Akamatsu Ken and Kodansha created and own Negima... aren't you as sick of reading that disclaimer crap yet as I'm of writing it?
Two Loves, Two Cards, Too Much.
With Proofreading and Edits by Shadow Crystal Mage.
"Now," Negi Springfield said, standing at the front of the classroom holding the Neo Horizon textbook, "I would like someone to translate the third paragraph of Page 126 into English. Let's see…"
Seat 27 was quiet and silent as ever, its inhabitant paying close attention as always, sitting up straight and staring directly at the child teacher through the thick purple bangs of her short hair. Or so it would look to the casual observer anyway, for while Miyazaki Nodoka indeed tried her best to absorb as much of the English lessons as ever (even if she already knew most of them either way), her mind couldn't help drifting away…
Negi-sensei's smile was as kind and soft as it'd always have been, his words never failing to be measured and considerate. That was what she liked so much about him. Negi-sensei invariably made her feel at ease and relaxed, while the mere presence of most other men, even the likes of Takahata-sensei and Morisato-sempai, would inevitably make her feel on edge and alert. To be fair, so did Haruna, but that was a different thing entirely.
And yet…
"Negi!" barked the strong, confident young voice after classes. "I've come to challenge you!"
"Again?!" cried the boy teacher incredulously. "I've got important things to do, Kotaro-kun!"
Nodoka slowed down as she watched them face each other once more in the middle of the hall while most of her classmates, used to it, left in a hurry, happily talking to each other and pondering what to do for the rest of the day. Notable exceptions included Paru, who was grinning while readying her pen and sketchbook, and Asakura, who smirked while preparing her camera. Otherwise, Negi versus Kotaro fights were so common place already they didn't even register on most radars, similar to Asuna versus Ayaka fights, Batman versus Superman fights and Sagara Sousuke versus Anyone fights, and nobody wanted to stick around to help clean up after the mess sure to follow.
"Kotaro-kun! You can't just come into the middle school and pick up fights with a teacher! I know for a fact your classes aren't over yet!"
"What?! It's your own fault for ignoring my text messages!" the black haired boy replied. "I've been asking for a rematch somewhere nice and private for days now, you coward!"
"You know I've been very busy! It's almost midterms!"
"Ooooohhhh, somewhere nice and private…" Haruna cooed to herself, hips swinging as she struggled to capture the passion of Kotaro's expression on her drawing, perhaps going a tad overboard all things considered.
Nodoka sighed from the sidelines. What she liked so much in Negi-sensei was the exact opposite of what she liked in Kotaro-kun, but why was that…?
"Neeeee, Nodoka-chaaaaaan!" Konoe Konoka startled her then, sneaking right behind her with a skill Kaede and Tsunetsuki would have approved of, and making Nodoka jump in place with a high pitched squeal. "You're going to be late for library dutyyyyyy!" Oblivious to this playful whine, the two boys kept on squabbling.
"Nodoka, are you okay?" asked Ayase Yue far more softly, standing by Konoka's side. "You look out of it…"
Haruna cackled to herself, slinking towards the other librarians while still glancing towards the boys, who were now trading preliminary punches even as Chisame shouted at them to stop. "Or," the mangaka said, "out of yourself and in them! Still split on which flavor to savor, aren't we…?"
"I, I, I am not!" Nodoka squeaked, blushing bright and all but shoving Hrauna aside and running away.
"Well," Yue huffed while Haruna straightened herself with a huff of wounded dignity, and the kids resorted to kicking each other now, "great approach there, Paru. At least this time you didn't tell her to choose both…"
"She didn't give me enough time to," the much taller girl answered, "but she's definitely got to let them know how she feels!"
"How she feels about what?!" demanded Negi and Kotaro at once, both stopping briefly in their mutual strangling.
"Sorry, but we can't answer that!" Konoka giggled, firmly tightening her hands around Haruna's mouth from behind before Saotome could give her own reply. "That's something Nodoka-chan needs telling you herself!"
"See, you scared her moron!" Kotaro grunted, punching Negi in the face.
He punched back. "Me?! Who was the one to come here disrupting peace and order?!"
"That wouldn't have happened if you hadn't ignored me first!"
Yue sighed to herself. "I only hope you guys don't end up stealing each other away from her…"
Late that starry night, while Yue and Kerberos slept, Nodoka sat by her desk, in her favorite sleeping shirt, diligently working on her thick, pink hardcover diary. She wasn't the type of girl to handle other thick, pink, hard things during nights.
Today, I thought about Sensei and Kotaro-kun a lot again, she wrote. Seriously, I don't know what to do about it anymore! I can't stop feeling torn between them, and Paru won't stop teasing me about it either…
She looked out her window while Kero stirred in his tiny drawer bed, paws stiffening, hissing at some imaginary foe or videogame challenge. For a moment, she believed she had felt a Clow Card presence outside, but the vibrant sensation stopped just as quickly, and Nodoka returned to her writing shaking her head to herself. Maybe one had indeed just passed by, but even if it had, it'd be useless looking for it in the dark right now. She'd have to stage a proper hunt tomorrow, with Kero's guidance.
Sometimes, I'd like to be two people at once, just to be spared the choice. If only Paru's dad hadn't broken that mirror back then! I'd hold hands with Sensei while touring the libraries, and I'd also let Kotaro-kun take me away, to learn all he knows about the wide world outside, the world always denied to me…
But that is impossible, of course…
Exhaling quietly, she closed the book, returned it to its drawer, locked it back with her master key, and climbed onto her bed bunk above Yue's. Soon, she was deeply asleep too, dreaming in the fresh darkness of the bedroom.
She didn't really feel the lingering ghostly form peeking through the window, curiously staring towards the small drawer…
"I didn't sleep well last night…." groaned Nodoka as she and Yue walked together the next morning, heading for the school.
"I hope you weren't dwelling on what Paru said to you," Yue said. "You know she only does it to mess with you."
"No, I'm sure she means well, in her own way, it's just—"
"Hey, you!" a voice called out from behind them, making the girls squirm. "Miyazaki Nodoka!"
"And speaking of the devil, he didn't come himself but sent a minion…" Yue muttered to herself and her roommate, before both turned around to face Haruna's sempai at the Manga Club and her own roommate, the always heavily bandaged Kobushi Abiru, whose left arm was in a sling and cast this time. "Fujiyoshi-sempai, and—Someone-Or-Other-sempai," Yue said louder, but also more icily. Like every other time 3-A students faced any 3-F students but Ai and Matoi, who were honorary 3-A by now, it was a tense standoff from the start. "What do you want?"
Harumi pointed at Nodoka while holding an open envelope in the other hand. "Nami and Kafuka saw you this morning, leaving this on our doorstep and running away! What the hell, girl, what are you trying to pull here?!"
Yue frowned. "Are you insane?" It was a rhetorical question, of course, but… "Nodoka's been with me all morning long! Your friends must've seen someone else!"
"Are you going to deny you wrote this?" Harumi huffed, pulling a letter out of the envelope and reading aloud from it. "'You both would better watch your steps around my Kotaro-kun! Stop being weird hussies and harlots or else I'll have to lay the holy Librarian Law on you! And if you don't like that then let him go—'"
"W-W-What do you mean?!" Nodoka stammered, shocked to no end and trembling from head to toe. "I'd never write anything that, that mean!" Then she grew cross-eyed behind the bangs when Abiru, bland but sternly, grabbed the note herself and shoved it in Miyazaki's face without a word. "Eeeep!"
Nodoka instantly gasped in horror, for there was no mistaking the handwriting on the letter, which matched her own exactly. She read the rest of the venomous message herself, struggling with each written word for once in her long life of easy, comfortable reading.
"'A-additionally, while we are on the s-subject of your perversions, let me t-tell you I am well aware of y-your lascivious inclinations to m-manh-handle several parts of my Kotaro-kun, m-mostly including but not limited to his ears and lower back, which f-from observation from sources I do not h-have to share with you, work as… unusual… ahhhhhhh… erogenous areas f-for… him…"
These pauses and ahhhhhs weren't part of the missive itself, but came from Nodoka's reading as she overheated and began puffing smoke out her ears, unable to continue reciting the rest of a flowery overabundance of exotic and rare crass words and profanities aimed at her sempai.
"Well?!" Harumi demanded furiously.
Nodoka blushed, mouth hanging well open. "W-W-Would you believe this was foolishly done on… a dare, and that I, I'm, I'm very sorry…?"
"The former yes, the latter not," Abiru said dryly.
Yue shrugged just as stoically. "That's good enough with us."
Then Yue and Abiru engaged into a fierce, silent duel of piercing stares, but since Yue actually had both eyes active instead of sporting heavy bandages over one, she won out in the end.
Later that morning, during classes, Nodoka got a text message she had not been expecting at all. It simply read:
Re: Your question. Sorry, but I'm to be consulted on subjects of galge only. Please never ask me for tips on how to seduce 3D boys again. The God of Conquest.
"Aaargh!" Nodoka cried right in the middle of the classroom, startling everyone.
Hour and a half later, a frowning Minamoto Shizuna-sensei walked into 3-A's classrooom with a confident stride only she and very few others could ever achieve while venturing there.
"Sorry to interrupt you, Negi-sensei," the busty woman said, "but I promise this won't take long. Miyazaki-san?"
"Y-Yes?" Nodoka gulped.
"The Headmaster would like to know why you've placed a large ad showing yourself in Meido and proclaiming 'For my beloved Kota-kun' right in the middle of the elementary school…"
"Aaaargh!" Nodoka cried again while Negi paled horribly and Ayaka turned several shades of disgusted green at once.
"Way to go, Nodo-chan! You've made your mind up at last!" Haruna cheered. "Not what I'd have chosen, but…!"
"Saotome-san, please don't spur her on!" Shizuna scolded.
"Of course not!" Ayaka stood up, slamming a hand down on her desk. "Miyazaki-san, I'm so surprised at such an unbecoming behavior and repulsive taste coming from you of all people! But I suppose I am also to blame…" she grandly sighed, taking her head back and stifling copious tears, "for I, as your Iinchou, should have counseled you on your unhealthy attraction towards underaged hooligans before. My deepest apologies, Minamoto-sensei, Negi-sensei! I never imagined Miyazaki-san's shameful passions would go this far…"
"Oh, this is just rich, now," Asuna snarked, then took a look at Nodoka's very pale and distraught expression and reconsidered matters. "I mean, Iinchou, don't be so quick to judge, we all have our—"
Ayaka turned to her. "Asuna-san! I thought that, if anything ever brought us together, that was an agreement on that boy's damaging influence on our teacher and classmates!"
"I'll admit I've never liked that little punk myself," Asuna said, "but Honya's Honya, there's no way she'd do something like that without a really good reason for it. Right, Honya?"
"Asuna-san's right!" Negi nodded very quick and wide-eyed-ly. "There's a perfectly logical explanation for these actions towards Kotaro-kun, isn't there, Miyazaki-san?"
"Uhhhhh…!" Nodoka whimpered helplessly.
Asuna grimaced. "Oh for the love of God, Honya. Don't tell me-"
Nodoka fainted.
"Nodoka!" Yue gasped, rushing to her with the smelling salts already well in hand.
"I hope," Misa calmly said, "this doesn't mean she's got puppies in the litter already."
Sakurako elbowed her in the ribs. "That's too much even coming from you, Misa-chan…"
"Besides," Konoka said cheerfully. "This is clearly Haruna-chan's doing."
Haruna blinked. "Wait, what did I do?"
"Obviously, who's more likely to put an ad featuring a meido Nodoka and sticking it in the elementary school, Nodoka or Paru?" Konoka pointed out.
"It wasn't me!"
"That's what you say every time," Skuld said.
"Yes, but it's true this time!" Haruna wailed.
"You say that every time too," Madoka said.
"Indeed," Shizuna said. "Detention, Saotome-san. And you will apologize to Miyazaki-san in a way that doesn't involve nudity."
"But I didn't even do anything!" Haruna cried.
"You say that every time too," Negi said.
"Et tu, Negi-sensei?-!"
"It's a Clow Card! It's gotta be!" Kero's voice said from within Nodoka's backpack as the unusually angrily fuming girl ran through the campus, with Yue and equally unusually angry Haruna in tow, her Clow Staff held tightly in hand. "I can feel it, but why were you so sure it'd be here tonight in the first place…?"
Nodoka growled something incoherently for all reply. Yue and Haruna knew her well enough to correctly guess that was her way of saying it was what she would have done herself had she the courage for it, but wisely chose to remain mum on the subject. They also knew better than anyone, after all, that Hell hath no fury like that of a librarian emotionally toyed with. Except perhaps a librarian unfairly accused.
Sure enough, by the time they arrived to the World Tree under the full moon, they saw them both standing before them, facing each other, still several steps apart from each other. Inugami Kotaro and…
"Whaaat?! A-Another Honya-neechan?!" the fearless young mercenary gasped as he witnessed the arrival of the three amigas. "B-But how…" then he squinted in suspicion at the smiling Nodoka who stood with him. He sniffed the air before himself and grunted, "No way, that's Nee-chan's smell, there's no mistaking it…!"
"Of course there isn't, Kotaro-kun!" the Nodoka in the frilly pink dress sweetly said, feet cutely pointing towards each other as she stood in a very charming girlish way. BA-BUMP! BA-BUMP! went Haruna's heart as a wide grin slowly crept up her face.
"And yet…" Kotaro sniffed again, towards the other Nodoka, "your smell's also the same! That's impossible, even twins and clones smell different from each other!"
Yue raised an eyebrow. "Clones?"
Kotaro aloofly poked on his nose with a finger. "What kind of bounty hunter of the occult would I be if I'd never hunted clones down? Anyway… I guess this one's the fake, right?" he pointed a thumb towards the Nodoka who'd been with him. "I knew something was fishy! No wonder she was so bold!"
"Wha-Wha-What did she do?!" the just arrived Nodoka panicked.
Her doppelganger pouted. "Oh, Kotaro-kun, you wound me…! I only was telling you how much I like you, there's nothing bad about that…!"
"Of course there isn't," Haruna agreed, nodding. "But I have a bone to pick with you! You got me detention! I never get detention! I'm to good at not getting caught to get detention! You ruined my perfect record!"
Kero's head popped out of the backpack. "Stop agreeing with Clow Cards already, go blast it! That's so unprofessional!"
"N-N-Never mind that now!" the real Nodoka said, holding her staff shakily towards her copycat. "Please step away from Kotaro-kun as you tell me exactly how you, what did you do to… so boldly…"
"Asking for dating tips from a Clow Card is a wee bit pathetic, don't you think?" Kero had to mutter, sweatdropping.
The other Nodoka smiled sweetly, holding two fingers casually to her pale pink coated lips. "Oh? Why, I didn't have to do much… or did I, Ko-ta-kun?" she playfully sing-sang.
"Hm? W-Well, no, you only called me and told me to come here, of course…" the boy said.
"Right…" Yue said.
"And then you tried to kiss me!" Kotaro recalled.
"I really like this Ero-Nodoka too! We must have both…!" Haruna approved in her best feverish Kuno Tatewaki mode, while the real deal (Nodoka, not Kuno) violently choked in saliva. "Er, after she's paid for getting me detention!"
"And when I pushed you away—"
"I thought you were a gentleman who didn't do such things to ladies?" Kerberos snorted cynically.
"I did it very gently!" Inugami argued. "And it wasn't my fault she flipped her skirt up and flashed her pink panties!"
"Gaaaaaaaahhhhhh!" Nodoka yelled while her faker just giggled.
Haruna pouted. "Ero-Points taken for not going commando instead, Ero-Nodoka-chan…"
"Its name is The Mirror! The Mirror!" Kero reprimanded her.
Kotaro frowned, uneasily shifting around in place. "W-Well, when, when I asked her if she was crazy, she pulled her—"
"Noooo-ooooo!" Nodoka whined as her copy whistled innocently and twirled around a set of frilly pink panties in her fingers. The real McCoy ran forward and swung with the Staff, trying to outright bash the duplicate's head in. It, of course, dodge easily with a girlish chuckle, splitting into two other Nodokas. "What, what in the world?!"
"This keeps getting better!" Haruna began to drool and pant. "At last, I can have my own Nodo-harem without worrying about my Artifact's time lim—"
Yue roughly elbowed her in the stomach. "Not the time! Not the place! And I thought you were pissed?"
"My heart is big enough for forgiveness!"
"I was telling you, that's The Mirror card!" Kero fluttered around his master. "The one that can create copies of anything and anyone within visual range! And much like a British tabloid, it loves vulgar gossip, prying into others' affairs! And going topless on the second page!"
Kotaro blinked. "So… Clow Reed named it after a cheap rumor rag, not after the thing it's supposed to actually outright reflect?"
The Guardian shrugged. "It's more like The Mirror inspired him originally, and then the whole actual mirror functions were an added afterthought. Geniuses think differently, you know. We shouldn't try understanding them. Not you, at least."
"Forget that! How do we beat it?" Yue asked at the same time the spirit split into half a dozen extra Nodokas who quickly surrounded them from all sides, rushing on them and trying to hold them steady. "Kya! Inugami-san, Paru! Do something!"
"Even if they're fake, I'm not sure I can hit any Honya nee-chans!" Kotaro growled, with a Nodoka pressing herself against his front and another against his back, tugging on his tail. "Eeehhh! D-D-Don't grab me there, th-that's sensitive!"
"And I'm not sure I want to break free…" Haruna admitted, starry eyed as she was fondled from all directions by several Nodokas. "I, I mean, I've dreamed of this more than once…"
"Why are we friends with you, again?!" Yue protested as several other Nodokas seized her, their numbers multiplying constantly.
"You like it too, admit it!" Haruna shot back. "Just look at the way your eyes are rolling back!"
"They, they are noooot…" Yue's teeth chattered as she struggled back against incoming ecstasy, and the copies kept on caressing her almost everywhere.
Suddenly, Kotaro's eyes grew very wide. "Okay!" he barked. "Mom told me whoever did that to me wouldn't be human, so the gloves are off!" Angrily, he kicked one of the Nodokas in the stomach and sent her flying off, only to have the Nodoka stopping in mid-trajectory with a graceful spin, then to land on her feet and change into a perfect lookalike of Kotaro, much like all of the other Nodokas surrounding the boy. He grinned. "Now this is more like it. Looks like I've found the best kind of enemy for me!"
Haruna chewed on her lower lip. "Oh, just when I think it couldn't get any better…" she moaned. "Hey, could half of you girls turn into Kotaro-kuns?" she asked her Nodokas. "There's something I'd really like to try next…"
"No, no Kotaro-kuns for me, please," tensely requested Yue, teeth tightly clenched now. "No, I mean it seriously…"
Kotaro laughed as several versions of himself jumped on him, lashing out with an upwards swinging kick that swept them away in all directions. "That's it, brat, don't let 'em scare you!" Kero cheered, flying over the surroundings. "The Mirror can produce copies, but they aren't as strong as the originals, and she's got limits! The more she does, the weaker every copy becomes! And what are you doing now, Nodoka?!"
The real Nodoka winced as the copy before her gestured a very clear and slightly salacious 'Come on', materializing a Clow Wand of her own in her hand. Swallowing loudly, the 3-A student rushed forward once again and they clashed, staffs banging together with a loud metallic sound. Nodoka clenched her teeth and began a furious exchange of blows where her counterpart had her matched hit by hit, blocking just as she stroke, and striking just before Nodoka blocked in turn, neither gaining any sort of advantage over the other.
"Hey, Nee-chan!" Kotaro called out while punching his way through several Kotaros (literally) dogpiling on him, biting and clawing, making him wince in pain. "Why don't you use your other Cards on her?!"
"I've read up on The Mirror, Kotaro-kun!" his friend shouted while still locked in an even combat with her lookalike. "She can reflect damage upon those whose shapes she's taking! By hurting her, I'd only hurt myself!"
"Unh. Guess that explains why I hurt when I do this…" Kotaro forced himself to grin as he punched another Kotaro away, "Or this!" he added, slapping another across the face. "What are we supposed to do then?!"
Nodoka seethed, remembering her lessons on The Mirror as she and the main body of the card stared at each other, mutually pushing back and standing their respective grounds stubbornly. "What do you want?!" she ended up crying. "You have no sense of self of your own! You don't even have your own will, you only reflect those of others! So why are you doing this at all?! What do you have against us?!"
"Nothing…" chirped the Card sweetly, and then gestured again, creating a wide glowing circle under all of them, its light spreading everywhere under the Tree.
The real version of her gasped, then assumed as grim of an expression as she could manage. "I see… You've looked into my heart, haven't you? You're trying to tell me what to do…"
Kotaro blinked several times, shaking several copies off himself while Yue finally began struggling back and Haruna pulled one of her own Nodokas into a French kiss. "W-Wait, you telling me this is one of those, those things like the ermine's…? But why…?! How?!"
Kero snorted. "Please, brat, Master Clow knew all there was to know about magic, why wouldn't his creations know how to…? B-But anyway, Nodoka! Don't listen to her! She's got no reason to—"
"No, but I do." The true Nodoka breathed deeply, pulled back from the copy as it lowered its own staff respectfully, and stepping before Kotaro while a dozen of his copies held him in place. "I'm so very sorry, Kotaro-kun," she humbly, meekly said, lowering her face until the bangs obscured it completely again. "But they are right, I just had to tell you myself! I, I like you, Kotaro-kun!"
"… bwah?" he said.
Haruna pulled back from her kiss. "That's my Nodoka-chan…! Um, no offense intended," she quickly added for the copy she'd just kissed, who now stared at her with a deeply offended expression.
The real Miyazaki Nodoka closed her eyes, leaned ahead, and pressed her lips on Kotaro's.
And there was a large flash of white light.
When it was over, Kotaro wobbled down to his knees as his smiling copies vanished into the night, letting go of him. The Nodokas holding Haruna and Yue also disappeared while the original one caught her freshly minted Pactio card as it fluttered down gently, with a stoic face.
"Ah!" Haruna called out to the wind. "Don't leave me, my Ero-Nodoka! I thought we had something special together! I wanted to introduce you to Rito-chan…!"
"None of this ever happened, what are you talking about?" a blushing Yue mumbled, hastily buttoning the top buttons of her gray blouse back on and pulling up her panties from where they had slipped around her thighs.
"I hope you can forgive me," Nodoka quietly told the boy before looking at her card, which showed her holding an open book, several smaller books floating above and around her. It was pretty much identical to Psycho Purple-san's, down to the titles.
Miazaci Nodoca
Pudica Bibliothecaria
She sighed oh so very deeply and faced the card's last remaining physical form, which now had shifted into a single figure of a pale lithe girl holding a large mirror in her hands.
"Mirror," she told it. "Thank to you, I could say how I feel… I… And I even managed to kiss Kotaro-kun! You really knew what I was actually thinking the whole time, didn't you?"
The Mirror smiled affably at her and nodded.
"But…" Nodoka said, then violently slammed her staff down on its head, "I DIDN'T WANT OR NEED YOUR KIND OF HELP! Return to the humble form you definitely deserve, Clow Card!"
And there was another, just slightly smaller than the prior, flash of blinding white light.
"Well," Yue summed up later that night, as a depressed looking Nodoka stuck The Mirror into the Clow Book after signing it, "look on the bright side, you got the Artifact Ala Alba wanted so much after all, you finally settled for a boy, and Inugami-kun will still talk to you, plus that's another Card that won't bother anyone anymore. So it wasn't that bad a day in the end, now was it?"
"Ah-hah…" Nodoka moaned blandly before plopping down, face first, on Yue's bunk. "Of course, Paru will now tease me even more, Kotaro-kun's roommates will hate me more than that, and Ala Alba won't stop wondering why I didn't do it for them instead of him, but yes…"
"Don't feel that bad you chose the worthless punk over the likable, kind scholar," Kero shared. "The Mirror only created a copy of you that would do things repressed away by your education and manners, your bad side if you must. So it didn't show you a definitive decision of your heart, only what the more rebellious half of you would go with!" he smiled.
Nodoka's prone form twitched violently a few times, hiccuping.
"Orrr…" the guardian gulped, "did you want to have the matter settled already, after all? I have erred, right?"
Yue only dropped a quite thick and heavy book down on his head.
The End?
Omake: What Do You Hate?
"Me? Hate?" the Rider of Versailles hummed thoughtfully. "Why, I don't think I hate anything… Oh, I know! Guillotines! I definitely hate those things!"
"Well, yeah, but… who would ever like guillotines? Could there be any such person, outside of the Addams Family?" Shirou wondered.
"… actually…" Chachamaru spoke very quietly, "Onee-san is rather fond of them…"
Marie Antoinette did a gasping double take.
A little while later, Chachazero was stuffed into a hole in one of the resort's backyards, only her tiny legs sticking out as they wiggled desperately.
"Wow!" she said to herself, sounding more pleased than upset. "Queenie has an edge after all! I like it! I wonder what brought that on, though…?"
Omake: What Do You Love?
"Why, people, of course!" the Rider of Versailles gushed with a giggle. "I love everyone…!"
"What a coincidence!" Haruna said. "So do I!"
Rider lost her smile almost instantly. "Not that way, however."
"Aw, come on…!"
"Sorry, but non. That love is reserved for Master and husband!"
"It's okay. You'll keep on loving me though, won't you?"
"Of course I will!"
"Ah-hah!"
"Not that way…!"
Omake: Bad Influence.
"Sempai!" Misa grew alarmed instantly. "You let Saber-san spend a whole day with Chisame?!"
Shirou blinked, then nodded. "Um, yeah… Why not? At first, Saber didn't want to, but I finally convinced her I didn't need protection here in the resort. Relax, even if Matoi-san took it the wrong way, she couldn't ever be a threat to Saber… most of the time."
"I wouldn't be so sure of that," pondered a worried Sakurako. "Sempai is a terrifying foe when she wants to be…"
"Even if she weren't, why would you ever do such a thing, Sempai!" Madoka gasped, as shocked as Misa. "What has Saber-san ever done to you to deserve that?"
Shirou frowned. "I wanted Saber to have more of a social life, of course. What's so bad about that?"
"That's the point!" Sakurako said. "Leaving her to Chisame will only give her an anti-social life! It's… it's… well, just look at it yourself! Here they come!"
True enough, Chisame was now approaching with a Saber who now wore glasses, and a thick hooded coat tossed over her Sailor fuku-clad frame. Shirou gulped. "S-Saber? Wow, that's a… nice change of look there but why—"
Chisame placed a hand on Saber's shoulder. "Rejoice, Emiya Shirou! I have trained your Servant in the Hikikomori Side of The Force. She has mastered the Internet addiction, the perfect placement under the kotatsu, the ways of indoor life, the long sleepless nights, all in record time. She is one with the lifestyle now."
The three cheerleaders shuddered and tightly embraced each other.
"Ummm… that's good to know? I guess? Thank you?" Shirou babbled, still not getting it.
"Shirou, buy me lots of Japanese candy, a laptop, a complete set of Siscalypse light novels and a PFP, will you?" the fresh Alter requested, even more dryly than ever before.
Madoka sobbed. "Oh my gosh, it's just like being back with Nagato-sempai again…!"
And that was how Emiya Shirou learned Chisame was a worse at corruption than even the Black Grail Mud.
Somewhere else, Karagiri Jinako perked up suddenly. "What is this I feel all of a sudden, like a mighty beacon calling over to me…?"
