Ranma Aqua-Isekai'd, by Chaos Orchid
Chapter 26: Before the Disaster
"After you shampoo'd me to forget my destiny!? At least if I'm livin' in the sorority barracks, I won't be alone with somebody else I don't trust! The walls can be heard through: There'll be a "jury" of housemates!
"But I'm only stayin' until I can get a campin' pack and leave!" And Ranma headed for street out of the still crowded town square.
"My offer remains. You will be welcome at my place! Day or night!" Cologne called after the teenage boy. And then her voice lowered. "I look forward to when you do trust me." But she had to smile. Scent was correct. She could be a cunning calculator.
By himself, joining the few leaving and passing those arriving, the gaggling of high, female voices lessening, he could relax his guard and his male brain. Memories of what it was like to be a girl threatened to take over his thinking. He needed something else to think….
His stomach growled. That was right! It was lunchtime and he needed to get something to eat! But how?! Cologne? Of course not. She could feed him some potion! Maybe she already had! There was that dinner (date) she-he!-she?-had with Tsukiko. *Shudder*
There had to be another way. Kaguya!? She owed him credentials for getting the monster man Nylon became out of town.
But she was targeting him. And He, Tint, was targeting her. Him? Did it matter to the easy sex changer?
Did it really matter to any of them he was seeing? Among the women there were some men, but where they really men!? To stay in the village of women they had to be women. At least that was the idea Kaguya had given him. Their men had to live in the village of…not men, but mothers. …And the kids they had.
Suddenly, he wanted to go somewhere where he didn't have to see or hear the other sex that could become the same sex. Like he could.
"The barracks dorm!" If they were all on guard duty, he could raid the pantry and get to seriously thinking of getting' back to Japan! It was a great idea! What made it even better was, "I'll finally have food all to myself! No Pop makin' me fight for it!"
He frowned. "Pop. Geez, I wonder where the Old Man is?" He's gotta be okay, right? He knew more about martial arts than he do; he was his sensei. But he was cursed, too, right(?) or he wouldn't have come up in that onsen hot spring, too, right(?). What was it he changed into? Maybe an animal? "I guess I'll have to go to Animal Town and see if he's there. They could have him locked up in jail." Ha! An Animal Zoo.
"Naw, he's got ways of escapin'." He had the techniques to. …And had to have practiced them. A lot. Because he had to? Because his master had been…this Happosai?
"Man! From what I overheard, the guy was worse than Pop." Maybe way worse. So bad her people had had been punishing Cologne for what the guy she loved did for over a hundred years(!)(?)
"Love!" He didn't understand it.
Ranma arrived and pulled the short bar up from its cradle on the side of the building. Attached on the inside was another bar and cradle, moving at the same time. And that was it. The thing was there only to keep the door shut; there was no lock. How many locks were there in the town? Did they generally trusted people?
"Man! Maybe I shouldn't just walk in." This was the first time he would have gone in without somebody. (Tsukiko). He hesitated. Would going in be like making this his home? His home because he was letting others think he was willing to be a guard? But he was only pretending! It was only until he could leave with a camping pack and maybe some supplies!
Why did that bother him? He hadn't signed up to be a guard. They just made him a guard! He had nothing to honor. He walked in!
But he thought of Pop. He thought of Pop's Master. He thought of the reputation the Anything-Goes School had. It had no honor.
His stomach growled louder. "I won't pretend. I'll pay them for what I take when I can. Man! I'm already good from takin' care of Ox Man the kaiju for them."
"Talking to yourself, huh?" A girl wearing a slit qipao/cheongsam dress was lounging on one of the lobby chairs.
"Kaguya! What are you doin' here!?" he frowned.
"Winning a bet. I told Highlight you'd be heading here, looking for something to eat."
"You think I'm predictable, do you!?(!)"
"I think using a lot of ki energy requires refueling. I know I get that way when I actively guard." Then, swinging her bared legs off the arm, she leaned forward and smiled. "But: Yeah! So far."
"Shouldn't you be(!) guarding!?(!)" he said to her, heading to the kitchen.
"Highlight has to give up a lunch break and eat field rations." She followed him, holding hands over her butt. "We have an hour and a half to…do things…together."
"She shouldn't've bet." Then Kaguya wouldn't be there, harassing him.
"She knows that. They all do. But they do," she said smugly. "There's pool on when You'll make your first bet."
"I'm gonna win it. I ain't bettin'." There was no refrigerator but there was what looked like it could be a pantry door. It turned out to be thick. And the air behind it was cold.
"That's the ice room," she informed him. And Ranma did see some ice blocks behind bundles of straw. "Not much meat."
"It's the Curse." She was leaning so close to him his chilled body could feel her (feminine) body heat. "We have to import it from outside the Roof Valleys from, quote, Friendly Colonies." She waited until the boy had picked up a wrapped and labeled [yak] steak before she said, "There's still a chance it could have been somebody who hadn't stayed in Animal Town."
"It's gonna take me too long to cook this on that three stovepipe thing," Ranma said, putting the meat back.
When he turned to leave, she didn't move fast enough to keep from being bumped. He knew Kaguya hadn't really tried to get out of the way. He went to set her aside. "Anyway you touch me gives me permission to touch you in the same way."
He picked her by the upper arms and put her down out of his way. "I did it as a guy. You hafta do it as one, too. How well trained are you in martial arts?" And he went to the door that was to the pantry.
"Not as well-trained as you, obviously. However, I Was raised around show people and learned some stunts." And she chuckled. "In fact, you could say, I'm always pulling stunts."
There was her sense of humor. He wasn't feeling it. He took out a loaf of barley bread and a ceramic jar of [Yeast Jam]. "What is this?" he asked, smelling it.
"It's the sludge left over from making barley beer. It's supposed to be a meat substitute. But you'd have to eat that whole jar in a day. No thanks. I'll stick with beans. Though I'm sick of beans. And don't talk to me about sprouts! Too many sprouts!"
"You don't like this?" There was a reason to try it: Make her cringe. "There's no booze in it?" Alcohol was good only for developing Drunken Style fighting. …Hmm. There was one he hadn't learned yet.
"It's dead yeast." She kept herself in front of him as he moved the table with the cutting board top. "How dead are you?" she said in a sexy voice.
"A few sandwiches will take the edge off my hunger. But I know there's rice and eggs: That's what was the breakfast that didn't get finished!"
"Which I came back for earlier: Victory! They are among the many things that pass as expensive treats. You know about the eggs; and other things grow better than rice up here in the Little Sisters of the Himalayas. I'm surprised at all that Can grow up here. But the Women Heroes still depend a lot on tribute from the colonies. We're protecting them from the Evils of Jusenkyo, after all. That's why guarding is so important to the economy."
Sampling, Ranma decided he had eaten worse stuff than the sludge and spread it on the bread. "Aw, man! I am(!) gonna have to be a guard to pay for what I eat." Was honor worth it? He could eat a lot, given the chance.
He put the sandwich to his mouth and took a smaller bite than he intended. "I'm a n-girl again-m!" she said with her mouth full. Man! The other Ranma was determined(!) to keep on building fires and heating water! She wished she could do that to him!
"Now's your chance to learn what I already know about a woman's body." And she ran a hand sensuously down her curve while hefting a breast.
"I all-m'ready know more 'n I mm-wanta kngow." And she swallowed. "I could've given up my log stompin', the quakin' and ripplin' were so damn distractin'." She didn't heft; she swiped. "Especially these. They're the worse parts: They get in the way in more ways than one!"
"Yes, you Were quaking their Log of Judgment." Her smile turned into a grin. "But I know how to have you quake in a way you'll like. It's very satisfying…" She moved closer.
Ranma eyed her as she finished up the sandwich in a couple of bites.
"Hunger needs satisfyin'." She then said and headed back to the pantry. "I don't need more to hunger for. Did I smell stinky cheese hidden away in there?"
"Not that! Look, how about I make you a tofu burger and stir fry French fries?"
"I know how to cook…." But not on that kind of cast iron stove that- "French fries?! You got potatoes?!"
"Sure do!" Bingo! Take care of Ranma's stomach and she could work on bringing out another kind of hunger in her. And she went into the pantry, saying, "People get cursed, complain about what's missing and somebody or other set out to find it or make it. There's even been a couple or so inventors.
"But guess what(?), the really smart people aren't interested in curses." She came out carrying two handfuls of potatoes. And she was wearing an apron (that was too feminine: ruffly around the edges with a heart-shaped bib). "Get that jar marked "arrowroot"."
When Ranma had come to the cutting board table, she saw the entirety of Kaguya's back, from neck to heels. "Why is that half naked!?(!)"
"This is the recommended way in some mana and anime I've seen," the teen said, slicing the potatoes. "Would you like to go naked-apron, too?" she suggested, wiggling her butt.
"I only go naked when there're no girls are around," she frowned, walking out from behind her.
"Okay, I'll become a guy!" She suggestively lowered the knife below her waist.
"I'm the girl!" Then she realized what she had and said, "But I'm a guy!"
"Double standard!"
"Right! You get the stove goin' and I'll coat the taters." The problem was, she wanted to see how different it was to use the strange stove. And that meant she had to see Kaguya's bare backside, too. And the other girl knew it-She made a show of it. And it was a very good show. The redhead's own hips and thighs almost picked up on those sensuous movements…. Until Ranma stopped them!
But not before she had gotten a wok from a shelf under the table and oiled it. Dumping the strips into it, she brought them to the stove.
"This thing heats up fast."
"It saves fuel by being heated by water piped in from the magic hot spring. But let's be honest: We've been making each other hot, too. It makes me want to reach out and sear myself on your-'
Ranma shoved the pan into her hands. "It's gotta be the hot magic! You like it: You cook!" And she got away from the stove. And her.
"You are certainly hard to entertain!" And she took off the apron and tossed it down as a statement. (She had on strategically placed stickers.)
"Entertain? Is that what you're tryin' to doin'!?(!)" Ranma said, before thinking to look away from her (nearly) naked (nearly) perfectly proportioned figure.
"Try? Ha! That's What I Do! There are no TV shows or movies on This-side! That means I know more about what makes them work than anybody! I'm what everybody needs to get away from the monotony of routine and the worries about the Evils! I'm the real(!) Celebrity of the Women Heroes!" Getting no immediate reaction from her target, she shoved the wok onto the stove. "Burn!"
"No!" Ranma cried and hurried over to save the fries. She had to maneuver around the naked girl. Then she had to let go of the wok handles, spin around her, and take them on her other side.
Kaguya wouldn't give up her game. "Keep away! Touch me and I get to touch you!"
Ranma, all while tending to the stir fry, picked up the wooden spatula and pushed the nude away at (her short) arm's length, poking her when she had to, avoiding the pervert's bullseyes.
Kaguya countered with a wooden spoon. Ranma had to wonder how many sword duels she had seen. (Maybe memorized?). But those in shows were choreographed and this wasn't, so-
"Kaguya!? Put your clothes on!" It was Eyeshadow, the other redhead. "Having One exhibitionist sister is bad enough!"
"Stop trying to spoil the fun." She then stopped and put the spoon hand's wrist on a hip. "Better, strip out of that silk pants suit and get naked, too."
"No! I, I can't!" She reddened.
"Oh, brother! And how many baths have you taken with the girls you live with, Little Bro? You've seen every one of us el buffo except Ranma. Only I guess you have! You're practically her twin. I bet she hasn't taken a good look at herself nude, yet. Why not give her a preview at what she's going to enjoy?"
Glaring at her, the guard stood at attention. "Squad Leader Shé has ordered me to order you and-"
"Oh, no! I can't believe it! You're Hot! My little brother is hot and horny!" And she hurried over to her and sniffed. "And sweaty and wet!" She giggled.
"But for nude idol, me? Or…."
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NOTES:
I've skirted close to the M rating with this chapter. But I draw away from it in the next chapter. Sex is just the entry into Ranma's biggest problem!
"Honor" now becomes yet another reason for Ranma not to leave the Roof Valleys…for a while.
The cynic in Kaguya sees that "It's good for business" to remind the colonies how important the Women Heroes are by "letting" one of the Evils threaten them once in awhile and the guards coming to their rescue. But ruling women also help the colonies when called upon. There's Ranma's ticket to visit other places.
You can get an idea of what Kaguya's apron looked like by googling "Mirror Ranma apron". (That story arc is in Manga Chapters 367-370.)
Rumiko Takahashi has said that she hadn't intended Ranma to have the personality traits he ended up with, but that he sort of wrote himself. Well, here, Kaguya has now made herself different from Nabiki.
Kaguya has a nearly photographic memory for things that interests her. Her ambition had been to be a multi-media star. Her assistant producer father could have helped her if they had thought there was a future for those no longer a child star.