Reverse Psychology

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Haruhi Suzumiya was a persistent girl who loved to have her way. She was also, apparently, a being of such magnitude that the universe almost literally centered on her. Not surprising, Kyon thought. Through some means she usually always had it her way.

Kyon had planned to spend this particular Saturday lounging around at his house, doing absolutely nothing to offset all the days that Haruhi spent dragging her SOS cronies everywhere. That was, until Haruhi rung him up on his ol' cell phone to tell him the SOS Brigade was meeting in some abandoned park, some five blocks and change from Kyon's place. It was "Brigade" because SOS was neither a "Qualified Student Organization" nor a "Gathering of Like-Minded Individuals" by any stretch of the imagination (well, maybe Haruhi's imagination).

Kyon sighed. Haruhi had said it would be a five-hour meeting to discuss how to improve the frequency of supernatural, occult, or otherwise strange happenings. Or, in Haruhi's words, "We're not leaving until we find out why you guys have been sucking so much lately," which, Kyon conceded, was more succinct than his summarization of the circumstances. Kyon could almost predict Haruhi's solutions to the "problem", such as skimpier outfits for Mikuru-chan (good) or increased hours of running all around the city chasing ghosts both literally and figuratively (bad).

But today Kyon had an idea. Usually he didn't like the idea of pretty much anything and everything Haruhi suggested, which was how she generally knew what she was doing was right. BUT! What if, he thought, he were to agree with her? Then what would she do? Kyon walked along, his head down, and laughed to himself. He was almost too smart for his own good—almost. Why he didn't just ignore it all, he didn't know, even if half of his brain wanted to believe it was to avoid spontaneously combusting by an act of god (or Haruhi), and half his brain and about all of his pants wanted to believe it was the presence of three beautiful girls, one of whom was viciously well-endowed, one of whom looked like she wouldn't care if you ripped her clothes off, and one of whom was literally ungodly beautiful. Regardless, he had perfected his "I think that's a great idea, Haruhi! Let's try it out!" speech, and when he heard Haruhi's exceedingly loud voice he knew he had found the place, and he ambled up to the bench in the quiet park around which the usual suspects had gathered.

"Kyon!" Haruhi said as he came up on them. "You're ten minutes late!"

"Yeah, sorry. I had trouble finding the place." A lie. In reality he had lost track of time, and yet still found time to grab a bottle of imported coffee milk before sprinting off to the assigned meeting point.

"Well, whatever," Haruhi said. She looked up at the sky, which was beginning to darken with the coming of night, and the clouds were beginning to gather. "Anyway, strange things happen in the night. Therefore! We're going to split off into two groups to look for temporal anomalies. Thanks to Mikuru for this little 'tip'!"

Mikuru squeaked timidly.

"Anyway," Haruhi continued, "We're going to split up into two groups, and—"

"You already said that!"

"Oh, shut up, Kyon," Haruhi said. "Anyway, Yuki, Itsuki, you head north and check out those old abandoned apartments at the Tanigawa Complex. There has to be something interesting there. Meanwhile, I will go with Kyon and Mikuru-chan. We're going to go into the center of town," Haruhi said, grinning, "to see some of the night people. Kyon, you're coming with me so I can keep an eye on you, and Mikuru is coming so we can use her fantastic boobies to attract supernaturally strong men."

"Right, um," Kyon said, "I, uh—" At this point, Kyon was unsure whether or not he was going to continue on with his plan or not. After all, he would be with Mikuru, and anyway, what if his little plan backfired? What then?

"What is it now, Kyon?"

"Uh, I just wanted to say that…" Make or break time. "That this was a great idea! Going out in the nighttime to investigate the supernatural and the parapsychological is a really good idea. I know great things are going to happen."

Haruhi looked at Kyon after he finished speaking, eyeing him as though he had completely dived off the deep end—with sharks. "What's wrong with you?" she said. Kyon held his breath. Was it working? Was it actually working?

"Anyway, let's get going."

Crap. Didn't work. Kyon shook his head and Haruhi impatiently motioned for him and Mikuru—who was wearing a remarkably thin T-shirt that night—to come along.

Oh well, Kyon thought, his mind rather characteristically shrugging. At least they had boobies.