And then, they steadied.
Hmmmm. Say, wasn't that minibus coming up the road familiar-looking, somehow...?...
The minibus trudged up the road, tires skidding tiredly, the sunset at her back. Summer was going and autumn would soon be here, but she was just so tired...
Damn all medical emergencies. Oh, the patient had survived, this time, and that was good, but...
And damn that husband of hers for getting cold wheels at the last moment, anyway. He could have been here in time, even if she hadn't been able to, if only...
"Oh. Dr Igarashi! ...I thought you weren't on shift here this month, ma'am..."
Igarashi Megumi blinked her window-eyes blearily. OK, so she did know that tech from someplace, but what was her name now...
"...I'm not, Nurse. I - I've come to pick up my child..."
This particular birthing ramp section was practically empty, now, with nobody there but the medical staff. Which was good in some ways, but...
The tech blinked. "Oh. - Oh! I, I didn't know you were expecting, Doctor! Ahh..."
The tech looked around, and prudently decided not to comment on the absence of one Igarashi Megumi (Master Mechanic)'s husband.
"There was an emergency, and I'm late, I know... I'm sorry for the inconvinience, everybody."
The techs and attendants all blinked at that. "No prob, Doc." A burly kei-class small truck said gently. "Everybody has emergencies. Ahh, if you could show us the number...?..."
There was more then one yet unclaimed child here today? Megumi sighed. Alright, where was that notice card, now...
Or maybe...maybe she or he wasn't here. It had taken so long, and she knew most of the worst of what could happen in cases like that then most, and... If the child had been a stillbirth, or deformed, or had died or gotten worse because she wasn't there to help, or, or...
It was a good thing she was too tired to really panic, Megumi decided muzzily. And here was the card, at last...
The small truck nodded, taking the card. "...Oh, this one! She's right here, ma'am...Over this way..."
Well alright, so there was nothing really wrong with it seemed, judging from the techs reactions anyway. Megumi followed him, feeling rather relieved in a numb fashion. Though it was rather worrisome that nobody seemed to be rushing to congratulate her, somehow...
And the techs and attendants were whispering among themselves. "The blue one?" "Yep." "Well alright, she seems...healthy, anyway." "My thought exactly."
So it was a she, well, the truck had said she too, and blue. Well, OK...
Megumi wheeled closer to the Car Pool next to the ramp area. There were no less then three baby Cars in there. A tech was singing them some kind of lullaby, and...
"It's the blue one, doc! See?"
Megumi blinked, trying to focus her window-eyes. Blue, blue...
The baby blue Car looked back at her, and blew it's horn once. It really was a very pretty blue, Megumi thought numbly.
"Hi, baby. I'm your mom, I'm sorry I was late, and I can't promise it wouldn't happen again but I'll try to do less of that in the future, alright?"
The baby siddled nearer to the fence and bleeked again.
"You're such a pretty van, my dear. Cuter then any other van on the street."
And indeed, the blue baby Car was a midsized van, of a style very often seen on the streets of Tokyo and elsewhere.
The truck gave the other techs a fender-up behind Megumi's back. Some of the techs and attendents sighed and smiled, while some of them simply blinked.
"Well OK, if she doesn't mind..."
"Congrats, doc, she's beautiful!" The truck boomed out, while some of the others mumbled something that sounded vaguely congratulatory. Megumi murmured thanks in their general direction, not taking her eyes off her child.
"Are you a Toyota Hiace or a Nissan Caravan, dearie? - Or maybe you're a Isuzu Como?" Megumi murmured. Megumi's own sub-type marking said she was a Isuzu Journey 'Friendly Journey' which was basically a Journey with somewhat atypical seating arrangements and a back ramp, and it would have been nice if she'd been able to share part of her sub-type name with her daughter, but -
"Well, ahh..."
Somebody had apparently called the Master Mechanic on shift, as he came rolling towards her, brushing oil-flecks off himself.
"Ahh, Dr Igarashi! I had no idea you were expecting a child - Ahh, well, um, congratulations, it's a girl as you've no doubt saw already, and quite healthy and intelligent as far as we can tell..."
"Thank you, Doctor Nitta. Is she a Hiace or a Caravan, though? Or maybe a Como?"
The Master Mechanic blinked at her. "You don't mi - Oh, ahh, um... About that, well, she does have something that seems to be a sub-type marking, but it doesn't seem to be any of the common ones, and - well, we haven't been able to find a match anywhere, I'm afraid."
Megumi blinked. "How odd! She looks so - so Hiace or Caravan-ish... How many seats does she have?" Megumi wheeled about, trying to get a better look at her daughter. "She does have a sort of - well, people-friendly feel about her, though..."
Maybe she was a small mini-bus inside? Though most Hiaces and Caravan style vans were clearly commercial vans, some were born outfitted like a small minibus, or some kind of van-shaped jumbo-taxi. There were even some who were a bit like van-shaped 'family-styled' Cars. And that even wasn't counting the many, many 'specialized' versions that were born every year, some of them even having what seemed to be their very own very sub-*sub*-type markings...
"Uh...um..." Master Mechanic Nitta fiddled with his fenders. "I think it'll be easier if you looked at her specs yourself, Doctor... Or maybe you should try scanning her yourself?"
Megumi blinked yet again, taking the scanners and specs gingerly. Oh, it felt different when it was her own child...
"Hmmm, hmmm...oh, her back seats are on the sides? Two in the first row, the rest are fold-downs against her inner walls, OK, that counts as two - no, three each I suppose, so 8 seats in all. A not-unheard-of number for a van her size, though the seating arrangements are atypical. And there's lots of...stuff in her. Why so much extra scanning and computing capacity, I wonder? And she has so many extra interfaces, too. - I wonder what you're going to be when you grow up, baby..."
The baby coo'd at her. Megumi nearly turned to goo, but managed to smile back without dropping the scanners.
"Err, maybe you should look at her engines and suspension and such..." Master Mechanic Nitta murmured.
"Ahh, yes, yes..." Megumi blinked. "Are you sure this is...no, never mind." Her scanners were telling her the same thing as the specs. "Underpowered she is not. You could probably tow me if you actually had to, baby. And you're - waterproofed all over, aren't you. Inside and out, seats, floors... And you have good air conditioning, and first-rate suspension, and..."
Megumi looked at the scanners and specs, murmuring to herself. "...Um, what?"
"Ahh..." MM Nitta coughed, then. "It's more like all-weather-proofing, I think. As well as... well, she isn't a SUV, and I don't think she should try to run the rubicon trail, but she comes closest to a all-terrain car then any van-type I've ever seen in my life before..."
"And she's...well, she's not really a 'luxury' style Car, not from her looks, I don't think, but she has seems to have all the 'works' and then some anyway..." Megumi sighed, then.
"Oh, baby. No wonder you took such a long time getting made..."
She'd never seen nor heard of any Car like her daughter before in her life.
"Well, OK, then. I was wondering what we should put down on her papers, though..." Nitta murmured.
"Ahhh." Megumi thought about that. "I think we should...keep it simple. Just call her a multi-purpose van, with some um, 'campervan'? No, not quite..."
"...'Hobbymobile'? That ought to cover everything, I think."
"Ahh, that sounds about right. A mid-sized multi-purpose van with some 'hobbymobile' style fittings."
Master Mechanic Igarashi Megumi looked at her daughter, and smiled.
"And her name is Ami."
The familiar shape of a good-looking sporty sedan was wheeling aimlessly about right outside the Factory Complex. Megumi sighed.
"We have a daughter, and she's perfectly healthy. You idiot, Kazuhiko."
"Oh, um..." Her husband fiddled his wheels. "I'm sorry, but I really did have to go to Mr Hakone's granddaughter's birthday party, he's one of our major sponsers and -"
"Oh, shut up, you." Megumi muttered, too tired to be really angry with him.
"And how, um...uh..." The silence after that was very, very long.
"- Yes, Kazuhiko?"
"......It's a, a, a... Hiace?"
That was not the reason they eventually separated. No. Not that.
And Kazuhiko had loved Ami, in his own dorky idiotic absent-minded fashion. At least, he had afterwards.
But...
What happened the day I was born, Mama?
One of my patients almost died, you smiled at me, and your father looked like the world had fallen in around his shoulders.
The only things she told Ami was the first thing and and the second thing, of course.
Pluto grimaced in sympathy. Ouch. That idiot of a husband...
OK, what next?
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(Posted Fri, 06 Oct 2006 21:16)
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らんま1/2 © Rumiko Takahashi
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