Kohran glanced over at him, wondering how much he'd really understand. There was little doubt that he was interested, but the question was just how much attention he was giving this. She'd known him for so long that she understood how to interpret his wording without trying, and right now, she had to imagine that he couldn't be too intrigued by the technical bits. But he did seem to want to know more, and he'd always been attentive to them, no matter what sort of stupidity his father had pushed onto him.
So the Kitten shrugged her shoulders before speaking again. "It is not so much what we decided, as what we have to consider."
"That makes... no sense what so ever," he grumbled, furrowing his brow in response.
"Sorry, but it also explains some. You see, we think, beyond his attempts to hurt you, Hibiki would be a good choice to have a pokegirl."
"You mentioned that. You want him to compete against me?"
"And against us. We need some rivals too," Kohran told him.
"The thing is that I'm pretty sure that the universe doesn't need help with that. It can make opponents for you guys all on its own...."
"That might be true...."
"Then why invite someone else to come here?" Ranma asked. "More enemies ain't exactly a good thing."
"Yes, but any pokegirl that he has could be a friendly opponent."
"Hold on a sec...."
"With such an arrangement, we can be competitive with someone outside of our group, and still hang around. It's a good arrangement, yes?"
It was clear by his frown that Ranma wasn't quite convinced. From the wary look in his eyes, one could see the protectiveness he had towards his girls rearing its head, but he was doing an admirable job of holding it in. At the same time, he also seemed to be unclear on what exactly this would entail, and so he kept his mouth shut... for the moment.
"That's not all," the Normal type hurried to explain.
He just crossed his arms over his chest.
"Really, it isn't. You see, this would be good for the pokegirl too. She'd be free from a world where a lot of people would think of her as 'property'."
"What kind of idiot would think something like that?" he snapped.
Hearing that sort of response was just what a pokegirl liked to hear, and those in earshot got all tingly inside over his care and concern for them.
Shaking off the distraction after a moment's joy, Kohran gave a small and sad smile. "Plenty of people back there think of us as tools and toys. Many don't think like that, but the others.... There's enough of them to make it bad."
"I can guess," he admitted.
"Because of that, it can be very lonely to be a pokegirl. And that's why going through with the idea of giving Hibiki a pokegirl might be a good one."
"It gives him another person to play with," Iris pointed out.
"Huh? went the sole male in the area.
"If you actually look at him, you'd quickly see that Hibiki is very lonely. He's never stayed long enough to make friends, and until Iris... 'fixed' him, he hadn't been able to stay long enough to do so."
"Then you're giving him a... friend?" Ranma murmured.
"Something like that. Seeing as he's been on the road a lot, he hasn't had time for buddies. But having someone who'd stay with him through it all would be the perfect way to give him a stable life."
"It sounds like you guys are playing 'matchmakers'."
"You got us there. Just think of what this could mean. He could wind up becoming more relaxed, and give him a chance to talk to people more."
"Then it's all well and good."
Peering over at the pair, the blonde A-bra shrugged. "If you don't mind inviting bad girls too."
"Huh?"
"Some pokegirls really are bad," Kohran allowed. "Part of it comes from their breeds, but most of the others are just nasty girls who don't think of innocents in their list of things to do."
"On the other hand, we don't want to bring every free pokegirl here, not knowing what sort of reception they'll get when they arrive."
"What could go wrong? We're keeping an eye on it everyday."
For some reason, those words didn't quite fill Ranma with confidence.
With the feed coming from the other world, she could hear what was going on. It wasn't like it was coming directly towards her, but she'd managed to listen in anyway. Doing so gave her the chance to 'eavesdrop', so to speak, and she'd kept on doing it... even if she wasn't a Mechanique.
Then again, she was a Legendary, and that sort of power more than counted a little for something.
Due to her status, she had plenty of power to do many things, and in this instance, the 'conversation' between the two groups was of great interest for her. In a lot of ways, it represented a way out for more than one pokegirl, and the allure of being on a world free of the assumptions and indulgences of this one was tempting. Why, it was a world where a pokegirl wasn't a stereotypical way for fathers of means to give their sons a chance to 'break into adulthood'.
And that meant that these latest developments were of great interest to her, and she was quite... curious about that 'Saotome' boy.
Musing to herself about what was going on, she gave no outward sign of how her thoughts were going, while:
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(Posted Mon, 15 Feb 2010 08:25)
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