FATE
A Ranma1/2 fanfic by PansutoTarou5925
Disclaimer to follow at end of chapter
Sifu Morisato was having a bad morning. First she had beaten
herself up over her impulsive decision to confront the little
demoness rather than just watch and report like she was supposed
to, and then she had discovered that the hot water was out. Then
she ran out of gas, meaning that she'd barely made it to the school
before it started, rather than well before so she could get all the
paperwork finished. The last straw was finding out that the parking
lot was faculty only.
Which was why she was in the courtyard with her motorcycle,
parking it among the pedestrian, muscle?powered bikes where it
most certainly did not belong. This morning sucked, and she knew
with divine intuition that it was going to get worse.
"Hey! Greasemonkey!" a familiar, hated voice called out.
How right she was.
Sifu looked up at the sky, silently asked her grandfather what she
had done wrong to deserve a day like this, and turned around to
glare at the young demoness perched on a handrail.. "What do you
want, Chiyeko?" She noted that the boy from yesterday was still
with her. Must be some sort of demonic contract or something.
"Nothing." Sifu turned back to the bike and decided to ignore the
blond pest. "Just saw you in the parking lot. Don't tell me your
family is moving to Tokyo..." Sifu stopped pretending to inspect
the motorcycle and decided that she might as well harness the
power of evil just this once.
"No, I moved here myself... to stay with my Aunt for a little. To,
uh, teach me some of the secrets of the family art." There. Phrased
in as many one?syllable words as possible and in terms her
opponent could comprehend with her crude mind. Sifu smiled.
"Wow, I didn't know you had a family style of martial arts,"
Chiyeko said, obviously interested.
"We're going to be late if we don't get inside soon," the boy said,
checking his watch.
"Could you do me a favor and tell me where the principal's office
is?" Sifu asked.
"Hell, I'll bring you there. Atasuke, tell the teacher I might be a bit
late, helping the new student. OK?" Chiyeko answered
energetically, then grabbed Sifu's hand and dragged her towards the
front entrance.
Atasuke shook his head quietly and grinned. He wanted to talk to
the new student. Well, that was a given ? she was female ? but he
had reasons other than to flirt and maybe sneak a few photos of her
in the locker room, if possible. But there was another thing that
interested him about her. Other than Chiyeko, she was the only
person he'd ever seen with those kind of markings on her head.
Although destined to be mortal enemies and worlds apart in acting
like a civilized human being, there were some things that could
unite Sifu and Chiyeko together, such as the shared disbelief they
both felt confronting Principal Ninomiya.
Looking for all the world as if she just might be old enough to
attend the school as a freshman ? maybe ? the principal almost
swam in the oversized and overstuffed seat at her desk, and there
was something faintly ridiculous about the stern expression she had
as she looked back and forth from student to student. She looked
down at the papers in front of her.
"I've read here that there have been... incidents between the two of
you in the past." Her eyes flickered between the two of them. "I
hope that whatever caused you to put your differences aside
continues. I won't put up with the sort of shenanigans that went on
in your father's day, Chiyeko, the way the previous principal did."
She slapped a pile of papers in front of Sifu. "These are your
schedule, a code of conduct, and assorted paperwork. Keep the
schedule, fill out the rest, and return it. Saotome?san, bring
Morisato with you. You two are in the same class. Dismissed."
Principal Ninomiya turned to her computer, effectively dismissing
the two from her personal universe. The two students retreated
from the principal's office quickly.
"That was weird," Sifu said, looking back at the office door. "That
girl doesn't look a day over fourteen."
"Mom says she was a teacher when she came to Furinkan,"
Chiyeko whispered.
Sifu shook her head. "I refuse to believe that. Anyways, where's
our class?" She thought she lucked out there, despite the fact that it
would mean she'd probably want to shoot herself ? or Chiyeko in
moments of mental clarity ? from the demoness's occasional violent
antics. She could keep an eye on the person she was supposed to
watch without any trouble.
"Just follow me."
It was later in the day that Atasuke had his first chance to talk to his
new classmate without Chiyeko noticing. "Hey there!" he said,
smiling warmly. "I'm sorry that I didn't get to introduce myself
earlier." He bowed. "I'm Atasuke Ono. So, I take it you know
Chiyeko?chan already?"
Sifu frowned. "You could say that."
Atasuke nodded. "I'm sorry, since she seems to be a point of
irritation with you, but, well, I was just wondering how you knew
her."
"Chiyeko and I went to the same school together for a while out in
Nekomi, that's how I know her," Sifu said, then sat down on the
windowsill. "We didn't get along very well."
"I can see that," Atasuke said. "I'm just wondering why... she
seems nice enough."
Sifu growled. "I was our class president, and I'd never seen a
student so casually dismissive of the school rules before..." she
explained, giving several examples: "She never, ever wore the
school uniform. Except for the fact that she's blond and has a tan
and would stand out in any crowd, I wouldn't have recognized her
today. She was always asleep in my class, always, and didn't care
how disrespectful she was being to the rest of the class or the
teacher. She just laughed off being sent to the hall with buckets.
And that demoness would always insult me whenever I pointed out
what she was doing was wrong. 'Bother someone who cares,
Greasemonkey'. 'Who died and made you god?' That sort of
thing."
"She still sleeps through classes," Atasuke said.
"At least she's wearing a uniform now," Sifu said.
"Chiyeko grew up on the road," Atasuke said, "and I gather that
money wasn't always something that she and her mother had the
luxury of having."
Sifu said nothing, being unwilling to think of the demoness as
anything other than one of Hild's minions. "Actually she kinda
looks like Hild," she mumbled absentmindedly.
Atasuke's head whipped around. "You know Hild?" he asked
curiously.
'Oh h?heaven!' Sifu said, flinching. 'How the heck does he know
about Hild? He's no demon...' "Well, not like I met her in person or
something." A moment of inspiration. "My mother knows Hild."
Atasuke laughed. "Small world, then, that your mother knows
Chiyeko's aunt."
'Hild has a brother?' Sifu thought confusedly. "Small world, I
guess."
"There is one other thing I meant to ask you," Atasuke said,
adjusting his glasses. Now, to get down to the real point of this
conversation. "I wanted to ask you about those weird markings
Chiyeko and you both have. What are those?"
Sifu froze. How was she supposed to explain this? 'Well, you see,
those are goddess and demon markings, they're our links to heaven
and hell. You didn't know your friend was a demoness?' wasn't
going to cut it, even if she was inclined to blow her secret, which
she wasn't. "Well, you see?"
"A?TA?SU?KE!" Chiyeko yelled, then latched onto his shoulder
with an iron grip. "How dare you flirt with her in front of me!" she
yelled, then pulled him into a side hallway.
Sifu clapped her hands together and thanked her grandfather for the
lucky save, then quickly headed back to the classroom.
"I wasn't flirting with her!" Atasuke said frantically, as Chiyeko
pulled him into an empty classroom.
"I know that," she said, then turned back to him. "I just wanted to
warn you about miss high?and?mighty there."
"Warn me?" he asked, surprised. "About what?"
"She has it in for me. Always hanging around me like a shadow,"
Chiyeko said. "Just because I didn't goose step to their silly rules,
she would go around calling me a demoness and telling all the other
students I was trouble."
"You weren't this annoyed with her this morning," Atasuke said.
"Mom told me I should try to start over with her and let bygones be
bygones. But all she did was watch me all through class so far.
She's not even our class president, what does she care?" Chiyeko
ranted, pacing back and forth. "I offended the goddess of
motorsports and now she's going to send bad thoughts my way,
ooh, how mature."
"Just ignore her."
"Why did she have to come here?" Chiyeko said, ignoring him.
"This sucks! Somebody up there doesn't like me."
Atasuke got up and stood in front of her. "Look, maybe you could
just get this settled between the two of you. Talk it out. From what
she said she doesn't sound to unreasonable." He looked at the still
annoyed Chiyeko. "And if all else fails, you can always insult her
some more."
"I guess it's worth a shot," she grumbled.
It was at lunch that Chiyeko had her chance.
"Hey there!" she yelled out, seeing that Sifu was babying her
motorcycle again, and refraining from yelling out 'Greasemonkey'
again because that would be, well, undiplomatic.
Sifu looked up with a pained expression. "What do you want?"
Chiyeko held up her hands. "Whoa. All I wanted to do was
apologize, maybe, for offending you with my very existence." Sifu
snorted and turned back to her bike, which she studied intently.
Chiyeko walked over and looked at it as well, although to her it
was just a bunch of machinery she didn't understand. "Seriously, I
was just going to ask if you could stop watching me all throughout
class. It's really annoying."
'Crap, she noticed', Sifu thought. "Nothing wrong with it," she
said, standing up and wiping her hands absently on her school
uniform, having momentarily forgotten what she was wearing.
"...damn," she said, having realized a moment too late.
Chiyeko laughed. "You dork. You better run to the locker room
and try to soap that out."
"Then it'll be all wet. Forget it." She inwardly was annoyed that
Chiyeko was here; had it not been for having a witness, a single
little spell would have fixed her little mistake. Then she remembered
who her witness was. "Hey, Chiyeko, keep an eye out for me." The
bikes were fairly distant to the other students, and it wasn't like
Chiyeko would really care if she used her magic like one of the
other students would.
"Sure thing, why, you got a spare uniform in the bag?" she asked,
pointing to the saddlebag. Chiyeko glanced around briefly.
"Wouldn't it just be better to do this in an empty room?"
"Right," Sifu said. Why tempt fate... even if they were your mother
and aunts?
A few minutes later Chiyeko gave a quick look in each direction
before slipping into the PE equipment shed. "Nobody's coming,"
she told Sifu. "You can change now."
Sifu nodded and concentrated briefly, then began speaking in the
heavenly language. She floated off the floor slightly, glowing, then
her symbols flared. Her clothes briefly shimmered and then
reformed, and she landed lightly on her feet again.
She was quite surprised to see Chiyeko scared out of her wits and
edging back towards the door. "What?" Sifu said, confused.
"AAAAHHHH!" Chiyeko yelled, then tore off the door and ran off
like a bat out of hell.
"Yeesh..." Sifu said, and headed back to class. "What in heaven was
all that about?"
"...and that's the whole story," Sifu said to Skuld, as the two ate ice
cream. Skuld had found this place not a hundred yards from her
apartment, with her unerring ice?cream homing senses. Sifu had
wasted no time in relating the events of the past twenty?four hours
to her aunt.
"You shouldn't have confronted her at the restaurant," Skuld said
reproachfully.
Wince. "I know, Auntie..."
"But after that you did good enough. Be a little more discreet in
watching her, though. You don't know how powerful she is, and
she seems to take offense to you hanging over her head like an
avenging angel. She's not going to cause trouble at school under
your nose anyways."
"She's Hild's niece," Sifu noted. "She's probably plenty strong."
"And Hild is no cakewalk either. The Daimakaicho wouldn't take
kindly to any injury to her niece, the same as she wouldn't to Urd."
Sifu shuddered at the thought of being that far over her head on her
first assignment. "I wonder what Father is up to, assigning you this
mission? It seems more suited to someone more powerful, simply
because of the possibility of Hild getting involved."
"Chiyeko is my age," Sifu said, taking a bite out of her sundae, and
watching Skuld finish off her third. "That seems to be the logic
behind it... I think."
Skuld shrugged. "I'd like to take a good look at this demoness
myself."
"She looks kinda like Urd, but shorter and in better shape."
"I won't tell Urd you said that," Skuld said. "I'll claim that line for
myself." Sifu laughed. "It makes sense, given that she's related to
Urd ? a cousin. I wonder if Urd knows?" Urd could be cagey about
her relationship with Hild, and Skuld still didn't know how well her
sister knew her own mother. Skuld finished off her third sundae and
watched Sifu finish off her first. "I guess that's it for ice cream... for
now."
They paid and left, Skuld much happier than when she came. She
looked down at Sifu. "Now, it's time to start teaching you how to
really use your powers. It's very sad that Belldandy neglected to
teach you how to transport yourself..."
"She knew how much I liked to go riding with dad, or on my own
bike, later," Sifu said, feeling defensive.
"But that really needs to be fixed if there's a possibilty of a fight.
Discretion can be the better part of valor, you know."
"Oh, all right..."
Meanwhile, across town, a very different conversation was taking
place.
Ranma and Chiyeko were currently meditating while upside down,
balanced on their heads, in the dojo. Chiyeko opened one eye warily
and looked at her mother. "Mom?"
"Yes Chiyeko?" Ranma answered, not opening her eyes at all.
Chiyeko flipped herself back over and fidgeted for a few seconds.
"Do you believe magic exists?"
Ranma fell over. "What?" she asked, now sitting normally. "I've
seen things ? experienced things ? that can only be explained by
magic. I've tried to shield you from that kind of thing."
"Oh," her daughter replied, now curious as to what magic Ranma
had seen. "Er... I saw someone.. um.. It's Sifu." Chiyeko slid
towards Ranma, and said quietly, "She's a witch."
"Sifu is a witch?" Ranma said, smirking. "I thought you considered
her a bitch, not a witch."
"Mom, be serious!" Chiyeko complained. "She cast a spell today. I
saw her cast a spell today," she elaborated, catching her mother's
smirk. "She was chanting in some infernal language and glowed for
a second, and then the oil stain on her skirt was gone."
"OK, so Sifu glows and cleans stains, and you glow and throw ki
blasts that can blow holes in walls. Which one is weirder?"
"Ki blasts aren't magic!" Chiyeko said, annoyed. "Don't you find it
disturbing that one of my classmates is a witch? She doesn't like
me, she might put some kind of weird curse on me."
Ranma shrugged. "I wouldn't worry about it, Chiyeko?chan. She
would have put a curse on you before, if she was going to put a
curse on you. Now I'm going to go take a shower and get over to
the dinner table, and so should you. And I don't want to hear any
whining about a diet, your training is intense enough that you don't
need to worry about that."
"You eat like a pig, and I resent your attempts to make me a pig in
your own image," Chiyeko said. Once her mother left, she practiced
alone in the dojo for a while before getting bored and re?entering
the house for a nice soak in the furo before dinner.
"Still," she said, still thinking about the magic Sifu had shown at
school. "That was weird." She then considered the weird markings
on Sifu's head. The only other person that she knew of besides
herself and her Aunt Hild with the weird marks she had was Sifu
Morisato. Chiyeko looked into the water and looked at the red
trapezoid on her forehead, now not hidden beneath its usual
headband. What the heck did those markings mean? They weren't
'birthmarks' like Ranma dismissed them as. Hild had said that they
were a family thing she'd learn about when she was older. Well,
damnit, she was older, and she still didn't know... but she was
going to ask Hild next time she saw her. "I sure hope we're not
some other rival family of witches," Chiyeko said. "Though that
would explain why Sifu seemed to dislike me from the moment she
met me." Chiyeko got up and stretched. "Nothing like a good warm
soak in the tub," she said, before picking up her towel and drying
off.
She walked to the table with another towel around her wet hair and
sat down, seeing Atasuke coming down the stairs. "Working out in
your room?" she asked, noticing that he seemed a little out of
breath.
"Yeah, since you two were working out in the dojo," he answered.
Privately, he rationalized that he hadn't broken his word with
Ranma. After all, he was no longer practicing Happousai's
techniques or stealing panties... but she said nothing about peeping.
Of course, if she had known, she would have, but he ignored that.
Later that night, when everyone was asleep ? even Atasuke, who
had watched his latest clip of Chiyeko taking a bath at least a dozen
times before turning in ? storm clouds gathered over Nerima and
thundere ominously as the winds picked up. The violent storm
woke many, although not Ranma or Chiyeko, who could sleep
through almost anything.
The storm built to a crescendo quickly, and at a nearby apartment
Skuld and a groggy Sifu were watching the unnatural weather with
displeasure. "Daimakaicho Hild..." Skuld murmured. "She's
coming."
In the Tendo home, the person in question flew lightly through the
guest bedroom window and landed silently next to Chiyeko. Hild
reached out a hand and delicately traced the outlines of her
daughter's demon markings. When she was finished, they flared
briefly, and then dimmed.
"Soon, my daughter, soon," Hild whispered, then flew out the
window. She knew that Ranma felt Chiyeko was strong enough,
old enough, that she could confront the Amazons once and for all.
It was high time for Chiyeko to learn the truth of her past... and for
Ranma to learn the truth of her future.
DISCLAIMER: Ranma ½ is the property of Rumiko Takahashi,
Shonen Sunday, Viz, and other parties; I make no claims of
ownership of any of the intellectual or other properties pertaining to
it. Oh! My Goddess belongs to Kosuke Fujishima, Studio Proteus,
Dark Horse, and other parties, and I make no claims of ownership
of any of the intellectual or other properties pertaining to it, either.
Author's Note: Finally fixed the annoying FFnet formatting errors, I think.