Dominoes


Akane closed the door to Kasumi's bedroom behind herself, struggling not to slam it as she seethed to herself. For a moment, she stood there, taking in the familiar surroundings of her elder sister's personal chamber and trying to let the familiarity wash away some of her irritation. Her sister's clothes cupboard to her left, and directly in front of her was a window, with her sister's bed underneath it. On the right wall stood a bookcase, which housed the only new additions that Akane could ever remember her sister making to her room; an old television that had previously graced the washitsu back when their mother was alive, only to be put in storage when they upgraded to a new(ish) one a year or two ago, and a Gamestation that Kasumi had bought only a few weeks ago.

The eldest of the three Tendo sisters was currently seated on the foot of the bed, eyes fixed on her television screen and fingers flashing across a controller as she played... some game with a blue-furred humanoid fox in it dressed in clothes that Akane thought were far too skimpy for any woman with taste to wear. On other days, Akane would have wondered what possibly made her sister get into gaming, since she'd never been interested when she was younger, but today she was too worked-up to feel contemplative.

"Honestly! What was daddy thinking with this stupid engagement? How backwards can you be!?" Akane loudly scoffed, stalking over to the bed.

"It's been a rather disappointing day, hasn't it?" Kasumi mildly replied, never taking her eyes off of the screen as she spoke.

Akane sat down heavily on the bed, elbows resting on her knees and chin cradled in her palms as she scoffed.

"You can say that again! I thought today was going to be special when I saw that purple meteor flashing across the sky... I wonder what that was, anyway?" She mused, anger momentarily forgotten with the distraction.

"Who knows? Could have been a supervillain, maybe?" Kasumi suggested absently.

Akane scowled at the thought. "Ugh, I hope not! Freaks have started to crawl out of the woodwork since they took that phony Commander Daizo down... Hey, you don't think that Ranma could be one...?"

That statement got the first reaction from her big sister since she'd entered. Kasumi actually paused her game, tilting her head quizzically to the side before turning to look at Akane, a confused look on her face.

"I... don't think he is? I mean, I've only just met him, but he doesn't really give that kind of impression," Kasumi observed mildly.

Akane blew air through pursed lips and shook her head. "Nah, you're right, that's going a bit too far. I mean, what kind of self-respecting supervillain would come here?"

"What kind indeed?" Kasumi repeated, a soft smile on her lips and a faraway look in her eyes, before she turned her attention back to her game. As she unpaused, she added, "Look on the bright side, Akane; that makes two positive things you can say about Ranma."

Akane blinked in confusion, turning to look at her sister's back. "What's the first?"

"At least you didn't have to marry him," Kasumi explained absently, fully engrossed in her gaming once more.

Akane groaned in exasperation at the very thought, allowing herself to flop over onto her back on the sheets.

"Ugh, don't remind me! Poor Nabiki... I can't believe she's going through with it..." Akane shook her head sympathetically at the thought of it.

For a moment, there was silence, save for the sounds of enemies dying to Kasumi's attacks in her video game, before the eldest of the Tendo daughters spoke. "Well, he does have that curse of his... perhaps Nabiki thought that being a fellow freak, he would understand her own situation?"

Akane frowned savagely, instinctively twisting Kasumi's blankets into wads between her fingers. "Nabiki is not a freak! How dare that loser prey on my innocent, vulnerable sister like that! Gah, I'll bet that sicko does all kinds of perverted things with that twisted body of his! Well, I won't let him corrupt my sister - I won't!"

As she ranted, she sat upright, hands clenching themselves into fists as she cried her determination at the uncaring ceiling. Then, as suddenly as she had raged, she fell back onto the bedding, dismay on her face. "But how can I stop him? Daddy's determined that this stupid engagement has to go through!"

Kasumi hummed in agreement, bobbing her head in time with the music from her game as she absently observed, "Yes, daddy really does think that marrying Ranma will be good for the Anything-Goes School of Martial Arts. Why, I think he'd only consider breaking the engagement if he thought Ranma was too weak to be a worthy heir..."

Akane blinked as her sister's words sank in, her eyes going wide in realization as she smiled - the first smile she'd made since her father had told her about the Saotomes coming to visit. She leapt off of the bed and to her feet, fists clenching excitedly.

"Kasumi, you're a genius! I'll show him what I can really do - we don't need some puffed-up boy coming in here and taking over the dojo, I can do it all by myself!"

"That's the spirit, Akane!" Kasumi chirped, but her words fell on deaf ears, as Akane was already near-sprinting for the door and out through it to the stairwell, intent on hunting Ranma down.

Kasumi listened to her sister's fading footsteps, and then smiled to herself. Had one of her siblings been present, they would have been rather disturbed by this smile. The smiles they knew their sister to bear had always been warm, motherly, and full of love. This smile was cold, reptilian, and cruel.

"This should be... entertaining. A nice little compensation for that failure earlier. Just save this game, and... done! Now, I better hurry; I don't want to miss this..."

As she powered down her game and put her controller away before heading downstairs, she absently mused to herself, 'Why does Nabiki have to take her VMU with her all the time? How am I meant to 'randomly' delete her saves? It was so much easier before memory cards...'