Scary as it may seem, when I finish True Identity, I'm going to
compile it into a single file. I've been trying to do that with False
Identity, but it's really hard and annoying and all that, so it might
take awhile. Not that it really matters-- when I finish compiling them
into their separate books, I'll be uploading them to FF.net under the
title "Tales of Identity". If someone can think of a better title, I'm
all ears.
True Identity
Chapter One: Crossings
Li Xiang
Four redheads crowded around the table, staring happily at the
ceiling-- alright, three redheads stared happily at the ceiling, and
one of them looked a bit melancholic. Fujimiya Ran, otherwise known as
"Aya", in honor of his little sister, was thinking about that selfsame
sister. Thinking about how much she had loved ice-cream, and how she
would have adored this little trip to the ice-cream shop to wile away
the hours outside of the House.
The House was, in all reality, the old warehouse Rache-- one of the
two female redheads at the table-- had purchased in Nyu Xue Shi's
name. Xue Shi being the other redheaded female. It had taken nearly a
month of constant debates but the two groups of assassins had finally
come to the decision to move in together. Their clothing and personal
items had all been shipped to the House, and put in Rache's
predesignated rooms. While the Weiss boys still accepted missions from
Manx and Kritiker-- they _were_ still working at the Koneko no Sumi
Ie-- Schwartz had only cut their final tie a couple nights earlier.
Schuldich was celebrating his "freedom" by treating his sister, his
best friend's so-called pet, and the pet's own newly named best friend
to ice-cream.
The only reason Aya had agreed to come was so that he could get away
from the fairly loud disagreements of Yohji and Crawford. They
preferred to argue with one another, over speaking civilly and working
out problems. Although, Xue Shi-- aka Saotome Ranma-- had to muse,
that was usually how _he_ got along with both Yohji and Omi. Or, in
his world, Kudou and Tsukiyono.
"Stop being so depressed all the time," Rache snapped, leveling her
licked-clean spoon at the violet eyed assassin, "you're making me
depressed."
"And we can't have _that_," Ranma grinned widely, and the natural
female stuck her tongue out. Schuldich dropped his elbow on his little
sister's head.
"We should probably have Balinese around when you do that, hmm
schwester?"
Rache blushed a red to match Ranma-onna's hair-- her's was a bit to
brown a shade to be considered "blushable red"-- and shot a glare at
she who was normally male. Ranma shook her head, sending wild strands
of red hair fluttering around her face. She glared angrily at the
strands, tucking them behind her ears. Getting a haircut sucked, she
thought to herself.
Apparently, her mother had decided that Ranma needed to have good,
proper non-split ended hair. Which resulted in a hair cut, where she
lost the hair up to her chin. Nodoka had wanted her to get a more
boyish cut, but Ranma had drawn the line. While she didn't exactly
like her female form, she didn't actually hate it. Ranma wanted a hair
style that would look good on both forms, and that had resulted in a
chin-length straight cut that curled in slightly at the bottom, where
it followed the pretty much permanent curve of where it had been tied
back into the formerly thought to be eternal pigtail.
Another reason for the ice-cream-- it was Ranma's first day out with
her new hair cut.
"I said nothing!" Ranma proclaimed before shoving the first mouthful
of her ninth sunday into her mouth. Aya hiked an enquiring eyebrow,
but could infer what exactly they were talking about. It didn't take a
genius to see that Rache had a crush on Yohji. Nor one to figure out
that Yohji was not flirting with Rache for a reason other than
Schuldich's death threats.
The two green eyed redheads stared at each other for a few moments,
then back at their friends, and burst out laughing. Aya looked vaguely
sophisticated, with his single ice-cream bowl empty in front of him,
spoon in the bowl. He'd knit his fingers together and had his chin
resting upon them. The only thing that put this off was the splatter
or two of ice-cream on his face from the girl seated beside him. And
the fact that he'd begun glaring at said girl.
Ranma-onna, on the other hand, had the previous eight sunday bowls
scattered around her, licked clean, her spoon in one hand, and the
ninth sunday in the other. A few seconds later, that bowl was empty,
too.
"I never thought I'd see the day when someone could eat faster than
Usagi-chan."
Two of the four gathered stiffened noticeably. Aya's cold glared
turned on the speaker, Ranma set her spoon down very carefully, while
Rache bowed her head to hide her face in the shadows of her
shoulder-length hair, and Schuldich looked like he was trying to crush
the tabletop, his grip was so tight. Ranma had recognized the voice,
even though it had been almost three months since he'd last heard it.
It was that shrine maiden that had all but sent Schuldich into a
mindless-rage.
She was wearing a black and grey school uniform, while the girls with
her just wore normal clothing. They appeared to be about the age to be
starting college-- in other words, older than Ranma by about two
years; Rache's age. Her violet eyes were closer to black, and didn't
have that same shimmer that Aya's did. But then, she _was_ a shrine
maiden, and not an assassin.
"Hey, you're that freak that showed up at the shrine a few months
back!" Obviously, the girl remembered Schuldich, too. His knuckles
turned that much whiter as he grit his teeth and forced himself to
calm down. He wouldn't kill her. Not even maim her. He was going to
leave that to Rache.
Said girl could hear her brother's teeth grinding, and it made the
hairs on the back of her neck rise. She finally lifted her head,
placing a palm on her brother's shoulder, "Calm, Schu. Be calm."
"Naru-chan?!" shrieked one of the priestess' friends. A blonde haired
apparently gaijin girl with large sky blue eyes. Her hair was up in
the stupidest style Ranma had ever seen-- a pair of buns/war knots on
either side of her head with long pigtails extending down to her
ankles. The boy-turned-girl made a face. She was wearing way to much
pink. Which was, most definitely, not one of her most favorite colors.
Not after all those incidents where "Ranko" had ended up wearing it.
"Tsukino-san," Rache intoned formerly, "if you can't control your
friend's rude mouth, go away."
"Naru-chan?" the girl repeated, hurt shining in luminescent blue eyes.
Rache found herself gritting her own teeth, gaze narrowing, and
emerald eyes turning hard.
"You do not have the privileged to call me that," the redhead hissed,
"no right."
Ranma blinked, "Man, I wish I'd done that with Ukyou."
"Ranma, be quiet," Rache, Aya and Schuldich spoke as one. The redhead
smirked, then swiped what remained of Schuldich's ice-cream. But her
eyes were hard, and focused on the girls before them. Committing their
faces to memory. Every thing about their appearance she learned. She
wasn't going to let a chance to punish these people for what they'd
done to Rache over a year earlier just pass her by.
A brunette with green eyes stepped forwards, and stared at Schuldich
for a moment, then, "I know you from somewhere."
Schuldich grinned to himself, tweaking her memory and bringing the
image of him fading from her sight forwards. She gasped a bit, staring
at him. Her eyes were wide and unfocused for a second, before
Schuldich darted back in and took the memory away from her, /You've
never seen me before, liebe./
While the other girls were busy trying to figure out what was wrong
with their friend, the quartet of redheads stood and exited the shop.
On the way out, Ranma grabbed a cup of hot water, being prepared for
tea, and dumped it over her head. Ranma-otoko shook his head out,
sending water droplets flying. Rache shrieked as the water hit her,
then glared playfully at her friend, "You wanna try that again,
Kitty-cat?"
Ranma grinned, whipping his head around again, and sending the last
bits clinging to the strands flying. Behind them, Schuldich watched
with an amused eye at how fast his sister recovered from the meeting
with her ex-friends, and Aya pondered for a few moments.
"Ranma?"
"That's me," the boy snickered at the dark look he got in return,
"What's up Ayan?" Oh yes, Ranma had picked up on that little nickname,
and couldn't help but call the older boy by it.
The dark look intensified, but Aya let the name slide, "Why do you
always go female when you want ice-cream?"
"Guys aren't supposed to pig out on candy and ice-cream," Ranma
parodied his father's voice, his face serious. After a moment or two,
his cocky grin flickered back into being, "Besides. Ice-cream doesn't
taste as good as a guy as it does when I'm a girl."
"Nice reasoning, Bishoujo." Three guesses on who _that_ was.
"Why thank-you. And don't call me Bishoujo," sending the culprit an
evil glare, Ranma opened his mouth to continue when the ringing of a
cell phone interrupted them. Seeing as Schuldich didn't need one, and
Ranma refused to carry one, it was between Rache and Aya as to who's
it was. Rache shrugged, "I didn't bring mine."
Abyssian nodded, pulling his out. Flicking it on, he spoke softly for
a second, before an irritated look crossed his face, "You could have
just asked Schuldich to relate the message to us, Ken." Only Ranma
heard the other side of the conversation, his cat-side's hear much
better than any human's.
"I'm not talking to Schuldich," Ken huffed, although there was a
twinge of fear in his voice. Hidaka _still_ had not gotten over the
German man's teasing, despite it being almost four months since it
happened. It didn't help that Schuldich practically followed Ken
around-- tormenting him, Ken believed.
Aya growled a bit, low in his throat, and spoke dangerously, "I.
Don't. Care."
"But Aya--" Ken's whine was cut off by Aya hanging up on him. The
irritated redhead turned to look at his companions, "We're to return
to the House. Mission details."
"Right," the other three nodded, Rache hopping onto her brother
piggy-back style. Ranma and Schuldich bent then pushed off, jumping
from the street to a roof top from a standing position. Aya followed
their lead, although he had to get a running start. He was capable to
jumping down from a building and not getting hurt-- it was jumping
thirty, forty, fifty feet into the air that was the problem.
However, Ranma and Schuldich's "Learn How to Jump, Accelerated
Course", as they had a tendency to call it, had been helping. The
course being a combination of Ranma's training under Genma, and
Schuldich's training by Estet.
In any case, after a few minutes, Aya, Ranma, Schuldich and Rache had
vanished in their roof hopping.
End Chapter
Yes, I do have a plan for why they've been "recalled". Mwahahahahaha!
(Actually, this part was planned out way back before Rache actually
showed up in the False Identity!)
compile it into a single file. I've been trying to do that with False
Identity, but it's really hard and annoying and all that, so it might
take awhile. Not that it really matters-- when I finish compiling them
into their separate books, I'll be uploading them to FF.net under the
title "Tales of Identity". If someone can think of a better title, I'm
all ears.
True Identity
Chapter One: Crossings
Li Xiang
Four redheads crowded around the table, staring happily at the
ceiling-- alright, three redheads stared happily at the ceiling, and
one of them looked a bit melancholic. Fujimiya Ran, otherwise known as
"Aya", in honor of his little sister, was thinking about that selfsame
sister. Thinking about how much she had loved ice-cream, and how she
would have adored this little trip to the ice-cream shop to wile away
the hours outside of the House.
The House was, in all reality, the old warehouse Rache-- one of the
two female redheads at the table-- had purchased in Nyu Xue Shi's
name. Xue Shi being the other redheaded female. It had taken nearly a
month of constant debates but the two groups of assassins had finally
come to the decision to move in together. Their clothing and personal
items had all been shipped to the House, and put in Rache's
predesignated rooms. While the Weiss boys still accepted missions from
Manx and Kritiker-- they _were_ still working at the Koneko no Sumi
Ie-- Schwartz had only cut their final tie a couple nights earlier.
Schuldich was celebrating his "freedom" by treating his sister, his
best friend's so-called pet, and the pet's own newly named best friend
to ice-cream.
The only reason Aya had agreed to come was so that he could get away
from the fairly loud disagreements of Yohji and Crawford. They
preferred to argue with one another, over speaking civilly and working
out problems. Although, Xue Shi-- aka Saotome Ranma-- had to muse,
that was usually how _he_ got along with both Yohji and Omi. Or, in
his world, Kudou and Tsukiyono.
"Stop being so depressed all the time," Rache snapped, leveling her
licked-clean spoon at the violet eyed assassin, "you're making me
depressed."
"And we can't have _that_," Ranma grinned widely, and the natural
female stuck her tongue out. Schuldich dropped his elbow on his little
sister's head.
"We should probably have Balinese around when you do that, hmm
schwester?"
Rache blushed a red to match Ranma-onna's hair-- her's was a bit to
brown a shade to be considered "blushable red"-- and shot a glare at
she who was normally male. Ranma shook her head, sending wild strands
of red hair fluttering around her face. She glared angrily at the
strands, tucking them behind her ears. Getting a haircut sucked, she
thought to herself.
Apparently, her mother had decided that Ranma needed to have good,
proper non-split ended hair. Which resulted in a hair cut, where she
lost the hair up to her chin. Nodoka had wanted her to get a more
boyish cut, but Ranma had drawn the line. While she didn't exactly
like her female form, she didn't actually hate it. Ranma wanted a hair
style that would look good on both forms, and that had resulted in a
chin-length straight cut that curled in slightly at the bottom, where
it followed the pretty much permanent curve of where it had been tied
back into the formerly thought to be eternal pigtail.
Another reason for the ice-cream-- it was Ranma's first day out with
her new hair cut.
"I said nothing!" Ranma proclaimed before shoving the first mouthful
of her ninth sunday into her mouth. Aya hiked an enquiring eyebrow,
but could infer what exactly they were talking about. It didn't take a
genius to see that Rache had a crush on Yohji. Nor one to figure out
that Yohji was not flirting with Rache for a reason other than
Schuldich's death threats.
The two green eyed redheads stared at each other for a few moments,
then back at their friends, and burst out laughing. Aya looked vaguely
sophisticated, with his single ice-cream bowl empty in front of him,
spoon in the bowl. He'd knit his fingers together and had his chin
resting upon them. The only thing that put this off was the splatter
or two of ice-cream on his face from the girl seated beside him. And
the fact that he'd begun glaring at said girl.
Ranma-onna, on the other hand, had the previous eight sunday bowls
scattered around her, licked clean, her spoon in one hand, and the
ninth sunday in the other. A few seconds later, that bowl was empty,
too.
"I never thought I'd see the day when someone could eat faster than
Usagi-chan."
Two of the four gathered stiffened noticeably. Aya's cold glared
turned on the speaker, Ranma set her spoon down very carefully, while
Rache bowed her head to hide her face in the shadows of her
shoulder-length hair, and Schuldich looked like he was trying to crush
the tabletop, his grip was so tight. Ranma had recognized the voice,
even though it had been almost three months since he'd last heard it.
It was that shrine maiden that had all but sent Schuldich into a
mindless-rage.
She was wearing a black and grey school uniform, while the girls with
her just wore normal clothing. They appeared to be about the age to be
starting college-- in other words, older than Ranma by about two
years; Rache's age. Her violet eyes were closer to black, and didn't
have that same shimmer that Aya's did. But then, she _was_ a shrine
maiden, and not an assassin.
"Hey, you're that freak that showed up at the shrine a few months
back!" Obviously, the girl remembered Schuldich, too. His knuckles
turned that much whiter as he grit his teeth and forced himself to
calm down. He wouldn't kill her. Not even maim her. He was going to
leave that to Rache.
Said girl could hear her brother's teeth grinding, and it made the
hairs on the back of her neck rise. She finally lifted her head,
placing a palm on her brother's shoulder, "Calm, Schu. Be calm."
"Naru-chan?!" shrieked one of the priestess' friends. A blonde haired
apparently gaijin girl with large sky blue eyes. Her hair was up in
the stupidest style Ranma had ever seen-- a pair of buns/war knots on
either side of her head with long pigtails extending down to her
ankles. The boy-turned-girl made a face. She was wearing way to much
pink. Which was, most definitely, not one of her most favorite colors.
Not after all those incidents where "Ranko" had ended up wearing it.
"Tsukino-san," Rache intoned formerly, "if you can't control your
friend's rude mouth, go away."
"Naru-chan?" the girl repeated, hurt shining in luminescent blue eyes.
Rache found herself gritting her own teeth, gaze narrowing, and
emerald eyes turning hard.
"You do not have the privileged to call me that," the redhead hissed,
"no right."
Ranma blinked, "Man, I wish I'd done that with Ukyou."
"Ranma, be quiet," Rache, Aya and Schuldich spoke as one. The redhead
smirked, then swiped what remained of Schuldich's ice-cream. But her
eyes were hard, and focused on the girls before them. Committing their
faces to memory. Every thing about their appearance she learned. She
wasn't going to let a chance to punish these people for what they'd
done to Rache over a year earlier just pass her by.
A brunette with green eyes stepped forwards, and stared at Schuldich
for a moment, then, "I know you from somewhere."
Schuldich grinned to himself, tweaking her memory and bringing the
image of him fading from her sight forwards. She gasped a bit, staring
at him. Her eyes were wide and unfocused for a second, before
Schuldich darted back in and took the memory away from her, /You've
never seen me before, liebe./
While the other girls were busy trying to figure out what was wrong
with their friend, the quartet of redheads stood and exited the shop.
On the way out, Ranma grabbed a cup of hot water, being prepared for
tea, and dumped it over her head. Ranma-otoko shook his head out,
sending water droplets flying. Rache shrieked as the water hit her,
then glared playfully at her friend, "You wanna try that again,
Kitty-cat?"
Ranma grinned, whipping his head around again, and sending the last
bits clinging to the strands flying. Behind them, Schuldich watched
with an amused eye at how fast his sister recovered from the meeting
with her ex-friends, and Aya pondered for a few moments.
"Ranma?"
"That's me," the boy snickered at the dark look he got in return,
"What's up Ayan?" Oh yes, Ranma had picked up on that little nickname,
and couldn't help but call the older boy by it.
The dark look intensified, but Aya let the name slide, "Why do you
always go female when you want ice-cream?"
"Guys aren't supposed to pig out on candy and ice-cream," Ranma
parodied his father's voice, his face serious. After a moment or two,
his cocky grin flickered back into being, "Besides. Ice-cream doesn't
taste as good as a guy as it does when I'm a girl."
"Nice reasoning, Bishoujo." Three guesses on who _that_ was.
"Why thank-you. And don't call me Bishoujo," sending the culprit an
evil glare, Ranma opened his mouth to continue when the ringing of a
cell phone interrupted them. Seeing as Schuldich didn't need one, and
Ranma refused to carry one, it was between Rache and Aya as to who's
it was. Rache shrugged, "I didn't bring mine."
Abyssian nodded, pulling his out. Flicking it on, he spoke softly for
a second, before an irritated look crossed his face, "You could have
just asked Schuldich to relate the message to us, Ken." Only Ranma
heard the other side of the conversation, his cat-side's hear much
better than any human's.
"I'm not talking to Schuldich," Ken huffed, although there was a
twinge of fear in his voice. Hidaka _still_ had not gotten over the
German man's teasing, despite it being almost four months since it
happened. It didn't help that Schuldich practically followed Ken
around-- tormenting him, Ken believed.
Aya growled a bit, low in his throat, and spoke dangerously, "I.
Don't. Care."
"But Aya--" Ken's whine was cut off by Aya hanging up on him. The
irritated redhead turned to look at his companions, "We're to return
to the House. Mission details."
"Right," the other three nodded, Rache hopping onto her brother
piggy-back style. Ranma and Schuldich bent then pushed off, jumping
from the street to a roof top from a standing position. Aya followed
their lead, although he had to get a running start. He was capable to
jumping down from a building and not getting hurt-- it was jumping
thirty, forty, fifty feet into the air that was the problem.
However, Ranma and Schuldich's "Learn How to Jump, Accelerated
Course", as they had a tendency to call it, had been helping. The
course being a combination of Ranma's training under Genma, and
Schuldich's training by Estet.
In any case, after a few minutes, Aya, Ranma, Schuldich and Rache had
vanished in their roof hopping.
End Chapter
Yes, I do have a plan for why they've been "recalled". Mwahahahahaha!
(Actually, this part was planned out way back before Rache actually
showed up in the False Identity!)