hi guys,

Fragments is taking me ages to edit (I have no idea why, this section is actually shorter than the first one i posted *sigh*), so I decided to take a break and work on something I hadn't been staring at for nearly ten hours straight (darn holidays, giving me time and no excuses...).  Here's the first part of a much cleaned up (from the original posted on the delphi forums) Catharsis.

This is a diverging continuation, read at your own risk.

Please, please send C/C

=====

DISCLAIMER: Ranma 1/2 is property of Rumiko Takahashi.  No profit is being generated from its use in this original work of fiction, and no infringement is intended.  Louis Armstrong and W.C. Handy perform the version of "The Beal Street Blues" used in this story, no infringement is intended and no profit is being made.  Michi Hirugashi is my own property; please do not take her without my permission.

ARCHIVE: Do not archive; this is a draft

RATING: R (adult themes and graphic description of eviscerated corpses)

All C/C and commentary is welcomed at echonymph@msn.com (trust me, I need the C/C, save your eyes, preserve the grammatical sanctity of the ffml, please, please C/C)

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CATHARSIS: ONE (part a - hey, this is a work in progress, you know)
Hubris/Pride Above Power

=====

Some people were uncooperative.

Some people were simply insane.

Others grew to acquire so many eccentricities and abnormalities that they became legends.

It so happened on that sun-soaked March afternoon that Michi Hirugashi was about to meet one of Japan's most notorious detectives.  She'd heard stories about him, of course, a man who didn't have all his faculties in perfect order.  It was said that his blue eyes glowed chaotic, and that he was extremely unpredictable, ready at will to rip the arms off of anyone who dared to violate his ideal of propriety.  But he also possessed a phenomenal success rate that had at times reached 75%, and was thus disposed only to the most difficult and gory of cases.

Which was probably why he was being put into action in the Special Ops department, and probably why he was being partnered with her.

And while she would have been thrilled to meet the man in person - having worked for the Japanese Government's Special Operations department for nearly seven years, and hearing about three thousand different variations of how insane he was - she didn't want what she was given: that being, of course, a partnership.

Michi scowled into the dim light of the offices, seeing her boss' shadow form a hefty outline against the blurred glass window in his doorway.  She could see him checking his watch and hear him saying, "She's usually late, but not *this* late.  Women."   She heard him release masculine chuckle and had to steel her nerves against the sudden, overwhelming urge to kick the man in the office between the legs.  Hard.  Hopefully, hard enough to dislodge the chauvinism that seemed to reside there.

The Japanese Police Department was still a boys club; any way you looked at it, women had to work three times as hard for one tenth the recognition given to their male counterparts.  That wasn't to say that women weren't appreciated, in recent years, equal-opportunity was gaining upon the outdated parochial society of Japan, yet it did not extend its reach to all aspects.  Fortunately, Michi Hirugashi was hardly a rampant femnist.  While she harbored no outward nor secret desire to stay home and raise her children as a good, quiet housewife, her irritation toward the male-dominated was tempered with a long-suffering resignation; she knew what society thought was her proper place, while she had no plans to occupy it, it didn't mean that she had to press frantically against the gilded cage that contained her.

Taking a breath, she strode towards the office and flung open the door.  She took in her boss' shocked and halfway embarrassed expression, and flopped into a chair.  She glared at him darkly.  Certainly, due to both her upbringing and her subordinance, she could hardly *say* something to the effect of "you jackass," but she could certainly think it.

He smiled weakly at her.  "G-Good afternoon, Detective Hirugashi."

'At least,' Michi thought, 'he has the good sense to look ashamed.'  She narrowed her eyes at him.  "I could be better, Detective Eda" she answered coldly.

He sighed, running his hands over his tired face.  Michi felt a sudden pulse of worry as she saw his facial expression.  He was absolutely exhausted, by the looks of it.  There were dark circles underneath his eyes, and his entire form looked drained, as if someone had let out the bull-headed spark that fueled him.

"Is there anything wrong?" she asked, leaning forward her in seat to see his eyes cloud over with frustration.

"Just this case, Hirugashi.  Just this case."  Her commanding officer cleared his throat and continued, "The reason you were called into this meeting was so that you could meet your new partner - he's very good, and very, very dangerous."  He cocked an eyebrow at her.  "I assume the rumor mill already informed you."

"Yes," she replied simply.  "Two weeks ago."

He shook his head slowly.  "I'm not going to lie to you, Hirugashi, he's been known to do some pretty lunatic things."  Eda grinned.  "I find that your personalities would," he trailed off, searching for the proper words, "be more *cohesive* than those of the other officers in this department."

Michi was surprised, and felt a new respect for Eda deep in her heart.  She'd always assumed that he, like much of the force, looked down upon her and her abilities because of her gender; rather, now it seemed that Eda thought more highly of her than even her *male* coworkers.  She harbored this secret pleasure and decided that the day didn't look so terribly grim; after all, equality was making headway.

And then she realized his rational: she and Saotome would be 'cohesive.'  Read: similar in thought and action.  She found herself frowning slightly.  She'd heard plenty of rumors over the years.  In fact, she'd almost been sent on the Kyoto case that had made Saotome a precinct legend.  His reputation was very clear to her, and Michi found no parallels.

"He's a renegade, Detective Eda; we're entirely different," she said, her voice solemn.

"Different," her boss laughed, "is not the word that I would use."  He calmed himself for a moment before adding, "You may have the fancy degree from medical school, and the training from Quantico - and we're proud that you did so well and proved yourself so strong - but you're too much like him, watch your step."

She rolled her eyes, drawing a frown to her boss' face.  He'd had been a good cop for many years, risen through the ranks and finally gotten a good position in a rather unsavory part of the Japanese police department - the one that got all the unpleasantness that the regular force didn't deal with. Tokyo Homicide's Special Operations department dealt with the types of crimes that were too much for the public knowledge, too disturbing to the general psyche.  Unfortunately, with this assignment came over 30 police officers who were the best and most jaded of the bunch; they had no patience for diplomacy, and very little respect for their superiors, something that had gotten them in trouble during their promotions, but landed them in their own private kasbah: the S.O. Dept.  While on the whole Michi Hirugashi was an exception, there were still times that he wished desperately to be able to put the fear of reckoning in her: an impossible task at which he'd failed countless times before.

"I'm sure I can handle it, Detective Eda," Michi said offhandedly.  "If worse comes to worse, I'll sedate him."  The man before her frowned, his face turning pale.

Then suddenly, there was the presence of another human being in the room, and a low, pleasant voice, "I'm very resistant to drugs, you know.  I hope you have a backup plan."

She whirled around at the sound of the voice, gray eyes growing wide at the sudden appearance of a strange man.  He was sturdily built, lithe, well-muscled, with a strong jaw and high cheekbone.  His eyes flashed slate-blue, shaded by a brush of wild, dark, bangs, the rest of his hair was cut rather messily, leaving the whole of it longish and thick, teasing her momentarily with the idea of running her fingers through it.  His mouth was drawn into a small, nearly persnickety, smile across his face.  Like every other man in the Special Ops department, he was dressed in a conservative suit, his being a dusty blackish color, offset badly by a pale, cream-colored shirt and a paisley tie.  He looked slightly disheveled, like a college professor after his lunch break, and gave off a comfortable, familiar air.  He did not look like the type of man to level buildings with a glare.

The ill-matched clothing did nothing to hide the stranger's more attractive physical traits; Michi had to admit that this was a fine male specimen standing before her, grinning and holding out his hand to shake hers.

He looked repentant for a moment when presented with her stunned facial expression.  "Ranma Saotome."

She gathered up what remained of her dignity and replied, shaking his hand firmly, "It's all right, Detective Saotome, and I shouldn't have said that, anyway."

He waved it off, releasing her hand.  "Forgiven."

She smiled.

"Right," she said quickly, standing up.  "I'm looking forward to working with you, Detective Saotome," she said, slightly abashed.

He managed to hide the grin that spread wide over his features long enough to say, "Likewise."

=====

END PROLOGUE

One Month Later

=====

"Three dead bodies, and not one warm one," she sighed, leaning against the hood of the car, stretching her arms out into the morning sunlight, and completely ignoring the expression her partner tossed in her direction.  "This is the type of bitch wrapped up in a conundrum tied in an enigma that ought to be shot on sight."

"Well," he said evenly, "seeing whoever is getting away with this *is* getting away with this, it might be a little more complex than that."  Ranma caught himself staring at her as he spoke, and quietly rebuked himself, turning away as quickly as possible.

He breathed in deeply and tried to banish the thoughts that fluttered through his mind.  Michi Hirugashi was a strange reminder of a past that he preferred to forget.  She looked remarkably like - well - like Akane.  But that was to be understood.  His ex-wife's dark hair and shining eyes, the shadowy charm that she had exhibited, they were rather typical traits of beauty: pretty adjectives that could have been used to describe over 90% of the lovely brunettes that the world had borne.  Though Michi may have resembled Akane, she bore no other similar characteristics.

While Akane had been quick tempered, he found his new partner pleasantly good-natured, stubborn, but ultimately hard to anger.  Where Akane was difficult to read, Michi's moods were as translucent as glass, she wore her emotions on her sleeve.  When she was angry, the world damn well knew about it, and when she was happy, so too, did the world share her joy.

Michi smirked at Ranma, saying strangely, "You know, Ranma, nearly five weeks of working with you, and I've yet to hear one thing come out of that mouth of yours that isn't strictly related to police business."

He frowned, settling himself next to her on the hood of the silver-gray sedan uncomfortably.  "That's not true, what about the first words I ever said to you?"

She laughed at the memory, breaking their eye contact and glancing across the way towards the bustling streets of a Tokyo afternoon, watching people with a dim fascination that never escaped Ranma's notice.  "I suppose that counts, but just barely."  Turning back to him, she said, "But still, aside from that first day, that's it."  She cocked her head to one side.  "I know nothing about you, really.  Just what's in your file, and what I could gather from your multiple commendations and assorted reprimands."  She smiled.  "You're a mystery, Ranma."

He was quiet for a moment, drowning in the sound of the streets.  "Well, you've told me nothing about yourself, either."

She rolled her eyes.  "Name: Michi Hirugashi; Age: 32; Blood Type: O negative; Parents: in a dreadful fit over whether or not their daughter will ever give them grandchildren - shall I go on?"

"Hush, Michi," he said, amusement glittering in his eyes as he smiled at her.  "You've made your point.  So I'm not entirely forthcoming; I've got my reasons."

She shrugged.  "Fair enough."  Crumpling her coffee cup into a ball, narrowing her eyes, and shooting carefully, she landed it perfectly into a nearby trashcan.  Grinning proudly, Michi clapped her hands together, catching his smiling gaze as she slipped off the hood and into the driver's seat.  "Come on, I've got the autopsy bay for us in ten minutes.  Maybe the latest victim will reveal something the other ones haven't."

He rolled his eyes, stuffing his long legs and arms into the moderate-sized sedan, grunting softly at the discomfort and wishing quietly that Michi would just let them take his car.  She had looked puzzled at his gentle prodding, saying only that her car was already there, why not go ahead and take the simplest route?  She had not understood all the height references; Ranma had a sneaking suspicion that Michi wouldn't have cared either way.

"You're the only woman in the world who would rather hang around a half decomposed body than go out for dinner and dancing," he remarked.

She looked both ways as she pulled out of her precarious spot along the side of the road, murmuring in a distracted tone of voice, "Is that an offer, Ranma?"

"No," he said quickly, looking at her in sharp surprise.  "It most certainly is not."  The sudden shock of it making his hands nervous, and he fumbled with the seatbelt for half a second before finally hearing the familiar click.

She didn't seem to be offended, and signaling, the car merged into traffic.  "Then stop bugging me about it."

=====

To: AkaRyo@tdojo.co.jp
From: rsaotome@police.go.jp
Subject: Surprises

Dear Akane and Ryoga,

Congratulations!  I heard from Kasumi last week that you're planning to welcome your third child in a few months!  I always knew you guys would have a whole mess of them - but at such close intervals?  Gosh, Akane, can't you keep that pig off of you at the hospitals?

I'm kidding, honest.

The point is - since she mentioned it, I thought this would be the perfect time to mention my own surprise - I'm back in Tokyo!  Yes, after spending nine years in Kyoto patrolling shrine-thieves (please, I'm still mentally scarred from the boredom) and the occasional bust, I'm where the heat is.  Don't be surprised if you hear plenty of bad things about me in the papers soon.  Actually, I've been here for awhile, but what with finding an apartment and settling in, filling out paperwork and getting a new partner (M. Hirugashi, got a set of iron balls if I've even dealt with iron balls), writing to you just slipped my mind!  Thank God for email, I probably would have never actually *written*.

Hmm - well, my address and a couple of important legal documents that Akane probably needs to sign (just a few dojo papers - you know, finalization of the sale and things like that) are attached.  Just so you can glance over them.

Once again, I wish you two the greatest happiness.

- RS

PS - Send Kasumi and Nabiki my love

=====

"Need any help?" he asked dryly.

Although watching his 5'1" partner struggle with the autopsy saw and the victim's ribcage was massively fascinating - if very, very nauseating - he couldn't bear to hear her rock back on her heels and curse under her breath any more.  There seemed to be a distinct pattern about it.  First, she'd strain and mutter darkly for five minutes, attempting to wrench something that would occasionally make sickening, squelching noises inside the body cavity.  Then, having failed to accomplish whatever she'd been trying to do, she'd pull the bloodied, metal rib-cutters away from the body, occasionally banging it against the autopsy table and cursing loudly.  She'd pout, stomp a bit, compose herself, and go again.  So it went for the twenty minutes where Ranma had watched her.

The assistant had begged off of duty, as a resident at the hospital and highly superstitious about death in general, being in the same room with the body was giving the poor kid the hives.  Michi had rolled her eyes, waving the child off, grunting about the "quality of the garbage that med school was turning out these days."  Based upon a strict code of medical ethics, what she was doing (performing an autopsy without a deiner) was dreadfully wrong and bad; she didn't particularly care.

She turned her eyes to Ranma, the curiously dark mercury color masked by a pair of slightly yellowed goggles, and smirked.  "Finally, you ask.  I was about to pray for gaining thirty pounds."  She stepped back, handed him a pair of autopsy gloves, helped him pull them up over the cuffs of his suitcoat, and told him exactly what to do.  "I need you to saw straight down the sternum, can you do that?"

He rolled his eyes, and with his voice dripping sarcasm, he held the saw over the partially exposed and cut-open stomach.  "Oh, you mean this thing?"

"Cute, Ranma, real cute," she said, guiding the saw back to the ribs, fingers brushing carelessly along his strong, calloused hands, not noticing the way his eyes studied the movement.  With an intent expression, she watched him work through the bone in moments.  'Dammit,' she thought mournfully, 'that would have taken me an hour.  The guy most lift some serious weights.'

"There you go, Michi, now, tell me, what have we learned from this sickening experience?" he said, peeling the gloves off of his hands with a 'snap' and tossing them away quickly.  When he turned back around, he realized that his partner's face was *pressed into* the pried-open chest cavity of the three-months-past dead man.  He whispered a silent word of thanks that she was wearing a surgical hairnet, had she ended up sitting across from him while picking entrails out of her hair, he wasn't sure he'd be able to keep his gag reflex from overwhelming him.

"Well, nothing specific," she admitted, voice hollow.  "Did you bring down the labs?"  After Michi had dismissed the assistant, she'd glanced at her watch and chuffed in annoyance, turning to Ranma and saying, "Make yourself useful," before sending him upstairs to retrieve a set of test results.

He nodded mutely, and grabbed the folder that he'd placed on the counter.  She pulled her face away, wiping a smear of blood off of her goggles with the sleeves of her dark blue hospital scrubs and snapping off her gloves.  With a sigh, she grabbed a coffee cup as she took the folder from him, asking curiously, "Hey, are you all right?  You look sort of faint."  She said this with a look of bewilderment, as if being faint while in a room with a three-months dead, hacked-open corpse was the oddest thing in the universe.

He shook his head.  "In all my years working on murders and assault, I never had to sit through an autopsy."  He turned a bit paler.  "This is just a little bit nauseating."  He would have left, but earlier, he'd requested to watch the autopsy, just so he could be there in case there were any medical revelations (since the crime scenes had yielded nothing useful).  Michi had sighed and muttered and tried to convince him not to stay; Ranma had been firm.  She'd finally given in.  It would hardly be polite to bolt after causing all that trouble so he could watch.

She shrugged.  "You can leave if you want."  She was smirking wickedly.

He desperately wanted to run out of the room.  The body was not only months-dead (which, in and of itself, was bad enough), it was months-dead with bits of soil and wood stuck to it from having been exhumed.  Michi had commented that they were just lucky that Mr. Soru's family had not chosen to have him cremated, or else vital evidence would have been lost.  At the moment, Ranma saw little else other than an utterly disgusting half-man/half-goo formation on her autopsy table.  He had to give Michi credit; she had to have either no sense of smell or balls of steel to sit through this with a serene expression on her face.

Serene, perhaps, wasn't the correct word.  She looked smug.

Ranma felt sheepish and angry all at the same time.  She had *known* he would seek an excuse to leave!  She'd *known* when she'd decided to let him stay!  He steeled his nerves and tried to dull his sense of smell, determined not to let her get the best of him; if this was her way of testing his intestinal fortitude, then by God, he'd prove that Ranma Saotome was made of rock solid steel.

"No," he replied hastily.  'More like oatmeal right now,' he thought sickly. "I'm fine," he insisted, feeling his ire rise at the knowing expression on Michi's face.  'If she says anything, I swear,' he promised himself, 'I'll kill her.'

Instead, Michi just smiled.  "Of course."

He snarled at her.  "Go on.  What do the labs say?"

She raised an eyebrow to him, but said no more on the subject.  She bent her head to the still-warm computer printouts, frowning deeply.  "Death by poison."  She glanced upward as he asked:

"Poison?"  He wandered over to her side, leaning the small of his back against the edge of the counter. He causally eased her coffee mug from her fingertips, wanting the strong, familiar smell of it to calm his nerves.

She sighed.  "Yes.  For example," she said, an annoyed tone in her voice as she watched Ranma pressing his lips to the rim of her cup, "a notably potent protein poison is caffeine."  Ranma turned pale, and set down her mug, momentarily content not to sneak long swallows of her 1500 yen a pound fairly-traded Hazelnut Cream coffee.  She smirked.  "The fact that a good, lethal dose of caffeine, about 35 mg, distilled straight from coco beans, would have made his heart explode, lead me to believe that *wasn't* it.  We're actually lucky in that respect."

Ranma frowned.  "What do you mean?"

"Like all protein based poisons, the caffeine would have petered out of his blood stream eventually, and considering this body is nearly three months old - we'd have no direction."

Ranma looked thoughtful.  "Why *is* the body three months old, anyway?  I thought you said that your guys had swept and checked the scene just a few hours after death."  If it was one thing that drove Ranma to absolute frustration, it was that he knew that he hadn't been on the case for the entire *duration* of the case.  He knew only what the reports said and what Michi remembered to tell him.  He had no opportunities to gather the atmosphere at the crime scene, nor know all the details of the crime.

Michi snorted derisively.  "That we did.  But considering the fact that this man was fairly high up on the socioeconomic ladder, and his family had reservations about letting me slice and dice..." she trailed off.  "You get the idea."

Ranma cocked his head to the side, seeing her face turn slightly red.  She was frustrated, irate, annoyed.  He fought the urge to grin; Michi was just as tired of bureaucratic nonsense as he was.

She took a breath, and continued, "It seems that Soru-san was given a rather rare poison."  She walked over to the lab counter, picking up a folder and handing it to him.  "Wolfsbane.  It's seasonal - we're right on time for a new crop of it to pop out." she bit her lip, "The victim would have had to have ingested an impressive amount of the poison derived from distillation.  He would have had a burning sensation, coldness, shaking, sweating - all within the first couple of minutes."  She furrowed her brow, and lowering her eyes to the paper again, she said in a softer tone, "Then there would be numbness, vomiting, diarrhea, severe abdominal pain.  Cause of death would ultimately be cardiac arrest.  He would have had six hours, tops."  She stared at the body for a moment.  "We found signs of diarrhea, and vomiting, which is the only reason that we suspected something other than a simple heart attack."

Ranma blanched, amazed that she was able to prattle off that list of symptoms without feeling the slightest bit queasy.  He added it to the increasing list of things that he couldn't seem to understand about this new partner.

He sighed softly.  "I'm confused.  There was no discernable causes of death on the previous murder victims either, so I'm going to assume that they were poisoned in this manner," Ranma said studiously, staring at the lab folder and flipping through pages and pages of blood-analysis, noting with a whistle that the alcohol content at the time of death.  "So how come the previous tox screens came up blank?"

She grinned.  "Because they *were* blank."  Ranma reached for her coffee mug again, and she frowned, saying, "Perhaps those men drank caffeine."

Her partner scowled at her, and in outright defiance, he took a mouthful, swallowing slowly, he commented, "Good stuff, Hirugashi."  She sighed, turning to look at the dead body.  She shook her head, glancing at Ranma again as she said:

"But then again - the distillation process would take lots of time, patience, and extensive knowledge of medicinal herbs.  The entire process would take days, maybe even weeks; who would do that?"

He bit his lip - memory flashing back in a cloud of black rose petals.

=====

To: nerriy@tech.co.jp
From: mhirugashi@police.go.jp
Subject: Kazuaki-crisis!

Nerri -

I'm at a crisis.  I have something to admit: Kazuaki asked me to marry him a few weeks ago...and I said yes.  I don't know what was going through my head (obviously, my brain was on vacation).  I know I don't love him.  That much was apparent to me from the first time he told me that he did.  I don't know what to do anymore.  My parents waited for me to remarry years ago, they gave up hope, and I'm tired of waiting.

What if there's no perfect man?

Argh.  Come over tonight, we must binge.  I will shop.

New partner, Saotome - hot, but not.  Handsome in a mature, dark-haired sort of way, but much too polite for you.  Not at all like Tomo.  People say he's a lunatic, haven't seen any signs so far, I would tell you if he starts frothing at the mouth - that *is* your type of thing - but I don't want you corrupting the people I work with.

Later - Michi

=====

"Right, I'll meet you tomorrow morning, bright and early at the soba stand near the station, all right?  We've got stakeout for the next twelve hours - so pee if you've got to pee, and don't drink anything before getting in the car!" came the warning voice.

Ranma had to chuckle at the tone, even over a cell phone, her every emotion was translated through her voice.  "Hirugashi - lay off the booze yourself tonight, I don't want to bust our watch so you can run to the McDonalds and let you into the ladies room."

He heard her snorting over the line.  "I'll pee into a damn cup before I'll ruin the stakeout, Saotome."  She paused.  "Oh, yeah, bring food."

He raised his eyebrow, turning the key to his apartment in the lock, and punching the knob twice as he twisted it to get the door open.  Once inside the room, he slammed it behind him, tossing his long trench coat onto a chair, and tossing his suit jacket in the 'dry-clean' basket near the bathroom.  He kicked off his shoes, pushing them with a foot into his hall closet and closing it softly, glancing around his nearly spotless apartment with a vague sense of dissatisfaction.  He'd moved into the apartment just a few weeks ago, and there were still some boxes stacked precariously in his apartment.  But with his social calendar, he was guaranteed to have all of those unpacked by the next week.

"What kind of food?" he asked, focusing immediately on the most important thing in the immediate future.

"*Edible*, preferably," she said. 'Well,' he conceded, a faint smile on his face, 'at least she's not a picky woman.'  "All right, see you tomorrow, seven o'clock," she reminded him, and hung up.

He pressed 'end' on the phone, a grin still on his tired face.  With a long sigh, he wandered into the bedroom of the small, but comfortable, apartment. Unbuttoning his shirt with one hand and untucking it with the other, he hummed softly to himself, eyes far away as he went through the usual motions.  Changing from his stringently regulated work-clothes into a gray t-shirt and a pair of old jeans.  And heading towards his kitchen to fix dinner, he caught a momentary image of himself in the mirror.

He was older, if not old.  And he looked wiser, if not wise.  His eyes didn't sparkle as arrogantly as they once had, and he had yet to decide whether that was a positive or negative thing.  His hair was his deepest regret, but the Japanese Government required all their law enforcement officers to wear short hair - the way his was cut was already pushing the limit - and he did that enough already without adding fuel to the Eliminate Saotome fire.

Setting the kettle to boil, he stared out of the kitchen window.  The sunset was starting, and faded tones of oranges and reds made the clouds swell with their colors and shades - everything was softened in their light.  There was something very maternal about sundown, the way the brilliant blue of the night start so softly at the edges of the sky, and slowly wrapped its soft arms about the heavens, whispering lullabies and twinkling with stars.

He was setting out to do something that was undeniably foolish that night, and he wasn't looking forward to it, either.  Contrary to popular opinion, Ranma did not seek trouble.

'Grow up, Ranma,' he lectured himself sternly.  'You sat through an autopsy today, you wasn't a three-months past dead man being hacked open by a small, irritated woman.  You can do this.'

And then there was a sudden zapping sound of a fuse shorting out, loud, audible curses coming from the next apartment over, and darkness claimed the apartment - all the lights winking out and his stove turning off.

Growling, Ranma pounded his fist against the wall, yelling, "Damn it, Toshi - this is getting ridiculous!"  To which a frightened, teenaged voice replied:

"I'm sorry, Saotome-san!  Really!  I'll get the manager to fix it up right now!  Honest!"

He sighed.  "What was it this time?"

The muffled voice was now filled with excitement, "Man, it's beautiful, an absolute black-market electronics sampler - didn't think it would short out the entire floor."  There was an uncomfortable pause, "Again."

Ranma rolled his eyes.  "You know I'm supposed to arrest people who do stuff like that, right?"

"Um - right."  There was a pause.  "Oh, man, my parents are going to be so pissed off."  Ranma laughed softly, walked across the kitchen, into his living room, opened the hall closet door, took out a leather jacket, and left, locking his front door behind him.  Oblivious to the panicking voice still chattering to the empty room.

"I really didn't think that you could get in trouble for something like this!  I mean, had I but known, I would have *reported* these - these *hackers* for their flagrant disregard for the law!  I mean, I'm not a bad kid, Saotome-san - you have to know that!  Oh, God, I'm not going to get into college, much *less* TouDai!  Oh, God, I'm going to be a bum!  Oh, God, oh, God - Saotome-san?  Are you there?  Saotome-san?"

=====

To: AkaRyo@tdojo.co.jp
From: rsaotome@police.go.jp
Suject: Re:[Re:Surprises]

Ryoga -

I was kidding, you damn lunatic.  Besides, one well-worded phone call and your ass would be grass and a judge would be the mower - you don't wanna run that risk.

Get your mind out of your pants, iron balls = one tough chick.  *Michi* Hirugashi - she's a woman!  Keep your homosexual fantasies to yourself, please!

Good Lord - I got the pictures you sent, the dojo's overflowing with kids!  Two from Kasumi and Tofu, two and a third from you and Akane, and with Nabiki visiting, how do you guys have any space?  At least there's no significant property damage.  Tako can't break anything other than wood at this point, right?  And if he can - damnit Ryoga!  The kid is four!

Tell Kasumi I got the thing through, she ought to have no trouble with the suppliers for now, and I got the collectors to lay off of the clinic for a while.  But tell them to get on it - I can't hold them off forever if the place never turns a profit.  I'm not that good at finagling.  Shouldn't this be Nabiki's department?

How're the students?  Any of them ask about me?

-RS

=====

"Table for one, Sir?" asked a perky, redheaded waitress.  He whipped around at the female tone, and with an embarrassed smile, said:

"No, actually.  Two."

She led him through the small, cozy diner, seating him in what obviously was her section of the floor, a bewitching smile on her face.  "So," she said quickly, "are you always at a table for two, or is there a chance you might have an empty seat the next time out?"

He frowned softly.  Romantic relationships were something that he had sworn off nearly a decade ago, fresh out of college, bitter and angry at the entire world.  Of course - he had been notoriously bad at keeping that oath, and had spent about six years philandering around, caught a case of the clap, and after being laughed at by his doctor, decided that maybe celibacy wasn't so terrible after all.

But he needed an excuse - the woman looked like one of the persistent ones.  "Well," he started, leaning forward and thinking hard.

"If you're still taking orders, I'd like a bourbon chaser, please."

Ranma's head whipped up, his eyes wide with surprise and a hint of fear, the expression tempered by good amounts of thankfulness: he'd been saved.

He and the waitress both stared intently at the tall, elegant woman before them.  'She's still as beautiful today as she was years ago,' Ranma thought distractedly.  His observation was not unfounded: her ebony black hair shined nearly purple in the dim light of the restaurant, and her cold, shimmering eyes were violet-gray, hinting at wisdom earned over time.  Her figure, Ranma surmised, was still the perfect six that he'd seen in years past when she still pranced around nearly nude, and the damnably sensual smile on her face had not changed at all.

The waitress, observing his startled, awestruck expression, pouted and stomped away, leaving Ranma and the woman alone at the dinner table.

The woman smiled.  "It's been too long, Ranma."

Ranma, gathering himself, managed a feeble, "Hello, Kodachi."

=====

To: nerriy@tech.co.jp
From: mhirugashi@police.go.jp
Subject: Re: You're a whore

Nerri -

I don't think I'm toying with him.  I probably will marry him, is that sad?  Hey, I'm post-30, I'm hardly a catch, and I don't want you contradicting me on this point, we both know the reality of my situation.  You're engaged (granted to total crap, but still), I am both widowed and 32 years old.  I've got very little to look forward to.

Oh, and I'm not telling you anything.  Ranma's a colleague; I'm not letting you sink your claws into him.

Anyway, I expect you at my apartment at half past ten.  Tell Tomo that you and I are going to have a lesbian orgy or something.  If he's fallen for it twice before, why not go for lucky three?

I have to meet Kazuaki in twenty minutes, pray for me.

Later - Michi

=====

"You're beautiful, Michi," sighed the man in front of her.

She repressed a yawn as she said, "Thank you."

It wasn't that she didn't enjoy Kazuaki's company, he treated her like some sort of treasure, always cautiously chivalrous around her, watching his every move.  His charm had won her over the first time she'd seen in the street, and her wit had intoxicated him.

Calling him a date was a tad bit of an understatement.

Technically - she was probably supposed to marry him.

She twisted the platinum engagement ring on her finger; gently tracing the princess cut diamond with idle brevity.  She didn't wear it outside of her meetings with Kazuaki, and no one else knew of their engagement, either.  Not her coworkers, not her friends, not her family - and she preferred to keep it that way.

She rested her cheek on her hand and watched her fianc� as he complained to the waitress about the temperature of his wine, citing the slightly over-chilled liquid as an injustice to sommeliers everywhere.  She barely repressed the urge to remind him that his knowledge of fine wine extended as far as the difference between a Chardonnay and hard cider, but bit her tongue.  Sure, he was attractive, with dark blond hair and laughing green eyes - but he was just so *wrong*.  He always drank in moderation, dressed tastefully, took vacations when they were allotted, and took his work as a tax lawyer very seriously, pushing his reading glasses further up his nose each time when they lay in bed after making love, explaining some other facet of the Japanese tax code.

She guessed that she loved him, or at the very least, was fond of him, and for someone like her, wasn't that good enough?  She needed to learn how to be content, not to seek meaningless passion for the rest of her existence.

"Michi," he said, concern in his voice, "are you all right?  You've been - well, despondent all night."

She scowled darkly, and then was instantly regretful of the action as she saw the wounded expression on his face.  She sighed, saying, "I'm just tired, Kazuaki, I've got a stakeout tomorrow starting at seven, and well," she feigned a yawn, "this is really draining me."

"Why didn't you say something earlier?" he asked.  "I absolutely *command* you to go home and get to bed, you understand, Michi?"  She nodded, happy for once to go along with his 'orders'.

"If you say so, Kazuaki," she murmured, a demure expression on her face.

=====

To: ntendo@pricewaterhouse.co.jp
From: rsaotome@police.go.jp
Subject: hi

Nabiki -

Hey, back in Tokyo, sorry for the late alert, boxes take ages to unpack.  Ranma Saotome, master martial artist, defeated by yards of packing tape.  How's Jacob?  Did the gaijin turn out to be better stock than Japanese guys?

You'll never guess who I'm having dinner with tonight.

-RS

=====

"How have your last few years been?" Ranma asked quietly.  He looked up to her nervously, gauging her reaction.

The whole night had been...surreal.

At first, when he'd called, he'd been stunned by how calm and collected she'd seemed, nothing at all like the half-crazed girl he knew from years long past.  Now, at dinner, he found his surprise increasing exponentially.  Kodachi was not only more collected, she was very nearly, well, very nearly...*attractive*.  Her maniacal laughter had been toned down into a soft, effeminate giggle, and her eyes, once twinkling so disturbingly, had grown softer, if not soft.  She was funny and sweet, gentle and everything that pleasant dinner conversation was supposed to be.  Everything that could have changed (aside from her icy beauty), had changed.

She smiled gently.  "I spent a few years at Nerima Psychiatric after you left," she admitted.  At Ranma's very badly feigned expression of astonishment, Kodachi continued, a slightly amused tone in her voice.  "You don't have to pretend, you know."

Ranma smiled, abashed.  "I just didn't think that you'd...you know."

She raised an eyebrow.  "Let them put in the hospital?"  He nodded.  "I did resist," she started, and at Ranma disbelieving expression, she blushed, "quite a bit."

"I can imagine," Ranma said kindly, a grin on his face.

She looked away for a moment, unwilling to meet his curious gaze as she started speaking, "It was strange, and scary.  I'd been hearing people say that I was nuts all my life, no one ever, ever *did* anything about it, you know?"  She smiled weakly, her eyes still far away.  "For three years, I sat in a room, went to group discussions, and after three years, I finally started to get well, because I wanted it."  She turned to Ranma, a bashful expression on her face.  She said, "So?" as if she was looking for his approval.

He stared at her in genuine admiration, just observing her delicate features and the new calm that pervaded her.  She was so peaceful, so unlike the girl he had both feared and hated so long ago.  It was time to make amends, a time to create friendships that ought to have existed years and years ago.

He found himself grinning wildly as he said, "I'm just - I'm just amazingly proud of you."

She blushed bright red.

"What brings you back to Tokyo, Ranma?" she finally asked, a question that had plagued her mind all night.

Ranma found himself frowning.  "I requested a transfer out of Kyoto."

"Oh," was all she said.  "I read about you in the papers last year."  He nodded vaguely, sipping his wine idly and wondering at what she thought of him.  "I think what you did was very brave," she finished quietly.  "Those men deserved what they got."

He hid the flush that rose to his cheeks.  "You don't have to say that, Kodachi."

She cocked an eyebrow at him.  "I mean it."

Ranma regarded her curiously, now more certain than ever that his initial theory was bunk.  In fact, he was starting to grow ashamed that he'd even had the slightest thought in that direction.  The Kodachi of his childhood memory might have been slightly psychotic, but hardly a murderer.  Regardless of her reckless endangerment of his other fianc�es, that hadn't meant that she'd had *murderous* intentions.  She was just a competitive girl.

'That's it,' he decided, 'my suspicions were way off.  It wouldn't have been her.  Not a chance.  Kodachi's not like that, not anymore.'

She smiled at him.  "What are you thinking about?  You look...distant."

Startled, he replied, "O-oh!  Nothing, really.  Just got the stares."

And so the night drew on.  They spoke like new friends, with bright and eager anticipation of what was to come.  Both knew with certainty that they'd never been embroiled in deep romance (some things in the past were not forgiven nor forgotten).

There were always other things.

=====

To: aoi120690@hotmail.co.jp
From: mhirugashi@police.go.jp
Subject: Re:[Dad's B-day]

Look, Aoi, I don't understand what part of "I don't have time" you don't get.  Sure, fine, I'll chip in for the gift; whatever, I do it every year.  But I cannot (and will not) drop everything and drag my ass to Osaka in the middle of an important case.

=====

"It's cold out here, Ranma," she muttered hatefully, watching her partner saunter up to the noodle stand, hands casually tucked into the pockets of his pants.  "How can you be nonchalant?"

Michi was dressed in a pair of dark blue jeans, a Quantico t-shirt, sweatshirt, and a heavy coat over top of it all.  Good, thick socks and sneakers were keeping her feet marginally thawed.  She still felt like a popsicle.  He was wearing a t-shirt with the letters 'TDS' emblazoned on it and a pair of ratty pants.  He looked as if he was walking through the tropics.

He shrugged, in a remarkably good mood, saying, "Conditioning, the weather stopped bugging me a long while back."

She stared at him for a bit, cursing him silently, before asking, "What was that on the phone last night?  *Were* you drunk?"

He blushed.  "Nah - but I have to thank you.  I had a run-in with one of those overly enthusiastic waitresses, if you know what I mean."  She laughed.  "What was it that occurred to you last night?"

She shrugged.  "Just that it seems odd there's no discernable purpose for these killings, I mean, if they're yakuza killings at all."

Ranma raised his eyebrows.  "Well, if they aren't, we'll just have to take it as it comes, won't we?"

She growled, but jerked her head towards the car.  "Come on, the warehouse we're watching opens for business in about an hour and a half.  Lets not screw this up."

=====

To: AkaRyo@tdojo.co.jp
From: rsaotome@police.go.jp
Subject: don't push it

P-chan -

First off - Hirugashi is my *work partner*.  Meaning that there is no sexual interaction between the two of us.  Our most stimulating conversations occur in rooms ten feet underground soaked in formaldehyde and stocked with dead people in coolers.

Second - Ryoga, do you want Tako to end up like me?  I thought not.  Lay off the kid, and don't let Akane make him eat anything she cooks by himself.

Are you serious?  They all really want me to visit again?  All right, when I've got time, I'll drop by the dojo.  They *do* need an instructor who *actually* knows martial arts occasionally - long enough with you, and anyone would forget how to fight.

How's Tendo-san holding up?  And my Mom and Dad?

I'll see you in a week anyway when you and Akane come by to finalize the deal.

- RS

=====

They had taken one of the department cars that day - sleek and gray and aged so that it looked inconspicuous in any crowd.  Driven by a crowd of people who were later asked to describe it, all they could remember was its color.

Ranma was at the wheel that day, and sidling up against the street, and squinting to see over the blinding sunrise, he muttered, "Shit, this is going to be a pain in the ass."

She nodded, and turning on the radio, leaving it on so softly that it was barely audible, they spent the first two hours of their stakeout staring at people pull into the warehouse and leave, the morning radio shows whispering in their ears.  Off and on, Ranma wondered whether or not they were *allowed* to play music in the car while they were on stakeout, it had been expressly forbidden as long as he'd worked with the Tokyo Police Department. He hid a grin; either Michi was directly disobeying a cardinal rule, or she had broken it so many times she'd forgotten there was a rule to begin with.  By the time lunch rolled around, both were starving.

Michi pulled out the first of twelve cds she had brought, pressing it into the player, she sighed happily as Louis Armstrong and the thick, sultry tones of a brass jazz started playing quietly in the car.  Grinning at Ranma, she said, "Well, Ranma - I provided entertainment, now you provide the food."  She looked expectant.

He reached into the backseat for the shopping bag he had toted along with himself into the car.  And setting it in his lap, he handed her a can of iced-tea, and a wrapped lunchbox.  "Salmon, unagi, and daikon bento," he explained, adding a bag of baked potato chips to the small pile in Michi's hands.

"Man," she said, a giggle coloring her tone, "you eat like a girl."

He scowled.  "Just because I don't suck down burgers and fat - " 'Anymore,' he added to himself silently " - doesn't mean I eat like a girl.  I just watch my diet, that's all."  He cautiously avoided mentioning how he was terrified he'd end up looking like his father.  Ignoring her expression and turned to look out the window, blue eyes focusing on a beaten-up Ford that parked itself conveniently beside the warehouse.  "Hey, Michi - check this out."  His partner, still chewing a mouthful of salmon leaned over to look out the window, eyes narrowed in the bright afternoon light.

"It seems kind of stupid for them to do anything underhanded in broad daylight, though, doesn't it, Saotome?" she asked, a slight daze in her voice.  She focused on the woman who stepped out of the car, and on the smiling man that ran up to her.  Moments later, the two were locked in an X-rated kiss in front of the warehouse.  "Huh," she said, a smirk on her face, "seems like she's got it bad."

At that exact moment, Ranma hung up his cell phone, having just been informed from HQ that the plates most definitely verified that the car was property of one Reiko Yosho - a known yakuza mistress - last seen in the company of Kaneda Ayoko, a suspected shipping and trade agent for the collaboration.  He specialized in narcotics, firearms, and shooting irate policemen where it mattered.

"Reiko Yosho," Ranma said, and added, "and I'm going to assume that man there is Ayoko himself."

Michi took the binoculars from his hands, and looking through them at the interminable kiss between the two, she shook her head slowly.  "No, no, it's not that bastard.  I remember him well enough.  It's someone else, someone a lot taller than Ayoko."  She turned to Ranma, "Hey, can you see his face?"

"Sorry, Hirugashi," he said, smirking, "there's a smudge of woman all over it."  His partner scowled at him.

"Fine, then just going by height and weight distribution, and how he holds himself, I can pretty much guarantee that it's not Ayoko."

Ranma raised an eyebrow.  "Really?  New guy stealing Ayoko's woman?"  His partner turned to grin at him.

"Interesting proposition, isn't it?" she smirked, and pausing, she sighed.  "Dammit, nothing's going to happen today.  Short of seeing that woman screw around with danger, maybe quite literally."  She turned to her partner, slumped against the headrest of her seat.  "So, talk."

He raised an eyebrow.  "We're on stakeout."

She shrugged.  "So?  If we miss something, the boys down at HQ won't'; the cameras and the mics are wired, they can see and hear better than us.  The only reason we're here is so the parking break doesn't come loose and the car doesn't roll down the side of a hill."  She grinned.  "So talk."

"About what?" he asked strangely, mentally conceding her point.  The truth in her statement was disconcerting.  Did it mean that they as investigators would soon become expendable?  Would detectives recede into the background of things, leaving officers bored wrecks in their offices, doing the billions on billions of pages of paperwork generated when their flawlessly accurate machine counterpart did something in the field?

She paused for a moment, seemingly free from the panicked wonderings that had seized Ranma.  "Marital status?" she ventured.

He sighed.  Most of the time, when he explained his past 'relationships', he earned either glares of loathing or looks of pity, neither or which he desired at that particular moment.  He wondered how he'd best approach it, after all, he had to work with Michi for a long time.  It seemed so far that she didn't care about the bad reputation that he'd garnered for himself in Kyoto; for that, he was eternally grateful, he had no urge to change her mind about him with the horrifying truth about his social life.  He bit his lip, carefully censoring the past before he said, "Engaged a few times, now I'm divorced."  She nodded, but added no commentary to his revelation.

"How come?" she asked.  He stared at her for a moment, blue eyes haunted.  'Shit,' she thought.  'Great, dumbass, poke his sore spot.'  "I'm sorry," she added quickly, "you don't have to answer."

He laughed ruefully.  "No, it's okay.  It's just that most people never ask me that - they sort of assume that I was an asshole to my wife."  He sighed, casting her a shy expression.  "You really want to hear the whole sob story?"

She nodded.  "But only if you're comfortable with telling me the whole sob story.  I don't want to pry."

He shrugged, glancing distractedly out the window, seeing that all the people had disappeared from the warehouse, and an enormous 'Closed for Dinner' sign had appeared on the doors.  For a brief, crazy moment, he wondered if the cameras on the car were rigged with x-ray capabilities.  "Actually, it'd be nice to get off my chest - most people just don't want to listen."

She smiled, for a moment reminding him of a girl with brown eyes he had cherished so long ago.  "Don't worry, Ranma; I've heard worse."

He looked uncomfortable for a moment.  "It's...pretty outrageous."

Michi cocked an eyebrow.  "I've heard outrageous."

"No," Ranma protested nervously, "we're talking anime outrageous."

She blinked at him.  "Well, then."

There was a long pause before she smiled at him encouragingly.  "I'm not going to accuse you of lying, Ranma.  Just tell it like it is."

=====

To: nerriy@tech.co.jp
From: mhirugashi@police.go.jp
Subject: Oh, God.

I'm in trouble.  My period is late - by three weeks.

What am I going to do?  What am I going to do?

Please, come over tonight - I bought a pregnancy test.  I'm panicking; I know if I try to do this on my own, I'll die.  I'll really and truly die.

=====

"That was...interesting," she said vaguely, the immediate memory of his tale of fianc�es and wives and lovers and friends still fresh in her mind.  Either her new partner was a pathological liar, and a fantastically creative one at that; she had half a mind to tell him to quit his job as an officer and pursue a career in writing fiction.  Then again, his voice and his eyes had been so earnest.  One of the first behavioral science classes that she'd taken at Quantico had dealt with the art of discerning truth from lie in the course of an interrogation.  His tone had never wavered, yet he didn't sound rehearsed.  He even looked truthful.

Ranma looked at her shyly.  The story he had told her had been the condensed version, he'd kept the parts about his curse from her, just the basic outline: Ranma meets Akane, Ranma meets another fianc�e, and another, and another, ends up marrying Akane after a lot of stuff happened.  Then was somehow, Ranma was left completely alone.  It was a tough tale to swallow under any circumstance, but by an investigator, it was even more unlikely to be believed.  He'd heard the doubt in her voice as she'd murmured her distant reply, yet decided not to push it.  'Great,' he thought miserably, feeling very doomed, 'if she has a hard time taking this, she's going to have a cow when she finds out that *other* stuff about me.'

They shared a companionable silence for a while before Ranma asked, more desperate to break the silence than anything else, "What about you?"

She sighed.  "I was married right out of college, before I went to med school."  She either ignored or did not note Ranma's expression of surprise. She'd said nothing about having a husband, nor did she wear a ring.  "I was twenty-one, na�ve and as stupid as they come."  She smiled softly, absently tracing a circle onto the dashboard of the car, eyes strangely distant.  "But I loved him, and he loved me.  We were happy for a while."  She paused, then added, "He died two years later."

"I'm sorry," Ranma said quietly.

"Don't be," she said firmly.  "I've moved on."  She smirked at him.  "I survived.  Though, I doubt my parents will, they're having a fit that I haven't remarried."  She cast him a sidelong expression, "Not as interesting as yours, but a story none the less."

He frowned.  "Why the pressure from your folks?"

Michi sighed.  "Haven't you ever heard the saying, Ranma?  'Women and Christmas cake are all useless after the 25th?'"  She glanced over to her partner and found him trying to hide his amusement under a false air of horror.  She rolled her eyes, trying to fight her smile.  "Appalled, I see."

"Absolutely," he replied.

She sighed, and looked out the window, effectively ending the brief, but enlightening conversation.

The rest of the stakeout passed uneventfully, and later on that evening, the partners that had relieved them relayed a rather depressing message: "Yeah, nothing out of the ordinary, in fact, aside from the fact that loverboy and lovergirl met here, *nothing* happened all day."

=====

To: ntendo@pricewaterhouse.co.jp
From: rsaotome@police.go.jp
Subject: You're kidding me!

Nabiki -

Engaged?  Really?!  The great Nabiki Tendo - settling for some gaijin with green eyes and blond hair?  Whose net worth is *only* 1.5 million dollars?  Why, I'm shocked!

In all seriousness, the best of luck to you and your fianc�, heaven hope that you don't end up like me.

Don't forget to invite me to your engagement party, and of course, the wedding!  And before you get any sick ideas:

I refuse to be a bridesmaid.

- RS

=====

"Arms importation?" Ranma called out.

She wrinkled her nose in concentration for a moment, and said, "Nah - the last shipment was caught, they'll lay off of that for at least two months."  She shrugged.  "Besides, as quasi-legal as the yakuza is, the higher-ups don't want attention either, they know there's a limit to how much we can tolerate."

Ranma was worried.  All day, Michi had been easily irritable, anxious: her eyes darted from the corners of the room like a trapped animal, and she'd been releasing long, tired sighs every few moments.  When he'd inquired as to what might have been wrong, she'd only shaken her head, apologized for her snappish behavior that day, and returned to wringing her hands.

Michi crossed her arms flat on her desk and laid her cheek against her hands, eyes closed.  It seemed that whatever was bothering her had peaked; she was surrendering to her fatigue.

He raised his eyebrow and commented, "I suppose that's got a certain kind of logic to it."  He looked up at her again.  "Drug trafficking?"

"I would have heard about it months ago," she murmured distractedly, eyes closed and listening to the quiet whir of her office fan.  She had gone home after the stakeout smelling of fresh air and the palest wisps of juniper, a strange combination that she attributed to being in the car with Ranma for so long.

"Right," he said, not questioning her statement, and looked up once more to say, "Far-fetched but - child pornography?"

She made a face at him.  "Disgusting as that is - it's a distinct possibility.  We're living in a country of underground sextrade."

He frowned.  "Prostitution?  Escort services?"

"You never know," she sighed unhappily.  She looked embarrassed for a moment.  "You sound like you did a lot of research for this case already."

He'd spent the last three nights holed up in his apartment and in the crime library, trying to connect various yakuza gangs and members, attempting to link their activities to what had been happening.  He'd researched all possible avenues, contacted all his informants, and paid Nabiki an exorbitant amount of money to try and get a different perspective.  'Damn right I've done a lot of research,' he thought.  'No thanks to you.  What's going on with you, Michi?  Everyone says that you're usually right on the ball.'

He caught her expression.  "Not too much, no."  She smiled at him gratefully, and for some strange reason, it didn't seem so bad that he was shouldering both their loads anymore.  "All right, enough sap," he muttered, lowering his gaze to the stacks of paper before him again, "lets get back to work."

He could feel her radiant expression on the back of his neck.  "Sure, Saotome," she agreed.  "Whatever you say."

=====

To: Kodachi@kunoinc.co.jp
From: rsaotome@police.go.jp
Subject: meeting

Kodachi -

Dinner the other day was fun, nice to talk again.  Not sure if I'll have any time in the immediate future - big case and all.  But, if you're free, give me a call, number's on the card I gave you.

-RS

=====

"That's really sick, you know," Ranma muttered, watching his partner sip a cup of coffee over the most recent body under her blade.  She scowled at him, setting the cup next to the victim's motionless head.

She countered, "It was simply visual observation, it's not sick!  Doctors are supposed to do it!"  Putting her hands at her waist, she added, "Besides, he *is* handsome, there's no shame in saying so."

Ranma rolled his eyes, turning to the assistant medical examiner.   "You think it's sick?" he asked.  The man nodded eagerly, a mile-wide grin on his face as he watched Michi's face grow to a dark red color.

"Fine," she said, "I'm sick, does that work?"

The two men nodded, and the assistant, clearing his throat, asked, "Is it okay if I head out?  I've got a big date tonight, and I don't want to smell like - well - dead stuff."

Michi grinned.  "If you're going to be medical examiner, you will *always* smell like dead stuff.  You could peel off your skin and boil yourself inside and out, and you'll *still* be stinking of formaldehyde and decomposition."  She waved her hand casually, "Go.  Saotome and I have got it covered."  The man left the room at a quick clip, and Michi sighed wistfully at his retreating form.  "I remember when *I* worried about smelling like dead people."

"How boring *is* this guy?"  She turned to peer at Ranma curiously as he went on, "I mean, come on, you dread your dates with him, you spend half your time in the morgue so you can stink yourself up and drive him away - just break up with him!"

"I never said I was seeing anyone, Ranma," she said quietly.

He smirked.  "I'm an observant guy."  She looked at him critically.  "That and I fielded three phone calls from him while you weren't in the office on Tuesday," he said quickly, the smile still on his face.

Michi rolled her eyes.  "I see."

"So," he quipped, "why *don't* you break up with him?  He even *sounds* boring, Michi."

She sighed, an expression of weariness on her face, her tone filled with black humor.  "It's just not that easy sometimes, Ranma."  She turned away, hiding her eyes from him.  Releasing a short grunt of dissatisfaction, and busily closing up the corpse at long last, she left a grotesquely neat line of thick, autopsy stitches up the middle of the body.  With shaking hands, she removed the latex gloves, and stripped away the paper shirt and pants over her clothes, going to find her jacket where she'd left it on a counter.

Ranma narrowed his eyes.  There was something wrong.  What his feminine intuition screamed at him at that very moment wasn't to be ignored.

"You look tense.  Is there something wrong?" he asked carefully, knowing that being invasive would only serve to earn her annoyance.

Still turned away from him, she asked in a quiet tone, "Ranma, have you ever done something horribly, irrationally stupid?"

He stared at her for a moment.  "Well," he finally said, blushing in embarrassment, "maybe once or twice at the most - why?"

She laughed softly, finally turning to meet his gaze, a sad, defeated expression on her face.  "You're a guy, Ranma.  I don't think that you'd understand the position that I'm in."

He stared at her for half a minute, fighting back giggles at her last words, before he finally said, "That's a tad stereotypical, isn't it?"  She closed her eyes and chose not to respond.  Ranma continued, "Come on, tell me, I'll listen, and if you don't want to, tell a friend at least, keeping it inside is only going to make it worse."

She smirked at him.  "Thank you, Dr. Ranma."  And sighing, she went on, "Actually, I *did* talk to a friend, she's in Osaka at her uncle's funeral.  If he wasn't giving her an enormous amount of money in his will, she'd be back here in an instant."  She shook her head.  "As it is, I'm alone."

"I won't mind, I promise," he said solemnly.  "I can *guarantee* you that I've heard worse."  He held up three fingers.  "Scout's honor."

She rolled her eyes and sneered, batting his hand from in front of her face. "You weren't ever a boy scout, Saotome."

He shrugged.  "Details, details."  And grinning as he saw the grudging smile make its way across her face, he asked, "Well?  Come on, it'll make you feel better to talk about it, I promise."

She rolled her eyes.  "Maybe later, Saotome.  I'd at least like to speak to my doctor first."

Had she not said the word 'doctor', Ranma might never have even thought to read her ki lines.  His heartbeat sped up.  Was she ill?  How bad was it?  Was she in pain?  Was she forcing herself to work despite...despite being injured?  His maternal instincts kicked into high gear.  He studied her carefully, willing the blue lines of her energies forward, pulsing gently as it created a curving matrix of light around her body, betraying her secrets far more vividly than any medical tests could.

Ranma's eyes grew wide, and he was suddenly rocked back to a scene many years ago when he was younger and he sat at Akane's side upon their cozy bed in the dojo.  He remembered celebrating with another round of overjoyed lovemaking.  He remembered the sadly guarded expression on her face when she came back from Tofu's office, putting up a brave smile and saying, "Bah!  Obviously just a flaw in how often we're doing it," she'd kissed him quickly, "We'll just keep trying."

"You're pregnant," he said in a hushed tone, relating the information as if it were the first, last, and only time he'd ever see such a condition.

Her eyes grew wide, and her mouth fell open.  For half a second, she looked utterly confused, and then she snapped her jaw shut, hardened her gaze, and said, "Lucky guess."

Ranma opened his mouth to explain to her about the ki lines, but stopped himself, realizing that as a doctor, she probably didn't give too much credence to that sort of thing.

"What're you going to do?" he asked softly.

She looked annoyed.  "It's not for sure yet, Saotome."

He wanted to tell her that it was, and that if he had paid a little more attention to Dr. Tofu's lessons, he could probably tell her what gender the baby was, too.

Instead, he only nodded gravely, wondering how she could take the news.  More than likely, she'd be devastated.  From what he knew about Michi Hirugashi (which wasn't much more than she knew about him: basically nothing), she was a generally straight-laced officer, someone who preferred to get in, get out, and get the criminal, keeping it all rather low-key.  She had been in and out of the tabloids a lot in her earlier career at Tokyo Homicide both because of her training at Quantico and a firearm scandal that had occurred during her second year on the force.  She did not look like the type of woman who would celebrate the coming of a child, at least, not at *that* point in her life.

"Does the father know?" he ventured again.

She glared at him.  "Look, I don't want to talk about this, okay?"

He frowned at her, ignoring the voice of reason, good sense, and politeness that whispered frantic warnings in the back of his mind.  "This is important, Hirugashi.  You can't just ignore this."

She slammed hand against the desk palm-down, the sound filling the room and falling away to an awkward silence.  "*I don't want to discuss this*," she said, her voice dangerously quiet.

It would be imagined that after years of dealing with females and having been married and subsequently divorced from one (largely due to the fact that neither party involved in the marriage had ever learned to censor their language), Ranma would have learned when to shut up.

This was not true at all.

"You're going to have to, eventually," he insisted.

Michi face twisted into something ugly, and the words that tumbled from her lips reflected her expression, "Yeah?  Well if I get it aborted, I won't have to, will I?"

Ranma felt as if she'd knocked all the wind out of him.  He reached forward and grabbed her wrist, whispering very softly, "*Never* joke about that."  He looked haunted.  "Some people go through their whole lives wanting children and never have what you do."

In retrospect, Ranma supposed that it was better that he and Akane had never been able to conceive.  After all, their marriage had been on the rocks anyway, having a baby had seemed to be a convenient way to fix things.  Besides, they'd been young and stupid, the only thing that had held their marriage together as long as it lasted was the sex, and that was fragile indeed.  Deep down, Ranma conceded, there *was* love, but since on the surface, they didn't like one another, the whole relationship was so much harder to maintain, that much more impossible and bad.  At the time, a child seemed like the answer, something soft, and the product of their affections. It made sense to Ranma that a baby would be the key to happiness, and that loud arguments and petty disagreements would fade away into happy mornings where they lay in bed, cooing to their child.

Michi narrowed her eyes, jerking her arm away, ignoring the bruises that began to make themselves known.  "If they're such gifts, why don't you have one instead?"

She stalked away from the autopsy bay, leaving Ranma gasping for breath behind her.

=====

To: aoi120690@hotmail.co.jp
From: mhirugashi@police.go.jp
Subject: Re:[Re:[Dad's B-day]]

I work in the real world, Aoi.  I understand that they're going to be upset if I don't show up, but they'll get over it.  Tell them the truth: I have a job.  If I don't do it, people get hurt, end of story.  Besides, you were always their favorite, I'm sure if you try to reason with them, everything will be fine.

=====

Music roared in the background of Ranma's apartment, the gritty, electric sound permeating every inch of space in the room.  Of course, he couldn't understand a word they said, only occasionally picking out various four-letter permutations of synonyms for unhappiness.  His neighbor's complaints had all been met with the utmost disrespect.

He wasn't in a mood to please that evening.

With a growl, he slammed his fist into the titanium alloy punching bag his ex-wife had commissioned for him their first Christmas as a married couple.  It was the only thing he'd taken with him to Kyoto.  Everything else had been left in storage somewhere in Tokyo, and he preferred to keep it that way.  The old dressers, chairs, sheets, even his old clothes made him remember what a wretched failure he'd turned out to be.

And Hirugashi!  How did she had the nerve to throw it back in *his* face even after it was *her* who had wanted the advice!  'That bitch!' his mind had cried all night, angry with her and saddened by the truth of her statement.

He didn't have children.  Regardless of how much he wanted them, regardless of how much he'd ever desire to hold them in his arms.  He'd *never* have children.

"SAOTOME!  OPEN YOUR DOOR!" came a cry.  Ranma furrowed his brow, realizing that the music had been so loud he must have missed whatever amount of knocking his visitor had indulged in.  'Please, go away, I don't want to talk to anyone today,' he thought darkly.  And picking his way across the floor, trying to avoid stepping on the broken cement blocks or the decimated punching dummies, he walked away from his living room to the front door.  Taking a deep breath, he unlocked the door and opened it swiftly.

Michi Hirugashi stood just outside, her hair and clothes dripping wet from the torrential rains that had started earlier that evening.  Her lips were nearly purple with cold, and she trembled softly, whether from some internal conflict, or the chill, he couldn't tell.  "I'm sorry," she whispered, sadly, and taking a shaking breath, she continued, "My words were inappropriate and cruel, and, and," she lost her voice for a moment, "just mean."  She sighed deeply.  "I'll put in your transfer papers in the morning."

She started to walk down the hall; Ranma could do nothing but stare.

Two minutes previous, he had been gung-ho about faxing in his transfer forms.  He'd been *thrilled* to think that he could have the opportunity *never* to see that *hateful*, *spiteful* woman again.  He'd been ecstatic at the prospect of never hearing the echo of her harsh words in his ears.

Instead, he found himself grabbing her arm as she turned away and pulling her into his trashed apartment, saying, "It's okay."  He just couldn't stay mad at her, not when she was dripping wet and so apologetic, not when he could very nearly see the regret coming in waves from her shrouded form.  He couldn't be angry with someone who was genuinely upset.  'It's strange,' he thought to himself, 'of all the years of living, I've never met someone who got so messed up over making *me* mad, most people just accept it as a fact of life, and move on.'  She looked confused.

"But," Michi protested weakly, staring at him in bewilderment.  "I made you so angry, and you looked - "

"That doesn't matter," he said resolutely, pushing her down into a chair at his kitchen table, and disappearing to find her some towels.

She sneezed loudly and blew her nose on a napkin, wadding it up and throwing it away as she commented, "You're not *actually* forgiving me so quickly, are you?"

"Yeah, I am."  Ranma reemerged into the room, smirking all the while, saying, "You're the one that says I'm a nice guy."

She pursed her lips.  "I wouldn't forgive you if you'd said those things to me."

He waved it off.  "I'm special."

"You certainly are," she replied softly, not quite meeting his gaze and staring at the ground.  And after a breath, she said, "You're faking me out, aren't you?  You've got your special store of torture devices or semiautomatics stashed here, right?  You're going to kill me while I'm not looking."

Ranma ignored her words, and handing her a mug, he asked sweetly, "Coffee, Michi?"

Somehow, the day that had started off with a cruel argument ended with shy laughter, the beginnings of a new friendship.  Everything seemed quite rose-colored to Ranma that evening; after all, he'd repaired a relationship from ages ago, and made a new friend in his partner.  The possibilities seemed limitless, tomorrow was hopeful, and what unpleasantness that would come would come, he would deal with it when he had to.

=====

To: kasumi@nerimaclinic.org.jp
From: rsaotome@police.go.jp
Subject: Re:[Weekend Plans]

Kasumi -

Sorry, no can do.  My weekend's all booked up.  And no, not with women either, rather, a new case.  I'm going to be pretty swamped until we sort this all out, so how about this: I promise to have Christmas dinner at the Tendo dojo.  Heck, maybe I'll even bring a friend.

-RS

=====

The visit would be unpleasant, if absolutely necessary.

All things considered, even after his divorce from Akane, half the dojo still belonged to him, and since he was practically banished from the grounds in shame, he felt uneasy owning part of it.  Naturally, he'd made Ryoga a very reasonable offer, Akane would cosign, and the whole deal would be done and out of his mind forever.

He opened the door awkwardly and saw them standing in his hallway, the girl he'd first loved and first hated, and the boy who could never find his way.  'Oh, thank God,' he thought with a sigh of relief.  Akane's pregnancy had not begun to show yet.  He wasn't sure he could do this if he saw her rounded belly, swelling with the child of another man, he could choose not to see her ki-lines, but physical differences were harder to ignore.  He watched them with a reminiscent sort of moodiness - hoping that this would go swiftly and politely.

"Akane," he said, all smiles, "Ryoga, come on in, the contracts are right on my coffee table."  His ex-wife quirked an eyebrow at him, and touching Ryoga's hand, she said shyly:

"Thanks for letting us do this, Ranma, I know how much that dojo meant to you."  She tried to look cute, and - as Ranma had started to realize shortly after their divorce - failed miserably.  She was still beautiful to him; she was beautiful to every heterosexual man who bothered to look.  She just wasn't, well, likeable any longer.

He waved his hand dismissively in the air, stepping aside to let them into his immaculately cleaned and newly rearranged apartment.  It was one thing for them to think that he was a lonely, wretched bachelor who'd been forsaken by all those that he'd used to love - but it was quite another for him to prove it.  "Nah - I don't have any use for it any more, not like I'm going to quit my thrilling career in law enforcement and go play around with little kids again."

No one said anything for a few moments, letting the thinly veiled lie settle into their minds as they all sat down on Ranma's couch and signed, one by one by one - Ranma's signature coming last.

He hated to admit it, but it hurt like hell.

Signing away that dojo was like signing away the last bit of Ranma Saotome: martial artist, Ranma Saotome: husband to Akane, Ranma Saotome: father.

They all shook hands, and while Akane waited for her husband downstairs with the cab, Ryoga lingered, watching Ranma's discomfort with casual unhappiness.  "Ranma?"

His old friend looked at him and asked, "What, Ryoga?"

"Are you happy now?" Ryoga hazarded.

Ranma frowned.  There weren't many things to be happy for, really.  He was a thirty-three year old divorced man; he worked for a thankless nation of people who'd rather turn a blind eye than to notice the fruits of his messy labor.  He had no children, and all in all, the only bright spot that remained in his life was - well -

A slow grin spread itself across Ranma's face, and he plucked up the courage to say, "I made a new friend last night, if that answers any questions."

Ryoga looked surprised, happily so.  "Really?" he asked eagerly, suddenly lifted from guilt he'd garnered many, many years past.

Ranma almost laughed.  'Well, fuck,' he thought, 'here I am, talking to one of the driving forces in my wretched existence, and I'm trying to cheer him up.'  "Yeah," he admitted finally, "Yeah, I really did make a new friend, nicest person you'll ever meet, smart as a whip."

Ryoga laughed out loud, clapping Ranma on the back and then walked down the hall, exonerated, free to go on living.  Calling over his shoulder, "Come over for dinner sometime - bring your friend!  We'd love to meet him!"

Ranma smirked.  Him?

=====

To: nerriy@tech.co.jp
From: mhirugashi@police.go.jp
Subject: Re:[TAKE THE TEST ALREADY!!!!!!!!!!!!!]

Would you shut the hell up?

It's my life!  I'll take the test when I want to!

Sheesh!

=====



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