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The Grey Zone: Juggling Ferrets (Or: Livin’ In the Wild, Wild West)
by Ysabet
As a return gift to Icka for sending her KK & Hakuba as guests, gods help me. Or maybe them. Whatever.
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“How did she manage to talk you into this?” “How did she talk us into THIS one?” “And just how the HELL did she manage to talk us into THIS?” moaned Kaito, cowering behind Hakuba. *I can’t believe she talked us into—never mind, yes I can.* Hakuba Saguru watched his companions apprehensively as they chattered over the breakfast table at—what was the place called again?—the ‘Blue Willow’. Already their waitress was looking at them apprehensively; the detective wondered how long it would before the management showed up, considering the conversation that was going on… “—doujinshi sections in the libraries as well, broken down by genre and pairing. Makes book-reports a hell of a lot more interesting these days. Now, if you’re looking for bondage stuff, you have to get a special permission slip to check those out, but it’s not really all that hard—“ How, exactly had they talked her into this? wondered Ysabet, staring at the tools, weapons, unidentifiable gadgets, sports equipment and odd literature currently piled on her living room table. There had to be some logic to the whole thing, if she could only just sit down and think about it long enough…
“Me? I thought she talked you into it,” said Kaito reproachfully. He leveled an accusatory finger at the blond seated cross-legged on a large floor-cushion, eating ma’amoul; the sweet, Lebanese date-stuffed pastries were new to him but rapidly becoming a hazard to the detective’s waistline. “You tried on your costume first; you even said you liked it…”
Hakuba Saguru looked a little defiant (or as defiant as he could in harem pants, a bare chest and a felt vest); he raised his voice a bit to speak past the heavy Moroccan rhythm that had begun to resound through the room, accented with the sliding ‘ting’ of finger-cymbals. “I thought she was just… I don’t know. When people say “IborrowedthesefromtheBarony
“Uh uh.” Kaito settled down on another cushion, smoothing his embroidered Turkish coat into place and taking a piece of Hakuba’s ma’amoul. “We got railroaded. What’s she call this thing we’re at?”
“An SCA event with a Middle Eastern theme. I believe she said something about ‘Caravansary’ or something similar.” The drumbeats throbbing through the air intensified, and all around them the appreciative audience reclining on rugs, cushions and each other whooped and yelled their enthusiasm. “Don’t look now, but here come the belly-dancers again… Why are they looking at me like thaAAACK!?! HELP!!” Hakuba yelped as he was pulled to his feet, wrapped in veils, and dragged into the dance.
Smirking, Kaito settled down to watch and ate another piece of ma’amoul.
“Not sure. Could you please get your—aargh—foot out of my face? I may be flexible, but this is one position I don’t think I’ve ever tried before…” FLASH!! “I thought you took the camera away from her!”
“You—“ (grunt) “—are the pickpocket here, I thought you were doing it— ahh—and I believe I’m stuck…”
Kaito swore blisteringly. “You CAN’T be stuck! Wait, let me—oh hell, you ARE stuck—Ysabet-san? A little help here?” Their audience with the camera made a comment. “Uh, nevermind, we’ll figure it out…”
“—aaargh—why’d you tell her that--? Dammit, move your elbow—“
The thief sighed and twisted himself around. “Because she offered us lubricant.”
“Oh—“ Hakuba squirmed sideways, managed to shift several important vertebrae, and suddenly came loose from his predicament. “…almost…. there……. Got it!” He slid free, lying flat on his back and looking up at his companion. “Kaito?”
“Mmm?”
“The next time we’re invited to go spelunking, specifically ‘tunnel-crawling’, let’s just say ‘no’, shall we?”
Kuroba Kaito lay back on the cold stone of Colossal Cave’s floor, grinning up at the stalactites above him through a dirt-smeared, dusty face; a bat flitted by. “Oh, I dunno; it was kinda fun, watching you get all sweaty and bothered like that…”
“BITE me, Kuroba.”
The thief laughed, bending down; “Always ready to oblige,” he murmured; a camera flashed again, followed by a giggle from further up the cave, and he winced. “—but maybe later, okay? I think Ysabet-san’s already got way too many incriminating photos of us for comfort, don’t you?”
The half-Brit looked over one shoulder, smirking. “She said that she didn’t want us to get homesick. We’re from Japan. She likes Japanese food. The Japanese invented sushi. Therefore, she took us out for sushi. Q.E.D.”
“Q.E.D., meaning I’m screwed, ‘cause most sushi is f-f-f---“ Kaito averted his eyes from the platters on the table that his red-headed American host and her friends were currently decimating. “I’m not gonna be rude or anything, but—“
Another platter arrived, and the blond cut him off. “—and as it turns out, Ysabet-san doesn’t care for raw fish herself; broiled unagi, yes, but not raw tuna or yellowtail. And that is why she’s ordered okinomiyaki, vegetable tempura, chicken curry and pork gyouza as well… but I see that you’ve figured that out,” he murmured as the thief attacked with flying chopsticks, even as Ysabet dove in from the other side of the table.
There was a moment when the thief and their redheaded host paused, squared off in a momentary duel over the food (“Kyaaa! Aiieeee!! My Kung Fu is Greater Than Yours, Round Eyes! Hand Over The Cutlets!” “Says Who? I Have Chopsticks Of Doom! Fear My Wrath, Foreign Pig-Dog!”) before presenting a united front against the rest of their table’s diners (“Weeeee Aaaare The Chaaampions! Weeee Aaaare The Chaaaampions—“), who looked at each other and began throwing wadded-up napkins at the two.
“Bon appetite,” Hakuba murmured, taking that as an opportunity to field a stray gyoza.
Kaito was too busy defending himself—and happily stuffing his face—to answer.
“—oh yeah, it’s part of the high school curriculum these days” Kaito was saying seriously. “And our libraries have special sections for yaoi literature. It’s required reading.” His audience looked duly impressed.
Not to put too fine a point on it, the phantom thief was currently doing a wonderful job of screwing with several people’s heads.
It had all started when one of Ysabet’s friends, Morgan-san, had mentioned that they’d be having what she called ‘Anime Night’ that weekend. That had led to a discussion of anime in general, with a barrage of questions being thrown at the two visitors. Morgan-san had teamed up with two other females (Sarah and Linda) to drill him on Things Yaoi, much to Hakuba’s horror and dismay—not that the subject was that awful, it was just…
…well…
When Kaito’s eyes got THAT look, you were better off hiding behind the couch and covering your ears. Some serious bullshitting was about to take place, and it was every man (or woman) for themselves. And now he was busy severely warping American brains as to Japanese customs in regards to male/male romance…
“That’s right,” he was saying cheerfully to his rapt audience, “FAKE was actually based on a real-life story—“
Hakuba winced. When the thief put his mind to it, he was an excellent liar.
“—condoms? Well, of course you find ‘em packaged as inserts in the really GOOD manga these days; there’s even this series of trading-cards with—“
Oh. Dear. Gods. What on earth was Kaito telling them now?
The detective felt himself turning red enough to set his ears on fire and considered crawling beneath the couch; behind it wasn’t going to be good enough. Not that there was a couch nearby, as they were in a restaurant, but it was the thought that counted… Waitresses that passed were either going pale and hurrying on with many a backward look or, in a couple of cases, lingering nearby rather obviously in order to get an earful…
“—special tax-laws for gay couples who adopt. The manga’s really just the tip of the iceberg, you know… And then there’s that new holiday, Lavender Day, one month after White Day, where—“
Maybe if he screamed ‘FIRE!’ at the top of his lungs he could escape in the commotion--? The detective glanced edgily around for the nearest exit…
She looked up at her two visitors slowly; from beneath the couch, her cat Spot made a derisive prrrrowt. “You said that you wanted to learn how to pick locks—“ said Kaito helpfully, grinning.
“—and understand more about crime scenes,” added Hakuba, smiling at her.
“—and throw knives better—“
“And I believe you were curious about the game of Rugby…”
“—and you wanted to work on knots and I thought we could practice climbing too, there’s this great building downtown on 4th, if we go after dark nobody’ll spot us—“
Blink, blink. “….??” Her guests stood, and each one took an arm. “!!!!!” Still chattering, they pulled her towards her apartment’s door.
“—we figured hey, it was only fair. You’ve shown US so much stuff around Tucson—“
“Yes, as a matter of fact, I doubt I’ll ever get over—err, I mean manage to surpass getting stuck in that crawlthrough when we went caving. It was a very unique moment, or at least so one can hope.”
“—and so we thought we’d show you a few things.” Kuroba Kaito was still grinning wickedly. “It’ll be good experience for your writing, right? For starters, we thought we’d begin by teaching your local SCA group how they play football in Britain—they taught us how to play Viking Sheepball, so why not? It ought to be fun watching ‘em play in full armor, they ought to LOVE Rugby—and then we’ll move right along to the hang-gliding lessons—“
“! ! ! ! !”
A ferret bounced past, making a ‘BockBockBock!’ sound and dragging something that looked remarkably like a monocle; one of Hakuba’s eyebrows went up but he stayed put as his companion continued. “Don’t worry, it’s lots easier than it looks so long as you don’t hit any downdrafts. Or buildings, those’re bad too. Or cacti, oww. Bad spines. And THEN we’ll go show you around the main police station down town so you can take notes about police procedure—“
The blond half-Brit eyed his Japanese companion suspiciously. “…You arranged that? How?”
“Well, not exactly arranged as such. They really ought to pay attention to their security systems, though; the locks on that place suck through a straw. Badges, uniforms, paperwork, all that stuff was really easy to get to, y’know? Plenty of available sizes in the uniforms, too. No problem.” Another ferret went by, this time carrying a red man’s tie in its teeth; there was a certain amount of commotion as it was attacked by a fellow carpet-shark, playing tug-of-war. The first ferret went past again, determinedly hauling a white loafer nearly as large as its own body.
Hakuba’s other eyebrow went up.
“…Right—never mind, I should’ve known better than to ask.” Hakuba shrugged, turning back to their hostess. “In any case, Ysabet-san, we’ve decided that it’s our turn to entertain you now.” The red-head opened her mouth in protest and her guest shook his head firmly. “No, no, we absolutely insist.”
“—and later on we can handcuff you, tie you to a chair, watch you try to escape and practice knife-throwing!”
“Not all at the same time, Kaito—“ A fourth ferret skittered beneath the coffee-table and around the corner, a silk rose carried jauntily in its mouth.
“Well no duhhhh… How’s that sound, Ysabet-san?”
Ysabet gulped. Opened her mouth, tried to say something, but all that came out was “………….”
“Great! ‘Scuse me for a sec, I think your weasles got into my luggage—” As her dark-haired guest rounded up his stuff, Hakuba Saguru steered her firmly by the shoulders towards the door and the taxi waiting just outside. Kaito joined them a moment later, pursued by much indignant bock-bock-bocking. “There, that oughta do it unless they can pick locks... Ysabet-san, we’re gonna show you a day you won’t forget as long as you live!”
“…….that’swhatI’mafraidof…….”
“Bock? BockBock?”
The door closed behind them.
“Bock!”
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Icka Note: That's completely in character for Ysabet too. *nods sagely* (says the voice of Ysabet's former flatmate)