In a message dated 4/2/00 2:22:24 PM EST, desaix@sysnet.net writes:
<< Chapter 1: Natsume's WHAT?
Nine months earlier...
Another summer morning was proceeding at its usual pace at the
Tendou residence. Kasumi had just laid breakfast out on the table,
Saotome Genma was busily pouring his miso soup down his throat,
Tendou Soun picked at his breakfast as he read the morning newspaper,
Nabiki fiddled with her abacus as she ate, and Ranma and Akane sat
silently, for a change, simply eating and not arguing. Of course,
tranquil scenes like this rarely last long without some form of
interruption.
There was a knock at the door. Kasumi rose to greet their guests.
"Good morning...oh, hello again! It's been such a long time!" she
said cheerfully. Everyone at the table turned to see who had come to
visit.
Two girls walked into the family room. One was tall, wearing a dark
blue dress, her long black hair pulled up in a somewhat traditional
style, bound stiffly by a strip of white cloth, flowing freely down
her back from the top.
=[sugg] The sentence seems a little jarring to read, what with all the commas
breaking up the flow. Try something like this:
One was tall, wearing a dark blue dress. Her long black hair, pulled up in a
somewhat traditional style, was bound stiffly by a strip of white cloth which
flowed freely down her back from the top.
Her face, which served to make her look more
mature than her apparent age would suggest, was currently contorted
into an irritated scowl, which was aimed at the other girl.
The second girl of the pair, rather short, and quite young in
=...rather short and quite young...
appearance, wore a simple sailor-fuku, her dark hair tied back with a
long red ribbon. She was hanging onto the older girl as though
supporting her.
"I told you, I'm FINE, Kurumi!" snapped the older. "You don't have
to treat me like I'm going to fall apart at any second!"
The younger girl, Kurumi, if affected by the harsh tone with which
the other spoke, gave no indication of anything other than worry.
=[sugg] A little awkward wording. Try:
If Kurumi was affected by the harsh tone with which the other spoke, the
younger girl gave no indication of anything other than worry.
"I'm only looking out for you, Natsume," she said gently.
Everyone at the table smiled. Soun stood, and moved to greet the
two girls. "Well now, welcome! It's been such a long time since we
last saw you two!"
Natsume and Kurumi bowed, Kurumi still holding onto her older
sister. Natsume flashed her a glare which was ignored. "It is good to
see you again as well, sir," Natsume said.
Ranma and Akane stood before the pair, both smiling. "Hello you
two! How've you been?" Akane asked.
"We've been well, thank you," Natsume said. Kurumi's expression
indicated that her sister wasn't giving the whole story.
"So, what brings you back?" Ranma asked. "Come for a rematch from
last time?" Akane smiled. While at the time of their last visit
things had been rather tense, and the conditions of their last
meeting weren't the most amicable, no hard feelings remained over the
battle for the Tendou training hall.
Kurumi frowned. "Actually...we were hoping you might be able to
help us..."
Akane furrowed her brow. "What's wrong?"
Kasumi gently guided everyone to the table. "Come, sit, we're just
having breakfast...you two must be hungry."
Once everyone was served, only Nabiki noticed that Kurumi slid half
her breakfast onto Natsume's plate, which earned a quick glare from
the elder sister.
=Makes me wonder how distracted everyone else is. I would think that their
new guests would become more the center of attention, at least until the glow
wears off.
"So," Soun said as he sipped his tea, "You say you've come to ask
for help. What seems to be the trouble?"
"Well..." Kurumi began. Natsume cut her off.
"Sir, we were hoping perhaps you might allow us to stay here for a
while."
Soun nodded. "Of course, of course. Living on the road is never
easy."
"Especially now," Kurumi said. Natsume fired her a glare that would
have been hard to miss.
"Is...something wrong?" Akane asked. "You seem to be on edge,
Natsume..."
[Natsume] Yes, Akane, there is. You see...I'm in love with you!
[Akane] (shocked) Wh-wh-what?!
[Natsume] Just kidding.
[Akane] Oh... (wipes sweat off of her brow)
[Natsume] ...I'm really in love with Ranma!
[Ranma] (blinks) Again? (checks his invisible watch) That makes you the
twelfth girl this week to fall in love with me...
[Akane clobbers Ranma.]
[Akane] By all means, don't act too disappointed about it....
Natsume frowned, and forced a smile. "I'm...it's nothing," she
said.
"Natsume...you might as well tell them. It's not like you can hide
it or anything, you know." Everyone traded puzzled glances. Natsume
grimaced, then nodded.
"Hey, what's goin' on?" Ranma asked.
[Natsume and Kurumi pulls out a film projector and a movie screen.]
[Kurumi] Today, you're going to learn all about sex eduction! Hands on
experience, too.
[Natsume] Now, who wants to be Ranma's partner?
[Shampoo, Ukyou, and Kodachi pop out of nowhere waving their hands madly.
Even Akane tenitively puts up her own hand. Ranma bigsweats.]
Kurumi took a deep breath, and said, "This is going to come as a
shock, but...the reason we need a place to stay for a while is
because..." She paused. Natsume nodded, and she continued. "Well, you
see...Natsume is...is with child."
The Tendous and Saotomes fell into a stunned silence.
Kasumi was the first one to break that silence, with her typical response
of "Oh, my!"
"With... child?" Soun asked gutturally. "As in... pregnant?"
[Natsume] No, Kurumi was just referring to herself. Have you ever tried
living with her for about 18 years?
Natsume and Kurumi both nodded. "A- are you..."
[Kurumi] Incestual lesbians? No, though some hentai writer is undoubtably
beginning to get those juices flowing.
[Nabiki] (sarcastic) Thanks, Kurumi. Just what I need; another lesbian lemon
to be associated with.
"No, she's not married," Kurumi said.
"Who's the father?" Nabiki asked. "We can at least get him to pay for the
hospital bills."
"Er..." Natsume began. "I- I'm not sure."
[Natsume] And ever since I read Jack Staik's Kasumi's Surprise, I have only
one thing to say--"Ranma, this is all your fault!!"
Except for Nabiki, all of the Tendous and Saotomes facefaulted.
=I don't even think Kasumi knows how to facefault. Nothing hardly ever fazes
her.
Nabiki
knew of such things happening to girls of Natsume's age before- frequently,
a girl who had gotten into 'trouble' came to Nabiki for help in getting a
secret abortion- but even she was a little stunned that someone like
Natsume would let such a thing happen to her.
"How did it happen?" She asked. It wasn't quite in her usual
business-like tone of voice, but it was at least she didn't put TOO much
emotion into it. Her reputation for being imperturbable had to be
maintained.
Kurumi frowned. "Isn't that getting a LITTLE too personal?"
[Nabiki] No more personal than Don Juan deMarco and Natsume.
[Genma] Damn, Nabiki, that was just cold, even for you.
[Nabiki] Thanks.
Natsume sighed. "I don't need my little sister to protect me, Kurumi.
Besides, they have a right to know." She turned to Nabiki. "About two or
three weeks ago, we were still searching for our parents, as we have been
since before we were six years old. Having found that your father, Soun
Tendou, was not the one we sought, we no longer have any leads to assist us
in our quest. I was dwelling on this point, sitting in a... bar...."
Akane blinked. "A bar? How much older than me are you?"
Natsume squirmed. "I'm... eighteen."
"But I thought you had to be twenty to legally get a drink in a bar?" Ranma
said carelessly. Akane elbowed him hard and shushed him. Nabiki smirked.
She knew where this was going.
"You do... I was drinking illegally."
"Oh, my," Kasumi said again. There really wasn't much else for anyone to
say.
Natsume coughed. "Anyway, I was sitting in a bar, and got rather drunk. A
young man approached me... I doubt he was in the bar legally either, but
from the look of things the bouncers were too afraid of him to do anything
about it. I looked familiar to him, and he to me, and we began talking
about... nothing in particular..." She smiled sadly in recollection.
"I would recognize him," Kurumi interrupted. "I know I've seen him before-
I think I, er, borrowed some food from him before."
Natsume shot a look at her sister that quickly silenced the younger
sibling. "Somehow, the talking came around to why we had come to the bar
in the first place. For him, it was because he had just had a major
argument with his fiancee, and was worried that their engagement was over.
For me, it was a regret that... between my search for Kurumi's and my
parents and our martial arts training, I'd left myself no time for...
matters of the heart." Nabiki nodded in recognition. Ranma, ever so
briefly, glanced at Akane with a worried look on his face, but no-one
caught it save Kurumi, who had no reason to think it out of the ordinary.
=Right about now, klaxons are blaring to life. *IMPORTANT CLUE* *IMPORTANT
CLUE*
"One thing led to another," Natsume continued, "And... well, you can
probably guess the rest. In his drunken state, all he wanted was revenge
on his fiancee, and I, in my drunken state, wanted some... companionship.
After a week or two, I started getting sick in the mornings.
=It's usually no less than a couple of weeks before morning sickness strikes.
I was
recovering from these bouts after only a short time, but it still worried
Kurumi, so I went to see a doctor. The doctor told us that I was pregnant,
and that's when Kurumi and I decided to return here, to where the closest
things we have ever had to a... to a family... lived."
Silence rained for a few seconds. Surprisingly, it was Soun who broke it.
"Well, of course you're family... In fact, if you want, I'll make it
official by adopting you two."
Akane and Nabiki gasped. Ranma blinked. Genma started examining his long
time friend, wondering if there was any physical evidence of what caused
the sudden loss of his sanity. Even Kasumi didn't seem entirely
comfortable with the idea.
Natsume and Kurumi both noted the reaction of the assembled clans. "Er,
that isn't necessary," Natsume began. "I would rather keep hope of meeting
my real father one day."
Many of the assembled company gave out a sigh of relief. "Then at least
let me be your foster father until you are able to search for him again,"
Soun begged, once again throwing everyone else in the room for a loop.
=Well, I never saw "Akane and her Sisters" so I don't quite get the big deal
about Soun and adoption. No one seemed very disturbed when he tried adopting
Chibi-Ranma and chibi-Ryouga in vol. 33...
Natsume saw no polite way to refuse, however, and so nodded tiredly. "Very
well... father." She and Kurumi, after the tension had broken from the
awkward semi-adoption, were soon made as comfortable as possible by their
new family.
* * * * *
Nodoka arrived home later that day, and met Ranma practicing a kata at the
gate. "Ranma!" she waved.
Ranma broke out of his form and walked over to great his mother. "Hello,
Aun... Mom. Nice to see you! You missed something very... interesting.
Where've you been all day?"
She smiled. "Looking over the repairs to our house. In a couple of weeks
time, Ranma, we'll be able to move back! Won't that be wonderful?"
Ranma's face fell a little at the thought of moving out. "Yeah...
wonderful."
Nodoka appeared oblivious to this, however. "So, what was so interesting
that I missed?"
Ranma shrugged. "Oh, Mr. Tendou took in a couple of new foster-daughters,
that's all."
Nodoka facefaulted. "He did what?"
"He took in a couple of new foster daughters. I told you about Natsume and
Kurumi, right?" She nodded. "Well, they finally returned, but not to
challenge me and Akane for the dojo but to get some help with a... little
problem... Natsume's having."
Nodoka considered carefully. "What problem is it that she's having?"
Ranma started to say something, but then closed his mouth, and looked
around. 'Hmm,' he thought. 'Probably not the best of things to be talking
about in a public street.' He gestured Nodoka inside. "Perhaps you'd
better ask HER that. I'm not entirely sure she would want me to discuss
this sort of thing out here."
=A thoughtful Ranma? Ye Gods, what's this world coming to?
Nodoka's eyes became slivers.
=Muscle, Winged, Crystaline, or Queen?
(Anyone who played Magic during The Rath Cycle should be able to get the ref.)
"Very well. Can you take me to her, then?"
* * * * *
"...and that's how it happened," Natsume finished. Nodoka was sitting by
her as she rested on the futon she had been given. Soun had already
ordered a new bed to be delivered, but it wasn't expected to arrive until
later that week.
=Well Soun tried to get Genma to bring it down, but after calling him a
"fatass," he refused, even under threat of the Demonhead technique.
"There, there, child," Nodoka patted her shoulder comfortingly. "Don't
worry- there are plenty of things we can do, especially in this day and
age. If you want, I can take you to a nice, out of the way clinic where-"
Natsume flared in anger. "NO! This is my baby, I'm not getting rid of
it!"
Nodoka smiled. "That's nice, dear. I was going to say 'where we can get
you a thorough check-up,' but it's good to here you're planning on becoming
a mother." Natsume looked down, embarrassed. Nodoka smiled, and patted
her again. "Now, is there anything else I or... our family can do to help
you?"
"As a matter of fact..."
* * * * *
"Ranma?" Nodoka approached her son, once again practicing a kata in the
dojo.
"Yes, Mother?"
"I was just talking with Natsume." Ranma nodded- he had been expecting
that. "I asked her if there was anything we could do for her... and she
asked if we could continue searching for her parents. She wants to find
out who her family is before she gives birth. Could you possibly... try
and find them?"
That, Ranma was not expecting. "Uh... how? I wouldn't know where to
begin..."
Nodoka smiled. "You probably know as much as they do- they know nothing at
all."
Ranma sighed. He still wasn't really comfortable around his mother- he
never knew what she might consider 'unmanly.' He'd better do what she
said, just to be safe. Besides, she seemed rather insistent on it. "Okay,
Mom, just give me some time to prepare..." >>
One must wonder why Ranma? I can see both him and Nabiki (a logical choice
when concerning the collection of info, plus the sympathetic ties she's
beginning to form with Natsume.
I really enjoyed it. Look for more soon.