Sekirei 99

The story of how Uzume met Chiho.

Damn you for ruining our yuri moment!

Summary:
Uzume climbs into Chiho's hospital room and holds her hand and starts apologizing. Chiho wakes up and recalls that she dreamed about her first meeting with Uzume. On that day, Chiho was in a park sitting in a wheelchair when she spotted Uzume hiding in a tree. Uzume and Chiho took a liking to each other on first sight. Uzume explained that she was helping a friend escape from some pursuers because that friend took something valuable. Chiho stated that Uzume didn't seem like a bad person and revealed that she is staying in the nearby hospital. After the first meeting, Uzume would regularly visit Chiho and eventually asked Chiho to wing her. Back to the present, Chiho and Uzume's meeting is interrupted by Kakizaki who tells Uzume that Higa wants to speak to her.

Back at Izumo Inn, Matsu brings up some data on Chiho and discovers that Chiho is slowly dying of a disease that's incurable with modern medicine. Minato wonders if MBI can cure Chiho, but Matsu states that Uzume can't ask the MBI because she had helped Matsu escape with the jinki. Despite knowing this, Minato thinks MBI is still worth a shot and wants to rescue Uzume.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

It's a little disappointing that Minato's crew hasn't started the "rescue Uzume" operation yet, but after reading Sekirei for so long I'm getting used to this. The back story between Uzume in Chiho was nothing out of the ordinary. A random meeting between a Sekirei and potential Ashikabi is probably how many Sekirei were winged, and the story was what I would've imagined. The only notable bit was that Uzume had helped Matsu escape, and this ties in with the fact that Uzume lives at Izumo Inn. People in trouble with the MBI like to come to Miya for help.

I'm still looking forward to the showdown between Minato and Higa. Minato will definitely rescue Yukari and likely Chiho as well, but I'm not too sure about Uzume. I like happy endings, but the Sekirei Plan is made so that only one Ashikabi can win, and so Uzume and also Shiina will have to be defeated somewhere down the road. I can see Uzume being defeated in the showdown between Minato and Higa as a way to add some emotional impact to the story. In any case, hopefully the action won't be too far off now.