Chapter 9: The Afternoon
Shampoo (Afternoon – Part I)
Shampoo sat at her table and sipped her soda. She had finished her nice lunch and settled the bill, making sure to treat the waitress nicely – as one herself, she understood what the woman had to put up with. She needed to move on though and free up the table. What was taking Akane so long? As much as Shampoo teased her, the girl didn't really eat that much. Suddenly, Shampoo felt Akane's aura vanish again. The Amazon quickly switched her internal tracker to Sayuri and Yuka with predictable results. "What the hell is going on here?" she muttered to herself in Chinese. She quickly went to the back of the restaurant, ostensibly looking for a bathroom, but dodged up a stairway when no one way looking.
Stealthily, Shampoo climbed the two flights and crept out onto the third floor. Happily enough, the stairway was near a set of bathrooms on this floor as well, so she didn't look that out of place – not that it mattered; there was no one about. She managed to locate the table Akane and her friends had sat at (their empty dishes were still there), and followed the trail to the service elevator. The young woman could feel the very sharp demarcation where the three auras had vanished. Unfortunately, she couldn't identify if someone had joined them here or not.
Since her Other senses were not helping her, she opened up her physical senses. Her eyes scanned the floor and saw a few drops of blue wax. When she scraped it up, the scent reminded her of something out of her past. Closing her eyes to concentrate, the image of her two childhood tormentors, Pink and Link, rose to mind. This scent was very similar to the perfume the two girls wore; two girls that could often surprise her despite that fact that she had "marked" their auras. Thinking further, she ran through some of the Lore Cologne had taught her. It was possible, very possible. Someone had given Akane and her friends an item of some sort that could mask auras. Cologne had speculated that there might be some mages among the local people here besides the doctors and the priests given all the weird events in Nerima. For that matter, Link could have given the scent to Ranma in repayment for saving Pink's and Link's lives, a more likely scenario.
Shampoo let out a groan. Either way, Shampoo had her answer to the mystery of the vanishing auras. Unfortunately, it meant that she couldn't rely on her Other abilities to track Akane. Obviously, the girl saw her and took steps to hide herself and her friends. "Great, just great," the Amazon thought. "I now have to track Violent Girl through a very crowded shopping district with limited line of sight, no footprints, no smell, and no chance of hearing her above the crowd. Can this get any worse?"
Ukyo (Afternoon – Part I)
Ukyo waited outside the restaurant until she noticed that Shampoo and Kodachi were no longer at their tables. "Ah hell," she thought. "Everyone is gone out the back again. Maybe I should have gone in and talked to Shampoo. Now, I have to track everyone down again." She gathered herself together and walked to the nearest dress store. She found neither the hunted nor the hunters and moved on. After nearly an hour without seeing anyone, she began to get frustrated and decided to try higher ground once more.
Ukyo stood looking out a fourth floor window, wondering if she should change stores, when she saw the trio again walking down the street. Relief began to flood her system until she realized Akane was holding a plastic garment bag. "No! She bought her dress!" she cried to herself. As she watched, the young women began to pass beyond the view of the windows. "Hell, I've got to get that dress!" Ukyo said to herself.
She pulled her battle spatula off her back and began to run through the crowded store pushing people out of her way. Her progress was marked by cries of pain and outrage. She was a little more careful on the stairs, making sure to push people to the side instead of down, but she was still very rough. She jumped the last seven steps to the second floor and, as she took the turn, she bumped a pre-teen out of the way. The last thing she remembered was a familiar cry of "Delinquent!"
Mousse (Afternoon):
Mousse peeled back Ukyo's eyelids professionally and checked her pulse. He then turned to the tall brunette beside him. "How long will she sleep?" he asked.
"A couple of hours. I was very careful in how I drained her. She won't take any permanent damage," Hinako said. "Now if you'll excuse me, I have some shopping to do."
"Huh?"
Hinako addressed the Amazon: "Do you know how hard it is to go shopping for my adult form? Most places will not let me take a fish bowl into a store. I have about an hour before I revert to my child form. Good day." She then turned imperiously and left the young man.
Mousse turned to the store attendant. "You have two choices. You can either call the police and file a complaint against this woman for causing a disturbance in your store, or you can let her sleep it off quietly in the employee lounge. Either way, this isn't my problem."
As he started to rise, the attendant placed a hand on his should. "Look, you seem to know this woman…" the lady started.
"She's an acquaintance. Nothing more," Mousse replied.
"Could you please carry her to the lounge?" she asked.
"I'd rather not be involved," he answered.
"Please sir! I realize it's a little bit of an imposition...maybe we could offer you a tab in our restaurant? Have a nice meal on us?" she pressed.
Mousse pretended to think about it. "Well, I suppose I could use a break from ramen…"
Ukyo (Afternoon – Part II):
Ukyo woke up to find Konatsu watching her. She still felt very weak, but forced herself to sit up. "How long have I been out?" she asked.
"And good afternoon to you too, Mistress," the ninja replied. Ukyo winced at the disapproval in his voice – a very unusual occurrence. "By my guess, about two and half hours. Since I didn't see what happened, I cannot tell you exactly. The store has made it very clear that you are an unwanted shopper and we should leave as soon as you are able. They also said that you are lucky not to be in jail right now. Apparently you shoved a bunch of folks out of the way and one took exception and knocked you out."
"I'm not sure about that," Ukyo commented. "I think Ms. Hinako drained me."
Her kunoichi shrugged his shoulders. "I haven't seen Ms. Hinako, but that doesn't mean she wasn't here. Did you see her?"
"No, but I thought I heard her."
"I cannot confirm or deny."
"Where's Akane? Did she get her dress?"
"I have no idea. She was carrying some shopping bags, but I do not know what was in them. As I said, I watch over you, not her."
Ukyo sighed. She lost the whole day to this chase, and her quarry had escaped.
Konatsu spoke again: "So are you ready to go home now?"
Ukyo took a deep breath and blew it out. "Yeah, I'm done for the day."
"Good. On our way out of the district, we need to go bail out Ms. Shampoo."
"Huh?"
"She is stuck in cat form at a pet store about two blocks up…"
Shampoo (Afternoon – Part II):
Shampoo continued to look for Akane through the district. After an hour or so, Shampoo resumed hunting for her quarry by aura again, figuring that the talisman Akane was using probably had limits – otherwise the Amazon would never have found the girl in the first place. After some time, she finally picked up Akane's trail deep in the district and began tracking it. As she continued, Shampoo was disturbed by the number of dress stores Akane had been in. It was hard to hope that Akane had not found something in all this time. The Amazon could also tell where Akane (and, by extension, Sayuri and Yuka, but Shampoo didn't bother to check) had stopped to look at the various performers. Judging by the trail, Akane was staying longer and longer as things progressed – another bad sign that she had achieved her goal. Still, it also meant that Shampoo was getting closer to Akane, because Shampoo wasn't stopping.
Finally, she located the trio as they were watching a performer. There was a dress bag in Akane's hands. "Fine. I just have to grab the dress, bruise Akane's ego a bit, and take off," Shampoo thought. As she watched, the trio wandered into a small store on a side street. "Perfect. There will be few witnesses."
Shampoo ran across the street and was about to throw open the door when she heard a child yell out: "Mom watch out with my water!" Shampoo immediately felt the disorientation that accompanied her shape change.
As she struggled to free herself from her clothes (the dress was unfamiliar and the material kept snagging in her claws), another child's voice cut in: "Look Mommy, someone left their shopping on the street. And they left a kitten there too!" Shampoo felt a child scoop her up, clothing and all.
A woman's voice called "Oh no, you don't Mia. You're not getting a kitten that way. Besides, she's a bit big to be a kitten. You take her right back inside that pet store."
"But Mommy, I didn't go in the pet store."
The woman paused, looked the cat over, and then spoke again: "Hmmm. Must have been just purchased. Please take it inside and hand it back to the store. Whoever purchased it will be back looking for it."
"Yes, Mommy."
Inside the store, Shampoo was still tangled up in the clothes as the store owner heard the child's story and took the cat from the little girl. The owner looked at the cat. "She's not one of ours. She's very well groomed, but with no tags. She's obviously just been bought. I'll make a few phone calls and hold her here until her owner comes to get her." Shampoo quickly found herself untangled from the clothes and tossed in a cage. Unfortunately, the store owner was very familiar with animals and there had been no chance for escape.
Shampoo looked outside the cage and saw Akane, Sayuri, and Yuka playing with a black retriever puppy. She tried to get their attention by yowling, but they paid her no mind. Why was she not surprised that Akane was a dog person?
Sasuke (Afternoon):
"This cannot be happening…someone has to be playing a joke on me" the ninja sighed to himself.
"Sasuke! No slacking!" Kodachi shouted at him. "I found her trail again! There were more dresses on hold at Ojima's." Sasuke accepted another pile of dresses from his Mistress and walked back toward the car. Thank heavens they had a special pass that allowed them to park close by. As soon as he dropped off this load, he was going to swing by a convenience store and pick up some aspirin.
It was after lunch when Kodachi's plan finally came to him. This had to be one of the craziest schemes yet. He had tried to stop her. He pointed out that Akane could get a dress back in Nerima. He mentioned that Kasumi was a competent seamstress. The young lady could use a dress she already had. But Kodachi had such a focused mind, and believed that the world behaved to her expectations. When Kodachi didn't get her way, she pushed and pushed until she either got exactly what she wanted, or the idea was supplanted by something else. She believed that if she completely disrupted part of Akane's plan, the girl wouldn't be able to proceed beyond "step one". The idea that someone could be flexible in handling adversity was beyond her scope.
"Ah hell…" he muttered to himself. "At least we seem to be running out of stores finally. And Kodachi seems to be wearing out as well. Maybe I can just get her to go home instead of trying to gloat at Akane."
There was one good thing about this – if he could arrange it so there was no direct confrontation between the two women, Kodachi wouldn't be spending any time in the hospital this time around…
A/N: Two chapters left to go! Let's see if Konatsu can convince Shampoo to go home as well...
