Ranma 1/2 Fan Fiction ❯ Memoirs of being in the Saddle ❯ Being trusted: Venturing away from shore ( Chapter 30 )

[ X - Adult: No readers under 18. Contains Graphic Adult Themes/Extreme violence. ]

=-=-=-=

 

The very next day I watched from my rooftop perch as Ranma bolted out the school at normally inhuman speeds and made a beeline to the Tendos, leaving Akane and everyone else in his dust. 

 

Can you guess where he went? 

Every bit of film Nabiki had was exposed, ruined, then carefully rolled up an returned. Checking the tapes that night confirmed it, not that I could see, but I only needed to hear the smugness practically radiating from his voice at the dinner table. 

Subtle Ranma was not, but like Nabiki, no one had actually seen him do it. Two could in fact play at that game.

 

I kept checking the audio tapes every day for the inevitable confrontation, only there wasn't one.

Strange, Nabiki had to know it was Ranma, even Kasumi had figured out that something had occurred even if she was not privy to the specifics. Not that he ever admitted to anything, as in Ranma's eyes this was a battle and was out to win. 

 

But this was Ranma after all, and with such a decisive blow he was not holding back his attitude. 

 

A Saotome Special was brewing.

 

Nine days after we'd taken those photos, Wednesday evening, I heard a knock on my back door. Hobbling over, I was greeted by the sight of Ranma, male, clutching his backpack. His only looked mildly annoyed, mostly trying and failing to hold back his smug satisfaction. 

 

What was interesting was was two things: First that, despite there being no actual witnesses to the fact, Ranma got in trouble for sneaking into Nabiki's room. Not for destroying the film, which had happened, but instead for some sort of manufactured perversion. 

Second was the fact that it took so long. Why?

 

When Ranma dumped out his backpack it quickly became apparent. 

 

Thank you Nabiki, you wonderful vicious bitch. 

 

His tent, carefully perforated.

His sleeping bag was damp and smelled sickly sweet and rotting. 

His brand new tent cover also sported cuts to let water in.

And the clouds outside rumbled. 

 

Nabiki had been waiting for the perfect weather.

Ranma couldn't camp out in this, rather he could, but he'd be less likely to catch a disease if he slept under a bridge in a cardboard box.

 

Naturally I waved away any efforts at recompense. He'd crash on my couch, head to school a touch earlier, and afterwards...

 

Well, I'm sure I'd find something.

 

That very night Ranma as Girl helped cook dinner for us, apron over her blouse and skirt over her bra and panties. 

 

Then came the photos. Much easier this second time round. Three rolls taken, twenty made the cut this time. She permitted them all, even the one that showed much of her supple thighs.

 

And then bed, me to mine, and the couch for Ranma, with a blanket and pillow as her sleeping bag was ruined.

 

I'd sneak the bathroom tape out the next day, when Ranma was in school.

 

-=-=-=-

 

Ranma went to school, went out training somewhere, and then carefully ventured back to me. And the velvet choker.

 

And that was how we spent our week for the most part, and gradually I steered her further and further from shore.

 

Once Girl and dressed appropriately, Ranma tackled whatever chores there was with renewed vigor. Then we ate, she did her homework, and then we got to our time together. Using Girl as a housekeeper doubled what I paid her normally to clean, but I wasn't worried about the debt running out, I had plans for that.

 

Ranma was spending more and more time as Girl, and not only for the money. Having helped him best Nabiki, even if the victory was Pyhrric with him being accused and kicked out, Ranma wanted my approval more than ever. 

 

Boundaries were pushed by both of us.

 

The second day saw her introduce a little makeup. 

Lipstick, a little mascara and a little powder. 

She was pretty without it, a healthy sort of pretty, but with it she looked softer, more delicate.

It was another layer, pushing Ranma deeper into Girl. 

 

A start into the depths. 

 

And she was surprisingly good at applying it. I too was fairly good, both at applying it to others and myself, which is why I could tell that it was practiced. When I was fresh out of the hospital the scars were quite bright and noticeable. As for dealing with applying it to others, it was a skill I've picked up more from my official job, having to do touch ups on live sites when crew was limited and an idol had smeared something. 

 

Everybody in front of a camera, man or women, tended to get makeup on. The world needed to see them at their best.

 

I wonder who taught her. Kasumi? Her mother? Had she taught herself by watching others?

 

In any event, she saw that I liked it and so she kept doing it.

 

My own addition that same day turned out to be a major breakthrough, though it seemed so innocuous at first. 

And of course it was an accident.

 

Ranma had been trained quite well as a martial artist, his reign of dominance in Nerima evidence enough, but less so in other fields. His roughness mostly came from not being immersed in all the subtle social minutiae unique to each area, due mostly to him moving a lot as his father led him from school to temple to training ground. He countered this deficiency by habitually watching and mimicking others. Slang, gestures, phrases, motions, he used them to fill in the gaps he had. 

 

Thanks to the stories he told me, I was fairly certain he actually did think his feud with Ryoga was about bread at first. Lunches in an all boy Jr. High were mini wars, even I knew that despite not going to one. But that he only fought for bread because all the other boys did, despite being cheaper to make a lunch at home, that was how his rival Ryoga came to be.

 

That said, he put his laundry up like Kasumi, counted money like Nabiki, and often carried his school bag like how he saw some of the boys at Furinkan doing it, not knowing that they bent their arms like that because of the weight of the books and homework, as his arms didn't notice the weight at all.

 

And it wasn't limited to just the local people, as I was quick to find out.

 

-=-=-=-

 

The movie I picked for Thursday was another comedy, though this one was Japanese. It was fairly new, pretty popular, and something Ranma hadn't seen, but had heard of from kids at school and inquired about it. He hadn't watched many in his busy life.

I won't bother to name the movie, it's not an American one so any trivia I offered would be wasted on you. Call it an exercise in your local knowledge base.

 

In a little makeup, and wearing her orange and red figure skating outfit (which was quite lovely and showed off her legs), we enjoyed the movie together -I enjoying the closeness of the one sharing my couch much more.

 

With the popcorn bowl no longer sitting on the seat between us as a barrier, the distance between us on the couch had been gradually decreasing over time, though we weren't at the point where our knees might touch. Call it a couple feet apart. I wasn't pushing here.

 

In any event, our hapless hero about halfway in the movie finally gets the girl he had a 'secret' crush on (read blindingly obvious except to her) to go to the movies with him. We both chuckled at his clumsy efforts at exaggerated yawning and trying to get his arm around her shoulders, only to fail time and again.

 

But then, while he was in a dejected sulk, she turned to him, smiled, and gently grabbed hold of his hand.

 

I thought nothing of it.

 

Not ten seconds later, I felt Ranma's small hand grab mine, clasping my fingers exactly the way the girl did. And she didn't let go, having taken the popcorn bowl to her lap.

 

This was big. 

 

Without fail, Ranma would always flinch at nonviolent physical contact as a girl. Always.

Rather, when someone touched her...

Apparently the other way around didn't bother her.

 

Ranma was imitating to fill in the gaps in what she knew. This is apparently what people did at the movies. What girls did.

 

My mind was so busy trying to find a way to exploit this revelation that I wasn't paying attention to the movie until the screaming started.

In true comedic fashion he'd taken the girl to see a horror movie, hoping she'd be clinging to him, and instead she was shrieking and crushing his fingers of his hand making him scream as well.

 

When my own fingers began to be squeezed I turned to her in a fairly controlled panic, only to see her smirking at me.

 

"Yer lucky this ain't a horror movie." She chuckled, then her gaze went back to the movie, and the hero with his hand in a comically oversized cast. 

 

But she didn't let go of my hand. 

 

In her mind I think it was okay because she wasn't Ranma, she was Girl right now, and as she saw, that was what girls did while watching movies.

 

And at the end of the movie, when the Hero had won and got the girl and saved the day, he took her to another movie. He tried and failed again to casually drape his arm around her shoulder so many times, that she rolled her eyes at him, grabbed his arm, and draped it around her herself and snuggled close. 

 

I felt Ranma's hand freeze as she digested that bit of apparent fact. 

She didn't try it, but it was out there now.

 

Naturally, it was another horror movie, and he was shrieking as she crushed his whole arm instead of just his hand. An excellent end to a comedy, Rule of Three and all that.

 

And then the movie was over, and Ranma let go. We stretched and I gestured at the stairs for us to go upstairs. It was photo time.

Still smiling, she didn't hesitate.

 

In keeping with the theme of her outfit Ranma went into many figure skating poses, and such was her skill that she could hold absolutely motionless, even in some of the more difficult ones that figure skaters do. We ended the shoot with her holding her leg straight up and perfectly still. That the tiny skirt did nothing to hide what the pose offered, though it was a thick leotard.

 

And when the photos were done she accepted them all. That was how much she wanted my approval.

 

If she was that willing, what else could I introduce?

 

-=-=-=-

 

Quite a bit as it turns out. It just had to be packaged a certain way.

 

The test on Friday was simplicity itself. A horror movie, though as it was a Japanese one so it was not so much scary as it was an elaborate ghost story. 

Not to my taste, but the younger teenagers ate it up. American horror movies had ruined me for the local ones.

Honestly, if the ghost haunts a place and can't leave, then just don't go there. Give me zombies or werewolves or even vampires over ghosts any day. 

 

But this movie had some things going for it, namely the two main ladies, whom I christened by their stereotypes; The elegant oujo class president, and top-heavy the delinquent. 

 

"A chick flick, really?" Her surprise was mixed with her skepticism.

 

"That movie got me thinking yesterday." I replied, setting down the popcorn. "We've stuck to comedy and action mostly, but we haven't actually done anything with horror."

 

Ranma was incredibly picky about his martial arts movies, but guns and explosions were fine. Van Damme in Cyborg was fine, but in Kickboxer I got a theatrical groan and a long rant afterwards about how such and such wasn't right. 

 

"Don't worry, this is a pretty mild one, but I figure it'll be better to test it now rather than later." I smirked slightly. "I don't want my arm in a cast after all."

 

She nodded absently before a subtle clenching went through her posture. "There ain't any c-c-cats in this, are there?"

 

I blinked and thought about it before I shrugged. It wasn't something that I tended to remember about movies. I'd have to be careful about that in the future. 

 

It didn't have any cats in the end, but it did have two things I wanted. The first was a lecherous ghost haunting the school and who began targeting the class president, the second was their efforts to discover and later distract said ghost. 

 

Ranma wore some nice denim overalls and a pink t-shirt with 'China' written on it, some of the first girl clothes donated to her while her own were in the wash. At least, so we're his tales. Pretty tight on the chest and loose on the waist, it certainly earned Akane's ire in those first few days.

 

We watched the movie, and Ranma actually looked interested in the show. Teenagers. 

The antics of the stuffy class president clashing against the delinquent top-heavy girl were cliché to the extreme. 

How they became friends, the top heavy delinquent thawing the chilly demeanor of the President, encouraging her to go for her hidden dream and be a model. 

The president getting the delinquent's grades up to an acceptable level and more respectful of the teachers and the school. 

 

I endured this slog for what would come next.

And when the Class President was coaxed into modeling in a swimsuit for photos, both the ghost, and Ranma, paid close attention to how she moved and posed in the one piece. Nothing undue was shown, as this was actual teenagers and not a set of twenty-somethings pretending to be teenagers as was common in America. The two were idols if I recall, new ones in their debut movie, which is almost always horror for teenage girls. Probably because they don't have to act that much.

 

The rest of the movie drizzled past me, as you can imagine not my cup of tea, save near the end, when Top-heavy Delinquent bought time for the Class President to finish the exorcism by doing a sexy striptease from a school uniform to some gym bloomers underneath, I noticed how Ranma's eyes furrowed slightly. 

 

More importantly, my hand remained unsquished throughout. 

In the end, not even remotely scary and Ranma commented as such. 

Entertaining, but not thrilling. 

 

If memory serves, the girl who played the Class President eventually went into porn, not us a rival group, and Top-heavy Delinquent quit early and opened a cafe instead. Playing against the tropes indeed.

 

With time left over, we made it a double feature with Cobra, starring Stallone. Ranma seemed to like his other movies thus far. And it also had the lovely Brigitte Nielsen, who was modeling a swimsuit in the beginning of the movie. 

Purely coincidence I assure you.

 

Ranma noticed that too.

 

And as I thought, during our evening photoshoot Ranma imitated many of the poses Brigitte took. The hands on her hips, the side pose, and so on. 

Oddly though, only Brigitte and not the first movie. Wrong outfit perhaps?

 

And nothing special happened during her time getting either dressed or undressed.

 

Perhaps something was missing?

 

-=-=-=-

 

Saturday arrived and with it my other job, while Ranma had a half day of school. As we didn't have any evening video shoots planned I'd be home by six thirty, seven at the latest.

 

This upset Ranma, though not for the reasons you'd expect. She was getting close to finishing off her debt. But unless the photoshoot did very well and there were zero bad shots, the few remaining hours this evening wouldn't quite be enough. Factor in the fact Sunday would have even later hours for me meant Sunday would be near worthless to her efforts at debt hammering.

 

And she really wanted it gone this weekend. It was understandable, the debt had been hovering over head for months, going up and down as she worked it off and she tacked more on. Nabiki, Happosai, and general Nerima chaos did that.

 

And I could work with that. 

All I'd need to do was get up a touch early. 

 

-=-=-=-

 

I think this would be a good time to better explain how we kept track of everything. After I gave that no interest loan to pay off those dipshit boys, I went out and picked up an invoice book and an accounting journal and showed Ranma how to use them. Every time she did chores, was Girl, or now completed a photoshoot, invoices would be signed and money would change hands. The Tendos would never see the paperwork, and I don't know where exactly Ranma stashed them, But they really mattered.

 

You see, it enforced in Ranma a routine and a displacement of responsibility, and I can't stress on this memoir how vital they were. 

Everything Ranma did, or offered me, or wore for me, that was towards a tangible goal, and it allowed Ranma to gloss over mishaps, discomfort, and unease given time and repeated applications.

 

And excuses, especially the excuses.

 

Vital, dire, critical. Got it?

 

Originally Ranma wanted everything to go towards the debt to pay it off as fast as possible, but I argued that if he was supposed to be working, he had to have some money to show for it, if only to allay suspicion. In the end, Ranma got two fifths in cash and the rest went to the debt. 

 

It wasn't just the money, it was control I offered, and that is an addiction few could resist. Doing things and getting paid for them, rather, choosing to do things, it meant a lot to her pride. 

 

Of the money, Ranma spent little, mostly on snacks and the occasional manga. The majority went to two different women. 

 

The first was Kasumi, as after a few barbed comments from Nabiki about freeloading stirred up his guilt and he passed most of his earnings to her. I think that sudden shift in maturity is what sparked their friendship. Naturally, I paid close attention to what conversations I could get from the tapes, making sure that I wasn't being mentioned. 

 

As history will show you, many a convoluted and sinister plot hath been undone by yon friendly ear. 

 

The second was of course Nabiki, who waited for Ranma to hand over his money before striking. At first Ranma didn't understand why she was content to get IOU'S instead of cash itself, until Nabiki brought out her camera. 

 

I was fairly certain she was taking a bit of a loss bartering for photoshoots, unless she was making an exorbitant sum on the photos, which meant it was more for the power over Ranma than anything.

 

Regardless, after those experiences and the subsequent destruction of the film, Ranma always came to me and took on more debt when she could, denying Nabiki the opportunities. 

 

And I accepted it, and gently pushed our interactions ever further into the depths.

 

-=-=-=- 

 

That Saturday morning, as Ranma got ready for his half day of school and I for a long day of work, I tried my gambit. 

 

"Last night I noticed that you copied poses that Brigitte used in the movie last night." I said while swapping my slipper-foot for my shoe-foot. When he nodded, I pressed on. "Is that how you learned? Movies I mean?" 

 

"Yeah, and magazines." His face tightened slightly. "And Nabiki."

 

A minefield it was then, I'd have to be careful. 

I paused in my foot swapping and leaned against the wall to look at him directly. Using the cripple angle worked on so many people and situations.

 

"Well, between that and the figure skating poses you did, I figured it was simply a lack of repertoire. So I thought about it last night and I had an idea..."

 

There were three tapes on the living room table. Three videos with now famous idols, only one of which I had the honor of being the man with the camera for. 

 

Two were absolutely innocent, as woe betide the man who dared to even imply sullying an idol. Japanese idol fans were quite zealous and it was a serious business with strict conduct. 

 

One was slightly less innocent, and I must stress the slightly. That was where the gambit lay. 

And for the nosy, that one wasn't mine either, mine was the most innocent one of all three, thank you very much. 

 

I don't just do porn after all. I can even do a pretty decent documentary and an adequate crime scene reenactment. 

Not that I get to, but I could. 

 

"How about this," I offered. "You watch those tapes on the table, and I'll pay you for an hour each one you do. And, I'll add an extra fourth roll this one time."

 

Ranma's eyes flickered back and forth as he did the numbers in his head. That'd put him over, easily. But... "What kind of videos are they?"

 

I shrugged as casually as I could. "Idol videos, pretty standard stuff." I resumed putting my foot on all the while internally crossing my fingers and remaining toes.

 

I didn't insult his intelligence by implying something stupid like 'idol videos are like Martial Arts' or equating it to 'training' or anything like that. To do so would be to insult everything he'd worked for and suffered. 

 

This is also why I was doing this when he was a guy. It had to be direct, not hinting at it when he was a girl, or in some situation where it might have the hint of coercion. He knew he could say no and simply clear the debt on Monday or Tuesday. This was a simple offer of do more and get more. 

 

It would also set a dangerous precedent, one I would use sparingly but to overcome the worst hurdles. 

 

Ranma for his part, had set his mind on it, contemplating the work, and it would be work to him as I was paying him for it.

 

"I'll take a look then decide."

 

And then he was off, circling to intercept Akane.