Previously:
"Let's do what we can first." Bou-san said, placing a comforting hand on her head. "Don't worry, Naru will be just fine."
"… Right…" Mai said, still looking down.
"Besides, if we don't get it done, he'll probably get mad at us." Hitomi added with a wry smile.
"Oh!" Mai said, flinching, as she was abruptly brought back to reality by that dangerous realization. Naru could be really scary when he was mad…!
Case 3: After School Hex (Part 6)
[Friday]
Between taking care of the hitogata and Lin's call, there had been enough time for them to change and freshen up, so on the Brightside, they looked nice and clean when they arrived at the hospital that Naru had been taken to. They headed straight for room 503, just as Lin had instructed.
"Hey, are you sure this is the right room?" Ayako asked.
"His name isn't on here." Mai pointed out, frowning slightly in confusion.
"Lin-san said it was, so I'm sure it is." Hitomi said.
"If we're wrong we can always apologize." Bou-san added, knocking on the door.
"Yes?" They heard Lin's voice answer. They definitely had the right room.
"Hey, Naru-chan." Bou-san greeted the patient as the four of them walked in.
"Are you really going to be hospitalized for a while?" Hitomi asked, concerned. "How are you feeling?"
"It's just some simple anemia. No big deal." Naru said dismissively. "Nevermind me." He could tell from the look on Hitomi's face that she didn't believe that for a second, but was smart enough not to ask too many questions in front of the others.
CLICK. FLASH.
"… What are you doing?" Naru asked when she abruptly whipped out her cellphone and took a picture of him.
"Oh, sorry. I just suddenly felt like maybe I should document this for posterity. I feel like I've spotted a rare animal, seeing you in non-black clothes for once." She replied with a brilliant shit-eating grin and a gleam in her eye.
"That's right! How rare is this!?" Mai whispered excitedly to Ayako.
"That is rad!" Ayako said, admiring Hitomi's guts.
"It's kind of funny." Mai said, snickering.
"You guys are so inappropriate." Masako commented, chagrined on Naru's behalf. But the reason they could all joke like that, was because they were so relieved to see that Naru was all right.
"Erase it." Naru ordered Hitomi in a dangerously low tone of voice.
"No way." She said brightly, refusing to intimidated. "I'm making this background."
"Ahem!" Bou-san cleared his throat in order to get Naru's attention, while masking a laugh. "As you instructed, we burned the hitogata and also threw the ashes into a river. Now we just need to find the jusha."
"I think I've figured out who it is." Naru said.
"Really?" Mai asked.
"I'll meet her in person and take care of it." He replied. "This case is now closed."
"Aren't you going to tell us who the jusha is?" Bou-san asked.
"It's not your concern." Naru answered coolly.
"Oi, oi! Don't you think I have the right to know? I had an official request from my client to work on this case!" Bou-san reminded him.
"You're joking if you think I'm about to get shut out at this point too!" Ayako huffed indignantly.
"Naru…" Mai said. Hitomi heaved a sigh.
"Are you that mad I took you picture? If I promise to delete it, will you let us stay?" She asked reasonably.
"… Except for Bou-san, would everyone please leave the room?" Naru said. Hitomi having the picture wasn't a problem since she knew better than to let it spread beyond her phone, but since he had given his real name when being admitted to the hospital, it would be a problem if the rest of them were there if a member of the staff came in wanting to see Oliver Davis. He wanted to minimize the risk of more people finding out as much as possible.
"Naru!" Mai exclaimed, upset that he was still trying to kick them out.
KNOCK. KNOCK.
"Will you get the door, Mai?" Hitomi asked.
"Yeah, sure." Mai said rather obediently. "Yes?" She asked as she opened it. "Ah… Taka… Kasai-san…" She said, surprised to see Yuko and Kasai there.
"I asked them to come." Naru said. "Please show them in."
"Ah, sure… and… Ubusuna-sensei is also here…" Mai informed him.
"Ubusuna-sensei?" Naru asked.
"?" Hitomi could tell by the brief expression that flashed through his eyes that he had neither expected nor wanted the teacher there. That must mean…
"Hi… Sorry, should I not have come?" Ubusuna-sensei said, leaning in through the open door. They could see she was holding a nice bouquet of flowers. Naru didn't say she could come in, but he didn't try to stop her either, so all three of his latest visitors were allowed inside. They were seated in the chairs for visitors, while everyone with SPR stood against the back wall to listen. Naru had apparently decided to let them stay after all. Hitomi almost felt like they were in an Agatha Christi novel, with Naru about to do his great reveal of the culprit's true identity.
"… Takahashi-san and Kasai-san. Did you two hear that I may be an onmyouji?" Naru asked when he was ready to begin.
"What's that?" Yuko asked.
"Yes, I did." Kasai-san said.
"Did you tell anyone else?" Naru asked.
"… Yes. I told Kei-sensei about it… is there a problem with that?" Kasai asked.
"In our current case, Mai and Hitomi have both been very helpful. Mai with her intuition, and Hitomi with her ability to see evidence that was left behind by the culprit. Did you hear about that?"
"Yeah, I think Mai mentioned it passing." Kasai said thoughtfully.
"Did you mention that to anyone?"
"… I told Kei-sensei about it…"
"Was I not supposed to know about these things?" Ubusuna-sensei asked. "I didn't tell anyone else about them…"
"… I see." Naru said. It was just as he had thought. "I'd also like to confirm something with you." He told the teacher. "What school did you graduate from?"
"… I graduated from a local university in my hometown." Ubusuna-sensei answered, wondering what that had to do with anything.
"If I remember correctly, you're from Fukushima prefecture, right?"
"That's right."
'What? She's not from Tokyo? I thought she graduated from Yuasa High…' Mai thought, surprised.
"You came to Tokyo for the first time after you became a teacher, correct?" Naru asked.
"Yes, that's correct." Ubusuna-sensei replied.
"I've got it now." Naru said, closing his binder of notes. "Thank you for your help. I think I can now solve the mystery of the various problems occurring at your school."
"!" Yuko gasped excitedly.
"Excuse me… What do you mean by 'solve'?" Kasai-san asked.
"I figured it out." He said simply. "It was a zuso. More specifically, and enmi, performed by using hitogata… which means that we just need to get rid of the hitogata. Then we need to convince the jusha to stop the zuso."
"What's that mean…?" Kasai asked. She didn't completely understand what he meant by that, but she knew she didn't like where this was going… "The reason why you called us here is because you're saying that I'm the jusha!?"
"No way. Kasai-san, you're innocent. The jusha is Ubusuna-sensei." Naru answered matter-of-factly, shocking most of the room.
"Wha…" Mai said, stunned. She may have suggestedthe possibility herself at one time, but she never actually thought… "What do you mean, Naru…?"
"We've burned all the hitogata." Naru stated. "Sensei, you made those hitogata, correct?"
"… What are you talking about…?" Ubusuna-sensei asked, still playing innocent.
"We gathered all the items for the zuso and burned them." Naru stated again. "At least the items that were in the empty lot."
"I'm not sure what you're talking about." She said.
"If you have any other zuso items that you used, please let me know." Naru continued seriously. "And please promise me that you'll never do this again."
"… I'm not the jusha." Ubusuna-sensei insisted, furrowing her brow slightly.
"Yes, you are."
"No, I'm not."
"There's no one else it could be." Naru stated. "We know that all of the victims were people who rejected Kasai-san's psychic power, which she demonstrated at the morning assembly. I'm sure the jusha's motivation is related to that somehow."
"Really?" Ubusuna-sensei asked. "The shouldn't you be accusing Kasai-san of being the jusha rather than me?"
"!" Kasai-san was understandably horrified by this sudden betrayl. "… Kei-sensei…" Hitomi frowned as she watched.
'Take her down, Naru.' She thought. That was cruel of Ubusuna-sensei to try to throw Kasai-san under the bus just because she was trying to avoid being caught for something she did herself.
"Kasai-san didn't do it." Naru said without faltering. "Because she knew the first victim, Murayama-san. Isn't that right?" He asked Kasai-san.
"… Yes." Kasai-san replied slowly, still shaken. "During my second year… we were in the literary club together."
"If she knew the person who sat at that desk, she wouldn't have needed to place the zuso on 'anyone' who sat there. She would only have to place it on Murayama-san." Naru explained. "So, the question is why the jusha had to place the curse on the desk, rather than the actual person… and that's because the jusha didn't know Murayama-san's name."
"What nonsense… I could have asked someone what her name was." Ubusuna-sensei said.
"At that time, many people didn't want to associate themselves with you or Kasai-san. Would the circumstances have allowed you to ask?" Naru asked rhetorically, already knowing the answer.
"Then… it must have been someone else." Ubusuna-sensei said. "We are innocent."
"It wouldn't make sense." Naru told her. "Aside from the motive, why would the jusha place curses on Mai, Hitomi, and myself? Mai accidentally told Kasai-san that I was an onmyouji. Then Kasai-san told you. I heard that Kasai-san doesn't really speak to anyone aside from you and Mai. So that means that no one else could have known about Mai's good intuition and Hitomi's ability to see the psychic energy of the curse."
"I didn't hear about that." Ubusuna-sensei said coolly.
"… I did. And I did tell you, Kei-sensei…" Kasai said, not understanding why she was lying. She didn't want to think for one minute that her kind sensei would really curse anyone, but…
"Also, regarding our names." Naru continued. "There are a limited number of people who know My, Hitomi's, and Mai's full names. As for myself, I did not tell anyone that my name was Shibuya Kazuya except for the principal and you, Ubusuna-sensei. There was no one else. And the principal doesn't know Mai's or Hitomi's names. But if Kasai-san knew their names, you would have had a chance to have gotten them from her. As far as I can tell, there's no one else the jusha could be but you, Sensei."
"But what reason would I have to want to hurt all these people?" Ubusuna-sensei asked.
"Because of Kasai-san's psychic power, both od you were attacked and treated poorly." Naru replied. "That was enough to cause you to want to hurt them."
"But that was just Kasai-san's problem, not mine." Ubusuna-sensei said. "It's true I did defend her, but I only did that out of sympathy…"
"No. It was your problem too." Naru said firmly. "You understand parapsychology very well. You're very knowledgeable and resourceful in the field, which I found to be very interesting. However, it seemed that you had more than just a curiosity in Kasai-san's psychic power. I found that to be a little odd and began looking through old news articles, and sure enough, I found some that had stories with you in them. A little over twenty years ago, Uri Geller came to Japan. Shortly after that, his followers, the Gellerini started. The Gellerini were the children who were inspired after seeing after seeing Geller bend spoons. They began to bend spoons just like Geller. Some of these children ended up under the spotlight of the paparazzi. Sensei, you were one of these children."
Almost everyone's eyes widened.
'I see… so that's why…' Hitomi thought. She could guess where Naru was going with this now.
"Along with the fall of Geller's popularity, psychic bashing had begun in Japan." Naru continued. "Most of the Gellerini were accused of cheating, and some of them even admitted to using tricks… and some were forced to say that they were cheating. Ubusuna-sensei was one of the children who admitted to using tricks—"
"—But I… I… I never cheated! I really was able to bend spoons!" Ubusuna-sensei yelled, finally snapping and dropping all pretense. "But sometimes, I just couldn't do it… But that one journalist… He said if I was really psychic, then I should be able to bend a spoon right then and there. He insisted I show him! So I got nervous and worried that if I messed it up people wouldn't believe me. That made me even more nervous, so I tried to use a trick another Gellerini member taught me. And that one time I cheated, I was photographed…"
"You must be referring to an old magazine article called 'Let's Find ESP cheaters'." Naru said. "I saw a series of photographs in it where you were caught bending a spoon by using a chair."
"Are you talking about… the same trick that Kasai-san tried to use…?" Mai asked.
"I… unlike Kasai-san, I didn't have anyone that would tell me it was the wrong thing to do… Nobody was there to tell me it was okay to say when I couldn't do it… No one was ever there for me…" Ubusuna-sensei said sadly. She had Mai and Hitomi's sympathy.
"For you… it was unfortunate that it happened when it did, because at that time, Japan depended on the media to decide the legitimacy of psychic phenomena. Japan had no proper psychic research organizations. There were no proper tests to determine your psychic ability. It should not have been left up to the media to decide. The paparazzi were more interested in creating a sensation rather than presenting the truth." Naru told her.
"Kei-sensei…" Kasai said sympathetically.
"I… I just wanted to… protect Kasai-san's ability as much as I could." Ubusuna-sensei said, lowering her head slightly. "However, we somehow became the object of the school's criticism… and even other teachers started attacking us. They criticized Kasai-san's psychic power at various times even prior to that day of the morning assembly. They criticized me and even told me I wasn't being a proper educator."
"That's why you did it?" Naru asked.
"Yes…" She said, raising her head. "It was just a prank." She smiled. "I couldn't stand them." Mai's eyes widened.
'… Why? How… can she be smiling… in a situation like this…?' Mai wondered, unnerved.
Hitomi frowned at the teacher's seemingly flippant attitude about everything she had done. If this was what Ubusuna-sensei considered a 'prank' then she'd hate to see what this woman was like when she was serious…
"This is much more serious than just a prank." Naru said humorlessly, thinking something along the same line as Hitomi. "Do you understand that enmi is a curse placed on others to violently harm them? Luckily no one has died yet, but it was only just a matter of time. With that desk, it's very likely the next student who sat there could have been dragged by the train and killed."
"That… would be unfortunate." Ubusuna-sensei said thoughtfully. "But if that were to happen, people would finally start to realize, you know? That in this world, there are things that can't be explained by science."
'I wonder how everything went so wrong…?' Hitomi wondered. She knew it wasn't simply because Kasai-san or Ubusuna-sensei had bent spoons. No, it wasn't that, not by itself. It wasn't because of anything in particular or someone specific… it was the combination of a lot of things. Humans tend to fear the unknown, and fear can bring out the worst in people. It creates a friction that allows prejudice and hostility, and a lot of other things to take root. 'So many people got emotionally involved, that everything snowballed… until they got so caught up in this dispute over psychic powers and the zuso… and their fear and anger made them lose themselves. Caught up in a circumstance like this, Ubusuna-sensei lost sight of herself, and forgot what was most important, as a human…'
"Bou-san." Naru said after a moment, making sure he still had the monk's attention. "Please contact the principal. Let him know Ubusuna-sensei will be needing a counselor."
"How rude! You're a parapsychologist too! And you're going to treat me like a sick person?" Ubusuna-sensei exclaimed incredulously.
'Well, you are… in a way…' Hitomi thought, sweat-dropping. She was pretty sure the average emotionally stable and healthy person wouldn't normally cast death curses on people…
"Sensei, you must be exhausted." Naru said calmly, "You need rest. A zuso uses both physical and mental energy."
"… Okay." She said, closing her eyes. He really did believe her, after all. "You may be right…"
—∞—
[A few days later…]
"In many ways, this was a very tough case." Bou-san said as they all relaxed in the SPR reception room. Naru had finally been released from the hospital, and they had all wanted to see how he was doing since he wouldn't let any of them visit after that first day, when he finished solving the case.
"Sure was…" John said softly.
"Yeah…" Mai agreed.
"Don't worry about it." Ayako said. "What's done is done."
"Yeah. Worrying never fixes anything." Hitomi agreed. It was like praying for something you didn't want. "I'm sure Ubusuna-sensei and Kasai-san will be fine. After all, their counselor is someone Naru recommended."
"Matsuzaki-san and Matsumoto-san are such optimists." Masako remarked somewhat sardonically.
"What did you just say!" Ayako demanded indignantly. "I can't believe you…" Hitomi just smiled wryly and sweat-dropped.
"H-Hey, please keep it down." Mai said nervously. "Naru will scold me and Sempai if…" She trailed off when the devil himself appeared.
"Mai." Naru said, causing her to flinch and pale in anticipation of his wrath.
"How may I help you, boss?" She asked, plastering a fake smile on her face. Maybe they were lucky and he hadn't noticed…
"I need you to participate in a quick experiment." He told her.
"An… experiment…?" She asked, blinking in surprise. Well, that was unexpected…
"Are you giving Mai that test?" Hitomi asked curiously. He had her take it a while back.
"Yes." Naru said, placing a box with numbered lights and buttons in front of Mai. "One of the four lights will light up each time on its own. You need to guess which light will light up next and push the button first, okay?" he explained for Mai's sake while he finished hooking everything up.
"Okay, but… what's this all about?" Mai asked.
"It's a psy-ability test." Naru replied matter-of-factly.
'Huh… psy…' Mai thought, blinking. "…You mean a psychic ability test!?" she asked, jumping up out of her seat.
"Yeah, for ESP." Hitomi clarified with a bright smile. Mai sweat-dropped.
"No way! Why do I have to do this!?" She demanded, glancing back at Naru. "You know I don't have psychic ability…" Her rant fell short when Naru hit her with a sharp glare.
"Let's start." He said.
"Yes, sir. No problem." Mai said obediently, immediately taking a seat. 'But… which one…' Mai wondered. "Uh… this one…" She said, pressing the button for light III. The button for light II lit up instead.
"False!" Bou-san said, laughing.
"Oops, that's too bad." Ayako said, laughing behind her hand.
"What's next!?" Bou-san asked as a vein mark throbbed on Mai's head, starting to get into it. This was more entertaining than he'd thought it'd be.
"Urgh… by the way, this machine is really fast!" Mai complained as she continued hitting the wrong button.
"Get it, Mai!" Hitomi cheered.
"Argh! I can't catch up with it!"
BAM! BAM!
"Argggh!" Mai growled in annoyance as she started smacking the crap out of it every time she he had to hit a button.
"Pfft… You'll never get it right." Ayako said.
"Ugh…!"
"No matter how much you bark, it won't get better." Bou-san told her.
"Arrrrrgh!"
"At least be a little more ladylike..." Masako chided her.
–∞–
"… Oh… impressive…" Bou-san said, clapping. "You missed them all. You're a genius."
"Good job. I'm proud of you." Hitomi said brightly. That was supposed to be some kind of mathematical impossibility, wasn't it?
"…." Mai said, still panting from the effort of smacking the buttons so energetically for what must have been a thousand times in a row. "S-See? Just like I told you!" She snapped at Naru. He humiliated her for nothing!
"As I expected." Naru said, reviewing the results on his laptop. "Mai has latent sensitivity."
"Huh?" Mai said, sweat-dropping.
"Sensitive?" Ayako asked, still laughing. "Mai!? You mean like, 'delicate' and 'emotional'!?"
"I'm pretty sure he means 'sensitive' as in psychic." Hitomi said with a smile.
"Correct. Mai has extrasensory perception, ESP." Naru answered. Everyone's eyes widened in surprise.
"Ehhhh!?" Mai exclaimed, shocked.
"This explains why she sometimes has good intuition even though she's usually dumb. Perhaps it wasn't a coincidence Mai exhibited such sharp instincts on this case." Naru said. "Out of 1000 lan she scored zero. When you have 1000 chances, you should get a certain amount of correct answers based on probability. The number of correct answers a normal person should get is 25%. That means if you score above or below 25%, you will be considered abnormal." He explained.
"What then? So you're saying she has preternatural power!?" Ayako exclaimed.
"Basically." Naru replied calmly.
"She did a lot better than I did." Hitomi said, praising Mai.
"Eh!? Hitomi-sempai took the test too? What was your score!?" Mai asked excitedly.
"25%." Hitomi answered with a radiant shit-eating grin.
"… Huh?" They all said, sweat-dropping.
"But you can see ghosts!" Bou-san said.
"And her intuition isn't bad either." Ayako added.
"Uh… Naru, do you want to explain that one?" Hitomi asked, smiling wyly, as she sweat-dropped.
"All right." Naru said with a small sigh. "Hitomi is an unusual case. Her ability to see ghosts seems to be an extension of her PK abilities. Somehow, her body has adapted to create a 'phantom eye' using PK to replace the physical one she lost. But the optic nerves are still damaged, and pure psychic energy can't replace the lost physical tissue, so she can't see perceive light and images reflected from physical world, but because the phantom eye is the result of psychic energy, it can pick up and read other kinds of psychic energy. And, judging by this last case, its perception doesn't seem to be limited to only spirits." He explained. She most likely had PK-LT in order to be able to pull something like this off, but after reading how Kulagina used her power to stop a frog heart, Hitomi seemed to lose interest in the idea of performing any experiments to test her abilities.
"W-Wow…" Mai said as they all looked form Naru to Hitomi, amazed.
"That's impressive in its own way…" Bou-san said thoughtfully.
"It's just a theory, though. I've never come across something like this before." Naru admitted. "As for her intuition… that's actually just her subconscious mind solving problems using facts and information filed away just below the surface. She's just better at picking up on subtle nuances than the rest of you."
"Well… if Mai's psychic, then why was she at all useful in past cases!?" Ayako asked, chagrined at that little barb Naru had snuck in at the end.
"That's a little unfair…" Hitomi said and she and Mai sweat-dropped. "Remember that case at the Morishita's house before, when she fell down the well and had that strange dream? I think it was a vision of the past."
"Sounds like post-cognition." John said.
"Yeah, I thought she as sharp before this too." Bou-san agreed. "There was also the time when the gas burner exploded, and she saw the silhouette of a child. Are you sure that wasn't a spirit?" He asked Mai, grinning.
"Eh!" Mai gasped, flinching. Now they were saying she could see ghosts too!?
"Mai is extraordinarily sensitive to outside things that are harmful." Naru stated. "She has a self-defense instinct, just like an animal." Mai's smile upon hearing such praise began to falter. "She can instinctively sniff out friend from and foe."
"You mean, her appearance may be human, but her mind is like a wild animal's!?" Ayako asked, amused, as she and everyone except John and Hitomi laughed.
John and Hitomi sweat-dropped. Poor Mai… everyone was picking on her today…
'What now?' Mai thought, twitching.
"Maybe she has an invisible antenna on her head!" Bou-san said.
"Wait, that would make her a bug!" Ayako exclaimed.
"Ahahaha! That's too funny, stop it."
"… Naru…" Mai growled in a dangerously low tone of voice, shaking with anger. "I'm telling everyone." She said with a vein throbbing on her forehead.
"!" Naru said, visibly flinching.
'Uh-oh…' Hitomi thought. Looks like someone's in trouble.
"Who's an animal?" Mai asked again, stalking towards him. "Who's abnormal? Huh?"
"Well… that was just an example…" Naru said a bit nervously as he stood up. It looked like his own 'fight or flight' instinct was beginning to kick in.
"Then what about you?" Mai continued mercilessly. "Is bending a spoon not abnormal? And I suppose you're saying that breaking a spoon just by touching it isn't unusual either?"
'Ah. She really said it…' Hitomi thought, sweat-dropping.
"What did she just say?" Ayako asked as everyone else's eyes widened in surprise. "What? What do you mean!?"
"Hey, Naru! what is—"
"Naru!" Lin shouted sternly.
"Ah, Lin-san… you were there…" Mai said awkwardly as she and Naru sweat-dropped. The one person Naru really didn't want to know had just been lucky enough to catch the most damning sentence of all.
"Did you really do that!?" Lin demanded. "You promised you would never do that!"
"Mai!" Naru snapped indignantly. Hitomi knew there was something more serious than spoon-bending at stake, but she couldn't help but smile slightly as she watched Mai begin to cautiously slink away in a rather comical manner.
'Ah, I'm very scared…' Mai thought, sweating nervously under Naru's glare. "Ha ha ha ha, Sayonara!" She said, hiding behind Hitomi, who didn't seem to mind that she was basically being used as a human shield at all. In fact, she seemed amused.
"Naru! Are you listening!?" Lin yelled, still not done with him yet. "You are—"
"I know." Naru said, cutting him off, clearly chagrined. "I understand."
"Clearly, you don't!" Lin snapped.
'Eh? Is it just me, or is Lin-san even more upset than Naru…?' Hitomi wondered, glancing between the two of them. 'Also… she got the feeling this was about something more than just everyone finding out he had PK…' Hitomi had to fight to keep her expression neutral when something startling occurred to her. 'Naru… I'm sure he used PK to save us when we fell… Neither of us was seriously injured, but then he ended up in the hospital—could it be because of that!? Is that why Lin was so freaked out? But before, Bou-san said he was able to use it to throw something that weighed fifty pounds across a room…'
"… This is more rare than a psychic phenomena!" Bou-san commented as they watched Lin continue to rip Naru a new one. Not only was Lin talking, but he was yelling… at Naru.
"Darn, I wish I had my video camera." Mai remarked. This was even better than seeing Naru in that white kimono that the hospital had provided for him…
"…" Hitomi said, smiling wryly as she sweat-dropped. These guys… If only they knew... Well, maybe she was just overthinking things.
"By the way, I never knew he had a hidden talent like that. I'd love to check it out some time." Bou-san said louder when there was a lull in Naru's scolding, getting his and Lin's attention.
"Yeah, me too." Ayako agreed.
"… Mai, I'll remember this." Naru said dangerously, shooting her a sharp look. Mai stuck her tongue out at him. Apparently she felt safe enough to treat him to some sass, even though she was still hiding behind Hitomi.
"Naru!" Lin said sternly when Naru picked up the spoon he had used to stir his tea.
"I might as well demonstrate, right?" Naru said calmly. "Are you ready?" he asked the others as they gathered round to see. Naru concentrated on the spoon in his hand. Then he raised the other, and effortlessly bent the bowl forward and down, towards himself, using only a light touch from the tip of his index finger on the very tip of the spoon. Ayako, Mai, John, and Hitomi's eyes widened as they stared at the bent spoon in awe, completely stunned.
'… S-so cool…!' Hitomi thought with sparkling eyes. She'd never actually seen someone use PK before. 'But… didn't Mai say he broke the spoon last time?' She realized, furrowing her brow slightly. Was it because Naru still recovering…?
"Here you go." Naru said boredly, tossing the bent spoon to Ayako.
"Wow…" Ayako said as she examined it. "… very impressive."
"Hey, now." Bou-san said as vein throbbed on his forehead, chagrined. It looked like even Hitomi had been fooled. "Oi, oi, oi, Naru-chan. You may be able to trick the others, but you can't fool me!"
"Huh?" Hitomi said.
"What, what's going on?" Mai asked.
"Ah, you guys are so gullible!" Bou-san exclaimed. "Naru just bent it with his physical strength! It would have been very obvious that he cheated if you were looking from this side!"
"What, with the strength in the tippy-top of his finger? How?" Hitomi asked, frowning slightly in confusion.
"Okay, ready?" Bou-san asked, grabbing another spoon off the table. "Watch! You support the handle with the bottom of your palm, right here." He explained, pointing to the spot on his own hand as he demonstrated.
"Ah, you're right." John said as he gave it try, bending the spoon effortlessly.
"It really is that easy…" Hitomi said, sweat-dropping, as she leaned over the priest's shoulder to look. She was tempted to show this trick to her family later, but she knew her grandfather wouldn't appreciate them wasting perfectly good spoons…
"Hey, that wasn't psychic power at all, was it!?" Ayako asked Naru, clearly disappointed.
"Knowing the same tricks as a conman is the best way to protect yourself from him." Naru stated coolly.
"Ah, makes sense." Hitomi said, nodding in understanding. He probably learned that coin trick he showed her for the same reason… Naru had probably run into a lot of fakes in this line of work.
"Eh? You're going to let him go with just that?" Bou-san asked her, sweat-dropping. He had been hoping she would tell him off.
"Ahh… is it really okay for a cheater like that to be a parapsychologist?" Ayako grumbled.
"I'm disappointed it was just a trick…" Mai said with a vein mark on her head. And one she had nearly fallen for twice…!
"I won't do it again." Naru told Lin with the barest hint of a sly smirk that was so slight, it was almost imperceptible to the human eye. "I promise."
"Sure… We'll see." Lin said with a sigh.
"Ah, man… I got all excited for nothing." Mai remarked with a pout.
"Well, since we're all here, we might as well go out for dinner." Bou-san suggested.
"Eh~? Your treat~?" Mai asked excitedly, suddenly lighting up with the radiance of the sun. Bou-san sweat-dropped.
"Okay, but I can only treat the underage squirts." He conceded, hoping this wasn't going to hurt his wallet too much.
"Hooray~!" Mai cheered.
"That's really generous of you, Bou-san." Hitomi said with a bright smile.
"How about Naru and Lin-san? Aren't you coming?" Mai asked, glancing back at them.
"I have to work." Naru said.
"No way." Hitomi said with a brilliant shit-eating grin as she popped up in between the two workaholics and captured them by hooking her arms with theirs. "There's no telling when you'll eat if we leave you on your own. You two are definitely coming with us!" She declared. "Get the door, Mai!"
Aye, aye, Sempai~!" Mai said, grinning, as she held the door open so Hitomi could drag them out. Naru sighed as he let himself be pulled out along with Lin. As soon as they were done eating, he was leaving… At least, that's what he told himself….
