Author's Notes: As I said in the attached chapter's Author's Notes, I'm glad that people like this idea to use "ship's logs" to provide more meta-info to keep readers from getting lost with OCs or worldbuilding, so I hope to exploit this in the future.

As for Harumi, his inspiration lies in the simple fact that Takahashi did two urban fantasy series with a badass crossdressing guy in them - Nagisa Shiowatari from Urusei Yatsura and Konatsu from Ranma 1/2 - and did absolutely nothing with either of them. Nagisa only made it into a single OAV in the anime, as far as I'm aware, and I have no idea how well he was used in the manga. As for poor Konatsu, well, he only appeared in about three stories before the manga ended, and the third was just a cameo in the finale story. With Harumi, I want to homage both those characters, but put my own spin on them... and also to actually do something with the idea. Hopefully, it'll work out.

Ship's Log: Harumi Recruited

Two of them. In just under two weeks. How the heck did this happen?! I didn't set out to collect a crew! I'm not a real pirate captain! ...Ah, who am I kidding? I couldn't leave him there...

Today, we went to a Summer Island called Femille Island, looking to pick up some pomegranates and some hallucinogenic mushrooms for a ritual that would let Umok change Ryoga's curse from Spring of Drowned Pig to Spring of Drowned Girl. So that's a thing that happened. While we were on the island, we met this girl - well, we thought they were a girl - being beaten up by a bunch of other girls. I've never liked bullies, so I stepped in, and long story short, we have a new crewmate.

Harumi Tsukuyomi is his name... yes, his. Guy's like Tsubasa Kurenai; he's a sixteen year-old boy who looks like a flatchested girl, unless you get him out of that damn dress. Apparently, Femille Island has a tradition about breeding for bishie boys as well as strong warrior women, and the guys are forced to dress up like girls.

...Look, I don't know why, and I don't really care enough to ask.

Harumi's 169 centimeters tall, slender as a reed, and looks way too much like a girl for his own good. Between the ink-black hair he wears down to his butt (and which he dotes on almost as much as Shampoo and Ucchan do), the moon-pale skin, the coal-dark eyes, and that face of his, he is one seriously pretty boy. Like, goddamn, I've known girls back at Furinkan who would have killed to look as good as he does.

Despite a rather lousy homelife, Harumi seems to be a really upbeat, optimistic kind of guy. He's always smiling - I don't think I've seen him without one so far - and he tries to look on the bright side of things. Still, he's not quite as... uh... "fluffy" as Kasumi was; he can be pretty sarcastic if you actually pay attention to what he's saying and not how he says it. Also, he has to be one of the most determined people I've met, and considering who I know, that's saying something. The whole island spent sixteen years trying to verbally and physically beat him into conformity, and he still defied them up until we came along and took him away. He's definitely got a sneaky side to him. I will say he seems a little too eager to please sometimes, though...

Despite comparing him to Tsubasa (and Umok says he reminds him of somebody called "Nagisa Shiowatari"), that's not really fair. Harumi doesn't do the dress up thing or try to pretend to be a girl; it's just he was brought up in a place where guys are supposed to be quiet, demure and gentle. Not his fault that makes him girlier than some of the girls I know.

Another big difference with Tsubasa: Harumi actually knows how to fight. I mean, it's obvious he cobbled his style together from spying on the other fighters on his island and practicing alone in the wilderness, so his moves are full of holes and flaws I'm going to have to train out of him, but he's got some pretty good skills! Actually, I'd call him almost the opposite of Miriam; she's slow and clumsy but strong, whilst Harumi is fast, agile and weak. He can really move when he wants to, and he's great at stealth and climbing too, but there's not a lot of power in those punches... then again, what would you expect of a guy with enough curves to pass for a girl at a casual glance? Plus, his family style does rely on lots and lots of weak hits to wear their foe down, so that's working against him too. Still, that's something we can work on.

He's got other talents, too. He's a pretty decent homemaker, in his own words, at least conversational in a variety of dialects, and he's really good at handling ropes and sails.

All in all, he's a bit of an oddball... but then, he's sailing with two guys who turn into girls, one of whom couldn't find his own butt with both hands and a roadmap; a cabbit-girl Amazon; a former crossdressing chef who wields a giant spatula; a money-grubbing trickster; a three-eyed imp; a half-tiger shark giant dwarf; and Kodachi Kuno. He'll fit in just fine, I'm sure.