"Let me see, let me see!"
"Rin stop jostling me, I can't focus on the words!"
"Manga again? Does it include any Idols?"
"No, Rin."
"Oh, so you're here early Niko. I wouldn't have expected anything less."
In one fluid motion the thick pages decorated in panels, action, words, stories, found themselves yanked under a gleaming metal table into the deep obscurity of shadows cast upon Niko's lap. From cheeks to ear tip, she flushed as the piercing presence of both mildly condescending and invasively curious eyes and faces so close to her person remained fixed.
"W-Well yeah, a real Idol is always early and ready to go!"
"Hmm, reading that stuff at your age only adds to my secret list of ideas as to how you're even in high school."
"Rin thinks it's something more for a first year like herself, nya!"
Teeth clenching in sync with her fists still clutching her hidden treasure and slightly crinkling its pages, Niko let forth a low wild grumble.
"Shaddup!"
Suddenly the door swung open with an exuberant flair, revealing a heaving, huffing Honoka with sweat matted bangs, heavy breaths and a fire in her eyes to match the whirling of her now disoriented school bag, which if given sentience would complain of vomiting and wanting to just go home.
"Niko, I've come for that book, I leant you my copy of JoJo for long enough."
"JoJo?" Chimed Maki and Rin.
"Ok ok! No need to frickin kill yourself getting it. I almost thought someone was trying to nab you there-"
"Honoka! Those papers aren't done! You can't just leave the Student Council room whenever you want while leaving Kotori and I to pick up the pieces!"
Umi's shadow cast a foreboding highlight over all, her gaze boring holes so fiercely that Honoka's already quivering form felt the back of her head tingle as her stomach did flips. With all the stiffness of a primitively mechanical robot, the culprit in question turned around to meet her maker, her face contorted into an odd cross of knowing impending death and the serenity of Buddha.
"Umi, uh well I thought we were done for the day so I came to get my-"
"Yes yes I know, you've been hounding after it all day. This Jo Jo's Bizzare Adventure is consuming your life."
"You wouldn't understand, you haven't even read a single page!" Honoka fired back.
"Tell her Niko! I'm not crazy right?"
Slumping further and further down into the hard steel chair, Niko seemed to begin vanishing as she inched toward the depths, a jolt rippling through when she heard her name.
"Ehehehe...it's really good! Trust me, please...look could you just stop grilling her it's giving the rest of us chills."
"Sit up straight Nikkochi, or you'll melt into the floor."
"Uwah! When the hell did you get here?!"
"Boo!"
Her open hands raised next to her cheeks, a hunched Nozomi appeared seemingly from hiding, pouncing on Niko, Maki and Rin as she stuck her tongue out in a brief flash.
"Elicchi and I are done with today's classes, how else could I be here?"
"N-No shit...just don't surprise me like that..."
"Oh? Was Nikkochi scared like a little kid?"
An audible, sharp gasp left Rin as Maki merely shrugged while taking her seat. From the corner of her eye, she continued watching in covered stares, twirling a strand of hair already misplaced from thousands upon thousands of hours in smooth contact.
"No I was not!"
"Was to!"
"Was not!"
"Was to!"
"No. I. Was. Not!"
Their voices clashed in a din of wills, Honoka trying her best hand at what truly seemed on the outside like excessively obvious tip toeing. It was immediately crushed by Umi's ironclad grasp on her blazer collar dragging her again toward the dragon's den. A knowing air came over the would be escapee, her shoulders sagging and frown resigned.
"Nozomi! Stop teasing Niko its making everyone in the hallway stare like a fight's about to go off."
"Sorry I'm late everyone!" Followed Kotori.
Puffing her cheeks, Nozomi quietly glared at Niko, ceasing their argument and spinning in a one eighty.
"Elicchi! Kotori! Hello there! Niko was the one who started it."
"Don't play at being innocent!" Came the cry as Niko sprung to her feet with a deep scowl and petulant whine.
The book she had been holding collapsed to the floor with a resounding thud, not going unnoticed by the keen ear of Maki, who's finger had been psychotically twirling faster and faster as if she were teetering on the verge of a manic episode. Rin herself scooted a few inches away from the absolute madwoman at her side, her heart gradually quickening and with it bringing a light outbreak of sweat.
"Niko, take better care of Honoka's things-"
"Eh? What have we here, a manga?"
Plucking the book as if it were a delicate flower, Nozomi held it up, eyes tracing each panel as her brow slowly shot upward. Lifting a finger, she thumbed through the pages. Glancing across the top of the binding, she grinned.
"Is this yours Maki?"
"No!"
"Nozomi that's mine! It's cool right? Please say it is so Umi will let me go?!"
A strong tug was all it took to release a peep from within Honoka's lungs.
"Hmm...Elicchi, come and take a look at this."
"This book is nothing but trouble, nya..."
A huff accompanied by short, lazy strides found Eli soon peering nonchalantly at the curious material for herself. A low hum resonated when in a stroke of rarity, each individual drawing found itself building upon the realistic intricacy of the last.
"This is supposed to be a manga? It looks like a fancy art book to me."
Gone were the plain faced, bare essential sketches of the usual fare that truly exemplified the definition of cartoon. These characters bore chiseled features, sculpted muscles, looming statures and best of all, vivid colors to match bold shadows. They struck magnificent, gravity defying poses as if they were marble recreations of Greek gods.
"This actually seems pretty cool."
"You've read my mind Elicchi, as usual."
"Too bad Johnathan is so plain and boring."
"Thank you for an observation I didn't ask for Nikkochi."
"Seeee Umi? Even the seniors like it, now please let me go?"
Pouting her lip, Honoka's eyes softened, radiating her desperate plea for freedom.
"Not the puppy dog eyes..."
"It's not so bad Umi, I finished the rest of her work myself. You can let her go if the original problem is solved, right?"
Kotori's soft voice reached out with steady hand, making Umi's rigid posture slacken. Gently sucking her teeth, she released Honoka, casting her out wordlessly. Leaping with arms outstretched, she twirled and spun in open air. A beaming smile spread eagerly across her face.
"Hurrah! Yes! Now, Eli, Nozomi, fetch me the JoJo. We have work to do on a certain grumpy someone!"
A snort cracked through the air, Eli held her hand over her mouth as her shoulders shook in waves of laughter.
"Fetch me the JoJo." Nozomi snickered in repeated phrase.
"Shh, it sounded cool!"
"Sure sure, here's your precious book." Eli eased out with a gleeful smile.
"Thank you, now..."
"Umi, I'm afraid I can't help you here." Kotori mumbled.
"Let's see what ridiculous thing it'll be now." Came the low response.
Honoka's voice grew in strength and continued speaking.
"Umi, you'll be getting an education in one of the best manga ever created and put to paper, so listen like your life depends on it!"
Jumping with an earth shattering thud onto the clubroom table, Honoka's wide grin and gleaming eyes remained steady as Rin collapsed flying backward into the wall, Maki startled into tumbling from her seat before she fully knew what hit her, and Niko nearly collided with the ceiling in a leap of terror. Eli stood reflexively on her tip toes with all her ballet learned precision while seizing the nearest bookshelf with her hands for dear life as Nozomi merely broke the would be gale by raising a single tarot card between her fingers.
"This here is the very pinnacle of man made entertainment. Something so crazily transcendent from the mortal plane that even the gods couldn't question it, but be sworn to kneel before its majesty!"
"I think rather that you've completely begun to lose your mind."
"Silence! I'm trying to make a point Umi, you need to be even more in touch with your imagination!"
Suddenly the open window rattled, it's panel shaken by a mighty breeze as the curtains threatened to be torn asunder. In soared Hanayo, her stance in top diving form as she barreled through the free space. Her body curling into a ball seconds before impact, she rolled onto the linoleum with whipped tousled hair and sweat dripping into a pool staining her clothes. Nipping at her heels came a majestic, monstrous howling wind that bellowed its presence to these mere mortals, these cretins who crawled upon the Earth like mice. It blew Niko straight into the door with a crashing bang, knocked Eli off her toes and spiraling toward the ground with a thunderous cry that only amplified the great cacophony of din. Maki and Rin clung to each other while crouched against the window wall so fiercely in resistance their faces grew alarmingly pallid as the fourth horseman Death itself. Nozomi however leaned coolly against the bookshelves, sipping a refreshingly cold Coke whilst in perfect health. Kotori too merely stood firmly, eyebrows arched for the ceiling as her eyes widened to rival the expanse of outer space. Umi herself cowered with her hands racing to cover her ears with eyes squeezed shut as storm clouds rolled into view from beyond their window, the portal to another world, and Zeus sent forth a tremulous thunder and flash of righteous lightening in his wrath. It's crashing glare illuminated Honoka in mystical, terrifying shadows as she stood towering still as an all encompassing deity.
"Sorry I'm late! The alpacas suddenly caught a fit and chased me around, I thought I was a goner!" Shouted Hanayo at the very peak of her lungs.
"See that?! That shit is fucking creative!" Honoka carried on, seemingly oblivious to anything Hanayo had said.
Oddly enough her voice seemed to echo across the room, reverberating in its walls and piercing the very fabrics of consciousness that comprised every other member of Muse. She was everywhere and no where at once. She was Alpha and Omega, the Beginning and the End.
"WHAT THE HELL IS THIS HONOKA?!" Umi screamed from the depths of her soul.
"A gateway to a new world! A world invoked by the item I hold within my hands!"
Holding the book aloft over her head, it burst into a blinding light that consumed everything it touched, washing over every person in that room and absorbing their essence.
"Now we enter the world where absurdity rules as Emperor! Now, we experience the very meaning of JoJo!"
"None of this makes any sennnssssseee!"
That was Umi's final cry, her body in suit with those of her friends vanished leaving behind no evidence save for their worldly possessions preserved within their school bags.
The clouds dispersed, sunshine poured in to lap at clear baby blue skies, in their nests and on the branches birds were chirping. Cherry blossoms sailed through the air on gentle wings. In the distance car horns and exhaust pipes could be heard matching the carefree calls of eager students departing for home reciting daily gossip within their cliques.
It was a typical Monday afternoon.
That had only just begun.