Story Arc 3: "Growing Pains"
Part 1: Just can't win
By Luna12

Akane struggled to keep herself from bouncing around the dojo floor. She was ecstatic. Ranma was finally going to take her seriously! No more playing his annoying game of tag-the-speeding-fiancée. He had agreed to train her and, after their recent run-in with Kaimen the energy demon, Ranma was set on keeping his promise.

Akane watched her fiancée, eager to begin. She recalled the rush of speed and skill under her control when she wore the enchanted do-gi. If what that old monk said was true, she could be that good naturally if she trained hard enough. That knowledge gave her hope. She knew Ranma's life was an adventure, and a dangerous one at that. Trouble found him faster than Ryoga could get lost. It was this that became one of her main incentives to improve in the Art. Akane wanted to be there to watch his back and fight at his side, not stand on the sidelines as if wearing a "kidnap me" shirt to all of his opponents. More importantly, she refused to be a burden to him. All of his past comments that she got in his way when she tried to help stung more than any of his other insults combined. Unlike some of his other jeers, it was that one she couldn't outright dismiss.

Granted, she still managed to help him out in a bind. Besides the countless number of times she went out of her way to bring him hot water, and save him from his mother's insane intentions with a katana, she had risked her life multiple times just to come to his aid. She had dove into a giant Hiryuu Shouten Ha to retrieve the moxibustion map which held the key to returning Ranma to his original strength, entered Rink and Pink's poison garden to rescue Ranma, and while falling to the poison of a snake plant, had given the magic charm that would save her life to Ranma, so that he was saved instead.

Fresh in Akane's mind, however, were two most recent cases. In the battle against Saffron, she had turned off the phoenix water tap, successfully saving Ranma from being consumed, but in the process got herself deathly dehydrated. Even more recently was her battle with Kaimen. It was by a small margin and a stroke of luck she managed to defeat the demon, and she had come closer to death than she wanted to think about in Jusenkyo. How long would her luck hold? She refused to depend on something so fickle. She needed to rely on her own skills instead.

Akane remembered a time before Ranma company arrived in Nerima. Those were the days when she was undeniably the best fighter in town. She had competed and won martial arts tournaments throughout the Tokyo area. She easily faced off and defeated a horde of boys every morning. Now, she was a second-string amateur. Akane clenched her fists. She would change that.

Ranma watched his fiancée. He could feel Akane's barely contained excitement and sighed. This wasn't going to be easy. Although Akane had the strength and endurance to match most athletes, male or female, he felt terrified. What if he hurt her by mistake? Bruises and sore muscles from training he could accept, but what worried him was the possibility of using force beyond her limits, of causing undue pain or injury. Ranma forcibly pushed the thought out of his mind. He simply wasn't going to let that happen. Besides, there was a bigger issue to deal with: her temper. Akane was never one to take criticism well, least of all from him. If he was to help her, she needed to listen to him.

Ranma cleared his throat. "Lesson 1: Control." Akane nodded.

Ranma looked at the energetic girl and internally cringed at what he was about to do next. "Ya got the strength of a gorilla but you're just as clumsy and slow in defense." As expected, Akane's previous jubilant faced immediately turned to one of fury.

"RANMA!" she yelled, her fists balled and raised to strike.

Ranma simply waved his index finger in front of her face. "Whoa! There's your problem, see? You're useless if ya can't control your temper, Akane."

Akane reluctantly lowered her fist. She continued to glare at him, though.

"Your temper is your number one problem. Ya can't fight well if you're mad. It's how I beat Ryoga so easily."

Akane crossed her arms in front of her chest. "That doesn't mean you have to be rude."

"In the real world, opponents are gonna be rude. They get under your skin with words, they win half the battle."

Akane lowered her arms, the tension slowly releasing from her body. Ranma breathed a sigh of relief as he noted the fact. She was actually listening!

Ranma pulled a red marker out of his pocket. "Lesson 2: Speed. Your gorilla strength's nothin' if ya can't land a hit or block well."

Akane purposely ignored the gorilla comment and watched her sensei.

Ranma shifted the marker to his left hand and withdrew the cap. "I'm gonna come at ya, and ya better block."

Ranma smiled on one side of his mouth and struck like lightning. Akane's reflexes took over and blocked and deflected the oncoming marker. His attacks steadily increased in speed until he was performing the Kachu Tenshin Amaguriken attack. Akane had seen him do it a hundred times, but was never actually victim to it until now. She continued her efforts to block, but she was now deflecting a fraction of his attacks. Each touch, though, was feather light.

Finished, Ranma stood back. Akane was breathing heavily, but tried not to show how much effort the exercise took out of her. Ranma circled Akane, studying her carefully.

"Well, not as bad as I thought you'd be, tomboy, but we got a lot of work ahead of us."

Akane wanted to wipe the smirk off his face, but his reprimand on temper control kept her in check.

Ranma led Akane over to the dojo's mirror. Akane gasped at the sight. Her gi was covered in tiny red pinpricks of ink. Only a few gaps of white remained from where she successfully managed to block some of her most vital areas.

An unprecedented feeling of despair threatened to overwhelm her. Was she that poor at the Art? She looked down at herself, frustrated and depressed. It was a bitter medicine to swallow.

Ranma read the expression on her face clearly and felt bad for her. "Oi, don't look so gloomy! I told ya that I'd train you, didn't I?"

Akane nodded, forcing her attention away from the massive amount of red on her gi. Akane's back immediately straightened into her characteristic never-give-up, die-hard attitude. She met his blue-grey eyes with a sparkling, brown determination that shown from her own.

"I'm ready when you are," she replied.

Ranma smiled. This was the Akane he loved.

-

At school, Ukyo watched the interactions between Ranma and Akane with worry. She didn't need the rumor mill to tell her that something was up between the two of them. It was obvious. After Shampoo's sudden departure, Ukyo was thrilled. With that Amazon hussy out of the way, surely Ranma would be hers. Yet, by the look of things…

Ukyo shook her head hard. Ranma choose Akane? She ruled that thought out as impossible. Just because Ranma was suddenly spending all his time training Akane, and they weren't yelling at each as much, didn't mean anything - right? Still, she knew she needed to stake her claim as the proper fiancée before it was too late.

Just being the "good ol' pal" wasn't enough. She would have to be more forward. Poor Ranchan was probably confused, thinking of her mainly as a friend and not as a potential wife. She would fix that.

The bell rang.

It was now or never. Ukyo took a deep breath and approached Ranma. With a tap on the shoulder Ranma turned around. Suddenly, Ukyo threw her arms around his neck and forcibly brought her lips to meet his. Ranma was too stunned to react. He was actually kissing Ukyo!

Akane's battle aura glowed a bright red as she physically pushed the two apart. "What do you think you're doing!" she yelled, jutting her face straight into Ukyo's.

Ukyo smiled, her face still flushed from her imposed kiss. She turned her back to Akane, purposely ignoring the enraged girl. She looked at Ranma, whose entire body was rigid in shock.

Akane turned towards Ranma, who stood openmouthed like a stunned fish.

"RANMA!" she growled. Akane's yell brought him back to reality.

"Huh? Yeah, what?" Akane felt her barely contained self-control slip. "YOU—YOU—BAKA!" she screamed, swinging her book bag at him.

The first swing hit its target perfectly. Ranma ducked and dodged, clutching his throbbing head. "I didn't do nothin'! She just – just kissed me!"

"And you don't see anything wrong with that!" she yelled. Akane stopped swinging her bag at him. Her fists remained at her side, clenched and twitching. She tried as hard as she could to remember her training on temper control. 'But so help me,' she thought, 'if he says anything stupid I'll make him wish he'd never been born!'

Ranma knew he was on treacherous ground. One false step and he'd be airborne.

Ukyo smirked at the scene before her. After Akane's brutal treatment and a few more displays of affection on her part, Ranchan would - without a doubt - come to love her.

"And you!" Akane focused her energy away from Ranma to face her romantic rival. "What were you doing kissing my fiancé?"

"He's not just yours, honey. Ranchan's also my fiancé, remember?"

Akane boiled. It was bad enough when Shampoo would glomp and grope Ranma in front of her, but she had always assumed Ukyo was above all that. She rather liked the Okonomiyaki chef. There were times when they had walked and talked peacefully together, and Akane had gladly rescued her from Konatsu's stepsisters' trap in the woods. (A/N: see vol . 35)

Ukyo watched with a smile as Akane flushed with anger. "You're the one who always said you didn't want to be engaged to Ranma," she pointed out.

Akane felt at a loss of words to say. She had never admitted to anyone openly that she, in fact, welcomed the engagement - and had for some time. "I-I, well, that was then!"

"Sure…" Ukyo replied, her voice dripping with sarcasm. "And that's why you continue to hit him like a personal punching back, ne?"

Ranma felt the tension rise to a stifling level. "Uh, girls…"

Akane gave him a glare that made him flinch. It was a look that clearly told him to shut up and stay out, or else.

Ukyo noticed his reaction and felt pleased, but there was little more she could do now in front of Akane. She had already succeeded in more ways than she expected this afternoon. Ukyo stroked Ranma's arm.

"I'll see you later, sugar," she called out with a cute wave goodbye as she scampered out of the building.

Ranma felt Akane's aura burn and sizzle with a jealous rage. 'Uh oh', he thought.

Akane closed her eyes, counting silently in a desperate attempt to control her temper. As outraged as she was at the girl, Ukyo's words struck too close to home for her own comfort. 'I only hit Ranma when he deserves it… right?' She asked herself. Ukyo's words made her doubt herself. 'Am I really unjustlyviolent towards him?'

Ranma closed his eyes, expecting Akane to send him flying through a brick wall, or smash his head with some painful object. Finding himself unharmed, he opened them. Akane was gone.

-

Tentatively, Ranma opened the dojo sliding doors. The whole house could hear Akane's demolishing efforts.

"Akane?"

! CRACK ! She ignored him.

"Would ya please listen to me?"

! SMASH !

"Why should I?" she asked.

Her voice was a mixture of hurt pride and bruised heart. Even though their feelings were (finally) known to themselves and each other, neither of them had directly told the other person those "three little words". She had assumed that now, at last, Ranma would stop the other girls from chasing him. The image of Ranma kissing Ukyo and letting her stroke his arm filled her mind. At least when Shampoo made her advances, he would eventually try to get of them. With Ukyo, he just stood there and took it. She didn't just feel angry; she felt betrayed. Akane tried to force the tears back, but despite her best efforts a single drop escaped to trail down her face.

! CRACK ! Another cement block bit the dust.

Ranma felt exasperated. "This ain't gonna work if ya don't trust me!"

Akane turned to face him. "I trust you with my life, Ranma, and I've always trusted you to do the right thing. But when have you ever shown that you're trustworthy with women?"

Ranma groaned in frustration. He refused to admit she had him there. "I didn't ask for those girls to hang all over me, you know! It just… happens."

"It happens because you let it happen! Do you know how many guys tried to pull stunts like that with me before you arrived?"

It was a rhetorical question, but Ranma remembered the hordes of high school boys that would contest for a chance to win Akane on the school grounds.

"Look, I'm sorry, okay? But I can't just hit girls to make them go away."

Akane stopped her destructive act to look him straight in the eye. "Are you in love with Ukyo?"

"I do love her," he answered on automatic. Akane's eyes grew wide and Ranma continued speaking as quickly as he could, "But as a brother! Well, sister I guess. Just 'cause I can turn into a girl doesn't mean I'm so mixed up as to fall for my old best friend, who I still think of as a guy!"

Akane's expression softened, but she still didn't look entirely convinced. "Then why did you call her cute?"

"Well, I'm not blind either."

! SMACK !

Akane stormed off, slamming the dojo door behind her. It broke and splintered upon impact.

Ranma rubbed his red-marked face, realizing all too late that his foot-in-the-mouth disease was having a major relapse today.

Ranma sighed. There was no use talking to her now until she cooled off for a bit.

The martial artist was used to his life being complicated, but sometimes he wished it would settle down and stay down. The Furinkan students weren't the only ones to notice a change in Ranma and Akane. Soun and Genma were bringing up marriage plans again, now that their children were getting along better. It was becoming more and more difficult to convince them to back off. Ranma's usual tirade of "That sexless, uncute tomboy!" when matrimony was brought up failed to come out of his mouth. Akane' usual "That pervert!" also went unheard.

Ranma heard the undamaged, outside door to the dojo slide open. He turned around, hoping it was Akane coming back to hear him out.

The person he saw made Ranma's face fall.

"Ranchan!" Ukyo called out, her miniature travel grill and cooking supply bag was clutched in her hand.

Ranma could not believe his bad luck. Was he the gods' idea of some cosmic joke? If so, it was getting really old.

"Ucchan, now isn't exactly a good time."

Ukyo opened the bag. The scent of past mouth-watering Okonomiyaki assailed his senses. "Oh come now, Ranchan. I came all the way over so you could taste-test a new recipe. You won't let it go to waste, will you?"

Ranma's common sense told him to send her away. If Akane caught him, he was a dead man. Ranma's stomach, however, had other plans.

"I guess..." he consented.

Ukyo beamed and began to set up her grill and cook, babbling away about her latest recipe and how she knew he would love it. It was finished in no time and she placed it before him expectantly.

Once in front of him, Ranma wolfed it down as usual, but the anxiety in his gut took away half the taste.

"Uh, thanks Ucchan. It tasted great." The words were typical, but the tone sounded mechanic.

"What's wrong, honey?" She reached out and touched his hand. As casually as possible, he pulled it away.

Ranma took a deep breath. He knew he needed to settle things with Ukyo. He had put it off for far too long. He owed it to Akane.

Ranma looked Ukyo directly in the eye, not knowing how to begin. Something in his eyes, in his very posture, caused her flesh to goose bump and a lump to grow in her throat.

"Ucchan, you're my best friend, right?"

Ukyo nodded, suddenly terrified at what he might say next.

Ranma continued. "You know I care about ya a lot, right?"

They were words Ukyo had been dying to hear for over a year, but she knew they didn't mean what she wanted them to mean. She gave a small nod.

Ranma swallowed hard. "What I'm trying to say is, well, shouldn't you find some other guy to make Okonomiyaki for? You're a cute girl, you're a great cook, you could have any other guy ya want."

Ukyou found her voice. "Ranchan, don't you understand? I don't want just any guy. I want you!"

Ranma shook his head. This wasn't going well at all. He remembered Akane's hurt face, and it gave him the courage to continue. "You can't have me, Ucchan." The next three words were spoken softly, but with a firmness that carried them across the dojo. "I—I love Akane."

Ukyo's world shattered into a thousand pieces. She sat there, her face as white as a sheet. How could he love her? Akane, the violent, uncute, tomboy? Akane, the clumsy, cooking disaster? Akane, who always bailed him out of trouble. Akane, who never beat him up when he was down. She felt herself shake all over. This couldn't be happening. Akane, who had screamed and wailed about her arranged engagement, who never forced her affections on him, was the one to capture his heart?

Before Ukyo could pull herself together, the remnants of the dojo door burst open. Soun and Genma came dancing in the room, patting Ranma firmly on the back.

"That's my boy!" shouted Genma, glowing. "We heard everything, didn't we Tendo-kun?"

"We'll have the wedding at once, Saotome-kun!" cried Soun, tears of joy pouring down his face.

Ukyo couldn't stand it any longer. Her giant fighting spatula was in her hand and she shook with a scarcely controlled rage.

"You really are a BAKA!" she screamed and slammed the spatula on Ranma's head.

Ranma lay on the dojo floor, his head spinning. 'If it isn't a mallet it's a spatula.' He thought. 'I just can't win.'

-

A/N: Please REVIEW. I need ideas for how Ranma will continue to train Akane. I'm trying to be original, but it's so hard after reading so much fanfic! I keep worrying that I'll use someone else's published idea without realizing it. Especially in the areas of balance and ki.

Oh, and even though I'm a Ranma Akane fan, I really admire Ukyo's character. Stay tuned: Ukyo won't give up on her Ranchan without a fight!