Gratuitous Self 
Part 7: Kuno-chan ga yatte kuru (Kuno-chan is coming around)


	Takezo, after struggling through his finals, finally returned to 
the restored list, only to have it nearly split before his eyes. 
Quickly deleting all the messages related to the topic, (all 300 of 
them) he immediately went to the other stuff.
	"So," he said, "the Scriviner's working on another story idea. 
'Bubble Gundam'. O-kay�"
	"What? 'Logs in Love' is delayed? And I was looking forward to 
it. I even have a slogan for the darn thing that I was going to give 
Keener� 'Logs in Love� where the line 'Here we come' takes a whole new 
meaning!'"
	"'Space Quest for Glory W: So you want to be like Heero.' Huh?"
	"What?! Kojiro is High Commander?! No way!" He mused on this for 
a while, then� "Oh well," he finally said, "he can't be any worse than 
Templar, that's for sure. Speaking of Templar� I wonder how the little 
bugger's doing?"


	[�Damn you Kojiro. Damn you Takezo. I will have my revenge upon 
you, and you will suffer for this treason!!!]


	Somewhere, Kojiro Sasaki, High Commander of the Holy Crusaders 
of Nabiki Tendo, sneezed.



	Takezo was wondering which of the proposed five lists he would 
subscribe to. "I mean," he said to himself, "I definitely will sub to 
the Ranma Fic list. Maybe the Sailor Moon list. The 'Other' list� 
definitely. Now, do I subscribe to the Discussion list? I mean, 
they're bound to discuss fics on that one. Or is it off-topic 
discussion? Wait, no, that's the Spam list. Then again, won't threads 
on the Discussion list degenerate? When is it time to carry over a 
thread on the discussion list over to the spam list? Does C&C for a 
Ranma fic belong to the Ranma or Discussion list? How does a person 
subbed to only the discussion list follow a thread if it is ported 
over to the Spam list? If my fic is a crossover of Ranma, Sailor Moon, 
and Oh My Goddess!, do I post it on three lists? If not, how will the 
other lists get a hold of my fic? And since C&C is not off-topic, and 
may be posted on the fic lists, can it be posted on four? If the 
thread degenerates, will it be posted on all five, including the Spam 
list? What's to prevent me from getting a post five times? Why is the 
world round? Why did the chicken cross the road?

	But before any resolution could be brought to the split issue, 
the list crashed.
	"Oh, well," he said to himself as he looked at all of 10 new 
messages reach him, most of them from the Ronin list, "at least it 
gives me time to write part 6 of Turning Road, I guess� "

	Bob and Takezo met at the local gyudon place, as usual.
	"Is this it?" Bob asked while Takezo handed him a manuscript.
	"Yeah," Takezo said. "Give it a thorough roasting so I can 
improve it before I post it."
	"Okay. You asked for it," Bob said as he put on his glasses and 
begun to read, taking the cap off his red pen.

	

Turning Road 
Part 6: A Smack on the Head is Worth�


	Sandwich in mouth, bag under arm, and top partially buttoned, 
Takezo ran out of Ryo Kurin Ryo and headed straight for Furinkan. 
"Damn it, damn it, damn it! I overslept!"
	Kojiro had already left, earlier that morning. "That's because 
it was HIS snoring that kept me awake all night!" Takezo said aloud. 
That and thinking of Nabiki and Ukyo, he added silently.
	What is this� predicament? I mean, Ukyo's a friend, right? So 
why�? And I'm only supposed to get even with Nabiki, right? So why 
can't I, for the life of me, bring myself to do so? And what's this 
about my plan working? What was Ukyo talking about?
	Takezo had not spoken to either Ukyo and Nabiki the whole 
weekend. Frankly, he couldn't bear to see the look of triumph he 
imagined would be on Nabiki's face. And Ukyo� What was with that girl? 
What was with ME, for that matter. What was she talking about? What 
plan? What acting?
	He bumped into something. Someone. Well, that woke him up.
	The figure in the ponytail and blue boy's uniform shouted "Hey!"
	"So sorry� Eh?" Takezo stared in surprise. "U� Ukyo?"
	"Ta� Takezo."
	They stared at each other and at the ground for a while.
	Then a smack behind the head woke Takezo from his reverie. 
"Hey," an all-too familiar voice said. "If you don't get in now, Mr. 
Loverboy," Nabiki said as she ran for the front door of the school 
just as the bell rang, "you'll be carrying pails of water out in the 
hallway again."
	Damn that woman! "Uh," Takezo finally said to Ukyo after Nabiki 
had entered, "I guess we'd better get going, huh?"
	"Yeah� I guess so� "

	"Poor Takezo," whispered Kojiro to Nabiki from inside the 
classroom. "I wonder what kept him up all night. He was still asleep 
when I left Ryo Kurin Ryo, you see."
	He was up all night? Why? Did he�? No! He couldn't have! "Uh,  
Kojiro," Nabiki whispered back, "where was he all night? Did he leave 
the room? Was he on a date?"
	Kojiro blinked. "Why? What do you mean?"
	"I mean why was he up all night? Did someone keep him up all 
night? Er, I mean, uh�"
	Kojiro frowned slightly. "I don't see what you're trying to get 
at. He was in the room all night, although he said, just before I 
dozed off, that he couldn't get any sleep. Not last night, and not the 
night before."
	Nabiki breathed a sigh of relief, although why she did was lost 
on her. "Oh," she said, "I was just asking." She turned to look at the 
window to the hallway. It was closed, but she could just make out an 
outline�
	Idiot, thought Nabiki. Why am I wasting my time on him?

	Takezo stood in the hallway, grumbling. Not due to the weight of 
the pails of water, though, which he was carrying with ease. It was 
more of the 'damn that woman damn that Kojiro'-type grumbling.
	A 'klong' down the hall made him turn. It was Ukyo, walking down 
the hall back to her classroom, carrying a pair of buckets, like 
himself. One of them had hit the wall, and she was in the process of 
trying to keep all the water in.
	Takezo chuckled softly as he watched. Suddenly, Ukyo turned to 
him and smiled, reddening slightly. He smiled back at her, mouthing 
the words, 'Sorry, was I staring?'.



	Bob looked away from the manuscript, smiling in spite of 
himself.
	"What is it?" asked Takezo through a mouthful of rice and beef 
and vegetables�
	"It's nothing," Bob replied. He looked at Takezo and said, "You 
know, it's generally considered bad manners to talk while your mouth 
is full�"




	Kuno, also with two pails, was running in the other direction 
Ukyo was going.
Why?
	Because for some freak accident (or normal occurrence, depending 
on how jaded you are about Nerima and Furinkan in general), Ranma was 
ALSO out in the hallways, carrying a pair of buckets filled with 
water.
	"You shall not evade me much longer, Saotome! I shall smite 
thee!"
	"You know, you've been saying that to me for what, months? 
Years? Aw, heck, it's been so long, I don't remember anymore!"
	Either that or it was just your normal anime timestream at work.



	Bob looked up from the manuscript. "Normal Anime Timestream? 
What's the heck does that mean?"
	"You know, like in that fic by Switch." Clearing his throat, he 
'quoted' (at least, as close as he could possibly remember) from the 
fanfic.  'Nerima is one of those odd patches of land on the face of 
the Earth where 8 years worth of seasons pass in one year'."
	"Oh. Yeah. That."



	The window to the hallway had now opened, and the usual gang of 
spectators were now watching the events transpiring at one of Japan's 
busiest hallways.
	Nabiki sighed. "And Kuno and Ranma are at it again."
	Kojiro asked Nabiki, "Is it ALWAYS like this here?"
	"Oh, yeah. Ever since Ranma came to town."

	Kuno dropped the pails and drew his sword. "Make your necessary 
preparations for death, Saotome!" Saying this, he charged at Ranma, 
swordpoint forward.

	Takezo raised his own pails to avoid getting them hit by Kuno's. 
"Hey watch it!"
	KLONG!
He felt one of them hit something. Or someone. A head, probably. 
With a loud 'klong' and a splash.
Nabiki smirked. "Kuno falls again."

And, as usual, Ranma had fled. In fact, shouts of 'Musabetsu 
Kakuto Saotome-ryu Saishu no Kogeki!' rang throughout the hallway.

"Kuno! Kuno! You okay down there buddy?" Takezo tried to wake 
Kuno up, and Kuno began to stir.
"Uh�" Kuno sat up and rubbed the part of his head where the pail 
hit him.
"Hey, I'm sorry, man. I didn't mean to hit you like that. It was 
an accident."
Kuno fixed him with a sharp gaze, which involuntarily made 
Takezo swallow. Then Kuno simply shrugged, picked up his sword and his 
now-empty pails,  and started walking down the hall. "Hey," he finally 
said, back turned to everyone, "it happens. Don't worry about it."

	Nabiki, Takezo, Ukyo and the rest stared after Kuno. Takezo then 
turned to Nabiki, who turned to him, too. Both of them had the 
'freaked-out' expression on their faces.
The sound of a temple bell droned throughout the hallway.
Kojiro asked, "Why? What's going on?"



	"Whoa," Bob said. "This is creepy."
	"You think so?" Takezo said, cracking his knuckles to loosen 
them up. "Read on."



	Lunch arrived.
	Takezo was having lunch alone, under a tree next in the field 
next to Furinkan. He absently chewed the katsu-sando he had obtained 
from the cafeteria. He took for granted how hard it was to get the 
damn things, since all he needed to do was get to the cafeteria before 
anyone else did.
	And he always got there first.
	Of course, that's taking into consideration the fact that Ranma 
and Ukyo always brought their own lunches.

	All of this never crossed Takezo's mind however.
	He was too busy watching Kuno.

	Nabiki wasn't paying attention to what her flunkies were saying. 
Friends, she would say if anyone asked, and that's what they were, but 
to everyone else, the way they sucked up to Nabiki said 'flunky' in 
big bold neon green letters.
	Nabiki wasn't paying attention to what her friends were saying.
	She was too busy watching Kuno.


	Kuno was in the ordinary 'white polo black pants' uniform.
	He was talking to a group of girls sitting by one side of the 
wide-open field.
	They were smiling. Some were even giggling.


	 Nabiki and Takezo could only stare in shock.

	
	"You� you're kidding, right?" Ranma said in disbelief.
	"Nope," said Daisuke. "Kuno's undergone major personality 
change, man."
	"Yeah," added Hiroshi, "and you won't like what he's become."
	"This I gotta see." asked Ranma. "I mean, anything's gotta be 
better than what he usually is."
	"Don't say we didn't warn you," said Daisuke.

	"You� You're kidding, right?" Akane said in disbelief.
	"No, I'm telling you," Yuka said, "Kuno's� different now."
	"Yes," Sayuri said, "and whatever's come over him is definitely 
an improvement."
	"Really? I gotta see this for myself," said Akane.
	"What? You don't trust us?" said Yuka.



	"Interesting device," said Bob.
	"Device?" asked Takezo, who was finishing off the last of his 
gyudon, "What device?"
	"You know," Bob said, "this parallelism. You used it twice in 
this fic. In fact, you use it a lot."
	"I did? Parallelism? What are you talking about?"
	Bob sighed. "Never mind. It must have just been a fluke."



	Akane ran out the front door and nearly bumped into a tall young 
man in a white and black school uniform�
	"Oh, Akane! I'm sorry, I didn't see you there."
	Why did that voice sound so familiar? She looked up and found 
herself face-to-face with Kuno Tatewaki. "Er, uh, that's okay, Kuno."
	"That's good� Say, where are you headed off to in such a hurry?"
	Akane couldn't get over it! It was like he was a whole different 
person! "I, uh, well�"
	Kuno simply smiled at her in a way she had never seen him smile. 
It was a simple smile, not self-indulgent or over-confident or� 
lecherous, like the old ones, just� a simple smile. "Yes?"
	"Actually," she finally said, "I came to see you."

	Ducking to hide behind a tree lining the front path of the 
school, Takezo bumped into something soft. "What the�?" Whatever, or 
whoever it was whose back he had run into spun around angrily.
	"Hey, watch it!" Nabiki exclaimed.
	"Na� Nabiki!" Well, THIS was a surprise. "What're you --"
	"Shhh! Pipe down or you'll let them know we're here!"
	"Who are you talking about?" Takezo asked. "Kuno and Akane? I 
kn--"
	Nabiki put a finger to Takezo's lips and to her own as if to 
shush him, and nodded. She then pointed up.
	Takezo was at first stunned by all of this (after all, that WAS 
Nabiki's finger on his lips), but then, at Nabiki's insistence, he 
looked up�
	�and saw a very familiar red-shirted young man perched on one of 
the branches,  watching Akane and Kuno.

	Hmph. What's she getting all nice and friendly with Kuno for. 
Look at them. Smiling at each other. What's the big idea, anyway?
	Why should I even care what that tomboy does? She's uncute, 
she's unsexy, she's got no taste in clothes, she�
	What're they saying? What's he telling her? I can barely make it 
out I� WHAT?!

	Nabiki clamped down on Takezo's mouth with her right hand as she 
put a finger to her own. "Calm down!" she whispered.
	As soon as she took her hand away, Takezo whispered frantically, 
"He just asked her out on a date! And she said yes!"
	"I know! I know! I'm in shock too, y'know!" Nabiki got this look 
on her face, as if she was in deep thought but had her face running in 
the direction she left it� Takezo could almost feel her thought 
processes fill the air� 
	He felt Ranma jump off the branch, away from Kuno and Akane, 
fuming�
Suddenly, as suddenly as she had started thinking, she grinned 
at him and said, "I know we're not supposed to be on the best of 
terms, but�"
	"But� What?" Takezo asked warily. He did NOT trust this girl.
	"How would you like to make some extra cash working for me?"



	Bob blinked. "How many subplots are spinning through that head 
of yours, Takezo?"
	"A dozen and a half. And only a select few make it into the 
final story."



	"Did you hear, Ukyo?" Kojiro said through half a mouthful of 
okonomiyaki. "Akane's actually going out on a date with Kuno!"
	"So I heard� Say, Kojiro, why aren't you with Nabiki?"
	"I dunno. She said she had something to do. And Takezo's 
missing, too."
	"Oh, really," she said as flatly as she could.
	"You sound like you had a fight with Takezo or something, Ukyo. 
Did you?" Kojiro gave her that innocent look that annoyed the heck out 
of Takezo whenever he used it.
	"No," she said. "We had nothing of the sort."
	"Really?" Those sparkles in his eyes were blinding her.
	"Really." Damn it. What was that woman's game?
	"I guess this is good for you, huh?" Kojiro quipped.
	"Is what good for me?" Ukyo asked.
	"That since Akane's going out on a date with Kuno, this leaves 
your fianc� completely free."
	Ukyo stared at Kojiro. "You� you're right! I completely forgot! 
How could I forget something like that?"
	"Well," Kojiro said, getting a sparkle of intelligence in his 
eyes amid those sparkles of innocence, "I can think of a reason�"

	"Oh yeah? Oh yeah? Oh yeah?!"
	You like him better than me, is that it?
	"Is that so? IS THAT SO?!"
	Ranma ran to the top of the tallest building he could find and 
shouted at the top of his lungs, "AKANE YOU DUMMY!!!"


	
	Bob sighed as he handed back the manuscript to Takezo. "You're 
going to post this no matter what I say, so why make me pre-read it at 
all?"
	"Because I value your opinion."
	"But you already know what I'm going to say."
	"What? That it's so blatantly self-glorifying? Tell me� If that 
detracted from your enjoyment of the story, why are you waiting for 
part 7?"
	"Am not."
	"Riiight."


	High Commander Kojiro Sasaki turned on his mail client and 
sifted through his mail.
	"Hmm. Spam should be limited. This list is now moderated. Sounds 
about right to me."
	"'The Wizard of OZ', featuring Lt. Zechs. Strange.."
	 "Scriviner's '801 TTS Wing'. But I thought he was doing 
BubbleGundam."
	"'I am not a very nice person anymore.' What's this? A Rand 
al'Thor quote? Oh, sorry. It's Tybalt. Hey. You're only doing your 
job. No need to apologize."
	"'Video Girl Aiyah,'. Where do these people come up with these 
ideas?"
	"Ah, here it is. 'Turning Road part 6'. Let's see what the devil 
has to say today, shall we?"

	[Blasphemy! Blasphemy! I shall have my revenge on you, Takezo, 
for breaking my life! And you Kojiro, for usurping the position that 
was granted me by divine right!!!]

	
	"Well," Kojiro said, a strange smile on his face, "this would 
have angered our former High Commander Templar to high heaven. So why 
is it I find myself strangely amused by all of this? Am I being drawn 
to the Dark Side?"
	He chuckled. "Well, Templar, let's drive you out into the open, 
shall we?"


	"Hey, Takezo!" Bob waved to Takezo down the university walkway.
	"Bob!" Takezo slowed down his walk to let Bob catch up with him. 
"What's up?"
	"I just checked my e-mail. Kojiro actually sent constructive C&C 
to you publicly, telling you to keep up the good work!"
	"That's strange," Takezo said as he continued walking.
	"That's all you have to say? That's strange? What about, 'The 
world is going to end'?"
	"Bob, Bob, you know Kojiro's got something up his sleeve, 
otherwise he wouldn't do something like this. Right now, he's weighing 
all the political implications of every move he and I make, and is 
planning his next three moves."
	"And you?"
	"I just like to write."


In Part 8: Kuno and Akane's date! Nabiki and Takezo's plan! Ukyo and 
Kojiro's counterplan! Kojiro and Templar's political maneuverings! 
Bob's and Takezo's third bowl of gyudon!

Scorecard:
BubbleGundam: 3 pts.
Space Quest for Glory W: So you want to be like Heero : 2 pts for each 
game, 5 pts for the anime.
Logs in Love: 3 pts
List split: 1 pt
Ronin list: 5 pts for everyone on it.
Fic by Switch: 5 pts and Switch's gratitude for naming it.
"AKANE YOU DUMMY!": Name the episode where the scene comes from, get 5 
pts.
"Wizard of OZ" : 5 pts.
"I am not a very nice person anymore": Name the book -- 3 pts; Reason 
why Tybalt and line used in same breath - 5 pts; If you're Tybalt - 
pat on back, we appreciate the job you're doing.
Video Girl Aiyah: Name the series and character - 5 pts

=====
TimeRunner's Page:
http://www.geocities.com/Tokyo/Towers/7482

icq: 7153134 (Keiichi)
=====

"The story grew in the most convoluted way, as many people will be
surprised to learn. Writing episodically meant that when I finished one
episode I had no idea about what the next one would contain. When, in the
twists and turns of the plot, some event suddenly seemed to illuminate
things that had gone before, I was as surprised as anyone else."

--- Douglas Adams, "A Guide to the Guide"

"Mos people who want to be writers don't really want to be writers. They
want to HAVE BEEN  writers."

--- James A. Michener