Unclear On The Concept

By Kebinu

Love Hina is owned by Ken Akamatsu and distributed by Bandai and Tokyopop.

[Sar·casm
Pronunciation: 'sär-"ka-z&m
Function: noun
Etymology: French or Late Latin; French sarcasme, from Late Latin sarcasmos, from Greek sarkasmos, from sarkazein to tear flesh, bite the lips in rage, sneer, from sark-, sarx flesh; probably akin to Avestan thwar&s- to cut
Date: 1550
1 : a sharp and often satirical or ironic utterance designed to cut or give pain tired of continual sarcasms
2 a : a mode of satirical wit depending for its effect on bitter, caustic, and often ironic language that is usually directed against an individual b : the use or language of sarcasm this is no time to indulge in sarcasm"

-from Merriam-Webster's Dictionary]

Keitaro's head struck the wall with a sickening thud. Stars flew before his eyes as his legs, no longer receiving information regarding keeping his body upright, collapsed from under him; a brief message from his knees indicating they had impacted the ground arrived in his brain shortly before his face collided with the hardwood floor of Hinata Inn, driving the point further home.

He struggled for just a moment to speak before realizing he had bitten down on something small and hard. Spitting it from his mouth, he realized it was a tooth as it clattered on the floor and rolled across the room to stop at the feet of the person who had struck the devastating blow.

"Keitaro, you pervert!" roared Naru Narusegawa with a fury unmatched by man or beast. "I cannot believe the gall—the sheer impudence—of what you just did!"

"But what did I do?" Keitaro asked weakly, slowly lifting his swollen eyes to look at the angry female, who answered his question with only a gaze of utter contempt. "Narusegawa, I was just sitting in here reading my math textbook—"

"Ha!" snapped Naru, tossing her head to the side and sticking her nose up, her red-brown hair swaying in the air. "Ha! Ha I say to you! Ha and Ha again! You act like I've never heard that one before! I can tell you were planning something perverted! Probably trafficking in naked pictures of the girls! Don't deny they exist!"

"I'm not!" pleaded Keitaro. "I know, I saw them! But I'm not the one who took those pictures, for god's sake—it was Su and Sarah pulling a prank on you guys!"

"Ha! Ha! A thousand times HA!" Naru snarled, rolling her eyes and rolling up her sleeves. "A likely story! This is all your fault! Everything is your fault! Me failing my exams, Shinobu burning lunch, this humid weather that makes my hair go all frizzy… everything is your fault!"

Keitaro made an effort to throw his hands in the air in frustration, but found his left arm refusing to cooperate—apparently, it was broken.

"Fine! It's my fault!" he snapped weakly with as much venom as he could muster. "It's all my fault! Remember when your ice cream cone melted the other day because you were too busy studying to eat it? That was my fault! And remember how Kitsune lifted that thousand yen from your purse to buy sake? That was my fault too! Oh Naru, what can I ever do to atone for my terrible sins?"

Naru paused for a moment, as though thoughtful.

"A good start would be you dying the Chinese thousand-cut death," she announced, pulling the cursed Hina blade literally out of nowhere. Keitaro immediately regretted his words as he faced down the grinning girl, a black aura of devastating evil surrounding her. In his injured state, it was clear he had no chance—like he ever had one to begin with.

"Shinmei Ryu – Evil Bitch Slaying Attack!"

The blast of wind ki appeared from nowhere and heroically flung Naru straight across the room, her body making a loud cracking noise and indentation in the wall as she not so heroically crumpled to the ground. Keitaro struggled to turn and face the doorway, where Motoko Aoyama stood heroically, holding her sword in an I-just-whipped-your-ass pose.

As if on cue, cherry blossoms immediately swirled through the room, borne on a light breeze, the tiny pink petals cheerfully ignoring the fact that the window was closed.

Motoko slowly turned to look at Keitaro, and the expression on her face changed from one of determination to shock and horror.

"Urashima!" she cried in an unnaturally high voice, breaking out into a sprint towards the injured manager, who remained on his knees. As Aoyama reached him, she immediately pulled him into her embrace, pressing his face to her bosom and letting out a very out of character sigh of pleasure.

"M-Motoko…" Keitaro whispered. "You came…"

"Gentle Keitaro, my love, I will protect you, so do not speak," she cooed in a maternal fashion, stroking his head with her fingers. "Save your strength. You will need it tonight, if you know what I mean…" Motoko added, with a very smug glance backwards at the injured Narusegawa.

Impossibly, with the strength and endurance of an inhuman beast, Naru sprang to her feet, pointing her katana straight at Motoko.

"Fat chance!" the redhead roared. "You'll both die before the sun sets! Well, actually, Motoko… you're going to die first. And very slowly, from slashed arteries in several strategic spots, with Keitaro watching, for maximum trauma effect. Then, I'm going to cut Keitaro's arms and legs off, and while he slowly bleeds to death, I'll have sex with Seta and Kentaro in front of him just to force him to see what he's missing."

"Foul beast! Only a demon like you could come up with such a nefarious plan!" Motoko cried, readying her weapon.

Naru laughed crazily, beaming with self-satisfaction. "Of course only I could! Isn't it obvious? I'm the evilest being in the universe!"

Aoyama steadied herself and planted her feet firmly, swaying slightly on traditional Japanese wooden clogs that she was wearing for maximum legendary-samurai-warrior effect, in spite of the fact that they were ludicrously impractical for fighting on in reality. "Naru-senpai, by my blood, my honor and my family, I swear I will purge the world of your evil!"

"CUUUUUUUUUUUUTTTTTTTTTT!!!!!!!"

Motoko sighed in irritation. "Damn it, we were almost finished… what is it?"

"You dropped Keitaro," came the voice from the next room. "You're not supposed to do that, remember? You're unlikely lovers!"

The samurai girl glanced down in time to notice her 'lover' sprawled out on the floor. He took a second to pop his left arm back into joint and waved.

"Hi."

"…whoops," Motoko mumbled, looking away in embarrassment and clutching her sword a little more tightly.

Naru rubbed her forehead in exasperation. "Look, can we please hurry it up and get this over with?"

"Yeah, we're going to miss our dinner reservation," Keitaro growled, standing up. "And I really don't want to have to dislocate my shoulder again."

"You think you've got it bad?" the tawny-haired girl sighed. "These blood-red contacts are making my eyes itch like crazy. I mean, isn't this kind of overkill?"

"If I remember correctly," Motoko replied, rubbing her chin, "the director said it was needed to give you the full 'evil-demon' effect."

"But I'm NOT a demon!" Narusegawa protested. "And how many more times am I going to have to punch Keitaro?! I'm sick of punching him! He's my snuggle-bunny! It's no fun to snuggle with a guy covered with bruises… he won't even let me touch him!"

"And what's up with all these injuries?" Urashima added. "I could tolerate all the abuse before when I was invincible, but I don't know where these guys get off with giving me internal bleeding…"

"They said something about working to make this more realistic," Kitsune said, walking into the room with drinks and passing them to all three people, who accepted them gratefully.

"But I thought the whole point of this show was that it wasn't supposed to be realistic," Keitaro said, scratching his head. "I mean, if we were being realistic, there's no way Motoko could use that secret technique against Narusegawa, right? And if she was really beating me up this much, wouldn't I have tried to defend myself? Or at least call the cops?"

"Yeah," nodded Kitsune. "Keitaro may be a dork, but he's not that stupid."

"On top of that… god, I—" (swallow) "—Can't believe this! Have you looked at this script?!" Naru barked in frustration, pointing at the sheaf of paper sitting on the table nearby. "It has me hitting Keitaro every single time he talks to me! And even sometimes when he doesn't! I mean, I know I did punch him a lot, but when he wasn't doing something stupid, we got along great! I swear, this is character assassination!"

Konno opened her eyes just enough to roll them, laying a hand on her hip. "You think that's out of character? Get this," she giggled, motioning for the other three to follow. Motoko shrugged and led the way through the door, down the hallway and into the living room.

*

"Hey, ass-sniffing donkey-raping psycho bitch!"

Naru was taken aback before she even set foot in the den. "Su? Were you talking to me?"

The platinum-blonde foreigner nodded, smiling cheerfully as she bounded up to Naru. "Yup! Just trying out some of the new words I get to call you!"

"Well… nice delivery," Keitaro said gamely, ruffling Su's hair as Naru tucked an arm under his, looking slightly nervous.

"Thanks, Keitaro!" Su chirped cheerfully. "Although Su's having some trouble with a couple of these phrases," she added, glancing down at the sheaf of paper in her hands. "Like, 'Crap-guzzling sub-human gutterwhore'. What's a gutterwhore? Does it taste good?"

"Hell if I know," Keitaro mumbled, rolling his eyes. "They're creative, if nothing else—" he nearly jumped out of his skin as something poked him in the back, whirling just in time to come face to face with a wheelbarrow full of plastic bags, filled with some red liquid.

"Hey, who's in my—oh, sorry big brother," came the voice behind the wheelbarrow, a calm, level female voice that clearly belonged to Keitaro's younger sister, Kanako, who poked her head around the bags to glance at the people in front of her, her expression typically unreadable. "Did you guys finish yet? We're almost ready for the next one."

The elder Urashima sighed. "I really don't want to know, but I'll probably regret it if I don't ask, so… is that stuff supposed to be blood, Kanako?"

"Yes—I mean, no—I mean, sort of," Kanako hesitated. Noting the confused glances she was receiving from everyone in earshot, she quickly shook her head. "Okay, stay with me here… half of it is fake blood for the next 'Keitaro gets turned into a vampire and has to drink blood' story, and the other half is real blood for the transfusions he's going to need after the next 'Keitaro slashes his wrists in despair at Naru's mistreatment of him' story."

"How do you know which is which?" Kitsune asked, confused.

Kanako glanced from side to side, then took a step backwards.

"…let me get back to you on that," she replied, grabbing the wheelbarrow nervously and getting the hell out of there.

Keitaro rolled his eyes. "Oh man, not again. The last time I had to wear those fake fangs, I chipped one of my teeth."

"What about us?" snapped Motoko. "They may be fake, but that does not mean they do not hurt when we get bit with them!"

"Speaking of drinking, it's almost time for dinner, isn't it?" said Kitsune, glancing around. "Where's Shinobu?"

Su wordlessly pointed to the corner, where Shinobu Maehara, dressed in high school buruma, panted breathlessly in front of a forty pound bag suspended from the ceiling. Steeling herself, she stood up straight and threw a few punches into the bag, then reared back for a kick—a kick that ended in both a dull thudding sound and a sharp, wince-inducing crack.

"Aaaaaaauuuuuuuuuu!!!!!!" the tiny girl wailed pitifully, hopping around on one foot. "I think I broke a toe!"

"Shinobu, what on earth are you doing?" Naru called out to her young friend, stunned. Shinobu looked up with teary eyes, then pointed at the bag.

"I have to get in shape, Naru-senpai! Tomorrow, I have to beat you up and then cook Urashima-senpai a three-course dinner in a span of fifteen minutes! Now, I should be able to handle cooking a lobster in five minutes if I turn the gas up real high, but then if I have to stop to bash your face against the stairs outside, I won't have enough time to get back in and toss the salad… aaaaauuuuuuuuuuuu! What am I gonna do?!" Shinobu bawled, hopping over to Naru and tugging desperately on her shirt.

The older girl uncertainly patted Shinobu's head. "There, there. I'm sure they can use some abrupt scene change or something."

"B-but…"

"Heh heh, she said 'toss the salad'," snickered Sarah MacDougal as she wandered into the living room with a stack of papers under her arms. Pausing in front of Naru, Keitaro and Shinobu, she handed each a sheaf, stapled together.

Keitaro blinked. "What's this, Sarah?"

The American rolled her eyes. "The final scripts for the shoot tomorrow, duh. Good to see you've been practicin', Shinobu… by the way, do you know how to do a Kame-Hame-Ha?"

"What?! I don't even know what a Kame-Hame-Ha is!" wailed the blue-haired girl as she clutched at her bangs.

"Well, you'd better learn quick, because you're supposed to use a Kame-Hame-Ha to finish Naru off tomorrow before you and Mr. Ronin elope to Vegas—" Sarah's words were cut off by a katana at her throat.

"That… attack," Aoyama snarled, her eyes glowing. "What… did… you… call… it…?"

The pint-sized blonde sweatdropped. "Whoa, hey! Psychos are closer than they appear! Down girl, I didn't name the dumb attack."*

Motoko let out a guttural sound as she pulled her sword back and sheathed it in a huff.

"Don't worry Shinobu, I'm sure Mutsumi has some old Dragonball Z tapes you can pick it up from," Keitaro said, ruffling Shinobu's hair. The younger girl seemed to enjoy the attention, but hardly looked at ease.

"Incidentally," Naru added, "Where is Mutsumi anyway? I haven't seen her all weeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeek…"

Naru's words trailed off as she abruptly rose into the air and began traveling on a highly random, looping trajectory through the room, screaming bloody murder the whole time.

"Oh my," came the voice of Mutsumi Otohime, smiling cheerfully as ever, as she wandered into the room. Wandered in, that is to say, with an entourage of various inanimate objects, from silverware to screwdrivers to Liddo-kun plushies, orbiting around her and spinning gyroscopically. "Oh my, oh my, oh my."

"Mutsumi?" Keitaro sputtered, gaping. "What on earth is going on?"

"Oh, Kei-kun!" Otohime replied brightly, beaming. "Isn't this fascinating? All of a sudden I can make all these things go wherever I want to! I was thinking at first it would only work on small objects, but now I see I can lift heavy things too!"

"ARE YOU CALLING ME FAT?!" Naru roared as she continued to streak about in the air above the others' heads. "AND WHAT THE HELL ARE YOU DOING TO ME?"

Mutsumi tapped her head, smiling vacantly. "Oh my, Naru, it seems I have developed freakish powers that are quite handy for forcing you away from Kei-kun. I guess it does pay to have friends in high places. Oh my oh my oh my."

"What?! Why on earth would you do that, Mutsumi?!" Naru sputtered, starting to get airsick already.

"Well," the older girl frowned, "Apparently I wasn't cut out to be a nurturing saintly 'big sisterly true friend and confidant' figure after all. According to next Monday's script, we'd all be much better off if I backstabbed my best friend, that being you, and ran off with Kei-kun."

"Well, I hope those things wouldn't keep flying around you in bed too, or Keitaro would be in for some rough nights," Kitsune muttered under her breath.

"That's crazy!" Naru snapped, folding her arms angrily as she hovered upside down in front of Mutsumi's face. "I know we don't have any choice but to play along, but I still think a line has been crossed here."

"Well, tough," came a deep, commanding female voice. Everyone turned in unison to spot Haruka walking into the room, cigarette perched in her mouth like always, holding a few pink slips of paper. In the process, Mutsumi lost her concentration, and Naru went plummeting to the floor along with various pieces of hardware and cutlery.

"Aunt Haruka? What's—OW!" Keitaro winced as he received the traditional upside-the-head smack. "I mean… Miss Haruka, what's that stuff you have in your hand?"

"An eviction notice," Haruka replied, holding it in front of Keitaro's face. "I need you to sign it… Friday, we're doing a story where Naru gets thrown out of the apartments for violent behavior. I've been having some trouble figuring out the procedure, considering we've never ever had to evict someone before…"

Keitaro rolled his eyes and sighed. "All right, give me a pen, I'll fill it out—"

"No! N-O!" Naru shouted, standing up and snatching it out of his hands. "You are not going to sign that! We are going out to dinner right now, and to hell with these stupid scripts! I've had enough of this!"

Haruka shook her head. "Naru, we don't have a choice. You know as well as the rest of us do that we exist for their entertainment. Whether we like it or not, we have to do whatever they say."

"But—"

"It's not worth getting worked up over. Let's just get it over with and be done with it for the night, okay?"

Naru stared at the ground. "Dammit, I thought once our contracts were up we'd finally have some free time…"

"People are just going to be the way they are and we have to accept it," Haruka said, folding her arms. "Why do you think my cigarette isn't lit? They always write me as smoking five packs a day or something, so I try not to smoke at all when I don't have to. Judging by all the 'realism' they seem to like, it wouldn't surprise me if we wind up doing a 'very special episode' where I get lung cancer."

"I don't think that's gonna happen, Haruka," said Kitsune. "This realism seems to be pretty selective; I should have rotted my liver out already, after all. It seems like the only person bad things ever happen to is Naru."

At those words, all eyes in the room turned to look at Naru. The girl in question was down on her haunches, her face buried in her arms. Keitaro knelt down next to her, frowning concernedly.

"Narusegawa, what's wrong?" he said softly, knowing what her answer would be before it even came out her mouth.

"I-I-why do they hate me?!" she screamed, looking up at him, angry tears running down her face. "I just did what I was told to do! They told me people would laugh! And Keitaro never got hurt—well, really hurt—because of it! For god's sake, the male lead gets beat up in lots of shows! Kenshin got the shit beaten out of him by Kaoru and he never fought back even though he was a legendary assassin!!! Lina smacked Gourry on the head so many times it's a miracle she didn't damage his brain and leave him even dumber than he was to begin with! And Motoko and Sarah and Su beat Keitaro up just as much as me! Why am I the only one who gets hated on?!"

"Ssshh," Keitaro said softly, embracing her. "I don't hate you, and nobody else here does either, and that's all that matters. Right, everyone?" he added, glancing up at the others.

Kanako raised a hand. "Well, I wouldn't presume to speak for everyone—" she began before being cut off as Keitaro, Motoko, Kitsune and Haruka all fixed her with Truly Evil Glares (Shinobu attempted to as well, but because of her overpowering innocence she was only able to muster a Moderately Evil Glare)—"But I suppose she does have redeeming features," she hastily backpedaled.

Keitaro gingerly helped Naru to her feet, the redhead still trembling slightly and her eyes now bloodshot naturally rather than through cosmetics. "Now I'll tell you what, Naru. We'll finish up the shoot with Motoko and then we'll go to dinner, all right?"

"Okay," she sniffled, leaning on him for support as they made their way back down the hall.

Kitsune smiled and shook her head. "As dumb as he can be, his heart is always in the right place. I think that's what she sees in him."

"I think that's what we all saw in him," Kanako said as she went back to sorting out the real and fake blood bags.

Sarah clapped her hands. "Okay, guys, that was beautiful and moving and all, but we've got an agenda to keep here! I've just received the new scripts that we'll be working on next Thursday! It's a retelling of the storyline, except in this version, Naru doesn't exist!"

For a moment, silence reigned as the women of the house glanced disdainfully at the script, disturbed only by the dull thud of Shinobu's hands striking the huge punching bag.

Motoko finally threw up her hands in exasperation and rolled her eyes as she headed back down the hallway to the landlord's room. "Well, at least Naru-senpai will get to sleep in next Thursday. Me, I have to be up at 6 AM every day. I swear, some days I just want to say 'take this training routine and shove it'…"

end

* (Kame = Japanese for "turtle")

Author's note: This was not intended to be a diss. My intention wasn't to knock any particular person or writing style or plot device… I just felt I had to write this as a way of responding to some really irritating clichés I keep seeing appear around here. So I hope you're not offended, but if you want to be angry at me for writing this, go ahead, I can't stop you. That's all I have to say. Oh, and this work was inspired by Davner's "Ryoko Wins Tenchi For The Umpteen-Billionth Time."

And remember…

…it's only sarcasm.