Ranma 1/2 Fan Fiction ❯ The Crow 1/2:Dragons Rising ❯ Chapter Three: The Calm Before the Storm ( Chapter 3 )
[ Y - Young Adult: Not suitable for readers under 16 ]
By: darkangel98s 
Ranma and Ukyou bond, and Ranma sees Akane. Ranma accepts his Role as the Crow.
Anime/Manga: Ranma 1/2 Fan Fiction | Genre(s): Action / Angst / Drama / Martial Arts / Romance / Supernatural | Type: Crossover | Uploaded On: 09.22.2001 | Pages: 5 | Words: 5.6K | Visits: 933 | Status: Completed
Ranma and Ukyou bond, and Ranma sees Akane. Ranma accepts his Role as the Crow.
Anime/Manga: Ranma 1/2 Fan Fiction | Genre(s): Action / Angst / Drama / Martial Arts / Romance / Supernatural | Type: Crossover | Uploaded On: 09.22.2001 | Pages: 5 | Words: 5.6K | Visits: 933 | Status: Completed
Authors Notes: Well, this sucker is just flowing right out of me. Kind of surprising, as I wanted to finish my El-Hazard story, Ancients Dreams, before I started this, but I can't seem to get away from this one. Oh well, nothing to do about it, but run with it. This one isn't going to go away easy folks, so be ready for one dark and nasty ride, with all your happy little Ranma characters seen in a new light. Till later enjoy.
C+C at darkangel98s@yahoo.com . Flames can go to hell. Also, check out my website at www.geocities.com/shadow_angel48s, where all my other fan fictions are kept.
Legal Stuff: I don't own any of the copyrighted materials in these little works of fiction that I produce, and am in no way challenging said copyrights. All I have come up with is the story I have stuck them into.
The Crow 1/2: Dragons Rising
Chapter Three: Calm Before the Storm
Later that same night…
Ukyou had never been more surprised in her life, than when Ranma, in his girl form, had walked into her restaurant, and spoke to her.
"Hey Ucchan. Sorry 'bout this…"
Then, the shorter, red haired girl collapsed upon the cold checkerboard tile floor, out cold. Ukyou just stood their, staring at the form lying on her floor, mind having gone numb, sure she had gone mad. It was only when Konatsu entered, today dressed in a very lovely blue and green silk kimono.
"Ukyou-chan? Did I hear somebody come in? I must have forgotten to lock…" Seeing the person sprawled out there, he hurried over, and knelt down beside her, beginning to roll her over. "What happened here Ukyou-chan? This girl is all dirty and soaked and… and… it's RANMA!!!" Konatsu jumped back a dozen feet easily, holding his finely manicured hands up as if to ward himself from evil spirits. "How did that body get here?!?"
"You mean you see it too?"
"OF course I do. It's lying right there!" He pointed.
"Oh my God! Do you have any idea what this means?" She jumped over the bar/grill, and landed smoothly on the other side, and hurried over to the red head. "Help me out here Konatsu, we need to get him upstairs."
"I am not carrying a dead body."
"Konatsu! He's not dead! He walked in here, and talked to me! He's breathing for goodness sakes! Now get over here and Help me!"
With the cross dressing ninja taking Ranma's shoulders, and Ukyou taking her feet, the two of them made quick time up to Ukyou's bedroom, him complaining the entire time how Ranma smelled like she was dead, even if she were breathing.
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Ukyou remained by Ranma's side all through the night, even into the early morning. Konatsu was more than capable of handling the restaurant. She could hear him downstairs already getting the restaurant ready for business. He was a good worker, and they had grown very close since the funeral.
How could Ranma be alive? He could not. She had seen his body, skull cracked open, a mix of brains and blood staining the ground around his head. She had watched as the bodied last nervous twinges had ended, and he lie still. He had died that day. There was no other explanation, except that either he had somehow faked his death, which was doubtful, or somehow he had risen back from the dead, which was even more unlikely.
She reached out and took his hand, squeezing it, trying to understand how he was now here, that he was actually lying in her bed, breathing quietly. As their flesh met, something seemed to hit him like a jolt of electricity, and his body slammed upwards, resting only on heels and shoulders. Ranma's eyes opened, and a silent scream seemed to tear itself from her.
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Images and memories flooded her mind. Images of a man lying dead upon a cold warehouse floor mixing with memories of feeling himself die on that very floor. She saw his funeral, and cried silently for the loss everyone felt, for he felt it too, deeper than any of them ever could. She felt the woman named Ukyou struggling to live on after all that had happened, the attempt to kill herself, cold steel blade cutting across warm flesh. Konatsu crying over her, as he tried to stop the blood; there had been so much blood. Her being taken care of, getting help, and finally moving on, and the budding relationship the two of them developed. And with her memories, rode his own, just pieces, but more than had been there. She… no he, for he remembered his curse, was Ranma Saotome, sole heir to the Saotome School of Martial Arts. He lived with the Tendos since he had arrived here, and he was engaged to Akane Tendo, whom he secretly loved more than anything in this world. And that he had died.
It was slow, her body relaxing, but it did, and it lay back against the soft, cool sheets of the bed. Ever so slowly she turned her head to look at Ukyou, who stared at her in worry, with her eyes tinged with pain. Ranma released her hand, which she had gripped reflexively when the memories had come. She smiled at her weakly.
"Hi there, Ucchan."
She seemed to be debating how to respond to her. She seemed to be unsure if Ranma really was who she appeared to be. "Hello there, Ran-chan."
She looked into Ukyou's eyes, calm and serious, and smiled. "I guess I have some explaining to do, huh?"
"Yes you most certainly do…"
For just a moment, their was a flash of the old Ranma in her eyes, and she grinned. "If you don't mind, I would love to tell you over something to eat. Not having anything for a year can make a guy REALLY hungry…"
********************************************** *********
Ranma, now back in his male form, bathed to remove the smell and filth of the grave from himself, and dressed in some of Konatsu's rarely used guy cloths, sat shoveling Ukyou's okonomiyaki into his mouth with his usual intensity. He had already eaten five of them, and despite his promises of telling her what had happened to him, he had not taken a break since he had sat down.
Ukyou herself was finally convinced the he was who he said. No one ate quite like her Ran-chan. She stood across the grill from him, watching him eat as fast as she cooked. She could not figure out why all the questions she had, which their were many, did not seem so pressing. It seemed that all that was important was that he was alive, and sitting across from her. She smiled.
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From his place at the foot of the stairs, Konatsu watched silently. He was happy that Ranma was actually not dead. He had wanted Ukyou, but not at the expense of another's life. But now, with Ranma back, he feared that what Ukyou and he had developed over the year since the funeral would vanish, as she went back to her feelings for Ranma.
He watched the two of them from a distance, Ranma stuffing his face, and Ukyou watching him, and felt pangs of loss. He did not stand a chance against this. He was going to loose her…
************************************************** *****
When he was finally done, so full he felt he was going to burst, he pushed his empty plate up to the edge of the grill. He took a drink of the water , and looked at his friend, seeing her smile. It was time for his story. At least what he remembered of it. What he had learned from her memories, and what it had reawakened in his.
"I guess it is time for me to talk, huh?"
"You had better believe it, Ran-chan. And it had better be good, or I might just have to kill you myself." She glanced sideways, towards her battle spatula, which rested next to Konatsu as he sat on the stairs that lead up to the bedrooms above. He got the idea. "I mean, if this is come kind of trick, it was the most horrible thing you could ever have done."
Ranma smiled at her sadly. "I am afraid it was no trick, Ucchan. Not me running away." He looked down at the table, and his hand began to trace a pattern across the countertop. It was something he did when he was nervous, like when he thought no one would believe him. "It was for real. I died."
She crossed her arms. "Died huh?" She reached out and poked him in the shoulder. "You don't feel like a ghost to me. And no spirit just ate all that food."
"I know it is hard to believe. Heck, I don't believe it myself. But it happened."
She looked at him, eyes downcast, waiting to be blamed. It all sounded so preposterous, so impossible. How could he be dead and be sitting here, eating her out of house and home. It wasn't possible, but something in the way he acted, the way he spoke, brought her the impression that he believed what he was saying.
"Ok then. Tell me what the afterlife is like then.."
He glanced up at her briefly. "I don't remember much about it." He looked down her hands briefly, at her wrists. She noticed, but did not think anything of it. "Actually I don't remember much of anything." He turned his head fully up, and locked his cool blue eyes with her brown ones. "When you took my hand upstairs, I felt something. It was like I could see into your memories. That gave me some memories of what had happened after you all broke in, and found me and Akane. I can remember seeing myself dead…" He shivered slightly, before continuing. "Your memories of me seemed to jar loose other things, and I remembered more, stuff only I knew, but not much. Like I remember that I was a martial artist, but no matter how hard I try, I can't remember much about it. Just some basic katas and stuff. Other than that, my mind is a complete blank."
His eyes traveled back down to her wrists, and she looked down to see what he was staring at. A nasty looking scar ran about three inches down her wrist, cut into her flesh by one of her own throwing spatulas. Suddenly self conscious, she tried to hide her arm behind the counter, but his hand shot out, just as fast as she remembered, a blinding blur, yet his grip was gentle. He drew her arm towards him, and turned it wrist up. He stared at it intently, and ran a finger softly down the injury. She shivered herself, but not from the feather light touch, but because just for an instant, she could feel the cool steel sliding through her again. At that, she pulled her arm back, almost violently.
"It was a cooking accident. I was slicing up some vegetables, and a slipped. It was pretty bad. Konatsu managed to get me help before anything bad happened." The lie fell flat, when he locked gazes with her again.
His eyes were filled with pain, near tears. It was not a look she had ever seen from him. It was something she hated to see in him.
"It was not too long after the funeral. Business had been bad, and Konatsu had been running the restaurant for almost a week. You refused to even come out of your room." His voice was steady, despite the emotions on his face. "No matter how much everyone tried to tell you that you were actually the hero, since you were the one that had brought help and saved Akane, you still blamed yourself. You were so sad Ukyou…" His hand rose slowly, and traced a faint line down here cheek, where a tear had just escaped. "Finally, in the end, you could not take it any longer. The pain had to end, the misery had to. All you wanted to do was end it all, and be with me. So you had locked your bedroom door, and taken one of your spatulas. It had surprised you, after all the fights you had been in, how much one little cut could hurt. You passed out, from the pain, and blood loss, and the next thing you knew, you woke up, in the hospital, Konatsu by your side, holding your hand, about to pass out from the constant vigil he had kept over you…" Finished, he wiped a tear of his own away.
She backed away from him slowly. "How... How could you know that…?"
"I saw it in your memories, Ukyou. I felt it, hear it, saw it all, just like it had happened to me…"
"No…no…no…" She tried to run, ashamed of her weakness, ashamed that he had seen her at her worst. Worst than that, had felt it all. She was half way through the doors into the kitchen when he caught her, having leaped the grill, and covered the distance to her in a starling burst of speed.
He took her in his arms, hard and strong, meant for fighting, hugging her close in a grip that was soft and gentle, but unyielding. There, they cried, releasing all the pain and sorrow they felt, comforted by the presence of someone that cared for them.
Time had no meaning for them. When they parted, it had been almost a half hour they had stood there, Ukyou finally letting out all the pent up anguish she had held inside for so long. Wiping their tears away, they both managed a smile.
"I-I Guess I needed that. I have been holding all that in for so long. Therapy didn't even help this much." She gave him another hug, this one friendly and brief. She then lead the two of them back around the counter, and over to a booth, where they both took a seat, across from one another.
Taking another swipe at her eyes, she let her smile fade. "I guess you did come back from the dead huh?"
"Yep."
"Care to tell me how?"
He shrugged. "I don't know. Just before I remember walking in the rain, following this huge bird, I remember a girl. She was telling me something about how it wasn't my time yet. That I had to find peace. Before that, I don't remember anything."
"Find peace? Like put your affairs in order? I know you left a lot of people behind who depended on you, but I have never heard of anyone coming back because they had been promised to a dozen fiancés."
"A Dozen fiancés?" He looked confused.
"You mean you don't remember?" A year ago, she would have jumped at the opportunity. But now, things had changed. She could not quite bring herself to take advantage of the situation.
"Well I remember you, and Akane… AKANE!!!" As if just remembering her, he suddenly bolted up. "How could I forget her! I have to go see her! See if she is ok."
He was heading towards the door, almost before Ukyou could react. She turned, raising her hand in an attempt to stop him. "Ranma! Wait!"
He was in a near panic to go see Akane, as if his life depended on it, but something in her tone made him stop. "Something wrong with Akane? It isn't you being jealous is it?"
She shook her head. "No… No… I just wanted to remind you it was raining, and to take an umbrella."
He smiled and nodded. "I'll be back Ucchan. I promise." He turned to look by the door, and found only one umbrella in the can near the door. A red bamboo one, which resembled the one Ryoga always carried. He grabbed it, and shook his head. Could not have been Ryoga's, because too light. A memory tickled at the back of his head, but for the moment, he ignored it. His need to see Akane was too great. The opened the umbrella and was out the door, racing into the stormy night.
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Ukyou shook her head sadly. He was about to find out something that would hurt him worst than what she had done to herself. What the Kuno's and those damned Amazons had done to the youngest Tendo daughter. She had wanted to explain to him what had happened, what was still going on, but something held her back. She doubted he would have believed her had she told him. It was something he needed to do on his own.
She sighed, and turned, deciding to tell Konatsu to go ahead and start the morning preparations. It would be morning soon enough, and they might as well get an early start. Yet when she looked over, he was no longer there, and the sounds of someone working in the kitchen could already be heard. It was only then, that she realized that he had witnessed everything that had happened here in her restaurant. He had stood by, and watched them hold each other, cry in each others arms. She suddenly realized what he must have been feeling, and she felt like crying again. Yet another person she ended up hurting through her actions.
She got up, and hurried into the kitchen, to talk with him, set things strait. She hoped that he would understand…
******************************************* **********
Two silent watchers witnessed Ranma's departure.
The crow, having been resting under an overhang across from the restaurant, cawed softly at Ranma's quickly disappearing form, and took flight. It had one simple purpose on this earth, and it was completely devoted to it's task. It dropped from it's perch, and took flight, following the recently reborn young man, intent on guiding him through his vengeance.
The other watcher sat silently as the great black bird took flight. He wished it was not raining, so he could smoke his pipe, but shrugged. It was a minor inconvenience. At least compared to what was to come.
Happosai frowned, and began to work over plans in his head on a way to perform damage control. He knew once Ranma got started along the path of vengeance, the normal level of destruction they caused would seem minor by compare. He had never been a good master, but he was a kindred spirit to Ranma, in at least one way, and he felt he owed him this, as a way of atoning for his past sins.
Quickly, the little martial artist hopped away into the darkness, heading out to prepare for what was to come.
*****************************************************
Ranma cleared the Tendo compounds tall stone walls with a single leap, balancing the umbrella just right to keep the rain off of him. He did not want his return to be like his first arrival here, as a girl.
As he landed, atop one of the Koi ponds stones, he frowned. He could feel something about this place did not seem right. It was like a wave of sadness seemed to radiate from the very ground around this place. He wanted to put it up to just his nerves at finally returning to this place, but somehow he could not. He knew deep down that something was wrong.
Instead of just walking up to the front door and knocking, like he had planned, he decided to make a wide circuit of the grounds. Slowly he walked the houses edge, and despite the darkness, his vision seemed fine, and he saw something that bothered him.
The house was not like it had been. Despite all the property damage, Kasumi kept the place neat. If her father or her could not fix it, she had a repair person come out and take care of it immediately. It was her driving goal in life that her home be a proper one, and always in its top shape. What he saw was a home, that while it was still kept up, no longer was taken care of like it had been. Some of the paint was peeling, and some of the roof tiles needed replacing. The lawn needed to be cut a few weeks ago, some of the plants did not look to be in good shape.
When he reached the Dojo, it was in even worse shape. It looked like no one had even been in it in months. He slid open the doors, silent as he could, and was shocked at the insides. Broken bricks, something Akane loved to practice on, lay scattered everywhere. There were several roof leaks, and water mixed with the brick chips and layers of dust, to make a slippery film beneath he feet as he walked. He remembered little of this place, not much more than a layout of the home, but he knew that all of this was wrong. For it to be like this, something terrible had to have happened.
He slid the doors shut, and hurried along the covered walkway that ran from the dojo to the house. Worries began to assault him about what could have happened to Kasumi. He knew the name, and could conjure a face to go with it, but beyond that, all he had was a feeling of kindness about her. If anything had happened to her, he would be very angry.
He decided on the easiest way to sneak into the house, already deciding that he would have to check things out more, try and remember more about the people that lived here, before he announced his return. He vaulted to the roof without a thought, and swung over the edge , to sit on a window sill. It was all instinct he was going on now, and his body seemed to remember doing this many times. Using the umbrella to shield himself not only from the rain now, but water pouring off the roof, he slid the window open, and slipped inside.
This room was his, or had been. He had shared it with his father while they had lived here with the Tendos. Apparently his father was no longer staying her through, no one was inside, and both sleeping mats were neatly rolled up and laid against the wall. A brief thought about his father, an image of him taking a young Ranma away from a woman he knew was his mother, flashed through his head, and suddenly he knew without a doubt that he disliked his father very much. He was glad that the older Saotome was no longer here.
Ranma did a quick run through of the room, finding most of it empty. All that remained here was a single shirt in the closet. He slid it out, and looked it over. It was similar to the ones he always remembered wearing. A Chinese style martial artists shirt, but he did not remember one like this. It was solid black, made of some very soft fabric, and had a sliver dragon stitched from front to back across it. He did not remember owning anything like it, but that did not mean a whole lot, considering his current memory problems. He folded it up, and tucked it under one arm, deciding that he could wear it later, since he would need to change cloths eventually.
Something fluttering by the window caught his attention, and he spun, to find that bird, gleaming wet and black, staring at him. It did not make a sound, as if understanding he was trying to be quiet, and after staring intently at him for a moment, hopped into the room, and glided over to the door. It looked at the door, then back at him, and back at the door again, and Ranma had the feeling that it wanted him to go into the hall.
He shrugged. The bird did seem to know what it was doing, and he slid the door open as quietly as he could, and almost as soon as it could squeeze through, it walked through, and waddled down the hall. Ranma followed, leaving the door open. It went around a bend in the hall, to the right, and Ranma had to step quickly to keep up. Where it lead him, was to a door at the end of the hallway, one that seemed very familiar. He saw a small wooden duck carving on the door, and squinted in the gloom to read the single word on it. Akane…
Images of the young woman filled him then. Her smile, the way her short hair swirled around her face when she sparred with him, the way her eyes twinkled when they shared one of the few tender moments they had together. He remembered other things, like how they had fought, and how he had almost lost her in a fight once, against some guy with wings, but those things were unimportant. All that was, was that he back, and could be with her again.
He had not even realized he was moving, and before doubt could stop him, he had opened her door, and walked inside, shutting it behind him.
He saw her, and his heart skipped a beat. She was sleeping, and looked like an angel to him. He approached her slowly, as if afraid she would awake, and he had a faint series of memories of being tossed, punched, and kicked from the room on countless times. He did not want anything like that to occur. Not now. He just wanted to look at her.
He had no idea how long he stood there, looking down at her. Again, time seemed to loose meaning to him. But as the first rays of dawn began to filter through her window, muted by the clouds and rain, she stirred, whispering something in her sleep, and rolling onto her back fully facing him now.
The scar had healed cleanly, and was a neat little line of scars across her face. He could not remember anything like that on her. It was something new, something disturbing. It was another thing that tickled at the back of his mind, like he should recognize it. And again, his body seemed to react on it's own, and he watched his hand reach out, and trace the lines across her cheek, as he had done to the one on Ukyou's wrist, and feeling the thin scars under his skin. It was then, that it hit him, like a bullet to the heart…
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Her legs no longer worked. That was the only reason she was not fighting what Kuno was doing to her. She felt her panties rip from her body, and him enter her. Her virginity taken away by one of the rivals of the man she had so desperately been saving it for. And it was not just there, he violated her. It was in any place he could stick it, and if she resisted, it was pain for her. But the rape was not the worst of it. It was the look he had while he was doing it, a cruel, hate filled gaze, mixed with lust and something else, something wilder. She could only akin it to the look his sister always had in her eyes when she was fighting over Ranma, except a thousand times worse. Insanity, in it's purest form.
This degradation was far from the worst of it. The worst did not come till Kodachi arrived. That was when the true pain started. She watched them kiss, tongues touching, mouths open, and her not even looking when she slid the scalpel across their victims face. Kuno had been even more excited, and this excited his sister, and that was when the pain began for real…
************************************************* ******
Akane awoke to the sound of a scream so tortured, so anguished, that she was for sure that she was back on that table again, with the insane Kuno siblings. That it was her screaming. But in the moments it took her to wake up fully, she found herself lying in bed, in her room alone. Wondering at the chill breeze blowing through her room, she glanced over at the window, and found it open. She could have sworn that it was closed when she went to sleep the night before.
She rolled over onto her side, thinking of Ranma, the feeling that he was close almost overwhelming her. She lay their crying for at least an hour, before her body finally decided it had woken up enough, and needed to relieve itself. Wiping her eyes, she rolled over, and started to reach for the pair of crutches and leg braces she laid beside her bed every night, when she saw the feather lying on her floor. It gleamed blackly against the early morning light, and she wondered how it could have gotten there.
**************************************************
Ukyou had been so busy during the day, that she had not had time to check on Ranma more than once during business hours. He had gotten back just as they were opening, and had run upstairs to lock himself away in her room, and away from the world. The one time she had gone up, no one had answered, and she had come back down. She was starting to worry, but figured he was taking what had happened to the Tendo's pretty hard. He just needed time, she was sure.
To add to her stress however, was Konatsu, who was avoiding her like she had the Black Plague. When confronted, he acted ok, his normal cheery self, but when he was away from her directly, she could see him moving and acting like he had just lost the love of his life, and she guessed in his mind, he had.
When Ucchan's finally closed down, Ukyou turned the open sign around to closed, and readied herself for a heart to heart with Konatsu, when the door at the top of the stairs opened, and Ranma began to walk down. She gasp when she saw him.
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He did not know why he had done as he had. He had changed cloths into the shirt he had found in his old room at the Tendo's, and a pair of black pants he found in Konatsu's room. As he had been leaving, the crow had some how found it's way into the room with him, alighting on his shoulder just as he passed the large mirror where Konatsu put on his makeup. He had turned his head, and found himself staring at his own image. An image that did not look quite right.
He caught new memories, this time ones he knew not to be his, of other men and women, people like him, back from the dead. He saw their faces, and knew their purpose, his purpose now. He had taken the makeup, and began to work, crafting a new face to go with his task, one that would fit into his new, darker world…
He took the steps one at a time, slowly. His face was now a pale white, and both eyes were painted dark, a single long black streak coming down from his right eye, like a trail of a tear. He nodded inwardly as Ukyou too a step back, fear lighting her face. He was ready.
"Time to make them pay…"
End of Chapter Three.
Authors Notes Again: Whew. Wrote this on in one night. I bet you can tell. I don't think it is AS good as the others, but hey, I tried. Of course I wrote the other two chapters in one night as well. <Shrugs> Lets see. Yes I know, there are a few overdone things. But I thought that the ability to touch someone, and read some of their memories to help gather back your own was kind of cool. They did it in the first crow movie after all. AND YES I DO KNOW THE KUNOS ARE A LOT LIKE THE VILLANS IN THE FIRST MOVIE. They are only going to be part of the problem in this series. I am not ripping off the first movie in it's entirety. I promise I will be done with them by 2/3 of the way through. YEA!
Oh yea. You will see how off the deep end the Kuno's have gone in the next chapter, I promise. And the next chapter is gonna have a couple of cool fights, just for you action junkies. Whee!!!
Just for your reference, above where I mention Akane almost dying against a guy with wings, that was Saffron, Prince of Phoenix Mountain. I just finished that Manga (Ranma 1/2 Manga 38) and it was damned cool. Just in case you were wondering if Ranma WAS willing to kill for Akane, read that one and you will get your answer. Also has the failed wedding where Ukyou and Shampoo are tossing bombs. Ranma is probably less mad about that than the loss of the Spring of Drowned Man water that Happosai drank. Anyway, keep checking back for new chapters, and remember, the more mail I get, the more I write!
] Darkangel98s
P.S. NOMINATE ME FOR AWARDS GUYS!!! IF I WIN ONE< I MIGHT JUST FINISH THIS WHOLE SERIES IN A WEEK!!! TALK ABOUT INSPIRATION.
C+C at darkangel98s@yahoo.com . Flames can go to hell. Also, check out my website at www.geocities.com/shadow_angel48s, where all my other fan fictions are kept.
Legal Stuff: I don't own any of the copyrighted materials in these little works of fiction that I produce, and am in no way challenging said copyrights. All I have come up with is the story I have stuck them into.
The Crow 1/2: Dragons Rising
Chapter Three: Calm Before the Storm
Later that same night…
Ukyou had never been more surprised in her life, than when Ranma, in his girl form, had walked into her restaurant, and spoke to her.
"Hey Ucchan. Sorry 'bout this…"
Then, the shorter, red haired girl collapsed upon the cold checkerboard tile floor, out cold. Ukyou just stood their, staring at the form lying on her floor, mind having gone numb, sure she had gone mad. It was only when Konatsu entered, today dressed in a very lovely blue and green silk kimono.
"Ukyou-chan? Did I hear somebody come in? I must have forgotten to lock…" Seeing the person sprawled out there, he hurried over, and knelt down beside her, beginning to roll her over. "What happened here Ukyou-chan? This girl is all dirty and soaked and… and… it's RANMA!!!" Konatsu jumped back a dozen feet easily, holding his finely manicured hands up as if to ward himself from evil spirits. "How did that body get here?!?"
"You mean you see it too?"
"OF course I do. It's lying right there!" He pointed.
"Oh my God! Do you have any idea what this means?" She jumped over the bar/grill, and landed smoothly on the other side, and hurried over to the red head. "Help me out here Konatsu, we need to get him upstairs."
"I am not carrying a dead body."
"Konatsu! He's not dead! He walked in here, and talked to me! He's breathing for goodness sakes! Now get over here and Help me!"
With the cross dressing ninja taking Ranma's shoulders, and Ukyou taking her feet, the two of them made quick time up to Ukyou's bedroom, him complaining the entire time how Ranma smelled like she was dead, even if she were breathing.
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Ukyou remained by Ranma's side all through the night, even into the early morning. Konatsu was more than capable of handling the restaurant. She could hear him downstairs already getting the restaurant ready for business. He was a good worker, and they had grown very close since the funeral.
How could Ranma be alive? He could not. She had seen his body, skull cracked open, a mix of brains and blood staining the ground around his head. She had watched as the bodied last nervous twinges had ended, and he lie still. He had died that day. There was no other explanation, except that either he had somehow faked his death, which was doubtful, or somehow he had risen back from the dead, which was even more unlikely.
She reached out and took his hand, squeezing it, trying to understand how he was now here, that he was actually lying in her bed, breathing quietly. As their flesh met, something seemed to hit him like a jolt of electricity, and his body slammed upwards, resting only on heels and shoulders. Ranma's eyes opened, and a silent scream seemed to tear itself from her.
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Images and memories flooded her mind. Images of a man lying dead upon a cold warehouse floor mixing with memories of feeling himself die on that very floor. She saw his funeral, and cried silently for the loss everyone felt, for he felt it too, deeper than any of them ever could. She felt the woman named Ukyou struggling to live on after all that had happened, the attempt to kill herself, cold steel blade cutting across warm flesh. Konatsu crying over her, as he tried to stop the blood; there had been so much blood. Her being taken care of, getting help, and finally moving on, and the budding relationship the two of them developed. And with her memories, rode his own, just pieces, but more than had been there. She… no he, for he remembered his curse, was Ranma Saotome, sole heir to the Saotome School of Martial Arts. He lived with the Tendos since he had arrived here, and he was engaged to Akane Tendo, whom he secretly loved more than anything in this world. And that he had died.
It was slow, her body relaxing, but it did, and it lay back against the soft, cool sheets of the bed. Ever so slowly she turned her head to look at Ukyou, who stared at her in worry, with her eyes tinged with pain. Ranma released her hand, which she had gripped reflexively when the memories had come. She smiled at her weakly.
"Hi there, Ucchan."
She seemed to be debating how to respond to her. She seemed to be unsure if Ranma really was who she appeared to be. "Hello there, Ran-chan."
She looked into Ukyou's eyes, calm and serious, and smiled. "I guess I have some explaining to do, huh?"
"Yes you most certainly do…"
For just a moment, their was a flash of the old Ranma in her eyes, and she grinned. "If you don't mind, I would love to tell you over something to eat. Not having anything for a year can make a guy REALLY hungry…"
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Ranma, now back in his male form, bathed to remove the smell and filth of the grave from himself, and dressed in some of Konatsu's rarely used guy cloths, sat shoveling Ukyou's okonomiyaki into his mouth with his usual intensity. He had already eaten five of them, and despite his promises of telling her what had happened to him, he had not taken a break since he had sat down.
Ukyou herself was finally convinced the he was who he said. No one ate quite like her Ran-chan. She stood across the grill from him, watching him eat as fast as she cooked. She could not figure out why all the questions she had, which their were many, did not seem so pressing. It seemed that all that was important was that he was alive, and sitting across from her. She smiled.
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From his place at the foot of the stairs, Konatsu watched silently. He was happy that Ranma was actually not dead. He had wanted Ukyou, but not at the expense of another's life. But now, with Ranma back, he feared that what Ukyou and he had developed over the year since the funeral would vanish, as she went back to her feelings for Ranma.
He watched the two of them from a distance, Ranma stuffing his face, and Ukyou watching him, and felt pangs of loss. He did not stand a chance against this. He was going to loose her…
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When he was finally done, so full he felt he was going to burst, he pushed his empty plate up to the edge of the grill. He took a drink of the water , and looked at his friend, seeing her smile. It was time for his story. At least what he remembered of it. What he had learned from her memories, and what it had reawakened in his.
"I guess it is time for me to talk, huh?"
"You had better believe it, Ran-chan. And it had better be good, or I might just have to kill you myself." She glanced sideways, towards her battle spatula, which rested next to Konatsu as he sat on the stairs that lead up to the bedrooms above. He got the idea. "I mean, if this is come kind of trick, it was the most horrible thing you could ever have done."
Ranma smiled at her sadly. "I am afraid it was no trick, Ucchan. Not me running away." He looked down at the table, and his hand began to trace a pattern across the countertop. It was something he did when he was nervous, like when he thought no one would believe him. "It was for real. I died."
She crossed her arms. "Died huh?" She reached out and poked him in the shoulder. "You don't feel like a ghost to me. And no spirit just ate all that food."
"I know it is hard to believe. Heck, I don't believe it myself. But it happened."
She looked at him, eyes downcast, waiting to be blamed. It all sounded so preposterous, so impossible. How could he be dead and be sitting here, eating her out of house and home. It wasn't possible, but something in the way he acted, the way he spoke, brought her the impression that he believed what he was saying.
"Ok then. Tell me what the afterlife is like then.."
He glanced up at her briefly. "I don't remember much about it." He looked down her hands briefly, at her wrists. She noticed, but did not think anything of it. "Actually I don't remember much of anything." He turned his head fully up, and locked his cool blue eyes with her brown ones. "When you took my hand upstairs, I felt something. It was like I could see into your memories. That gave me some memories of what had happened after you all broke in, and found me and Akane. I can remember seeing myself dead…" He shivered slightly, before continuing. "Your memories of me seemed to jar loose other things, and I remembered more, stuff only I knew, but not much. Like I remember that I was a martial artist, but no matter how hard I try, I can't remember much about it. Just some basic katas and stuff. Other than that, my mind is a complete blank."
His eyes traveled back down to her wrists, and she looked down to see what he was staring at. A nasty looking scar ran about three inches down her wrist, cut into her flesh by one of her own throwing spatulas. Suddenly self conscious, she tried to hide her arm behind the counter, but his hand shot out, just as fast as she remembered, a blinding blur, yet his grip was gentle. He drew her arm towards him, and turned it wrist up. He stared at it intently, and ran a finger softly down the injury. She shivered herself, but not from the feather light touch, but because just for an instant, she could feel the cool steel sliding through her again. At that, she pulled her arm back, almost violently.
"It was a cooking accident. I was slicing up some vegetables, and a slipped. It was pretty bad. Konatsu managed to get me help before anything bad happened." The lie fell flat, when he locked gazes with her again.
His eyes were filled with pain, near tears. It was not a look she had ever seen from him. It was something she hated to see in him.
"It was not too long after the funeral. Business had been bad, and Konatsu had been running the restaurant for almost a week. You refused to even come out of your room." His voice was steady, despite the emotions on his face. "No matter how much everyone tried to tell you that you were actually the hero, since you were the one that had brought help and saved Akane, you still blamed yourself. You were so sad Ukyou…" His hand rose slowly, and traced a faint line down here cheek, where a tear had just escaped. "Finally, in the end, you could not take it any longer. The pain had to end, the misery had to. All you wanted to do was end it all, and be with me. So you had locked your bedroom door, and taken one of your spatulas. It had surprised you, after all the fights you had been in, how much one little cut could hurt. You passed out, from the pain, and blood loss, and the next thing you knew, you woke up, in the hospital, Konatsu by your side, holding your hand, about to pass out from the constant vigil he had kept over you…" Finished, he wiped a tear of his own away.
She backed away from him slowly. "How... How could you know that…?"
"I saw it in your memories, Ukyou. I felt it, hear it, saw it all, just like it had happened to me…"
"No…no…no…" She tried to run, ashamed of her weakness, ashamed that he had seen her at her worst. Worst than that, had felt it all. She was half way through the doors into the kitchen when he caught her, having leaped the grill, and covered the distance to her in a starling burst of speed.
He took her in his arms, hard and strong, meant for fighting, hugging her close in a grip that was soft and gentle, but unyielding. There, they cried, releasing all the pain and sorrow they felt, comforted by the presence of someone that cared for them.
Time had no meaning for them. When they parted, it had been almost a half hour they had stood there, Ukyou finally letting out all the pent up anguish she had held inside for so long. Wiping their tears away, they both managed a smile.
"I-I Guess I needed that. I have been holding all that in for so long. Therapy didn't even help this much." She gave him another hug, this one friendly and brief. She then lead the two of them back around the counter, and over to a booth, where they both took a seat, across from one another.
Taking another swipe at her eyes, she let her smile fade. "I guess you did come back from the dead huh?"
"Yep."
"Care to tell me how?"
He shrugged. "I don't know. Just before I remember walking in the rain, following this huge bird, I remember a girl. She was telling me something about how it wasn't my time yet. That I had to find peace. Before that, I don't remember anything."
"Find peace? Like put your affairs in order? I know you left a lot of people behind who depended on you, but I have never heard of anyone coming back because they had been promised to a dozen fiancés."
"A Dozen fiancés?" He looked confused.
"You mean you don't remember?" A year ago, she would have jumped at the opportunity. But now, things had changed. She could not quite bring herself to take advantage of the situation.
"Well I remember you, and Akane… AKANE!!!" As if just remembering her, he suddenly bolted up. "How could I forget her! I have to go see her! See if she is ok."
He was heading towards the door, almost before Ukyou could react. She turned, raising her hand in an attempt to stop him. "Ranma! Wait!"
He was in a near panic to go see Akane, as if his life depended on it, but something in her tone made him stop. "Something wrong with Akane? It isn't you being jealous is it?"
She shook her head. "No… No… I just wanted to remind you it was raining, and to take an umbrella."
He smiled and nodded. "I'll be back Ucchan. I promise." He turned to look by the door, and found only one umbrella in the can near the door. A red bamboo one, which resembled the one Ryoga always carried. He grabbed it, and shook his head. Could not have been Ryoga's, because too light. A memory tickled at the back of his head, but for the moment, he ignored it. His need to see Akane was too great. The opened the umbrella and was out the door, racing into the stormy night.
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Ukyou shook her head sadly. He was about to find out something that would hurt him worst than what she had done to herself. What the Kuno's and those damned Amazons had done to the youngest Tendo daughter. She had wanted to explain to him what had happened, what was still going on, but something held her back. She doubted he would have believed her had she told him. It was something he needed to do on his own.
She sighed, and turned, deciding to tell Konatsu to go ahead and start the morning preparations. It would be morning soon enough, and they might as well get an early start. Yet when she looked over, he was no longer there, and the sounds of someone working in the kitchen could already be heard. It was only then, that she realized that he had witnessed everything that had happened here in her restaurant. He had stood by, and watched them hold each other, cry in each others arms. She suddenly realized what he must have been feeling, and she felt like crying again. Yet another person she ended up hurting through her actions.
She got up, and hurried into the kitchen, to talk with him, set things strait. She hoped that he would understand…
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Two silent watchers witnessed Ranma's departure.
The crow, having been resting under an overhang across from the restaurant, cawed softly at Ranma's quickly disappearing form, and took flight. It had one simple purpose on this earth, and it was completely devoted to it's task. It dropped from it's perch, and took flight, following the recently reborn young man, intent on guiding him through his vengeance.
The other watcher sat silently as the great black bird took flight. He wished it was not raining, so he could smoke his pipe, but shrugged. It was a minor inconvenience. At least compared to what was to come.
Happosai frowned, and began to work over plans in his head on a way to perform damage control. He knew once Ranma got started along the path of vengeance, the normal level of destruction they caused would seem minor by compare. He had never been a good master, but he was a kindred spirit to Ranma, in at least one way, and he felt he owed him this, as a way of atoning for his past sins.
Quickly, the little martial artist hopped away into the darkness, heading out to prepare for what was to come.
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Ranma cleared the Tendo compounds tall stone walls with a single leap, balancing the umbrella just right to keep the rain off of him. He did not want his return to be like his first arrival here, as a girl.
As he landed, atop one of the Koi ponds stones, he frowned. He could feel something about this place did not seem right. It was like a wave of sadness seemed to radiate from the very ground around this place. He wanted to put it up to just his nerves at finally returning to this place, but somehow he could not. He knew deep down that something was wrong.
Instead of just walking up to the front door and knocking, like he had planned, he decided to make a wide circuit of the grounds. Slowly he walked the houses edge, and despite the darkness, his vision seemed fine, and he saw something that bothered him.
The house was not like it had been. Despite all the property damage, Kasumi kept the place neat. If her father or her could not fix it, she had a repair person come out and take care of it immediately. It was her driving goal in life that her home be a proper one, and always in its top shape. What he saw was a home, that while it was still kept up, no longer was taken care of like it had been. Some of the paint was peeling, and some of the roof tiles needed replacing. The lawn needed to be cut a few weeks ago, some of the plants did not look to be in good shape.
When he reached the Dojo, it was in even worse shape. It looked like no one had even been in it in months. He slid open the doors, silent as he could, and was shocked at the insides. Broken bricks, something Akane loved to practice on, lay scattered everywhere. There were several roof leaks, and water mixed with the brick chips and layers of dust, to make a slippery film beneath he feet as he walked. He remembered little of this place, not much more than a layout of the home, but he knew that all of this was wrong. For it to be like this, something terrible had to have happened.
He slid the doors shut, and hurried along the covered walkway that ran from the dojo to the house. Worries began to assault him about what could have happened to Kasumi. He knew the name, and could conjure a face to go with it, but beyond that, all he had was a feeling of kindness about her. If anything had happened to her, he would be very angry.
He decided on the easiest way to sneak into the house, already deciding that he would have to check things out more, try and remember more about the people that lived here, before he announced his return. He vaulted to the roof without a thought, and swung over the edge , to sit on a window sill. It was all instinct he was going on now, and his body seemed to remember doing this many times. Using the umbrella to shield himself not only from the rain now, but water pouring off the roof, he slid the window open, and slipped inside.
This room was his, or had been. He had shared it with his father while they had lived here with the Tendos. Apparently his father was no longer staying her through, no one was inside, and both sleeping mats were neatly rolled up and laid against the wall. A brief thought about his father, an image of him taking a young Ranma away from a woman he knew was his mother, flashed through his head, and suddenly he knew without a doubt that he disliked his father very much. He was glad that the older Saotome was no longer here.
Ranma did a quick run through of the room, finding most of it empty. All that remained here was a single shirt in the closet. He slid it out, and looked it over. It was similar to the ones he always remembered wearing. A Chinese style martial artists shirt, but he did not remember one like this. It was solid black, made of some very soft fabric, and had a sliver dragon stitched from front to back across it. He did not remember owning anything like it, but that did not mean a whole lot, considering his current memory problems. He folded it up, and tucked it under one arm, deciding that he could wear it later, since he would need to change cloths eventually.
Something fluttering by the window caught his attention, and he spun, to find that bird, gleaming wet and black, staring at him. It did not make a sound, as if understanding he was trying to be quiet, and after staring intently at him for a moment, hopped into the room, and glided over to the door. It looked at the door, then back at him, and back at the door again, and Ranma had the feeling that it wanted him to go into the hall.
He shrugged. The bird did seem to know what it was doing, and he slid the door open as quietly as he could, and almost as soon as it could squeeze through, it walked through, and waddled down the hall. Ranma followed, leaving the door open. It went around a bend in the hall, to the right, and Ranma had to step quickly to keep up. Where it lead him, was to a door at the end of the hallway, one that seemed very familiar. He saw a small wooden duck carving on the door, and squinted in the gloom to read the single word on it. Akane…
Images of the young woman filled him then. Her smile, the way her short hair swirled around her face when she sparred with him, the way her eyes twinkled when they shared one of the few tender moments they had together. He remembered other things, like how they had fought, and how he had almost lost her in a fight once, against some guy with wings, but those things were unimportant. All that was, was that he back, and could be with her again.
He had not even realized he was moving, and before doubt could stop him, he had opened her door, and walked inside, shutting it behind him.
He saw her, and his heart skipped a beat. She was sleeping, and looked like an angel to him. He approached her slowly, as if afraid she would awake, and he had a faint series of memories of being tossed, punched, and kicked from the room on countless times. He did not want anything like that to occur. Not now. He just wanted to look at her.
He had no idea how long he stood there, looking down at her. Again, time seemed to loose meaning to him. But as the first rays of dawn began to filter through her window, muted by the clouds and rain, she stirred, whispering something in her sleep, and rolling onto her back fully facing him now.
The scar had healed cleanly, and was a neat little line of scars across her face. He could not remember anything like that on her. It was something new, something disturbing. It was another thing that tickled at the back of his mind, like he should recognize it. And again, his body seemed to react on it's own, and he watched his hand reach out, and trace the lines across her cheek, as he had done to the one on Ukyou's wrist, and feeling the thin scars under his skin. It was then, that it hit him, like a bullet to the heart…
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Her legs no longer worked. That was the only reason she was not fighting what Kuno was doing to her. She felt her panties rip from her body, and him enter her. Her virginity taken away by one of the rivals of the man she had so desperately been saving it for. And it was not just there, he violated her. It was in any place he could stick it, and if she resisted, it was pain for her. But the rape was not the worst of it. It was the look he had while he was doing it, a cruel, hate filled gaze, mixed with lust and something else, something wilder. She could only akin it to the look his sister always had in her eyes when she was fighting over Ranma, except a thousand times worse. Insanity, in it's purest form.
This degradation was far from the worst of it. The worst did not come till Kodachi arrived. That was when the true pain started. She watched them kiss, tongues touching, mouths open, and her not even looking when she slid the scalpel across their victims face. Kuno had been even more excited, and this excited his sister, and that was when the pain began for real…
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Akane awoke to the sound of a scream so tortured, so anguished, that she was for sure that she was back on that table again, with the insane Kuno siblings. That it was her screaming. But in the moments it took her to wake up fully, she found herself lying in bed, in her room alone. Wondering at the chill breeze blowing through her room, she glanced over at the window, and found it open. She could have sworn that it was closed when she went to sleep the night before.
She rolled over onto her side, thinking of Ranma, the feeling that he was close almost overwhelming her. She lay their crying for at least an hour, before her body finally decided it had woken up enough, and needed to relieve itself. Wiping her eyes, she rolled over, and started to reach for the pair of crutches and leg braces she laid beside her bed every night, when she saw the feather lying on her floor. It gleamed blackly against the early morning light, and she wondered how it could have gotten there.
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Ukyou had been so busy during the day, that she had not had time to check on Ranma more than once during business hours. He had gotten back just as they were opening, and had run upstairs to lock himself away in her room, and away from the world. The one time she had gone up, no one had answered, and she had come back down. She was starting to worry, but figured he was taking what had happened to the Tendo's pretty hard. He just needed time, she was sure.
To add to her stress however, was Konatsu, who was avoiding her like she had the Black Plague. When confronted, he acted ok, his normal cheery self, but when he was away from her directly, she could see him moving and acting like he had just lost the love of his life, and she guessed in his mind, he had.
When Ucchan's finally closed down, Ukyou turned the open sign around to closed, and readied herself for a heart to heart with Konatsu, when the door at the top of the stairs opened, and Ranma began to walk down. She gasp when she saw him.
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He did not know why he had done as he had. He had changed cloths into the shirt he had found in his old room at the Tendo's, and a pair of black pants he found in Konatsu's room. As he had been leaving, the crow had some how found it's way into the room with him, alighting on his shoulder just as he passed the large mirror where Konatsu put on his makeup. He had turned his head, and found himself staring at his own image. An image that did not look quite right.
He caught new memories, this time ones he knew not to be his, of other men and women, people like him, back from the dead. He saw their faces, and knew their purpose, his purpose now. He had taken the makeup, and began to work, crafting a new face to go with his task, one that would fit into his new, darker world…
He took the steps one at a time, slowly. His face was now a pale white, and both eyes were painted dark, a single long black streak coming down from his right eye, like a trail of a tear. He nodded inwardly as Ukyou too a step back, fear lighting her face. He was ready.
"Time to make them pay…"
End of Chapter Three.
Authors Notes Again: Whew. Wrote this on in one night. I bet you can tell. I don't think it is AS good as the others, but hey, I tried. Of course I wrote the other two chapters in one night as well. <Shrugs> Lets see. Yes I know, there are a few overdone things. But I thought that the ability to touch someone, and read some of their memories to help gather back your own was kind of cool. They did it in the first crow movie after all. AND YES I DO KNOW THE KUNOS ARE A LOT LIKE THE VILLANS IN THE FIRST MOVIE. They are only going to be part of the problem in this series. I am not ripping off the first movie in it's entirety. I promise I will be done with them by 2/3 of the way through. YEA!
Oh yea. You will see how off the deep end the Kuno's have gone in the next chapter, I promise. And the next chapter is gonna have a couple of cool fights, just for you action junkies. Whee!!!
Just for your reference, above where I mention Akane almost dying against a guy with wings, that was Saffron, Prince of Phoenix Mountain. I just finished that Manga (Ranma 1/2 Manga 38) and it was damned cool. Just in case you were wondering if Ranma WAS willing to kill for Akane, read that one and you will get your answer. Also has the failed wedding where Ukyou and Shampoo are tossing bombs. Ranma is probably less mad about that than the loss of the Spring of Drowned Man water that Happosai drank. Anyway, keep checking back for new chapters, and remember, the more mail I get, the more I write!
] Darkangel98s
P.S. NOMINATE ME FOR AWARDS GUYS!!! IF I WIN ONE< I MIGHT JUST FINISH THIS WHOLE SERIES IN A WEEK!!! TALK ABOUT INSPIRATION.