Tendo Nabiki had NOT been having a good two weeks. A simple day-long train ride to Satan City had turned into a circus of calamity. First, there was the water buffalo on the tracks not ten miles outside of Nerima. She swore that she’d eat more hamburgers if it would prevent that from happening again. She also had that chatterbox old lady that sat on her left the entire trip. She knew more than she EVER wanted to know about this old lady and how it sucked to grow old. If someone else even mentions Alzheimer’s around her one more time, she would scream. As if it wasn’t bad enough hearing the stories the first time…
Then there was that pleasant stop at the halfway point. Who robs a train in this day and age? Honestly? She barely managed to talk her way out of losing all her money and the clothes she had brought with her. Luckily the cops showed when the train didn’t. Of course they took their time about it. She honestly didn’t know how she fended the thieves off for a week. That was the last time she was going to be a hostage if she could help it.
And then there was the breakdown at the three hours till arrival. She swore that Kami was out to get her. What had she done to deserve all that? Okay, maybe selling pictures of her sister to lecherous men and running the largest betting pool and extortion ring in Nerima was probably bad in some people’s books, but she hadn’t really done anything bad, had she?
To top it all off, the showers on the train were broken and she hadn’t had a chance to bathe in all that time.
Nabiki shook her head. “I swear, if one more thing happens to me before I see my ‘fiancé’, I’m going to scream.”
Click. “Give me all your money, toots!” A gruff, forceful voice demanded from behind her.
The middle Tendo daughter unleashed the most blood curdling, loud, obnoxious, frustrated scream that had ever been heard on the face of the Earth. The thief had to clear his ears for a second before he could finish the robbery. “Nice set of lungs you got there, but your Yoko Ono karaoke career is going to be pretty short lived if you don’t hand over your money now.”
Nabiki turned to see the tall, rough looking bandit holding a gun on her. He was about a foot taller than her wearing sunglasses and a bandanna to cover his face from the nose down. She looked around quickly, trying to find something to help her. Damn! There’s nothing I can do! And I worked hard for my money. Maybe I can convince him I’m broke. Lord knows I smell like it. “But I don’t have any money, sir. I’m just a lost teenager trying to find my way home.” She gave her best innocent look.
“Then maybe you can pay me in other ways. Heh, heh.” He smiled lecherously. He walked around her looking her up and down. “Yeah, I think you’ll be real nice.” He licked his lips and grabbed her arm. “You’re coming with me!”
“Let her go!” Came a shout from behind them.
The robber turned around, hauling Nabiki around with him. “Who’re you?” The mugger asked. “Some sort of Boy Scout?”
Nabiki gave her would-be savior a quick once-over. He was tall with a head of black hair done up in a pigtail in the back. He was obviously very strong from the tone that his bare arms shown. He was wearing a red sleeveless shirt with wooden ties on the front, black kung-fu pants, and bronze studded bracers on his forearms. He stood with his arms crossed with a sever expression on his face. He’s pretty cute! Gohan may have the ‘little innocent boy’ look, but this guy has the rugged man look down to a tee.
“I’m Saotome Ranma of the Saotome School of Anything Goes Martial Arts. I’m also one of this city’s champions of justice.” He uncrossed his arms and cracked his knuckles. “Now, are you going to let the girl go, or am I going to have to get rough on you?”
Nabiki’s eyes widen. This was him. This was her fiancé. She couldn’t believe her luck. Now all she had to do was get out of this lug’s grasp and start getting to know him, good or bad.
The man pulled the Nabiki back to himself and put the gun to her head. “Listen, Boy Scout, either you walk away or this girls brains decorate the walls of this alley.”
Ranma took a step forward, a determined look on his face. “You’ll never get the chance.”
Nabiki had had enough of being a hostage to last a lifetime. She ducked her head and elbowed the guy in the ribs. His eyes went wide as the blow took him by surprise. The pigtailed martial artist didn’t miss a beat. In a blur of red and black, the mugger was black and blue. Ranma took the robber’s bandanna off his face and used it to tie his hands. He then tied the guy’s shoe laces together, both very tightly.
“That should keep him until the police get here.” Ranma brushed his hands off. He turned to look at the girl he had just had a hand in rescuing. “You okay? He didn’t hurt you or nothin’ did he?”
Nabiki smiled a sly grin. Now to find out how much of a womanizer he really is. She walked over and hugged him tight, rubbing up against him suggestively. “Oh, thank you!” She gave her best impression of a grateful damsel that had just been rescued by her knight in shiny armor. “I owe you my life! If there’s anything I can do to repay you, just ask! And I do mean anything.” She smiled a predatory grin. “You don’t know what kind of hell I’ve been through for the past two weeks. You’ve been the first bright point I’ve had in a long time.”
“Gulp.” Ranma swallowed hard. “Uh, it was nothin’. Really! I, uh, really have to be going. I’m just glad you’re okay.” He quickly wormed out of her grasp and started walking off. “Uh, see you around.” He quickly jogged away.
Nabiki stood with one hand on her hip. He’s definitely not a womanizer, and not that particularly evil either. I had a funny feeling that Ryoga was full of it. The boy didn’t strike me as the brightest star in the sky. Maybe this entire trip wasn’t a waste at all. We’ll if I’m going to settle here for a while I’ll need a place to stay, but first things first. She sniffed her shirt. I need a bath and a change of clothes!
Up on the rooftop, Videl was tapping her foot with her arms crossed. Where is he? She thought. We’re going to be late for school.
Ranma came up over the edge of the building. “I’m here! I told you I heard someone scream.”
She sighed and dropped her arms to her sides. “So what was it?”
“Some girl was about to get mugged. I talked the guy out of it.” He smiled his trademark grin.
A shift in the wind sent a putrid stench across Videl’s nostrils. “Pee-ew! What did you do?! You smell like you haven’t bathed in a week!”
Ranma sniffed himself. “I coulda swore I took a bath this morning. And that crazy maid won’t let me have any dirty clothes.” He thought for a second. Must a been that girl. I guess it smells like she’s been through hell. Wonder how she’s doing?
The daughter of Satan shook her head. “Come on, Ranma. We can miss the first half of class today to get you changed, but next time wait until after school before you decide to rescue zoo animals.”
“Actually, it was a girl who had been having a lousy couple weeks.” He turned to go toward the mansion. When Videl didn’t move he turned back. “You coming?”
Videl had her arms crossed and her eyes narrowed. “A rough couple of weeks, huh? What did she look like?”
Ranma scratched his head. “A little shorter than me, brown hair…”
“Did her clothes look like they had been worn for a while?”
Alarms went off in the back of Ranma’s head, but, being the man that he is, he had no clue what they were for. “Now that you mention it, they did look wrinkled.”
“Grrrr.” Videl growled. “She hugged you, didn’t she?”
“How’d you know?” He blinked as he realized what he had just admitted. He waved his hands in front of himself. “It’s not as if I like her or anything! She was just grateful!”
One of her eyebrows went up. “That sounds believable. I just don’t like other women pawing you.”
“NIHAO!” GLOMP!
Videl glared. “Case in point.”
“Airen! You take Shampoo to date, yes?” The lavender haired Amazon hugged tightly to Ranma as he tried to peel her off of himself.
“Get offa me! I told’ja I ain’t your husband!” He continued to break the Amazon death grip of love.
Shampoo sniffed the air. “Aiya! Did tomboy girl let fart? Tell truth now!”
Videl stomped over to where the couple was tangled up. “I did NOT FART! And how many times have I told you to KEEP YOUR HANDS OFF MY MAN!!!” She hauled back and punched Shampoo off the building. “And don’t come back!” She huffed after the departed Amazon. She turned and grabbed her boyfriend by the arm and drug him in the direction of her home. “Let’s get you changed and see if we can’t avoid any more close encounters of the Amazon kind for the rest of the day.”
They managed to get home and back to school in time to make their second set of classes. They were surprised to see a new student standing in front of the class. She was wearing a blue and white uniform dress, and had short brown hair that came to about to chin length around her head, but had bangs cut up just above her eyes. Videl and Ranma walked in right at the beginning of her introduction.
The teacher raised an eyebrow. “Fighting crime early today, are we?”
“Yeah.” Ranma replied.
“I hope you’re not using your status as champions of justice as an excuse to stay home and fool around.” He gazed at them evenly.
Videl latched onto Ranma’s arm. “Oh, he found us out, Ranma!”
Ranma’s face went beet red and his eyes bugged out. “We didn’t do nothin’ like that!” He had his hands flailing in warding gestures.
Videl rapped him on the head. “I’m only kidding. Let’s get to our seat and find out about this new girl.
Ranma looked at her. “Hey, you look familiar.”
Nabiki had a smug grin on her face. Definitely not an evil womanizer, and it looks like he and his girlfriend haven’t done anything serious yet. There may be some room here. “Try picturing me wearing a two week old jeans and blouse combination.”
“You’re that girl I rescued this morning!” He stated the obvious.
She winked at him. “Bingo.”
The teacher cleared his throat. “Videl, Ranma, if you two will take your seats, I can finish introducing the new student.” The two quickly complied and literally hopped to their seats. “I wish you two would stop doing that, but anyway…Class this is the new student Tendo Nabiki…”
Ranma’s eye started to twitch. “Tendo?”
“She just recently hailed from Nerima where she went to Furinkan High School…”
“Nerima?” A chill went up Ranma’s spine.
Ireeza noticed Ranma was not being himself. “Something wrong, dreamboat?”
Ranma’s pigtail was standing upright. “Nothing’s wrong.” He laughed nervously. “What makes you think there’s something wrong?”
“Well,” the blonde leaned in close. “This is the first time I’ve ever seen you sweat.”
“Heh, heh, heh. Nothing’s wrong. Really!” His voice had a sick desperation to it.
“Ooookaaaay.” Ireeza turned back to the teacher would was continuing the introduction.
“Even though she’s a year older, she chose to join this class to make up for our more modern curriculum.”
Nabiki looked over the class and then at herself. “I wish I would have known this school didn’t require uniforms.”
The teacher rolled his eyes. “It does, just no one seems to listen. We couldn’t send the WHOLE class to the hall, could we? Why don’t you grab the seat behind Videl and Shyapuna? As soon as you’re seated we’ll begin class.”
Nabiki nodded her head and took the seat. As the teacher began to teach something she had already heard once before, she started to tune into the other conversations around the room.
“Come on, Videl! You’ve got to help me with Ranma’s sister!” Shyapuna was whispering to an annoyed Videl.
Sister? Nabiki thought. Dad and Mr. Saotome never mentioned anything about a sister. She looked over at Ranma, who was fast asleep behind a strategically placed textbook. The blonde beside him was looking him up and down like he was the main course at her dinner table. Looks like I’m not the only one here window shopping. I guess he’s pretty popular.
“For the last time, Shyapuna,” Videl’s voice had a note of weariness to it. “Pan’s not interested in you.”
Nabiki paid attention to that and other conversations in the room. She also paid close attention to who was paying attention to whom. Looks like there’s some money to be made here. I think I could get used to this.
At lunchtime, Nabiki watched Ranma tear through his lunch like a whirlwind as he girlfriend just shook her head and sighed. I’d approach him, but Videl never leaves his side. It’s like they’re glued together or something.
Just then a purple blur hopped over the wall and collided with Ranma. The dust settled and there was a very curvaceous girl with long lavender hair wearing a too short red Chinese dress sitting on Ranma’s lap holding a takeout box in one hand.
Nabiki raised an eyebrow. Very friendly Chinese delivery girls they have in this city.
“Nihao Airen! Shampoo bring you too too delicious lunch!” She presented the box to the raven-haired boy who was still reeling from the impact of her arrival.
“All right, you Chinese hussy!” Videl put down the remains of her lunch. “You, me, now!” She launched herself at the Amazon, fists at her sides.
The two began to battle back and forth. It was obvious that Shampoo had been training more, but so had Videl. Ranma was so rapt in watching his student/girlfriend fight that he didn’t even notice the girl sitting down next to him.
“Hello, Saotome.” Nabiki tried out her most winning smile.
Ranma slowed turned to Nabiki. “Yo, Nabiki. Uh, how you doing?”
She settled back and smiled at Ranma. “I’m doing all right. I was just thinking about honor. What does honor mean to you?”
“It means everything to me.” Ranma answered immediately.
“Good.” Nabiki purred. “What do you know about an agreement between your family and mine?”
“Heh, heh.” Ranma started to sweat. “Uh, I, uh really don’t know what you’re talking about.” He put on his best nervous smile.
Nabiki smiled wider. “Oh, I think you do. Otherwise you wouldn’t be sweating bullets right now.”
“Well, I, er, that is…oh crap.” He took a deep breath. “Let me guess, you’re my new fiancé.”
“You got it.” She chuckled.
Ranma’s face dropped into his hands. “Oh, man.”
“It could be worse.” He turned to look at her. “You could be engaged to my mallet wielding sister. Trust me, you’re a lot better off. She probably have hammered you into the ground and called you a pervert for letting two girls hang all over you.”
“She doesn’t sound like a very nice person.” Ranma commented. He suddenly had a sharp, but brief, headache for some reason.
“She just needs a durable man, that’s all. Luckily, she found one.” She narrowed her eyes. “I’ve got my eyes set on a more ‘down to Earth’ man.” She chuckled a bit at her inside joke.
Ranma was sweating bullets again. “Listen, can’t we call this off? I mean, uh,…I’m already engaged to Videl.” He finally remembered his and Videl’s anti-Amazon defense system.
“Then why was that Amazon calling you husband?” She asked with a smug grin on her face.
Ranma frowned. “It’s just a stupid Amazon law. If a male outsider defeats an Amazon, she has to marry him. I keep telling her that her laws don’t apply here, but she won’t believe me.”
“So why are you engaged to Videl?” She asked off-handedly.
“Because I like her a lot.” He answered. He still had some difficulty saying he loved her.
Nabiki had a ‘cat that got the canary’ grin on her face. “So, you disregard two countries’ honor so you can marry a girl you ‘like’?”
Ranma buried his face in his hands again. “Come on! You can’t be serious!” He looked at her again and saw the confident look on her face. “You are, aren’t you?” He shook his head.
“Saotome! Prepare to die!” A dozen chained spikes flew down on his position.
Ranma quickly scooped up Nabiki and jumped out of the way in the nick of time. He turned to face Mousse. “HEY! You could have hurt an innocent bystander, idiot!”
“Not only do you steal my Shampoo, but you seek to add yet another woman to your harem.” Mousse pulled out a pair of steel cats claws. “You unfaithful scoundrel! For that you shall pay!” He charged in, claws forward.
Ranma threw Nabiki into the air, startling her. “Kachu Tenshin Amaguriken!” He quickly shredded the cat’s claws with the Chestnuts Roasting Over an Open Fire technique and kicked Mousse over the school perimeter wall. He finished just in time for Nabiki to fall back into his arms. “Stupid moron! Doesn’t he know he can’t beat me?”
“Very popular guy, aren’t you?” Nabiki grinned and put her arms around his neck.
Finally realizing he was still holding her, Ranma put Nabiki back down on her feet and took two steps away. “Listen, isn’t there something we can work out?”
“I’ll think about it.” Nabiki pondered a second. She still had some money to make while she was here. “But first, tell me about your sister.”
Sweat beaded up on Ranma’s head. “Uh, she’s okay. She’s a real good fighter.”
Nabiki’s eyes narrowed. “I was actually wondering how to get a hold of her.”
“Well, she kinda pops up every now and then. I’m hoping she won’t visit for a while…”
“Why’s that?”
“She can come in at some of the worst times…”
At that moment a heavy fist on flesh sound could be heard and Shampoo joined Mousse’s flying circus. Videl wiped a trickle of blood off the side of her mouth and spit out the rest. “Damn floozy won’t leave MY Ranma alone.” She turned around to see Ranma talking to Nabiki. She strode up quickly and grabbed Ranma’s hand possessively. “Hello, Nabiki was it?”
The brown-haired mercenary smirked at that female version of territorial pissing. “Yes, and you must be Videl. My sister is a big fan of yours.”
“Really.” Videl deadpanned. “So what were you two talking about?”
Nabiki waved her hand dismissively. “Nothing, really. Just family business.”
“Are you two related?”
“Not really, but we could be.” Nabiki eyed Ranma.
Videl didn’t miss the gaze. She slid in front of Ranma. “Listen, sister, Ranma’s mine. I don’t know what your game is, but you can’t have him.”
“Too late, ‘sister’.” Nabiki decided to go for the kill. If it didn’t work, she could use it for blackmail material. “Ranma’s my fiancé, by an agreement between our families. Honor must be satisfied, right Ranma?”
He gulped continued to sweat.
“Listen, he’s living with me because of honor too!” Videl got in Nabiki’s face. “He’s going to live with me until I’m as good a fighter as he is! That’s the agreement.”
“What kind of binding agreement is that? He just agreed to train you?”
“He lost a bet and now he has to abide by the conditions of the wager.”
“You’re putting my family honor above a petty bet? You’ve got to be kidding me!”
“HOLD IT!!!”
Both the girls stopped and turned to Ranma. He took a deep breath and calmed himself. He turned to Nabiki. “Do you have the ability to call off the engagement?”
Nabiki raised an eyebrow. “What do you mean?”
“What if you found me, uh…What if you found out there was something wrong with me, and you didn’t want to marry me?” He tried his hardest to pick his words carefully.
The middle Tendo narrowed her eyes. “Go on.”
“Follow me.” His shoulders seemed to slump as he walked over to the closest water fountain. He took a quick look around to make sure no one was looking and turned the water on his face, transforming him into a shorter, bustier redhead. “What if I was a freak?”
Nabiki’s eyes went wide for a second and then went back to her calculating look. She saw some definite money making material here. “So, like father, like son. I guess I’ve just met your ‘sister’, am I right?”
Ranma-Chan nodded her head. “How did you know about pops?”
“I watched him turn into a panda when our dads were talking about him staying at our place.” She smiled as she thought how things might have ended up if she hadn’t seen his father transform. She probably would have dumped the engagement right then and there and went home, to most likely dump the engagement on one of her other sisters. But, since she had known that something like this was possible, she could see the man that was still there, and the money that such a figure could bring in.
“So pops is freeloading off you guys now, huh? You might want to go home and kick him out before he eats you out of house and home.” Ranma-Chan smirked.
“Naw, he and daddy are too close. They agreed to marry their kids, didn’t they?” She stated the obvious. “Besides, aren’t you freeloading off of Videl?”
Videl’s face screwed up with anger. “He’s training me! He’s NOT freeloading!”
Ranma just blinked as his girlfriend defended him.
The bell rang signaling the end of lunch. Ranma quickly doused himself with the hot water in the thermos he still carried, despite not needing to hide as a girl at the Satan estate, and they all went back to class.
After school Ranma and Videl made every effort to get out of the class without attracting the attention of any more fiancés, and went home checking over their shoulder for any followers the whole way. Too bad Nabiki had already done her homework and knew where the Satan Estate was. She just decided that she wouldn’t go there first. She knew of Mr. Satan’s gym that he trained his students at in town. She was just surprised when she saw Shyapuna making his way there as she was.
“Hello. You’re in my class, aren’t you?” She said it as more of a statement than a question.
“Yeah. I’m just coming here to train with Mr. Satan.” He smiled. “I’m going to defeat Ranma if it’s the last thing I do.”
Her eyes narrowed. “So why do you want to beat him?”
“So he’ll let me date his sister!” He smiled a goofy grin.
Yen signs played around in Nabiki’s head. Hello Kuno all over again! Cha-Ching! Hope this poor slob has some money. “What would you think if I told you I could probably get pictures of his sister for you?”
“I’d think you were a god-send!”
Now to go for the kill. She had her sly, another-sucker-born-every-minute grin. “Okay, 1000 yen apiece upon delivery. Deal?”
He shook his head. “I can’t afford that much!”
Damn. Plan B. “Okay. I’ll knock some off the price if you’ll get me in to meet Mr. Satan.”
“How much?”
“Half.”
“Now you have a deal!” He smiled and led her into the gym. They threaded through the security guards who knew to let Shyapuna in. He just had to explain that he was bringing a girl in to watch the training. They finally made their way to the workout room where Mr. Satan was bench-pressing around four times his weight.
The skills that served Nabiki so well at her old high school kicked into full gear. Hmmm…He’s definitely strong, but he doesn’t have the look of being strong-minded. He’ll most likely be easy to manipulate. So this is the guy that defeated Cell, huh. He doesn’t give off as much energy as Gohan. I don’t see how he could be stronger than my sister’s fiancé. After he had reracked the bar, she walked up and bowed to him. “Hello, Mr. Satan. My name is Tendo Nabiki. I’m here to talk to you about Saotome Ranma.”
“So do you want to date him? It’d would be great if you could get him out of my hair!” The older man chuckled.
She noticed how protective he was concerning his daughter. Even though he had a light laugh, a serious concern was conveyed by his body language. “Actually, I’m engaged to him by agreement of our fathers. I just need some help from you.” She smirked.
He scratched his head. “So what can I do for you?”
“I need a place to stay while I’m in town. If you could put me up at your place, it would go well towards me winning Ranma away from your daughter.” She knew she had him.
He thought for a second, and then a broad smile crossed his face. “I’d be glad to do it! Woe be it for me to come between two fiancés!”
Nabiki smiled a smug grin at the older man. The people around here are even easier to manipulate here than they are at home. I think I could get to like this place.