Okay, this is something I started writing quite some time ago, but which has only now really started swinging forward. This story was originally devised as a oneshot, but as of writing this now I feel it is simply going to be way too long for a oneshot. Thusly I am splitting this up into parts that will most likely top out at three or four chapters in total (depending on how long the individual scenes within are going to dictate). Scenario wise, this is set before the Carnival proper began in Mai-HiME, and is meant to be pretty much a classic comedy situation of two opposites being stuck in a small space together they can't escape from - these two of course being Shizuru and Haruka. I'm trying to keep them as much in character as possible, but feel free to correct me on any particular. I handle critique well. ;)
Here's just hoping my inspiration won't falter in the middle of this…
Mai-HiME © Sunrise, 2005
Original Story © Berlioz II, 2010
5:35 pm.
"Ahh…" Shizuru voiced her satisfaction as she sat behind the desk of the quiet and otherwise empty Student Council office sipping her tea, an activity she was quite fond of indulging in on a regular basis whenever she just had the chance… which admittedly was pretty much every time she sat behind the council desk.
Just the pure sense of refined, unadulterated bliss in a cup was enough for Shizuru to feel like every worry she could have - be it school related or a more personal issue - just melt away… washed away by the small slice of heaven she held in the small container between her hands.
And the drink never tasted better than during moments such as this. School was out for the day, with Shizuru having just finished doing whatever remaining council matters she had to attend to for the day, so there was nothing else to do but to just sit back and enjoy the tea in the mesmerizing orange of the coming sunset, before she'd also head back to her own lavishly well-equipped dorm suite, an envy of many other students not privy to the perks of Shizuru's presidency. No work. Nobody bustling about with one concern or another. No paperwork to review. No nothing. Not anymore. Just the empty room, a cup of tea, and utter peace in which to unwind in perfect tranquillity.
The only little thing that somewhat stuck out in the scene of serenity was a rather heavy looking box of… something, that sat on one of the vacant desks in the office. It had apparently been brought there by one of the school's clubs… Shizuru didn't really know which as the materialization of the box in the Student Council office was not due to any order she had given. It was most likely the work of the ever-busy Executive Director Suzushiro Haruka out to hunt another head to pester with one or another "breach of rules and ornaments".
Didn't really bother Shizuru. It wasn't her problem, and there was no particular need for her to even get involved with Suzushiro-san's usual antics if she could just avoid it. The box - whatever it was - would in all likelihood disappear in due time even without the President's active input.
Nope, the most pressing matter for Fujino Shizuru right now was her tea, and nothing but her tea, as she gracefully tipped the thermos beside her on the desk for another refill.
But as if her moment of inner tranquillity and harmony was just too good to be true Shizuru, to her slight consternation, soon found her beautiful moment shattered to pieces in one fell swoop as her sharp ears picked up the sounds of heavy stomping feet approaching the council room from the hallway.
"Ara…" she muttered just moments before the council door slammed open as the imposing presence of none other than Suzushiro Haruka marched in, looking every bit as pissed off as she usually did.
"Bubuzuke!" she barked immediately in an aggravated tone.
Shizuru slowly opened her eyes, and with a slight turn of her head, gave an inquisitive look at the infuriated blonde.
"Do you have any idea what's going on outside?" Haruka raged.
Shizuru put on a somewhat puzzled expression at the sudden question, and turned her head to look out the window. Of course she couldn't really see anything else but tree branches from her position, but she supposed the gesture would be enough to tell Haruka that she really didn't know.
"I am afraid you have me at a disadvantage, Suzushiro-san," Shizuru said with a smile as she turned back to the bullheaded girl.
"Figures! You're supposed to be the Student Council President, but your lax handling of school issues are appalling! Hand it to you to be completely unaware of what's actually happening in this school. It's just that kind of an attitude that has gotten us into this situation to begin with!"
"Ara… I am afraid I am somewhat confused, Suzushiro-san. What situation are you referring to?" Shizuru patiently said.
"The open fornication on school grounds, that's what!" Haruka shouted in a way that Shizuru was half-certain that her voice carried all the way to the outer borders of the academy.
"I see," Shizuru said blandly as she sipped her tea again.
This didn't seem to go down well with Haruka, "What do you mean 'I see?' There's students pissing with each other in broad daylight with no shame at all! And I demand that you, as the President, take action!"
Shizuru sighed, "First off, I do believe the word you are looking for is kissing…" Shizuru started, and quickly silenced Haruka's upcoming indignant protest with a lift of her finger, "…And, I do not see anything wrong with a little showing of affection among the students."
"Well, a hippie like you would say that, wouldn't you? But I am talking about the morals and decadency that we should value above everything else. One kiss can lead to hickies, and hickies can lead to inappropriate touching, and inappropriate touching can lead to sex in the Director's rosebush! And what the hell are you laughing at now? This is serious!"
Shizuru couldn't help it. The thought of the Director's "rosebush" being invaded like that was probably the funniest thing Shizuru had heard from Haruka in a while. "Nothing. Nothing at all, Suzushiro-san," Shizuru said as she settled herself down again to her usual cool and composed demeanour.
"Hmph! So are you going to do something about it or not?" Haruka pushed, crossing her arms.
Rather than allowing Haruka take on some kind of over-achieving policing action, Shizuru decided that she should appease her enough before she did something truly regrettable, "Very well, Suzushiro-san. I will look into it."
"Döh… Y-you will?" Haruka said, sounding somewhat bewildered as she wasn't exactly expecting the brunette to consent, like she usually didn't regardless how much Haruka raged about other important matters designed to maintain the order around campus.
"Yes. I will take care of it," Shizuru said again with a smile that would have convinced the grand jury if necessary. Of course Shizuru had no intention whatsoever to do anything regarding the matter, but if it only made Haruka back down a bit, then she figured a small lie wouldn't hurt anyone. In fact, the students would probably thank her in their sleep for dulling the looming blade of "justice" a bit on their behalf.
"W-well good then! That's what I was expecting to hear," Haruka said victoriously as she slowly got over her shock of the bubuzuke woman actually agreeing to do some work for a change.
"So, was there anything else?" Shizuru asked, trying politely to hint that Haruka's presence was starting to wear a bit thin.
"No, I don't think so…" Haruka said as she seemed to look around the room to see if indeed there wasn't anything further she needed to vent about. And then her eyes nailed on the box sitting on one of the flanking desks, another spark lighting in her eyes, "Oh, wait! What's this?"
"I do not know. It was delivered here while I was absent from the council room," Shizuru said as she sipped her tea again.
Haruka walked over to the box and flipped the top open, revealing a clump of metal, wires and other machinery parts.
"Ach! I can't believe those people," Haruka bit out.
"What is it, Suzushiro-san?" Shizuru inquired.
Turning around indignantly Haruka said, "These are some things I confiscated from the electronics club that were not abiding to the regulations of the academy or the needs of their club. I ordered them to pack it all up and deliver it to the Student Council office's storage room. But the nincompoops apparently just decided to leave it all right here. Oh, wait till I get my hands on them…"
"It is that serious?" Shizuru quietly asked.
"You give them a little responsibility for their actions, and SNAP! They're ready to bite the master's hand. Typical… and it's mostly your fault for being too lenient all the time, Bubuzuke!" Haruka said accusingly.
Shizuru, however, didn't seem to take offence. Instead she just smiled sweetly and countered Haruka's words with, "Well, in any case, that box cannot really be left sitting there either. Since it was through your orders that it is here in the first place, could you move it into the storage room yourself instead, Suzushiro-san?"
"Me?" Haruka asked.
"Yes. You can handle it, can you not?" Shizuru responded.
"Uh… sure. Just…" Haruka started, but was stopped when a certain devious thought popped into her mind, "It is rather heavy for me to carry on my own. How about giving me a hand, Fujino?"
Shizuru kept the smile on her lips, but the look in her eyes turned more staring, as if trying to ascertain whether Haruka was attempting to tell a joke or something, "Are you saying you cannot do it on your own? You are rather strong, are you not?"
Snap! Okay, that was a hit, but Haruka bit her tongue from saying what she would have normally said in favour of, "Well, yeah. But even I have my limits. I could throw my back trying to lift this alone." That's right, Bubuzuke, I'm not letting you get off the hook that easy from doing something actually useful for a change.
Shizuru just smiled behind her desk. She saw what Haruka was trying to do. That smirk on the Executive Director's face didn't fool Shizuru for a second. The blonde wasn't exactly that subtle when it came to hiding her intentions. "Kikukawa-san has already went home?" she asked instead, while directing her gaze toward the door.
"Yes, she's already gone," Haruka said victoriously.
"I see," Shizuru said back as she slowly sipped her tea again.
"So… are you going to help me or what?" Haruka said, starting to get fed up with the other woman's evasiveness.
"Maybe you could go to the library and get one of those trolleys you could load the box on," Shizuru suggested.
Haruka stared back at the brunette. I can't believe this! She's such an unbelievable snake! She'll do anything to slither away from doing anything even closely related to honest work! Now Haruka didn't have any other choice anymore. This was a matter of pride and she'd be damned if she wasn't going to manage to coerce that bubuzuke woman into helping carrying this box even if it was the last thing she did. "If you think I'm going to go all the way to the library to get a trolley, you're out of your mind! The damn storage room is right there!" she said while pointing to the adjoining door in the other end of the room, "Now get your lazy ass off of that chair right now and help me carry this stupid box! It'll only take a couple of lousy seconds of your supposed 'precious' time!"
Shizuru kept her mask of serenity on throughout all that, but eventually came to the conclusion that she'd probably just get off easier if she'd do this one thing for Haruka. After all, despite outer appearances, carrying something like that wouldn't really be a big challenge to her, and she'd have plenty of opportunities to get back at Haruka for this at a later date.
Sighing deeply, Shizuru laid her cup down on the desk, stood softly up from her chair, smoothed out her uniform jacket with deliberately measured movements, and without missing a beat in the carefully set tempo of her motions, turned to Haruka and said in her smooth Kyoto-ben, combined with a firm smile adorning her lips, "Very well, Suzushiro-san."
Haruka looked a bit dumbfounded in front of Shizuru's grand display of dramatically choreographed theatrics. While there certainly was no love lost for the President, she had to (begrudgingly) admit that Shizuru was quite impressive to look at, no matter what you thought of her. After all, very few people could make the simple act of getting up from a seat look so elegantly refined and perfectly balanced down to the tiniest detail, and to top it all off give the action such a sense of dramatic gravitas that made this simple, everyday act feel almost like a moment of operatic monumentality.
As Shizuru took a step toward her, Haruka snapped herself out of the daze she had to her great consternation been descending in, and fixed a confidently hard expression on her face.
"Shall we?" Shizuru said with a confidently defiant look in her striking crimson eyes and a fixed smile on her soft, red lips, as if challenging Haruka with that ever present feeling of superiority that would have turned a lesser person into putty.
But Haruka wasn't going to be that person, "Sure."
Without breaking eye contact, both Haruka and Shizuru moved to the other ends of the box and grabbed the handles. Then, with one swift move, they lifted the box up and started carrying it toward the storage room. It was indeed heavy, but neither girl let it show, Haruka for being too proud and Shizuru for just being Shizuru.
It didn't really take a lot of effort to move the box the ten odd metres from the desk to the metal door at the back of the room. Once there, Haruka juggled her other arm free for a moment as she fished a key from her jacket pocket and opened the door. Pushing the door open, the two then stepped inside and quickly set the heavy box down in the back corner of the room revealed before them, next to a collection of other junk that had been piling in the room almost for, what it seemed, many years already.
Flicking on the light switch that caused a poorly-looking light bulb in the ceiling to flicker on with a faintly yellowish tint, barely illuminating the space with any real adequacy, and seemed more like a relic from the 19th Century, Haruka gave a critical once over to the room. The room itself wasn't particularly big as you wouldn't expect a storage room to be, but it wasn't exactly cramped either, the most of the space being taken by the mismatch of assorted items littering the walls, shelves and floor in a rather haphazard fashion. If anybody ever bothered to clean up the space, then it would perhaps better emphasise the roomier qualities of the area than the cramped ones, but as it was the whole room seemed more like a general dumping ground for stuff to be forgotten once they were left there. Out of sight, out of mind, as the saying goes.
But just the same as the snow melts when it is squeezed against the warmth of your hand, this observation didn't have a chance of eluding Haruka's keen sense of order and discipline, and it certainly didn't take a great analyst to figure out such behaviour was not going to fly with her.
"Jeez, would you look at this place! What a complete pigsty! Honestly, don't people have any sense of keeping things tidy and well in order, or are everybody so indifferent to the state of the campus to not give a damn?" she raged majorly pissed off.
Shizuru instead gazed around indifferently, not really caring much for the room's condition and just waiting for Haruka to leave so that she might also go without seeming too rude… not that it would have much mattered when considering it was Haruka concerned here, but Shizuru still wanted to keep her well-bred poise high if for no-one else but herself. "I think the room is rather charming," Shizuru said somewhat mildly feigning interest.
"Charming?" Haruka said with a bit of incredulous contempt seeping into her voice at even the suggestion that this mess was somehow 'charming'. "The only thing charming here is that steel door hiding this… this… abomination out of sight! Charming… yeah right! Though I guess your standards of excellence are as flimsy as your abilities to lead the school as an authoritive leader in an important post. I guess I shouldn't be too surprised," Haruka scoffed at her immediate superior.
Shizuru simply ignored the barbs… as usual, instead keeping on unfalteringly the semblance of the carefree smile she usually wore, which by now Shizuru had perfected to its highest manifestation.
Haruka on the other hand continued on looking some more around the storage facility, already formulating ideas on how to fix this offending sight in the near future - perhaps as a new kind of a disciplinary move executed on a few hapless slackers - while giving out random huffs and puffs, reminding Shizuru slightly of a steam engine letting out steam to draw the most idiosyncratic comparison.
"Ah!" Haruka voiced suddenly, striding over to the side of a shelve right beside the open door, and grabbed a long stretch of thick cord randomly hanging from the shelves. "This for instance is a clear fire hazard!" she proclaimed as she held the cord for Shizuru to see.
Shizuru looked blankly at the cord. This whole room is a fire hazard… she thought in a deadpan mindset, but didn't bother voicing her thoughts. She honestly just didn't care, and wondered how long this was now going to take. Her tea was getting cold.
But Haruka was of different mind and, having perceived an imminent threat, started pulling on the cord to dislodge it. Unfortunately it seemed that it was attached to the shelves more strongly than Haruka anticipated as it didn't seem to come off. After a couple of more stronger pulls Haruka then started to loose what ever little patience she possessed and decided to put all her might into ripping out her inanimate adversary, never even considering that it would probably be just easier to get a knife or something sharp like that to simply cut it off. Maa… Haruka-san should really put her energies to better use than in these kinds of pointlessly unproductive endeavours… Shizuru thought while resisting the impulse to sadly shake her head at her fellow student's antics.
However, after only a short while of Haruka pulling the cord with no apparent success, fate decided to step in at that very moment, putting forward a chain of events that would have consequences neither of the two girls were expecting to happen.
The cord unexpectedly snapped. The sudden jolt sent Haruka flying against the half-open door, causing it to slam shut. As Haruka landed on her butt on the floor, the shelves beside her shook a bit due to their sudden contact with the forces of gravity and inertia, causing a batch of five baseballs to promptly roll off a shelve and, one by one, drop on Haruka's head with resounding bonks underscored with several "ouches" and "oomphs" emanating from the downed girl's mouth.
Shizuru giggled a bit. …Although she can be quite entertaining at times too… she added inwardly, finding the scene very amusing.
Haruka didn't seem as appreciative as she held her head and shot a glare at Shizuru's direction, "Yeah, laugh it up, Bubuzuke! But why don't we just see how much you'll be laughing when you're rolling around on the floor, why don't we?"
"Oh? And may I inquire why exactly would I be 'rolling' around on the floor for?" Shizuru smiled back clearly still amused.
"Because I'm this close to clocking you in your pretty little face, that's why!"
"Ara! Haruka-san is so violent!" Shizuru said with a mirthful tone of voice, completely unconcerned.
Haruka simply looked at the Council President with nothing but exasperated contempt, but eventually succumbing to her fate of knowing there wasn't actually anything she could do to the brunette without selling out on her prized obedience of rules she had pledged to uphold, she just struggled back to her feet with a pronounced pout on her face.
"Are you all right, Haruka-san?" Shizuru asked a bit more sympathetically.
"Yeah… I'm fine," Haruka grumbled, "…and I don't remember giving you permission to call me 'Haruka-san' either."
"Oh? I thought you might enjoy it," Shizuru teased, not being able to resist her habitual urge to get reactions out of people, particularly when the target was somebody easy like Haruka.
"Hmph! Well, you can stop right now. I'm not your friend and I never will be," Haruka said stubbornly as she crossed her arms.
"Hmh… And here I was just trying to be nice," Shizuru said with a mock hurt look.
But whereas someone like Natsuki would have been in complete panic over such a response, Haruka just glared back, "Don't bother. I don't like you, I never have liked you, and I don't care to like you in the future, either. So you can quit wasting your time in trying to cash that."
"Aren't you being a little too unyielding there, Haruka-san? We are colleagues in the school council, after all."
"Which is all we'll ever be, and I'm perfectly fine in keeping it like that, too. And for the last time, stop calling me Haruka-san already!"
"Ara, ara! Very well, if it bothers you so much… Suzushiro-san," Shizuru said disarmingly.
"Good. And don't you format it, Bubuzuke," Haruka said with finality.
"Close enough," Shizuru said as she regarded Haruka with a gentle smile before a little idea crossed her mind that caused her lips to curl up in another smirk, "Although~…" she stretched.
"Eh…?" Haruka gave a somewhat apprehensive glare at the comment, knowing the snake before her was a devious one indeed. Obviously the crimson-eyed woman had just figured out she had something stashed in her sleeve yet.
"Ah, just a little thought that snuck up to me just now unbidden… but I do not believe I have ever given you permission to call me… umm… 'bubuzuke', have I?" Shizuru said with a cunning smile.
"Err…" Haruka voiced uneasily, starting to see a trap being set for her, though not really seeing what that trap was going to be like, or how much she wasn't going to like it. Though the odds were that since it was Fujino we were talking about here, it would most certainly be unpleasant.
"So, in the name of fairness… would it not be only appropriate that I would also get to call you with a likewise affectionate… nickname," Shizuru said silky smooth. "Such as… what I do believe I have actually heard some other students refer to you as… what was it again?"
Haruka was now shifting in her place rather uneasily, hoping against hope that Shizuru wasn't thinking of…
"Oh, yes. Debochin."
No such luck!
"No… No, you… you can't," Haruka said nervously.
"Ara? And why not? It would only be fair, would it not? And it would be rather appropriate as well, considering Suzushiro-san does have quite an impressively sized forehead," Shizuru said innocently.
"No, you can't call me that! If you do, as the Student Council President, and with all the fans you have, then soon everybody will start calling me 'debochin' and my authority as the head of the Executive Committee will be completely ruined! I can't let that happen!" Haruka shouted desperately.
"Is that so? Well, isn't that a dilemma, then?" Shizuru purred with a look of shock etched on her face, knowing she had completely ensnared the blonde loudspeaker into her web now.
Haruka gritted her teeth, and gave Shizuru a cold glare. "Alright… name your price," she said testily.
Shizuru smiled widely at her and said smoothly as ever in her distinctive Kyoto-ben, "Do not worry, Suzushiro-san. I won't ask for the impossible. Only that you will allow me to call you 'Haruka-san.'"
Haruka's eyes narrowed a slight bit. Was that really all she wanted? Or was she trying to trick her again? "Why?"
"Why not?" Shizuru asked in return.
"I mean, what are you up to? Why's this name thing so important to you all of a sudden?" Haruka asked extremely suspiciously.
Shizuru just gave a small laugh before responding, "It is nothing sinister, Suzushiro-san. I simply think 'Haruka-san' is so much more pleasant to say than 'Suzushiro-san'. 'Haruka-san.' 'Mou, Haruka-san.' 'Haruka-saaaan~…' Rolls off the tongue rather nicer, no? Suzushiro-san is quite the mouthful. And in exchange I will let you call me whatever you wish. So, what say? Do we have a deal?"
Haruka shot daggers from her eyes at the devious woman standing in front of her, yet again managing to defeat Haruka in such an infuriating way. Well, what other choice did she have? Give this allowance, or be ridiculed by the entire school's student body with an incongruous nickname, fully sanctioned by the Student Council itself. "Very well! You win again, you tea-sipping viper!" she bit out, seething in fury.
"Ara, very good then, Haruka-san. Although please do not get carried away with the… colourful metaphors too much, agreed?" Shizuru smiled in victory.
"Bah! Don't get cocky! I'm a high-minded person, so I'll give you this little freedom. But don't push your puck!" Haruka said angrily.
"Whatever you say, Haruka-san," Shizuru smiled.
"Gah! I've had enough of you for the day! Consider the matter closed. I'm going back to the dorms, and far away from you, Fujino," Haruka said vehemently as she turned around on her heels and grabbed the door knob and… to her surprise found the door didn't open. Jiggling it some more, and then twisting it with all her strength while putting her back into pulling at it, the door remained closed.
"Ara, Haruka-san? Something the matter?" Shizuru asked.
Haruka glanced back at Shizuru, before jiggling the knob some more.
"Haruka-san?" Shizuru tried again.
"Umm… It's nothing! The… the door… It… it just doesn't seem to… to open… at this time…" Haruka said a bit nervously.
"Oh? As in 'not opening' meaning that the door has… locked itself?" Shizuru voiced her suspicion.
Haruka's forehead was starting to get a bit sweaty at the implication, "It… it would appear so…"
"Ara, ara…" Shizuru gave a small, light giggle upon seeing how silly Haruka was looking, causing the blonde to turn around with another glare.
"And you find this situation somehow funny, do you Bubuzuke? You're in here too, you know!" she growled.
"Of course, but hardly is this something to get upset about, right Haruka-san? Meaning, you do have a key for the door, do you not?" Shizuru said stating the obvious.
Haruka immediately got her lioness-like confidence back as she exclaimed, "Well, yeah! Of course I have a key! What do you think, I'm stupid or something?" Hiding her embarrassment from not realising this simple little fact right away, she started rummaging in her pockets with renewed vigour. However, after a while of going through all her pockets without the desired success apart from finding an eraser, a pencil stub, some loose change and a small pad of marking paper, she was starting to get nervous again. "I have it in here somewhere… some… where… umm…"
"Haruka-san?" Shizuru asked a bit more seriously this time, her smile faltering a bit.
"Umm… Um… Except… Uh… that I think I… umm… actually left… the… the key… in the lock… on the other side…" Haruka said hesitantly as the realisation of their situation started to dawn on her in all its horror.
"Ara…?" Shizuru said, her eyes widening a slight bit in understanding as Haruka gave a look of utter destitution.
Oh. Shit.
The first, and oldest, part of the story is now there. After this the real action starts. A remark about the Haruka nickname: I don't think it actually appears in the anime, but "Debochin" (large forehead) does appear in the manga, and Tate often refers to Haruka with the name. So, that's a little mixing of the two mediums if you wondered. Hope you've enjoyed thus far, and stay tuned for the following.