Wednesday, June 22, 2005

   Remember: Kitty Heaven is Mousie Hell!!!

Tuesday of the Dead...

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What the heck is that all about?

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Well, nothing much happened today. I still haven't figured out my Java errors. I studied the Web Design Fundamentals stuff today. Yippee. Now I just have to make the drive to Omaha to take that test.

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Since nothing exciting happened today, I decided to post another part of the story. If you don't wanna read it, that's cool. Just scroll down to the bottom of the post and look at the interesting stuff there!

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“This much is known, Yonaha-san,” Ashida said, “there is a boy named Hikaru living at the Nakamura dojo and he is the son of Yoshihiro. The boy is almost 15 years old and has been ill since an injury occurred during lessons about two weeks ago.”

Yonaha sipped his tea. He had returned to Kamakura with the person physician of Nakamura. “I see,” he said. “Any word of the manner of illness or of the boy’s mother?”

“Nothing on the illness and nothing on the mother. I have asked around town, but no one seems to know the answers to my questions.”

Yonaha sighed. “Things like that require one to be discreet. A delicate touch is needed.”

Ashida laughed, “You’re right, of course, Yonaha-san. I probably have made them more aware than what Nakamura-sama would like.”

“Yes, and if we’re lucky, you won’t have frightened them into closing the gate against us.”

Yonaha was not happy with his comrade. “This is important to Nakamura-san. He is most anxious to meet his grandson.”

“I know,” Ashida said. He was distracted briefly by the arrival of the man from the dojo. The one Yonaha had identified as Takeda, a close friend of the late Nakamura Yoshihiro. “Yonaha-san, there. It’s the man from the dojo.”

Yonaha had already noticed Takeda. “Yes, I wonder what he is doing here when his young master is ill.”

The two men watched as Takeda went to meet a man at another table. They could not hear the conversation, but watched as some papers were produced and signed by both parties.

Ashida broke the silence and said, “I wonder what that was all about. It looked like a business deal.”

“You’re right. It did.” Yonaha took another sip of his tea and watched as the large, clumsy youth that worked at the inn went to Takeda and whispered something to him. Takeda nodded in reply and he left the inn.

“They’re up to something,” Ashida said.

“I agree,” Yonaha replied. “Shall I find out?”

“No, leave this to me. I have my ways of finding things. You go and watch the dojo. Do not approach. Just watch. I will return here at sundown. Meet me then and let me know if anything has happened.” Ashida left the table and disappeared into the marketplace.

Yonaha made his way to the dojo and found an out of the way place to watch.
***
The sun had gone down some time ago, and Yonaha was still watching the Nakamura dojo. He had been there much of the afternoon and nothing much had happened for most of the time he watched. Nothing much until the large youth from the inn went into the dojo. That was why he was still watching a while after the time he had agreed to meet with Ashida.

“There you are, Yonaha-san,” Ashida said as he approached. “You stayed too long. Why weren’t you at the inn?”

“The large boy from the inn went in before sunset,” Yonaha said. “He has not come out.”

Ashida looked at the dojo with narrowed eyes. “I see. I have heard the boys are friends, so he may just be visiting a sick friend. However, I think there is more to it. Have you noticed how the boy seems to be watching us when we’re at the inn?”

“Now that you mention it, he does seem to be watching us. He’s spying on us, isn’t he?”

“More than likely. But let us not worry about that now. Let’s return to the inn and I will tell you what I learned today.”

The two men returned to the inn and met in the room of Ashida instead of talking in the open eatery.

“What have you learned, Ashida-san?” Yonaha asked as soon as the door was closed.

Ashida went to the window and closed it. He turned to his comrade and said, “The Nakamura dojo is running in the red. It seems Master Yoshihiro left many debts with local merchants when he went off to battle, leaving a boy of barely fifteen years to run the dojo.”

“But there’s that servant.”

“Yes, but he’s just a servant. He can’t make any decisions about the dojo. Those must be the responsibility of the boy. He may be acting as a go-between right now.”

“Go-between… for the boy and the man we saw earlier.” Yonaha stopped to think. “What are they doing? You don’t think… you do, don’t you?”

Ashida looked up with a smile. “You figured it out? I think they’re selling the dojo to cover the debts. A boy of fifteen can’t run the place even if there’s a servant to help him.”

“But he surely would want to keep the dojo and let someone else run it, wouldn’t he? He’s probably been training in sword art since he could walk.”

“That’s what I thought, but I found out something interesting. The Nakamura boy is not sick. He was injured during a practice session.”

“I know that already. Perhaps his injury was serious.”

“I thought that as well, but I found out that the large boy from this inn is the one that injured him. He knocked him out with a bokken. Nakamura-kun was unconscious for days. A priest was even called in.”

“A priest? Was the injury really that serious? How did you find all this out?”

Ashida smiled again. “I spoke to the local doctor. Ply him with enough sake and he’ll tell everything. The doctor is the one that suggested the priest see the boy. The truly interesting thing was why the priest was called in.”

Yonaha was beginning to have his doubts about what Ashida was saying, but he was curious about why the priest was summoned. “Why did the doctor ask for a priest? Was the boy dying?”

“No, not even close. The doctor said young Nakamura woke once and his eyes were glowing an unnatural green color. The priest was called to exorcise the demons plaguing the boy.”

“Demons,” Yonaha said with a snort. “The boy was possessed by demons. Forgive me, but that is too much to believe. You said the doctor could be plied with sake. It sounds like the ramblings of a drunk.”

“It’s what the doctor said.”

Yonaha rubbed his eyes. “Well, I am hungry and am going to get something to eat. Tomorrow I am sending a cable to Nakamura-san. He asked me to keep him updated on things here.” He stood up to leave.

Ashida stopped him before he could leave. “Don’t send the cable until afternoon,” he said. “Let’s see what else we can learn about the dojo first. Those are the instructions I received.”

“All right. We’ll see what else there is to see. Now, I’m going to go eat.” Yonaha left the room and went to the dining area. He did not like the way Ashida was handling the issue of the dojo and Nakamura’s grandson. Instead of stopping to eat, he decided to go to the dojo himself and try to speak with the man called Takeda and the boy, if possible.

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Okay... time to spark up my social life by dating anime guys again!

Blind date with a hot anime guy ^.^ by Originality
Name
Age
Lucky Number
Favorite color
Date ===
Where the date is	Japanese Steak House
First thing date says to you	"Hurray! My date's as hot as I am!"
Last thing date says to you	"I'll see ya later!"
Quiz created with MemeGen!

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Well. Now that I've either bored you all or confused you all, I will shuffle off in search of true excitement... or sleep.

And, SunfallE, the current location of the Edge of Sanity is northwestern Iowa. One would have to be insane or damn close to live here in the cultural backwaters of the Universe!

Laters!

Comments (7) | Permalink

Tuesday, June 21, 2005

   Shag on out there, beany boy, and fix that WhoopWhoop noise!

Monday...

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Not much happened today. It was really hot out, so my brother & I didn't go for any more of a walk than necessary. And by necessary, I mean a walk down to the local convenience store for an ice cream cone. It was 82°F out at 9:30 this morning!!! Ick.

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I still can't figure out what's wrong with my Java application that I was working at on Friday. *pounds head on desk* I didn't work too hard at it today... it was towel & bedsheet laundry day! Wheee.... *drops from the excitement*

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Well, I don't know what I'm going to do now.... Oh, yeah! I gotta scan in a picture!

Laters!

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Monday, June 20, 2005

   *seriously contemplates sticking finger in eye again*

Mildly bored on a Sunday night.

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Didn't do much of excitement today. Watched TV all afternoon. Hooray for the DVD of the Mummy with Brendan Fraser! Then I watched most of Vertigo with Jimmy Stewart. I've seen it two or three times already, so I know how it ends. Instead of watching it out, I went for a walk with my brother. That's better for me than sitting & watching movies.

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So I leave you all with a bit of culture tonight. Here is a little bit of Shakespeare...

What a piece of work is man, how noble in reason,
How infinite in faculties,
In form and moving, how express and admirable,
In action, how like an angel,
In apprehension, how like a god.
The beauty of the world, the paragon of animals.
I have of late, but wherefore I know not, lost all my mirth.
This goodly frame, the earth seems to me a sterile promontory.
This most excellent canopy, the air, look you,
This brave o'erhanging firmament,
This majestical roof fretted with golden fire,
Why, it appears no other thing to me than a foul and pestilent
Congregation of vapors.
What a piece of work is man, how noble in reason.

Laters!

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Sunday, June 19, 2005

I'm Batman!

*hanging out in the Batcave on a Saturday night*

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Oh, man... we went to see Batman Begins today. I liked it a lot! I was a little disappointed in Ken Watanabe in the movie, but so what? It was good! My brother said it was better than Revenge of the Sith, and I'm afraid I must agree with him! Christian Bale was great as Batman. I hadn't seen him in anything since Empire of the Sun and he was just a kid in that. I've also come to a conclusion:
I want the Batmobile!!!!

In the last Batman movie (the one with George Clooney, which I didn't think was too horrible a movie. Trust me, I've seen worse.) I actually cheered when the Batmobile got blown up. I thought that was the most hideous thing on a movie screen. They sure made the Batmobile cool in this one! I want one! I want one! I want one! I want one! I want one! I want one! I want one! I want one! I want one! I want one!

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Other than that, not much went on today. My brother bought me some more DBZ cards at Target. Yay!

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Oh... I read SunfallE's comment the other day about my eyes. At first I couldn't figure out what she was referring to, then I reread my post. I forgot to say that I used to hang my Raiders of the Lost Ark poster over my bed until my eyes got too bad to see it without my glasses. I see about 6 inches clearly without my glasses.

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Now I go cause some havoc somewhere. I haven't figured out where yet.

Laters!

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Additional: Since this thing is posted with Sunday as the date, I thought I'd add this quick: go wish Matt3402 a Happy Birthday!!!

Happy Birthday, Matt!!!! You're getting old!

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Saturday, June 18, 2005

   Domo arigato, Mr. Roboto! Mata au hima de. Domo arigato, Mr. Roboto, himitsu wo shiri tai!

Friday!

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Well... did a little bit of Java today. Gave up when I got a bunch of errors in my little application and couldn't figure out where they came from or why they are there. I even compared my code to the answer and I have pretty much the same thing, but still have errors. I'm gonna have to really think about it.

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Then I went to Sioux City with my brother to run around a while and do some grocery shopping. I was supposed to go with my sister & her family to the Awesome Biker Nights thing downtown for a concert and motorcycles and other stuff, but she had something come up and we couldn't go. She knew that the adults of the group would be able to handle it, but was concerned how her daughter & her friend were going to react. They're both around 12 or 13. I told my sister to find something else fun to do with the kids.

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Well, we're probably going to go see the new Batman movie tomorrow. I'll let you know what I think in tomorrow's post.

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I swear I ate almost a half-gallon of ice cream tonight. Oog...

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Well, I think I'm going to go off in search of some pictures for stuff now...

Laters!

Comments (10) | Permalink

Friday, June 17, 2005

   You're so unhip, it's a wonder your bums don't fall off!

It's Thursday! You know what that means? Me neither.

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Well, then. I didn't do anything worthwhile today except for a couple loads of laundry and read a lot of manga. Gads, I'm lazy!

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Well, I had a few questions from people yesterday. So here they are with answers!

katocool asks:
How did you get the inspiration for your story?
Hmm... too much manga and anime. The funny thing is, my original idea for the story had Hikaru named Kohaku. He was also a fox-demon travelling with a monk and looking for his mother. His sister was also going to be a character. I did some major revisions, but some of what I had in mind may still show up. However, Hikaru doesn't have a sister.


DarkKiba asks:
What is your worst fear?
If you're talking phobias: falling. I don't have a fear of heights, though. Weird, eh?


chesza382 asks:
wat r u afraid of?
See above for the phobia. I am also a little afraid of dogs. A friend of mine knew this, and when we went to his farm, he was surprised to see me go right to his dogs. I told him I'm okay as long as they don't jump up on me or lunge at me. His two dogs were so nice... collies. So pretty.


Caprice asks:
Who's your favorite Star Wars character?
All right... When I saw the first one way back in 1977, I had a crush on Luke Skywalker. Then my tastes matured and I discovered Han Solo to be the truly cool character. I think part of that may have been the release of Raiders of the Lost Ark. I have the movie poster from the original release of that movie and I used to hang it above my bed. Then my eyes got too bad & I wasn't able to see the poster anymore!

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Well, that about wraps it up. I am rather tired tonight and may go to bed earlier than I have been. As soon as I figure out something for prizes, the winners will receive PMs with their prizes!

Laters!

Comments (12) | Permalink

Thursday, June 16, 2005

   I'm not mad, I'm Evil!

Wednesday is for summarizing things. And the summary is going to be a bit long-winded! Whee!

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Well, I thought I'd do something different today and summarize a bunch of stuff.

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I'll start out with the results of the Incredibly Difficult Contest. Believe it or not, I had the correct answer within a few minutes of me putting the contest up!

The correct answer: they were all lyrics from Weird Al Yankovic songs! The winner is SunfallE!!! Second place goes to bebopinutrigun188.

The obvious answer: they all mentioned food. The winner of that part is lilsangofan! Kudos go to Hieiartemis, Nikorasu, katocool & aodtr666 for also seeing the food connection. (I had my brother draw a name out of a pink bucket to determine the winner for this part)

The prizes will be determined at some time when I'm a little more fully conscious of my surroundings. (I gotta stop posting so late!)

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Results of the mini-poll are in!
Which universe would you like to live in?

1. Lord of the Rings with 10 votes


2. Star Wars with 4 votes


3. Star Trek with 0 votes

For the first day or so, the top two were neck & neck. But LOTR took a big lead the last day!

I did not vote in my own poll, but will tell you all what my brother and I decided. My brother chose Star Trek. He said that's because in the other two universes, you don't know who is going to turn around and stab you in the back. You know who the good guys & bad guys are. I chose Star Wars for pretty much the same reasons. The possibility of having someone turn on you when you least expect it seems a little more exciting to me. And I also think that Jedi powers would be so kickass.

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And now...I'm going to comment on the comments on yesterday's post.

metal-inuyasha: It depends on which alphabet you're talking about. I've encountered several and they differ.
SunfallE: Yes, you have missed a lot of the story. Just click the cute little picture of Sam & Hikaru up in my intro for the site where the whole thing is.
joeyw23: Satsuo is a boy. If you want an idea of what Hikaru looks like, check my fanart. He's there a bunch of times.
mega-matt: No wonder Shinta is tired! You made him run on that wheel for three minutes!
bebopinutrigun188: Check it out! You got second place!! Sweet!
Caprice: Thanks for checking out the story on the website. Thanks also for giving me two hits on this site! It does wonders for the ranking.
katocool: Those six chapters were spread out over 6 to 7 hours, but still... 6 chapters in one day! Ick.
Conneryalexis: And why didn't you enter my contest? Hmm?
aodtr666: I think "Pie Day" sounds better, too. I like apple or peach.
yami seto: Thanks for the vote in the poll! I gotta do those poll thingies more often. They're fun.
iluvsasuk: Really now? Baby corn & cauliflower... I had no idea.

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Well, if you made it this far, congratulations! You've put up with the semi-psychotic ramblings of a slightly crazy, incredibly tired Kitsune!

I'll give it a shot again. Go ahead and ask me questions. I got the idea from Panda, so it's not an original idea, but it's a cool idea!

Laters!

Comments (9) | Permalink

Wednesday, June 15, 2005

   If olive oil comes from olives, and peanut oil comes from peanuts, where does baby oil come from?

Tuesday....Flag Day for those in the US.

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Well, then. Today was nice and cool. The temperature didn't get too hot at all. It felt so good.

I did another chapter in Java! Whee! I think I may be getting the hang of this thing called Java. Well, a better grip than when I had my class back in March. It may be the slower pace at which I am attacking this. The first day of class we covered six chapters. Just plowed through the stuff like there was no tomorrow. Now that I'm going at my own pace, things seem to be clicking into place.

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Okay. I've been threatening y'all with it for the past few days, so here's the next part of the story. So those of you that don't read it, just scroll down to the end and comment on anything. Maybe answer my question or leave me a question you think I need to answer. (Okay. I got that idea from Panda. I admit it)

I've been doing a lot of writing the past couple days, so there's actually a lot more ready. I just have to get it all figured out as to what order things go. Everything is happening at once and I need to get the continuity just right. Okay... enough babbling. It's story time! (It's also a long one tonight!)

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The waning moon was hanging low in the sky over Kamakura. Satsuo paid it no attention as he sat on the rocks at the seaside. He stared out at the waves, yet did not really see them. There was too much on his mind.

He had run to the shore from the dojo after being frightened by the unnatural figure in the garden. That had been earlier during the afternoon. Now it was dark and he had best be returning to the inn. His parents would be angry. He stood and turned to go back to the village.

Satsuo snuck into the in with no problem, but when he got back to his own room, he was surprised to find his father waiting.

“Where have you been, Satsuo?” his father said.

“At the shore,” he stammered. Satsuo looked at his feet.

“Your mother has been sick with worry, and I am angry. Takeda-san was looking for you."

Satsuo’s heart skipped a beat. “I’m sorry, Father.”

“In the morning, apologize to your mother. I will send for Takeda-san and you will apologize to him as well. He was very upset with you for some reason. He would not tell me, but said you would know the reason.” His father started to leave. “Now go to sleep,” he said as he approached the door. “Tomorrow you are to stay here at the inn and work. You will not be permitted to see your friend Hikaru.”

“Yes, Father.”

Satsuo got ready for bed. Hikaru, he thought. Hikaru does not know about the thing in the garden. He put out the candle by the door and crawled into bed. As he pulled the covers up, another thought struck him. The thing in the garden was wearing Hikaru’s clothes. Hikaru’s clothes…Hikaru’s voice… Hikaru?

Satsuo did not sleep well that night.

The next morning, Satsuo had to work at the inn. His mind was not on his work. What if things had been different? he thought. What if I had looked closer at the practice sword?

“Watch what you’re doing, Satsuo!” his father yelled. “What is your problem today?”

“Sorry, Father,” Satsuo said as he started to clean up the bowls he had dropped. As he picked the pieces up, he didn’t notice Takeda approach. He turned to take the pieces back into the inn and nearly knocked Takeda down. The already broken bowls shattered into even more pieces.

Satsuo’s father looked over at his son and shook his head. “My apologies, Takeda-san,” he said. “My idiot son has been breaking things all morning. What can I do for you?”

Takeda smiled and said, “Do not worry, it is Satsuo-kun that I have come to see. May I speak to him, please?”

“By all means, please do. Perhaps I will not lose any more bowls that way.”

Takeda did not like the way Satsuo’s father was treating the boy, but said nothing. He took Satsuo aside to talk. They sat at a table out of the way of the main crowd.

“What can I do for you, sensei?” Satsuo asked.

“I need to talk to you about what you saw in the garden yesterday,” Takeda said.

Satsuo said nothing at first. “I didn’t see anything,” he whispered as he avoided Takeda’s gaze.

Takeda looked at his student. “Please, Satsuo-kun, this is important. I need to talk to you about this.”

Satsuo seemed at the verge of tears. “I’m sorry, sensei,” he said. “I should not have gone in like I did. I just wanted to talk to Hikaru.”

“I know. You’ve been so worried about him since the accident. But remember, Hikaru has always been stronger than he looks. However, right now he’s hurt in a different way. He thinks you won’t come to see him anymore.”

“But, sensei, why would he think that? I want to visit him, but Father says I must work at the inn today because of yesterday.”

“You told your father what you saw?” Takeda was suddenly afraid for Hikaru’s safety.

“No, after that I did not come home. I stayed on the shore until after dark.”

Takeda sighed in relief. The boy had told no one of Hikaru. “It is good that you said nothing of what you saw in the garden, and I thank you for that. But you should have gone home.”

“Yes, sensei.” Satsuo thought for a moment before asking, “Sensei, that… that person in the garden, was that?”

Takeda answered before Satsuo could finish, “Yes.”

“But why? What has happened? Will he stay that way?”

“I do not know if he will stay like that. I do know something of why it happened, but I cannot speak of it now. Please, say nothing of this to anyone.”

“Of course, sensei. I will keep this to myself.”

“Thank you, Satsuo-kun. Will you come visit again when you can? Hikaru will be happy for the company of someone his own age.”

“I will come tomorrow, sensei.”

“Good. I will speak to your father and let him know that it is all right for you to visit Hikaru, and I will tell Hikaru that you will come. That should make him feel better. He was so sad yesterday.”
Takeda stood up to leave and went to talk to Satsuo’s father.

Satsuo watched his teacher as he spoke to his father. He had been right about what he had seen in the garden. His main concern now was what had happened to cause this. He spent the rest of his day working at the inn. Nothing more was broken as the day went on.
***
Hikaru fell asleep at the table with his father’s swords nearby. Takeda found him there when he returned from his talk with Satsuo. Good, he thought, the boy needs to rest. Takeda found a blanket and put it across Hikaru.

Takeda went to the main house of the dojo and found the family shrine. Carefully he removed the items within and carried the empty shrine to the guesthouse. He returned to the main house for that which he had removed and brought them to be put in their places within the shrine. Hikaru still slept.

After he had the shrine set up again, Takeda took his place in front of it and began to reflect upon the life of his friend Yoshihiro.

Nakamura Yoshihiro was a good man. An honest man. He lived for swordsmanship and wished to continue teaching the art to those willing to learn the art, despite the ban on swords. He had survived the Revolution nine years earlier, only to be called to arms again in the Satsuma Rebellion. Leaving had been hard on him.

Takeda knew in his heart that Yoshihiro had a feeling he would not return from battle that time. That was why Takeda had been left behind to take care of the boy. “Be strong for Hikaru,” Yoshihiro had said the night before he left. “He will need your strength in the future. He is more fragile than he lets on.”

Fragile. The word lingered in Takeda’s thoughts. Yes. Fragile is a good word.

Takeda finished his meditation and went to Hikaru and gently lifted him and put him to bed. You may be fragile right now, Hikaru, he thought, but you will be strong one day. Stronger than your father ever expected. You will have to be strong.
***
Hikaru was somewhat surprised to wake up in bed, as he had fallen asleep at the table. He knew that Takeda must have moved him. What actually surprised him more was that Takeda had moved the family shrine to the guesthouse. The stand for his father’s swords was sitting in front of the shrine. A sad smile crossed his face as he placed the swords there.

“I’m glad you found the stand,” Takeda said. “Your father would be pleased to see his swords there.”

“Sensei,” Hikaru said, “I didn’t hear you come in. You startled me.”

“Forgive me.” Takeda set a tray of food on the table. “I didn’t mean to scare you. You haven’t eaten all day. Here, come and have some ohagi. Satsuo’s mother sent it over. She’s worried about you as well.”

“She makes good ohagi. I…” Hikaru’s voice trailed off as a question formed in his mind. “Takeda-sensei, what was my mother like? I don’t remember her.”

Takeda was mildly surprised by the question. “Well,” he said, “she was a demon, of course. From what she told your father and I, her clan is silver like you are now. She was very kind and loved your father very much.”

“But weren’t people frightened of her if she looked like this?” Hikaru held his hands out, a look of dismay on his face.

Takeda laughed quietly. “I’m going to tell you a little secret,” he said. “Your mother was one of the few members of her clan that was able to change.”

“Change?”

“Yes, change. She could change her appearance to be able to pass as human.” He reached for another ohagi.

“Pass as human,” Hikaru repeated.

Takeda nodded and said, “There was, however, one feature she could never disguise, and that was her ears. They were pointed instead of round.”

Hikaru felt his own ears. He’d always been a bit self-conscious of the slight point to his ears, but never considered why they were pointed. “Pointed…like mine?”

Takeda shook his head. “Yours can almost pass as normal. Shizuyo’s ears were very pointed. She always wore her hair down so no one could see.”

“Ah,” Hikaru said and fell into thought.

Takeda watched his young master for a while and then asked what he was thinking.

“I was wondering if I have the ability to change like my mother. If I can change back to myself… how I used to look.”

Takeda said, “There’s only one way to find out. Try to change back.”

“But how?”

“I don’t know how Shizuyo did it. She would just turn from one form to another.” Takeda thought about this for a bit. “Maybe if you close your eyes and relax. Think about what you want to look like. Think about being flesh instead of metal.”

Hikaru closed his eyes and pictured himself as he was a few days earlier. “All right,” he said.

“Good. Now relax and keep that image in your mind. You’re going to be normal again.”

Hikaru kept the image in his mind and told himself he could change back to normal. He repeated it as a mantra.

Takeda watched with interest as Hikaru slowly changed from the silver-colored demon back to the human boy he had known for years. “Open your eyes, Hikaru-kun,” he said with a laugh.

Hikaru opened his eyes and looked at his hands. They were back to normal. His arms as well, even though the marks of fire and metal were still visible. “I did it!” he exclaimed. “I changed back! What’s so funny?”

Takeda smiled and said, “You’re right, you did change back to normal…almost. Take a look at your hair.”

“My hair?” Hikaru kept his hair long and in a braid. However, there was the part that framed his face. The part that he kept about chin length. The part that was still as silver as it all had been. “What has happened here?” he asked as he held part of it in front of his face. His eyes crossed slightly as he looked at the silver hair.

“It didn’t change back,” Takeda said laughing. “But don’t worry, it actually looks good. I like it. It’s different.”

Hikaru looked at his teacher and began to laugh with him. Things were definitely different now.

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Well, there you have it. Takeda has changed a few things around in the house, Satsuo has come to terms with what he saw, and Hikaru is back to "normal." For those of you that are wondering about Sam, she'll be making an appearance again one of these days.

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Now I think I will go do something truly constructive: SLEEP!

Laters!

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Additional: The contest has officially ended now that it's been shoved into the archives. Winners will be announced tomorrow. And there's still one day left on the minipoll, so scroll down and vote if you haven't!

Good grief! I was rather long winded today!

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Tuesday, June 14, 2005

   Blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah...

Mundane Monday comes to an end.

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Well, nothing particularly exciting happened today as usual. I had some quality time with the kitten again. He's starting to trust people a little more. I wish we could bring him inside, but we have an old cat in the house and we don't want to jeopardize her health and well-being. She has come outside a couple times and went nose to nose with the kitten. Then she hissed at it and ran back into the house. Chicken!

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Please... go down to yesterday's post and vote in the poll! It's the subject of a deep philosophical discussion my brother & I had yesterday.

And, yes, SunfallE, my answer was Star Wars. I haven't put it into the poll, though. Wouldn't be right for me to vote in my own poll!

I will let the poll go until the post gets shoved to the archives in a couple more days.

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As for the contest. I know I said I was going to let it run for a week. I changed my mind. I'm going to let it run until it gets shoved to the archives, which will be after tomorrow's post.

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Well, that about sums it up. I am still going to torture you all with another part of the story, but not quite yet. You have been warned!!!

Laters!

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Monday, June 13, 2005

   I've got a bad feeling about this....

Sunday is over at last!

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Not that today was a bad day. It's just over now. I had a pretty good day. The cat wouldn't let me sleep too much past 9:00. The morning was pretty uneventful. Watched a little TV, read a little in the novel I grabbed at the library the other day.

After lunch, my brother & I went up to LeMars to WalMart. Whee. Wandered around there for a while and then went back home. We then went for a walk and after that, he went and napped for a while. I watched more TV, then went outside to see if I could get the kitten to play. We've been adopted by a little grey & white kitten. He's kind of scrawny and can be a scaredy cat at times. But I did get ahold of him and had a good fifteen minutes of quality time with him. He's not quite sure what to do to play. But I still got him to cuddle a little bit and purr!

After supper, my brother & I went and got ice cream cones and had a deep philosophical discussion. The question we were discussing is in the following mini-poll:

At this point, I won't tell you our answers. I don't want to influence you guys. But I will say this, we chose two different things, but the reasons were pretty much the same as to why we chose as we did.

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Well. I guess my mood tonight is pretty good, but the urge to put up more story just didn't happen. I did submit more artwork, though. I went back to Kenshin! Wheee!!!! I also spent time getting a GIF to work properly. And here he is:



Laters!

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Additional: Oh yeah, the contest is still on! Read the post for yesterday for details and give it a try if you haven't done so already!

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