Schoolgirl Kenshin and the Badfic of Doom
Chapter 5

Conveniently, it was a Sunday, meaning there was no class. Kenshin relaxed a little, though he was still on alert – one could never be too careful when dealing with either badfics or parody fics, after all, particularly the badfic parodies.

Karou was off with some friends. She had said something about "shopping" and "Hot Topic", but Kenshin hadn't been paying much attention. The radio was still on, a distant, annoying hum in the background until Kenshin figured out how to turn it off. Oddly enough, despite being in Japan, all it ever played was those depressing-sounding English songs. He supposed it fit, considering his predicament.

His roommate didn't return until a few minutes before curfew, leaving Kenshin with many hours of personal time. He spent the first few hours sulking, but he then decided that that wasn't very productive. "Well...maybe those fanfiction writers actually have something going," he murmured to himself, cringing. It was a way to pass the time.

---

Finally, a midnight-haired girl dragged herself inside, dropping her bags to the floor and slumping on the couch conveniently placed parallel to the computer Kenshin was seated at.

He quickly clicked the "x" button on the window he had open: a steamy KxK lemon. There were some things best kept to oneself, after all. "How was your day, Karou-dono?" he said, trying his best to remain polite. If he was stuck here for one more chapter, he might as well attempt pleasantry.

"My name is Kauru," she said, like it was obvious, "and it sucked. Life sucks. I suck."

"Kar - Kauru-dono, you don't need to be so down, de gozaru. Try to cheer up." Hey, if he could remain positive in this insane fic, anyone could.

"Tomorrow's the sports festival between this school and the local public school, Bakayarou High."

"...Dumbass High?"

Kauru shrugged nonchalantly. "I think it was named after its founder."

"Oro."

"Anyway, take me, please? Otherwise, I can't go on...I need to find my razor so I can cut myself and be all emo."

Kenshin sighed. "Hai. This one will go with you, de gozaru."

Kauru looked up at him, tears and the all-too-heavy mascara from her eyelids dripping down her face. "Thank you. Will you be my lover now and be all possessive and tie me up?"

"Oro...no."

"Damn. It was worth a shot."

---

It was the day of the school festival. To Kenshin, it hadn't come nearly soon enough, as Kauru had been clinging to him all night like a drowning squirrel would cling to salvation's tree branch, or some similarly lousy simile.

The grounds were brightly decorated. Principal Shimatta was sitting on a random, high balcony, with a microphone in hand. "Students, welcome to Konoyarou and Bakayarou Highs' first annual sports festival, which is actually just a pathetic excuse to get all of you together at once by an uncreative writer! Have a great time, and remember: Someone help me! I'm forty seven years old, and I still live with my mom!"

Kauru - or was it Karou? Kenshin could never keep those names straight anymore - pulled him from stall to stall, begging him to buy her things. Apparently, she had forgotten all about her emo/goth streak the previous night. That is, until...

"Yo. You're totally stealing my girl, yo, an' I don' like that, man," said a white-haired teen wearing an enormous pair of sunglasses and a lot of bling.

"Enishi!" Kauru said, gasping. "I'm not your girl anymore, remember?"

"Look, girl, I know I proba'ly creeped ya' out wid' the whole stalkin' thing an' all, but y'know I love ya', right?" Enishi gave her the puppy-dog eyes, which Kenshin found rather disturbing on a thug/gangsta/drug dealer.

"Well...I'll go back to you on one condition: You tie me to your bed immediately and force me to have hawtsex with you."

"Deal, yo."

"Sorry, Kenshin," she said, looking back at him unapologetically, "but I've got a bad smut fic to star in." With that, Kauru disappeared.

Kenshin sighed, shrugged, and turned around, immediately bumping into a hyperactive underclassman, who simply beamed at him and started doing jumping jacks, out of nowhere. "Hi!" she said, bubbling. "I'm Misao! I'm about as mature as a three-year-old who's high on drugs! Ooh, the colors!"

A taller figure loomed up behind him, and Kenshin fought the urge to flinch. It was Aoshi, or at least, it looked like Aoshi. "I'm Aoshi," he said. Well, that answered that...maybe. "I'm her boyfriend, but she's an annoying little bitch, so I'm going to go cheat on her with Megumi behind the bathrooms, where anyone can find us and watch. Later."

Kenshin shuddered. Not Aoshi. Definitely not Aoshi.

"Waah! Aoshi-sama, don't leave!" the jade-eyed (or were her crystalline orbs more of an emerald color?) girl wailed. "Oh well. Guess I'll go do some LSD with Soujirou, then, who I'll randomly call Sou-chan!" She skipped off into the distance before tripping over her own feet. "I'm okay!" she said, even though no one was listening.

And then...Kenshin saw a face he had never expected to see again, particularly not in this fic. He reached out to touch her face, just to prove that this wasn't a hallucination. "Tomoe..."

"Like, eww," the girl with pitch-black hair said, drawing away from him as if he held something repulsive on his hand. "Hello, my name's Tomeo, not Tomoe, and you're, like, less popular than, like, that tree over there, so don't touch me, okay? In fact, like, stay away from me entirely. Like, gag me with a spoon, wtf."

A boy ran towards them. Kenshin's eyes widened, and he couldn't keep from gasping. Tomeo gave him a condescending look, but he didn't notice. "Kiyosato Akira," he murmured under his breath.

"Tomeo! Do you need help? Is there anything that I, as your often forgotten star quarterback trophy boyfriend, can do for you?"

"Yes, there, like, is. Like, get me away from this loser," she said, pointing to Kenshin, "and, like, buy me lots of, like, stuff!"

"I am yours to command! I will buy you the entire country of Japan if I must in order to win your love."

Tomeo scoffed. "You're, like, almost as bad as that thing. Don't, like, forget that the only reason I, like, put up with you is because you're, like, popular and, like, rich."

"I know, but one day...!"

"For the love of, like, god, like, get me the hell, like, out of here!"

"I'll hail the best limo in Japan for you, my sweet."

Tomeo rolled her eyes, mouthing the words "Like, save me," to Kenshin before the limo arrived and the two departed.

"That was...interesting, de gozaru."

"And painful to write," the school's mascot, someone in a wombat costume, commented. Wait.

"Misaoshiru-dono?" Kenshin said, incredulous.

"The one and only."

"Why are you wearing the wombat costume, de gozaru ka?"

"So I can use mad stealth ninja wombat skillz0rs. Duh."

"Oro..."

"So. How are you coping?"

"Fairly well, this one supposes. No thanks to you."

"If you have any questions, you know, now's the time to ask them."

"Just what part of Japan is this, anyway, de gozaru ka?"

"Uzbekistan."

Kenshin gaped at me...I mean, her. "Sessha thought Uzbekistan was a country, de gozaru."

"That's what they want you to think." There was a strange glint in misaoshiru's eyes as she said this, visible despite teh wombat suit of d00m.

"They, de gozaru ka?"

"Yes, they. In italics."

Kenshin sighed. Perhaps it was better not to ask... "Why this one?" he said instead. "Plenty of other fandoms seem to be filled with badfics, de gozaru."

"Yeah, but you're my favorite."

It might have occurred to Kenshin to be flattered by this statement, had it come from anyone else. But... "What about Pirates of the Caribbean, de gozaru ka? This one thought you were rather infatuated with that at the moment..."

"True, but Captain Jack Sparrow is crazy enough as is."

"...Good point."

"Anyway, I have to run. They're giving away free Mountain Dews in the cafeteria!"

"Oro..." This situation had bad written all over it.

---

Kenshin was barely able to take three steps before encountering another familiar person. Well, a familiar face. "Hi," said face said. "I'm Sanosk-Sanou-Sano, and I want to get to know you better."

Kenshin sweatdropped. The sweat broke. Angrily, it blew a raspberry at him - it turns out that sweat really doesn't like being dropped. "No thanks, de gozaru."

"Aww..."

And then came the ambush. "Kyaa!1!tenthousandonehundredandone! There he is!"

He groaned. Great. Fangirls. Not only that, but they were the writer's friends, even worse.

"He's even cuter in person!" an older teenager, SuperSheba (A.K.A. Mi-chan,) squealed. "Kaoru's so lucky."

"Hold him down - I want to play with his hair!" Lem said, her hair falling down her back in a cascade of ocean blue, her sparkling gray-blue orbs glinting more than usual in glee.

"I'd like a crack at it, too," PraiseDivineMercy added, reaching out to touch it. Kenshin flinched away.

"Shouldn't I be the first allowed to touch his hair?" an Australian redhead - the well-known Nekotsuki - said, smirking. "I mean, it was down for most of 'Tanabata Jasmine'. I provided you all with fanservice, so..."

"Oro... Sessha remembers that fic, de gozaru. It hurt."

Nekotsuki merely gave an evil grin in response.

Sano stared at Kenshin, mouth agape. "Wait, you're a guy? Oh well; that works, too. If you want to go with me to my house, I've got some really sexy movies we could watch together," he said in a seductive voice.

Apparently, some random, possibly rabid yaoi fangirls had approached when no one was looking, for there was a collective swooning at Sano's words.

"Umm...sessha would really like to go with you, but, uh...Look, a three-headed monkey, de gozaru yo!" Kenshin pointed in a random direction. When everyone's eyes were averted, he took off with godlike speed.

...And bumped right into his former roommate.

"M-Mary Sue-dono!" he said, staring.

"Yup, it's me," she said, giggling. "After my heroic death, I've finally returned to become your bride! I know that you're a guy because I have a special, uh...guy-sense that tingles whenever I see my husband-to-be!"

"Oro...this one is married, de gozaru. And...your heroic death?"

"Oh, Kenshin, Kenshin," Mary Sue said, sighing. "Don't you remember? I gave my life protecting you from evil guys from the sea who wanted your soul for a hundred years' service on their crew. Wait, or was it from the guy who marooned you twice on an island and left you to die? I don't remember anymore."

"Anou...sessha thinks you have the wrong fandom, de gozaru... And this one really must be going." Kenshin bolted.

Mary Sue was right behind him, despite his godlike speed. "You can't outrun someone who's half-cheetah, silly! Oh, wait...was it half-cheetah or half-panther?"

Kenshin tried to run faster...and ran into another teenager. "Hi," the boy said. "My name's Harry Potter, and I think I'm in the wrong fic, so I'll be going now."

The distraction was just enough for Mary Sue to tackle-glomp Kenshin, who made a mental note to tell the writer to quit having him always bump into people. He wasn't that clumsy...was he? "Oh, Kenshin, don't you see? This is destiny! Oh," she said, seeing Harry for the first time. "Who's he? He's cute..."

Salvation! "This is...umm...Parry Hotter-san, and he's your husband to be," Kenshin said, feigning a smile.

"I love you!" Mary Sue said, trying to latch onto Harry, who ran.

"All I wanted is to make it back to Hogwarts!"

"At least let me have your babies first, Hotter-sama!"

Kenshin sighed in almost-relief. Well, that was one problem down. And, conveniently, another was approaching him at that moment.

Misaoshiru was whistling, practically drunk on Mountain Dew. "Oh, hiya, Kenzhin," she slurred.

"The reason you said you wanted this one here was penguins," Kenshin said, his voice cold and hard, his eyes narrowed amber slits. "I see no penguins. Send. Me. Home."

"Are you blind?" misaoshiru shouted, all signs of almost-drunkenness gone. "There are penguins everywhere!"

Kenshin was about to respond with something along the lines of "I'm not blind, but you're definitely insane! I want my wife!" when he noticed that he was surrounded by the various self-inserts and OOC characters. Then, when they started pulling down their hidden zippers...

That was when Kenshin snapped. It wasn't a Saitou-like snapping, either. It was a sitting-in-fetal-position-"I want to go home"-sort of snapping.

And then...that was when the real Kaoru, Yahiko, and Sanosuke appeared.

Kaoru took one glance at her husband before turning to misaoshiru, jabbing her hard in the stomach with a finger. " Listen, misaoshiru! You're going to fix this mess; can't you see you're driving the poor man insane?"

"I know, I know," misaoshiru whined. "Just send him to therapy and I'll pay for it."

"You expect me to let you off that easily, when you have tortured Kenshin, my husband, so much?"

"Okay, I'll admit I'm cheap. Hmm… How 'bout I throw in a trip to a hypnotist to make him turn into a mass of hormones every time you say the word 'banana'?"

"…Deal."

Sanosuke winced. "Jou-chan, that's not the kind of thing I want to hear from you."

"Yeah," Yahiko said, cringing. "Eww…"

"What? I have needs, too."

"…Let's change the subject," Sanosuke said with a final twitch before pointing at misaoshiru. "You had better have a way to get us back home. Now."

"Fine… Spoilsport." The writer donned a pair of sparkly red shoes and tapped their heels together. "There's no time like Meiji. There's no time like Meiji."

"Why does that scream rip-off?" Yahiko muttered. He was ignored.

"There's no time like Meiji…"

---

Somehow, all four Kenshin-gumi and the writer were knocked out. Travel by crossover wasn't for the faint of heart, after all. Worse, they all had pounding headaches when they awoke.

"Oro…?"

"Oi, Neko," Sanosuke said, poking misaoshiru.

She twitched. "Just because I wear cat ears…"

"Never mind that. Where the hell are we?"

The writer looked around, only to see a yellow brick road and what may have been a castle in the distance. "...Tori atama, I don't think we're in Uzbekistan anymore…"

That was all that could be said before the group was attacked by a swarm of flying monkeys.

---

End!

---

Author's Notes:
And with that, the fic is finally complete. This is actually only my second time completing a multi-chapter fic, so it's really exciting.

Lem told me I should explain why I couldn't write as well or as quickly as I wanted to. Well...let's just say that I spent a ton of cursed gold and had to put it all back in the chest along with a human sacrifice. Yup.

(I swear, that was her idea, not mine.)

So...as a final word...

Omake

"You tried to put whipped cream on this one's hot cocoa!" Kenshin pouted.

"So?" misaoshiru said, raising an eyebrow. "A lot of people like whipped cream on their cocoa. I know I do."

"There's no accounting for taste," he mumbled.

"You know," misaoshiru said, grinning, "for a moment there, well...let's just say that you could have given the readers a rather more...risqué impression than you intended."

Kenshin shuddered. "Let's not go there. Please."

"Already have."

The redhead sighed. He had a distinctly bad feeling about this...

---

And with that, I must bid you all adieu.

You will always remember this as the day that you almost caught Captain misaoshiru! -trips over something- Oro...