[FFML] [fic][rk][cont][rewrite] Rurouni Yahiko Chapter 7: The Peculiar Chicken

[Abdiel]

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Rurouni Yahiko
A Rurouni Kenshin Continuation fic
By Chester Castañeda
chester.castaneda at gmail.com
gabriel_gabdiel at yahoo.com
http://www.fanfiction.net/~abdiel

More of the same, but better.

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Chapter 7: The Peculiar Chicken
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"...." was Yahiko's witty quip-retort-comeback-catchphrase-snappy-reply
to Gan's amazing feat.

"That was so cool, Gan-chi!" Minoe appraised with a grand flourish after
freeing himself from batty nuisances care of the multipurpose fish that
Gan stole and used to ambush Yahiko with. "Three cheers for the Great
Gan!" the man-boy shouted, hopping up and down in his garish purple and
black costume and waving the fish and a confused bat around for good
measure. 

"...." was Yahiko's droll wisecrack-rejoinder-riposte-teasing-response
to Minoe's... whatever. What he _meant_ to think was, 'Oh man, I'm
stuck with a couple of psychotic dunderheads that almost make Psycho-Kid
seem like a nice, happy, and well-adjusted human being... and that's
saying a _lot_,' but was too flabbergasted to do so. And who could blame
him?

"BWAHAHAHAHAHAHA! I like you, Patches! You're all right," Gan hollered
boisterously, grabbing Minoe's ditzy head and petting him like a stray
puppy. "Ours were quite the magnificent performances. Weren't they, 
Yoshi-boy?"

Not bothering to "hear" out Yahiko's predictable four-dotted answer,
Gan did an idle follow-through twirl with his weapon that ended with a
rather loud thunk on the crater it helped create. Unwrapping the dusty, 
torn, and withered tarp, he revealed the mystery object to be a sizeable
metal stick twice as long and ten times as thick as Yahiko's sakabatou. 

"Mine's bigger than yours," Gan predictably sneered at the boggling
samurai. "And guess what? I've given your little offer some thought, and
I've decided that I'll be the one who kicks your ass from here to Sunday
and pay my food tab when I feel like it. I came here to kick ass and eat
meat buns, and I'm all out of meat buns."

"Quit acting like that's a spur of the moment decision! You were going
to do that anyway!" Yahiko screamed incredulously. He also gulped, but
smirked to cover up his hesitation and keep up his confident facade.
'First Psycho-Kid, and now this delusional food bandit. It just never
ends.'

Minoe looked adorably troubled for a moment before he put the fish and
the bat away and struck his palm with a closed fist of enlightenment.
"Meat buns. That was why I was chasing these two. I forgot."

And so, a few metallic clangs, testosterone-filled pose-downs, and
lengthy jeers later, the fight finally started.

After getting an initial feel of Gan's rhythm and attack pattern, Yahiko
assaulted his languid opponent with Advanced Kamiya Kasshin Ryu Forms
Twenty-Four, Fifty, Twelve, and Eighty-Eight with unnerving precision.
He landed a chain of unerring combinations that served as both offensive
and defensive strikes that took advantage of Gan's sloppy form and
lackadaisical approach in combat. In regards to pure sword-fighting
skill, Yahiko had the inelegant brute beat.

"You sure you're good enough for this match? We can stop before it gets
_really_ humiliating," Yahiko heckled, his confidence slowly rising
despite his Psycho-Kid-related wounds.

The slightly battered Gan chuckled, balled a fist up, and struck his
face outright. Straightening his bleeding nose and blowing on it loudly,
he drawled, "Now, _that_ hurt. On the other hand, those little mosquito
bites of yours didn't. You should've sharpened your sword first, boy;
it's as blunt as a rock. Maybe if you hit me about seven times with your
strongest strikes, then I might start to feel it." Afterwards, in true
smash-mouth fashion, Gan smashed Yahiko's mouth.

Then the real fight started.

Gan weathered the storm of Yahiko's effective counterstrikes and bull-
rushed the boy with his whirling dervish of a huge metal stick. Looking
at the club up close, it was indeed one of the strangest weapons the
young man had ever seen. It had controllable range depending on where
Gan slipped his hand, enabling him to switch from attacking with a quick
yet bearable blunt strike to a ponderous yet crushing blow in a moment's
notice.

'It's annoying, that's what it is,' Yahiko complained in his head as the
bulky hooligan kept his strike patterns circular and narrow; even though
the Tokyo Samurai Descendant was on the defensive, he still didn't have
the opportunity to use the Judo-like Kamiya Kasshin Ryu Defensive Ougi,
and doubted he would even have a chance. The downward strike needed to
activate the move just wasn't happening. 'Yet.'

Yahiko immediately rectified the situation by striking hard with a
calculated Ryu Sho Sen wallop that started somewhere near his ankles and
exploded on Gan's hefty jaw. The ruffian reacted as expected,
retaliating with a cumbersome yet irresistible finishing blow aimed at
the boy's head.

Yahiko crossed his wrists as the metal bat approached his kabuto-covered
cranium. "Defensive Ougi--HADOME!" 

Gan countered by slipping the metal staff a few notches from his grip
and missing Yahiko's head and wrists by mere inches. Consequently, he
struck the ground in between the both of them and roared words of
rumbling thunder: "HAPPA!"

"Oh bother," Yahiko murmured as he saw the resulting mushroom cloud of
utter destruction form in front of him. A few moments later, he found
himself sprawled on a pile of rubble and debris from the wall where he
had his head stuck into just a minute ago: deja vu and all that.

Had Yahiko not just fought with Soujiro Seta three weeks ago and
procured a variety of injuries--and had Gan not just took out a big
metal stick that Yahiko couldn't exactly apply his sword-snatching or
sword-breaking expertise to--the boy _might've_ had a fighting chance.
Hell, he could barely keep up with the plump, brawny man during their
impromptu marathon across Shinshu. 'No excuses. A fight's a fight, and
I've got to fight smart.'

Yahiko did a quick kip-up, sprinted towards Gan, and when he was just
about to crash into the big lug, used his momentum to execute the Kendo
version of the Ryu Sou Sen, striking the man down with a Men strike to
the top of the head, a Sayu-Men and Yoko-Men to the left and right side
of the head, a right Kote to the wrist when Gan struck back, a mocking
left Kote when Gan reverted to his guarded position, a Do strike to the
torso, and a handle-first Tsuki thrust to the neck within two eye
blinks.

As Gan promised, once Yahiko hit him about seven times, he sure did feel
it. He fell onto one knee, feeling a bit winded and headachy by the
unexpected assault. "Ouch."

Wincing through the agony that chose to make its presence known at that
particular exertion, Yahiko fell back and slipped on his heels in sheer
exhaustion. He cursed under his breath. 'I should have sat this one out
and made Chizuru handle this moronic lug herself, dammit.'

The two combatants shook their heads off of their remaining cobwebs, but
alas, Gan recovered his senses first. "I've said it before and I'll say
it again, Yoshi-boy; I will _not_ let you take away my _baby_! Not
EVER!" He lifted his steel staff once more over Yahiko's head, this time
with the intention of not missing its the proper target due to a feint.

Yahiko's metaphorical Sword of Damocles had reappeared, hanging over his
head like a specter of death. 'His baby?' he thought through his haze of
pain. 'Does he mean the big metal stick?'

Minoe had seen enough. "You can't do that to Yahiko-chi, Gan-chi! You
still have your nikuman tab to pay to _me_!" the effeminate boy whined
as he gracelessly hit Gan with the overused and trite fish, the edible
water-dweller exploding upon impact. "Huh. I don't know my own
strength."

"Ick," Gan blubbered after wiping his face and spewing fish entrails out
of his mouth. "Jeez. Honestly, Patches! Get out of my way, because I
need to conk this latest debtor of mine out cold and call it a day!" the
thug waxed poetic as he unceremoniously took Minoe by the scruff of his
gi and heaved him off like a wayward house pet.

As Minoe went flying, he pondered aloud, "Then again, the fact that the
Great Gan-chi can make Yahiko-chi's head cave-in has nothing to do with
the meat bun tab. I saved Yahiko-chi for nothing." He sighed and
shrugged in midair. "Oh well." Tragically, due to the fact that he just
destroyed his "Bat-Swatting Fish of Doom", the--

"THEY'RE BACK! AHHH! THE BATS ARE ALL BACK!" Minoe screamed as he soared
into the sky.

With bored, half-lidded eyes, Gan cleared his throat. "Now where were
we? Ah, yes. Sorry, Yoshi-boy. Life can be such a bitch, y'know?" the
muscle-bound goon apologized as he hefted his mighty metal club and let
it fall down towards the chicken perched on top of Yahiko's kabuto-
covered head with all the inevitability of a falling star.

Wait a second. Something wasn't right.

Gan backpedaled _hard_ as he used every muscle in his arms to stop the
forward momentum of his metal club, exploiting every last possible
loophole of all known laws of physics and gravity by his sheer willpower
alone.

With that done, physics and gravity retaliated with a vengeance by
bouncing back all the pent-up energy that Gan used to stop his club's
descent, which made his arms hyper-contract. The man bit his lip amidst
his self-induced torture. "That was close. Ow. So worth it, but ow."

Yahiko... blinked. And blinked. There was some strange human reaction to 
surprise that demanded him to blink many times to clear his eyes and
assure his brain that, "Yes, you did just see the muscle-head stop his
own club from turning your head into a second kabuto." It also gave him
something to do other than sit like a statue, which was visually
uninteresting. "Um, what's up, Gan?"

Bird poop fell on Yahiko's nose. The boy crossed his eyes towards the
brim of his hat and saw even more drippings and an upside-down chicken
head staring right back him--a funny-looking chicken, at that. 

"MY BABY! Oh, please don't hurt my BABY!" Gan begged with completely
inappropriate and disturbing motherly tones. "I'll do anything...
_anything_... to get him back! I'll... I'll even sell you this big metal
stick for scrap metal! Actually, this technically _is_ scrap metal, but
a blacksmith doesn't care about those details! Metal is metal! I'm sure
it's good enough to pay at least half of my food tab!"

"W-Wait. The chicken is your baby? I thought that stupid metal stick was
your baby!" Yahiko confusedly remarked as he wiped the bird feces off
with his wristband.

"Oh, this hunk of junk? I love it just a little more than a cheap four-
by-four plank, and only because it doesn't chafe my palms and splinter
on impact," Gan admitted. "I also buried it here to guard my precious
treasure better. But back to our discussion: Come on! _Please_ give me
the chicken back! I'll be your best friend!"

Yahiko exhaled loudly and caaaarefully slackened his body to give the
poultry atop his head a false sense of security so he could catch it and
use it as Gan-bait. Still, the boy couldn't but help feel a bit out of
the loop. "So let me get this straight. You made us run the entire
length of Shinshushin, hit me with a fish to the face--"

"It was actually for the chicken," Gan elucidated.

"...had my head stuck to a rock wall, talked to my butt, and nearly
killed me with your metal version of a four-by-four because of a...
chicken?" With amazing dexterity, Yahiko suddenly grabbed hold of his
one leverage against the Elusive Gan by its legs. It struggled and
squawked. He eventually held it by both wings and it stood still. "Are
you really that hard up on drumsticks, sunny-side ups, and chicken
wings?"

"Don't be silly, Yoshi-sama," the Humbled Gan soothingly cooed, amiably
addressing the young man by adding a special suffix to the name he gave
him but still missing the part that annoyed Yahiko the most, which was
the name itself. "He's a rooster, so he can't lay any eggs. Also, he's
not here to be eaten, or else he'd be long gone--"

"Tell me about it," Yahiko idly interjected.

"--But, _but_, his true purpose is far more, shall we say, rewarding."
Gan put his little whacking club away, hunched forward, and wrung his
hands in a show of good will, unaware that his body language was giving
his true intentions away quite as easily as a pencil-thin moustache, a
maniacal laugh, and a buxom beauty tied to the rails of a looming train
would.

"I was half-expecting you to say 'sinister' instead of 'rewarding',"
Yahiko accentuated his implicit suspicions.

"_Anyway_, since you look like a good, intelligent, handsome young man
who'd sooner give me my precious baby back than add to my troubles," Gan
expressed the complete opposite of what he thought, even though he hoped
the last parts of his lie were true, "I'll tell you the story of how I
caught that little moneymaker--er, baby of mine."

Yahiko crooked his mouth to a disbelieving half-frown, closed his eyes,
then nodded for Gan to go ahead with his story. 

"Thank you. Y'see, I was just around the neighborhood of Suwa, minding
my own business, when I heard the rapid flapping of wings. I turned in
the direction of the sound and saw these two chickens fighting at the
far end of the field. Beak against beak, claw against claw; it was a
spectacular fight to the death in a whirlwind of feathers and dust! This
rooster--the one you're holding now, anyway--won the fight with a
spectacular finish, which had me thinking, 'If I caught a rooster like
that, I could get rich in the cockpit.' So I caught it and planned to
use it in the local cockfighting circuit. What? Don't look at me like
that, that's the whole story, I swear!"


***


Going back, Shinshushin... "Shinshu", in short... wasn't just well-known
for its Shinshu Soba and Silk-Weaving. The unmentionable things it
wasn't known for--some questionable, some mundane, some innocuous, some 
controversial, and some even outright illegal--well, one of them was
cockfighting. Or, as the Spaniards called it, "The Poor Man's Bullfight"
but only imagine it in Spanish: "Toreo del Hombre Pobre" or something.
Of course, such a title could only be used metaphorically, for it was
indeed quite the popular gambling game.

The quick and dirty facts: A cockfight was a betting bloodsport that
pitted a pair of specially conditioned roosters against each other
inside a ring or cockpit. The cocks or gamecocks were well-bred fighting
machines trained to have better power and endurance compared to normal
chickens.

Hoods were usually planted on the combatants' heads to pacify them
before their match began. Therefore, their wattles and combs were sliced
off to fit these hoods easier and to reduce the risk of wounds and
infection in those fleshy areas. 

Gamecock training also took advantage of and increased the congenital
aggression that all roosters had against fellow males of the same
species. Furthermore, bets were made on the result of the cockfights,
with some of the battles ending up in the death of one or both birds.

The Origin of Cockfighting in Japan was a bit unclear, but cockfighting
in general was a murky business to begin with. Nevertheless, it was
known for a fact that the "Shamo" or the "Ou (King) Shamo"--a
distinctively bred and prized species of gamecock most associated with
Japan along with the "Shokoku" and "Satsumadori"--was introduced into
the country from Siam way back during the heydays of the Edo period two
to three centuries earlier. 

Seeing that cockfighting should have been around even before that, the
deadly bloodsport was indeed a very old tradition rooted into the very
heart of Japanese Underground Culture.


***


"How typical of you to use a _stolen chicken_ to aid to your gambling
addiction," Yahiko drolly commented as he took a closer look at the fowl
in question. He blinked, tilted his head to the side, and chortled. 

"I'm afraid lady luck isn't smiling upon you at all, you dolt. I doubt
she's even in speaking terms with you. Karma has struck again! You can't
use this chicken to get into the cockpit because this chick's a chick!
It's a hen, you moron."

"What's the matter with you?" Gan asked in disbelief, nearly slapping
the boy for making such ridiculous claims. "Is the heat making you sick
and confused?"

"No. If anything, your body odor should be making me sick and the bumps
on my head should be making me confused. Still, listen to reason. I
mean, look at its head. It has no comb or wattles," Yahiko pointed out.
"I'm no expert in chickens, but I've never heard of a rooster that
doesn't have a comb or wattles."

"Well, you're right about one thing; you're no expert in chickens," Gan
retorted as he attempted to requisition his stolen bird from Yahiko, but
the boy still saw it fit to move the prized possession just out of the
hoodlum's reach. "No comb or wattles! HA! Who cares about its comb or
wattles? You're just saying that because you didn't see it fight!
Besides, who's to say this wasn't an escaped professional gamecock whose
combs and wattles were already cut off prior to us finding it?"

"Okay, fine," Yahiko relented in the most condescending, disparaging
tone he could muster; intonations he usually reserved to get Kaoru/
Sanosuke/Yutaro/probably Chizuru, since he'd already met her/Misao/some
random, irritable stranger all riled up. "Let's presume, for the sake of
argument, that this hen kicked another chicken's behind. Fine. I'm all
for that. Woman power. I've seen ferocious moms that are scarier than
thugs like you, so I still say that it doesn't prove anything and this
chicken is still a hen."

"A hen! Did you ever see a hen with spurs like that? Or a hen with a
tail like that?" the Livid Gan enumerated for Yahiko, now more
interested in proving that the big snag in his harebrained moneymaking
scheme was all in his skeptical debt collector's cynical, untrusting,
and generally mean imagination than getting his prized hen/rooster/ren/
hooster back. 

"Okay. Keep your pants on. We'll talk about the chicken's sex on our way
to the Sakaguchis. If you can convince me that this chicken is a
rooster, then maaaaaybe I'll let you get it into the cockpit so that you
can win back the money you owe my friends. If I prove that this chicken
is a hen, then it's either we barter it for something more profitable,
sell it to a chicken breeder, or have it for breakfast just before you
work your soba debt off by washing dishes at the Sakaguchi Soba Shop.
Understand?" came Yahiko's ultimatum.

After a few minutes of harried pacing, nail biting, and contemplative
brooding, Gan ultimately assented, "Fine! Fine. But if this is a trick
to somehow make me lose my baby bird, then you're in for a world of
hurt, bandage boy."

Yahiko kept his cool and his machismo in check, remembering the near-
loss (or was it "loss"?) he had against his fight with the Blustering
Gan and absently rolling down his shirtsleeves to hide the aforesaid
bandages.

'If I weren't so busted up because of Psycho-Kid, I would've made mince
meat out of you, you two-bit hoodlum,' he griped. Aloud, he scoffed,
"Whatever, dude. Pick up your metal stick, wrap it up, and let's get
moving." 


***


A short while later, on the same debris-ridden outcrop of wasteland
that used to be a safe haven for bats and birds alike...

"Helloooo? Gan-chi? Yahiko-chi? Anyone-chi?" the scratch-marked, bite-
marked, and generally bat-marked Minoe whispered carefully, earnestly,
and _desperately_ at... no one in particular as he crawled on his belly,
hid behind some bushes, and checked out the quiet graveyard. Catacombs.
Surroundings. Same difference, if you asked him.

It was early afternoon, and the sun remained up, but because of a
wayward bunch of uninvited clouds and the accursed shadiness of trees,
Minoe's immediate environs soon gave the young-looking man-pirate the
impression of a chilling, ominous menace.

"Are you two still out here? Because I still need to get the payment for
all the meat buns you ate, Gan-chi. Cash-on-delivery would be
preferable, but miscellaneous goods and products that are ready for
bartering are okay too."

He heard a startling rustle in the distance. "Gan-chi? Yahiko-chi?" He
gulped. "Mister Myojin? Mister... Gan? Mister Mojo Risin? Mister
Anybody? Please?" He raised his eye patch to get a better look.

Hundreds of pairs of glowing eyes curiously looked back at him. His
dearest friends had returned, and none of them were either Gan or
Yahiko.

And so Minoe did scream like a little girl amidst hundreds of similarly
hypersonic screeches and leathery wing-flaps. Then again, in contrast to
his far more emasculating reaction, he ran away like a stampeding horse
hooked on heroin.


***


Back inside the Sakaguchi Soba Shop...

"Welcome to the Sakaguchi Soba...? Ah, Sakaguchi-san! What the hell are
you doing here?" Chizuru exclaimed before covering her mouth in shame,
muttering a mellifluous, uncommitted apology in regards to her apparent
brashness to the visitor that had just arrived at the doorway. "Welcome
back, Mister Sakaguchi."

Kyoko Sakaguchi's face brightened like a fireworks display as she set
aside the empty serving tray she was holding. "Daddy!" she greeted
giddily as she ran towards the rough-shaven man in police garb and gave
him a warm embrace. "What are you doing here? I thought you were still
stationed over there in Yokohama!"

"I still kind of am, honey, but as soon as I heard that Akahori-san's
police escorts for his special Daijokan meeting in Shinshu were a bit
shorthanded, I volunteered immediately," Satoru Sakaguchi grinningly
explained to his diffident daughter as he hobbled towards her with his
cane and patted her head.

"I'm sorry I haven't been able to visit you and your mother earlier.
Things have been hectic in and around Yokohoma, what with politicians
getting their noses in our business and all. Still, the good news is
that the Kaishinto Conservatives had finally toppled that silly Jiyuto
Liberal Party--I'm boring you with all this talk about politics, aren't
I?"

Kyoko playfully pouted, but couldn't keep it up as it quickly melted
into a delighted smile--a shy, tentative, yet happy one that said,
"Even though there weren't many police volunteers in Akahori-san's
meeting because of the very real danger of an announced assassination
attempt right here in our sleepy little town, and you're in danger too
for volunteering, I'm just glad you're home." She snuggled closer to
her father. "How long are you going to stay here, chichi-ue?" 

Kyoko's father scratched the back of his ear and looked at the ceiling.
Just like his daughter, he wasn't very good at maintaining false
pretenses, so his open-book discomfiture earned him a not-so-playful and
heartbreaking scowl of daughterly disappointment.

"The restaurant business is doing well, I hope," Satoru hastily changed
the subject as he reluctantly let go of his sweet and precious child.
Indeed, their reunion could have gone better.

"It'd probably fare a lot better if Nonoko-san were just a bit more
practical with the way she handles customers. She's a patient wife and
devoted mother, but those things have little to no bearing with the food
industry," the granddaughter of the Sakaguchi's old family friend,
Chizuru Raikouji, nonchalantly related--more like tattled--to the
Sakaguchi Patriarch in typical roundabout Japanese fashion.

Usually, Chizuru was above such notions of coy backtalk, double
entendres, and guerilla conversations. In fact, she had been accused 
several times of being a pushy, candid, half-Gaijin demon spawn with the
sheer amount of brazenness, insolence, disrespect, and moxie she usually
brought to the table, as seen with how she dealt with the fake Battousai
Group's terrorist activities. 

However, she felt that her erudite un-Japanese-ness was only applicable
on a case-to-case basis; she didn't think that either of the two elder
Sakaguchis would take her seriously with her usual uncouth approach.
Raising a big stink, confronting Nonoko's husband in regards to his
wife's culturally ingrained doormat submissiveness, and demanding
immediate change and action would only make things worse, burn bridges,
and reinforce her bad reputation of being a pushy and rude girl. 

There were times when even an independent woman like herself had to
learn to adapt to the kind of culture she was born in, even if it went
against everything she believed to be true in her heart. When in Rome,
do as the Romans do; play by other people's rules and learn to respect
their opinion as much as you would want them to respect yours and all
that jazz.

'Sorry, Kyoko-chan. I can barely stand hearing myself talk like this,
but a girl's gotta do what a girl's gotta do. This is for Nonoko-san's
sake, not mine.'

"Still, I'm slightly unnerved about all these unpaid tabs, customers
gambling over food, and unsightly characters inside a family restaurant.
It's very surprising, to say the least," Chizuru let out in due course,
hating every last calm, prying, and hypocritical word she spewed out of
her mouth.

"Oh, really? I see," Satoru idly commented as he lifted his cane to his
armpit and gently sat down on a nearby bench, making his words as
undecipherable and indistinct as possible lest he was within his wife's
earshot and he inadvertently made a negative remark about her or
betrayed any sort of ill-will and pandering to the concerned/busybody
granddaughter of their old family friend. Keeping the peaceful status
quo during these very sensitive discussions was the way to go.

Kyoko frowned a moue of consternation, narrowing her eyes ever-so-subtly
at Chizuru and her brownnosing but not saying a word about it. Two could
play this game.

"Actually, daddy, Chizuru-san just met a boy three weeks back. He's
slightly younger than her--by about eight years--but he has already come
of age. I do hope I'm not being too brash and all, but in just a year or
so, if Chizuru-san were to fail in landing a husband, she'd be at an
unmarriable age." The statement was unabashedly non-sequitur and
insultingly ad hominem, but it would do.

A pulsating vein popped up on Chizuru's forehead as her face reddened to
a slight pinkish color. Truly, the sweet smile that was currently
plastered on her burning face would have done Soujiro Seta proud. Kyoko
grinned at the much older woman in kind, knowing full well that she'd
just hit a nerve.

The Raikouji Heiress refuted, "Speaking of May-December romances, how is
Minakata Kinta anyway?" She tossed her luxurious black hair and smirked.
"That's a wonderful theory you got there, Kyoko-chan, but Yahiko just
isn't my type, I'm afraid. Oh, by the way, didn't you help bring Yahiko
back here to us after that incident with the fake Battousai Group? The
same Yahiko you've suddenly brought up for no particular reason? You two
looked so cute back then!"

Chizuru meant, 'Butt-off, Kyoko. I'm only doing this because Nonoko-san
literally had her inventory emptied by a mooching, two-ton brute, and
she's doing diddly squat about it. Well, if she won't, then I will, and
I'm sure 'daddy dearest' wants to hear more about it.'

The young soba waitress giggled daintily and responded, "I'm sure that
Kinta-sama is doing fine, as is Yuki-neechan, grandfather, and all the
rest of our friends back in Kanagawa. Yahiko-san has his own rugged
charm, I admit, but if you insist that you don't see him as anything
other than a friend, then it's all right. You probably have the same
attitude towards him as you do Seta Soujiro-kun anyway. Always the cold
shoulder, the insults, the tirades--no man seems ever good enough for
you, Chizuru-san. I suppose you were really smitten by that 'vagabond'
Battousai you always kept telling everybody about."

Kyoko meant, 'At least _I_ actually have prospects. What do you have,
Chizuru-obaasan? Besides, mom knows what she's doing. Unlike cynical,
bitter _you_, mother actually has faith in other people. Besides, until
she allowed in Gan-san and his gambling troop, we've never had that
many customers. True, most of them weren't paying customers, but...
You'll never get married, so nya!'

All the same, taking into consideration both literal and implied
meanings of Kyoko's statement, Chizuru now appeared like a human kettle
that was just about ready to burst and let steam out of her ears.

"Oh yes. I've met that boy during my last visit here. He and his boss
had been up and about the whole Kanto and Chubu regions all month long,
as though they were on a long campaign trail or something. Akahori-san's
been a very busy bee," Satoru nervously interjected to the rather
strange, tense conversation, inwardly cringing at all the hidden female
hostilities. "Anyway, from the few times I've talked to him, Soujiro-kun
seems like a nice, happy young man, though he usually keeps to himself."

"Speaking of the Seta boy," Chizuru "innocently" interrupted, ignoring
Kyoko's wide-eyed glare of warning, "he's a swordsman and a bodyguard to
that Akahori person, isn't he? Well, I heard he was actually involved
with the sudden demise of an entire gang of gangsters that claimed to be
the notorious Battousai Group. Not that he actually did it per se; the
remaining Shinshushin police who bothered to do an investigation stated
that Keisuke, the fake Battousai Group's leader, was killed in a
slightly different manner than all the rest of his deceased comrades.
And, knowing how close your wife was to Seta-kun, she might have
mentioned to him what happened between Keisuke and your daughter."

Chizuru meant, 'Damn girl, you're better at this than I am, but I won't
give up just yet. So yeah, I went there. I tattled on Psycho-Kid.' The
Kaoru look-alike watched Kyoko's reaction, expecting yet another round
of sweetly acerbic doubletalk, but one look at the girl's eyes told her
that she had indeed said too much.

Kyoko waxed melancholic as she remembered Keisuke's last words, her own
questions, and Soujiro's regret-filled response.

"Girls, girls," Satoru declared in all seriousness, putting his heavy,
sword-calloused hands on both their shoulders and leaving all pretenses
of willful conformist tolerance aside, replacing it with a more
universal fatherly worry. "What's this I hear about some boy, a fake
Battousai Group, Seta-kun, that bastard Keisuke, and a food bandit?"


***


It was already in the middle of the afternoon when Gan and Yahiko got
back to the town of Nojiri, but they still couldn't agree on what
determined the gender of a chicken. 

If the animal in question had been a cow, it would've been simple. All
they would have to do was to look at the cow--or even look under the
cow, to be completely sure. They would've wasted no time at examining
its tail, hooves, or horns. 

They would simply have looked at the animal straight in the face, and if
that wasn't enough (or if they were blind and stupid), then they could
check if it had a brass on its nose. If so, the cow would undoubtedly be
a bull. But chickens were not like cows. So the argument went on in the
semi-bustling streets of "the village that was previously under siege"
all the while.

When they passed the marketplace--with Gan carefully avoiding the stall
of the merchant he stole fish from--Yahiko bought a tether with the
money he just made during Gan's last gambling spree. He was planning to
tie the fowl on a peg when they got back into the Sakaguchi's residence.
Of course, Gan wasn't feeling too keen about the idea; not the tethering
part, but the going-back-to-the-Sakaguchi's-residence part.

"Wouldn't they be a teensy bit angry to see their food thief come back
to the scene of the crime?" Gan ventured, airing out the source of his
trepidation. Both Yahiko and the chicken gave him a blank look.

The bulky man made a resigned hissing sound with his grit teeth and
exhaled. He clenched his hands together with a loud clap and rambled,
"Shoot, okay! Okay! I get it. If I don't go with you, I don't get my
rooster--"

"Hen."

"--back. Fine. I'm going. I just ain't gonna be happy about it." And so
they did just that, arriving soon after on the front porch of the
Sakaguchi Soba Shop. Yahiko slid the door leading into the restaurant,
entering with a cowed Gan and the tied-up chicken in tow. "We're back. I
got your soba thief right here, Chizuru, and he has gotten us a
chicken."

"Hello everybody!" Gan greeted, immediately recovering from his initial
glumness and wiggling his fingers around in jolly salutation. He was
then welcomed in return by a swift kick to the crotch.

"H-Hello to you too! Chizuru, isn't it? Yeah, I remember you," the thug
squeaked and shuddered as he slumped down to his wobbly knees, his voice
going up a pitch or two higher than before.

Chizuru put her hands on her hips and gave Yahiko a raised eyebrow of
begrudged appreciation. "I'll give you this, little boy; you can _at
least_ get the job done. It took you long enough, though." 

Yahiko tipped Takae's kabuto over his eyes and snorted. 

Chizuru subsequently took the kneeling, bandanna-wearing ruffian by the
scruff of his neck, gave him a 'Well, well, well. Look at what we have
here,' type of smile, and then loudly inquired, "Hey, Nonoko-san! The
damn food thief that cost us a bundle of money has come back with a
chicken! He still owes us quite a lot, but would you like some chicken
broth mixed with porridge anyway? We still have ginger in the kitchen!"

She blinked after she heard no response. "Oh, that's right. She went out
for some groceries. Guess I'll just have to kill, pluck, chop, and boil
the chicken myself with or without permission."

"HEY! Don't I get a say in all this?" objected Gan, still feeling the
full effects of Chizuru's attack on his manhood. As a consequence,
Yahiko warily slinked away from the two, knowing the rich girl's
personality well enough to know when to back down, even though they'd
just met for a short period of time.

Chizuru easily invaded Gan's personal space in a decisively threatening
manner, her predatory grin appearing as if it had a second row of sharp
fangs behind it. "Okay then. If you want the chicken to live, then how
about I kill, chop, and boil _you_ instead?"

"Er, thanks but no thanks?" Gan hazarded a reply as round globules of
cold sweat drenched his taut head bandanna.

Satoru released a tired sigh at the Raikouji daughter's antics. Even
though she meant well most of the time and was indeed one of the
Sakaguchis' closest family friends, she had an indubitable tendency for
overkill. "Stop scaring the food bandit, Chizuru-kun. Besides, you've
never actually killed livestock before."

"Hey! No fair, Mister Sakaguchi! _He_ didn't know that!" Chizuru pouted
sullenly, then whispered to Gan's ear, "Well, there's always a first
time for everything, so don't even _think_ you're off the hook, pal."
The robust man's face consequently paled.

The Head of the Sakaguchi Household cleared his throat with finality and
motioned to all present to take a seat and gather around him. They
quickly obeyed. Though he didn't look the part, Satoru Sakaguchi had an
air of unmistakable authority surrounding him.

Once everyone had settled down, Satoru clasped his hands together,
smiled congenially at each familiar and unfamiliar face, and announced,
"So let's start from the top, shall we?" He turned towards the nearest
person. "Who are you?"

Yahiko paused, stared about him, and then pointed towards himself in
askance. After Satoru confirmed that it was indeed him he was talking
to, the boy hesitantly introduced himself as, "Y-Yahiko. Myojin Yahiko.
A descendant of Tokyo Samurai. I've actually started journeying Japan to
further my training and--" 

'Don't say 'stuff'! Don't say 'stuff'! They won't take you seriously if
you talk like that!' he mentally berated himself before lamely adding,
"...To widen my horizons. Yeah," taking off his kabuto in a decisively
browbeaten and embarrassed manner. 

"Oh, OH! Oh yes, I know you! Chizuru-kun and Kyoko-chan have been
talking about you! So you're the one who kept my daughter from attacking
her stalker and his gang, as well as stopping her duel with her friend!
That Yahiko! It's so nice to meet you!" 

Satoru beamed, grasping and shaking the Tokyo Samurai Descendant's hands
vigorously. Before Yahiko could even utter a response, the older man
effortlessly segued, "And you? What's your name, Mister Food Bandit?"

"Er... Gan. Just call me Gan, I mean. It's spelled with the character
that looks like a broken, funny-looking chair instead of the one that
looks like a crown balanced on a flat tray that's wedged on a wooden
box."


***


After a nice, long chat concerning the last three weeks' events--and
very careful repetition of certain unbelievable details--Satoru was
still left confused and perplexed at the complexity of the seeming tall
tale's happenings. 

It was an understandable reaction. It was hard to wrap his mind around
all these stories concerning his hometown of Nojiri being held under
siege by a group of pretender terrorists led by his daughter's very
stalker, Keisuke. It was like his personal nightmare came to life! God
couldn't possibly be this cruel, could he?

Furthermore, just why and how in the world did the so-called fake
Battousai Group come up with such an ill-advised name? It was also
rather peculiar that a group of men named as such would gather in the
very place where actual members of their more dangerous namesakes were
reportedly on the prowl for an assassination mission. For the fakes,
doing so was equivalent to suicide.

Or perhaps the whole thing smelled more of a setup than a simple bout of
stupidity. What a curious debacle. If Akahori weren't shaking in his
boots before, he should be right now. 

Satoru shook his head to help it sort out his priorities better. In the
end, fatherly worry won out against political intrigue. After all, his
dear sweet daughter had just risked her life and innocence to stop
Keisuke's mad ambitions, as though the trauma he put her though all
those years ago wasn't quite enough to satisfy him, that damn perverted
asshole. "Honey, I'm so sorry. If I'd known, I would've made that trip
back here in Shinshu months ago!"

"...." Gan interjected.

"You couldn't have known, daddy. That's why Keisuke took advantage of
that... and the fact that all our local law enforcement had been asked
to report to that cowardly politician's mansion... to terrorize our
town," Kyoko reassured as she gingerly patted her father's gloved hands.
"I'm so sorry for making you worry unnecessarily."

"Then again, you should have known better than to take your grandpa's
sword and go off on your own to exact vengeance upon some hooligans and
whatnot," Chizuru berated Kyoko in a bossy tone usually accompanied by
finger-wagging and intense ladle-whapping.

Also, just to add to the list of people she'd so far affronted, she put
her elbow over Gan's shoulder just as she delivered the "hooligans and
whatnot" portion of her admonition. "If Yahiko hadn't shown up and
stopped you, you would've committed a big, no, _huge_ mistake."

"...." both Kyoko and Gan retorted.

Yahiko raised an eyebrow upon hearing Chizuru's sentiments. "If I hadn't
shown up? More like if that mysterious, cross-scarred redhead hadn't
shown up and killed off the entire band of Keisuke's goons before
Psycho-Kid finished their head honcho himself, then Kyoko-san here
would've been in a serious dilemma."

Kyoko furtively glanced at the younger man's direction, reddened like a
lamp on New Year's Eve, looked down on the wooden floorboards near her
socked feet, and nodded somberly. "If you put it that way, then yes,
maybe I should be thanking Soujiro-kun and that stranger, in a manner of
speaking."

Yahiko put his hands up defensively at Kyoko and her somber mood as
though he were under arrest by the police or something. The very reason
he even contended Chizuru's insensitive comments was to spare the mousy
girl from delving further into her guilty feelings over Soujiro Seta's
actions. The fact that she was acting so very much like a certain Tokyo
girl he knew with short hair and a teeny voice didn't help matters
either; cue the obligatory sneeze from faraway, if you would. 

But then Satoru turned towards the Tokyo Samurai and grilled, "This
redhead, what do you think of him, Myojin-kun? Between you and me, I get
the feeling he's part of the _real_ Battousai Group. I mean, sure it's a
bit presumptuous of me to claim such a thing, but it'd make a lot of
sense that such a notorious band of terrorists would send one of their
representatives--a particularly obsessed Battousai look-alike fan,
even--to finish off their pesky doppelgangers. This act of aggression
can also be interpreted as a warning sign to Akahori Tetsuo-san, their
intended target."

"I-It's just like you said, sir, but to tell you the truth, outside of
that and other circumstantial evidence, I don't really know much of
anything about this red-haired guy or the Battousai Group," Yahiko
admitted warily, alarmed at Satoru's sudden outburst of inapt
enthusiasm, feeling as though the policeman was more interested in the
Battousai Group's activities than the trauma his daughter just went
through simply because it had something to do with his job protecting
the Ishin Shishi politician's life. Then again, Yahiko was _supposed_ to
gather more information about the massacring, cross-scarred redhead.

Unbeknownst to the spiked-haired boy, the squeamish Kyoko gave her
father a shy but grateful smile for his earnest attempt at changing the
very awkward and delicate subject: the dark side of the enigmatic
Soujiro Seta. To discover such a murderous aspect from someone so
familiar was unnerving to the young girl. The fact that he evidently
killed Keisuke for her sake made her feel even more bewildered.

The mysterious Soujiro had always kept his distance from Kyoko and the
Sakaguchis since day one regardless of his facade of amiability, all the
while maintaining an air of secrecy behind his mask of bliss. 

Satoru nodded to Yahiko's bemusement whilst distracting him from his
daughter's own distress before asserting, "Well, what's done is done.
There's nothing more that we can do about it. The Battousai Group is on
the move and have revealed that they're about to strike two days from
now. It's out of our hands." Yahiko flinched accordingly to that part
of the announcement. 

"I'm truly glad that everyone is safe, but now's the time we discussed
our _other_ agendas. Let's talk about that chicken of yours, Food
Bandit-san."

The tethered chicken that Yahiko tied to a peg near a tree at the back
of the Sakaguchi Restaurant in the middle of Satoru's cross-examination
suddenly flapped its wings and crowed to announce the dawn of the
afternoon sunset.

"Aha! Did you hear that?" Gan exclaimed triumphantly. "The chicken
crowed! Only _roosters_ crow, Yoshi-boy! 'Hen' my tight, hairy butt! I
suppose you're going to tell me now that cows can fly."

Chizuru opened and shut her eyes animatedly at Gan's exclamation, her
mouth slackening in confusion. She turned towards Yahiko and asked,
"'Yoshi-boy'? Who the hell is he talking to?"

"Yoshi-boy" hurriedly growled a vague and irritated, "Who knows?" at
Chizuru, which prompted the young heiress to pause in wonder before
widening her eyes in gleeful realization and giggling to her heart's
content. 

"Aaaaah, so _you're_ Yoshi-boy, huh? Come to think of it, you do look
more like a Yoshi than a Yahiko to me! Hihihihihihihihi!" she annoyingly
cooed.

"He does, doesn't he? He doesn't think so though, Kaori-neechan!" Gan
piped up in kind, as though forgetting that the very same woman he was
toadying-up to just recently put his fatherhood in peril. Then again,
his unthinking commnet just earned him even more hostility from the
aforesaid female. 

To say that Chizuru was taken aback by the random name was something
that the word "understatement" didn't even begin to cover.

"KAORI? Who the heck is this 'Kaori'? She sounds like an annoying little
witch with the vocal range of a baby parrot! And what's with this
irritating habit of yours of giving people names that they don't like?"
the Kaoru--not Kaori, just to be clear--look-alike lectured with a sharp
undertone of "And if you disagree with me, you'll taste my Fist of
Death."

Chizuru's outburst earned her bullets of perplexed sweat from a rather
baffled Yahiko. 'So it's okay for him to do it to me but not to her?
Jeez. Talk about your double standards!' the Tokyoite mused.

"Oh, pipe down, the both of you." As cross-shaped veins popped all over
his head, Yahiko did his best to bear with Chizuru and Gan's behavior.
"And more to the point, I don't care if your pet chicken crows or not.
She's still a hen. If you want to pay back your tab, give the hen to the
Sakaguchis for payment and then get a damn job to even out the rest of
your balance!"

"Bullshit, that _rooster_ of mine is going to make me lots of money at
the cockpits, so I don't need no stinking job!" Gan rowdily rejoined,
pointing madly at the tethered fowl's direction. "What I could make in
a month doing construction work I can make in a day with my super
fighting rooster! So there!"

"It's a hen," Yahiko insisted straightforwardly, his eyes half-shut and
his arms crossed. "Give it to the Sakaguchis to either make a stew with
or get eggs from."

"Why should they get eggs from it? It's not a hen," Gan persisted,
grinding his teeth in aggravation. "It's a rooster. It crows, it's
hardcore, and it has the earmarks of a champion. Are you blind?"

"I'm not blind. And that's not a rooster." 

"Shut up. It's so a rooster."

As it was, Gan remained as focused on the argument as an arrow was on a
target. Or a metal bat to a target, as the case may be. Vigilant and
ready to do battle, to lock horns and prove his mettle. Ready to smash a
swift path to victory... but so was Yahiko.

"It's not!"

"It's too!"

"Oh, that's real mature."

"So you're admitting defeat?"

"Who's admitting defeat? It's a hen!"

The Sakaguchi Patriarch and his beloved daughter watched on in awestruck
fascination as the bizarre dialogue concerning poultry declined into
churlish and juvenile prattle. 

As they turned their heads back and forth from Yahiko to Gan while the
ping-pong exchange escalated, they pondered to themselves, 'Have these
people really met each other just recently? The way they talk to one
another makes it seem as though it's the other way around.'

"I don't see what the problem is, you two. I mean, if you really wanted
to know what gender that chicken is, all you really have to do is...
well, y'know... look underneath and see for yourself," Chizuru pointed
out awkwardly but bluntly, her cheeks pink yet her eyebrows raised in
wonder at how Yahiko and Gan could miss out such an obvious answer.

Typically, the entirety of the somewhat diffident Kyoko's face turned
bright crimson after realizing what Chizuru was suggesting. "Y-You don't
mean...?" She gave Yahiko and Gan a quick glance then hid her burgundy
face beneath her hands after her eyes involuntarily traveled southward.
"Eek! Chizuru-san! That's so embarrassing!"

"Chizuru-kun! Wash that potty mouth of yours with soap, young woman!
There are children here!" Satoru protested as he pointed at both Yahiko
and Kyoko, which earned him looks of exasperation from the very same
people.

A vein popped on Chizuru's forehead as she snapped, "Lift the chicken up
and see what it has got underneath its knickers. Yeah, that's what I
said. So what? Kyoko should know the difference between a bird and a bee
by now, and so should Yoshi-boy."

Yahiko scratched his cheek in vexation and sighed. "Boy," he supposed
condescendingly, "where in the world do you get these silly ideas? I
guess you really are a spoiled little rich girl. Right, Kaori-neesan?"

"Wha--? Watch that tone of voice of yours! What does that have to do
with anything?" Chizuru demanded. "And if anybody calls me 'Kaori-
neesan'--or whatever variation thereof--one more time, I'll... I...
well, you'll damn well wish you hadn't, that's for sure."

Gan boomed and rumbled with baritone laughter. "Chickens don't have any
obvious limp noodles or pink oysters underneath them, Kao--I mean,
neechan." He cleared his throat. "Chickens have no external sex organs.
Male and female alike only have one opening for everything: egg, pee,
poo, and sex all carry on in the same place--in their special little
'vents,' so to speak."

"Ew! Gross!" Kyoko girlishly cried out as she made a face. "I'm not
quite sure I wanted to know that, Food Bandit-san."

Chizuru stuck her tongue out in kind. "That's disgusting. Informative,
but disgusting." Coughing primly, the Raikouji Heiress relented to some
extent, "So I guess it really is tough to tell a rooster from a hen
outside of wattles and crowing, huh?" which was her roundabout way of
admitting, "I was wrong. I went on and on about that rooster-hen thing
even though I really had no idea what I was talking about. Sorry about
that." Or at least that was the way Gan interpreted it.

Gan roared with even more misplaced mirth. "Ah, don't worry about it!
It's a common mistake for city folk to make about chickens, Kaori-
neechaark!" the thug-like food thief choked as his umpteenth thoughtless
remark of the day caused his brief schlep with Chizuru's goodwill to
come to a grinding and painful halt.


***


Next: A rooster or a hen?

Credit for most of the framework of the story goes to a, er, local
"bard" this time. Hearty thanks and salutations to Alejandro R.
Roces for providing most of the material on which this chapter was
based on. "My Brother's Peculiar Chicken" is a fascinating and
funny story I've read in my childhood.

And though I'm probably going out on a limb here with the "Yoshi"
references, I don't care. My nostalgic bias of the (in retrospect,
mediocre at best, horrific at worst) Sony dub of "Samurai X"
demands that I put it in there. Expect references to "Kenshi", 
"Kaori", and "Sato" in the near future.

Disclaimer: All characters used in this fanfic (save some others)
are the rightful property of Nobuhiro Watsuki and Sony. Don't sue
me please, I'm very poor.

Salamat sa pagbabasa!
Abdiel