We met back up with Koizumi and Nonaka, who had each found a book of their own. Nonaka had The Book of Forbidden Knowledge: Black Magic, Superstition, Charms, and Divination and Koizumi, ever the brown nosed, had a dictionary-wide text with a skull etched into it called The Grimoire of Everlasting Night. Neither volume looked as promising as the one Haruhi had found. It was hard to put into words, but held next to Practices and Procedures for Restoring the Beloved Departed to the Mortal Plane, they both stood out as novelty books meant to appeal to those with an occult fetish rather than honest-to-goodness, dead-serious, "This actually works" books of the occult. Which only made me worry all the more that Haruhi had wished up some real black magic.

"Okay, looks good," Haruhi said, stuffing all four books into her bag. "I'll take these home, read them, tell you all what materials we need to collect, and we should be ready to cast the spell in about a week. Dismissed!"

I turned and wearily headed home.

In my head I ran through the possible scenarios that might transpire if we actually raised Nonaka's mother from the dead. A nationwide panic, probably. An end to the SOS Brigade's secrecy, certainly, as we would be inundated with reporters and requests to appear on various paranormal TV shows. Haruhi would insist that we accept most of them, of course. This would lead to her becoming a teen idol, and between that face and that singing voice, she'd become a nationwide sensation. The Agency would have to have goons follow her everywhere, posing as bodyguards and managers, to make sure nothing happens to her that might result in closed space. She'd keep on Nagato in her role as a lead guitarist, and Koizumi and Nonaka could weasel their way in as roadies if nothing else, but I'd be cast aside. Even if Haruhi wanted to bring me along, my parents would never let me drop out of school. I'd drift apart from the rest of the SOS Brigade, and...

"Hey, don't look so down there, buddy."

I jolted out of my reverie, realizing only now that Nonaka was walking beside me. She was looking at me with a warmly reassuring smile. "I, uh..."

"You're thinking about this black magic ritual Miss Suzumiya has planned, right? Don't worry about it. It's not going to work, I promise."

I raised an eyebrow at her. "You don't know Haruhi at all, do you?"

"Oh, I know her," she chuckled. "But even she can't bring someone back from the dead who isn't dead to begin with."

There was a moment of silence as that sunk in. "...You lied to Haruhi?"

"Not at all. I told her that I've never met my mother, which is completely true. She jumped to the conclusion that my mother was dead all on her own."

Much as I dislike crediting Haruhi with common sense, that is kind of the obvious conclusion to draw.

"See, this is why I'm walking home with you. The two of us haven't had 'the talk' yet." She managed to make the air quotes obvious with annunciation alone. Like I said before, her booming tone was annoying. "You've probably already figured this out, but I'm not a normal high school student."

I nodded. "You're a time traveler."

"Right. But where Mikuru Asahina is a time traveler from the future, I'm a time traveler from the past."

I glanced sideways at her. "Miss Asahina told us that no one can time travel any farther back than five years ago."

"Five years ago is still the past, buddy."

We walked in silence for a moment. I had gotten my hopes up for a second there, thinking Nonaka might have come from the days of the samurai. Five years ago was technically the past, but it wasn't the least bit exciting. I mean, even my sister had technically time traveled from five years ago, since she was alive then.

"See, my father is from Mikuru Asahina's time, but he was sent back to five years ago on a mission."

Five years ago? Could this have something to do with the manifestation of Haruhi's powers? "What kind of mission?"

"Classified information."

Well, there's one thing Nonaka has in common with Miss Asahina.

"During the mission, he met and fell in love with my mom. Romances with people of the past are strictly forbidden, but by means I can't explain without giving you classified information, he got away from the oversight of his superiors and, well, fornicated with my mom."

She didn't sound embarrassed in talking about the means of her conception. She actually sounded amused at the thought.

"It was easy to decide what to do with my dad: bring him back to his present immediately, permanently strip him of his TPDD, and punish him. The problem was my mom being pregnant. A child who isn't supposed to exist, by a father who wouldn't be born for decades, was all sorts of tampering with the timestream. An abortion still wouldn't take away the fact that I existed, and the consequences on my mom's health might even have more impact on the past than if I lived. There was only one solution: bring my mother to the future, wait for me to be born, and return my mother to the exact same time they'd taken her from, with some hypnosis to make her forget me."

"And raise you as a time traveling agent."

"Right. This way I'm basically out of time, not really connected to any point in the past or future. Hey, don't look so angry. My mom agreed to all this."

"I'm sure because they didn't give her any good alternatives."

"They didn't have any good alternatives to offer, thanks to my dad. That incident is what made them realize they needed better safeguards to keep people from breaking the law against romance with people from the past. So now, anytime a time traveler thinks about having sex, it triggers a mental image of an old man in a speedo." She chuckled. "Luckily, I'm not the least bit attracted to either you or Koizumi."

That's lucky for more than one reason. "You really have no problem with working for the people who took you from your mother?"

"Not at all. I've had a happy life. Besides, it's more important to be useful to society than it is to be happy. A human life should be more than just a few fleeting moments of pleasure. That's what my dad didn't get."

"So who raised you?"

"Oh, he did. But I'm a smart kid. I learned better than his example."

Or maybe their education system trained her that way. It occurred to me for the first time that I had no clue what sorts of ideas children were taught in Miss Asahina's time.

"Anyway, I've got to be heading home. Thanks for listening."

"You're welcome." That felt insufficient. "And thanks for telling me about your mother being alive."

"Hey, I'm glad I could set your mind at ease." She walked off in a different direction, waving her hand back at me. "Bye now."

I bought Haruhi a ring.

That was my assignment in the gathering of materials for the occult ceremony. Koizumi's was to find a suitable altar, Nagato had to procure some priestly robes, and Nonaka had to get flowers.

Frankly, I didn't get it. Shouldn't an occult ceremony involve more powders, skulls, and curved daggers?

"What, you're some sort of expert on the occult now?" Haruhi demanded with a raised brow.

"No, it's just... what is the ring for, anyway?"

"I have to wear it as part of the ceremony. It's all right here if you don't believe me." She held Practices and Procedures for Restoring the Beloved Departed to the Mortal Plane open to the relevant page.

I peered at it, not because I didn't believe her, but to get a look at what sort of ring I was supposed to be getting. It didn't specify, though. Apparently just any old ring would work.

I still felt we needed more of that old-fashioned black magic vibe, so I popped into a party shop and bought a plastic ring with a black spider.

"Are you kidding me?" Haruhi said when I showed it to her in class the next morning.

"What?"

"It's cheap, tacky, and hideous. I know you can do better."

On a high school student's budget? Not by a whole lot. Besides, the book didn't say it had to be anything fancy.

"That ring is going on my finger." She glared at me. "Think about that."

Well, obviously not even a solid gold ring with a diamond as big as my thumb would be good enough for Queen Haruhi's finger. But that afternoon I picked up a ring with a green "gemstone" made of glass. It looked fairly creepy, I felt.

"Better," Haruhi allowed with a nod.

The ceremony was scheduled for a Saturday. Another of Koizumi's relatives had a particularly impressive shrine at his home, so we headed there.

Stepping into the massive backyard, I looked around at what had to be the liveliest occult ceremony of this century. Various members of Koizumi's "family" were arranging the furnishings. An assortment of Haruhi's friends were mingling around, among them Ishigaki and Tsuruya. Nonaka, a basket filled with flowers on her arm, was chatting them up. My sister, who Haruhi had insisted on inviting because there was no excuse for not giving my own flesh-and-blood a chance to see such a once-in-a-lifetime event as this, broke away from me and ran to join them. (Haruhi had wanted to invite my parents as well, but I convinced her that they would not approve of their children being involved in an occult rite. She did invite her own parents, but I'm sure she was no more surprised than I was that they hadn't showed.) Taniguchi, delighted at the high female-to-male ratio, was attempting to charm some of the more promising prospects, with Kunikida as his wingman. I still hadn't told him that Ishigaki had broken up with her boyfriend, so I rested assured that she would be relatively safe from him.

The little matter of the black magic about to take place was a little more worrying.

I located Koizumi. "Where are Haruhi and Nagato?" I asked.

"Changing into their ceremonial attire." He was surveying the proceedings.

"Both of them? I figured those priestly robes were for Haruhi, but what's Nagato wearing?"

"Actually, Miss Nagato is the priestess. Miss Suzumiya acquired her own garment."

"What for?"

"I don't know," he shrugged. "Incidentally, my connections took a look at the architectural plans for the bookstore Miss Suzumiya found that book in, as you suggested. There are no schematics for a secret passage, or any below-ground rooms whatsoever."

I slumped. "Meaning the real author of that occult book is H. P. Suzumiya."

"Perhaps. Or perhaps it was relocated from another bookstore so that Miss Suzumiya could more easily find it. It really doesn't matter. Though Miss Nonaka is forbidden to contact her mother, agents from her organization have confirmed that she is indeed still alive."

I turned to scowl at him. "You can't honestly believe that means there's nothing to worry about. There's no telling what effect a Haruhi-made spell will have on someone. It could turn her into an instant vampire or something."

"True. And yet... A new member of the SOS Brigade having a dead parent hardly seems like sufficient motivation for Miss Suzumiya to work a miracle of this order."

"She created a whole new section at the local bookstore. Call it illogical all you like, but she obviously has sufficient motivation."

"Yes, but perhaps not for raising the dead. Her goal may be different." He turned to me and smiled. "This project has restored the group's spirits, hasn't it?"

I shook my head. "Haruhi has never needed to use her powers just to get the SOS Brigade working on a project. ...Hmm?"

My attention was captured by Nagato entering the yard, attired in a simple dark red robe. The outfit not only added to her usual solemn appearance, it made her look intimidatingly sacred. She went to stand at the altar in silence, arms folded.

I walked over to her. "Hey Nagato, you look really good in that." She didn't acknowledge the compliment, so I pressed on, "Do you really know how to perform this occult ceremony?"

She answered: "I have read Practices and Procedures for Restoring the Beloved Departed to the Mortal Plane."

...Of course she has.

"Well, can you tell me what's involved?"

"You wait for Miss Suzumiya to process in." She pointed. "From there."

"Right." I scratched the back of my head. "Is there some reason for that? What's my role in all this?"

"To bring the deceased back into the living world."

"Isn't that your job?"

"I conduct the ceremony and provide the blessing. No more."

"Are we doing all of this correctly – according to the book, I mean? Would this actually bring someone back from the dead if they really were dead?"

Nagato blinked, like she knew the answer to the question but didn't know how to express it to me.

"Maybe we should call this whole thing off, tell Haruhi that Nonaka's mother is alive. It would blow Nonaka's cover, and there's a 99.9% chance Haruhi would then take us on an adventure to find her mother, which would give us a whole new set of problems, but..."

"Haruhi Suzumiya would not believe you."

...That was true. Not because Nonaka having simply never met her mother is at all hard to believe, but because when Haruhi sets her mind on a project, nothing can turn her away from it. I could tell her that Nonaka's mother is alive until my throat was raw, and she'd still insist I was just lying because I have cold feet about the ritual.

A small commotion made me turn. Haruhi had entered the yard. She was wearing a thick kimono of purest white, and her hair was done up in an old-fashioned bun with hair sticks in it. Even her facial expression was uncharacteristically solemn and proper. If you didn't know her, you'd have thought she was an ordinary, traditional, polite young woman.

She was arm in arm with Koizumi, the two processing in together while Nonaka and my sister threw flowers about them, rather cheerfully for an occult ceremony meant to raise her still-living mother from the dead. Haruhi's eyes widened as she neared me. "Kyon! What in the world are you wearing? You look like a homeless person!"

I was garbed in a grim reaper costume that Taniguchi loaned to me. "It's a cloak. This was the only thing I had that was appropriate for an occult ceremony."

"Why do you keep thinking you know anything about the occult? Oh, never mind." She turned her head from me, again looking uncharacteristically serene. "It'll do. At least the color's right."

So there's a designated outfit for me to wear in this ritual? Nice of you to tell me that just now. "What about you? What are you wearing?"

"The ceremony calls for someone to represent the dead person. They wear white, to symbolize death."

"I see. What's my job?"

"You represent Charon, who is to ferry the deceased back across the river Styx," Koizumi explained.

Great. So once again, I'm Haruhi's ride.

"I'll explain as we go." She took her arm from Koizumi and linked it with mine. "Your part's pretty easy, anyway. Unless you screwed up and forgot the ring."

"How incompetent do you think I am?"

She raised an eyebrow. "You've made bigger mistakes."

Koizumi stepped out of the way, and Nagato came to stand in front of us. Her eyes briefly met Haruhi's, then mine.

Then she said, "Tijoki ruhira ro frectus, picori bru vindictas Haruhi Suzumiya wah..."

I caught her mentioning my name, but apart from that, nothing but unabated gibberish. "Uh, Nagato..."

"Shh!" Haruhi jerked her elbow into my side. "You'll interrupt the spell."

I shushed, all right. As concerned as I was about what would happen upon the spell's completion, I was smart enough to see even greater danger if I interrupted it. I was a little unnerved at the confidence and precision with which Nagato was speaking whatever that language was, though.

I took a nervous glance back. Koizumi and Nonaka were smiling at me and waved, as if this was just another lark. I felt a brief twitch of irritation at that, before I remembered that we needed to keep our happy faces on for the sake of the guests, especially my sister.

When I turned back around, I realized from her emphasis and the fact that she was looking at me that Nagato was asking me a question.

Haruhi was right on top of it. "She's asking you if you will take Umeko's mother back to the land of the living. Answer 'Yatashi resolvus.'"

I gave her an uncertain look. "Which means?"

"It means that you will." When I still hesitated, she sighed. "Come on, just say it. It's part of the ritual. If we were going to prank you, don't you think we'd come up with something better than making you say something silly in a language that no one here speaks?"

Actually, I kind of had been thinking of how doing an elaborate project like this just to have a woman in monster makeup pretending to be Nonaka's mother jump out and scare me was a pretty typical level of Haruhi maturity. So she was at least somewhat accurately keyed into my thoughts. But that wasn't the reason for my hesitation.

I was thinking, Do I really want to go through with this?

Every time that Haruhi has caused trouble with her powers before, I've been a victim like everyone else. Usually I'm the one who suffers worst for it, and that's the truth. If I say those two little words now, I'll be making myself an accomplice to Haruhi's blunder here. And that's something I'll have to live with for the rest of my life.

Still... I couldn't believe there was any chance of Nonaka's mother being harmed by this. Haruhi had wished for this spell to be cast, and Haruhi would never wish for anything evil to happen to someone. Looking at the situation from a purely logical standpoint, the fact that Nonaka's mother was not dead could turn the road of Haruhi's good intentions towards Hell, but I just didn't feel that was possible. Haruhi's use of her power had been reckless, but precise. She always got exactly what she wanted, and nothing else.

I looked at her. The combination of her stern face with the chaste white of her kimono made her look like a warrior noble. That wasn't the sort of personality that you normally associated with Haruhi, but it was an aspect of her. Her decisions were sometimes irresponsible and selfish, but she executed them with her own particular sense of responsibility. Her flaws were the sort that you could live with.

"Uh..." I couldn't help but squirm a bit at the growing impatience on her face. "What were the words, again?"

She gave another exasperated sigh. "Yatashi resolvus."

I turned to Nagato. She at least did not mind waiting.

I'd decided. Maybe we were doing nothing more than humoring Haruhi once again, but what was so bad about that? "Yatashi resolvus," I said.

Nagato looked at Haruhi now and spoke some more in that made-up language. She again ended with a question, and Haruhi too said, "Yatashi resolvus." I didn't bother to ask what she was agreeing to do.

After Nagato said a few more words, Haruhi said, "This is the part where you put the ring on me."

"Got it." I reached into the pocket of the pants I was wearing beneath my grim reaper cloak. "...Huh." I tried the other pocket. Nothing there, so I felt around the first one more carefully. "Hang on. I... Oh no."

Seriously? I mean, seriously? What have I done to have this happen to me now, of all times?

There was a hole in my pocket.

Haruhi was glaring at me. I'm not sure which I feared more: the possible consequences of aborting the ceremony at this late phase, or her wrath.

"I swear... these pants did not have a hole in either pocket when I put them on this morning..."

There was a finger tap on the shoulder. "Hey Kyon, drop something?"

It was Taniguchi. He was grinning at me and holding up the ring. "I saw this drop from your pant leg while you were walking up there."

I was embarrassed, and really not in the mood. "Give me that."

"Hey, don't thank me or anything!" His smile turned into something of a bitter scowl as he put the ring in my hand. "Looking out for each other is just what friends do, right?"

A soft rush of relief came over me at feeling the ring again. "Sure. Thanks."

I actually felt bad for snapping at him. It's just that this situation felt like an unpleasant cliche of some sort. I couldn't put my finger on what it was that it reminded me of, but it gave my nerves an irritating twitch.

There was no time to think it over. Haruhi was proffering her hand. I grasped it and slipped on the ring. "What is this for, anyway?"

"It channels the magic of the spell and binds Umeko's mother to Charon, so that she won't be trapped behind in the world of the dead," Haruhi answered. She held out a hand to her side, and Tsuruya stepped forward and handed her a small box. "You get one, too."

I held out my hand and she slipped onto it what looked like a real gold ring.

"Tsuruya borrowed this from her grandfather, so don't lose it, or someone's going to have to perform this ritual for you," she warned.

I was surprised the ring fit so well. "Alright, now what?"

"The last part. You just need to carry me across the threshold between life and death, and the spell will be complete."

I raised an eyebrow. "Carry you? Hooooowwwwww!?"

That last syllable was elongated because at that moment Haruhi leapt up into my arms. Apparently this was to be a literal carrying. I was caught off-guard enough that she's damn lucky I instinctively caught her instead of letting her fall on her butt. I wished I had, because then at least I wouldn't be left with the humiliation of holding Haruhi princess-style in front of a whole gathering of my friends, classmates, and little sister. Though I'd already noticed it in a sort of back-of-my-mind way, I was now painfully aware of the fact that several of them were taking photos of the event. At the shrine visit last year, I carried Haruhi on my back precisely to avoid having me and her in this embarrassing position. Apparently whoever was in charge of the universe was just determined to visit this particular humiliation on the two of us.

"Got a firm hold?" Haruhi asked, and then without giving me time to answer, affirmed, "Good!"

"Can't I just pull you along in a wagon or something?" I muttered.

"Not even if I were willing to submit to something so degrading. The book says the dead person has to be carried in this exact manner. Otherwise the spell won't work."

"You're grinning," I pointed out.

"Because this is exciting! When was the last time someone got brought back to life?" She thrust a finger in the direction of the white archway built near the garden. "Now, march! That over there has been enchanted as the representation of the threshold between life and death. You've got to carry me across it!"

Easy for you to say. My back already feels like it's breaking.

"Stop pretending like this is hard. You've carried me plenty of times before."

With a sigh, I proceeded forward as directed.

Actually, Haruhi was a pretty pleasant armful. She had one arm wrapped around my shoulders, stabilizing her balance, and even through her chaste kimono, the warmth of her body was pleasant and reassuring. It certainly felt nice to have that enthusiastic smile lingering so close to my face. And to be honest, she wasn't even that heavy. Most guys would consider themselves lucky to have a girl like this in their arms.

The real issue was that we'd been having too many of these... easily misunderstood situations over the past two or three months. Even before then, there had been talk about me and Haruhi. And while everyone in the SOS Brigade knew that we were performing this ceremony because Haruhi sincerely believed it would bring Nonaka's mom back to life, the others present were undoubtedly starting to wonder if this was all just a weird romantic masquerade for the two of us.

As we approached the archway, Haruhi muttered, "If you bang my head on that..."

"Yeah, I know. I'm not a complete klutz, all right?" I turned ninety degrees and stepped through.

"That was fun." Haruhi grinned still more brightly.

Needless to say, my embarrassment was at its peak. "Can I put you down now?"

"Of course. The spell is com-plete." She said this like it was a big accomplishment as I gently set her on her feet. "Now we just wait."

"Wait?"

"Sure, you didn't think the resurrection was going to be an instantaneous thing, did you? Even Jesus took three days!"

Good grief. Why are you citing the example of a person you don't even believe in?

"The book says you have to wait at least until the next full moon, which is three weeks from now."

Three weeks? I don't think Haruhi's attention span will hold out that long, even for something like this. "What do you mean 'at least'?"

"Well, it varies from person to person, you know. It could be three weeks, it could be four weeks, or it could be ten months."

Ten. Months.

After Haruhi had gone back inside, presumably to change into normal clothes, I confronted Koizumi by the refreshments table.

"You should get changed, too," he said. "You'll be more comfortable, and, while I do not wish to offend, you really do look like a homeless person in that attire."

"Never mind that right now. Haruhi just told me that it'll be anywhere from three weeks to ten months for the spell to take effect."

"Oh?" He put some sashimi on his plate.

"Why would someone with so little patience set such a ridiculously long time for her efforts to produce any results?"

He smiled at me. It was a particularly disturbing smile. "Well, having seen what casting the spell involved, I would say that Miss Suzumiya most likely never believed that we could bring someone back from the dead at all. It is fairly clear that a resurrection was not her true goal, is it not?"

"What the hell are you talking about?"

"Oh." He looked at me, faintly surprised, the smile vanished from his face. "You didn't notice, then."

"Notice what?" I was feeling a certain lack of patience myself. Every time Koizumi gets cryptic like this, I become a little more convinced that he does it on purpose.

"Didn't the occult ceremony strike you as somewhat familiar? Bearing a resemblance, perhaps, to a more holy, mundane, and commonplace – though still once-in-a-lifetime – ceremony? One in which you and Miss Suzumiya, rather than Miss Nonaka's mother, would be the recipients of the ceremony's blessings?"

...Oh no.

It didn't hit me all at once, but as Koizumi spoke each word slowly and with pronounced emphasis, realization sunk in. My throat went dry, my body stiff and immobile, as if I were a newly entombed mummy.

My conversation with Haruhi from a couple weeks before came back to me:

"How do you expect to stick with me after college?"

"I don't know. We'll work something out."

Haruhi had worked something out, all right. I felt numbed.

Koizumi laid a hand on my shoulder. "Don't worry. I'm sure it's not legally binding. Even supposing that the words Nagato spoke were valid for the service, you didn't know what she was saying, so you didn't know what you were agreeing to. In fact, I strongly suspect that on the conscious level, Miss Suzumiya is as clueless as you are as to what just happened. Certainly, she would not want you to be authentically joined with her under these circumstances." He leaned closer, and the smile returned. "I would interpret it as more of a... signal of intent. On both your parts."

With those final words, he took his hand from my shoulder and moved further down the food table.

Taniguchi had to slap me on the back to get me moving again.

END