Gensou Rakuen
By Thermopyle
Thermopyle.anifics.com

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Chloe's last knife flew through the air and embedded itself within the
Japanese man's gun-arm when he brought it up to defend himself,
causing the yakuza thug to yell out in pain. She took the chance the
distraction gave her and rushed forward as best she could on her
wounded leg, hoping he wouldn't recover in time to shoot her again,
this time in a more fatal location.

He did.

She was almost there, just a few feet away and about to make a
desperate grab for the knife, when he realized how close she was and
swung the gun around, wildly, desperation and fear on his face despite
the difference in size between the two of them, and fired.

The bullet smashed into her left shoulder and she was knocked away,
falling on her back to the floor. The pain flooded through her, both
from the sensation of tearing skin and muscle and from the impact when
she hit, and she was stunned momentarily. Quickly regaining her
senses, she pushed up with her other arm and shoved both legs out,
trying to jump to the side in case he fired again.

In her pain, she'd forgotten about the previous, less distracting
injury, and when she tried to use her right leg the pain flared back
up, causing her to collapse again as her movement became uncoordinated
and too weak to succeed.

Why wasn't she dead yet?

Blocking the pain with a great deal of mental effort and deliberately
slowing her breathing because she knew that if she was to survive, it
would only be through desperate, unfailing action, she looked up at
the gunman.

He was staring down at her now, blood dripping from both hands. In
one, her knife was held in a fist, and the blood was from his other
arm, from where the blade had been removed. In the opposite hand, his
gun was held and blood could be seen leaking out the cuff of his suit
and running down the body and barrel of the gun before falling to the
ground below. His breathing was rapid, much more so than her own, and
he had a furious look on his face.

He tossed the knife aside, still looking at her, then raised the gun
to aim at her face. "You little bitch," he said, in Japanese, which
she knew, "you cost me a good job today. When you meet my boss and
comrades in hell, give them my regards."

As he squeezed the trigger, another form shot out from behind the
nearby trees and its arm flashed in a scratching motion towards the
man's. The bullet went wide, impacting on a nearby tree, and his
sleeve was instantly shredded, bits of cloth scattering into the air
around it, and the skin bared beneath was ripped, long trenches of
gore appearing, deep enough that the bone was evident in several
places. The man dropped the gun, screaming once again, holding it to
his chest and cradling it protectively with his other hand as they
both looked at the newest arrival in astonishment.

It was a boy, about ten years old, just like Chloe, and whereas the
yakuza had scratches on just his arm, the boy had them all over his
body, albeit less severely. His filthy clothes, some kind of martial
arts dogi, were barely intact, and even the few areas that they
covered could be seen to have barely-dried scabs running underneath
them from the more openly displayed regions.

Not having any idea what was going on, or how the boy had done that,
Chloe managed to push herself up, favoring her right leg and being
careful not to move the injured arm. The boy, an odd gleam in his
eyes, turned at her movement to look at her, and then when the man,
tears running down his face as he tried to hold his arm motionless,
reached down to pick the gun back up with his uninjured hand, the boy
whirled back around and... hissed at him, like a cat. He froze.

Unsure of whether the boy was friend, foe, or just some wandering
psychopath, Chloe stood slowly, carefully. The boy ignored her, so
she moved away from him, her eyes never wavering as she watched him,
unsure of his capabilities. He stayed crouched in front of the yakuza
thug, staring at the man intently as if the two of them were cat and
mouse, and the cat wanted to play.

Backing up to almost fifteen feet away where her knife lay on the
shortly-cut grass, she picked it up with her off hand, wiping the dirt
that had stuck to it from it's impact with the ground off on her
cloak. She'd trained to use both, but her left hand, the injured one,
still had the advantage. That wouldn't stop her from killing with her
right, however.

Taking advantage of the man's frozen terror, she snapped the knife
forward in a throwing motion. It hit him in the throat, catching him
completely by surprise, and he fell to his knees, clutching at his
throat as a look of terror filled his face. He clearly didn't know
what to do, whether to try pulling it out or if that would simply
aggravate the situation. A few moments later and it became a moot
point.

The boy moved his attention from the corpse ahead of him back to
Chloe, who stood still, unsure of what to do next. Witnesses had to
be killed, but she was already injured, and she'd thrown her knife
away to kill her target's last bodyguard because she wasn't sure if
she could get close enough to the boy to simply stab the man to death,
instead. Would the boy let her kill him, when he'd already shown some
odd fighting ability?

His clothes, his feral state, the scratches all over his body, and the
way he'd come out of the forest surrounding her target's mansion
suggested he was some kind of wild kid who'd developed mental issues
after being abandoned at some point. So was he capable of telling
anybody about her or what he'd seen, and if he was, would he be
believed?

Wondering for a brief moment what that child would do, Chloe quickly
came to a decision. She stepped forward, careful not to hurt her leg
or swing her torso enough to aggravate her shoulder, and began to move
towards the gun that lay on the ground several feet away from the boy
and corpse.

He did nothing in response, other than continue to study her closely,
so her actions gained a bit of confidence, although she didn't let her
guard down. She soon reached the gun and bent to pick it up, keeping
her eyes on the boy the whole time despite the incredible pain coming
from both of her gun wounds.

Slipping her finger into the trigger guard, she raised the gun to
point at him. "Sorry kid," she said quietly, and he tensed, then she
pulled the trigger.

He moved to the side, evading the bullet completely, but did nothing
else.

She adjusted her aim with a bit of concern. She hadn't seen him move.
She fired again.

He moved back.

She began pulling the trigger as quickly as she could, the shots never
quite hitting him as he began to run about in random directions, but
always staying within thirty or forty feet away from her.

When the last shot was spent, she tossed the gun to the side, deeming
it useless. The boy, still once again, watched as she pulled her
knife out from the man's throat, then wiped it clean on his clothes
before slipping it into a harness beneath her cloak.

The kid was crazy. Leaving him alive would cause no problems.

She turned and walked away, towards where she was supposed to be
picked up, and then heard him move to follow.

Chloe sat silently in the back seat of the limo, wishing fervently
that the damn boy would die and leave her alone. He'd followed her
all the way to the rendezvous point, then, when she was forced to
answer questions about who he was and why he was following her, the
men who were to escort her back to the village had been amused at her
answer, obviously thinking that she was mentally incapable of killing
a boy her own age. They soon found out it wasn't a mental problem
when she told them to shoot him, and they all failed.

Having regained a healthy respect for her, as well as a certain sullen
mood at so having embarrassed themselves, they had agreed to leave the
boy as he was, and simply depart as planned. Chloe had gotten into
the limo, and they'd started to drive off. The boy, obviously not
wanting to be left behind, ran to the car in his strange four-legged
lope, and ripped a hole in the door before jumping in to resume
staring at her.

She was the only person sitting in the back seat, and she was too
injured to fight such a lunatic, so she did nothing. The men had been
forced to do the same, since the only way they could try shooting at
him again was to stop the car, get out, and then shoot into it, and
there was no telling if the boy would stay put if she were to exit
first out of a desire to not get shot herself. So they, too, did
nothing, and the car continued towards where the private jet back to
France was waiting.

The hole in the side of the car, making the wind blow rather loudly as
they drove, as well as the intent study she received from the crazy
cat-boy sharing a much-too-confined space with her, was really
beginning to get annoying.

Despite that, she soon found herself drifting, getting sleepy after
the night's events, and was about to slip off into unconsciousness
when something heavy landed in her lap.

Her eyes shot wide open and she looked down, letting out a whimper of
pain from where the crazy kid was curled up on her legs. After
shoving him to the floorboard violently with her usable hand, she
quickly slipped it back within her cloak and drew the knife, trying to
stab him with it before he recovered.

She missed, and in the small lunge forward, managed to unbalance
herself as her leg once again failed to move properly. She fell on
her face beside the knife, which was embedded partially into the
floorboard, and the boy simply sat next to her, staring once again
with a hint of playfulness and something close to reproach in his
feral eyes.

Glaring at him, she pulled herself back up to the seat behind her and
resolved to stay awake from then on.

She lay now on a table in the jet, a plastic sheet beneath her to
catch the blood, as a Soldats physician inspected her injuries. The
leg, she knew, had just been grazed, so there was no bullet to be
removed and only the cut to be sealed with some number of stitches.
The shoulder, however, had been hit regularly and the bullet had,
after impacting hard enough to chip bone, remained in her flesh and
would need to be dug out.

Noir or not, that wasn't a level of pain she was eager to experience,
and she accepted the suggestion of the doctor to have drugs
administered to keep her unconscious for that part of the operation.
As she slipped off to sleep, she hoped that the crazy boy that nobody
had been able to get rid of wouldn't try jumping on her again and
making an even bigger mess of things.

Chloe started awake as the plane touched down on her native soil. She
was back in France, and would soon be rejoining Artena, who would look
after her until her next mission was necessary.

She was no longer on the table and instead was lying on a comfortable
couch, a blanket draped over her body, underneath which she found
herself to be naked except for panties and the bandages on her leg and
shoulder. Both injuries were somewhat painful, but much less so than
they had been right after she had received them. The drugs would
probably finish wearing off soon and the pain would return, but she
could deal with that without any problems.

Sitting up, she tossed the blanket aside and moved to stand. She
stopped in surprise when she saw the boy in the room and looking at
her with those strange eyes of his. What was his problem? Presumably
nobody had been able to get him to leave her in peace while she slept,
but apparently he had been deemed safe enough to be left alone with
her while she did so.

Ignoring him for the moment, she carefully pulled on the change of
clothes that had been set aside for her, then belted on her various
harnesses, which had already been stocked with knives, and wrapped her
cloak about herself before sitting back down. The plane was still
moving, so there were a few more minutes before they finished taxiing
around the airport and were able to get out.

Looking back at the boy to study him in return, she saw that, even
though his dogi was still in miserable shape and he had smears of dirt
on various parts of his body, he was remarkably fit for their age. He
was also fully healed from all of the scratches that had covered him-
-she looked at the digital clock on the nearby wall--only fifteen
hours before. How was that possible?

He'd been awake both when she'd been knocked out, and since she woke
up, had he slept at all in that time? If so, had anybody tried again
to kill him, or had they figured keeping out of his way was the safest
option?

Either way, it looked like Artena would probably have to decide what
to do with him. She'd already proved herself incapable of doing so in
her current condition, and none of the men on the plane would be able
to, either, whether that was from lack of opportunity or from lack of
taking advantage of some opportunity that she didn't even know about.

Once the plane pulled to a stop, the doctor knocked on the door and
entered. He wasn't surprised to find her awake, and quickly ran
through a set of questions with her about how she felt, just to make
sure that he'd done his job properly. Once that was done with, he
left and she followed him out the door, the boy trailing behind them
as expected.

There was another car waiting for them on the runway, not far from the
stairway leading out of the plane, and she said nothing to any of the
people about before immediately going to get into the car, holding the
door open for the boy because she definitely didn't want to endure
another windy ride. He jumped in after a moment's hesitation, and she
stepped inside herself, then once she was settled, the driver switched
gears and they headed off.

They drove for hours through farming country, the last stretch being a
dirt road many miles long, before they arrived at the village. The
driver stopped at the outskirts of town, knowing he wasn't very
welcome within, and they exited the car and she began to walk, the boy
scampering about alongside her. Everybody she passed bowed in
respect, although there were a number of curious glances at her
companion, but she did nothing to acknowledge their gestures and
simply moved on. Soon they were past the town and headed for the
manor itself.

Now the boy was behaving a bit more wildly, jumping into trees and
chasing off after butterflies, and despite her hopes that he'd lose
track of her while running off, he did not, and always reappeared
after several minutes. She'd been expecting him to wear himself out
and simply collapse into sleep, since they'd both been awake when they
arrived at the airport not long after dawn and he hadn't, as far as
she knew, had any sleep during the night, but he was still behaving as
actively as when she'd first seen him the night before. Jetlag didn't
seem to have any hold on this boy.

Soon enough it was getting dark and they still had several hours of
travel ahead of them, so she unwrapped her cloak and laid down a bit
off the side of the path, covering herself with it for a bit of added
shelter. Almost immediately the boy tried to jump into her lap again,
which she found odd since he'd left her alone when she was sleeping
before, but she simply shoved him to the side, after which he kept his
distance. She fell asleep wondering how human eyes could glow in the
darkness like his did.

When she woke the next morning it was just after dawn, and the pain
from her injuries had abated somewhat, to be replaced by an added
general soreness in the damaged parts of her body. It wasn't too
uncomfortable, and she was able to ignore it just as she had after
being shot in the first place.

Standing up, she saw that the boy was awake, and she wondered yet
again if he had had any sleep or if he was just perpetually alert, as
seemed to be the case. Dismissing it as unimportant, she walked back
over to the path and was again on her way. The boy quickly followed.

By midmorning she could see the manor and the grape fields surrounding
it, and she found herself walking slightly faster. It'd been about a
week since she'd left, and she was eager to return home, to Artena.
Soon she was almost running through the fields, ignoring the burning
in her leg as she overworked it and possibly split the stitches. She
looked about, knowing that somewhere out here, Artena would be
attending to the grapes as she usually was at this time of day.

A flash of shiny-brown caught her eye and she stopped, turning, to see
Artena stand up and do the same, looking towards her with a warm
smile, a basket full of fruit on the ground at her side. Suddenly
Chloe was flying forward, going as fast as she could, and then found
herself in Artena's arms.

"Hello, child," said a pleasant voice into her ear.

She looked up and smiled. "Hello, Artena-sama. I'm back!"

"Yes, I see that you are," Artena said, a hint of playfulness in her
voice. "Did you have fun?"

Chloe heard a sound from behind her, and turned, and she felt Artena's
posture change as she looked up. A little ways behind them was the
boy, torn clothes hanging loosely, looking upon them with interest.

"Who is this?" Artena asked, a curious note to her tone as she looked
at the pigtailed wild-boy, causing Chloe to hate him for distracting
Artena from her own homecoming.

"He saved my life in Japan," she said, "I tried to kill him, since he
was a witness, but I haven't been able to, nor has anybody else who
tried. He won't quit following me." She hesitated, suddenly aware of
her own slightly labored breath from running and the wetness on her
leg, where several stitches had probably bust. "Should I try again?"

When Artena didn't answer immediately she separated herself from the
older woman and prepared to attack. She could see as she did so that
the boy looked fresh as a daisy, like he hadn't just been chasing her
for the last twenty minutes as she searched for Artena. How did he do
that?!

Slipping her hands beneath her cloak, she grabbed several throwing
knives and quickly snapped her hands forward, releasing them towards
the boy as fast as she could. Throwing several at the same time was
nowhere near as precise, but this time she was trying for coverage,
not accuracy, as she'd already found that he could dodge one at a time
with ease.

Four knives flew through the air, spread out enough and at different
heights so that a normal person couldn't dodge in either direction
fast enough to avoid getting hit, yet they were still close enough
together that somebody who stood still would get hit by at least one-
-more, if they tried too late to get out of the way. Rather than
trying to duck or run to the side, or even take cover behind some
grape vines, he jumped.

Fifteen feet, straight up.

Gawking in surprise for a brief moment, she took advantage of the
situation and threw some more knives at him, knowing that he didn't
have enough maneuverability to dodge them as he fell. The knives were
on target, exactly where she wanted them to be, spread out over an
area of about a square foot centered on his torso. Before they were
even close enough for him to block, he swung his arm out in front of
the knives as if to defend himself from them.

Despite the impossibility of it, his action worked, and the knives
were all knocked out of the air, hitting the ground at about the same
time as he did. He never touched them, they just... flew aside, as if
hitting an invisible wall, or being hit BY an invisible wall....

Chloe stared at the boy in consternation, who looked back in apparent
boredom. How dare he embarrass her so in front of Artena-sama?

Trying once again, she grabbed several knives and whipped them at him,
this time not even trying for accuracy, hoping that if one or two flew
wild he wouldn't have time to react. Instead, he ran forward, right
at her! Just before the knives would have thunked home into his body,
he leapt through the air, twisting as he did so, dodging each one.
One of the knives did go in the wrong direction, but didn't even get
close to hitting him, two others were a bit off and he was able to
slip by with feet to spare, and the last slipped through a hole in his
dogi before continued on its way, having gotten within mere inches of
his flesh.

She didn't have time to react to his charge, she was only beginning to
reach for another knife when his body impacted with hers, his weight
landing on her chest and knocking her to the ground, the pain from
both the hit and the landing causing her to cry out despite her best
efforts.

Her cloak had been closed when he landed on her, and his weight was
keeping the flaps immobile, preventing her from reaching any of the
weapons contained within. While she contemplated what to do, looking
up at the hateful boy, he bent down to put his face right above hers,
then licked her on the nose.

She punched him in the head, with the arm that wasn't screaming at her
for mercy, and he let himself be knocked aside. She knew he could
have stayed put if he wanted to, he was obviously toying with her for
some reason.

Breathing heavily, she pushed herself up, again favoring opposite arms
and legs, then drew out her dagger and moved to attack at close range,
instead. She didn't think she would be successful at that, either,
but Artena-sama seemed to want the boy taken care of, and she wasn't
going to let her down, or dishonor that child as her future partner.

"Chloe."

She stopped, but didn't take her eyes off the boy. "Yes, Artena-
sama?"

"Has he ever jumped on you like that before?"

"No, Artena-sama... twice he jumped into my lap, but never onto my
chest."

"Has he ever tried to hurt you?"

She frowned. "No, Artena-sama, he just... stares at me, like he's
playing a game, and it's my move."

"Very well. That's enough for now, lets go inside and eat."

Chloe turned in confusion, the boy forgotten for the moment, and
watched Artena pick up the basket of grapes and then move towards the
manor, holding it at her side. Looking back over at the boy, she
hesitated, then moved to pick up as many of her knives as she could
find, and he did nothing to obstruct her. When she gave up on finding
the last three, she turned and headed after Artena, and the boy
followed behind her.

With Artena's urging, Chloe went to her room and changed into some
more comfortable clothes, being careful not to upset the bandages any
more than they already had been. Also at Artena's urging, she left
her harnesses in her room and headed back to the kitchen unarmed. It
made her feel nervous, with that boy following her everywhere, but the
fact that he hadn't attacked yet as well as the way he'd easily bested
every effort she made to kill him when she did have weapons consoled
her somewhat, although she'd rather have a knife in her hand if he did
attack, even knowing that it would probably do no good.

When they returned to the dining room, there were three plates set
out, and Artena was already sitting at her usual place. The boy's
plate was, thankfully, not set where that child ate when she came on
her infrequent visits. Chloe sat down in her spot, and, when given
permission, began to eat. The boy simply jumped up onto the table and
put his face in the food, somehow managing to transport the stuff
directly up into his mouth in a manner she didn't quite see, and then
by the time she was on her third bite, he was licking the surface of
the plate clean. She stared for a moment, but when she saw that
Artena was continuing as if nothing had just happened, she resumed
eating her own meal in silence, waiting to see what Artena would say.

Once they were both finished, she looked at Artena expectantly.

"Did the mission go successfully, apart from this boy's... unexpected
participation?" asked the older woman.

Chloe nodded in response. "The target was easily killed, as well as
his bodyguards, but there was one man who had been separated from them
for some reason and he caught me by surprise as I was about to leave.
His first shot hit me in the leg, and I was already down to one knife,
so I threw it as a distraction and then tried to kill him before he
recovered." She hesitated. "I failed, and he was about to shoot me
when the boy arrived and... clawed at his arm, somehow, making him
drop the gun. I killed the man and then tried to do the same to the
boy, as a witness, but was unsuccessful."

Artena was silent, and stared at the boy with a thoughtful expression
on her face, so Chloe looked at him as well, wondering again at the
oddity that he had displayed in his physical capabilities and the way
he acted, as well as why he seemed to be fixated on her.

"Has he ever said anything, given any indication of his identity or
why he's following you around?"

"No, Artena-sama, he hasn't. He's not talked at all, at one point he
hissed, like a cat, at the man who was trying to kill me." Chloe
frowned, remembering what he'd looked like at that time. "When he
first appeared, he had scratches all over his body, but they were gone
when I woke up on the jet yesterday morning, and they shouldn't have
been."

"Well," said Artena, "he doesn't seem to be a threat, so don't hit him
anymore. We'll just see what happens and take it from there. For
now, let's get those clothes off and take a look at you, it looks like
you're bleeding again."

"Yes, Artena-sama," she said, then stood up and moved towards the
medical room, taking off her clothes and setting them aside, then
slipping up onto the flat bed contained within for this purpose.

After checking that her shoulder wound was okay despite the fighting
earlier, Artena peeled off the gauze on her leg, which had been soaked
through and pulled painfully at the injury when it came loose.
Several of the stitches had to be re-sewn and she was able to handle
the pain for that well enough, but she was really annoyed at the way
Artena kept having to step around the boy, who seemed to delight in
putting himself in her way.

Soon enough they were done and Artena helped her off the table and
assisted her in putting her clothes back on, which she appreciated.
By then it was around one in the afternoon, since they had arrived
several hours earlier, and Chloe was ready to rest a while, which
Artena supported--Chloe usually took naps in the early afternoon
around her training and reading times, and her day so far had
certainly been full, if not of practice.

After being walked to her room by Artena, with the boy tagging along
as he seemed happy to do, Chloe was put in bed and the curtains drawn
shut. She was about to ask if Artena could tell her a story when the
boy jumped up into the bed and then settled himself down on her
stomach, curling about like a cat and seeming to think the spot was
rightfully his. She reached out to shove him away.

"Stop," said Artena, "let him be. We'll see what happens, remember?"

She nodded, still annoyed at him, and Artena let herself out of the
room, turning the light off as she went.

Chloe lied in bed with the boy's weight on her stomach, happy that he
didn't weigh much for a boy his apparent age, and tried to not think
about the knives that were just out of reach within her wardrobe
cabinet, and how useful it would be to have one of them at this
moment.

She was still thinking about that when she fell asleep.

Ranma opened his eyes slowly, cautiously, unused to the idea of having
time to do so. Pops must have some kinda trap planned, some weird
training exercise that would surely teach him something about an
obscure martial arts waking technique. It was the only explanation.

Staying still as his now wide-opened eyes looked about the room he was
in, he wondered at his location. He was lying, curled up, on
something warm and lumpy that was slightly smaller than he was. It
was a person, but definitely not his father.

He listened silently for a few minutes, hearing nothing but his own
breathing, which he was careful to keep controlled and even, and that
of whoever he had been sleeping on, whose breath sounded the same.
They must be sleeping.

Trying to keep his weight stationary as he moved, he raised his head
off of the chest it was lying on, then turned it to the left, to look
upwards upon the person beneath him.

It was a girl with short reddish-purple hair, a lock of it bound into
a ponytail that hung along one side of her face. Her eyes were
definitely not closed, and her mouth was made into a frown as she
looked down at him.

"Ah... who are you," he asked, "and where's my pop?"

Her frown deepened, and something about the expression on her face
made him want to laugh, but instead, he just uncurled himself so that
he was laying lengthwise on top of her, looking straight down at her
face and in a more comfortable position. He noticed her hands balling
into fists as he did so, but she didn't move to hit him.

"He's probably back in Japan," she said. "Where you should still be.
How come you can suddenly talk?"

Back in Japan?

"Hey, what do you mean by that, and where am I?" he demanded, looking
around the room to see stone walls, and that the room was completely
bare except for the bed and a clothes cabinet that stood in one
corner.

As he was glancing about, he felt the girl shift beneath him and
turned to look at her, but too late to keep her from hitting him in
the side of the head and knocking him to the floor, landing on his
side.

"Ow... what the hell did you do that for?"

Instead of answering, she threw the sheets she laid under to the side
and jumped out of bed herself, in the opposite direction from where
she had pushed him, and ran over to the wardrobe. He heard her pull
the doors open but couldn't see what she got from inside, since the
bed was in the way, so he stood up, still annoyed about being hit like
that.

Once he did so, he could see that she had furled a cloak about her
shoulders, somehow managing to buckle the top around her neck already,
and she had a knife in each hand. She was standing in a position that
would allow her to throw them easily if she wanted to, he noticed.

Ranma grinned. "I hope you don't think you could hit me with those."

"Who are you, and why have you been following me around?" she asked,
extending the knives in a threatening gesture.

"Hey, I'm Ranma Saotome of the Saotome School of Anything-Goes martial
arts, and I don't follow no dorky girls around! You take that back!"

Instead of doing the reasonable thing and saying she didn't mean it,
then putting the knives down and wandering off to play with some dolls
or something, she yelled something he couldn't understand, and threw
them at him!

Surprised by her speed and accuracy, he almost failed to dodge in
time. They were spaced just under chest-width apart from each other,
with each one being aimed at a different side of his ribcage so that
he couldn't escape in either direction without having to move his
whole body several feet to the side, which he knew he wasn't fast
enough for. So instead, he lifted his arms into the air and turned,
letting them approach him from the side, and they quickly flew past
him to bounce off the stone wall a couple of feet away, falling
towards his feet and making him hop to escape having his toes cut off.

He turned back to the girl. "Hey, are you nuts?!? Don't do--shit!"
He dodged the next two knives by rolling forward and putting the bed
between him and the girl, then before she could jump on top of it and
stab him from above or go around the bed, he shoved backwards with his
whole body, sending the bed skidding backwards on its wheels towards
the girl.

Hearing her startled yelp, he took advantage of the situation, jumping
to his feet and dashing towards the door, which was luckily on the
same side of the room as he was, and escaping the room before the girl
could retaliate. As he passed through the doorway, he swung the heavy
wood shut behind him to give him more room to escape and find out what
was going on.

Finding himself in a hallway, the walls and floor made of heavy stone
like the last room, he guessed and ran left, turning at the nearby
corner. There was a window on the left, and as he went passed, he
glanced outside to see snow-capped mountains in the distance, with
hills closer by, and, a little distant from the building he was
currently in, fields of some kind.

Where the hell was he?

Continuing to run around in fairly random directions, although trying
not to go back in the direction he came from, he quickly came upon a
room with a an old wooden table set up in the middle of it. The table
had two glasses of water on it and one of what looked like wine, with
some of that odd foreign silverware set to the sides of each glass.
He stopped. Where there was a dining room, there was always a kitchen
nearby, and, looking through the several doors that led out of the
room, he quickly found it.

For some reason, he was absolutely starving, like he hadn't eaten in
days, and just the idea of getting some food was making him incredibly
anxious, his belly growling out 'feed me!' in a pleading, insistent
tone that he just couldn't resist.

Stepping quickly into the kitchen, he was surprised to see that it was
already occupied by a woman in her late twenties, who had brown hair
down to her upper back and some kind of white robes on. She didn't
look at all Japanese, and, now that he thought of it, neither had that
crazy girl from earlier. He did notice that she was in the middle of
setting out a meal for three people, judging from the number of plates
she had sitting on the counter.

"Um... hi!" he said, a bit nervously, as he looked at her food.

She smiled at him. "Hello, child. You look hungry."

"You bet I am! Is any of that for me?" he asked, pointing to what she
had on the stove. He wasn't sure what a lot of it was, but it smelled
pretty tasty and looked reasonably edible. Maybe he could eat most of
it before that girl showed up looking for him.

"Some of it is. We'll be ready to eat in just a minute, and Chloe
should be here soon."

Ranma frowned. "Is Chloe the girl with red-purple hair, my age, a
real psycho?" She smiled, so he continued, "She'll be here pretty
soon, maybe you should just give me the food now."

"No, we'll all eat together. Don't worry about Chloe, she'll calm
down. Ah, it's done," she said, turning the stove eyes off and
separating the food out evenly onto the nearby plates. It didn't look
like it was going to be enough.

Just as she was finishing, the girl burst into the room, chest heaving
and knives in her hands. He noticed that she was favoring her right
leg slightly, and wondered if he'd hit her with the bed earlier, not
that she hadn't deserved it. She looked like she wanted to attack
him, but he was standing close enough to the woman that throwing
knives at him could be risky.

"Artena-sama?" Chloe asked, glaring at him.

"It's time to eat, child," Artena said simply. Chloe frowned, but
tucked her hands inside her cloak, pulling them back out soon
afterwards, empty. After doing so she walked calmly up to him, taking
one of the plates off of the counter at his side, then turned and
walked back into the dining room.

Ranma followed her example, and heard Artena do the same as he headed
for the table. He sat down opposite the girl, and Artena sat at the
head of the table, in-between the two of them.

Chloe and Artena sat in silence for a moment, hands pressed together
in front of them and eyes closed, then relaxed from their positions
and began to eat without a word, using those strange looking utensils.
He stared at his own, trying to figure it out, before picking the
thing up and trying to spear his... whatever it was, with it. When he
lifted, it flopped back down onto his plate, so he looked over at
Artena to see how she was eating.

She was using the edge of the utensil to chop her food into smaller
pieces, then scooping it up as if with a spoon. He tried duplicating
the maneuver with his own utensil and found it to work, although
holding it seemed rather clumsy. Why didn't they just use chopsticks?

Setting the utensil down carefully he drank some of his water, quickly
emptying half of the glass before returning to his food, which he
started shoveling into his mouth as fast as he could now that he knew
how to. It was soon gone, so he gulped down the rest of his milk then
looked to his dining companions to see how they were doing.

Chloe was looking at him with annoyance, gripping her utensil a little
bit harder than was probably required, and the woman had a slight
smile on her face, for some reason.

"What?" he asked, looking back and forth between the two of them.

The girl muttered something he didn't quite catch before returning to
her own meal, and Artena simply said, "I wasn't expecting you to be
that hungry."

"Oh," he responded, somewhat disappointed. She obviously didn't
intend to give him any of her food, or make more. Maybe there would
be something to eat out in those fields he saw earlier?

He sat in silence for a minute, watching them eat, before he felt he
needed a distraction from all the food that was going into other
people's mouths.

"Where are we?"

Artena finished chewing, swallowed, then said, "We are right on the
border between France and Spain. You're a long way from home. What
is your name, by the way?"

"Oh, it's Ranma Saotome, of the Saotome School of Anything-Goes
Martial Arts. What do you mean, we're in France?" he demanded,
stumbling slightly over the foreign word.

"I mean, you're not in Japan anymore. What is the last thing you
remember?"

Ranma thought back, then frowned. "Well, my dad was teaching me
something... a new technique. I must have blacked out during the
training." He looked at Artena suspiciously. "Did you kidnap me?
Where's my pop?"

"We didn't kidnap you," Chloe said irritably. "You followed me home.
I was in Japan and you were acting like some crazy animal, you kept
jumping on me and wouldn't go away."

He stared at her. "I did not!"

"Yes, you did!" she said.

"I did not!"

"Ranma, what are your parents' names?" interrupted Artena.

Sticking his tongue at the girl briefly, having had the last word, he
answered, "My pop's name is Genma Saotome. He told me my mom is dead,
but I don't remember her much anyway."

She nodded in response. "I'll see if I can contact your father.
You'll have to stay here for a few days, though."

"Okay... it'd be easier if you just told me which way Japan was,
though. I can walk home, right? Me and my pop have been traveling
all over Japan, I think I could make it back okay."

Chloe smiled, and he glared at her. "What's so funny?"

"It would take you most of a year to get to Japan from here if you
were walking, and you would still have to get from China to Japan
somehow, and I doubt you have any money," Artena answered. "Just stay
here a few days, and I'll try to get you home, okay?"

Taking advantage of the girl's distraction, he reached out and speared
some of her food with his fork, slipping it into his mouth before she
noticed. Somebody that ate as slowly as her obviously wasn't very
hungry anyway, and besides, she deserved it.

Judging from the look in Artena's eyes, she noticed the movement
despite his speed, but said nothing, so he merely grinned at her.
Maybe being here wouldn't be too bad after all, if he could get her to
make more food for him.

"So?"

Belatedly, he realized he still hadn't answered her question. "Oh.
Yeah, that might be better, I guess."

"Good," she said, then resumed eating her breakfast. After a minute,
Chloe started to do the same, and she glared at him when he laughed at
her look of confusion.

When they finished, Artena told him to have a look around, telling
Chloe that they needed to go look at her bandages, which made him
wonder how she'd gotten hurt. At least he knew why she was favoring
her right leg, though, which he'd noticed earlier.

Rather than starting to explore the house itself, Ranma decided to
head outside and see what the area was like, since the glance out the
window had made him curious. Locating a door that led outside was the
work of a few minutes, and once he exited the building he was left
blinking at the brightness, since it was so sunny out.

It was also a bit colder than he was expecting. Nothing he couldn't
handle, but he was still a bit chilly because of the state of his
clothes. Taking it as an excuse to get some exercise in, he started
running around the building, looking in all directions as he did so.
He found that he was located in a small valley, the fields he'd seen
earlier being a short distance away. Beyond and to the side of those
fields was an old, broken-down stone structure that looked like some
kind of coliseum like he'd seen on television.

The mountains seemed to stretch in all directions, or at least rather
jagged looking hills, but they were higher to the north, and that was
where the snow-capped peaks were located. If he decided to split even
after his decision to stay, he'd have to head south, but after that he
didn't have a clue what direction Japan was in. Would Artena tell
him, if he asked?

Shrugging the thought aside, he jogged over to some of the nearby
field, which he soon found to be of grapevines. Reaching out eagerly,
he tore a bunch away, then proceeded to pop a few of them into his
mouth, planning on inhaling as many as he could. He was still really
hungry.

When he bit down, he found out that they had seeds. Yuck!

Grumbling at the injustice of it all, he started walking around,
trying to keep moving in the chilly air, and began eating the grapes
one at a time, spitting the seeds on the ground as he devoured their
plump wrappings.

He wouldn't be cold if his dogi wasn't ripped near to shreds, and he
remembered how that had happened, but what about afterwards? How did
he get here, wherever here really was, from Japan? From traveling all
over the country with his father he was familiar with Japan's climate,
and he knew it was a bit too cold here for him to be in Japan, at this
time of year anyway, which meant Artena had to be telling the truth.

And if she was, then Chloe might be right about him acting like an
animal and following her around, which really sucked. If that was the
Nekoken, then he didn't think it was going to be very useful.

Why would he follow her around, though? Sure, she seemed to be a good
enough fighter, for a girl, and her throwing stuff at him did bring
back memories of playing with Ucchan, but that's all that Chloe was--a
girl. She was likely to bang her knee and start screaming her head
off or something, as one of the girls that wouldn't leave him alone
last time he went to school had done, and that had gotten annoying
real fast.

So if he had been acting like a cat, why would he follow her around?
Maybe cats were too stupid to know the difference.

Ranma finished off the grapes and tossed the stem into the nearby
fields, then decided that his hunger had faded enough that going
inside would be more comfortable than staying out here and getting
full while being cold. The seeds made it so he just couldn't exercise
properly while eating--if he tried, he was likely to swallow the damn
things and choke to death. Besides, he still had to look around
inside, to see if there was anything fun to play with.

Shivering once more, he headed for the nearest entrance.

Chloe laid still as Artena reapplied the bandages, the pressure of her
touch still painful but getting easier to ignore. She was a fast
healer, and she would be okay within a week or so.

"Everything looks fine," said Artena. "We'll just keep you on the
antibiotics I gave you last night for a while, and you should heal
quickly, as usual."

Chloe nodded. "Artena-sama? Are you really going to let that boy
stay here?"

"Yes, at least for a few days. After that, we'll see."

She hesitated, then asked, "You aren't going to put him in that
child's room, are you, Artena-sama?"

"No," said Artena, "I don't think I will. He probably wouldn't like
sleeping there, anyway."

Chloe frowned at that. He should be happy to be put in that child's
room, not that he deserved to even go there. It would be
disrespectful to let him.

"Do you want him to stay with you?" Artena asked, with a hint of a
smile.

Artena must have read the answer in her face, so she quickly
continued, "I'll put him in one of the guest rooms. I do want you to
try to get along with him for now, by the way, at least while you're
still injured. You need to relax your training for now, too."

"I'll try to be nice, Artena-sama," she said. If that boy were
disrespectful towards Artena-sama or that child, though, she would
have to teach him a lesson.

"That's all I can ask," was her reply, as Artena helped her get down
off of the table and put her clothes back on.

"I'm going to go practice, Artena-sama," Chloe said, wrapping her
cloak about her shoulders and clipping it shut at the neck.

The older woman looked at her for a minute, then nodded to give
permission. "Alright, but don't go overboard."

Thunk. Thunk. Thunk.

Chloe sighed. There went her last knife again.

Standing up, she walked over to the target and pulled the knives out,
not even bothering to slip them back into their harnesses, then
returned to her seat twenty feet away and started over.

There wasn't really anything else she could practice right now, with
her leg and left arm injured. It was best to let them heal before she
tried any more strenuous activity, even though she hasn't hesitated to
use them as hard as necessary when attacking Ranma the day before, as
Artena had desired her to do. That had been a mission, part of her
responsibility towards Artena, and her own health wasn't a
consideration in that case.

Thunk. Thunk. Thunk.

Even when he had made her angry earlier she had been careful to stay
within certain limits of activity, with her jumping out of bed being
about as rashly as she had acted with respect to her wounds. She'd
paid for it, too, having been barely able to throw accurately after
the way she'd shoved off with her arms, the pain in her shoulder being
almost unbearable. Her leg wasn't as big an issue, but it, too,
needed to heal, which is why she hadn't been able to catch Ranma when
he fled her room.

For that same reason, she was unable to reasonably do more than throw
knives at a target board, and even then it was just with her right
hand that she did so. It was chilly out, as well, which made her
forced inactivity more distressing than it would have been otherwise,
since the cold made her rather uncomfortable despite the pants and
long-sleeved shirt she had on underneath her cloak.

Thunk. Thunk. Thunk.

Again, she stood up and went to retrieve the knives. When she was
halfway there, Ranma appeared at the target and yanked the knives out
himself. She stopped, and waited. If he wasn't being helpful and
fetching them for her, she was going to hurt him.

She watched as he started tossing one of her knives up a couple of
feet, catching it when it fell, then tossing it back up again. He did
this for several minutes without giving any indication of even seeming
to notice that she was there. Finally, she gave up on being patient.

"Do you mind? I was in the middle of practicing. Give them back!"

He just looked over at her, eyes shining with innocence. "But why?
You're a girl, don't you have some dolls to play with?"

Reminding herself that she'd been told to be nice, that his being a
complete jerk didn't negate that in any way, and that she was injured
and supposed to be taking it easy, she said, sweetly, "I'll go play
with my dolls if you can show me that a real man, such as yourself,
can do it better. Otherwise, YOU can go play with the dolls while I
stay out here and practice."

He reddened at that, clenching his fist, and, she noticed as some
blood began to trickle out from within it, cutting himself. "You're
on!"

Chloe just turned and walked away, halting where she had been throwing
from earlier. Ranma had followed her and soon stood at her side,
alternating between glaring at her and glaring at the target. He was
also massaging his hand, which seemed to be bothering him.

After a minute of waiting, she asked, "Are you going to throw? Or
will you just give up?"

Not giving her a verbal answer, he dumped all the knives but one into
his left hand and took the remaining one between the fingers of his
right. He pulled his hand back over his head, then brought it down
and forward quickly, releasing the knife.

It hit the ground about halfway to the target, base first, then
flipped forward several times, passing the target before coming to a
rest.

"Imbecile," she said, in French.

"What did you say?" he demanded, stepping right up to her and yelling
the words into her face.

"I said 'That was one.' Keep going," she responded calmly.

Ranma stayed there a moment longer, then backed off, muttering
something she was sure was insulting but didn't quite catch. Looking
back over at the target, he took a few deep breaths, then prepared to
throw again.

This one cleared it by several feet.

He tried again, and missed again. He went through the whole set, some
hitting the target, none sticking, and by the time he was finished
Chloe had lost track of most of her knives, which, while annoying, was
also very satisfying at the same time. She had others inside that she
could get easily enough, losing some wasn't going to be a problem.

"Well," she said, looking at the target, "it seems I've won. You can
go ask Artena-sama where my dolls are while I try and see if I can
find any of the knives you scattered all over the place."

Not waiting for an answer, she walked forward, heading for the first
one, trying to remember where the others went.

Ranma stomped back to the house. Yeah, he'd play with her dolls...
maybe rip some of them to shreds, but boys could be rough, right?
She'd deliberately embarrassed him for no reason at all--he'd been
about to give her the knives back when she'd challenged him like that,
and he'd had no honorable choice but to accept.

Weapons were for weaklings, and he knew that her skill with knives, no
matter how surprising in a girl, wouldn't help her at all in a fight
against him, but it still allowed her to beat him at throwing them.
He'd lost, horribly.

Which meant he was going to have to train to be better than her.

Brightening slightly at that thought, he started moving a little bit
faster. The fact that he was still cold was another incentive.

Once inside he headed for Chloe's room, having a general idea of where
it was. He hadn't gotten around to exploring the place earlier,
having decided to follow the girl when he saw her exit it when he was
on his way in, so he wasn't sure where her room was. After a few
minutes of wandering around the hallways and poking his head through
doorways, he found the right one.

Her bed was still where he'd shoved it to, right in front of her
wardrobe, so he pushed it back out of the way and then opened the
cabinet, looking inside. Not that many clothes were contained within,
but there were certainly more than he had, and none of them had rips
like his dogi. Pushing hangers to one side, he looked at the floor,
but the dolls weren't there, either. Instead, there was a box filled
with several dozen of the throwing knives she had been using, the
thin, hiltless blades piled on top of each other.

Figuring she wouldn't miss a few, he grabbed five of them. He'd need
some for practice. After taking them, however, he realized that he
didn't have anywhere to hold them. The whole trashed outfit thing was
really starting to suck, but at least he could hold all five of them
grouped together within one hand until he went to practice. Hopefully
Chloe or Artena wouldn't notice before he hid them somewhere.

Shutting the cabinet, he looked around the room again. There weren't
any dolls.

Ranma frowned. She'd said he could ask Artena where they were, but he
didn't really want to do that, so he might as well use it as an excuse
to explore the place. Then, when he found them, he could just pretend
to play with them for a minute or two, then go start working on his
knife-throwing skills.

Decision made, he exited through the doorway and started wandering
around, trying to explore the house as thoroughly as possible. No
telling what kind of neat stuff might be hidden, even in a house of
girls.

Most of the place was made of brick, but he found that a few of the
rooms did have wood starting about five feet high. The most notable
of these had a very high ceiling and looked like one of those
Christian churches his pop had dragged him to on occasion while
begging for food and wine. It even had the whole stained-window
thing, the sunlight shining through it to cover the room in varying
shades of light. Near the front of the room were two long swords
fastened to the normal podium type thing such churches featured, which
he thought was rather odd. Behind them, on the wall, was the stained
glass, which was made in the image of two women with the same swords
as on the podium, with another woman standing between and back from
them.

What religion was this, anyway?

Dismissing the thought, he resumed his self-guided tour. There really
wasn't much to see, there were a few rooms similar to Chloe's, most
with the beds bare although he did find another that had sheets on it,
which he figured to be Artena's room. There was also a basement but
not enough light for him to see into it, and the torches set
infrequently into the walls of the building were all unlit, so he
couldn't use one of them to brighten his way downstairs. He'd go back
and look at it later, though.

It wasn't long before Ranma was pretty sure he'd explored everything
but the basement, and he still hadn't found any dolls. Where the hell
were they? Had she hidden them somewhere? He'd been looking for them
for quite a while, it seemed like....

Ranma smirked. He'd played with her dolls long enough, he decided, so
now he'd get some practice in. He headed towards the front entrance,
knives still in hand, and was almost there when he passed a room he'd
checked out earlier. Before, it had been empty, but now Artena was in
it. She was sitting at a table set by the window and writing on
something, but she noticed him and looked up, smiling.

"Ranma?" she said, causing him to stop. "If you're going to go
outside we're going to need to find out some nicer clothes, because
it's a bit too cold out to be running around dressed in those rags."

He frowned at her suspiciously. "I ain't wearing no girls' clothes.
I'll be fine."

She seemed amused by his response, and said, "Chloe's pants and shirts
are made for boys your own age, she just wears them instead of
dresses. So they're not girls' clothes."

Ranma shook his head. "If a girl wears them, they're girl clothes."

Artena nodded thoughtfully, studying him, her smile gone.

"Nope. Not gonna do it," he insisted stubbornly.

"This sucks," he said sourly, stepping outside. She'd stuck him in a
pair of brown cotton slacks and a plain white button-up shirt. At
least they really were guy's clothes, and even though Chloe shouldn't
be wearing them to begin with, it had worked out well for him. Artena
either hadn't noticed the knives, which were now in his pocket, or
she'd decided to overlook them. He wasn't sure which, and didn't
really care.

Now that his skin was properly covered, though, the slight chill of
the fall air was easily ignorable. Artena had told him that she would
send Chloe into town with him sometime in the next day or two to get
more clothes, so what he had on now should be alright until then. In
the meantime he'd spend time practicing to make sure he was able to
beat Chloe before it was time for him to go back to Japan.

He walked over to where Chloe was still throwing her knives, careful
not to make any noise, and watched her for a while, trying to get a
sense of what the movements involved were. He studied the way she
gripped the knife, the manner in which she swung her arm, and the
timing of the release as she did so. Ranma also noticed that she
almost always hit the target near the center, although he wondered why
she was only practicing with one arm instead of trying to become
proficient with both.

Deciding that he'd picked up the basics of knife throwing, he headed
off towards the ruins he'd seen earlier, of that old coliseum. That'd
probably be a good place to practice, since it was far enough away
that Chloe probably wouldn't see or hear him training.

While on the way there, he made sure to grab a couple more bunches of
grapes, popping them into his mouth and then spitting the seeds back
out as he went. The ruins were a good twenty-minute walk away, and he
managed to finish the grapes off before arriving.

It was much bigger than he was expecting, and once he got there he
could see that there was even more behind the coliseum, with rows of
broken-columns following stone roadways to other buildings and areas.

Ranma entered the coliseum and saw that the arena within had a number
of broken and rusted weapons scattered about the sand of the fighting
area. There were big bricks all over the place, as well, that had
been stacked into miniature towers at one point but had since fallen
with the passage of time. Looking at the stands that surrounded him,
he couldn't even begin to guess how many people used to watch fights
here.

He carried a wooden post, one that he'd seen lying unused at the edge
of the grape field, over to the center of the arena, then put it down
and begun digging. He soon had a hole that was a couple of feet deep,
which he put the end of the post into, then began refilling it with
sand while holding his target steady with one hand. It wasn't as
sturdy as he would have liked when he finished but it would hold well
enough for throwing knives at, which was the whole point anyway.

He backed away from the target until he was about the same distance he
had been throwing earlier, then took the knives out of his pocket and
tossed the first one, making sure to copy the movements he had seen
Chloe using. The knife duplicated his first throw and hit the ground
halfway between him and the post, the sand stopping it much more
quickly than on the previous attempt.

He tried again, then again and again and again, then went and picked
them all up to start over. After about a half hour he had managed to
get a few hit the target and actually stick, although none of them
sunk very deeply into the wood, and those that weren't hitting were at
least coming within a few feet of doing so.

A couple of hours later he was hitting the target consistently, which
was good because the post was smaller than the square board Chloe had
been using for target practice, but he still hadn't managed to figure
out how to get the knives to fly through the air properly, so that
when they struck, they would be pointed blade-first. Instead, the
knives were just as likely to hit with the base of the handle and then
bounce back from the post without sticking.

When he threw, the knife would spin through the air, flipping end over
end before it hit, but when he had been watching Chloe, her knives had
been unwavering as they sailed straight towards the target, sinking
deeply into the bulls-eye of what she was throwing at. So what was
the difference?

Having stopped to try to figure out what the problem was, he finally
noticed that it was beginning to get dark and the temperature was
dropping. Ranma picked up the knives and slipped them back into his
pocket, and then headed back towards the building they were staying
at. He grabbed some more grapes on the way, hoping that what they had
eaten earlier hadn't really been dinner, but some kind of late pre-
dinner snack.

Chloe watched silently as Ranma walked past her on his way to the
Manor. She had noticed him spying on her earlier while she practiced
and decided to follow him when he left, not expecting to see him begin
teaching himself how to throw knives properly. At first she'd just
been annoyed at his theft and had simply stayed where she was while
trying to think of a proper method of punishing him for it, but by the
time she had come up with a good solution she'd already seen a rather
remarkable improvement on his part.

So she stayed longer, and he kept getting better as she watched. The
boy certainly wasn't as good as she was yet, but at his current rate
of improvement it wouldn't be long before he got awfully close to
being so.

After waiting a few minutes to let Ranma get his distance, she left
her hiding place in the stands and moved to follow. She remained at
the exit until Ranma had gone out of sight over one of the hills on
the way back to the Manor, and then started towards it herself. While
she didn't really think it would matter if the boy found out she had
been spying on him, she still preferred to not get caught at it. When
she got to the top of the hill, she crouched down and crept forward to
check his location, and saw that he was almost there.

It was hard tell from this distance and in the fading light, but it
looked like he was eating some of Artena's grapes. Surely even he
couldn't be *that* rude, though, to steal food from his host just
shortly after being fed.

After he entered the Manor she stood back up and started walking
towards it herself, looking for any evidence of what she both hoped he
hadn't been doing and also hoped that he had, unable to figure out
which would be better, for him to have not been eating Artena's
grapes, or for him to have been doing so. The first would show that
he was at least slightly respectful, and be the only sign of such a
trait that she had seen so far, while the second would be something
that she might be able to get him in trouble for.

Chloe got past the grape fields and then to the Manor without finding
any signs of Ranma's theft, but was still uncertain as to whether that
was because he hadn't taken any grapes, or whether he had simply
thrown the remains far enough away that she couldn't see them with it
almost dark out. Somewhat disappointed, she entered the Manor and
went looking for Artena, deciding to check the room the older woman
wrote her letters in first.

When she reached the room, she heard Artena say, "No, Ranma, we've
already eaten dinner. You'll have to wait until tomorrow."

"But you only gave me a bit of food! I'm still hungry!"

Greedy fool.

She stepped through the doorway and announced, as both of them turned
to face her, "I'm done practicing, Artena-sama."

Artena smiled at her. "Good. Are you going to get ready for bed?"

"Yes, Artena-sama," Chloe replied, then noticed Ranma popping
something into his mouth. She looked at him to see that he had the
decimated remains of a grape bunch held in one hand, and a group of
seeds held in the other.

She found her hands balling into fists at her side, but still asked
calmly, "Did you have fun playing with my dolls, Ranma?"

His response was for his face to contort into an annoying smirk and
say, "Yup! They were fun! Best dolls I ever played with!"

She glared at him, fists shaking now. "I don't have any dolls."

Ranma's smirk turned into a big grin. "You didn't mean these?" he
asked, pulling her knives out of his pocket with the same hand he held
the grape seeds in, smearing juice all over the polished metal. "You
were playing with them earlier."

"I wasn't *playing* with them, imbecile! They're not toys!" Chloe
tried to snatch them from his hands, but he pulled away at the last
instant.

"Ah, wait!" he said, jumping back from her. "I'm not done playing
with them yet!"

Chloe reached into her cloak and grabbed at her knives, deciding to
take advantage of Ranma's hands being full and kill him while she had
the chance.

"Chloe," said Artena, who was still sitting at her simple desk, "I'm
going to show Ranma to his room, and then I'll be along to tuck you
in."

She stopped, her knives still in their harness, but continued to glare
at Ranma, who was leaning back against the wall in a relaxed position
and popping the last few grapes into his mouth. After a moment she
turned to Artena.

"Okay, Artena-sama. I'll go get ready," she said.

Artena smiled at her. "It will just be a few minutes, Chloe."

She nodded in response, then left for her room wishing that she really
did have some dolls, because she felt the urgent need to stab
something.

When she got there, Chloe found that her bed had been moved back into
its original position, either by Artena or by that annoying boy when
he had been in her room stealing her knives. She hung her cloak and
harnesses in her wardrobe and then took off the pants and shirt she
had been wearing. She changed into another shirt, a much bigger one
that she liked to sleep in, and got into bed.

A half hour later she found herself to be nodding off. Usually Artena
would come to tuck her in, then tell her a story. She'd then fall
asleep to the sound of Artena's voice talking quietly right beside
her. She enjoyed that.

Chloe was really, really beginning to hate that boy, because she was
sure that Artena's absence was all his fault.

Ranma woke, blinking uncomfortably in the sunlight that shone upon him
through the nearby window. He turned to the side to look away, then
rubbed the crusty sleep out of his eyes. Yuck.

He climbed out of bed and then looked out the window curiously. It
was still bright, but his eyes were adjusting quickly, and he was able
to note the position of the sun in the sky. It was much higher than
it should have been.

His stomach grumbled suspiciously.

He left the room Artena had showed him to the previous night and went
looking for the woman, hoping that she had something ready to eat.
Usually Ranma wouldn't have breakfast immediately after waking up, but
most mornings started out with sparring with his father at dawn, which
had been hours ago. His stomach was on a certain cycle of eat, empty
quickly, eat again, and for some reason it had been disturbed this
morning.

After checking in the crude kitchen and dining room, he looked in the
room that Artena had been writing in the day before. Once again, she
was there, scrawling out the weird symbols of some other language.
French, he guessed.

"Hey," he asked, "when is breakfast?"

Artena looked up at him, her pen stopping. "It was over two hours
ago, Ranma. Lunch will be ready at noon."

"What? Why didn't you wake me up?" he demanded. He was hungry!

"I sent Chloe to get you up," she said. "She told me that you
wouldn't wake, so we let you sleep. Chloe ate your breakfast for you,
so the food wouldn't go to waste," she added, almost as an
afterthought.

"She ate *my* food?"

Artena nodded slightly. "Yes."

He was really beginning to hate that girl.

Grumbling vague threats, he left Artena and headed outside, keeping an
eye out for Chloe as he did so. Ranma didn't see her anywhere, but
she doubted she was hiding from him. He walked to the coliseum again,
more slowly this time to give him an opportunity to eat more grapes
and fill his stomach as much as possible. Once there, he began
practicing again, setting himself the same distance from the wooden
post as before.

After gathering the knives again for the umpteenth time, he stopped.
He was doing something wrong. His throws, while hitting the target
consistently now, seemed to be completely random as to which end the
knives hit with: base or point. They were also spread out where they
hit the board, more than he would have liked, anyway. That they were
hitting it was an improvement but not enough of one to satisfy him, or
to beat Chloe when he challenged her to a rematch.

His right arm had gone beyond hurting some time ago. It felt heavy
and awkward, and it was difficult to move it as adeptly as he normally
could. There was an easy solution to this, however.

Ranma switched hands and resumed throwing, this time starting over
with his left. He did even worse than he had started out. He was
right handed, and while he had in training become quite familiar with
the use of his left arm, it was still a little bit less accurate, a
little bit less comfortable to use. For what he was trying to do,
that difference in performance made quite an impact.

None of the knives hit the target. He kept trying, though, picking
them up and then walking back to the throwing point and tossing again.
By the time his left hand and arm were starting to hurt, to become
even more clumsy in comparison, he was only able to hit the target
about half of the time, and even then the knives were sinking into the
wood at seemingly random points. One would hit near the base of the
post, another near the top, a few in between. He just couldn't get
them to group together at about the same height, those that didn't
just sail past the post and into the sand beyond.

Deciding that his left hand was becoming too tired to continue, he
switched back to his right, which had had enough time to recover that
he was able to throw effectively with it again.

After letting one last knife fly, which missed as his arm was again
feeling completely dead, he collapsed to the sand, lying on his back
and looking up at the sky. Each arm lay parallel to his body and felt
so heavy that they might have been of the sand beneath him rather than
of flesh and blood. He would rest awhile, to recover, and then start
again.

So Ranma deliberately relaxed his muscles as much as he could, to the
point where his arms started to hurt even more. He wasn't quite sure
why that was, but it was something he had become familiar with, when
he had the opportunity to relax after any kind of unfamiliar exercise
that his father would put him through. He started with his arms, then
worked his way to his other muscles just for practice, letting his
whole body go as dead limp as he could cause it to. His arms, having
had the most exercise, hurt the worst from it, but the rest of his
body was uncomfortable, too.

Satisfied that he was relaxed enough, he studied the few clouds that
passed high above him. There was a light breeze, which brushed
lightly, strangely ticklish against his skin, relaxed as he was, and
it pushed the clouds slowly past. The sky darkened slightly as one
passed across the sun, and the temperature dropped slightly with the
sudden lack of direct warmth.

As he stared up at the partially obscured star, he noted its position.
It was after noon, by an hour or two.

"Dammit!"

Ignoring his hollow stomach, which his noticing the time had called
attention to, he wondered what it was that he was doing wrong. As far
as he could tell, he was throwing the knives in the same way that
Chloe had, so he should be able to hit the target perfectly. That he
wasn't meant that there was still something he was doing wrong. So
what was it?

After thinking about it for a while, he still couldn't figure out what
the problem was, and his stomach was beginning to get more insistent,
so he stood up and brushed off the little bit of sand that had stuck
to his back and head. Then he went and got a few more bunches of
grapes before heading back to the coliseum, eating them as he walked.

Once he finished eating, he started practicing again. His technique
was flawed somewhere, and he wasn't going to quit until he'd figured
it out.

The next time he stopped, this time completely exhausted and barely
able to move his arms with any real dexterity at all, was when it was
getting too dark to see the post. He had never gotten substantially
better--the whole day had been, for the most part, a waste of time.
Throwing with his left hand had become slightly more accurate but
still not even to the mediocre level that his right was at. His right
hadn't improved at all.

After spending a few minutes finding the knives, none of which had hit
because of the low lighting and his dead arms, he set off towards the
Manor.

Chloe was full. Incredibly so. She felt slow, sluggish, and she
definitely did not want to be involved in a fight in her current
state. Ranma's not being here, of course, meant that she wouldn't.
It was also the cause for her stomach protruding so obviously. She
could actually see where the food had caused her to expand, a lump in
her middle being easily visible.

Regardless, she was quite happy. Ranma had missed dinner. He'd also
missed breakfast and lunch. That meant he should be starving. Even
if Ranma had eaten a few of Artena's grapes, damn his rudeness, he
would still be disappointed when he showed up to find a lack of food
waiting upon his arrival.

Assuming he showed up at all, anyway.

She'd gone to the coliseum a couple of times during the day, being
quiet and careful as to not alert Ranma to her presence, and watched
him practice for a while. His attitude towards the knife throwing had
changed completely from what it had been before. Previously, he had
been calm, methodically throwing the knives and judging the results,
using small variations on the movements involved in order to refine
and improve his skill. Today, however, he had been acting quite
frustrated; throwing the knives harder than necessary, not aiming as
carefully as he had before, and muttering curses regularly. Ranma
hadn't improved substantially, either, unlike the day before, despite
his spending much more time at it.

Chloe herself hadn't been able to do more than low-level practicing,
just using her right arm, since she wasn't able to stress her body too
much. Her wounds were healing quickly and there was a significant
amount of improvement after only three days, but she still had to be
careful to keep from making her injuries worse. So instead, she had
spent much of her time in one of the sitting rooms, reading,
completing most of 'Through the Looking Glass' that day alone. There
weren't many books at the Manor, but she was able to borrow others,
like she had that one, whenever she went into the village. The
villagers were always eager to please her.

She wasn't sure what alerted her, but Chloe looked up from her book
and over to the doorway. Ranma stood there, looking at her with an
odd expression on his face. She wasn't quite sure what to make of it.
Was he going to ask about dinner?

"You look like a pregnant cow," he said. "Maybe you should start
eating less."

Before she could respond, he stepped away and was gone.

"Jerk."

The next morning Ranma woke himself in time for breakfast, and ate
just as quickly and noisily as he'd done the first time he was fed.
As soon as he finished he left without a word of thanks to Artena, or
even bothering to wait until they had eaten their own meals. They
continued in silence for several minutes before Artena spoke.

"Are you going to go see what he's doing again today, Chloe?" she
asked.

Chloe finished chewing and swallowed. "Yes, Artena-sama. I don't
expect him to improve much if he's still acting like he did yesterday,
though."

Artena nodded, and Chloe wondered why the older woman was so
interested in the boy's training. Ranma would be gone soon, so why
did it matter to her? That he could avoid Chloe's knives certainly
indicated his skill, even if she was injured at the time, but that
shouldn't have any importance to Artena, except perhaps in that Ranma
might be a threat. If he was a threat, he should be killed. Chloe
would do it, if Artena allowed her to. If she could, which she wasn't
sure about in her partially healed state.

Chloe paced herself so that she finished eating at the same time as
Artena, and when Artena said nothing, Chloe thanked her for the meal
and went to her room. After putting on her harnesses and cloak and
making sure that all her knives were accessible, Chloe left the Manor
and headed to the coliseum again.

On the way, she spotted a number of grape seeds lying scattered across
the ground. That boy was definitely trying to annoy her.

When she arrived, she was careful to make no sound, slipping through
one of the huge arching doorways that so many people had once passed
through, so very long ago. Now, she entered alone, and the only
participant in the games was a young boy her own age. Chloe wondered
what the girl would think of Ranma, not that they were likely to ever
meet. No doubt she would be more than a match for him. Chloe herself
was certainly less skilled, more hesitant to strike, than that girl
was.

Inside, instead of throwing knives, Ranma was running through various
kata. She assumed them to be from his family school, which he had
mentioned when he introduced himself in such a rude fashion after
waking up sane two days previously. He jumped about on the sand,
throwing punches and kicks and twirling around to strike at imaginary
opponents in all directions. The sand underneath him, mostly hard
like everywhere else in the coliseum, was beginning to break up,
becoming loose under the repeated impacts and Ranma's shifting weight.

Ranma wasn't, by any stretch of the imagination, the best she has
seen. She herself had had a number of instructors, teaching her knife
throwing and how to fight barehanded, with swords, spears, and a
number of other weapons. Every lethal weapon she could conceivably be
taught with had been trained into her to some degree, to the point
where she could now use almost anything, no matter how innocent in
purpose, to kill people. Her instructors, however, had still been
better in their specific fields than she was. Being able to recognize
that difference in skill also allowed her to realize that Ranma was
better at unarmed combat than she was, enough so that even if she was
healed, she didn't think she could kill him except by surprise.

She wasn't sure what his capabilities were, though. As he danced back
and forth across the arena, leaping from place to place as he went,
she noted that he wasn't jumping near as high or easily as he had when
they arrived at the Manor. His jumps, while impressive for a boy his
age, weren't at the same extreme as his jumping fifteen feet into the
air as he had done previously. The effort he was putting into his
practice was easily visible, he was sweating profusely, making small
grunting noises before pushing himself into the air, sometimes a bit
clumsily and landing with awkwardness, and the difference made her
wonder if there was more to the feline behavior he had at first
exhibited than his simply acting as a cat. The physical abilities he
had shown before weren't present now. Why?

By now, Ranma was taking big, gulping breaths, his actions had slowed
down, and it was clear that he was soon to stop. She watched
silently, and several minutes later, he did, and she could see that he
was literally shaking with the effort he'd just put himself through.
Rather than taking a break to recover, however, Ranma walked over to
the post he'd been using as a target for the past two days, picked up
the knives he had placed there, then moved to about thirty feet away.

Taking a deep breath and then releasing it slowly, he threw the first
knife, and Chloe tracked it through the air as it sailed towards the
post--and then passed it.

"Shit!"

Ranma took another breath, held himself still for a moment, and then
threw the next knife. It hit the target, but base-first instead of
point, and it bounced and fell to the ground. The next knife hit the
post as well, this time correctly, and stuck with the blade sunk into
the wood by about half an inch, as best Chloe could tell.

Half an inch really wasn't enough, she knew. The blades were four
inches long, the handle the same length. That was enough to kill
somebody if the knife hit in the right location, but a half-inch
wouldn't do more than irritate and cause some hesitation or panic in
the target. That could be effective, but it was still better to
simply kill the person, instead.

The next knife hit a few inches away from the previous one, this time
penetrating twice as deep. An inch still wasn't enough. The fifth
knife clipped the top of the post and then flipped end-over-end until
it landed in the sand several feet beyond.

Ranma stood still for a minute, fists clenching at his sides, then
relaxed slightly and breathed out. Then he went and picked up the
knives, easily jerking free the two embedded into the post, and went
back to his throwing position. He started over.

Three of the knives hit and stuck this time, the other two bouncing
off after hitting with the knives hit wrong. Of the next five, only
one throw was successful, and the five after that, two. In the next
set, none.

Ranma continued to get more and more erratic in his throws, repeating
his mistakes of the day before, until eventually Chloe couldn't even
consider what he was doing to be practice. He wasn't at all in
control of himself, and the way his knives were missing was a clear
indication of that. What was the problem? He was obviously capable,
physically, of throwing better, his quick improvement of two days
before showed that, yet his current performance was simply abysmal.

Deciding that she was wasting her time, Chloe backed away from her
observation point carefully, until there was no chance that Ranma
could see her if he happened to look in her direction, then turned and
walked back towards the Manor. If she and Ranma were to go into the
village and get him some more clothes the next day, then she wanted to
finish her book so that she could return it in exchange for something
else.

By the time lunch was ready, Chloe had finished her book and found
herself with nothing to do, so she decided to help Artena by setting
the table. Putting the silverware and dishes out, she wondered if
Ranma would show up today, or if, like yesterday, he would continue
practicing. By the time she went back into the kitchen to help bring
the food in, however, Ranma had arrived. Rather than helping, he
simply sat down and waited for the food to be delivered. Chloe
noticed that his hands had dirt on them, which he hadn't bothered to
wash off.

Once they sat down and started to eat, Artena asked, "Ranma, are you
still playing with Chloe's knives?"

Startled, Chloe looked at her, and then over at Ranma, who smirked
back.

"Yeah," he said. "They're a lot of fun!"

"I've seen your target. It's not getting much use," Chloe shot back.

Ranma reddened at that and opened his mouth to retort, but Artena beat
him to it.

"Ranma, I'm going to send Chloe into the village with you tomorrow to
pick up more clothes. You're going to be here a bit longer and I
don't want you to keep wearing those every day."

"Hey!" he said. "I ain't staying much longer, and these clothes are
just fine! I don't need no more!"

Artena sighed. "They're getting dirty and you can't just keep
borrowing Chloe's outfits all the time when those need to be washed.
And you will be staying until I can locate your father, which may not
be for another week or maybe longer."

Ranma looked down, obviously inspecting his garments, which had sand
stuck to them in some places, and sweat stains in others. Chloe was
sure that would make a mess of his bed sheets, if he hadn't already
done so the night before.

"Fine," he said, after a few moments. "I don't need HER to go with
me, though. Just tell me where it is, and I'll make the trip alone."

"Do you know French?" asked Chloe, pausing with a forkful of food
halfway to her mouth.

Ranma glared at her.

"The people in the village don't speak Japanese, you know," she
continued. "You'd just wander into town and start speaking gibberish,
and they'd look at you like you were mad. Then you'd probably try to
steal some poor woman's clothes and get shot for it."

"I would not!" Ranma burst out.

Chloe just smirked, and resumed eating.

"I wouldn't!" he insisted.

"Chloe will go with you," Artena said again.

Ranma grumbled under his breath in response, but did so quietly, and
Chloe kept eating her meal with silent satisfaction, although she felt
a trace of regret as well. Chloe wished that Ranma had refused to go
along with her; in that case, Artena would have had her pick up some
clothes for him, which she would have been delighted to do. Most of
the villagers wore simple attire, however, and she wouldn't have been
able to get anything too embarrassing for him. But she could have
tried.

Once Ranma stopped muttering what Chloe didn't doubt were comments
about her, he quickly tore through his meal, finishing before she or
Artena were even close to being done. Having completed, he stood and
stepped away from the table.

"I'm gonna go play with Chloe's knives some more," he announced, a
smile pasted on his face as he moved towards the door.

Chloe waited until he'd already exited the dining room and she could
hear Ranma walking away, then called out, "Try not to hurt yourself!"

When she heard the boy miss a step, she grinned over at Artena, who
looked back calmly, her lips curved slightly upwards. Apparently
Ranma couldn't think of a response very quickly, however, and he kept
going after that brief pause. Chloe sighed happily. Life was good.

"He's going to try to get back at you for that, you know," Artena
said, still smiling.

Chloe nodded in response. She expected that the boy would attempt to
retaliate in some way, but she was sure she'd be able to handle it.
She was Noir.

Chloe ate a few bites more of her meal, then asked, "Artena-sama, do
you think Ranma will start trying harder, now that he knows I've been
watching him?"

"Maybe, Chloe. If he did, would it matter?"

"...No."

She was Noir. Someone like Ranma could be a challenge, but she would
always come out on top. For Artena, and for that girl, she would
eliminate or overrun all obstacles.

"No, it wouldn't."

"Good."

She was Noir. Which meant that she was going to have to figure out a
way to beat Ranma in more than a simple knife-throwing competition.
She might be able to nail him with her knives, once her left arm
finished healing and she was able to use it properly, but there wasn't
any way to be sure without testing it. The easiest solution she could
think of was to kill Ranma while he was asleep. Greater skill meant
nothing in the face of willingness to make use of all means necessary.
The best solution, however, would be for her to improve to the point
where surprise was no longer necessary. But how long would that take?
Certainly more time than Ranma would remain at the Manor for.

So. If Artena allowed her to, Chloe would kill Ranma while he was
sleeping. Then she would train until, if Ranma had been present or
alive, she would have been able to kill him without the boy's
abilities being handicapped in such a manner.

"Chloe?"

She looked up, and saw that Artena had finished eating and was looking
at her in concern. Chloe smiled. "Sorry, Artena-sama. I was
thinking." She quickly started in at her food again, cursing her
absent-mindedness.

"I see," said Artena, before she went silent.

Over the next few minutes, Chloe was very self-conscious of the
scraping and clicking noises the silverware made against her plate.
She ate quickly, but carefully, and she didn't look up as she chewed.
Instead she kept an eye on her quickly diminishing food, until it was
gone. Finished, she raised her head, and saw Artena smile at her.
She smiled back, relieved that Artena wasn't angry with her for
becoming distracted.

"Would you like to take a bath today, Chloe?"

"Yes!" she said, happily, and Artena gave her another smile.

"Very well. Let's clean the dishes, and then we'll go to the hot
springs."

Chloe jumped to her feet, almost knocking her chair over, and began
taking the dishes into the kitchen. It'd been a while since Artena
had given her a bath.

Chloe stepped into the steaming water carefully, not wanting to slip
this close to the edge of the pool. Breaking her head open wasn't
something she'd like to do. The hot water, calm and unmoving, crept
up her legs as she walked forward, the submerged areas of her body
feeling disjointed, almost cut off from the rest of her. But
pleasantly so. She continued until she was deep enough, then ducked
her head under the water and held herself still for half a minute,
relaxing in the comforting heat that surrounded her completely. With
a sigh, she stood again, and this time it was the revealed portions of
her body that felt uncomfortable, like they'd just been ripped from
the womb and wanted nothing but to return to their previous warmth.

"You enjoy this too much, you know. I might have to begin rationing
your baths out more carefully."

She turned and looked guiltily towards Artena. "I like the heat," she
confessed. "Almost hot enough to hurt, but not quite. It feels
good."

The older woman nodded, stepping into the pool herself. Rather than
moving further out into the water, however, Artena settled down onto
one of the steps. Her hair was bound up safely to keep it from
getting wet, though she was submerged up to her upper chest. She
leaned back against the edge of the pool, and Chloe could see Artena
roll her shoulders. Maybe they were slightly stiff from spending time
at her desk, writing letters.

Chloe also noticed the effect those movements had on Artena's body.
Artena was so pretty; Chloe hoped that she could look like that when
she was older. That was a ways off, and for now, it was unimportant.
Still, Artena was her ultimate goal. She wanted to be as good as that
girl was, true, and wanted to live up to the expectations that were
held for those who were Noir, but what she desired after that was to
be like Artena. Beautiful, intelligent, and kind. So very kind.

While Artena took a few minutes to relax, Chloe moved about in the
deeper area of the spring. The floor where she was at was very hot,
where the water leaked up through the rocks beneath, so she was
careful to keep treading water rather than letting herself settle down
into it. The water was deep enough that she had a foot or two of
freedom to move around in, which was plenty as long as she didn't
forget where she was.

The temperature was higher, here in the middle of the spring. It was
borderline intolerable, and as Chloe swam around, arms and legs
passing through the water, each motion was accompanied by a surge of
heat running across her body. The air she breathed in was hot, her
lungs feeling a touch scorched as she inhaled. Her body felt heavy on
the exhalations, sinking into the water. She closed her eyes, sleepy.

"Chloe!"

She turned her head to the side, somewhat dizzily. She was so hot. It
felt good. What was wrong? Her breath came in short gasps. "Artena-
sama?" Where was she?

The heat felt different now, lesser. She was moving through the water
again. Hadn't she stopped? Her arms, legs, were limp, but she could
feel water passing over them, over the rest of her body.

She tried to slow her breathing, but it was hard. There was something
across her chest, preventing her from breathing deeply. It was one of
Artena's arms, she realized, and she was being pulled.

The water was cooler. She shivered at the change in temperature,
uncomfortable. But Artena was holding onto her. Artena was warm,
too, she could feel, now that Chloe noticed she was pressed up against
the older woman, being held carefully in place as she was dragged
towards the edge of the spring. But Artena still wasn't as warm as
the water had been.

Chloe felt herself being lifted and was shocked at the sudden
coldness. The abrupt transition caused her to shiver uncontrollably
in Artena's careful grasp. She was out of the pool now and being
carried, held closely against her surrogate mother. Artena was warm
where they touched each other, but Chloe was still freezing, the cool
air ripping away even that comforting heat.

She stared at her fingers in sick fascination. They looked pink,
redder than usual, but she was sure they'd turn blue and black at any
moment as the blood within thickened and slowed and turned to ice.
Her toes and feet would, too. But no matter how closely she looked,
they remained the same.

Chloe wrapped her arms around Artena, clinging to the older woman, who
was trying to put her down. She refused to let go. Artena was warm.
"Artena-sama?" she murmured.

She heard a slight sigh, the exhalation brushing against one of her
ears. A moment later Artena sat down, carefully keeping Chloe in her
lap. Chloe smiled slightly and relaxed her grip, resting her head
against Artena. She felt hands begin to run softly through her hair.
She liked that, it was nice.

"Sleep, Chloe," she heard. "We have plenty of time still."

Ranma lied on his back, chest heaving and limbs stretched out in all
directions. He gulped down great big lungfuls of replenishing oxygen,
his heart slammed in his chest and his blood through the rushing
rapids that were his veins. He was covered in sweat, his eyes
stinging slightly at the saturated moisture, the taste of it upon his
lips. The clothes he wore clung wetly, uncomfortable, heavy with his
fluids, stained through with his salt.

The oh-so-strenuous workout had accomplished nothing. Ranma was no
closer to figuring out what his problem was than before. His throws
were still completely off. His mood was frustrated and irritable; he
was easily distracted and his wandering mind kept returning to the
question of what he was doing wrong rather than simply focusing on
practice as it should. His father had trained him just as hard as
this on previous occasions and Ranma had had no such problems.
Usually he'd already have gotten a solid, sometimes near-perfect grasp
on whatever the technique was by this point--Ranma had been trying to
learn knife-throwing for four days with no significant progress. Why?

His breathing began to slow as his body cooled down, no longer
required to run like an overworked steamboat boiler. The heart
slowed, its beats becoming less the pounding of a fleet of drummers
and instead a slow, easy pace, eventually inaudible. Ranma's muscles,
previously masses of well-done, cooked beef, changed to the sleepy
lethargy of a lazy young calf.

Ranma's eyes glided across the sky until he looked upon the brightly
shining sun. Just a couple of hours after noon. He had plenty of
time before dinner. Plenty of time to get more practicing in, to
figure out what his problem was. Plenty of time.

"Ranma."

He opened his eyes to see that the sun had moved unexpectedly and that
it was now late in the afternoon. Ranma blinked again, but this time
it stayed still. How odd.

"Ranma," said a quiet voice.

He stretched, curling his feet and balling his fists as he pushed them
as far apart as he could. Breathing out in a sleepy sigh, his eyes
clenched shut again. He felt his muscles ripple deliciously as he did
so, bringing a smile to his face. That always felt good. He peeked
upwards to find that nothing had changed. Then he sat up and saw that
Artena was standing in front of him.

Her hair was damp and dark and uncombed, no longer hanging straight at
her back with any available illumination making her light-brown
tresses shine. In Artena's arms Chloe slumbered, her torso wrapped
around with towels, the girl's arms draped over Artena's shoulders and
her head resting against one side of Artena's neck. Chloe's hair,
too, was wet, the normally fluffy reddish-purple substance instead
pressed closely to her scalp.

Ranma stood and yawned, stretching his arms upwards this time as if to
grab at nonexistent clouds. When finished, he looked towards Artena
again. She was still standing there holding Chloe.

"What?" he asked.

Artena leaned backwards, changing the position of Chloe's weight upon
her, and adjusted one of her arms under the girl to better support her
weight. With her other hand, which had been pressed against Chloe's
back, Artena held some clothes out towards him.

"Please carry these," she said, in the same low tone of voice.

Ranma looked at them for a minute, then up at Artena, who simply
smiled at him, holding Chloe's weight steady with no apparent trouble
while using only one arm. He shrugged and took the clothes from her
grasp. "Okay."

"Thank you."

Artena adjusted her grip on Chloe again, this time able to use both
hands to hold the girl up. The position looked more comfortable, but
Ranma couldn't help but wonder if it had been necessary since Artena
hadn't seemed to be having any trouble to begin with.

"If you'll come with me back to the Manor," Artena said, "dinner will
be ready soon."

Ranma yawned again then nodded, and Artena started walking towards the
arena exit. He followed, trudging slowly through the sand. Chloe's
face peeked at him from over Artena's shoulder, but her eyes remained
closed. Her face was flushed and pink, for some reason.

He looked down at the clothes he now held. They were Chloe's, and
what she had been wearing earlier that day. Where had they gone
swimming? He'd have to search the area around the coliseum later on,
to see. He liked swimming.

For now, though, Ranma followed Artena back to the Manor. Swimming
could wait until later.

Dinner was quiet. Ranma, still nappish, ate his food slowly, without
effort. His lack of real hunger or enthusiasm caused the meal to be
bland and tasteless. Picking at it was about the limit of his energy.
He had no doubt that if his father were present he would not be able
to eat even the slightest bit of the food on his plate. Ranma just
wasn't up to holding a defense right now.

Chloe, too, was quiet and subdued. Her face was still pink and her
motions drowsy and slow as she slowly used her fork to break up her
food before sending it to the abyss one tiny load at a time. Even the
clicking of silverware on plate was dull and muted.

Deciding he'd had enough, Ranma push his chair back and rose to leave.

"It's your turn to help with the dishes, Ranma," Artena said.

"...What?"

"Somebody needs to dry and put away the dishes as I clean them."

Ranma stared at her. "Have Chloe do it."

"Chloe has been helping me in the kitchen even though she's injured.
Now it's your turn."

"But you're making me stay here! I shouldn't have to help!"

"That doesn't matter. You should still make yourself of some
assistance. And I'm not forcing you to stay. You can leave at any
time, even if you don't know where to go."

"That's not fair!" he protested. He hated doing dishes!

"I'll do it," Chloe said quietly, speaking for the first time since
dinner began.

Artena frowned and started to speak, but Ranma beat her to it.

"Okay, Chloe will help you! I'mgoingtobednowgoodnight!"

He ran away as quickly as possible.

After he had turned a couple of corners he slowed back down to a
lethargic, dragging walk, once again drained of energy. Even his room
seemed like a long trek. Maybe once he got back to Japan he could
make his father teach him some kinda teleporting technique, like in
that Dragonball manga.

Ranma was sure that'd be easier to learn those stupid knives, too.

He didn't mind doing chores, at least some stuff. Setting and packing
up his and his father's tents, making a fire, scrounging for food and
then helping cook it, those were all things he had to do whenever they
went on the road. He hated the boredom and senselessness of the
repetition but knew it was necessary. And his father always did his
share of those tasks.

Cleaning dishes, though, was a chore Ranma absolutely detested, and
one that he'd always get stuck doing himself. When they were staying
somewhere Ranma would arrive home after school to find a massive
amount of dishes scattered across the kitchen counters and dining room
table. Every day. Even when he washed the dishes before heading to
school, and his father both left for work before Ranma exited the
house and arrived home hours after Ranma himself returned, there would
still be dishes delivered by a mysterious grunge fairy that Ranma
could never seem to spot.

When they were on the road for a training trip Ranma and his father
would end up trying to steal each other's food until it was gone or
scattered about their campgrounds. Afterwards the battle would move
on to a full-fledged sparring session that gave plenty of time for the
leftover bits of food to fuse completely with the plates and cooking
utensils they remained on. Trying to scrub dishes clean in the
always-cold water of a nearby stream or pond, or worse, having to use
a canteen or some other kind of water bottle that made rinsing almost
impossible, was a hell Ranma was quite familiar with.

So no, he wasn't doing dishes. Not a chance in the world.

What he was going to do was sleep. Arriving at last at the room he
was a guest in he collapsed onto the bed, and, ignoring the dirty
sheets and the sand stuck to his clothes and hair and skin, he did
just that.

"Wake up."

Ranma eyes opened stickily and he blinked, trying to figure out what
the problem was.

"OW!"

He started rubbing at his eyes carefully, moisture running from them
now after the sand got in. There was gunk all in the corners, stuck
to his eyelashes, rusting his doors to the world shut. Cleaning it
out wasn't pleasant.

"Are you done yet?" Chloe asked quietly.

Ranma finished and looked over at the girl. She was dressed again in
clothes similar to his, but hers were noticeably cleaner, and there
was a distinct lack of sand and dirt stuck to them. Chloe stood
patiently, looking at him calmly, but he was sure there was something
dismissive, condescending, about her deigning to wait for him.

"What?" he asked. This was the first time she'd ever bothered to wake
him up in the morning. "Is it time for breakfast?"

"Yes. Artena-sama is waiting."

Ranma shoved himself out of bed. Sand and dirt fell to the stone
beneath him, grinding painfully under his toes and heel. He ignored
it.

Chloe turned away and exited the room, and he followed her.

Breakfast was simple, same as it was every morning. Artena cooked for
the purpose of satisfying stomachs, not greedy taste buds. Even
Ranma's father spent more time than she did in preparing a meal. But
it tasted well enough despite that and it filled him up just as he
liked his food to do, even if he would have liked more than what she
gave him.

Once again his plate was clean and his glass empty before Chloe and
Artena were even halfway done with theirs. Today he was going to the
village, though, which meant he couldn't just leave--he didn't know
where to go. So he continued to sit there and watched the two of them
eat. Neither seemed to notice him doing so, or care. They just used
their forks to separate a bit of food and then scooped the stuff up
and lifted it into their mouths. Repeat, repeat, repeat. So slowly.

Ranma wished his father were present. He would have ended up hungrier
for it but at least the meal would have gone faster, taking place
during a chopsticks duel that was the trademark of Saotome eating. He
could try to steal food from Chloe or Artena, but he was sure it
wouldn't work out. Forks just weren't designed properly for the
quick, unnoticed theft that would be required.

The clicking of silverware on china came to an end, the sudden silence
catching his attention. They were done at last.

"Ranma," said Artena, who was looking at him now. He noticed that
Chloe was, too, and that the hint of a smug smile twisted her lips and
colored her eyes.

"What?" he asked, a bit suspicious.

"Chloe will take you to the village to get some new clothes," she
continued. Her face was serious now, none of the friendly warmth she
had looked at him with before present. "Somebody there will give you
some food. After that you are free to go wherever you wish, as long
as you don't return here or bother the people in the village."

Ranma stared at her, his heart thumping audibly in panic. He didn't
know how to get to Japan! She said he'd help him! "You told me I
could stay here until you found my pop! You lied to me!" Ranma yelled
at her.

Chloe gripped her knife tightly, glaring at him, the soiled, dull
blade pointed in his direction but her fist surrounding it stayed at
table level, in a neutral position. He ignored her.

Artena didn't deny his words at all. "Yes, I said you could stay
here. But I never invited you to come to this place, never invited
you to show up requiring food and clothing and expecting a made bed
and someone to pick up after you as though it is your right to be
here. You are owed nothing. I have no obligation towards you, to put
up with an unruly, ungrateful houseguest. I have every right to ask
you to leave."

Ranma looked from the cold expression on Artena's face over to the
mostly happy, somewhat angered expression on Chloe's, then back again.
"You're going to make me leave because I wouldn't do the dishes?"

"Yes," Artena said.

"Fine, then! I will leave! And I'll leave right now!"

He stood, his knees thrusting backwards and knocking down the heavy
chair. Then he marched to and out the door to the dining room, down
the hallway leading to the front exit, and then outside.

Ranma stopped in front of the opening, the grape fields sprawling out
before him, hills and mountains within his view in all directions, the
sky blue and cloudless and the sun marching across the horizon, and
tried to figure out which way to Japan. No heading seemed obvious.

Chloe's voice came from the dining room, saying something to Artena
that he couldn't make out, and he scowled. Very well. Any direction
would do.

He started walking south.

Then sun was directly above by the time he cleared the hills and
started working his way into the rockier, more jagged upthrusts that
lay beyond. He was glad for it, because it was just a little bit
windier out here with no real shelter. The relatively motionless air
inside the coliseum and Manor had been chilly enough to make his skin
feel a touch cold, yet out in the open the air was constantly in
motion, waves of coolness making the chill a little bit more
insistent, a little bit more than skin-deep.

It made him glad that he wasn't wearing his torn gi anymore, with the
gaping holes leaving large areas of his chest and back and sides and
legs uncovered and exposed to the elements. Girl clothes or not,
being covered with even a small amount of overall insulation really
did help.

His feet, however, were nowhere near comfortable. They were colder
than the rest of him, as he stepped over and onto sharp-edged rocks
that had been sitting out in the wind all day, and felt like they'd
spent days, not hours, being ground under a millstone. Each time he
put a foot down a new rock would join its brothers and sisters in the
assault, trying to find another chink in the armor, to work its way in
deeper and more painfully than any had before. Ranma was beginning to
hate those rocks, but stomping on them in revenge was out of the
question.

"This sucks," he said to himself, keeping his eyes on the ground
immediately before him. Careful steps seemed to help somewhat, if not
enough. Sometimes he could go a few paces in a row without his feet
have to leave the patches of dark, hard, flat earth that were spread
thinly among the rock fields. But not often.

Was this the way to Japan? He couldn't tell. He could turn around
and see the Manor from where he was, he'd climbed high enough that he
cold peek over the hills between his present location and the place
that had been a temporary home only earlier that morning. The Manor
was a tiny thing from this distance, the coliseum being bigger but not
that much. It was almost a half a day's travel, now.

By the end of the day he should be twice as far. How far was that?
What lay on the other side of the mountains he was trying to pass
over? The village Artena and Chloe had talked about couldn't be too
far away--maybe he could see it when he got to the top of this peak?
That was just a couple more hours away.

Ranma clenched a fist around the knives in his pocket. He'd tried to
juggle them a little bit earlier, while walking, wanting to keep
handling the things, increasing his familiarity with the tools even
though he'd never see Chloe again to get a chance to beat her. It
hadn't worked, he kept getting too focused on tossing the knives
around, catching and flipping and throwing them back up again, and
then he'd step on a rock and suddenly lose his rhythm, knives falling
everywhere, right by his face, right by his toes. So he'd stopped.

Now the sun was overhead and looking up at the knives, if he tried it
now, would probably cause one to fall into his squinting eyes.

Instead he studied the ground, searching for particularly vicious
looking rocks that would not take being trampled upon lightly. There
were many of those, and he was quite sure that he was finding each
one--just not with his eyes.

Ranma looked south and concluded that maybe this was the wrong way to
go. He'd already been traveling for six hours and the village wasn't
just on the other side of this peak, as he had hoped. The trip was
only supposed to take a bit over half a day, which meant that
whichever direction the village was from the Manor, it wasn't south.

The other directions he couldn't see very far in. East and west both
had treacherous looking mini-mountains of their own to stand against
him. If either of those were the right way to go, he couldn't tell
from here with his view blocked. North lead right back to the Manor,
and if the village was in that direction he didn't want to go there
anyway. Ranma couldn't tell where Japan was, relative to him, but he
knew it wasn't north--it was already colder here than it had been in
Japan. No, north wasn't the way to go.

East or west it was, then. And that meant he was going to have to
head back to the Manor, which he'd been traveling away from for a good
six or seven hours.

"Dammit!"

Ignoring the cold pit in his stomach and the loudly protesting,
slaughtered remains of his feet, he turned around and started
retracing his footsteps. Surely those rocks would be a bit softer
this time around. His feet were.

His feet, formerly cold and abused, were now masses of over-tenderized
meat that had been left in the refrigerator for too long. They
weren't blue, not really, but they definitely weren't the healthy
looking color they had started out being. At least, he didn't think
so. It was hard to tell, when his ability to see color had passed
away with the sun who sponsored that ability.

He couldn't quite tell what color they were, because he couldn't quite
see very well of anything. He'd reached the little hills surrounding
the Manor but they, too, had plenty of rocks strewn about, hiding
beneath the sparse, mostly dead grass. By that time it had gotten
fairly close to being dark. The sun had gone down and the moon was
missing its shift.

Ranma was a couple of hours from the nearest source of food, the
grapes he'd been stuffing himself on so freely over the past few days,
he had nothing to sleep in or on, and his feet were no doubt an ugly
color underneath the monotone shading everything took on at this part
of the evening.

He laid down on the dead grass and tucked his feet as best he could
into the pant legs that they didn't quite fit in, curled himself up
into a ball, and tried not to think about how long it was until
morning.

It was a long, long time.

He shivered, the rocks below him digging their way into his flesh like
a fleet of assorted-sized drill bits, spinning madly. His hands were
cold, and his feet, too, the temperature having dropped with the sun
hours and hours ago. The warmth had quickly drained out of him,
seeping into the ground and fading into the needy air, each puff of
exhaled heat abandoning Ranma for greener pastures.

It started at the roof of his ceiling, the black turning to a dark and
then gradually lighter shade of blue. The barely-remembered hills
around him took on definition, separating themselves from the sky as
color began to trickle over the edge of the world in a slow flood.
Soon his existence began taking on a wider range of shades, skin and
clothes becoming more than just dark in imperceptible darker. Faded
paints sprang into existence like the coming of spring, winter's death
of color reversing in a resurrection of light.

And then Ranma could see.

His feet were a pale reflection of the sky that almost, but not quite,
overwhelmed the normally light-brown sun-toned skin that covered them.
His hands were better off, having been held clutched against his
chest, trapped between his torso and his tucked-up legs. Clutched
against his stomach, attempting to succor by osmotic cannibalism. A
failure, but they'd stayed warm.

Ranma stretched, his feet running away from the pants they'd been
trapped in as his legs extended beyond their confining reach. The
pants hadn't been quite big enough and he could feel the buzzing of a
thousand mosquitoes underneath his skin, burrowing through the flesh
and bone that terminated at the end of each leg. Then the stinging
began, and went on and on and on until he had to move, had to make it
stop, tucking his feet back under him in defense. They touched with
an orgasmic burst of sparkles, every deadened nerve celebrating at the
renewed stimuli. He gasped in pain and froze, unwilling to try and
stand, to let the reviving blood flow faster, forcing himself to wait
it out.

A few minutes later it was gone. Ranma moved his feet experimentally.
They were tender and very sensitive and still cold, but they were
usable.

He stood, and stretched again, this time his fists thrusting into the
treacherous air and waving about slightly in a vengeful attack. He
sighed, dropping them again.

Ranma looked around. The hills rose to the sides and behind him, and
he could see where he'd walked the previous day. Ahead of him lay the
Manor at another couple of hours travel, a trek made possible only by
his returned sight and the revival of his transportation method. It
was still a rocky voyage that he wanted nothing to do with.

His stomach made a valiant attempt at setting a marching beat, which
soon devolved into a noise quite, like that of heated shrink-wrap
sucking itself down for long transit times. It went on and on and
Ranma could feel his insides becoming more compact and streamlined
starving Afghanistan with every rock-hitting step that he took towards
the Manor's grape fields.

It was a long few hours.

The ripped earth that was the grape fields had been meticulously
cleaned of stones. It was soft and compressed comfortingly beneath
his feet, the coolness somehow being soothing as it squeezed between
his toes. The gentle massage made his abused feet feel like they
might actually be worth something in a few hours.

Reaching what he deemed an invisible point in the grape fields, Ranma
sat down. Wooden posts wrapped about with green grapevines, splashes
of tasteful purple hanging heavy, surrounded him. If Artena or Chloe
hadn't spotted him approaching they wouldn't have any idea that he was
here, among the grapes, a wolf among sheep.

Only sheep do not die so quickly.

He popped the things into his mouth as quickly as he could, spitting
out the pits and then replacing the remains with a new grape. Several
seeds were swallowed but were quickly dismissed after the sweet flesh
of the next plump fruit washed away the feeling of the previous rough
passage. He had to move three times in order to keep the grapes
within easy reach as he decimated everything his greedy mouth-guided
hands could snatch up.

Ranma collapsed onto his back, bloated belly making him top-heavy
enough to justify the sudden laziness. The sun was making its
presence known and he was warm despite the surrounding vegetation and
the cool earth pillowing his entire body. He glimpsed down and saw
that his feet had regained normal skin tone, although the scratches
and generally beaten appearance was still present. They looked like
they could use some rest, so he gave it to them.

Ranma opened his eyes and winced. The sun was past its equinox and
was in the exact position for over at him from where it was falling to
the earth. It was late afternoon.

The juices on his face had dried and become a sticky mask, its glue
painful as it clung to the skin and tried to prevent the movement that
his yawn entailed. He wiped it off with his hands, using his shirt to
clear away as much of the stuff as he could.

That done, he sat up. Corpses of grape bunches lay everywhere. Here,
a severed stem that looked raw and painful where the flesh of the
grapes had been ripped from its nurturer, there a plundered post that
not one of the grape bunches attached to remained free of rape and
slaughter. Seeds were scattered everywhere, the heat of the sun
already causing the sticky remains to be rotting at a rate that would
have required bodies to immediately be carted off to the morgue. That
a killer had been on the loose could never be more apparent.

Ranma's belly had recovered during his nap and was once again ready to
go to war.

A short time later he was once again sated, though he stopped before
the bursting point. It was time to get moving again, to find out
where the village was, and then from there, which direction to Japan.
It couldn't be as far as Chloe had said. A year's travel? Ha! Ranma
doubted it'd take even half that long.

He stood and then walked to the edge of the row, to the open area at
the edge of the field he'd slaughtered, and looked around. Artena
wasn't in sight. Chloe was right behind him.

Well, not that close, but he could see her about a half-mile off,
heading from the very same set of hills that he'd nearly frozen
himself to death on the night before. She was a tiny splash of dark
green trickling rolling away from the mostly-dead slopes. She
probably had shoes on.

What had she been doing over there?

Ranma turned around and headed back into the field, following the path
between rows until they had curved enough that Chloe wouldn't see him
when she walked by. Then he sat down to wait, munching on a few
grapes as he did so. Not many, since he was still pretty full. Just
as a snack.

Chloe had been headed south, and was now returning. Why? She had
shoes on and could walk faster than he could over all the rocks. Had
she had enough time to go to the village and then come back while he
was sleeping? He hadn't seen anything when he'd gone that way...but
what else could it be?

Ranma scowled at the ground in annoyance. If he was going to go to
Japan he needed to get moving. So which way was it?

Chloe would know. Maybe he could trick her into telling him.

Chloe marched back to the Manor. Ranma hadn't been there, hadn't been
anywhere that she could see when she headed south just like he had.
She'd worked her way up the hills, getting ever higher as she got
further into her pursuit, and when they turned to solid rock jutting
into the air, she had had a view of miles around. Within that view
was a distinct lack of Ranma.

So she turned around and headed back.

After finally getting permission to kill Ranma, he managed to escape
her entirely. The only consolation was that he'd headed in the wrong
way and would probably starve to death before figuring it out. The
boy had all the brains of a boiled turnip.

Chloe rubbed a hand through her hair in irritation. Something bounced
off it again. She stopped and looked down to see a grape seed to the
left of her feet. A couple of paces behind her was another one.

Again, something bounced off her head.

Ranma was at the edge of a row, smiling cheerily at her. He spat
something into his hand, then threw another seed.

She responded by reaching beneath her cloak and stripping her
harnesses as fast as she could manage, emptying their contents in
Ranma's direction. He dodged each one, running back into the field
and out of sight. Chloe followed, hands once again filled with metal
death and itching to make good use of it.

She turned down the row. Ranma was a ways ahead of her, running
straight down the line. The row curved with the arcing growth of
fruit and she had no way to nail him in the back while running and him
being shielded by vegetation. She hastened in pursuit.

Ranma didn't slow down, keeping at a set distance ahead of her and
depriving Chloe of any chance to attack. She saw the edge of a grin
whenever he glanced to the side to peek back at her. He was so going
to die.

The row ended, opening up into a wider pathway that separated the
small fields. Ranma turned left. She did the same when she reached
it, and he was gone. The Manor lay another half mile ahead, grapes
extending half that distance on each side.

She ran forward, trying to look down the rows both on her left and her
right. Ranma was gone, probably hiding just a little ways down one of
the rows, laughing silently at her. She hadn't thought he'd know to
do it quietly.

Chloe stopped and listened, just to be sure. No sound, so he really
was keeping his mouth shut. She waited a moment longer and then
turned left down one of the rows, walking slowly back towards where
she'd been attacked, listening. Nothing.

She arrived at the end of the row and turned left again. Ranma wasn't
going to show up so she should head back to the Manor. She still had
something to do, first. She kept walking, searching the ground to her
left where the grapes began.

Again, Chloe stopped. She frowned and then looked at her
surroundings. There was a seed next to her foot. Two more were close
by. There were marks on the wooden post at the end of one row, and on
it a few bunches of grapes that had sustained some form of attack.
The blood of the casualties dripped down.

The marks in the post were where the knives had hit, the slaughtered
grapes the unfortunate victims of her attack on Ranma. But the
instruments themselves were gone.

Ranma had stolen her knives. Again.

From where Ranma lay watching, Chloe looked really pissed. Her hands
clenched for a second before she swept her cloak open and tucked the
knives back into their sheaths. He couldn't tell how many she had
left, but there were plenty of empty spots in the harnesses he'd been
able to see. He'd picked up eight of the things. Scary how fast
she'd gotten them off. He could do it as quickly, of course, but not
with any accuracy.

But he couldn't do it with accuracy even while throwing one knife in
the time she'd tossed eight. That definitely needed fixing. If he
could just figure out what his problem was...

It didn't matter. Soon he'd be back in Japan and he could get his
father to show him how to do it, show him the training method that'd
make him much better than Chloe was. Wouldn't be long now, nope.

Chloe turned and started to walk back towards the Manor. She was
walking quietly, slowly, obviously trying to spy or hear him. Ranma
stood up and moved out onto the pathway behind her. He opened his
mouth and she twisted around and ripped two knives through the air,
aimed right at his face.

Ranma ducked and two more were on the way, spaced a foot apart and
centered on his chest, one trailing the other slightly. He rotated
right and quickly sucked in his breath. The knife on the right went
behind him harmlessly. The other skimmed his chest, the tip trapping
itself in his clothes and causing the handle of the knife to flip away
from him, digging the point into his chest before the knife continued
moving past, flipping end over end now, drops of blood spraying from
it.

Ranma yanked his hands out of his pockets and whipped two of his
borrowed blades in Chloe's direction, then dove forward to evade the
ones she'd already tossed. They missed, but his did, too, by a wider
margin, and two more knives were already headed at him.

Ranma rolled forward into a row of grape vines to escape. He
continued to his feet and then took off running. So he had six of her
knives now. Damn. She was faster than he'd thought.

He peeked back and she wasn't there, so he kept moving. He crossed
out of that field and then turned right. He went a short distance
down the pathway and then turned left into the next field, running to
the end of that one before turning left again. He turned back into
the field shortly before it ended, then went almost to the other side,
staying far enough away from the field divider that he had to peer
through grapes to see it clearly.

After about ten minutes Chloe passed by, once again holding a knife in
each hand and her eyes all over the place. Stepping softly, quietly,
carefully, and listening. Ranma grinned. Ukyou hadn't been near this
much fun.

He looked down at where his shirt was sticking to his bleeding chest,
because he'd pushed it up against his wound, holding it there as he
waited. Ranma didn't have to hold it anymore. The shirt had a red
stain the size of his hand that was literally soaked through. As
bandages went, it sucked. But it was better than nothing.

Still, it'd be healed in a day or two. He was just surprised that
she'd gotten him there. For her to detect him when Chloe was ahead of
him, and he knew he hadn't made any noise walking barefoot and
listening to his clothes, was impressive. His father had done a good
job teaching him to sneak. Who had taught her how to listen?

Ranma waited until she was past. This time he didn't approach her
from behind, instead deciding to let her go back to the Manor for now.
He could find out later where Japan was. It was probably too late in
the day for him to get to the village by dark anyway. Sleeping here
rather than out on the hills again sure did have its appeal. Plus
there were grapes.

Ranma slithered out to the end of the row and peeked around the
corner. Chloe was almost to the Manor now and walking at a normal
pace. She'd given up on finding him for the day, which was fine with
Ranma. They could play again tomorrow, only then he wouldn't let
himself be surprised. They could play every day until she told him
how to get to Japan. Or until Chloe ran out of knives.

In the meantime he might as well get some practicing in.

Chloe stomped into the Manor and headed for her room. Six knives, the
imbecile had taken. Plus the five he'd already swiped before. She
had plenty of knives but none of them did she want to give up to some
grinning little catamite who couldn't have even used them to cut
butter, sharp though they were.

So Ranma had figured out that south wasn't the way to go. Or maybe he
just wanted to spare his uncovered feet the pain of the route he saw.
Either way he'd come back and decided to pick a fight. If it was
because he didn't know where to go, well, she'd soon send him on to
his final destination. If not she would anyway.

Her leg had healed well enough. So had her arm. She'd seen the
surprised look on Ranma's face when she first threw at him, seen that
he was unprepared for her uninjured speed. And so she'd tagged him,
but not good enough. Not good enough to slow him down or at least
leave a bit of a blood trail for her to follow. Too bad.

Maybe next time.

For now it was time to get back to practicing. Her left arm had been
a bit off and though the speed was mostly there, the accuracy was down
a bit. When she'd nailed him the two knives were supposed to have
been slightly closer together. If they had been the knife that hit
him wouldn't have been just a slash-by. It'd have stuck to his chest
long enough to be joined by companions.

Chloe refilled her harnesses using the box of knives in her wardrobe.
She stuck a few in her shorts pockets, too, just in case. If she ran
into him again, she wanted plenty of ammunition. If not she could
spend more time throwing and less time retrieving.

Fully stocked, she set out to turn a target board into toothpicks.

Ranma continued to lay down at the end of the row of grapes, thinking.
Where could he practice? Chloe already knew about his going out to
the coliseum, she might think to check if he was out there again. Was
there anywhere he could go that wouldn't allow her to sneak up on him?
He was going to have to do some more exploring of the area. Maybe a
spot in those ruins behind the coliseum...

His wondering was interrupted when Chloe came stomping back out of the
Manor. Ranma grinned when he saw what she was up to. Throwing
practice? Was that a challenge? She was just a little ways away from
the Manor, tossing at her usual target. It was a little in front of
the left edge facing the building, and she was throwing from close to
the center.

Ranma was about a quarter mile away but he could still see that she
kept looking in the direction of the fields, towards him.

He was going to have to do something about this.

Sneaking over to behind the Manor took a lot longer than he thought it
would. First he had to go west a half-mile or so, to make sure he was
completely behind Chloe, then he had to cross the quarter-mile between
the edge of the grape fields to where the Manor was. That part of the
trip was filled with slow movements and dropping to the ground
whenever he could see more of Chloe than her hair and back, when she
looked to the sides or turned around after going to fetch her knives.
Then he had to travel the extra half-mile to get to the left side of
the Manor.

Now, though, he quickly crossed the length of the backside of the
Manor. He crouched down to put his head at a less obtrusive height
and then slowly, slowly glimpsed around the corner. Nothing. Just
the rightmost edge of the building.

He went around the corner and then began to work his way towards the
front of the building, thinking quiet thoughts, sneaky thoughts filled
with an intent to deceive, to evade, and to slip by unnoticed and
unheard. He could hear impacts now, the sound of Chloe's knives
thunking into her target. And sticking, of course.

But he couldn't see the target. It was in front of the building, just
a little left of where he snuck. He couldn't see it quite yet.

He moved closer to the next corner. From where Chloe stood the
difference in distances between him and her target would be
negligible. Sneaky thoughts, quiet thoughts, unseen thoughts.

His eye floated past the edge of the building and he saw Chloe. She
was standing where she had been before, about thirty feet in front of
the Manor. The target was the same distance from the building, almost
directly in front of him, just five or so feet to his left. The
distance between Chloe and the target was twenty feet.

Damn.

Ranma settled down to watch. Chloe continued to throw and he studied
the way she held her body before beginning the throwing motion, the
way her stance shifted and her weight was balanced as she made the
movements that gave her throw its force, the way she held her arm and
wrist and fingers as the knife was given its direction and purpose and
left to streak through the air and sink into the wood that her
violence was directed at.

Only she did it with both hands, throwing two at a time, which was
giving him fits as he tried to watch. And each knife hit in the
center of the board, right where she was aiming, penetrating side-by-
side without any difficulties.

Ranma continued to watch. After a couple of minutes Chloe ran out of
ammunition and then began to approach the target. He retreated to the
back of the house. When the sound of the knives hitting wood resumed
he again moved forward to watch, keeping track of how many she threw.

Thirty-two, he counted. The board was a pincushion.

He kept studying her throwing style, trying to memorize what she was
doing. His accuracy with one knife at a time sucked, but if he
started practicing with both arms, wouldn't that be twice as
efficient? He thought so. He could hardly get worse.

After several repetitions of this same sequence, he was ready to make
his move.

Chloe threw her last knife and he leapt around the corner and threw
two of his own. She dodged just in time and he was already halfway to
the target board. By the time she moved forward he was there.

He threw the first knife back at her to cause another dodge, to slow
her down. It went wide and he cursed, then pulled the rest as quickly
as he could.

Ranma threw his body to the left, dodging the knife that hit the
target right where he'd been standing. Chloe had picked up his
knives.

He hit the ground at a roll and then used his momentum to get to his
feet and start running. After a few steps he leapt into the air and
twisted himself around, flying backwards, and tossed two more knives
at Chloe. Her knives flew under him and she was out now. She caught
one knife with her cloak and the other went nowhere close.

She threw the knife to where he was about to land, would have landed
if not for his aerial techniques, and he dodged and then took off when
he hit the ground. After a couple of seconds he dodged to the side.
A knife went by and he glanced back to see two more on the way and
Chloe getting too distant to continue throwing. She sure did look
mad.

Ranma easily evaded the blades and kept heading towards the grape
fields. He needed to count how many of Chloe's knives he had now.

Chloe glared after the pigtailed boy as he ran away. He'd made off
with almost half of her knives. She was going to kill him, yes she
was. Soon.

"Chloe."

She turned to see that Artena was standing just outside the Manor
entrance. How long had she been there? Artena's expression was
pleasant, she didn't seem upset or disappointed.

"Yes, Artena-sama?"

"It's time for dinner."

"...okay, Artena-sama."

Chloe slipped the remaining knives into their harnesses. The ones
she'd thrown at Ranma took a few minutes to locate. She wasn't going
to leave them out here for the boy to come and retrieve while she
wasn't looking.

Chloe followed Artena inside.

Ranma watched from halfway to the grape fields as Chloe went back
inside. Artena had called her off. He had been expecting pursuit and
having the game cut early was a bit of a disappointment. His heart
was thumping and his feet and hands were wide awake and tingling and
ready for anything. But Chloe had skipped out.

He sighed and crouched down, pulling out the knives he'd stuck in his
pockets. Nineteen, and the pockets were completely full. He'd had to
carry some in his hands because he couldn't get any more to fit inside
his pockets, as rushed as he was. Running with masses of sharp steel
on each hip made him nervous, too. He'd have to do something with
them before too long.

Maybe he could steal a couple of Chloe's harnesses?

Ranma carefully replaced the knives inside his pockets and then
started walking towards the fields again. He could eat some grapes
while considering the problem.

Chloe ate quietly. For some reason Artena was watching her. Artena
hadn't said anything, but Chloe wasn't surprised. She had asked what
was wrong but had gotten no response. She knew what the problem was,
though.

She was a disappointment, she knew. That girl would have killed Ranma
in the first meeting. Chloe hadn't been able to do it after a number
of attempts. If Ranma was an assassin instead of an imbecile he would
have killed her already. That he hadn't was from no accomplishment on
her part.

Chloe wanted to be as good as that girl was.

She set her fork down, finished, and looked up at Artena, who placed
her own utensil on the table.

"You failed again," Artena said. Her voice was pleasant.

She nodded. "Yes, Artena-sama."

"Do you wish me to bring the other girl here? To help you with this
problem?" Understanding.

Chloe bowed her head. "No, Artena-sama. I will do it." Tears
dripped from her chin.

"You can have a week, then. After that it will no longer be your
concern." Kindness. A reprieve.

She breathed in through her mouth because her nose was blocked up, its
tip wet. "Thank you, Artena-sama," she said.

She would kill Ranma. She would kill Ranma so that she could be Noir,
just like she should be.

Ranma spat out another seed, tossed it over to the next row where it'd
not be in his way. They always felt a bit slimy afterwards, the
combination of his saliva and the fruit's juices mixing unpleasantly.
Plus they were hard if the decided to lay down. Better to just keep
them out of the way.

So, he had two pocketfuls of knives, a belly full of grapes, no shoes,
and no idea how to get home. Maybe his dad would hunt him down.
That'd solve his problems quickly enough.

If Chloe and Artena had been telling the truth about where he was,
though, that seemed unlikely. He'd done enough traveling around Japan
with his father to know that even his country was a big place. His
father probably wouldn't even have a clue where to begin looking.
First he'd check the nearby villages, and if nobody had seen him, then
what?

Ranma didn't know how he'd gotten here. He didn't pay enough
attention in class; France was a country but he knew no more about it
and had no idea how far it was from Japan. Artena had said it'd take
most of a year to walk the distance. Had he arrived in a plane?
Maybe he could hitch a ride on one to get back, as well. He didn't
know how easy it'd be to find the airport, though, or to figure out
which plane went to Japan.

Ranma sighed. It was going to get dark before too much longer. He
needed to figure out where to sleep, if staying in the fields would be
a good place. Also, some of the knives needed to be ditched, and he
still had to figure out where he could practice without Chloe finding
him and making a nuisance of herself. Not that she could ever be
otherwise.

Ranma stood and started walking.

Chloe stepped outside of the Manor. It was dark out and had been for
a couple of hours now. It was time for the search to begin.

First she waited until her eyes adjusted to the moonlight present.
The fields were visible, rows of graduating blackness off in the
distance. Empty ground spread ahead of her before terminating in the
dark, bloody maliciousness of the purple grapes. The grapes were a
dark horde eating at the land.

She crossed to the black. Here it was broken, uneven. Up close the
moon's light filtered through, exposed the space between each row.
The places she had to look, had to search, were revealed.

She walked down the first row of this particular field, from one end
to the next. Then she turned and went back using the next row. Then
the next, then the next, until she lost count, until she got to the
end of the last row.

Then she started on the next field.

Chloe was quiet as she could be. Her hands were empty; she had no
wish to make a mistake simply because she got so accustomed to holding
a knife that she didn't try to throw it right away if necessary.
Familiarity brings it's own problems. Inertia is a killer.

She stepped silently through the grapes and her eyes were everywhere
as she forced herself to look about continuously. It wasn't enough to
just walk down each row--what if Ranma heard her coming somehow?--she
had to keep an eye out for her will-be victim to ensure that she
caught the rabbit.

So she stalked through the fields, row by row, field to field,
searching for the boy she had to kill.

Ranma woke suddenly to find himself staring up at blackness. He
listened, still, trying to figure out what scared off the sandman.
His surroundings breathed quietly, the wind rasping as it scraped over
the stones above and all around him. But nothing else sounded.

He sat up and looked about. The sand below was empty of spectators, a
white glare at the sky, the focus of the coliseum harshly blank and
lonely. The moon was low on its arc over his nighttime, but there
were still several hours until the sun began its own trek.

His head smacked softly against the stone beneath and he winced.
After putting his hands to the back of his skull as an inadequate
pillow, he closed his eyes and went back to sleep.

It was morning and the moon's cheerful wake had commenced. The sun
was now alive, the newborn weak and small, soon to grow in position
and power. The fall was forever away, but it would come.

Ranma yawned and stretched. After a couple of minutes he could feel
his hands again, so he used them to prop himself up to his knees. He
stood, then climbed up the few remaining steps. A leap gained the
top, outermost ring of the coliseum walls.

The drop was two feet away, death waiting at a distance below. The
edge of the stone was smooth from years of triumphant wrinkles that
ruled dominant and then faded into each other over the course of
centuries. The theatre screen that was the rest of the world
stretched forever in all directions, starting at the ledge before him.

One small smudge on that screen was a fluff of bright, purplish red,
under which a creature in green carried it about.

Ranma stared. Chloe was already out looking for him? Talk about
dedication!

"Chloe! Hiiiii!"

She stopped, looked around. Blinking made the universe smear
slightly. She'd stay awake, though. She would.

Ranma was a couple hundred feet away, waving at her from outside the
grape fields, in the clearing east of her that extended towards the
coliseum. He had a big smile on his face. He opened his mouth.

"Which way to Japan?" he shouted. Casual tourist asking for
directions.

Chloe pointed south.

When Ranma turned to look she was already on the way, running as fast
as she could. She exited the row she was in and quickly covered the
empty ground between them. But not quickly enough.

He turned towards her when she was halfway there and she saw his
surprise. Ranma's grin returned quickly, though, and he, too, pointed
south.

When she looked back at him, the pigtail was bouncing around on his
back as he ran ahead of her to the coliseum. He was only slightly
faster than her and the distance remained mostly even, though by the
time they arrived he had gained a little. The arc of the stone
entranced pass overhead.

The sand inside was cluttered with junk, as usual. Ranma's practice
post still stood near the center of the arena, though it listed
heavily to one side. The boy must have tried using it as a stationary
target for something other than the knives he'd stolen from her.

Chloe watched the stands carefully as she moved towards the post,
turning in all directions as she went. There was no sign of Ranma,
but with the angle and height of the seating she couldn't see the
spaces behind the upper benches. That had to be where he was.

Still keeping an eye out, she moved to the nearest staircase and began
to ascend. She was quiet, and listened for sound other than that of
her shoes scuffing noisily with each step on the stone. Her breath
was slow and relaxed like moving gently through hot water. She was
ready for this, ready to get it over with.

Each step came with the expectation that she would hear him break for
cover, his hiding spot discovered. Each step was an exercise in
alertness, her eyes and ears remapping the coliseum a thousand times.
Each step came unaccompanied by anything but the next.

Chloe arrived at the top step and looked around again. Nothing. She
could see every part of the coliseum, now, except for the tunnels
leading into it. Ranma hadn't had enough time to get to one of those
before she arrived, so where was he?

Behind her was the last ring of stone that made up the outer wall of
the gladiator pit. It was eight feet taller than the highest step,
the highest benches. Ranma could be hiding up there.

She jumped and caught the ledge with her hands, pulled herself up
after seeing that Ranma wasn't immediately before her. Once stable on
the stone shelf, she looked around. It was bare the entire length of
the wall, and she still couldn't see Ranma within the coliseum.

"Chloe! Hiiii!" His voice was faint, but she could tell where it
came from. Outside the coliseum.

Chloe twisted about and looked over the edge. Ranma was several
hundred feet away from the building and she briefly considered
throwing herself off of it to at least have a chance to catch up. But
even that wouldn't be enough.

"Which way to Japan?" Ranma shouted again. Then, when she didn't
respond, "I'm going to go get breakfast! Seeya later!"

She said nothing, and after a minute he turned and started walking
back to the Manor, and to the grape fields, where he would eat the
breakfast she had skipped in order to hunt for him.

She watched from above, defeated once again.

Ranma popped another grape into his mouth as he observed Chloe passing
by. She was going slower than he'd seen her walking before, no doubt
embarrassed at having been tricked so easily. She'd get over it
quickly enough, as soon as she next saw him, he was sure, and be
attacking him again in no time. She seemed excitable like that.

She headed for the Manor, so he waited until she was inside, and then
started walking in the opposite direction, back towards the coliseum
and the ruins that lay beyond. He wanted to see what was over there.

Twenty minutes later and he was inside some ancient stone city.
Corridors of giant bricks formed roads twenty feet wide for him to
walk down, the buildings and walls on each side thirty feet tall.
Doorways were cut intermittently, and when he looked inside one it
contained an empty, echo-laden room that responded eagerly to his
yells. He played with that for a few minutes before moving on.

It didn't take long to figure out that there wasn't much of interest
here. Lots of old stones making up empty old rooms. Maybe if Chloe
had been chasing him around with those knives of hers it would have
been more fun, but as it was he felt like he was taking a slow, in-
depth tour of a boring museum, like his father had forced him to go on
before. The tours were a good scouting method for his father to use
before sneaking back in and stealing stuff later. Since his father
had never taken him along on those "Saotome School of Acquisition
Liberation" expeditions, Ranma would usually fall asleep on a bench
while everybody else walked around going "ooh" and "ah" while gawking
at old stuff.

That's what this city felt like; old and dead and having nothing to
fun play with.

After exploring for a little while he came across a big indention in
the ground, a circle inset so that a number of rows of steps lead down
to the center, which was about a hundred feet across. Pillars forty
feet high were spaced evenly throughout the circle. Ringing the
outside edges were benches that were built into the slope. Ranma
guessed that the circle was some kind of theatre.

The rest of the city, which really wasn't all that big, was just more
of what he'd first seen when he'd arrived: boring stone buildings in
various stages of falling down. Most of it didn't seem to be falling
down very well, though.

When Ranma was just about at the end of his exploring limit he found
the hot springs. They were really, really hot, but he still had fun
swimming around for a little while. He noticed that the cut on his
chest was scabbed over neatly and well on its way to healing. While
relaxing he kept an eye out for Chloe to show up, but she never did.
She could have nailed him pretty good if he was in the middle of the
spring and had no quick escape.

The springs would probably be a good place to sleep, he figured, since
the heat rising off of the water and surrounding stones kept the area
nice and warm. The theatre would have been useful for practicing if
the whole place wasn't made out of stone with no way to set up a grape
post to use as a target. He'd find something else. Maybe he could
still use the coliseum, as long as he was careful.

Those knives were really sharp, after all.

Deciding that was what he would do, Ranma headed back to reinvent
somebody else's wheel.

Ranma pulled the post up out of the ground and pushed some of the
surrounding sand over the knives he'd hidden underneath. Then he dug
another hole a foot away from its predecessor and shoved the end of
the post into it before packing sand up against the sides to hold the
wood upright. The sand was dry and didn't pack well, instead just
seeming to settle easily to wherever he pushed it, so he just piled
the stuff onto the base as best as he could. After giving it a few
experimental shoves, he deemed his target stable enough to use.

He backed up to about twenty feet away, and threw his ten remaining
knives with his left hand. Then he retrieved them and returned to his
standing point. Ranma tried throwing with his right hand this time.
He hadn't magically improved since his last practice session.

Throwing two knives at once was next, so he fetched the knives again
and got ready to toss them. He stood at the previous spot, then
closed his eyes and visualized Chloe while she was practicing. He
emulated the vision, holding his body as close to her stance as he
could. Then he watched Chloe's movements in slow motion and followed
them, his eyes still closed, the only difference being that he didn't
release when he got to the end of the motion.

It felt right. He was going to do it perfectly this time.

Ranma opened his eyes, staring at the target now, and, with his blue
orbs staring, re-pictured Chloe's starting posture. Then he copied
her movements while fixating on the target, which was directly ahead
of him. The knives flew freely, he wasn't sure when they left his
hands, and sailed through the air towards the target. The left knife
passed over the top of it by about half a foot, the right-handed knife
cutting across to the left and then hitting the ground five feet to
the opposite side of the pole.

Ranma frowned, then closed his eyes and tried again. He superimposed
Chloe's image over his own kinesthetic sense of placement. He started
the movements, opening his eyes partway through to glare at the enemy.
His arms unerringly followed the paths set by those of another.
Release, and both missed. Again.

So did the next six, and the ten after that, and the ten after that,
and...

He was hungry, and it'd been hours since he'd last eaten of grapes.

Ranma collected the knives again, replacing them carefully into his
pants pockets. Five knives to a pocket were the most he could
comfortably fit, and even then, the hilts stuck out a few inches for
each one. At least that made them easy to pull out, if Chloe showed
up and he needed to use one of them as a distraction. She could be
somewhat startling, Chloe could, and requiring of diversion.

The trek back to the fields was uneventful. He looked around to see
if the girl was anywhere about, but failed to spot her hiding in the
grass or anything. There wasn't the slightest movement. Since it was
a little after noon he figured she was probably in eating lunch. She
might not eat as much as he did, but she did clean her plate
(sometimes with his help) every time he saw her sit down to a meal.

Ranma sat down in one of the fields he hadn't filched from before. He
didn't want to develop a habit of eating at the same place, and strip
the area or something equally drastic. Not that he'd be here for that
long.

The grapes tasted as they usually did, like little balloons bursting
of sweet water, foiled only by the hard seeds contained within. The
fleshy remains scattered as wind-swept corpse ashes, tossed about in
random directions as one hand snatched at the next morsel and the
other disposed of the previous.

Good as they were, his belly still felt like it sloshed of liquid
after binging on the things. A change of provisions would be nice.
Something heavier and more substantial, like rice or noodles, maybe
some fish or even a beef bowl. Cup ramen would be wonderful.

Ranma wondered if they had any of that in France, and where in France
it would be, since it wasn't here.

He glimpsed over at the Manor again, and there was no longer a lack of
motion. Chloe was exiting the building.

She stopped after marching a few paces, then started to look around.
Her face revolved slowly as she searched for him. Partway through the
task her jaw detached itself in a wide yawn. Ranma grinned, wishing
he was close enough to toss in a grape.

After glaring about, probably wondering if he saw that, Chloe set off
towards the coliseum, or the ruins beyond. He waited as she walked
by, giving her a good five-minute lead, and then stood himself,
playing the wine keg. Bread would be nice, too.

Ranma followed at a discreet distance and made like an ostrich
whenever she seemed about to look backwards. It hurt, sometimes. His
clothes got dirtier, the dried red blood of his previously white shirt
becoming overlaid with a caking of brown. His feet were holding
together well, though. Cold sharp rocks seemed to be their weakness.

She went into the coliseum so he ran along the outside of the building
until he came to one of the other entrances. He didn't want to be
caught the same way he'd done her, jumping down from over the
passageway. Chloe wouldn't use the opportunity as a chance to escape.

When he reached the inner end of the tunnel he sidled up to one of the
corners, watching in the opposite direction for Chloe to come into
view. When she didn't, he peeked around the stones at his back, to
check the other side of the arena. He saw her enter the tunnel that
was opposite the direction of the Manor. The one that led directly
into the middle of the ruins.

He waited a minute and then dashed out into the open, quickly reaching
the passageway Chloe had walked. He again peeked around the corner
and saw that she was near the opening on the other side. When she got
there, she kept going straight, following the road that lead in that
direction rather than turning to one side. The passageway was dark
enough, shadowed enough, that he decided to risk following her down
it. He could flatten himself down again if she turned around for some
reason and probably not be seen.

Once he reached the end he quickly turned right down one of the side
roads, hiding behind a wall whose face was perpendicular to the road
Chloe was on. If she looked back and he wasn't hiding behind
something she would see him, with the flat stones making up the street
surface and the sun being overhead to reveal any sneakiness. Laying
on the ground in that situation would only give her a head start on
tagging him.

Chloe continued going straight and the road remained unbending. There
was no way for him to follow her without making himself painfully
visible, so Ranma hurried down the side street he was hiding in,
turned left, and then traveled a few blocks in Chloe's direction.
Then he turned left, sneaking up to the corner and peeking right
around it. Chloe was another couple of blocks ahead, just as he had
anticipated, still walking forward.

Where was she going? The direction she was headed in would just take
her through the ruined city, with the more broken-down buildings being
ahead of her. The hot springs were in another direction; she would
have had to turn right like he had in order to get to those.

Ranma followed, checking her progress every few blocks while he ran
along the road parallel to Chloe heading.

Soon the stone buildings began to show increasing signs of disorder.
Stones were strewn about the roadway, obviously parts of damaged
houses or whatever the stone structures that lined the streets had
been. Some walls were caved inwards, some ceilings collapsed. The
destruction hadn't been caused by the passing ages--if they had, all
of the buildings would have been similarly effected. Had there been
some kind of fight here? When was it, when the city was abandoned, or
did it occur afterwards?

There wasn't anything that indicated explosions had done the damage.
The rocks didn't have holes and craters blasted into them, so he
didn't think that whatever had caused the devastation hadn't been some
kind of modern weaponry. Not unless a tank had just come rolling in
and knocked everything over, anyway.

Catching himself spending more time looking at his surroundings than
looking after Chloe, Ranma rushed down the side street once more. He
again looked around the corner, this one barely his own height due to
the missing blocks of stone. Chloe wasn't there.

He looked back in the opposite direction, to see if she had turned
around, but saw nothing. She must have turned down one of the streets
when he wasn't paying attention. But where had she gone? There
hadn't been anything interesting in the area when he'd come by
earlier. Nothing worth walking all the way from the Manor for,
certainly.

Ranma stepped out into the street and turned right, following the
direction Chloe had been going. He walked quickly, looking down the
smaller streets on each side as he traveled, checking for her
presence. He saw nothing. The buildings were damaged heavily here,
only some of them even having intact walls facing the street. He
stepped carefully to avoid the stone fragments that littered the
street.

After a few blocks he stopped. Maybe she had turned and gone back the
other way, or taken a turn before he'd switched to this road? If she
had continued this far he would have been able see her still. Or...
His eyes widened.

Ranma jumped to the side and two knives hit the stone street a moment
later, passing through the spot he'd been standing. Chloe was above,
had climbed up one of the ruined buildings and waited for him from the
rooftop. Right as he moved, she threw again and he had no doubt that
she was going as quickly as she was able, because they came two at a
time, one pair after the other as he leapt about and dodged as best
and as erratically as he could.

After a minute of this his foot came down hard on a rough piece of
rock. He yelled out in pain and pushed himself off with his other
leg, rolling towards Chloe, getting a few more rocks in the back for
the cost of his escape as two more knives barely missed him. There
was no way to make a drastic change of directions in mid-somersault
using only one leg. He used his momentum to roll to his feet,
ignoring the still-stabbing pain in his foot and now back, and tossed
the knives he'd snatched from his pockets during that last move.

They weren't great throws but they caused Chloe to pause for a second.
He used the opportunity to move forward again, more easily now, to use
the wall of the building Chloe stood upon as shelter. He grabbed a
few rocks, bending down as he ran and snatching them up. Rocks he was
good with.

Now close to the building, he ran alongside it, heading for the
nearest way up to the top. Ranma heard a slight scuffle behind him,
on the opposite side of the street. He stopped and whirled, tossing a
rock at where the noise had come from. One of Chloe's knives hit the
wall behind his ear, bouncing off in the right direction to miss
getting him on the ricochet. The girl ducked to avoid getting hit in
the face with his rock. They both threw again.

They both dodged, and he could see the frustration on her face. She
had to be getting low on knives. He had two pockets full of the
things. He threw another rock, keeping an eye on Chloe's arms as she
did the same, using his judgment of the throw vector to anticipate
where the knives would be, and dodge them. This time he dodged
towards Chloe. She was fifteen feet away.

She looked angry at the advance but moved to meet him. A blade was in
each hand and she was in a knife-fighter's stance, something he'd only
seen once before when his father had gotten into a drunken brawl with
someone who was fond of making stabbing gestures. She held the side
of her body towards him, left arm leading with knife extended and the
right hovering in front of her torso, waiting for a chance to twist
her body towards him and plunge the knife into his stomach or neck or
something else that was soft and necessary for Ranma's well being.
Ranma made the mental adjustments to compensate for Chloe's extra
range.

He tossed one of his rocks at her head and she ducked while sidling
forwards, now only a few feet away. The last rock followed on a
heading for her gut. Chloe used the flat of her left knife to knock
it away, stepping forward with her right foot and turning her body so
that the right side was the vanguard, gaining more ground as she did
so.

She turned that movement into a forward lunge, knife leading in a
full-body motion with her weight emphasized on the attacking arm and
shoulder. Ranma used his left hand to deflect her arm, knocking it to
the inside of her body line and preventing a strike with her other
knife. While she was off-center he stepped in with the right leg and
punched her in the stomach. She tensed before the blow landed to help
absorb the damage, but he could tell that her breath was still knocked
out by the hit.

She stepped back and twisted left, continuing the momentum of the push
he'd given her, bringing her left arm and knife around in an arc to
make a backhanded swipe at him. Ranma used his right hand to grab her
arm just above the elbow and his left caught her wrist, stopping the
leading knife and leaving her out of line for attacking with her
right.

He pulled down and back on her wrist, keeping the elbow steady, his
leverage making her body try to flip forward. Chloe went with the
force, bending down. Ranma hopped back slightly when she tried to
plant her other knife into one of his feet, then gave her arm a more
vicious twist. She cried out and he used his right leg to kick her
hand away. The knife flew free from her hand and skidded down the
stones of the street.

Chloe's right arm being knocked wide put more pressure on her left and
he could feel more of her weight pulling on her trapped arm. She
yelled out in pain again. Ranma pushed down on her elbow, bringing
the wrist and forearm further up and extending Chloe's whimpers. He
stepped to the inside of her arm, his foot wrapping about her ankle,
and released the elbow. His body keeping it pinned in place, he used
his free hand to wrench Chloe's knife away. Then he used the girl's
twisted arm to push her away. His ankle caused her to go to the
ground and he stepped back cautiously. The knife slipped into one of
his pockets.

Ranma grinned. He knew what was next. Now that he'd beat Chloe she'd
have to feed him, just like with Ukyou. It would truly be a wonderful
thing to have a wider range of food substances. Essence of no-grape.

Except that Chloe didn't get up.

Chloe lied on her side, collapsed to the ground with her left arm
tucked protectively inside her cloak. Red-purple hair covered the
upper half of her face and Ranma couldn't see her expression at all.
She was shaking slightly.

Ranma's mouth did a one-eighty. Was she crying? She was, wasn't she?
Man, there was a reason he didn't like playing with girls; they played
along with the fun games until they lost and then they got all weepy,
or they clung to you with demands to play house or doctor or some
silly crap like that. With Chloe being such a tomboy he'd thought she
would be as fun as Ukyou had been, but if she was gonna get like this
over a twisted arm...

"Hey, quit that!" he demanded.

Chloe's only response was to pull her cloak tighter around herself,
defensively. She turned her face away from him, pointing it towards
the stone beneath. The rock fragments were probably digging into her
cheek, but she didn't show it. Or if she did, Ranma couldn't tell.

"Quit it!" he said again. He hated it when girls pulled this.

Ranma picked up a few small rocks and bounced them off of Chloe's
hair. One of her hands snatched the edge of the cloak and yanked it
up as protection, wrapping it over her head. The red-purple fluff
disappeared under a dark, solid green. The bottom of the cloak pulled
up some to expose her feet and lower legs.

Grinning again, he leaned forward to poke her behind the knee, then
yanked himself backwards just in time to avoid Chloe's swiping at him
with another knife as her left arm came slicing out from behind the
cloak. When she missed Chloe pushed herself off the ground with her
right arm, springing forward to try to stab at him again with the
left.

Ranma twisted frantically and knocked her arm to his right, giving
Chloe who was smiling fiercely the opportunity to turn with the force
and bring in her other hand, which also had a knife now. She was
still moving forward and that gave her enough speed that he couldn't
block or deflect the blow in time. He twisted and the knife thrust
most of its length into his left arm.

"Ow! That HURT!" he yelled at her. Chloe tried to pull the knife
back so he let her, then grabbed her wrist with his left hand before
she could stab him again. His arm was weak and he could feel blood
running down it, but he yanked on her wrist, bringing her right up
against him before she could try anything with the other arm. He
smashed his forehead into her face and she was knocked backwards, off-
balance from trying to knee him in the groin.

His arm pleaded with him to release her wrist but Ranma ignored the
whiny bastard and kept at it. Chloe still hadn't recovered when he
punched her in the stomach. This time she wasn't ready for it and she
was pushed back, folding forwards slightly. Her face was white and
she struggled to breathe, but she still tried to bring the other knife
around to cut at him.

Ranma twisted and moved forward underneath her extended arm, yanking
it up behind her back. He could feel her chest heaving as she
struggled against him, still unable to pull in air. She stomped on
one of his feet, her heal crushing him into the stone beneath. Ranma
yelled in pain and shoved her away. The edge of her knife sliced his
hand as she pulled it to in front of her. He took a few steps back
and she turned around and did the same, glaring at him triumphantly.

Ranma looked at his hand. A long cut ran the length of his palm. It
wasn't too deep but blood was running freely from the wound, mixing
with what had already coated his arm from when she'd stabbed him just
before. Chloe's knives were very sharp and it hadn't hurt much at
first, but where his arm had been punctured he could now feel the
buzzing of a million invisible bees as they began to dig into his
flesh, working their way into him, an invasion of spreading stings and
chewing insects.

He let his arm drop and the blood fell to the floor a tiny bit at a
time, the trickle slow but steady, that of the leaking milk caused by
a full baby who still sucks habitually at teat. Red paint dripped
similarly from one of Chloe's knives, gripped caressingly, reverently
in a tiny fist. The other knife was handled with disdain, scorn, and
it screamed in jealousy and a desire to prove itself. Chloe seemed
willing to give it another chance.

He curled his fist. "You cheated," Ranma accused. She had.
"Pretending to cry like that, jeez, that was low."

She smirked in response. "Anything-Goes. There are no rules, right?"

"...Yeah. Just remember that." His smile made his head feel tight.
The bees were spreading. He had a special attack he could use now.
An appropriate one. One Chloe deserved.

Ranma jumped forward to attack, his right hand coming up sharply,
releasing the knife he'd pulled out of a pocket. It was aimed
correctly and Chloe was forced to dodge, losing her stance in the
hasty step to the side. She stepped right into his other attack. His
left hand flung forward, snapping open as it jerked to a halt at the
end of his reach, and collected blood spat itself at Chloe. She
barely had time to flinch, to stop it from getting into her eyes, but
it still splashed all over her face and forehead, running down, thick
red opaqueness hampering her vision with a salty sting of not-quite-
sweat.

Her hesitation cost and Ranma kept moving forward. Extended knife arm
was knocked aside and his foot slammed into the side of her left knee.
She cried out, went down. As she fell away her right arm crossed her
body, Chloe bringing the knife around to throw at his chest. He
arched his back and it flew past, then he bent forward again to punch
Chloe in the jaw, her face smacking against the stone beneath and
stunning her.

Ranma grabbed the edge of Chloe's cloak and ripped it away from her.
He stumbled back when the cloth pulled out from where it was pinned
under her body. A red handprint branded the green. He clenched his
fist around the fabric to help slow the bleeding. Plus it'd stain
better.

Chloe got up awkwardly, having trouble standing. The empty hand went
to her cheek and she was glaring at him again. Ranma could see her
harnesses, one on each limb, and it looked like five fit to each arm
and eight to a leg. They were empty, but Chloe still had one more
knife. Plus there were others from when she'd been throwing at him
that were scattered all over the road surface, easy to pick up.
Underneath she had clothes identical to what he was wearing; a long-
sleeve white button-up shirt and a pair of brown cotton pants. She
also wore tennis shoes, dirty white and with big laces.

She looked very angry to be without her cloak.

"Give it back!" The blood on her face turned her enraged, upset look
into something ridiculous.

"Umm... no." Ranma grinned, then wiped the wrap against his bloody
arm, turning it into a soiled, oversized rag. Chloe's fist tightened
around her last blade and he wondered if she'd try throwing it. He
could block or deflect with the cloak. "You have another one of
these, don't you? I like this one."

The girl wiped her arm across her face, her eyes. The blood streaked
over her skin but didn't go anywhere. But she didn't attack, she just
watched him angrily.

Ranma frowned, made a guess. "Catch," he said, and tossed the cloak.
The blood made it stick and fall short. Chloe stumbled when she
stepped forward to catch, the knee he'd stomped buckling under her
weight. She gave him another glare and then held open the cloak to
see the bloodstains that covered it.

"I hate you," she said quietly.

He stared at Chloe, then picked up a rock and tossed it at her. She
moved the cloth aside and the stone bounced off her injured knee.
Chloe made a small noise but continued to stare at the bloody
handprints.

"...Whatever. Seeya later," he said, then turned and ran down the
street before she could reply or throw her knife at him.

Blood didn't wash off. This was something she knew well. Because of
that, she was always careful to not get blood on her clothes or on
herself. The cloak wasn't hers. Chloe didn't know whose it was, but
she'd found it some years earlier. It had seemed like a nice blanket,
the dark fabric warm and soft.

Artena had been surprised at her discovery. Her smile had seemed sad,
then, and Chloe was sure she was going to be told to put the cloak
back where she'd found it. Instead, Artena told her what it was for,
and that she could use it if she was very careful. The older woman
hadn't said who had used it previously, and Chloe hadn't asked. But
she wondered.

And blood didn't wash off easy. From her first few assassinations she
knew that to be the case. Standing to close to the victim, the knife
or sometimes bullet hitting in the right (or wrong) spot, a brief
spray, and the clothes had to be scrubbed and scrubbed and scrubbed.
They wouldn't come clean. Artena just threw the clothes out once they
got blood on them.

Chloe tucked the cloak under her arm and then slowly limped around the
street, picking up and harnessing her knives. It took only a few
minutes, then she hobbled to the nearest side street and turned
towards the hot springs. Maybe if the blood didn't have enough time
to dry, she could clean it off. The water was hot and she could scrub
it out. Maybe.

Her knee was badly sprained and each step drilled a thick steel pin
home. The pant leg surrounding it seemed tight, tighter than it
should be, and she was sure that her pants weren't getting smaller.
The other knee still had plenty of room. She stepped carefully but
sometimes her haste turned the pin into heavy pick chopping away at
pain barriers.

Her cheek throbbed, too, but that was a lesser pain, more easily
ignored. It didn't fluctuate, it was just a steady hum along her
nerves. Except when she clenched her teeth those times when her knee
got hit by a sledgehammer. Then it did hurt, but not as much.

It took her a half hour to reach the hot springs. The blood felt dry.
The color was darkened and drying out to an almost-brown. Her own
clothes she would have deemed trash. Not this, though.

There were several small springs, the water bubbling up in different
areas. Only the biggest one, the one with the lowest temperature, had
steps leading down into it. One of the others was almost hot enough
to boil. The earth surrounding it was of a similar temperature.
Chloe could feel the heat seeping through her shoes and knew she
wouldn't be able to stay here long.

Crouching was hell. Each thump of the fuel lines contracting was a
crushing blow designed to torment. She almost wished for her leg to
fall off so that her knee would stop hurting. But if it did she
wouldn't be able to keep her balance when doing this, so she suffered
willingly. She would clean the cloak.

She carefully dipped the garment into the water. When she pulled it
back out it steamed. Red dripped down from where it was heaviest,
spreading in a diluted red dye throughout the rest of the material.
She laid the cloak out on top of the ground and tried scrubbing at the
blood with a flat rock. It'd work the clotted, thick mess free yet
wasn't rough-edged enough to cause tears or permanent stretching. She
hoped.

She started where the blood was like a printed plastic design on a
shirt; heavy and stiffening, making the cloth feel cheap and
uncomfortable. The crust softened slightly, turned more reddish and
runny, the absorbed water a thin spongy sheet that collected the dry
excess as it was rubbed free.

Chloe moved on to each bit of the stain, burning her hands on the
cloak and ground whenever they slipped from the rock, ignoring her
sawed-off knee's protests as she rocked back and forth, pushing the
rock as best she could. Soon the scrubbed areas were so littered with
bits of congealed blood that she couldn't tell what was still stuck to
the cloak. So she picked it up and leaned forward painfully to dip
the reddish-green thing into the water again, holding one edge
carefully as she shook the cloak back and forth. Dirty crimson specks
swam free like ship-jumpers escaping the sinking Titanic.

When she pulled the cloak free the remaining stains looked almost like
they'd been there forever. The affected areas just had a little blood
dried into them, nothing she could pull off with her fingernails or
separate from the actual cloth. But the discoloring was easy to see.

A few hours later she started back for the Manor. The cloak was heavy
and dripped, the water she hadn't been able to wring out escaping
slowly. It was hot, too, where she carried it draped over one
shoulder, and the moisture seeped into her shirt where they touched.

The blood hadn't come out, and now appeared baked into the threads.

Her walk was slow. The injured knee was worse and she could barely
take a step without wanting to cry. If she thought she could make it
far enough she would try hopping on the other leg, but even holding
her damaged one up was very painful. Chloe wished she could just lie
down and wait for Artena to come and carry her back to the Manor, but
why would Artena bother?

So she took one excruciating step after another, trying not to think
about what Artena's reaction to the ruining of the cloak Chloe had
been lent would be.

It took her almost two hours to walk back to the Manor. Usually it
was a quick but relaxed forty minutes. Today it was the march from
hell.

The sun was low and it was about time for dinner when Chloe arrived.
She didn't know if she'd be able to eat anything. Her stomach felt
empty, butterflies need room for high-speed maneuvers, but she didn't
think holding it down would be easy. She kept picturing Artena's
disappointment at her failure to be Noir, and her failure to keep the
cloak, whoever it belonged to, from getting damaged. The tears and
thin runs of snot that dripped off her chin weren't all because of an
injured knee.

She hobbled through the doorway. The smell of food scampered about
like an energetic puppy, making Chloe feel nauseous. She slowed
beyond what he pain limits required, not sure if she really wanted to
go to the kitchen. She knew she had to, though. She couldn't hide
from Artena. She'd tried it before and it always made the woman sad.
Chloe didn't want that.

So she stepped slowly, timorously, through the threshold and into the
kitchen.

Artena was at the stove, stirring something that smelled like it would
make her taste buds explode in an orgasmic frenzy. Chloe's stomach
did flips and somersaults and all kinds of acrobatics that involved
not staying still. She stood motionless, waiting. Chloe was sure
that Artena knew she was there, knew when she had entered the Manor
and probably knew when she'd even gotten close to it. Artena was much
better than she was. So was that girl.

After a couple of minutes, Artena turned to look at her. Chloe stood
still, dirty clothes hanging limply, her skin contaminated by dust and
scrapes. She could feel the deep bruise on her cheek, and the
incriminating evidence hung heavily on her shoulder. Her knee
trembled.

Artena's eyes studied her up and down, measuring, taking everything
in. No surprise was evident, the woman just stood there, taller and
prettier and better than Chloe would ever be, looking at her as though
she had expected Chloe to show up with such a bedraggled appearance.
Except for when she saw the cloak. When Artena saw the cloak her eyes
widened slightly and Chloe died. That hadn't been expected. Artena
had thought she would do better than that.

"Dinner will be ready in a few minutes," Artena said, turning back to
her preparations. "Why don't you go get changed?"

"Yes, Artena-sama," Chloe said quietly. She turned and limped off to
her room.

Easing her leg out of the pants was difficult. The knee had swelled
badly; it hadn't been her imagination that made the pants tight.
Chloe didn't want to ruin another garment, though, so she pulled the
knee out sharply. She wiped her face on the sleeve of her shirt,
especially her eyes, which were dirty, and changed out of that, as
well, carefully putting on new, clean clothes. Artena would do the
laundry later, hopefully getting out any of the simple stains that
might be in the stuff she was wearing. Chloe carried the dirties,
along with the cloak, to the room the laundry stuff was in.

After she put her clothes in the basket she hesitated, then went to
the kitchen, still with the cloak. Artena had already seen it, but...

The table was already set when she got to the dining room, and the
food was placed. Artena stood up when Chloe entered. She took the
cloak without a word, then held Chloe's chair for her and helped her
scoot it in after she'd sat. Then Artena went to her own place again
and did the same. She put the cloak on her lap.

When Artena started to eat, Chloe did the same. The silence that was
normally comfortable wasn't. Every time Chloe started to look up at
Artena she caught herself and tried to concentrate on her food. She
didn't want to see. Eventually her eyes met Artena's and she looked
away, ashamed.

"Artena-sama, I-"

"Why don't you tell me what happened?" the woman interrupted, and
Chloe nodded miserably.

She told Artena of how she'd gone to the ruins to look for Ranma and
noticed him following her, then how she'd waited and attacked from
ambush and still failed. She told Artena of how she'd been beaten,
how she'd tricked Ranma and then stabbed and cut him. She told Artena
of how Ranma had just left when she'd been defeated for real. And she
told Artena of how she'd tried to clean the cloak, but that the blood
wouldn't come off.

At that, Artena stopped eating and looked down at her lap. "You tried
cleaning this in the hot springs?"

"Yes, Artena-sama," she answered.

"Stains only come out when washed in cold water. Hot water sets them
in," Artena said quietly.

Chloe didn't look up. Her plate was wet, but it wasn't from something
she'd been served. She didn't want to look up.

"I'm sorry, Artena-sama."

A scraping noise sounded. It was Artena's chair moving across the
stone floor. A rustling of cloth was the woman's standing, then came
the sharp clicking of heels to rock as Artena exited the dining room,
went out into the hallway. The footsteps faded away and Chloe's food
swam in a hot salty sea.

Chloe's sweaty hands were on her legs, clenching the material of the
pants within each fist, soaking it through. She held her eyes shut
because it was better than seeing everything blurry. Thin snot
trickled into her mouth over the overhang of her upper lip. The
little food Chloe had eaten was on the verge of successful rebellion.

After a few minutes of silence interrupted occasionally by a wet
sniffle, she knew Artena wasn't going to be coming right back. Which
made things even worse, though she fought to make it not so. She
wiped her face with the sleeves of her shirt, and they turned wet and
heavy and sticky, but she recovered herself enough to realize her food
had gone cold, and so had Artena's.

She might not be good enough for Noir, but she could at least clean
the dishes, so she set about doing so. Chloe carried the dishes into
the kitchen, scraping the plates and other implements clean, and then
scrubbed them in the sink. After each item was clean she dried her
hands with one towel and then carefully did the same for the dish with
a second. It was slow, doing both tasks by herself. Adjusting her
weight was painful as she leaned to one side to pick something up off
the counter for washing, or leaned to the other to pick one of the
towels up. Plus she had to walk over to the appropriate cupboard for
each dish, since there wasn't a clean counter to stack the things on.
But Chloe wanted to get the job done before Artena returned to see her
in the middle of another unhandled mess, so she kept at it. Each bit
of inflicted pain her knee could throw against her was met with a
surpassing desperate need to not fail in this, as well.

She finished the dishes, then wiped the counter and table down
carefully. The wolf chewing on her leg went along obligingly, and
then there was no more to clean. Chloe wondered if Ranma's kick had
done more than sprain, if something had torn or broken. It felt like
it.

Chloe hobbled to the room with the laundry supplies, and Artena was
there, her back turned to the doorway Chloe stood in. She was
kneeling on the floor with a wooden bucket before her, a metal rubbing
board angled into the water. Artena scrubbed the cloak back and forth
across the board, the sudsy water sloshing around in the wide pail.
Chloe remained where she was, not wanting to get closer. Artena
didn't respond to her presence at all.

Her leg hurt, though she was leaning on the opposite limb and the
doorframe. Should she ask Artena to look at it? Chloe had mentioned
her injury when telling of her fight with Ranma, so the older woman
already knew. Artena had also seen that she was having trouble
walking. Maybe she didn't think it was that bad? Maybe she didn't
care.

"Artena-sama," Chloe said quietly. No response, the scrubbing
continued. "I'm going to bed, Artena-sama."

She waited a moment and then turned on her good knee and headed off to
her room. When she got there she pushed herself into bed, pulling her
leg around awkwardly, and raised the covers to her chin. She would
wait until Artena came to tuck her in.

Soon her knee started hurting, the position uncomfortable. Lying on
her back made it stretched out, the natural tendency for the knee to
be slightly bent foiled by the flat surface of the mattress and the
weight of her leg. So she turned to her side, to let the knee lie
flat against the bed. That left her other knee on top, a ball of
pressure bearing down painfully.

Chloe shoved her pillow down between her legs to ease the pressure.
That helped immediately, the cool fluff soothing her injury. Soon she
caught herself starting to drift off. She hadn't slept in two days,
but she wanted Artena to come and say goodnight. She would wait.

So she kept pinching herself as needed, opening her eyes to the
maximum, employing little tricks to keep herself from falling asleep.
She didn't know how long it was but eventually her legs started
getting warm as her body heat was absorbed into the pillow. Her lower
body started to sweat, the previously comfortable room temperature
rising to the seek-shade zone. The sheets, too, got hotter, and the
bed was a slow-cooking roaster that was just getting started.

Flapping her sheets to get some fresh air between them didn't help but
momentarily. Folding the sheets back and leaving herself exposed to
the air quickly left her feeling cold except where the pillow was.
She didn't want to remove that because then her knee would start
hurting again. Instead, she pulled the sheets back over her body.
They were cool for a little while and Chloe wondered how long she had
been waiting for Artena.

Before too long she had to move the sheets away again. A few times
she could have fallen asleep but held out long enough to become
uncomfortable again, which left her fidgety and restless and wide
awake. Artena would be along any time now.

The candle that had been burning on the nightstand beside her bed went
out. The sudden blackness was only broken by little wisps of white
smoke that streamed up from the burnt string that hid under a puddle
of wax. Chloe stared wide-eyed and concentrating until the wick
cooled. Tendrils of white spread across the room as her eyes adjusted
to the lack of light. They made odd shapes, like clouds, and Chloe
wondered if it was cloudy out, and if it would rain, cold water
falling upon Ranma in a flood of tiny bullets. She hoped so. She
hoped he went running for shelter and slipped on a wet rock or in the
mud and then hit his head and died.

Chloe noticed that the smoke was gone and wondered how long it had
been. How long had she been waiting? Was Artena still scrubbing at
the cloak, whoever it belonged to, or had she finished and decided not
to tuck Chloe in? Was it because she thought Chloe was already
asleep? No, if she cared she would have come to check anyway. So
Artena was either still trying to work out those bloodstains or she
was in bed and sleeping without any concern and perhaps with a bit of
resentment towards the undeserving. Chloe wasn't fit to live with
Artena; that girl was, but not Chloe.

That girl did everything better. Everything but the knives, and so
Chloe practiced with those every day, even though the girl would still
win their fights, Chloe was the more skilled in that respect. So she
practiced to keep it so.

The high, small window set in one wall of her room let in a bit of
light and soon Chloe could see her cupboard and the door and the
stones built up around and above and below her. They were all in
varying shades of black and dark blue shadow but it was enough for her
to watch the door in its motionlessness, waiting. Artena would come
to tuck her in, just like she always did except for the night of
Ranma's arrival. She would.

So Chloe stared at the door, eyes wide-open in alertness, silent,
expectant, and ignoring how the sheet below her head became damp where
it touched her down-turned cheek.

Ranma woke, looked up sleepily, and got whacked in the eyeball by a
raindrop. Then he scowled and pulled his shirt collar up over his
head for a bit of protection for the light barrage of chilled suicide
bombers. Problem fixed, he went back to unconsciousness.

Ranma's arm was sore the next day all around where Chloe had stabbed
him. Moving his arm wasn't too painful, but it was reminiscent of
over-enthusiastic training sessions that had been punctuated by deep
bruises that went all the way to the bone. That was what his wound
felt like. The scab over the cut itself looked healthy enough and he
guessed that his arm would be fully repaired within just a few days.

His hand was bothering him far more, however. Every time he clenched
his fist, opened it up, or tried to hold something he would get a
burning sensation like from a disturbed paper cut. With the sharpness
of Chloe's knife and the fact that the blade had barely done more than
open a flap of skin on his hand and cause a lot of blood to spill out,
a paper cut was just a less affected version of what he had.

Everything he did that raised a sweat dropped his hand into a vat of
salty acid. He hoped that cut went away quickly.

For now, though, he snacked on some more grapes. Yum. Grapes for
breakfast, lunch, and dinner of every day. He loved it. If Chloe
came out he might just skin and eat her for the meat. Not that he
knew how to do the skinning, his father always did that, but still, he
was going to have to find something else to fill his belly with.
Maybe sneak into the Manor and steal some food? It couldn't be that
hard.

After finishing breakfast he looked over at the Manor to make sure
Chloe wasn't around, then headed back to the coliseum. Time to get
some more practice in. He knew what he was doing wrong now.

A bird mocked him, its voice shrill and unreasonable, proclaiming that
it could throw knives better than he could. Ranma wondered if it was
right. He'd spent a few more hours trying to improve, to no avail.
Maybe he was some kind of knife cripple. Did handicaps get that
specific?

Ranma finished collecting his knives and returned to his throwing
point. No matter which method he used, right handed throwing, left
handed throwing, or throwing with both hands, his performance was
abysmal. He quit using his injured hand after only a few tries--his
accuracy went down even more, and the flapping skin started to leak
blood from underneath. The other hand didn't do too much better, but
he'd keep on trying it. He refused to give up, though the bird's
voice grew louder and more insistent.

Some of his knives sought out avian intelligence on the situation but
were turned down without being received. That damn bird.

Soon enough he was hungry again. The bird became more than a simple
annoyance. It was mocking him, saying, 'Eat me. Eat me, if you can!'
while chuckling in its insane way. Ranma didn't know what kind of
bird it was but the thing looked like it tasted non-grapelike and had
a meaty texture. That was a big plus.

The sun bore down and his arm sweated and ached and whined like crazy
as he worked it for hours without a break. His rebellious limb tried
to toss itself to freedom with every abusive exercise of it, but he
refused to let it go. It was his arm. He owned it, no matte what it
might think of the matter.

He threw knife after knife at the wooden post, the only difference
coming when the bird would settle down for a minute, on the grass or
on a stack of bricks or even on top of the post. Then he'd throw a
few knives at it, which never hit but scared the feathered fellow into
taking a walk, its obscenities banished temporarily. Next open season
was again declared on the target and he went to town, unsuccessfully.

This simple practice just wasn't getting him anywhere. He knew his
father would have been able to figure out the problem, but the old man
wasn't around. Which way to Japan? South? East? West? He didn't
think it was north, mountains in their white-bearded and cranky dotage
could be seen up that way.

Ranma picked up his knives and went to go get lunch. The bird
followed him like some demonic imp sent to make his life a nagging
hell, poking, prodding at him with its incessant presence.

He kept an eye out as he walked towards the Manor but Chloe was
nowhere around. Was she still upset about losing to him? He hadn't
beaten her that badly--his kick to her knee shouldn't have hurt the
girl that much, and she'd gotten him twice with her knife. She'd been
the one unable to fight at the end of their match, but she hadn't done
too badly. Better than anybody but his father and some of the dojo
masters he had fought while traveling. So where was she?

Ranma ate from the outside edge of the grape field closest to the
Manor, watching the building entrance in between chomps on fleshy
victims. Maybe Chloe had gone to the village, or to somewhere else
nearby, and since he hadn't seen her leave...

He frowned. Chloe leaving when he wasn't paying attention was no
good. He'd never find out which way to the village or Japan or
anything, like that. So had she left, or was she just inside the
Manor? Maybe she was outside and somewhere he couldn't see her?

Ranma finished another grape and stood, then turned around to look at
the hills surrounding him. He didn't see Chloe, but she could have
just passed out of sight on the backside of a hill, or gotten far
enough away that she was a small, slow-moving dot that was just
unnoticeable.

Well, there was one place he could check...and it'd have food, too.

He studied the Manor intently. He knew that there were windows on all
sides, plus the front doorway. Big building, to have only one
entrance. The terrain surrounding it was bare enough that anybody
paying attention would be likely to see his approach. Which meant
getting there as fast as possible was the best way to cut down on
visibility.

Ranma ran quickly towards the front door, thinking sneaky thoughts,
quiet thoughts, thoughts about nobody being around but a few bunnies
and an annoying bird. A hundred feet, seventy-five, fifty, twenty-
five, fifteen, ten, five. He stopped abruptly when the doorway filled
before he got there and Artena stood blocking his passage. She didn't
look quite as friendly as he remembered.

"Uh...hi," he said, slightly out of breath. Grin. Happy thoughts,
happy thoughts, starving-little-angel thoughts. Feed me!

"Why are you here?" Artena asked. The annoying bird flapped its way
over his head and settled on her shoulder. It stared at him and
Artena paid it no mind. Weird.

"Ummm..." Ranma took a cautious sniff, tried not to give himself
away. No food, dammit. "Which way is Japan?"

"Any direction will get you closer to Japan," was her response.

For some reason he hadn't expected her to tell him. "Right. Say,
where is Chloe? I haven't seen her."

"Why do you want to know?"

"She invited me for lunch..."

The bird laughed at him and he wondered if he could shove one of his
knives down its throat. Artena's mouth just twitched slightly. "We
already ate lunch," she said. "If you do the dishes you can join us
for dinner."

"Oh, well, maybe later. When is Chloe going to be out?" He could
probably get Chloe mad enough to tell him where Japan was, just to
make him go away, but he was sure it wouldn't work with Artena. It
wasn't working with Chloe so far, either, though. The Saotome School
of Anything-Goes Being Annoying was usually more successful than this.
Maybe it didn't work as well on girls? Or maybe Chloe knew all the
tricks? It sure seemed like it.

"Not for a few days. She sprained one of her knees and has to stay
off of it for a while." She looked sad. So did the bird, oddly
enough. Why was it on Artena's shoulder? It abandoned the sad look
and mocked him in some strange birdish manner. He wasn't sure how
that worked, but something about the way it was looking at him was
definitely scornful.

"Do you want to tell her you're sorry?" Artena asked, distracting him
from the avian.

"What? No." It was Chloe's fault anyway, attacking him like that.
Plus she'd ripped his shirt. Twice, actually. Well, it had been her
shirt first, but it was his now so that didn't matter. "I didn't even
kick her that hard."

The bird laughed and launched itself into the air, flew off. Artena
paid it no attention, and Ranma considered trying to hit it with one
of his knives. Soon it was a tiny black dot in a clean Etch-A-Sketch
sky.

Ranma turned back to Artena and notice how precisely in the center of
the doorway she stood. He hadn't seen her fight any, but knew he
wouldn't make it past her if he tried, so he didn't. "Okay. Well,
I'm going, then. Tell Chloe I said 'hi'."

"I will," was her response, the slight smile on her face again.

Ranma headed off after the bird, keeping an eye out for slower moving
critters. Maybe he could tag a bunny or something. Anything would be
better than more grapes.

Chloe looked up from her book as Artena entered the room. "Artena-
sama?" she asked. A pillow was propped under her knee for support,
and Artena had brought her another one earlier to put her back against
so she could sit up properly.

"Ranma came by," the woman said. "He told me to tell you that he said
'hello'."

"Um, okay. Did his arm look infected?" A brief prayer.

"No, it looked fine. It will be well-healed soon. Probably before
your knee is."

Chloe nodded. It would be. Ranma was the better fighter, so he'd
recover faster. That girl did, definitely. "Did he say anything
else, Artena-sama?"

"He wanted to know where Japan was."

Yeah, so he could walk there. "Did you tell him?" Chloe had to kill
him. If he left, that'd be harder. Could she get a rocket launcher
and kill him with that? It'd stop his grape filching, but Artena
didn't seem to care much about that. Probably not.

"No, I didn't. He'll stay here."

"Thank you, Artena-sama."

"How are you going to kill him, Chloe?"

"I don't know, Artena-sama." Unless she could find him sleeping,
Ranma held the advantage. Her knee testified to that.

"Well, keep thinking on it, then. I'm sure you'll come up with
something," Artena said encouragingly. "I have to go clean the dishes
now, so call if you need anything." She smiled at Chloe and then
stepped out of the room without waiting for a response.

Chloe looked back down at her book. She was rereading 'Through the
Looking Glass' since she hadn't gone back to the village to get a
replacement yet. The book had been in one of the other rooms, Chloe
forgot where she had left it, but Artena had brought it to her that
morning, along with another pillow. She'd been cheerful and as kind
as ever, checking Chloe's knee carefully so as to not cause any pain.

She hadn't stayed awake long enough for Artena to tuck her in, and had
been woken to breakfast in bed. Artena had carried in a chair to keep
her company during the meal, handing Chloe her glass of milk when she
wanted it. There wasn't a place on the bed to set the cup down, so
Chloe was glad about that. Lunch had been delivered the same way and
they had talked normally during both.

Artena had said nothing about the cloak and whether she had fixed it.
Chloe hadn't asked, though she wanted to. Artena hadn't given it
back, so she would assume it to be trashed. Better that than simply
unreturned from lack of faith. She was pretty sure which it was,
though.

Chloe sighed, put her book down, and wondered how she was going to
kill Ranma. Catching him when he was asleep or going to the bathroom
was all she could come up with. Both of those would require either
great luck or an ability to follow Ranma completely undetected until
he engaged in one of those activities, or something else gave her a
similar opportunity.

She was pretty sure she wasn't skilled enough at sneaking to avoid
Ranma's notice, and most of a week wasn't enough time to improve the
necessary amount--especially when some of that time would be spent
waiting for her knee to heal. She really only had about a half a week
that she would be able to use in order to kill Ranma. That wasn't
enough time to get better. Which meant that she was going to have to
get lucky, instead, or trick the pigtailed boy into making himself
vulnerable.

She had already pulled the weepy female routine once and it had
worked, but she didn't know if even someone as dumb as Ranma would
fall for it twice from the same person. But there were other ways of
getting to him, to be sure. Pretending to be hurt was only the most
obvious one.

Some of the others would require Artena's assistance, however, and
Chloe wasn't sure if that would be allowed. She was supposed to kill
Ranma herself, not with somebody else's help. Artena could easily
execute Ranma at any time; that she hadn't done so indicated it was
supposed to be a test of Chloe's abilities.

So, no help from Artena. She wanted to kill Ranma on her own anyway.
But how?

Ranma chased the rabbit. It hopped to the left, to the right, more to
the right, darted between the grape posts and took off down the row on
the other side. When Ranma got to the end of the row he was in he
turned to where the bunny had escaped. It was gone. Damn rabbit.

The grapes laughed at him. Well, they'd get theirs. He'd see to
that.

The bird had taken off, he'd not seen the thing since it left him and
Artena standing at the entrance to the Manor. Then that damn rabbit
had shown up and taken up the mocking game. What was it with the
wildlife here? Were they trained in psychological warfare? Some
variant of the Saotome School of Anything-Goes Being Annoying? No,
his pop was back in Japan, wherever that was, and wouldn't have taught
anybody but Ranma anyway.

Any direction gets him closer to Japan than staying here. Heh. That
was true, but it really didn't help him any. The world was a big
place. He didn't know how far he was from Japan or what direction he
had to go in to get back home, but he was sure that picking a
direction randomly would probably make it take a long, long time.

Which meant that he was going to stay here, wandering around in the
valley with no clue where to go. The grapes would do him in before
too long, Ranma was sure. Practicing with those knives had gotten old
and annoying. He wasn't getting any better, he didn't know why; he
carefully copied Chloe's movements and the accurate throws that she
made almost every try were wildly varying misses for him. So that was
no good. Plus, Chloe was going to be inside the Manor for the next
few days, too, which meant that along with not wanting to practice he
would have nobody to play with. Boring.

Ranma started walking through the grape field again, looking for more
rabbits. Even a simple opponent was better than none at all. And if
he did catch one, he could finally eat something different for a
change, break up the routine of grape after grape for days on end.
How he'd ever enjoyed the things he had no idea.

Chloe sat on the ground out in front of the Manor, her back up against
a tree and a pillow set underneath her knees. Artena had put a second
case on the pillow to make sure it didn't get dirty. Her book was on
her lap, angled nicely because her legs were raised somewhat.

Where was Ranma? She had expected him to show up shortly after she
came outside, but she was already a good ways through the book and
it'd been a couple of hours since he had come by shortly after lunch.
If he'd decided to try leaving again, well, that'd make things
difficult. Tracking him down when he left in a random direction and
had a lead of half a week after her leg healed would be almost
impossible. The only way she'd be able to find him is if he turned
back towards the valley or if he lucked out in his bearing and ended
up coming across the village. They wouldn't do anything to a
linguistically inarticulate young boy, not without instructions, but
if she showed up asking about him they would give her whatever
assistance they needed. But that was only if he went by there, and
the odds on that were rather small when he would be taking a blind
guess.

Archimedes touched down a few feet in front of her, head cocked to the
side so it could look upon her directly. The bird hopped forward a
few times until it was beside Chloe's legs.

Chloe smiled at her. Artena hadn't thought the name fit. The bird
wasn't that smart, she had said, but Chloe thought the opposite.
Archimedes was the most intelligent bird she'd ever met. Archimedes
wasn't a female name, though, so Artena had been right about that.

"Hello," she said. "Artena doesn't have anything for you to do?"

The bird's head shook back and forth, a quick, jerky set of motions.
Smart though it was, its communication abilities were still rather
limited. It seemed to understand her well enough, though.

"Have you seen Ranma? The boy that's been here lately?"

Archimedes stared at her, and Chloe wondered if it didn't understand,
then it turned itself to face out towards the grape fields, a bit west
of southwest. Ranma must be out by the far edge of the fruit,
probably gorging himself on the things again.

Chloe nodded to the bird when it turned back to look at her, to
indicate that she understood. Its response was to hop closer to her
again and look directly at her lap, where Alice in Wonderland lie.
Chloe grinned, delighted, and put her book on the ground, then her
hands to her sides to show that the coast was clear. Archimedes
jumped up on to her lap, facing sideways so that it could continue to
look at her. The impacts as it landed on her were light, barely
noticeable. The book had been hardbound and heavier.

Slowly, Chloe brought one of her hands up. Archimedes tensed
slightly. Chloe could crush the bird in that hand, if she were of a
mind to, and she was sure that Archimedes knew that. But it remained
still as she brushed her extended index finger down the back of the
smooth, egg-fragile head. Its beak pulled upwards and her finger dug
in slightly to the crook between skull and back. She scratched, and
Archimedes crooned, a soft vibration passing into her fingertip and
legs.

"Hold it still so I can chop off its head," Ranma said quietly. "I'm
gonna eat that bird."

Chloe yelped in surprise, covered Archimedes by bending forward,
holding her arms in the space between her legs and chest. Ranma was a
few feet in front of her, to the left side enough that he had
approached from behind the bird. Chloe hadn't been paying attention
at all.

"You are NOT going to eat Archimedes!" It was Artena's bird, her
bird. If he tried to eat it she'd shove one of her knives down his
throat and see how sharp his mindless appetite was. She could feel
Archimedes trembling against her, but the bird didn't struggle to get
free, which only would have hurt it.

Ranma stood still, a knife in each hand, glaring at her. "Why not?
I'm hungry! And I hate that bird! It won't leave me alone!"

"I don't care! She's my bird, you jerk, and if you touch her I'll
kill you!" Her neck hurt from looking up at him with her body facing
the ground, but she stayed there, still, holding Archimedes
protectively.

Ranma relaxed slightly, his hands dropping most of the way to his
sides. "Well, feed me, then," he said. "You're costing me my dinner,
right? So you have to make up for it."

"I do not! Archimedes isn't your dinner!"

The knives came back up, and he smirked. "Wanna fight for it?" One
of them pointed at her knee. He'd probably miss in a throw even from
this distance, clumsy imbecile that he was, but if he tried to stab
her, he'd have no problems.

Chloe flung one of her hands towards Ranma and he flinched, suddenly
awkward, probably because he wasn't sure what to do with the two
knives in his hands while being attacked. But she hadn't thrown
anything, and she took his hesitation as an opportunity to sit back
up, freeing Archimedes, and cup the bird in her hands. Chloe yanked
her arms skywards, propelling Archimedes into the air, the bird
narrowly missing several of the tree branches above. Archimedes
recovered quickly and flew up, went through the branches, and then
took off towards the Manor.

Chloe grabbed the pillow from behind her back and whipped it at Ranma,
hitting him in the face before he could throw a knife at Archimedes.
She looked to see if the distraction worked and saw her bird escape,
flying into the Manor's open door and probably going straight to
Artena. Maybe Artena would come out and kill the boy.

Her pillow smacked into the side of her head, knocking it into the
tree behind her. The pillow fell back into her lap and she put a hand
to the back of her head to feel for injury, rubbing where it hurt.
"You jerk," she said, looking at Ranma again.

He just grinned at her and held up his hands. The knives were gone
and she could see the hilts of a number of the things sticking out of
his pockets. Replacing them was her book, closed, the page she'd been
reading lost. "What's this?" he asked.

"It's a book." Her own hand dropped back to her side, and Chloe
wished she hadn't decided to leave her knives in her room. "Give it
back."

"What's it about?"

"It's about a little boy who got shoved into a sack full of useless
kittens and tossed in the river. Now give it back."

Ranma gave her an odd look, stared at the cover, which just held the
title, then opened to a random page. He frowned. "I can't read it."

"It's in French." Moron.

He grunted, snapped the book shut, then tossed it to her. "Why don't
you read it in Japanese?"

Chloe caught it by the spine and started looking for where she'd been.
Since she'd just read it a few days earlier it was hard to remember
her place. "Because it's not my book, and the person who owns it only
reads French. Now go away." She looked back towards the Manor and
saw that Artena was standing in the doorway, watching.

Ranma noticed the gesture and looked, too, saw Artena, then turned
back to Chloe. "You owe me dinner," he said.

"No, I don't. If you want Artena-sama to make you some food, go ask
her."

Ranma crouched down, facing her. "No way. She just wants to make me
do the dishes."

If Artena had a gun, she could shoot him from where she was standing.
Ranma would never even know what hit him, his head would just snap
slightly, a wet pinging noise would sound as the bullet ripped through
his brain and bounced off the inside of his skull, and then he would
fall over, legs still bent like a frog's, dead before he hit the
ground. Artena did have a gun, Chloe was sure, but she never took the
shot and Ranma remained alive.

Chloe was glad, because if Artena killed him it would be because
Artena had decided she was unable to do it herself, that she was a
failure as Noir.

"If you told Artena-sama you were incapable of doing the dishes, she
might feed you anyway." Chloe smirked slightly at Ranma's hungry
look. "Try saying you are mentally handicap."

"Hey!"

"You can stand and both sets of fingers are usable. That's all you
need for drying dishes. Mental handicap is all you could claim."

"I ain't mentally handicapped!" he lied, outraged.

"You're limiting yourself to eating stolen grapes because you don't
want to rub some dishes down with a towel. You're a moron," Chloe
told him.

"I am not! I just hate doing dishes!" Ranma was standing now,
glaring down at her. "Now you take that back!"

"Or what?" Chloe lifted her injured knee slightly. "Will you kick me
again? Stab me with one of my own knives, which you stole?"

His fists were tight and shook slightly, his face red with anger. He
stepped forward and her knee tensed. This would hurt.

Ranma stopped, turned, and stalked away, towards the grape fields, and
Chloe breathed out slowly. He would have smashed his heel into her
knee, had been just about to do it, but he'd stopped. She wondered
why.

"Are you going to be able to do it this way?" Artena asked from beside
her.

Chloe looked at the woman, wondering when she had come over. "Yes,
Artena-sama. It's just... difficult. But yes."

Artena nodded acquiescence. "Be careful. Ranma was very angry. He
views fighting as a game, and a fun one, so attacking him is fine, but
you can get him mad in other ways."

"I know, Artena-sama."

"Good." Smile. "If you need it, he can eat with us sometimes. Only
if it is necessary, though."

"Thank you, Artena-sama. That will help." If she could feed Ranma,
this would be a lot easier, Chloe was sure.

"Archimedes is inside. It will probably be a few days before I have
to send her out again, so you can check on her later, if you want.
She got a bit of a fright, it seems, but she's fine."

"Ranma wanted to eat her."

Artena's smile froze, dropped completely. "Make sure he doesn't do
that. It's very important."

"Okay, Artena-sama. I will." Chloe knew that if Ranma ate
Archimedes, Artena would probably kill him herself.

"Make sure," Artena repeated, then, "I'm going back inside. Call me
if you want to come in or need something."

Chloe watched as Artena walked back to the Manor and went inside. Had
she already been on the way over when Ranma was about to hit her?
Ranma hadn't been facing in the right direction, but could he have
sensed Artena coming?

Chloe hadn't, and never could unless the woman let herself be
detected.

She sighed and tried to find her page again. It was going to be a
long wait for her knee to heal.

Ranma stomped carefully through the grape fields. It was difficult,
being barefoot, so he was watching his step. He purposefully made as
much noise as he could, smacking his hands against posts as he walked
by, kicking one every once in a while, the wood rough and loud and
smacking against the soles of his feet. No rabbits had been scared
out yet, though.

Chloe was annoying. He'd just been playing around with her about the
bird, he wasn't gonna kill her pet no matter how maddening the two of
them were. But she coulda given him some food as compensation anyway.
It'd only be fair. Instead she'd gotten all nasty and pissed him off
when he was trying to be nice because of her messed up knee, which was
her fault for starting the fight anyway. Stupid girl.

*SMACK*

A fluffy head poked itself out from nowhere and stared at him. They
both froze, then the bunny took off and Ranma ran in pursuit. It
switched to the next lane over but continued in the same direction, so
Ranma followed it.

They hit the end of the field, the separator gigantic compared to the
rows they'd just left, and the rabbit turned away from him, ran down
the length of the pathway. Big mistake.

Ranma's knives were in his hands now, the injured one slick and
stinging with sweat and a bit of blood. He threw, the bunny didn't
change direction and just stayed straight ahead. Both blades missed,
the quarry turned back into the fields, and he continued, not far
behind. Fifteen feet into the row the rabbit threw itself between
posts, the vines running between stopping him from doing the same, and
kept going. It was gone.

"Dammit!" There went supper.

He went back to pick up the knives he'd tossed, then reentered the
field. It was in there somewhere and it wasn't like he had anything
better to do than search for supper.

Chloe was helped into her chair, then Artena scooted it forward
gently. "Thank you," she said, and Artena went to sit herself. They
began to eat.

Between bites, Artena asked, "Has Ranma come back yet?"

"No, Artena-sama. Not since he left earlier." Where was he? She
hadn't seen him walk towards the coliseum. Maybe she'd missed it,
reading her book, but she didn't think she had. He couldn't have been
eating grapes the whole time. Chloe was pretty sure he couldn't have.

"The other girl will get here on the last day. She'll be staying for
a little while, a few weeks, this time."

Chloe grinned happily. "She's coming to visit? I'll kill Ranma
before she gets here. I will!" It'd been a while since she had seen
the girl, the other Noir. Months, she wasn't sure how many, had
passed. Much too long.

"Good." Artena's pleased smile made the news even better. Ranma was
going to die, and then the other girl was coming to visit! It would
be perfect!

She spent the rest of the meal plotting the boy's demise and thinking
about how nice the following weeks would be.

Hide and seek was a horrible game, when you were it. He walked up and
down the rows, looking for some cute little critter to pop up and make
itself edible, but found nothing. The grapes passed on each side and
his stomach grew increasingly demanding, but he ignored both. Ranma
was going to eat something else this time. He was!

Step. Step. Step.

Ranma's eyes narrowed.

Step. Step. Step.

The grapes were getting closer. He wasn't sure how, but the rows were
becoming more narrow, the posts and vines and bunches getting bigger,
pressing in. The dull purple became brighter, more alive, more
menacing. They were watching him, hundreds and thousands and millions
of eyes staring, filled with malice.

Step. Step. Step.

A grape reached out and touched his arm, and that was it. He ripped
into the enemy. They ran away shrieking, but they weren't fast enough
and their numbers dwindled quickly from his attack. The stragglers
were picked off first, then the main body took a hit to its center and
collapsed. It was over.

Afterwards he lied on his back, a belly full of juicy grape flesh,
surrounded by seeds. Even if he caught a rabbit or bird or something
else now, he was too full to eat it.

"This sucks."

Soon he started feeling drowsy, his digestive system declaring war on
the malicious little buggers. Ranma wondered who would win, and fell
asleep.

The early bird gets the worm, but Ranma wanted something a little bit
bigger and not quite so slimy. The sun was only partially risen, and
he was gonna catch him a rabbit. They all seemed to still be in their
little rabbit holes, with better sense than to be up this early,
though. He'd get one eventually.

Instead of checking the grape fields, today he was checking the area
around the Manor.

Ranma tripped, his foot falling an opening in the ground that he
hadn't noticed. He yanked his leg out quickly, happy that he'd not
twisted it, and inspected the hole. He put his face up against it,
the thing was almost as big around as his head, and looked inside.
Nothing. If there were critters home, they were deep. There had to
be rabbits in there somewhere, right?

Or it could be a snake as big around as his head, about to come out
for a morning snack of its own.

Ranma pulled back quickly, looking suspiciously at the hole. Maybe
there weren't any rabbits in there.

He stood, stepped carefully around the hole, and then continued his
search for breakfast.

A few grapes can taste great, but Ranma was beginning to suspect that
there was some kinda aftereffect to eating the things. A few, no
problem. A lot, they start to get old. Eat hundreds of the things
for days on end, though, and you about die. It felt like that one
time he'd eaten two pounds of butter, yuck. He'd never touched the
stuff again, and never would, either.

He'd eaten a lot more grapes than two pounds worth, though.

Ranma wobbled over to Chloe, who was reading under the tree again, and
collapsed to the ground. He lay on his side, facing her, in case she
tried anything even with her bum knee. She didn't even look up, and
Archimedes glared at him from her place on Chloe's shoulder.

He breathed out slowly, then back in through his nose, and smelt grape
air. Gah.

"Isn't Archimedes a boy's name?" he asked.

She frowned, but continued to read.

"It is, isn't it? I saw this movie with this kid who pulled a sword
out of this stone, Exterminator, and this old guy in it had a bird
named Archimedes, and it was a guy. So how come you named it
Archimedes?"

He stared at her, then looked around lazily for a rock to toss at the
girl.

"It's not that easy to tell the difference," she said, finally, right
after he found a nice round one.

"Uh, yeah it is. See, you just--"

"Not when you're three years old."

"Oh." That would make it a bit harder. "Still, that was pretty
stupid."

The bird chirped angrily, and Ranma wondered if he should throw the
rock at it, instead. Wait, he'd probably hit Chloe in the face if he
tried. Not that that was a bad thing. Getting her mad wouldn't be
boring, at least. Plus that'd happen even if he did hit the bird. He
took aim, then tossed, and the rock flew past the tree without hitting
anything. Figures.

How boring. Too bad Pop wasn't here, he'd have somebody to spar.
Kata was dull and all the ones he knew were easy anyway. Chloe was
busted as far as fun went, and he didn't think Artena would be any fun
to play with. She wasn't even his age, and she couldn't be as good as
his pop was, so why bother?

"You still reading that book about the boy and the bagful of cats?" he
asked.

Both Chloe and the bird looked at him funny.

"What?"

"Well, yes," she said. "It's a long book."

"So read it to me."

Chloe seemed annoyed, but flipped back to the start. "'There once was
a boy who was shoved into a sack full of useless kittens and tossed in
the river,'" she began.

Creepy.

"'Luckily the kittens were able to claw their way out of the bag
before they drowned, leaving the boy to fend for himself. Since he
couldn't swim he fell to the bottom, where he was found by a merman
who poked the kid with his trident. The boy tried to run away but was
too slow. The merman captured him and took him to see the king.'"

Chloe flipped to the next page, then resumed. "'The king...'"

She reached the end of the third make-believe chapter and glanced up
to see that Ranma had his eyes closed. His mouth was hanging
partially open and some kind of bug was in front of it, eyeing the
opening with consideration. Imbecile.

"Archimedes," she said hopefully, but quietly, to her bird, who was
still on her shoulder, "go get one of my knives."

A blank look was her only response. Now would be the time. She'd
deliberately left her knives inside, to keep herself from trying to
take a chance that her knee would prevent her from succeeding in
anyway. And now she could have slit Ranma's throat with the most
minimal effort. It wasn't fair.

She didn't have anything she could use to attack Ranma with on her.
The boy was stronger and would wake in time to overpower her if she
tried to strangle him. Nothing else she could have done right now
would have worked, either. Yelling for Artena would just wake Ranma
up, which wasn't help at all, and she was supposed to kill him herself
anyway.

Chloe sighed, disappointed, and turned back to where she had left off
reading the real story. She still had plenty of time.

Ranma woke, slightly. Artena was in front of him, picking Chloe up.
One of the woman's arms was under Chloe's knees with one of the
pillows padding the contact, and the other was under Chloe's arms,
holding her up by the armpits. Chloe was asleep.

He briefly considered running inside while they were busy and grabbing
some food. He wasn't hungry again yet, though, and he had an odd
taste in his mouth anyway. Probably from all those grapes, disgusting
things. Plus he wasn't done napping.

He closed his eyes and drifted back off.

The sun had moved and the tree no longer shaded him. Everything
behind his closed eyelids was a bright orange and that wasn't
something he could sleep through. Ranma yawned and sat up, blinking
about and seeing that it was a little after noon. He was hungry
again. Time to take another shot at hunting.

He stood and began making his way slowly back over to the grape
fields. Stupid critters probably loved the things. This time he
wasn't going to give up until he had something new to eat.

Ranma collapsed to the ground, panting, completely out of breath and
energy. Run here, run there, no matter what he did he couldn't catch
any rabbits. It was like they had some kind of early warning system
to let them know he was coming. He was sneaking about completely
silent, yet they still knew when he was approaching and took off
instantly. And they were fast, too, bouncing all over the place in
seemingly random directions that he could never guess right ahead of
time. None of his knives got very close to even tagging one. Well,
not close enough.

There had to be some kinda trick to doing this, but he didn't have a
clue what it was. He was already getting hungry enough that the
grapes were looking appetizing again, dammit. That shouldn't be
happening!

He exhaled slowly, completely, and then stood again. No more grapes.
Nope! Some grape-eating critter it would be, instead!

Chloe was back under the tree again, reading her book and taking tiny,
neat bites out of sandwich. Oh, how he hated her. "Gimme that."

"No." Another bite. "Go ask Artena-sama to make you one."

"I don't wanna do the dishes!"

Bite, chew, swallow. "Well, making a sandwich isn't something that
would make more dishes dirty. All she has to do is cut stuff up. So
she might make you one if you ask nicely and she hasn't already washed
the dishes."

"...you think she would?"

"No."

Ranma eyed what was left of her lunch. "Wanna make a bet?"

Chloe held on to her sandwich with both hands, looking at him
suspiciously now. "What?"

"I bet... that... um... a bunch of grapes would fill you up better
than half a sandwich would!" That was so lame.

"Okay," she said. "So go get me some grapes and we'll see."

No way. "You'll eat what's left while I'm gone, won't you?"

She smiled. "I won't."

Ranma stared at her. "You better not."

"You better hurry. I don't know how long I can wait." Chloe glanced
down at the sandwich. "It looks really good, doesn't it? I sure
liked the first half."

He took off running.

Chloe stared as Ranma kicked up a small dust cloud in his wake. If he
wanted to run the quarter mile there and back just to earn a sandwich,
that was fine with her. Seemed stupid of him, though. What was wrong
with grapes? She ate them all the time. His mother must have taken a
few bad falls when carrying him, because Ranma had problems.

She set the sandwich down between her legs, on the pillow beneath.
Ranma would be back for it quick enough. He was already halfway
there. Must be the motivation.

Chloe picked her book back up and resumed reading.

Ranma came to a stop in front of the sandwich-holding girl, a huge
lump of grapes almost as big as he was cradled to his chest. They
were large and heavy things and he doubted even he could eat the whole
bunch without getting full. Chloe had a smaller appetite.

"Here ya go," he said, and dropped the grapes in her lap, the sandwich
snatched from her hand sometime later in that same second.

Ranma took a big bite out of it as he sat down and suddenly a third of
the thing was already gone. Must take smaller bites. "Ow." A huge
shock jolted through the lower back corners of his mouth. He hated
that. Another sign that he'd been living on grapes for too long, if a
simple sandwich could give his taste buds a heart attack.

Chloe started on the grapes. She ate one, he took a bite, she ate
another, he took another bite. After a few repetitions of this his
sandwich was gone. Ranma licked at his fingers, and Chloe ate another
grape. There were over a hundred of the left. It wasn't fair.

"Are you gonna eat all those?" He didn't really want to, but he had
to have something else. That sandwich half was so tiny!

"Yes."

"You're going to eat every one of those grapes?" he asked,
incredulous.

"Yes. Go get your own, if you want some." She was annoyed! At him!

"Fine." He'd watch, and she'd have to eat EVERY ONE!

Chloe ignored him and resumed reading her book, popping grapes into
her mouth regularly. He noticed that she turned the book pages with a
hand other than the one she tossed the messy seeds away from herself
with.

"Read more of that story," Ranma said to her. "I fell asleep,
earlier."

She looked up, sighed, and then turned back to near the beginning of
the book. "When did you fall asleep?"

He tried to remember. "Um, the boy was sent by the merman king to
fetch a pearl that an evil diver stole from a great big octopus."

"It was an oyster, not an octopus." Chloe flipped a few pages.

"Yeah, something like that."

"Okay," she said. "'The merman king took the boy back to land, with a
warning that if he didn't return he would never see his beloved snake
friend again. He would be unable to pee. The boy's bladder would
just fill and fill until the boy exploded and died.'"

Ranma winced. That evil merman king!

"'The boy swore that he would return before it was too late, and set
off to find the horrible diver. He knew it would be a long, dangerous
trip, but the alternative was too terrible to bear. The boy would
succeed!'"

Ranma listened intently. This was much better than the stories his
father told about growing up to run a boring dojo!

After a couple of hours Chloe didn't want to read anymore, her throat
beginning to hurt from the constant talking. In exchange for the
remaining grapes Ranma went and told Artena that Chloe was ready to
come in, then wandered back out to the grape fields, picking the bunch
clean as he went. There was just enough left to make sure he wouldn't
be hungry for a while, yet still not leave him wobbling about like a
drunkard filled to the brink. Not that that was a bad way to walk, it
was fun to copy his pop like that sometimes.

But he couldn't go running around easily on a full stomach.

He entered the field, tossing the desecrated bunch away, and pulled
out one of his knives. Only one, because trying to throw two at once
while running seemed to throw him off-balance, which just made his aim
even worse. He'd never catch anything that way. Besides, his other
hand and arm were still injured.

Ranma began walking down the rows as quietly as he could, thinking
sneaky thoughts just like his father had taught him to do.

The point of the knife stuck through the tip of the rabbit's ear. The
animal took off with even more effort, the knife bounced free before
he could throw another, and then it was gone, cutting through the
field.

Ranma stopped, short on breath, right in front of the knife. There
was a bit of blood on the blade, just a smearing of red, and a few
drops lead away, after the rabbit. He grinned, picked the weapon up,
and squeezed his way between the plants. The trail wasn't that easy
to find, but the red stood out barely enough on the dark and ripped
ground that he could follow it anyway.

Within just a few minutes it was impossible to continue the pursuit.
The blood was changing color with its contact to the air, darkening to
an almost brown that was imperceptibly different from the earth it
faded into.

He'd still hit the thing, though. He might not have killed the
rabbit, but he'd hit it for the first time. Next time he might be
eating it for dinner.

Ranma started walking again, aimlessly, thinking sneaky but triumphant
thoughts as he searched for his prey.

He never found it, though.

The next two days were very much the same. Ranma woke up, chased
around furred evil, then gorged himself on grapes and listened to
Chloe tell about the boy who was now being chased by a band of
harpies. The harpies were after the boy because he got something
called herpies from a girl named Monahr, Ranma wasn't sure how that
worked or what herpies really was, but the harpies seemed to think it
was a good thing, for some reason. Some of the story was confusing.
It was fun, though.

The first day Chloe limped back into the Manor on her own, still being
careful of her knee but it seemed more that she was being careful with
it than that she was really in pain. So Ranma figured she'd be able
to play again soon. His hand and arm were both almost completely
healed by that point.

The second day was a bit tense. Chloe came out walking almost
normally so Ranma sat down and listened to her read for a while. She
did, just as she had the previous few days. But he was waiting for
her to attack him, her leg healed enough by this time for them to have
some fun. But she never did. Chloe just read to him for a couple of
hours and then went inside. It was disappointing, but maybe she
wasn't really ready for that yet.

Ranma managed to sneak up on a rabbit that afternoon, but as soon as
he went to go after him with a knife, it bolted. Since he'd been
moving slowly, concentrating on stealth instead of outright attack, he
didn't adjust in time and it got away. But he was closer.

Chloe was wearing shorts the next day that cut off just above her
knees. They were just another pair of the pants she wore, with the
legs shortened, really. But Ranma could see nothing wrong with her
knee, no swelling or discoloration. Well, it wasn't strong and manly
looking like his were, but they looked fine for her, for a girl's
knees.

Despite that and the way Chloe didn't seem to have any trouble walking
when she came out, she still never attacked him. She didn't even wear
her harnesses, going weaponless as far as he could tell. She wasn't
good enough to fight him without her knives.

Ranma still waited until she had sat down before doing the same, just
in case. Chloe started reading.

"'The terrible diver turned out to not be that bad after all. He told
the boy that he hadn't really stolen the pearl; he was just returning
it to his wife, who had accidentally dropped it into the sea when they
went on their honeymoon. The giant pearl was the centerpiece of a
necklace the diver had given his wife as a present.

"'So the boy was stuck. Was it right to take the pearl away from the
diver's wife if it really belonged to her? On the other hand his
bladder was getting really full and if the boy didn't take the pearl
back to the merman king and have his beloved snake friend returned
soon, he might explode and die.'"

"Wait," interrupted Ranma, "why doesn't the boy just beat the merman
king up and take his beloved snake friend back that way? Then he
wouldn't have to take the pearl."

"Because the only place he could fight the merman king is underwater,
and the merman king is the one who cast the spell that makes it
possible for humans to breathe underwater. If the boy beat the merman
king up, the king would break the spell and the boy would drown."
Chloe looked annoyed. "I told you that already."

"But it's not fair!"

"Life isn't fair. Why would a story be?"

"It should be!" Ranma insisted.

Chloe stared at him. "You know what would be fair? It'd be fair if
I'd never had to meet you."

Grin. "You trying to start something?"

Chloe stood, and he jumped to his feet, ready for the fight he'd been
waiting on. She didn't move.

"It would be fair," she said, "if you'd just wandered off in your
crazy cat mode and gotten hit by a car. It would be fair if you died
and your body turned into the worm food that your brain already is.
IT WOULD BE FAIR IF YOU'D NEVER BEEN BORN!" she yelled at him
furiously.

Ranma frowned. "Hey, you don't have to--"

"You don't get it, do you? I hate you! I wish you would die!
Nothing could make me happier! Japan is east, okay? Go home, go to
hell, wherever, just leave me alone!"

Chloe collapsed onto her bed, rocking back and forth as she sobbed
into her pillow. It wasn't fair! Her time at the Manor was supposed
to be fun and spent with Artena and that girl, not taken up by some
stupid jerk! And he wouldn't leave her alone, he kept pestering and
pestering and trying to pick a fight like it was supposed to be a
game!

"Chloe."

She looked up. "Artena-sama? I--"

"I heard what you said, Chloe." The woman stood in the doorway. "Is
he really that bad?"

Chloe nodded, mute, looking down miserably. She held her breath to
keep from crying, clenched her eyes shut. It wasn't fair!

"I've tried to get him to relax around me, tried to get him to fall
asleep while I was talking, but he just won't! He just gets more and
more wound up and now there's just a few days left until that girl
gets here! And since I told him which way Japan is, now it's going to
be even harder to kill him in time!"

Footsteps, then a weight settled down next to her on the bed.
"Artena-sama?"

"Shh."

Chloe let herself be pulled into Artena's lap, wrapped her arms around
the woman.

"Don't worry about Ranma, Chloe. He's not going anywhere."

Artena killed him, and now Chloe was useless, not Noir as she was born
to be, blessed to be, raised to be.

"I don't think Ranma believed what you said. He's sitting outside
waiting for you to come back out. He has no idea why you're mad at
him."

Chloe looked up and Artena smiled at her. "Really?" Chloe asked.

"Yes, really."

"It doesn't matter anyway," Chloe said quietly. "It wasn't working.
Instead of getting bored and falling asleep, he keeps getting more
tense and waiting for me to attack him again."

Artena just shushed her again and began rocking back and forth
slightly on the bed, Chloe in her arms. "Don't worry about Ranma. He
doesn't matter. If you don't kill him before that girl gets here,
nothing bad will happen."

Chloe held on tighter. "Thank you, Artena-sama."

Ranma stared at the Manor entrance, waiting. Where was she? Chloe
went running inside an hour earlier after acting like she hated him,
for no reason. What was that about, anyway?

He picked up Chloe's book, which had been left behind, and opened it
to a random page. It was filled with gibberish, whatever nonsense
words and letters these French people seemed to use. What was it
really about? Chloe was making it up as she went along, he knew--the
number of words she read per page was widely inconsistent, and the
story had nothing to do with a looking glass, as she'd said the book
was called after.

Chloe didn't make sense. She was a girl after all. More fun than
most, but still just a girl who would run off crying for no reason at
all.

Ranma took the book up to the Manor entrance and left it on the floor
just inside the doorway. He'd go hunt rabbits, instead.

He walked towards the grape fields, slowly. Was east the way to go,
or had Chloe been lying just to get rid of him? South couldn't be it-
-there was nothing but more mountains in that direction. Same with
north.

Why would Chloe hate him? It's not like he'd done anything mean to
her. She kept starting fights, and he kept winning them. Why would
she get mad about that? Ukyou had gone and given him free food
whenever they finished fighting. Was the difference because Chloe was
a girl? Or was she just weird?

His dad had said stuff about girls being overemotional, and moody.
Was that what was wrong with Chloe, she was just in a bad mood? She'd
been crying when she ran off and he knew he hadn't done anything to
her. So maybe she hadn't really meant it, maybe she'd just had PMS or
whatever it was Pop had talked about. How long did that last?
Probably not more than a few hours, whenever he got mad it only took
that long for him to settle down.

So, he'd check back after lunch to see if she was fixed yet.

He wandered the fields, looking everywhere. The rabbits were hiding
better than they usually did and his whole sneaky thoughts, quiet
thoughts thing kept getting off track. Was it noon yet? A look at
the sky showed the sun as being just off center, so not quite.

Ranma continued his hunt. Grapes were particularly nauseous when they
were heated, as the things certainly were now. Little bubbles of hot
and sweet water that left him feeling thirsty on an already
uncomfortably warm day. Wasn't it supposed to be getting chilly?

Chloe might be sitting under the tree again, waiting for him with
another half of a sandwich, eying the thing and thinking about how
she'd much rather eat it than a bunch of boiling grapes. All happy
and in a good mood and sorry for getting mad at him earlier because
she was fixed now. Or she could still be inside crying. Which was
it?

He sat down and started to eat.

She wasn't under the tree, or even outside as far as he could tell.
Maybe she was still messed up. Maybe she didn't want to have to tell
him she was sorry for what she'd said.

Ranma turned around and headed back out to hunt for supper. He'd
catch a rabbit! He would!

The one with the scabbed ear he named Bugs. He'd seen those American
cartoons, and he knew it was the only name that fit. Bugs was
everywhere. Ranma would be at one edge of the grape fields, see Bugs,
chase him around for a little bit, and then the rabbit would disappear
down some invisible rabbit hole. Then the thing would pop back up
when he was way over on the other side of the fields, searching again
for his food, and the same thing would happen. It was like some
magician's trick of making a rabbit appear out of nowhere and then
sending it back to that same place again later.

Ranma was pretty sure that Bugs was the Satan those religious people
had been talking about when his pop dragged him to church on occasion.
The bunny was that evil. It even seemed to be waving its injured ear
at him whenever it was about to pull one of its vanishing acts,
taunting him. Seeya later, it seemed to say. It's been fun.

If not for the scabbed ear showing differently Ranma would suspect
that Bugs was the only bunny around. Any others that were present
either didn't want to mess with him or were just a whole lot better at
hiding. So he only saw a rabbit other than Bugs once in a while. He
was pretty sure there were more rabbits, hidden, that were just
laughing as Bugs played around with him.

Looking over at the Manor yielded nothing. Chloe wasn't there, wasn't
outside at the tree waiting for him to show up. The only thing he had
to play with was Bugs. He hated Bugs. Bugs laughed at him but kept
running away.

Bugs was gonna die.

Sneaky thoughts, quiet thoughts. Step. Sneaky thoughts, quiet
thoughts. Step. Repeat.

It was late afternoon, almost time to eat. He wasn't going to eat
grapes for dinner, not again, so he was gonna kill Bugs and eat him,
instead. Ranma was sure that the next level up in fare from eating
grapes was eating a grape-eating little monster. And Bugs had it
coming.

Step, step, step. The grapes were motionless, the air still and heavy
and pressing down on him. Every nerve tingled with anticipation, on
the edge of explosion, looking for that telltale flicker of movement.
Looking for the target to make itself known. His own presence was
masked, Ranma was sure of it. Sneaky thoughts, quiet thoughts.

Step, step, step. The world moved forward one step at a time,
centered around him. It moved because he willed it to do so. And
Bugs raised his head because Ranma wanted that, too.

They stood, staring at each other. Bugs looked more serious than
usual, his scabbed ear hanging limp. Ranma was going to kill him, the
rabbit would die, he was sure of it. Did Bugs know?

A knife thunked into the wooden post next to Bugs, and Bugs took off.
Ranma followed. Each hand held another knife. Bugs hopped left,
hopped right, a knife brushed through the fringes of its fur, missing
otherwise. Ranma pulled another knife out of his pocket as he ran,
his other hand preparing to throw again.

If Bugs was resigned to his death, knew it was coming, he didn't let
it show. The rabbit bound forward quickly and Ranma could barely keep
up, fast though he was. Bugs bounced from side to side but stayed in
the row, and they crossed the length of the field as they chased what
they wanted.

The field ended and they ran through the open area beyond. Bugs
should have turned but went straight instead and now had nowhere to
hide. If Ranma could throw well enough, Bugs would die.

A knife hit the earth a foot away from Bugs, dodged. With the follow-
up Ranma guessed better and it shot by Bugs' head, barely missing. He
was careful not to step on the weapons as he ran forward.

Bugs' took off to the right and a knife stabbed into his side, the
blade digging into the ribs and catching. Bugs tumbled over the
impediment, rolled to a stop.

Ranma halted just before the wounded animal. The side of Bugs' head
was toward Ranma and one of the rabbit's eyes stared at him. Bugs was
trying to move forward but the knife blocked the swing of its legs.
Blood seeped out around the blade, down to the grip. Bugs stared at
him.

Ranma watched as his furred enemy poured out crimson life until the
cup was empty. Bugs never stopped staring, not even after the
movement of its chest stopped. Ranma had won his supper.

Ranma sat cross-legged in front of the corpse, a knife in one of his
hands. It wasn't the one that had killed Bugs, that knife was still
stuck into the rabbit. The blood was dried. Ranma had poked Bugs a
few times and the bunny was stiffening. He needed to cook his supper.

There was no fire. He had wood, if he looked for loose or unused
boards from the grape fields, but no matches or lighter. The burnable
material he had available wasn't going to just burst into flames
without help. His pop would have found a way and Bugs would already
be cooking, if he were here.

Rabbit fur wasn't something he was willing to eat. His father had
caught rabbits and birds and such before and they had eaten the meat
product left over after Genma's butchering, but Ranma had never
watched the act itself. Little bits of entrails or organs or pieces
of red slimy stuff that looked like it could have come out of him were
always involved. So he just waited until it was time for dinner,
doing kata, preparing the rest of the meal, doing whatever involved
not watching a little animal be torn to pieces or plucked of feathers
or whatever it was his father would always do to the things.

Bugs stared at him.

Ranma set about removing the skin.

The grapes tasted raw and fleshy and sweet like blood. Ranma wondered
how he had ever been able to eat the things. He couldn't, now, only a
few going past his lips before they tried to come up again. No more.
He'd starve himself first.

He now had two less knives. The one that had killed Bugs was next to
the desecrated corpse. The other one, which he'd used to rip the body
apart as he tried to separate fur from everything else, clumps of the
stuff sticking to his bloody hands and getting on his clothes, he had
thrown that knife away. Hopefully he wouldn't wander across it and
step on the thing, the rabbit fur and blood tarnishing the blade and
infecting when it sliced into his unshod foot. But he didn't want to
carry it around in his pocket, either, and take it to the springs for
cleaning.

He'd gotten most of the blood off his hands, onto his clothes, which
were really Chloe's. The rest of his knives, which were really
Chloe's, were still in his pockets, eight of the things remaining
since he had taken the time to search for the ones he'd thrown at
Bugs. The ones that had missed. There was still some dried redness
covering his palms, though, which he hadn't been able to remove.
Maybe that had gotten onto the grapes, maybe that was why they tasted
like mutilated rabbit. He should probably wash his hands.

Ranma looked to see if Chloe's colorful splash of hair was by the
tree, in front of the Manor. It wasn't. He could have traded her a
bunch for half a sandwich, or a quarter. He was hungry, just not
enough to eat grapes. He probably would have left after the exchange,
to get around watching Chloe eat the things, seeing them chewed and
the seeds spat out with bits of corpse clinging stickily like bits of
Bugs' entrails.

But Chloe wasn't outside reading or munching on some Artena-made food,
instead she was still inside, crying and hating him and wishing he
would die. How long did that hormone stuff last?

He set off towards the springs, wanting to wash the blood off of his
hands.

Ranma opened his eyes and it was early morning. He'd fallen asleep
after scrubbing himself clean in the hot water. How had he managed to
not wake up while his stomach spent hours eating away at his spine?
He yawned, stretched, and the emptiness within ripped him in two. It
wasn't getting any grapes. They'd probably cause him to erupt like an
acid volcano if he tried some anyway, the disgusting things.

Maybe he should try sneaking some food out of Artena's kitchen.

Chloe slipped another knife into the last harness. She'd already
filled the other ones. Two more and she was loaded down completely.
Eight on each leg, five on each arm. A few went into her pockets for
good measure.

That girl would be arriving tomorrow. Artena said it didn't matter if
she killed Ranma before then, but it did to Chloe. She wanted to kill
the boy herself. She would kill the boy herself, to prove that she
was Noir, as she should be. She would be more than a second choice.
She would be deserving of being that girl's partner.

And so Ranma would die.

There was nobody in front of the Manor, again. Was Chloe still
crying? Artena served breakfast over an hour earlier, so Chloe should
have come outside by now, if she was going to. Was she in her room or
somewhere else? Where was Artena? The woman's writing area wasn't
between the front doorway and the kitchen, so if they were in those
rooms he could sneak in and out and not run into either of them.

Ranma circled around to one side of the Manor, walking through the
grape fields from a distance. Chloe's room was on this end of the
building but her window was small and set too high for the girl to see
through. Artena did her letters on the opposite side in a room with a
window that gave a good view of everything in that direction. So he'd
approach from the blind side and hope neither happened to be looking
out the wrong window from a room he hoped they wouldn't be in.

He stepped away from the fields, crossing the distance to the Manor.
Sneaky thoughts, quiet thoughts, but moving quickly. Sneaky thoughts,
quiet thoughts. Mustn't get caught.

He reached the edge of the building, stopped, listened. Nothing. He
listened some more. Sneaky thoughts, quiet thoughts, thoughts of big
floppy elephant ears that caught everything. Still nothing.

Ranma worked his way around to the front of the building, ducking
under the couple of windows that he came to. He peeked around the
corner, listened again. Chloe or Artena could come marching out the
doorway right after he stepped out of cover. He'd be seen instantly
if they just happened to look right. But he heard nothing.

The corner was huge and felt like the edge of one of those western
style beds when waking up from a nightmare, in the dark, knowing there
was something underneath and that if he bent down to look it would rip
his head off, or if he stepped out of the bed it would eat his feet,
then he wouldn't be able to run and he'd just be stuck there waiting
while it finished the appetizer. He hated western beds. Futons hid
nothing.

The corner didn't, either, and nothing happened when he stepped
around. He ducked under the front windows, peeking through as he went
to see if anybody was inside watching him, waiting for him. Nobody
was, that he could see. The front door loomed large and open and had
a maw like a snake's, ready to swallow him whole. Artena was probably
just inside, waiting patiently for him to make the turn, forbidding
entry with her passive aggression, Chloe a step behind. Would she be
crying, hateful, knives out and ready to attack? Probably the last.
Probably. Sneaky thoughts, quiet thoughts.

The doorframe was the edge of the unknown. Everything lurked beyond.
Adrenaline fed him like the grapes he'd gorged on days before. No
aftertaste. Standing here on the brink wasn't good. If he turned and
looked and somebody was waiting for him, Chloe could attack with her
knives, stick him in the arm again before he could react. So he had
to do it quickly.

He jumped across to the other side, looking through the doorway as he
moved, ready to take off running. He didn't want to fight right here.
Nothing. An empty hallway. It was safe.

Ranma started to turn back, to step through the door, then froze.
What if Chloe or Artena had stepped into the corridor after he'd leapt
across the entrance? Useless thought. He turned and peeked around
the corner this time and nobody was still there. He stepped inside,
his bare feet perfect for moving quietly. The stone floor was cool.

A door on the right, not where he wanted to go. Somebody could be
beyond, though. He took a quick look, nothing. Sneaky thoughts,
quiet thoughts, listening like a bat. Echoes of silence bounced from
everywhere, reflected endlessly by the walls. His heart thumped out a
rapid punctuation of each imaginary approaching footstep. He knew he
was grinning and that he shouldn't be but couldn't help it. Sneaky
thoughts, quiet thoughts.

First door on the left. Dining room, then kitchen. There was no
reason for anybody to be within so he stepped into the room without
looking. He needed to get out of the hallway, which was too open,
doors on both sides leading to far too many rooms. The dining room
was empty and so was the kitchen. Empty of people.

He checked the cupboards quickly, opening the doors and closing them
rapidly as he checked for food. Lots of dishes stacked within, more
than needed for just Artena and Chloe. Who else ate here?

He found bread. Who brought bread? Artena must have made it,
otherwise it'd be stale. There hadn't been any people delivering
food, not that he had seen. Ranma grabbed a couple of short, fat
loaves, leaving most of ten. Artena said something from another room.

Ranma glimpsed out into the hallway and saw nothing. Artena must be
in one of the rooms along the side. But she might be about to enter
the hallway to go to the kitchen for a drink or something, so it was
time to go.

He ran towards the entrance and then outside, heading for the grape
fields again. Looking over his shoulder revealed nothing, there was
not a tall brunette or a shorter girl with reddish hair, watching
angrily as he made off with stolen food while wearing borrowed clothes
and carrying confiscated knives. Nobody watched at all.

He slowed down but kept the bread held in front of his body. If
nobody was looking there was no reason to flee, and if he was seen
doing that the missing bread might be noticed. He'd want to eat more
later, after all, so it was best to not give himself away.

His stomach tried to envelop the bread that was being held to it.
Should he eat the bread in a field of grapes? That seemed wrong,
somehow, but he was too hungry to walk out to the coliseum, which was
the next closest shelter. It had been almost a day since he'd eaten,
and that had just been more of those evil fruits.

He entered the fields, walking just a few rows deep before turning in.
He sat a short distance from the edge and looked down at the bread.
It was brown and rough, but heavy in his grasp, each loaf about the
size of his head. Could he eat it all?

Ranma brought one of the loaves up to his mouth, tore a great big
chunk off with his teeth. It was dry with a thick crust but very good
and his mouth did that shrieking suicide thing again that hurt so much
in reaction. He swallowed and a huge rolled-up towel worked its way
down his throat, catching in his ribs. Water?

A loud squawk from behind made Ranma roll to the side ahead of a flash
of reflected sunlight. Chloe was back. Two knives stuck into the
fence post he'd been eating in front of. Ranma jumped to his feet to
avoid two more, then took off running down the row. He couldn't fight
with bread in his hands. He could hear Chloe a few steps behind in
the next aisle.

He turned right when he reached the end of the field, then right again
to go into the next row. It'd give him a bit of space. Ranma ripped
another mouthful of bread off and swallowed it awkwardly as he ran,
then did the same again before the previous bite was finished working
its way down. Fast thoughts, speedy thoughts.

There was nobody behind him.

Ranma stopped, listened. He couldn't hear any pursuit. Chloe
wouldn't have given up that quickly. He quit chewing and a massive
lump of partially masticated bread hit his stomach with an audible
splash. The waves settled and all was silent. Where was she?

Another bite, this one quiet, chewed carefully and slowly as to not
make any noise. Splash. Quiet thoughts, sneaky thoughts, elephant
ears that catch everything thoughts. Still nothing. She was gone.

Ranma started walking again, though quietly. The second heel of the
first loaf of bread disappeared past his jaws. He was mostly full.
Too many grapes had made his insides shrink in protest. What a
surprise. Damn the things.

Chloe was out here somewhere, hunting for him. Archimedes was, too.
Would the bird tell Chloe where he was? It had startled him earlier
and that was why Chloe's first two knives had missed. He probably
would have dodged in time anyway. Probably. Chloe would have made a
bit of noise to warn of where she was. Wouldn't she have?

He frowned, looked down at the remaining loaf. Too bad there wasn't a
good place to put it until he was hungry again. Ranma reached the end
of the row and kept going straight. Chloe had to be behind him
somewhere so he'd head for the coliseum and ditch the bread somewhere.
Then they could play, if that was what Chloe wanted to do.

Ranma jumped to the top ledge of the coliseum and looked towards the
Manor. Some hills, grapes in the distance, the building tiny from
this far away, but there was no Chloe following him. Had she gone
back inside or was she still looking for him? He couldn't believe
that she would quit so easily.

He dropped back down to the uppermost row of seats and started the
descent back to the sands below. Sneaking around was fun but he was
bored and wanted to fight. He was going to march right up to the
Manor and wait for Chloe to show up, whether it was from inside or
from hiding somewhere in the grape fields.

Ranma squinted, the sun shining across as he looked south from under
Chloe's tree. There she was, stepping out into the open, a quarter
mile away. She wasn't covered in green, though. Where was her cloak?

She walked towards him and he waited for her. When she was fifty feet
away he stood, ready. She stopped at twenty feet. The same distance
she practiced throwing her knives from.

Her harnesses were visible since Chloe wasn't wearing her cloak.
Black things that covered a good portion of each thigh and forearm,
under which she wore clothes just like the ones he had on. His were
ripped and bloody, though.

"So you're gonna try to kill me?" he asked.

Chloe smiled slightly. "Yes."

Was that a truthful smile or a lying smile? His own lying smiles were
big and impossible for him to resist making. Chloe might be better at
it, though. Or she could be telling the truth. Which was it?

A knife was suddenly in each of the girl's hands. A neat trick and he
hadn't even noticed. "Are you ready?" she asked.

"Yup."

She nodded, glanced over towards the Manor doorway, then threw both
knives. He dodged and two more were in the air again, which he also
dodged. She was fast but not so much that he couldn't make sure she
missed from twenty feet off. He pulled a blade out of his pocket and
threw one of Chloe's knives back at her.

She had to step aside, and he grinned. "You don't want to get close,
do ya?"

Chloe frowned, pulled two more knives, and ran forward. At ten feet
he threw again. She had to almost jump to the right to avoid getting
stuck in the chest. His aim was better now? She stopped at that
distance.

She threw one knife and he started to dodge. She threw the second one
to where he was moving. Ranma snatched it out of the air and tossed
it back. He grinned again when she yelped at another close miss.

"That distance isn't good either?"

Chloe stopped, stared at him. "When did you get so good at that?"

"Dunno." Bugs would be proud. Is that what Chloe would look like?
"Maybe you should give up?"

She pulled two more knives out and again did the staggered release
trick. He dodged the first, had to duck the second which slipped
right over his ear, and then the next two were almost planted in his
gut. He jumped and caught a tree branch, the knives going under his
feet. This was annoying.

Chloe looked like she thought she'd won and the next two knives came
at him. The first was torso level and the second by his feet in case
he let go. Ranma yanked his body up, his feet hitting the branch next
to his hands, then jumped away from it, towards Chloe, a knife caught
from each pocket and thrown at her.

She dodged, barely, and threw one back. He twisted and it went by and
then he landed and she swiped at him with another knife. He caught
her wrist and she stepped forward to stab him with the other hand, a
new blade in it now. He turned and grabbed that wrist, too, and her
heel smashed into his knee.

He pulled away, that leg almost collapsing under him, and he used his
momentum to yank forward on her arms and head-butt Chloe in the face.
She cried out in pain and they both fell back, Chloe clutching at her
forehead and him testing his knee gingerly. It was bad but not enough
to keep him from fighting for several days, like Chloe's had. He'd
just have trouble during this one.

Ranma stood with his injured limb away from the girl. She was looking
at him, the base of one palm above her brow, her lips twisted in a
slight smile. Yeah, dodging knives with a bad leg was probably gonna
be really hard.

Chloe reached for her harnesses arm and Ranma pulled a knife out of
each pocket, throwing before Chloe could. The first knife missed but
the second shoved into the back of her left hand. She yelled out
again and Ranma could see the tip poking through her palm. A knife
flew at his face from her other hand and he barely managed to slap it
away.

When he looked back at Chloe he saw her grasp the handle of the knife
stuck though her and pull it free. Her face was white, the blade and
her hands covered with red. He ran at her as best he could but she
recovered and threw the knife at him. Twisting to the side made it
slice across his chest. He kicked Chloe in the stomach and she
stumbled back, knocked off her feet by the blow.

He dropped back to his feet, wincing at the pain. Chloe's chest
spasmed as she tried to suck in air but couldn't. She stood anyway
and her face was wet and she glared at him. Dirt clung to her bloody
hand from where she pushed herself up, a print upon the ground. She
shouldn't be using that hand at all. Even he knew that. A line
burned across his chest. He was hurt, too, his tattered shirt dyed
red in front.

"Hey, quit it," Ranma said. "You gotta go have Artena fix you up."

Teary red eyes glanced passed him, over at the Manor again. Was she
there? Ranma wasn't going to try looking.

"No," Chloe said.

She had to have forced that out, she still couldn't breathe. He
couldn't just split, not fast enough with his messed up knee. He had
to make Chloe stop attacking him. Blood was almost pouring off her
fingers.

Another knife was pulled from harness by Chloe's uninjured hand. She
still wasn't breathing right and she was going to attack?

Ranma rushed forward. Chloe didn't throw and he had to stop quickly
to avoid her taking a slash at him. It was slow and clumsy, though,
and Chloe was still trying to get more oxygen into her lungs. When
she swung the knife back at him he stepped in and punched her in the
gut. Any air she'd gained was ejected and he tried to grab the
weapon. She struggled and he knocked her down again, the knife in one
of his hands now.

Chloe stayed on the ground, arms clutched to her chest as she fought
to take a breath. Red soaked into her previously clean shirt; eyes
clenched shut but still leaking. Was it from the pain or something
else?

Ranma looked to the Manor and Artena was in the doorway, watching
calmly. Didn't she care? Chloe was bleeding pretty badly.

Ranma stared down at the girl. She was crying breathlessly, dirty,
and wounded. His pop probably woulda beat the shit out of any kid
that hurt him that badly. Artena just stood there and watched. What
would happen when he left? Would Artena help Chloe out, or not?

A click sounded. He raised his head in time to see a Japanese girl
the same age as he and Chloe, then something smashed into his good leg
and she had a gun and Ranma fell but not before the next bullet hit
high on his right arm and then he landed on it and it hurt then
another shot blasted his ringing ears and he was punched by another
fist of lead again this time in the chest.

The girl walked to him and he knew that even if Chloe didn't hate him,
he wasn't sure if she really meant it or not, he knew that this girl
did hate him and wanted him to die more than anything. Her face was
framed by hair the same color as his but her eyes were dark and mean
and her face told him that he was going to die. He couldn't move, he
couldn't stand or attack or even try to run away. He could barely
even turn his head to look up as she pointed the gun at his face. His
blood washed stickily over his body as it escaped in a steady stream.
He was going to die.

He saw the girl's finger tense to fire. He was going to die.

"You're early," came Artena's voice.

The girl paused, looked away from him but kept the gun pointed at his
head. "Yes," she said.

He heard something else but a black hole swallowed the sun and muffled
his ears and he could no longer see or listen or feel anything.

Chloe hadn't come by to visit. Neither had that other girl, the one
who'd shot him three times and almost caused him to die. He knew he'd
almost died because Artena had told him so. She also told him that
Chloe had wanted him to die and that the other girl had also. He'd
known that.

Ranma was stuck in bed and had been for the past few days, ever since
he woke up. The bullet to his leg had broken the bone. His opposite
knee hadn't healed as quickly as he'd thought it would, probably
because he got shot a bunch of times, so that still uncomfortable as
well. Which meant that he couldn't walk at all. His right arm was in
a sling to keep him from moving it. He didn't have a reason to move
since he didn't have a place to go anyway. There was a big bandage
over his chest and it hurt to breathe or move or even stay still like
he was. He didn't know how Artena had gotten that third bullet out
and hadn't asked. He was alive.

Artena fed him three times a day. There had been no talk of doing
dishes; she'd just fed him pleasantly. When he had to go to the
bathroom she helped him with that, too. It was difficult and
embarrassing but she remained pleasant no matter how much he wished
that girl had shot Artena instead. She came to his room to feed him
and check his bandages occasionally but other than that he stayed
alone.

He knew now that Chloe really did hate him. He could hear her voice
as she walked by his room on occasion, shy and happy as she talked to
the silent girl who'd shot him three times. Chloe didn't sound weepy
and hateful like when she'd been talking to him. He was sure the hand
he'd stabbed was still useless and bandaged up and that she probably
needed help eating too, but she was still happy and friendly and eager
to please the girl who'd shot him three times.

Archimedes had come by, though. The bird flew in through the open
doorway and settled down out of his reach on one of the corner posts
at the bottom of the bed. Archimedes just stared at him from there,
motionless until he tried to shift slightly, to make it's support
shake and the damn bird to leave. When it did its laughter was
mocking, harsh. Archimedes probably hated him, too. Why had she kept
Chloe from putting a knife in his back?

Footsteps clicked down the hallway and he heard Artena enter the room.
Ranma looked to the side, the door being in the wall behind him, and
saw her standing there with something cut out of a newspaper. It was
a Japanese newspaper because he could read the ad on the back of what
she held. Something for toothpaste. Artena wasn't here to check his
bandages.

"I found your father." Pleasant as ever. Pop was in the news?

Artena stepped over to the bed and held out the clipping and he took
it with his uninjured left hand. "You can stay here as long as you
want," she said, then left the room.

On the other side of the toothpaste ad it said that a man named Genma
Saotome was found present at the scene of a massacre. After
attempting to flee the suspect had been shot to death to prevent his
escape. The man had a number of small wounds covering his body, his
clothes were torn, and he had a knife fitting those that were used on
the victims in his hand when he was spotted. The police judged him
the killer and considered the case closed. The motive was guessed to
be an intent to steal from the victims. His father had a history of
theft.

Ranma hopped into the dining room. It'd been a week and the damaged
knee was fine now. His other leg was healed well enough that he could
at least hold it up slightly for getting around. His chest only hurt
when he breathed too much, an ache that spread all throughout his
torso. It hurt whenever he bumped into anything, too, and it was hard
not to do that while hopping around with only one useful arm.

The others were waiting, Artena patiently, Chloe watching the girl
that'd shot him three times, and the girl that'd shot him three times
just staring ahead in that odd hateful way of hers. He stopped next
to his chair and Artena scooted it back for him, holding it still
while he seated himself. When he was ready she pushed it forward
again so he was up against the table. She sat down.

Artena had already cut up his and Chloe's food so everybody began to
eat. The other girl picked at hers. She never ate much, her plate
still having food on it when everybody finished. He hadn't tried to
take any of her leftovers, both because it'd be hard to do with a
busted arm and because he knew she'd shoot him if he did. Artena had
told the girl not to kill him, but she would anyway.

The girl didn't have a name. Chloe never called her anything, nor did
Artena. It wasn't a big deal, it was easy for them to look at the
girl whenever they said something to her and everybody would know whom
they were talking to. A name wasn't really necessary. But it made
the girl even weirder, made her seem even more malicious. She was a
nameless girl with a gun who wanted to kill him for no reason. Chloe,
at least, hated him in particular, and had reasons for wanting to stab
him to death with her knives.

The person who'd killed those men in the paper had used knives. His
father had picked one of them up. Had it belonged to Chloe?

Even wounded he still finished eating first. Chloe ate awkwardly with
her right hand, just like he did his left, and the other two went
slowly, or hardly at all in the girl's case. Chloe rested her
bandaged hand on the edge of the table and he wondered if it still
looked like Bugs had after Ranma had ripped him open, red and gory and
sickening with a bit of white barely glimpsed through the bloody
flesh.

She ignored him, just as she'd done ever since he had woken up after
being shot three times.

The others finished, Artena pulled his chair back for him, and he
hopped back to his room.

Ranma stared at the stone ceiling. Sleeping was something he had
always liked to do. Usually when he and his pop were on the road
between sessions at school they would spend their time training all
day and stop only for meals. He would collapse after their evening
sparring session, a full stomach and an exhausted body knocking him
out until it was time to start again the next morning. He got almost
ten hours of sleep and it was something he missed when going to school
and having to train later at night to make up for the missed practice.

Now, though, that wasn't going to happen anymore. Not if his father
was dead. He was sleeping all day because he didn't have anything
better to do. He couldn't even run through boring kata, not with him
being shot up like he was.

Ranma stared at the ceiling. He was trying to sleep, anyway. Sleepy
thoughts, drowsy thoughts, thoughts of the Sandman coming to make him
slumber for a few years. But he didn't come and Ranma couldn't sleep.
All Ranma could do was lie in bed and wish for something to do that
didn't require any kind of movement.

Artena held out a book and he took it with his left hand. She turned
to leave, but spoke from the doorway, "You need to know that in a week
because afterwards we'll stop talking Japanese." She stepped out of
the room.

Learning French? Dammit, he'd asked for something to read, not a
paper brick. And it was shaped just like a brick, too, tall and
narrow and thick enough that he could barely hold it with one hand.
He opened the book and looked through the first few pages. Copyright
1964? It was as old as Artena!

Ranma flipped to the first chapter.

He concentrated. He had to get this right, otherwise it'd probably
sound really stupid. "Please pass the butter," he said in French,
carefully.

Chloe stopped with her fork halfway to her mouth, looked at him. The
other girl didn't react at all. Artena was at the opposite end of the
table and too far away to reach him, but the butter was right between
her and Chloe.

Artena picked the butter up and held it out to Chloe, expectation
clear. The girl frowned slightly but put her fork down, took the
butter with her right hand, and gave it to Ranma. He grinned, put the
stuff next to his plate, and went back to eating. Chloe glared at him
and then picked her own fork back up, almost stabbing at her food in
annoyance. Had she thought he could have put it on something using
only one hand?

Common phrases. Which way to the capital? Why would anybody ask
that? He flipped to the next page. Where is the restroom? He
memorized that one. Does your poodle have rabies? What? Next page.

Brick. Window. Brick. Bed. Brick. Cupboard. Brick. Sheet.
Brick. Pillow. Brick. Brick. Brick. Too many bricks. He knew
that word already.

Ranma pulled himself off the bed. His arm seemed fine and it didn't
hurt to put weight on his leg anymore. He knew it was still fragile,
though. His chest ache seemed to have gone away as well. Two weeks.
It'd taken long enough. He probably still wasn't ready to do much,
but walking around outside should be fine.

He picked up the book and left his room.

Chloe's tree was abandoned. He wasn't really surprised. Her hand had
healed faster than his bullet wounds so Chloe and that girl had been
sparring. Chloe came to dinner every night with bruises on her face
and exposed skin, looking cheerful as the other girl just ate
sullenly, unmarked. He didn't understand girls at all. Chloe just
got upset when he'd beaten her. But she hated him, so maybe that was
different.

Ranma sat under the tree and flipped through the book on French. He'd
also gotten a dictionary from Artena before heading out, since the one
in the book wasn't very complete. Tree. Sky. Building. Manor.
Hills. Mountains. Clouds. Leaves. Grapes. Wood. Lots more stuff
to learn when he left his room.

Off in the distance, coliseum.

They didn't look or even seem to notice when he entered the sand-
filled arena. He went over to the stone benches to watch. His leg
hurt a bit from walking so far, but he ignored it.

The two girls were fighting with staffs. The wooden poles were taller
than they were and as big around as their wrists, but they still swung
the things about and smacked at each other almost as quickly as he
could have. It was clear that Chloe was losing, the other girl's
staff impacting on Chloe's side or arms or legs almost regularly.
Chloe could barely keep up a partial defense and never managed to land
a hit in return.

Though she kept going, Chloe had to be hurting pretty badly. His pop
had trained him with staffs and Ranma was pretty sure that the girl
was hitting Chloe harder than his father had him, even though the
training was supposed to be something to help toughen him up against
repeated damage. Chloe just kept up that happy smile that faltered
only slightly at particularly vicious blows.

The crazy chick looked at Chloe the same way she'd looked at Ranma, as
a bug to be crushed. The same way she'd looked at him before shooting
him three times. She was working Chloe over methodically, though,
putting a careful amount of weight behind each swing. Bones that
could have been broken weren't, but they probably came close.

Suddenly the girl quit playing nice. Chloe was pushed back as blow
after heavy blow beat upon her staff. Chloe held her stick up in
defense and the other girl brought hers down again and again to hit
it. The other girl was going so fast that Chloe couldn't do anything
but try to keep from getting hit by something that would crack her
skull.

The girl knocked Chloe on her back with another blow. Chloe's staff
fell to the side. She looked scared. They were friends? The other
girl brought her stick up again for another swing. Ranma tensed.

She stopped and turned towards him. He stayed still. Fifteen feet
separated them. Did she have a gun? The staff would be enough. No
way could he beat her right now.

She looked back down at Chloe, then headed for the exit. Practice was
over. He watched her go.

Chloe stayed on the ground, on the sand. He could see she was
breathing quickly, and a bit shaky. It was probably because of the
workout. Eventually she sat up, then stood.

She glared at him like the other girl had, her stick back in hand.
Chloe wouldn't attack him, though. Not like the other girl would.
She said something in French that he didn't know, then went after her
friend. Her bruises weren't quite as cheerful now. She hurried
painfully.

Ranma stared. What was that about?

He sighed, opened his book. Benches. Stadium. Arena. Sand. Ranma
checked to see what she'd said, then frowned. He was not!

Ranma limped back into the Manor, hungry, his leg hurting. He
shouldn't have walked that much yet. He'd wait a few days before
trying it again. He would probably be back to normal in another week,
broken bones and all. Then he could do kata again.

Dinner was quiet as normal, the crazy chick not saying anything,
Artena eating silently. She'd stopped cutting his and Chloe's food
up. Chloe seemed a bit sorer than usual, and a bit angrier with him,
for whatever reason. He ate quickly, his speed no longer handicapped
by using only one hand. As soon as he finished he pushed his chair
back to leave.

"It's your turn to help me with the dishes, Ranma." Artena spoke in
Japanese for clarity. Chloe cheered up visibly.

"Uh, my leg hurts. I should go lie down." It did hurt. He wasn't
lying, really.

"Chloe is bruised all over."

Ranma looked at the other girl. She stared back. She had a butter
knife in one hand.

"She helped yesterday," Artena said, then repeated, "it's your turn."

He sat down and waited while the others finished their meals. The
girl put the knife down and resumed picking at her plate. At least
this way he could finish what the crazy chick didn't eat.

Ranma lied in bed, 'Through The Looking Glass' on his lap, the
'Learning French' book on one side and the Japanese to French
dictionary on the other. Chloe had quit reading when that girl
arrived, so it gave him something else to do. His leg hurt too much
and his chest did, too, so he couldn't do anything fun, anyway. Plus
he needed to learn this.

He really hated Alice, though.

Ranma jumped, dodged in midair, and threw his leg out at his opponent
who leapt to meet him. Miss. A fist slammed into his stomach and he
was knocked back to the ground, breathless. He landed on his feet and
threw himself forward, fists flying at his unprepared enemy just as
the man touched down. The fists were blocked easily and a foot rose
to crush into his side.

Ranma collapsed to the ground, bellows pumping. He'd lost a bit of
his conditioning after most of a month relaxing and spending much of
the time asleep. His pop woulda been disgusted, for him to run short
of breath so easily against an imaginary opponent. He'd have to get
back into shape as quickly as possible. Not that it mattered much.

He forced the air out quickly in a small explosion, then stood, sucked
it back in, and started again.

He stopped immediately when the crazy chick entered the arena. Chloe
he might not have felt arrive. The crazy chick was like a weird kid
who had been in his class one year, though. The boy would burst out
yelling stuff all the time and not even notice he was doing it. The
girl was like that only she did it while carrying around a megaphone.
She never actually said anything, but she didn't need to. He knew she
was there.

She walked out not looking at him at all, and stopped near the center.
Chloe was with her. Neither of them looked at him but he went and sat
down in the stands anyway. If he got in the way she'd probably shoot
him again. Saying he was there first wouldn't do any good. She
wouldn't care.

Ranma watched Chloe get beaten on by a pair of nun-chucks, this time.
His pop had never taught him those, so he tried to memorize all the
tricks the other girl used. He could figure out where they had gotten
the things, then practice with them later.

What the hell were they using nun-chucks for, anyway?

Ranma frowned, looking up from the book as Chloe walked by, talking to
that girl in the shy manner she had with the crazy chick. What the
hell was she saying? He'd started listening whenever he could, trying
to pick out the words, but he could never find them in his dictionary.
It was annoying.

"Keep going," Artena said.

The crazy woman was making him read the crappy book about Alice out
loud to her. Practicing his French, she said. He didn't even have to
know what the words meant to speak what it said on the page, so what
was the point?

He started reading again.

He limped back to the Manor. Smacking himself on the shin with those
things had really hurt, but he knew how to use them well enough now.
In case he ever needed such a skill.

He'd spent a few days looking for the things before Artena had simply
given them to him. Odd that she'd lent him a pair without even having
to be asked, though. How'd she know?

Ranma stopped again and glared towards the doorway. What the hell was
she saying? He should know by now! "How come I can't understand
her?" he demanded. It was really pissing him off!

Artena smiled pleasantly. "Chloe is talking in English. You haven't
learned that yet."

"Oh." She thought he was gonna study another new language? Artena
was as nuts as the crazy girl.

He came to a stop, his breathing heavy but stable and smooth. He
could barely hear his heartbeat now, his body again accustomed to the
exercise that it'd been getting for years. Quit for a month and it
was like having to start all over again. Scary.

Ranma turned to leave, done practicing for the moment, and almost
missed a step. That girl was at the edge of the arena, sitting down
in the first row of benches, watching him. He hadn't known she was
there at all. How long had she been watching? Why hadn't he sensed
her?

She could have taken her gun out and been taking aim, pointing it
right at his head, able to fire at any time, and he'd never even have
known what hit him. Scary.

He walked out, flinching only slightly as her oppressive malevolence
suddenly returned. He didn't even peek back over his shoulder to make
sure she wasn't about to shoot him. Why would she bother, at that
point? She could have done it already.

Ranma slammed the book shut. "There. The end," he said in French.
No more Alice, and no more reading to Artena.

The woman just nodded, and responded in kind. "Good. Tomorrow you
and Chloe will go to the village to get some new books." She looked
down at his feet, and Ranma did, too. "You can get more clothes, and
some shoes, as well. It will be too cold to go barefoot, soon. Chloe
will know what you'll need, and where to get it."

More books? Yay. Shoes would be nice. Not that he needed them, but
sometimes he'd step on a rock that was pointed up like a little tooth
reaching out to take a bite out of him. "How come the other girl
isn't coming along?"

"Do you want her to?"

"No."