Memories and Flowers

This was inspired by a oneshot of the same name written long ago by HimuraAlucard. While it is a good one, I found many things about it I disliked. Mainly the short length and the lack of several vital scenes for such a plotline. Overall it felt rushed and greatly summarized to me. With HimuraAlucard's permission I have for several months been working on this rewrite, which should provide a more complete story. There won't be much action, so sorry to all the fans that enjoy reading martial arts fights.

I want to make one thing clear to everyone: I am NOT changing the original storyline of HimuraAlucard's fic. I am simply expanding upon it. So don't expect many good things to happen to Akane, because they didn't in the original. If you can't handle Akane being portrayed negatively, then you might want to go read something else.

Chapter One

One clear warm afternoon in Nerima, Japan there was a young man flying across the sky. In any other city in the world, with the possible exceptions of places like Metropolis or Juuban, this would be the sort of thing that would make the citizens think either someone was playing an elaborate trick on them, or they were on some sort of drug. However, in Nerima, this had become something of a normal occasion over the past year. To the inhabitants a young man soaring through the sky was nowadays no different than a bird doing the same. In fact, the lack of such a thing might get them worried instead.

This particular young man happened to be Ranma Saotome, and he wasn't up there under his own power. As great as he was at making the impossible happen, Ranma simply couldn't fly as if he had sprouted wings like he was a member of the Phoenix tribe. Instead, he was up there solely because of his first of three fiancées, Akane Tendo, giving him one of her standard uppercuts just moments ago because she got mad at him. Again.

'What the heck did I do THIS time?' Ranma thought as he tried to remember anything that might have triggered his uncute fiancée's temper.

He was already in a bad mood today because Akane chose to wake him up with a bucket of cold water, mostly to humiliate him rather than wake him. He knew that for a fact because if she didn't enjoy it, why did she do it so often? With a smirk? And if that wasn't bad enough of a wake-up call, it also woke up the panda and that allowed him to catch Ranma off guard for the morning spar that day. Genma knew his son was no longer in his class so he took any chance he could to have the upper hand in a fight. Then he would try to take more of Ranma's breakfast despite Nodoka's warning not to.

Then when the teens were off to school, Ranma, as a boy again thanks to Kasumi giving him hot water beforehand, was ambushed by Shampoo with her patented Amazonian glomp and Akane accused him of encouraging and enjoying it before hitting him, and Shampoo by default, into the canal. Naturally Shampoo became a cat and Ranma, a girl again, ran in a blind screaming panic, unfortunately in the direction away from Furinkan High. Happosai, on his current stealing binge, chose to make himself known and latched onto Ranma's chest like a remora. When Ranma finally lost Shampoo and Happosai, with much difficulty, got some hot water from Dr. Tofu's, and actually got to school he was already running late, but Kuno just absolutely had to be there to challenge him yet again, never minding the fact that it made him late as well. Apparently since his father was the principal and didn't like Ranma at all Kuno often if not always got away with this behavior, even though the teachers did make sure it affected his grades. Ranma was in no mood even to toy with the delusional idiot so he simply knocked him out cold with one quick move and dashed inside.

The combined result of all this added on stuff was that he was twenty minutes late for class. Ms. Hinako made him stand outside holding water-filled buckets as punishment since he wisely emitted little ki for her to drain just then. Ranma didn't fail to notice Akane's smirk at seeing this, as if he somehow deserved it. It was the same smirk she gave him after she malleted him.

The rest of the morning had been smoother, with nothing worse than Akane and Ukyo barking at each other near the end. Ranma found it odd that even though Akane had no intention of being near him during lunch, the tomboy was adamantly against Ukyo sitting close enough to put her arms around his shoulders. "Ranma! How dare you flirt with this tramp!" She screamed at him when the okonomiyaki chef succeeded in getting her arm where she wanted it.

"He's my fiancée you know! I have a right to be with him!" Ukyo shouted back, glaring but not moving from her acquired position. If she lost it there was little if any guarantee she would regain it anytime soon.

"I wasn't talking to you!" Akane shouted to the chef before returning her glare towards Ranma. It looked a lot like Soun's Demon Head technique but was missing the size part. However Ranma had seen it from her enough times that by now it lost the edge Akane wanted it to have. Also, after facing people like Saffron, Herb, and even Happosai and Cologne, little actually scared him anymore besides cats.

"Look Akane you weren't anywhere near me, so unless you were going to ya have no right to complain that Ukyo beatcha to it. Okay?" Ranma should have expected what was coming to him but his mind was to preoccupied with trying to find a way to sneak away when Akane hit him and sent him to the other side of town. For some unexplained reason, Ukyo wasn't hit or even grazed in the attack. And after Ranma was gone, Akane couldn't care less what Ukyo was doing so she left the other girl alone then.

Which brings us back to the present, where Ranma was currently up there flying past the roofs, hoping that for once he didn't land in water. It looked like this time he would get his wish, as he was above the shopping district Kasumi always went to. After a while he felt the first pull of gravity which meant that he was about to land, so he closed his eyes to brace for the landing. The next thing he knew was the sound of a loud sharp 'clang' along with the familiar pain of a blunt impact, and then he saw nothing but black.

"Oh my. Ranma, are you okay?"

Ranma slowly opened his eyes, moaning as his head felt like he had a vicegrip on his temples. He slowly focused on a figure that was looking down at him. At first all he saw was the silhouette, but it shortly came into focus as Kasumi. For once she wasn't smiling like she normally does, but rather looked worried with concern.

"Are you alright Ranma?" She asked again. She was kneeling down to see any possible injuries and help him back up.

"Yeah Kasumi. I'm fine... I think. I might need a ton of aspirin though ta get rid of this freakin' headache I have now." Ranma told her as he sat up and rubbed his sore head.

"I'm glad you're alright, but we better leave here before any people that work for the city come for you."

Ranma didn't catch her drift, but when he looked up he saw that he had managed put a 30 degree dent on a newly installed metal post with his head. "Yeah... sounds good."

"Ranma, did Akane hit you again?" Kasumi asked as they started walking back to the dojo. She was positive she already knew the answer, but wanted to give her sister the benefit of the doubt.

"Akane... who?" The pigtailed gender bender answered blankly. By the look of shock on Kasumi's face, Ranma could tell he had just said something wrong so he tried his best to remember who this Akane person was. But after a few minutes of hard thought, he still drew a blank. "Am I supposeda know someone named Akane?"

"Ranma, are you okay?" Kasumi asked with more than a hint of surprise. "Akane's your fiancée."

"Akane's my fiancée? That can't be right, Kasumi. You're my fiancée." He smiled innocently and sweetly at Kasumi and took one of the bags of groceries from her hand before starting to walk back to the dojo. Kasumi just stood there for a moment trying to comprehend this before snapping out of her daze and catching up to him.

Ranma had gotten back to the dojo first, only because Kasumi shyly stayed a few steps behind him. He went into the kitchen and placed the bag filled with ingredients for tonight's dinner on the counter. Kasumi walked in after him, her mind still in shock from what he had just told her. "Kasumi? Are ya feeling alright?" Ranma asked as he placed his hand on her forehead.

"Ummmm... yes I'm fine." She managed to say with a weak smile. She then gently removed Ranma's hand from her head.

"Ok, so let's get ready to make dinner. Sound good?" Ranma suggested while he was putting on the spare apron that hung by the kitchen door. For some reason he was acting like he and her doing this was completely normal. Kasumi was at first a little hesitant to let him help her, but then when she saw how well he handled the cutting of the vegetables and the cleaning of the fish, she decided to enjoy having the extra help for once. At least with Ranma helping instead of Akane, it would turn out edible.

The aroma of dinner was in the air as Ranma heard heavy footsteps approach, which he knew belonged to his father. "Always the first to enter the dining room." Ranma sighed before they put the finishing touches on dinner. Genma plopped down at the table and was soon followed by his wife Nodoka and the rest of the Tendo family along with Happosai. Ranma helped Kasumi bring out dinner and then slowly sat down beside her, making her blush and the others watch in confusion. Ranma suddenly felt the burn of an angry stare being directed at him from behind while he happily accepted a bowl of rice from Kasumi.

"RANMA! You... What do you think you're doing with my sister?" Akane screamed, glaring at him as if he was committing the biggest sin imaginable.

Ranma just looked blankly at her, completely unintimidated, then turned to look at Kasumi. "We're having a guest tonight dear?"

"Guest? DEAR? I'm a guest? RANMA YOU PERVERTED JERK!" It was hard to say just what Akane was more upset about: Ranma treating her like nobody, or him being nicer than usual to Kasumi. In the end it didn't matter, because Akane generally had only one way to reply when Ranma upset her.

Ranma saw the aforementioned 'guest' stomp up to him, about to crush his skull with a mallet she pulled out of seemingly nowhere. She never got the chance to, since Ranma quickly used a single finger to break the weapon's head. The mallet cracked right through the center and fell to pieces like a puzzle, leaving the now very angry looking 'guest' holding up what was left of the handle.

Ranma retracted his hand back to holding his bowl. "Who do you think you are ta try and strike me at my own dinner table?" He commented.

Akane was ticked off to a new level. Any angrier and her head might soon vent radioactive steam through her ears to avoid a meltdown. Despite all her claims of being a martial artist, Akane was not used to anyone who actually fought back. The Hentai Horde didn't count since they never actually tried to hurt her, and Kuno because he often tried to lose on purpose to 'win' a date out of her. Also, Akane held onto the notion that as a girl, it was a bad idea for anyone, especially men, to actually attack her, period. Thus her basic mentality regarding martial arts was best summarized as 'Stand still and let me hit you.' Someone who actually fought back was not what she had in mind, especially if that someone was Ranma Saotome.

Running on pure rage and reflex, Akane shrieked like some sort of berserker ready to hit Ranma like never before. If by chance she had succeeded, later on she would have regretted it, but at that moment, she believed she couldn't have been more justified if Ranma himself had been the guy to poison the Tokyo subway system.

Too bad Ranma didn't feel like complying with her. He ended her assault with a small jab to the abdomen to send her to the backyard and into the koi pond, where she briefly blacked out. Ranma didn't like hitting girls still, but he liked being attacked for no reason even less. "Just who invited her tonight anyway?"

Soun began to cry, wailing about Ranma mistreating his fiancée while the elder Saotome was shouting about him owing an apology to his fiancée. Nabiki and Nodoka just sat there stunned at the whole event, with Nabiki and Happosai still eating but going much slower to avoid missing anything entertaining.

Ranma had just about enough of this and stood up to face the two men/crybabies. Ranma felt that there had been already enough interruptions in his daily life to last his a decade so he wasn't gonna let his dinner time become a circus. It had happened before, but now his patience for it was up.

"Look Mr. Tendo, I ain't mistreatin' my fiancée. How was I, when she's right here sitting nexta me trying to enjoy a nice quiet dinner? I did nothing wrong to Kasumi but if you and Pops demand I apologize to her, then fine!" He then looked down to Kasumi, his expression now soft and gentle. "I'm sorry Kasumi, I ask you to forgive me from the bottom of your heart for whatever it is I did to bother everyone." Ranma could see her trying to hide her blush by looking down to her hands. 'She looks so cute.' Ranma thought to himself.

"RANMA! WHAT ARE YOU TRYING TO...?" Akane screamed once she recovered and threw a punch at him. Ranma saw it coming so he simply dodged it and took her arm in his and threw her over on her side, dazing her again.

"You know, from the way you've acted tonight I'm not sure if you're a girl or a gorilla dressed up a girl." He then turned to calmly look at the oldest Tendo daughter. "I'm sorry Kasumi, your dinner was delicious but I lost my appetite. If ya need me I'll be in the dojo."

He left, and everyone still in the room was dumbfounded and wanted answers. And there was only one person who could give at least some. "Um, I have something to tell all of you." Kasumi tried to gather the attentions of the group before her, knowing this would not be easy.