Miu's P.O.V

Chapter 2

We just met

And I know I'm a bit too intimate

But something huge is coming up

And we're both included.

Bjork/Big Time Sensuality

Sunday 15th November 2003

As soon as we said those words, there was no hesitation, and there was no going back. There was a moment of complete silence, in which I could not even hear myself, or any of the others breathing. I looked at Toshigami who had his black eyes closed. The atmosphere around us felt like it was growing thicker, and I did not move.

Then there was the headache. It felt like someone had reached their hand into my head to my brain, and started messing around with it. My eyes squeezed shut tightly, and I was seeing black.

When I came to my senses, the first thing I noticed was the noise. I shut my hands over my ears, blocking out the sound. My eyes opened, and hissed, squinting. Why was it so bright?

Then someone bumped into me, and since I was so disorientated, I almost fell over. I regained my balance quickly, as the person walked away without as much as a sorry. I blinked wildly, trying to force my eyes to get used to the light, and slowly lowered my hands away from my ears.

Ayako was standing right beside me, her hands covering her eyes completely, only leaving little gaps in between her fingers like blinds. She turned around and looked at me… at least I think she did. It was hard to tell, what with her fingers covering her eyes.

I looked at the ground, but the sun was reflecting against the gravel, so that made it all the worse to see, so I figured that covering my eyes like Ayako was doing wasn't such a bad idea, and so I went to extend my arms to cover my eyes, but when my hand uncurled, something heavy had fallen into it.

I involuntarily made a noise of a mix between shock and confusion, and looked at it, covering it with my hand to make a shadow. It was a small red plastic firework, like something from a child's toy. With my free hand I shielded my eyes like a visor, and looked around. And then I jumped. Right before my eyes was Toshigami. I nudged Ayako with my elbow, and indicated Toshigami to her. She looked at me confused, frowned.

"What?" She mouthed, the 'w' playing on her lips.

"Look!" I said, pointing.

She looked at me like I was going crazy, her hands coming to a rest by her sides. Apparently she could see just fine now. Then she lifted her hand up to her eyes, as if examining something.

"What the…?" She muttered, looking at me, then showing me the object that had mysteriously appeared in her dark tanned hand. I noticed that her fingers were thin and spindly. In her hand was a dark grey stone, like asphalt. I held out my own hand, showing her the small toy firework.

Suddenly Ayako jumped backward onto the foot path (we were standing on the gutter), her heel hitting the raised pavement.

"What? Hey, Ayako!" I said, startled. I looked back at Toshigami, who came stalking towards us on all fours.

My attention was drawn away from Toshigami when Ayako started talking to herself. "Make her touch this as well….? Yes, I know that's what you just said… Okay whatever. Be quiet now."

"What did you say to me?" I asked, offended. "I didn't say anything."

She looked at me, her eyes wide. Her cheeks flushed, abashed. "I wasn't talking to you. I was talking to Hajime."

"He's here? Where's the mushroom?" I looked around, my eyes drawn to the ground searching for him.

Ayako snorted, and held out the stone for me. "He says to touch this. And I have to touch your toy firework."

I shrugged and held out my hand. Her fingers tapped the toy once, and then I grazed her stone.

"…And who are you calling a mushroom?" Came a gruff voice.

My eyes landed on the brown, goblin looking creature.

"I'm calling you a mushroom." I said bluntly. Toshigami had crossed the road over to us. It was then that I realised that this place was really familiar. "Are we… in Shibuya?" I asked.

I looked around, noticed the wide crossing, and all the building surrounding us.

"Yes, we are." Came Toshigami's deep voice.

"What are we still doing here?" Ayako asked.

Toshigami leaped gracefully onto the sidewalk, and continued to walk, leading us past many shops and kiosks.

Hajime answered. "We're not still here, exactly. Look around you. What seems different here than before?"

I looked around. We passed a bus stop which had a billboard for a movie: When the Last Sword Is Drawn. The movie sounds familiar. I must have watched it a very long time ago, but the strange thing was, at the bottom of the poster, it said 'Now Showing,' like it had only come out just recently.

I pointed it out to Ayako, who was looking around at the people on the street. "That's weird. I'm pretty sure I saw that movie when I was 9 or ten something."

Then if came to us simultaneously. "Oh!" We exclaimed in delight.

"We went back in time, didn't we?" Ayako asked, grinning. A couple walked past us, giving us strange looks.

Toshigami turned back to us, his mouth curled upwards into what I supposed was a smile. "That's right. You are in the Shibuya district of Tokyo, November 15th 2003."

I nodded, understanding. "Right." I said.

Ayako frowned. I could tell that she was brimming with questions. I was too, but I figured to let her go first.

"How come we need these objects to see you?" She asked, holding up her piece of asphalt as if they had forgotten. "Why didn't we need them before? Wherever we were before…"

Toshigami was the one to explain. "Because we were in the midst where humans and kami can meet, in Limbo, as would be the broadest definition of that land. Even we kami don't know of its origins, and we believe it is older than even the earth itself. You didn't need those objects because our own objects, even the Death Note have been infiltrated with the properties of that being. It will allow you to see the invisible."

"Oh." Ayako says. "So we didn't need these because we were basically touching them the whole time. I guess that makes sense."

I nodded. It did. I frowned at the mention of the Death Note. Toshigami and Hajime had been talking about it like we were supposed to know exactly what it is, but we didn't.

To me, it sounded like a letter that somebody would write when they died, or something like that. I was about to ask, but Ayako had another question that she put out before I could even open my mouth.

"Who is Kira, anyway?"

Good question.

"All will become clear in due time." Toshigami said cryptically.

"That doesn't help…" A thought came to my mind. "Are you just trying to say that you don't even know who the person behind Kira is?" I asked, my voice rising a bit.

"What do you mean we don't know who it is?" Hajime grumbled. "Of course we know who it is. We just want to make it a bit harder for you, that's all."

I stopped in my tracks, "Is that supposed to be a joke?" I asked harshly.

"Nope." Hajime replied.

I looked at Toshigami, but he just kept on walking. I turn to Ayako, who looks just as annoyed and unsettled as I do.

"Can you believe this?" Ayako asks under her under her breath.

I shake my head. "Why does this have to be so much more complicated than it already is?" I grumble back to her. "I suppose all that we can do now is try to use our knowledge to narrow it down to who he actually is."

Ayako nods, we keep walking until we have caught up with the kami. "So since you won't tell us, can we make reasonable deductions as to who it might be?"

"Why wouldn't you?" Toshigami says.

I grumble under my breath, "'Cos you're not being very helpful right now…" But nobody picks up on what I said.

Ayako keeps on going. "So you know that Kira is definitely a 'he,' right? Because you keep on saying he."

"That's right." Toshigami admitted.

Ayako turns to me. "Let's review what we know so far. He's male, he lives in the Kanto region of Japan and… what else?"

I shrug. "That's basically it. Even back at home they would keep everything silent." Kira's death was hidden from the public, so for months on people still paraded on about how Kira was the world's saviour. But since then, mostly everyone figured that something had happened and that he was unable to kill anymore.

"Helpful." I muttered, then I said loudly: "Can you give us hints?"

I heard what I thought was a chuckle escape from Toshigami's lips. "I can give you guidance, however don't think that I am a guardian angel."

I shrugged, and Hajime butted in. "Yeah! We didn't sign up for that when we agreed to help you. We have our own jobs to do, so don't expect to see much of us."

Toshigami grumbled. "But if you ever need any help, don't hesitate. To get into contact with us, just tap your object once, and we will arrive as soon as we can. Now, since you need a place to stay in the time being, we've already found an apartment for you to stay in. The rent will be paid in due time by Hajime and I, since you have no funds, and you will be given some money by Hajime to get food, and other necessary items."

Hajime made a start, pausing to turn around back to us. His long spindly feet pointed towards as he walked backwards, digging a hand into his pants pocket with had a bulge, and pulling out, handing it to Ayako.

"Woah." She said, ruffling through the notes.

"How much is there?" I asked.

"A lot," She replied, still counting. "There's about 6,5000 yen here!"

"Are you joking?" I asked, ecstatic.

"Not at all!" She chirped. We turned a corner and almost bumped into a teenage girl. Ayako squeaked out an apology, and stuffed some of the cash into her jeans pocket. She gave the rest to me.

"How long will it be until we get to the apartment?" I asked. I took out my wallet from my bag and shoved it in.

"Not too long… ah, here it is." Toshigami said.

I looked straight ahead, looking at the towering apartment. It was painted white and had gleaming windows and a small balcony in each of the units.

"Awesome." I said.

In a few minutes we had arrived. We moved into our rooms not before greeting the landlord and getting our keys from him. Our room was three floors from the top, and we could see the city down below us from the balcony. "Wow." I muttered.

I turned back inside, searching around the rooms. It was fully furnished with a kitchen, a bedroom and a bathroom.

Amenities we had were an air conditioner, a heater, internet, cable tv and even a hair dryer and a flat iron.

There was only one bed, and a double futon. I ended up taking the futon out of the goodness of my heart, and also because Ayako had been overseas for a lot of her life, and had spent most of her time sleeping on beds, instead of on the floor, and I was afraid that she would get a terrible night's sleep if she slept on a futon on the floor.

I went into the kitchen where Ayako was sitting at a small wooden table talking to Hajime. I looked at the kitchen counter, noting the microwave, a toaster, and oven and a stove. In the corner we had a large fridge which had been plugged in, and occasionally made a whirring noise.

I heard Ayako's conversation to Hajime. I went looking for Toshigami, but I figured that he had left since I couldn't see him anywhere.

"…So, our parents don't know about this at all?" She was asking. Her voice took on a sombre tone.

"Well, no they don't. But if you go back when you've finished the mission, it'll be like no time had passed at all, see? We would send you back at the exact time before you left, makes sense?"

Ayako worried her bottom lip. "I guess…"

"Oh, and before I forget. You're still going to school tomorrow." Hajime said quickly.

Ayako and I looked at each other. I felt my face drop. I groaned inwardly.

"Now, we've enrolled you into a school that's different from your original schools, and it's highly prestigious, so we had to make it out like the two of you were really smart to get the two of you in there."

I smiled. I already knew that I was plenty smart. "What school is it?" I asked.

"Daikoku Private Academy. Heard of it?"

I nod. "Yeah. What about after high school? Do we still get to go into our university that we wanted to?"

Hajime shrugged. "I don't see why not. I just suppose that when you get back to your time, you would have to choose a different uni to go to. Or not, since you've already been. Although I would suppose that you would have a hard time explaining that to your parents."

"…Okay." I said. "Do we have our uniforms already?"

Hajime grumbled. "I knew I was forgetting something. Right. Well the day is still young so I don't suppose you girls are up for some shopping?" He asked.

I tilted my head up. "I'm cool with that."

"Same," Ayako said.

Hajime leapt of the table, landing on the tiled ground like an ugly, fat brown cat.

"Let's go then." He said, and began guiding us outside. We decided to get groceries as well since we were there, and then I had an idea.

"Hey, do you think that we could go back home and get some things that we want to bring over… like books and stuff for entertainment?"

Ayako looked impressed. "Good idea." She commented, as we walked, trying to find the uniform shop.

Hajime rubbed the back of his neck. "Ah, I would let you go, but we've received orders not to let you go back until you've succeeded in the mission."

I frowned. "Orders from who…? And what if we fail? What if we never even find out who Kira is?"

"Well, our orders come from our leader, the one who watches over the earth. And I know you won't fail, because you have us kami to guide you, alright?'

I shrugged, still not satisfied. And he hadn't given us a straight answer about who is giving him the orders either.

"Oh look!" Hajime said, changing the subject. "I found the uniform shop."

We went in, searching for the seifuku: a black sailor fuku with a skirt that reached above my knees, and when I tried it on it reached even a bit higher than I would have liked it to because of my height, so I ended up getting a size up. It fit perfectly for Ayako. We paid for it, and then made out way to the nearest grocery store and bought as much as we could carry in plastic bags which included: fruit, vegetables, frozen meals, canned food, soda and cordial, rice and a lot of sweets. We also bought some school books, stationary, and plain school bags for the both of us.

When we arrived back home, we piled the vegetables and the drinks in the fridge and stored the frozen meals into the freezer beneath the fridge. We had bought a small fruit bowl from the grocery store as well and put the apples and bananas in there as well. I took the container of strawberries into the fridge and Ayako stored the rice and sweets in a shelf above the sink.

When we had finished packing everything away we looked around.

"Hey, where did Hajime go?" I asked.

"Oh, he said that he had some other things to do, so he left." Ayako said.

"Oh, cool." I said offhandedly. I walked over and slumped down on the wooden chair at the table, with Ayako following me. She let out a heavy sigh.

The table was next to the white painted wall and I leaned against it. "What a weird day." I said quietly.

Ayako looked at me with her piercing dark eyes. Her fringe was poking into her eyes, and she swept it away with a lithe finger. She brought it down to her black t-shirt and began playing with the hem. "Definitely." She said.

The atmosphere had turned into something like anticipation, and nervousness. The sun was filtering into the room, shining on the metal of the toaster, which reflected onto the ceiling. I yawned. Even though it was still in the morning, I was tired. It was probably because before we left, it was midnight, I realised. Weird, to be jetlagged when you never even left your own country.

"Are you tired?" Ayako asked.

"Yeah." I said.

"Me, too."

We fell into a silence for a few seconds.

"Wanna go to sleep?" I asked.

"Not really."

I understood that. "Me either. Wanna talk about all this stuff?"

"Yeah, okay." Ayako said.

I tried to think about what to say, but I couldn't. I didn't want to think of the possibilities of what might happen if we didn't succeed in this seemingly impossible mission. Something terrible, probably. We just fell into an awkward silence. I decided to try and get to know Ayako instead.

"So…" I said. "What are your hobbies?"

"I like to draw." She said, looking at me. "You?"

"I love reading." I said.

"Oh, cool."

We fell into a silence again, but I was determined to keep the conversation going.

"What's your favourite band?" I asked.

"Big Bang"

"Oh, I haven't listened to them before." I said, all I knew about them was that they were a popular K-Pop band.

She felt around in her pocket, pulling out her smart phone. "You wanna listen?" She asked hopefully.

"Sure!" I smiled, happy that we were finally getting somewhere.

She pressed a few buttons on her phone and soon music started playing out of the speakers.

The song had an upbeat tone had a heavy beat. The members of the band sang fast, and made me want to get up and dance. "This is cool!" I said.

"I know," She said, finally with a smile dancing upon her lips. The song finished, and she paused it before another one could play.

I thought for a moment. "Hey, since it is 2003, do you think we wouldn't be able to use our phones in public?"

"Why is that?" She asked.

"Well, I think people just use flip phones or things like that don't they? So it would be weird if we went around carrying a phone that nobody had heard of before it even hits the market, right?"

Her eyes widened slightly. "I suppose your right. Hey, you're pretty smart, aren't you?"

I laugh. "I try to be. I'm terrible at studying though. I never do it, but somehow, I've managed to pass all of my exams… or I did. Do you think we'll have to take all of our exams again? Even the entry exams?"

Ayako rubbed her arms, and let out a small groan. "I hope not, but probably. Oh well, we already know what all the questions are going to be about, so I think we're going to be fine."

I nodded. "True, that."

She looked at me. "You actually look kind of familiar though. Have I seen you before this…?"

I frowned, and now that I thought about it, she was actually familiar to me as well. "I don't think so…"

"Oh! I know!" She started. "You were in that restaurant before the countdown, weren't you? With your little brother, and your parents, I think."

That was it! "Yes, I was. This is cool, to think that we were in each other's presence before even knowing that we were meant to go on this mission together!"

She laughed, then lowered voice, looking at me seriously. "Did you see that woman, with the unsettling eyes?"

I nodded, recalling her. "Yeah, she was staring at me,"

"And me too."

"Do you think that she knew something about us?" I asked.

"Maybe… Well, I guess we'll just have to see how thing fold out."

"Yeah I guess so." Then I said with a grin gracing my features. "Maybe we'll find love!" I said in a sing-song voice. I giggled.

"Oh, I'm always in love." Ayako said. "Just wait, the hottest guy at school tomorrow, and I'll be all over him."

I laughed. "I'll bet."

We spent the rest of the day talking, and getting to know each other and talking until our throats were sore, and we decided to take a nap to wake up fresh tomorrow in the morning.

When I woke up, it was night time. I couldn't believe how long I had spoken to Ayako for. There was nothing else to do, anyway. I got up of the futon, and looked over to the bed where Ayako was still peacefully sleeping, and sneaked over to the small living room, where the television was and turned on the television, grabbing the remote and turning the volume down so it wouldn't wake Ayako.

There this late at night, there were mostly only home shopping channels on. I switched to a channel playing a drama, so I watched that.

It was pretty predictable, but I found myself hooked, my eyes glued to the TV screen. I didn't even notice that Ayako had woken up until she sat onto the couch next to me, her legs crossed in front of her and her hands in her lap.

"Good morning." I said.

"It's night time." She pointed out.

"I know." I replied. "It's past midnight, though."

"I guess so."

I kept on watching the drama, and Ayako was even more interested in it than I was. I looked at her next to me, her eyes were half-lidded from exhaustion and she had sleep in the corners of her eyes, but she was alert, and even yelling at the TV screen when a character did something stupid, which seemed to be every 5 seconds.

Her enthusiasm infected me, and I found myself yelling at the characters as well, quietly, since everyone else in the apartments around us were all probably sleeping.

It was around 4am when the program finished, and I tried going back to sleep, but I couldn't, and neither could Ayako. So we just sat on the couch together until the sun came up and we decided to put our uniforms on. We changed one after the other. Me first, then Ayako. While I was waiting for Ayako to get ready, I went to the toilet, and then as I was washing my hands I realised I didn't have any of my beloved makeup. I sighed, deciding that I could go one day without it, and making a mental note to myself to go to the grocery store after school and buy some, also some pads and tampons, since we forgot to buy those as well, and they were definitely a necessity.

"Hajime told me yesterday that since the school was already expecting us today, we just have to go to the office, and announce that we're here, and they'll tell us what to do."

I nodded. "They've really thought everything out, haven't they."

"They have." Ayako agreed.

I was getting too impatient to wait for school to start in 2 hours, but I had to put up with it. I contemplated actually going to the grocery store just to pass the time, but I decided that I would probably get lost and end up being late for school.

I ran my fingers through my hair because we also didn't have any brushes or combs, and turned on the flat iron and straightened my hair to make it look neater. Ayako didn't have to do anything to her hair because it was pretty short to do much to it anyway.

Running the straightener through my shoulder length brown hair, I studied myself in the mirror. My skin was pale and my cheeks were red, and I could see some pimples forming on my chin. My small brown eyes were wide and alert, although they did have bags under them.

When I had finished, I went to the kitchen and got a glass from a cupboard which had already been stored there beforehand, and had a glass of water. My mouth was dry.

Then after those agonisingly long hours, it was finally time to go to school. Ayako tapped her stone once, as Hajime had told her to do, and not too long after, he materialised in front of us.

"Hey," He said. "Time to show you the way to your school?" He asked.

"Yep." Ayako said. I pulled on the socks and shoes I was wearing yesterday, and went and stood next to Ayako.

"Right. Follow me." Hajime said, walking to the door and trying to reach for the door knob, but he was too short. "Uh, can you open it for me?" He said.

I leaned over and opened it up, and then we took the elevator down to the ground floor, and then we were on our way.

I was happy to find that the school was only a short 10 minutes away from where we lived. When we entered the school, Hajime guided us to the office.

Inside, the office looked very sophisticated. The lady at the office looked up as we walked in. She was plump, with a nice made up face. "Hello," She said. "You must be the Hashimoto girls, am I correct?" She asked. Her voice was strict.

"Ummm…" Ayako said.

"Yes, you are!" Hajime said urgently. I almost freaked out, but then I realised that nobody could see or hear him unless they touched the enchanted object.

"Yes, that's us." I said calmly.

"Right. Well, nice to meet you both. I'm guessing you are twins, since you are in the same year level, but you don't look anything alike."

I nod, playing along. "That's right. We're not identical though, so that would explain the differences."

"Okay." She goes on her computer, and presses the keyboard a few times, and something prints out. She hands two sheets of paper to us, and we take it. "These are your timetables, each based off your electives that you had from your old school. If you need to know where anything is, there is a map printed on the back of that sheet, but also don't hesitate to ask your peers if you need any help. I hope you like it here." She said with a smile.

We smile back, and head outside. Hajime walks beside us. "I'm surprised that she didn't ask more questions, to be honest."

"Yeah, that's true." I said. Some people walked past, but I didn't think that they would think that I was talking to myself, just answering something that Ayako might have said to me. "That's good though, right?"

"Sure." Hajime answered. "Why wouldn't it be?"

We sit down on a bench near the entrance of the school, and look at our time tables. I have a look at my classes.

I had six classes.

8:30-9:20: Japanese

9:30-10:20: Science

10:30-11:20: English

11:30-12:20: Mathematics

12:30-1:20 lunch

1:20-2:10: Social Studies

2:20-3:10: Moral Studies

All in all, I was pretty happy with my classes. I was pretty decent in all of them, except for maybe science, which was my worst subject, and I had four 10 minute recesses which I would use to catch up and do all of my homework.

I looked at Ayako's subject list when we were done. We had almost all the same classes, except for last period: where I had moral studies, she had art.

Then the bell rang for class to start, and I looked down at the class list. On the side where it listed the classes it had a column indicating where all the classrooms were.

I looked on the back of the piece of the paper at the map, finding where we were, and where the classroom was. I had Japanese in class 4-1 and after studying the map, I had a vague idea where it was.

"Come on." I said, standing up, and going inside the school. Inside it was sterile, and looked slightly like a hospital. There were lockers lining the inside of the grounds, but we weren't assigned any lockers yet, so we had to carry our bags inside the class room. It turned out I had a pretty good sense of direction, because I found the classroom quickly. I quietly walked into the room, with Ayako following behind me, and Hajime behind her. A few glances turned towards us, but mostly everyone ingored us. I walked up to the teacher, clearing my throat.

"Um, hi." I said. "We're your-"

The teacher stood up behind her desk, smiling. "Oh! You must be the new girls. Welcome to Daikoko Academy. My name is Sensei Mizuno." She turns to the class, and she introduces us. "These are the two girls that have transferred into our school! They are twin sisters, Hashimoto Ayako and Miu," She turned to face us again. "Now tell us who you are, hmm?"

I speak first, loud and feigning confidence. "My name I Hashimoto Miu." I say, smiling a little.

Ayako is quieter. I can tell that she would rather not be speaking in front of a large crowd. She told me yesterday, that she was very shy. "I'm Hashimoto Ayako." She says quietly.

I don't think anybody could hear her, but since I already said that I was Miu, they could have been able to figure it out.

"Great!" Sensei says, clasping her hands together. "Well, we've brought in some desks for you two, right next to each other, but if you want to move them, don't hesitate. Lord knows how I get so annoyed with my own siblings, but never mind that. Those two spare tables at the back are for you two."

We nod simultaneously, and walk across the other desks to our assigned desks, I let Ayako take the seat next to the window, and we pull our writing books out of our bags. Mine just has a plain black cover, and Ayako chose cuteness over practicableness, and hers was pink with colourful pandas all over the cover.

Sensei started the lesson, and it passed pretty quickly. We were looking at the themes of the text that we were studying, and applying them to an essay that we would have to write soon. I think I did well, this class, especially since Japanese was my favourite subject, and also because I had already read the book and written the essay, and I still got pretty high marks on that. I guess the syllabus was the same at every school in Japan. Sensei was openly impressed when I participated in class, answering the questions that she had asked without fail.

After answering her question about what sub-themes were evident in the text, she raised her eyebrows. "Well, it looks like we have a dedicated student in my class! Finally!"

I was shocked to find that she actually said that out loud, but looking around the classroom, I noticed that all of the other students were hardly even listening to the teacher. They were all leaning around, and lazily talking to their friends. I frowned. Wasn't this supposed to be a prestigious high school? I don't know, I guess I was just thinking that it was supposed to have a higher ratio of intellectuals than lazy students. Oh well. As long as I can do my best in class, I didn't really mind. I actually liked learning, so going to school while we were on this insane mission didn't really bother me.

At my old school, there was a lot of pressure upon the students to get the top marks, but I didn't really care much about that. Although at this school, I wouldn't be surprised if I did turn out to be the top student, judging that if the people in this class were like all the other students in this school.

The rest of the class was just mostly Sensei writing on the chalkboard about the plot, and themes of the text, and then we had to write them down into our own notebooks. It passed on like this uneventfully, until the bell rang for the next lesson, but before that, we had out first 10 minute break for recess.

The next class, I had science. I moved to the next classroom with Ayako by my side. She had ink stains on her hands from where she had been doodling in her excersise book, and I was amazed to see that she was actually really good at drawing.

Ayako was the one to guide me to the science room, and she was bounding up and down, actually excited. I was dreading to go. I hated science class with a passion, because I was terrible at it. I don't understand all these atoms and atomic numbers and atomic mass and whatever else it was. Experiments were nice, I guess, but they were too methodical. I didn't like methods. However, Ayako seemed to like science, because she was telling me about how much she loved it, when we saw him.

You know how every school has that one guy that is really good-looking? Well, we found him. He was walking inside the classroom that we just had in English. Ayako had noticed him first, and then she pointed him out to me. He was tall and slim, with fair skin and brown hair.

When he disappeared into the classroom, Ayako turned towards me. "I think I'm in love."

I nodded. "I definitely think that he is hot. But still, he's not my type."

She looked at me incredulously. "Not your type? How can he not be your type? What, don't like pretty boys?" She looked at me sternly, but I could see a crinkle in her eyes.

"You're only half right." I say. I smile. "I don't like boys."

She frowned, "So you like men? Older men?"

I laugh. "No, not that either."

I wait for it to sink in. Then a light comes to her eyes. "Ohhhh! You like girls!" She says, her voice rising, she looks at me for confirmation.

"Yep." I say.

"Great! That means I get to have all the guys to myself!" She smiles widely.

I chuckle at her antics, when the guy came out of the classroom again. I nudge her, and she looks at me, then follows my line of sight. She blushes when she notices that he's coming closer, and I turn around, trying to hold in my laughter.

"Come on," I say. "Let's get to class."

She doesn't hear me. Her eyes are locked onto Hottie McHot. He is looking down though, so he doesn't notice and get creeped out or whatever. "Hey… Ayako." I nudge her. She looks back to me, her face as red as a beet.

"What?" She asks.

"Let's go to class.' I reiterated calmly, biting the insides of my cheeks to stop myself from laughing.

"Oh. Right." She says. She begins leading the way, just as Hottie walks past us to our next class, walking briskly, and I realise that we were going to be late. Ayako is leading us, and soon, I realise that we are following him.

"Um… Ayako?" I say in a whisper. "Are we following this guy, or are you taking us to our classroom?"

She looks at me, frowning. "As if I would do that! No, this is the way to our class, I'm sure."

I hoped so. I also hoped that the guy wouldn't turn around and figure out that we were following him. Then we turned into the same class, and if Ayako was red before, this was an entire new colour.

Ayako and the hottie walked into class at the same time, and he got through first, accidentally bumping Ayako into the door frame.

He muttered a quick "Sorry," before the teacher noticed the three of us. Ayako blushed even more, and turned back to me with an expression her face as if to say he touched me and spoke to me! I was almost losing all self-control at this point, sucking in my lips, as to stop the laughter from escaping.

"Yagami," The teacher said. "Strange for you to be late."

Finally, a name! Yagami bowed, and said an apology. The teacher looked towards us, and we filed in, saying the same thing that we had said to Sensei Mizuno. Our science teacher smiled and introduced herself as Suzuki.

She introduced us to the class, and I noticed that some of the people from Japanese class were in this one as well. She made us sit down a few seats apart from each other. I let Ayako have the seat closer to the Yagami boy, so she could stare at him without having to position herself awkwardly.

I usually got distracted by my friends in science before, so that might have been a reason about why I was so terrible at it, but I definitely wasn't going to go out of my way in this class than I did in Japanese, because I simply did not care about science, however I was surprised to find that Ayako excelled at it. And so did Yagami. We were learning something about forensics something or other, and Ayako raised her hand for every question, answering them all correctly when she was picked on by the teacher. It appeared that almost every student slacked off at this school. The only other person who didn't slack, from what I could tell, was Yagami.

I wasn't really paying attention to what the teacher was saying, only focused on Ayako. I looked at Yagami, and noticed that he was looking at her from the corner of his eye. The corners of my lips twisted into a smile.

"Hey," A voice whispered in my direction. "What're you smiling about, huh?"

I looked to the direction of the voice, and a guy with short black hair gazed at me. He was sitting in the table right next to me, and I vaguely recalled him my Japanese class. "Hmm? Nothin'" I whispered back. I opened my book, as Suzuki had told us to do, and began writing down what she was writing on the board. She then told us to get out our textbooks and read the pages from 171-172.

Damn it. I knew we were forgetting something. I raised my hand, and waited until she called on me. "Um, sorry miss, it was a bit late notice when we were told that we were coming here, so we didn't have enough time to purchase our textbooks…"

I heard her give a sigh. "The person on the right side of Ayako and Miu please share you're book." She looked at us sternly. "I'm expecting you to get your own textbooks by the end of the week, am I clear?"

I nod. Great… she was one of those teachers. The kind who shove the blame onto you, even when you couldn't control what had happened. If she knew that I was the person who was going to stop the world from going to shit… it was then that I realised that Hajime had gone missing. Damn it. He probably had something else to attend to.

I turned to the person who was supposed to be sharing his textbook with me, and he had moved his table closer to mine, so they were touching. "Hey." He said. "I'm Arakaki Ren. Nice to meet you."

I nodded. "You too." I look down at the textbook, and begin reading the page about things I don't understand, but that doesn't mean that I'm not going to try.

"So, why'd you move here for?" He asked. He hadn't even picked up a pen.

Thankfully, I had already thought up a cover story. "My dad's job makes him move around a lot, so we had to come here."

He nodded, actually seeming interested. "Oh, nice. Where were you from originally?"

I thought about it, then said the first thing that came to my head. "Kyoto."

His eyes widened. "You've come a long way then."

I shrug. "I suppose so."

I write down the questions on the opposite page even though I hadn't finished reading the page.

At the end of the day, it's evident that I am terrible at science, since I had gotten every single answer wrong, and that Ayako was the genius, as she had all of them right. Apparently, her and Yagami were now competing for the top science student, and she was doing all that she could to beat him. Something I like about Ayako was her competitive streak when it came to something that she liked. She would not let anyone stop her from being the best.

The rest of the day wasn't really all the noteworthy. After recess, we had English, which I had with Ayako and Yagami. I excelled at that, but Ayako did even better than everyone in the whole class, and it quickly came apparent to me, that in all of his classes, Yagami was the best, but it soon turned out that he was going to have some competition in Ayako and I. Ayako had spent four years in Australia, so her English skills were perfect. She was also born in the Philipines, so she was fluent in that as well, but we wouldn't tell anyone that, since we were supposed to be twin sisters, and it would be weird if one of us was born in Japan and the other wasn't.

After the class had ended, our teacher had considered her in getting to drop the class, but she decided not to, admitting that her English skills weren't perfect, and she still needed to perfect it. I was sitting on top of the table waiting for her to finish, when Yagami came in, just as she was admitting that she wasn't perfect. He had heard her.

"What do you mean that you're not perfect?" He asked, walking in, and going to his desk next to the window, and picking up something that he must have left behind: a pen. "You're better than even me at English, and I'd hate to say it, even at science."

He waited for Ayako to say something, like 'thanks.' But it never came. He shrugged, and left. I looked at her, and noticed that she was hiding her face with her hair, but I could see her neck, which was slowly turning red. I leapt off the desk, and took her by the wrist and led her outside. I snuck a quick glance. Our teacher had a completely bemused expression on his face… poor guy. Couldn't understand the woes of the heart.

I look at Ayako and I laugh. Her face is red, and she looked like she's stopped breathing. She's biting her lip, and looking like she's either going to cry or burst out in laughter. Except that's me: bursting out in laughter.

She looks at me, and smiles as well, but it's not too long after she gets annoyed at me and smacks me upside the head. "Stop that." She orders me.

I look down on her and stop laughing, amazed that a person of her small stature could even reach up and hit me.

"Thank you." She says exasperatedly.

The rest of the week passed uneventfully as well. There were no more interactions between Ayako and her crush, and we had both made friends fast, but our thoughts were still on our goal: to find the Death Note.

November 23rd 2003

The entire week had consisted of us studying for the National Practice Entry Exams, which if it was the real deal, would help enlist us to get into a university, not necessarily the one we wanted to go to, but the one which would fit with our skill levels, but if we got high enough marks, we would put our preferences down, indicating which university that we wanted to get in to.

Ayako and I had already taken the test before we left, so we figured that the test was going to be a breeze, but she still studied anyway. I didn't, as I mentioned: I hated studying. I preferred learning.

We were in the last period of class, and we were on red alert. Toshigami and Hajime had come to us with serious expressions and told us that today would be the day of the first recording of a Death Note hitting the earth in this time frame.

We were sitting in English, the last period of the day. We were sitting apart from each other. But still next to the window, just in case a Death Note would happen to fall to the ground outside, which I highly doubted, but still.

I was looking at the teacher, but in the corner of my eye I could still see outside. I was sitting to seats down from the front, with Ren sitting behind me, and behind him, was Yagami, which I found out that his first name Light. I thought it was a weird name. Behind him, was Ayako, and I hoped that she would focus on the task at hand, rather than Yagami's backside.

From what I could tell, there was no Death Note sightings anywhere around us, but when the bell rang to go home, I couldn't find Ayako anywhere, so I figured that something had happened. I came out of the classroom, chasing after Ren, I asked if he had seen Ayako anywhere.

"Sure, I saw her run outside, but I stopped to talk to her for a bit, but she left in a hurry. Weird, right? You know, you girls are absolutely nothing alike."

I nodded. "Right. Well, I gotta go. Bye!"

I ran outside, not before hearing Ren say, "Well, except for that. That's what she said to me, as well."

I ignored him. Ayako must have seen something. I walked past all the classrooms, and raced outside, looking around for her. Then I found her, and she was racing towards a small section of grass, with small benches around. I saw her run up, but then stop in her tracks.

She hadn't seen me, but I could see what she was looking at. Yagami was there, and he had picked up a small black notebook. He began leafing through the pages, and I could see some kind of writing on the front and back of the book. He dropped it, and it fell back to the ground. I let out a breath that I hadn't realised I'd been holding in. He began walking away, and Ayako turned around started to walk away, to make it look like she hadn't been following him. I was going to walk up to her, when I noticed that Yagami had turned back.

Oh no. Ayako was still walking, she hadn't seen it. He picked up the notebook, and shoved it in his back pack.

Shit. I ran up to Ayako, avoiding Yagami. I tapped her on the shoulder, she gave a start and turned around, a hand clasping her chest.

I didn't wait for her to give me a greeting. "He has it." I say quickly. She looks at me. "I saw him put it down too, but he picked it up again." I lowered my voice to a whisper. "Light Yagami has the Death Note."

Her face fell.