Chapter 18. Thursday, July 21

Ranma woke from a dream where the word “BOY” hadn’t been embroidered on her swimsuit, but was instead tattooed across her chest in the same position. She wanted to have it removed, saying she didn’t even know how it had got there, but Akane said she liked it and anyway, Ranma-chan hadn’t earned the right to change it. As she opened her eyes and surveyed the room, she knew it was just a dream, but she resolved to replace that swimsuit as soon as possible anyway. She sort of wished she could remember why on earth Ranma-kun had ever thought it was funny to have those letters on there in the first place, but maybe not knowing was better.

* * *

The first part of school this morning was optional. The first three periods were for club activities devoted to planning for the fall festival; then, at 10:30, it would be time for Oosouji, the big end-of-year cleaning event. Ranma was a bit ambivalent about the fall-festival planning. On the one hand, it was fun to think about possible activities and events; on the other hand, it had been a draining few days and she couldn’t help feeling that she might not be around to enjoy whatever they planned. She’d decided that she’d go in with Akane, whenever that would be, since she loved walking with her, but she’d forgotten to ask her last night. So she got herself ready for school, just in case they’d be leaving at the normal time, and headed downstairs. (In positive news, it felt like her period was finally petering out and would be done with today or tomorrow.)

She found Nabiki and Akane at the breakfast table. Nabiki had a small file folder beside her, and Ranma wondered what was inside. Not more photos, I hope.

“ ’Morning, Akane-chan, Nabiki-neechan,” Ranma said cheerfully. “What are you two up to? Thinking about fall-festival plans?”

“Good morning, Ranma-chan,” Akane replied. “Actually, I do want to be involved in the fall-festival planning, but Nabiki-neechan wanted to show us something first. If it makes us a bit late, I don’t think anyone will mind.”

Ranma immediately twigged that whatever they were going to discuss had something to do with whatever was in the file folder. “After breakfast,” Nabiki said, and tilted to her head to indicate they’d go upstairs in private, “but as I was telling Akane, it’s not really anything to get excited about, just a history lesson, really.”

Ranma was intrigued despite Nabiki’s downplaying and ate her breakfast quickly, but then she had to cool her heels as Nabiki seemed to take ages finishing her tea before they finally headed upstairs. She thought they’d end up in Nabiki’s room, but for whatever reason, they ended up in Akane’s. Nabiki’s room was always neat and tidy, but Akane’s felt more relatable, a bit more lived-in, and that lived-in quality was a lived-in-by-an-actual-girl feeling that both Nabiki’s and Ranma’s rooms lacked.

They all sat on Akane’s bed, with Nabiki in the middle, holding the file folder on her lap, still closed. She began, “So, Ranma-chan, do you remember that day nearly three weeks ago when you were off to fight Mousse?”

Ranma cringed. It would be so nice to imagine that there was this sharp divide between her life as Ranma-kun and her life as Ranma-chan, but the reality was far messier. On that Sunday… yes, physically, she was just as she was now, but mentally, well, no, the idiot was in charge back then. That “bunny girl” outfit… Ugh… She shuddered at the memory. “Yes, I remember,” she said reluctantly.

“Well,” Nabiki continued, “that day, before you left for the fight, Akane asked me if I could figure out a way to help you, to end all the chaos that seems to follow you around. She was really worried about you, Ranma-chan.”

Ranma stiffened. She wasn’t sure she would like where this was going. “Uh huh…” she said cautiously.

“Well, I didn’t find out anything useful, at least nothing that we can use, but I did try and I think I found something interesting. It turns out that it’s a useless dead end, but I thought you might like to hear about it anyway. It’s a bit of a history lesson.”

Ranma relaxed a little. “Okay, Nabiki-san, I’m listening.”

“Me, too,” Akane added, adjusting her position to face Nabiki more directly and get more comfortable.

“Well,” Nabiki began, “I tried to find out what I could about the Jusenkyo springs, and I found some interesting accounts, mostly just telling us things we already know. But in one of these stories, there was a mention of something called The Leopard’s Fate Manipulation Technique, but no clue as to what exactly that technique was or what it did. I just knew from context that it was something that was done to people who had the Jusenkyo curse. So I dug a little deeper, and, in the end, hired a researcher at the Qinghai Provincial Archives in China to look into it for me. He found a reference in The Miscellaneous Records of the Qianlong Reign, compiled by historian Liu Wenzheng in 1847. He made a copy of one of the key pages, added some notes, and included a detailed description of the background story.”

She paused.

Ranma and Akane leaned in, eager to hear more.

“So,” Nabiki continued, “back in the time of the fourth emperor of the Qing dynasty, there was a group of warriors who had fallen afoul of the imperial authorities. Initially, they were a loose-knit group, but over time they organized themselves into a resistance movement against the Qing government. They were based in the remote Qinghai frontier, and while fleeing imperial forces, they stumbled across the Jusenkyo springs. One of the band fell into the Spring of Drowned Leopard, and when he emerged, they realized how advantageous this transformation could be for their cause. The whole group exposed themselves to the waters, and they began to use the curse as a weapon, naming their group the Bào Yǐng Shè—the Leopard’s Shadow Society.”

Ranma and Akane exchanged glances. This was getting interesting.

“They soon became widely feared,” Nabiki went on. “They would transform into leopards to scale palace walls and enter through high windows that guards couldn’t watch. They assassinated officials, stole documents, and spread terror throughout the imperial court. Although they were a small group, maybe only twenty or thirty warriors, they were highly effective. Their leopard-paw prints became their calling card.”

Ranma and Akane were both riveted. This was like something out of a wuxia novel.

“The Bào Yǐng Shè successfully infiltrated the Forbidden City twice, killing several high-ranking officials,” Nabiki continued. “But they also took losses. Sometimes they were killed outright, but some were captured. Given their reputation, it wasn’t too hard for them to recruit new members to bolster their numbers as no one outside their group knew their secret; it turns out that the Jusenkyo springs have been discovered and forgotten many times over the centuries. The emperor hung leopard corpses outside the palace to frighten the Bào Yǐng Shè and show the public that everything was under control, but some people claimed the corpses were just ordinary leopards, not members of the Bào Yǐng Shè, and their paranoia only increased. But then a leopard was accidentally splashed with hot water while in captivity, transforming and revealing the fundamental secret of the group. That warrior died under torture without telling them everything they wanted to know, but that just meant they needed to capture more of the group.”

Ranma nodded for her to go on.

“In 1766, three members of the Bào Yǐng Shè were captured and turned over to Imperial Physician Chen Qiyuan so that the mechanism of their transformation could be understood. The ‘medical research’ that Chen conducted was gruesome, transforming them into and out of their cursed form over and over as he tried to understand the process. He was a skilled acupuncturist, and he found that some points seemed to correspond to aspects of the curse and the transformation process. The original three captives all died under the tortures of the experiments, but Chen continued his work, documenting what he learned and trying to perfect a technique to understand and perhaps manipulate the curse. For members of the Bào Yǐng Shè, their biggest fear became being captured and subjected to Chen’s experiments.”

Akane was finding this all a bit disturbing, but she wanted to hear the rest of the story so she gestured for Nabiki to continue.

“Eventually, through trial and error, Chen developed what he called ‘The Leopard’s Fate Manipulation Technique’. He found that by using four commonly known acupuncture points, he could bind the curse and then manipulate it through two more points at a precise position relative to the first four. One of these points would move the upper set point of the curse, the temperature of the water needed to transform out of the cursed form, back to human form. The other point would move the lower set point, the temperature needed to transform into the cursed form, up or down.”

“That could actually be useful,” Akane said thoughtfully. “You could make it harder to be accidentally transformed, like needing ice water rather than summer rain.”

Nabiki nodded. “Yes, that’s exactly why I was interested and why I paid the researcher. But there’s a catch. Although the position of the two points was always the same, which one was which varied from person to person, so you couldn’t tell which one you were manipulating except by the results. You couldn’t tell whether you were moving the set point up or down.”

“Couldn’t you just move it and see if they transform?” Akane asked.

“No,” Nabiki replied. “If the person transformed while the needles were in place, they’d come flying out and the acupuncture points would be destroyed. They’d be trapped in whatever form they’d shifted into. For Chen, that didn’t matter. He didn’t really care what happened to the members of the Bào Yǐng Shè—if they ended up locked in human form, locked in leopard form, or constantly transforming between one form and the other until they died because the two points overlapped, to him that was just more data. His goal was to neutralize the threat they posed to the empire, and he succeeded in that. By 1770, the Jusenkyo springs were under armed guard and the Bào Yǐng Shè were effectively extinct.”

Wrapping up the tale, she continued, “The only members of the Bào Yǐng Shè who didn’t die at Chen’s hand were the ones who ended up locked in one form or the other. The men were hanged, but the ‘leopards’ were put in the Imperial Zoo for the Emperor’s amusement. It was said that initially, from the way they moved and acted like they seemed like human warriors in leopard form, but over time it seemed like they forgot what they had been and became indistinguishable from ordinary leopards.”

Ranma had found the whole story rather disturbing, but that last part, well, that was the kind of ending to a story that would bother anyone, but for her, it raised an uncomfortable thought. Was she like those leopards, stuck in her cursed female form so long that she’d forgotten who she was? She shuddered involuntarily.

“So it can’t be used,” Akane said finally, breaking the silence. “Because you can’t tell which way you’re moving the set points or even which ones you’re manipulating.”

“Exactly”, Nabiki acknowledged. “And Chen killed many of his victims by manipulating the points the wrong way,” Nabiki continued, “so it’s way too dangerous to try and use. Plus, the technique was kept secret, so no one really knows how to do it anymore anyway. It’s just a historical curiosity now.”

She opened her folder, and inside was a single copied page from The Miscellaneous Records of the Qianlong Reign, with a complicated and confusing acupuncture diagram drawn on it, with notes from the researcher Nabiki had hired in the margins, with a few additions from Nabiki herself in red for emphasis. Another couple of pages detailed the story she’d told, including some rather grisly illustrations of people half transformed between human and leopard form.

“And that,” Nabiki concluded, “is what I spent ¥30,000 to acquire. I’m happy not to make a profit on it since it doesn’t work, but I think it would be nice if you two could cover my expenses. Maybe ¥15,000 each?”

Ranma and Akane exchanged glances.

“I did take the time to practice the story and tell it nicely,” Nabiki added with a small smile. “So I think I’ve added some value. It’s a history lesson if nothing else.”

“Maybe we could pay in installments with no interest?” Akane ventured.

“That would be fine with me,” Nabiki replied. “Just let me know when you can pay me back. You can keep the folder, too, it’s included in the price.”

Nabiki exited, leaving Akane and Ranma alone on the bed.

“I suppose you’d better have this,” Akane said, handing the folder to Ranma. “After all, it’s your curse.”

“That whole story kind of freaked me out,” Ranma admitted. “I mean—” She shuddered again.

Poor Ranma, Akane thought. The story about being stuck in leopard form must cut too close to home, what with her being stuck in her female form. “Yeah, I get it,” she said gently. “But at least you’re not stuck as a leopard—being a girl isn’t too bad, is it?”

“No, Akane, I actually like being a girl, remember?” Ranma said patiently, trying to keep the exasperation out of her voice. She decided not to mention that her reaction was really to the part about the warriors trapped in their cursed forms seemingly forgetting who they really were. She wanted Akane to have a clear and simple answer to her question. She shrugged, “It’s just that… That story was disturbing.”

Akane almost believed her, but she’d noticed Ranma’s hesitation and knew she was keeping something back. And it wasn’t hard to know why she had been so disturbed, even if she tried to obfuscate now. The analogy was clear: being stuck in leopard form was like being stuck as Ranma-chan, and the idea of that becoming permanent had freaked her out—understandably so. But she didn’t want to add to Ranma’s stress when she was already being so brave about the situation, so she brought the conversation back to their plans for the day. “Yes, it was disturbing. Let’s give ourselves a bit of space to decompress and maybe head into school in about ten minutes?”

In her room, Ranma almost dropped the folder into the trash. But then she stopped, opened it, leafed through the story of the Bào Yǐng Shè (豹影社) and its grisly images, and then returned to the first page again. The acupuncture chart didn’t look that complicated or hard to decipher. And the key thing from the tale Nabiki told them was that Chen and the members of the Bào Yǐng Shè were enemies, with no reason to help each other. But if she brought this to Dr. Tofu, they’d be working together. If she sat in a bath of cold water, there would be no risk that she’d transform, but since that also let her sense the way the curse felt, she might be able to know which way its set point was being moved. There was still the issue of figuring out which point was which, and Nabiki’s annotations had plenty of red ink and dire warnings, but maybe this information could be useful sometime down the road. She certainly shouldn’t just throw it out. She put the folder carefully under the other books Dr. Tofu had given her.

* * *

They had a quiet walk to school that morning. Ranma was still trying to process how she felt about the notion that the Jusenkyo curse might, over time, transform someone so completely that they eventually forgot who they really were. The idea of losing your identity that way, slowly and inexorably, was utterly terrifying. But she hadn’t forgotten being Ranma-kun, right? As far as she could tell, she still had all of her memories and pretty much the same personality she’d always had (although she thought she was more aware of other people and how what she said or did affected them). She still liked martial arts just as much as he had (in fact, she thought her skills were more disciplined and finely honed). And she was certainly still capable of saying exactly the wrong thing to Akane sometimes and regretting it, even if she seemed to be doing better at patching things up afterwards. Wasn’t who she was now just a fuller and more complete version of the person she’d always been? Sixteen-year-old Ranma-kun might look at his eight-year-old self and think, “Wow, I’ve changed a lot.” But he wouldn’t think “Who am I really? Am I still me?”. So maybe where she was now was just another few steps along the same path she’d always been on. She sighed. One quality he’d had, which she was a bit envious of, was his ability to blunder along without overthinking things so much. Maybe she could try to be more like that.

Ranma looked up at the sky, and consciously turned her focus outward, to the world and to her own physicality rather than her internal musings. However much she got tangled up in unanswerable questions, she could not deny that this—this whole experience—felt right. Did any of the other questions even matter when that was true?

Akane, too, was lost in thought. Yesterday Ranma had told her that the “BOY” on her swimsuit didn’t mean she was a boy, thought she was a boy, or wanted to be a boy. This morning, when she’d asked Ranma whether she thought that being a girl was bad, Ranma had said, “No, Akane, I actually like being a girl, remember?” Those words still bounced around inside Akane’s head. She had assumed that Ranma’s swimsuit-related declaration was just another example of her brave method acting. But what she said this morning cast yesterday’s—confession?—in a different light. Could Ranma really have been telling her own personal truth both times?

Akane thought about how Ranma had seemed to relax more and more into her new identity over the past few weeks. Everyone accepted her as the girl she appeared to be. So maybe it was real. Maybe Ranma-chan really did like being a girl now. But at the same time, maybe she was just letting her own wishful thinking sway her towards believing that. I wish I even knew what I should wish for at all, now, she thought to herself.

When she’d sent Nabiki off on that wild-goose chase to find a way to restore normality, the goal had seemed so simple: just bring an end to the latest round of chaos created by Cologne’s Full-Body Cat’s Tongue attack, and maybe even somehow clear up the Jusenkyo curse, too. That Akane had seen Ranma-chan as an annoyance and a vulnerability for Ranma-kun. That Akane had also had a vague, half-imagined future with that young man.

But that Akane didn’t know about this Ranma. That Akane didn’t have a bestie like she did now; someone who understood her in a way no one else could. Yes, that Akane had had small crushes on older girls when she was a bit younger; she’d been nervous about what that meant until she found out that it was perfectly normal, and that other girls she knew had the same sorts of crushes. But what she was feeling now was different. It was much stronger and she thought it was mutual. She wasn’t imagining having hot, steamy, passionate sex with Ranma-chan; but then again, she’d never imagined having hot, steamy, passionate sex with Ranma-kun, either. Or, honestly, with anyone else she knew. It seemed sort of gross and wrong to fantasize about people you saw in daily life in that way—how could you look them in the eye afterwards?

Dropping that line of thought, she returned to thinking about her and Ranma and their relationship. She still had more questions than answers, but one thing seemed undeniable: no matter what body Ranma wore, Akane loved her, and she was (almost completely) sure that Ranma—Ranma-chan—loved her back. Where that love might take them, she didn’t know. Circumstances might change—and probably would, given their lives—and make their relationship confusing again. But for now, there was no need to spoil what they had by overthinking questions she couldn’t answer.

By the time they got to school, they were both glad to set aside their personal concerns and take part in the fall-festival planning activities. They’d arrived late and didn’t end up contributing much to the discussion, but they had fun and it was a welcome distraction for both of them.

* * *

Next up was Oosouji, the school’s big end-of-year cleaning event. The students were divided into four teams based on colors (Ranma was on the green team), and within each team, they were further divided into groups assigned to different parts of the school. Akane was on the yellow team and sent to the gymnasium while Ranma found herself assigned to cleaning windows across a section of the school with another girl, Koharu-san. She knew Koharu was part of Yumi’s friend group, or one of them, anyway. In fact, she’d actually been there last Saturday when she’d stained her dress and Akane was behaving so irrationally—but they’d never really talked before.

At first they didn’t say much other than exchanging pleasantries and conferring about what it was they were supposed to be doing, but as they got into the rhythm of washing and drying windows, they started to chat a bit more.

“You know, Ranma-san,” Koharu began hesitantly, “Everyone laughed when you said that thing about boys being an enigma to you, but that really resonated with me. Yumi-chan is always mooning over this boy or that one, and half the time I don’t even know who she’s even talking about. Sometimes I…”, she paused, wondering whether she should say more to this girl she barely knew, but then plunged on, saying, “Sometimes I feel like there’s something wrong with me because I don’t feel that way about anyone. Like I’m missing out on something everyone else gets.”

“It’s hard to fancy anyone when boys are such idiots,” Ranma replied bluntly. “And men… men are disgusting!” she spat the word with surprising vehemence. She launched into a rant about the patriarchy, her career-counseling session, and how this whole idea that women were just supposed to aspire to settle down with a “nice man” (Were there even any?) was so limiting and demeaning. Koharu was a little overwhelmed by Ranma’s passionate tirade, but she listened sympathetically, nodded or shook her head when appropriate, and even occasionally managed to chime in with some of her own experiences.

When Ranma finally paused for breath, Koharu said, “Do you think you’ll get married anyway, even though you don’t feel it, just because that’s what everyone expects? When I think about it, I… I…”—she really wasn’t sure if she should expose herself so much—“It makes my skin crawl,” she finished, feeling like that was as much as she dared venture.

Ranma thought about her own private fantasies, with the princess and the strange ungendered dryad and realized that she wasn’t exactly on solid ground with her own feelings about relationships, either. She paused to gather her thoughts, then said, “They say that opposites attract, but that doesn’t really feel true, does it? It seems more likely that they’d repel. A man is never going to understand what it’s like when you’ve got your period, or how penned in you feel by all the social expectations you’re living with. So how would he know what you liked or wanted in other ways? He’s probably just thinking about his own needs.”

Koharu and Ranma exchanged a look. Girls understand each other. Neither said it, but they didn’t have to. It was an unspoken truth between them.

Ranma got ready to launch into another rant about how some girls were just enablers, too, but Koharu beat her to it by launching into her own rant about her older sister, who barely gave her the time of day but was apparently seen as completely perfect by her parents. Their conversation freewheeled as they worked, and by the end, she was giving Koharu a history lesson on feudal Japan and the role of onna-musha (female warriors) in that society. They were both a bit surprised when they came to the end of the hall and realized they’d cleaned all the windows. They were amazed at how quickly the time had flown by.

“It was awesome getting to know you more, Ranma-san,” Koharu said sincerely as they packed up their supplies. “We should hang out sometime.” She paused, and looked awkward for a moment, like she was trying to decide about something.

Ranma smiled encouragingly, “That would be nice, Koharu-san. I’d like that.”

Just then, Koharu had made her decision and she stepped close to offer a quick hug. Ranma was a bit taken aback, but she returned the hug, feeling the warmth of the girl’s embrace. It was nice. It did feel like it went on a teensy bit longer than she would have expected, but quickly enough, Koharu pulled away, blushing slightly. “See you around, Ranma-san!” she called out as she hurried off to their team’s coordination point to check in and say they were done.

* * *

There was more waiting around as inspections were done, and students milled about, taking advantage of the unofficial break. Ranma spotted Akane and went over to her. “Hey, Akane-chan, how was your cleaning assignment?”

“I don’t know how the gym got so dirty,” Akane replied with a sigh. “We had to scrub for ages. But at least we got it done.”

“I was doing windows with Koharu-san,” Ranma said. “She’s really nice. We should all hang out sometime.”

Akane gave Ranma a slightly cryptic look. “Koharu-san? Yumi’s friend? She’s kind of… quiet, isn’t she?”

Ranma nodded. “Yeah, but she’s nice once you get to know her. We had a good chat while we were working.”

Hmm. Akane nodded slowly. “Yeah, uh, it could be fun to do a movie or something with all of us sometime.”

Akane tried to process her feelings. Was she jealous? She wasn’t sure. Koharu had always seemed a bit odd to her; she’d sometimes catch Koharu staring at her and think, What are you looking at? Do I have seaweed in my teeth or something? But Ranma needed other friends besides herself, just like she had Yuka and Sayuri. And in any case, the future was still so uncertain. After this morning’s insights, her relationship with Ranma felt even more uncertain; while she thought everything could work out for the two of them as they were, but the likelihood of Ranma-kun’s return, probably coming sooner than she—or they?—really wanted, still hung over them. There was a good chance that an outing for the three girls would never happen anyway.

Before she could tumble further down that rabbit hole, her attention was caught by some commotion at the front of the room. A moment later, the adults got themselves organized and gave them the all-clear—the inspections were complete and according to whatever complicated evaluation metric had been used, the red team had won. She hadn’t even realized it was supposed to be a competition, and, from Ranma’s expression, neither had she. They shrugged at each other, both thinking, Whatever! and headed off to lunch together.

* * *

Lunch turned out to be a bit frustrating. The cafeteria had been cleaned along with everything else, which meant that they had to eat very carefully so it wouldn’t have to be cleaned again. The time passed quickly as the students chatted about what they expected from their report cards, which would be handed out tomorrow, and their plans for the summer break. Once everyone was done eating, there was an awkward few minutes as they all worked to return the room to its pristine state. There were really far too many people for the task, even in that large room, but even though they got in each other’s way a bit, no major accidents occurred and they finished quickly. After that, they were released until tomorrow.

Akane and Ranma were glad to be getting home early. Today promised to be a scorcher, the worst yet this summer. Ranma briefly thought about suggesting they head to a local swimming pool to cool off, but then she remembered that she didn’t have a usable swimsuit—she never wanted to wear the one with “BOY” emblazoned across her chest again—and she’d already ruled out the ones Nabiki had given her. Just thinking about wearing one of them in public made her flush bright red. So instead, she was happy to just head home and hope the house wasn’t too hot.

It was a bit challenging for them to find the right pace; you wanted to spend as little time in the direct sun as possible, and you wanted to get home as soon as you could, but you also had to moderate your speed so you didn’t get too overheated. They made a bit of a game of it, trying to maximize the shade they could find along the way, preferring to take narrow alleys, hug high fences, and sometimes even leap across sun-exposed gaps like they were doing some kind of ninja training exercise.

At home, the shutters were already down and while they made the house dimmer, they did a lot to keep the heat out. Kasumi-oneechan was in the kitchen working on colorful toppings for the evening’s meal, a fan buzzing away in the corner. Genma was in the living room in the corner, in panda form, dripping wet. He’d clearly used the pond outside as a way to cool off. He held up a sign that said, “Too hot!” as they entered, and Ranma-chan laughed, while also being glad that his communication was limited to written signs rather than speech, so she didn’t have to hear him make another idiotic remark about “the boy”. Soun was also in the living room, reading his newspaper and sweating profusely. He looked up as they entered. “Ah, you’re back early. How was Oosouji?”

“Ranma-chan made a new friend!” Akane said in a tone that, to Ranma’s ear, seemed like it might be tinged with… something… Sarcasm? Jealousy? It didn’t make a whole lot of sense to her, so maybe she was imagining it.

“Yeah, Koharu-san is really nice,” Ranma added. “We had a good chat while we were working. I think she’s a bit lonely, I guess she feels like a bit of an outsider, you know, so it was nice to be a friendly face for her.”

“Well, just remember you’re engaged to Akane-chan, okay?” Soun said, folding up his newspaper. “I’m sure you’re having fun playing around as Ranma-chan, but soon enough things will be back to normal. You don’t want this Koharu girl thinking she’s got a claim on you. It’s bad enough with Shampoo’s obsession.”

Ranma bristled at Soun’s casual invalidation of who she was. She was trying to carefully choose her words for a response when it occurred to her that she’d put in a new tampon that morning and hadn’t changed it. It must have been in over six hours at this point. She so wanted to say something like, “I hope you’ll excuse the boy while he goes and changes his tampon!” but she bit back the urge. Instead, she just said, “Don’t worry, Soun-san, girls can’t marry girls in Japan, so you have nothing to worry about!” and excused herself. Soun just looked confused, as if Ranma had spoken in gibberish.

The stern warnings from the instructions about toxic-shock syndrome ran through her mind as Ranma headed to the bathroom. This tampon hadn’t been particularly happy going in this morning and it wasn’t much fun coming out, either. Looking at it, she thought it would have been perfectly fine for a couple more hours, except for all those stern warnings. On the bright side, it definitely seemed like her period was finally in its final stages, and she should probably have picked a different tampon meant for “light flow” or whatever. (She remembered Akane’s intricate matrix calculations in the store, and wondered if she’d ever get it all sorted out in her head.) But overall, she felt like (given this was the first period she’d ever had in her whole life!) she was doing pretty well. But maybe it was time to go back to a pad for this last stage.

Once she was done in the bathroom, she thought about just hanging out in her room. Unfortunately, the heat was much worse in the upstairs part of the house, so she decided to get changed into something lighter and head downstairs to the dojo and maybe try to do a little bit of light training. There were some big ceiling fans in the room and a large floor fan off to one side, so it seemed like that might be okay.

Once she reached the dojo, she was surprised to find Akane already there, brandishing a bokken. Ranma’s training told her that the weapon was too long and heavy for Akane, and she was just about to suggest that Akane should choose a more appropriate weapon from those intended for women when she caught herself. Why did Akane need to use a girl’s weapon? Earlier in the day, she’d been about to rant to Koharu about how some women enabled the patriarchy by buying into gendered expectations, and here she was, about to tell Akane that she had appropriated a sword that was clearly meant for boys. Ranma sighed inwardly. We’re all steeped in this crap; we can’t escape it. But she could try.

“You look pretty mean with that bokken, Akane-chan,” she said, in a tone she hoped showed admiration for Akane’s choice of weapon. “Can I watch your moves?”

“Well, my blade work isn’t that great, really, but it doesn’t hurt to practice, right?” Akane replied, shifting her stance a little. “Sure, you can watch, but maybe you can give me some tips, show me your moves, and then we can spar a little?”

Watching her, Ranma was struck again by Akane’s obvious skill. She moved fluidly, with purpose and precision. She handled the bokken with ease. Honestly, Ranma-chan wasn’t sure what she could really critique (without being a jerk), but eventually she noticed a few issues with Akane’s stance. She showed Akane her own moves, and Akane made a few observations of her own which Ranma, a bit reluctantly, admitted were fair points. They did a round of practice working through the kata really slowly, allowing them to focus on precision (and let them stay a bit cooler), but after a bit, it came time to spar.

They swapped the bokken for shinai (practice swords made of slats of bamboo), which were lighter and less dangerous than bokken, but still hurt if you were struck with one. They squared off, and Akane made the first attack, moving with surprising speed and power. Ranma really had to be on her toes to keep up, and she found herself sweating profusely despite the fans.

“Don’t hold back, Ranma-chan!” Akane admonished.

She hadn’t been! “Oh, I would never hold back against you, Akane-chan!” Ranma replied, trying to keep the competitive spirit alive despite the heat.

At one point, she swore she heard Akane mutter something about Koharu-san under her breath. She couldn’t quite make it out, but it made her redouble her efforts in the fight. Across a sequence of clashes of their shinai, Ranma thought her own response at Akane: There. Is. Nothing. Going. On. With. Me. And. Koharu-san. Now. Get. Over. It. Don’t. Be. Jealous. As they separated and regrouped, eying each other carefully for clues about the next move, Ranma couldn’t help feeling that this fight felt like old times. It was sort of funny in a way.

Eventually, both out of breath and drenched in sweat, they called a truce. They flopped down on the floor, arranging themselves to try to maximize the airflow from the fans.

“That was a real workout!” Ranma said, panting. “You really pushed me, Akane-chan! We should always fight on the same side!”

“There was a point there, Ranma-chan, where I thought you had so much battle lust you might kill me if I didn’t block your moves, even with a wooden sword!” Akane replied, equally out of breath. They both laughed and grinned at each other.

* * *

By the time they’d taken cold showers to wash off the sweat and cool down, it was time for dinner. Kasumi-oneechan had made a colorful array of dishes, including hiyashi chūka (cold ramen with various toppings), which was perfect for the hot weather. They all sat down to eat together, and the conversation was light and easy, with everyone enjoying the meal and no problematic comments.

After dinner, Nabiki asked if they might please turn on the small air conditioner in the living room. It was relatively new, and she’d managed to get a good deal on its acquisition, but Soun was still very reluctant to actually use it, given the electricity costs. But, Nabiki countered, if they were ever to use it at all, today was surely the day. Soun grumbled a bit, but relented, and after dinner, they all crammed into the space, enjoying the temperature drop.

Ranma would have liked to lie on the couch with her head in Akane’s lap, but there wasn’t quite enough room for that with Nabiki perched on the end, so she settled for sitting next to her instead. Akane reached over and took Ranma’s hand, giving it a gentle squeeze. Ranma smiled, feeling a warmth that had nothing to do with the weather.

They watched a new crime drama and then a game show that put its contestants through a gauntlet of unpleasant physical challenges, including eating some unpleasant-looking “delicacies” that made Ranma shudder. As the evening wore on, people excused themselves one by one until Ranma and Akane were alone together.

“You’re pretty awesome, bestie,” Ranma said, leaning her head on Akane’s shoulder.

“And don’t you forget it,” Akane replied, wrapping an arm around Ranma. They sat like that for a while, enjoying the cool air and each other’s company.

In that moment, Akane felt a powerful urge to kiss Ranma—she was just so damn sweet right now—but something held her back. She felt a bit bad about the possessiveness she’d shown earlier, and somehow that made her think she didn’t deserve to demand a kiss or receive one in reward. And anyway, she told herself, even if Ranma wanted to be kissed, they were a bit exposed in the living room—anyone could walk in at any moment. So instead, she just held her a little closer, enjoying the moment.

Eventually, they decided they’d better get to bed. Tomorrow was the last day of school, when they’d get their report cards. Just one more day of school uniforms before they were free for the summer. As they parted at the top of the stairs to head to their respective rooms, they exchanged a look that said everything without words. Joy and sadness, wistfulness and hope. No matter what the future held, they both thought, this time they’d had together was pretty damn special.

The windows in the upstairs part of the house were all open to let in the breeze, and the cicadas in the garden buzzed loudly. Ranma wanted to take a moment to listen to them, but she fell asleep almost instantly, and they vanished from her perception before she could form a coherent thought about why their sound felt so comforting.