Love Hina: Once Again
Chapter 31
Naru liked getting letters from the Hinata Inn in Japan. They were entertaining, and it was nice to keep up with their friends. And as they were usually from Kitsune, they dished all the 'dirt' on what was going on too.
"She caught Tennyo and Mutsumi in the act?!" Keitaro yelped.
Naru snickered loudly. "Yeah," she nodded, "they were SO embarrassed."
Keitaro looked bemused. He was probably considering that at one point he had very nearly been dating Mutsumi.
"Oh hell," Naru murmured as she hit the last bit.
"Hmm?" Keitaro looked over her shoulder. "Su and Sara were spying on guests..." he blinked.
"Rei found a camera in her room, and she was REALLY pissed," Naru mused.
Both Naru and Keitaro exchanged somewhat guilty looks. As the kinda 'head' of the household, they had sort of been in charge of controlling Su's behaviour. And to be honest they hadn't really managed it. Too often Su had helped them out of jams, making it hard to punish her for more extreme things she did.
"We'll have to tell Seta, then send a really firm letter," Keitaro noted.
Naru gave him a look, but realized that really WAS all they could do from where they were. "And Haruka. She's gonna be PISSED," Naru noted.
"Oh yeah," Keitaro agreed.
"Well," Naru sighed, "let's hope nothing ELSE has gone wrong..."
0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0
"AAAAA!" Shinobu yelled as the young woman ran away down the hall from what looked like a slime monster.
The mob of the things had... plopped down from the sky only a few minutes ago, and had driven off all the random passerby. Now they were surrounding the Inn, apparently trying to do SOMETHING to the residents.
"Head over here!" Su yelled, wearing a huge backpack and what looked like a gun. In fact she pretty much looked like a Ghostbuster.
Shinobu staggered by her breathlessly, even as Su's gun poured out a thick white mist. "What...?" Shinobu managed to gasp.
"Super cooled gas," Su noted crisply.
The creature blob THING staggered a few steps towards them, then just froze solid. It teetered a moment, then fell over with a loud thud.
"You okay?" Sara asked, also carrying one of the cool guns.
"I think so," Shinobu managed. "What is going ON?" she demanded.
"Not a clue," Su noted cheerfully. "Let's find the others."
"This would be a LOT easier if you hadn't boarded up the tunnels in the Inn," Sara complained a few moments later as they fought off more slime critters.
"Or they could be using the tunnels themselves," Shinobu noted, now carrying a broom handle. Apparently the things didn't like being hit, too.
"Point," Sara admitted.
Sticking to the hallways they found Kanako calmly evading another one of the critters with her family fighting style. "WHAT is going on?" she demanded as she slapped a jumping blob down with a graceful palm strike.
"No idea," Shinobu admitted.
"Nice!" Su noted as they froze more of the blobs.
Kanako frowned. The black haired woman noted, "Where is Tennyo and Mutsumi?"
A loud crash came from outside, distracting them. "Let's check that out!" Su suggested.
The group advanced through the Inn then out to the hot springs, where they froze. Tennyo Masaki was wielding what looked like an actual LIGHT SABER as she fought a giant slime. And defending her back was Mutsumi, using a broom handle to clobber any smaller critters.
"AWESOME," Sara blinked.
"We should help them," Shinobu declared.
"She's right," Kanako took charge. "We need to help Mutsumi keep the small ones back, then maybe help Tennyo."
Shinobu trailed behind as they all charged into the fray. Her broom was enough to force back a slime, but it was mostly Su and Sara that did the most damage. It was crazy how calmly they all took this soft of thing... tho Shinobu supposed they were sort of used to mad science stuff exploding from Su's lab and such.
"Is everyone all right?" Tennyo asked as she sliced at the huge slime. Burning bits dropped off, crumbling apart as they fell.
"As far as I know," Kanako answered. "Do you know WHAT is going on?" she asked.
"Long story," Tennyo sighed.
'Well, at least someone knows,' Shinobu sighed.
They watched in awe as Tennyo fought the giant slime, leaping up and literally slicing it right down the middle. That massive amount of damage, coupled with what had already been done, finally killed the thing.
As the massive creature crumbled to dust, the smaller ones did too. Even the ones frozen by Su and Sara broke apart.
"Too bad," Su prodded one, "I wanted to study one."
"Oh hell no," several women noted.
"Meanies," Su sighed.
"And another mess to clean up," Kanako sighed as she looked around. "And Tennyo, I think you have an explanation to give?"
"Yes, ma'am," Tennyo smiled wryly.
They ended up at the Hinata cafe, where Shinobu and Mutsumi made everyone tea. As they settled down with relieved sighs, Tennyo explained what she guessed had happened.
"Your RELATIVES sent it?" Sara blinked.
"I think so. Washu, maybe... or my aunt. Or..." Tennyo shrugged helplessly.
"Huh. You have relatives as interesting as mine," Su noted.
"Su," Shinobu sighed.
"I'm really sorry about this," Tennyo addressed Kanako politely. "If it's an issue, I will reluctantly move out..."
"Hey!" Mutsumi yelped.
"It's fine," Kanako shook her head as she added, "I suspected when you moved in you weren't just an architect."
"Whew," Tennyo sighed in relief.
"Just... please try not to let it happen again." Kanako added wryly.
"I'll try," Tennyo answered.
0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0
At the offices of Jurai Interests Inc, the office manager Mitoto Satoko finished compiling the report. She opened a communications link to the off-world ship, then sent it.
Within seconds, she got the call. "How did it go?" Seto Kamiki Jurai demanded.
"They repelled the attack in ten minutes," Mitoko informed her. "Several women were surprisingly combat capable."
"Hmm," Seto agreed as she skimmed the report. Several moves Kanako did actually looked Jurai in origin... she made a note to ask Yosho about that.
"It should also be noted that more than half the residents were away," Mitoko added, "including several we expected to be the most dangerous."
"Do you think that Tennyo is reasonably safe there, then?" Seto asked. That was, basically, the point of this test after all.
"At the worst, I feel confident they can hold out until a response team gets there," Mitoko answered her cautiously.
"Fair enough," Seto conceded. That WAS the point of this test after all.
"I WOULD like to move our headquarters nearer to the Masaki Shrine as well as the Inn. I think we can cut down on our response time that way," Mitoko added.
"And you could visit the hot spring guilt free," Seto noted.
"That too," Mitoko conceded.
To be continued...
Notes: short random break from the Durarara arc. It occured to me Seto would wanna test how safe Tennyo is, living out at the Inn. So, dropped an army of slime monsters on them.