The Mystery of the Masaki Shrine


"Excuse me, is this the Masaki shrine?" Tenchi turned from his sweeping to face the speaker. It was a gaijin girl with short brown hair, glasses and wearing a turtle neck.

He immeadiately thought it was odd that so many gaijin had come to the shrine, especially in light of a lot of recent events. He could only imagine the rumors floating about this place. He couldn't help but hope that the two girls of this odd group didn't suddenly develop a liking for him.

"Yes it is, are you tourists?"

"Well actually we're here to solve the mystery of the Shrine," the speaker was a tall blonde gaijin with some kind of orange scarf.

"What mystery?" Tenchi asked, genuinely confused.

"Well all the locals told us this place was being terrorized by a demon that was released from the shrine," this time it was the red head that was talking.

"Oh, you mean Ryoko." The gaijin seemed surprised by his casual comment.

"Roko?" Tenchi blinked, the dog had just talked.

"Wait a minute," Tenchi snapped. "I'm not this fluent in English!"

"Oh don't worry about it," the blonde gaijin waved that aside. "It seems like everywhere we go everybody speaks English."

"Oh...Kay."

"Anyway, what's a Ryoko?" the tall skinny kid in the green shirt asked. "Because they won't be happy until we solve a mystery here."

"I've never heard of that particular creature either," the girl with the glasses noted.

"Ryoko's...hard to explain."

"That's odd, you don't seem scared at all," the blonde guy said again.

"Yeah, usually people are either terrified or denying the stories," the red-haired girl agreed.

"Maybe there isn't a mystery here and we can go," the skinny kid said.

"Yeah, ret's ro," Tenchi arched an eyebrow and stared at the dog.

"Actually he seems embarrased," the brown haired girl noted. "Maybe HE'S behind whatever pranks have people thinking there's a demon up here."

"Huh? Between training and tending the fields I don't have much time for pranks."

"Sure, that's what you say," the blonde guy pressed. "But I think you are this..." Ryoko popped into existence next to Tenchi, the gaijin tourists all jumped.

"Tenn..."

"ITS A MONSTER!!!" the tall skinny one called out running for hiding.

"I'M NOT A....what language am I speaking?" Ayeka appeared out of the house in time for the comment about a monster.

"OHOHOHOHOHOHOHO!!! They have you pegged right, Ryoko!! You are a...wait a minute, what language ARE we speaking?" Ayeka looked confused for a moment.

"English," Tenchi answered. "Don't ask me how we're speaking it."

"A monster and a banshee," the blonde said nervously from several yards away. "This mystery keeps getting more mysterious."

"Let's get out of here Freddy!" the red-head whispered.

"WHAT DID YOU CALL ME!?!" Ayeka demanded, ignoring the redundancy of the blonde's comment.

"Hey, hey, everybody calm down," Tenchi said. "Excuse me, I don't know your names."

"Uh, Fred Jones," the blonde said. "This is Daphne Blake, that's Velma Binkley, that's Shaggy and the dog is Scooby Doo."

"Scooby Dooby Doo," the dog agreed nervously. Ayeka and Ryoko looked at each other before staring at the dog in confusion.

"Okay, well I'm Tenchi, and the two girls you just called a monster and a banshee are Ryoko and Ayeka."

"THAT'S the demon from the shrine," the one called Shaggy blinked.

"I'm not a demon," Ryoko said, sitting down...in midair. The gaijin blinked and looked at each other nervously.

"Re's frying!" the dog barked.

"Wow, where's the wire?" Velma asked. This "monster" seemed intent on not scaring them, strangely enough. Or rather they just didn't care about scaring them.

"What wire? Anyway, I'm Ryoko, a space pirate and Tenchi's my boyfriend!"

"Oh an Alien, we've heard that one before," Fred laughed. Ryoko glared at him as AYeka gave her own reaction to Ryoko's introduction."

"Why you reprehensible woman! I am destined to wed Lord Tenchi and you know it," Ayeka turned to face the gaijin. "I am PRINCESS Ayeka daughter of the second Empress of Jurai."

"I take it your father remarried then," Velma asked, as she tried to cover the fact that she had never heard of "Jurai" before.

"Of course not!" Ayeka snapped. "Neither of the Empresses has yet died, and with Lord Tenchi alive there is no need of an heir to the throne."

"Wait a minute, he has TWO wives," "Daphne" sounded mildly annoyed.

"That's weird," Shaggy agreed, the dog nodded right along with him.

"Of course, it is the tradition of the Jurai kings and queens to take two spouses," Ayeka explained. "At first it appeared I would have to take two husbands, but since Lord Tenchi is the most eligible to take the...." Ayeka paused and turned to face a mirrored thoughtful expression on Ryoko's face. Tenchi began to look very nervous.

"So why are you two fighting over him if you can both marry him?" Shaggy asked.

"Yeah why are we?" Ryoko asked.

"Oh no," Tenchi whimpered.

"Let me guess," Fred started. "You were playing them off of each other so they wouldn't press you for a commitment until you were older."

"And I would have gotten away with it, if it weren't for you meddling kids," Tenchi paused. "Actually this is something of a relief, why'd I say that?"

"Oh every body does," Velma said. Daphne was eyeing Fred closely and analysing how quickly he had come up with that answer.

"Okay..someone said meddling kids," Shaggy interrupted, then whimpered. "Can we go now?"

"Yeah, ro now," the dog agreed.

"Suure," Daphne agreed. "Come on, I think that I need to talk to Fred anyway." Fred swallowed nervously as the gaijin walked away. Then the two girls turned on Tenchi and smiled.

Well at least I don't have to choose between them now, Tenchi sighed expressively. Though trying to get through school before getting married is going to be a lot tougher now.


Anime@Fan.Fic