The night is for dreaming.
Sometimes.
Finally. Nephrite sighed, then, watching the small sporty scooter go bouncing down the ramp at long last. Jedite looked perfectly fine and every bit a proper member of the Royal Guards with his new sparkly paint job (if a rather pint-sized one, though he'd never say that) - everybody had said so, even Lady Beryl, and she should know if anybody did, but Jed did tend to be a worrywort about such things.
Ahh, well. Being a worrywort was still somewhat better then being totally oblivious to such things as one's appearance, he supposed - it was horrifying to think of what Kunzite would be looking like right now if Zoicite hadn't gotten on his case, or rather sic'd both the Prince and Lady Beryl on his case. That was one Car with no kind of fashion sense what-so-ever, alright...
And anyway, he really was quite aware that what was really worrying Jedite wasn't his appearance or even his poor much-abused front basket, but his family - or rather his father and brother, to be precise. And boy, did he understand that.
Though his feeling on the matter of 'family' probably weren't quite the same as Jedite, now that he thought about it...
Ahh, well. There was no time to think about that now, anyhow - the opening ceremonies were starting in less then 3 hours, and -
He blinked, then. Alright, Kunzite was still where he'd seen him last, but where was the Prince? Or Zoicite, for that matter?
Not to mention that Kunzite seemed to be half asleep again, from the exasperated gestures of the young page that was waving some papers in his face and trying to ask him something, from the tone of his voice. He sighed again, seeing the page pounce on Jedite, who at least wasn't half asleep. Here it comes...
"What? - No, how would I know - Hey, Neph, help!"
Yes, yes, Nephrite to the rescue again - "- Coming!" Nephrite called out, wheeling down the near brand-new ramp. Lady Beryl and her people really had outdone themselves with the wholesale 'remodelling' of the Court Main Standium, to be sure...
And speaking of Lady Beryl - Nephrite looked up, then, in the general direction of what had used to be 'the Lower Servants section' of the old Stadium. A large red pavilion had been set up, waving in the breeze, and yes, the little figure with the cheerful bright red canopy just had to be Lady Beryl - it was just, well, so her.
He sighed, then, remembering just how Lady Beryl and her crew had ended up almost entirely rebuilding the Main Stadium in the first place. The section of the Stadium traditionally reserved for the Lower Servants of the Court had become rickity indeed over the years, but it had been one of those problems that always ended up being put on the back burner - rebuilding it was terribly expansive and time-consuming, however which way the bureaucrats calculated it, and it was only the Lower Servants section anyway, and hey, it wasn't like anybody had actually died there, right? So things had gone on, year after year, till one day part of the third row had almost caved in, and the problem suddenly got much more difficult to ignore. Almost impossible, in fact.
And that was when Lady Beryl had come up with a rather ingenious solution. It was a good one too, in his humble opinion, anyhow.
From what he had heard, she had gone right up to His Majesty at one of the dinner parties, and offered to rebuild the entire section in return for her being leased an entire - small - section of it for her use, and the use of whatever heirs she may have, for a hundred years from the time of rebuilding. King Endymion had apparently thought it was an idea worth considering, and the negotiations had started in earnest, and -
It was then that entire situation had gone utterly haywire. It had had something to do with kickbacks and institutionalized minor corruption on one hand and Custom and Tradition on the other, and Nephrite still couldn't really get his thought processors around the fact that people had actually tried to have Lady Beryl killed just because she was trying to get part of the Stadium 'fixed' for a rather unorthodox 'price', but that was exactly what had happened, so what the hell.
And all's well that end's well, anyway, he supposed. When the dust had settled - with no little help from his Prince and the whole team, if he said so himself - Lady Beryl and co had ended up 'redoing' the entire Main Stadium, the 'reward' for that being a 100-year lease on a rather larger section then they'd been considering at first. 'Lady Beryl's Pavillion' took up nearly half of what had been the old Lower Servants section, and there had been some grumbling at first, till it was revealed that (1) the 'redone' Stadium had much more room in general then before, thanks to clever engineering and (2) Lady Beryl's team had rearranged almost all the sections, with the new Lower Servants section being overlapping the Middle Servants section, which meant that though there weren't as many choice seats as before, there were actually something like a third more seats in general. Since all the Stadium widescreens had been 'upgraded' as well, most Cars in even the worst seats could see what was going on with no problem, now - and so there had been very little complaint after that. Well, not from the Lower Servants, anyhow...
"Heey, Nephrite, help me here!" Jedite called, wheeling around in agitation.
Oops. Time to stop wiregathering. Nephrite wheeled down the ramp, smiling at the page. So what could be the problem, now...
"Hey, Kunzite, Kunz, wake up damn you... Did you or did you not send invitations and tickets to that orphanage you grew up in?"
"...Hmph." Kunzite mumbled, still half asleep. "They asked me to..."
And why oh why oh why why why couldn't you tell me that beforehand, pray?
"So you just expected them to fend for themselves in the Open Section?" The 'Open Section' was open to anybody who could buy or get a ticket, and tended to turn into a madhouse whenever there was a big event, and this was one of the biggest events of the entire year, damn it all.
Well, probably not. This was Kunzite they were talking about, after all. He'd probably just sent them the tickets and invitations - and then had forgotten all about it, ten minutes later.
Alright, alright, where could he place them, now...
"Lady Beryl's? I can't think of anyplace else..." Jedite murmured.
"Well, neither can I, but where is the Prince, anyway? Kunzite?"
"Mmmmm..." Kunzite murmured. "Wait a minute...Zoi?"
"He isn't here either." Nephrite muttered, wheeling about.
"Hmmm. I think he was saying something about..." Kunzite hiccuped, softly. "Your parents, actually. They're both here, aren't they?"
Nephrite stared, then. His parents what? Yes they were both here, they both had just had to decide to come at the very last moment and it had been a utter nightmare getting there even a little cubby for themselves in S-G-22-17, please don't even mention all the string-pulling and favor-trading he'd had to do to get them both even 'probably presentable', thank you, and, and -
"They got edged out by some of Vice Minister Tottlewheel's hanger-ons, or something. I think."
They got 'edged out'. They got edged out.
Nephrite tried to find some wall to bash his front against, then. No wall. Oh, well, Kunzite would do in a pinch -
" - Ouch."
"Shaddup, you. I'm thinking."
"Can't you think without banging on my sides?"
"- No. " Nephrite banged him again, just to make himself feel better. Why the hell not.
"So just where are the Prince and Zoicite now, and - "
"...Son? ...Just what are you doing?"
Uh, oh.
Nephrite shuddered, swallowed, and turned around.
His parents were both there, two big boxy goodlooking SUVs that practically shouted 'serious offroader' to the skies, and twice as large as life. They were gleaming in their new paint, his father a deep brown-black with faint purple highlights, his mother some kind of muted green and blue medley shading into dark brown. Nephrite took a good look at both of them. (Not flashy, not gaudy, no rust or dents in sight, just plain minor-noble-from-the-provinces/retired-military-Car and wife type understated elegance, yes, thank goodness, he owwed Alicone and his girls'n'boys a bonus - )
And then his father slowly and dilibrately saluted him. Nephrite googled before following suit.
"...No banging on teammates just because you can't find a wall, son."
Nephrite swallowed. "I'm sorry sir, it wouldn't happen again - " Kunzite sniffed at that but thankfully declined to comment.
His mother smiled at him, then. "You look well, Neph. - And those colors and patterns suit you."
"Thank you Mother, you look wonderful yourself - "
His father sniffed, then, murmuring something that sounded like 'paintmobile', but it didn't sound like his heart was in it, somehow. Nephrite grinned.
"And you look good yourself today, father!"
"Well, I should, with all the hours - " His father leaned closer to him, then, whispering. "Never tell your mother how much that makeover cost, alright? I can guess, sadly enough - she doesn't have to."
"Yessir." Nephrite whispered back. Sometimes his father could be oddly canny, strangely enough... "But make sure to take lots of pictures?"
"Oh, I will, I will." His father grinned, then. "It's not like your mother doesn't like looking good, you know... And you are looking good. - In a vaguely minivan way."
Nephrite sighed yet again. This again?
"Not a minivan, father..."
"One cup minivan, one cup station-wagon, one cup SUV and set to puree. That's youu..." His father sang at him softly, window-eyes twinkling.
"Which makes me a 'crossover' SUV. Not a minivan. Nobody who sees me would ever think 'minivan' as a first choice, you know that, fatherr..."
"...Except when you look inside, that is..."
Well, probably, but...
Well, on the other hand, there was a method to his father's madness, though he hadn't realized that till much later. He'd been told so many times that he was a minivan-stationwagon-SUV combo when he was young that by the time anybody he thought to insult him by telling him he was 'more then half car' and 'not a real offroader at all', the reaction had been 'So what? Can't you tell by looking?' Which had discomforted those particular bullies mightly, as he recalled...
Not to mention that it really had made certain relatives and neighbors shut up rather quickly about - certain subjects...
"Oh - and who is that terribly good-looking and helpful young male Car, anyway? And the girlish looking one - oops, I shouldn't have said that. ... You really should introduce us to your teammates, you know?"
Nephrite swallowed yet again, and turned, slowly. Yes, there was the Prince, talking to one of Lady Beryl's servants, what was her name, and there was Zoicite, and -
Nephrite sighed, then. Yes, alright, alright. First things first.
And don't forget the nuns and orphans from Kunzite's old orphanage either, right...
Cars rarely do such things as turn over in their sleep.
Which is a good thing, most of the time...
The Car slept on.
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(Posted Mon, 30 Oct 2006 14:26)
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らんま1/2 © Rumiko Takahashi
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