A/N: I do not own or profit from any of what Kazue Kato has created.
"Wow, how do you do that?" Ryuuji stared in awe at Shiro's target practice sheet.
"Gut feeling?" He shrugged, taking off the ear protectors: they made the frames of his glasses cut painfully into his head. "I used to do a lot of airgun shooting in Mepphy Land, and in games in the arcades." He had shot real guns, too. But that was different. That was a past that didn't belong here and now.
"You should go for Dragoon, Shiro-san." Ryuuji gave a shy smile. "I heard Ando-sensei say so." He nodded discreetly in the direction of their Dragoon instructor.
Ando-sensei looked plain. There was no better way to describe him, really. He was the kind of man you forgot the moment you took your eyes off him, and Shiro was quite sure he would have forgotten about him altogether if it hadn't been for the way Ando-sensei walked: he strode with long steps, as if he was always in a hurry to get somewhere, and it made him bob up and down with each step like some kind of buoy. How exactly Ryuuji had overheard what he said was a mystery, though, as Ando-sensei was standing a good thirty metres away in discussion with Kohu-sensei.
"I don't think I'm the only one he'd want for Dragoon", Shiro observed.
A few booths away, Agari was putting her sheet through ruthless mastectomy. Her full lips pursed in concentration. A strand of raven hair had escaped the bun and hung – quite becoming – by her ear and curled slightly. Every sharp rebound of the gun bobbed through her breasts…
"Ye're not gonna defeat any demons by drooling, Shiro-san."
"You'd drool too, if you still had anything down there after Kita-san got you."
Shizuku barked out a good-natured laughter. He was very tall - same height as Shiro, even. But sinewy. He had helped himself to a shotgun from the rack of practice weapons, and in combination with all those piercings he looked like a veritable gang leader.
"I'm tryin' ta leave my earthly desires behind here! Now, if you've got anything up there", he tapped Shiro on the head with an ammo clip, "ye'll stay on her good side. Someone has to. Tame the wild-cat, o great leader." And with that he sauntered on down the aisle to his own booth, shotgun slung over his shoulder and whistling out of tune.
"Good aim, good punch, good looks: what haven't you got?" Shiro seated himself next to Agari with a winning smile and peered at her clea- lunchbox. "You cook, too?"
It had been difficult to locate Agari during lunch - in fact it was pure luck that he had spotted her through the windows of the crowded school cafeteria where all the rich brats were eating. She had been headed in an entirely different direction.
"Yes. …do you want some?"
Yes would have been the polite answer, but at some point politeness has to give way for survival instinct. When you can't tell if food is boiled, fried or raw, that point is way passed.
"I've already eaten", he assured. "Thanks anyway. So... why are you sitting here and not in the cafeteria?"
"The cafeteria is too noisy." Her eyes wandered over the poplars and the gnarled old fruit-trees, the grass and weeds that peeked up furtively in the pavement of the lowered square: that special nook in every park that keeps to itself, like the first brown, curled-up leaf in autumn. "I'm used to dining in silence."
If that was a hint, Shiro was determined to blatantly ignore it.
"I'm used to being taller than my friends – doesn't mean I like being tall." Well - he did like being tall. But honesty wasn't the aim of this conversation. "Want one?" he asked, offering a smoke.
"No."
"The looks of a model, the charm of a bucket…" Shiro cupped the tiny flame of the lighter and lit the cigarette. "So what do you do for fun?" What's with that blank stare? Surely even an uptight soldier-librarian must do fun stuff sometimes… "Me, I go to Mepphy Land with my friends, or hang out in the arcade. Sometimes we go to the hot springs, and we never miss the night market. What do you do?"
"I read."
"Yeah? I-" He wondered for a brief moment if the magazines he read could be called literature, then quickly discarded the idea. "I don't read much. Would you recommend me something?"
"The Holy Bible."
Oh. Well, True Cross Academy was technically affiliated with the Vatican, and officially a school with Roman Catholic roots. In practice? In practice Agari might even constitute the entire student body of actual Catholics. But hey, it's quality that counts, not quantity: and the quality of that body was really good.
"Doesn't sound like my kind of literature."
"The word of the Lord is needed most where it isn't heard."
Shiro quirked an eyebrow.
"Does that uniform come with a rod in the back? And I mean literally. You sit like a komainu on guard."
"I wasn't reared to slack and slouch and smoke cigarettes", she returned coolly. Yeah, she definitely liked to dine in silence. "I'm here to fight in the name of God, and to bring death to his adversaries. Do you believe in God, Shiro-kun?"
"Should I?" he smiled around the cigarette. "I don't need God to kill demons, just a good gun."
"Then you shouldn't call yourself an exorcist but a mercenary." Agari dismissively plucked a piece of something that might once have been food out of her lunch box and ate it.
"Oi, stop being so dead serious about things", he grimaced. "It's enough to make a guy queasy. Look, in practical terms anyone who gets rid of demons is an exorcist, and anyone who does is doing a good thing whether there's faith involved or not."
"You speak heresies in a Catholic school." If Agari's gaze grew any colder Shiro would have to dust frost off his cigarette. "I thought better of you."
Shiro laughed. Oh, this girl! Did she realise how hilarious she was? No, not at all. Agari's face was positively white with rage, and how wonderful she looked~
"Hate to break it to you, but I'm not a good person by any standards." He flashed a wolfish grin as he struck another nail in the coffin: "I'm still going to make one hell of an exorcist."
"Being an exorcist is about more than aim and strength of body, Fujimoto Shiro", she hissed between clenched teeth. "It takes strength of soul. Strength to resist the evil temptations Satan plagues the heart with. Strength granted only by the Lord to those who praise His name."
"Yeah? The Lord dishes out His fair share of temptation too, judging by the size of your-"
With a sharp whack, Agari's hand left a burning mark on his cheek.
"Scum!" Her lunchbox spilled its contents on the ground, and her other arm closed protectively over her breasts. "Those unclean thoughts of yours are the kind of thing demons feed on! And you would call yourself an exorcist, when you've already fallen to their temptations?"
Now that his yes and thoughts had been effectively diverted from Agari, Shiro discovered that there had been witnesses to this embarrassment. And the worst witness thinkable: Midori's red hair added a late flower to the top of a pear tree, where she was passing fruit down to a softly smiling Sen.
"Eyoo, Agari-san, Shiro-kun~! Come see what Shizuku-kun is doing?" Midori waved vigorously at them from her tree branch.
Shiro made a move to pick up Agari's lunchbox, but she caught his wrist and swatted it away.
"What keeps you? Don't you hear the demons' calling?" she said, not even hiding the scorn in her smile. The more beautiful the face, the more striking the hostility in it.
Shiro didn't bother to say goodbye. He set off towards Midori and Sen, inwardly cursing at himself. Nice job figuring out Agari, it would be so much easier now that she hated him.
"I just can't keep my mouth shut…" Things usually worked out anyway, when you were around people who knew how to bite back: when you weren't, you ended up being slapped in the face. There is no reasoning with people who have no sense of humour.
"Is not what they call 'smooth', yes~?" Midori said when she jumped down, soundlessly, laughter dancing in her eyes like sunlight on water. "Can't write calligraphy with a broomstick, you know?" She hefted a stack of chunky, medium-sized branches from the ground.
"Yeah…" He rubbed his stinging cheek, a hesitant smile forming. She'd heard everything, hadn't she? Half-demons had heightened senses, right…? "She's more tightly knit than I thought."
"No", Midori declared with a wink. "You didn't think, Shiro-kun. Fun to you but not to her – is not the way to win a woman. No loss, methinks; she isn't right for you."
Shiro was so absorbed in listening to her voice that he barely heard what she said. That kind of odd cadence would have been attractive if it hadn't reminded him of Faust. Still, how could anyone be that cute?
"Shizuku-kun requested pear-wood for his omamori", said Sen airily. "He said he would make me a gakugyo joju if I got him the material."
They walked leisurely towards the Academy's main building. It was one of those sweltering late-summer days when people stayed where the air condition was, except some brave souls who sat outside with fans in the shade.
"I could use a gakugyo, too", Shiro thought aloud. "Do you know what you will be meistering in after Esquire?"
"Tamer. And Aria", Sen replied, eating her pear in small nibbles.
"Double offensive or offensive and defensive." Shiro nodded to himself. "What about you, Midori-chan?"
"Doctor and Knight."
"Is everyone meistering in two? I thought that was optional."
"Is, but people who come here have – what do you call it? Strong will for goal?"
"Ambition", Sen helped with a warm smile. "The students here have strong ambition. Too strong, at times."
"What would you meister in, Shiro-kun~?"
"Don't know. Not Aria, that's for sure. I haven't tried Knight yet. Futotsuki-sensei wants me for Tamer, and Ando-sensei is pushing for Dragoon. I think I'd do well in both…" In all honesty, Shiro didn't know if he would be around long enough to meister in anything. It all depended on how fast he could wheedle out who was responsible for the sabotaging.
Shizuku sat under a fig tree, legs crossed and eyes closed in meditation. Beside him lay a leather bundle and an incense burner that looked like it had travelled around the world and a little farther.
"'Ello, little Buddha~ Shiro-kun wonders if he could get a love charm?"
"Wha-! The evil demon is weaving lies, Shizuku-san." A statement that only made Midori laugh, but that was okay; it made her even prettier.
"That so?" Shizuku opened one eye. "She give ya that thing in ye' face, too?"
"Oh no~" Midori grinned. "That's Agari-san trying to rid him of impure thoughts~"
Shizuku laughed his loud, unrestrained laugh when Midori related, with mimicry that made even Shiro laugh, his failed courtship of Agari.
"Well, ya deserved it. Beating's the only known cure for stupidity", Shizuku chuckled as he unwrapped the bundle. "Ye didn't have to bring a whole tree, Midori-chan. There's enough wood here for all of you. Sen-chan wants a gakugyo – what about you?"
"Kaiun for me", Midori smiled, rocking back and forth on her bare feet.
Shiro thought for a moment.
"What do you wear?"
"These." Shizuku pointed to the piercings in his ears, eyebrows and nose. His other hand selected a whittling knife from an array of differently-sized, differently-shaped woodwork tools. "A special kind for my family. Peddling henro, people call us." He deftly cleared the bark off the wood, smoothing the corners of the little tablet with expert strokes. "We travel all directions, trading amulets and services for food and accommodation. The ones I wear are inscribed for a combination o' luck, protection, and avoidance of evil." He picked up another tool without even having to look, setting to inscribe the prayer with a delicate hand-chisel. "I don't have any for protection from idiocy, sorry."
"That I could tell by listening", Shiro enlightened with a crooked smile. "Can you make amulets for other things? Like repelling demons?"
"Yup." He blew tiny peels of moist green wood from the first two characters in the prayer. Midori drew a deep, humming breath through her
nose and seemed to enjoy the smell of it.
"So you could make, say, a barrier of wards around a place?"
"As long as there's somethin' to attach the wards to, yeah. A rope or a fence or something that goes 'round the whole perimeter. For small
things a piece o' string will do."
"Does there have to be a rope or fence? What if you just put wards all around a place?"
"Then ye're building a wall full o' holes, and even you shouldn't be that stupid."
Shiro scratched his nose, trying to come up with a good way of asking without seeming too specific. Midori had taken off to climb the fig tree, weaving swiftly back and forth between branches. Sen had taken to picking flowers in the shade, selecting her colours according to some pattern he couldn't grasp.
"I was told there was a ward that worked that way, but it could be bull. It looked something like this." Using his finger, Shiro drew an approximate image of the symbol on the paper-slip wards in his palm.
Shizuku kept looking at his palm. Then he looked up at Shiro.
"That's all? Definitely bull. That's not gonna ward off anything." He went back to carving and didn't see the look that crossed Shiro's face.
"Any idea what it could be?"
"Something used ta trick flagpoles with glasses", Shizuku grinned. "I'm told they fall fer it every time."
"Have you got an amulet that wards off smartasses? I could use one."
"It's called fist-to-the-face. I see ye've already got one."
It takes a perfect day, with good laughs and pretty girls, for a dark cloud to dominate the sky however small it is. Shiro listened and joked by proxy, his thoughts busy with one thing alone: if Faust's wards weren't wards, what the hell were they?
A/N:
Komainu are the guarding lions outside gates of shrines, temples and such. I'm thinking of that very straight-backed variety, obviously.
Omamori are the little tablets inscribed with prayers to help/protect the bearer. Usually wrapped up in a little bag (that you are not supposed to open), so I guess Shizuku keeps such in a pocket somewhere...
Gakugyo joju is an omamori for students and scholars, aid in education and passing exams.
Kaiun is also an omamori, for "open luck" (whatever that means - had a hard time finding out specifics in this area. There is supposed to be a blessing ritual involved, to imbue the omamori with spirit, but I couldn't find how it was done, so...).
Henro means pilgrim. Here I use it for the kind of, well, "travelling monk peddlers" I made up. They came off a bit like the travelling, multi-talented craftsmen that have gone extinct in modern-day Sweden.