This story is purely meant for entertainment and should not be taken seriously.
You know what? Actually, it should, because it has a lot of important things to say.
Most of them make good sense. The others make no sense. Try and discern the two.
Please enjoy… although I don't think I have to tell you. I'm pretty sure I don't.
Contains girls loving girls and girls hating stories where guys love guys. …Huh?
Chris and Yun's Bogus Shoujo-Ai Journey
By Al Kristopher
Some people knew Lady Chris Lightfellow as a soldier, or the leader of the Zexen knights. A few others were lucky enough to know her as a companion, a friend, and a worthy ally. Unfortunately, absolutely EVERYBODY believed that poor Chris was not always on the…well, straight and narrow path, in so many words. Oh sure, she was a warrior of good and a champion for justice, and sometimes extended mercy to her most vile enemies. But her goodness wasn't in question: her "preferences" were.
It all began simply enough, when the Grasslands desired peace. Many people saw it as a chance for the wars to finally stop: others swore that Lucia, chief of the Karaya clan and one of Zexen's former enemies, was flirting with poor Chris. Rumors spread fast, and soon poor Lady Chris found herself in a jam--and not the delicious type, either. It didn't get any prettier after that, even after she received "harmless" flirts from Nash, Borus, and Percival (and on at least one occasion, Louis and Melville). A chance meeting with a certain Alma Kinan girl shattered all those previous flings to pieces.
And if that had not been enough, an encounter with the ninja Ayame, involving a hot tub and soap, ensured that everyone would be questioning Chris about "certain things" for the remainder of her life. This would put a severe disadvantage to her career as a knight, not to mention her fan club! Then again, it also gave her a very rare advantage that very few other women really had.
Chris Lightfellow, more than any other woman in the Suikoden world, was the closest and therefore best example of a shoujo-ai character (whether she liked it or not). Since this was the case, she was elected to be permanent poster child for the almost nonexistent movement to eliminate rampant shounen-ai. Sadly, there were very few people who championed the straight pairing--most of them had to step up out of obscurity just to be noticed--and shoujo-ai was even more ignored. Lady Chris was perhaps the best and loudest voice for the movement to prevent rampant yaoi fan fiction, even though she loathed it.
"I'm not doing it!" she shouted stubbornly. "It's foolishness! I refuse to have any affiliation towards this ridiculous movement! Furthermore, where do these people GET these ideas anyway? Anyone who's watched me work any longer than five minutes will know that I have the hots for Fred!"
"But I have the hots for Fred!" whined Lilly, coming out of nowhere. Chris gave her "friend" a strange look.
"I thought you liked Hugo."
"I thought you liked Hugo!" gawked Lilly. Chris bolted for the redhead angrily, glaring as she grabbed Lilly by the collar of her dress shirt.
"WHAT? That's even more ridiculous than me being bisexual! I have no relationship with him outside of our companionship in Budehuc Castle!"
"That's not what a lot of people are writing about," sang Lilly. Chris snarled, flaring her nostrils, and released Lilly. If she had clenched her fists any tighter, she would've ripped Lilly's clothes.
"This is absolutely insane!" she spat bitterly. "I'm a knight! I have duties! Don't people realize that I don't have time for that sort of thing? And if I did, I wouldn't be spending it with some woman, or the son of my rival!"
"You shouldn't say things like that," sighed Lilly as she sat down on a plush chair and made herself comfortable. "If you do, it'll only make people want to pursue you even more." Aggravated, Chris wheeled around and gave Lilly a nasty look, though it really wasn't aimed at her.
"I can't seem to please anybody, then! I shouldn't even bother! Grr, something has to be done about all this!"
"But why? You would look so cute with a pretty young lady in your arms, looking up into your cool violet eyes like a damsel recently saved from destruction by her dashing knight!"
"I'm not hearing this!" screamed Chris, forcing her hands over her ears. "Lilly, where do you GET these ideas?"
"I snuck a look at Fanfiction.net while Cleo and Sonya were away," she indicated. "I like what they're doing, though I don't really care for yuri. I just read all the stuff with me in it, and maybe you, Hugo, Fred, and a few others. I haven't seen any shoujo-ai stories with you in them yet, but if we're patient…"
"I'd really rather not be patient," moaned poor Chris. She slumped down on the nearest sofa, sighing wearily and blowing a few stray strands of silvery hair from her face. Lilly smiled at her, and stood up with that same Pendragon's determined look in her eye.
"Chris, I got it! Why don't you go over to the Pairings Office and tell them that you're only attracted to men?!"
"They won't believe me," she moaned wearily. "I could have eight men surrounding me as my vouchers, but if one woman comes in and says hello to me, everything is ruined. You know, Lilly, some people will try and pair up two characters on the sole basis that they were polite to each other. For example:
Chris and Lilly are friends! They must be in love!
Yumi smiled at Kathy! She must love her!
Viki said that Young Viki was cute! She must love her!
Belle looked at Mel! She must have a crush on her!
Iku gave Nash an apple! They must be in love! Poor Frantz!
Thomas and Fred live in the same castle! They must be in love!
Rhody and Percival were in close proximity to each other! They must love each other!
Luc wants Sasarai dead! He must love him!
"I could go on, but by the time I got finished, I would be eligible to retire," sighed Chris. "Anyway, you get the point."
Lady Chris, lady Chris!
"Huh? What was that?" asked Lilly, who had been startled from the sudden voice. Chris groaned and gave her friend a weary look.
"Oh, that was just Yun. Somehow, she managed to find a way to talk to me through the True Water Rune. It's not a bad thing usually, unless I have to use the bathroom or take a shower. Ugh!" Lilly's face grimaced in confusion, as she gave Chris the kind of look that was only reserved for when something extremely unusual had just happened, such as Samus turning into a giant neurotic squid or Reed doing the Macarena in his underwear.
"Uhh… Chris? Are you feeling okay? The True Runes don't talk to you!"
"Mine does," she replied, holding up her right hand. The True Water Rune, still attached to her hand, shined with a mysterious light.
I really can talk, Lilly! came a voice suddenly. Lilly jerked right out of her chair (and almost did the same to her skin) as the voice took her by shock.
"Whoa! No way! The Rune talks!"
"And she finally figures it out…" Chris moaned and covered her face with her hand, desperately trying to hide her irritation.
Ooh, soft! You smell good, Lady Chris! Quickly, Chris jerked her hand away and screamed at it.
"Yun! Stop smelling my face! Stop talking to me! People will think I'm crazy if they see me talking to a Rune!"
"Too late for that," said Lilly, pointing to an area behind Chris. The Silver Maiden turned around, and to her anger and shock, she saw Arthur there recording everything!
"What a scoop!" he exclaimed. "This article will make me millions! 'Zexen Knight Leader talks to dead lover via the True Rune!' Wow!" The news writer scurried off to print his story, but Chris was both faster and louder than he was.
"ARTHUR, YOU HAD BETTER GET BACK HERE RIGHT NOW! I SWEAR IF I EVER CATCH YOU, I'LL SHOVE THAT NOTEBOOK IN YOUR EARS AND BLIND YOU WITH HOT POKERS!!!"
"AAAAAAAHHH! Wait for me, Lady Chris!" shouted Lilly, desperately scurrying after her friend. "I wanna watch the carnage!"
After exacting messy justice on Arthur (read: his face wasn't the only thing Chris rearranged), Chris decided to take the sketchy advice of her spoilt friend and journeyed to the land of the magical Pairings Office so she could straighten out all the mess about her, erm, questionable preferences. Of course, it wasn't enough that Chris had mere rumors to contend with, oh no. She also had the threat of DCR: Dead Character Resurrection.
The most famous recipient of DCR was Aeris Gainsborough, obviously, and a young lad named Kenny McCormick had also experienced DCR at least 50 times in his life--erm, lives. If fan fiction authors had their way, then Yun would join their ranks and spend her entire life clinging to Chris like some Lolicon love-struck barnacle. And considering the reliability of the True Water Rune, that would be an eternity of queer peril for the lovely knight--trouble indeed! With the risks loosely balanced on her shoulders, she marched towards the office of the Pairings Office with her demands set. Ayame appeared out of nowhere and accompanied her.
"Huh? Where did you come from?" asked Chris, surprised to see the purple-robed woman. Ayame grunted.
"…The plains. I followed you."
"Why?"
"HLS, of course." Chris rolled her eyes and moaned wearily.
"Oh, please! There's not even a hot tub around!" Ayame took a step towards Chris, her mysterious blue eyes piercing into the other woman.
"Then I've come to clean my slate as well. You can understand how tiresome it gets when people think you're a poster child for the Gay and Lesbian Alliance of Video Games and Anime."
"…Yes…"
"It's a terrible situation, inherited in the system when all inhibitions went away during the 60s," muttered the ninja, casting her face aside. "You notice some suds on a person's face and suddenly you're declared gay. I've noticed lots of things on Watari's face before, but nobody's ever bothered to hook us up!"
"Yet," muttered Chris. "But what kinds of things were on Watari's face?"
"Oh, you know," shrugged Ayame. "Dirt, leaves, bugs, lobsters, Dick Cheny, a poodle…" Chris made a disgusted face.
"Ugh. I see."
"Yes, we're too busy hating each other to have any kind of love relationship, though," sighed Ayame. "So I guess I can forgive people for not putting us together. Thankfully, I haven't seen a story yet that has the two of us in a romantic relationship."
"Oh, just you wait," moaned Chris, hugging herself as she shuddered. "If you give these people enough time, I'll have been whored around the Stars of Destiny like a dog in heat! They could have an orgy centered around me one of these days!"
Aah! Lady Chris! Your body feels so warm! Would an orgy be so bad?
"Stop that!" Chris screamed, and slapped her own hand around for a few good minutes. She ran over and smacked it up against a tree, screaming "Stupid True Water Rune!"
WHAM! WHAM! WHAM! WHAM!
"But that's MY shtick!" pouted Mel miserably. Ayame shook her head in irritation, and managed to yank her comrade away from self-destruction. The poor spirit of Yun was in no better a condition.
Owie! Lady Chris, I only want to love you! Why do you abuse me so?
"I'm not gay!" she screamed loudly, perhaps a bit too loudly. "You're… you're just a friend of mine! An acquaintance! I barely even know you! And besides, you're way too young for me! What would people think if they saw me with a 13 year old girl?"
"They'd say you were a pedophile," answered Ayame bluntly. Chris glared at the woman and slammed her hand on her shoulder.
"Exactly! So Yun, I can't pair up with you!"
"What about me?" asked Lucia, her voice saucy as she emerged from nowhere. Chris' head nearly exploded from the anger and shock that came out of it.
"NO! We're not even friends! Remember, we used to be enemies!"
"Only because a few dirty mages tricked us," answered the Karayan with a small gesture. "I'm sure that we could've become very close if the situation was different…"
"AAAHHH, I'm not hearing this!" Poor Chris nearly clutched her throbbing head with her hands, but then remembered that Yun was still part of the True Water Rune, and thus a part of herself, and so she simply ran off as fast as she could towards the Pairings Office. Bewildered, Lucia strolled over to Ayame with one hand on her hips.
"…Weird! This is such a strange side of her. I've never seen Chris act this way." The ninja shrugged.
"What can I say? This whole story is one big festival of weirdness. Hey, wanna screw?"
"I thought you'd never ask!" (Speak of the devil…)
Twelve minutes lair, in the lair of the pairings office, we find our heroine demanding action from the Pairings Office official.
"I'm not gay! Can't you do anything about it?"
"It's too late," sighed the poor man. "I can't stop rumors once they're spread, unless you give me an even bigger idea to use against them. Besides, Cleo and Sonya did too good of a job to champion the shoujo-ai movement. It's really blossomed into a gigantic industry! There's even a website of it up on the internet!"
"Well, anyone who goes to that website must be a ridiculous twit!" spat Chris. "Are you really saying that you can't do anything about these rumors?" The man shook his head, to her disappointment.
"No. You have two choices left, miss. You can either embrace these rumors or continue to run from them. At this point in your career, you have no hope of dispelling them."
"EVER?"
"No. I'm sorry." Chris growled, but slowly regained her composure. With the choices presented to her swirling in her mind, she slowly gazed back to the True Water Rune on her hand, and considered her options. It wouldn't be so bad being branded a model yuri representative… would it?
"…Fine," she sighed in defeat. "If I must lose in either situation, I may as well find some kind of happiness in one. If I chose to run, I would just be miserable forever; at least by accepting things, people may leave me alone. All right, I'll do it. Now my only problem is who I'd rather be with: Ayame or Lucia."
What about me, Lady Chris? Chris gave her hand a sad smile, shaking her head in regret.
"I'm sorry, Yun. It would be nice, but you're dead and part of the True Water Rune. It'd be kind of hard to experience the kind of love I need with a voice, wouldn't it?"
"Oh, that won't be a problem at all," said a voice from behind. Chris nearly jumped out of her armor (Yun would've loved that) and bolted around to see the smiling face of an un-impaled Aeris staring back at her. She recoiled.
"Aeris? But… you're supposed to be dead!"
"Oh, don't be so silly, Chris!" laughed the Ancient. "I've been resurrected so many times that I'm now legally alive! My 'rebirth', as it seems, has made so many people happy that it's been officially declared that I'm alive!"
"…No kidding." Aeris smiled warmly, when all of a sudden, the roof caved in and smashed right on her.
"Oh my god, they killed Aeris!" screamed Stan.
"You porcupine-kissing cactus-hugging hippie-loving midget-worshipping knuckle-dragging no-driving nose-picking perverts!" screamed Kyle. They looked at each other and shrugged. Chris couldn't help but smirk in bemused awe, and wheeled around to share her expression with the Pairings manager.
"Where's your God now, Moses?"
"…Excuse me?"
"I'd like to see you resurrect that!" she stated, pointing to the rubble that had smashed Aeris' body. The manager sighed, whipped out a Game Shark, and in moments, Aeris was back on her feet and smiling again! Chris' face brightened in shock.
"That's amazing! Can you really revive people with that?" The manager shrugged.
"Hey, what do you think this is, real life? Here, try it out!" He tossed her the small black machine, and she caught it with great care. Slowly, she stared at the object as if it were some precious jewel swiped from Sindar ruins, not sure what to do with it.
"How does it… work?"
"It's very easy," said the manager, pointing at it as he began his speech. "You see, blah blah blah yak yak yak etc etc etc and so on and so forth, and that's how it's done!"
"Why that is so easy!" said Chris. Smiling happily, she used the Game Shark and brought Yun back to life, extracting her spirit out of the True Water Rune and putting it back into her body (mysteriously, Jimba remained inside). With a flash, Yun came back to the living world and gave Chris a gorgeous smile that had been worth all the trouble. A loving embrace, shared by both of them, was added to that smile.
"Oh, Chris!"
"Yun…" The girl and the woman held each other closely, feeling the touch of each other's bodies for the first time since… well, since ever, really (well, then again, Yun had been connected to the True Water Rune long enough to definitely "touch" Chris' body). They both released a sigh, and slowly looked into each other's eyes as their embrace loosened but never lost.
"…Milady Chris… we meet again."
"Yun…" The knight couldn't help but smile sweetly, and without another word said between either of them, she bent down and laid her lips upon the girl's forehead. Yun tilted herself up on her toes so that a whole different part of her face was being enveloped by Chris' lips.
"OUCH! YOUR TONGUE POKED MY EYE OUT!!!!!!!"
"…Sorry."
And now, for the extremely crappy conclusion…
--As Chris and Yun walked outside of the Pairings Office, hand in hand (with one of their eyes covered with a cute bandage), they couldn't help but notice that Lucia and Ayame were… doing things with each other. Finding that it was best not to ask, they resumed their walk and ended up living in Alma Kinan for the rest of their lives. Chris parted ways with the True Water Rune three years later, opting to grow old and die with her "companion" rather than live on eternally without her.
--Hugo, in the meantime, was eternally grateful that it had not been he who ended up with the Rune. He honestly had no idea how to handle being connected to a bizarre Alma Kinan girl for the rest of his life. He somehow ended up with Lilly instead, who felt her cameo role in this story wasn't big enough. They had four kids, and one dog.
--Oh, don't give me that look. You know what I meant!
--Fred became very sad that both Lilly and Chris were denied his love. He had fallen for them both, and they had fallen for him. He decided to go live with Tenchi Masaki and see what kind of luck he would run into there. As long as Washu didn't hook his brain up to a transmogrifier, everything would be peachy.
--He ended up being turned into a moogle. Never trust Washu, no matter what.
--Ayame and Watari are still trying to kill each other. People can oftentimes hear their "loud, disturbing, strained efforts of violence" emanating from a locked room. Oddly enough, even after spending up to three hours in the same room, both ninjas always walk away with nary a bruise on them, except for a few red marks around their necks, only to return and continue their "activities" the next day. Sometimes, the clothes they have when they enter the room are not always there when they come out.
--Lucia got over her infatuation with Chris (and later, Ayame), and resolved to hunting down Jowy for back-pay in child support. There is still no conclusive proof that he is Hugo's father, but that isn't stopping Lucia. Poor Jowy.
--Not really.
--Yumi, sick and tired of being branded a lesbian, did the exact opposite of Chris and endured the slings and arrows of outrageous misfortune. She is now happily married to Borus, who is still a bit overprotective of Chris. The poor chap now has Yun, a wife, and a future baby to worry about as well.
--Yuiri and Dios' nose fell in love and lived happily ever after.
--Luc continued to deny being a poster child for the popular shounen-ai movement even after being revived by the Game Shark. Viki, Mille, Lotte, Nanami, and Sara still fight over him. For never being mentioned as a partner in said movement, Sasarai was eternally grateful. Sadly, nobody fights over him.
--Qlon and Mina were married and had three kids. Wow, that came out of nowhere!
--Yuber fell on a sponge.
--Cleo and Sonya, surprisingly, continued their relationship. It did not last long, though, as they began to realize that being champions for the heterosexual movement would be even more rewarding, and thus parted ways to be with Gremio and Alen--respectively.
--Gremio and Alen have no complaints.
--Well, maybe a few here and there, but other than that, everything's okay!
--Except that maybe once in awhile, Camille will stalk them both.
--Sometimes at the same time.
--Finally, it was decided that the shoujo-ai movement would be left up to the fans of that genre, and the lone website that stands against the tide and offers something else to the platter. In a world dominated by needless shounen-ai and reckless yaoi stories, isn't it a relief to read something different? Isn't it? You can bet your buttons, and since experiencing new things is such a wonder, let's all try and think outside the box for just a few moments. You may like the freedom it offers.
--Never start a land war in Asia.
The End