Hi. Please enjoy. Bye.

--

Whoever said "the pen is mightier than the sword" obviously never encountered automatic weapons.

-Gen. Douglas MacArthur

"You owe me a favor."

There was a short silence, and then Yuka let out a bark of laughter. "Why do I owe you, Oujou-chan? I protected you for most of your life."

"And then you sent my best friend to die. You owe me a favor, and I'm going to collect. Now."

There was a sharp intake of breath, and then some rustling; Yuka, Oujou guessed, had pulled the phone away from her ear and set it down somewhere. Finally, the phone was picked up again.

"What do you need?"

Good. It was easier without a lot of argument. "I need to know what's going on with the invasion."

Yuka laughed again. "You think I can tell you that?"

"If you have to."

"Oujou-chan, we're enemies. I can't just give you vital information."

Really? "You owe me a favor. I need you to do this for me. Do you want more people to die?"

Yuka let out a sigh, which flooded static across the line. "No, I don't, but I also don't want to be killed." She paused, then continued. "And what the hell are you going to tell your superiors about where you got this from?"

That was a good sign—she was saying that like she was going to tell.

"I'm leading this with the headmaster of Gakuen Alice. That's not something I have to worry about right now."

There was another long silence. And then, "I can't tell you much right now, but I can get back to you with more information. And you can tell your friend Hyuuga Natsume that his little companion is fine."

And then Yuka hung up.

Oujou closed her phone, then stared down at it. She smiled.

--

At promptly nine o'clock in the morning, all Gakuen Alice students above the age of 11 were standing in a grid in the auditorium, with Oujou, Satsuto, and the section leaders standing on the stage, watching them.

Oujou addressed them first. "I will be leading the training of all students. That said, I will not be training you most of the time. Your section leader will be training you. First, Hyuuga-san will choose those he will use for the offense. Then, Jinno-sensei will choose defense, Narumi-sensei will take all of the dangerous ability students left, Noda-sensei will take the rest of the special-ability students, and Yamada-sensei will take everybody else. There are a few students that I will pull out of these assigned groups later. And at any time we can and may change the group that you are in. Hyuuga-san, you may begin."

Natsume stepped forward. "Ruka, Imai Hotaru, Kokoroyomi, Kitsuneme, Mochiage, Andō Tsubasa, Harada Misaki, Ibaragi Nobara, Amane Rui, Yakumo Hajime, Tonouchi Akira, Yamanouchi Shizune, and Goshima Hijiri. I will talk to anyone else who wants to be in the offense."

Oujou frowned. She had to talk to Hotaru again, and Tonouchi Akira. She couldn't have them in the offense. That meant she also had to talk to Natsume again.

A voice whispered in her ear, startling her. "What are you thinking about?" It was Satsuto.

"I can't have Imai or Tonouchi Akira fighting. I need to talk to them later."

Hot breath blew into her ear as Satsuto though; finally, he answered with, "Call them up after this, along with anyone else you need to talk to."

And then he stepped forward and announced, "Now you know who is going where. All offense members or potential offense members report to Gym 1. All those already assigned to defense cannot try to get into offense. All defense members report to Gym 2. All dangerous ability and special ability students report to your classrooms. Everyone else report to Gym 3. And now Oujou-san has a few last words."

Oujou passed him as he stepped back and she walked in front of the microphone. "Imai Hotaru, Tonouchi Akira, and all healers are to report on stage when everybody else leaves. Now go to your assigned places."

There was a huge clamor as everybody flooded out different exits of the room. When the room cleared out, Oujou, Satsuto, and the people ordered up on the stage all stood in a clump near the microphone, which Oujou switched off. She nodded to Satsuto, who left, and then turned and faced the group.

"I will speak with Imai Hotaru first." Hotaru walked up to her, one eyebrow raised. "You're not going to be fighting."

Hotaru's calm demeanor broke, and shock showed in her eyes as they widened. "What? I can fight. I've been training with Hyuuga while you've been off doing whatever the hell you've been doing."

Really? That was an interesting development, though not all that unexpected.

"That doesn't matter. That's not my reason. I need you to be in charge of recon. Monitor radio chatter; keep track of who's on campus. We can't have you running around and getting killed. That doesn't help us."

Hotaru stared at her for a moment, though whether it was in shock or anger, Oujou wasn't sure. "At least let me train with them," she offered at last.

That was fair enough. "But for the rest of the time, instead of going to class, you will monitor things. Good?"

"Good."

"You can go now."

Hotaru left, and Oujou called up Tonouchi Akira, who was a tall, good-looking boy a few years older than her.

He smiled at her, and she knew it was completely fake. "Is there something you need me for?" he asked, and she raised an eyebrow at his feigned innocence; of course she needed him for something—if she didn't, why would she call him up?

Might as well cut to the chase. "How well can you control your Amplification?"

Akira actually looked moderately surprised for a moment, and then he laid a hand on Oujou's shoulder.

Emotion flooded through her—his, Satsuto's, Natsume's, Mikan's, emotions, emotions, suffocating her, raking through her body, clogging her lungs and running through her veins. Stabbing through her, like a knife driven through her one inch at a time until—

It stopped. Oujou was on the floor, her body aching from her collapse and from her convulsions. Both Akira and Subaru were kneeling down beside her, and she tried to shove herself into a sitting position, hating the looks of pity on both their faces.

"I didn't ask how strong you were," she rasped at Akira, "I asked how well you could control your powers. Never do that again."

Akira smirked a little, but nodded; he stood, and didn't offer her a hand as she struggled to stand. Subaru supported her with as minimal contact as he could manage; each time he touched her, a pang of emotion was sent through her, almost taunted her by reminding her body of what it could be suffering.

"I can make as many alice stones as you want," he told her, "and I can make my alice encompass at most about five or six feet on all sides of me. Probably more if I really tried. Ironically, my own alice stones down work on me."

If he could make alice stones, it was probably good enough for now. "Okay," Oujou decided, "you are going to continue to be part of the offense, but during your class time, you're going to make alice stones. We're going to need enough for at least all of the offense and defense people and all of the healers."

Akira smiled sardonically and bowed. "Of course."

He left, and Oujou called up Subaru, who had been hovering anxiously about five feet away. "Are you feeling okay?" Subaru asked before Oujou could get a word in; laughed a little, breathy laugh.

"Am I okay? That's a stupid question. I'm never okay. That doesn't matter. I need you to be in charge of the healers. Train them, do whatever."

Subaru's eyebrows rose, and he frowned at her. "Those are your orders?"

Did she stutter? "Yes, those are my orders. Now take your healers, go to infirmary seven or wherever you want to practice, and get them training. By tomorrow, I'm going to want at least one healer on standby. I want you constantly on standby. During the day. At night, if possible, I want at least one healer awake. Preferably not the same one everyday. I don't care who as long as they're competent."

Subaru nodded and, when dismissed, herded all of the healers out of the room, leaving Oujou standing alone in the auditorium. She adjusted her crutches, then left the room, limping towards Gym 1, where Natsume was beginning to get all of the Offense members together. She was under orders by Satsuto to give a talk to every group about what was coming up.

When she reached the Gym, she entered and saw a line of teens—many of them ones he hadn't called up—with Natsume standing ramrod straight in front of them.

They all looked at her when she entered, and then Natsume nodded to her. "Oujou-san," he muttered, then turned back to face his troops.

"I'm supposed to give you a pep talk," Oujou told the group, "but that's not going to happen. I'm not going to tell you that everything's going to go perfectly well, etcetera, etcetera, etcetera. That is untrue. You are our front line. You need to be as strong—physically and with your alice—as possible. I don't care if you go to sleep bruised every night, and bleeding half the time. I've done that. If you have the unlimited alice type, you are to inform me immediately. As in, now."

Nobody made a move, so she just walked up towards them, rested her weight partially on her crutches, and began speaking again. "How many of you think you can fight?" All of the hands raised, Natsume's excluded; he seemed to be just watching. "How many of you think you can last five minutes against me?" About half of the hands dropped, though none of them were from those that Natsume had called up. "How many of you think you can last ten minutes against me." Now, even more hands dropped, so she smirked and asked the final question. "How many of you think you can last ten minutes against Hyuuga-san?"

Every hand dropped except for Hotaru's, and she kept it up even against the stares from the rest of the inhabitance of the room.

Finally, Natsume said, "You've only lasted seven minutes, Imai."

That was surprising, but not completely unexpected—Oujou had guessed that Hotaru would be good at fighting. "If I used my inventions, I would last longer."

"If I used my alice, it would lost not nearly as long. Put your hand down, Imai."

Another girl stepped forward, tossed her hair behind her shoulder, and announced, "I don't get why we have to do this."

"Then get out," Oujou told her, then focused her attention back on Hotaru, who seemed to be competing in a staring contest with Natsume.

But the girl didn't move, and instead shot back, "I mean, this seems so stupid. A war? An invasion? That's so ridiculous."

"Then get out. You weren't called here. You can go to the main section if you want. If you don't want to be here, get out."

The girl took a few more steps towards Oujou, stopping when she was only a few feet away. "I mean that this whole thing is ridiculous. Why the hell do we need to learn how to fight?"

Oujou finally tore her gaze away from Hotaru and Natsume and focused on the girl, who was standing with her weight leaned towards one side, her hand on her hip. "We are doing this because if we don't, everyone in this school will either be taken, or killed."

"Yeah, right. They won't kill children. People don't kill children."

"Yeah, right," Oujou mimicked, making her voice higher to match the girl's. "People do kill children. Now if you don't want to be in this group, get out."

"Whatever. I mean, this is the only group that's interesting. I mean, the other one's are just, like, 'here, let's do this now.' That's so boring."

"So you want something that's interesting, but you don't want to do work. You have to do something."

"Why?"

"Because, as I said, if you don't, you will die."

"And, like I said, that's stupid."

Oujou pointed to herself, waving her hand as though to encompass her entire being. "I don't have to be here. I have enough injuries that I could get out of this in a heartbeat. I have been shot multiple times. I could, literally, get out of this by just asking. But I'm not, because everyone needs to work, and I am included. If you think I'm going to stop working because I don't want to, then you are so much more of an idiot than I originally thought you were."

"You bitch," the girl snarled at her. "You're the stupid one. If you can get out of this, why don't you get out, and stop bothering us."

Oujou kicked out at her, her leg catching the girl in the face and sending her flying backwards nearly ten feet. And then Oujou spun and walked out of the room, limping heavily.

The girl's nose was bleeding heavily, and she swore under her breath as she struggled to sit up. "What the hell is her problem?" she spat out, coughing blood out of her mouth.

"You're stupid."

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Hi again. Please review. Bye again.