Day 1
"I can't believe this! How can there not be any parking!"
Armed not in his own Mitsubishi, but his parents' van, Kyle growled as he continued searching the hotel lot for any place to park. If he actually had the infamous Air Void, he'd have used it by now and cleared out a spot, and to hell with the owner of the former vehicle. As it was, he didn't have that black hole in his palm, and had to settle for trying to find a spot. "I knew we should have left sooner, we all got the day off from school for this!"
Ears perking as his eyes got sight of an empty spot, Daniel pulled on Kyle's shoulder as fast as he could to get his attention. "Right there!" he cried, which reshanie close behind carrying another two bags and the giant foam boomerang that was Hiraikotsu. "We got about an hour before the prereg starts, so that's enough time to check in, get to the hotel room and change, then hang out in the line."
Lily and Kyle quickly caught up, being they didn't have much left to carry in, just the last bag and some props like Kyle's staff and a bow and arrow set for Lily. Oh yes, and the little plushie tucked under Lily's arm that was going to be their Kirara. Sadly, none of them had a Shippo plushie. She'd spent all night trying to get Daniel to work on acting like InuYasha, but in the end, the best they'd gotten was halfway between perfect and Daniel being unable to act like a jerk. It was going to have to do, since most of it was made up caught up, being they didn't have much left to carry in, just the last bag and some props like Kyle's staff and a bow and arrow set for Lily. Oh yes, and the little plushie tucked under Lily's arm that was going to be their Kirara. Sadly, none of them had a Shippo plushie. She'd spent all night trying to get Daniel to work on acting like InuYasha, but in the end, the best they'd gotten was halfway between perfect and Daniel being unable to act like a jerk. It was going to have to do, since most of it was made up for by the fact his voice was perfect. He just needed to sound a lot more arrogant and pissy most of the time.
"Coming through," Kyle intoned as they entered the lobby and headed for the front desk. Already there were people waiting around, some in costume, some not, but it wasn't even ten seconds before someone squealed, ran over to the group and asked to play with Daniel's ears. And then the minute they saw that said ears were not props, they squealed even more and were now begging for tweaking permissions.
They expected Lily to uphold her usual harem guard routine, but for once, the girl grinned, nodded, and then proceeded to inform Daniel as he endured the treatments that, while she got full rights to him, he was free game to the other congoers when it came to his ears. He made a mental note to get used to a sensory overload with all the tweaking and rubbing he was going to get this weekend.
"Is this with cash, or credit?"
"Credit," Kyle replied as he handed the desk clerk a credit card. "It's my parents' account, but I'm an authorized user."
"Can I see some ID?"
He dug into his shorts and pulled out his wallet, flipped it open to show his driver's license, then got the card back after the clerk charged the rooms to the account. Now armed with a set of keycards and their room numbers, Kyle led them all off in search of their lodgings for the next three days. "Try and get a hold of Alex to find out where they're having the room party," he said while they rode up in the elevator toward the fourth floor. "I promised I'd bring the X-Japan albums and the Vampire Hunter D movies."
As the door opened at their floor, Stephanie pulled out her cellphone and brought up a quick-dial, now handing her bags off to Lily so she could hold the phone and the giant boomerang. It was a few rings before someone finally picked up, but thankfully, it was the right person. "Alex, it's Steph. We just got checked in and heading to our rooms, where are you guys?" A moment later, she turned to Kyle. "Room four-twenty," she repeated from what she'd been told. "Thanks, Alex, we'll head over in a bit."
A laugh as Kyle shook his head. "We better not have a four-twenty this weekend, or I'm gonn'a be pissed," he stated while Stephanie shut her phone and took back her two bags.
"What's a four-twenty?"
"Police code for marijuana," Stephanie answered while Kyle was busy unlocking the hotel room they were staying it. "My uncle's a cop out in California with the Sheriff's Department."
Made sense. Daniel hefted his own luggage while Lily got the key from Kyle for their own room and opened the door. A minute later, three gym bags were on the floor, Tetsusaiga was leaned against a wall, and Daniel was rummaging through his own bag and getting his costume out, which he'd made sure to fold nice and neat so that it didn't get all wrinkled up before he got it on.
His shirt quickly came off, replaced by the white under kimono and then the red main one before taking off his pants and pulling on a pair of shorts and the hakuma. "Lily," he intoned. "Pants time."
As he turned, he almost wished he hadn't because Lily was already in nothing but her underwear. It didn't seem to matter much to her, since she just walked over and helped him finish putting on the costume. He was very thankful, however, that his shorts and the kimono were covering his rather embarrassing, reaction to seeing his girlfriend just about as naked as he was ever going to any time soon. Or, at least, he'd thought it covered it.
"Need a carpenter for that wood?" she quipped after pulling the rosary out from the kimono. When he went red, she only laughed. "Don't mind me, I'm just a cute fourteen year old schoolgirl in almost nothing, no reason to get excited at all." Lily grinned as Daniel pulled down his ears in emarrassment, then gave him a kiss on the lips. "I'm glad you find me so desirable, my little puppy, because if you didn't, there's something wrong with you."
Yeah, he'd rather be getting the Sit than be so horribly teased like this. Lily knew how bad his sex drive was compared to any other boy, because he'd told her what his last medical examination had shown. Granted, it seemed that such an overactiveness was normal for his body, but it wasn't good news when Lily did this to him. "I'll be waiting in the lobby," he muttered while grabbing Tetsusaiga and heading for the door. "If I stay any longer, I might start humping your leg."
"Oh, it only takes me a minute to get this on!" she snapped as she finished slipping her costume shirt on and pulled on the pleated skirt, buttoned in back and zipped just a few seconds later. "You're the one it takes forever with because of those claws."
Well, at least he wasn't having such a massive overload of Lily's skin to worry about now. Still, did she have to make that skirt exactly that short? He kept having the feeling that it was going to flip up at the wrong moment, and then he'd be staring at her panties...again, in front of everyone. Okay, if that happened, he wasn't the only one who was going to get some fanservice, but he was the only one with the rights to get fanservice from Lily. Gah, stop thinking like that, you're not that much of a dog!
A knock came from the door that joined the two rooms. Daniel breathed with relief and opened their side to see that Kyle was changed already. "Where's Steph?" he asked.
"I doubt your schoolgirl will want you seeing me naked!" came the half-laughed reply. Daniel gulped while Kyle chuckled and pushed him back a bit. "You're liable to get a nice sit for it!"
As if trying to get rid of this problem in his pants wasn't enough... "I'm sorry I asked," the boy muttered while letting Kyle through into their room and closed the door behind him. "Why is she naked?"
"She was messing with you," Kyle stated while he fixed the little black strap that went around Daniel's chest. "She's got half the jumpsuit on, and she's wearing a bra, so at most, you'd have gotten the Sango version of Victoria's Secret." There once more was that devious grin that let Daniel know Kyle was going to say something really evil. "Then again, you've got a Kagome who's probably going to give you a lot of fan service, unlike on the show." Pull that bit of lint from his kimono, straighten the beads... "Who knows, you may just catch her bathing in the springs."
Luck was on Kyle's side when that shoe came at him. It barely missed his head, which warned him to move out of the way as Lily hopped out of the bathroom on one foot with her right hand trying to pull the other shoe off for a second shot. "Maybe we should have stuck that damn rosary on you, ecchi!" she growled.
"Hey, I can't help it!" he replied while hopping back and gripping the prayer beads wrapped around his right arm. "Stand back, or I'll Air Rip your little schoolgirl butt, Kagome!"
Heaven help him, but Daniel knew that he had the urge to join in on the act. It was held back only by Stephanie's arrival and the thwacking of Kyle's head with her boomerang. "Save it for the dance floor," she said while her boyfriend rubbed his head. "I know you're gonn'a live up the whole Miroku act, just like you do every year, and ask half the girls at the con to bear your child."
"But my dear Sango," he replied, now going completely in character and grasping her free hand. "You know that I only have eyes for one woman in my life." Grope, grope, slap. Hand to face to rub the sting that actually wasn't there, but they were having too much fun.
"No chasing after any other mes," she stated while slipping the strap of the boomerang around her body to run across her chest. "There's gonn'a be enough Mirokus to handle them, we don't need the monk himself trying to do all the work." She paused, knowing that she wouldn't be much better at it. "Maybe...no bearing of children though."
A grin as Kyle once more put his arm around her waist. "Of course. That honor is yours."
And thus, it was now Daniel who did the thwacking of heads with his Tetsusaiga. "Save it for later, you two," he said as he and Lily headed for the main door. "We need to get down to the lobby and wait in line."
With boomerang and staff in hand, the pair went back to their room to get a card key, shut the connectingdoor, then met the two fourteen-year-olds outside to head back down to the main floor. Ludging those large weapons around proved to be a pain for getting into the elevator. Daniel wasn't sure who had it worse between him and Stephanie. Her boomerang was pretty wide, but his sword was as tall as he was.
First floor, once again. Stepping out, the quartette walked back into the lobby, and was quickly greeted by friends, other congoers, and of course, the fangirls who squealed and begged to played with Daniel's ears. One would think he'd come to like all the attention, but it did get annoying after happening so much and so repetitively. A few were freaked by the fact that the ears were real, but for the most part, the tweaking and rubbing had begun.
One attendee of the convention perked his head up from his seat in one of the potted trees. He sniffed around, and found something that he knew he shouldn't have been smelling. But, after a few more sniffs to make sure, there was no denying that scent. "It can't be," he whispered in Japanese, being that he wasn't so adept at English, and it didn't matter since he rarely had to use the European born language.
Hopping from his seat, the little man bounced about across the hotel convention center, heading for the lobby in chase of that familiar scent. He'd had to leap back into the trees to avoid being stepped on, since one his size had that problem, and people tended not to notice when one was only half an inch tall.
A few minutes and three trees later, he sprung into the lobby where the line of pre-registered attendees was forming. Who was that scent coming from? It couldn't be the person he'd known, they were dead, had been for a very long time. And yet, the scent was just as strong as it had been back then. Who was carrying that smell on them?
Cosplayers, people dressed in jeans and anime themed t-shirts, a boy whose dog-ears on the top of his head were twitching, girls who were trying to get a hold of those ears...wait a minute, ears on the top of his head that were twiching on their own! The little being bounded further into the lobby to get a better look, not sure he actually seen that. Yep, those ears were most definitly moving on their own, and not from anyone's hands toying with them. But that was impossible! "There's no hanyous in the United States!" he exclaimed, then bounded over and leapt from the ground onto the boy's shoulder. Before he could have been noticed, he hid in his hair, now being overwhelmed by that familiar scent. Yes, this boy was definitely the source of it, but how?
Well, only one way to really be sure. His prickle for a mouth and nose readied, he crawled over to the boy's neck, found a spot, and bit in to taste his blood. Which was summarily followed by a slap and him floating down to the ground all flattened.
"InuYasha-sama, how I've missed you...ow..."
"Ow." Slap.
"What is it?" Kyle asked as he glanced back at Daniel, who was pulling his hand away from his neck.
He shrugged and looked around, but all he saw was something that was fluttering to the ground like a piece of paper. "Not sure, felt like something bit me," came the reply. His neck didn't itch, and it couldn't have been a mosquito or something like that, not here in the hotel. Besides, this was Seattle. You didn't find mosquitoes here, especially when it was barely the middle of spring.
Did something that looked like a half-inch tall man with four arms just scurry away on the ground? He blinked and shook his head. He'd definitely watched too much InuYasha last night as last minute study for character. Still, that was way too odd to have seen right then. Had he gotten enough sleep last night?
It was about ten more minutes before they got to the registration desk and picked up their badges and promotional grab-bags. "Hey, who do we have doing the camera for our video assignment?" Stephanie asked as she remembered that they had that to deal with this weekend.
"Taylor, he's bringing his mom's digi-cam so we can do all the editing on computer."
Good, they weren't going to have to head back and get a camera from the school for that project. That meant all they had to worry about right now was finding Taylor and keeping an eye on him to make sure they got footage. That shouldn't be a problem.
Wonder what goodies they gave us? he mused, glancing over as Kyle was checking the content of his bag. "What do they give us in these things?"
"Mostly stuff promoting whatever's coming out this year," Kyle replied as he pulled out a VCD case. "Oh, Bandai promo disc. Looks like they licensed Dot Hack finally." He plopped the case back into his bag and started rummaging through the rest of the contents. "Yeah, the usual con program, magazine, and promo stuff."
"Opening ceremonies are in about half an hour," Stephanie reported as she checked the convention schedule sheet. "Hey, who's this 'surprise guest'? There wasn't anything about that on the website."
Glancing to Daniel, Kyle gave him the wink to keep his mouth shut while he handled it. "Must be something they wanted to keep under wraps," he stated while a pair of girls they passed waved to him. "Chotto Matte." Handing his bag off to Lily, he quickly bounded after that same pair of girls and grasped their hands. "Such visions of beauty that I am unworthy to bask in the glory of," came the flattering words. "Please, celestial maidens, would you do me the honor of bearing my-"
Whack!
And he now had Hiraikotsu planted on his head. "Children," he finished, much to the amusement of the girls as Stephanie dragged him back to their companions, acting completely like an irritated woman who doing those two a favor by taking him away.
"Keep it in your robes, Miroku!" she hissed while glancing back at the girls. Yep, they were having a good laugh, just like Kyle had planned. "They have no need of your brand of attention!"
Yep, definitely a crowd pleaser. One of those girls promised to find him later, while her friend was giggling madly at the whole scene. Ah, it was nice when the girls he did that to played along. A couple in the past had gotten a bit freaked until he'd quickly apologized and explained it was part of the act. Thankfully, he, Lily, and Stephanie were quite the local celebrities at this convention.
"Five minutes into the con, and already he's in full Miroku mode," Lily remarked while she stuck her little Kirara plushie into her bag. "That's gott'a be a new record."
Considering he'd not seen previous records being set, Daniel assumed that Lily was telling the truth. That or being sarcastic. Either way, he got a laugh out of it. By now, he'd finally gotten completely used to girls coming up and tweaking his ears, done a few photo poses, and was in general having the best time ever in his life.
And then, his nose twitched. What was that odd scent? He's smelled something like it once before, but that had been four years ago. Was his mind playing tricks on him again? "You smell that?" he asked, just to make sure he wasn't the only one.
"Smell what?" Stephanie asked as she glanced back to him.
Well, it was just him then. Probably just catching a whiff of something and his mind was messing with him again. "Never mind, it's nothing." He sighed, shifted the Tetsusaiga, and then felt someone pulling at his leg. He stopped, blinked, then looked down to see a little red-head boy standing there dressed in a little Shippo costume. He was the perfect height, and oddly enough, his hair was done up perfectly, and he even had little pointed ear pieces on. Hell, he had a set of padded foot pieces to look like his feet were really tufted like a fox. "Hello."
"Nice InuYasha costumes," the boy remarked as he looked over the group. He took a step around Daniel to get a better look at Lily, but she quickly realized that the kid would get a good view right up her skirt and moved her hand to hold it down a bit more. "How'd you get the ears to do that?"
So young and so thankfully naive. Wait, did his ears just twitched right in front of the kid? How was he going to explain that to the boy?
"Kistu, don't ask so many questions."
Walking over from where he'd been talking to a member of the convention staff, a man about Kyle's height walked over, brushing a red bang from over his eyes. He had a very vulpine look to his features, eyes resembling those of a fox, and he had something of a peach tinted Asian complexion. His hair was about shoulder length, tied back in a ponytail, and hung over his ears to hide the upper part. "Sorry about that, he tends to get a little too curious."
"It's not a problem, Mister..." Kyle glanced to the badge, then went wide-eyed as he recognized the name. "Kistunebi! The Kistunebi Shippo!"
There was actually someone with the name Shippo? What kind of parents were that crazy as to name their kid Shippo? Hang on, didn't Kistunebi meant 'fox fire'? And Shippo was 'Seven Treasures', or 'tail', depending on the kanji and hiragana. But that meant the man's name translated to 'Seven Treasures of Fox Fire'.
"I didn't know many people in America have heard of me."
Kyle was about to fall over and start kowtowing. "I'm a huge fan of yours! I loved Fox Fury and Sons of the Inferno!" He started scrambling though his bag, trying to find something to write on. "Can I...wait, you'll probably be at the autograph signing later."
With a grin, the man pulled a pen out of his pocket and gestured for Kyle to hand him the program magazine. "Actually, I'm with my sons as a normal attendee, not as a guest. We're out here visiting some friends, and I thought it would be nice to bring them to an American convention." Scribble, scribble. "I'm actually surprised to find I have American fans, my work hasn't been picked up by a western publisher yet."
The man spoke amazingly good English, missing the Japanese tendency to approximate words and say his 'l's as 'r's. Maybe he'd been coming to the country a lot and grasped the language very well. "If I'm not being rude," Daniel said as he walked over. "Shippo is your real name?"
"Daniel!"
Much to Kyle's surprise, Mister Kitsunebi just laughed and finished with Kyle's program book. "It's alright, I get that all the time. As to your question, Daniel, yes, my parents really named me Shippo." He handed the book back to Kyle, who was now just as giddy as the girls he flirted with as he saw that, not only had he gotten an autograph, but he got a sketch from his favorite manga artist as well. "Can't say I knew them too well, though. They both died when I was only a kid, but, I like to think that they had a good reason for calling me their 'seven treasures'."
Well, that answered which translation his name was. "It's just, your son is dressed up like Shippo from InuYasha, and with that being your actual name, it-"
"Ironically fits?" came the response as Mister Kistunebi picked his son up and set him on his shoulder. "Kistu is a handful, just like his brothers. Kaitsu is around here somewhere dressed as Kurama, and I think Kotsu is with the staff helping set up for opening ceremonies." It was then he noticed something; Daniel's ears were moving on their own. He blinked, then saw it again. Now it was his turn to be surprised. "I'm sorry but...may I?"
Confusion, then realization that the man wanted to examine his ears. "Uh, sure," he said nervously. "They're...real." Yeah, that look of shock was definitely the expected reaction. "The doctors said I have a rare extreme form of animalistic mutation. It just happens to be perfect for cosplaying InuYasha."
His eyes sparkled for a moment, and Daniel could swear that he caught a glimpse of pointed ears under his hair. That was another thing. The Japanese didn't normally have natural hair colors other than black or very dark brown. Yet both Mister Kistunebi and his son had bright fox fur red hair. "You even sound like him," he remarked while carefully examining the boy's ears. It was then that he felt his son crawl from his shoulder and onto Daniel's. "Kitsu!"
"He's just like a hanyou!" the little boy exclaimed as he pushed aside Daniel's side lock to find no ear behind it, then noticed the look his father was giving him for having said that. "Well, he does look like one, like in all the stories and Takahashi-san's manga." He glanced at Daniel, then suddenly braced himself like he expected to get hit over the head. Instead, he found that Daniel was kneeling down to let him off.
"I'm so sorry," Mister Kitsunebi said in apology while eyeing his son. "He's so curious sometimes and forgets his manners."
A shrug as he stood back up. "It's alright," Daniel replied as he cracked his neck. "I'm more than used to it, and that's actually one of the better reactions I've ever had from a kid."
"Danny, we gott'a hurry if we want good seats," Kyle said, now having recovered from his happily bouncing around. "Opening ceremonies starts in fifteen minutes." He turned to Kistunebi. "I'm so sorry we have to run."
Kistu pulled on his father's pant leg. "Tousan, can I go with them?" he asked, now putting on the most cute and irresitable anime face that was possible, complete with large watery eyes. Was that even physically possible? "They need a Shippo."
He looked conflicted. On the one hand, he had brought his sons here to have some fun, and he knew that Kistu was in good hands hanging out with this group. Plus, he had ways of finding Kistu if need be. On the other hand, he also knew just how much his youngest boy was just like he had been at that age. Daniel seemed to be very calm and level headed though... "If they don't have a problem with it," he replied, then glanced to the teenagers. "You four mind having him tag along with you?"
They took a moment to discuss it, but Daniel seemed alright with having the boy tag along with the group, and the girls quickly deemed him 'adorable as all hell.' That pretty much sealed the deal. "Sure," Kyle stated for the group. "You want my cell number so you can keep tabs on him?"
Almost declining, Mister Kistunebi instead nodded and saved Kyle's number into his own phone. Besides, he wanted to talk to Daniel later about some things that might very much deal with him and his 'condition'. Speaking of which, where the hell was Myoga? Was he off trying to suck some pretty girl's blood again? Sometime, he didn't know why he kept that blasted flea around. "I'll give you kids a call in a couple hours to see how it's going, I need to go find my other boys."
Kyle quickly bowed and thanked Mister Kistunebi once again while Kistu was climbing up onto Daniel's shoulder, which received a surprised look from his perch. How did the kid do that? He was so friggin' tiny. "We'll keep an eye on him for you."
With that, the group of now five headed off to follow the crowd to the big room where opening ceremonies was just about to start. Shippo sighed, then felt something land on his shoulder. He quickly moved to a more secluded spot before picking the flea youkai off his shoulder and glaring down on him. "(Where have you been?)" he hissed in old form Japanese. "(You were supposed to meet me ten minutes ago and go find Kotsu.)"
"(Please forgive me)," the flea replied. "(But something very odd is going on here, Lord Foxfire. You must have smelled it as well, the scent of Lord InuYasha.)"
Yes, he had picked up an odd and familiar scent. Being he knew one possible source of a similar smell was here, he hadn't paid it much thought, but thinking back, this had been in addition to that person's scent. He'd picked up the odd one when talking with Daniel's group. Wait a minute... "(Did you track it?)" he asked, voice urgent as he gripped the flea. "(Tell me, Myoga!)"
"(Yes, yes! It's coming from a boy who's dressed as the late Lord InuYasha!)" The flea paused for a moment as he remembered the taste of that blood, and the reaction he'd recieved. "(He has to be a hanyou, but the Americas have no inu youkai! And his blood tastes like that of Lord InuYasha!)" Now he sighed. "(And when he smushed me, it felt just like my late Lord.)"
Now Shippo understood it. No wonder he'd gotten that phone call frantically telling him to get over to Seattle as quickly as possible. If he was right, they'd found someone they thought had died so long ago. But how was he here, and just how had he survived? There was only one option right now. "(Find Sesshomaru,)" he ordered firmly. One look at the flea and he knew that Myoga didn't like it, but Shippo had long ago let go of old animosities. "(He is lord of the West and my equal, Myoga, and he's the one who has to know about this. Now go and find him, and report everything you told me!)"
The flea sighed, depressed. He never liked going to the Lord of the Western Lands of Japan, even if he was the brother of his previous liege. "(As you command, Lord Foxfire.)" And then, he bounced away and vanished.
