Soun saw in her eyes the affection that his wife had for his daughter, and that took any sting away from the comment. That reminded him yet again why he'd married her, not that she'd have even any sort of romance with him in the first place. For a person like her, she'd been rather shy, and it had taken him a lot of wooing to make her realize that he truly did care for her. And now they were married, and he was the envy of all his friends from the neighborhood. After all, he had a lovely wife whose beautiful face was framed by the flame colored hair that she kept in a ponytail most days, which was combined with a body that had not lost anything over the time of their marriage.
Of that, he was certain, as he could remember plenty of times feeling it as that wonderful mane of hair was spread on their pillows...
"Husband?" his wife commented, looking both pleased and embarrassed at the same time.
He blinked and looked at her, confused as she normally only called him that when he was in trouble. "Yes, dear?"
"You're drooling."
"Eh? Oh..."
Ranko gave a most becoming blush, and showed that she was really aware of what he was thinking.
"I was just thinking..."
"You can think in our bedroom."
"I know, but..." he began, but trailed off when he realized what she meant. "Okay..."
"Good. Now, I believe that you have something important to gather us for."
"That's right! I do."
"Then I suggest that you get your other children," the redhead informed him, "This way I can find out what's so important."
"Oh, I think that you already know..."
"I do?"
"Yes, you have been waiting for it yourself. You told me so," Soun answered, giving her a knowing look.
It took her a few moments to comprehend his meaning, but once she did, a smile slowly grew across her features. "Hmmm... Then this will be most interesting."
"For more than just you."
"Go on then. And I hope that things won't go quite like I fear."
Kasumi watched her father leave before turning to her step-mother. "What can go wrong?"
"Plenty, when I consider what's involved."
Genma Saotome stopped in the middle of the street and shivered, though he wasn't quite certain why that was. Sure, he'd fallen into that water, but it shouldn't have been enough to do it. What it did feel like was almost as if someone had been drawing steel against his gravestone.
Then he simply shook it off, and tried to ignore it. There had been plenty of times when that'd happened over the years, and he still hadn't seen anything that would cause the sensations, or prove them to be a warning of some danger. That made it silly to worry about such things, especially considering that he had more important things to worry about, like finding his son or a hot water kettle.
Of course, that would have gone better, had the people on the street not seen it as a good idea to stop and stare. One would think that they'd never seen a guy walking down the street. But if that was the case, he was going to walk proud and tall.
He didn't realize that such an appearance was odd for a giant panda.
"WHAT?!" came from three voices at once in shock.
"My old training partner, and his son, your uncle, are coming to our house," Soun repeated calmly.
"Our 'uncle'?" Kasumi murmured. "That does sound nice."
"Sure does... If we knew anything about him," Nabiki muttered.
"Ah, but we do. My father might have taken my brother on a training journey all that time ago, but they are still part of my family," Ranko told them.
"I'm sure that they'll be good if they're related to you," Akane said with all the confidence of an admirer.
"I hope so..."
"Huh?"
"Pop was always an idiot. He was then, and I'm sure that he is one now. My only hope is that he hasn't done anything too bad with my little brother."
"What was your brother like?" her eldest step-daughter asked.
"Him? Well... he was a very happy little kid, who always wanted to go full throttle into everything, from playing to the Art. A bit innocent and easy to fool, but he was a really sweet little guy. Used to always want to play with me..."
"But why would you think that he changed then?"
"Kasumi, my father trained me and only me until my baby brother was born. I was the only heir he had, and so I know his training techniques. They were bad enough when I went through them and he had Mom to worry about, but now? He's had years with my brother, alone and unsupervised."
"You make it sound like your father's a real jerk," Nabiki drawled.
"That, and a moron."
"Dear," Soun commented, "Your father is my oldest friend, and we went through a lot..."
"You trained under that... freak. You know how he taught?"
"All too well."
"Well, Pop never comes that close, but does follow in his footsteps."
"Oh dear..."
"Exactly," his wife sighed, while:
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(Posted Sun, 19 Jun 2005 17:35)
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