Though he'd searched the rest of the afternoon and into the evening, Ranma never managed to find Ryoga. He thought he did multiple times — a black pig, a woman with short black hair, a bird, a dog that he was pretty sure belonged to a neighbor... But a quick splash of warm water — in a kettle he'd grabbed from Dr. Tofu's — had quickly proved him wrong every time. It had also gained him a few new enemies, but he wasn't too concerned about any of them being a real threat.
And then he'd gone home, where he discovered that Akane coincidentally had a brand-new little black dog. He immediately tried to splash it with hot water, a plot that Akane not only foiled but was suspiciously upset about.
"What the hell, Ranma!?" she screamed, most of her front newly soaked and the squirming puppy held out to the side with both of her hands.
"I'm just tryin' ta prove that puppy ain't Ryoga! Lemme just-" Trying to throw more water out of the kettle, he realized with irritation that it was empty. Dammit, he hadn't even transformed back to his regular self yet.
Kicking the kettle out of Ranma's hands and into the wall, Akane said, "Why would you think P-chan is Ryoga!? He's just a cute little puppy!"
"Well Ryoga ran out on the fight, right after I knocked his umbrella an' he got soaked. Sounds pretty dang suspicious, right? So I've been trying ta-"
Jabbing a finger into Ranma's buxom chest, Akane said, "You can't just go throwing hot water around! Now I'm soaking wet again!" Despite what she'd just said, she squeezed P-chan to her chest, which only seemed to make the pup squirm more. "You could've burned him!"
"Oh, c'mon, it wasn't even that hot anymore!" Ranma said, rolling his eyes and pushing Akane's finger away. "I just know he's gotta curse, an'-"
Turning on her heel, Akane marched away. "Not interested! Just keep me and my new dog out of it!"
He didn't, though. Twice more that evening he tried to splash "P-chan", and both times Akane prevented him from doing so. The second time she slapped him so hard that he still felt it that evening, as he lay in bed, trying unsuccessfully to go to sleep.
Stupid 'Kane. Why wouldn't she let him splash the dumb dog? If it was just a dog, it probably wouldn't even care much. But if it was Ryoga, then Ranma could force him to talk! Ranma could make him explain what the big idea was, getting all upset about Ranma's curse when he had one too. ...Though hopefully that conversation could avoid circling back to the whole 'Ranma lying about the curse' thing, and the reasons behind that.
...Why had Ranma lied about it, anyway? Why did he care whether or not Ryoga knew? And more than that… why was he still keeping up a separate identity at school, anyway? The truth was going to come out at some point, he was sure of it. It had every time he'd tried to pull similar schemes before, both before and after the curse. So why was he postponing the inevitable?
The answer came to him quickly. It was simply easier to be Ranko at school. The other students were nicer to Ranko than they were to Ranma, which made the whole school experience, which was usually frustrating and boring in equal measure, much more… pleasant. If there was a way to be Ranma and still have that, then of course he'd ditch Ranko in a heartbeat!
...Ranko wasn't a great name, was it? Admittedly, it had been rather spur-of-the-moment, at least when he initially thought it up. On the road in China, not long after getting the curse, there had been a few situations in which Ranma had needed to provide a name for his red-headed form, and the first thing he'd thought of was a simple variant of his own name: Ranko. But, well… hearing the name used so often by others, and most recently in his own head, he had to admit it wasn't exactly his favorite. He was fairly certain he'd come up with better ones in his youth, but none of them were coming to mind now. Not to mention he wasn't sure how easy it would be to get everyone else to use a new name anyway, now that they were all so used to Ranko. ...Eh, he'd cross that bridge when he got there.
As Ranma lay in bed, his mind throwing out various new name possibilities for his alter ego, he eventually, finally managed to drift off to sleep.
"Oh, good, you're awake!" Nabiki said cheerfully as a groggy Ranma descended the stairs.
Even with his foggy mind, Ranma was aware enough of the middle Tendo sister's inherent dangerousness that he was instantly suspicious of her sudden cheer. "Uh... yeah?"
Warm smile quickly morphing into that obnoxious smirk that Ranma was used to, Nabiki said, "Just wanted to thank you! I'm going to make a killing off that fight from the other day."
Though he tried to process this info on his own, Ranma found his sleepy brain unprepared for such a considerable challenge. "Wait, but… thought your pics of the fight's end show Ranko…"
"They do!" Nabiki said, moving a bit closer, her grin growing. "But since you're doing a whole 'double identity' thing, that actually makes explaining the situation far simpler. See, to everyone else, it'll just look like Ranma ran away and let his sister take over the fight! Which, of course, counts as a loss for you, hm?"
Oh no. "But I didn't run away!" he cried, suddenly in a full-blown panic. This was a threat to his reputation!. "You can't be tellin' people I'm the sorta chump that-"
Nabiki's smirk slipped away. "I can tell them whatever I want, Ranma dear. As long as it's plausible and matches up well enough with the photos, there's no reason they won't believe me." Though anger was rapidly rising within him, Ranma found himself at a loss for what to say. He wasn't used to fighting with words, and it wasn't like he could physically combat Nabiki. To his displeasure, the smirk returned in full force to Nabiki's face. "Too bad for you, though, huh? You were the favorite to win, so there's gonna be a lot of people at school that're pissed at you." With a wink, she added, "Both versions of you."
Without another word, Nabiki turned and walked away. Today was not going to be a good day...
"Why'd your loser brother run out on the fight!?" a student Ranko had never talked to before practically screamed, as she made her way to the school entrance. Ranma had decided today would be a Ranko day, in the hope that the jerks who had lost out on the fight would be nicer to his girl form than his guy form. So far, that wasn't working out.
"He didn't! Nabiki just didn't take pictures of 'im, but he was still in the fight, too!"
"Oh, so he needed your help to take that Ryoga guy on? That's cheating!"
"I-! But-!" Wanting to strangle this guy, Ranko slammed her mouth shut, realizing she had no idea how to argue her side. This whole dual identities thing had been working out great before, but now it was creating a situation that made it impossible to defend both identities' honor. "Okay, look, that wasn't actually what happened, but-"
"Enough of your excuses! You two owe me big for this, I bet months' worth of allowance-"
"I- we don't owe ya squat!" Ranko shouted, fists clenched. "Now leave me alone or I'll beat ya like I did Ryoga!"
That particular jerk finally took the hint, but there were many more to come as Ranko tried to make her way to homeroom. Growing increasingly angry, Ranko was close to slugging the newest complaining roadblocks when someone else pushed them aside forcefully, shouting, "Out of my way, cretins!"
Kodachi! What a sight for sore eyes. Though Kodachi was a pain on Ranma days, today was a Ranko day, so-
"Ranko!" Kodachi shouted, fixing the red-head with a stare that was far less friendly than usual. Ranko felt her heart begin to sink. "What's this I hear about your accursed brother dueling with some random man I have never heard of!?"
And it plummeted. "Well, he had kinda promised Ryoga a fight a long time ago, so-"
"And yet the lout refuses to duel me, despite my numerous requests!" Hah, requests — more like demands. Still, if Ranko weren't already so irritated, she might've been able to acknowledge that Kodachi's angry pout was actually... very cute. "I insist that he acquiesces to a date and time this week that he and I might duel!"
Trying to ignore the itch in her side that flared up whenever she considered going another round with the beautiful but underhanded bokken-wielder, Ranko shook her head. "He's not gonna do it. He said ya don't fight fair and he just plain ain't interested. I won't be able ta change his mind."
Fists clenching, Kodachi's lip wavered right before she turned on her heel and marched away. ...That hadn't gone nearly as well as Ranma had hoped... but at least the hallway to homeroom was clear.
But the day's annoyances didn't stop just because class started. Throughout the rest of the day Ranko was assailed by angry students, whether by notes or in person. At lunchtime, she managed to get Yuka, Sayuri and Akane to agree to help defend her from those morons, though not without a snarky remark from the latter. That worked reasonably well, but the fact remained that, at least for now, Nabiki had managed to ruin Ranko's ability to enjoy school. She wouldn't forgive the evil woman for that, yet at the same time, she felt helpless to actually do anything to stop the same thing from happening again in the future. Nabiki was, without a doubt, the most infuriating person Ranko had ever met.
To Ranko's irritation, Akane and her puppy were nowhere to be found when she got back home after school. She'd wanted to vent her frustrations by trying to prove P-chan was Ryoga again. But now all she could do was some boring training exercises in the dojo.
Halfway through those exercises, Akane showed up, holding both P-chan and a pot of water. What...?
"If I let you pour some warm water on him, will you stop bothering the poor thing?" Akane said, looking irritated yet resigned.
Dour mood instantly lifted, Ranko smiled wide. "Yeah!" Eagerly grabbing the pot when Akane held it out, she wasted no time in pouring some of it directly on the squirming pup. Yet despite making some sad noises and wriggling so much that Akane had to hold it with both hands, no change occurred! But-! But she'd been so sure!
Holding the pot over her own head, Ranko poured, and sure enough, she felt a familiar tingle as she suddenly became taller than Akane again. So it was the right temperature, and yet…
"Satisfied?" Akane asked, holding the sad puppy to her chest and glaring Ranma's way.
"No," Ranma readily admitted. "Lemme hold him and try one more time…"
Rolling her eyes, Akane frowned but handed the pup over. Once more Ranma poured water on the increasingly distressed puppy, and when nothing happened he set the pot down and lifted the dog up, looking it over as though there was some sort of trick to be found. But, of course, there was nothing there except a sad, wet dog, and Ranma knew it. Sighing, he handed the dog back to Akane.
"Well, uh… guess I wasn't on the right track with that, then." Rubbing at the back of his neck, he said, "I mean, I'm still sure Ryoga's gotta curse, but apparently that ain't him."
"So you'll stop bothering us, then," Akane said, apparently really needing verbal confirmation.
"Yeah, yeah," Ranma muttered, not trying to hide his new sullen mood. "Oh, uh, that dog's a girl, by the way."
Akane's eyes went wide. "Wait, really?"
Nodding, Ranma said, "Yep, you've been wrong 'bout her gender this whole time. Good thing the name you picked out works either way."
"Y-yeah... Good thing!"
The rest of Ranma's school week didn't get any less upsetting. Students he could swear he'd never even seen before yelled at him, regardless of which form he was in, and despite threats from both himself and Akane, they rarely let up. But they weren't the only ones - Kodachi was getting more and more emphatic about getting a "fair chance to duel", as she put it. Though she was certainly more aggressive on the two days Ranma went to school in his uncursed state, she was no less upset and insistent about the issue on Ranko days. But no matter what form he had to deal with her in, Ranma refused to budge on the idea of fighting her. Normally he'd be happy to accept a challenge to a fight, but with Kodachi… he just wasn't interested in fighting someone who'd already made it clear they were going to fight dirty - potentially lethally so.
When Kodachi approached Ranko on Friday, the red-head prepared herself to give another tired refusal. But then she saw the look on Kodachi's face, and the words died on her lips. The other girl looked haunted, her eyes red, puffy, and dead, expression despondent.
"Ranko," she croaked, looking somewhere to the left of Ranko's eyes. "Why won't your brother fight me?"
"I-I told ya," Ranko started, trying to hide her shock, "he says ya don't fight fai-"
"Does he not know that all is fair in love and war?" Kodachi said in a bitter whisper. Voice rising in pitch, she continued, "Does he not understand how fervently I yearn for you? How fiercely I wish for his continued obstruction of our love to cease?" Finding it difficult to maintain eye contact, Ranko allowed her gaze to drop to the ground for a few moments, while she tried to ignore how warm the hallway had suddenly become. Which left her unprepared for the moment when Kodachi's hands tightly gripped her shoulders, the other girl's head moving unnervingly close. The smell of perfume overtook Ranko's senses — roses and… was that mint? Whatever it was, it made it difficult to focus on anything besides that smell and the desperate, pleading, beautiful face in front of her. "Please, Ranko. You must make him understand. I need to duel him. I need to prove my love for you in the face of the adversity he has presented!"
Though an increasingly large part of her wanted to give in, the ghost of a pain in her side refused to let her forget why she'd so staunchly refused to do so up to this point. "I… Kodachi, I want to, but… he won't- I can't-"
Something in Kodachi apparently broke, because a moment later she was on her knees, face pressed against Ranko, bawling. Looking like a terrified, wide-eyed animal cornered by a predator, Ranko stared around the hallway, as if something in the nearby environment could solve this sudden problem for her. But there was no one and nothing around - the hallway was actually surprisingly empty. But what was she supposed to do, then? People weren't supposed to just break down like this! She couldn't even move away, with Kodachi pressing against her; the sobbing girl would fall. Tentatively, Ranko reached a hand out, patting the crying girl's poofy hair like it was a potentially violent dog.
"I-I, uh… there, there?" she offered, her voice rising unnaturally.
For a moment, the crying softened, but it soon returned to a sorrowful wail, as Kodachi pressed even harder against Ranko.
Something strange was happening in Ranko's chest. As though invisible vines were wrapping around her lungs and heart, squeezing them so hard that she almost doubled over. She had to make the crying stop, make Kodachi happy again like she used to be around Ranko…
"K-kodachi, what if… what if we just ignore him and start dating?"
The crying almost stopped altogether, its only remnants Kodachi's haggard breathing and sniffling. "Wh… what?" she said, quietly.
Reaching down and pulling Kodachi back up to her feet, Ranko forced a smile, hoping none of her nervousness was coming through. "What if we just ignore my idiot brother and we… we just, uh… start dating?"
For a moment, Kodachi simply stared, as though this offer was difficult for her brain to process. ...Hopefully that was a good thing? The sudden scowl on her face a moment later indicated otherwise. Sniffling, Kodachi said, in a firm, even tone, "I do not want—" her breath hitched for a moment "—my love to be with me out of pity."
Taking a step back, Kodachi attempted to compose herself, wiping away some tears that were still on her cheeks, smudging her running makeup in the process. "Ranko, please, I…" A single tear rolled down her face. "I wish to prove my love for you. I need to prove that no man can force me to shy away from my heart's desire. I want you to develop genuine feelings for me, once you understand the depths of my devotion." Looking away, she said, much more quietly, "Do not offer me this… this farce. ...I will not abide it."
Barely able to comprehend how badly she messed up, Ranma could do little but stand stock-still and stare. She'd just wanted… she didn't mean to… She did like Kodachi, a little bit, but… Eyes falling to the floor, she sighed. There was no other way.
"..I'll do it. I'll convince him to fight you," she said, in barely a whisper.
Eyebrows rising in disbelief, Kodachi said, "Truly? You believe he will listen?"
Steeling her resolve, Ranko said, "Yes. But... only if you agree to a few conditions."
Nodding, face scrunched up in determination, Kodachi said, "Provided they are reasonable, I shall! What are your terms?"
"First off, an' most importantly - no lethal weapons."
Kodachi rolled her eyes. "What a coward your brother is. A true warrior would-"
Waving a hand, Ranko said, "Look, call him what'cha want, but he's not gonna agree ta fight unless ya agree not ta try an' kill him. And, I mean… I don't want ya to kill my brother, either, ya know? Imagine if you had a sibling."
"I do have a sibling," Kodachi said, crossing her arms with a huff. "Fine, I shall agree to that term."
Ignoring the curiosity that welled up within her about the mention of a sibling, Ranko pressed on. "Great. Second, he wants ta fight indoors somewhere. And, well, this is kinda a third thing I guess, but no one else needs ta know 'bout this fight. He had a bad time with the weather and a buncha jerks bettin' on the fight last time."
Though she was silent for a moment, Kodachi ultimately agreed to the terms. "But I do have an alteration request for that third term. Perhaps we can each invite one person to the fight? As witnesses, so there is no dispute over the victor."
With a shrug, Ranko said, "Fine. But no cameras."
Kodachi nodded. "And there is one more term that I must insist on." Ranko raised an eyebrow, but didn't interject. "He and I must both use weapons to fight. In our last scuffle he disarmed me and immediately had a clear advantage. Fighting without a weapon must be strictly prohibited in this battle!"
"But-! He's not trained ta use weapo-"
"You mean to say one as cocky as him, one who claims to be so skilled in the field of martial arts, would be afraid to wield a weapon aside from his body?"
Glaring, Ranko said through gritted teeth, "...No, he… he'll do it."
"Marvelous!" Kodachi said, smiling brilliantly. It almost made Ranko feel better about being goaded into a terrible decision. "Now then, all that remains is to determine the stakes. If I win, then that boor needs to stop coming between you and I, and, more than that, he must pledge his support of our love!"
Trying not to roll her eyes, Ranko said, "Sure, he'll agree ta that. But you gotta agree that if he wins, you'll stop tryin' ta fight him, and-" She paused, realizing she didn't actually want to finish that sentence. It had seemed like the natural thing, to request that Kodachi would stop romantically pursuing her. But… well it wasn't that bad, receiving her affections... and the poor girl had already cried today, so why make her feel worse? "...And just that."
Looking like she'd just been asked to eat the most disgusting food in the world, Kodachi sighed. "Fine. I agree. Shall we shake on it?"
In silent agreement, Ranko outstretched her hand, and the two girls finalized the agreement. Kodachi's hand was warm, and rough, presumably from all the bokken training. Ranko had to admit… she enjoyed the feel of it.
"Ranko," Kodachi said softly, drawing the red-head's gaze. "May I…?" Her big brown eyes flicked down to Ranko's lips. Then, as a hint of red grew in her cheeks, her eyes darted off to the side. "M-may I… hug you?"
Also blushing, Ranko rubbed the back of her head. "Uh, yeah. S-sure…"
Hesitantly, Kodachi moved forward, slowly wrapping her arms around the shorter girl. Ranko, too, slowly did the same. It felt… really nice. Warm, secure. There was something oddly satisfying about being the shorter one in the hug, too… And that perfume was once more overwhelming Ranko's senses. Dating Kodachi might actually be kind of nice, at least if more of this was involved. But… but she wouldn't… if she found out about the curse… Frowning, Ranko tried to stuff the thought down, not immediately realizing that when she did so she also nuzzled her head into Kodachi's shoulder. Once realization struck, she froze. That was… she was a guy, she shouldn't be… this close to the other girl, though, Ranko could feel Kodachi's heart racing, and her breathing becoming a bit heavy. Something about having that effect… it was kind of amazing.
All good things had to come to an end, though. Slowly, clearly reluctant, Kodachi pulled away and looked at Ranko, face beet red and a few tears in her eyes. "I-I… thank you, t-that was…" Taking a step back, she bowed low, and shouted, "Until next we meet, my love!" Then she swiveled around and raced down the hallway until she was out of sight.
Was there a way Ranko could lose and still maintain her martial artist sense of honor? Probably not, but… She'd have to seriously contemplate that over the next few hours. Though even if she won, if she wanted, she and Kodachi… Of course, technically Ranko was engaged, but… Ugh, there was no point thinking about it. She'd prepare for the fight, and whatever happened during it would happen, and she'd deal with the consequences. All she had to do now was wait. Oh, and to tell Akane about the whole thing, since that was who she planned to invite. She would probably take that okay, right? ...Right?