I don't own 'Princess Princess' and I have no desire to profit from this story in any way. I post it here solely for the enjoyment of other fans of this delightful anime series.

The Lady Doth Protest
based on 'Princess Princess' by Mikiyo Tsuda

Yuujirou wandered aimlessly through the hotel suite looking for his friends Touru and Mikoto. The idea that the student council president, Arisada, had rented such an extravagant place to hold his 'End of Year' party was not unexpected. The large and freely flowing quantities of alcohol were. Yuujirou was already feeling a bit tipsy and he wanted to find his fellow Princesses before things got out of hand.

Not that there wasn't something for the trio to celebrate. After the assembly at school tomorrow they would no longer be Princesses. No more cross dressing in Lolita costumes made by that fruitcake Natashou. No more acting as cheerleaders for the entire student body. Finally they could be themselves again and as far as Yuujirou was concerned it was about bloody time.

He spotted Touru with Akira Sakamoto and figured the dark haired Princess was safe for the time being. So he went looking for the third member of the team and finally found Mikoto sulking on the floor in the corner of a bedroom. Two empty beer cans sat on the floor beside the redhead and a third was balanced precariously on his knee.

"Hey, Mikoto," Yuujirou said. "What're you doing on the floor, buddy?"

"Leave me alone," answered the despondent Princess.

"What gives? I thought you of all people would be dancing for joy tonight. If anyone should be depressed it's Sakamoto since he's got to take over Arisada's job tomorrow, but he's out there having a great time."

"There's nothing for me to celebrate," Mikoto said before taking a swig of beer.

"What are you talking about? Tomorrow's our last day in drag. Doesn't that qualify?"

"No!" Rather than cheering his friend up, Yuujirou thought Mikoto looked even more miserable than before.

"You can't seriously tell me you're sorry to see our reign come to an end. You're the one who didn't even want to do it in the first place. You used to run and hide every time we dressed up. Even after your girlfriend said it was okay, you still complained about it. I just don't understand you, man."

"You couldn't understand, Yuujirou," Mikoto said and then took another long drink of beer. "You and Touru never even tried to understand my problem, so just leave me alone."

"What problem?" Yuujirou asked genuinely confused. "If you're talking about your girlfriend Megumi, I thought that was all settled."

"Megumi doesn't understand either. Nobody understands me. Why do you think I came to this school anyway?"

"I don't know, to get an education?"

Mikoto laughed. "That's a good one! When was the last time you spent an entire day in classes? We're probably the least educated cross dressers in Japan. No my blond friend, I came here to get away from shit like this. I thought if there's one place in the world where I wouldn't be tempted again it's at an all boys' school. Man was I wrong!"

Yuujirou sat down next to his friend and took the nearly empty beer can out of his hand. "What are you talking about, Mikoto? What exactly don't you want to be tempted with?"

"Cross dressing of course, what else have we been talking about?"

Yuujirou drained the can of beer and set it aside. "Are you telling me you cross dressed before coming here?"

"Sure," Mikoto's voice was beginning to slur as he spoke. "None of this cosplay crap either. I'd put on my sister's old clothes and look ten times better than she did. Boy that always pissed her off. She'd make me promise never to do it again, but I always did."

"Wait a minute," Yuujirou asked in amazement. "How long have you been doing this?"

"I don't know," Mikoto said as he leaned back and let his head hit the wall with a loud thump. "Since four… maybe five years old. I never really worried about it until I met Megumi. I really like her, you know. I'd do anything to be with her. So I figured coming to an all boys' school was the best way to 'cure' me, to make me into a real man. Now look at me! Forced to do the one thing I swore I'd never do again."

"Well," Yuujirou said as he tried to get Mikoto to sit up again, "after tomorrow that'll stop, right? You won't have to wear girl's clothes anymore. You can become the kind of man Megumi wants."

"I don't think so," Mikoto whined as he slumped onto Yuujirou's shoulder. "Don't wanna be a man. Just wanna make Megumi happy."

Yuujirou thought about that for a second then asked, "Mikoto, what do you really want to be?"

"A girl," Mikoto said groggily. "I've always wanted to be a girl. I… I… I don't feel so good."

Mikoto's face began turning green, so Yuujirou hauled him to his feet. He got his shoulder under the drunken boy's arm and started to drag him towards the bathroom. They were halfway there when Touru walked into the room. He grabbed Mikoto's other arm and together they got him to the lavatory just in time.

"What the hell's he been drinking?" Touru asked while Mikoto was heaving into the toilet.

"Just beer, I think," Yuujirou said while searching the cabinets for a washrag. "But that's not the half of it. Help me get him back to our room and I'll fill you in."

&

Crimson light, like a blast furnace, burned its way through Mikoto's eyelids. He covered his eyes, but the blazing red light wouldn't go away. It seemed to pulse with the same frequency as the searing pain in his head, so it must be coming from the inside. His throat burned too and his mouth felt like it was full of vile tasting cotton. His sister had once described a hangover, but Mikoto couldn't have imagined it was really this bad.

How much had he actually had to drink at the party? He lost track long before he retreated to the quiet corner of the bedroom with three cold ones. There was a lot he didn't remember about last night, but he did remember talking with Yuujirou right before he got sick and passed out. When he remembered what they had been talking about, he wished he had drowned himself in the toilet.

Experimentally he opened his eyes and found that the offending light source was a sunbeam coming through the window. Sunlight never came through his window in the morning, so he must be somewhere else. He looked around and recognized Touru and Yuujirou's room.

"You guys brought me back to your room?"

Touru turned around from the letter he was writing and smiled at his hung over friend, "We thought it was a better idea than leaving you alone in your own room."

Mikoto blinked and looked around, "Where's Yuujirou?"

"He went to get coffee and to ask the nurse for some aspirin." Touru got up and came to sit on the edge of the bed. "We figured you'd need them both this morning."

"Oh God," Mikoto groaned. One look at Touru's grinning face let him know Yuujirou had spilled the beans. "Just kill me now. He told you, didn't he?"

"Yes, he told me," Touru said while tucking the covers up around Mikoto's chin. "What I don't know is why you never told us about this before? We might have been able to help you."

"That's easy to say now," Mikoto said after closing his eyes, "but it was just too embarrassing. I thought you'd make fun of me."

"Probably," Touru answered honestly, "but we'd have also tried to be understanding. We're your friends Mikoto, we'd do anything to protect you. Don't you know that by now?"

"Yeah, I guess, but this…"

Just then the door opened and Yuujirou walked in carrying a bag from the convenience store and a medicine envelope from the infirmary. "How's our little girl doing?"

"Still a little green around the gills and ashamed of her big mouth, but nothing a couple of aspirin and a can or two of coffee won't fix."

As they helped Mikoto to sit up he said, "Are you guys going talk about me like I'm a girl from now on?"

"Well that really depends on you," Yuujirou said handing him the aspirin and a bottle of water. "Last night you said a lot of contradictory stuff, but one thing you seemed pretty clear about was that you've always wanted to be a girl."

Mikoto popped the pills into his mouth and chased them down with a long drink of water. "Look, I don't remember everything I said last night, but all I really want is for Megumi to like me. I'm willing to make any sacrifice for that."

"That's not what you told me last night," Yuujirou said opening one of the cans of coffee and handing it to Touru. "Better drink the rest of that water, it'll help get rid of your headache."

"Mikoto," Touru said while sipping his coffee, "what makes you think Megumi wouldn't like you if she knew you cross dressed? She didn't even blink when she saw you in costume."

"That's because it was obviously a costume and we told her being a Princess was just a job. What I feel inside is different. She'd think I was a pervert or something."

"Maybe," Yuujirou said exchanging a full can of coffee for the empty water bottle, "but wouldn't it be better to know for sure? Maybe you should tell her how you feel and see what she says."

"I can't even imagine doing that," Mikoto said sipping cautiously at the hot coffee.

"Just think about it then," Touru said. "Right now there's something a bit more pressing to consider. Yuujirou and I were going to wait until after the assembly this afternoon to talk to you about this, but now seems a better time. What are you planning to do about your room when break's over?"

"I haven't decided what I'm going to do yet," Makoto groaned. "I know I'll have to move out of the Princess Room eventually, but there aren't any other single rooms in the Eastern dorm. I guess I'll have to move in with someone else."

"Which means," Yuujirou said, "moving in with someone who spent this entire year idolizing you. How do you think someone like that is going to react when they see you in girl's panties?"

Makoto's eyes grew wide, "How... how did you know that?"

"Just who do you think undressed you last night?" Touru said with a grin.

"I... I don't usually..." Mikoto stuttered. "I mean I... I only... Aw, shit! What am I going to do?"

"Well, you could move in with us," Yuujirou said. "We have to move out of this place as well and we've been looking around."

"There's a room even larger than this on the next floor," Touru continued, "that's occupied by a couple of graduating seniors. There's more than enough room for a third bed if you're interested."

"Really?" Makoto said, his face brightening for the first time. "You guys wouldn't mind?"

"How else are we going to keep an eye on you?" Yuujirou said with a smile. "If you really want to quit cross dressing, someone's got to remove all of the temptations from your life."

"And if you decide to keep on doing it," Touru said, "who'd be better to cover for you. We're a team, Mikoto, we can't just let that end."

"It sounds good to me," Mikoto said, "but what if you can't get the big room? I'll bet there are some second years with their eyes on it already."

Touru laughed, "You still don't get it, do you? We're Princesses. Even after the final assembly today we'll still be Princesses, just like Arisada's still a Princess in everyone's eyes. And Princesses always get everything they want."

&

The freshman knocked timidly at the door before stepping into the room. "Excuse me, is this the student council office?"

Another boy his age stood up from one of the two ornate couches and said, "I think this is it, but no one's here yet."

"Hi, my name's Yoshiro. The head of my dorm said I should come over here, but he didn't tell me why."

"I'm Susumu, nice to meet you. I live in the eastern dorm and I was told the same thing."

The boy's shook hands and sat down on the couch together. Then Yoshiro said, "Look, don't be offended or anything, but has anyone ever told you that you look like a girl?"

Susumu laughed, "I was just about to ask you the same thing. I got teased about it all through middle school, and you?"

"Same thing, but luckily no one's said anything since I came here. In fact everyone's been super-nice to me."

"A couple of freshmen teased me the first week I was here, but some upperclassmen yelled at them and I've been treated like royalty ever since."

There was a sound at the door and they both turned to see an older boy with wild strangely colored hair enter the room. As he walked over to them, they noticed that his eyes were crossed. "Oh, hello. I didn't think you'd be here already. I'm Akira Sakamoto, the student council president. We'll get started as soon as the other council members get here."

He shook hands with both boys and sat on the couch opposite them. "So, how do you like going to school here?"

"It's great," Susumu said. "We were just talking about how nice everybody here has been to us."

"I'd always heard this was a tough school," Yoshiro said, "but so far it's been a lot of fun. It's surprising how considerate everyone is."

"Looking at you both," Akira said, "I can see why the dorms had no trouble picking you as candidates."

"Candidates for what, sempai?" Susumu asked.

The door opened again and a tall blond haired boy walked in followed by a dark haired boy. Susumu and Yoshiro automatically jumped to their feet at the sight of the older students. They were easily the handsomest boys either had ever seen.

"Sorry we're late Akira," the blond said. "Mikoto couldn't decide what to wear."

"This is official student council business," Akira said a little peeved, "I hope he chose to wear his uniform."

"Oh, he's wearing a uniform all right," the dark haired boy said with a chuckle.

The two handsome boys took up positions behind the couch where the president was sitting. "While we're waiting, let me introduce the vice president of the student council, Yuujirou Shihoudani and the treasurer, Touru Kouno."

"Nice looking kids," Yuujirou said with a grin. "Did you tell them yet?"

"No," Akira said, "Mikoto said he wanted explain everything to them."

"If he ever gets here," Touru said with a sigh. "I thought keeping up with him would be easier once we were all in the same room."

Suddenly the doors burst open. Susumu and Yoshiro jumped up again and turned to find a girl with long red hair standing in the doorway wearing a black dress with silver piping that looked like a Gothic Lolita version of the standard school uniform. She strode confidently into the room and took up a stance between the two couches facing the younger boys.

"Yoshiro and Susumu," Akira said, "let me introduce the student council secretary, Mikoto Yutaka."

Mikoto stood with his hands firmly on both hips and glared at the young boys, "Gentlemen, you are about to embark on an important mission. One fraught with dangers and lots of hard work, but there are rewards for those with courage enough to stick it out. You have been chosen by the rest of the student body to fill a very special role. From this day forward, you are to become our new Princesses."

Yuujirou shared a grin with Touru, "And may God have mercy on your souls."

The End