Disclaimer: All the Tenchi gang are property
of AIC and Pioneer, but again The Tenchi O-Rusuta
universe plan is an arrangement by The Jetset
(Jim 'Diabolo' Moore, Kage Maru 3:16 and Jinchi)
and Kazekera is a creation of Jim 'Diabolo' Moore.

Notes:
This is the second part of 'Tenchi O-Rusuta: Kazekera'
and followes directly on from the last. If you haven;t
read it recently (or at all), and have no intention
of doing so again (or ever), then all you need to
know is that a Dryad called Kazekera has come along
and Mihoshi was in the process of telling the story
of how they first met.
So, on with the story!
-Jim
		
       TENCHI O-RUSUTA©: KAZEKERA
	PART 2- THE DRYAD GUEST

Mihoshi had been visiting the Dryads beautiful 
home planet with her mother, when she was 
about six years old. She was staying in a 
lodge, which were dotted all around one half 
of the planet where hardly any cities were. 
It was near some others, including one with 
#a dragon-like silver-and-gold haired woman 
#lived, who went out everyday 'to hunt bears' 
so the other children around told her.
One evening, when the sun was turning from 
the afternoon gold to pink, she was walking 
along a river bank near her lodge when she 
saw a shape nearer the water.
She got closer and noticed it was a little 
Dryad boy. He was quite tall for his age, 
and with long bronze hair. His body was lightly 
tanned and slightly furry. The hair down his back 
was a pleasant mossy green.
'Why is his hair so different there?' she wondered. 
This would become a matter of some importance to 
both of them during the course of their relationship.
She went down to join the little boy and spoke to 
him softly, so as not to frighten him.
"Hi. What are you doing?"
The boy turned round and smiled at her- he did 
not seem at all frightened, so she guessed it must have worked.
"Oh, hello. I'm just looking at the river."
"Why?"
"It's pretty." 
"I suppose so."
This agreement was a sign of what was to be an 
instant, life-long bond as children can so often 
form (as easily as a deep dislike) in a single sentence. 
"Who are you?"
"My name is Mihoshi. I live near here. Or at least, 
I'm staying here."
"I'm Kazekera. My parents call me little Kaz. 
You can if you like, although I'm not as little as you."
"No, your not." Said Mihoshi, and laughed. 
Then she tried a new line of conversation.
"Do you know that gold lady who hunts bears?" said Mihoshi
Kazekera whipped round, almost tearfully
"My mummy would never hurt any animal just for 
hunting! You don't go listening to the other kids, they're 
just being silly!"
"She's your mum? Can you hunt too?"
"Yeah. I can fight as well. Do you want to fight me?"
"No! I can't fight."
"Oh. Okay." Kazekera looked crestfallen.
At this moment, the respective parents of the two little 
kawaiis (Lit: I think it means 'cuties' or something similar. 
I would appreciate anyone who knows what it means to tell me, 
because if I'm wrong it could be embarrassing. - Jim) 
were talking together.
Actually they knew each other quite well, having been seeing 
each other around since Mihoshi and her mother had arrived. 
Kera, 'the silver-gold lady', did indeed hunt  because 
unlike the other Dryads around this area she was a Nobilis Dryad. 
Mrs. Mihoshi was saying how beautiful the Dryads planet was 
and how she wanted to stay here  for a while, but couldn't 
pay the rent. Here came a wonderful solution- 
Kera offered her a job in town where she worked, 
and Mrs. Mihoshi accepted, although 
she was worried about how her little daughter would respond 
if she revealed that they were going to stay here for a lot 
longer than she had intended. Of course, by the end of that day 
she would know that Mihoshi responded to this news by jumping 
with joy and laughing, but now the girl in question was still 
talking with the little Dryad she had met by the river.
"Er...what type are you, Mihoshi?"
"I donno...why? Do I have to be one?"
Kazekera thought deeply.
"Don't think so. It's just everyone is here."
"What type are you, little Kaz?"
Kazekera swelled with childish pride.
"I am a hybrid from the family of Bronze and the consortium 
of the Hammer."
"Ooo...what does that mean?" said Mihoshi after a careful pause.
"I don't know." Kazekera grinned "But it sounds good, doesn't it?"
"Yeah. Better even than Detective First Class."
"Is that what you're going to be, Mihoshi?"
"Yeah!" squeaked Mihoshi, glad her new friend was interested. 
"I'm gonna join the galaxy police and have a partner and go 
round fighting crime! I'll have a uniform and an office 
and my own coffee dispenser and...and..." she thought, her mind 
whizzing with things she would get when she was an officer 
of the galaxy police "and a ship all of my own!" she finished.
A bee buzzed in the aftermath of this triumphant speech.
"Wow." Concluded her new friend. Then he looked over at the river.
"That is really beautiful" he stated calmly. Mihoshi 'oooed' 
in agreement, and then started playing with the grass by her feet.
"Mihoshi..." started Kaz, then stopped and looked at the ground. 
Mihoshi looked up and the returned to her grass when he slowed.
"Mihoshi..." he tried again 10 seconds later.
"What, Kaz?"
"...er...nothing."
He carried on looking at the river. She carried on playing with 
her grass.
"Mihoshi." He finally said with authority.
"Yes, Kaz?" He hugged his legs to him and blushed deeply.
"Would you...would you be my girlfreind?" Mihoshi's blue eyes lit 
up at this question. She hugged Kazekera round his tanned body, 
squeezing him till his eyes started watering.
"Well, Kaz..." she started to say... 

"And that's the question I've been trying to answer ever since." 
Mihoshi finished.
"Wow. I wonder after a heart warming story like that you could 
remain cold at all, Ayeka." Said Ryoko, looking over at her 
sulking rival.
"Huh!" said Ayeka, and tossed her hair, almost knocking Sesami over. 
"I wonder why, if Mihoshi loves him so much, they don't just 
go and...what's the human expression?"
"Get a room?" attempted Ryoko. As Ayeka was about to return 
an acerbic rebuke, Kazekera re-entered.
"Hello again. I think I forgot something...ah! There it is." 
He bent down and retrieved the photo of the house from the 
table where he had left it.
"Could one of you tell me where I could find your resident 
scientist? She's not in her lab."
"Oh, she's..."  began Ayeka, but just then Washu herself 
entered from the garden, accompanied by Ryo-ohki. 
"Miss Washu!" cried Kazekera "What are you doing here?" 
he sounded as shocked as the others had when he first arrived.
"You!" said Washu "I recognise that face staring at me from behind 
a desk! Kazekera!"   
"You know him too?" asked Ryoko unbelievingly 
"What is this, a conspiracy or something?"
"Ah..." sighed Washu. Her eyes sparkled. 
"He was my best pupil. His parents sent him back in time to learn 
with me. 
He always knew the formulas, got his reports in on time, 
and he kept my second most able pupil in control."
"Who was that?"
"Weren't you paying attention when we were getting killed by him? 
Kagato! He was always daydreaming and threatening other kids, but Kaz 
here kept him in line...ah..."
but then Washu grabbed a newspaper from a nearby table and set about 
her 'star pupil' with it viciously. She shouted at his between hits.
"BUT...THEN...YOU...LEFT...AND KAGATO...IMPRISONED...ME...AND...
RYOKO...FOR...THOUSANDS...OF...YEARS! 
Why did you have to go? WHY?"
It was clear that Washu had hurt Kazekera's feelings, if not his body, 
with these remarks.
"Little Washu, you know that he couldn't have travelled back to his 
own time after that!" 
said Mihoshi, eyes misting at the site of her "old friend"'s clear 
emotional pain. Washu slowed down her beating, panting and 
sweatdropping.
"DON'T...GIVE...ME...THAT!" she shouted, and then fell backwards, 
completely unconscious. 
"I think she's been hit by the sun a little too much, young ladies." 
Kazekera said as he caught the little sunburned genius. 
"She should rest in her lab. Come on my love."
He carried her down with Tenchi and Kiyone who had offered to help 
unpack. Then, arm linked with Mihoshi, he went off to collect things 
from his pod.

The lab was dark and cool, but Washu carried on snoring.
Tenchi guessed it must be overworking more than the sun which made 
Washu so tired. Kazekera handed down yet another trunk for Tenchi 
and Kiyone to unpack once 
again thanking them for their kindness, and Mihsohi dropped a bag 
down the stairs accidentally, but luckily it neither hurt the two 
industrious unpackers or damaged Washu's precious equipment. 
Then the two went off laughing and joking for what seemed like the 
thousandth time, but counting the trunks it was probably 
only the sixth.  Much to Tenchi's (and possibly Kiyone's) 
disappointment, there was almost nothing risqué about the contents 
of the packages, and so they made a little light conversation.
"I just hope when Washu comes round she doesn't hit us for letting 
Kazekera in here." Said Tenchi
"Yeah." replied Kiyone, thoughtfully.
She had been acting thoughtful since Kazekera arrived.
"Do you know him?" Tenchi asked her "I mean, have you met him before?"
"No, I've never even seen him before."
"You didn't seem too surprised to see him. In fact you seemed to know 
everything about him."
"Yeah, well, he sent us...Mihoshi, a lot of letters. I'll show you..."  
She ran upstairs to her and Mihoshi's 'temporary' room and handed 
Tenchi a bundle of letters hand written in neat script. 
"Here you go."
Kiyone said hesitantly. 
"Mihoshi won't mind. She insisted that I read them with her. 
I suppose she never mentioned him because no one asked. She does that 
kind of thing."
"Yeah, I know."
"These are about his work, and his family. He puts everything 
into those letters. But he usually puts in some interesting stuff at 
the back."
Tenchi riffled through the sheets to the back. 
There might turn out to be something risqué 
about their tall guest after all.
"Er...but I'm not sure you should read those..."
But Tenchi had spotted a word and was reading intently.
"Don't worry. Wow...I'm surprised these didn't scorch the pages."
"Try this one...it gave us a giggle on The Yagami because, 
well...he did...illustrations."
Kiyone blushed deeply- her cheeks went wine red, in sharp contrast 
with her hair.
"Is this physically possible? I should show these Dad and Grampa!"
"Don't you dare Tenchi Masaki! I'm not even sure 
I should have showed you these in the first place!"
"Relax Kiyone, it was a joke! Hey...there's something about you here... 
best wishes to your partner Kiyone, I hope her birthday went to plan. 
Sorry I couldn't be there, but I was a little busy. Send my regards, 
Kazekera."
"I never saw that! Show me!" Tenchi passed the letter. There was a 
whole paragraph congratulating Kiyone on her missions, presumably 
before she had joined Mihoshi.
Her eyes misted over a little.
" Oh...how...sweet. He shouldn't really be writing to people he 
doesn't know, silly man, that's just asking for trouble, but..." 
this attempt at rebuke was well recognised by Tenchi as the rarely 
used I'm-a-big-strong-independent-police-woman-and-will-not-show
-my-emotions style attempt at regaining her sobriety and asserting 
herself. And Tenchi knew better than to tell the cyan follicled 
police woman that she had a very small tear in her eye.  

Washu didn't mind, in fact she rather liked the company of Kazekera.
She did numerous studies of him in his sleep, and concluded, 
correctly, that he was a Metal \ Hammer Dryad hybrid. 
When Tenchi foolishly asked
"Little Washu, I thought Dryads were just in mythology- 
how come Kazekera IS one?
She had given him a lengthy explanation.
The Dryads, she said, were indeed a real species which had lived on 
the Earth for some while, but died out. They had also evolved on 
their own millions of light years away, in an almost incredible 
coincidental evolutionary phenomenon of natural selection. 
These Dryads were now in two separate species- 
Dryadis Nobilis and Dryadis Superior, one remaining warlike and one 
becoming civilised. Although there was and is no active war between 
the two, they do not mix as a rule. They come in types, Nimbus (air), 
Crystal, Metal, Fire, Water and Hammer (earth and plants). 
Dryadic hybrids are very rare, and Kazekera was a shining example 
of the warrior ways of Nobilis and the intelligence of the Superior. 
Tenchi had then scratched his head and asked if he could go. 
Washu told him okay then she didn't know why she bothered. 
So Tenchi went off to breakfast.
Kazekera was starting to fit in well, he thought. 
But just then he had a nasty fright. 
They were just starting breakfast when Kazekera said
"Would you pass the salt, Ten-chan?"
Tenchi almost leapt from his seat at this. No one else seemed to 
have noticed. As soon as they were finished, Tenchi pulled Kazekera 
aside for a talking to.
"Kaz- has anyone ever told you about the correct usage of certain 
terms?"
"What?" the Dryad said, mystified. 
"You don't call another man 'chan!' It means lover or...
well, you know!" 
Tenchi hissed.  
"What? Oh! I'm sorry, Master Tenchi! It was the only word in your 
language 
which seemed appropriate..."
"What do you mean?"
"In my culture, it is usual to apply three sorts of respect to a 
person. That of elder, equal and younger- with a man, it's father, 
brother, son, a woman is mother, sister, daughter."
"We have something a little similar."
"But we use the same term for everything. It's all in the inflection."
"And what is that term?"
"Runu. You, for example, are Runu Masaki or Tenchi Runu. 
You have to put it in the space for the missing name."
"Well, use that." Said Tenchi.
Kazekera spent a while telling Tenchi all about 'Runu', 
before he had to go and train with his grandfather. 
Tenchi resigned him to the fact that still a few certain 
things about Kaz would always throw the household, 
but he supposed they could all get used to it. 
He was certainly learning some interesting stuff about 
Dryad culture. And about Kazekera himself. For example, 
they practised no discrimination, or even identification, 
of the sexes- it was, in essence, a matter of choice 
who you were and who you loved. There were no concepts of 
homosexuality in Dryad culture, although it was generally 
accepted that at some time you should take a mate of the 
opposite sex. That was why Kazekera had difficulty learning 
the different terms for 'man' and 'woman' in the Earth tongue- 
his, hers, and so on- because there just wasn't any difference 
in his society. 
The rest if the day was not quite as revealing about his 
mysterious guest, and went a little like this...

THE END

Well, that's all for now. I have to say that this is one of
my favourite episodes of the whole thing, so I hope
you enjoyed it as much as is humanly possible. 
Any comments can go to

comageddon@ntlworld.com
or
jetset@ntlworld.com

Till next time, and the next romantically
involved episode of 
Tenchi O-Rusuta©: Kazekera,
byebye.

-Jim 'Diabolo' Moore