"We realize that Miss Tendo."
THAT being a sufficiently unexpected response, Akane shut her mouth with a click.
She was standing, shackled, with guards pointing weapons that she wasn't sure were legal in her direction. Seated behind desks which were themselves behind some thick clear wall that seperated her and her guards from the people involved.
"Miss Tendo, do you realize exactly what you did?" asked one of the shadowed figures.
"I was being sexually assaulted!" Akane exclaimed.
"Your hand was kissed in a fairly old fashioned courtly manner," corrected another shadowy figure. "What you did, Miss Tendo, was to assault a foreign head of state in a 'First Contact' situation. A foreign head of state who has creatures of myth and legend on his side and whose offensive capabilities are unknown. For all we know they could wave their hands and sink the Japanese islands beneath the ocean. What you did MIGHT have triggered a war between entire worlds. All on international live television!"
"Yet it is not her fault," said the first shadow. "Miss Tendo, there will be a trial and you will be found psychologically incompetent and sentenced to spend time in a psychiatric institution. Thereby the Japanese people will save face, our reputation as a civilized people will be salvaged, and your own family honor will be met. We'll institute a number of school based legislations and reforms that will deal with the problem, and life will go on as usual."
"You're saying you want me to go along with this? With everyone saying I'm crazy and locked up in some nuthouse?" Akane jingled her chains as she shifted. "Why would I go along with this?"
"Because the alternative is your trial, a guilty sentence, and your execution in some bloody but satisfying public spectacle," said a third figure.
Akane gulped, imagining a guillotine dropping into place.
"If it will satisfy your sense of fair play to some degree, the person who drove you insane has been... dealt with," said a fourth shadowy figure. Something about his voice indicated a smirk was present.
Akane gulped again.
"You can cooperate, Miss Tendo, and your incarceration will be fairly pleasant. You can not and..." the third voice let that hang in the air.
"I had to put up with Kuno and his stupid challenge for almost the full school year," said Akane. "I think that gives me the right to ask, what are you doing with him or those idiots who attacked me every morning for six months and then twice a day for five?"
"The other males participating in that fiasco have had their families fined, a black mark stricken upon their record, and are currently spending the day in jail cells." This from the first one who had spoken, who made a gesture as if adjusting glasses. "The faculty of Furinkan that allowed the situation not only to exist but escalate are being dealt with rather more harshly - as they are supposed to be the responsible adults. We have a committee looking into it, and it may be that Furinkan itself will become a reform school with the more normal students sent to other schools. You fail to realize Miss Tendo, what a furor this has already caused."
"As to Tatewaki Kuno, he will find happiness," said the second speaker, "whenever he is sufficiently medicated. He will be put on trial, his insanity and that of his family will be made obvious, and his land and holdings seized and liquidated. The Kuno line has fallen from its past of glory, and will be but a memory within a year. His sister shows signs of insanity, but may be rehabilitated in a few years after treatment. It has been suggested she change her name, as reporters have been looking over every aspect of the Kuno family and have found things that will likely leave the name 'Kuno' as a most impolite term."
"Miss Tendo, you have brought a loss of face upon all of Japan," said number three. "We are Japanese - we do not show our dirty laundry to outsiders, it is our way. That little attack of yours may cost Japan considerable diplomatic clout, and economic hardship. Many foreign companies competing with Japanese companies are already seizing on this as part of their advertising. The Nikkei immediately began freefalling on speculations and rumors caused by this. Fourteen other countries are now clamoring for their own shot at First Contact since the Japanese have proven 'unstable.' My colleagues have outvoted me on this, otherwise yours would be the first internationally televised ritual seppuku."
Akane paled and began to sweat. She believed him. If Number Three had his way, she'd be dead of suicide and no doubt if she was reluctant she'd get "help" in that endeavor.
"As it is, we've already determined that your father somehow missed paying taxes for a number of years and was an accomplice in a theft ring masterminded by a scoundrel named Happosai twenty years ago," said the seventh, a woman from her voice.
"We haven't confiscated his property and thrown him out on the street," said Number Two in a voice that said the idea had been considered. "Your sister Nabiki apparently is getting an advance from Shogokukan to write the story of how you were driven insane and snapped. While she has not paid those back taxes, and her own record seems to indicate some desire to play Yakuza - we are willing to give you time to consider your own involvement and what would be an appropriate response."
"Oh dear," said Akane, knowing that there were two choices here. "Did I say it wasn't my fault?"
The herald had been chosen for appearance, this was going out internationally after all.
He was a particularly tall and regal avariel elf. His blonde hair was matched by golden wings, a bronze breastplate enscribed with the royal crest, and his armor had been polished to a near mirror sheen.
"Though the Prince has some reluctance, particularly following the reception in Japan, to the engagement - the Congress of Civilized Sentients have reached an accord. Prince Ranma of Rangard will be betrothed to the one who doth win a contest of:"
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(Posted Sat, 14 Feb 2004 13:15)
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らんま1/2 © Rumiko Takahashi
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