Disclaimer: Love Hina is not mine. That's that.

---Scene change

Italicsthoughts

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The next morning was a welcome change of pace. Ryusei had finally left his room after days of moping around. Of course, no one knew about what had happened the previous day. No one but Motoko and Ryusei.

After breakfast was served everyone just sat there eating, nobody said a word. They girls knew that if they said the wrong thing that they could drive Ryusei back into his mopey mood. Ryusei realized how uncomforterable everyone was, so he decided to break the akward silence.

"I'm going to do it. I'm going to get that account." he said firmly. The other girls just looked at him and went back to eating. Ryusei sweatdropped and asked the inevitable question. "Is something wrong?"

Naru was the first to respond. "You just locked yourself up for three days, you blew us all off, and now you act like nothing happened. Of course something's wrong." Motoko nodded solemnly in agreement. Shinobu looked down at her plate and poked around at her food. "We were all worried about you Tanaka-san. I hope you can understand."

Ryusei felt awful. He never realized that these girls cared so much for him, that anyone could for that matter. "Shinobu, I'm sorry that I made you worry, I'm sorry to all of you. I promise that I'll never do that ever again. Will you forgive me?"

Shinobu nodded slowly, followed by the others. Ryusei smiled and pulled a chart from out of nowhere. "Alright, here's my plan. In the event that Kokusho didn't accept me, I had put together a three-part plan. A plan that would be sure to land me the account. "Was part one of your plan to mope around in your room?" Kitsune asked bluntly. Ryusei laughed nervously. "Actually, it was." The girls sweatdropped in unison.

"But you see, by doing that I was preparing myself for step two. This step will recquire some time, but if I give 100 I'll have a new book written in no time." "You're going to write a new book!" Kitsune, Motoko and Shinobu said in unison. Ryusei nodded and pulled out a notepad and a pencil.

"I'm going to need to ask you girls some questions." Su raised her hand high in the air. "Yes, Su." "My favorite food is Bananas, I love to play "Neverwinter Nights", my shoe size is..." Sarah placed her hand over Su's mouth before she made a total fool of herself.

"Thank you, Sarah. Let's see now...Naru, which one of my books did you enjoy the most." Naru was silent. "Naaaaaruuuuu. Are you awake?" Naru snapped out of it and laughed nervously. "Well, to be honest, I haven't read any of your books." Ryusei filled something out and looked at Mutsumi. "And yours?" Mutsumi wasted no words. "I just love that "Guide to Watermelon Growth" book you wrote!" Ryusei sweatdropped and filled out something on the sheet.

"Su, how about you?" Su said something through a mouthful of food, but Ryusei couldn't hear a word of it. "Sarah?" Sarah shook her head. "I don't really like your work." Ryusei dropped his head to the table.

"Ahem! How about us?" asked Kitsune. Ryusei looked up and saw that Motoko, Shinobu and Kitsune had pulled up as close to him as they could. "Alright, how about Shinobu." Shinobu smiled blissfully. "My favorite is "Romance under the Sakura"." Ryusei jotted something on the paper. "And you, Kitsune?" Kitsune pulled up next to him and ran her finger up and down his chest. Needless to say, this made Ryusei very nervous, especially with Motoko in the same room. "I agree with Shinobu. I just love those kinds of stories, not to mention the men who write them." Ryusei blushed heavily as he wrote something else down, his hand shaking fiercely. As soon as Kitsune removed herself from Ryusei, he looked at Motoko. "I know which one." he said as he winked at her.

Ryusei got up from his seat and tore the notepad into pieces. "I guess I'll just write a romance." "What was the point of taking notes if you were just going to tear them to pieces?" naru asked as she served herself some more rice. "I always do that, It helps me to prepare for the writing process. Now if you'll excuse me, I have work to do."

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"I have no idea how to start it off!"

Ryusei had been hard at work for a couple of hours, working on the computer he borrowed from Su, when he realized he had a wicked case of writer's block.

"I haven't even gotten through one chapter and I'm already out of ideas! Aaaaargh!"

Ryusei decided to take a break from his work and just stretch out on his futon. As he lay there, he reminisced about his date with Motoko.

"That was such a great day. I think that might have been my first date in ages...alright, my first date ever." He closed his eyes and played the date back in his mind. "I can't believe how soft her hands were, it was so smooth, like silk. I wonder though, she seemed defensive at first, maybe that was her first as well."

Ryusei got up from the futon and got back to work. "There's no time to reminisce, I've got work to do."

Chapter 1

It was a cold day, a morbid day, a despicable day. The sun had been blocked by rainclouds early on in the day...

"Damn it to tell! This just won't work!" Ryusei yelled as he deleted what little he got done.

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Motoko decided to take her training out in the yard, after all it was a beautiful day to train. Motoko began her training much like any other day, with deep meditation. Motoko had been meditating under one of Hinata-sou's many trees. To any normal person it would seem that she was napping, Ryusei is of course a normal person. "How's it going?" Motoko removed her sword from its scabbard in one lightning fast motion, placing it a centimeter away from his neck. "I-I see that you're busy, so I'll just leave now." Ryusei whimpered. Motoko opened her eyes to see her "assailant" cowering in fear.

"Sorry about that." Motoko said as she put her sword away.

"Aren't you supposed to be working on that book of yours?" Motoko asked as she sliced the falling leaves into pieces. Ryusei laughed nervously. "Wow. You're pretty good." Ryusei noticed another sword over by the tree that Motoko had been meditating under.

"Hey, how about a sparring match?" he asked as he readied the sword. Motoko was silent as she cut the last of the leaves. "Motoko, a match?" Ryusei asked. "Fu fu fu fu fu. If you honestly think you can handle that sword, then by all means we'll fight."

Motoko leaped high into the air, preparing to bring the sword down with a magnificent force. Ryusei brought his sword up to block the oncoming attack. "Klang!" Sparks shot out as both swords collided with one another. Motoko merely smiled. "Not bad, let's try something a little tougher!"

Motoko launched herself off of Ryusei's sword and began to charge Ki into her sword. "Prepare yourself! God's Cry School technique, "Boulded Cutting Blade"!" as Motoko landed she swung her sword vertically, launching her ki along the ground and into Ryusei's direction.

"Well...shit!"

There was an explosion, followed immediately by Ryusei's body flying high into the air. Motoko sweatdropped. "This is all too familiar."

When Ryusei finally came back down to earth, Motoko had finished her morning training and began her studies for Toudai. "I hope you realize how foolish it is to challenge me." Motoko stated as she opened her english book. "I guess it was pretty stupid of me." Ryusei said as he scratched his head.

"You know, there are two reasons I came out here." Motoko paid no mind to him. "I have a bad case of writer's block and..." Motoko put her book down. "And?"

Ryusei blushed. "I wanted to hang out with you." Motoko sighed and closed her book. "You know, you're really pathetic." Motoko said jokingly. "Yeah, I know." Ryusei replied.

Ryusei sat next to her and closed his eyes. "Things have been pretty hectic lately, not just with Kokusho either." Motoko cracked open her book. "How so?" Ryusei sighed. "Well, before I came here I had been having a lot of trouble with crazed fans. They had been camping outside the my house, trailing me at my morning jog, asking for autographs during lunch, I even got someone's ear in the mail." Motoko flipped through a couple of pages as she patted him on the shoulder.

Ryusei continued his tale. "But that's not all, this one girl just wouldn't let up. She went through my garbage, tried to break into my house on countless occasions and she proposed to me 427 times." Motoko sweatdropped.

"But that's not what's bad. The reason I came here is because someone had broken into my house and destroyed everything I owned, leaving only a note in their wake. "I will have you!" I was so scared that I packed up and ran away, hoping that no body would find me. That's when I came to Hinata Onsen."

Ryusei looked up at the clouds with a look of whistfulness in his eyes. "I'm glad that you guys took me in. I don't know what I would have done if a fangirl had found me, brrrrrr." Motoko giggled and poked him in the ribs with her elbow.

"You don't need to worry about crazed fans during your stay here. Now how about another match?"

Ryusei sweatdropped.

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Later that day.

"I guess not even the hot springs can give me the inspiration I need."

Ryusei had decided to lounge in the hot springs in an attempt to conjure a plot for his new book, but all he could think about was how warm the water was. "I've tried everything! Why Muse, why hath thee forsaken me?"

After another hour of bathing he decided to get back to work, but something stood between him and work. Motoko had just entered the bath. "Hello. Is anyone in here?" Motoko asked.

"Occupied!" Ryusei shouted.

"Whew. Almost had another incident on my hands. I don't think I could take another beating."

"I thought you were going to work on that book of yours." Ryusei panicked and shielded himself. "Don't panic, I'm not going to hurt you. At least you made yourself noticed. Keitaro would try to sneak out, but that just complicated things for him."

Ryusei sighed a sigh of relief. "Thank goodness." Motoko tapped him on the shoulder. "Could you turn around, please?" Ryusei did as he was told. "Now stay there." Motoko said as she removed her towel.

"Dinner was good, don't you agree?" Ryusei asked. Motoko began to scrub herself. "Indeed." Ryusei realized that the bath might not have been the best place to strike up a conversation. "Shinobu's cooking seems to be getting even better." Motoko was silent.

Ryusei couldn't stand the silence, he just couldn't take it anymore. He knew he had to say something, but what?

"Ryusei, I'm afraid that you may never get started at this rate." Motoko said angrily. "If you can't even think of a beginning, then how do you suppose you'll finish it?" Ryusei was silent this time. "You need to buckle down and do some work."

Ryusei nodded to himself. "I guess you're right. I can't really impress anyone with a book full of empty pages." Motoko placed her hand on his shoulder. "Tell you what. If you work hard on this, I'll let you take me out again." Ryusei smiled and placed his hand on hers.

"Yay! Bath time!" Su shouted. "I guess it's time I break from my studies." said Naru. "Hey! Who's in here?" asked Kitsune.

It was too late to run, Kitsune had pointed them out. As Naru began to boil Ryusei decided now was the time to run.

"Dear Muse, If I live through this, give me the strength to start my story. If only to go out with her again."

"Crash! Smack! Kapow! Auuuuuuuugh!"

End Chapter 9

Author's note: I had some trouble with this chapter. I really wanted to have another onsen scene, but I wasn't sure if Ryusei and Motoko needed another dialogue. In the end, I just settled.