Arianna Habiki

"Ranma 1/2" and most of the charicters and setting are copyright Rumiko Takahashi.

"Next stop, Nerima!" The young girl heard the conductor's voice over the loud speaker, signaling her stop. As she approached the door of the train, she let out a long sigh.

"Here goes nothing." She said as she exited the train and started the next, and hopefully last, leg of her journey, which was to find her mother. Over her short eight years she had learned only a few clues about her mother. One was she lived in Nerima, which came as a total shock to her since, until two days ago, she thought her mother had died when she was one. The next came from a picture she had found in her dad's backpack. It was wrapped in one of his prized bandannas. It was a picture of her mother breastfeeding her, with a shocked expression on her mother's face. When she asked her father about it, and after a fight for the photograph, he told her that he had taken it on accident. He had known that she was going away, and he wanted her to have something she could remember her daughter by. That was how she found out that her mother was still alive. "You know," she said to herself, "with all the revelations about my mother, maybe I went too easy on my dad." In the next breath, she was glad she didn't, because she didn't want to put too much burden on her dear aunt Akari. Before any more thoughts could cross her mind, a policeman approached her.

"Excuse me, miss, but aren't you a little young to be wandering about on your own?" He asked her.

"Well, if you're offering to help, could you tell me how to get to the Tendo Dojo?"

Akane backed into a corner to catch her breath. The attacks were coming almost to fast for her. She knew that one more could put her out of action for two days and totally at her attacker's mercy. She didn't want that so she did the only thing she could think of: "Alright, I give!" She yelled in between breaths.

"Damn!" Ranma exclaimed. " And I was so close to getting out of chores for a week." He had a mock pout on his face. "I guess I'll have to settle for just two days."

"Well, three if you massage out the pain you just caused." Akane said in a low tone as she sauntered over to the corner of the dojo he was currently standing in. As she got over there, she gave him a light kiss on the lips.

"You know, I would do that for free." He rebutted. "And the happy ending too." He wiggled he's eyebrows at her, causing her to giggle.

"So you think?" She asked him in a light voice

"Hey, it might happen, my dear Akane Saotome." He knew just how to get a rise out of her. Just as they leaned in for another kiss, a knock at the dojo door startled them.

"Hey you two, we just had the floor waxed after the last time. Give the wax time to get old, will you?" Nabiki said as she walked in. Well, waddled is more like it, considering she was eight months pregnant.

"Sorry." The couple said in unison as they separated and bowed toward their CPA. Nabiki laughed a light laugh at the younger couple.

"I just came by to drop off these papers before I go on maternity leave." She said as she walked over to them with a manila envelope in her hand. Ranma met her half way and took the envelope from her opening it up. "Their your financial reports for the third quarter. I took home a copy so David could get up to speed."

"These should get put in the safe before something happens to them." Ranma said as he hurriedly left the dojo.

"Oh, right, just be sure to leave me some hot water." Akane exclaimed as she walked over to her sister.

"There he goes again. You know, at times like this, you two remind me of when you were younger." Nabiki said.

"Oh, you mean before the trip." Akane said in a quiet tone.

"He still hasn't told you yet what happened on that trip, has he?" the older sister asked

"No, not yet." Akane said wistfully.

"Yet! Akane, its been eight years, you would think that after five years of marriage, that he would have told you something for his suddenly dropping his long held stubborn streak and finally moving along with your courtship."

"I guess I hadn't realized it. I suppose that a part of me thought that anything that made him change like that I didn't want to know about. I guess I just figured that he would talk about when he was ready."

"Well, any ways, I have to get going. David is waiting at the front gate…" Nabiki started but was interrupted by a male voice.

"Anybody here?" A young man, about the same age as Nabiki entered the dojo with a little girl. The man was a little taller than Nabiki, with short brown hair, thin framed glassed, a polo shirt and kakis. The little girl only came to just above his hip. She had short red hair, and piercing blue eyes. She had on a loose green Chinese style shirt and brown drawstring pants. The most striking features on the girl were the bandanna in her hair, and the little fang in the corner of her mouth.

"David, who is this?" Nabiki asked as they entered the dojo.

"I don't know. A police officer approached me saying that she had wanted to come her." As the girl felt all present eyes on her, she cleared her thought before she began her explanation.

"Hello, my name is Arianna Habiki. Yes, my father is Ryoga Habiki. Aunt Akari assured me that you all know him."

"Yes we do." Akane assured her. "Where is your father?"

"Dad had to stay on Aunt's farm until his injuries healed." As the two Tendo sisters gasped, Arianna felt the need to go on. "We sort of had a disagreement, and dad found out just how good of a student I really am." She said as she cracked her knuckles, a small grin alighting her face. "The argument is the reason I am here."

"And that would be?" Nabiki prompted

"To find my mother. Dad said if any where, I'd find her here."

"Oh, and what is her name?" Akane asked as she ran thru a list in her mind of every girl that had crossed her path that might have had a child eight years ago. No one crossed her mind.

"Here, I have a picture of my mother from shortly after I was born." Arianna searched thru her backpack for the picture. Once she found it, she handed it to Akane. After seeing the picture, Akane passed out on the spot. Nabiki took the picture from her sister and looked at it.

"Oh yeah, this should prove to be interesting." She commented as both her and David looked at the photo. Just at that very moment, Ranma walked into the dojo still in his gi.

"Hey, Akane I thou—What happened!?" He exclaimed as he witnessed the seen before him.

"Why don't you tell me?" David said as he handed Ranma the picture.

"I..I..I..I" Ranma's brain had shut down as he saw a picture he thought only one other person in the world knew about, much less had. It was a picture of his girl side feeding her newborn daughter.