Chapter 6 A few nights later
"Ranma, Akane, time for dinner," Kasumi called upstairs. Everyone came running into the dining room to eat. Missing one of Kasumi's meals just wasn't something that anyone wanted to do.
Ranma spent the next several minutes fending off his father's attempts to steal his food and eat it. The dinner conversation was the same, talking about the activities of the day, mostly the same old things. Ranma getting attacked by Ryoga, Akane punching out Kuno, Gemna taunting Ranma about being slow, just the usual. Finally, everyone finished eating, Kasumi stood up and began to gather the dishes to take them back to the kitchen, when Akane spoke up "Kasumi, Nabiki, could you stay here. Ranma and I need to talk to everyone here."
"What's going on boy," Gemna growled.
"Shut up Pop and listen, and maybe you'll find out," Ranma responded. Akane threw a glass of water over Gemna, turning him back into a panda.
"What did you do that for?" Nabiki asked.
"I didn't want him to interrupt anymore," Akane said with a smile.
"Pop, Mr. Tendo, Akane and I have had several long conversations over the last few days and we have made a couple of decisions," Ranma began.
Mr. Tendo began crying, "I am so happy, the houses will finally be joined." The panda held up a sign Way to go boy, I knew you would do the right thing. When do you want to get married?.
Akane and Ranma looked at each other. Then Akane jumped up and said, "What on earth gave you the idea that I wanted to marry Ranma?"
"That's right, Pop. What we decided was that we needed to break our engagement. Neither one of us felt that we should get married because of some promise, probably made while you guys were off drinking, that you made prior to us being born. Akane wants to go to that college in America, and I need to stay with Mom for a while! We still are friends, though."
Boy, what about family honor? Gemna's sign read.
"What family honor? We talked to Mom about this, and she agreed that since she was the clan head, she was the judge of the family honor. She decided there was nothing honorable about any of the engagements. She told me the only honorable thing was to break all of the engagements. By the way, we also talked a lot about the training trip we went on, so she told me to tell you that she was still trying to decide if she wanted a husband, an ex-husband, or a panda-skin rug, so I wouldn't talk to her right now if I were you! Furthermore, she gave me this, named me clan head and told me to do the honorable thing," as he pulled the sheathed katana blade from behind him. The panda cringed and hid behind Soun.
Soun said "Well, if you don't want to marry Akane, what about my other daughters? We need to uphold our family honor and join the schools."
"Hey," Nabiki said, "Leave me out of this."
"She's right father! Leave me out too" said Kasumi.
"It's all right, Nabiki, Kasumi," said Ranma, "Mom talked to me about you two as well, and we don't believe that is a good solution either. Kasumi has already sacrificed too much of her life to this family and while I like her, I really think of her as a sister figure. Besides, she's already taken, if a certain someone ever gets up enough courage to ask her out." Kasumi blushed.
"And Nabiki just wouldn't do either, I'm afraid. She has a big chunk of her life planned out right now, and a husband just isn't in those plans," Akane chimed in.
"Akane's right, plus I don't love Nabiki, and she doesn't love me either. Though, she is kinda cute. Listen, all three of your daughters are wonderful people, pretty and all that, and any man would be lucky to be their husband, but I just don't want to marry anyone unless it's our choice. As clan head, I have renounced all engagements made in my name by the panda."
The Soun Tendo waterworks started again.
"Mom asked me to move back in with her for awhile, and I guess I will do that tomorrow. The only reason I hadn't before was so I could graduate from high school, and since that's over with there's no real reason for me to stay here and further burden you guys," Ranma said, "Now the panda probably ought to stay here out of Mom's way for awhile if that's ok with you."
Kasumi asked "What about Shampoo and Ukyo?"
"I've already talked to both of them and told them much the same. I ain't ready for any fiancées and I think I made that pretty clear. I did talk to Mom a bit about Ukyo, and she suggested that one way for us to redeem her honor was to adopt Ukyo. If Ukyo agrees, that would be one way to satisfy the promise Pop made. I asked Ukyo about it, and she is still trying to decide how she feels about that. Since I always thought of her as a sister, I hope she accepts. Anyway that's all we have to say about the subject. Do you need any help with the dishes, Kasumi?" in an obvious attempt to change the subject.
"That's kind of you to offer, but I can manage," she replied. Hearing that, Ranma got up.
"Wait for me," Akane said as the two of them ran off to the dojo.
Next morning, Ranma packed up all of his belongings. Once he finished he ran downstairs to get ready for breakfast.
The meal was mostly spent in silence, since no one was real happy about what was happening. Gemna for once kept quiet. Once everyone was finished eating, Ranma said "Mr. Tendo, I want to thank you for putting up with me these last two years, I know that things didn't go as well as we would have liked, but I want you to know how much it meant to me to be part of this family."
Mr. Tendo began crying. "Father, stop that," Nabiki said, "That was very nice of you to say, Ranma, what are your plans?"
"Well, once I get to Mom's, I need to sit down and work out a few things. I plan of fixing up a place to practice there. I'm not going to be too far away, though, so I still intend to be around here some too. Hopefully, though, once I move out, things will settle down here. Maybe it won't be quite so expensive to live here."
Nabiki said, "One can only hope. It certainly hasn't been dull around here. I was actually talking about your plans though."
"Well, if I can, I am going to one of the local colleges. After talking to Mom, I finally realize that I want to learn other things besides martial arts. And even if I do decide to be a Sensei, I need a college degree to do that. But if that doesn't work out immediately, then I'll probably just get to know Mom better. After that, I don't have a clue," he replied.
Ranma stood up, went over to Kasumi and hugged her, saying, "Thanks for everything, Kasumi. You are a wonderful person, and I liked having an older sister like you. I know I am going to really miss your kindness, oh, and your cooking too." Kasumi giggled.
"Oh my, Ranma, you are going to make me cry," Kasumi said with a sad smile, "Don't worry though, I plan on coming around there some, your Mom promised to show me some recipes." She kissed him, blushing as she did so.
He then went over to Nabiki and hugged her too. "Don't look so surprised, Biki-chan, You're special to me too. I just don't show it too well around you," he said.
"I'll miss you too, particularly at the photo shoots" she said. "Maybe you'll end up at my college if your scores are good enough," she smirked. Ranma leaned over and kissed her hard on the lips. Nabiki's eyes got real wide, and then she blushed, looking at him oddly. Akane glared at Ranma, he just winked at her. Akane turned to hide a smile from her sister.
"Gotcha, Nabiki," Ranma said with a smirk.
"Hey Akane, you ready to go over to Mom's? Remember she said she was going to help you with cooking," Ranma said.
"Sure, let's get your stuff and go," she replied. They ran upstairs and then came down carrying the luggage, and left.