Title: Lord Butler

Author: Veronica Marie

Chapter Rating: G

Spoilers: none

Pairings: Takeru Shiba & Kotoha Hanaori

Summary: This is my version of episode 22 of Samurai Sentai Shinkenger. Kotoha catches the eye of a young Bocchama. He asks Genta to ask her to pretend to be his fiancée in order to keep the gold-diggers away. Meanwhile, Doukoku unleashes a new monster that feeds on the feelings of affection of its victims.

Chapter 2: Training Menu

Later that night, Takeru sat Indian style on the dais with an impassive look on his face. Kotoha knelt in front of him with her head bowed, looking at the sheaf of papers that he had handed to her. She looked up at him, a worried frown marring her pretty features, and met his gaze. Seeing the anxious look in Kotoha's eyes, he nodded his head and the barest hint of an encouraging smile touched his lips. It was the training menu, and Takeru had decided that Kotoha should try her hand at picking the next training regimen for the Shinkengers.

"No, I can't. I couldn't possibly think of the training menu." She stated, clearly distressed.

"Just pick what you want. Try it," Takeru insisted, in a not unkind tone of voice. He knew it wouldn't be easy to convince her to do this, but he was determined to help her grow into her own as ShinkenYellow.

She looked up at him with pleading eyes and began to speak. "But," she began, and looked down at the papers in her hands, "um". She looked back up at him and asked, "What would you like to do, Tono-sama?"

Takeru looked at her with the faintest bit of amusement and affection in his eyes. "I told you, it's not what I want to do. Just pick what you want," he stated, only a little bit put out that she was being so stubborn in her refusal.

"Eh?" She asked, unused to being asked for her opinion or input, in well, anything.

Before Takeru could say anything more, Genta came bounding into the room, his arms full of dresses of assorted styles and colors.

"Kotoha-chan!" Genta exclaimed, happy to find her in the room with Takeru. It was like killing two birds with one stone. He'd be able to talk to both of them at once and that meant he'd have one less person to look for later. "Hey! Hey! Hey! Kotoha-chan!" He came bounding up to her, completely ignoring Takeru's presence in the room, which no doubt annoyed Takeru, his supposed best friend. Kotoha got up and took a step back away from the smiling ShinkenGold.

"I wonder if this suits you." Genta said, more to himself than her as he began to pull one of the dresses from the pile of dresses resting in the crook of his right arm. Pausing mid pull, Genta turned to face Takeru before shoving him to the side to make room on the dais for the dresses.

"Hey!" Takeru exclaimed, annoyed at being shoved. He fell back on his hands and his right leg dangled over the edge of the dais, while his left leg was pulled forward up towards his stomach. Genta ignored his outburst and picked up a beautiful red dress from the pile of dresses before turning to face Kotoha and dangling it in front of her to see if the style and color would be okay on her.

"What is this?" she asked anxiously, as she looked first at the dress and then at the young man holding the dress in front of her. Still smiling, Genta nodded, obviously pleased with at least one of his dress selections.

"What is this all of a sudden?" Takeru asked, still in the same position as before. He was completely in the dark, just like Kotoha. Genta turned to face him and walked back to the dais to put down one dress before picking up another one, this time it was a pretty white one. He walked back to Kotoha to dangle this one before her as well. While he did this, he began to explain exactly what was going on.

"To be honest, my number one regular customer is a bocchama, the son of a rich family." He walked back to the dais, picked up a lavender dress. Turning to face her, he decided now would be the best time to drop the bombshell, so to speak.

"I'd like you to be his fiancée, Kotoha-chan." He said, as he walked back to her and dangled the pretty lavender dress in front of her from its straps.

The response was immediate, from both Takeru and Kotoha. "Fiancée?" Takeru exclaimed, dark eyes widening in shock. While all Kotoha could do was say, "eh?" and smile, not exactly sure how she should respond. Genta grinned and nodded. Getting over the initial shock first, Takeru schooled his features into a look of indifference, though on the inside he was anything but calm.

What are you getting her into, you idiot? Takeru thought with a scowl as yet another dress was added to either the discard or keep pile.

"Yoshibou has many women after him, but all they want him for is his title, looks, money-or all three. Not himself." Genta stated with a hint of sympathy slipping into his tone. His smile faltered and he stared directly into Kotoha's sympathetic eyes. "You remember meeting him, right, Kotoha-chan?" he asked. Kotoha smiled and nodded, "yes, I do. He was very nice."

Takeru continued listening, silently, while he watched what was going on between Genta and Kotoha. He felt a twinge of something, he wasn't sure what, when she said that this bocchama, Yoshibou, was 'nice'. What exactly does that mean anyway? he mused to himself. He managed to listen with half attention to what Genta was saying and what he said next perked his interest so much that he left the question unanswered. For now.

"He wants you to pretend to be his fiancée to keep the gold-diggers away. There's going to be some sort of gathering this coming Saturday, that's three days from now and that's when he's going to announce your engagement."

Pretty much this whole, excluding her answering his question and her initial response to the news, Kotoha had remained still and silent. She had initially smiled uneasily at the news, thinking perhaps this was some kind of joke. But apparently not, and after hearing the reasoning behind Yoshibou's request, how could she honestly say no?

Kotoha clutched some of the bottom her pretty yellow blouse in her fists, a nervous habit, and bowed head as she thought over her options. Honestly, she just wanted to look up, meet eyes with Takeru and cry out, "what should I do, Tono-sama?" But she thought better of that because of what they were talking about before. With a sinking heart, she realized that she was the only one who could make the decision. But what if I'm wrong? She thought to herself, full of uncertainty.

All while she was in her thoughts, both Takeru and Genta watched as emotions played across her face. Both young men could see how troubled she was, but neither one knew exactly what do to alleviate her fears. Genta was distressed that she was distressed, but he also felt for Yoshibou. While Takeru was completely focused on Kotoha and how lost she looked. He frowned and tried to think of something that would make her feel more comfortable and possibly help her gain some confidence in herself as a human being as well as Shinken Yellow. Will this fake engagement help with that? he asked himself and not sure of the answer one way or another.

After what seemed like forever, but in actuality it was only five minutes, she stopped clutching at her blouse and looked up with a sweet smile on her face. At the sight of her sunny smile, Takeru could have sworn his heart skipped a beat and he had to fight to keep from either blushing or turning away from the sight.

"I'll do it," she said, looking up into Genta's eyes. He smiled at her, his cheerfulness back to 110% power, and laughed. "Yes!" he exclaimed, giving her shoulder a gentle squeeze before he whirled to face Takeru. "Take-chan, can you have the kuroko's summon Mako, Ryunosuke, and Chiaki here? We have a job to do. Operation: transform Kotoha-chan into an Oujo-sama. We're going to need their help."

With a resigned sigh, Takeru nodded and rang the bell to summon some kuroko to find the other Shinkengers.