"So the stupid alien's finally leaving, huh? Good riddance!"
"About time, too," Momoe Marubeya, one of Shutaro Mendou's more ardent fans at Tomobiki High School, sips her expresso. She now sits with several of her schoolmates at a streetside bistro in downtown Tomobiki. "Hard to believe, huh?"
"Yeah, you can say that again," Kumiko Gekasawa, Momoe's best friend and a girl who had once been voted the most pretty in her class (this was before Lum began attending school), nods. "Still..."
"What?" another girl, Rio Andou, asks.
"I guess I'll kinda miss some of it, you know," Kumiko shrugs. "I mean, yeah, there're things I definitely won't miss!"
"Ataru-kun's lechery for one," Momoe chuckles.
The others laugh. "I kinda miss that," Rio's best friend, Yumi Nagai, sighs.
"You DO?!!" Kumiko exclaims.
"Oh, that's right! You didn't hear what happened a couple weeks ago," Rio chuckles. "It was swimming class for us..." -- she and Yumi are in Class 2-2 -- "...and one of the guys in class tossed some gunk he whipped together in chemistry at Yumi-chan's bathing suit!"
"Oh, yeah! I heard about that!!" Momoe nods.
"What?! What?!" Kumiko looks at Momoe, then Rio, then Yumi.
"Well, the stuff had some real nasty itching powder mixed into it!" Yumi shudders, her cheeks flaming. "It got so bad that I had to rip off my suit right then and there, right in front of all those hentai jerks in class!"
"No...!" Kumiko pales.
"Then, right out of NOWHERE, Ataru-kun lands beside Yumi-chan, takes off his jacket, then drapes her with it so Shiraishi-sensei could get her to the showers to wash that stuff off!" Rio finishes, throwing up her hands in a half-shrug. "Of course, EVERYONE in class was speechless! You'd never expect something like THAT from ATARU MOROBOSHI of all people, ne?!"
Kumiko gazes on her friends, then turns back to her coffee. "Yeah, it's really strange, ne?"
"You can say that again," Momoe shakes her head. "You'd think we'd be used to weird things like that by n-..."
"OHMIGAWD!!! Who is THAT?!!"
The others jolt on hearing Mai Nakajou's surprised cry, then glance across the street to see someone get off a bus, lugging a large backpack. Staring at that well-sculptured face, the shaggy-styled raven-black hair tied in a tightly-wound braid, the honed muscles barely hidden by the sleeveless red tang and black workout pants, that tight butt...! Oh, dear sweet kami, that BUTT!! As he walks away from them, five pairs of wide eyes watch his every move with a passion they once reserved for a certain scion of Tomobiki's richest resident family or a certain alien fighter pilot. As he disappears through the front doors of the Hotel Tomobiki, the girls then exchange shocked looks.
"Who is Mendou-san...?" Momoe's eyebrow twitches.
"Who is Rei-san...?" Kumiko giggles in a barking laugh...
"AH-CHOO!!!!"
Ranma rubs his nose, glancing around him curiously before shrugging. By then, he had been noticed by the front desk clerk, a smiling woman in her late thirties. "Irasshaimasen!" she bows politely to the handsome young stranger with the camping gear.
"H-hai!" he stutters. "Single room for two nights, please?"
"Hai!"
As the clerk goes to work, Ranma sighs, grateful that he had stashed away enough cash for contingencies like this; living under the same roof as Nabiki Tendou -- much less a father who never once respected other people's property rights, especially when said property had any sort of real monetary value -- had taught him how to husband his money whenever he got the chance. He had enough to survive pretty much on his own for a week before he'd have to start worrying. Still, he had endured worse during the training trip. Scrounging shouldn't be too bad though he wouldn't think of following his father's path and revert to any form of thievery. Surely, given the level of sheer insanity Tomobiki was world-famous for, there had to be some martial arts dojos he could offer to teach or apprentice at. He knew Genma hadn't dragged him through this town during their training trip, so he shouldn't suffer any surprises from that particular quarter.
"Room Four-oh-nine," the clerk offers him a set of keys.
"Thank you," he nods, then heads to the elevator.
As he disappears behind the lift doors, the clerk smiles. "Nice boy..."
Sometime later...
"Eh?! You saw some handsome boy?!"
Shinobu Miyaki nods pleasantly as she hears Momoe's explanation over the phone. "What?!" she perks surprisedly, then gapes. "No!"
"It's true, Shinobu-chan!" Momoe calls back. "He just checked into the Hotel Tomobiki tonight!"
"Soo ka," Shinobu giggles. "Well, I'll have to see this for myself, then."
"Warn Momoe-san that if she wants to chase that person down, she should exercise some caution."
Shinobu glances at Ataru, he now hovering over the stove as he watches the sukiyaki simmer, then turns back to the phone. "Ataru-kun just told me to tell you to watch it around this new guy, Momoe-chan," she relays to her classmate.
"Eh?! How'd he notice that?!" Momoe demands.
Before Shinobu could parrot the question, Ataru lightly smiles. "Tell her that I can empathically sense everyone in this town. And that it was impossible for me to ignore someone like him." He closes his eyes, then slowly nods. "He's running from some bad girl problems."
"Right..." Shinobu slowly nods, then relays the word back to Momoe.
The conversation soon ends, then after hanging up, Shinobu walks over to stand beside Ataru, she glancing into the pot of soba noodles he was making to accompany the sukiyaki. "It's weird every time you do that, Ataru," she glances briefly at him.
"I'm sorry, but given the levels of pain people our age can inflict on each other, even by accident, I thought it was best to warn them before they wound up doing something wrong," he returns her look as he gives her hand a friendly squeeze. "It's almost ready."
"Soo ka," she impishly smiles, then glances around the studio apartment her former -- or was that "current?" -- boyfriend presently resided in. Sparsely furnished -- Ataru had only been living here for three weeks -- it still seemed worlds warmer than the home Ataru's parents resided in with Lum and Ten-chan. Though the presence of the two Onis might be very questionable after today. "Ataru?"
"What is it, Shinobu?" he gazes curiously at her.
"Aren't you angry at her?"
"Lum-chan, you mean?" he blinks, then turning the heat off the noodles and sukiyaki, walks over to stand beside her, gently grasping her hand. "No, I can never be really angry at her, Shinobu. Sad and regretful that things didn't ultimately work out, but I have no right to demand anything of her. If..." he sighs. "She's made her choice, Shinobu. I respect that. I'll miss her, of course. But I'll respect whatever decision she makes. If I don't do that, then everything that I've dedicated my life to protecting is meaningless."
Shinobu gazes at him, then leans her head against his shoulder. To hear Ataru call her just as "Shinobu" instead of "Shinobu-chan." Even more, to hear him call Lum "Lum-chan." In Japan, when you dropped all suffix titles, even the quite personal "-chan," you either were spitting out a vicious insult or were acknowledging a level of intimacy that went past friendship, went past even love. And Shinobu knew it wasn't the former between herself and Ataru. That filled her now with such joy. "She's a control fanatic, Ataru," she slips her arm around his. "When you Crossed Over, whatever controls she had over you were broken just like that," she snaps her free hand's fingers.
"I should've tried more," he gazes out the living room window.
"No," she shakes her head. "You did what was necessary to try to put what you had with her on an even keel. It's not your fault that she never wanted a relationship like that in the first place, Ataru. I..." she closes her eyes. "I only wish I could've sat back and realized what was really going on between you two, Ataru. I'm so sorry that..."
"Stop that," he turns around to draw her into an embrace. "None of us were angels back then, Shinobu. Not you, not me, not anyone."
"I know," she gazes up at him, then leans her head on his shoulder as he gives her a squeeze with his arms...
Morning soon comes to Tomobiki as we...
(Posted Wed, 12 Mar 2003 07:50)
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