I'd like to give a word of thanks to Richard Ryley, one of the most insightful writers I've spoken with on this site, who helped me see an oversight and error in the original version of this chapter. So now I present a revised version that should work better. For those of you unfamiliar with Richard Ryley, I recommend his story "The Saotome Sisters."
Chapter Twenty-Six (Revised)
In the eastern part of Tokyo a train came to a stop, the passengers departing not moments later. Among the small crowd was Akane, who was a bit nervous stepping out on her own. She had failed to find Cologne and Mousse on her train, so right now she was completely alone.
'Now what do I do?' She asked herself, walking around to avoid getting in anyone's way by standing around for no reason. 'I mean, how do I get into the jungle? Finding it will be the easy part, but what do I do when I get in there? How do I find Ranma?' She found a bench to the side and sat down. 'When I left, it all made so much sense to me. But now that I'm here... I don't know what to do.'
She looked around and saw no familiar faces. 'I hoped I'd be able to find Cologne and Mousse and have them help me find Ranma. I don't know how to do so on my own.' She closed her eyes. 'C'mon Akane, think. It won't be that hard to track Ranma once you get inside. You found him when he snuck away to learn the Hiryu Shoten Ha, this is no different. The only problem is where do I start looking? Nerima?'
The idea of returning home gave her a good feeling. 'I can see Ranma trying to keep the jungle there as much as possible. So I should head there.'
With her resolve returned, Akane got back on her feet and decided to head west, certain she'd be able to find the jungle in no time. This stop had been the closest she could get to Nerima on still-active railways, so she had to be close.
Surprisingly, it didn't take that long to get to the edge of the jungle. But once she got there, she found a new obstacle. Between her and the unnatural environment was a fenced-off canal, and she could see alligators in the water. Signs were on the fences telling people to not approach, under orders from the JSPF. Barbed wire on fences helped reinforce their seriousness.
'Okay, clearly they want people to stay out, that I can understand. But this wouldn't stop a martial artist with a goal.' Akane thought. Being careful, she grabbed the chain-links and tore open a hole large enough for her to squeeze through then closed it from the other side. Standing on the thin section of concrete between the fence and water, Akane had to wait for the right moment to act next.
When it came, Akane did something that would surprise anyone that knew her. She jumped as far as she could and landed on one of the alligators, surprising it, and before it could respond (it probably wouldn't have since she landed hard on its head) she jumped to another then another before finally reaching the other side of the canal and official jungle territory.
"Ha, beat no one can say they've done that." Akane told herself confidently. Some growling was heard and she turned to see the alligators come at her, some with large bumps on their heads. Thinking quickly, she went off into the jungle and didn't stop until she was certain the alligators wouldn't bother following her out of the water anymore.
Akane paused for a moment and sat on a rock to rest and think, while enjoying the strange yet beautiful scenery around her. 'Okay, I'm here. Somewhere in this jungle Ranma is... I'm not exactly sure what he's doing. But even he can't be so perverted as to delay finishing the game just to spend time with Shampoo.'
A brief image flashed before her eyes of Ranma and Shampoo living like Tarzan and Jane. She quickly dismissed the thought.
'How do I actually find him? I don't want to just wander around like Ryoga does. Not to mention I could run into anything in there, what would I do then? I mean, it's not like I can just mallet an elephant or something. A monkey sure, maybe a tiger if I got lucky, but... but not everything.'
That made her remember what she had seen while the game was being played before she was forced to evacuate. She remembered how plants engulfed Furinkan, how Nabiki was assaulted by primates, how a stampede destroyed half her home, and of course the volcano that grew and burst like the world's worst pimple. Not to mention the things she hadn't seen yet, which as far as she knew could be anything.
Not liking her current train of thought, Akane shook her head as if to clear it out. 'C'mon Akane, stop be afraid. If an idiot like Ranma and a bimbo like Shampoo can handle being in the jungle surely you can too. How hard can it be? You're just over-thinking it is all.'
But despite that, she couldn't bring herself to get up and act on it. And for a moment her own thoughts betrayed her with a pang of self-criticism. 'By that logic it should be easy to shatter boulders, jump across roofs, and run on fences.'
That didn't sit well with her, as she remembered the times Ranma and Shampoo did things she could not. How they could demolish building walls in a way that would make the Big Bad Wolf green with envy. How they could hop from one building to another like some kind of pumped-up kangaroo. How balancing on a fence, a fraction the width of a balance beam, either with feet or bikes came so naturally to them.
While based on truth, Akane was at the present exaggerating the strengths of the two in mind without even realizing. The exaggerated memories made Akane angry. 'Dammit, they were just showing off. If I wanted to do all that I could easily. Maybe even better. In fact, I'll prove it. I saw Ryoga train in the Bakusai Tenketsu, I know how it's done, I can do it too. I just know it.'
Determined, Akane got up and looked for something specific. A large boulder, bigger than the rock she had been sitting on. Following an overgrown road in the jungle, what used to be a road that is, Akane was led to a cluster of large boulders. The jungle had merged with a city park so it was impossible to determine if the boulders had already been there for decoration or if the jungle somehow put them there.
"This will do." The short-haired Tendo girl checked around to ensure no one could see her at the moment, and when she was satisfied she readied herself. "The old woman said you need to hit a certain spot, one that must be a sort of obvious weak point." After inspecting it she found one point that she had a good feeling about, then hit it with all her might with her finger.
A crack was heard, but it wasn't the boulder that broke. No, that was the sound of Akane's finger bones snapping against the unyielding stone, making her scream in agony and clutch her hand, briefly applying too much pressure to the injury. No damage was left on the boulder itself.
You see, while Akane was able to break bricks, what she failed to take in mind was that she always broke them by either punching them or chopping them, never once by poking them. As a result, her knuckles and hand bones were conditioned to resist the damage of the exercise, but her fingers were not. Not to mention this boulder was bigger and thicker then any brick or cinder block she had ever destroyed.
On her knees crying, Akane asked herself all sorts of questions. 'Why didn't this work? Is my finger broken? I did everything Ryoga did. Have I gotten weaker somehow? Why can't I be as good as Ranma? Or better than Ranma? Is that so much to ask?'
Someone had heard Akane's shouts and came running to her. "Excuse me, is someone hur... Akane? What are you doing here?"
'Him?' Akane thought, recognizing the voice. She turned and saw Ryoga, someone she wasn't particularly happy to see right then. She still felt betrayed by him, and offended by his plan to get rid of Ranma in such a permanent way. "What are you doing here Ryoga?" She said with a hiss, mostly out of pain but partly due to anger.
"I'm lost. And even if I could find my home I can't go there anymore because I'm told the whole area's been turned into a jungle. I'm just glad Checkers got out of there fine and found me." He explained, referring to the black-and-white dog by his side that barked. With the dog were a few of the puppies she had the one time Akane came by the Hibiki house, now older and bigger.
Akane scoffed. "Well it's your own fault for that."
Ryoga looked confused. "What do you mean?"
"Don't give me that. None of this would have happened if you hadn't brought that damn game to Ranma."
Ryoga looked even more confused. "Akane, I have no idea what you're talking about."
"Yeah right. Try another one P-chan." The short-haired Tendo stated defiantly.
Ryoga jerked as if struck by a mallet. "What? How do you know?"
"Ranma told me. One of the last things he was able to tell me before he... disappeared." Akane admitted. Fortunately her anger at Ryoga was dulling the pain from her broken finger.
"But... but it's his fault I got cursed in the first place! You should be mad at him, not me! I'm the victim here!"
"Victim?" Akane repeated, strongly disagreeing with the claim. "What victim takes advantage of a girl who's unaware of the curse? What victim puts himself in that position knowing full well the one he blames his suffering on will add to it? What victim pretends to be someone I can trust then goes around and sneaks into my bed night after night?"
"I'm sorry, I never wanted to hurt you. Sometimes I did want to stop the charade. But what you're mad at me for never would have happened if Ranma hadn't pushed me into the spring to begin with." Ryoga insisted, then proceeded to tell Akane the story of how he got his curse.
"I'll bet you're just making that up." Akane said when he finished. "Just another excuse to be mad at Ranma to make yourself feel better at his expense."
"I'm not." Ryoga said. "I never would have gotten cursed if he never pushed me into that stupid spring!"
"And you never would have been there if you didn't follow him to China in the first place!" Akane countered, letting more of her anger surface. "Ranma didn't make you go to China Ryoga. That was your choice. Why did you have to go? Couldn't you have just said you won the stupid duel? No one would have been able to ever prove you wrong if you did."
Ryoga looked bothered by the idea. "No real martial artist would do such a thing."
"You're no real martial artist." Akane insisted insultingly.
That remark really upset Ryoga, sending him on the start of another depression. But despite that he knew she needed his care. "How did you get hurt?"
"I tried to shatter this boulder. It shouldn't be this hard. I mean, I saw you train in the Bakusai Tenketsu. I should be able to do it too."
"Akane, that's just it. You only watched, you didn't participate." Ryoga stated, pulling out some gauze and a small splint he carried in his first aid for the unlikely chance he broke a bone himself. "Don't you remember how many times I got hit by the boulder before it finally shattered? How many times I came close to breaking my own finger? And even when it did shatter, don't you remember the debris from the blast?" He reached for her hand but she pulled away.
"Don't touch me you lying pervert." She accused, wincing a little more from the pressure she just applied to the fracture. But his words did have the intended result, Akane was now recalling the parts of his training she had momentarily overlooked. The pain on his face from the training, the explosion at point-blank range, and how the training was just as much for enduring the damage as it was for delivering it.
'I... I could have killed myself if I had actually succeeded.' Akane realized, picturing herself at the epicenter of a rocky explosion. Strong as she was, she definitely lacked the endurance to withstand that.
"Unless you want it to stay broken you're going to have to let me." Ryoga insisted, bringing her back to the present.
Stubborn as she was, Akane didn't want this to last so she held out her hand, allowing him to set the splint. "You better do it right."
"This isn't my first time setting an injury. Anyway, my point is there's a difference between watching training and actually doing it. Take Ranma and the Hiryu Shoten Ha. You don't really believe just from watching the old hag do it he suddenly could do it too do you? No, he figured out how it was done, but he still had to work on conditioning himself to perform it himself. Just like me and the Bakusai Tenketsu, Ranma works on his abilities. I may not like the guy but that doesn't mean I don't respect the work he put into getting the skills he has."
"But he makes it look so easy." Akane complained.
"That's because you're focusing too much on the end result. You forgot the preparation." Ryoga reprimanded gently.
"But I break bricks all the time." Akane stated.
"So could I, but I still had to learn the Bakusai Tenketsu before I could do it right. I didn't just hit a boulder and get what I wanted. I tried, but the result was wrong so I had to be trained to get the right result. You don't just wake up one day and decide you're an expert Akane, you've got to work at it."
Her finger and hand bandaged and set, Akane withdrew it back to herself, testing the mobility of her others fingers, which wasn't great. Making a fist with her right hand was now impossible. "Why am I even listening to you? This whole situation is your fault."
"How is it my fault? The last thing I remember is dealing with getting Ranma cured of that moxibustion mark. Next thing I know I'm told Nerima has become a jungle and it's spreading. What happened?"
"Don't play innocent Ryoga, you were there. I saw you myself. You did all this because you wanted to wipe Ranma off the face of the earth." Akane told him.
"What are you talking about?" Ryoga asked.
Akane rolled her eyes. "Typical, pretending to be innocent even after being proven guilty."
"Dammit Akane listen to me!" Ryoga almost shouted, running out of patience. He now could see what Ranma meant by Akane being difficult to talk to. "There is a huge gap in my memory. One day we cured Ranma's strength problem, the next it was weeks later. Everything between then is a complete blank for me. If I did anything in that time involving this jungle I. Do. Not. Remember. It!" He made sure to emphasize his amnesia, hoping the girl he liked would listen.
"You really don't remember?" Akane asked, semi-skeptical.
"What did I just tell you?" Ryoga asked.
'I'm still not convinced, but what if he's being honest?' Akane asked herself. 'My biggest problem is there's no way to explain why he'd lose his memories. I know the Amazons can do that, but why would they? If anything they'd ask him where the game came from.' A new idea then came to her. 'Wait, what if he had been tricked? What if someone like Shampoo used some magic to take control of him and framed him to look like he set all this up so she could take Ranma away from me? And now that it's faded he can't recall anything that happened?'
Somehow that stretch of the imagination made more sense to her, mostly because it gave her some sort of explanation instead of a big question mark. Even so, it didn't undo the betrayal she felt upon learning the lost boy had been posing as her pet, taking advantage of her kindness. Listening to her private thoughts. Watching her undress for bed. Lying in her embrace while sleeping.
Everything Akane accused Ranma of trying to do to her at some point, she had pretty much invited Ryoga to partake in. And she hadn't even known it, which made her angrier. Angry at Ryoga for abusing the situation. Angry at Ranma for being silent on it possibly the entire time, no matter what excuse he could come up with. And angry at herself for not seeing it sooner when she prided herself on being smarter than Ranma if nothing else.
Nevertheless, she had to ignore that because Ryoga provided her something she desperately needed.
"Ryoga, if you're really telling the truth, then I'll tell you what happened. But first, you need to help me find Ranma. He's been in this jungle for two months and that means something's gone wrong. You're going to help me find him."
"Help Ranma? Why should I help him?" Ryoga asked, mostly for reputation. Sure he had assisted Ranma in the past, but he'd always deny it.
Akane glared at him in a way that almost made him wet himself. "Because if you don't, I'll lock your curse and leave you here. Good luck being at the bottom of the food chain P-chan." She was bluffing about the lock, but not the rest.
Despite having never been locked himself, Ryoga remembered hearing about the time Ranma had been so such a threat wasn't impossible. "Akane, it's not that easy."
"Do you want Ranma to die in here?" Akane asked, mostly to test his reaction. 'He claims he doesn't remember what happened, and therefore it's possible his desire to end Ranma's existence is gone too. But if he still feels Ranma is better off gone, then his claim of amnesia is highly questionable. Heck maybe he's the reason Ranma hadn't finished the game yet.'
"Akane be realistic."
"Do you want him to die?" Akane repeated much firmer, sticking her face right in his with much fostered authority.
This particular issue was getting under Akane's skin, for two reasons. The first being that it reminded her of her own death wish she gave Ranma in the heat of the moment. Of the many things she wished she could go back in time and undo, that had to be near the top of the list. To this day she didn't know why exactly she said it, other than she was just angry over learning he had been with Shampoo for days and had lied about it. But even so, it was going too far and Ranma showed her the last time they spoke that it had really hurt him to hear that from her.
The second reason was that this whole situation really made her question Ryoga's character. She had thought the lost boy was someone she could trust, despite his gender, mostly because he had never made a direct move on her like Kuno or Ranma had. He had never tried to force her into dating him, or invited himself into her room, or spoke to her in a demeaning way. At least not in any ways she had recognized at the time. Ryoga had sort of been the exception to her rule, the kind of guy she wanted to believe existed, much like Tofu. But it turned out she was wrong, and that made her wonder exactly how wrong she had been.
'All those times he said 'Ranma prepare to die' I thought he was just venting. But was there some truth to those threats?' Akane asked herself.
"Not before I have the chance to beat him finally." Ryoga answered.
"Ryoga, I don't know what to think about you. Part of me hates you, but part of me thinks you've been used here. So if you want to avoid me hating you, you are going to get me to Ranma and you are not going to kill him or let him die. Is that understood?"
Akane was giving off a rather frightening aura along with that demand and it was making the lost boy panic. Heck he was tempted to pull a Genma and try a 'I'm just a harmless little pig' trick to avoid her wrath. But he wasn't about to waste his water bottle on something like that.
"Alright, I'll try. But Akane, the biggest problem is finding anything in this jungle, especially with my sense of direction. It took me four days to find one lot and several years to catch up to Ranma after that. Knowing my luck if I actually try to find Ranma I'd end up in a desert instead."
'I wonder how the Amazons intended to find them then.' Akane thought. "You're not the only one who will be looking. Besides, you do have a habit of finding Ranma by accident."
"Akane, why do you want to find him?" Ryoga asked. 'Please don't let this be the time she chooses to admit love to him. I don't think I can be a part of this if that is the case.'
"It shouldn't take two months to finish a board game. Something's gone wrong, and I can't sit around waiting to find out what that is." Akane answered.
'There's more to it than that, but at least she's not admitting love.' Ryoga thought, a glimmer of hope somehow remaining. "Alright, I'll help you. If you promise not to hold the whole P-chan thing over my head the whole time."
Akane mentally groaned. "No promises. You hurt me and I'm not about to pretend it didn't happen."
"I'm sorry, I didn't intend for it to happen." He said gloomily.
"But you sure enjoyed it while it lasted."
In another part of the jungle, Ranma and Shampoo were on a search of their own, a search for Happosai.
"Obviously he didn't go off on another of his binges. The damage in the area alone proves he was ambushed by something. It could have been anything, but my gut tells me it's that spirit Soap warned us about." Ranma thought as they followed a path of broken branches and trees, implicating something had been practically smashing the jungle apart thus creating a walkway.
"Shampoo agree. Timing seem too too strange. Good thing Great-grandaunt tell us. Temple was good thing after all."
"You mean even with the scorpions, moving statues, big snake, ants, mosquitoes, and crazy fog?" Ranma asked, then shook his head. "Yeah, you're right. It was worth it. Though I wish I got something better than this." He said as he held out his scepter.
Shampoo stopped in her tracks. "Airen, trail stops here."
Ranma looked around and put his scepter away. "You're right, there's no more damage from this point on. Did whatever this thing was fly off somehow?"
Kahn, having recovered, was sniffing the area trying to track the scent. He was no bloodhound but he was all they had. A whine revealed he lost the scent, but he looked up which made Ranma think he was right.
"It be easier to track if we knew what scent was." Shampoo said. "Maybe I become cat and see scent, then tell you Airen."
"No, with all the scents in the jungle there's no way for you to know which one to look for. Only Kahn saw what came and only he knows what to smell. If only he could talk." Ranma said, then gained a look of surprise. "Wait a minute, Shampoo, I just realized something."
"Yes?"
"You're pregnant right?"
Shampoo nodded. "Yes, Great-grandaunt say so."
"But you became a cat this morning. I always thought pregnancy locked a form. So am I wrong? Or does that mean you weren't pregnant this morning?" He asked, remembering he and Shampoo were both in their cursed forms hours ago to get rabies shots after the bat attack last night.
Shampoo looked as surprised as Ranma felt. "I... I not know. Shampoo not be with man other than you, so maybe curse... no lock forms like that."
Ranma glanced at her stomach. "Does that mean the kid's affected by your curse? Would this kid, or any kid you have, be part cat then?"
Shampoo looked down at her belly, gingerly touching it. "Not know. Great-grandmother only one to ask. Shampoo... hope baby not affected, but still love."
"Maybe it's a good thing then that this kid might never be born." Ranma softly suggested, well aware he was treading dangerous ground. "I mean, it could spend its entire life half-human half-cat, never knowing anything else. I can't imagine how that would affect it."
Shampoo shed a tear, but fortunately for Ranma she didn't explode. Instead she hugged him, not an Amazonian glomp but an affectionate hug. "Maybe Airen right. But Shampoo... feel sorry for baby. But after game over, we cure curse and then have baby. Is okay?"
"You say it as if getting the cure is easy." Ranma replied.
"It is." Shampoo said, surprising him. "We just go back to Jusenkyo and get right water. Simple."
"When?" Ranma asked.
"Anytime you ask."
"Wait, you're saying that all this time I've known you, all I had to do was go to you and ask to take me to Jusenkyo?" Ranma asked, a bit overwhelmed by the idea that all this time he had a chance for a cure he had never seen.
Shampoo nodded. "Yes, but no that easy. Shampoo get curse as punishment. You get cure anytime, but Shampoo no allowed until marry you."
Hearing that made Ranma remember something. 'Stupid, of course Cologne wouldn't let me go without marrying Shampoo first. I knew that, just forgot for that one brief moment. Maybe that's why Shampoo never mentioned it before. She wouldn't want me to say yes just to use her. I already did that with the Instant Nannichuan and that hurt her.'
A bellowing roar was heard in the distance, drawing both of them out of their conversation.
"What was that?" They said in tandem.
Following the roar was a distinctive sound of an explosion, accompanied by a follow-up roar.
"That sounded like one of the old man's Happo Fire Bursts." Ranma noted.
Without another thought, the two teens and their tiger companion charged off in the direction of the sounds. The noises got louder, and some of the animals in the jungle appeared spooked by the commotion.
"Sound like he put up good fight." Shampoo said.
"He's as mad at the game as we are. I bet he'd love to kick this spirit's ass." Ranma commented.
"Why spirit go to him when we ones playing?"
"Dunno, maybe because he was out in the open or is an older player."
While running they came to a small river where some deer had been drinking, but their arrival scared the deer off. Kahn looked tempted to chase them but wasn't hungry enough to do so yet. Shampoo was ready to jump over, but to her surprise Ranma scooped her up and carried her over while jumping himself. When he landed, he set her down.
"Airen, why do that?" Shampoo asked.
"It just felt right. You really shouldn't change too much in your condition." He told her.
"Shampoo could have made it over." She insisted with a bit of a huff.
"Still, we really should avoid you getting wet at all. What if your body can't handle the curse and the pregnancy at the same time? Couldn't that hurt you? Even kill you?" He asked.
Shampoo silently gasped. 'Body could reject baby, make miscarriage. Here in jungle, that might be fatal.'
Putting the thought aside, they soon reached where Happosai was. He didn't notice them, because he was busy running away from something while throwing firework bombs continuously. Before they could even think to question what he was attacking, they got their answer. In the form of a hulking beast.
"I really hope that's not the spirit of the game." Ranma whispered.