"And we're very proud to once more have Mister Paul Dobson!"

"Yeah, even if you guys all wanted Scott back again."

There was a chorus of laughter as Paul Dobson playfully bowed and headed back to his seat in the front row. From about five rows of chairs back, the quintette of Daniel, Lily, Kyle, Stephanie and Kitsu watched in earnest while most of the guests were introduced. So far, there'd be a few Japanese guests, the voice actors from Ocean, which included Paul and Kirby Morrow, who Stephanie had proceeded to drool over before Kyle reminded her she was already attached to someone by groping her butt in true Miroku fashion. And then there'd been that producer from Sunrise, Sesshoumaru Taishou. If he'd thought Shippo was an odd name, Daniel was really wondering why anyone would name their child 'Sesshoumaru', being that 'Circle of Cruelty' was hardy a flattering name.

Even more disturbing though was that Mister Taishou looked just like the Sesshoumaru in InuYasha. Minus the large piece of fluffy fur around his right shoulder and the real Sesshoumaru was dressed obviously more modern, but he had some odd purple marks on his cheeks, and his hair was long and white. Still, Daniel had to wonder about that. There had been mention that he'd worked some on the manga as well, maybe Rumiko had thrown him as a character in tribute.

But right now, they were all waiting to see who this 'surprise guest' was, even though he and Kyle well knew. The wait was killing them though, why were they waiting so long just to introduce that person?

"I'm sure you all noticed that little note about a surprise mystery guest," the speaker on the stage said as he decided to finally get to it. "We didn't list it on the site because it wouldn't have been as fun if you guys knew about it." Music was playing now, very familiar music. This had to be it. He glanced to Stephanie and Lily, saw the reactions on their faces as they tried to figure out why the Zelda theme was being played. "He's the newest rising star at Ocean Group, just came in from a project he's working on in Japan, and is the first ever English voice actor to work in anime in Japan." A dramatic pause as people were now very much paying attention. "Currently starring in the recently premiered 'Zelda no Densetsu' anime, ladies and gentlemen, may I present...Mister Chris Blair!"

And coming out from behind the stage curtain, dressed in a form fitting white bodysuit and strappy green tunic, with the Master Sword in his left hand and a Hylian shield on his right, was that same young man from the magazine and the NDK photos. His hair was pulled back to show off those elongated elf ears, and with a yell that made people cheer out enmass, it was just like seeing Link himself leap from the TV screen. He even had the hat on.

"Ohmygodohmygodohmygod!"

Well, that lacked anything more to describe how Stephanie and Lily were reacting. They were both about ready to flip, not just because they'd been completely duped by the young man into thinking he wasn't going to be there, but also because he had landed the role that any fanboy of the games would have killed to have; he was Link.

"Kyle, you son of a bitch!" Stephanie hissed as she grabbed her boyfriend by the robes. "You knew about this the whole time, didn't you! You knew he was going to be here, and you knew why he was in Japan!"

He grinned. "Blame Chris, not me," he replied. "He told me not to tell you what he was doing, he wanted it to be hush-hush." Yeah, that didn't help much to calm her down. "He's also voicing Ganon."

And the screams and cheers continued, while Chris was up on stage going through some routine of mimicking Link's actions in the game before he finally held a pose, allowed the cameras to go off one last time, and did a half-moon twirl to slide the sword into his backsheath. With a grin, Chris held his hand out for a mic and tapped it to make sure it was working. "Navi would have joined us, but we ran out of food on the plane, so I had to make a Menchi Special out of her." And the laughs resumed again. "Seriously, I'm so happy to be here this year, especially so close to the Land of Hockey that Paul, Kirby and I call home." He noticed a look from one of the other VAs. "Well, you too, Mark, but everyone still remembers you in biker shorts while blowing yourself up a bajillion times."

"It's more than Scott can ever claim!" Mark Hidreth snapped back, which got another round of laughs from the audience. "And biker shorts are better than a Peter Pan ensemble!"

"Hey, it takes some serious balls to wear this thing!" Chris retorted playfully. "And these ain't tights, I had one hell of a row with the Sunrise guys to make it an actual jumpsuit!" He grinned, took his hat off, then threw it into the audience, where a good portion of the female population thereof scrambled to fight for it as it landed. "That thing better be in one piece when it comes to autograph time so I can sign it!" And someone finally got a hold of the coveted cap and was squealing out their victory. Fangirls...

With his shield shifted back on his arm a bit so he had use of both hands, Chris switched the mic to his right hand and continued. "Anyway, I just got in from Japan after doing voice work for about the first twelve or so episodes of the new Zelda anime..." He stopped and let the cheers roll out, then continued when they'd died down again. "Yes, I am the official voice of Link, since Miyamoto-sama has decided that he finally wants spoken dialogue in the next game, and I'm the guy. But something you might not have heard is that on the new show, I'm also..." He paused, then began again, this time in that creepy and deep voice. "Ganon, the lord of Darkness."

Once again, the cheers rose, except this time some girl cried out that she wanted him. From Chris' reaction, it probably wasn't going to happen, not if he could help it. "I thank you for the offer, but you'll have to wait in line with all the others right behind one Princess Zelda Hyrule, who gets first shot at everything involving me." And the laughs came again. "You guys would not believe what a blast it's already been, and I haven't even been in the business for a year." He glanced to the other Ocean VAs and shrugged. "I know, I'm to expect the beat-down later. Just remember to give me my root beer."

"I brought about five two-liters of Barg's!"

Yep, Paul was holding a two-liter bottle of root beer up, which go the intended reaction of the audience cracking up at the sight. No wonder his friends went to all these conventions, this was just a blast. "What's with the root beer?" Daniel asked as he leaned over to Kyle.

"Chris has this weird ginger root allergy," Kyle replied while Chris was going on about how the series was already up for licensing due to how much a hot item it was. "To him, root beer is like alcohol."

Weird allergy indeed.

"I'm really hoping that ViZ gets this so that I'm on the English cast when it comes time for dubbing," Chris continued. He glanced down to one of the other guests and gave a weak smile. "Sorry Tristian, but we both know that ADV isn't going to put out the effort to get me if they call it, and we all know everyone is praying to God that 4Kids keeps their grubby hands off it so that it doesn't get ripped to shreds."

Once more, there was a round of cheers, and while Daniel didn't exactly get the joke, he had a feeling that everyone was in agreement about 4Kids. Come to think of it, he had read about how much they butchered and hacked any anime they had the rights for into diced onions.

After a few more words, Chris handed off the mic, pulled the Master Sword back out, and did one last round of the act while people cheered. Sword back in sheath again, and he hopped off the stage and took his seat in the front row. Not long after that, it all wrapped up, and everyone was either milling toward the voice actors or leaving to catch some anime being shown or to head to the video game room.

"Come on," Kyle said as he got everyone on their feet and led them toward the front row. They had to push a bit through the crowd, and was there a crowd around Chris. "Chris!" he called, but he wasn't sure if the young man could hear him. "Hey! Mini-McNeil!"

A hand went up to stop all the questions he was getting as he recognized that nickname. "Is that who I think it is?" Chris said as he got the crowd to open up and let in the group. "Well I'll be damned, it's the monk himself! Still trying to have someone bear your children as usual?"

There was a smile as Kyle and Chris exchanged handshakes. "I've got Sango, it's not much a problem," he retorted before pulling a bit on the sleeve of Chris' costume. "I never thought I'd see you in this. I would have expected the leather one from NDK."

"Unfortunately," came the reply, "Nintendo wouldn't go for it. I had one hell of a fight with the costume people. They actually wanted me in tights, and damnit, I refuse to wear those things!" With a grin, Chris brushed back his hair. "They chaff like nobody's business when I'm doing the full act on stage." He glanced over and noticed the rest of Kyle's group. "I remember the ladies," he commented to Lily and Stephanie, but it was on Daniel and Kistu that he stopped. "I don't remember this pup and the Shippo. They new?"

Thre was a round of nods as Kyle patted Daniel on the back. "Daniel's been with us about two months now, while we actually picked up Kistu just today."

Kistu looked at Chris, about to leap over onto his shoulder, but then thought better of it with so many people around. "Those are really good ear pieces," he remarked, being he wasn't sure if they were prosthetics or not.

"I would hope so, since they're not props," Chris replied as he pulled his sidelocks away to show off that there was no line where a fake set of ears would have been revealed. "Real deal, kid. I was born with a deformity that's really worked out my favor." While Kitsu stared, Chris was grinning just before he saw Daniel's ears move. "Whoa...do that again."

He blinked, then realized that the young man meant his ears. "Like this?" Daniel asked as he made his ears twitch. While Chris was looking at them in amazement, he was shrugging. "Massive mutations, they're real, along with the claws, the eyes, and the white hair."

"You guys have a real life Inu now?"

Again, Kyle nodded. He'd expected this reaction. "Yeah, just like how you're a real life Link. You should have seen the girls screaming their heads off when you came out on stage, dude. It was priceless."

"That's because he told us we wasn't coming!" Stephanie snapped, then gave Chris a nasty glare. "You know how upset I was when I got that email, now just to find out you actually were coming here!"

With a grin while he used his left hand to scratch the back of his head, Chris tried to get her to calm down. "I wanted it to be a surprise," he said, trying to defend himself. "Besides, Nintendo wants to hype up the series in the US with the huge bidding war that's going on over it. That's the only reason I got the time off to come out for this weekend. Come Monday, I'm on a plane straight back to Japan to get back to work on the series."

Someone called for him, and as luck had it, was one of the con relations people, which meant he had to be off to one of the panels. He shrugged, grinned, and said his good-byes. "We'll be showing the first episode of Zelda no Densetsu today, catch me then and we'll catch up."

"Hey, any word on who's got the InuYasha slot?"

As he headed off to follow the con staff and the other voice actors, Chris turned about and walked backwards. "I'm stuck in Japan until July, it's definitely going to be Richard!" he called just before spinning back on his heel and heading off. Well that clinched any hope they'd had for him being the English voice.

"Maybe he'll get the movie," Lily said while they as well head out back into the convention. "Or is that asking for a miracle?"

"Richard will do fine," Kyle stated while he kept an eye out for roaming fangirls. "He's had the better part of a decade to get better at sounding nice while covering the accent, and when the series starts, sounding like a jerk all the time will work." He quickly pulled out his schedule and frowned. "Speaking of acts, are we going to enter the cosplay this year, or just costume contest like usual?"

The girls broke out their own programs, looking over the notes about the cosplay contest that was Saturday night. "That depends on how well Danny can act like InuYasha," Stephanie said while she glanced over to the boy in question. "If he can do it within believability, I say cosplay." There was a wicked grin on her face as she then fingered the rosary around his neck. "And people are going to crack up when Lily gives him the Sit."

There was an audible gulp as Daniel pulled the necklace out of Stephanie's reach. "Not in front of the whole convention!" he exclaimed. "She's promised not to do that to me!" Then he realized something about the whole exchange; Kitsu had heard it all from on his shoulder. "Um, uh..."

"You guys have trained him do that!" the little boy squealed while looking at the necklace. "That'd dedication, Danny!"

Oh, good, he didn't get that it was a real deal subjugation rosary around his neck. "We've had a lot of practice," he weakly stated, now glaring at the other three in the group to go along with it. It had been bad enough they had to show Stephanie what happened, he didn't want the whole convention to know about it. Having his ears under assaulted from the fangirls was enough, he didn't need them trying to make the rosary work for them too. Thankfully only Lily seemed able to do that, and they still hadn't been able to figure out why it only worked for her.

"So," came Kyle's voice as he finally started moving along down the hallway. "Do we just stand around here, or do we go out and enjoy this convention?"

The answer came in the form of everyone heading off to the game room. And there was much insanity with Daniel's ears along the way.


Meanwhile, sitting in his hotel room while getting ready for a panel that was in about an hour, the man named Sessohmaru Taishou was reviewing some papers and making notes on his palm pilot. He'd just finished checking how things were going back in Japan, and had spared a moment to check the stock markets. While he was a producer at Sunrise, he was also so much more, heading the powerful Taishou Nishi corporation that had a hand in almost every industry in Japan, ranging from publishing to entertainment to manufacturing, and many less publicly known endeavors. It also had branches in Europe and here in the Americas. All that tended to place him as a very powerful man in the world.

Someone else was in here with him. Calmly tapping on the screen of the palm pilot with a long fingernail, Sesshoumaru got up, then looked around for any sign of the intruder. "I know you're here," he said, sniffing the air, then raising a brow as he recognized the scent. "Why does Foxfire send his retainer to me, Myoga?"

Hopping up from behind a chair, the flea youkai sighed and bowed to Sesshoumaru. He didn't like it, but the man was indeed a ruler to be respected. "Sesshoumaru-sama," he began as he rose from his bow. "Kistunebi-sama wishes me to inform you of some startling information that I have uncovered in regards to one of the children at this convention."

His golden yellow eyes narrowed. Yes, he'd smelled something odd earlier during opening ceremonies, but he hadn't been able to pinpoint it. Granted, that young blonde American had a unique scent to him, but he knew well the reason for that. This was something different, something he hadn't known for a very long time. "Continue, Myoga. What did he tell you to relay to me?"

The flea took a moment to brush himself off after the dust he'd collected bouncing around the hotel. "There is a hanyou here, Sesshoumaru-sama, one that has the scent and blood of your late brother." He paused, eyed Sesshoumaru nervously, then was satisfied that the man was not going to react angrily to being reminded of that deceased relative. "He even has the ears of an dog hanyou, as well as your father's eyes and InuYasha-sama's hair. And the taste of his blood-"

His hand went up to stop the flea there. Yes, now that Myoga mentioned it, that scent had been much like that of his brother, who had been murdered so long ago. It couldn't be him, but then who was it? It was also going to be hard to find the right cosplayer, since there were several people dressed up as InuYasha here. That was narrowed down by the fact that Myoga had stated it was a boy, but that still left the trouble of finding him. Did this boy even know what he was? Wait, if Myoga had told FoxFire about this first and then been ordered to inform him, then the taiyoukai of the South had probably already encountered the child in question. It was best to handle things quietly for now. If the boy didn't know what he was, it was going to be difficult to accept it.

And then it still left the question of who his parents were. There were no inu youkai here in the Americas, not of the kind like in his homeland. The great canine spirits out here were wolves and desert coyotes. In fact, the heads of his company branches here in the United States were wolf youkai, though they went by the term lycan out here. The spirits of the Americas were rather unorganized like that; they didn't even have a unifying race name.

A thought passed in his mind. "Myoga," he intoned while now drawing out his steel gray cellphone from his coat pocket and flipping it open. "Return to your lord and inform him than I have been brought up to speed. Let him know that I would like any more information he may have as to who this boy is so that I may investigate this myself."

"Actually-"

His eyes flared while the sides of his hair moved to reveal his elongated youkai ears while the purple markings on his face stretch to their natural form. "Would Kistunebi-san object to the Inu no Taishou looking into a matter that is his business?"

"My lord, you misunderstand my intervention," Myoga quickly stated to calm the youkai lord down. "I was going to say that Kistunebi-sama has already met the boy and told me that his own son Kistu is with him and his group."

Yes, that did make sense. No wonder Foxfire was so adamant on letting Sesshoumaru know of this, he'd already met this boy. He quickly canceled the call he'd been able to make, then selected a rarely dialed but very important non-the-less number and hit the call button. It was bout three rings before the intended person picked up. "Kistunebi-san, your retainer has just informed me of the situation."

"I've got my son with him, Sesshoumaru, and if he's who I think he is, we need to find a way to keep a close eye on him from now on."

The inuyoukai nodded, then glanced to Myoga and gestured for him to stay for a while. "I have a suspicion that I saw them at opening ceremonies." He paused for a moment, then looked out the room window to gaze down on the lobby. "Out of curiosity, why are you here? You don't often come to the western countries."

There was a silence from the other end before Foxfire finally gave the honest answer. "Kouga called me about a month ago and told me I had to attend this convention, guest or not. It had sounded urgent, and now I know why." Another pause. "It's a good thing I brought my boys along with me, Kitsu is the perfect way to keep tabs on Daniel."

Daniel? He had a western name? Yes, this was more and more confirming his suspicions as to the boy's identity. But if he was right, then how did the child end up here in the United States, let alone this era? He'd have to check into that old well back in Tokyo and see if that had something to do with it.

"Something else," Foxfire continued. "I can feel the energy of the Shikon no Tama. There's a shard here, and we both know what that means."

A shard of the Jewel of Four Souls here? That was an impossibility, there were no more shards of the Jewel, not since five hundred years ago when it had be restored. Granted, its power had never been used as meant to be, but no one had shattered the Jewel since, and it was sitting in a sealed vault that was under his control. Wait...there had been a piece missing when he'd been given the Jewel to protect. This indeed was something to be concerned about. "You think that it's the boy?"

A confirming sound. "I can smell it on him, Sesshoumaru. Daniel has the missing Shard, but I think he doesn't realize he has it."

Indeed, it was doubtful that this boy knew much of anything relating to what he really was. Perhaps he should, as soon as possible, find this boy and plan out how to keep an eye on him. "Your information has been most helpful, Kistunebi-san. I will expect to speak with you in person later. Until then." Click. "Return to your lord," he stated to Myoga while shutting his phone and slipping it back into his coat pocket. "I will be meeting with him to discuss how we should proceed from here after I meet this boy."

The flea remained on the chair back for a moment longer than he was expected to, then finally hopped down and scurried away. After so long, was it possible that this boy was the person they thought had died so long ago? They'd assumed the infant dead, though there was no sign of the body or any remains, while there had been of his parents. But, here, in this country and this era?

Only time would tell if this child was indeed the son of his one time master.