Still Waters 3, Chapter 8, Preparations
I see her seated on a great seat made of bones, wearing the demon horn crown. She is a ruler, and her subjects stand around the base of her seat, facing all comers and coming away victorious. She has some mysterious power over them, and they happily obey her every order. She holds so much power, and she doesn't even realize its meaning or the role she will play.
From a series of visions regarding Abe Aiko, S. Dream Journal
Friday, April 24th, 2009
After roll call, Negi made the announcement he had been dreading. "I regret to inform you, but due to an outbreak of swine flu, our class trip to Okinawa has been canceled." The class immediately erupted into noise as the girls grumbled and complained about how they had been looking forward to the beaches of Okinawa, and how much they had spent on new clothes and bathing suits and the like.
Negi let them go on for a moment to get it out of their systems before he continued. "Due to this and several other factors, it has been decided that we will be going to Kyoto instead." The grumbling slowed, but didn't stop. Well…that was to be expected. You couldn't dangle a southern island in front of a teenage girl and then replace it at the last moment with a place like Kyoto without expected some grumbling. In fact, Negi himself had been looking forward to the Okinawa trip; they had gone to Kyoto every year since he arrived in Mahora, and he had been ready for a change. Then again, he had been more than a little worried about seeing these girls in Okinawa. In bathing suits. He glanced up at them, carefully skipping Kara-san (a dozen kids, plus or minus three, see where we go from there/no no no no that's bad, don't think such things she's just a kid/don't worry, she's only a little younger than you/no she's not and besides I'm her teacher I can't just—/a dozen kids and see where we go from—) Negi quickly cut off that line of thought and felt the need for a cold shower. And then another with boiling water where he could scrub his skin raw. He felt dirty. Some of these girls…he offered up a silent prayer to whomever might be listening thanking them for the fact that he didn't have to deal with seeing this class on the beach in Okinawa. A cold sweat broke out on his forehead as his traitorous mind dropped another bombshell on him: Kara Stride in all her glory on the beach in a stringy little thing that barely covered—
"Well! I'm sure this is for the best!" Negi declared in a strangled voice as he abruptly sat down in his chair. 'Okay, enough acting like this,' he told himself. 'You are a responsible teacher, not just a random eighteen year old who's never had a real girlfriend before. Right? Right.' Well…only eighteen if one counted the time spent in Eva's resort…or was it nineteen now? And the girlfriend thing was true too, he admitted reluctantly, though there had been a moment in Tibet when he had pushed Nodoka out of the way of some falling rocks, and it seemed as if they had almost…boils. Boils and gangrenous limbs. Yes, yes.
Negi sighed in relief, smoothed his hair back out of his eyes while half the class swooned, and took a quick drink from his water bottle. Good. Better.
He took another look at the class as the grumbling and complaints spawned by his announcement died down, and noticed one of the students in the front row seemed particularly upset.
"Abe-san? Is something wrong?" he asked.
Abe Aiko was a rather plain girl, all around average except for her short height. She was usually cheerful and talkative, so seeing her with a frown and her arms crossed like that was most unusual.
"Eh? Oh, no, sorry sensei," she said, obviously lying.
"Okay then, if you are sure," Negi said. She obviously didn't want to talk about it with him, and there was no point in forcing the issue in front of everyone... He turned his attention to the rest of the class. "Okay everyone! Please remember to repack your bags for Kyoto. We will be leaving early Monday morning, so please be at the station on time. Any questions? No? Okay, dismissed."
When class finally let out, Aiko took her bag and quickly left the classroom. Her roommate, Yamamoto Kimi, followed her.
"Aiko? What's wrong? You usually stick around to listen to the gossip after class."
Aiko glanced at her and shrugged. "It's nothing. I just have some distant family in Kyoto I don't want to meet." She took out her digital camera and began cycling through the pictures as she walked. It was relaxing, and she was quite good at photography if she said so herself. Sleeping Negi-Sensei Under A Tree.
"That's a good one," Kimi said, glancing over at the picture as she strolled alongside her. Aiko grunted something unintelligible and went on to the next picture. Kamo-kun Stealing Underwear. It brought a smile to her face; the teacher's pet ermine was so cute, even if he was an underwear thief. Though how he managed to consistently find his way all the way across campus to the girls' dorm was a mystery...
"I like this one more," Aiko said, holding the camera so Kimi could see. "Or this one," she said, moving on to another, more recent picture. Dark Skinned Pale Haired Foreigner With Birds. The woman spent a lot of time around the World Tree, and Aiko had snapped this picture one sunny day last week when several small birds had suddenly flown down and landed on the woman's head and hands. It was a very nice picture.
"Yes." Kimi shifted her bag from one shoulder to the other as they walked. She glanced up at the sky and smiled a little; it was a beautiful day, far too nice for her friend to waste moping around. She herself had to meet up with the Library Club later, but…she could probably blow off the meeting. She didn't like to do things like that, but her friend was in need, and that was more important. "We should do karaoke again, we haven't done that since September."
Aiko smiled absently. "That sounds fun."
Possum Cade strolled along, humming an old Led Zeppelin song and singing occasional snatches of it as she swung her schoolbag.
"Hey, what are you so happy about?" Taro asked as she came up from behind.
"Nothing much. Just that I don't have to go to Okinawa," Possum replied. She switched to another song and raised her voice. "Hey hey mama said the way you move, gonna make you sweat, gonna make you groove," complete with a swishy little dance that drew concerned looks from passersby.
Taro just laughed. "You know, someone's gonna call the police on you one of these days."
"All I ask for when I pray, a steady loaded woman gonna come my way," Possum replied, louder than before.
"Hey now Whiskey, that's not really appropriate, you know?"
Both girls jerked to a sudden stop and turned to face the speaker.
"Sorry Max-sensei."
"Sorry sensei."
"Don't worry about it. Besides," Max said, bending down to their level and whispering conspiratorially. "I'm pretty sure it's 'steady rollin woman' rather than 'steady loaded woman'." He straightened up and stepped back. "At least keep it down on campus, ok? When you hit the city, knock yourselves out. Just don't get arrested." He put his hands in his pockets and strolled away, leaving the two girls confused.
"That was…unexpected," Possum said.
"…was he hitting on you?" Taro asked after a moment.
"Scary Max-sensei? No way. He's just clueless about that stuff I think. You've seen him with Youko and the class rep, right? Completely clueless."
"'Scary Max-sensei'? What's with that?" Taro asked. While she wouldn't put it past some teachers to flirt with their students, she had a feeling that the P.E. teacher was far too incompetent in that sort of thing. But this 'Scary Max-sensei' stuff...rarely did a teacher get a nickname like that.
"It's what the girls all call him," Possum said dismissively. It seemed silly and stupid to her, but it was kinda amusing too. "Stupid isn't it?"
"Yeah," Taro said. She knew all about that sort of thing. With nicknames like 'Death Glasses Takahata' or 'The Ace of Spades', Mahora had more than its fair share of silly nicknames. In fact, her own nickname of 'The Street Sweeper' brought her quite of a bit of horrified amusement every time it came up in conversation.
They walked in silence for a while.
"Wanna play some games later?" Taro asked suddenly. She had the dubious honor of being the only student in the class with her own dorm room, due to a history of intimidating irritating roommates. While it was nice to not have to deal with a stupid airhead of a roommate and she could go in or out at will and even leave the room a total mess without worrying about complaints, it could get pretty lonely at times.
"Sure. Got anything new?"
Taro nodded. "Kanako-nee sent me a new one, it's called Melty Blood."
"Sounds promising," Possum said. "You're gonna have to introduce me to this Kanako girl you're always talking about someday, you know?"
Taro grinned. "Sure thing, you two would get along great."
Rally Wheeler remained crouched down behind the bushes, listening as her classmates' voices died away.
"Melty Blood," she said experimentally. Classmate Urashima Taro-san had said it was a game, though she had not specified type. Most troubling. "Melty Blood," she said again.
"Bbrraow?" the cat she had been feeding for her onee-chan said as it looked up at her. Rally very carefully reached down and rubbed its head, then stood up straight and looked at her two classmates as they walked away. Hakase had told her to make friends in class this year. Maybe she could become friends with these two? She stepped carefully through the bushes and out into the street, and set off after them at a sedate pace.
Negi looked up from his desk where he was gathering his papers, as Takahata stepped through the open doorway.
"Hello, Takamichi," Negi said as he removed the class roster from his briefcase to make room for the stack of test papers he would have to grade later. "What brings you here today?"
"Hello, Negi," Takahata replied as he approached the desk. "May I?" he asked, gesturing toward the class roster.
"Sure."
Takahata grinned slightly as he took up the roster and flipped it open with a long practiced motion and quickly scanned the faces of Negi's students. "Somehow, I am not surprised," he said to himself.
"Hmm?" Negi asked, looking up at the other teacher, pausing in his struggle to snap the overfilled briefcase shut.
"Nothing," Takahata said as he returned the class roster to the desktop. "Are you busy today?"
Negi struggled with the briefcase for a moment more before he finally managed to squeeze it shut. "I'm afraid so; I was planning on finishing my club visits today," he said as he stood back and wiped some sweat from his forehead. For a moment there, he had begun to wonder if everything would fit...
"Club visits?"
"Yes," Negi said, grinning crookedly. It was no secret that he enjoyed visiting his students during their club meetings immensely; for Negi, it was one of the highlights of the school year, right up there with getting a new class. "I only have a few left. I was planning to visit the Library Club, the Fortune Telling Club, and the Pottery Club today; Care to join me?"
Takahata shook his head. "No thanks, I only have a moment. I just wanted to clear up something about the class trip next week." He put his hands in his pockets, fingering the note Chisame had sent him earlier, and frowned thoughtfully before looking back at Negi. "You should visit Eishun-san. He is not doing very well," he said uncomfortably. Takahata frowned slightly; it was hard to think of Eishun not doing well, but according to the note from Chisame, he likely wouldn't last out the year. Now how could she know that...? He would be visiting him as well without a doubt; he always did when in Kyoto. But why had Chisame seen fit to send him this note, practically begging him to ask Negi to visit Eishun? What did she know about his old friend? How did she know? He pushed those troubling thoughts aside and focused on his young friend, who was now speaking. "I'm sorry?"
"Oh, I just said I was already planning on visiting the Konoe estate on the final day," Negi replied as he hefted the overfilled briefcase experimentally. He let out a sigh of relief; the briefcase's latches would hold. "I'm sure he will be fine, he's a tough old coot," Negi said as he picked up the class roster and put it under one arm.
Takahata grinned at the young teacher's words. A 'tough old coot'... that could describe himself as well. He closed his eyes and let out a small amused noise, then looked at Negi. "Good luck with your club visits. I have an appointment with the Headmaster. Goodbye," he said as he raised a hand in a lazy wave, which Negi returned in kind.
"Goodbye, Takamichi!"
Negi looked at the class roster thoughtfully as he strolled down one of the hallways of the club building, half-noticing an amused looking girl in a witch's hat and robe and an infectious grin looking at him as she leaned against the wall. He smiled back at her, and she nodded at him as he continued past. 'No doubt a member of the occult club,' he thought to himself as he scanned the room numbers. The occult club had become enormous in the past five or six years, without a doubt due to the vastly increased rate of what had been unofficially classified by the faculty as 'unusual incidents'; events such as ghost sightings, mysterious glowing lights, people having sword fights outside in the middle of the night, people jumping from rooftop to rooftop or even flying...oh, and the occasional unidentified 'animal'. The campus had certainly become busy.
"Ah, there it is," Negi said aloud as he spotted the room he had been looking for. He stood before the door for a moment straightening his tie, then entered.
The Pottery Club met in a fairly large room on the ground floor. Several students glanced up at him as he entered, and one unfortunately lost control of the bowl she was trying to form on her pottery wheel.
"Argh...! Not again! That's the third time today..."
The club president, an otherwise unremarkable girl with severe features quickly made her way over. "Excuse me, can I help you?" she asked, slight annoyance coming through her otherwise polite tone.
Negi nodded as he spotted the student he had come to visit. "Ah yes, I am here today to see how my student is doing," he said, giving the president a winning smile.
The girl staggered back under his attention and mumbled something, gesturing for him to go ahead.
Negi left the president behind and walked over to the pottery wheel his student Suzuki Keiko was seated behind. "Hello, Suzuki-kun."
"Hello, sensei," Suzuki Keiko said quietly as she concentrated on bringing up the top of the vase she was working on. "What brings you to the Pottery Club?" she asked idly a moment later.
"It's just my yearly club visits," he replied, watching in fascination as she shaped the clay. It was very strange to watch, as if the clay simply came alive under the potter's hand, changing shape seemingly at random until suddenly it was a bowl or a vase or a cup. He had never seen a potter in action before; it was quite interesting.
Keiko finished the vase and carefully removed it from the wheel. Negi reached down and gently prodded a lump of clay that had been left on the wheel while she placed the vase in the drying area.
Finally, she stood opposite Negi. "Can I help you, sensei?"
Negi looked at the lump of clay as he rolled it between thumb and forefinger for a moment before turning his attention back to the student. "It's just my yearly club visit. You are quite good, Suzuki-kun. Have you been making pottery long?"
Keiko shuffled her feet awkwardly for a moment. "No sensei, just since I entered the middle school..." Her attention drifted back to the potter's wheel, so she started cleaning it.
Keiko tried to calm her racing heart as she wiped down the potter's wheel for lack of anything to do with her hands, which she had no doubt would be trembling in her teacher's presence if she didn't find something to occupy them.
"So what do you like about the club, Suzuki-kun?" the teacher asked, smiling pleasantly at her in a way that made her heart flutter.
"It's..." Keiko started, then paused. How could she put it so that he would understand? How could one describe the sheer wonder inherent in the act of creating something new? The potential of a lump of fresh clay on the potter's wheel, the joy of seeing it take shape in your hands...? That indescribable feeling in the pit of your stomach when, after all the glazing and firing and that torturous wait until it was time to remove it from the kiln, you finally saw your finished piece of art on display...? And it was an art form; she had been in the club long enough to see that. How could she put all of those feelings into words her teacher would understand?
He was smiling at her again.
Keiko shut her eyes for a moment and took a deep breath. 'He's only a teacher, his smile doesn't matter,' she thought to herself as she turned her attention back to her teacher. She locked eyes with him and began to speak.
"It's creating something new," she said, meeting his gaze and holding it. "Going from this," she said, gesturing to a nearby box of clay, "to this," she said, gesturing at a nearby rack of finished products. "Changing the clay into something beautiful and useful, it's just..." she trailed off and abruptly turned away as the way he was smiling finally got to her. "It's...it's just amazing," she finished lamely as she picked up a towel and began wiping off her hands.
Negi quietly shut the club room door as he exited the room fifteen minutes later, thoughts of Suzuki-kun's speech running through his mind. The feelings she had described...it was a lot like the way he used to feel about magic. It had been years since he had last felt that way though; the wonder he had once felt had long ago been beaten back and drowned out by the necessity of constant training and the drive to improve. He had succeeded in that, far beyond anything he had ever dared to imagine in his younger days in fact, but at what cost...? He thought about Kamo-kun, his longtime friend and familiar, off again doing research for him. It had gotten to the point where Kamo-kun spent more time away than at home, not to mention his old students...most of the class he had gotten to know as 2-A and later 3-A back in 2003 had based their lives around his. Yuuna, Asuna, Konoka and Setsuna and all the others...Nodoka and Yue. Nodoka and Yue in particular had put off what would have become spectacular careers simply for his sake. Some of the others had started their own careers; Misa, Madoka, Sakurako, and Ako had started a band, for instance, though they were so good they should have already hit it big by this point, when they were still doing shows at bars. Were they and the others really holding off on success for his sake? It was a sobering thought.
His mind worked back around to Suzuki-kun's hesitant, somewhat embarrassed words again. He had been surprised to feel an inkling of those old feelings of wonder while exploring the ruins in Tibet, but...did he really have the right to use his old students-his friends-in such a way? Eva had suggested that he bring everyone with him to Mundus Magicus when he went this summer, but was that really fair to them? What about what they wanted? What about-
"You look troubled...is it love? Here, why don't you come in and let me tell you your fortune."
Negi was jerked from his introspection as someone grabbed his wrist and pulled him into one a room. He looked at the offending student and recognized her as the girl wearing the witch hat from earlier. "I'm sorry, but I really must be going..." he said, carefully masking his annoyance at the utter lack of respect she was showing.
"Nonsense! Something's bothering you, and this is the best way to get to the bottom of it!" she said, glancing back at him and making a catlike grin. "Now come on, just sit down right here and let the Fortune Telling Club take care of it. Mari! Hey, Mari!" the girl yelled, then disappeared behind a curtain.
Negi let out a long-suffering sigh as he sat in his uncomfortable wooden chair at a small table and gave his surroundings a good look. It was obviously one of the club rooms, but the club members had hung up thick curtains to split the room in half and again into booths; the curtains were very heavy, made of dark blue or purple cloth, and had homemade foil moons and stars stuck to them. There were several magic circles here and there, but none of them were 'real' magic circles, something he found oddly relieving. He heard someone searching for something on the other side of the curtain, shuffling through objects in a box, perhaps. His mood had gone so sour by this point due to his own self-loathing that he contemplated just leaving even though he had been planning on visiting this club today, but then the witch hat girl came through the curtain again with a very old ouija board under one arm. He caught a glimpse of a design drawn on the bottom of it and his eyes widened. Someone had drawn a magic circle there, a real one...! He sighed again and began massaging his temples. Great, this was just what he needed, another club full of amateur mages to break up...
"So!" the girl said as she smacked the heavy wooden board down on the table between them and took a seat. "I'm Kotobuki Minami, the president of the Fortune Telling Club. Nice ta meetcha! Here!" she said, producing an ancient planchette on a chain around her neck. She opened the small clasp that kept it on the chain and placed it on the board, looking at him expectantly.
Negi decided to humor her and placed his fingers on the planchette. "Hello Kotobuki-san. My name is Negi Springfield." Kotobuki-san smiled prettily at him, and he couldn't help but grin a little 'I might as well get this over with...' he thought, disgusted at himself for his cynical thoughts, but was startled back to attention by the almost minuscule surge of magic when she touched the planchette. So, the girl had some power... The effect was utterly destroyed for him when the lights in the room dimmed and the strategically placed fake candles he had failed to notice earlier lit up to provide an eerie glow, and he realized someone had silently pulled the curtain shut across the entrance of the booth behind him. No doubt it would have had a normal student utterly spellbound, but the special effects, while actually quite well done, were simply the sort of thing the average person expected in this sort of situation and weren't realistic at all.
"So...what would you like to know?" Kotobuki asked, her voice low and husky.
'No doubt to help set the mood,' he thought cynically. Now, for something to ask that this girl would know nothing about... He grinned ruefully. "Will Sayo be able to go on the class trip?"
Kotobuki raised an eyebrow as she looked at him, but shook her head and focused on the planchette, which began to vibrate and then slid across the board with startling speed.
"The spirits say 'No'," she said, meeting his gaze from just under the brim of her witch hat.
"Oh..." Negi replied as he tried to think of another question. "Then, where can I find a magician?" he asked, startling himself with the question. The planchette vibrated again, and the girl across from him let a frown show on her face for an instant as the pointer slipped out from under her fingers.
"The spirits say 'Here'," she said, giving him a reproachful look as she reclaimed the tool. Then, she jerked her hands away from the board and jumped out of her chair, Negi only an instant slower.
Negi just looked at the board for a moment. Something...hadn't felt right. Had it been black magic? It was sort of...slimy, and made him feel unclean in a way he couldn't explain. He tugged at the collar of his shirt and loosened his tie a little. Why was it so stuffy in here...?
"Uh...hey, are you okay? You look kind of pale..." Kotobuki said, all the spooky slyness gone from her expression. She glanced back down at the still-vibrating planchette and shouted toward the curtain behind her "Hey Mari! Turn the lights back on!"
The lights flicked back on, he could see the light through the pinholes in the curtains, but the booth remained dark, and Negi found that he was unable to speak.
The girl stood there a moment, gaping at him as his mouth opened and closed like a fish. "Uh, hey, if you're faking it's okay to stop now," she said as she took a hesitant step toward him.
Negi, however, was staring out into space, his mouth still working. "Uh, hey...hey!" she said as she touched his arm and immediately jerked her hand away. She shivered and cringed back. So...so gross! The sensation wasn't unlike the time her cousin had dared her to hold a giant slug. She went for the curtain to pull it open, but couldn't seem to get a grip on it. "Hey Mari! You better not be messing with me in here!" she shouted, but there was no reply.
"It is almost time," a young woman's voice said dreamily, and the girl whirled around to face Negi again.
"Time for what?" she asked warily.
"Time for Fire and Flood and Wind and Lightning and Frost and Avalanche and Growth and Cleansing and Light and Shadow," the voice said again from Negi's mouth in an odd lilting manner. "It is time for Storm."
"O...kay," Kotobuki said as she backed away to the curtains again and felt for the spot where two curtains came together behind her.
"Almost time..." the voice said again, more quietly, and then Kotobuki found the edge of a curtain and yanked it open so hard it almost came down on top of her. Light flooded into the booth and she heard Negi gasp behind her, and saw the other two members of the club, Ono Ran and Mari Nichols, standing there, though only Mari looked worried. Ran, instead, simply gave her a sad, knowing look and entered the booth.
"Hey, I don't think you should do that," Kotobuki said, but Ran ignored her and went to Negi's chair, where he sat with a stunned expression on his face, breathing heavily and staring down at his hands as if seeing them for the first time.
"Greetings, sensei," she said.
Negi swallowed a lump in his throat and looked up at her. "H-hello, Ono-san..."
"Have you come to visit my club today?" she asked, her utterly normal tone going far toward helping him regain his sense of reality. What had just happened? One moment he had been trying to loosen his collar, almost in the next the curtain had been thrown open and he felt drained and what he could only describe as oily...
"Ah...y-yes, yes I did," he replied, trying to fix his tie with shaking hands, her odd pale green eyes holding his gaze firmly. Somehow it was reassuring, and he felt his heart rate returning to normal even as he spoke. "What exactly...happened?" he asked as his gaze drifted over the contents of the booth again. It was just a cheap table and a couple of wooden chairs, with an old, badly worn ouija board and planchette. He stood up and leaned on the table for a moment for support.
"It's not important," the girl replied as she caught his gaze again, and he realized she was right.
"I'm sorry Ono-san, I think I need to leave a little early," he said as he stepped shakily out of the booth and headed for the door.
"I understand. Perhaps some other time, sensei?" she asked.
Negi nodded as he opened the door and stepped outside.
The three girls in the club room stood in silence for a moment after the teacher left.
"Okay, what in the hell was THAT all about?" Kotobuki demanded as she whirled on the other two. Mari still looked terrified, but Ran had already turned back to the book she had been reading earlier. "I'm talking to you, Ran! You know what happened, don't you?"
Ran just glanced at Mari and Kotobuki sighed irritably. She knew Ran well enough by now to know that she sometimes knew things, and often refused to answer questions or perform tasks until some condition had been met. Kotobuki didn't understand it, but she knew Ran wouldn't answer her questions until she talked to Mari. "So, what happened?" she asked the other girl.
"Y-you two just went in there like normal and after a minute everything went, well, slimy," Mari said, finishing up with a shudder.
Kotobuki shuddered too; she knew exactly what Mari was talking about. "So...did you guys hear anything?"
Mari shook her head, but Ran looked up at her. "'Time for Storm', wasn't it?" she asked, then looked back down at her book.
Kotobuki stood there for a moment, her fists propped on her hips, contemplating the girl. It wasn't for no reason that Ono Ran was considered one of the creepiest people in the whole school. When Kotobuki had first roped her into joining the club, it had simply been an effort to differentiate the failing Fortune Telling Club from the more popular Occult Club, but it had worked far better than she could ever have imagined. Ran's mere presence was enough to lend the room a spooky air, and her fortunetelling was almost always spot-on. So spot-on, in fact, that Kotobuki had taken to intercepting customers before they got to her, simply to keep them from hearing things they wouldn't want to hear. One thing was clear: whatever she had expected to find in Ono Ran, whether simply a misunderstood student, a set piece for the fortune telling club, or even just a third club member, she hadn't at all expected what she had gotten when she had finally convinced Ran to join.
"Ran, we're friends. You'd better not be holding back on me," Kotobuki said warningly as she locked eyes with the other girl.
"I-I really need to go," Mari said as she snatched up her bag and fled the room. Kotobuki ignored the fleeing girl and held firm, one of the few students in the whole middle school who could meet Ran's gaze for more than a few seconds without getting weirded out.
Finally Ran relented and closed her book. "'Time for Fire and Flood and Wind and Lightning and Frost and Avalanche and Growth and Cleansing and Light and Shadow, a time for Storm'," she quoted. "It is part of a prophecy."
"And how do you know that?" Kotobuki asked warily. Ran just shook her head and shrugged, and Kotobuki sighed. So, it was one of those things Ran just seemed to know...she knew she wouldn't get anything else out of the girl on that subject. "Then who was speaking? Because that damn sure wasn't his voice," she said.
Ran shrugged again as she began packing up. "Anyone who could tell is too close to him to see," she said. When she finished, she stood up and dusted off the seat of her skirt, then looked at Kotobuki. "Want to get some crepes?"
Kotobuki raised an eyebrow as she looked at the other girl, then sighed. That was Ono Ran in a nutshell. Spouting spooky riddles one moment, asking her friends out to get crepes the next. No wonder nobody liked to hang out with her... "Sure. Let's see if we can find Mari."
Ran nodded and smiled slightly.
Negi shut the door behind him and stumbled down the thankfully empty hallway to the nearest men's bathroom. He tugged open the door and stumbled inside to lean against one of the sinks.
What had that been about? Now that a few minutes had passed and his initial shock had passed, he could only vaguely recall the words someone had used his body to speak. Something about fires and flooding and lightning? Even now it was fading from his memory, like a dream. Well, whatever it had been, one thing was clear...he would have to put off seeing Nodoka-no, the Library Club today. He was simply too exhausted to do anything but go home and collapse on the couch for the rest of the day.
He looked up at the mirror, only a little surprised to see the sweat on his face. He shivered again as he recalled the sensation of having that slimy...thing take control of his body, and splashed his face with water from the faucet. Okay, good. Better.
He had almost totally forgotten the incident by the time he left the club building, and had begun to wonder why he was feeling so tired when he finally arrived at the teacher's dorm.
Author's Notes: So here it is, a week late and a little short. The shortness is, sadly, a result of the chapter growing too long and having two separate themes that split it almost straight down the middle, so I decided to go ahead and split it in half and post the halves as different chapters. With any luck, I'll have my problems with the next chapter fixed and have it up on time next week. Also, no student profiles this week.
Next time: Class trip!