Author's notes: I've had this story in mind for a long time, and was planning to have it set during The Dissociation. For various reasons it got pushed back until after I had posted a few post-The Surprise fics, and while I could have done it out of chronological order, it occurred to me that the story would work better if I changed the setting so that it was taking place in May, post-The Surprise. That change of setting made the fic's ending possible, among other things. The timing also makes sense because I'm working on other fics where the anti-SOS Brigade has a role, so I'd like to test the waters as to whether I can do a decent job of writing those characters. Let me know, okay?

The characters and milieu of this fan fiction work are property of Nagaru Tanigawa, with one exception.

Sasaki's Regret

Sasaki was laughing.

Not rolling on the floor laughing, just shaking as she held a hand to her mouth laughing, but the fact that she was laughing at all was a fresh sight. And of itself, it was certainly good to see; Sasaki didn't laugh much to begin with, and the weeks since their associates had tried to murder Haruhi Suzumiya had been tainted by glum regret.

But the laughter was at Kyoko Tachibana's expense. So it was difficult for her to muster a smile. "Well, what was your biggest mistake?" she demanded.

"You shouldn't be so mortified," Sasaki said, still with a hand to her mouth, torso vibrating. "Yours is more humorous than embarrassing."

"It could have gotten me fired."

"I've told you before that you should just quit that job. If you were fired you would have gotten severance pay, too."

Tachibana shook her head. "You don't understand. My job is fighting for the fate of the world. I can't just give up on the world."

"Why not? I have." She tilted her head back. "What's the point in the world, anyway, if you waste your life away fighting to change things that other people don't want changed?"

They were at Sasaki's house, both of them in their pajamas. The sleepover was Sasaki's idea; lately, most of their get-togethers were. Tachibana wanted to be simply Sasaki's friend for the time being, and she always felt like setting up something herself turned it into an assignment, another way of observing Sasaki. Or even of keeping her distracted; there were a few of her associates who still believed that Sasaki might become volatile, like Haruhi Suzumiya, under the wrong conditions or with the wrong development.

Tachibana knew better. Sasaki was the most sane and stable person she knew.

Which also meant there was no need to take it easier on her. "Quit stalling," she said, poking Sasaki in the arm. "I told you my biggest mistake ever, so now you have to tell me yours!"

"We never agreed to that," Sasaki pointed out. "Neither of us even proposed such an exchange. I asked you what your biggest mistake was, and you told me. Gratis."

"You're asking for a tickle torture treatment." She raised her hands, fingers curled like an old seamstress's in a gesture of menace.

"But you know, I don't think I'm ticklish." Sasaki leaned back, looking perfectly relaxed in the face of the threat. "And since I'm as capable of tickling as you, carrying out that threat would probably end up with you being the one curled up in the fetal position from helpless laughter. Still, if it will make you happy, I'll tell you what my biggest mistake was. Gratis."

"About time." Her tone was teasing, but Sasaki did really seem to be stalling. She was always so cool under pressure and intellectually on top of things, having to admit to a mistake probably was hard for her.

"It was when I met the SOS Brigade." Sasaki propped her back up on some pillows. "Kyon started to introduce me to Suzumiya, you know, and I cut in that I was his good friend."

Tachibana waited. "Go on."

Sasaki looked back at her for a moment, seeming slightly baffled by her reaction. "I guess I'm not explaining this at all. See, at first Kyon sounded like he was really happy to introduce me to his friends. But when we actually met them, he had this sudden change of heart. He was the biggest bundle of nerves you've ever seen, and it was pretty obvious what he was nervous about. His line of sight fell within Suzumiya's zone 92.6% of the time."

"Well, she is his god, after all," she remarked wryly.

"No, this was something completely different. I wasn't sure of it at the time, but looking back, it's pretty unmistakable. He's in love with her."

"Uh huh." Tachibana kept herself abreast of the doings with Suzumiya, so the theory that Kyon had a crush on her was old news. She didn't mean to let her disinterest show, but it came out involuntarily.

And was mistaken for incredulity. "No, really, you should have seen him. I've never seen a guy so terrified at being seen with another girl his age. He was acting like they were married."

It seemed like Sasaki was reading an awful lot into a few nonverbal cues, but she decided she'd better not argue about it. "So he was worried about looking like he was cheating, and you straightened things out by saying you were just friends. Go on."

"No, that's not right. I mean, at the time I told myself that's what I was doing, but it was just the opposite." Sasaki started fiddling with one of the buttons of her pajamas. "See, despite how Kyon was acting, Suzumiya didn't look bothered by me at all. As for Kyon, a guy who's that nervous about his girlfriend wouldn't tell her that a girl his age is his good friend. He'd be afraid she might read something else into it. It was a sure bet he either painted our relationship as more casual, or he didn't tell Suzumiya about me at all. Either way, telling her I was his 'good friend' was the most obvious thing I could do to stir up trouble between them."

"Well, why would you want to do that?"

Sasaki paused. "You know that you can't tell this to anyone, right? Not even your bosses or your associates."

Of course not! she wanted to say. But the truth was that she did have to keep her organization informed of important developments with Sasaki as much as she could. Which still didn't mean that she could step over their friendship, but it was always something she had to consider. "Alright," she said. "I promise I won't."

"Don't promise me anything. Just answer me honestly. I mean, if I thought you might lie to me, promises wouldn't make me trust you any more, right?" She didn't wait for an answer. "It's because of this idea I had. What I told Suzumiya is true: Kyon is my good friend. Nothing less, nothing more. After middle school, I started to think that maybe, when we met again, I'd have grown into a woman and he'd have grown into a man, and we'd go from being friends to being lovers.

"I'm sure I got the idea from the trope of the romance between childhood friends. They build a friendship that grows and strengthens over years, and that gives a stronger foundation to their eventual love. It's a fanciful idea made for fiction, obviously, but I could see some sense in it. Kyon and I were too young to be romantic. Preadolescent romance is just a form of play-acting. You can't have sex, so you're obviously no more capable of being real lovers at that age than you are of being real doctors while you're playing with your toy needle and stethoscope. At the same time, having all that past between you, developing a relationship without the baggage of sex, jealousies, and dating should make you better equipped for a romantic relationship, at least in theory."

Much as she enjoyed Sasaki's philosophical musings, in this case she was more interested in the personal side of the issue, so she decided to cut to the chase. "You're saying you're in love with Kyon."

"No, not at all," Sasaki replied, completely unruffled at the suggestion. "It's just an idea I had. After all, I have to get my genes passed on somehow, and this seemed like a more pleasant way than most. Of course, the easiest way would be to visit a sperm bank. But single motherhood doesn't appeal to me. In fact, I'd much rather have the father of my children take on the housewife role so that I can focus all my time on my career and intellectual pursuits. Kyon could easily be convinced to do that. He's very acquiescing, and being such an underachiever, he's not likely to get the kind of job that he would want to stick with if he didn't have to, anyway."

She paused to stretch and yawn. Tachibana wasn't sure what to make of what she'd just said. She'd noticed that Sasaki often used her intellect as a mask for her emotions.

"The point is, I could see it working, me and Kyon in that sort of relationship, and the idea got stuck in my head over time, until eventually I just assumed that was what would happen. Even if I didn't necessarily want it to happen, I got so used to the idea that it was a shock when I saw Kyon with Suzumiya and realized that it wasn't going to happen."

"Whoa, hold on," Tachibana jumped in. "Just because you have some competition doesn't mean you should give up on Kyon. He probably just hooked up with Suzumiya because you weren't around. All those months you two were together can't just be erased by some..." Words failed her.

"Fling?" Sasaki suggested. "You realize, don't you, that even if I've technically known him longer, by then Suzumiya had probably spent more time with him than I have? Besides, the time I've spent with Kyon doesn't make any difference. I could have realized that before, if I'd spent more time listening to Kyon instead of just talking his ear off – he's not a hard person to read. He's attracted to girls who are feminine." She smiled. "I doubt I need to point this out, but I don't meet that description at all. I'm so masculine, you'd practically have to be bisexual to be attracted to me."

"Well, we can change that. We'll just get you a new hairdo, some new clothes..."

"...and change my speaking habits, and learn how to blush, right?" She shook her head. "But then I wouldn't be me, and that's not worth getting together with any guy. Besides, it's not just the fact that it didn't work that made it my biggest mistake. It was a bad idea in the first place. All that time I was contemplating Kyon and I being a couple, it should have occurred to me that the biggest reason why I like Kyon in the first place is because he never tried to be that way with me."

Tachibana frowned. "I don't understand. Why would that make you like him? Especially if you wanted to be that way with him?"

"I didn't really want to be a couple with Kyon. Like I said, it was just an idea I had."

"Okay, but even so – how can you like a guy for not being attracted to you?" she pressed.

"That's really not obvious to you? I mean, you're an attractive girl. 73% more attractive than me, I'd say, though I won't embarrass us both by saying how much of that is down to your more likable and feminine personality and how much is due to your better figure. You must have had plenty of guys hitting on you."

"It can be annoying," she admitted. "But I think I'd miss it if it stopped entirely. And if there was a heterosexual guy who was perfectly happy being just friends with me... well, that would be a real blow to my ego."

"But haven't you ever wanted something deeper than that from a guy?" She looked happily reflective. "Haven't you ever thought of what it would be like to have a guy who you could just talk to, without having to worry about him trying to make a move on you, and how you're going to react to it? Someone who could just appreciate you for who you are, instead of the fleeting physical gratification he might get from you."

"Isn't that what other girls are for?" Tachibana said with a wink.

"Maybe that's so, for you. To me, there's something different about males – besides their position in the procreation scheme, I mean. Besides, half the world's population is male, and why should half the people I meet be off-limits for friendship?" She sighed. "The fact is, the vast majority of guys don't want anything to do with me, and most of the remainder are only interested in me for my... gender-specific merits. Kyon's the only one who's been willing to just listen to me and be my friend, without demanding anything more. That's something very precious to me, even if we may never meet again. It was a huge mistake to think, even for a single moment, of throwing it away."

Tachibana did wonder sometimes about Sasaki and her views on men. If you thought over what she was saying, the most obvious conclusion was that she would have preferred to have been born male. But if that were the case, she would have said so. Sasaki wasn't shy about things like that.

"Even if I did want Kyon, taunting Suzumiya like that would have been the wrong thing to do. I don't believe that all's fair in love and war." She extended a hand into the air, as though holding the issue in her palm. "If anything, all's fair in everything, but certainly not specifically in love and war. I could have really upset Suzumiya, and after all, she didn't ensnare Kyon to antagonize me. She deserves a boyfriend like Kyon, if not better."

"What do you mean? You don't know her."

"Not intimately, but I know her well enough to be sure of what I just said." She smiled. "It's funny, isn't it. According to your organization, there are just two people in the entire world who create closed space, and not only do they both live in Japan, they're former schoolmates. Just by amazing coincidence, right?"

Tachibana felt wary now. "What else could it be?"

"Manipulation by a greater power, of course. Now that you've introduced me to humanoid interfaces, I don't even need to be religious to consider that a real possibility." She cocked her index finger. "And I could name two other hypotheses that would cover it, just off the top of my head. In actuality, though, I don't believe that Suzumiya and I are the only ones. My suspicion is that there are hundreds if not thousands like me out there, people with the power to create closed space, but not Suzumiya's ability to alter reality. The only reason your organization came to me is because you can't enter anyone else's closed space, and the only reason Fujiwara and Kuyoh Suoh focused on me is because I conveniently have a connection to Suzumiya's right hand man, Kyon."

She knew what Sasaki was getting at. She was suggesting that Fujiwara had planned to use Kyon as a hostage, first to draw Suzumiya into his hands, then to get Sasaki to use her power to do what he wanted. "I thought we weren't going to talk about this."

"So, you still prefer to think of me as the one true god?" Sasaki lowered her head. "I wish that we could just be friends."

"I didn't mean the idea of there being other people like you. I don't want to talk about what you are at all, because that has nothing to do with our friendship."

"That's nice of you to say, but we both know it's not true." Sasaki sat up and slid off of her bed. "You stick with me because you're hoping another opportunity to give me Suzumiya's power will come up, and that you can persuade me to take it." She smoothed out the rumples in her pajamas. "That's fine, though. I like having a friend who keeps me mentally on my toes. If Kyon has a shortcoming as a friend, that is it." She was now heading for the bedroom door. "I'm in the mood for late night snacking. You want anything in particular?"

"Dried fruits or granola is always great with me."

"No wonder you stay skinny. I was thinking chocolate, but I'll see what we have."

Once she was gone, Tachibana started thinking over her approach. No matter what Sasaki said, Tachibana did want to be her friend, and she wished she could make her see that. She could use her power to make Sasaki believe her, but that would be a betrayal of the very friendship she was trying to prove. Plus, she was still holding out hope of turning Suzumiya's power over to Sasaki.

Kyon was the key, clearly. Even if Sasaki was genuinely not interested in him romantically, she had to hate having another girl lay such a claim on him that he was embarrassed to be seen with her. Having a guy not be interested in you was a blow, but losing him to another girl was an outright stab in the chest. It was something you couldn't just walk away from. And Tachibana would know, having had both experiences.

The trouble was Sasaki's lack of confidence. It was hard to even say whether her disinterest in dating stemmed from her certainty that no guy could be attracted to her or the other way around. She needed to build that confidence if Sasaki was ever going to stand up to Suzumiya and take back what belonged to her.

The bedroom door opened, and her friend came in with a bag of granola and a slightly sour grin. "It looks like you get your wish. My parents keep a stash, and I can hardly disappoint my guest to satisfy my own cravings, can I?"

"You could bring your own snack, too. I wouldn't mind."

"No, we'll eat in solidarity. Here." She plopped the bag of granola down on the bed before hopping on herself.

That was an uncharacteristically irrational thing for Sasaki to say. Maybe she believed in the purity of their friendship more than she let on.

"Listen," Tachibana said. "You shouldn't give up on Kyon that easily. The truth is, you're smart, beautiful, interesting, and any guy would be thrilled to be your boyfriend. And you can't say that Kyon will never give up Suzumiya for you when you haven't even tried."

Sasaki smiled. "Boy, you won't let go of the notion that I want to be Kyon's girlfriend, will you? I told you, it was just a stupid idea that I had. Kyon, Suzumiya, and I are all better off the way things are." She titled her head, as if a thought had suddenly struck her. "You know, for you to be so stubborn about this, it sounds like a case of emotional transference. As in, when a person is ashamed to admit to an emotion they have, so they convince themselves that the person they're talking to has that emotion instead." Her smile turned sly. "What's his name?"

Tachibana considered herself quite good at hiding her real emotions. More importantly, her comrades considered her quite good at hiding her real emotions; that's why she was their primary field agent. And she definitely did not want anyone to know her feelings in this regard. But Sasaki's intellect was so penetrating, she couldn't resist the sense that she knew exactly what she was feeling even without her giving any outward sign of it. So in spite of herself, a bit of pink came to her cheeks at the question.

There was a brief silence. Sasaki's smile didn't change, but Tachibana could feel that she'd just given herself away.

She sighed in defeat. "It doesn't matter," she said. "There's not even a faint chance of anything happening between us. I'm less than nothing to him."

"There, you see? You tell me that I shouldn't give up on a guy so easily, and that any guy would be thrilled to have me as his girlfriend, when you should be telling yourself that. If I can have any guy I want, that must be even more true for you."

"You don't understand." She struggled to regain control, but her voice still came out as a mousy squeak. "It's not that I don't think guys can be attracted to me... It's just that he can't be."

"Of course. It's always the guy you want who you think you can't have." Sasaki's smile was now calm, in command, like a psychiatrist talking to a patient. "If you're not interested in a guy, it's easy to say, 'I could have him, I just don't want him.' Because there's no consequences. But if you're in love with a guy, then saying 'I can have him' means you have to try to get him. That's why you're afraid to admit it."

"No. I'm not thinking this on my own. Believe me, I wish I were." She wanted to look away from Sasaki's scrutinizing eyes, for fear that she might start to cry, but then Sasaki would think she wasn't telling the truth. "He told me, right to my face, that I'm worthless. That I'm completely beneath his interest."

Sasaki was quiet for a moment. She had stopped smiling, but it felt like that was for sympathy's sake rather than because she'd lost control of the situation. "Well, if he really did say exactly that to you, then either he's such a callous fool that you shouldn't even be thinking about him, or he's sick of your sense of inferiority and wants you to try harder."

He wasn't either of those things. And Tachibana had already tried as hard as anyone possibly could, even tried to beat him at his own game. She had to stop talking about it, though. Much more and Sasaki would be able to guess who she was talking about. "Maybe. Either way, I've had enough of him. I think your romantic prospects are a lot more hopeful."

"Oh, I agree. You remember that guy who confessed feelings for me?"

Tachibana remembered, and restrained the alarm she felt. "I really don't think it's a good idea to hook up with a guy you barely know."

"Too late. We've got a date set for tomorrow night."

Tachibana gave her a pouty face. "And when were you going to tell me that?"

"That's the wrong question. I told you just now, of my own free will, so obviously now is when I was going to tell you."

"You let me rant on and on about how you shouldn't give up on getting together with Kyon, and you never said a thing. Some friend."

Sasaki shrugged. "I was interested in what you had to say on the subject, even if it is academic. You think along different lines than I do. In some ways, you're smarter than I am."

"It doesn't feel like it." Sasaki always seemed to dominate every conversation, not by talking over anyone, but just by being smarter and more logical than they were. It wasn't a trait which Tachibana disliked, but it was hard not to feel a little inferior because of it. "So what's he like? You still haven't told me."

"What do you mean? You just a moment ago said I barely know him."

"Come on. I just meant, as compared to Kyon."

"Ah, of course. How could I possibly know the guy who's been my classmate for over a year as well as the guy who I went to junior high with for one year?"

"It's not just a question of time."

"Just because I haven't talked about him as much? But that's only because you were more interested in Kyon." She yawned. "Anyway, he's pretty smart, but insecure. It's a cute combination. I'll introduce you to him some day."

She waited a moment. "What, that's it?"

"I'm tired." Sasaki yawned again. "I don't know about you, but I'm ready for bed."

Tachibana nodded. "Alright." She wasn't especially tired, but she didn't think she'd have any trouble going to sleep.

They got out their sleeping bags and pillows, tucked in, and bid each other goodnight. Sasaki soon fell into a pattern of steady breathing, and with dreamy, reassuring images of Sasaki's closed spaces drifting in front of her eyes, Tachibana soon drifted off as well.

The next day. Sasaki waited at the train station.

She supposed someone else would find something romantic about that. But even though she was waiting for a boy, with whom she was going on a first date, to Sasaki there was nothing romantic about it. It was simply a fact: She was at the train station. Her date was yet to arrive.

Not that she wasn't interested or excited about the date. She liked her guy. They'd had plenty of good conversations. He understood her at a level that Kyon was too oblivious to grasp. While she would hesitate to call him handsome, he certainly wasn't bad looking. He'd make a suitable vehicle for passing on her genes. Maybe, if their dating went well enough, she might even find she loved him. After all, he loved her, so anything was possible.

She probably should have accepted his confession earlier. Still, one good thing had come of holding off. She'd brought the matter up with Kyon, during their most recent discussion. He'd been surprised, but not the least bit dismayed.

That reaction took away a big chunk of her regret. She still didn't know if her thoughtless words, introducing herself as Kyon's good friend, had perturbed Suzumiya, but she at least knew that they hadn't perturbed Kyon. If Kyon had any doubts about his relationship with Suzumiya, she wasn't the cause of them. He had no romantic feelings for her whatsoever.

She wished she could tell Suzumiya that, tell her that she had no competition for Kyon's heart. But anything she might say to Suzumiya now would only make things worse. That part of her regret would have to remain. Even if it was probably empty. It was quite likely that Suzumiya had laughed her head off at the awkward tomboy who thought she could take Kyon from her. A 43.8% chance, she'd guess.

"Good evening, Miss Sasaki." Her date had arrived while she was lost in thought. He was one of the few people she knew who could genuinely take her by surprise. "You look lovely."

That statement was objectively untrue. While she had spent a good hour cleaning up and was wearing the best dress she had, it was a bit like polishing a turd, much as that analogy repulsed her. Her assets were still meager, her legs still more gangly than graceful, and her short hair looked boyish no matter which way she combed it. She wasn't ugly by any means, but no one could say she was lovely without a bit of bias.

Not that she was complaining. She didn't believe anyone could honestly complain about someone being biased in one's favor.

"Thanks," she said with a smile. "You don't look so bad, yourself."

"Well, I do have a lot riding on this date, don't I?" He pushed his glasses up his nose. It was a little nervous habit he had which she found endearing. "Given how long you took to say yes, I get the sense that I'm hanging on a wire here."

"Untrue. I just hadn't expected anyone to ask me that in the first place, so I hadn't had time to think about it. It's more a question of whether or not I was ready than anything to do with you. I already was sure that I liked you." She put an amused hand to her jaw. "If anyone's level of confidence in our relationship should be questioned, it's yours. I took a few weeks to answer your question, but you took over a year to ask it."

"Well, you are intimidating. You have to admit that."

"Intimidating? Absolutely not. Off-putting, maybe."

"Only to some. Not to me." He pushed his glasses up his nose again. "So answer me one question, honestly. You didn't take so long to respond to my confession with the hope that someone else, maybe even someone in particular, might confess to you as well? Someone you would prefer over me?"

He caught her off-guard again. It was a perfectly natural suspicion for him to have, but she wasn't prepared for him to voice it.

"Not exactly," she said, hoping some honesty would make up for her two-second delay. "There was someone I was afraid might confess to me, and even though I didn't want him to, because he's been such a good friend, I felt like I owed it to him to give him a shot." She smiled at him. "He didn't take it, and I'm more relieved than I thought I would be that he didn't."

"I see." He seemed satisfied with her answer. "I'll bet you're not half as relieved as I am, though."

The train pulled up in a roar, drowning out any awkwardness that might have come from the moment. By the time it came to a stop, she again felt like they were just two somewhat nervous teenagers on a first date. Her past had no more hold on her, if it ever had.

"Well," she said, stepping up to the platform. "Let's go, Mishima. It's three stations to that restaurant, and I'm hungry already."

END