Copyright 1997 by Shuriken
The day approaches..
part 2

After returning to Township from their trip, Ryu Bateson and Bow spent the morning checking out the redecorated mansion. After getting apologies from Rand and Jean for breaking the den's window and destroying an antique flower vase, (The vase and the mirror had a chance encounter after getting tossed in a heated discussion over where to place it two days ago.) Ryu settled down to read a letter sent to him from Katt that was evidently mailed right after he left.

He ended up spending the rest of the morning and a greater part of the afternoon sitting in a bench at the town square trying to decipher her handwriting. She wasn't that great of a speller/writer to start with, just learning the basics a few months ago. But, the scrawlings seemed more erratic than usual. He eventually thought he got the gist of it, which basically meant he understood the words "Ryu", "fight", and "no". There was also a word that looked a lot like "collie", but he was pretty sure she meant coliseum.

"Guess this means she changed her mind about fighting at the coliseum... No, maybe it meant she didn't change her.. Hmmm, maybe she wants me to fight..?" Ryu kept mumbling to himself the various ways in which he could piece the known words together, drawing the occasional strange look from the passerby.

So after another half hour, (once Ryu obsesses with something, he doesn't keep track of the time) he decided that he'll go back to Hometown and sort it out himself. He wasn't going to visit Coursair in the first place, but since there is nothing to do, why not? Plus, it'll keep him away from Jean and Rand's mission to 'remodel' the mansion.

Ken Masters stood perplexed inside his inn room. 'When these guys go renassience, they go flat out!' he thought. But he knew that what he saw this past week wasn't just some Medieval festival, and that REALLY troubled him.

He remembered starting to nod off on the jet, but between then and waking up under the tree with a raccoon happily eating anything that it can get it's hands on out of his duffel bag was a complete mystery to him. 'Well, at least I remembered to bring my gi along.' Ken thought as he rummaged through what was left of his bag. 'The people here don't take credit cards, but they were more than happy to take all my quarters for this dump.' he thought. His thoughts drifted back to that girl who he beat the snot out of two days ago. He shouldn't have gone berzerk like that, he hope he didn't seriously injure her. She didn't seem too bright, fighting in that cat costume. "Wasn't even wearing the upper half, either!" he chuckled to himself. After a few minutes, he came to realize that that WASN'T some costume. "Just where the hell am I in the first place??" he thought as he plopped down on the mattress. He didn't even want to think of all the bugs and other things that could be sharing the bed with him right at that instant.

So he decided to think of the tournament, the only thing that could take his mind of his current predicament. 'Hell, if you're in Rome,' he thought, 'might as well kick their butts!' In two days, the entire country would know the name Ken Masters... whatever this country is.

"What do you think? Should I take this?" Katt held up a jacket for Nina to see. "Hardly." said Nina. "Yeah, you're right." Katt threw the jacket behind her and set back to work on the pile of clothes and assorted items, that sat like a huge mountain, in the middle of her room at the School. Nina sat on Katt's bed, watching the teenager throw things around and thought about how she changed since she first met her, that day in the Joker Gang's hideout. 'Katt's gone from a irresponsible, immature, egotistical kid to a.... hmmm, maybe she didn't change that much after all.' Nina thought to herself, 'She thinks things a little more through before jumping into things. She's curbed her temper a little bit.' Nina thought about how Katt has been talking about nothing but whipping that Ken guy, 'She still can hold a grudge, though.' she smiled at the thought, and watched the Worren continue her scavenging for clothes.

A passing student looked in and smirked. "Hey kitty, why are you digging so much? It's not like you wear hardly anything anyway!" His guffaws were silenced as a book came sailing and slammed him in the face. "OUCH! Stupid cat!" He yelled as he stalked off. "Retardo." Katt muttered as she slammed the door and went back to work. Katt hasn't really made that many friends at the Magic School. She feels out of place, and would really like to return to Township.. and Ryu. But Bleu's stern command that she stay here always stopped her from running off. This tournament would finally put her back at the hobby where she feels at home; beating the crap out of people for sport.

"Two days!" Katt said as she examined a yellow scarf she dug up. "Hmmm, yellow ain't my color." With that said, she tossed the scarf aside into the other pile that was being created from the first pile.

"Think you can handle the fighting life again? You've been more or less out of it for the past year." Nina asked. "And remember what that fellow did to you."

Katt glared at Nina for a brief second. The look was almost murderous. But it disappeared in an instant, replaced with Katt's usual nonchalant response to being 'insulted'. "So, it was a lucky shot. I wasn't prepared for that, that, Tatsu-hooky-whatever kick." Katt glared at Nina again. "Anyway, I've never seen YOU try to fight hand to hand!" Katt noticed she almost yelled that last part, and quickly set back to her business, pretending that Nina wasn't there.

Nina was very perplexed about her friend's behavior the last couple of weeks. She just seemed...different. Nina hoped that Katt CAN hold up in the tournament. If she got this defensive over her decisive defeat by that Masters guy on the Magic School grounds, who knows how she'll react if he beats her again at the Coliseum in front of thousands of people?

Why yes, I would like a Chapter 5.
Why no, you can get me outta here instead.