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From: Philip John Stroffolino <ps1o+@andrew.cmu.edu>
Newsgroups: alt.games.sf2
Subject: STORY: HONDA: The Making of a Rogue
Date: Tue, 11 Jan 1994 14:49:50 -0500
Organization: Junior, Math/Computer Science, Carnegie Mellon, Pittsburgh, PA
Lines: 269
Message-ID: <0hAk=Sq00iV547GW8A@andrew.cmu.edu>
NNTP-Posting-Host: andrew.cmu.edu


    "A group in denmark measured barbie and stated that if barbie
    were real, she would not be menstruating as she has too little
    body fat.  Quite a message to send to our little girls."

The frail boy struggled, but it was no use.  He was pinned down and
helpless, as the crowd of youths jeered and gawked.  His attacker was a
bully named Kazuo.

"What is the matter, weakling?" asked Kazuo, "do you need your mommy to
help you up?"

This was an especially cruel taunt, since little Edmund's mother had
recently passed away from a mysterious illness.  Edmund grunted,
thrashed wildly, taking advantage of the his tormentor's momentary
surprise to squirm out from underneath him.  He remembered his mother's
pretty face, and her graceful movements.  Edmund pounced on Kazuo, who
was in the process of standing up.  Miyuki had been the most wonderful
woman in the world, but she was gone -- forever.  Overcome with anguish,
the sobbing Edmund began pummeling Kazuo's face repeatedly, so fast that
his hands were but a blur to the startled onlookers.

Kazuo screamed and flailed, but the tables had been turned, and there
was no stopping Edmund's fury.  That is, until several of Kazuo's
unscrupulous and loyal friends seized young Edmund by his jacket, and
flung him aside.  They propped him up and immobilized him as Kazuo
staggered to his feet.  Kazuo wiped blood from his torn lip, and picked
up a fist sized stone from the ground. "I'll teach you a lesson you'll
not soon forget," he hissed.

That had been long ago, and Edmund Honda counted himself lucky that his
uncle had chosen that moment to look out the window of his home.  His
bellow alone had sent the urchins scattering.  By the time he had
arrived at Eddy~s side, they were nowhere to be seen.  Honda remembered
his uncle's words well, "I had warned your mother never to get involved
with that soldier!  Your father was a typical American swine, as are
you!  You will never amount to anything, half-breed!  You are nothing
but trouble!"  When Honda was caught stealing rice cakes that same
evening, his uncle used that as an excuse to beat him until he screamed
for mercy.

Honda had never met his father.  He knew only that he had been an
American soldier of Japanese-Korean decent who had escaped from a POW
camp, assisted by his fluency with the Japanese language.  His late
mother, Miyuki, had taken him in, and eventually fallen in love with
him, the man whose first name he carried on.  Before his birth, his
father's identity had somehow been discovered, and the man had died in a
clash with police.  Edmund's mother had told him that his father had
been shot while trying to protect her from an officer that was jerking
her about by her hair, slapping her face, and threatening awful things. 
His uncle on the other hand maintained that his father had fled after
being discovered, abandoning the woman he had claimed to love, and been
shot a few days later while stealing food like a dog.  Perhaps both
versions of his father~s death has truth to them.

But that was a long time ago, Honda reminisced, gravely, unclenching his
fists.  Many slaps from superiors, much eating, and many very short sumo
wrestling matches (with happy endings) later, Honda was now approaching
middle age, and regarded his past without emotion.  He had long since
achieved the honorable status of a champion sumo wrestler, and ran the
most prestigious sumo stable in Japan.  What bothered him this day was
that one of his most promising students, Hiroshi, had humbly asked
permission to leave.  Honda had seen him talking quietly with a
stranger, on more than one occasion, but had never demanded an
explanation, trusting time to make things right.  But now it was too
late.  Honda all but pleaded for him to stay, and had finally told
Hiroshi that if he left, he could never come back.  His words had no
effect other than to cast a veil of silent anger over Hiroshi~s eyes.

Now Honda was hanging from a thick branch of the sacred tree, exercising
his ire away.  Each grunt was accompanied by a great shaking of living
wood as Honda pulled himself higher and higher, climbing towards the
topmost branches.

Honda was powerful beneath his layers of fat.  He was fortunate in that
he had been able to gain considerable mass despite exercising regularly
in secret.  He could do pushups and chin-ups with ease, an incredible
feat considering his weight.  Of course, it was not always easy finding
trees or beams sturdy enough to support him in the latter exercise these
days.  His skills were top-notch, his stamina, balance, sheer strength
and sumo techniques unmatched in all circles.  In addition, he was
extraordinarily quick for a man of his size, propelled by leg muscles
that could easily support a fellow Sumo held across his broad shoulders.
 He would often astonish the younger sumos with his agility by leaping
high into the air, doing a full somersault before landing  with a floor
rippling thomp!

Crack!  Honda had never risked climbing this high, and now he remembered
why.  It was dark as the man came crashing down, still clinging to a
bleeding bough.  It seemed to Honda as if time stood still.  In his
mind, he heard the tree's scream of pain, and envisioned himself
crashing into the ground, his body breaking as surely he deserved.  His
plummet was slowed as he smashed into branch after branch until he
finally broke free from the tree's clutches, and was silhouetted by the
moon ever so briefly before landing flat on the cold, hard ground.  His
whole body felt numb, and he was afraid to move.  Slowly at first, he
tested his limbs, and finally clambered to his feet, shaken and tingling
all over, but apparently without serious injury.  He apologized to the
gods, and knelt to ask forgiveness of the tree.

---

Two tourists starred at him in amazement as he strode down the street, a
large branch held across his massive shoulders. One of them raised her
camera and began taking pictures.  Honda smiled benevolently and would
have waved if he could.  As he passed her, he overheard her jabbering in
English to her companion, and made out only a single word, "circus."  He
flushed red and growled softly with displeasure at her ignorance.  His
body was a work of art, carefully molded over many years of ritualistic
training.  The women did not appear to notice his loss of composure.

As Honda approached the temple, he felt weak.  This branch, I offer, to
be burned...

Returning home, he saw a poster on a shop window, advertising a
"professional wrestling event."  He was overcome with a momentary burst
of anger, tore it down, and crumpled it within his large, sweaty hands.

"Just what do you think you're doing?" asked a tiny (in the relative
sense) foreign businessman, who stepped out of the door of the shop and
gave Honda a baleful glare.

"I am sorry, Sir... I apologize for my rudeness" spoke E. Honda
sincerely, lowering his eyes to the ground "I don't know what came over
me."

The stranger snatched the crumpled paper from Honda, and lovingly
unfolded it, trying to work out the creases as he attempted to put it
back up as neatly as possible, spouting a series of insults all the
while.  Honda was amused, until the rat of a man, apparently mistaking
Honda~s deference for fear, mocked sumo wrestling, calling it "a sport
with no entertainment value tailored to clumsy elephants with no brains
who couldn't fight their way out of a barn against a 'real' fighter."

One quick scooping motion later, the offensive man was held aloft by his
collar, squirming helplessly, shouting for police.  Honda spoke, "Now,
dear Sir.  I'd be more than happy to demonstrate Sumo~s effectiveness,
the art to which I have dedicated my life, to you or anyone else, thank
you very much."

Honda froze.  Hiroshi Hirose's name was on that poster.  In fine print,
near the bottom, but there nevertheless.  He dropped the promoter who
began wheezing and scurried back into his shop on all fours.  "I must
speak to my student," whispered Honda to no one in particular.

---

"The lights - they are so bright...," thought Honda.  He shivered as he
made his way through the rowdy crowd.  It had been an expensive trip to
America, but Honda had money to spare.  His specially tailored suit had
cost more than the two seats he had been forced to buy, for comfort~s
sake, on the plane.  There was no sight of Hiroshi.  "Sit down!" yelled
a large man with a beer in each hand.  Honda moved along quickly,
towards the front row of the stadium.  The crowd was exuberant, as music
began blaring from invisible speakers, flooding the arena.  A deep,
resonant voice boomed, "...and now presenting, straight from the land of
the rising sun, Yokozuna Tanto and the Ninja Kid!"  Honda blinked,
"Yokozuna?"  Before he could finish his thought, he realized he was
standing in the main aisle, and quickly moved aside, finally sitting
heavily in an unoccupied seat, which creaked and trembled under his
weight.  The child next to him stared unashamedly in awe at the giant
who had just crushed his carton of popcorn and extra-large coke without
even flinching.

A familiar looking large robed figure wearing gaudy face paint and a
black garbed "ninja"  strolled down the aisle, to jeers and catcalls.

"And defending the USA tag team title, the immortal Captain USA with his
partner, the ultimate savage, the king of the ring, and mauler and the
brawler, the one and only Hulk Logan!!!" spoke the announcer, as a new
song with a hero's beat began belting out from the speakers.  Honda
covered his ears, and craned his head from side to side, looking for his
student.  "Hiroshi Hirose is here somewhere," he thought,  "I must speak
with him."

Suddenly, as the event began, understanding dawned on Honda, and his
face went pale with horror.  His former pupil was the "yokozuna" in the
ring, shambling around and howling like an untrained pup!  Honda stood
up, his hands clenching the seat in front of him as he watched Hiroshi
get pummeled in the face by the man called Hulk.  Honda's jaw dropped,
and he felt dizzy at such an outrage.  He lumbered towards the ring,
determined to salvage the dignity of his student.  The outrageousness of
the spectacle seared his senses.

The audience howled with glee at the turn of events.  An unknown
enormous man in a fancy suit, his hair in a shiny top knot literally
dove into the ring, flinging himself over the top ropes with astonishing
grace!  The security guards that weren't stunned with surprise bumped
into each other as they jabbed at their walkie-talkies and hustled
towards the center of the arena.

Hiroshi was flailing, held overhead by the one called Hulk, who was
shuffling in a circle, chanting, "Hulk, Hulk!" in a throaty voice.  Hulk
Logan eventually turned to lock eyes with the fattest man he~d ever
faced in a ring, outrageous in a spanking new suit.  His mouth pursed,
as he accidentally dropped "Yokozuna Tanto," backwards over his head. 
His feet flew out from under him.  The security guards would never have
believed what happened next if they hadn~t seen it with their own eyes. 
The enormous intruder crouched slightly, then dove headfirst right over
the still falling "Hulk" catching the newly acquired sumo wrestler in
his arms.  Honda landed, with Hiroshi in his arms.

"Honda-sensei???" gasped Hiroshi Hirose.

"I have come to take you home, 'yokozuna'" spoke Honda, softly.  "We
must leave quickly, Hirose-san.  Let us go now!"  A fake knife fell from
it's hiding place in Hiroshi~s shorts.  "So you fight with a tanto, now,
Hirose-san?" said Honda with an upraised eyebrow.

A strong hand clasped Honda~s shoulder from behind.  The crowd roared. 
From a balcony overhead, the owner gave a thumbs up to the professional
wrestlers in the ring, as he spoke urgently into the security
microphone, "Hold until I give word - the crowd is eating this up..!"

~Who the hell do you think you are, busting in on my act,~ bristled Mr.
Logan.  Hiroshi stumbled backwards away from Honda and Logan, giving a
hurried word of warning to his old teacher as he retreated.

"I mean you no harm," spoke Honda, looking Hulk Logan in the eyes.  "I
am leaving, now."

"Like hell you are!"  Logan's fist slammed into Honda's face -- or did
it?  Suddenly his hand hurt hell.  It felt like it was in a vice.  The
fat guy had caught his punch in an open palm, and was squeezing so hard
he felt he was going to faint.  But then Captain USA slammed into Honda
from behind, breaking his grip.  Logan, his hand still afire with pain,
grappled briefly with the slightly off balance fat man, then bawled like
a baby as he was suddenly flung backwards head over heels out of the
ring.  The crowd booed, and a chant of "USA, USA!" started up.

"Hold your positions!" shouted the owner, as the security guards lunged
forward.

The Ninja Kid and Captain USA both approached Honda at once.  A jolt of
pain shot up Honda's knee as it was forcefully greeted with Captain
USA's booted foot.  "A sumo, eh?" snarled the good captain.  "I always
like to beat the stuffing out of someone for real - might as well be a
slant eyed toad!"

Honda collapsed as his knee buckled again, and managed to block what
would have been a third kick below the belt.  What was supposed to be a
viscous strangle hold from behind turned into a flying ninja that
collided with Captain USA.  The Ninja Kid's mask came loose, revealing a
particularly homely white man.  "A 20 inch neck comes in handy," thought
Honda, huffing and puffing with his exertion.  But then Captain USA was
there, in his face, screaming racial epitaphs and pummeling him without
mercy.  Honda struggled to his feet, trying to ignore the red haze that
hovered in front of him, and was tripped forcefully to the mat yet
again, by a leg tackle.  The last thing he remembered was the sensation
of kicks striking him harmlessly in his well-protected ribs as he lay on
his side, protecting his face with his hands, and raucous laughter from
the crowd.

---

Honda was shackled like an animal, his fine suit torn and stained with
blood and sweat.  One of his teeth felt loose.  When he had come to, it
had taken three of the security guards to restrain him, and even then it
wasn't easy.  Hiroshi had long since disappeared, out of shame and fear.
 Honda was not kept long by the police - money has its privileges, and
sympathy has its place.

Honda vowed that he would prove himself for once and for all, in fair
competition, for the sake of his students, present and future, and to
gain respect for his art outside of Japan.  He had only to find a
suitable means.

pjs