Because of all that, Ryoga had wound up in that damned place!
No one would have thought that a set of springs could be anything other than a nice place to get water, or to take a bath, but then most people had been Jusenkyo. That place had a fairly innocent look, with the worst that one could imagine happening there was some sort of fight. However, he hadn't known about the cursed nature of the place, and hadn't been aware of the trouble that he'd gotten himself into.
Still, how could a guy really expect a panda to come along, scare him, and then push him out of the way? Sure, it didn't seem logical, but it'd happened to him, and what followed was all that panda's fault. Had the big puffball not done what he did, he wouldn't have been so confused and out of it that he didn't pay attention to where he was going. Due to that action, he wound up stumbling straight into a pool, and had come out changed.
Then, after the incident that had led him to change back into a human being, and learn the secret of his new curse, he had wound up lost and trying desperately to get out of that area. Unfortunately, he hadn't meant to wind up in that one village, and sure as hell hadn't expected to offend some girls when he'd come into there. After all, he hadn't meant to crash through their practice, but he also hadn't expected to see cute girls in small dresses doing what they were.
Even as they'd tried to attack him, he understood their reasoning for what they did, and didn't blame them. They were only trying to defend themselves, despite the fact that there was no threat from them. But he'd also had to protect themselves, and he'd merely struck out on instinct when he'd felt too cornered.
Now, he had a curse to turn into something else when he got wet, and a girl who thought that he was married to her. A little too freaked out to take that in safely, he decided that a retreat was his only option. So, after she'd kissed him, he'd yelped and ran for the nearest horizon, intending to get to a place that he could understand a bit more.
Then he'd had to hitch a ride on a supply plane when those nice people from the archeological dig in Mongolia let him.
But he was back in Japan, and trying to find the trail of that pain in the ass Saotome. That guy had pulled him into so many messes that he couldn't wait to pay him back for all of it. Killing him might have been extreme, but he wouldn't mind beating him to a pulp. Of course, that meant that he'd have to find the idiot first, and he had no idea on how long it would take to do that, save for the fact that he wanted it to happen sooner, rather than later.
Many thought that Soun Tendo didn't do a lot when he was relaxing at home, other than to lay around. But he did tend to do a lot of things, like playing shogi, reading the newspaper, or simply drinking sake. It was a simple differentiation, but it was there, as he wasn't one to just stare at walls all day.
However, at the moment, he was sitting and looking out at the yard of his home as the sun lowered in the sky, ignoring the sounds of flesh being hit coming from the dojo. The shogi board stood put away, the newspaper was nicely folded, and not a single bottle of sake sat next to him. Instead, he merely stared out at the yard, and thought.
He couldn't believe the mess that had come from what had gone on in the past day. When he'd tried to protect his eldest daughter, he'd wound up causing havoc and trouble, and she, who had always been the image of sweetness and light, had asked him to leave. That was a hard pill to swallow, and now he had lost the trust of his daughter.
"Thinking about your sins?" murmured a voice from nearby.
Soun turned to look at the speaker, and saw his middle daughter leaning against a door jam with her arms crossed over her chest. "Nabiki?"
"You heard me, Dad. Have a nice day today?"
"I suppose that you heard about what happened."
"We saw the results."
"And now you want to know why I did it."
"Actually, I already know that," Nabiki told him, raising one hand to wave it in dismissal.
"You do?"
"You were trying to play the 'big father', and let your buddy push you along, right?"
"How did you know that?" he asked, frowning a bit in confusion.
"Simple. You were doing it earlier, even though I tried to make you not worry. And look what it got you."
"Nabiki, I am your father...."
"Then act like it!" she snapped, and settled her gaze into a penetrating stare. "Before, it was okay. You were just our overemotional father. But to do this, to Kasumi of all people?"
"I lost her trust, I know. Probably hurt yours and Akane's as well."
"Oh, you did worse than that."
"Eh?"
"You lost respect," his daughter told him simply.
"What.... I did...."
"Yes, you did. You have to remember, this is the sole time that I can remember when she's been happy, really happy, about something that a girl her age should be interested in. And you've been interfering in it, with horrible results."
"I know that," he sighed. "But...."
"'But'.... You didn't think of her feelings, only of trying to push her into what you wanted. And as soon as you stop showing that you care, and start acting based on assumptions, we start losing respect for you. And that is not something that a daughter should think about her father."
"I just wanted her to be happy, like your mother was."
"Then there is someone you should ask about how to allow your daughter her happiness."
"Really? Who is that?"
"Her," Nabiki said, jerking her thumb at something as she turned and left the room.
Soun looked, and couldn't understand what she meant... until he saw the family shrine, and the picture of his wife in it. He stared at the image, and saw the woman who'd not only brought love into his life, but had cared deeply for her daughters. And he'd gone and done something that would have hurt her deeply.
"I seem to be disappointing everyone," the Tendo patriarch sobbed quietly, while:
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(Posted Fri, 21 Jul 2006 02:53)
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