Well I'm back again you know the drill blah blah blah I don't own any of the characters, OOC'nes and Yaoi (if you want). Also just in case you didn't read it before all the characters are around 18 years old and have just finished school.

Yes, most of the chapters will be only about 3-7 pages long, this is because I can't keep on track for very long and I have to write little bits at a time. However, just because they are short doesn't mean that I will be updating a lot. My updates depend on my mood, my timetable and wether I can get onto the internet or not from school, seeing as how they have blocked the main page of " Speaking

' ' thoughts

flashbacks (they'll come in later)

Ranma-Chan ran as fast as her legs would carry her. She had always promised herself that she would never cry about anything, but as she ran her vision started blur and go out of focus. She got about 2ft away from a tree before she even saw it. She suddenly had to serve to her right, running right into Kuno.

"Oh what foul fiend is this that has knocked over the great Tatewaki Kuno I shall smit thee. Oh but it is my pigtailed goddess who is crying. Oh why do you cry my love? Is that evil Ranma Saotome chasing you?" Kuno said as he grabbed Ranma-Chan and wrapped his arms around her.

"let… me go…Kuno…I'm not… in the mood… for this…" Ranma-Chan said through her sobs.

"Ranma, Ranma where the hell did you go?" Ryoga screamed loudly as he ran down one of the back streets. Soon he found himself back on the main road.

"Ranma, where are you Ranma? How the hell can I find you when I can't even find my way out of a one way tunnel?" Ryoga sighed, defeated.

"Ryoga, is that you?" Akane's voice came from down the street on his left.

"I thought I heard your voice." Akane ran up to Ryoga and guided him to the local park. (The same one Ranma was in.) She sat him down on a bench and went through her bag to find him something to eat. After a little while she pulled out one of her trials for the cooking contest. She handed it to Ryoga.

"Here I know it's not very good, it's only a trial, but you're the only one I know who will willing eat my cooking." Akane said as Ryoga looked at the container that seemed to have the contents of it growing and breeding by the minute.

"Thank you Akane, this looks like a very nice…"

"Beef salad Ryoga, it's a beef salad." Akane said looking a little displeased that he couldn't tell just from looking at it.

'Well that explains the mouldy looking stuff and those bits of brown that I didn't even want to think about where they had come from.' Ryoga thought as he took his fist mouth full. It was horrible, not even starving ally cats would eat the junk Ryoga had put in his mouth. He almost gagged when he first began to feel it work its way down his throat. But thought better of it when he saw Akane looking at him with those eyes waiting for him to saying thing good about it.

"It's delicious Akane, you've really out done your self this time."

'Yeah at making this the worst tasting food I have ever tried and I have tried a lot of disgusting things in my life.' Ryoga thought as he said the words that he knew Akane looked to him for.

"Really Akane, I think your getting better at this. Keep it up soon you'll be able to enter the contest." Ryoga was lying through his teeth, which he knew was wrong, but worst of all he was lying to Akane, the so called love of his life. The one thing he lived for. But as his mind came to from the attack on his tastebuds by the so called 'Beef Salad', he realised that he didn't feel that way about her anymore, and that he had more important things to do, like finding Ranma, then to be chit-chatting with Akane. Ryoga got up quickly bowed, said good bye and ran as fast as he could so he's mind would get off Akane and back onto Ranma.

Akane watched as Ryoga quickly said his good bye and bolted out to the middle of the park.

"Ryoga, Ryoga wait, wait for me Ryoga." Akane yelled as she chased Ryoga through the park right past Ranma and Kuno.

Ryoga stopped as he saw a flash of red go past his line of vision. He quickly turned around and ran past Akane back to where Kuno looked like he was trying to strangle Ranma-Chan to death.

"Let me go Kuno. Why can't you get it through your head that I don't like you I will never like you 'cause I like someone else." Ranma-Chan said as her face started to turn blue. Kuno slightly loosened his grip from Ranma and stared down at her.

"Who is this new rival that must be slain at my hands. He shall be killed like the mad dog that he is." Kuno had started to babble again and his grip tightened on Ranma-Chan's belly almost crushing her.

"Put her down Kendo Boy or you'll kill her and the…" Ryoga had almost said the word. Kuno looked over Ranma-Chan's head to see Ryoga in a fighting stance ready to fight if Kuno didn't do as he said.

"Is this the mad dog that a stolen your heart my pigtail goddess? For you I will steal it back from his grasp and then you can freely give your heart to me." Kuno said has he put Ranma-Chan down and took up his own fighting stance.

"Ryoga don't do it, lets just get out of here I want to talk to you, come on." Ranma-Chan said as she ran up to him and pulled at the right sleeve of his jumper. Ryoga looked into Ranma-Chan's eyes and saw the same look that Akane had given him earlier today. He caved in.

"Alright Ranma but just let me sort this out first, I'll only be a sec." Ryoga pried Ranma-Chan's hands from around his right arm. Ryoga walked up to Kuno and, with an air around him, challenged Kuno to a fight in a 2 months time (so he would be able to get lost and get back again) right where they were standing and on that very day and time. Kuno agreed and they parted. Ranma-Chan was too far away to hear so she asked Ryoga what they had said.

"I've challenged him to a fight in 2 months." Ryoga said as they walked along.

Ranma-Chan and Ryoga walked for about half and hour not saying anything to each other. Once Ranma-Chan had found a good spot to talk, she sat down and Ryoga sat opposite her.

"So Ranma, what did you want to talk about?" Ryoga said looking at her.

"Do you know what happened that night that we were at that bar? Cause I sure as hell don't." Ranma-Chan said looking out towards the children playing in the park. Ryoga watched as her eyes glazed over as she stood up and walked over towards a little kid that had fallen off the see-saw.

"There, there little one, don't cry. Here we'll wash that blood off and put a band-aid on it, and it will feel a whole lot better." Ranma-Chan said as she bent down to look at the little girl's knee.

"Ryoga, can I have one of those band-aids from your bag and some water?" Ranma-Chan called out across the park.

"Uh?...yeah sure Ranma, whatever." Ryoga was stunned, he had never seen Ranma like this before.

'It must be those motherly instincts coming out in him.' Ryoga thought as he walked over to where the little girl was sitting on Ranma-Chan's lap and crying on her shoulder.

"Shh, now here let's have a better look at that knee. Oh thanks Ryoga. Here now doesn't that feel better?" Ranma-Chan said once she had cleaned up the girls knee and kissed it better.

"Thank you very much nee-san1. It does feel better. Bye bye." The little girl said. She then got up and ran to play chasey with the rest of the children.

"Oh look at them Ryoga don't they just look so cute? I would just love to take them all home with me. And wasn't that little girl so sweet and she had manners too, now that's rare these days." Ranma-Chan exclaimed grabbing hold of Ryoga's left arm and snuggling into it.

"Hey Ranma, don't get too comfortable there. I have an idea. Let's go and see if cologne has some sort of spell that will help us remember what happened that night. Come on, let go, I said let… go." Ryoga said trying in vein to dislodge Ranma-Chan from his arm. So he just walked along with her attached to him her eyes still glazed over.

Shampoo was taking out the rubbish when she saw Ryoga walking down the street with Ranma-Chan hanging off his arm telling him where to go.

"Aiyah what they doing?" she said to out loud to no one. She watched as Ryoga tried to move off to the right and Ranma-Chan lead him to the left.

"Don't go that way Ryo-kun. The restaurant is this way. It's left, not right silly." Ranma-Chan said giggling at the end, from her use of Ryoga's new nickname.

"Will you please stop calling me that Ranma. It's embarrassing having you hanging of my arm, let alone you calling me Ryo-kun." Ryoga looked ready to kill at that point but tried to control his anger because of the most resent circumstances.

"Look, here we are Ranma now you can let go of me I won't get lost now." Ryoga sighed in relief as they walked up to Shampoo, who had a very dazed look on her face.

"You never know 'RYO-KUN'. You might get lost before we even get through the door." Ranma poked playfully and emphasized the nickname because she knew that it would annoy him.

"Looks like Ranma's finally coming back to us. Now get off." Ryoga was losing what ever cool had had managed to hold on to for so long. If Ranma didn't let go of him soon something bad would happen. Ranma wasn't stupid, despite popular belief and knew what would happen if he provoked Ryoga anymore.

Ranma-Chan sulkily untangled her arm from Ryoga. Immediately she regretted it, her arm was now cold because of the lost body warmth, Ryoga didn't get off scout free either his entire right side was now cold, because Ranma had had her body pressed so close to his that if she wanted to get any closer she would have to go through him.

"What you two doing?" shampoo asked breaking from her daze. She hadn't liked the scene that had just played out in front of her.

"Did pig-boy get hold of rod again?" This was the only thing that her mind could think of that would have caused the two in front of her to be so close like they were.

Normally Ryoga would have pummelled Ranma into the ground, or tried to, for what the red head had just said. But something was different. There was no talking about revenge or such, and they seemed to be getting along quite well. This was new to Shampoo; she had always thought that they would never get along. While her brain was ticking, trying to figure the cause of the most recent turn of events, the boy and girl had started to go inside.

"Wait, wait why you two friendly now?" Shampoo managed to say to their backs as they went inside. They either didn't hear her or choose to ignore her. It was at that moment, that Mu-mu the duck decided to fly into shampoo's arms, well at least it tried. All he managed to do was fly into a pole that was 3 metres away from his intended target. Shampoo walked over to the concussed duck and picked it up.

"Silly Moose" she said and walked back into the shop.

She always did have a soft spot for the bird and its human counter-part but she would never tell him that unless he beat Ranma in battle. She might not have had feelings for him when they were younger, but she knew that it all started to change when he first showed up in Nerima to win her heart by beating Ranma and taking her back to china so that they could marry.

She liked living in Japan now and she had decided that she would raise her family here. She was even thinking about getting a permanent visa but she wasn't quite sure how she would go about that yet.

Coming out of her little dream world she quickly walked inside the shop and put the closed sign up. She knew that this would be big news and they didn't need any distractions right now.

When she walked in Cologne, Ranma and Ryoga were all sitting around a table drinking tea.

"So, you telling me that you need something to make you be able to remember a night that both of you can't remember. Right? And what will I get out of it?" Cologne said resting on her stick.

"We'll do whatever you want. But I won't marry shampoo." Ranma said looking into the short woman's face. Cologne pondered for a little while thinking what she could get out of Ranma.

"I want you to work to pay off how much it costs." Cologne said grinning at the other two at the table.

"And how much is that?" Ryoga asked saying something for the first time since they were there.

"About a weeks' work full time. For each person. Two weeks for part time." Cologne said looking at Ryoga and then frowning.

"For you Ryoga I'll make an exception, one day of full time work without you getting lost or breaking anything." Cologne said suddenly remembering the boy's strength and well-known ability to get lost in a one-door room.

"That's not fair old ghoul, Ryoga only gets one day and I have to work a week." Ranma said standing up quickly only to sit back down just as fast putting her hands on her head as she sat.

"Aw, I shouldn't have done that. Now I gotta headache. Alright give us the stuff now and we'll start work tomorrow. Come on Ryoga lets go." Ranma said standing up once again, only slower this time and unknowingly reached across the table for Ryoga's hand. Cologne quickly hopped to the back of the shop and just as quickly hopped back with two pouches in hand.

"Instructions are in the bags. I trust both of you can read. I hope they help and I'll see you two tomorrow at 7am sharp. Now go." Cologne said opening the door for the two as they walked hand in hand out the door. Well, actually Ranma was pulling Ryoga along beside her to make sure he didn't get lost. Cologne, Shampoo (who hadn't said anything through out the whole time the two were there) and mu-mu watched out the window as the two got further from view.

"Something is happening with those two. But I just can't put my finger on it." Cologne thought out loud more to her self then to shampoo.

TBC

Nee-san in Japan it is quite normal to address someone as aunt or big sister or grandpa etc, even though they are not relatives or even people you know.

I'm starting to get back into the swing of this story, so I hope it will be good. I want to thank K.M, for helping me. After an extensive brainstorming through emails, she helped me come up with the idea of going to Cologne's for some herbs. So I must give thanks where it is due.

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