Complimenting Opposites
     A Ranma � fanfict by Tangent
     Pre-reading and editing assistance by:
     Lord Talon;
     Nevrmore;
     And some guy named Steve

     And possibly Howard Melton and maybe even
Metroanime too, although I am, once again, following
my usual habit of sending this to everyone at once...

^_^;;

     DISCLAIMER: 'Ranma �' and all characters
therein belong to Rumiko Takahashi, Shogagukan,
Kitty and Viz Video. This fanfict has been produced
for my own enjoyment and to pass on without profit.
Other characters that come into play in this fanfict may
or may not be pulled from other sources (including other
fanficts, RPGs, manga, anime, literature, or possibly even
*GASP* American comic books!).

     CHAPTER FOUR:

     Kuno examined himself in the mirror. The bruises from
his fight with Ranma Saotome were quite evident, and he
briefly considered hiding them with makeup or bandages.
"Bah, I'll not hide these marks of shame that my own actions
have brought upon me. Such petty vanity is unfitting of the man
I hope to one day become, and would be an insult to the honor
of the warrior who has inflicted such righteous punishment."

     Turning away from the mirror, Kuno strode across the room
to where his Kendo uniform had been laid out for him, cleaned
and pressed. He contemplated it for a moment, and then walked
to the closet and pulled out one of his school uniforms instead.
"Sasuke!"

     A stunted man wearing a ninja outfit appeared almost as if from
nowhere. "Yes, Master Kuno?"

     Kuno resisted the urge to berate his liege-man for startling him
once again. If he was to be the scion of the Noble House of Kuno,
he had best begin behaving as such. Abusing the servants was a
sign of a poor master. And there were others as well - so many
others..

     "Have a set of my Kendo gear delivered to my locker at Furinkan,"
Kuno instructed. "I shall not be requiring it outside of practice or
tournaments anymore, I would expect, and it would be unseemly
for me to arrive at school as if prepared for battle."

     "What about your challenge to Mistress Akane, Master Kuno?"

     "It has been recended, Sasuke," Kuno explained, "by a man
who has shown me to have been less than the honorable samurai
that I thought was."

     "How has this happened, Master Kuno?" Sasuke wondered if
he would be called apon to avenge the honor of the Kuno estate in
a more... descrete... manner than was the Kuno family's usual forte.
Perhaps it was time to brush up on his Ninjitsu techniques?

     "Ranma Saotome, betrothed of Nabiki Tendo, and future
brother-in-law of my beloved Akane, has seen fit to set me in my
proper place after I has so venomously insulted his beloved. I am
not the man that I thought I was, Sasuke. Thanks to Saotome
though, I have seen my errors and can hope to actually become
that man someday."

     Sasuke sighed, and then paused to reconsider what his young
master had said. It didn't sound like he would be called apon to
perform a silent vendetta after all. In fact, perhaps this evening he
might even dare broach the subject of a raise with the defacto
head of the Kuno clan. It had been what? Five or six generations
sinse the Kuno family had last given their retainers a wage increase
in keeping with the economy of the time. Best to take advantage
of this window of opportunity before it closed....

*     *     *

     Nabiki sat quietly in class trying not to think about the bento
in her desk. She had prepared it herself, for herself, as a preliminary
test to see if she wanted to do the same thing for Ranma in the future.
Unlike Akane, she wasn't about to inflict her meals on anyone
untested. And the Bento was her test, to see if something she made
could last until lunch-time and still be edible. The money she had
brought along with it was purely a precautionary measure in case
it wasn't.

     It was with a sense of relief that she observed Kuno walk into
the classroom. He was always good for a distraction, whether it
was him going on and on about Akane, or merely espousing other
aspects of his 'Greatness'. Shooting him down verbally was an
amusing hobby, especially since she never once had to resort to
lying to do so.

     "Nabiki Tendo," Kuno bowed politely before seating himself
at his desk. "Once more, I deliver my humblest apologies. Mere
words cannot express the magnitude of my error, nor may they
convey the shame that I have so righteously garnered upon my
own name through my thoughtless actions."

     "That's all well and good that you realize this, Kuno-chan,"
Nabiki observed in her traditional dry tone. "Now is there a point
to all this? You've already apologized to me yesterday, although
I must admit, it sounds so much better when you aren't mangling
what you call poetry along with it."

     "It's high theater," Kuno corrected, "and it was sheer arrogance
on my part to try to force it into my daily life in such a manner."

     "So you're going to stop quoting Shakespeare?" Nabiki
prompted, surprised.

     "No, I am merely going to try to fit such quotes more
appropriately as applies to the situation," Kuno stated,
practicing his own brand of dry humor. He found Nabiki's
raised eyebrow to be reward enough for his efforts. "But that
is neither her nor there - I would like to express my gratitude to
you and your fianc�."

     "Gratitude?" Nabiki prompted, her curiosity truly piqued now.
"For what?"

     "For forcing me to realize that I have been making a fool of
myself," Kuno explained. "For too long, I have deluded myself
into believing that my actions were honorable simply because I
was the one making them. I, a scion of the House of Kuno,
allowed myself to set a poor example to those that I felt were
of lesser station. Instead, I have proven myself to be unworthy
of the respect that I had so vehemently demanded from others."

     "I'm sure that Ranma will appreciate your gratitude," Nabiki
stated politely, noting that Kuno was as long winded as ever, if
somewhat more tolerably so without the mangled narration.
Whether he knew it or not, he still lived his life as if it were a high
drama, but she wasn't about to begrudge him of it. He'd be a lot
less amusing otherwise.

*     *     *

     Akane sat at her desk, a bit stiff perhaps, but wearing a silly
grin throughout most of the morning. Her friends were dying of
curiosity, wondering what had happened to cheer Akane up to
such an extent. After a few classes, Akane having failed to
enlighten them in the least bit, they converged on her desk full
of questions.

     "Okay, Akane," Yuka demanded playfully, "Spill it! What's
got you into such a good mood?"

     "Ranma's training me!" Akane beamed cheerfully. "I mean,
really training me! He's so much better than I am, but he's taking
me seriously and everything!"

     "I thought that he was engaged to Nabiki?" Sayuri pondered.

     "That's the best part!" Akane confirmed. "He's not interested
in me romantically at all. I'm just his student. He really wants to
help me improve in the Art and achieve my potential. I'm not some
precious flower that he's afraid to hurt. It's been so long since
Daddy trained me seriously that I was beginning to form some
really bad combat habits."

     "Wait," Yuka interrupted. You mean to say that Ranma
actually hits you!?"

     "Of course!" Akane responded in a matter of fact manner.
"How else am I suppose to learn where the holes in my defense
are?"

     "But." Sayuri asked, concerned, "doesn't that hurt?"

     "Like being pummeled with an iron bar," Akane confirmed.
"Isn't it great?"

     Yuka and Sayuri began to seriously wonder about their friend.

     "I'm just glad that my training hadn't degraded any lower than
it had," Akane confided. "I don't think Ranma ever trained with
anyone other than his father before. If I wasn't able to take as
much of those hits as I could, I'd be in the hospital right now, or
at least at Dr. Tofu's clinic."

     "Shouldn't he. ummm. have been pulling his punches or
something?" Sayuri asked, concerned with her friend's well being.

     Akane's mood dropped a little. "That's the only problem.
He pulled every single strike and I still feel like I've been worked
over with a hammer. I hope that he doesn't think that he can treat
a beginning student like that, or he and Nabiki are going to be in
financial trouble when they inherit the Dojo."

*     *     *

     Ranma, for his part, was going over the training session he
had put Akane through the previous evening. Or, to be more
precise, he was trying to think of anything *other* than the fact
that Nabiki had walked in on him while he was in the furo again
last night.

     She had said that she wanted to thank him for defending her
honor. Not wanting to hurt her feelings, as the previous day had
shown them to be fragile at the present time, he tried not to seem
too uncomfortable with her forwardness. He was relieved that
she didn't try for anything more than leaning against him and resting
her head on his shoulders while they soaked in the furo though.
Not that she didn't excite him, far from it. He just didn't know
what to do with the new sensations yet, and the clues he garnered
from how he felt about the situation while in his cursed form were...
disturbing to say the least.

     Was Nabiki a friend? Definitely yes, if a trifle forward for his
tastes at times. Not that he didn't appreciate it, but it made him
uncomfortable due to his unfamiliarity with open affection as a
guy. As a girl, Ranma felt all warm and special whenever she
thought about Nabiki choosing to give their engagement a chance,
with little of the doubt and uncertanty that he felt as a guy.

     One good thing had come of this situation at least. Attractive
guys stopped turning Ranma's head while the curse was active.
Nabiki's affection *was* having a stabilizing effect on the
perception and mood shifts brought on since he had become
cursed at Jusenkyo. No more night time fantasies of how romantic
it would be for (for example) his childhood friend Uchan to show
up having grown into a handsome young stud and sweeping Ranma
off of her feet in a passionate embrace, with much snuggling to follow.

     Cripes, he had forgotten all about Uchan before that started
happening, and his first thoughts of his old buddy had made Ranma
break down in tears once she realized what she was doing. This
was followed by a rather nessessary beating of her father, who had
berated her for crying like a girl. Maybe now that Ranma's girl side
had refocussed on the relationship with Nabiki, Ranma could look
up his oldest friend without worrying about being turned on by a guy.

    Not that Ranma was using Nabiki, at least not deliberately. He
liked her a lot, and thought that she was rather special, especially
once you got past the shell she tended to wear around her inner
spirit. Ranma particularly admired how she seemed to know what
she wanted most of the time, which was more than he could usually
say for himself. For most of his life, his goal had been set by his
father, and for the most part, that was still the case, athough that
situation had begun to chafe a while ago.

     A peice of chalk bouncing off of his head told Ranma that the
class was once again in session...

*     *     *

     Nabiki marked her experiment with the bento as a qualified
success. It hadn't made her gag at least, even though it was a far
cry from what Kasumi could have done. On the plus side, it was
also a far cry from what Akane would probably have done. The
rice was a little lumpy in some places, and gooey in others, and
the vegitables had come out a little rubbery somehow, but the
fish had turned out okay at least.

**Well, that's what I've got for chapter four so far. I would've
written more, but I need to get some sleep before I go to work.
Comments and Constructive Criticism would be much appreciated,
even though this chapter is only about half finished. Suggestions and
Ideas would be nice as well, but flames wil be ignored as always.

**I've begun to really explore the difference between this Ranma
and a more cannon Ranma, what with the effects that Jusenkyo
apparently has on the personalities of its victims in this time line.
Not all of those changes are restricted to while the cursed individual
are in their cursed forms either. Ranma *is* aware that he has social
skills that simply weren't there before, but usually doesn't think about
them until well after the fact. A case of his tendency to say what first
comes to mind being preempted after a fashion. As the story goes on,
I plan to make it clear that Ranma *is* scared of losing himself to
these changes.

**Nabiki represents a welcome anchor to Ranma's sense of
masculenity. Right now, she has a tremendous amount of potential
to hurt him severely in a purely non-physical sense. Which is only
fair as he has obtained a similar potential to devestate Nabiki in a
similar manner. Shall we see what comes of all of this?

^_^

Tangent


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