“You’re getting the second flavor from Hatake.”

She looked at Kakashi. Kakashi glared up at the ceiling. “I don’t know where my pants are,” he said.

“It’s okay,” Katsuko assured him. “I can take imaginary rat bars for now. Imaginary rat bars of victory.”

“Ever the gracious winner,” Raidou said, laughter in his voice. “Tousaki, your turn, since you won.”

Katsuko and Ryouma hauled Kakashi upright as gently as possible under Genma’s watchful gaze, ignoring Kakashi’s disgruntled noises. Once Kakashi was settled and dusted off, Ryouma sat back and looked at the rest of them, straight-faced.

"Okay, here goes. One: I lost my virginity two years after I graduated from the Academy. Two: I can recite Abbot Ryougen's entire speech from the second Five Rings movie. Three..." Ryouma paused. The edges of his mouth tugged, dark eyes dancing. "Before I hit my growth spurt, I crossdressed as a geisha three times, and nobody but my sensei and the target ever found me out."

“But those all sound plausible,” Katsuko complained. “What was your favorite shade of lipstick for your geisha get-up?”

"It was the same each time. Some kind of purply red?" Even more cheerfully, he added, "I got plum-blossom perfume, though."

If she narrowed her eyes and squinted sideways, Katsuko could imagine a younger Ryouma in an entertainer’s kimono and decorative hair ornaments. She pursed her lips contemplatively.

“When did you graduate?” Kakashi asked, with faint horror. She remembered, belatedly, that Kakashi had passed the Academy exams when he was seven.

Ryouma grinned at him. "October, Sandaime year 27. I was thirteen and a half. Were you worried, Kakashi?"

Kakashi bristled. “Who wouldn’t be?”

“Awww,” Katsuko cooed, and patted Kakashi’s shoulder. “It’s okay, sugar-puff. Tousaki mocks because he cares.”

The annoyed growl that rumbled out of Kakashi’s throat was surprisingly canine. Katsuko resisted the urge to scratch behind his ears. He pointed at Ryouma like he had him on the stand and ordered, “Recite the last line of Ryougen’s speech.”

Genma intervened before Ryouma could reply. “That'd be cheating, Hatake. You can't make him prove the truth of one of his assertions before you make your guess."

“But that’s how you win,” Kakashi protested.

“Where’s the fun in winning a game you cheated at?” Genma countered, the lone voice of reason in a room full of drugged ninja. “Cheating’s for missions.”

“Cheating is for everything. That’s why it’s cheating.”

Katsuko reached behind Kakashi to tap Ryouma’s shoulder. When Ryouma glanced at her, she said, “If I ask really nice, will you do a geisha fan dance for me?”

"Taichou put the kibosh on dancing." Ryouma was still grinning. "So, guesses?"

“Virginity as the lie,” Katsuko said promptly. “Because I know how good your aural recall is, and I really want the geisha thing to be true.”

Genma drawled, “I have to agree with that logic.” Katsuko bestowed an approving nod upon him.

“Geisha is the lie. You look too happy and Ueno isn’t that lucky,” Kakashi said.

Raidou had been quiet up until now, but he interrupted Katsuko’s outraged squawk with an amused, "Since Ryougen dies in the first movie, I'm going to call that one the lie. But his speech was very moving."

Ryouma’s grin faltered. He stared at Raidou for a moment in mild shock. Then he folded over and dropped his head onto his knees. “You’ve seen it. Of course you’ve seen it,” he told the fabric of his trousers.

Katsuko and Kakashi groaned. Genma gave Raidou a look of ironclad disappointment and turned to Katsuko. “Do you feel betrayed, Ueno? I feel betrayed.”

“So betrayed,” she mourned, clutching at Kakashi’s pigtails to demonstrate the depth of her outrage.

Ryouma straightened up determinedly. “Okay. Your turn, taichou.”

“The geisha thing was true?” Kakashi burst out.

Katsuko blinked and turned to smile at Ryouma. “The geisha thing was true!”