Chapter 7: Cellphone Confusion
Nina burst into her apartment, locked the door, latched it, and slid home the deadbolts before running into Lelouch's room. "Lelouch we've got-" she began, but stopped halfway; his room was empty. She ran to CC's room; equally empty.
"Right," she told herself. "They're just not back yet, that's all. It's perfectly normal, they are teenagers out on a trip with their friends, after all. I would do the same." She took a few deep breaths to reassure herself. "They're fine. Not in any danger at all." She paced up and down the hallway. "Oh, who am I kidding? I've given them all away!" She grabbed her handbag and scrabbled around inside it for her cell phone, fished it out, and dialled Lelouch's number.
...
Lelouch was, at the moment, trying to find Kira in the basement level of the shopping mall. The ambience wasn't helping: evidently, there was some event going on, and the stupid announcer was speaking so loudly on the microphone that Lelouch was convinced that he couldn't hear himself think.
"Dammit," he muttered. "Back in the old days, this never would have happened." He tried to glance over the heads of the crowd to locate Kira, but to no avail. In desperation, he pulled out his cell phone and dialled Kira's number, but as bad luck would have it, the organizer of the event began blaring music over the gigantic speakers.
"F-" The rest of the word was drowned out by the music, so Lelouch angrily pressed his cell phone's red button to cancel the call.
...
"Ack!" Nina yelped as her call got cut off. "Why would he do that?!" She looked at her cell phone desperately; it plainly said, CALL DISCONNECTED. She started to feel panic rising within her, but forced herself to calm down.
"All right," she said, "Something just happened, that's all. Something perfectly normal. He'll call back in a while, I'm sure of it." She took a deep breath. "Calm down," she told herself. "Calm down, calm down, calm... Agh! I'm not calming down!!"
Nina bent over and took another few deep breaths. "I need a shower," she told herself. "That'll calm me down."
...
"I can't find him," Lelouch said to Nicolette, as soon as he had gotten away from the noise. "Not in the basement, not in the hardware store, not in Art Companion."
"Just relax, Luke!" Nicolette replied. "He'll turn up. At least we know he's still here. If he were leaving,he'd call me. We're still walking around, see how much our arms can carry."
Lelouch sneered. "Yeah, yeah," he said. "I'll still keep looking. Bye." He hung up, made for the nearest pillar, and thought hard as he leaned against it.
Kira isn't happy. That much I know, he thought. He'd usually be in Art Companion, but since he isn't, we've got to think where's the second most likely place he'd go to. But who would know? Let's see...
Lelouch punched in Nina's number on his cell phone, and pressed the green button.
...
Nina leaned against the cool wall of the shower as the warm water beat down on her skin. "Hmm," she sighed contentedly. I was right, a shower does wonders. Out loud, she said, "I guess I was right. There's really nothing to worry about."
Then her cell phone rang. Nina jumped in surprise; not a very smart thing to do in the shower. She slipped, fell backward, and hit her shoulder on the floor. Wincing, she got up, got her cell phone, and answered it, leaning precariously on the sink for support.
"Lelouch?" she said, and promptly slipped again on the wet shower tiles. "Ack!" She threw out her hands for support, letting go of her cell phone...
... which smashed against the wall and broke open, spilling the battery and SIM card onto the floor.
...
"Nina? Nina!" Lelouch shouted into his phone. "Hello?" He looked at the display. "Dammit," he swore, and punched in CC's number. "Come on, come on..." he muttered
"Luke?" came CC's voice. "Did you find Kira yet?"
"No, but something's happened to Nina,"Lelouch said. "We've gotta get back quick. Leave Nicolette to wait for Kira and meet me ASAP at the entrance." He disconnected and tried to run to the main entrance, but stopped before he'd scarcely gone ten metres.
"Dammit," he panted. "I... really... need to work out... weak heart or no." Still gasping for breath, he continued on his way.
...
Nina sighed in frustration and raged at her jumpiness, her broken cell phone, and most of all, her stupidity for leaning so far out of the shower and not holding on to anything.
Her apartment doorbell rang, long and insistent, and Nina, still raging at herself, got up out of the bathroom and went to answer it.
Stark naked.
And to make matters worse, standing outside the door was Andrew Li.
There was an awkward silence, in which Nina tried to understand why Andrew was standing there with a shellshocked expression on his face.
Then Mr Peters and the dean walked by.
All hell broke loose.
...
"Come on, come on..." Lelouch muttered as the monorail train seemed to take forever to arrive. "Dammit, why doesn't anyone answer their phone?!"
CC cleared her throat. "Dead batteries, noisy environment, or simply a desire not to talk to you right now," she said. "Seriously, why don't you take a moment to calm down and think, like how you used to?"
"I tried," Lelouch said, "But it's not working. It's like... my ability to think up possible explanations has become disconnected with my ability to rationalise those explanations, you know what I mean?" He glared at her. "This must be your fault."
"Me?" CC said incredulously. "Might I remind you that I brought you back to life, probably at the cost of my own, and you are blaming me for this? How ungrateful is that?"
"CC," Lelouch said, trying to be calm. "Did you ever ask yourself if I wanted to live again? Did you? I don't think so."
CC was quiet until the monorail pulled into the station, then she said, as she was boarding the train, "You might not have wanted to live again, but I wanted it to be so." She looked up at Lelouch when they were both safely aboard. "I've already explained to you why I did it, and I'm not repeating myself."
Anxious as he was about the situation at hand, CC's words silenced Lelouch for the rest of the journey back to Ashford.
...
Mr Peters yelled, "Holy shit!"
Andrew yelled something that sounded like "Water truck."
Nina yelped as she realised that she was naked, and ducked behind the door.
The dean pushed his glasses higher on his nose and said icily, "Miss Einstein, kindly explain what is going on."
"I- ah..." Nina stammered. "It's like this, see, I-"
The dean cut her off. "Miss Nina Einstein, are you aware that your very presence has made me bend the school rules to near-breaking point?" The light from the corridor reflected off his spectacles such that Nina couldn't see his eyes. "You are, after all, the 'Mother of FLEIA'... And a lesbian mother to boot. Now, though, having an affair with a student so soon after joining the school..."
"That's not true," Andrew said. "Sir, this looks like what you're thinking, but-"
"Be quiet, Andrew Li!" the dean snapped at him. "I was not talking to you." He glared at Nina again. "You are an aberration and an abnormality and a stain on the school's history. I don't care what actually happened here, but you will submit your resignation to me in two days." He turned and walked away without another word.
"Hey, that's not fair!" Peters called out after him. "Mr Harker, you can't just-" He tried to reason with the dean, but Harker had already turned the corner. "Ah, damn," Peters said. He turned to Andrew. "I don't know what happened here, Andrew, but you take care of Miss Einstein in the meantime, okay?" And he took off, fairly running after the dean.
Nina barely heard anything after the dean had cut off her explanation. All she knew was that the dean had reminded her of the destructiveness of FLEIA and he'd exposed her sexual orientation to Peters and Andrew. While both of them could be trusted not to talk, it was humiliating beyond belief, and she now felt cold and completely empty inside.
"... stein?Miss Einstein?" Andrew's persistent voice finally reached her. She looked up at him, eyes brimming with tears. "Come on," he said, "This isn't the time to go to pieces." He put a hand on her still-bare arm. "We'll try and reason with Mr Harker. You won't get fired."
Nina sniffed. "Andrew," she said, "Does any of what Mr Harker said bother you at all?"
Andrew rolled his eyes. "Wah lau," he swore. "Important things she don't care, unimportant thing care so much. Come on lah!" He said, his Singlish accent coming out really badly now, "Which way you swing isn't important right now, it's-!" Nina flung her arms around him and sobbed gratefully onto his shoulder.
If there's one person who can accept me... she thought, There will be more, definitely.
"Um... Miss Einstein?" Andrew said. "Sorry to remind you, but you're still naked." He looked around at the sound of a shopping bag dropping to the floor. "And your cousins are back."
Nina yelped in shock, jumped off Andrew, and ran back into the apartment. Andrew turned to Lelouch and CC, waved, and walked right past them, saying, "She'll explain everything. G'night."
Lelouch's mind rebooted from the shock of the scene it had seen, and he turned to see Andrew walking away, talking animatedly on his cell phone.
