Disclaimer: apparently I don't own this disclaimer either. See the previous chapters for full disclamation.

I apologies for not having a name for the last chapter, but # 3 zinged two songs, so I had one in the bank (so far: brown eyed girl by Van Morrison, purple haze by Hendrix (the line 'scuse me while I kiss the sky), the other is a combination of "lace and daggers" by Mcubed and "winter white" by fade to black. Neil diamond wrote "coming to America" but the story is already there. Hence: )

Chapter five: Already in America

Back at home, in his living room, john pulled the footage of the previous DOA from the internet. A simple search extracted Hitomi's bouts specifically, and as he sat back to analyze the tapes his mind drifted to his ne friend.

'I wonder what she's doing now.' (cue clichéd scene-change)

"and this is the visitors dressing room, which has been converted to the women's changing room and a small practice area." Her personal tour guide droned on

'this wouldn't be sod bad it this guy would stop staring at my chest' she thought 'he's one of Donovan's so he's a capable fighter. He, he, he, after the tour I'll beat the scheisse out of him and call it sparring'

Back in her hotel room, after beating the low-flying eyes guide, she ordered a wake-up call for 7:15am and got in her shower. As she shampooed 'I wonder what he's doing right now.' (here it is again star fade)

John's tape watching had lasted slightly longer than Hitomi's err, exercise, and it was 9:30 before he was done. Checking his email, he found a conformation of his DOA registration, and a message from one of the senior med students whom had befriended him his freshman year:

Hey, the DOA tourney is coming to Milwaukee if you haven't heard already. I'm starting at the children's hospital there in two weeks, so I should be able to get tickets if I can get off that week (hell, they'll probably scout some med personnel for the qualifiers too, so I bet we could both get jobs for that) Hope your enjoying your graduate-ness. Give my regards to Alan if you see him before I do.

The message was dated more than a week ago. 'he must not have known I was going take a road trip back from Massachusetts.' He thought to himself 'well better reply to that, then off to bed'

Both parties' breakfasts were rather mundane and un eventful, and Ruhs' ninety minute drive even more so.

They met in the food court, and after getting some strawberry hard candy at a kiosk, he drove them to the stadium. The group stage of the fights didn't start until 1530 local time so they had plenty of time before either had to be anywhere.

"Some kid who can't tell the difference between breasts and eyes gave me a tour of the facility" she explained as they walked along the concourse to a sparring room that had been converted from a skybox "I beat the crap out of him after the tour was finished, you can bet he'll keep his eyes up when the other girls get here"

"I don't get his problem" John said "a breast consists of tissue and a gland. Eyes are far, far more complex having a cornea, retina, pupil, lid, capillaries…"

"ha-ha", Hitomi laughed, taking his technical explanation as a joke after he lost his ability to keep a straight face.

"I have some friends that can make it so the guy physically wouldn't be able to lower his plane of focus." He said in a low voice.

"No," she chuckled "I think he learned his lesson, besides, scrubs like him aren't worth the money it would cost to do that."

"True, true indeed. This the place?"

"Yup. Fully furnished with five-centimetre wall to wall mats and the walls are also padded. Apparently they would rather have us get injured on international television, huh?" she deadpanned following the doctor into the room.

"oh, yeah. But it you want to joke about the facilities try "how much does the energy cost to open and close the dome?"

"well, how much does it?" she played along.

"Oh, its free."

"really?" she asked, not expecting that

"definitely, you see, they just have a bunch of illegal immigrants on giant hamster wheels. Forward to open, and back-peddling to close." He kept an even expression throughout.

At this she was bent over in a fit of laughter.

"whoa there girl. Don't die on me yet, I sure that's not the ultimate joke that the Britons used to win WWII!"

AND NOW FOR SOMETHING COMPLETELY DIFFERENT

we'll skip the part about disarming a man attacking you with a banana and cut straight to the upper-class twit or the year sketch. Chapter six will take us all the way to Hong Kong, since I just remembered that I listed said I'd include those two. Oh, and Hitomi's hair is brown, Ayane's is a purple haze, and Christie's is winter white. If you missed those, you need some serious help. See you in about a fortnight