"No Need for an Overthrow"
Washu quickly sat up in her desk. She rubbed her eyes and stared at the screen in front of her which had a small clock in the bottom right hand corner of it. Ack! 9:45 AM! I must've fallen asleep while I was working again. She sighed. She was ready to resume her experiments when she heard a low grumbling noise. Realizing the noise came from her stomach, she decided to get something to eat. She rapped lightly on the door to make sure that Tenchi wasn't changing, and when no response came she opened the door. She wasn't surprised to find that Tenchi's bed was empty. He had always been known to be an early riser, but she was confused when she when she saw that the living room was vacant. Ryoko didn't usually get up until noon. She was totally caught off guard by the hole-ridden table that was overturned in the kitchen. Something had definitely happened without her knowing, and she did _not_ like that.
Before she could ponder the situation more, the doorbell rang. Washu shrugged and walked down the stairs. She opened the door, and Sasami greeted, "Good morning, Little Washu. Is Tenchi up yet?"
"Morning, Sasami. Is your sister here with you?" Washu asked.
Sasami nodded and Ayeka walked up the porch steps, catching up to her sister who had ran the whole way to the Masaki residence.
"Good morning Miss Washu," the older sister greeted.
Washu ignored Ayeka's lack of using her preferred title. "You wouldn't happen to know where Tenchi and Ryoko would be this early, would you?"
"No... why?" Ayeka asked hesitantly.
"Because they're both missing. Come in," Washu offered.
Ayeka and Sasami stepped in reluctantly and surveyed the damage to the house.
Ayeka gritted her teeth. "RYYYYOOOOKOOOO!!!"
-Meanwhile, in the 8,239th Women's Correctional Facility...-
Ryoko abruptly sat up in her sleep, her face lined with sweat. She looked around and swore. This past day hasn't been a dream after all, she thought, disappointed. She looked to her left and saw a slumbering Tenchi. At least something good came out of all this. She smiled softly. She had embraced him, and he didn't throw her off! Well, he didn't exactly hold me in his arms and kiss me passionately, but hey it's a start, she mused.
A buzzer sounded and all the lights in the facility turned on simultaneously.
Tenchi stirred in his sleep and murmured something that almost sounded like Ryoko.
Ryoko smiled and she gently shook Tenchi. "Wake up."
Tenchi yawned and slowly opened his eyes. "What time is it?" he groggily asked. Ryoko glanced outside and saw a clock.
"It's about 8 o'clock," she stated.
Tenchi groaned and slammed the pillow over his face. "If's foo early..." he mumbled.
Ryoko pulled the pillow away from his face. "You don't have much of a choice in the matter, Tenchi. You either eat breakfast now or wait until lunch," she said.
Tenchi sighed and sat up, "All right, all right." Tenchi slowly stood up and staggered to the sink in the cell and turned on the cold water. He promptly dunked his face in it and jerked out of it. He wiped his face and said, "Let's go."
Ryoko shrugged and tentatively tested to see whether the field was still there or not. When she wasn't thrown back, she stepped through and Tenchi followed. "Hey, Ryoko, where is the cafeteria anyway?"
Ryoko shrugged, "I don't know, but who said we were going to eat?"
"Oh, come on, Ryoko! I'm starving!" Tenchi pleaded.
Ryoko sighed, "All right, all right, but you should know that the cooking here is not going to be very good."
"Trust me, Ryoko, when you've eaten my cooking, prison food couldn't be that much of a step down."
Ryoko smiled, "I'm going to go ask where the cafeteria is. Don't go anywhere now." She walked off to a couple of girls who were playing chess.
Tenchi looked out the window, trying to avoid the stares he was getting from seemingly everyone in the facility.
He thought about Ayeka. Man, I wish she were here right now, he mused.
What are you talking about?! You don't want her to be _here_! Tenchi sighed.
Suddenly he felt the hairs on the back of his neck stand on end. He quickly turned around expecting to see something unusual. There was nothing out of the ordinary, however. Tenchi frowned. He had a feeling in the pit of his stomach that something very bad was going to happen soon.
"Tenchi, what's the matter?" Ryoko asked.
He shook his head. He was probably just paranoid. "Nothing. Did you find out where the cafeteria is?"
A look of concern crossed her face. "You sure you're OK?"
"Yeah, I'm fine. Let's go," he said, feigning a smile.
Ryoko shrugged and lead Tenchi down a corridor that eventually ended in a large room, clearly identifiable as the cafeteria. Tenchi grabbed a tray and received his food after receiving flirting looks from the attendants handing out the slop. He gulped, quickly found Ryoko's seat, and sat next to her.
She stirred a particularly unappetizing gray blob with her spoon. She took a scoop full of it and held the spoon upside down. Much to her dismay, gravity didn't seem to affect the so-called food.
Tenchi however was shoveling it in as fast as he could. Many of the prisoners stared in complete shock at the scene. He finished and noticed all the attention he was getting. He blushed and tried to explain. "Uh... if you eat it fast, you won't have to taste it."
Some of the prisoners nodded approvingly and resumed their meals. The others were just too shocked to do much of anything, Ryoko included.
"Um... I'm going to go take up my tray now," Tenchi stated, and quickly got up to do so.
On his way back to his seat, he was intercepted by girl with long blonde hair. She appeared to be just a few years older than Tenchi, probably about 18. Her crystal blue stared up at Tenchi's brown eyes with interest.
"Do you know how long it's been since I've kissed a boy?" she asked as she reached up and ran her finger down the length of the scar on the left side of his face. Her finger continued until it reached Tenchi's lips. She stood up on her toes and brought her lips up to meet his. Tenchi quickly stepped backwards and slowly backed away. He turned around and walked quickly away, his brain still trying to make sense of what almost happened. He had gotten about 10 feet away when he felt two arms wrap around his torso. He froze in his tracks. "My name is Konoma Shii, and I like you. What's your name?"
Tenchi stammered out, "T-Tenchi Masaki."
"Tenshi? You're my angel, Tenshi," said Konoma.
"No, it's Tenchi with a 'c,'" Tenchi explained.
"Close enough," she said. Tenchi suddenly felt something wet trace up his neck, and he broke from her grip. He ran posthaste to his seat and wiped the back of his neck.
"Tenchi, what happened?" Ryoko asked.
"Um... let's just say I just met a girl who was _very_ lonely," he answered.
"What?! Who?!" She exclaimed standing up. Her golden eyes darted across the crowd.
"Ryoko, calm down. It's no big deal," he said.
Ryoko frowned and crossed her arms across her chest. "Well, she better stay away from you," she mumbled under her breath.
A bell sounded, and several of the guards left leaving behind only two.
Murmurs rose through the prisoners, all wondering what was going on.
Tenchi frowned. He just knew that this had something to do with the weird feeling he had had earlier this morning.
Ryoko's catlike eyes darted side to side and she spotted them first. Four prisoners were sneaking up on both of the guards. Something was definitely happening. She watched as they crept closer and closer to the unwary guards. She grabbed Tenchi's hand, ready to sprint if necessary.
Tenchi noticed the pressure on his hand and looked to Ryoko. He traced her line of vision and found what she was looking at. He opened his mouth to shout a warning, but Ryoko immediately slapped a hand over his mouth.
"Tenchi, you know that feeling you get in your gut when something bad is getting ready to happen?" Ryoko asked. When Tenchi nodded, she continued, "Do you have that feeling right now?" Again, Tenchi nodded. "Me too. I think something very big is going-"
She was cut off by the sound of one of the guards grunting and falling to the ground. One of the prisoners held a club-like object in her hand. The other guard made a mad dash for the alarm, but was intercepted by another club-toting prisoner. The guard never stood a chance and soon joined her unconscious partner on the ground.
All the while, Tenchi and Ryoko watched in complete shock.
The PA system screeched with feedback. A brusque voice sounded over it, "Sisters of the 8,239th, we are now in control!"
Tenchi gulped. He did not like the sound of that.
-Back on Earth-
Washu sat at her astral PC, watching the events of last night. She was trying to figure out exactly what had happened. She didn't want to miss a single thing so she had been reviewing the day, skipping only the parts that she was with everybody. She had sent Ayeka home an hour ago. She knew that this would possibly take all day, and she didn't want Ayeka's parents to be suspicious when they got home.
Washu jumped when she felt something warm rub against her leg. She looked down and was greeted by a small, brown-furred, rabbit-like creature. Washu smiled and picked the creature up and scratched it under the chin. The creature was a result of one of many Washu's genetic experiments. She liked to call it a cabbit, because it had the body of a rabbit and the face and voice of a cat.
The cabbit curled up in Washu's lap and purred softly. Washu stroked its fur softly and watched the screen. Washu glanced at the clock and frowned. It was already 7 o'clock. She looked at her PC's monitor and noticed that it was about the time that Ayeka and Sasami left. She rose an eyebrow when Ryoko jumped on top of Tenchi, and was suddenly glad that Ayeka had left earlier. When Ryoko wants something, she certainly goes for it, Washu mused.
Suddenly, Ryoko stood up and answered the door. Washu watched the following event. She frowned, "This is _not_ good!" The cabbit looked up at Washu's face and cocked her head to the side.
Washu ignored the creature for a moment, and began feverishly typing on the computer.
"OK, if Ryoko and Tenchi haven't gotten back then we can safely assume that they got arrested," she thought aloud, not really thinking the small animal would understand. "So we cross-reference the closest prisons with arrivals within yesterday and today," Washu stated. A list of 30 or so prisons appeared on the screen. "OK, we'll try to narrow it down a little bit. We can assume that they wanted to arrest Ryoko, so we narrow it down to women's facilities." The list narrowed down to just 10. "OK, Ryoko's going to be charged with murder. Let's narrow it to high-security prisons." Four remained. Washu rubbed her chin thoughtfully. She really didn't want to hack through all of those codes. Not that she couldn't, she was very confident that she could, she just didn't want to waste her time.
The small creature stood up and looked at the screen and raised its ears. It placed its paw over one of the names on the screen and mewed.
Washu's eyebrow arced again. "You think it's that one?"
The small mammal mewed affirmatively and removed her paw from the screen.
"The 8,239th? Let's find out," Washu said, her confidence evident. Within a matter of minutes, the scientist had pulled up the roster of the prison. Washu stared amazed when she saw Ryoko and Tenchi as the most recent additions to the index. She stared down at her creation.
"That was quite a lucky guess. But I suppose, with your relation with Ryoko, that it wasn't a guess."
The cabbit mewed excitedly.
"You're right! For what are we waiting?" Washu stood up quickly. "Let's go, Ryo-ohki!"
Washu quickly sat up in her desk. She rubbed her eyes and stared at the screen in front of her which had a small clock in the bottom right hand corner of it. Ack! 9:45 AM! I must've fallen asleep while I was working again. She sighed. She was ready to resume her experiments when she heard a low grumbling noise. Realizing the noise came from her stomach, she decided to get something to eat. She rapped lightly on the door to make sure that Tenchi wasn't changing, and when no response came she opened the door. She wasn't surprised to find that Tenchi's bed was empty. He had always been known to be an early riser, but she was confused when she when she saw that the living room was vacant. Ryoko didn't usually get up until noon. She was totally caught off guard by the hole-ridden table that was overturned in the kitchen. Something had definitely happened without her knowing, and she did _not_ like that.
Before she could ponder the situation more, the doorbell rang. Washu shrugged and walked down the stairs. She opened the door, and Sasami greeted, "Good morning, Little Washu. Is Tenchi up yet?"
"Morning, Sasami. Is your sister here with you?" Washu asked.
Sasami nodded and Ayeka walked up the porch steps, catching up to her sister who had ran the whole way to the Masaki residence.
"Good morning Miss Washu," the older sister greeted.
Washu ignored Ayeka's lack of using her preferred title. "You wouldn't happen to know where Tenchi and Ryoko would be this early, would you?"
"No... why?" Ayeka asked hesitantly.
"Because they're both missing. Come in," Washu offered.
Ayeka and Sasami stepped in reluctantly and surveyed the damage to the house.
Ayeka gritted her teeth. "RYYYYOOOOKOOOO!!!"
-Meanwhile, in the 8,239th Women's Correctional Facility...-
Ryoko abruptly sat up in her sleep, her face lined with sweat. She looked around and swore. This past day hasn't been a dream after all, she thought, disappointed. She looked to her left and saw a slumbering Tenchi. At least something good came out of all this. She smiled softly. She had embraced him, and he didn't throw her off! Well, he didn't exactly hold me in his arms and kiss me passionately, but hey it's a start, she mused.
A buzzer sounded and all the lights in the facility turned on simultaneously.
Tenchi stirred in his sleep and murmured something that almost sounded like Ryoko.
Ryoko smiled and she gently shook Tenchi. "Wake up."
Tenchi yawned and slowly opened his eyes. "What time is it?" he groggily asked. Ryoko glanced outside and saw a clock.
"It's about 8 o'clock," she stated.
Tenchi groaned and slammed the pillow over his face. "If's foo early..." he mumbled.
Ryoko pulled the pillow away from his face. "You don't have much of a choice in the matter, Tenchi. You either eat breakfast now or wait until lunch," she said.
Tenchi sighed and sat up, "All right, all right." Tenchi slowly stood up and staggered to the sink in the cell and turned on the cold water. He promptly dunked his face in it and jerked out of it. He wiped his face and said, "Let's go."
Ryoko shrugged and tentatively tested to see whether the field was still there or not. When she wasn't thrown back, she stepped through and Tenchi followed. "Hey, Ryoko, where is the cafeteria anyway?"
Ryoko shrugged, "I don't know, but who said we were going to eat?"
"Oh, come on, Ryoko! I'm starving!" Tenchi pleaded.
Ryoko sighed, "All right, all right, but you should know that the cooking here is not going to be very good."
"Trust me, Ryoko, when you've eaten my cooking, prison food couldn't be that much of a step down."
Ryoko smiled, "I'm going to go ask where the cafeteria is. Don't go anywhere now." She walked off to a couple of girls who were playing chess.
Tenchi looked out the window, trying to avoid the stares he was getting from seemingly everyone in the facility.
He thought about Ayeka. Man, I wish she were here right now, he mused.
What are you talking about?! You don't want her to be _here_! Tenchi sighed.
Suddenly he felt the hairs on the back of his neck stand on end. He quickly turned around expecting to see something unusual. There was nothing out of the ordinary, however. Tenchi frowned. He had a feeling in the pit of his stomach that something very bad was going to happen soon.
"Tenchi, what's the matter?" Ryoko asked.
He shook his head. He was probably just paranoid. "Nothing. Did you find out where the cafeteria is?"
A look of concern crossed her face. "You sure you're OK?"
"Yeah, I'm fine. Let's go," he said, feigning a smile.
Ryoko shrugged and lead Tenchi down a corridor that eventually ended in a large room, clearly identifiable as the cafeteria. Tenchi grabbed a tray and received his food after receiving flirting looks from the attendants handing out the slop. He gulped, quickly found Ryoko's seat, and sat next to her.
She stirred a particularly unappetizing gray blob with her spoon. She took a scoop full of it and held the spoon upside down. Much to her dismay, gravity didn't seem to affect the so-called food.
Tenchi however was shoveling it in as fast as he could. Many of the prisoners stared in complete shock at the scene. He finished and noticed all the attention he was getting. He blushed and tried to explain. "Uh... if you eat it fast, you won't have to taste it."
Some of the prisoners nodded approvingly and resumed their meals. The others were just too shocked to do much of anything, Ryoko included.
"Um... I'm going to go take up my tray now," Tenchi stated, and quickly got up to do so.
On his way back to his seat, he was intercepted by girl with long blonde hair. She appeared to be just a few years older than Tenchi, probably about 18. Her crystal blue stared up at Tenchi's brown eyes with interest.
"Do you know how long it's been since I've kissed a boy?" she asked as she reached up and ran her finger down the length of the scar on the left side of his face. Her finger continued until it reached Tenchi's lips. She stood up on her toes and brought her lips up to meet his. Tenchi quickly stepped backwards and slowly backed away. He turned around and walked quickly away, his brain still trying to make sense of what almost happened. He had gotten about 10 feet away when he felt two arms wrap around his torso. He froze in his tracks. "My name is Konoma Shii, and I like you. What's your name?"
Tenchi stammered out, "T-Tenchi Masaki."
"Tenshi? You're my angel, Tenshi," said Konoma.
"No, it's Tenchi with a 'c,'" Tenchi explained.
"Close enough," she said. Tenchi suddenly felt something wet trace up his neck, and he broke from her grip. He ran posthaste to his seat and wiped the back of his neck.
"Tenchi, what happened?" Ryoko asked.
"Um... let's just say I just met a girl who was _very_ lonely," he answered.
"What?! Who?!" She exclaimed standing up. Her golden eyes darted across the crowd.
"Ryoko, calm down. It's no big deal," he said.
Ryoko frowned and crossed her arms across her chest. "Well, she better stay away from you," she mumbled under her breath.
A bell sounded, and several of the guards left leaving behind only two.
Murmurs rose through the prisoners, all wondering what was going on.
Tenchi frowned. He just knew that this had something to do with the weird feeling he had had earlier this morning.
Ryoko's catlike eyes darted side to side and she spotted them first. Four prisoners were sneaking up on both of the guards. Something was definitely happening. She watched as they crept closer and closer to the unwary guards. She grabbed Tenchi's hand, ready to sprint if necessary.
Tenchi noticed the pressure on his hand and looked to Ryoko. He traced her line of vision and found what she was looking at. He opened his mouth to shout a warning, but Ryoko immediately slapped a hand over his mouth.
"Tenchi, you know that feeling you get in your gut when something bad is getting ready to happen?" Ryoko asked. When Tenchi nodded, she continued, "Do you have that feeling right now?" Again, Tenchi nodded. "Me too. I think something very big is going-"
She was cut off by the sound of one of the guards grunting and falling to the ground. One of the prisoners held a club-like object in her hand. The other guard made a mad dash for the alarm, but was intercepted by another club-toting prisoner. The guard never stood a chance and soon joined her unconscious partner on the ground.
All the while, Tenchi and Ryoko watched in complete shock.
The PA system screeched with feedback. A brusque voice sounded over it, "Sisters of the 8,239th, we are now in control!"
Tenchi gulped. He did not like the sound of that.
-Back on Earth-
Washu sat at her astral PC, watching the events of last night. She was trying to figure out exactly what had happened. She didn't want to miss a single thing so she had been reviewing the day, skipping only the parts that she was with everybody. She had sent Ayeka home an hour ago. She knew that this would possibly take all day, and she didn't want Ayeka's parents to be suspicious when they got home.
Washu jumped when she felt something warm rub against her leg. She looked down and was greeted by a small, brown-furred, rabbit-like creature. Washu smiled and picked the creature up and scratched it under the chin. The creature was a result of one of many Washu's genetic experiments. She liked to call it a cabbit, because it had the body of a rabbit and the face and voice of a cat.
The cabbit curled up in Washu's lap and purred softly. Washu stroked its fur softly and watched the screen. Washu glanced at the clock and frowned. It was already 7 o'clock. She looked at her PC's monitor and noticed that it was about the time that Ayeka and Sasami left. She rose an eyebrow when Ryoko jumped on top of Tenchi, and was suddenly glad that Ayeka had left earlier. When Ryoko wants something, she certainly goes for it, Washu mused.
Suddenly, Ryoko stood up and answered the door. Washu watched the following event. She frowned, "This is _not_ good!" The cabbit looked up at Washu's face and cocked her head to the side.
Washu ignored the creature for a moment, and began feverishly typing on the computer.
"OK, if Ryoko and Tenchi haven't gotten back then we can safely assume that they got arrested," she thought aloud, not really thinking the small animal would understand. "So we cross-reference the closest prisons with arrivals within yesterday and today," Washu stated. A list of 30 or so prisons appeared on the screen. "OK, we'll try to narrow it down a little bit. We can assume that they wanted to arrest Ryoko, so we narrow it down to women's facilities." The list narrowed down to just 10. "OK, Ryoko's going to be charged with murder. Let's narrow it to high-security prisons." Four remained. Washu rubbed her chin thoughtfully. She really didn't want to hack through all of those codes. Not that she couldn't, she was very confident that she could, she just didn't want to waste her time.
The small creature stood up and looked at the screen and raised its ears. It placed its paw over one of the names on the screen and mewed.
Washu's eyebrow arced again. "You think it's that one?"
The small mammal mewed affirmatively and removed her paw from the screen.
"The 8,239th? Let's find out," Washu said, her confidence evident. Within a matter of minutes, the scientist had pulled up the roster of the prison. Washu stared amazed when she saw Ryoko and Tenchi as the most recent additions to the index. She stared down at her creation.
"That was quite a lucky guess. But I suppose, with your relation with Ryoko, that it wasn't a guess."
The cabbit mewed excitedly.
"You're right! For what are we waiting?" Washu stood up quickly. "Let's go, Ryo-ohki!"