Growing Pains
Truth and Consequences
It would be nice to say that today was a quiet and pleasant day in the Tokyo prefecture of Nerima, but unfortunately saying so would be a rather blatant lie. It was anything but quiet. One of Nerima's premier martial-artists, a young man going by the name of Ranma Saotome, was on the run from another of the area's premier martial-artists, another young man, going by the name of Ryoga Hibiki. Of course if asked, Saotome would vehemently deny being on the run from Hibiki—he would likely insist that he was doing his best to lead the other away from 'civilians' [as many of the other premier martial-artists in the Nerima area, whom the so-called 'civilians' called with sarcastic-type affection 'The Nerima Wrecking Crew', thought of the prefecture's non-martial-artist population] and the potential to cause bodily or property damage.
Unfortunately, Ryoga Hibiki was particularly determined today, and he wasn't quite so easily swayed—or lost—as he might have usually been. But that was in part due to his curse, and the fact that said curse had nearly been revealed to one of the women who he felt with all of his being that he was in love with…provided he could only pull together the courage to actually tell her how he felt.
Of course, to him, one Ryoga Hibiki, it was all Ranma's fault. It was always Ranma's fault. Beneath the surface, where actual thoughts were birthed when he wasn't feeling angry, lost, or confused, he knew that it wasn't always Ranma's fault, but at the same time, it had to be Ranma's fault, because while there were choices that he had made that weren't a direct result of, or due to the influence of, Ranma Saotome, the initial fault for where those decisions that came later, were Ranma's fault. Ergo, it was always Ranma's fault. And if was Ramna's fault this time, as well; he was positive that Ranma had somehow orchestrated the events that led to his beloved Akane's nearly finding out about his curse. The honorless cur had nearly found a loophole to expose him to his raven-haired beauty with.
That could not be allowed to go unpunished.
"Stop running and dodging me, and face me like a man!" he snarled at the retreating form of the other, leaping up from the crater he'd just created, dropping down knee-first onto the spot that for a few seconds had been occupied by the pig-tailed boy. Ranma wasn't cooperating with him.
"I don't know why you're so upset," the other was shouting back at him, "I saved your hide, bacon-breath!"
"It's your fault in the first place!" Ryoga roared back at him, and reached into his 'weapon-space' and pulled out his umbrella; he hurled the heavy bamboo implement towards Ranma, and while he was sure that it would miss, it would serve as a distraction to help him catch his eternal nemesis, and finally deal with him.
"I didn't do a thing!" Ramna shot back at him, almost absently kicking the umbrella away, at an angle that would require the pig-cursed boy to have to veer off to get it back, or leave it and perhaps get lost looking for it later. Thankfully, the sight of himself and Ryoga had convinced the 'civilians' to get off the streets, and there were very few potential casualties to avoid. It didn't hurt either that he was leading Mr. Porcini in the general direction of the abandoned warehouses that most of his fights with others of the 'Nerima Wrecking Crew' took place, where he could finally stop running and take Ryoga down cleanly. The only problem was that he'd veered in the wrong direction a few blocks back, and now he had to draw Ryoga through the restaurant portion of Nerima on the way. He was hoping that his usual run of luck would forgive him long enough to let him get to the warehouse district, and not—
And that was when a ki-charged bandana sailed just past his elbow. It was a testament to his years of training that he reacted to the incoming weapon before he even consciously realized that he was in danger. He dropped down to street level, in the attempt to get the other to change tactics, to consider the potential property damage he might cause, and to draw him down to the street as well.
"You idiot!" he shot back at Ryoga, dodging yet another bandana spinning his way, "You could hit someone with those things!" Immediately reconsidering his earlier idea, he took to the air again.
"Yeah, you!" Ryoga snarled back at him, only now just touching down on the pavement, flinging another bandana towards him.
"There're civilians here!" he cried, ducking down even in mid-air. As if to prove his point, a group of four noncombatants scattered from the outdoor teriyaki stand Ryoga had just landed in front of.
"You're just trying to avoid being beaten!" the other teen shot back at him, and flunk yet another bandana in his direction with one hand, and with the other, then tossed out a weighted line, with the intent to snag some part of the acrobatic martial-artist and pull him back down towards the ground.
Ranma felt the line catch his leg at the calf, just as Ryoga pulled at him, hard. He flared his own ki in order to control his descent, and landed only slightly harder than he would have had he jumped down to the ground.
"We can't fight here!" he shouted back at Ryoga with some measure of alarm- he was just about to try and explain a bit further, but then his senses screamed at him of another presence. He took his eyes off of Ryoga just long enough to see who the other presence was, and took in a sight that chilled him.
She was coming out of a hair boutique, just a couple doors down from the teriyaki cart Ryoga stood in front of; she was young, only a little older than he, perhaps maybe only Kasumi's age. she was dressed conservatively, much like Kasumi herself dressed, her hair dark and just brushing the tops of her shoulders. Even as he was taking notice of her, it was still just dawning on her that she- and her baby!- were not alone, and that she was walking straight into a situation of danger.
Ranma's eyes widened in horror even as the young woman was looking back at him in surprise, and he whipped his head around to take in Ryoga…and see the other man already in motion.
Ryoga frowned deeply as Saotome took his eyes off of him. "Don't ignore me, Saotome!" he snarled, and crouching down to his own feet, he charged his fingers with ki energy. It wasn't until his fingers were touching, and then digging, into the pavement before him, as he was already pushing the words out of his mouth, that he realized there was someone other than the two of them in range of his attack.
"BAKUSAI TENKETSU!"
Ranma was already taking action, moving, turning to reach out and grab the woman and her baby, to shield them with his body. While his body wasn't quite as tough as Ryoga's, he could far more take the punishment than the woman or her baby—especially her baby—and it was the cost he would pay for putting her and her child in danger, even if it wasn't directly or truly his fault.
And then the woman squirmed, trying to fight him, trying to get away, unfamiliar with him and who he was and the shield he was trying to provide for her, even as the pavement at his feet suddenly exploded into the air. She tried to push at him with the arm not holding onto the baby, while he struggled to keep her close to him. Under normal circumstances, Ranma Saotome could lift nearly a quart ton with ease, could fight Ryoga to a standstill when he chose, and could even keep the roving hands of Shampoo from touching things on his body he wasn't ready for- or interested in- having her touch. But he couldn't prevent the woman in his arms from squirming, from creating space between his body and her own, and his own eyes locked with hers as fear and panic glistened in the depths of her being, and then gasped as she suddenly stiffened, the shock of pain just barely beginning to register in her look, and then her body went almost bonelessly limp.
Ranma gently lowered her to the ground, his heart incredibly heavy. He could sense Ryoga moving towards him out of the corner of his eye, but the main focus of his attention was on the woman. Just as he had her nearly flat on her back, she spasmed, gasping, and coughing up an entire mouthful of blood. A small splattering spray of it caught him in the face, but he barely acknowledged that, too caught in the surreal moment to really give it much thought.
"Am I dying?" she managed to cough out, more blood pooling in her mouth and dribbling out down the sides of her cheeks. "I'm dying," she announced, before Ranma could even open his mouth to lie to her, to deny what his eyes were telling him, to try and hold onto the hope inside of him that he could rush her to a hospital, a clinic, to someone who could help save her.
"No, lady," he found himself saying automatically, "I can get you—"
"Take care of my baby," she gurgled, coughing hard enough to almost toss her body around in the minor crater she lay in, where the pavement had been until a few moments ago. "Promise me."
"We're gonna get you—" he tried again, and braced himself to pick her up.
"Promise me!" She screamed, coughing violently.
"I promise! I promise!" he cried out, hoping that saying so would calm her down, "On my honor as a martial-artist, I promise I'll take care of your baby! Now we've gotta—"
It was as far as he got before he watched the life leak out of her eyes, and her head loll to the side. "Lady?" he called to her automatically, knowing immediately that she was too far away to hear him now.
"What'd you do to her?" Ryoga growled at him. The other boy's voice was gruff with anger, but heavily laced with worry and concern.
"What'd I do to her?" Ranma whirled on him, his voice not at all calm. "I didn't do anything! I tried to protect her- she was pushing away from me!"
"Maybe you shouldn't have tried to grab her—" Ryoga began before Ranma cut him off.
"Me? Maybe if you hadn't used the Bakusai Tenketsu, this wouldn't happened!"
"Maybe if you hadn't run away—"
"Maybe if you would have listened!—"
The two martial artists shouted at one another, but they were both cut off by a growing wail from the baby still lightly clutched in the mother's arms. Almost spellbound in a sense of unreal numbness, Ranma gently picked up the baby, cradling him to his own chest, which only calmed the baby somewhat.
"What am I gonna do?" he asked Ryoga, though a part of him didn't expect an answer from the Eternal Lost Boy.
"You promised," Ryoga shot back at him, his voice suddenly without heat.
Ranma swallowed.
In the distance, finally, was the faint sound of sirens.