Misato herded the two children into Gendo’s office. As usual, the place 
gave her the creeps. The symbology on the ceiling and floor of the room 
was odd, unfamiliar, and utterly alien to the man who sat behind the 
desk. As usual, he had on his suit, and he steepled his white-gloved 
hands on seeing their entry.

It was pretty obvious why Gendo wanted to see Ryoga. For almost a week, 
they had been looking for him. How could he run off like that? What if 
one of the Angels had shown up? What did he have to be unhappy about 
anyway? Ritsuko said something about neural feedback and unfamiliar 
stimulus, but it really didn't make any sense.

Why, then, was Rei in the room? She was on her feet now, no bandages, 
and presumably healthy. The doctors had recommended her return to duty 
only two days earlier. As usual, her expression was totally neutral. 
Perhaps Gendo just wanted her to see the coming rant? Not really; if 
Gendo was protective of anything in the world, it was Rei.

"Come in, Captain Katsuragi, Ryoga, Rei."

Ryoga had on a standard "I’ve been bad" face, looking at the sigils on 
the floor, shuffling his feet. Misato did feel a bit sorry for him. 
Right after he had been brought in by that Kensuke fellow, she’d have 
to be nicer to him after all, he had spent the entire night getting 
bawled out by one NERV staffer after another. Not the most fun way to 
spend the day. Now, he was going to get the re-runs, with the added 
benefit of delivery by a father she knew he wasn’t comfortable with. 
(And hadn’t they hated each other only a few days before they had met? 
She was certain of it.)

"Ryoga..."

"Yes, Dad?"

Gendo’s eyes narrowed. "Why did you leave without somebody with you? 
You KNOW that wasn’t a good idea." Huh? That didn’t sound like Gendo.

"I was just getting some snacks from the corner store..."

"And why did you take that pack along?"

"I always take my pack along."

"And why is that, Ryoga?"

Ryoga paused for a second. "Well, it’s because I always get lost... oh."

"Yes, oh indeed. What would have happened if an Angel had attacked 
while you were out wandering somewhere? Do you have any idea how many 
people could have died?" Gendo still wasn’t really angry. What the heck 
was going on?

"Sorry, Dad."

"Well, it’s not your fault." THAT was something that Misato had never 
expected to hear Gendo say to anybody. "You’ve got your parents’ sense 
of direction. But we still can’t afford to not be able to find you, you 
see?"

"I promise I won’t get lost again."

"Yeah, right." Ryoga turned and looked at Misato. "Can you really not 
get lost? Come on. You couldn’t find the door of this room in one try, 
Ryoga." He dropped his head again.

"Well, do you have any ideas, Captain?"

"Well, Hibiki-san, I’d just put a leash on him and be done with it." 
Ryoga’s head snapped back up. "Just joking, Ryoga." For a second, he 
had had murder in his eyes... but it was gone now. Did he not like 
leashes or something?

"Good idea, Captain, but not in the way that you expect."

"Huh?" Nobody understood that comment, it seemed.

"Rei?"

"Yes, sir?"

"Now that you’re well again, I’m assigning you to keep an eye on Ryoga. 
You’re in the same class at school. Make sure he gets there and back. 
If he goes anywhere outside Captain Katsuragi’s apartment, you’re to be 
with him. Understood?"

"Yes, sir."

Ryoga was taking this whole thing pretty well. Misato knew she’d be 
furious if she’d been assigned a keeper. "Does that mean I can go 
places now?"

Gendo looked at Ryoga. That COULDN’T be a smile on his face. No, no 
smile now, Misato was definitely seeing things. "Yes, son, you can go 
out, provided Rei is with you. Only when Rei is with you. Got that?"

"Understood, Dad." How could he be so happy at this? Surely... no, that 
thought was pretty disgusting.

"You may go now, Captain, Ryoga. And, Ryoga..."

"Yes, Dad?"

"You keep an eye out for Rei as well. If she gets hurt, I’ll make you 
wish that I’d never found your mother." There, Gendo’s back to normal 
already.

Ryoga swallowed. "Yes, Dad."
---
Paradise Lost, part 4
Fan Fiction by Andy Kent
All characters owned by Rumiko Takahashi or Gainax, respectively.
---
"Rei?" She hadn’t left with the others. Of course, Gendo hadn’t told 
her to leave with the others.

"Yes, sir?"

Gendo relaxed. With only Rei around, he didn’t have to keep up much of 
a front. "Do you realize what you just agreed to, and why I asked it?"

"Not really." Ah, honest as ever.

"Here’s the short explanation. My son gets lost as easily as I do. But 
we need him around, or at least we have to be able to find him quickly, 
in case of an Angel attack. Right?"

Rei nodded.

"Well, then, we need to keep an eye on him. We don’t have too many 
people available for that, and they couldn’t go everywhere with him, 
not inside class like you can. Understand?"

Rei nodded again.

"And we can’t just lock him up somewhere. He’s been wandering for 
years, Misato tells me. He’d really get depressed if he couldn’t get 
out every so often." Gendo knew that one first-hand. "So, you can 
follow him around. Make sure that he doesn’t get too lost, get him home 
in the evenings."

Rei nodded again.

Gendo opened a desk drawer. "You need to have these things at all 
times, then." He pitched a leather case with a NERV logo at Rei, and 
she snatched it out of the air. Never blinked. "That’s a pocket 
cellular phone. I have the number, so does Fuyutsuki. If we need you, 
we’ll call you. Keep it charged up." Another leather-cased and NERV-
stamped item. "This one’s a global positioning system. When we call 
you, you have to tell us exactly where you are, and we’ll send a 
helicopter for you."

Rei tucked the two items into her vest pockets.

"Here’s the last thing." Gendo reached down and withdrew a leather 
shoulder holster from his desk. He placed a pistol beside it, and two 
spare clips for that pistol. Another box of ammunition followed. "Do 
you know what this is, Rei?"

"It’s a gun." Hey, that looked suspiciously like an expression. 
Surprise? Well, her eyes were wide open.

"It’s a Heckler and Koch USP nine millimeter pistol. Very reliable. 
You’re to carry this, and two loaded clips of ammunition, at all times 
as well. The box of ammunition you can keep at home."

"Why?" She didn’t ask questions, most of the time. That she did now 
meant that the thought puzzled her.

Gendo leaned back a bit in his chair. "Misato tells me that Ryoga often 
travels into Nerima. He might even have a girlfriend there." Could 
Gendo believe that? He hoped so. Ryoga had never been good at 
socializing as a little boy. "I’ve been to Nerima before. It is quite 
possibly the most dangerous place in Japan, excepting wherever an Angel 
is at the moment. Do you understand?"

"No." 

Of course she didn’t understand. She’d never wandered into Nerima. It 
really wasn’t like the rest of the city. She might need that gun. 
"You’ll carry it anyway. Don’t use it unless you or Ryoga is 
threatened." He thought about the handprint he had seen in the catwalk. 
"Come to think of it, don’t worry about Ryoga. He can probably take 
care of himself."

"Yes, sir."

"That will be all, Rei. Take care."

As she left, Gendo swiveled his chair around and looked at the view of 
the Geofront. Was this really such a good idea? Obviously Ryoga could 
take care of himself, if he’d survived Nerima. But Rei? They’d eat her 
alive down there. Ryoga had BETTER take care of Gendo’s little girl.

---

Misato was still looking at Ryoga funny. It wasn’t a good feeling, 
especially because she was driving him and Rei home, and he got the 
sinking feeling that it wasn’t affecting her driving at all. He checked 
his restraints again.

"I still can’t believe he actually bought that snack story. That’s a 
bit much, even for him to swallow. Do you know how lucky you are, 
Ryoga-kun?"

Yeah, lucky. He’d only been trying to get some edible food. Misato had 
botched the instant curry (again) and not even a stomach able to 
withstand Akane’s culinary disasters could handle the fried mess. Of 
course he had never found the corner store... or the apartment... or Tokyo-
3, for that matter. Good thing that Kensuke liked to camp out. That 
really had been lucky.

Ryoga looked back at Rei. Another bit of luck, thoughtfully provided by 
his maybe-not-so-no-good father. Now he could get out and see 
everybody. Akane must be worried sick, with no Ryoga or P-chan around 
for weeks.

Hey, come to think of it, he hadn’t turned into P-chan for quite some 
time. Even more good luck, he supposed. "Hey, Rei, do you have any 
plans for today?"

"No."

Well, that was abrupt. "Do you mind tagging along with me for the 
afternoon, then? I’d like to visit a friend."

Misato giggled a little. "Hear that, Rei? He says, ‘a friend’. You know 
what that means, right?"

Ryoga felt himself blushing. "Hey, cut that out Misato!"

Rei responded, "No, I don’t know what that means." She still had that 
puzzled look on her face.

"Well, you see, Rei, there’s a girl that Ryoga..."

"Hey look out for that car!!" After a bit of reckless swerving, Misato 
finally returned to the correct side of the road. Ryoga had never 
thought he’d be so glad to have to narrowly avoid being killed in a car 
wreck, before. "Watch where you’re going!"

Misato stuck her tongue out at Ryoga. "Backseat driver."

"That’s because YOU’VE got an airbag and we don’t." Rei was being 
quiet. Hadn’t she noticed that truck? It must have had fifteen axles. 
Heck, Ryoga wouldn’t have survived getting hit by that thing.


After a quick breakfast, Ryoga and Rei set off for Nerima. Fortunately 
for Ryoga’s nonexistent finances, it was close enough (and far enough 
from the train stations) that it was just as easy to walk there. Ryoga 
had turned down Misato’s invitation for a ride. Sure, it was against 
his father’s rules, but he LIKED some people in Nerima.

"Hibiki-kun, why do you get lost?"

Miracle of miracles, she spoke. He looked up. Of course, she was 
leading the way, as he had only the vaguest idea where Nerima actually 
was. "I don’t know. It’s been going on all my life. I just never seem 
to get where I’m going, that’s all."

"Why not use a map?"

He’d wondered that himself. "For some reason, it doesn’t do any good. 
Takes me twice as long to find something with a map as without. Four 
times if I’m using a compass too." Usually, if he had to get somewhere 
fast, he’d just get Ranma or somebody to take him there. Just like he 
was doing now. Sigh.

"Why didn’t that plate kill you?"

He’d already done this once, recently, hadn’t he? Maybe the tough guy 
approach would be effective. "Hey, you ought to see what I’m used to 
getting hit by. That plate was nothing." She did something that could 
have been a single giggle or could have been a hiccup. He wasn’t 
betting on the latter. So he’d have to tell the truth. "I just don’t 
hurt much, that’s all. Lots of training."

"Why do you have an umbrella? It’s a sunny day."

Yeah, like he was going to up and tell her about his curse. "You never 
know. Besides, usually I’m lost. I’d never find where I left it if I 
didn’t always carry it." Hey, that made some sense. Was she nodding to 
herself?

---

Rei looked around. The directions she’d managed to get from a laughing 
Misato (what was with her? "Just ask Ryoga." That wouldn’t work.) led 
her here. It looked like a fairly normal suburb of Tokyo-3, streets, 
some drainage ditches, a few businesses.

At the same time, it looked like those pictures of Sarajevo that she 
had seen in history class. Lots of concrete damage, holes blown in the 
street, holes blown in walls, rubble here and there. A few houses were 
without power, as here and there power lines were down. She saw some 
sort of dust cloud in the distance, led by a tiny dancing mote. No cars 
moved down the street.

Ryoga moved forward. "Okay, now I know where I am. This way." Not 
likely. If Gendo-san had been telling the truth to her, and he didn’t 
always, then Ryoga had no idea about how to get where he was going.

"Where are you trying to go, Hibiki-kun?"

"Oh, I usually just wander around for a while. Then I bump into 
somebody and follow them around for a bit. Usually I end up at the 
Tendo dojo."

"What’s the address?" With that, they could just go straight there. She 
was already a bit tired. Ryoga tended to walk quickly, almost running, 
and he never stopped or slowed down. It was good exercise, really.

Ryoga stopped for a second. Then he set his pack down, started 
rummaging through the top pouch. He came up with a battered address 
book. It opened to a well-dog-eared page with a single address listed 
there, one Tendo dojo. "That good enough?"

Well, no, it wasn’t. She also needed a local map to tell her where that 
address was. "Do you have a map?"

"I can’t use maps, remember?"

Yes, but that didn’t mean he didn’t have a map. "Well?"

"No, I don’t have a map." He shrugged his pack on again, careful to 
make sure the umbrella stayed on top. "We could find one."

That made a little sense. If they kept going, they’d find a store 
somewhere that would sell maps. Of course, she couldn’t afford a map; 
Gendo had neglected to give her a wallet or money. It figured. She had 
to carry around all of those things that were doing her no good, and 
didn’t have those things that she could really use. Maybe the world 
really did work like that.

"Hey, I’ve got a better idea. You hungry?"

She was, but what did that matter? "Yes."

"Well, there’s Ucchan’s. She’ll have something to eat."

"Will she have a map?" That was more important right now.

"No, but she knows the way to the dojo. She can tell you."

Finally, something constructive. "Okay."

---

Ukyou looked up. It was a little late for breakfast and a little early 
for lunch, but she still had the grill hot. Two customers were always 
welcome.

Then she got a good look at them. THIS customer was always welcome. 
"Hey, Ryoga! Where did you wander off to this time? Nobody’s seen you 
for a month?" Who was that girl with him? Odd. Blue hair, red eyes, NOT 
a martial artist. Young, too. And packing, but that didn’t make any 
sense, Ryoga wasn’t going to rob her.

"Yeah, well, you wouldn’t believe me if I told you, Ukyou. You have 
anything ready?""

Of course she didn’t have anything ready, she always cooked fresh, but 
she couldn’t blame Ryoga for not knowing that. He wasn’t much of a 
cook. "Let’s see some money first, sugar."

"Can’t I put it on the tab?" 

Ryoga had no source of income at all. How did he manage to keep all of 
that muscle off of what he ate? "Well, this once, all right. You 
haven’t introduced your friend." She grabbed some batter and a small 
spatula and started frying.

"Oh, yeah, right. Ukyou Kuonji, meet Rei Ayanami. Rei, this is Ukyou, a 
friend of mine."

"Pleased to meet you." Had that girl blinked yet? She decided to really 
do some over-the-top work on her order. That’d impress her. "So, what’s 
been going on, Ryoga?"

Now why did he look embarrassed? Poor Ryoga was so pathetically easy to 
read. "Nothing really... how’s everything been?"

"You’ve been out of town, then? Didn’t you hear?"

"No, of course I was out of town. Hear what?"

Ukyou stopped for a second. "They found Kodachi a few days ago."

"Kodachi Kuno?"

"Yes. Somebody killed her." That pulled Ryoga up a bit. That look, 
though... haunted, really. "She was found in an alley somewhere. Whatever 
hit her, it was hard enough to blow her heart out through her spine."

The Ayanami girl spoke up. "No meat on mine, please."

"No problem. Anyway, they didn’t find anything that might be a clue. 
Lots of ki energy, though. You sure you were out of town?"

Ryoga swallowed. "Did it happen eight days ago?"

Ukyou flipped one finished order of okonomiyaki onto a plate and 
started in on the second. "Yeah. How’d you know?" He was white as a 
sheet. Really shocked. What for? Nobody had cared for Kodachi, not even 
her idiot brother, and Ukyou hadn’t gotten around to telling him... "Oh 
my god. You didn’t."

"No! I wasn’t here." He was almost hysterical by this point. "Heh. I’ve 
got the best alibi in town. Right, Rei?"

"Yes, the Angel attack was eight days ago."

What did that matter? Nice fireworks, the robot won, and everybody went 
home. Come to think of it, Kodachi hadn’t been watching with everybody. 
Ukyou remembered watching from a roof with Ranchan, and (unfortunately) 
Akane, and Shampoo, and Mousse, and Cologne, and Genma, and everybody 
else in town who could jump up on a roof without help. Except Kodachi. 
That was what was so puzzling... everybody who could throw a ki blast 
like that was accounted for. Except Ryoga, and now he was saying he 
wasn’t there, with some girl Ukyou had never seed before backing him 
up, and he was acting like maybe he really DID do it. "You have 
something to tell me, sugar?"

"No, I don’t. I’m not allowed to, anyway." They’d both managed a pretty 
good part of their food already. Ryoga ate like he hadn’t had a good 
meal in a month (which was likely, and why this one was on the house), 
and the girl just sat and ate hers quietly.

"Well, look, this is the bad part. Akane found the body." She saw his 
eyes go dead. Definitely a bad idea to tell him this now, but if he 
found out later that she knew and hadn’t told him... repairs were 
expensive, and he was better that her at fighting. "She’s still pretty 
shook up over the whole thing." Telling him this part would hurt. 
THINKING this part would hurt. "Ranma’s taking care of her right now." 
Ryoga was starting to glow, just a little bit, but Ukyou knew just how 
bad he could get when depressed. "Don’t worry, she’ll be fine, it was 
just a lot of blood, that’s all."

He finished off the last of his okonomiyaki. "Oh, god. Ranma’s taking 
care of her? You sure? Thank god." Huh? "Oh, man, I’ve got to get over 
there. Rei, you done eating?" At least he wasn’t glowing any more; she 
wouldn’t have to use her emergency pitcher of ice water after all.

"Yes."

"Well, then, could you tell her how to get to the dojo, Ukyou? She’s 
doing the navigating today." No kidding. "Thanks for the lunch."

Ukyou watched the two leave. What in hell was up with Ryoga? Normally 
the thought of Ranma and Akane together was enough to make him break 
down a wall. Today, he hadn’t even broken his chopsticks. And was he 
really involved in the murder somehow? Not that anybody here would 
talk; everybody had slept a little better the last few nights knowing 
they’d never hear that laugh again. It just wasn’t human.

Hey, what was Ryoga doing calling that girl by her first name? Not even 
"Rei-san", but just "Rei." She could have understood "Rei-chan", 
especially considering their size difference, but just plain old "Rei"? 
Ryoga wasn’t any good to her if he couldn’t win Akane over from Ranma. 
Was he?

---

Ryoga followed Rei. She was going down some side streets, familiar but 
not enough for him to navigate by. They were definitely headed toward 
the Tendo dojo, though.

Kodachi was dead. Well, that explained a lot. Ryoga hadn’t believed, 
not really, that the Angels were all well-versed in Anything Goes 
Rhythmic Gymnastics anyway. Of course, how Kodachi had managed to turn 
herself into one of those... things... hey, was there a Spring of Drowned 
Angel? It would make perfect sense.

No, wait. Ritsuko was spending all her time looking at the body of the 
last Angel. If it was there, then they wouldn’t have found Kodachi’s 
body here. Probably not, anyway. He didn’t know anybody with a Jusenkyo 
curse that had died like that. Then what was going on?

It had to be her. That laugh was unmistakable. He didn’t feel sorry for 
her death, even if he had done it somehow. Her fault for turning into a 
giant Angel and trying to destroy mankind, right? But that’s not how it 
had worked. He thought of asking advice from Baasan. No, bad idea, if 
she knew it was possible to do that, she would, and he didn’t want to 
fight HER as an Angel. If that worked. Huh?

"We’re here, Hibiki-kun."

Ryoga looked up at the familiar dojo sign. It showed a few scorch 
marks, a few scuffs, and a big ding on the bottom (he had really meant 
to hit Ranma that time), but it was definitely the right sign. He 
knocked on the door knocker.

"Oh, coming." That had to be Kasumi. Wonderful person, too good to have 
to be living with the rest of these people. Great cook, too. If she 
wasn’t totally not his type... "Why, hello, Ryoga. Come on in, lunch is 
ready. Who’s your friend?"

Ryoga performed the obligatory introduction. Rei still hadn’t so much 
as blinked, that he had seen. Don’t her eyes dry out after a while? "Is 
Akane in?"

"Yes, she’s at the table, with Ranma, Gendo, Father, and Nabiki. Did 
you hear what happened?"

"Ukyou told me. How bad is she?"

Kasumi looked at Ryoga. "She’s going to be all right. Ranma’s been 
looking after her. It must have been a horrible shock, though." That 
was her "I just cleaned up so don’t seek revenge right now Ryoga" look, 
slightly modified into a "don’t let your petty feud disturb Akane right 
now Ryoga" look. How much did Kasumi know? About his curse, probably 
not. Everything else, for sure.

They went into the dining room, and Ryoga introduced Rei to everybody. 
They sat down, Ryoga across from Ranma and Rei across from Akane. She 
looked normal, if still a little pale. Well, it had been over a week.

Ranma paused in shoveling food down his throat. "Hey, Ryoga. Try some 
of this stuff, it’s really good." Ryoga got a closer look. That was 
food? Oh, Akane cooked it. No wonder she was smiling at Ranma like 
that. In fact, now Ryoga could see Ranma’s death grip on his 
chopsticks. Well, if he was going that far to make her happy, the least 
Ryoga could do was help him.

"Yeah, that looks good. Would you please pass me a bowl, Kasumi?" He 
heaped it full of... rice, probably, and passed the dish on to Rei, along 
with his best "don’t eat this on pain of your life" look. She set it 
down and sipped her tea. Hey! It had worked. Well, crunch time... |crunch 
crunch| hey, he didn’t mean it literally. Oh well, anything this bad 
had to be chock full of nutrition, right? "It is pretty good."

Akane beamed. "Thanks, guys. It’s one of Mom’s recipes."

After a (blessedly quick) lunch, Ryoga motioned to Ranma. "Hey, could 
we talk?"

"Sure, go ahead."

He had to be teasing. "Not here!! Alone."

"Fine, on the roof all right?"

"Sure, let’s go."

---

Now how was Rei supposed to keep an eye on Ryoga if he did things like 
that? She hoped she had read his look right, and that dish looked like 
it could kill somebody. She was full of okonomiyaki anyway. Good, that. 
Well, if the mountain will not come to Mohammed... 

---

"Uh, Rei, could you wait down there for a second? I won’t run off 
anywhere." She could jump on the roof too? That was surprising; she 
didn’t do any martial arts.

"Yes." She hopped back down.

Ranma chuckled. "New girlfriend, Ryoga? Talk about cradle robbing."

Hey! That wasn’t funny. "Hey! That’s not funny!"

"Well," chuckle, "what did you want to talk about?"

Ranma wasn’t fooling anybody. "Come on, spit it out." Ewwww! That’s NOT 
what he had meant. Appropriate, but... "Okay now? What happened?"

Ranma wiped his mouth on one of Ryoga’s spare bandanas. "You heard the 
story yet?"

"Yeah, Ukyou filled me in."

"Well, she took it kind of hard." Ranma sat down, crossed his legs. 
"The first day, she wouldn’t eat, wouldn’t talk. The next day, she went 
into the kitchen, spent four hours in there. I won’t tell you what it 
tasted like."

"But you ate it all, didn’t you?"

"Of course I ate it all, stupid. Almost killed me."

Well, Ranma wasn’t stupid. Ryoga couldn’t see Akane not being overjoyed 
at people eating her cooking. It had worked downstairs, anyway. "She 
all right now?"

"Yeah, I figure after tomorrow I can stop eating the stuff. She cries 
every so often, though, I don’t know how to handle that, really."

"Thanks for taking care of her. Really. YOU all right now?" At least 
he’d done the right thing by Akane, even if it did put him between 
Ryoga and Akane. She’s more important anyway.

"Heh. I’ve been getting Ukyou to sneak me actual food. She’s great, 
really, it’s kept me alive this week."

"Don’t even think about it, Ranma." To insult Akane that way!

"What? No, no, that’s not what I meant. I’m taken." That hurt. "Well, 
mostly. But it’s hard, you know? She’s such a great person. Not like 
Shampoo; I don’t feel bad not liking Shampoo. Or Kodachi." That killed 
the conversation.

"Yeah, well, it’s all right. You wouldn’t believe what I’ve been up 
to."

"Does it happen to involve that blue-haired girl peeking over the rain 
gutter?"

Ryoga spun around. There she was. "Rei! I told you I’m not going 
anywhere. I’ll be right down." Sheesh. It’s not like the dojo took 
enough damage without somebody hanging off the edge of the roof all of 
the time. "Yeah, she’s a part of it."

"You giving up? No offense, man, but it’s been a while since you’ve 
been around."

What? No. "Not like that. I’ve got a new place now. Heck, with Rei 
there, I’ll even get back there tonight. Met a few new people. I’m in 
school again."

"No kidding? I thought you quit in the ninth grade."

"Turns out you’ve got to finish the ninth grade before quitting."

"So you’re in the ninth grade, now?"

"Yep."

Ranma assumed an imperious pose. "Then I insist you refer to me as 
Saotome-sempai."

They both had a good laugh over that one. "You know, Ranma, I met my 
dad."

"That jerk? Did you beat him up? Tell me all the gory details."

"Turns out he just wandered off. He had the wrong idea, thought Mom and 
I ran out on him."

"I’ll believe it of your family."

"Hey! Anyway, he’s an important guy now. Has me working for him and 
everything."

"Cool. Where’s your mom?"

"He doesn’t know either. That’s funny, too, because he always used to 
be able to find her. Where’s yours?"

"Not funny, Ryoga. I haven’t seen her in... god, I don’t even remember 
her. And I can’t go looking. Between that dumb curse and my dumb dad, 
she’d probably kill me."

Ryoga already knew that story. "Well, I hope not. I’m supposed to kill 
you, remember?"

"Yeah, in your dreams, P-chan. Hey, does that girl know about your 
curse?"

"Nope. I’ve been lucky the past few weeks. Why?"

"Well, if you don’t want her finding out the hard way, we’d better get 
inside. It’s about to rain."

"Yeah, she’d get the wrong idea about you, probably."

"I swear, if you even SAY the L-word..."

---

Akane looked at the door. All three of them were coming in, Ryoga and 
Ranma laughing and punching each other’s shoulders, that Ayanami girl 
following them. She was really, really quiet. Oh well, at least Ryoga 
wasn’t swearing vengeance on Ranma again. He could really be a nice guy 
when he tried.

"So, want to spar, Ranma? It’s been a while." 

"Sure, Ryoga, let’s go to the dojo. I could use a light workout."

"You..."

Akane went over to Rei. "You want to try it?" She didn’t look like a 
martial artist, but then again, neither did Akane. And she had jumped 
up on the roof. "I’m out of practice lately, myself."

"Try what?"

"You know, fighting. Martial arts. Kenpo."

"I don’t know how."

Even better. "Well, if you’re going to visit here, you need to learn. 
Come on."

---

Ranma and Ryoga watched the two spar. Their own fight had lasted only 
thirty seconds or so, as they weren’t really mad at each other and 
didn’t want to break anything. It was a draw (how could you KO Ryoga in 
thirty seconds?) but they weren’t trying to prove anything.

Ranma noticed that Rei picked up on the moves pretty quickly. "Hey, you 
sure she’s never done this before?"

"Well, no, but I don’t know her THAT well. She just got out of the 
hospital." Ryoga looked troubled.

"Fighting injuries? Tofu’s still the best for those."

"Well, no. It was an accident at work. She does the same thing I do."

"That is?"

"I told you that I can’t tell you. Some stupid rule."

"Well, never mind then. Wouldn’t want Ryoga breaking any stupid rules."

"You’d never believe it anyway."

Now Akane was setting up a cinder block. She was genuinely happy to be 
showing somebody how to fight in the Anything Goes style. "Don’t worry 
about Akane, Ryoga. She’s going to be all right, really. It’s not like 
we liked Kodachi." That shouldn’t have drawn that kind of reaction. 
Ryoga was getting defensive, like he did whenever you called him P-
chan. "Hey, do you know anything about that?"

"I’m not sure. I did have something to do with it."

Say what? "What?"

"I can’t tell you what. Work rules."

What, was he an assassin now or something? Have umbrella, will travel? 
"Be careful with that kind of thing. It’s not honorable to kill them 
when you’re done. What did she do, poison Rei or something?" Akane had 
broken her brick and was setting up another for Rei. 

"It wasn’t like that! I didn’t know she was dead until today."

"With an injury like that, how could you not know?"

"Hey, Ranma, remember the Angel attack last week?"

"Yeah, happened at the same time as the murder. What about it?"

"Anything familiar about that thing?"

"I don’t know... it wasn’t that close to here. Looked cool."

"Well, never mind then."

"Owwww!"

Ranma looked over at Rei. She’d broken her brick... and her hand, it 
looked like. "Hey, Ryoga, we’d better get her to Tofu’s office. Hope 
he’s in."

"He’s always in. Let’s go, Rei."

"Oh, I’m sorry, Ayanami! I didn’t realize it’d hurt like that!"

Of course, it always hurt the first time you broke a brick. "Akane, you 
dummy."

"Ranmaaaaa..."

---

Tofu shut the door to his office. He sat down, poured himself some tea. 
Got up again, broke into the medicine cabinet, added some vodka to the 
tea. He had never seen anything like the blue-haired girl that Ranma 
and Ryoga had just brought in. Sure, the hand was sprained, standard 
"you didn’t tape your hand before breaking the brick dummy" damage, but 
the girl herself was really strange. None of the pain-blocking pressure 
points worked on her. Not that she’d complained, even once, but he 
could tell that it was really hurting her.

He’d never seen red irises, either. Not anything when put next to the 
local crew, Jusenkyo curses and all... but combined with the other thing, 
it was the strangest thing. He heard them leaving as he wheeled his 
chair to the book shelf. Finding out about this would be a real 
challenge. Something to take his mind off of Kasumi for a few hours...

---

Rei knew that pain wasn’t a good thing, she’d felt enough of it, and 
knew that her hand was supposed to be hurting a lot worse than it did 
right then. Maybe that odd man with the glasses really had known what 
he was doing, even if he looked like he expected her to be cured 
instantly. Which was foolish, really; injuries healed up, they didn’t 
go away by themselves.

She looked behind her. Ryoga was still there, still with that really 
strange expression on his face that he did whenever he said "I’m 
sorry." It wasn’t his fault, it was hers. Why did she try to break a 
brick? She didn’t have any bricks that needed breaking.

Ryoga looked up. The dust cloud that seemed to wind around Nerima was 
almost to them, and the speck at its head was close enough to hear. 
"Ha, haaa, my silky darlings! They’ll never catch us!"

"Rei, look out!" He pushed her to the side of the road, she landed in a 
bush (soft, not prickly), and she watched as he launched himself at the 
head of the column. "Die, you old pervert!"

The shriveled old man evaded the attack, jumped on Ryoga’s head, kept 
going. Then the rest of the column caught up, and Rei realized that the 
dust was kicked up by what had to be half the female population of 
Nerima. They were waving various wooden cleaning implements and 
screaming bloody murder, and in full pursuit of the older man. What was 
that he had in his bag? She hadn’t seen an umbrella... Where was Ryoga? 
Oh, there, trampled into the pavement. He got up, launched himself 
after the crowd...

And disappeared two blocks down. She ran to catch up, Gendo-san would 
be really ticked if she lost him here... but he was gone. His clothes 
were still there, though. And his pack. Something was moving down 
there... that’s it. A small, black pig.

She looked closer at the pig, which looked completely stunned and a 
little angry. It was wearing Ryoga’s headband. His pet? No chance, he 
didn’t have any pets. There was something in the headband. Neural 
interface modules, two of them. There were only four of them, period, 
and Rei had the other two.

That made this pig Ryoga. Which was impossible. Of course, she had 
spent her entire life around the impossible and this wasn’t that 
strange. She picked the pig up, packed the clothes into the pack, 
shouldered it (sheesh this is heavy!) and started for home.

---

Great, Ryoga. Just great. You had to go and find the ONE sprinkler 
system in Nerima that was on at that exact moment! He was furious with 
himself, mostly because Rei didn’t know about the curse. There was no 
way she was going to run across any hot water anytime soon. 

A few months back, in a particularly boring time in Nerima, Ranma and 
Ryoga had spent some time hiding kettles, water bottles, and instant 
heating tabs at a few places in Nerima. They figured it could come in 
handy...

Hey, there was hot water in his thermos, right? Except he couldn’t get 
his thermos now. Rei had it in his pack (how did she manage to carry 
the thing?) and he couldn’t tell her to let him have it. Plus, he’d be 
stark naked when she did. He could see the look on his dad’s face when 
she told him. Maybe it was better this way.

Where were they? This wasn’t Misato’s apartment (which was a good 
thing, considering) but he didn’t recognize the place. It was pretty 
run-down, however. Rei opened the door to the apartment, it wasn’t 
locked, and the mailbox on it was overflowing with old letters. She 
dragged both pig and pack inside before collapsing on the bed. "That’s 
one heavy pack, Ryoga." Was she talking to him? No, she had addressed 
the air, it seemed.

Hey, that hall must lead to either a kitchen or bathroom. When 
opportunity knocks... he headed out. The first door was indeed a kitchen, 
but he wouldn’t be able to get on the shelf to get his hot water, 
anyway. The next door was the bathroom. He pushed it open, sneaked 
inside, and pushed it closed. The hot water handle on the shower was 
rusty, but he managed to push it anyway. Ahhhh.

He poked his head (now with headband properly placed) out of the door 
and said, "Could you bring me my clothes? It’s cold in here!" So that’s 
what a shocked Rei looked like. Wasn’t too different from the ordinary 
Rei, just really open eyes and open mouth, but then again...

She handed him a bundle. "Here." He closed the door, scrambled back 
into his clothing, and stepped back out. "How did you turn into a pig, 
Hibiki-kun?" Well, no chance of her assuming it was a freak 
coincidence. How did Akane keep from catching on?

"Long story. Can I sit down?" She motioned to the one chair in the 
room. The apartment was a wreck. Bed, iron frame, made. One set of 
drawers, closed, with glass of water on top. Also a pair of glasses. 
Broken glasses. Nightstand, one lamp. Bloody bandages all over the 
floor. Chipped plaster. What was she doing living here? "Here goes. 
There’s a place in China called Jusenkyo."

"I know that."

NO way. Nobody knew about Jusenkyo. "Well, then you know about the 
curses and everything?"

"Not really. Hibiki-san said the word sometime."

His dad? How did HE know, for that matter? "Well, there, I fell in a 
pool. Spring of Drowned Pig. It cursed me, and now whenever I get 
splashed with cold water, I turn into a pig."

"And hot water changes you back?"

Hey, she caught on pretty quickly. "Yeah, it does. You know that Ranma 
guy? He’s got the same problem, except he changes into a girl when he 
gets wet. His dad turns into a panda."

Rei’s face was doing something strange. Was she choking? No, she was 
laughing. She rolled off her seat on the bed. "Hah hah hah ahah haaaa. 
That’s funny. I never understood humor before." She sat down again. 
"Really?"

That was one reaction. "Really. What do you mean, you didn’t understand 
humor?"

"First joke anybody ever told me. It’s funny. I thought jokes weren’t 
real, though."

"Well, this one is. You won’t tell anyone, will you?"

"Would you believe it?"

"Well, no. Not until it happened to me. But I still don’t want 
everybody to know."

"Gendo-san would understand."

"Not likely."

"Yes, he would. He always does."

He looked at her. This was another emotion, although he couldn’t read 
it at all. "What kind of person is my father?"

She thought about that for a second. "I don’t really know how to put 
it. Misato calls him..."

"I’ve heard."

"Well, I don’t think he is like that. Nice, maybe. He’s nice."

"Well, that’s good."

"And he didn’t like you much. Before. Now I don’t know."

"Yeah, well, it was mutual. Does he still get lost?"

"Of course, that why Fuyutsuki is there."

"Of course." He stood up, looking at the glasses on the dresser. 
"Yours?" 

"No, they were Gendo-san’s. He pulled me out of the plug after the 
accident."

"Yeah, I heard about that... so, he’s the hero type is he?"

"No, not like that." Rei cocked her head. "I think he likes me."

Sweatdrop. "What!"

"When I’m around, he’s nice. When Misato is around, he’s like all the 
stuff Misato says. I don’t understand it."

Ryoga went over to his pack. After a couple of seconds digging, he came 
up with a miniature Tokyo Tower. He sat it on the nightstand. "For 
carrying me here. Thanks."

"It’s my job. How do you carry that pack?"

It wasn’t hard, just two hundred pounds with the umbrella. "How did YOU 
carry the pack? It weighs what, twice what you do?"

---

End of part four

Send comments, flames, et cetera to akent@pdq.net
Yes, I admit it, I killed her. Any objections?