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* Ranma 1/2 Fan Fiction * Ranma 1/2 Fan Fiction * Ranma 1/2 Fan Fiction *
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Switch: Herbs and Spices (Chapter 20 / 22) by Nikholas "Switch" F. Toledo
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Please do remember that Ranma 1/2 is a trademark and a copyright of and
by some big name people and companies I am not even worthy to introduce.
Anybody who says that I took any of their stuff better not find me
hiding. Also, great thanks to whoever reads this and likes it, good
thanks to whoever reads it anyhow, and teeny-weeny thanks to whoever else
even saw this. The seeds of the righteous... never mind. It's Day 3.
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 Twenty Questions Unanswered



 "I wonder who that was," Nabiki wondered, holding on to the frame
of the sliding door to the room last occupied by Happosai.
 At that particular instant, her back arched, and her body was
caught in a paroxysm, her mouth and eyes opening and closing in an arcane
sequence, her face caught in a rictus of identifiable yet unnamed
insight.
 She breathed a "wow" and nearly twirled on her toes, had it not
been for the second doorbell.
 "Mrs. Saotome!" Soun hollered.
 "Dad..." She barely touched the wooden floorings, and no sound was
evinced.
 "Nodoka!" Soun reiterated.
 "Dad..." Nabiki slipped into her wooden sandals, "the door..."
 Soun was out the door faster than Nabiki's next step, which did not
say much. He opened the gate and saw one of Akane's friends dragging
another girl behind her.
 "Um, good m... is Ranma in?" Yuka looked confused.
 "He's still sleeping," Nabiki said, dreamily.
 Soun quickly came to the conclusion that the girls were there to
give Ranma last-minute advice on Akane, vis-à-vis Nabiki's invitation.
He smiled in approval, noticing that the Saotome matriarch did not carry
the lethal blade.
 "Would you girls like to come in for some tea?" he added, slightly
conspiratorially.
 "Sorry..." Yuka started to say.
 He did not realize that Nodoka could have slipped a ceremonial
dagger in the folds of her kimono.

 Dr. Tofu Ono walked hand in hand with the woman-child that he
loved. What he did not know was that she knew that he had loved her, and
that she had already told him off once. This deviation in their
knowledge bases might prove to be their undoing.

 Nodoka quickly gave chase, nervously knocking on the doorframe of
her house as she passed it.
 Not only did she succeed in losing the boy, after almost having him
killed, she also almost succeeded in getting herself lost. After a few
moments, she realized that her feet knew exactly where they were headed,
and she allowed them to take her with them.
 Right, left, left, straight away - the hot summer sun started its
toil-filled ascent to its apex, beating heavily without convection. The
river by her side merely burbled, light under the swift and fluid motions
of its recollection in the sea.
 Soon, her legs gave up their tension, allowing her to make use of
her knees, as she knew that one more turn would lead her straight to -
 The heavy wooden gate opened slightly.
 "Good morning, Soun."
 Soun's eyes bugged out for about .89 seconds. "G-g-good morning,
Mrs. Sa-" The pause was not even palpable, noticeable only on the
tactile level. "- Nodoka," he finished.
 She passed by him in temporizing steps.
 The door of the house was ajar, and she wasted little time with her
shoes. She heard Nabiki say, "I wonder who that was." The steps were
taken one at a time, then in bounds of two and three.
 "Mrs. Saotome!" Soun hollered, and was ignored.
 She, instead, heard the sounds of suckling.
 Turning the corner, she opened the door of the second floor
guestroom, revealing the source of the noise.
 "Nodoka!" Soun reiterated, but it was too late.
 Ranma quickly turned in his position, which just happened to hover
over the position of Akane, who was slightly obscured at that point.
 To the eyes of Nodoka Saotome, the sixteen-year-old who was sitting
up in the futon had, first, the face of a bespectacled child of age six,
then a pigtailed child of age six, finally filling out with age, and
contorting into the gravest form of terror.
 Nodoka Saotome, mother of one, could not identify the child she had
raised for six years and lost for ten more, but fell to the ground,
embracing the man-child who still had milk on his lips.

 In the Bedroom of the grandiose and verdant Kuno estate, three
figures lay in bed, in quite a precarious and censurable position. Point
in fact, this spacious and majestic chamber now included much of the roof
and the garden.
 Tsubasa groggily woke up, shaking his head. To reorient himself,
he turned a sleepy eye to his right. Sure enough, his ladylove lay
there, mumbling sweet nothings in the afterglow. He smiled, kissed her
forehead, and lay back down.
 He made small comforting noises, and nuzzled her tuft of curly
hair. Then he noticed a similar mumbling to his back.
 To his surprise, another Kodachi was there, similarly basking in
the late morning ambience.
 With much of a shrug, he opened his arms wide to receive them both.

 Shampoo snapped closed the shower and dried herself off with a
thick yellow towel.
 Although she wasn't quite above admiring herself, the look she gave
the mirror wasn't one that harbored any like for self. She had quite an
annoyed look at the way her breasts bobbed pertly, bravely jutting above
layers of honed muscle and stiff bone. Her hips skewed in posture and
she could not care less whether or not she would look this way in a few
years.
 How could she have been so selfish? The ugliness shown upon her
features, contorting it into withered caricature of herself, shrunken and
shriveled in spirit.
 Wearing a pink cheongsam, she took her bonbori from the closet and
met with her Elder to deliberate a counterattack.

 Yuka gently placed her lover in the futon, and adjusted the ice
pack on his forehead.
 She marveled at the hospitality of the Tendos, how they immediately
admitted her and Daisuke after bowing out to the invitation to tea.
 "Sorry," she had said, "my friend collapsed, and I -"
 "Say no more, young lady," Soun said, ushering them into this room.
 The room itself looked to be quite large, almost having the air of
a master bedroom.
 Not having visited the Tendo household in the recent past (mostly
due to the insistence of Akane herself), Yuka easily mistook the room for
what it once was: indeed, the master bedroom of the household. In
reality, it was now a guestroom and, in a way, the master's bedroom.
 Nothing was left of the mayhem from early on in the morning, aside
from a hole in the ceiling, which was skewed and, with its angle, did not
let light in.
 "'suke," she murmured, not wishing to call him, only to refer to
him.
 At her voice, the other female roused, if slowly. "Mmm...?"
 "What happened?" she wanted to ask, but she knew three things that
had happened, which would only be the answers her boyfriend would
provide: one, that he was cursed in apparently the same way that Ranma
was; two, that he had no idea who and why this was done; three, that
the water they were splashed with was the key.
 Yuka had heard from Akane that Ranma's "curse" wasn't one caused by
evil spell-casters or any of that medieval-sounding nonsense.
Apparently, there was this place in China, where Shampoo was from, that
had natural springs (?)...
 "Umm, Yuka..."
 She did not turn.
 She was fascinated by the lilting tone in Daisuke's voice, a
natural pitch aided by a wholeness of tone that quickly distinguished his
new voice from any other voice she had ever known - yet identified itself
completely with Daisuke himself. There was his sincerity, his
seriousness, his playfulness... and a heretofore-unknown aspect of him,
one of mild, yet self-aware fear.
 And pain - clear, dissonant pain. Quite clearly, one highly-
evidenced fact resounded in the painful bass of his vocal symphony:
 There was no cure.
 In an instant, Yuka knew exactly what the problem was between Ranma
and Akane. She saw the schism in all its facets, the denial of
commitment, the shadowplay and the hesitation. She realized exactly why
Akane took so long in realizing her emotions towards the pigtailed
martial artist.
 Knowing all this, she still did not know how it could be rectified.

 And, when all was said and done, Ranma Saotome had failed.
 He had failed his mother, who had expected him to be a man among
men, and found him skulking in the Tendo household, with one of the Tendo
daughters, to boot.
 He had failed his father, who chose to stick him with a contract to
his mother, a contract with the Tendos, a contract with his oldest
friend, and a contract to the (Founding) Anything-Goes School of Martial
Arts. With all these commitments, added to some he had inadvertently
placed himself under, he broke one, just one, under the strain. He only
had the satisfaction of knowing that his father would not be able to
escape the consequences.
 He would now fail each and every bond he had made.
 Most of all, he would fail Akane Tendo, as the one and only chance
for their consummation would be interrupted by the event of his undoing.
 The woman cannot be denied.
 "No! He's MINE!"
 Nodoka was hurled violently to a scrambled sitting position by
Soun's youngest daughter. She saw Akane sit up, forcing Ranma into a
similar posture, protectively clutching at the bare and lightly bruised
chest of the young man, while keeping her own obscured (albeit
coincidentally). "YOU CAN'T HAVE HIM! YOU DON'T EVEN KNOW HIM!!"
 "Ah... Akane?"
 Akane was beyond reproach, beyond care. She held his naked torso
with greedy and relentless possessiveness. "HE'S MY MAN AMONG MEN! HE'S
THE ONE THAT I CHOOSE!"
 "Akane?!" Ranma turned, sore and shocked at her boldness and her
volume.
 Nodoka was transfixed, more at the intensity of Akane than anything
else.
 "AUNTIE, IF YOU CAN'T ACCEPT HIM AS YOUR SON, THEN LET ME HAVE HIM
AS MY HUSBAND!"
 Then, the gist of her words began to seep. "Man... among men?"
 "IF YOU KILL HIM, YOU'LL HAVE TO KILL ME!" With that, she yanked
Ranma's pigtail from one side, "erk!" meeting Ranma's floundering lips
in her own.
 Akane closed her eyes, waiting for the perfect death.
 Ranma closed his eyes, counting slowly...
 Nodoka's eyes did not blink. "My... son...?" She began to pale,
realizing a ghost.

 Tatewaki Kuno had a dream.
 It went quite this way:
 He called his father to open the door
 and two girls came in. He could not
 recognize either one, but thought that
 he one of them was really a guy (?). The
 went father (who was not his father) asked if
 upstairs the girls would come in, there was some
 because sort of ceremony, and they were guests.
 there was Something like his sister getting married.
 this noise... It was probably a good thing. Anyways,
 Then he woke up, in a cold sweat. "Mother..."

 "What was that?"
 The doorbell rang yet again. Nabiki started to feel the pull of
gravity, but a buzzing persisted. Quickly down the steps and out the
door once more...
 Nabiki opened the gate for the Shinto priest. "I'm sorry, I'm
early, right?"
 "I remember you..." she started.
 "Funny... haven't I told you who I am before?"
 "You have..." Nabiki assured him.
 "I was told that there was supposed to be a 'celebratory luncheon'
in the 'traditional Anything-Goes Martial Arts fashion'."
 "That there is," she said, taking an elbow, then turning to close
the gate. "Right this way..."
 "Nabiki...?" The gate nearly muffled the sound completely.
 A heartbeat

 "Where are you going, my love?"
 The female turned to Tsubasa, haughtily looking over
 a svelte shoulder. "I have no wish to spend my morning in
 bed with you. You may, however, do with my vile sister as
 you please." With that, Kuno bade his leave.

 and another

 He couldn't understand it - he felt smaller.
 He brought the jacket of his kimono tighter around
 him, not quite aware that not only the cloth was loose. He
 trod down the street, gracefully and steadily enough not to
 trip.
 There was something wrong, he knew, and only one
 person was smart enough to help solve his problem, had been
 of any help to him through this time.
 He turned in time to see the gate nearly close.

 and a skip.
 "Kuno," she spun in place, "baby," the priest fell by the wayside.
 "Nabiki," he said, calling her for the first time with his mouth.
"I need..." Then he saw the look on her face.

 Tsubasa noticed a draft by one wing. "Where are you going, my
love?"
 He didn't quite catch what Kuno had said, beyond "... in bed with
you, with my sister, please." Kuno, for his part, did not notice the
realistic effects the transvestite used in his costume.
 Sister? Tsubasa grinned giddily, pulling off the sheets that had
draped over his body, thinking kinky thoughts in stereo. Happiness, his
mind supplied, always comes in pairs. He returned his attentions to the
other Kuno, rousing from the dousing finally. "And you, my l-?"
 Kodachi easily swatted the other girl, who happened to be in bed
with her, happened to be wearing just shorts and paint, happened to have
limbs embracing her. She rubbed her hands, thoroughly disgusted by the
fact that she herself was covered with paint. "Ugh. I would not allow
myself to be desecrated by a person of obviously low standing and
objectionable moral character."
 She spared the erstwhile bodypainting partner and conceded a small
amount of admiration of her features and attributes, mostly because they
were so blatantly displayed.
 She was barely out the door when she was accosted yet again.

 "Need...?" Nabiki caressed the "n" sound with much rolling of the
tongue. "You... need... me...?"
 "Um... yes..." Kuno felt two things: one, awkward, having to talk
to Nabiki Tendo (Nabiki! Master of Double-talk!) as though she was the
one having trouble catching up; two, a ringing, coming from, strangely,
the front of his mind. It made him extremely self-conscious, more so
with his clothes a gender too large.
 Because of this imbalance, he used his other hand, the first
holding the front of his trousers, to lean on the gate, pushing it
inward.
 Nabiki eyed his hand, much too intently. "So... nice... of you,
to... drop in..." In an instant, she grabbed -
 - for the gate, as Kuno slid his grip two hands' breadths up.
 A heartbeat. "Would you... like, to... come... in...?"
 They locked glances.
 Kuno knew of the battle of wits Nabiki had drawn him into, with
those shimmering pools of soul, yearning, reaching... and he won, hands
down. Still, he let her have her way: "Certainly."
 He pushed his weight forward, not losing contact with Nabiki's
glance, a step, another. The middle (now eldest) Tendo lightly pushed
the gate securely closed and maneuvered her way to the side of her ward.
 He saw her movement, her tactics, blocking the path with her radius
of... imbalance. He knew she and her aura were, innately, non-lethal,
but that was all he could gather. More out of curiosity than out of
fear, he allowed himself to be fielded along the left side of the Tendo
household.
 She smiled.
 He turned in time to avoid smashing blindly into a tree.
 At once, she took her opening.
 Nabiki lunged, extending her arms at Kuno - *BLAG!*
 Kuno opened his eyes. He was trapped between a largish tree and a
strange Nabiki, with both of the latter's arms blocking his sides, all of
her a breath's width in tentative margin. He knew/felt/reasoned that
they held much power, much force - but nothing he could not overcome.
 She Saw him, looked at him with the most intensity he had seen from
her eyes, gauging him in his new form. She put obvious effort to
stilling her breathing to a calm, collected state. She leaned forward,
her warmth and aura sending waves of clustering quiver, soothing and
exciting the new anatomy, confusing him with its queer tricks and clever
rhythms. With one deep, sharp intake of breath, the quick-witted tease,
the mysterious classmate, the arrogant crow, the jealous sister, the
informant, the tutor, the siren, the woman, took of him as she pleased.
 He saw the hairs of her neck rise, the flush in her cheeks, the
prick of her ears, the glaze in her eyes. It was then the wind cut along
their proximity, their distance, ringing like the run of steel, blood
singing, rejoicing - it was the warrior's wind, the wind of war, the wind
of ages - it was the wind of love, unbridled, passionate, pregnant and
life-giving - forever in chorus, forever in contest, forever in rapture.
 Nabiki Tendo smiled into the ever-changing passage of man's
history, smiled to the face of her one, true love - the only man to best
her in all the aspects of her being.
 "Kiss me."

 She breathed, "you're dead."

 "If you want to stop now, you just need to say so."
 She stopped in her tracks, a small difference really from the
snail's pace, and stood there, head bowed, as though waiting for a blade
to sever it from her body, waiting for the ultimate release.
 Her companion grew steadily angrier. "If you even begin to let up,
I will see to it that it is my face and my cane that you see last. Mark
my words, Shampoo."
 Shampoo stood her ground, taking a shoulder's breadth stance, fists
to sides, finally beginning to shake. But what of her aura? There
wasn't any. What could she have done, fought her mentor and sponsor in
what would be a fight to the death? Begged, pled, argued law and writ
with one who had been interpreter - indeed, creator, in parts - of the
written law?
 "On my sword, Elder, on my mother's soul," she recited from rote.
 Cologne nodded sagely. Shampoo's loyalty to the tribe was never in
doubt - it would be her loyalty to her oldest friend in question. Worse
yet, it would have to pit her love to the one man to best her in combat,
the one man who had stolen her heart without meaning to, against her love
to the man who had tried so many times, only to fail in each.
 They trod onward, a somber procession, to the appointed place.

 A bright yellow blur made good headway.

 Soun Tendo wanted to save the world.
 Actually, it was more of the world he knew, which composed mostly
of his house, his dojo and his children. But how could one be a hero
without starting from the local circles?
 So, like a good martial artist, a dutiful father, and a panicked
chicken, he scrambled up on the roof of the first floor, to clandestinely
peek upon the sleeping (he thought) son of his best friend Saotome,
before he would have to turn them away like a pox.
 Luckily, the window of the guestroom was open.
 Unluckily, the young Saotome was not, in fact, sleeping.
 "Oh my," Soun mouthed.
 Luckily, Akane was at hand.
 Unluckily, Akane was, in fact, in Ranma's hands.
 More of the reverse, really.
 Unluckily, Nodoka was right there.
 Unluckily, Ranma was male at the time.
 Unluckily, he had his back exposed toward her.
 "You're dead," she breathed, slowly getting up from her seat. She
took the first hostile step to him, shaky in its intent and -
 The wind changed direction.
 Soun...
 Huh?
 Soun... do you...
 K-K-Kimi... Kimi-chan? remember... love...?
 He turned, turned, saw nothing in the smallest amount of time -
then, he saw her lips move.
 Nodoka seemed to say, "it's time, my love..."
 No... But Soun knew, knew that the words of past written were, once
again, coming true...

 The famous mountain will erupt, and the ogre (sic)
 Will disappear apparent, but he will come again
 295 And a new heir will arise, from the Tendo line
 Born of the ogre's intervention - the eldest will
 Be youngest, and flaming women's heads will mark
 Those whose blood stems from heaven to heaven and.
 Marriage upon marriage broken, forgotten child
 300 Will find solace in truth, in name and in pride.

 ... as they did, foretelling even her death.
 "Is it... my turn?"
 She shook her head, slowly, deliberately, eyes still wide with
phantasmal awareness. She spoke with her eyes, brown to the edge of
fudge blackness, so much like Nodoka's eyes, in a voice much like
Nabiki's, "kiss me."
 He needed no more prodding.

 "Umm... excuse me? Might I trouble you for some tea?"
 Yuka turned, slightly bleary, to the priest. "I'm sorry, we don't
really live here."
 "Oh." The door slid to a close.

 Phooey! It isn't just paint!
 Oh, well, he sighed; the much-disputed Master of Anything-Goes
Martial Arts may have had very discerning fingers, but they, and he, knew
a good thing (or two equally, symmetrically superb things) when they felt
it up.
 Kodachi, the unwarranted object of discernment, was undergoing her
own epiphany, one which rushed headlong into a very solid wall of
willpower and self-preservation. The rising smirk of piqued lust was
stomped and smothered by disgusted fury, making for one of the queerest-
looking half-lopsided grins that even Kodachi had ever contorted using
her features. The dark spots covering her eyes did some sort of blending
with the red tinges at the tops of her cheeks, and her tongue stuck out
from an openly gaping mouth. What made it worse was that it changed
sides, then turned itself inside out, emotions pacing each other like
hungry predators around the landmark of her nose, forcing her to shake
her head and shoulders wildly, half in ecstasy, half in irritation.
 Her arms bent upward, spearing outward, as though looking for
pillars to shove, hoping to cause some architectural damage, mostly on
herself. Shakily, in sudden, jerky movements, the hands spasmed as they
touched wrinkled flesh all over the old lecher's forehead. "D-D-Duh-Doo-
DON'T!" She viciously pulled his head back - then unclenched her fist,
pushing his head right back into its favored position. "Do!"
 "Eh?" Happosai was not quite sure that he had, in fact, landed
back in the gymnast's cleavage - without him doing anything.
 The chemical warfare began.

 "Why would I do that?"
 She smiled - it wasn't a smile that boded argument, or victory
thereof. "Because you yourself are interested - curious, lustful,
attracted or merely gracious. Some part of you wants to feel my lips sit
upon yours, pressing the body of my warmth onto your sleeping form,
conquering your seat of power and spreading through your being, making
you helpless and embraced. You want to share yourself with someone else,
hold someone who will let you, rub against something soft that touches
back, be swallowed by the beckoning unknown. Who knows... you might want
to make me happy...?" A languid sigh filled her features and she leaned
ever closer. "You won't be disappointed."
 Her voice was hot, burning - he felt like buckling, leaning into
the tree, but something she was doing (pressing) to his chest was making
ovations with the hairs on his nape. "What makes you sure?"
 Nabiki slipped her left hand along the trees at the back of his
neck, making its trail to his skullcap. Each of her words were like warm
feathers in his ears: "because you didn't say no."
 With that, she planted her mouth onto his - a heartbeat later, her
right hand moved.

 "You're dead... you're dead... YOU'RE D-!"
 He forgot to breathe.

 Yuka opened the door to let some air in, then caught a glance of
Nabiki pushing someone to a tree with her face. Then she noticed that
this someone looked just like that gymnastics loony who was chasing after
Ranma.
 That loony was, she remembered, a girl. Kodachi...
 She slid the door closed just as Nabiki drew her hand from the
bush.

 "Miss Hinako!"
 A full hundred yards away, the English teacher/disciplinarian
stopped in her tracks. She turned, and squinted back. "Yes? Who is
it?"
 Out of the crowd milling about, held back by the arch of the
shopping center, Sayuri came into view. "Miss Hinako, are you on the way
to the Tendos?"
 Hinako eyed the student's outfit critically: it was a simple off-
white off-shoulder dress, with thin straps at her arms and a wispy black
belt, and a skirt that stopped right under her knees, capped by thick-
heeled shoes. She had her hair up and wore a thin layer of make-up. She
nodded appreciatively, walking over to her. "What's that, Miss Yamada?"
 She hefted the wrapped package in both hands. "Oh, this?"
 "What's in it? What's in it?" the teacher really wanted to know.
 She told her in about fifteen words or so.
 "Really?" Hinako hid her blush. Sayuri was surprised that she
hadn't gone on one of her "delinquent" rampages.
 They went on their way.

 *ring*
 *klik* "Hel-?"
 "'ey, 'suke! Did you get the invite from -?"
 "I'm sorry, but he's not in right now. This is Hiroshi, right?"
 "Mrs. M! Is he already gone to the wedding?"
 "Can't say, really, he left before the invite came. Say, Hiroshi -
?"
 "Thanks anyway, Mrs. M!" *klik*
 "- do you know someone named... drat." *klik*

 The gate opened. "Would you wait in the family room while I-?"
 She stopped in her tracks - only for a half-instant. In the other
half, she did an about face, pushed out the gate, saying, "but you
haven't seen the back yet, have you?", closing it behind her.

 There is a reason, Kasumi.

 "How DARE you!"
 As soon as she saw the ancient martial artist get punted into way
past the other endzone, she realized that the more familiar emotions were
much easier to use.
 She squared off the other girl with a feral snarl, hissed, made a
claw, scratching sounds, then sped off after Happosai.
 Tsubasa had no option but to follow - he just chose to run on just
two feet.

 Ironic, Mousse thought, that he would leave a place he did nothing
but clean sinks to find himself scrubbing away in someone else's kitchen.

 Mistakes have happened often in Soun's life. The only problem that
he has had is that he actually has a list of them - one someone else has
penned for him.
 He should have been happier - this was the last mistake, the last
written, known mistake logged and noted from Soun Tendo. He had read
through the rest of it - and he wanted no part of it.
 Unfortunately, there was this.
 "Mmmm..."
 "MMMMMMMMMPPPHH!"
 The magic was most definitely gone - whatever enchantment had been
woven by the moment, disguising his most dangerous guest (and with Ranma
and Genma and the trouble they brought, this was no small matter) into
his dear departed wife, was dispelled, brought about by the murderous
look in Nodoka's eyes.
 She, on the other hand, was mostly irritated by the mustache. Too
much input was coming in, but the mustache was the clearest irritating
element. Even the way that he had grabbed her, rolled with her, was not
as bad. The kiss wasn't - NO! She immediately reached for the blade on
her back to wave in a menacing manner - and got a pillow.
 She disengaged, yelled unintelligibly, surprising the other
kissers, then very, very quickly swiped at her host's head.
 Unfortunately, he heard *the knock* and was even quicker in
resolving that than in noticing the threat.
 The pillow flew.

 Rightly so, Shampoo and Cologne waited by the front gate, only
having to wait the standard two-two-nine seconds.