Chapter 5 – Tea House Mambo

Landing in Shanghai Airport was highly welcomed by two passengers of the JAL flight 8712. One Ranma Saotome, was feeling extremely relieved from having some real ground under his feet. Some would find it surprising, as being the heir of the Saotome School of Indiscriminate Grappling, his fighting prowess focused on air-born exchanges – in short, flashy jumps of extraordinary hang-time.

One may think that simply flying without seeing the ground, or not under his own power, was terrifying for one so attuned to the elements as Ranma is. That one would forget that, being acquainted with Akane Tendo, Ranma has spent a lot of time in Low Earth Orbit, courtesy of Mallet-sama (ergo, NOT under his own power) and seeing stars from the initial blow (which makes it hard to see the ground).

So Ranma Saotome, whose only fear known to date had been induced by a strong childhood traumatic event, was just plain uneasy when flying in a plane.

Which leads us to the other person feeling relieved by the landing, that person being Akane Saotome, formerly known as Akane Tendo, heir to the Tendo School of Indiscriminate Grappling (and a bunch of other titles liberally delivered by either Tatewaki Kuno or Ranma Saotome). While not frightened by the flight herself, Akane had been forced to use her travel mallet quite often on the cranium of her beloved but baka husband to keep him calm, or at the very least, silent. Some would say it was brutal and selfish of her not to try and reassure her husband that everything was going to be all right, that the plane wasn't going to crash, or whatever endearment that should have proven successful...

As a matter of facts, she knew that Ranma reacted to such behaviour with extreme scepticism and even a bit of fright, which would have compounded with his present concern and might have triggered his cat persona, which in turn could have proven hazardous seeing as he was able to slice about anything in that state, and she really didn't want to experience cabin depressuring while flying over the Sea of Japan.

So she had to resort to external means of calming him down, and since chemicals had almost no effects on him now, that left only the application of carefully calculated blunt force.

Or, to be truthful, to let free the mallet-happy reflex.

--

The trip to the hotel wasn't too difficult; what was quite intriguing was the sheer amount of policemen standing at ready in the street. Ranma, who spoke a little Cantonese, asked the hotel receptionist what the hell was that about.

"Oh, it's just that since the People Party decided to start turning the country towards commercial interests instead of pure communism, they didn't know what to do with the army – so they use them for everything, and those that misbehave are assigned to a hundred metres of street length and are not to move from it. That's one way to maintain discipline and reassure the tourists that they are well protected."

"Geez, and other than keeping poodles from peeing on their pants, what do they do?"

"Some were assigned to being museum guardians, some to gardening in parks, some play security at the entrance of some buildings... Who knows? Some may even be actually undergoing manoeuvre exercises!"

"..."

"Here you go Sir and Madam, have a nice honeymoon!"

Ranma took the offered key, and led Akane towards the lift. Once in their room, Ranma took the nondescript piece of paper and started rubbing it against a switched on lightbulb.

"What are you doing Ranma?"

"Nabiki used the oldest trick in the book to conceal a message: lemon juice. If you dip a quill - an old fashioned, clean one - in it and write as if it were ink, it can't be seen; you usually use it to conceal a few lines of text in an otherwise harmless document. The only problem with it is that it leaves a slight lemon scent behind, but it is otherwise very efficient."

"Oh? So how do you reveal what has been written?"

At the exact time Akane finished her sentence, the bulb finally got hot enough to reveal the writing.

"The burning point for lemon juice is a bit lower than that of a piece of paper; as such, applying the paper on the bulb burns the juice, but not the paper, thus leaving behind burnt traces – that can be read," Ranma explained while carefully applying different areas of the paper to the bulb, taking great care not to burn the paper itself.

"Wow."

"I hear that this technique was initially used with candles; at the time paper was thicker or made using very fine leather or fabric, and didn't burn as easily. It was much trickier, of course, but it really is the oldest trick I know of – apart from concealing the message under someone's hair."

Akane did a double take.

"What?"

"Some stuff in Egypt during the Antiquity I think, a guy shaved the head of one of his servants, wrote his message, waited until the hair grew back, and then sent his servant to bring the message; the guy who got the message merely had to re-shave the head of the servant. Very efficient, but a bit long in implementation for my taste."

"Except if you undo your hair, Ranma."

"Oh, ha ha. The dragon's whisker doesn't work any more, anyway."

"I know, I was just yanking your chain dear. So what does this message say?"

Ranma read the now visible script out loud, eyes following the neat, impersonal words characterizing Nabiki's writing. After a few seconds of pondering, Ranma spoke. "Basically, it boils down to wait for a couple of impersonators, trade clothes and get lost. The rest if up to us."

At that exact moment, a knock was heard at the door. The two persons who entered, one young man and a woman, were actually so much alike Ranma and Akane that they wondered if they weren't just looking in a mirror. And when they talked, they had the strange feeling of hearing each other's voice. Even the speech patterns were identical.

"Geez, when Nabiki looks for look-alikes, she doesn't do things by half..."

"Actually", the fake Ranma said, "we were at first supposed to model in your place in promotional events where calendars, magazines and stuff with your photos in prominent position would be sold. We're trained to look like you, and the Boss pays well."

At once reminded of what Nabiki usually did to them, they didn't know if they should congratulate her or throttle her when this rescue mission was done with.

The two martial artists on a rescue mission exchanged a look.

"Both", they thought at the same time.

--

After a fast exchange of clothing and some re-packing, Ranma and Akane left the hotel; Ranma led the way, until they reached a nondescript little shop. Akane recognized some of the kanji, and looked incredulously at Ranma.

"A tea house? Is that your first, superb training place?"

"Well, it doesn't look like much, and considering what you saw during this tea-fu parody I don't blame you for not trusting what they could teach here, but just remember that I learnt Kashu Tenshin Amaguriken between working in a noodle joint and a funfair. And they don't teach you how to fight here; they teach you how to relax."

"And that would help us fighting better?" Akane was scorchingly sarcastic.

"Me, not much; I'm already pretty relaxed and I didn't have to learn the basics here, I got started on the more advanced techniques. You, on the other hand, would finally learn how not to telegraph your moves, how not to put so much strength into them and how to save your energy."

Not convinced, Akane followed Ranma as he entered the shop.

A small little lady greeted them in Japanese.

"Welcome back, Wild Horse. I get it that this pretty lady here is your wife?"

"Thank you Mrs. Chi-li. I present you my wife, Akane. She needs to learn the basics, and let me warn you not only is she head-strong"-

"Hey!"

"-she's also plain strong. You will have to teach her how to relax a bit forcibly I'm afraid."

"Very well. I will see to her personally. Meanwhile I imagine you want to work some more on what your father interrupted last time? I think my daughter Lin just freed her schedule for the coming week just for you. Or so I heard."

By now Akane was wondering if she hadn't just agreed to follow Ranma in a brothel, and she dreaded what kind of 'training' her perverted husband had planned for her. The last thought got her pissed-off aura started, but the little lady just poked her in the plexus, and Akane deflated like a punctured tire, much to her amazement.

"Don't worry so much dear, you'll mar your beautiful skin with wrinkles before your age otherwise. I don't think you'll disapprove of the training one we're finished."

"What! You mean you're going to brain-wash me too!" Akane's aura sprang back to life at that point.

"Impressive. I think the advanced techniques will be even more useful on her than they were on you, Ranma." Saying so, she drew a few signs in the hair at the edge of Akane's aura, and in a short, extremely violent push of her palms that had the building groaning from the strain to contain the shift in energies, she redirected all the energy inside Akane's body.

Who was left wondering at how powerful yet crappy she felt.

"When you're better trained dearie, you'll be able to use your own energy as something else than an impressive yet ineffective leakage. Focus! Girl, that's the secret."

Akane blinked in astonishment.

"How – How can you learn this kind of technique in a tea house?"

"Well, that's what the training is about. Oh, and another thing." The middle-aged woman bended forward to whisper a few words to Akane. "The kind of training you were thinking about at first is also provided here, however I think you're already more advanced here than your husband."

"Huh?"

Chi-Li looked at Akane in the eye. "None of my girls were able to land the Wild Horse. Either he's a wonder of chivalry, or he's as innocent as a newborn."

"Humm... Well, actually he's both."

"And does he live up to his name?"

Akane blushed (or blushed even more, as she was already pretty red from all that happened before).

"Just checking." Chi-Li turned and started to exit the room, but then turned back to Akane. "Oh, and I'll take that as a yes. You lucky girl you. The same, my daughter is happily married and isn't interested in the Wild horse as someone other than a very exciting student to teach to. So you can send the green-eyed monster packing."

Ranma looked quizzically. "Huh, what wuz that about?"

Akane hadn't stopped blushing. "I'll tell you when you're older, Ranma."

"Oh. All right." Then he did a double-take, "HEY!"

Akane followed Chi-li, still blushing but stifling a giggle.