Twelve Days Before Christmas

Day 2: Four Eyed Freaks Unite

The morning sun hit Keitaro as he stirred from a rather fitful night of sleep. He woke with a warm feeling, forgetting all the troubles of the day before, just content to sink into the futon and find comfort in the arms that are draped across his body.

"Mmm…Naru…" he mumbled sleepily as he reached up to clasp her large, warm, hairy hand. Wait… hairy?

The events of the previous day came crashing down on him like a ton of bricks as he jumped out of bed to find a giant orangutan sleeping right next to him.

"Oh god… it wasn't just a bad dream. Oh man, eleven more days, I am going to die!"

As if to drive the point home, Shinobu chose this moment to knock on Keitaro's door.

"Sempai?" Her timid voice came. "Do you want some breakfast?"

"WHA?" Keitaro jumped, turning pale. He could not let Shinobu find him with a giant ape in his room. "Uhh, sure! Thanks Shinobu! I'll be out in sec."

Happy with the answer, the young girl happily dashed off to make breakfast and Keitaro let out a breath of relief.

Unfortunately, his woes were far from over. The rest of the girls were also waking up, and Keitaro knew it would be mere moments before Naru popped down into his room from the ceiling, or Su rushed in from out of nowhere to drop kick him. Keitaro needed to get Jody out of the house and somewhere safe, and he needed to do it FAST. But he can't possibly do it alone. Keitaro realized he needed help, and he needed it fast. Normally, he would turn to Seta for help and guidance, but seeing as the older archaeologist was currently somewhere in the middle of the Pacific Ocean hundreds of miles away; he would have to find different sources. Faced with no other alternatives, Keitaro became desperate, and turned to the only other people he could somewhat trust. Quickly he made a phone call, then, hoping beyond hope that Jody was tired enough to stay asleep, Keitaro snuck out the door, after pulling down the shades and keeping the heater up so Jody would hopefully stay asleep longer.

Breakfast was a cheerful affair. The girls were all in a good mood; even the usually solemn Motoko cracked a rare smile as she talked about how the clear weather would give her a chance to hone her skills in the snow. Nobody noticed that Keitaro was unusually quiet.

After breakfast, everybody went about their business. Shinobu got busy with the dishes; Kitsune went off to get her daily, almost toxic dose of booze; Motoko went out to train as usual; Su went off Tama hunting again, and Naru hummed happily to her self while heading to her room to wrap a few presents.

This left Keitaro alone to stare at the clock, hoping his resources would arrive on time. Luckily for him, Jody had yet to stir, but he knew his luck wouldn't hold out. Moments later however, he heard a knocking at the front door.

"I'll get it!" Keitaro called out as he headed for the door, hoping it was the people he called.

"Alright Mr. I'm-shacked-up-with-six-girls, what's the big emergency?" Shirai asked as Keitaro poked his head out the front door.

Keitaro sighed. Here he was, a man studying to get an archaeology degree, and yet his entire life fell in the hands of these two bums and players who came to his rescue only because it allowed them into a girl's dormitory.

"I'll show you, just keep your head down and be quiet! And whatever you do, DON'T LET ANYONE SEE YOU!"

"All right!" Haitani said holding his arms up. "Calm down. What happened? Did you and Naru break up?"

"No, it's nothing like that."

"And I had my hopes up…"

"What was that?"

"Oh nothing! So what's the problem?"

Keitaro looked around and motioned for the guys to follow him. Shirai and Hitani shrugged and followed him as he led them down the hallway into his room. The minute they saw the big hairy lump in his bed, their jaws literally hit the ground.

"Keitaro, what the HELL is that?" Haitani asked pointing at the giant orangutan still snoring in his futon.

"It's Jody. You know that family I lived with in the states? Well they own her and they kinda came over for the holidays."

"And let me guess." Shirai said. "They talked you into keeping Jody for a few days."

"Yeah, up until Christmas that is."

"That's eleven days including today you twit!" Haitani said smacking Keitaro upside the head. "And the girls don't know about this?"

"Of course not!" Keitaro said. "They'd kill me for keeping her here!"

"I see why you needed our help." Haitani said striking a pose. "But not to fear, for we are here, and our specialty is helping you with your problems!"

"That's true." Shirai said thinking back. "Come to think of it, that's all we seem to do in this series. I mean, Tokyo U, then Naru with the amusement park tickets, the movie tickets, hell do we do anything else?"

"That's not important right now." Haitani said waving his arms. "Right now, we need to get your problem out of your room Keitaro or el-"

A knock at the door disturbed them.

"Hey Keitaro, are you in there?" Naru's voice came.

Keitaro immediately pointed at his closet and his two friends dove for it. "Yeah, I'm fine. Did you need anything?"

"Oh no, I just wanna tell you that I'm going to pick Mutsumi up from the station."

"Oh okay. Do you want me to come with you?"

"It's okay, I'll be fine. Make sure Su doesn't blow the house apart okay? We'll decorate the house this afternoon."

"Okay, have a safe trip."

"Thanks, love you! Bye!"

"Love you too."

Naru's shadow disappeared and Keitaro breathed a sigh of relief. Shirai and Haitani came out of the closet each with smirks on their faces.

"Oh man, I never thought I'd see the day Keitaro would become whipped by a girl." Shirai said with a laught. Keitaro flushed and flailed his arms around while Haitani tackled him and gave him a noogie.

"Gah! Cut it out guys! You still have to help me."

"Oh right." Haitani and Shirai stopped. Haitani looked at Jody again, who was now beginning to stir. "Hmm, I don't suppose she'll just go into the woods and stay there like a good orangutan?"

"She broke a dozen priceless jars last night." Keitaro said. "I don't think she's too keen to sit still."

"Oh yeah." Haitani said. "Hmm, you're in quite the fix."

"And this is WHY I called you guys. Oh crap, someone's at the door; quick, block the view."

The three guys quickly stood in a row, blocking Jody out of the way. The door opened to the worst person Keitaro could imagine catching him and his friends.

"Urashima! What is the meaning of this!"

"Sorry Motoko, but the guys and I were just, uhh, catching up."

"You expect me to believe these lies?"

"What lies?"

"You Urashima, are a horrible liar. You will tell me what is going on here, or else I shall cut you down where you stand." Her katana glinted from its place at her side. The guys gulped and flailed their arms. "We're not lying!"

"WRONG ANSWER!" Motoko screeched getting her demonic eyes. Just moments before Keitaro and his buddies were cut to ribbons, Su made a running tackle and knocked Motoko to the ground.

"Whoopsies, didn't see ya there Motoko."

"How…did…you not…see me!" Motoko groaned from the ground.

"Well, I was aiming for Keitaro and his buddies. I guess I sorta just missed ya!"

Motoko sighed and rose to her feet. "All right, come on Su, lets get you away from them before they molest you."

"Ohh, is Keitaro being a pervert again?"

"He has his pervert friends here. Come on Su. Oh and Urashima."

Keitaro gulped. "Yes?"

"Put one toe out of line and I'll make sure you suffer the full wrath of the God's Cry School."

Keitaro nodded as Motoko walked off with Su.

"She's hot… but she's just batshit crazy." Shirai said. "Are you SURE she was actually in love with you?"

"Eh, I get used to it." Keitaro said. "Come on, we gotta move Jody."

"Right."

The guys, working together, managed to use the futon as a big tarp and lifted all three hundred pounds of the orangutan, before collapsing and letting Jody crash to the ground with a loud smash. The Orangutan woke, enraged at being woken in such a manner immediately bared her teeth and attacked Shirai and Haitani. Keitaro at the moment was more worried about the noise attracting attention immediately jumped at the door, waiting to see if anyone would come checking. He looked up and saw it was nearing eleven. Shinobu would be busy cooking at the moment, and Kitsune was no doubt drunk to a point of delirium. With Su and Motoko out playing and Naru out picking up Mutsumi, Keitaro realized he was overreacting.

He turned around to see Jody batting around the thoroughly mutilated Shirai and Haitani. Quickly, Keitaro calmed the orangutan down, who was more than happy to listen to her old friend.

"Wait, you can control that thing?" Haitani asked once he was set down.

"Well, yeah, she took a liking to me back in the states."

"Hmm, this gives me an idea." Haitani said. "But you gotta promise me two things."

"What?"

"First, I need the afternoon."

"That I can do."

"Second, we want to stay here until Christmas."

"WHAT!"

"That or no deal Keitaro."

Keitaro looked at his friends and thought about the responses he would get. But at the moment, saving his life was more important.

"All right." Keitaro grudgingly agreed.

"Awesome!" Haitani said. He quickly grabbed Shirai. "Keep her busy for the next few hours. We'll be back."

"Alright." Keitaro said as he watched his friends run off. On the inside, he was crying, scared of what to expect in the future.

The next few hours flew by with Keitaro in a nervous wreck. Jody was jet lagged or something as after playing with Keitaro for a bit, she fell asleep again. Keitaro dragged her into a closet and let her sleep there. Then he took out the can of Fabreeze and killed Jody's smell from his room.

Around mid afternoon, Naru came home with Mutsumi in tow, which didn't help Keitaro's situation at all. In fact, with Mutsumi's strange sense of the Hinata House and odd mannerisms, it might just make matters worse. His fears were well founded as he had already caught Mutsumi glance oddly at his room twice. He hoped it was just his imagination.

After dinner, Shirai and Haitani came by again. That's when Keitaro broke the news.

"Erm, guys, would you mind if Shirai and Haitani stayed here until Christmas?"

The reaction he got was better than he expected, although not by much. After the shock went in, Motoko was up in arms, literally, waving her Katana around furiously. Naru had a strange questioning look in her eyes, and Su went around drop kicking Shirai and Haitani until they started to cry.

"Keitaro, why this all of a sudden?" Naru asked as Mutsumi and Kitsune, both already wasted, watched on as Shirai and Haitani were beaten to within an inch of their lives.

"I just thought the holidays would be more fun with them around. They could sleep in my room."

"And where will you sleep hmm?"

"Well, there might be enough room in there."

"Are you kidding me Keitaro?"

"Well…then maybe I could…stay with you?"

Naru flushed. "Wha?"

"Well, we're engaged, and we haven't slept together for a while… so maybe…"

Naru glared at him before smiling shyly. "You should've just asked…" She looked back at his friends. "Do you think we should stop them before a murder is committed?"

Keitaro smiled. "Yeah, but I'm serious, can they stay? I err, haven't seen them in a while."

Naru glared at him for real this time. "Only if they don't do anything out of line."

"I'm sure they won't."

"Then it shouldn't be a problem, except with Motoko maybe."

Naru and Keitaro managed to pry the girls off the two unfortunate souls who were one step short of eternal sleep. A rather edgy debate soon ensued.

"ABSOLUTELY NOT!" Motoko cried after a while. "This is unacceptable, letting two more perverted males into the house!"

"Come on Motoko, 'tis the season." Keitaro begged. "They won't step out of line, I promise!"

Motoko just growled. She showed them her katana for a second just for good measure. "Make sure that they don't, or else." Then she walked away with Su trailing her as usual. Naru sighed and walked towards the bath. "I'm gonna take a bath, I'll see you later."

Shinobu soon went to take care of the dishes, and as for Kitsune and Mutsumi, the two had broken out another bottle of sake and were perfectly content, although Kitsune's addled brain did have a creeping suspicion about Keitaro's recent activities.

Shirai and Haitani were soon dragged to Keitaro's room and revived with some water.

"Christ Keitaro! How did you survive your first few weeks in here?" Haitani asked.

"You get used to it." Keitaro said. "Besides, I'm invincible, remember?"

"Oh, right." Haitani said. "I forgot. Anyways, we got a little house built for Jody. It's not the sturdiest thing ever, but it'll hold for twelve days."

"Great!" Keitaro said as he opened his closet to find Jody sitting there eating some fruit happily.

"Oh, one problem, she can't stay there during the day, only the night."

"She can stay in my room during the days." Keitaro said. "It's only ten days, what could go wrong? Especially with you guys here, none of the girls would imaging stepping into my room."

"Wait, where are you sleeping?" Shirai asked.

"Well…" Keitaro trailed off.

Haitani immediately caught on and tackled Keitaro again. "Ohhh! So our little Keitaro's getting lucky eh? Well, don't make too much noise!"

Keitaro shrugged the duo off him. "Ahh, it's not like that…JODY NO!"

Too late, the orangutan had pounced on the unfortunate duo again, thinking that they were attacking Keitaro. It took a moment for Keitaro to pry the orangutan off his friends.

"Okay, that orangutan is just insane!" Haitani cried. "Keitaro, lets go, the sooner we get this thing to the hut the better."

The little shack that the pair put together was near the woods behind the Hinata House. Keitaro took one look at it and decided that it wasn't habitable.

"No, I don't think so."

"WHAT? WE SPENT ALL AFTERNOON ON IT!"

"Well it's not enough." Keitaro said. "Jody's staying in the room tonight."

"With us?"

"Yep. Hey Jody, you wanna spend the night playing with these two?"

Jody smiled almost wickedly and bared her incisors. Keitaro smiled and started walking back down the path. Once back at the Hinata House, Shirai and Haitani looked like they were about to commit a mutiny; unfortunately for them, Keitaro had a three hundred pound blonde orangutan to keep them company. Minutes later, they were both in the vice grip of Jody, who was content to use the two as teddy bears as she drifted off the sleep. Shirai and Haitani were both scared to hell.

Meanwhile, Keitaro was settling in on Naru's futon as his fiancée cuddled up against him.

"How are the two doing downstairs?"

Keitaro sighed as he wrapped his arms around her. "I'm sure they're doing just fine."