Julia stepped closer, kneeling beside the big plinth to smile at the little boy on his own level. “I’m sorry, no. I’m not your mother.”
“Oh.”
“I’ve never been to Japan before. Theo told me there were a lot of great fighters here, so I had him bring me here to train.”
“But you’re a girl!”
Julia nodded. “Yes. Well, a woman. I’m a little too old to be a girl any more.”
“Girls can’t fight,” objected Ranma seriously.
Julia frowned. “Who told you that?”
Ranma blinked slowly. “I- my- my sensei?” he said uncertainly.
The two adults exchanged a glance. ‘Amnesia,’ mouthed Theo. Julia nodded.
A couple of hours later, Theo bowed respectfully towards the Japanese mage who had arrived at his call, and turned to the car waiting to take him, his wife, and the young victim to their hotel room. A woman in discrete clothing waited beside the driver’s door; she would move into the suite next to them as an official minder for the boy, but Theo’s credentials were sufficient that his hosts had asked him to care for the Japanese child – a signal honour, by Japanese standards, and one he intended to uphold properly.
Like all major countries, Japan denied the existence of magic in official matters. Also like most major countries, it had an agency to deal with such non-existent matters in a suitably discrete way. The American approach was an agency that didn’t officially exist; the British relied on a ‘gentleman’s club’ of the old school, where responsible men did things in the national interest without official intervention; the Japanese noted that their Emperor was notionally tasked with the defence of the islands from mystical threats, and quietly empowered the Imperial Household Agency to assist. The first ninja had arrived minutes after Theo found the telephone box to call his contacts; now, as dawn broke, men in anonymous suits or workmen’s overalls busied themselves in that curiously Japanese efficiency as normal commuters ignored them politely. The event would never be mentioned in the media – unlike in America, where some cover story would necessarily be invented to discourage curiosity, the Japanese public would simply assume it was none of their business anyway.
Theo smiled at the two women and folded himself into the small automobile. Julia exchanged a final assessing glance with the remaining (now disguised) shinobi, and followed, checking the boy now curled up in blankets – as well as Theo’s trenchcoat, which he seemed to have latched onto as a security blanket. The driver – another of the shinobi, now clad in street clothes but still with a selection of weapons hidden about her person – sat down, and waited for an elderly gentleman in the robes of a Shinto priest to debark safely from another car before pulling away.
“I wasn’t expecting this when you said Japan might be an interesting place to visit, Theo.”
Theo chuckled. “Neither was I,” he admitted. “Although perhaps I should have expected more than a simple tour of the better dojo. I seem to have some little mishap or adventure every time I travel west of Hawaii.”
“It would have been nice to know that before we set out, dear,” remarked his wife dryly, smoothing her clothing. “I wonder if this will end up affecting our family…”
“Unlikely,” assured her husband. “The Japanese will be disinclined to ask a foreigner to assist much in a case like this.”
“So why are they giving us the job of looking after him now?”
Theo leaned over and kissed her cheek. “It is unusual – but it is also an expression of great trust, on their part. Of both of us, Armsmaster.”
“Ah,” nodded the Jaden warrior, understanding.
(Posted Mon, 05 Mar 2007 11:52)
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