Big Sis
Angel Beats - the Pre-Otenashi Fanfic
Wake up, put on my school uniform and go directly to the principal's office. No, I'm not in trouble every morning (although I probably should be), that's just where the base of operations for the "Not Dead Yet Battlefront" is. Yes, we take over the entire principal's office to wage an ongoing war against god. No, I'm not exaggerating.
Well, to be fair, we were fighting a war against god. By now, I'm living out a normal life back in the world of the living. What kind of life? I don't know yet. I might be a human, I might be a dog, hell I might be a barnacle (oh please god, if you're out there, don't make me a barnacle).
But I remember the day that the kid who would change the fate of the "Not Dead Yet Battlefront" arrived. I remember it clearly. That morning I opened the door to the principal's office and, of course I'm not the first one there. Not at eight o'clock in the freaking morning. No... Yurippe's got me beat by like two hours. Seriously, I'd known her for somewhere on the order of decades, and she still hadn't learned how to sleep in like a normal teenager. She sat behind the principal's desk with her feet up, twirling her pistol in the air like it wasn't a deadly weapon. Well... ok. Nothing's really deadly since we can't die in the afterlife, but it still doesn't excuse playing with a gun like it's some kind of toy. Bullets hurt a hell of a lot more than BBs. Trust me. I know. I know many times over.
"Morning." I said.
"You're late, Hinata." she replied
"What?"
"I told you to be here at 8:00."
"Yeah..."
"It's 8:02."
"Really, Yurippe? I'm the only other person here."
"How shallow minded." Someone said from behind me. I jumped, tripped, and landed on the couch.
"Shiina was here on time." Yurippe said.
"Jesus, Shiina, do you have to stand in that corner every time we meet here?"
She nodded her head silently, still leaning against the wall with her arms crossed in disapproval.
I didn't even bother to ask what the daily operation was yet, since Yurippe always refuses to explain it until the entire battle front is there. She hates explaining things more than once, so if you don't understand the plan... then... sucks to be you!
Fujimaki, Ooyama, Matsushita, Takamatsu, and TK walked in around 8:30, except TK, who danced it. Ah, TK. Everyone loves TK. Noda trudged in fifteen minutes later, carrying his axe over his shoulder like a little kid carries the blanket that he brings everywhere. Of course,Yurippe doesn't yell at any of them for their punctuality. No, just me. It's fine. Fine. Be that way.
Everyone settled down, taking their usual seats or leaning in their usual spots against the wall. It looked the same as any other day. Another day of running around like a bunch of mad men, rebelling like teenagers, with the wondrous dramatic addition of guns, swords, halberds, knifes, and other things that shouldn't be allowed on school property. We were awfully smiley for a bunch of kids about to charge to our not-deaths.
"Alright, let's get to it then." Yurippe announced. Silence shot through the room. The lights dimmed. A schematic of the dormitories was projected on a screen. It reminded me very much of the Mission Impossible movies. We might be able to make stuff from our memories, but Yurippe must've watched those movies hundreds of times when she was alive to pull off such an accurate replica. Sometimes I can't think of any reason for Yurippe to start the "Not Dead Yet Battlefront" other than to recreate spy movies with outrageously complicated schemes and secret operations.
"Today, we're going to be running operation Angel HQ Assault."
A hushed sense of amazement shot through the room. Yurippe found angel's base of operations? Is it heaven? Did Yurippe find heaven?!
"We will split up into two teams, Team Screaming Eagle, which will consist of me, Hinata, and Ooyama. Everyone else is on Team Floundering Dodo. Screaming Eagle will be infiltrating into Angel's HQ, where we will hopefully get a clue as to how she communicates with god."
"Hey, why do you guys get to have all the fun? And the cool team name?" Fujimaki complained.
"Because, I need you and everyone else on Team Floundering Dodo to make a gigantic mess out of the boy's dorm. Kick down doors, smash the walls, break the windows. Be delinquents, and attract Angel's attention so she's away from HQ while we break in. Still complaining?"
"Nope. I'm good with breaking things." Fujimaki replied with a smirk on his face. The rest of Team Floundering Dodo also smiled maniacally. Except Shiina. But five out of six is close enough.
"Alright, we'll begin at 7:30 pm, sharp. I expect to hear screams from the boys dorm at exactly that time. Operation... STARTO!"
The lights came back on, and people began to leave the room. I almost made it to the door when I heard Yurippe.
"Hinata, Ooyama, I need to talk to you two separately."
Well. Crap. Ooyama and I exchanged a look of despair. Everything about this operation seemed too easy. Nothing Yurippe plans is ever this simple. If we weren't veterans of Yurippe-style punishment, Ooyama and I would've started shivering.
The doors closed with only the three of us on Team Screaming Eagle left. Yurippe sat on the principal's desk and dangled her feet off the front. She adopted one of those evil smiles that I usually associate with her punishment games. Oh dear.
"What is it?" Ooyama asked with a slight tremor in his voice. Yurippe's smile widened, which I didn't think was possible.
"We have to make special preparations for infiltrating Angel's HQ."
Ooyama and I gulped simultaneously.
"What kind of preparations?" I asked.
"Well, Angel's HQ is in the girl's dormitory."
"So..."
"Boys aren't allowed in the girl's dormitory."
"Oh… you're not having us—"
Yurippe reached back behind the desk and pulled out two girl's school outfits, "Yes. You're crossdressing for this mission. Why do you think I chose you two?"
"Because we're sneaky?" Ooyama replied. Oh how naive of him. He's been doing this longer than most of the SSS members, and he still doesn't believe Yurippe's a sadist. It's almost cute.
"No. Because you two are the least masculine people on the team."
"What about Shiina?" I asked.
"What about her?"
"Point made."
"Now, try these on quick. We don't have much time if I need to grab different sizes."
Ooyama and I changed tops quickly, and they seemed to fit pretty well, sadly. But then we both paused and just looked at Yurippe.
"The skirts too."
"Yeah... but..." Ooyama stammered.
"Could you leave the room? Or at least look away?"
Yurippe took a moment to process our request, but when she did I think she blushed. I couldn't tell for sure because she spun around so she faced out the window. Ooyama and I put the skirts on quickly, like drinking medicine. You tell yourself if you do it quickly, then it won't taste as bad, but at the end of the day, you're still wearing a skirt. Yurippe turned around, and lost her poker face.
"You guys look perfect." She said through a stifled laugh.
"Can we take these off now?"
"Fine, fine. Just remember, we're meeting up, in full costume, in front of the girl's dormitory at 7:10." Yurippe turned back around.
"Got it." I replied as I deskirted myself.
"See you there big sis!" Ooyama said as he left, his new uniform folded over his arm. I was about to follow suit when I saw Yurippe's pupils shrink, and her muscles tense up. She took a sharp breath, and gripped the desk edge tightly.
"You good?"
"Yeah. I'm fine."
"Ok..." I still hate myself a little for leaving the room. I caught up to Ooyama in the hall walking back to our rooms. When we walked side by side, we could hold the clothes between the two of us so others wouldn't ask us why we had girl's clothes. If the others saw us with the button up shirt and skirt, then we'd never hear the end of it.
"Hey, Ooyama."
"Yeah?"
"What did you call Yurippe before we left?"
"Big sis?"
"Why?"
"Well, she's always looking out for us and stuff. Seems appropriate."
"I guess..."
"Why'd you ask?"
"Just curious. On a different note, we still aren't done with preparations for tonight."
"Huh?" Ooyama jumped back, almost revealing our wrong-gendered clothing to the world.
"Well... we might be able to look the part, but we don't exactly sound it."
"You have a point..."
At 7:10 exactly, Ooyama and I arrived in front of the girl's dorm, dressed up in our white button ups and blue skirts. I carried a small just-in-case backpack full of all kinds of necessities. Yurippe was waiting for us with her hands on her hips.
"You're late."
"No we're not. It's 7:10."
"Really?" Yurippe looked around for a clock to check.
"Wait, you just assumed that it was late by the time we showed up?"
"Yeah..."
I was about to say something, but I realized that it wasn't going to be of any use, and we had an operation to do. We entered the girl's dormitory a bit too proudly. I mean, how often do you get to see the inside of a girls dormitory? If you're a guy. And not a janitor. You get what I'm trying to say.
An NPC passed by and waved at us.
"Hello!" Ooyama and I said in our practiced voices. Yurippe stopped dead in her tracks in front of us.
"Yurippe?"
"Stop. Stop talking now."
"What?"
"If you keep talking like that, you're going to blow the entire operation." She whisper-shouted.
"But, big sis, we practiced!"
"Ooyama, it's bad. Just stop. Before I shoot you." Yurippe lifted the back of her shirt up just enough for us to see the handle of a pistol sticking out of her skirt. That shut us up.
After we went up a few flights of stairs and through some halls, Yurippe stopped in front an innocent looking door. I was kind of disappointed at the lack of weird looks the NPCs gave us. Apparently, Ooyama and I blended in well.
"Alright, she should be leaving... now." Just as Yurippe finished, a loud explosion erupted from the boy's dormitory. It was the sound of the clock striking 7:30. Angel came out of her room, with that same straight face that creeped me out from the moment she started fighting us. I mean, it's like she has no capacity for emotion. "Oh. Looks like have to maim those delinquents again." is what goes on in her head. It's creepy.
Luckily, the poker-faced angel didn't recognize the three of us standing outside her door. Yurippe waited until Angel was out of sight before she broke out the bobby pin. It took about thirty seconds to unlock Angel's door.
"Ready guys?"
"On your mark, Yurippe."
She nodded and we burst inside. It was dark, but we could see outside the room onto the track and soccer field in the late evening light. I took a flashlight out of my backpack and shined it around. Both Ooyama and I sighed.
"What is it?" Yurippe asked.
"Well... I just thought it would be... you know..."
"More impressive." Ooyama finished for me.
"What were you expecting?"
"I don't know, something a little more celestial. More than just her room." because that's where we were. In her room. Nothing special. There was a couch in the middle that faced a small television, and a desk up against the right wall. A desktop computer sat atop the desk, turned off of course. Yurippe sat down and turned the computer on.
"Alright, let's see what kind of secrets you're hiding from us!" she said probably a little too enthusiastically. The computer immediately asked for a password. Yurippe went from all smiles to dead-faced.
"What?"
"It's a password, Yurippe."
"No. I got that, Hinata."
"It's so that people like us can't do what we're trying to do."
"Thanks again, Hinata."
"And it's doing a damn good job of it too." And, in one fluid motion that was quite impressive, Yurippe, spun around, bringing her leg up above the back of the chair and her head under the desk, and kicked me right in the head.
"Ow!"
"Yeah, you had that a little more than coming."
"Well, what are we going to get around it?" Ooyama asked.
"Uh... maybe it's this?" Yurippe typed in "I love God". No luck. She then tried about twenty other passwords while Ooyama and I watched from behind her, growing more and more restless.
"This is so stupid! We're never going to get in!" I said after twentyish minutes.
"Don't say that... we can figure it out. Maybe she's doing that 'O' to zero thing!"
"Yurippe, let's face it. We're done here. You didn't make preparations for hacking into a computer."
Yurippe stood up from the desk angrily. She walked toward me with a very pissed off look in her eyes. "Let's see you come up with an operation that'd work perfectly! It's not like I'm omniscient or anything! I'm looking for God, not the big man himself! So what if I didn't think I'd be trying to guess Angel's password? That doesn't mean we can't try. Ok? Ok? We're going to keep trying until we get in, damn it."
When she finished, she had backed me up against the door. I slammed up against it pretty hard, forgetting the door was there in the first place. I could feel Yurippe's hard breathing against my face.
"Big sis?" Ooyama innocently asked from behind her. And that sent her over the edge for some reason. And in my direction too. I've rarely seen Yurippe lose it, especially on a mission. But she did it, by punching me in the face. Also, thing that we forgot to do because we're freaking idiots, close the door entirely. So, I was sent through the door out into the hallway.
"What the hell Yurippe?" I shouted. And that's where things really went to hell, because I didn't even try to sound like a girl. I sounded like Hinata. And girls heard me, and saw me, and screamed bloody murder because there was a boy in the girl's dormitory.
"God damn it Hinata." Yurippe said before she turned back into the room. I got up and followed after her.
"What are you doing?"
"Angel's going to be coming back any second now. I'll hold her off while you guys check the rest of the room that we ignored like dumbasses." she replied as she opened the window, "You better find something."
And then she jumped out the window. I didn't even move to look if she landed ok. It's Yurippe. She makes cats look clumsy.
"Ok, Ooyama, I've only ever seen Yurippe flip out twice before. Once was when she figured out the whole "Luring out god" thing. The other one was when she tried the spicy mabou tofu. In other words, what you just witnessed was like a once a lifetime thing."
"Yeah. I wonder why..."
And then it hit me like a sack of bricks. Actually, I take that back. It hit harder. Like Yurippe's foot.
"Ooyama... You've heard Yurippe's memories of real life, right?"
'Yeah..."
"What's your new nickname for her?"
Ooyama thought for a few seconds, "Oh my god! I'm a horrible person!"
"Yes you are. I can't just let Yurippe go fight Angel when she's thinking about that. She needs to have her full attention on Angel." I grabbed the backpack and took out an assault rifle, and then kept going through it.
"What are you looking for?"
"These!" I pulled out a pair of pants and the sand colored coat.
"What?"
"I can't fight in this getup. It just feels wrong, you know?"
"Sure..."
"Ok, you scour the room, I'll give Yurippe backup."
"Sir, yes, sir!" Ooyama replied. I dashed out the door and ran to the front entrance. My cover was already blown, so it wasn't like I was doing anymore harm by running through the girl's dorm in my normal outfit. When I made it down to the front, I ran around the side and saw Angel walking across the field, with that still emotionless look on her face. Again, creepy.
I found Yurippe with a sniper rifle tossed to the side (where did that even come from?), talking to a kid with bright orange hair. He must've just gotten here, since he was wearing the standard uniform. I headed over.
After the orange haired kid said something, Yurippe stood up, "I'm on your side. If you don't want me pointing guns, then I won't. Trust me."
Wait… I got it! Maybe if I tried talking to her about recruiting then she'd forget about the whole sister thing!
"Hey Yurippe! What happened with recruiting the new guy? We're short on people right now. We need to resort to every dirty trick we have—"
Both Yurippe and the new guy gave me this weird look.
"What?" Oh yeah... new guy we need to be using the dirty tricks on was right there.
And now he was walking down the stairs saying ,"I'm going over there."
"Noooo! I couldn't recruit him!" Yurippe dug her fingernails into her head a bit. And then screamed some more. Oh, I felt so bad for that guy. Going to get obliterated immediately. Turned into a barnacle. Poor soul.
"And it's all your fault!" Yurippe shouted as she pointed at me.
"What?"
"I almost had him. Like this close." she held her fingers close together, "But noooo. Someone had to come down from his job scouring the room to interrupt me. and where did your outfit go?"
"So, first, I changed, second, sorry."
"Great, now if you'll excuse me..." Yurippe turned back to Angel, "I have to shoot a small girl."
"You never pitch this job like that."
"Just shut up. I wanna see this."
"What is it?" I walked over and saw the new guy talking to Angel, right when Angel turned on Hand Sonic. And... ouch. That's going to hurt. A lot. Hand Sonic through the chest.
"Hey! Looks like we can still recruit him!" Yurippe said.
"You're cheering that he got stabbed in the chest..."
"Hey, you were right. We need to resort to every dirty trick we have. You just don't tell the new people that."
"We should help him, shouldn't we?" I asked.
"Yeah, Ooyama can fend for himself. Besides, I'm pretty sure there's nothing up there anyways."
"Wait, then why did you want us to check it?"
"I just needed to blow off some steam. And if Ooyama called me 'big sis' one more time I swear..." Then Yurippe got really quiet.
"Yeah... about that... he realized what he was doing after the last one."
Yurippe perked up at once, "Great, then he'll understand that his punishment for bringing that up so many times is an Angel-Style maiming."
We waited until Angel had entered the girl's dormitory before we both went down to the new kid bleeding in the middle of the track. I rested my assault rifle on his stomach and grabbed his arms. Yurippe got his legs.
"So, what's his name?"
"Dunno."
"Another amnesiac?"
"Yup."
"I wonder what his deal is."
"Don't we always wonder what the new meat's past is once they get here?"
"Well, at least he doesn't speak in song lyrics."
"Hey, don't piss on TK."
"I'm not. I love TK as much as the next guy. It's just interesting."
"I'd smack you for pissing on TK right now if I wasn't holding orange-hair's legs."
"Thanks?" We walked the rest of the way to the infirmary in silence. Not that anything needed to be said. We put the new kid on the first bed, took off his blood soaked shirt and wrapped bandages around his midsection. When we finished, we stepped back and looked at our handiwork.
"Hey, Hinata."
"Yeah?"
"Have you ever wanted to actually redo your life?"
I thought about the question for a little bit, "I don't really know. You?"
She replied without even a second thought, "Nope. Never."
"Hmm. Why'd you ask?"
"Just curious. Bets on what happens when he wakes up?"
"I'm going to say that he freaks out about the blood and everything that happened, and then runs around the campus like an insane person."
"Same on the first part, but I'd have to say that he's going to get himself killed again pretty fast."
"How much you betting?"
"I'd say a Key Coffee."
"You know we get those for free, right?"
"I can't think of anything better, ok?"
"Fine, fine."
The next day, after a short report from Noda, I got Yurippe a Key Coffee.