"Bill Martin" hotmail.com> wrote in message
news:2007010112455975249-billrmartin@hotmailcom...

Team Bubba, the Old Men About Town from Love Hina:

I was hired as a special consultant by the Hinata Hot Springs Town Council
(or whatever it was) for the 2007 New Year celebration. I appreciated the
expense paid - if nothing else - trip to Japan. But, there was a lot of it
I didn't understand. For example, under the Asian calendar the new year
wouldn't begin until February 18 by the Western calendar. Which, since the
Year of the Dog had begun on January 29 of 2006, meant that the Year of the
Dog this time had two Valentine Days and the year that began in February
would have none since it would end on February 8 of 2008. Didn't seem fair
somehow, even though I'm a Dog myself.

Another thing I didn't understand was why the Council had decided a cat-folk
cosplay event would be a part of the celebration. The Asian calendar didn't
include a year of the cat. Their 2007 was going to be the Year of the Pig.
Nor was it the season for that kind of costuming to be comfortable to wear,
certainly not as sensible as a festival kimono. But, that's why I had
gotten this opportunity so I didn't worry about it. It was known I was
familiar with a certain notorious gaijin catgirl otaku who shall remain
nameless, being from the same state, having encountered him at several cons
without him knowing for sure who I was. Word was he was in Japan to make
arrangements for himself for Nippon 2007 SF Worldcom in Yokohama, and the
Council wanted to make sure he didn't stir up any incidents at their
festival relating to his particular obsession. I was apparently the first
one approached who agreed to take on the job for just expenses, or so I
suspected, not that it was important. I was having fun.

As it turned out, though, some other crazy decided to attack the
festivities, taking all the cosplay participants hostage and bellowing out
demands through a bullhorn. I had a translator assigned to me, thankfully.
She managed to get through his full rant before she broke down, apologized
for not being able to take it, and fled. She told me it was clearly a
Japanese national from the accent, so by the terms of my contract I bore no
blame for not stopping my assigned target from fouling things up, and I had
no responsibility to help out. But, no otaku can sit by when cosplayers,
especially catgirl ones, are threatened, and spaying and neutering was a
fairly serious and unacceptable threat. And, I got to feeling sorry for one
of the few catboys in the crowd. Once the threat was made, he kept getting
pushed or tossed directly in front of the sociopath by this group of girls
until an adult lady who had watched in amusement ordered them to stop. I
had been told if I got separated from my assigned translator or needed any
other help, to head uphill and look for three old gents on or near the
bridge leading to the inn on top of the highest hill in town.

The directions were excellent, and I found them without any problem. As
soon as I got within five meters of them, they began talking.

"We know why you've come to see us."

"You speak English?" I blinked.

"We have plenty of time to fill."

"We study and research many things."

"Which brings us back to why you've come to us."

"We heard the maniac make his demands."

"And some of the Hinata Inn residents are among the hostages."

"We're rather fond of them."

"So count us in."

"Just be aware we don't actually participate."

"We only comment and advise."

"And from experience we never expect anyone to heed us."

"But the first two things you seek are things we can help you with."

"Kaolla Su has a football helmet full of cottage cheese ready and waiting."

"In her grown up phase she was thinking of using it to make Keitaro's hair
appear more like her big brother's."

"And you don't want to know what sort of experiment her normal self was
planning to conduct on Keitaro with it."

"It's in the crock of one of the branches of one of the trees in her room in
the Inn."

"You'll have to fetch it yourself."

"We're not going in there."

"Mind the traps and random life forms."

"And the M&M's?" I asked.

"Plain or peanut?"

"Not relevant," I sighed. " Nor are the almond or peanut butter ones."

"This is true."

"They're in the kitchen."

"Some young gent gave Motoko ten pounds of them last Valentine's Day hoping
to gain her favor."

"Didn't work, of course, but at least holding the package with one hand
hindered her in drawing and using her katana, allowing him the chance to get
away in time."

"She gave them to that cute little Shinobu who runs the kitchen for the
inn."

"Shinobu uses them for cookies and cakes, and took the brown ones out
because they looked like plain dull chocolate chip pieces instead of
something festive."

"Then she found that if she rolled bananas in the brown ones, she had
something effective in distracting Su so she wouldn't eat everything up
before it could be served to the rest of the household."

"The chocolate makes Su a bit hyper, though, but you can't have everything."

"Where would you keep it?"

"The M&M's?" I asked.

"Oh, we know where those are kept."

"Left cabinet, second door from the top, behind Kitsune's hard liquor
supply."

"It's one of the few places in the kitchen Su has been trained to stay out
of."

"Kitsune can be rather persuasive when things she really values are
endangered."

"And she's one of the house residents who weren't in the crowd that was
taken hostage."

"So you better not let her catch you trying to get to the candies."

"You'd be wise to try fetching those after you get the football helmet."

"And you'll have to take the right size Ziploc bag with you."

"Ok, I understand," I nodded. "That takes care of the first two demands.
So I guess you can't help me with the, pictures, of Bea Arthur?"

"Oh, we could."

"He and I could, to be exact."

"But we won't."

"She was a guest here about fifteen years ago."

"Before the Inn was turned into a girls only dorm."

"A very nice lady, fun to talk to."

"Quite willing to respect and adapt to other folks customs."

"She can really put away the sushi and sake too, and never show it."

"I'm sitting next to her in the one I have."

"And the one I have is autographed to me personally."

They pulled each of theirs out, and sure enough, the pictures met the
pervert's demand, and were as the two old men about town had claimed.

"I just need a copy of each," I pointed out, quickly handing them back.
"If there's a computer in the Inn you're sending me to, I could scan them in
and print me a copy. And, save the image digitally so that if you ever did
lose the originals, you could recreate them."

"That would work."

"Follow us, we'll show you the rooms you need to go to."

"One second, I need to buy that Ziploc bag and a couple of other things." I
ducked into a store quickly and made my purchases, then followed. I won't
go into the details of what I had to do to get the items called for, but I
was beyond glad I had stopped and gotten the extra large Ziploc bag for the
football helmet - would have been gladder if I had gotten a second one to
put the first one in, but oh well. As my guides had warned, the young lady
named Kitsune spotted me when I tried to get the M&M's, but I had bought a
bottle of a liquor I was fairly sure she didn't possess any of and brought
it with me, assured her I was only adding it to the other stock. Her
attention promptly went to it, and after thanking me went off to give it a
try, completely forgetting to wonder what the strange man was doing in their
kitchen. I had to estimate what two pounds was, but managed by matching
against something around I was fairly sure was about right.

It took some time to get the pictures scanned in and printed acceptably on
the unfamiliar equipment, but I was glad I took the time.

Rushing back to the festival site, I followed a couple of alleys the old
gents had told me about and flanked the authorities, coming out just about
on top of the hostage taker. I tossed the bag with the filled football
helmet to him, held up the one with the M&M's, then played the ace, the
photo prints. His eyes went wide and started watering, his jaw quivered,
and his knees began shaking. The cops took advantage of his being
distracted and stunned to jump him and begin leading the hostages to safety.

I took advantage of the confusion to slip back through the alleys and head
back to the bridge leading to the Inn, carrying the chocolates and the
copies of the pictures. There was no way I was going to return that
football helmet to anyone, but the chocolates belonged to a young lady and
and the world was better off with the picture copies being in the hands of
those the originals had come from . I had no trouble finding the old gents
again and handed over their property. I was delayed returning the
chocolates, though, by the presence of two new people, one guy, one gal,
with them.

"It seems you had some unsought help in your task," one of the old men said.

"And you owe these two assistance in return."

"They will explain. But, because what you did benefited us -."

"And it will be something else interesting -."

"We will give you a hand if needed."

"I see," I sighed, turning to the new arrivals. "What's the story?"