LAST EDITED ON Mar-26-02 AT 11:03 AM (EST)
 

> While I got some of the big russets out from under the sink, 
>washed them, and started chopping them for home fries, I thought about 
>my old friend Logan. 
> I first met Logan eight years ago, on my first trip with Rose to 
>Japan, where I was to learn to handle myself abroad and defend myself 
>against bladed weapons by spending the summer touring the country 
>alone and being randomly attacked by ninja.  It was a pain in the ass, 
>but I can handle a swordsman now, and it did wonders for my ability to 
>swear in Japanese.  Anyway, I was getting my jusan-sai gaijin butt 
>kicked in a teahouse in Osaka when one of the guys trying his best to 
>skewer me knocked over this little hairy guy's tea table.  The little 
>hairy guy didn't appreciate that, and in expressing his displeasure, 
>he made one hell of a mess.  Then he bought me some squid. 
> Rose turned up for one of her periodic spot checks while we 
>were eating and didn't seem very pleased, since A, I was supposed to 
>handle the ninja on my own and B, she apparently knew Logan and didn't 
>like him.  The feeling seemed to be mutual.  She backed off a little 
>bit when she discovered that the ninja involved in this altercation 
>hadn't been part of the Ibuki Clan, with whom Rose's arrangement to 
>help with my training had been, and that these had, in fact, been 
>trying to kill me - but she still didn't like Logan. 
> That was all right with me; she was welcome to her opinion. 
>I, on the other hand, liked him quite a bit.  I hung out with him for 
>the rest of the summer, traveling all over Japan, Okinawa and South 
>Korea, learning far more than Rose ever thought I would (and in some 
>respects more than she ever -hoped- I would, but that's another story) 
>and getting into all manner of trouble.  After a while the Ibuki Clan 
>didn't need to bother me any more; they could see I was getting quite 
>enough practice without their help, so they switched to observing and 
>providing backup where needed.  You may have noticed that there isn't 
>a ninja crime syndicate in Japan called the Order of the Emerald Dawn 
>any more.  That's because of Logan and me, eight years ago.  

For some reason I'm thinking of Bud Spencer and Terence Hill now. ^_^;

 >For the last year or so he's had his wing over Jubilee, a 
>runaway from a California orphanage who'd been living in a shopping 
>mall for months when he found her - or maybe she found him.  It's hard 
>to say who's adopted whom in that relationship. 
> Which is why it was so alarming that she'd turned up on my 
>doorstep without him.  The last I knew they were in Arizona, hiking 
>the mountains around Flagstaff. 

And again something happens to a friend of WL Gryphon. I'm sensing a theme here. ^^;

(Edit: Gotta hate typos)