Disclaimer:
Ranma 1/2 doesn't belong to me. Rumiko Takahashi deserves all the credit.
My
Heart Was As Ice-prologue
A shrill whistle broke the air as the
train neared its stop. At the stop were
dozens of people who waited eagerly for the train to stop. When at last, the train came to its
destination, and the door opened, a stream of people came rushing out. Each looking around for their loved ones,
upon finding them, cried out in joy and rushed to them.
Among these people waiting at the stop
were two particular people. One, a fat balding man with a handkerchief over his
head with large glasses, and the other, his wife, a beautiful woman in a
kimono, holding a wrapped bundle. These
two people also searched eagerly among the crowd. Around them were people crying out with joy as they were reunited
and others were crying with grief as they were reunited with the dead. As the stream of the living coming out of
the train dwindled, so did their hopes.
The woman looked toward where they were
bringing out the coffins, when the man put his hand on her shoulder and shook
his heads saying, "No, Nodoka. I'm sure our son isn't among the dead. Look, there are people still coming
out."
"I hope you're right Genma."
Nodoka replied as she started to search for her son again. As the amount of people coming out from the
train dwindled even more to a trickle, and looked as if everyone has left, her
hopes began to be smothered out.
Suddenly she let out a gasp and Genma looked toward where she was looking.
There on the train came out the last
figure. First cloaked in shadows, no
distinct appearance could be made out.
As he slowly started walking down the steps, his foot clad in Chinese
slippers, then a black pants can be made out.
The sun slowly inched upwards and now a midnight blue Chinese shirt
along with his obvious masculinity can be seen next. Then, at last, the sun hit his face showing a bandage wrapped
around one of his eyes, but the eye that can be seen glittered in the brightest
cerulean blue that still showed a boyish innocence. His face which was handsomely modeled, and angular at the absence
of fat stood out clearly. As a gentle
gust blew, his pigtail can be seen swaying slowly.
Holding
her breath, she rushed towards the person who looked so much like her son. She tentatively cried out,
"Ranma?"
The
stranger turned his head and whispered, "Mother?"
Nodoka
rushed to him and held on tightly, as a drowning man grasping onto a piece of
wood, and in a way it was. Without her son, she may have been lost forever in
her grief. "Oh, my son has come
back to me." and she cried in joy on his shoulder.
Ranma
held his mother, but not a single emotion flickered over his face. Genma rushed towards them and smiling
broadly slapped Ranma across the back.
"Ranma, my boy, I knew you would come back fine. I trained you
after all."
They
all went and got on the taxi that Genma called to get here. As they were going home, Nodoka and Genma
asked a lot of questions. Ranma in turn
only replied with single syllables and rarely spoke more than that.
Nodoka
said "I can't wait until your sister sees you. You probably don't remember her because you and your father left
for your training journey four years after she was born. She couldn't come to the train station with
us because she had to go to school.
She's attending Funrikan High right now. She just turned sixteen."
Ranma
asked a question finally, "What is her name?"
"Her
name is Ranko. We named her in honor of
you son." Genma said proudly.
"Oh."
Ranma said and that was all.
As they
were nearing their house, Nodoka remarked "Wasn't it horrible seeing those
poor children that died? How sad their
parents must be."
"Then
they shouldn't have been there at all." Ranma said as they reached their
home. "They were useless, and most
didn't even kill a single enemy." Ranma said this calmly. "As for
those parents, this was war people die.
If they didn't want their child to die, then they shouldn't have sent
them out at all." He then got out of the car and walked towards the house
leaving his shocked parents behind.
As
Ranma walked away, Genma said to his wife, "Honey, Ranma didn't mean
that. He's just tired after coming home
after a war. So he must be stressed and
tired."
Nodoka
just nodded her head dumbly and walked towards the house. As she neared her door, she saw that mail
had come from the military. Upon
finishing the letter, her sword dropped from her nerveless hand and clattered
loud on the floor.
"Nodoka!
What's wrong?" Genma asked worriedly.
She always took the greatest care of her family honor blade.
She
just handed the letter over to Genma, who took it from her and read the
content:
Dear
Mr(s) Saotome,
We are
saddened to tell you of our discovery concerning your son. When your son entered the war at the young
age of fifteen, we were greatly concerned.
He was much younger than all the other volunteers. In order to see if he was fit to fight in
the war, we ran him through several tests.
In all the tests, he did it perfectly and we deemed that he was indeed
qualified for battle.
When he
first entered the battle is when disaster struck, even though we did not know
it at the times. Your son went into
shock after his first kill. We ignored
this as this sometimes happen with the newer member. However, after every battle, Ranma seemed to have a psychological
trauma. (extreme depression, sadness, anger, etc...) We put him under a psychologist and it was deemed that your son's
rare innocence and code of honor was interfering.
Suddenly
one day, Ranma went into battle and returned fine. We had put it off thinking that he had finally gotten over
killing. After two years of constant
battle, the war was over. To be on the
safe side, all the people who fought in the war had to go to a psychologist.
(we have found out that prolonged battle changes behaviors sometimes.) When
Ranma took his test, we found some disturbing news. It seems that in order for Ranma to protect his innocence, Ranma
somehow rid himself of all his emotion.
He does not feel any sympathy, happiness, etc... The only feelings he
seems to feel are extreme loneliness and anger.
We have
not had the time to try and correct this, because all the men wanted to return
to their families. Here is a phone
number of the doctor that may help your son: 273-4729.
Signed
Colonel Wasaki.
Author's
note: Finally done with the story. My second fic to be written. Pease read and
respond. My e-mail address is
Maverickmage@Hotmail.com. Danke.
