstrated. It was hard for the greater powers to keep enough power out of their children so that interesting would be the least of their problems. For two greater powers to have a child together…
"That is another reason we can't leave Ranma out, then," Kasumi said.
"Why is that?" Ukyou asked.
"If Ryoko is Ranma's aunt," Kasumi said, as Ranma turned to look at her in surprise as everyone else's eyes widened. "Then that makes this child a part of his family."
"Ryoko's gems, how'd I miss the 'auntie' reference?" Akane asked herself.
"Oh my," Kodachi said, beaming in pride. "You really are quite too humble, Ranma-darling."
Meanwhile, Ryouga was notably quiet as that fact slammed into him like a sledgehammer.
Ranma was Ryoko's neice.
Ranma had been at the center of his quest the whole time.
In fact, his quest started more than fifteen years ago, Akane couldn't have even thought about joining Ryoko's sect yet.
Every time he faced Ranma in battle, his quest was threatened.
And it wasn't because Ranma was the obstacle to his quest.
It was because Ranma WAS his quest.
****
Thabian walked down into the dungeons again, smelling again the thick scent of sweat, blood and other bodily fluids. However, the silence had a different character now than it had the last time he'd been down with food. A frown covered his face and he took a deep breath as he walked down the last few feet.
He surely convinced that he'd find Lady Nabiki, or what was left of her, in her cell.
Not strong enough to survive the change after all, however strong her soul was.
He just hoped that her mind went first so she couldn't feel the entirety of the pain as her body tore itself to pieces.
He made the last turn towards the woman's cell, passing the mutated and misshapen skeletons of many others that had failed to survive themselves and dropped his tray.
Leaning against the wall of her cell, looking perfectly nonchalant despite the days worth of dried blood, sweat and other secretions, was Nabiki Tendo. Body seeming just the same as it had when she first walked in to the dungeons two weeks past.
"I think I'd like a bath before I eat, Thabian," she said through a smirk. "Several, in fact."
"Right away," Thabian said as he set down the tray and opened the gate. "Sister."