Thanks to our pre-readers : Lord Talon, Seratia, Kahlil Noriega,
Reispirit and Ronald Chan

Disclaimer: All Ranma 1/2  characters belong to Rumiko Takahashi and Co.

All Fushigi-yuugi characters belongs to Yu Watase.

Fushigi Mizu Chapter 3a
by: Dy

     "Damn, it's hot!"Ranma muttered.

     Her back pressed closely against the wall, her lithe,
sweat-drenched body crouched down near the parked food wagon, Ranma
wiped the sweat from her brow and began crawling on all fours.

     It wasn't really her style to hide from anyone like this, but she
was left with no other choice. That conceited pervert she had the
misfortune of  "sleeping with" was still after her. They wentall around
town in a wild chase that Ranma started, but now, she was getting tired
and hungry. Definitely hungry! She was so famished that even the thought
of Akane's cooking made her mouth water.

     "Time- traveling... or rather, book- travelling , if there is such
a term, sure could make one feel and think weird. Besides, it was almost
24 hours since the last time I ate!" Ranma thought as she continued
crawling . Those two reasons alone were more than enough to justify her
confused emotions.

     Finally reaching the end of the wall, Ranma stopped crawling and
peered cautiously around the corner. First, she looked to her left and
then to her right. The coast seemed clear enough, no blue haired freak
waiting on her was visible from her point of view. Straigthening up, she
hesitantly put her foot out and stepped out of her hiding place.

     "Still no sign of him," Ranma felt her muscle started to relax.

     Feeling safer and more relaxed by the minute, Ranma began walking
down the street, her blue eyes taking in the unfamiliar surroundings.
She appeared to be in the town proper, with all the people milling about
the place, pausing on one store or the next. Some of the men gave Ranma
appraising, and even suspicious looks.

     "Probably because of the clothes I am wearing," Ranma thought. She
vowed to change as soon as she had eaten and then find a different set
of clothing. Right now,  she was way too hungry to consider her
appearance to be a threat to the people around her.

     "What can they do? Send a group of fighters to capture me?" Ranma
snorted at the idea.

     As she passed by the numerous stores, her nose caught the
unmistakable aroma of freshly cooked food.

     "Fresh baked bread... roasted chicken... shrimp dumplings... noodle
soup..." Ranma numbled.

      Ranma's stomach rumbled loudly in response.

     Without further ado, Ranma made her way to the nearest restaurant.
As her eyes adjusted to the dim interior of the place, she realized
immediately that it was a far cry from the restaurants that where she
used to go.

     The chairs  were composed solely of wooden benches, durable rather
than comfortable. The tables were all woden as well, cut and shaped
crudely to different sizes to accomodate varying numbers of customers.
The lighting depended only on the sunlight that streamed through the
open windows and the few lamps that were hanging from the low- beamed
ceiling.

     Not minding the ancient setting in the least, Ranma quickly headed
towards the counter area and waved  her hand eagerly at the man standing
behind it, attracting his attention.

     "Hey mister! What do you have to eat?" She called loudly.

     "Good Morning..." The restaurant owner began to greet, but
hesitated on recognizing the uniform of the customer. Since the customer
looked very hungry and probably would pay for his meal, he decided to
entertain the soldier.

     "Please sit down and relax. I will be with you in a minute," The
owner answered, giving the soldier a friendly smile.

     Ranma gave an indifferent shrug, acting as if she had all the time
in the world, but deep inside, her stomach was crying to be fed.

     "Uhh...sure," Ranma said.

     The man beckoned with his hand, and a young waiter came to answer
the summon.

     "Here, bring this to the man at the back. Don't do anything to
irritate him, you hear? He's in a dark mood, and you wouldn't want to
mess with one of the Emperor's Seishi do you?" The owner warned as he
pushed a tray loaded with food to the wide- eyed waiter.

     Ranma heard this and looked over her shoulder curiously. There were
only a few people in the restaurant, so it was easy enough to tell who
they were refering  to was. Even from this distance, Ranma could see
stiffness in the way he held his broad shoulders, frustration in every
movement.

     And then the man slightly turned his face to his side, revealing
his profile.

     Ranma almost groaned aloud.

     "Not him again!" She muttered after a short curse.

     "Of all my luck! It's the walking weirdo who follwed me everywhere!
So he was the Emperor's Seishi, was he? " Ranma thought, a devious smile
formed on her lips. She just thought of something very wicked.

     "Are you okay Sir?" The owner asked, scared at the thought that the
customer might do something to create a havoc in his restaurant because
of the nasty smile on the soldier's face.

     Ranma focused her thoughts back to the man behind the counter and
nodded vigorously.

     "Actually, yeah... I'm okay. Bring me the house's special, will
you? And the roasted chicken I smelled a minute ago... and lotsa
noodles, if you have them... and bread! Don't forget the bread!" Ranma
ordered.

      The owner chuckled at Ranma's enthusiasm. He thought about how
much the food the soldier ordered and he relaxed, no longer wary of the
soldier.

     "And some tea, I presume. Sir?" The owner suggested.

     He beckoned with his hand to call the young waiter from the kitchen
to come to him.

      "Tell the cook to prepare today's special, the roasted chicken and
the noodles! Quickly!" The owner whispered.

     "Tea will be fine," Ranma answered with a big grin on her face.

     "Oh, yes! Revenge is sweet." she thought. She could hardly keep
herself from laughing out loud. It wasn't her fault, anyway. The jerk
practically begged for it!

     When the owner left Ranma alone , she dropped again on all fours, a
posistion she realized had its advantages after all. Ranma bagan a slow
and steady crawl towards the chair just behind the blue haired pervert.
Besides the fact that "that" seat was the most strategic and convenient
one in the whole place, Ranma knew that she could do a bit of spying
from there, as well. Who knew what the pervert might say when depressed.

     As Ranma came closer and closer to her objective, she could feel
her heart beating faster and faster.  She saw that his muscles were
tensed as if he carried the world's problems on his shoulders. Ranma had
the most weirdest urge to stand up, forget her plot and give him a
soothing massage, one that she used to do to her father after she was
satisfied after she had beaten the hell out of him. If she really,
really felt sorry for him.

     "What in the world am I thinking? He is my enemy!" Ranma thought,
giving herself a mental shake.

     Crawling more determinedly, she continued on with her plan. Some of
the customers stared at her curiously, but she ignored them.

     Finally when she reached the chair she was aiming for. She gripped
its edge and slowly leveled herself upright. The she sat down
noiselessly, she back directly opposite the jerk's. Every now and then,
she would glance at him to make sure that he was still there.

     Ranma's food finally arrived, filling the wide table nearly
overflowing it. She forgot her revenge temporarily and concentrated on
the delectable dishes on her table. Plate by plate, she wolfed down
everything as if she had not eaten in her entire life. If there was one
thing she could rely on her bizarre situation, it was the food. Maybe it
was because of her hunger, but Ranma firmly believed that she had never
tasted anything so good before in her young life. Not only was the food
tasty, but very fresh and healthy as well.

     As Ranma was finishing her last plate of noodles, she heard the
jerk behind her shift restlessly and give out a very soft sigh.

     At the sound of the sigh Ranma felt her heart beat a little fast.
Angry at her sudden reaction, she gave herself a silent reprimand and
strained her ears closer to the jerk to listen.

     "Dammit! Where could she have gone to?" Tamahome said as he ran a
hand thru his hair. Then he cupped his chin in his hand, staring out the
windows as if he was looking and waiting for someone.

     "She? Who the heck was "she"? Could he be actually referring to
her?" Ranma worried over this as she chewed her food. Almost absently,
she pushed the finished bowl away and made a ninety degrees turn on her
chair. She could now see and hear the seishi more clearly.

     "It must be Nakago! He's holding her captive to render us helpless.
The coward!" Tamahome continued, muttering.

     "Nakago? I remembered it when he was pleading to me." Ranma
wondered maybe he could help her get back to her own world. Feeling a
little restless herself, she squirmed in her seat again until she was
looking straight at Tamahome's nape. He was massaging it to ease his
growing tension.

     She peeked over his shoulder and saw his untouched food. He was
just picking at it, pushing it around his plate this way and that. Ranma
couldn't resist clucking dissaprovingly under her breath. Living the
life of a wanderer before she came to the Tendo Dojo, she knew how hard
it was to find good food. She has already done everything one could
think of to have a full belly, from getting engaged to fighting Amazons,
so the mere thought of them going to waste sent her temper soaring high.

     In her next breath, Ranma launched a revised version of her
Chestnuts fist technique. With unbelievable speed, her hand flew to and
fro, using the chopsticks to pile all of the jerk's food from his bowl
to hers. Scant seconds later, Ranma plopped back down to her seat and
began to eat again. One by one, the dumplings vanished into Ranma's
mouth.

     As for Tamahome, he never noticed a thing. He was still too busy
thinking about Miaka. The desolation he was feeling over the loss of her
was threatening to overwhelm him entirely, but he wouldn't  give up. He
hadn't failed her before, and he was not about to start now. He loved
her, and had vowed to protect her with all his might.

     For what seemed to be the umpteenth time that day, Tamahome wished
again that Miaka was a lot stronger than she actually was. If that had
been the case, then he wouldn't have been this afraid.

     As he went on pushing and poking his chopsticks around the bowl,
his ears slowly became aware of the hollow and empty sound the two
objects made. Wherever the sticks landed, it met pure porcelain bowl and
nothing else.

     Snapping out of his reverie, he gazed down at his spotless bowl and
gaped.

     "Had I eaten that much already?" Tamahome wondered as he glanced at
each plate in his table. Not one scrape of food was left.

     He turned his head to call on a waiter, but ended up gaping wider
instead. There, right before his very eyes, was the Kotou soldier he'd
been searching for all morning. He evaded Tamahome so effortlessly that
the latter was ready to give up and resume his extensive search for
Miaka. Yet now, here he was, meeting Tamahome's stare with a smugness he
found infinitely annoying.

     Ranma stood up, laying her chopsticks and bowl on the table as
cooly as she could. She knew that she was irritating the hell out of the
pervert, but never once did she think of stopping. In fact, she was
having this urge to do more. She just couldn't help enjoying his obvious
discomfort.

     Being deliberately vexatious, Ranma chewed the last dumpling
noisily.

     "Thanks a lot for the dumplings, you pervert. I really like it, but
next time, get me shrimp." Ranma said.

     Then with an infuriating wink, Ranma rumpled Tamahome's hair and
sauntered off towards the counter.

     It took Tamahome a while to get over his shock, and a little while
longer to decipher his words. By the time he finally did, the Kotou
soldier was already talking with the owner behind the counter. >From the
doubtful expression on the maan's face and the expressive gestures of
the soldier's hands, Tamahome knew that this was one opportunity he
couldn't pass up. In his distracted state, the soldier would surely be
easy to catch.

     Tamahome pushed his chair back and hurriedly made his way towards
the counter. He tried to make his way towards the counter. He tried to
approach as silently as possible to avoid detection, but to no avail. No
sooner, had he come into six feet of tyhe soldier's proximity did the
latter bid a quick goodbye and rushed out of the door.

     Tamahome started to run after him as he did all morning, but a firm
grasp on his arm stopped him. Highly exasperated, he turned to the owner
behind the counter.

     "What?" Tamahome demanded.

     The man shrugged. "Pay up, Sir. You wouldn't want the Emperor's
name to be stained by having a thief for a Seishi, do you?" He thrust a
piece of paper in Tamahome's hand.

     "What the hell!" Tamahome exclaimed after scanning thru the receipt
presented to him. "I didn't eat all of this! In fact, I hardly ate
anything at all!" He continued as he crunched up the paper in his hand,
then threw it away.

     The owner refused to let Tamahome go. He pointed his fingers to the
door instead, obviously getting pissed, as well.

     "The one who just left said that you were a "generous" friend who
would gladly pay his bills. I was stupid enough to let him go, but I
won't repeat the same mistake. Now pay up if you don't want the Emperor
to hear about this!"