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NOTES: This is a response to a challenge issued by Ebon on the
Ronins mailing list. The fic had to include the following during a trip
to the beach with two/three characters:

1. a bucket of ice cubes
2. a vegetable peeler
3. a shedding cat
4. a broken lamp
5. the line "I swear that's the way it happened!"

This may indeed be the first Geobreeders fanfiction out
there. I don't know why; the series is incredibly fun to write. Oh, and
I must warn you: if you don't know the series, you'll be a... bit lost.
*winks* Taba is Yoichi's last name, by the by. It's what everybody
calls him, so why should I be different? =)
And no, the file number has no significance. This is my first
and rather poor attempt at humor. Some swearing. I suck at action
scenes. Proceed at own risk.
Usual disclaimers apply.
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File-39: Bikini Kitty
by Phi [umezaki@postmark.net | http://aurabuster.net]
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Nasutei smiled as she listened to the steady thrumming
her rollerblades were making on the boardwalk that ran alongside
the beach. Softly swinging the shopping bag that hung from her left
hand, she deftly wove in and out of the crowds, enjoying the warm
breeze on her face and the sun on her back. As she looked out on
the sparkling expanse of water and reveled in the perfect weather,
she could almost -- almost -- forget what she was doing out there to
begin with.

Sometimes, she wondered why she invited them all at the
same time. Really wondered.

Was she really such a sucker for punishment? She closed
her eyes briefly (she was, after all, still skating) and allowed a small
sigh to escape her lips. She had ~thought~ she had missed them,
but she supposed that happened after several months of being
apart. It gave her enough time to forget how much trouble they could
cause her -- and her poor house.

Her house. Her poor, defenseless house. It had never
harmed anyone. Really.

//Okay.// Nasutei tried to go over everything in her head
that had led up to her rather unexpected trip to the beach. //It was
five months since we were all last together. I missed them -- Lord
knows ~why~ -- so I invited them for a weekend stay. And they
came. And they wrecked my house. And... and... they're still there.//
She fought a sudden urge to sniffle. //Why, why, why? WHY? WHY do I
let them do this to me?//

They all had been, of course, extremely apologetic.

She just didn't understand how grown men could ~still~ be
that immature. Or stupid. Whichever worked. See, it was like this....
All five of them had arrived at her lakeside house at approximately
ten o'clock that morning, and things had proceeded well from there.
Nasutei had thought that it was going to be a nice little gathering,
free from the usual mishaps and misfortunes and property damage
that usually resulted from proximity to the Troopers. Showed how
much she knew.

Noon. Disaster struck.

Well, better to start from the beginning. Except... it wasn't
the ~exact~ beginning, but pretty darn close enough, so it could
have seemed like the beginning without actually being the true
beginning. Except, if it wasn't the real beginning, why would you
bother to call it the beginning if it wasn't? And wasn't the beginning
when they had all arrived at her house, and hadn't she already gone
over that? So then she wouldn't have to start at the beginning,
because she had already done that. But that wasn't really the
beginning -- it was more like background information that you need
to have before hearing the actual story. And wouldn't the beginning
have been when she thought up the idea of inviting them all in the
first place....

Whatever.

Shin had requested that he be allowed to make everyone a
special picnic dinner for that night. No, scratch that -- he had quite
forcibly insisted. And had done so with a dangerous little glint in his
eye that made you wonder if you were developing a sweatdrop on
the back of your head. It was strange, how he could do that.
Anyway, in the process of preparing said special dinner, he sort of
took over the kitchen and surrounding areas... which did not make
Shu and Touma happy. At all.

So somehow -- Nasutei was a bit fuzzy on the details --
those two had managed to sneak into the kitchen behind Shin's back
and do something bad enough to upset him into chasing them
around the house, brandishing a vegetable peeler (which,
incidentally, still had a bit of potato skin hanging from it). She had
watched the chase with a somewhat bemused expression and
reflected on how this really was like "old times," until... well... Touma
looked back to see Shin hot on his heels... and tripped over Shu's
foot... and fell... headlong... into...

The lamp. And not just any lamp. It was ~the~ lamp -- the
lamp her Grandfather had given to her on her thirteenth birthday,
the cute little Mickey Mouse lamp with a clock on his belly whose
alarm could be set to play that darling little "It's A Small World After
All" tune. She ~loved~ that lamp. She ~treasured~ that lamp.
She would ~kill~ for that lamp.

And now it was smashed into little itsy-bitsy pieces of
Mousey-ness over her living room floor.

But then she uncovered her eyes, and found that that last
part was purely her imagination. (It was probably a good thing, too,
since Touma had been nervously edging towards the front door,
ready to bolt at a second's notice.) No, it was mostly intact -- thanks
to the plush carpet she had installed during the house's latest...
remodling -- save for a broken bulb.

And would you believe she was completely out of bulbs?
Well, neither did she, until an hour-long search proved her wrong.
And by that time, she was thoroughly ~ticked~. Without saying a
word, she had strapped on her rollerblades and found herself
cruising down the sunlight, crowded boardwalk. (Completely taking
out the time, of course, to get to the beach in the first place.) She
had found herself in one of those wierd little tourist shops that don't
even sell anything a tourist would remotely need -- unless they were
tourons, which was a completely different matter -- and bought about
dozen red lightbulbs. She thought they would go nicely with Mickey's
adorable little painted red pants.

And so, Nasutei continued to skate, slowly letting off steam
and trying to enjoy the bright world around her.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Taba Yoichi sighed in relief as he let himself relax against
the sun-warmed blanket spread over the sand. His day off. No cats,
no spaz presidents, no gun-nut psychos, no narcolyptic
"professional" drivers, no ~anything~. His day off. He said the
words aloud, savoring the taste of them in his mouth. He had never
spoken sweeter words. "My day off. My day off." He had been
waiting ~months~ for this. No one was going to take it away from
him.

He rumaged around in the bucket of half-melted ice next to
him and pulled out a nice, cool cylindrical can. Popping the tab and
holding the drink to his lips, he shivered a little at the cold sweetness
it left as it poured down his throat. He frowned a little as he set the
can back down, muttering to himself. "Where did that cooler go? I
could've sworn I saw it just the other day...."

An explosion.

Nope, he didn't hear it. No how, no way. Nothing doin'.

Another. And another.

He started humming to himself, trying desperately to tune
out the shouts of the people who ran past his blanket. Nope nope,
can't hear a thing. Gone deaf.

It was getting harder to drown out the noise, now that the
whole beach was on the move -- running around him, over him,
~on~ him. Finally, when he couldn't stand being trampled any
further, he lept to his feet and yelled, "What the HELL is going on
here?!?"

Turning on his heels, he had no problem finding the source
of confusion. A ways down, a store on the boardwalk had exploded
unexpectedly; the flames were quickly starting to spread to the
neighboring stores. Before he knew it, Taba found himself running
towards the nearly destroyed shop.

He could have sworn... he thought he had seen... please, if
there was truly a god, let this just be a trick of his imagination. He
couldn't have seen one. It was his ~day off~, for Pete's sake.

But no, luck was not with him today. He had indeed seen it.
Taba stammered a little, still trying to convince himself that his eyes
were playing tricks on him. "Ba... Bake-Neko?!?"

------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Her head swam unpleasantly as she slowly tried to sit up
and open her eyes. Wait... sit up? What had happened? After she
had managed to crack one eye open, she gasped openly at the site
that greeted her.

The shop she had been skating by was completely
consumed by flames. And in front of it was a very smug-looking, very
~fluffy~... cat?

She must have hit her head harder than she had thought.

Wincing a bit as she gingerly touched her head, she
quickly ran through the possibilites. Arson? Maybe, but who would
want to hurt... she glanced towards the half-burned sign at the top...
Okaachan and Otouchan's Sushi Bar? Well then, what else could it
be? She gasped once again as a sudden, terrifying thought came to
her.

"Youjakai?"

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They noticed each other at exactly the same moment,
which was only natural, seeing as how they were standing (well, one
was standing and the other was sort of half-lying, half-sitting) right
next to each other. "What did you say?" they chorused, shocked
that the other could have a possible explanation for all this.

"What--" they began again, and then paused,
embarassed. "How did--" They couldn't seem to get out of synch.
Finally, Taba resolved to get in first, before they could start doing
that weird two-as-one deal again.

"Excuse me, ma'am, but I think you might want to get out of
here."

"Oh?" Nasutei raised an eyebrow eloquently. She
discreetly looked him over with a critical eye; he seemed average
enough, with his short brown hair, brown eyes, and medium build.
What could he possibly do about demon generals and soul-stealing
spirits?

Taba sighed, seeing the incredulity in her eyes. "That cat
is very dangerous," he tried to explain. "It was the one who caused
the explosions." He couldn't risk telling her anything further, since
the general populace was not exactly supposed to know of the
Bake-Neko's existance. It was getting rather difficult to keep them a
secret, though.

Nasutei tried very hard not to let her surprise show. A...
cat... did all this? The Youjakai was sending cats to blow up
buildings?

She gratefully took Taba's hand when he offered it and
managed quite an ungraceful rise. She blushed slightly as the hand
contact lasted a few heartbeats longer than necessary, and
smoothed her shorts self-consciously when he let go.

By this time, the Bake-Neko had stopped its arrogant
preening and was looking at the two people in front of it -- now the
only people anywhere in the vacinity -- with malicious curiousity. It
shook, as cats are wont to do, sending little puffs of fluff into the air.
Nasutei's eyes watered just watching it. Suddenly, recognition flared
in its slit eyes as it stared at the male in the pair, and a low growl
escaped its feline throat.

"Kagura...."

Taba and Nasutei turned simultaneously when they heard
a slight crackling in the air, as if electricity was passing from one of
those static globes to another. Nasutei's jaw dropped as she
watched the cat in front of her elongate, its limbs stretching in
grotesque, stomach-churning ways, to form the body of a... human
girl? She only faintly heard Taba's groan, "I hate this part."

The former cat was now a girl, approximately a little
younger-looking than she, dressed in nothing but a bikini. An itsy-
bitsy, teeny-weeny, yellow polka-dot bikini. And it left nothing to the
imagination. Openly gaping, Nasutei turned to look at the man
beside her, expecting to see some sort of lecherous or other
perverted look on his face -- but was surprised to only find panic.

Just what in the world was going on here?

------------------------------------------------------------------------------

"Kagura..." the girl grinned in a decidedly unfriendly way.

Taba's muttered swear was less intelligible this time, as he
abruptly turned and dragged Nasutei along with him. She could tell
he was muttering something, but could only make out bits and
pieces. "...damn cat...day off...gonna quit...my day off..." They ran
on and on down the boardwalk as he continued to mutter. It was
harder to hear this time, but she thought she heard the words
"seals" and "laptop."

"Umm... excuse me??" The last came off a bit more of a wail
than Nasutei had meant it to be, but it succeeded in getting the
man's attention. They were off the boardwalk now and onto the
beach, and she was finding it extremely difficult to run on sand with
rollerblades.

"Sorry about all this!" He shouted over his shoulder, never
letting his eyes leave the ever-nearing blanket in front of them. "I'm
Taba Yoichi. I work -- but I'm going to quit soon -- for Kagura
Security, a company set up to destroy the Bake-Neko." He paused
when the two of them reached the blanket, and let go of Nasutei's
arm. She sighed gratefully and plopped down on the sand, rubbing
her arm absently. It ~hurt~. And her lungs hurt. And her legs. She
didn't think she could run anymore, let alone stand up. She was just
about to reach down to take off her blades and massage her aching
feet, when Taba grabbed her arm again and hauled her painfully to
her feet. "No time!" Nasutei let a small cry of protest escape her
lips, but was quickly silenced when he motioned to the girl, who was
rapidly gaining on them.

She blinked. Wow. Had they really run that fast, to get that
much of a head start?

Before she could really understand what was happening,
she was being dragged along the sand again. Trying to ignore how
leaden her legs felt, she focused in on what he had said earlier. One
thing didn't seem to click. Bringing her lips as close to his ear as
possible, she shouted, "Bake-Neko?"

He winced slightly -- serves him right, she thought with
satisfaction -- and yelled back, "Phantom cats!" After glancing back
to see her uncomprehending look, he elaborated. "They can travel
through electronic equipment, like phones and computers. They have
a tendency to blow things up."

Nasutei nodded. She sure knew what ~that~ was like.

She was surprised when she felt the steady thrumming of
her rollerblades and realized that somehow they had gotten back on
the boardwalk. Forcing her aching legs to pump, she struggled to
keep pace with Taba, who was going at a surprising pace for an
ordinary human. She guessed he did this a lot.

She let out a small "Eep!" when Taba suddenly pulled her
into a small, empty shop and stuffed her behind the counter. Wasting
no time, he unfolded the rectangular box Nasutei belatedly realized
that he was carrying and started to type furiously. Ah, this must be
the laptop.

"I'm Yagyu Nasutei." Well, ~someone~ had to say
something. He glanced at her, looking a little embarrased, and
continued to type.

"I'm sorry to involve you in this, Miss Yagyu, but I can't
really let you leave. The Bake-Neko knows what you look like, so we
have to destroy it before it can get back to the others," Taba
mumbled absently, his eyes glued to the small computer screen. He
sighed, and looked up at her, looking a bit worse for wear. "See
these?" He held up four little slips of paper with a strange insignia at
the top -- a circle circumscribed about a triangle -- and something
that looked like a plug socket at the bottom.

What in the...?

She nodded, a bit reluctant and extremely confused. How
were four pieces of paper and a battered laptop going to stop a
shape-shifting cat? "These are seals," he continued. "We need to
delete the Bake-Neko using these." Delete? Were... were the
Bake-Neko some kind of computer virus or something? He had
said that they could travel through electronic equipment.... "They
have a limited radius, so we need to use this place's walls to hang
them. In order to be deleted, the Bake-Neko have to be surrounded
by the seals on four sides." He was speaking hurriedly now, nervous
sweat beginning to shine on his face. No matter how many times he's
done this now, it always made him edgy. Those cats were ~scary~.

A sudden crash in the front of the store and a growled
"Kagura!" warned them that their chaser had -- finally -- found them.
Pushing the seals into Nasutei's sweaty palm, Taba whispered, "I'll
distract her." She nodded firmly and waited until he had jumped onto
the top of the counter to move. "Oi, tuna-breath!" He sweatdropped
as he waved his arms frantically, trying to get the cat-girl's
attention. Unfortunately for him, it worked.

She lunged for him, a feral smile on her lips. Taba
panicked. //Dammit, where's that crossbow when I need it?!?//

------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Nasutei's heart was pounding so hard she was afraid it was
going to rupture. Oh, God... the fear, the adreneline, the ~rush~...
she loved it! She didn't think she had ever had this much fun in her
entire life. She almost wanted the cat to notice her, to start to chase
her. God, she was having a blast.

Poor Taba, though. He didn't look like he was having fun at
all. She frowned a little, trying to imagine why. //Oh well,// she
shrugged. //To each his own.// She grinned suddenly as she
successfully placed the first seal on the wall.

//One!//

Skating swiftly and silently, she managed to place the next
two slips without being discovered.

//Two!//

//Three!//

Feeling a little disappointed at this anti-climax, she paused
in hanging the fourth seal when she heard Taba's scream, followed by
an abrupt crashing noise. She looked around in curiousity, only to
see the man running for his life down the boardwalk, the Bake-Neko
close on his heels. Eh? Why was he running away? The seals were
over here....

Quickly slapping the fourth seal on the side of the counter
and shouting a jubilant "Four!" in her head, Nasutei skated out the
now-destroyed shop front. Maybe she could do something to help
that poor man.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Tears were streaming from his eyes as he ran. And ran.
And ran.

His curses under his breath fell into the pattern of his
steps... each footfall equaled a "Damn," a litany of his frustration and
fear. He knew he had to get back to the shop and Nasutei and the
seals, but his feet didn't seem to want to cooperate with his mind. He
could feel something coming up closer behind him. Taba closed his
eyes and willed his legs to move faster, to just get a little more
distance between them. When he opened them once more, he found
himself staring straight into the dancing eyes of Nasutei.

He stopped dead.

She giggled, winked quickly, and roughly shoved him out of
the way. Mouth agape, he watched her as she skated straight toward
the Bake-Neko, crouched low to gain speed. The idiot! What the hell
did she think she was doing? She was as bad as Umezaki!

He abruptly understood. Sighing the sigh of the long-
suffering, he started to run back, reminding himself that he was going
to put his letter of resignation on the Prez's desk first thing tomorrow
morning. If he lived that long.

He tried to swallow down the tears as he ran faster.

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Nasutei was rapidly approaching the Bake-Neko, skating
harder than she had ever done before. Lord, this was fun. With a
nearly maniacal glint in her eyes, she shifted her grip on the bag
behind her back to make sure it was still there.

The kitty cat was right in front of her now, dangerously
close. Without slowing, Nasutei swerved to the left and swung the bag
at the cat's face with all her strength. She smirked in satisfaction as
she heard both the crunch of smashed glass and a pained howl. Too
bad about the light bulbs, though. She would have to buy more tomorrow.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------

The whole situation was getting frustrating.

Nasutei was acting like she actually enjoyed it. The Bake-
Neko wouldn't get into the seals' range. And what's worse, this was
supposed to be his day off. Damn frustrating. Taba allowed himself to
wallow in self-pity, until he saw the cat-girl pick herself up from the
ground, dust herself free of red shards, and start to chase Nasutei.

Red... shards? Taba blinked. Had he missed something?

------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Nasutei ducked back into the shop and headed straight for
the seals. Okay... she was here, and so was the cat. Why wasn't it
disappearing in a puff of cat fur or something? She started to fidget.
Slowly realizing that maybe her idea wasn't so great after all, she did
the only think she could think of as the Bake-Neko made a grab for
her with those long, sharp, painful-looking claws.

"TABA!!"

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He heard his name screamed desperately.

"Nasutei!" He called back as he skidded through the
crooked doorframe. Diving behind the counter, he instructed, "Get
out of there!"

She didn't need to be told twice. Trying to duck under the
Bake-Neko's flailing arms, she managed to barely skirt by. She
winced as the claws caught across the back of her shirt, tearing the
fabric and the skin. She faintly heard Taba cry "DELETE!" before
everything became an overused cliche.

You know, went black.

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"That's the way it happened. I ~swear~ that's the way it
happened!" Taba found himself staring into three pairs of disbelieving
eyes. (Takami was making tea in the other room, and Himehagi was in
the basement, sleeping as usual.)

Umezaki snorted, while Rando simply rolled her eyes.
President Kikushima cleared her throat. Standing on top of her desk
-- as she usually does whenever she proclaims something that Taba
isn't going to like -- she pointed an accusatory finger at him and
began her speech. "Taba Yoichi! You have been found guilty of the
egregious offense of damaging private property while not under
contract! In accordance with Chapter 14, Rule 7 of Kagura Security's
Company Policy, you shall be required to perform your customary
duty without monetary compensation for a total of 72 hours! This rule
is now under enforcement!"

They stared at each other.

"You can't be serious," Taba deadpanned.

Kikushima continued to point.

"But I wasn't the one who set the seals!" Taba wailed. "I
didn't know the whole damn neighborhood was going to blow up!"

Kikushima continued to point.

He glowered for a moment or two, before sighing resignedly
and stalking to the door. He was going to quit. Really, he was.
Tomorrow. He was going to write the resignation letter tonight, and
put it on Kikushima's desk first thing in the morning.

He thought he heard a faint "Have a nice day!" as he
slammed the door behind him.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Nasutei smiled faintly as she continued to skate toward
her lakeside mansion, ignoring the stinging on her back and the
strange glances being cast her way. She knew she didn't look good;
her hair was a cloud of tangles, her shirt was tattered, and she was
covered in something that she hoped was soot. But, aside from the
slight concussion she was suffering from, she felt pretty good.

Goodness, that had been fun.

Did Taba do that every day? She closed her eyes, trying to
recapture the rush the adrenaline had given her. The way the wind
had felt in her hair, the thrill throwing her bag into that Bake-Neko's
face she had felt.... She hugged herself, smiling blissfully.

What was that company's name again? Kaguya? Kaguta?
Kagura...?

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