Live on Jeri Supuringaa: Love Hina Much Later! A Love Hina citrusy manga fanfic by hkmiller 10 September 2003 - FFML Draft 11 September 2003 - Fixed typos The characters of Love Hina were created by Ken Akamatsu, and are licensed to TV Tokyo and Bandai. No disrespect intended by my unlicensed usage. Spoilers for entire series. Serious Lime warning. - - - - - - - - - - "My first time with him?" Kitsune told the eagerly- listening studio audience with a wink and a smile. "It was the day of his first divorce from... let's call her 'Ranu'. A bunch of us had been celebrating in an onsen. See, the others had all wanted to marry him, and now they had another shot. Well, we'd been there for a bit, and maybe we'd had a bit too much to drink, you know how that goes. And then in he walks, strutting that macho strut and giving us that dazzling smile of his. I went all weak in the knees. He took all five of us right then and there, ignoring our feeble pleas and protests. We had no chance to resist him." The studio audience leaned forward, hushed. "And what happened then?" asked Jeri, the host. - - - - - Still confused, feeling partly like a loser, partly vindicated, Keitaro stumbled into the Hinata Inn. Why? Why hadn't Naru believed that they were right for each other? Hadn't they been happy? Naru must have thought so, since she'd changed her mind ten minutes after the divorce was finalized and pleaded to get married again as soon as possible. He'd agreed, of course, but the whole experience still bewildered him. The emotional roller coaster of feeling that he'd lost Naru forever, only to find that he hadn't, had left him drained. What did a guy do on his sole night single for the past two years, and hopefully his last ever? Naru had gone off to drink the night away with Mutsumi, so he was on his own. Not watching where his feet took him, he was surprised to look up and find himself in the onsen area, looking right at Suu, Motoko, Shinobu, Kitsune, and Kanako, all obviously drunk and staring back at him like a hungry tiger stares at a baby deer. The sight unnerved him, and he turned to flee. Unfortunately, his foot came down on a stray bar of soap. He fell backwards, somersaulting through the air and hitting his head on the stone floor before ending up floating face up in the onsen. "Well?" Kanako asked, pointedly looking at Motoko. "Hmmm," mused Motoko. "I suppose it couldn't hurt. CLOTHES SHREDDING BLADE!" Keitaro tried to move, but was too dazed to do so. His best suit shredded into tiny pieces of cloth as a whirlwind carried him straight up into the atmosphere. Dimly, Keitaro realized he was revolving as he rose; now he was facing straight down at the girls. Somehow none of them were wearing towels now, he noticed. Blood spurted from his nose as he crested and began to fall. Amazing how developed they all were these days. He landed with his face planted squarely in the middle of Kitsune's chest, knocking her down. She smirked at the top of Keitaro'd head. "So now you want me? Well, I don't know, Keitaro. You just got divorced from my best friend today; I really oughtta wait a few hours." "Fine with me," Kanako interrupted, glaring at Kitsune. "I'll take him off your hands." One of her hands grabbed Keitaro's shoulder; the other reached between his legs and took a firm grasp. She lifted Keitaro off of Kitsune and turned to flee with her prize. "Wait!" cried Shinobu in alarm. "Sempai should make his own choice." Motoko quickly grabbed one of Keitaro's ankles. "You're not leaving with him!" Motoko and Kanako both began pulling. Shinobu grabbed Keitaro's other leg, wrapping her arms around his thigh. "He's too dazed to make intelligent choices right now," Kitsune observed, crouching and peering up at Keitaro's face closely. Kanako remarked, "I think his lower brain will suffice for my needs this evening." Motoko spat out, "You don't get him unless we all do!" Two eye-blinks later, she muttered to herself, "Did I really say that?" "Goodie! I can measure how many times a Keitaro can do it with my invention!" Suu plopped a curious wired metallic helmet onto Keitaro's head, then hopped up and down, dancing in a circle around the other five and clapping her arms above her head, her manic grin threatening to split her face in two. "Mr. Erectric Mark 1!" "B-but, we can't!" Shinobu wailed, releasing Keitaro's thigh as she raised her hands to her face in alarm. "Not like this! It should be special, romantic!" Kanako relaxed her stance. "Nobody's forcing you to stay, Shinobu. Leave if you want." Kanako looked the other four women over briefly, then shrugged. "Let's put big brother down over there on the side." Motoko grunted in acknowledgement. Picking up Keitaro's other ankle, she helped Kanako carry the still-dazed Keitaro over to the edge of the onsen. "Shinobu, they're getting married again tomorrow. Tonight may be the only day he's single for the rest of his life. And I, for one, am not missing this chance." Shinobu stood frozen in indecision for another minute, then nodded decisively, if fearfully, as she stepped forward, following the others. - - - - - - - - - - "I suspect that that wasn't the first time for some of the others, though," Kitsune confided to Jeri. "Four years passed between his first engagement to 'Ranu' and the wedding... a lot happened during those years. I'm pretty sure he was playing the field for all he was worth." - - - - - It was a blazingly hot day on Pararakelse Island. Deep in a pit in the midst of ancient Turtle Civilization ruins, Keitaro wiped the sweat from his brow. Sitting up from where he'd been carefully brushing the remaining dust and sand from a pottery shard, he looked up at the sky. If only Naru could have gotten away to spend some time with him! But at least Shinobu and Mutsumi were here for a short visit, the first he'd had from any of the girls in a year. Shinobu and Nyamo were catching up on the last two years, he was sure, while Mutsumi took a siesta in one of the tents. "Kei-kun!" "Sempai!" Or maybe not. Looking up towards the edge of the pit, Keitaro could just make out the shapes of Mutsumi, Shinobu, and Nyamo, dressed only in leaves and silhouetted against the sun. They waved down at him. "Hey, be careful up there!" Keitaro yelled up. "That edge of the pit is kind of... too late." Sure enough, Mutsumi had put one foot in the wrong spot. "Oh my," she commented as she plummeted over the edge, dragging Shinobu and Nyamo with her towards the bottom. Galvanized, Keitaro surged to his feet and ran to the spot where the three women would land, arms out to catch them. The impact knocked the wind out of all three woman, while hammering Keitaro onto his back on the dirt floor of the pit, unconscious. "Sempai!" "Keitaro!" Shinobu and Nyamo cried in unison. "Oh-fu-fu," noted Mutsumi with amusement, "All our leaves have fallen off and now we're naked down in this pit where nobody can see us. Maybe we'd better remove Kei-kun's clothing and make sure nothing's broken?" Shinobu smiled timidly. "Time for Nurse Shinobu and her Amazing Medical Powers?" "Oh my!" - - - - - - - - - - "Sure the women were jealous. They fought constantly," Kitsune assured Jeri. "All the time. Tooth and nail. Dirty tricks, hair-pulling, everything. I remember this one time. It was during his second marriage to 'Ranu'. She'd been away on business overnight, and he'd taken advantage of it, spending the night with 'Goth-girl'. The next day, the two of them got into this incredible cat-fight..." - - - - - "I can't believe you," Naru huffed to Kanako. "Disguising yourself as me and sneaking into bed with Keitaro. Don't you have any shame at all?" "None," Kanako replied airily. The two walked side-by- side, both wearing power skirt-and-jacket combinations, Kanako's black, Naru's violet, both carrying identical attache cases with "From Keitaro, with love" inscribed discreetly on the inside of the handles. "No more than last time." "And here I thought that pervert could see through your disguises," Naru muttered to herself. "Not while the light's out," Kanako replied as the two raised their arms in synchronized motion to open the courtroom doors. Heads turned from the two tables in front to watch the two enter. "And I'm going to win this case, Naru." "Would you like to make a small wager on that?" Naru stopped, putting her hands on her hips, while smirking at Kanako. "My client's case is ironclad. If I win, you don't ever sneak into bed with poor Keitaro again." Light glinted from Kanako's eyes. "For the remainder of this calendar year or the remainder of your current marriage to big brother, whichever comes first. Agreed. But if I win, I get one night a week with him, whether you're in town or not, for the rest of the year. You don't tell him, you don't interfere. I think you're in for a surprise or two regarding relevant precedents, you see." Naru glared at Kanako for a minute, fists on hips, but then smirked herself. "And I have a pair of witnesses who will rather surprise you, I think. You're on!" Both women nodded in unison, then Naru went over to the defendant's table, while Kanako sat down at the plaintiff's table. "All rise," came the bailiff's voice. "The case of Mitsutomo Electric versus Hanagawa Inventions will now begin." - - - - - - - - - - A hand went up in the audience. "Why do you keep referring to the other women involved with pseudonyms? If this is all true, couldn't you get some of the other women on stage with you? Haven't you all been equally victimized? Or are they still under this sleazebag's spell?" Jeri raised a hand. "The pseudonyms are required by network policy; the ladies involved refused to sign releases allowing us to use their names on the air." Upstairs, the executive producer nodded slightly, sweating, as he recalled the threats contained in the letter from the up-and-coming law firm of Urashima, Otohime, and Aoyama. Kitsune grinned and added, "I can tell you this, though: yes, they're all still smitten. They don't realize how they've been victimized; they're all still under his spell. But the other reason they don't want their names used..." Kitsune trailed to a stop, pausing to let the audience's anticipation build, then raised a finger, smiling slyly. "Some of them have reputations to protect. Some of them hold positions of power and wealth. Two of them... if I told you their names, you'd recognize them immediately." Sudden intakes of breath came from all directions. - - - - - "Shinobu!" yelled Motoko, gripping a brand-new romance paperback in her left hand in fury. The cover displayed a bare-chested Archaeologist-Adventurer leaning down over a woman about to lose her skimpy blouse. The title read 'Homemaker in Love III: Short-haired Girls Have More Fun.' "How dare you rip off my best scene from 'Romance Ronin Avenges Her Honor'?" Shinobu leaned her head out the kitchen door and answered indignantly, "That incident happened to Sempai and me in the first place, not to you! I had every right to use it in my book!" "Huh? It happened to you too?" Motoko asked, surprised. "He tripped, fell down backwards between your legs while you were wearing a yukata, then pulled you down into a squat on top of his head?" "Well, I had to add the part about him panting desperately that he had to have me," Shinobu replied, blushing as she looked down at the batter she was stirring. "Sempai was too dazed to say much of anything." "Same here," answered Motoko. "But all my readers are going to think you ripped me off." "They won't care. My publisher say your readers and mine overlap almost completely, anyway." - - - - - - - - - - "Incest? Yeah, we had incest," Kitsune said dismissively. "I've mentioned his obsessed little sister, but there was also his wife's little sister. His aunt's foster daughter. More. Underage, too." Shouts of "Lynch the bastard!" echoed throughout the studio. "We even had Satanic initiation rituals!" Kitsune proclaimed, getting to her feet with fists raised to the ceiling. Jeri whispered to Kitsune out of the side of his mouth. "You may be overdoing it there. That stuff's kind of passe." "Whatever you say; you're paying," Kitsune whispered back. The muted response from the studio audience underlined Jeri's point. "Okay, here's what happened. A few years ago..." - - - - - Narusegawa Mei, Sara McDougall, and Maeda Ema crept quietly through the tunnels threading the inside walls of the Hinata Inn, their destination: Keitaro's bedroom. "I bagged the dork two hours short of my eighteenth birthday," Sara whispered over her shoulder to Ema. "'Bout time you acted; you've been nineteen for six months." "But won't Naru-sempai or Shinobu-sempai be upset?" Ema whispered back fearfully. "I don't want them mad at me." "Neither's married to the dork right now, so they can't say anything. Mutsumi could, but she won't care. She'll think it's funny." "Well, today's my eighteenth birthday," Mei whispered back. "And I'm going to do him whether you do or not, Ema. It's a tradition here at Hinata Inn, almost an initiation rite. You come to stay here; you suffer but never give up; you fall in love with Keitaro Urashima; eventually you get into Tokyo University; Keitaro makes you a woman, usually while semi- conscious." Ema whimpered, wondering not for the first time if she'd been wise to come here to live. And if Sempai really liked her like that. He was so nice to her, but all the other women were so much more beautiful than she was... The three emerged from the tunnel into Keitaro's bedroom. Keitaro was lying rigid and nude on top of his futon, eyes glassy, wearing "Mr. Erectronic Mark 10". Above him stood Suu and Mutsumi, both wearing spooky white robes with hoods up and nothing on underneath. Dozens of white tapering candles had been placed around the room, the scent of pine lingering in the air. The effect was spoiled somewhat by the way Suu was snickering and Mutsumi giggling. "Oh me, oh my. Whatever next?" - - - - - - - - - - "The children? They're always affected the worst by these situations," Kitsune said sadly, shaking her head. "Sometimes... they're affected for the rest of their lives." Murmurs of agreement, tinged with outrage, came from the studio audience. - - - - - Ten-year-old Urashima Kyoko chased her half-brother Aoyama Keiichi and her half-sister Urashima Mitsuishi down the hall and into the wrong room, trailed by the two-year-old "twins", Urashima Shinichi and Nyan-nyan. Their mothers (except Nyamo, who wasn't there) looked up and glared at them. "Can't you children be quiet?" Naru snapped. "We're in an important meeting!" "I told you having our monthly board meeting here at the Inn would be a mistake," Kanako replied quietly to Naru. "Oh-fu-fu," Mutsumi replied, smiling. "They're the reason we work so hard. Come here, little ones." "Particularly since their father's never here," muttered Motoko. "Can't we get Suu or Sara to look after them just until we finish?" asked Shinobu. Naru rolled her eyes and replied, "No thanks. The last time Suu babysat, she experimented on them; the last time Sara babysat, she spent the whole time telling them how badly their dork daddy sucks in bed." Mutsumi clapped her hands and bent down to look Kyoko in the eye. "Kyoko, you're a big girl now. Why don't you take your brothers and sister into the TV room and put on that new disk we bought? The one about your daddy's discoveries on Madagascar? We'll be out in a short while." Kyoko glanced at Naru for permission, then nodded. "Okay, Auntie Mutsumi. C'mon, guys, lets leave our Moms in peace." Shortly afterwards, the room was quiet again. "About time," muttered Naru. "I have to get back to the office pretty soon. There's an important vote tomorrow on a bill I'm sponsoring." Shinobu rapped her gavel. "Last order of business: is everyone still okay with the firm's name?" Kanako shrugged. "Only one 'Urashima' in the firm's name and there's three of us, but it is the first name in the list. I've no problems." Naru and Shinobu nodded agreement. Motoko dithered. "Four now, if he and I really go through with it tomorrow. But I have such an investment in my reputation as 'Aoyama'." "We can keep 'Aoyama' in the firm's name even if your name changes," assured Mutsumi. "I've been researching that point. If we were in America, you wouldn't even have to change your family name. But here in Japan, I'm afraid, you don't really have a choice on that." "It didn't matter to me," Naru added, "since I was an Urashima even before becoming a lawyer." "And I didn't even join the firm until after Sempai and I were married," Shinobu chimed in. "Let's keep it as is, then," replied Motoko. "I'm kind of attached to the firm's name after all these years, anyway." Later, after the meeting broke up, Mutsumi and Shinobu wandered out into the TV room. The younger children watched their father guide the camera on a tour of the extraordinary Snake Culture ruins, completely absorbed. Kyoko turned to them. "We're almost done with Dad's disk. What should we play next?" Mutsumi smiled and clapped. "I know! Sit your brothers and sister down and I'll teach you all a new game. It's called 'Todai Promise', and you play it for the rest of your lives. You all promise each other that you'll all get into Tokyo University and you all study real hard to get there. It's lot of fun, really." Shinobu smiled and added, "And it does have a way of changing your life." - - - - - - - - - - The End. This and other fanfics stored at: http://www.geocities.com/Tokyo/Dojo/5058 Notes: I finished volume 14 of the translated manga last night. The idea for this occurred to me this morning and wouldn't let me go until I finished it.