At the Earth-Neptune end of the "Slot"…
The small, egg-shaped starship flew onward as it passed the outer limits of the Oort cloud of the solar system containing both Neptune and Earth. Within this shell was a small, duck-shaped star boat, which had been placed within such a protective shell since the lone passenger inside was passing very close to Iprædies-claimed space (and Noukiite-claimed space, though the passenger knew the Noukiites would never do anything to one so young as he) en route to join his cousin and new cousin-in-law on Earth.
As he gazed at the small electronics board before him — the controls were very highly automated given his youth — Redet Ten could only sigh. He got the news about the tag race and Lum's losing to some really nice Earth man named Saotome Ranma a few hours ago. He also learned of Lum's marriage to Moroboshi Ataru's twin sister Tariko, which concerned the young kindergarten-aged boy a lot. He had met Ataru a year ago, back on Okusei when Lum had taken Ten to the Academy there to meet her adopted twin sister Hensô and her then-girlfriend, Seu-P'ye Yesu-T'ek Hechnich'-Nut'yek ("Kuhu" to her closest friends and future in-laws, of course). And while Ataru did seem like an okay guy deep down, he had resented Ten for taking the attention of all the girls away from him. Of course, Ten would have normally fried him with his flame-breath for being such a creep, but one didn't DO that to a man with DRAGON'S blood inside his veins.
Ten wasn't THAT stupid, after all.
Thinking of that, he then tapped a control to bring up a picture transmitted by his uncle back to Uru concerning Lum's new wife. She was depicted in her dress uniform, complete with her pilot's wings on her left side over her breast. Imagine that. She was Lum's age and she was a qualified small ship COMMAND PILOT! Thinking about that, Ten could only breathe out. Wow! You had to be REALLY smart to be that!
Hopefully, she'd turn out better than Rei…
Aboard Fort Erie (Welland time: 7:53 PM)…
"AH-CHOO!"
Lum looked over. "Bless you, Darling! Are you alright?!"
Tariko moaned, and then she sat back in her chair as she stretched. They were now in the Air Department's administrative office, located right below the hangar. "Need a kiss," she said as she bent her head back to give her wife a knowing look.
"Tcha!" the Oni said as she walked over to stand behind her, and then she leaned down to warmly kiss her on the lips. "Feel better?"
"Not really," Tariko stated. "Feeling better would be you and me, naked in bed with a two-headed dildo — or even better, a portable parthenogenesis device…"
Lum's breath caught in her throat. "Darling…!"
A chuckle. "Sorry, Lum. When everyone brings their kids aboard, I get reminded yet AGAIN that I now have a body that can bear a child." She straightened herself, and then turned around so she could reach over and pull her wife into her lap. "If there was one thing that made me finally realise I was a girl, it was being at Welland County General when Heather delivered her daughter and she asked me to be the godmother."
Lum smiled. "Much that I actually wouldn't mind having a man be the father of my child, I know that's going to be one really big step for you to take, Darling. So if we decide to start a family, when should we get ready for it?"
A sigh. "Depends on what happens at Squadron," Tariko note. "Jun's switching over to full-time service when she graduates this June from the Academy, so she'll be going straight to R.M.C. for her degree; she's already got the acceptance letter." A chuckle. "Man, that's going to be weird to see at Kingston: A second lieutenant as part of the Cadet Wing with actual PILOT'S WINGS earned from 15 Wing and 12 Wing on her uniform! Not to mention actually being formally COMMISSIONED before getting her degree!" As Lum laughed as she recalled meeting Tariko's commanding officer, Lieutenant-Colonel Mikoshiba Jun, at the Academy, Tariko added, "Miyuki's next in line to get promoted, which means one of the det bosses like me will get moved up to Flight Commander." Major Sakura Miyuki was flight commander of B Flight of 119 Squadron, which provided the six shuttle detachments to all of the 122nd Space Operations Group. Tariko then sighed before she gave Lum a look. "If it's me, we'll do it then, okay."
Lum blinked. "Darling…you want to do it first…?"
"Lum, we're both going to be wearing the pants in this relationship," her wife reminded her. "You're right; I doubt I will EVER want to have sex with a guy. It'd have to be one really, REALLY exceptional guy, I have to admit." As both girls laughed, she then shrugged. "Besides, who the hell says that raising kids has to be done by the stay-at-home parent? We'll both be living together no matter where we go, so what?"
"Are you thinking of the College?"
A hum. "Maybe. There's also the option of going to Brock and getting my degree there while staying in the Squadron before I switch over full-time after I get…"
A buzzer then sounded off. "Officer of the Watch to Air Officer."
Tariko tapped a control on her desk. "Air Officer. What is it, Shōko?"
"Sorry to bother you and the missus, Tariko," Sub-Lieutenant Takiguchi Shōko, the ship's navigator and current Officer of the Watch, called down from the operations room. "Flash traffic from NORAD. We've got an incoming ship from the direction of Toshitto; it just passed the Ceres orbit line and is heading towards Earth. Small ship and it's communicating with Kashin. We're trying to get Lum's father on-line…"
"Never mind. We're coming up," Tariko said as she and Lum got up…
Minutes later, on the bridge…
"Ten-chan?!"
"Hi, Lum-chan!" Ten called back from the cockpit of his ship. "How are you?!"
"I'm fine, but what are you doing here on Earth?!" Lum demanded, ignoring the giggles and snickers from the bridge crew as they all gazed on the image of the young Oni boy on the main view screen. "I thought you were still staying with your mother…!"
Ten awked, his face turning very pale. "W-w-well…!"
Standing beside her wife, Tariko could only sigh before she gazed knowingly at Shinobu, who was at her usual place in the captain's chair. "His mom's a firefighter and she's a fanatic about arsonists. And he, unfortunately, breathes fire from his mouth."
Shinobu blinked. "You mean like your brother does when he's drunk?"
Ten screamed as he hid himself behind the periscope-like device that he used to navigate his star boat. "IS HE THERE, LUM-CHAN?!" he cried out in fright.
Lum giggled. "Oh, relax, Ten-chan!" she gently scolded as Ten peeked out from behind his periscope. "Darling's brother isn't here! He lives full-time on Okusei!"
Ten breathed out in relief. "So why are you coming here, Ten-chan?" Shinobu asked.
"Um…w-w-well…y-you see…"
Tariko gazed at Shinobu. "He's too scared to admit what his powers are like to his mother," she said before she gave Ten a sympathetic look.
Ten jolted, and then he giggled in embarrassment. "Well, as long as you don't start a fire on my ship, young man, you can come aboard," Shinobu then said. "Shōko?"
"Aye, Cap'n?" the navigator called back.
"Call flight stations, please!"
"Aye, ma'am!"
Some minutes later…
"So why are we being asked to go down to the flight deck, Mom?"
Heather Mitchell could only shrug as she walked her five year-old daughter Sarah down the hallway to the hatch that connected the flight deck reception area — which would serve as the quarterdeck on Fort Erie when the ship was in space and away from a spacedock — to the main part of the ship's hull. The air force corporal was one of the fire fighters aboard the corvette, a division of nine specialists (one sergeant as fire chief, one master corporal as deputy fire chief, three corporals as section chiefs and four privates as apprentice fire fighters) that served as the fire prevention, damage control specialist and hazardous substance prevention team aboard the ship. She was also one of the ten million Avalonians who had been pregnant when they had been liberated five years before; she had given birth to her daughter in Welland four months after moving to Earth full-time. "I don't know, Sarah," the corporal replied. "But I'll bet it's something special if your Aunt Tariko wanted you to be there."
Sarah nodded, smiling as she thought of her godmother. She had her father's shaggy raven-black hair which was cut stylishly short, though she had her mother's soft face and deep brown eyes (Heather was brown-haired). Of course, she had long since had her ears rounded out; when she had been created ten years before, Heather had been shaped as a Niphentaxian-form Avalonian so that she could fit better in the home of her master (and spiritual husband), Mori dai-Murigsh (Heather's birth-name was Saari). Sarah was quite the energetic child, who was always excited when she got a chance to be aboard her mother's ship; given the close empathic bonds that formed between Avalonian mothers and young children (which usually faded after the child endured the Awakening), Navy regulations had been altered for reserve starships to allow children to come aboard when ships were still alongside the pier, even when a ship was the Ready Duty Ship.
Of course, Sarah Hines — along with her fourteen "shipmates" (as she called the other children of Fort Erie crewmembers) — understood that when she was on a warship, she had to be on her very best behaviour. In fact, she took it so seriously that Shinohara Izumi had declared the young girl the "Kindergarten RPO" for the dependent children; she even wore a variation of the old Royal Canadian Navy regulating petty officer's crossed cutlass-and-quill-in-a-wreath of laurel insignia on her black NCD jacket, with the gold letters K.R.P.O. written in an arc over it where the maple leaf would have been had it been an actual trade badge insignia (which is what Canadian Navy personnel right up to CPO1 rank wore on the collars of their dress jackets).
Once they passed through the hatchway into the reception area, Heather then spotted the ship's real RPO standing by the closed hatchway leading into the hangar deck. "Hey, Izumi!" she called out as the other woman gazed at her. "What's going on?"
Before Izumi could answer, Sarah stood to attention before the older woman and saluted; even if she was a civilian, she always wore naval combat dress (with no epaulette slip-ons, of course) and the ship's baseball cap on her head whenever she was aboard Fort Erie (as did all the other dependent children when they were aboard). "Kindergarten Regulating Petty Officer Sarah Hines reporting as ordered, Petty Officer Shinohara."
Izumi hid back her amused smile as she gave a solemn salute back. "Stand at ease, Petty Officer Hines. We've got your godmother's cousin-in-law arriving now."
"What?!" Heather gasped…
…just as the hatchway opened, revealing a delightfully grinning Lum, who was holding the hand of a very young yet quite handsome Oni boy with one horn on the back of his head, currently dressed now in a tiger-striped jumper. He was floating about a half-metre off the deck. Right behind them was a smiling Tariko and Shinobu, followed by the chief hull technician, Petty Officer 1st Class Kagawa Kyōko (who was in charge of the project that would turn the aft missile well into a special storage area for Lum's personal scout ship), as well as the chief fire fighter (and Heather's division petty officer), Sergeant Kimoto Yukari. "So you have to get changed into the uniform I'm wearing since it's a fire hazard and the clothes come with built-in safety features that…oh, hi, everyone!" the older Oni said on noting people waiting for everyone.
Ten blinked as he took in the two people there. He had quickly noted the difference of colours on the rank slip-ons on everyone's shoulders; Tariko had explained the colours indicated if you were Navy (black), Air Force (medium blue) or Army (charcoal green). Straight stripes (with the loops on the upper stripes for the Navy officers) were commissioned officers; crowns meant senior petty officers (who, if this was anything like the Urusian Defence Force, deserved to be treated with VERY great respect); and the hooked stripes (with or without the maple leaves) meant they were enlisted people. However, much to his surprise, there was a girl HIS age standing beside the younger Air Force girl, dressed in naval combat dress with a cap on her head and a strange badge on the upper arms of her jacket. He quickly noted she was now glaring at him with the same time of indignant anger he had seen on senior petty officers aboard his uncle's ship whenever the junior ranks were out of line. Ten immediately straightened himself; whoever she was — even if she was HIS age! — she was clearly somebody important.
"On the deck, you!"
He jolted, and then he floated down to land before Sarah. "S-s-sorry…"
"Don't say you're sorry!" Sarah stated. "Ship's Standing Orders specifically state that there will be no flying anywhere except the flight deck or the gymnasium by anyone who has that sort of paranormal power. There are overhangs you'll bump your head into if you don't watch out for them." She pointed up to indicate wires and several other conduits that were left exposed so that technicians could get at them.
"Oh," Ten said as he looked up.
The older people all exchanged knowing looks and smiles, and then Shinobu knelt down beside Sarah. "So, RPO Hines, what do we do with our new shipmate?"
Sarah hummed. "Well, we have to go to the Ship's Office first so that Aunt Mizuho can get his personnel file set up, then down to Sick Bay so that Aunt Mako can give him a full medical check-up. Don't want any weird alien disease to get out, especially with the Terran members of the crew. Then down to Stores so Aunt Mai can issue clothing…" She then looked at Tariko. "Oh, darn! Where's he going to rack out? Aunt Tariko and Aunt Lum only have one bed in their cabin and they'll be wanting to do all sorts of silly adult mushy stuff with each other when Aunt Tariko's off watch, so…" A hum. "Okay, we'll have to ask Aunt Terri to let him sleep with her. Let's go!"
She grabbed Ten by his arm and dragged him off. "Hey! Leggo!" Ten cried out.
The others watched him go, and then they exchanged looks before they laughed…
Sometime later…
"Hey, Terri! Who's the kid?!" Alice Morrow, one of the resource management support clerks currently assigned to the ship's office, asked before sipping her coffee.
"My new 'son,' believe it or not," Terri Hines, a corporal and the designated marksman assigned to the security and defence platoon detached from the Lincoln and Welland Regiment to serve aboard Fort Erie, replied as she walked into the junior ranks cafeteria with Ten in her arms. The Oni was now properly adored in baseball cap and naval combat dress for his size, including a jacket as the ship's internal temperature was normally kept at a cool eighteen degrees Celsius to save up on the internal heating energy. Heather followed them, hand-in-hand with Sarah. They immediately sat down at one of the tables as Heather headed off to get glasses of milk for her daughter and the newest dependant to be registered aboard the corvette. "This is actually Lum's cousin, Ten. He just flew in all the way from Uru to be with her and check out Lum's wife."
Introductions were made all around. "So what do you think of your new cousin-in-law, Ten-chan?" Kishimoto Eri, a master corporal who served as the chief air weapons systems technician in the shuttle detachment, asked as she reached over to slip off Ten's new baseball cap so she could ruffle his hair around his horn-bud.
Ten giggled. "She's nice! I'm glad Lum-chan married her instead of Rei!"
"Who's Rei?!" Nozoe Chiemi, the master corporal who served as chief avionics systems technician, then asked as she looked at everyone else.
"That metamorph that showed up in Japan along with the girl that just got married to the friend of the captain's husband," John Landry replied.
"Oh!" the others all trilled, nodding in understanding.
"Um…Master Seaman…?"
John smiled. "What is it, kid?"
"Where's the captain's husband? I…well…" Ten then chuckled.
"Well, you have some milk first to get some liquids back into you," Heather stated as she handed him a glass. "Once you're done that, Sarah will take you to the gym. He put himself down there so he wouldn't get in the way with the captain on the bridge."
Ten nodded as he took the glass in hand and began to drink. "He is pretty cute, isn't he?" Jim Woodson, the junior medical technician, noted from nearby.
The others all laughed before they turned back to their late meals. Ten could only blush as he looked around, and then he found himself looking at Sarah. She smiled at him from behind the opaque glass of her own milk, and then continued to drink…
A little later, aft of the cafeteria…
"So how come the guys with the green and blue slip-ons get called 'corporals' and 'sergeants' and all that instead of 'spacemen' and 'petty officers?'" Ten asked.
"Well, do you have marines in your military, Ten-chan?" Sarah asked as they stepped through the hatchway that allowed them to pass between the compartment holding the cafeteria to the one housing the gymnasium and swimming pool.
"Sure!"
"Would you call a gunnery sergeant a chief petty officer?"
Ten jolted. "NO WAY!" he yelped in fear. "Gunny sergeants are SCARY!"
"Yeah, and so are Army sergeants and warrant officers!" Sarah warned back. "Air Force sergeants and warrants are pretty okay; just like Navy petty officers." She stopped as she sucked air into her cheeks to puff herself up. "None of this 'Hoo-uh' gunk!"
Ten laughed. "So how many kids are aboard this ship?"
"Well, with you, there's sixteen now," Sarah said as they came up to the hatchway leading into the gymnasium. "When we sleep, we sleep in our mom's cabins; everyone's got their own private cabin aboard ship since it's so big, unless they're bond-mated and want to share a cabin. During the day, we go to kindergarten run by Aunt Izumi and the other PERIs so we still get to do some schoolwork."
Ten nodded. "Betcha learn a lot."
"Well, a lot more than normal Earth kids our age. But not like what I heard kids like you go through in kindergarten on Uru," Sarah said as she tapped a buzzer beside the closed door since the hatchway leading into the gymnasium; since it was now getting late in the evening, this part of the ship would be normally locked down as Izumi and her fellow PERI, Master Corporal Hanazono Rin, would be turning in for the night. "Aunt Rin?!" Sarah called out. "Are you still in there with Uncle Ranma?!"
"Just a moment, Sarah!" a gruff woman's voice called back.
Both children waited as a sudden burst of noise, followed by grunts and shouts that came from both Rin and what had to be some man, echoed over the intercom. "Aunt Rin is a martial artist; she studies Korean kwŏnbŏp, which is pretty similar to what the Japanese call 'kempō,'" Sarah explained. "She was REALLY happy to meet Uncle Ranma since he's been training in martial arts since he was even younger than we are!" As Ten gaped at her, she smiled. "I hope they don't hurt each other…"
The hatchway then unlocked, revealing a sweating girl in white martial arts uniform trousers with the white PERI shirt atop, her hands wrapped in protective gloves. "Hey, Sarah!" Rin, a tomboy with shaggy reddish-brown hair and deep green eyes, said with a smile as she knelt down before the fire fighter's daughter. "You should be getting ready to rack out for the evening in your mom's room!"
"I know, but Ten-chan here wanted to meet Uncle Ranma," Sarah stated.
Rin looked over, and then she smiled as footsteps heralded the arrival of Shinobu's husband. "Looks like you got a new fan, Ranma," she said. "I'll start shutting things down before we lock-up for tonight," she then advised before heading to the office.
Ranma nodded before he knelt down. "So what's your name?" he asked.
"Hi! I'm Ten! Lum-chan's my cousin!" Ten said as he found himself floating off the deck so he could stare his cousin's former opponent right in his eye.
"Ten! What did I tell you?!" Sarah snapped.
The young Oni awked, and then he dropped back to the deck. "S-s-sorry…!"
Ranma chuckled. "Well, nice to meetcha, Ten," he said as he took the young boy's hand in his own. "Your cousin actually gave me quite a workout the day of the tag race. She didn't predict I'd pull my dad's invisibility trick on her, but it was a good thing I did do that so I could get the drop on the first creep that tried to kill her."
Ten blinked — he HAD heard of that — and then he nodded. "Thanks…"
The older boy nodded. "She came to me — heck, your whole RACE came to us! — with honourable intentions and you challenged us properly. I did what had to be done!" He then turned to see that Rin was now shutting down the lights. "And by the looks of it, I think Hanazono-sensei's trying to chase us out of here, so we better go."
Rin blushed. "'Hanazono-sensei'…?!"
Sarah and Ten laughed…
Later…
"So THERE you are! Your cousin was asking where you were!"
Ten chuckled in embarrassment. "S-s-sorry about that, Terri-nēchan!" he said as Ranma carried him into Terri Hines' personal room. "I wanted to meet Ranma-niichan…"
Terri laughed as she took the young boy from the martial artist and moved to place him on the upper rack of her bed space; all quarters aboard Fort Erie save for the senior officers' spaces were designed primarily as two-person cabins despite the automation on the ship dictating no need for such a high number of people aboard. "Well, we got your star boat secured in the hangar; the shipwrights are gonna get working on the new hangar for Lum's scout and your boat tonight, so they may need you to move it out of the hangar after breakfast tomorrow, so you better get some rack time, kid!"
"Okay! 'Night, Ranma-niichan!"
"'Night," Ranma said as he stepped out of the cabin and then turned to head to the stairs up to the main hull deck, which had the primary fore-to-aft central corridor that connected all the main parts of the ship. Called "Burma Road" in following tradition from the surface navy, the corridor had little in the way of human traffic at this time of night; even if Fort Erie was on orders to deploy from dock if required, close to half the crew were pretty much in their cabins and preparing for sleep; the shift between the first and second watches would occur at 0200, twelve hours after the ship was shifted to the jetty dock at Spacedock #112. Well, that made his trip to the forward superstructure and up several decks to his wife's cabin all the faster.
Once inside, after giving John Landry a nod of greeting, he came over to gently wrap his arms around and under her arms, which made her groan; she was currently finishing up on some paperwork before she would turn in for the evening. "Anata…"
"How bad is it?" he asked as he looked at the offensive pages that were keeping his wife away from being able to sleep comfortably in his arms.
"Not too bad, but it won't get done if you're playing with my boobs!" Shinobu scolded as she gave him a knowing look, which earned her a depressed sigh. "You knew you were marrying a Navy officer when you put the ring on my finger, Ranma, so don't complain."
"Yeah, I shouldn't," he said as he moved to sit on the chair beside her desk. "'Sides, I shouldn't bitch about you being distracted by work after I left you alone for three months because Oyaji wanted to get in that last bit of field training…"
"I can't really complain, though."
"Why?"
Shinobu smirked. "It made me the envy of every girl at the Academy. Husband and bond-mate in one sweet, delightful package," she said as she moved to finish reading off the papers that had been brought up to her by Azato Miwa. She then sighed. "What are you going to do, Ranma?" she then asked. "About your father?"
He blinked as he considered that, and then he shook his head. "I dunno. He never ONCE gave me a damned clue about this whole idea of marrying either Akane or her sisters. And Jijii pretty well debunked this whole thing about 'uniting the schools' when he told both Kanami and me that he never gave Oyaji or Akane's dad their own masteries." A shake of the head. "He's probably still probably thinking of some way to get me back to Japan so that I could get married, probably to Akane since she's studying the Art." He closed his eyes. "Couldn't see myself doing that; she's practically as much a sister to me as Kanami is." A sigh. "And there's another damned problem, too."
"He still won't accept what she is, right?"
"Doubt it; then again, it's only been a few days since I got back to civilisation and I came straight out to see you as soon as Tomomi could arrange it with Tariko."
She nodded. "I just don't want you to get into a situation like what happened to Tariko with her parents," she stated as she gazed at him. "I've kept in touch with my parents all along and they've told me how much Tariko's parents just disintegrated after she left them for Canada and Ataru-kun went back to Okusei. And while Tariko did have a right to be angry at her parents for not accepting her as their daughter, there are times she does miss having a real family around her. I don't want you to feel that way when it comes to your dad, Ranma. It's just not worth the pain."
A sigh. "Yeah, I know. But even if he did teach me well, he still lied to me about a whole ton of things," he countered. "He never hinted ever that Ofukuro was still alive; when we bumped into her in Nerima, I was stunned. And there was all the crap he pulled to make sure he could get away with what he did with me. Especially that whole damned bit about the seppuku contract he forced on Ofukuro!"
Shinobu winced. "Well, she accepted your curse pretty easily enough. And she knows you can only be rid of it by having a baby with me." She then gave him a look. "Do you feel ready to become a father THIS early in life, Ranma?"
A shake of the head. "No, not this soon. I have to catch up on my schooling, maybe get a degree under my belt and be properly accredited as a master by Jijii before I could even HOPE to start up my own dōjō and hope to make it work out. And with me married to you and you here in Canada, I have to find some way to get one of the martial arts organisations HERE to accept me, which is going to take some work." He then smirked as he sat back in his chair. "Or maybe…"
"Maybe?"
"I'll go to university, join the Forces and be a PERO."
Shinobu blinked, and then she nodded. "Basic officer's training in Saint-Jean…" she trilled, and then she hummed. "Which uniform?" The Physical Education and Recreation Branch of the Canadian Forces was a "purple" trade group so all those who worked as either PERIs or PEROs had a choice of which uniform they would wear.
Ranma smirked. "I'm partial to Navy blue myself."
A nod. "Navy Environmental training at the Fleet School, probably in either Halifax or Québec City, then straight to Borden right afterward…"
"What about you?" he wondered.
A smirk. "There is H.M.C.S. Sainte-Marie, of course."
Ranma smirked. Her Majesty's Canadian Ship Sainte-Marie was the ship name that, three years ago, was given to the Naval Reserve Training Division located at Canadian Forces Base Borden, a sprawling complex located an hour north of Toronto. When the Naval Reserve began to expand as it took on its new space support mission thanks to the massive influx of Avalonian recruits coming in to join up, it was decided to transform NRTD Borden into a fully-fledged reserve training and manning unit to help support the new corvettes, frigates and command ships being brought into service. A proper "stone frigate" like her sister unit in Toronto, H.M.C.S. York, Sainte-Marie (named after the famous Jesuit settlement near modern-day Midland, due north of Borden) served as the support unit for the six vessels assigned to the 113rd Space Operations Group, based aboard nearby H.M.C. Spacedock #111, directly in orbit over downtown Toronto.
"Well, we'll have to think about that after university," Ranma mused.
A nod. "Hai, we will," Shinobu mused as we now…
Read the comments on this episode
(Posted Thu, 27 Jan 2011 05:01)
Questions? Problems? Suggestions?
Send a mail to addventure@bast-enterprises.de
or use the contact form.
らんま1/2 © Rumiko Takahashi
All other series and their characters are © by their respective creators or owners. No claims of ownership of these characters are implied by the authors of this Addventure, or should be inferred.
The Anime Addventure is a non-profit site.