Sitting in his room at the PokéCenter, Ranma blinked his eyes as he just stared at his Shaguar in shock. He had been meaning to tell them the truth, but Sheila, wanting to save her master any grief, gave them an ‘altered’ story.
Blinking his eyes once, twice, thrice, Gar finally asked, “Twin Brother?”
“Yes...” Sheila told her brother as she nodded her head. “A long lost twin... as well as nicer, more skilled, and not a three-inch limp dick.”
Gar nodded his head. “Yes, as he ran, I remember his taunting cry of, ‘she’s mine now, and I’ll show her the wrath of my three-inch fury’...”
Ranma visibly twitched. How could his other self be so PROUD of three inches?
“Well that makes sense...” The Mistress PokéWoman conceded. “Wsually when faced with people after his head, Sextome often pulled out his girls or just knee-capped someone and ran off... you didn’t.” Ayane said to Ranma
Well THAT explained the small .35 in his bag...
Ranma sweat-dropped and chuckled nervously. “Yeah... so as you can see, I freed Sheila and the other girls from... my twin brother...” oh Kami, did that sound like a strange thing to say.
Nodding his head, the redheaded PokéGirl Tamer slowly said, “I see...” sitting up, he asked, “So, I take it you’ll do the honorable thing?”
Blinking his eyes, the pigtailed Tamer asked, “Honorable thing?”
“Yes,” Gar said. “You’ll let me take my sister back home?”
“I’m not going!” Sheila exclaimed as she held onto Ranma’s arm tightly. “I wanna stay with Ranma, and that’s final!"
Ranma blinked his eyes in surprise at that. She called him by his name finally?
Gar blinked his eyes in surprise at his younger sibling’s reaction. “But Sheila, you were just TAKEN! And you were HUMAN before... I can’t believe you’d want to stick around the man... er, the brother of the man that took everything from you.”
“He’s not the one who took me and since I have been changed, its... hard to go back.” The Shaguar let out a sad little sigh as she looked up at her brother. “If I’m an untaken girl, someone else will just PokéBall me and take me or...who knows what. PokéGirls have limited rights as it is, and without a master almost none.”
The Mistress frowned, understanding where the small girl was coming from. “She has us there, Gar. She could be gang-raped on the street and the police wouldn't arrest the shit-bags.” Ayane pointed out seriously.
Slowly, Gar nodded his head. “That is true, but she wouldn’t be an untaken PokéGirl. I could take her to see our uncle, Professor Gaja Cherrywood. He could hold her for a time and find her a good Tamer from around home...”
Raising his hand, Ranma asked, “Excuse me?” When Gar turned to face him, he asked, “Why can’t I just keep Sheila?”
“Because she’s my sister, and I can get what’s best for her back home,” Gar answered seriously.
Growling with a hard edge to her voice, Sheila got up from the couch she was sitting on with her master and stepped over to her brother before STOMPING on his foot. “I-AM-NOT-LEAVING-RANMA!!” The Shaguar screamed
“OW!” Gar shouted as he jumped up to his feet before hopping up and down on one foot. “Sheila! What’s wrong with you!?”
“I think she wants to stay with me...” Ranma suggested helpfully. He chuckled nervously at the look his Shaguar was giving her older brother.
Staring at her brother coldly, Sheila waited for him to stop jumping up and down before continuing. “Gar...” she said his name with an icy tone. “I’m happy you came to find me, but I’m not in danger anymore and.... well... I’m not a kid either. I can choose what I want to do.”
Gar looked down at his sister. “But...” he sighed as he gingerly put his injured foot back on the ground. Placing a hand on Sheila’s shoulder, he told her, “I just want to take you someplace you’ll be safe and cared for...”
“I thought I was doing that...” Ranma grumbled to himself.
“Ranma is caring for me,” Sheila told her brother seriously. “I haven’t felt this good since... since... forever...”
Gar blinked his eyes. The way she said that having struck a cord with him. “Really?”
The Shaguar nodded her head at her brother. “Yeah... I mean, when I hit puberty, I was still considered scrawny and stuff... only you and your girls acknowledged I was pretty”
Hearing that, Gar slowly looked over to Ranma. “You think my sister is beautiful?”
Nodding his head, Ranma answered without hesitation. “Of course!”
Considering that answer, Gar saw this Sextome in a new light. He could tell the man was being honest. “Well, Ranma, I guess...”
*BRIIIING*!
Ranma blinked his eyes at that. “What the?”
*BRIIIING*!
“The phone?” Ranma asked.
Upon hearing the verbal word, ‘phone’, the communications system in the room went into action. A portion of one of the walls opened up, showing a blank screen. Fritzing into life, the image on screen was of the only person that Ranma has had to talk to so far on this system. And it was someone he was hoping he wouldn’t have to talk to again. Especially NOW!
“Ranma!” PokéGirl Breeder Soun Tendo’h shouted as soon as he saw Ranma on his end. “I’m pleased to be talking to you!”
“...Really...?” Ranma asked, eyeing the figure on the screen distrustfully.
As the two started talking, both the Mistress Ayane and her master Gar’s eyes narrowed in suppressed anger. Soun’s reputation was well know, including the probably true rumors about his more underhanded and dirty dealings...
“Yes!” Soun responded. “I watched the PokéBattle on TV yesterday. I must say I’m impressed with you. You gained such a magnificent victory with such an insignificant PokéGirl. Well done!”
Ranma frowned. “She’s not insignificant!”
Sitting up in her seat, Sheila was streaming at the insult, but held her tongue. She didn’t want to give this bastard any opening to see that something was off.
“Oh, of course she’s not,” Soun responded, his tone of voice a mocking one, conveying that he ‘got the joke’. “But seriously now, I want to thank you for going to such lengths to make that little titless kitten look spectacular.”
His eyes going wide, Gar growled with an, “EXCUSE ME!?”
“What?” Soun turned his head. “Oh! I didn’t realize you were with someone right now. A prospective buyer for the Shaguar, right?”
“WHAT!?” Ranma shouted.
“Of course!” The old PokéGirl Breeder said. Puffing in pride, he responded, “I should have known that after you made that little useless PokéGirl look so spectacular, people would be lining up to buy her.”
Her eyes wide with fear, Sheila paled at those words. Soun would… he would... s-sell her? After a few moments of allowing what the PokéGirl Breeder said to register, the Shaguar finally managed to retort with a tactful and diplomatic, “No fucking way!”
“Yes, fucking way!” Soun responded angrily as he glared at the Shaguar that would dare to speak that way to her betters. “And Ranma, and potential buyer,” Soun said, turning his attention back to the two humans. “It seems like you’ll need to ‘discipline’ that one some more so she doesn’t speak when not spoken to...”
His fists clenching tight in anger, Gar’s eye twitched. This old man would outright condone having his little sister beaten!?
Sitting back up, Soun smiled. “Thanks for being useful, Sextome. I was going to ask you to send that girl back to the Ranch, but you’ve obviously got everything under control here. It’s about time you got back on the ball...” he smiled a bit as he told Ranma, “Just make sure to deposit the payment for her purchase into the Ranch’s main account once she’s bought, all right?”
His eyes narrowed as he stared at the man who would speak like that to the poor petite PokéGirl, Ranma told Soun, “I ain’t selling her.”
His eyes widening, Soun shouted, “What do you mean you’re not selling her!?”
“I ain’t sellin' her!” Ranma responded as he stood up from the couch he was sitting on with Sheila. “Not now not ever! I’m sick of you talking about my harem like they’re meat at the market!” Openly glaring at this world’s equivalent of Soun, Ranma added truthfully, “In fact, I’m sick of you!”
Now Soun... he wasn’t angry right off the bat, because the response h got had him very confused. “But you were the one telling me that you didn’t want her... you were begging me to give you that stacked Icemaiden before you went out, but I told you she already had a prospective buyer... why wouldn’t you want to sell her?”
“......That wasn’t me.” Was all Ranma said after a long pause.
Tilting his head to the side, Soun blinked his eyes as he tried to figure that one out. “What?”
Meeting the older man’s gaze, Ranma continued. “And just forget that conversation, since it don’t matter no more. I ain’t selling Sheila, nor any of my girls.”
His eyes going wide, Soun leaned forward in his seat. “What do you mean!? Your job is to collect rare and valuable PokéGirls from the dumb schmucks around the world ‘fairly’ in PokéBattle and send them back to me to sell to other dumb schmucks for profit!”
“Well consider this my resignation! I QUIT!” The pigtailed PokéGirl Tamer shouted angrily. His anger so piqued, he tried to find the words to best describe how he felt. “So... so... fuck you!” Ranma shouted before turning to a small lamp-table by the couch.
“WHAT!?” Was all Soun managed to get out before said lamp table was thrown into the screen, causing it to break and disconnect permanently.
Ranma was breathing heavily, just so... ANGERED! What the hell was with that asshole Soun? He thought his own self was bad, but the ‘Tendo’h’ was even WORSE!
Finally coming to his senses after the call between Sextome and Tendo’h was finished, Gar turned to Sheila and told her, “We’re leaving.”
Her eyes widening as she heard that demand, the little Shaguar shot to her feet. “I’m not leaving!” Sheila declared as she clung onto Ranma.
At seeing her owner about to say something stupid, the Mistress placed her hand on his shoulder. “Master... Garfield...” Ayane said gently. “...We’re not taking her back.”
Turning to look at his Alpha PokéWoman, the freckled redheaded PokéGirl Tamer asked, “What? Why?”
“I’ve seen that look before,” Ayane told her master seriously. “It’s the one Carla, Luan, and I have over you.” The Mistress frowned as she looked over to the Shaguar and the pigtailed Tamer she was so attached to. “The only way she’d ever leave him was is if she were dead.”
“What?” Gar asked his PokéWoman. “But if I leave her here, that asshole, and she might...” as his Mistress PokéWoman’s words registered in his mind, Gar’s bravado and conviction deflated. “Really?”
“Yes!” Ayane shouted right before she let off a sigh. “Gar... she’s in love with him... and he obviously cares for her too. He’s not the Sextome who snatched her, that much is obvious... taking her away would be... just as cruel as when she was ‘Balled”
Gar stopped at that. He slowly turned to look at the pigtailed Tamer. “Do you care for my sister?”
Nodding his head, Ranma told Gar, “Without a doubt.”
Sighing, Gar shook his head. “Okay, okay... I’ll let Sheila stay with you... BUT...” he brought his head back up, looking Ranma straight in the eyes. “I’m sticking around...”
Blinking his eyes, Ranma asked, “What?”
“You heard me,” Gar said. “I want to see how well you treat my sister. Until I’m satisfied, I’m sticking around.”
Considering her brother’s words, the petite PokéGirl nodded her head. “Fair enough.”
“Er...” Ranma thought about that, and while it was a rather strange proclamation, it wasn’t very different from anything back in his original home. And since Sheila seemed inclined to agree, he guessed he couldn’t really say much else.
Smiling lightly at knowing she’d get to stay with her owner, Sheila turned her head and nuzzled Ranma’s arm. “Master?”
Ranma looked down at his petite PokéGirl. “Yeah, Sheila?”
“It’s been a long day...” the Shaguar admitted. “And you probably should Tame the other girls and give them some attention, since I’ve been getting the royal treatment as of late.” She smiled while squeezing his hand in thanks for all the love and attention. “And I do want to talk to Gar for a bit, so why don’t you go take care of the others while I talk with my brother and set some rules and all?”
Ranma sighed. “Okay...” he said slowly as he considered things. “Maybe I’ll take Jetta out to the Hot Stuff Café... let her know what’s going on and get some dinner...”
Oh he had so MUCH he needed to tell his Alpha PokéWoman... and honestly, he was a little afraid of how she was going to take it...
“That sounds like a great idea!” Sheila said with a large smile. She was sure the Lupina would enjoy the place as much as she had.
At his Shaguar’s agreement, Ranma nodded his head. Then, looking over to Gar, he asked, “You aren’t going to take Sheila away, are you?”
“It’s tempting,” Gar admitted. “But I’m going to keep to my word and give this a chance...”
“All right...” Ranma said slowly. Bending over, he gave his PokéGirl a kiss on the cheek. “Take care, all right? If you feel hungry later, you can call room service...”
“Thanks Master, I will!” Sheila kissed her master back on the cheek and gave him a reassuring smile.
Smiling at Sheila, Ranma bent over and gave her a tight hug. “Later, Sheila...” he looked at the trio still in his room one last time before finally exiting the area. He closed the door behind him.
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(Posted Fri, 23 Feb 2007 18:24)
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