For Persona related info: megamitensei [dot] wikia [dot] com/wiki/Megami_Tensei_Wiki
For Star Trek related info: memory-alpha [dot] org/wiki/Portal:Main
Hey guys and gals, how's it going?
I got very lazy with writing this chapter. For some reason, I wasn't really feeling it. Hopefully, it won't be so bad for next one.
Well then, happy reading.
"Welcome back to the Velvet Room," the ever-enigmatic Igor said.
"Thanks," Minako responded after entering the blue door invisible to everyone but Wild Cards. She looked around the place before asking, "Seriously guys, whose idea was it to turn the room into a starship's bridge?" The décor in question looked like the bridge of the Federation Sovereign class starship, specifically that of the Enterprise-E.
"That would be mine," said Theodore. "I thought that we should get with the times."
"That and he wanted to imagine being the captain of a starship heading into battle," snarked Elizabeth in the middle of her conversation with Eurydice.
"You didn't have to mention that!" Theo shouted a little flustered, making Minako giggle.
"Anyway," Margaret said, shaking her head, "did you need anything in particular?"
"Just answers, though I'm probably not gonna get any clear ones," said Minako. "I just want to know why I'm forming Social Links again. I haven't even signed a contract."
"I believe you know that you are still a Wild Card so Social Links will still be in play," Igor responded. "However, they are just a guide for your own personal journey, nothing more."
"Good, a clear answer for a change. I didn't want to fight Shadows again."
"Only the shadows that you will face are the metaphorical ones."
"I see. Well, that's all I needed to know. See you guys later. Come along, Eurydice." Minako was about to ask her initial Persona about what she was talking with Elizabeth until she was interrupted.
"I hope you have fun next week," Theo said.
"Oh why's that?"
"Let's just say admiration becomes aggravation."
Minako did not know what to think of that.
Theo, you could have given me a better warning!
The next week was hell for Minako. She expected it, but she did not think that it would be this bad. Everybody on the kendo team nagged her to join, despite several attempts to say no.
She wished that they would respect her reason why she would not. Despite Iwatodai being her original birthplace, she loved and was loyal to her new birthplace of Inaba and promised not to join any martial arts clubs in Gekkoukan or Iwatodai. In fact, she still sent and received holorecordings of practice sessions to and from the Satonaka Gym.
Things worsened from there. It turned out that the entire third week of April was devoted to joining or getting students to join clubs. After denying the kendo club's request, every other club badgered her to join. It was getting so bad that the popular girl from Inaba actually wanted to skip school for a day and said as much to her friends.
Apparently, they were not the only ones to notice her aggravation. In the middle of the week, her homeroom teacher, Ms. Ite, decided to step in and tell everyone to back off. She reminded the whole student body that clubs, while great to have on a resume or university application, were completely optional and that harassment to join would not be tolerated.
Minako was glad for the reprieve, so she could properly decide on which clubs she really wanted to join. For the rest of that day, she went to each club and received their info peacefully.
One of the things she noticed was that there were a lot more science based clubs now than in the 21st century; topics included quantum physics and temporal mechanics. She was not too surprised because most people nowadays wanted to get into Starfleet and needed a large scientific background to enroll. She was not most people though; she had her fill of space from being the Great Seal and was in no mood to fight to the death (as opposed to martial arts exhibition fights) that a life in Starfleet entailed. She really looked forward to a quiet country life in Inaba managing the Amagi Inn once she learned what happened to every one of her old friends and finished her schooling in the city.
Anyway, she knew the only sports club she was interested in was tennis, as the memory of Rio burned brightly. In terms of the culture clubs, she was interested in visual arts, band and drama. However, the lack of a cooking club crossed her mind. Everybody in the 24th century was too reliant on using replicators for practically everything that learning old skills never crossed their mind. She was glad that Inaba still reveled in these skills. She wondered if she should start one, though was worried about the turnout.
"Food for thought, you could say," said Ryoji. Amaterasu decided to burn his buns for that bad pun.
"Still, you never know if anybody's interested," added Izanagi.
"True," answered Minako, as she was cooking chicken teriyaki on her newly replicated stove on the Thursday of that week.
Eurydice then said, "If you do plan on starting one up, I hope everyone is used to blood. I want our mistress to teach butchery and skinning skills as well."
Minako was appalled at what her original Persona just said. "I don't know if I'd go that far. Despite the recent war, I'd bet people are still squeamish about blood."
"They should know though. Add it in and say that it's part of a basic survival course."
"Wouldn't that be a club, though?" asked Brea.
"I don't remember actually," said Minako. "I can check tomorrow."
"I've got an idea," Izanagi said. "I think you should set up a cooking display, like the one you used to say that Shinjiro did for your old friends years ago."
Minako just stared at the pot of stew, deep in thought.
As they entered school the next day, every staff and student were overwhelmed with a tasty aroma. Suffice it to say, most of them probably have not ever had a home cooked meal and ran to the source of the smell, the home economics room.
It was certainly a remarkable sight as Minako deftly showed off her multitasking skills by chopping up meat and vegetables, mixing up a cake batter, and checking all ovens and stoves to ensuring proper cooking. What also amazed them was that she was talking to everybody while doing this and that she had a helper in a little orange fox wearing a pink bandana and brown leather leash around its neck.
On the other hand, Minako was working just as hard to cook as to hide her stress. While she knew how to cook well and that last night's practice run went well without any hitches, she wondered if she was doing too much too fast. She was glad that Brea agreed to help and was really doing a good job at tending to the stoves and ovens.
Off to the side, she noticed her new friends as well as Ms. Ite and Ms. Manisa with varying looks on their faces. Both teachers smirked at the sight, Eiji looked surprised, Midori cheered her on, Miki had a grin on her face, but Kyo just blankly stared.
After another hour, Minako and Brea (with the help of Miki and Midori) served a breakfast consisting of two sets of muffins (blueberry and banana), miso soup, paella and chicken curry. Suffice it to say, school started much later than usual if the sated looks on everyone's faces were any indication. By the end of it, they praised the great food and the chefs.
Minako silently thanked Shinjiro for the cooking lessons long ago and the Inn chefs for the lessons now.
"Well, I hope everyone's full and happy, and not feeling any effects of food poisoning," she said. "I didn't want anybody to eat Mystery Food X or some such." Amaterasu fumed at that joke, while Izanagi laughed.
"Anyway, I believe that cooking is slowly becoming a very lost art with the advent of the food replicator. However, as some of you can tell, there is a distinct difference between the taste of food from a replicator and real food cooked by your own hands with love. So, I want to start a cooking club to keep this art from dying.
"Now, I will be teaching you everything in cooking, including the butchery of meats." This got a few reactions of disgust. "Not that you will really have to do that since most meats of precut and prepackaged, but it's a good skill to have, especially out in the wilderness on a camping trip.
"So, who would like to join?" finished Minako.
As expected, most of the people who came and left just wanted to take the opportunity of a free meal. Still, there was a lot of murmuring in the crowd and quite a bit of interest. However, the idea of chopping up a dead animal really did not appeal to many, regardless of the skills they would learn.
In the end, she had ten students and a couple of teachers join, including Ms. Ite. Two of the students made her curious, though. Based on their family names, they could be the descendants of best friends, Fuuka Yamagishi and Natsuki Moriyama.
Inwardly, Minako grinned at this result.
After classes ended for the day, Minako rushed straight to the tennis courts with her tennis racket going-away gift. Unfortunately, she had to cross paths with the kendo club, who again nagged her to join. She just walked by and ignored them as she walked out the doors to the tennis courts.
After she opened those doors, she was in for a shock. "Eiji, what are you doing here?"
"Playing tennis of course, Minako-chan," the brunet male responded sarcastically. "You?"
"Joining, of course."
"Great. Tennis is my passion, been playing since I've been a kid. I'll show you the ropes."
"Okay. Don't take it easy on me just cuz I'm your friend."
"Never do. In fact, I push them harder."
"Good, I love a challenge. Expect to be pushed back."
For the next hour, Minako and Eiji enjoyed a short round of tennis.
"Have you ever played tennis before?" Eiji asked.
"Maybe in a previous lifetime?" Minako half-lied. "Never really played it extensively.
"Well, you're pretty good for a newcomer."
"Comes with the martial arts training."
"Hey less talk, more cooking," shouted Midori.
"Agreed," said Miki. "My stomach's growling right now and I think I hear Kyo's as well."
He just shrugged.
After tennis club, Minako invited her friends to cook with her in the home economics room since she had leftover ingredients in the fridge. What they wanted to cook was no easy task though. They wanted her to re-create the Aragaki Bowl from Hagakure.
Ramen was one thing, as she had handmade tons of ramen noodles before, even if it usually caused her a bit a trouble to do. Re-creating the Aragaki Bowl was a different monster all together; it had so many intricacies and nuances that were only known to those who mastered the recipe. She had considered telling her friends to just go to Hagakure if they really wanted to eat that, but she was always up for a challenge and creating something that Shinjiro cooked up was a plus.
Off to the side, Brea was starting up a pot full of broth. She had to yip every so often to get advice on adding the correct spices and seasonings, as they were key for any meal to taste good.
Minako had already a couple of batches of noodle dough and was letting them rest so they could be cut. As she cut up some meat, a thought entered into her head. "You know, you guys can help us if you really want to the food any faster," she inferred to the rest of her friends.
"Uh sure, whatcha need?" Eiji asked nervously, exchanging similarly nervous glances with the other three.
As it turned out, their fears of handling raw meat were unwarranted. Minako handled the meat, Eiji and Kyo kneaded the now-ready noodle dough, Miki and Midori chopped up the vegetables and Brea kept watch over the broth.
Suddenly, the home ec door was opened and a couple of second year students popped in. "Hey Setamagi, you could've told us you were having a meeting," said the teal haired student of the two.
"Yeah, we'd like to learn how to cook now," added the brunette.
Minako sighed. "Does everybody have to call me by my family name? Senpai, please call me Minako."
"Well, we don't like being called 'senpai,' either. Then again, we never formally introduced ourselves. I'm Yuri Yamagishi," said the teal haired girl.
"And I'm Lillian Moriyama, Lily for short," said the brunette.
"Okay. You okay with cutting up meat?" They nodded, though with a bit of hesitation. "Don't worry, it'll be fine. Just grab an apron and a knife, and I'll show you the ropes."
"Sure," they responded.
Minako was glad to have the extra hands as she could slowly but expertly watched and taught everybody how to do each assigned task, and 'with all their fingers attached," as Eiji put it. She really enjoyed teaching everybody how to cook and wondered if she should have cooking classes when she inherited the Amagi Inn.
After every task was done, the vegetables and meat were put in the broth pot, while Minako cut up the noodle dough. It was then that Yuri asked, "How long have you been cooking? I mean, you even cut fresh meat and make your own ramen noodles… WHOA!"
"I've been doing this since I've been little," giggled the auburn haired girl as she startled everyone by stretching the dough and whacking it on the tabletop. "It's been a part of Inaba's mandate to keep traditional skills alive while progress forward to the future. Me, I just loved to cook and helped out in my inn's kitchen whenever I could. Butchery did make me queasy for a good long while, but I eventually got over it." Of course, she did not mention that the real reason she learned to cook was in memory of Shinjiro.
"Did you learn to make ramen at home?" asked Lily.
"Yeah, but not at the inn. We also have a great ramen shop called Aiya! Chinese Diner and that's where I learned to make ramen. I told the owners to treat me like one of the boys and not the Amagi Inn heiress when I asked them to teach me. Believe me, it's taken me the last couple of years to get this good and it's not even as great at either Hagakure or Aiya."
"Hey, don't be modest," said Eiji. "It's still good regardless."
"Thanks. How's the broth coming along?"
Brea yipped energetically while Midori took a taste. "Tastes good. Not quite the Aragaki Bowl but almost there."
As Minako finished with the noodle making, she was about to go taste the broth herself when the home ec door was opened again. She looked up thinking it was Ms. Ite or another cooking club member; she scowled when she realized it was three male members of the kendo club.
"So this is where the famous kendo champion is, doing an obsolete skill from some rickety old inn in some backwards countryside town. Haven't you heard of food replicators?" said the tallest of the bunch at 178cm. He was the same dark shaded, shorthaired male student she had seen on the first day of school and the main antagonize for her to join the kendo club.
"Samuel Hayase, what are you doing here?" Miki said with a bit of annoyance in her tone.
"Just curious why Minako here isn't in the kendo club."
"One, I never gave you the permission to use my given name. Secondly, I've told you a thousand times NO. Don't you know what that means? Didn't Ms. Ite give a stern warning about harassment or are you deaf?" Minako said vehemently.
"Not until you join the so I can beat you."
"Yeah, like that will ever happen," she nearly yelled before turning his back to him and focused on the noodles she just put into the pot of now-boiling broth. The guy was rubbing him the wrong way and Brea, who had been tending to that pot the whole time, seemed like she wanted to hiss and possibly pounce at him too. It was a very stark contrast to what Minato told her of his possible ancestor, Mamoru.
Kyo then spoke up, "Hayase, you really should leave."
Hayase walked closer to that same stove, while his cohorts stood to the side. "I will but at least you can at least let us taste some of that food you're cooking."
"I'm only cooking for my friends, not jerkasses," Minako retorted, not even bothering to look at him.
"Really, you think I'm a jerkass? Well you ain't cooking for anybody!" He shouted before he and his cronies took all the pots and dumped them over the floor. They ran out the room swiftly before anybody could retaliate.
Despite the surprise, Minako dodged the boiling broth from the pot. She was about to swear at them until Brea shrieked. The little fox was running in circles over the countertop in extreme pain as some of that broth splashed onto her tail.
"Brea!" the Amagi Inn heiress yelled as she quickly tiptoed over the broth to her friend's aid. She grabbed the little fox, brought her to a sink and doused her tail with cold water. It must have stung really badly as the fox wiggled violently in the girl's arms.
While this was happening, Miki yelled at the kendo club members, "HAYASE! Get back here!" Kyo and Eiji ran out after them.
Midori ran up to Brea to pet her and ease her pain. "There, there, Brea." The little fox rubbed her head on Midori's hand affectionately, but the pain was very evident on her face.
Lily meanwhile got an ice pack from a replicator and brought it to them. "We need to get her to a vet."
"And get this place cleaned up," lamented Yuri. "Those bastards wasted a lot of good food, a lot of hard work and hurt Brea."
"I'll report him to Ms. Ite. He's gonna pay this," Miki vowed.
"I'd rather just kick his ass," Eiji angrily stated as he and Kyo re-entered the room. The latter nodded in agreement. "Those buffoons are really gonna get it."
"Get in line," a very irate Minako said, still petting Brea. "Anybody know when's the next kendo club practice?"
"Tomorrow. Fencing and kendo alternate days for using the practice arena," Kyo stated.
"Miki, I know I'm gonna get in trouble for this, but if Hayase wants a fight, I will make him wish he hadn't picked a fight with me!" Her friends cringed at the tone of voice, the bright apple red colour on her face and the steam coming out of her ears; they probably thought some monster had been released.
Brea and her Personae knew better though and shuddered even more. They knew that anybody who disparaged her family, her friends, the Inn and especially Shinjiro were in for one very rude awakening.
The next day, kendo club were where Kyo said they would be, members adorned in kendo practice armor doing routines at the practice arena, while club advisor and second year history teacher Mr. Ono wore a samurai helmet like his ancestor. Hayase, however, was doing his own thing without his helmet, trying to be high and mighty. At least that was what Minako thought as she peered into the room. After a few more minutes of spying, she, Miki and Kyo eventually entered the room.
Hayase was the first to notice and grinned. "So Setamagi, you gonna join the kendo club? Finally ready to lose?"
Minako returned that grin with a determined stare. "No, I'm just her to kick your butt. You want a fight? You got one!"
Hayase's cocky grin widened. "Oh really? Go get suited up then."
"I don't even need practise armor 'cause you're not gonna hit me. Ever!" Mr. Ono was about to protest, but she smiled evilly and added, "But since you're gonna whine about a speed advantage when I beat your ass, I'll oblige your request."
Hayase laughed even more, giving off a foul air of confidence. "Oh, this is gonna be fun."
As Mr. Ono re-iterated the rules of kendo (and relating it to something from the Sengoku Era, just like her ancestor), Minako got dressed in practice armor, not particularly caring if anybody watched that she did and if anybody cared that her school skirt lay over top the pants. Despite her anger, she remained as calm as possible, using a few breathing techniques to ease her.
Finally, she and Hayase took to the combat circle and bowed. Hayase held his kendo stick in a standard two-handed grip angled forward. Minako held hers one handed with her right hand away from her opponent and her left hand raised up in a blocking stance, similar to the one handed stance her brother used long ago.
The arrogant boy smirked once again. "You really think you can handle all my attacks with one hand?"
"I only need one hand to beat you," the Amagi Inn heiress confidently responded.
Hayase attacked first with a forward vertical slash. Minako countered with a sideways clockwise parry and then tripped him up with her left foot. He quickly got up, his body language conveying anger and annoyance. "Hey, that's against the rules!"
"Ah so you know the rules. Didn't think you did," she snarked. "Though you might want to clean your ears. I said fight, not match. But since you want a match, I'll give you one!"
"She did say fight, Samuel," Mr. Ono said, making the boy emit a suppressed growl. "However Minako, since you now agree to making it a match, I will have to give a point to him." She just shrugged.
Hayase maintained his original sword stance, while Minako switched to a typical one-handed fencing stance, similar to the one Mitsuru utilized. As he raised his hands for another forward slash, she scored with a quick stab to his neck. After a reset, he slashed horizontally, but she parried and hit with a stab to his head, winning the first match.
Hayase started complaining about her improper stance; she countered by saying that he should learn more than kendo, which Mr. Ono agreed with. Regardless, she changed her stance to the same as his. The results did not change as her quickness and technique outdid his brute power.
After complaining about her defensive style, she went on the offensive and completely overwhelmed him with yet another match win. As she kept switching between stances such as a baseball bat grip and an iaido grip, he became increasingly frustrated, as he could not adapt to the changing tactics. It was very evident that the increasing praise of her and increasing chiding of him from the kendo club advisor was further bruising both his ego and his body.
After losing ten straight matches, he lost his cool completely and shouted, "That's it! You want a fight? Let's fight!"
Hayase started to slash angrily and wildly at Minako, who easily parried each slash. Then he started mixing punched and kicks into the fray, which she also easily blocked. Another forward slash was countered with a clockwise sideways parry, followed by a left shin kick to his right knee and finished with a spinning back fist with the butt end of her kendo stick to the back of his head. The counterattack made him stagger forward a bit, but he steadied himself and spun on his right heel for a diagonal upward slash. She backed away to avoid that slash, then ducked a counter-clockwise horizontal slash before landing a hard roundhouse spin kick to his liver area that made him keel over on all fours. The blow must have looked and sounded incredibly painful based on the reactions of their audience, the loud smacking sound the kick made and Hayase's groaning. Minako backed away and let her guard down.
Mr. Ono stepped in and said, "Alright, Samuel that's enough."
"No, it's not over! Not until I beat her!" shouted Hayase, still facing the ground.
"Why do you want me to join the kendo club so bad so you could beat me?" asked Minako. "What did I ever do to you?"
He turned towards, his body trembling in intense anger. "I'm defending my family honor! There's no way some little country girl could beat my older brother in a kendo match without cheating in some way. I'm gonna beat you to regain that honor!"
A realization started to dawn on her. "Wait, who's your brother?"
"You bitch! You forgot his name? It's Darien Hayase!"
Minako's eyes widened at that answer. She always wondered why he looked so familiar if he was the younger brother of her rivals in kendo. She remember her first match with the older Hayase in 2372. However, this revelation just made her angrier. "This is your idea of honorable, harassing someone into a fight? I know your brother would never approve."
"You don't know nothing!" Hayase shouted before quickly rising up and slashing at her again.
The attack completely surprised her in its ferocity and subsequently smacked her kendo stick out of her hands. She then had to dodge swiftly out of range of his kendo stick, which unfortunately forced her away from her dropped weapon. Miki was about to run and get it for her since she was closest, but Minako waved her off and took up a karate stance instead.
Hayase cocked his head curiously and laughed. "You really think you can beat me unarmed?"
"I know I can," she said in a cool, determined voice.
He stepped forward with a counter-clockwise horizontal slash. She block it by spinning with the slash, grabbing his wrists with her right hand to slow it down, and finishing with a back left elbow to the back of his head. She knew that the blow was most likely blunted by his helmet, but it also made his helmet turn around his head and blind him.
Hayase slashed wildly and angrily as he tried to fix his helmet. Minako ducked and weaved passed them and started pummeling his body with hard punches. She finished with a knee to his gut that left him winded and keeled over again.
She stepped back and took off her helmet. "Hayase, please stay down. I don't want to hurt you anymore than I have." She did want to beat him; she did not want to completely humiliate him.
Mr. Ono spoke up, "I agree. There's nothing wrong about conceding defeat."
That just enraged Hayase further. He violently took off her helmet and threw it at her, which would have hit her had she not duck at the very last second.
"I will not lose!" he yelled before running to slash her again. He started with another forward vertical slash, which she simultaneously sidestepped left and applied a left palm strike to his right cheek. Unphased, he continued with a clockwise horizontal slash. She turned with the slash, grabbed his wrists and followed up with a spinning back elbow to his back. Again, he staggered forward a bit, repositioned himself and turned counter-clockwise for another slash. As he was about to face her, she kicked his kendo stick out of his hands and followed up with a hard sidekick to his chest, pushing him back half a metre.
Roaring angrily, he took up a pseudo-boxing stance and fired a few wild jabs at her, which she easily danced and bobbed gracefully to avoid. He then telegraphed an overheard right, she turned into, pivoted off her left foot and grabbed his right and use the momentum to throw him over her shoulder. He landed on his back with a loud thud.
Hayase rolled on his stomach with a groan, before his eyes noticed that he was close to one of the dropped kendo sticks. He tried to dive for it, but received from Minako a left kick that broke his nose and a right uppercut that bruised his left eye and made him roll away from her another half metre. She kicked the stick towards the wall so he would not try for it again.
As he rose, Hayase noticed the blood dripping out of his face and looked utterly shocked. He could not believe that he was getting beaten by the same girl he vowed to beat.
"Please yield," Minako pleaded. "Your stubborn pride won't get you anywhere."
Enraged further, Hayase ran at her, arms wide and ready to grab her. Knowing that a bear hug would hurt like hell, she waited for him to close the distance before grabbing his armor with both hands, rolling on her back, planting her foot in his gut and pushing off with said foot to send him flying in the air and right into a kendo stick rack.
Minako performed a kip up to get back on her feet. Thinking that the fight was finally over (and with that loud a crash, anybody would have thought so), she was about to walk towards the wall to take off her armor. However, noise came from the broken rack told her otherwise. She turned around to see Hayase staggering up to his feet. A couple of kendo club members tried to stop him but he shrugged them off violently.
As he raised his arms drunkenly in another boxing stance, he made a "come here" gesture with his fingers. Minako almost fell for it until she noticed his eyes shift left and right, and his head make the slightest of nods. She was not worried nor looked it if the sounds of kendo stick blows and male grunts coupled with Hayase's shocked face proved that. She had a feeling that his cronies would try to interfere and asked Miki and Kyo to watch her back. She looked peripherally to see that they were standing with kendo sticks in hand over Hayase's prone and hurting friends.
It was then that she decided that he was going down hard for all his hypocrisy about honor. She closed the gap quickly, blocked an incoming right hand with her left forearm and answered back with a left jab that bruised his right eye. She followed up with right cross, spun with it and finished with a jumping spinning uppercut, breaking his jaw and knocking him down to the mat once again.
After landing in a crouch with her back towards him, she stood up and took a few deep breaths. She was about to make her way for the door again until a tug on one of her pant legs prevented her from doing so. She just closed her eyes and waited.
As Hayase's hands slowly crept up her legs, Minako reflected upon what just transpired. While she knew in her mind that she fought him to shut him up and defend the honor of her family and her town, she knew in her heart that she was just as dishonorable as he was by wanting pure spiteful revenge by breaking him down to pieces. It made her shudder how much she had changed from the eternally cheerful girl with a bright smile that parted clouds to what she had become today.
Once she felt one of Hayase's hands reach her shoulders, she swiftly spin around and smashed the left side of his temple with a very hard and very loud right cross. This time, he stayed down for the count. She started at the bloody mess that he was for about half a minute, breathing very heavily.
She turned to face Mr. Ono and bowed respectfully; he returned the gesture with a brief nod and then tasked the other kendo club members to help Hayase to the infirmary. She then turned around the door and started walking, stripping her kendo armor along the way and ignoring the bustling sounds behind her.
As Minako walked towards then, it only took a glance and a nod for Kyo and Miki to understand that she did not want to talk now and just wanted to leave school immediately. They quietly led her out, stopping any gawkers from asking questions along the way and met their awaiting friends. They too noticed the serious look on her face and followed their senpais' lead. Nobody needed to speak though; they all had a feeling that the Amagi Inn heiress was going to be expelled from Gekkoukan. Their turmoil was nowhere as painful as hers was, though.
Igor was right, she thought. There is only one shadow I'm fighting. My own… She held back her tears at this realization.
References:
The third week of April being a club recruitment week is a reference to a mid 90's dating sim called Season of the Sakura. In that game, the main character has a natural ability to take up a sport and excel in it immediately, even without any practice or knowledge of it beforehand. Obviously, that made him a target of everybody during club recruitment week.
The Hayase brothers' names are based on Sailor Moon. Their ancestor's name is Mamoru, real name of Tuxedo Kamen/Mask. His English name is Darien. A possible nickname for Samuel would be Sammy, Usagi/Serena's brother's English name.
Anybody who knows both the traditional and the most common translations for 'yuri' probably can guess what my plan is for Fuuka and Natsuki's descendants. This is a dual reference. The first being another reference to Lady Starwing's 'Persona: Guiding Light.' The other is actually from Star Trek, which for a progressive series as it was, never explored these kinds of relationships. However, there was one episode of The Next Generation where guest star Whoopi Goldberg fought to change a line about romantic relationships from a gender-specific "When a man and a woman are in love" to a gender-neutral "When two people are in love," stating the show is and thus the 24th century would be beyond that. I'm wondering if that's true so I'll try to explore that a bit, though I hope I don't suffer that Chris Carter Effect in the process (see TVTropes for that one).
The latter half of the fight was inspired by (read: stolen from) a different sci-fi fandom this time around. In this case, it was from the Star Wars novel, I, Jedi. There, the smaller, more skilled main character also beat up a larger, stuck up braggart.
Afterthoughts:
I don't know why, but I felt like the fight I wrote sounds very bland, despite the amount of description I used. Any suggestions on how to improve?
Not much else I can say. See you next chapter.