Thanks for reading Wired Insanity. This fanfiction is the brainchild of the
members of the RPG, so about eleven people worked together to write it. For
more information, please visit http://www.geocities.com/ctinsanity. We love
comments about this a lot, so please do not hesitate to review! Please
enjoy!
This fanfic runs from PG to NC-17. Please read with caution.
Again, thank you for reading.
______
At three AM, silence was what reigned over the Dark Mansion. In the immaculate darkness, the three people inside crossed the dreamworld.
That until contralto scream cut through the prevailing silence, waking up Hime, who seemed to be torn away from a bad dream, judging for her expression.
"What the hell was that? Nakita! Nakita, what happened?"
Beside her, Nakita was sitting bolt upright. A contralto voice escaped his mouth "Bad dream... oh... damn..."
"What is this voice of yours?"
"Damn... I can't switch back to my normal voice..."
"I had no idea you had THIS voice anyway... what bloody hell is that?"
"Did I wake Kojirou?"
"Seems not. Plus, he can sleep for days, depending on the situation. Now explain that scream of yours."
"That's good... now... to answer your questions... it's simply training my larynx. And... bad dream... the night my brother disappeared..."
"Your brother? You mean Tak?"
Nakita nodded.
"Want to talk about that for a while?"
"Not really.. it's still too painful... I know it's ironic... a psychologist not wanting to talk about something..."
"I can understand that... sometimes we're not ready to bring it up, right?"
"Yeah..."
"Don't think about that for now..." she hugged Nakita and pushed him down so they could sleep.
As he lay back down, Nakita thought /I don't want to be stuck in this voice come morning.../
***
"I gotta phone Tak... "
As soon as the words tumbled out... "Still stuck, Hime..."
"Anything we can do about it?"
"I keep quiet and you call Tak to remind him to report to the police."
"Report... alright." she picked up the phone and dialed Nakita's number.
... A groggy Takashi Iwakura answered on the fourth ring: "Yo?"
"Hello, Tak? It's Hime. "
"Hime? Wha' happened to Nakita?"
"Nothing, he's just showering right now. He asked me to call and tell you to report to the police, or anything like it."
"Ohhhkay... thanksh for the headshup... shee ya..."
Tak hung up.
"OK, I told him."
"Thanks..." He coughed... coughed again...
"How you get rid of it now?"
Took a deep breath... "I don't... well whaddya know... my original voice's back."
"Seems so. But you need some control over it... anyways, want breakfast?"
"Hell yeah, whatcha got?" Nakita cycled through his original voice, the "stuck" contralto, another, higher contralto and finished with a tenor before dropping back to his original voice.
"Weird..."
"Kept my psychology classmates amused..."
"Well, you didn't wake up any of them, I suppose."
"Wasn't sure in which voice I'd answer the next question. Pissed the professors off no end... that alone made it worth the trouble."
"Showoff." she answered playfully. "Anyway, let's hit the kitchen. I have no idea what we got, but you help yourself."
Hime heard her own voice ask, "Fish slabs and vegetables do?"
"Works. And yeah, I might start liking the little voice trick."
"Work on it yourself."
As they got into the kitchen a sleepy, kimono wrapped Kojirou greeted them.
"Morning, Kojirou."
"Hoe, Nakita. Hey, sis. Care to join me for breakfast?"
"Why not?"
"Well, the usual, Nakita. We got fish and squid slabs, vegetables, sake... suppose you can stand to start your day with sake... Kojirou, do we have milk?"
"Yeaown, and coffee too, but I wouldn't drink the coffee cause I made it... and there are some gaijin breakfast stuff here, like corn flakes, toast... help yourself."
"Okay... fish, vegetables and sake it is for me..."
"Ahn... sake, alright... do you have work today?"
"Nah... I'm just a consultant for the senior partners. My methods are too... unorthodox to be allowed to solo on mainstream patients."
"Ahn, OK. I thought it wouldn't be nice if you went to work drunk. Well sake isn't that strong anyway."
"What was that about unorthodox?"
"The methods I used on Tak... they're applicable to non-CMI patients..."
"CMI?"
"What did you use on Tak?"
"Cybernetic mental illness... combination of sensory deprivation, psychoactive drugs and plain ol' counseling..."
"Sensory deprivation?"
"Now THIS sounds interesting... keep going."
"Think we can adapt it, Hime?"
"Maybe."
Nakita shook his head.
"Anything wrong?"
"I used it to treat CMI... not to turn someone on..."
"Well, what are the effects?"
"Temporary deepening of CMI... violent outbursts..."
"Freaky... how does that help?"
"Removes basic inhibition, allowing the basic hatred of humanity to be safely expressed."
"Isn't that dangerous?"
"Better than bottling the hatred up and waiting for it to explode."
"Got it..."
"Still, I wonder how Tak reacted."
"Tied 4 inch thick steel bars into complicated pretzels."
The siblings just nodded in response, forgetting the idea.
"Now... we going to eat?"
"You said it."
Nakita fixed his breakfast, and dug in. The other two did the same, in a less starved fashion.
Kojirou being the first to finish, he said the traditional gochisoosama before leaving for his bedroom.
A little grin played across Nakita's face. Shifting his voice to match Hime's as well as he could, Nakita half-muttered: "Spend enough time in bed?"
Kojirou turned back at what he thought was his sister voice. "What do you mean with that?" Nakita kept a perfectly straight face and replied in his own voice, "What does she mean with what?"
"Sis just said something about me spending enough time in bed... didn't she?"
"Dunno... you say anything, Hime?" The glint in Nakita's eyes asked Hime to play along.
She looked awkwardly at Kojirou. "I didn't say anything."
Kojirou scratched his eyes. "Yeah, so you didn't..."
"I mean it!"
"You must be hearing things... getting enough sleep?"
"I guess so... I don't have to sleep much."
Nakita slipped into his "doctor" mode... "Any... weird dreams or... stuff like that?"
"Weird dreams... not really. Y'know, the usual..."
"Kojirou, our usual is weird..."
"Well... yeaown, it is."
"OK... weird for you, then..."
"No, you got it wrong. Normal for me, weird for others."
"Feverish nightmares, asleep and awake." Hime helped.
"So nothing unusual in the dreams department?"
"Nothing. And I've been sleeping quite a lot, also."
"That unusual for you?"
"A bit."
"As you know, Nakita, we can stay open all night long here."
"Speaking of which, is Kannai coming in this week?"
"I think. He said he'd be here, tomorrow or Saturday."
"Why you ask?"
"Every night he's available.... I get double the amount of referrals from here. I need to know so I can clear my schedule."
"Ah... oh damn... ahn, nee-chan?"
"Don't even look at me. That kid's too unpredictable." after some pondering, she added "But I don't recall anyone complaining about him, actually."
"His clients say he's a subzero sadist... but that's what lights their fires... bisexual to boot..."
"Subzero... the word kinda fits him."
"He's quite a pain machine."
"Yeah? Sounds like the standard sadist... gets off on hurting people..."
"Yeah, but that doesn't really describe Kannai."
"We can't see if he's really excited. But..."
"Judging from how well he does it, he must like."
"Why don't you tape him and check his crotch out?"
The proposition quite startled the two.
"Well... we could..." Hime started, which Kojirou ended "but it's really anti ethical."
"Just tape two sessions... then after you've answered the question... remove the concealed camera, and destroy it and the tapes."
"Maybe he doesn't want us to find out."
"And part of the canon here is that everything must be consensual."
"Or... ask him... he might want to analyze how he performed."
"Yeah, that works. We can ask him, if he agrees than it's done."
"Ah, by the way, sorry if he's causing you trouble." Kojirou said in a tone Nakita couldn't identify as polite or sarcastic.
"No trouble... he's just increasing the size of Hime's bill."
"Excuse me? My bill?"
"It's on firm time using firm resources."
"Ahn, explain this better."
"Well... the people that the Mansion refers to me are... talked to... at the firm's offices on the firm's time..."
"Explain literally." Kojirou helped.
"I can't talk to them for free."
"OK, I'm not following. Yeah, we do refer people to you, and sure enough you won't talk to them for free, but... where does 'my bill' fit all that?"
"As of now... eighty accumulated hours at two hundred US dollars per hour... is owing to the firm."
"But why are you supposed to charge us?"
"And not the people who go there? We won't take responsibility for that."
"You got their names filed?"
"In a way... they've already paid for it... Kannai charges... six, seven hundred US per hour?"
"Yeah, about that... sometimes depends on who's involved."
"And he personally gets around thirty percent of that?"
"Thirty five, that's what his contract says. Varies."
"OK... so it costs around 220 US an hour to the Mansion in direct labor... and indirect costs?"
"Like what?"
"Rooms, equipment, insurance, etc..."
"Say that comes out to another hundred... therefore Kannai makes you 320 US an hour in gross profit."
"We don't know the numbers exactly."
"They're filed in Hime's computer."
"I was working with rough figures."
"Or... amortize the cost among all of the Mansion's employees."
"Nah, not that."
"Not much fair. And for what you're saying we don't have to do anything, right? Or I missed something here?"
"Well... the Mansion refers clients to me as an SM-positive psychologist, correct?"
"Precisely."
"Therefore, in my professional capacity, I am providing a service to the referred clients?"
"Yeah, keep going..."
"Since the firm is providing the service, should it not be compensated for it?"
"Uh-huh..."
"Hime, you discuss that with Nakita, I'll hit the bed, alright?"
"Kojirou, that's really not the behavior for the Mansion's future owner."
Kojirou sighed in response. "I'm sorry, but not this time."
Nakita let the exchange pass without comment.
"This time, alright. Feverish dreams."
"Thanks."
Hime turned to Nakita, waiting for him to finish his chain of thought.
"Or... track the hours that each employee generates... charge that against their gross profit. We track both ends... from the Mansion and from the firm..."
"Yeah, that we could do."
"Hours that can be specifically charged to an employee are done so... the others are spread across all employees."
"Can you access the firm's files from here?"
"To give you some round numbers to work with... the employees are Kannai, your sexy self, Dom A, Sub B and Switch C. Forty hours have been referred... and no, I cannot..."
"Forty hours... bloody hell. You have an idea when this started?"
"It's just an example... let me continue... ten hours cannot be directly attributed, so 2 hours are charged against each employee's gross margin. Kannai has generated fifteen of the remainder, so another 15 hours are charged against his gross margin. You generated five, so five hours are charged against your gross margin.... the dom has generated 3... three hours charged against his margin... the sub and switch have generated 3 and a half hours each, so that's what's charged against their margins."
"I do understand, but... it doesn't sound fair. Later you tell me the people's names, that works better. Won't charge my employees with something that isn't their responsibility, ne?"
"In a way, it is their responsibility... and I have client doctor privilege to maintain."
Hime shook her head "No, it's not. I can understand that you have their privacy to keep and all, but if they can't handle what they start, that's not Kannai or anyone else's fault."
"True... and they are out to me.... but I can't record any real info at the firm..."
"Something has to be done... and, damn, I'm in the dark as for what."
"For the moment, pay the aggregate charge..."
"Have an idea how much it is?"
"Eighty hours at two hundred US an hour... 16 thousand US dollars."
"Bloody hell. I wonder how it came to this point."
"The senior partners kicked up."
"Hm?"
"If this account wasn't paid, I would lose their professional support, especially with the CMI treatments."
"Sigh... yeah, that we don't want to happen. Well, we are gonna pay... might take a while, though."
"They want it within thirty days. That's the best I could plead for."
Hime rested her head against her right hand, lost in thought. "Thirty days... well... alright. You can trust me to handle this."
"It's the best I could get... how much could you pay today?"
"I don't know... right now, maybe... one fifth of everything."
"Great... that'll get them off my back... and yours..."
"Wonderful. I'll be right back." with that the maiden stood up and went for her bedroom.
A few minutes later, she returned with a NAVI in her hands. "You remember the firm's account number?"
"Yeah."
"KK, I'm transferring then. 16 thousand, one fifth... that's ... 32 hundred, right? Yeaown, give me the number and I'll send the money to them."
Nakita gave her the number and in seconds the transfer was done. "They'll send them a confirmation of that. And I do think I can get the rest in thirty days."
"Great..."
Hime nodded in response. "You finished your breakfast?"
Nakita looked down at the remains... "Yeah..."
She got his plate and took it to the sink. "I'm gonna take a cold bath. Want to come along?"
"Yeah... sounds like a good idea."
"Wonderful. Let's go." without waiting for an answer Hime grabbed Nakita's hand and lead him upstairs. Nakita followed... having learned to expect the unexpected... "I hope the bath is just filled with water..."
"This time, yes." Hime answered with a malicious grin.
Nakita wasn't reassured until Hime opened the bathroom door for him. "See? Water."
Nakita checked it... sniffed it... seemed like water... but... we are dealing with Hime here...
Hime tapped her foot on the floor. "Nakita, get your hot ass inside, will you? What are you worried about anyway?"
Nakita let that one pass... he shucked his clothes, barely realizing when Hime slipped out of her nightgown. "Now, then... are you coming?" Not waiting for an answer, the maiden stepped inside the cold water, pulling Nakita by the shoulders with her.
The cold water sent a thrill through Nakita... he had an incongruous thought...
/Tak would cause a tidal wave... like the time Tak did a bomb from the five meter platform... water absolutely everywhere...
That thought didn't pass unnoticed by Hime, as she was looking directly into his eyes. Noticing his zoned out face, she invited him "A kiss for your thoughts, Nakita. And they better be the same as mine."
"Nah... just remembering when Tak did a bomb dive from the five meter platform..."
"Too bad, you get no kiss... ... ah, what the hell." barely saying that Hime crawled closer to Nakita, sitting on his lap. She turned her head backwards and locked her lips against his.
Nakita returned the kiss, having nothing better to do... or so he thought as she took his hands and placed them over her breasts.
Keeping the hands in place... Nakita shrugged and started slowly kneading, which he knew was eliciting moans from Hime, but these were muffled as she hadn't yet broken the kiss. Nakita interspersed nipple flicks delivered by his thumbs with the kneading, to the point that Hime couldn't stand it anymore. She took Nakita's left hand down to her thighs, while rolling her hips and adding her own hands to his. She finally broke the kiss, and her pleasure became more evident as her moans escaped her.
Nakita wasn't out of breath... "Enjoy that?"
Hime's answer first came in the form of a long, low moan. When it ended, she turned to face him, and, receiving Nakita's manhood in her, let out a sibilating "yessssss", which Nakita took as the answer to his question. He kept up the work with his hands.... and silenced the moan by kissing Hime again, which might have been a mistake by him, since now that she couldn't express her pleasure with moaning anymore, Hime hugged him and buried her fingernails into Nakita's back. She didn't mean to, but ended up drawing blood. Tak had caused worse injuries during their sparring bouts... so Nakita shrugged it off... and pinched... hard... once again Hime broke their kiss, this time jerking her head back and letting out a short, but loud yelp. When she opened her eyes again, everything seemed blurry...
"If I'm going too far... you can always safeword..."
"Mostly... mmmm... you're not... ahn... aaaahnnn... if ever.... *pant*... *pant*..."
Nakita squeezed again and twisted the nipples outwards...
"Yes... ahhh... keep on doing it... mmmmmm..." Hime grabbed Nakita's head and pulled his face against her breasts. Her whole body shook, far beyond her control.
Indulging his sadistic tendencies... Nakita stopped all stimulation... and placed his hands around Hime's throat and ... gently ... ever so gently... squeezed...
She wasn't running out of breath just yet, and kept on grinding herself against him, even with the slight frustration of Nakita stopping. In a matter of seconds, though, she was starting to run out... as Hime ran out of breath, Nakita stopped the squeeze.. and kept the hands there anyway...
A close look would have been able to notice Hime's slight smile... she closed her eyes again with her irresistible "kiss me" face. Nakita kept one hand supporting Hime's neck.... the other snaked to her engorged clitoris... and pinched that for good measure, breaking the "kiss me" face as her as eyes opened wide. Her lips burned for Nakita, but she didn't mind. Every touch in her clitoris sent spasms through her body, and soon she was adapted to that, and moaning loudly as the waves of pleasure swept her.
Nakita stopped that... lowered Hime's face to his to silence the moans... she guessed it as her time to play hard to get... or something along these lines. Instead of kissing his lips again, she snaked her face down to Nakita's neck, licking and sucking it restlessly. But not for long as the hand at her neck squeezed... dragging the pair's mouths together...
Who says she didn't enjoy being submissive? She accepted Nakita's violent kiss, and stretched her hands out to play with his nipples. Nakita let up on Hime's clitoris... then squeezed with all the power his right hand could generate....
That' was some kind of unnatural impact for Hime, meaning one she wasn't much adapted to just yet. Yet she didn't say a word, she kept on kissing Nakita and started again rocking her hips. Finally... he let himself go... not before moving his hands so they didn't threaten Hime's life. Nakita's hands around Hime's shoulders convulsed in time with his body and through acquired timing, hers. Maybe the only difference at that moment was that Hime seemed to make a point to scream her heart out.
***
Maybe because of her more delicate body, but Hime was still swept when Nakita got up from the bath. She groaned something and gestured for him to go, cause she'd be out shortly. Nakita climbed out, lifting Hime with him... he toweled the pair of them dry...
By the time he'd finished, Hime was more on the awake side. Yet, she let her body fall on his, smiling at Nakita. He shrugged back into his clothes... Hime's weight was easily carried.
Nakita kissed her. "Y'know... I've found the perfect guy to test out restraints and fittings..."
Hime's eyes focused on Nakita, while her ears seemed to twitch like a cat's. "Keep on talking..."
"Yeah.. Tak. Not gonna find many people stronger or heavier than him..."
"True, but... is he willing?"
"Don't know... haven't asked him... but... compensate him for his time and any injury he does himself..."
"Seems to work, but, again, you know the canon here. Part of it says that everything must be consensual, and everyone involved, fully aware of it."
"Put him down as a structural testing contractor. And make plans to rebuild tested rooms that don't come up to scratch."
"You just hit the nail here... what if he thrashes the rooms he tests?"
"They ain't strong enough... you rebuild and strengthen them at your expense."
"Yeaown, that makes sense... not always doable, but reasonable still."
"If Tak can't cause restraints and fittings to fail... your average customer doesn't stand a chance..."
"Yeah, I know... if he can, odds are that my regular customers can't anyway, but yeaown, I like the idea, and I have to try it, right? So, you ask him. If he's willing, we might put him to test the rooms."
Nakita found the phone and gave his brother a buzz... yes... Tak was interested... yes... Tak was doing sweet foxtrot alpha at the moment... hell yes... Tak is on his way....
"He's coming..."
"Ah, so he wants to do it... good, good!"
***
"Kojirou, can you see who it is?"
"Yeah... I had enough sleep already..." the boy went to the kitchen, and looking down he saw a huge body with fluoro green hair on top. "Nakita, there's a huge green haired guy out there... related to you?"
As they talked, the door rattled in its frame...
"Yes... let him in before you need a new door..."
Tak's knocking was a heavy rhythmic pounding delivered with his right hand.
"Alright, calm down!" Kojirou pressed the intercom button, unlocking the door. A few more thumps would have rendered the intercom buzzer redundant. "Come in."
***
The wooden gates were open as he drove up on his Vespa. As he stepped in, it seemed as he was stepping back into a time past. Blue eyes scanned the landscaping. Layers upon layers of green greeted his eyes and the sounds of a soft backyard waterfall hit his ears. Suddenly, the serenity of the scene was broken by the loud laughs of teenage girls.
Adam Langley carefully stepped on the round stones that guided his way to the shoji screen door. On the wooden front porch, he reached and grabbed a silk rope which aided in ringing a large bell. The hollow ringing was sorrowful.
He looked down as the screen slid open slightly to reveal the face of a short Asian girl.
"Oh... I'm sorry, I thought this was the Tsugoyaki residence." Adam said in English, as his Japanese was less than perfect.
The girl smiled blankly at his statement then a twinkle of recognition shone in her eyes.
"Tsugoyaki! Tsu..." she stopped as she slid open the door.
Standing in a room about twenty feet away was a short girl. She was near a small glass table. Her auburn hair fell down to her mid-back, a mixture of soft waves and curls. Her back was to him, but he could see that she was clad in a kimono. She turned, her hair lifting slightly off of her back, to look at him with dark eyes.
"Caomei, this is Adam Langley." she said in soft, articulate Japanese.
Adam walked to the room to shake her hand, but stopped when he looked out past the room. Beyond the room was another room composed entirely of glass with water running over it and below it. Waterfalls fell all around the room. Beautiful mist rose from the yard below. His awe was interrupted by a cold hand on his shoulder.
"You failed to remove your shoes, Mr. Langley," Eiri said, flicking a curl behind her shoulder. "That's not very polite."
"Sorry, I'm not... used to that custom."
She paused to look up at his face, which was a good eight inches above her own. The hand lifted from his shoulder and pointed to a short set of stairs heading to some unknown room.
"Your room is up there. Breakfast is at 7:00, I expect that you shall be down here by then. Caomei will be with us as her mother is out of town. She will be sleeping in the extra futon in my room, so she will not bother you. She does not know English, so don't expect any responses from her unless you speak in Japanese or Chinese," she looked down at the floor. "Perhaps we will get to know each other better."
"I do hope so, Miss Tsugoyaki." he said, taking her hand and kissing it lightly. Her face turned pink and she looked away from him.
Adam walked away from her and up the stairs. When he reached the top, he walked into the small room and dumped out a bag of files about Eiri...
"He's cute." Caomei said, giggling.
"That he is," Eiri said, laughing and then snorting.
"I see good things in your future with him!"
"Funny, Caomei."
Caomei grabbed a chunk of curls and started dragging Eiri to the kitchen, deciding it was time to prepare breakfast for the new arrival.
***
After the phone call from Nakita via Hime, Tak slammed the phone down as was his wont.
The apartment the brothers shared was a perennial low branch problem for Tak - it was built for average size Japanese people... and Tak was most definitely NOT average size.
Standing slightly above 220 centimeters and tipping the scales just short of 200 kilograms, Tak was barely a month past his sixteenth birthday. No one ever believed that at a first meeting.
After two intersections with low doorways, Tak made it to the bathroom and stooped to look in the mirror. As usual, his fluoro green mop was a stubborn mess that resisted any and all attempts to reform it - Tak had long since given up on that project. He had never suffered much in the way of acne - just a zit here or there.
/ Now for the shower... / Due to his size and the lack of size of the shower stall, Tak washed his body by sections.
When he was sitting down in the shower, letting the water rinse the soap off his torso... the voices returned...
...why do you persist in remaining ? ...
/ Not a fuckin' gain... / Although Tak didn't know it... the voices had become more frequent since the suicide of one Yomoda Chisa.
...why do you remain while we are rootless? ...
/ Shut the fuck up. I survived because I WANTED to. /
... you managed to escape your body? Why did you make it only temporary ? ...
/ SHUT THE FUCK UP! I SURVIVED, YOU DIDN'T! YOU'RE DEAD, SO ACT LIKE IT! /
...yet you cannot remain entirely. You have to make brief periodic returns, or retreat from consensual reality completely...
/ I bodydump because I damn well want to, not have to. /
...but how can you do it without any connection to the Wired? ...
/ Satellite uplink. /
...is that the real, whole truth? ....
The voices they have pissed off.
/ Too fuckin' weird... what in the fuck WAS that thing ten years ago? /
Tak finished rinsing himself and cautiously got out of the shower. After dressing, he powered up the NAVIs mounted in his forearms to check his mail.
"Any mail?"
"Fuck all, dipwad."
That was the major benefits of the forearm NAVIs - they were portable, could connect from anywhere and ran off the bioelectricity generated by the user. Tak had programmed his to be insulting. Absolute sons of bitches to upgrade, though.
After fueling his huge frame, Tak had nothing to do, as per usual. Surfing the Wired was boring, working out mindlessly repetitive. On paper, not going to school or having a job looked great, but palled after time.
So he called an escort agency, hiring the services of a lady named Ichiko for an hour.
***
Like it always was with escorts, sex was cold, passionless, mechanical and barely satisfying. It worked off some energy - that was about it.
Locking the apartment up, Tak went for a fifteen mile run to help pass time and burn calories.
Twenty minutes after he got back, his brother called.
***
Adam looked at the girls with an almost morbid fasination. They stood in the entry hall, laughing about some joke that Adam only understood two words of. Adam focused his vision on the ends of the soft pleated skirts, perhaps hoping for a peek at the lacy thong that Eiri wore. He grinned, and unfortunately that was the moment that Eiri and Caomei decided to look up to say their good-byes.
After a shoe had flown through the air and slammed him in the face [and Eiri had retrieved her beloved shoe...], the girls stormed out, leaving a dazed Adam sitting at the top of the stairs rubbing his face. Eiri locked the wooden gate, and after admiring the black Vespa, she ran to catch up with her friend.
As they had missed both the bus and train to school, the girls decided to walk to school. Their walk led them through both downtown and the more suburby places. Both girls stopped to stare at the Dark Mansion, admiring it from across the street, and fearing the green- haired man who was pounding the door. When he was let in finally, they felt that they could speak safely.
"I've heard that there's a woman in there who beats all others in beauty." whispered Caomei in awe.
"Really? I've heard that really odd things happen in there at night." Eiri said dryly.
"Oh really... odd things happen at a place that revolves around S&M. Who knew?" Caomei mentioned sarcastically.
Eiri shot daggers at her friend, then looked at her watch.
"We better get going, or we're going to be late to school!" said Eiri urgently.
Both paused to look at the building one last time before starting the sprint to school. The tapping of their shoes echoed off the buildings before mixing with the sound of passing traffic on a nearby road.
This fanfic runs from PG to NC-17. Please read with caution.
Again, thank you for reading.
______
At three AM, silence was what reigned over the Dark Mansion. In the immaculate darkness, the three people inside crossed the dreamworld.
That until contralto scream cut through the prevailing silence, waking up Hime, who seemed to be torn away from a bad dream, judging for her expression.
"What the hell was that? Nakita! Nakita, what happened?"
Beside her, Nakita was sitting bolt upright. A contralto voice escaped his mouth "Bad dream... oh... damn..."
"What is this voice of yours?"
"Damn... I can't switch back to my normal voice..."
"I had no idea you had THIS voice anyway... what bloody hell is that?"
"Did I wake Kojirou?"
"Seems not. Plus, he can sleep for days, depending on the situation. Now explain that scream of yours."
"That's good... now... to answer your questions... it's simply training my larynx. And... bad dream... the night my brother disappeared..."
"Your brother? You mean Tak?"
Nakita nodded.
"Want to talk about that for a while?"
"Not really.. it's still too painful... I know it's ironic... a psychologist not wanting to talk about something..."
"I can understand that... sometimes we're not ready to bring it up, right?"
"Yeah..."
"Don't think about that for now..." she hugged Nakita and pushed him down so they could sleep.
As he lay back down, Nakita thought /I don't want to be stuck in this voice come morning.../
***
"I gotta phone Tak... "
As soon as the words tumbled out... "Still stuck, Hime..."
"Anything we can do about it?"
"I keep quiet and you call Tak to remind him to report to the police."
"Report... alright." she picked up the phone and dialed Nakita's number.
... A groggy Takashi Iwakura answered on the fourth ring: "Yo?"
"Hello, Tak? It's Hime. "
"Hime? Wha' happened to Nakita?"
"Nothing, he's just showering right now. He asked me to call and tell you to report to the police, or anything like it."
"Ohhhkay... thanksh for the headshup... shee ya..."
Tak hung up.
"OK, I told him."
"Thanks..." He coughed... coughed again...
"How you get rid of it now?"
Took a deep breath... "I don't... well whaddya know... my original voice's back."
"Seems so. But you need some control over it... anyways, want breakfast?"
"Hell yeah, whatcha got?" Nakita cycled through his original voice, the "stuck" contralto, another, higher contralto and finished with a tenor before dropping back to his original voice.
"Weird..."
"Kept my psychology classmates amused..."
"Well, you didn't wake up any of them, I suppose."
"Wasn't sure in which voice I'd answer the next question. Pissed the professors off no end... that alone made it worth the trouble."
"Showoff." she answered playfully. "Anyway, let's hit the kitchen. I have no idea what we got, but you help yourself."
Hime heard her own voice ask, "Fish slabs and vegetables do?"
"Works. And yeah, I might start liking the little voice trick."
"Work on it yourself."
As they got into the kitchen a sleepy, kimono wrapped Kojirou greeted them.
"Morning, Kojirou."
"Hoe, Nakita. Hey, sis. Care to join me for breakfast?"
"Why not?"
"Well, the usual, Nakita. We got fish and squid slabs, vegetables, sake... suppose you can stand to start your day with sake... Kojirou, do we have milk?"
"Yeaown, and coffee too, but I wouldn't drink the coffee cause I made it... and there are some gaijin breakfast stuff here, like corn flakes, toast... help yourself."
"Okay... fish, vegetables and sake it is for me..."
"Ahn... sake, alright... do you have work today?"
"Nah... I'm just a consultant for the senior partners. My methods are too... unorthodox to be allowed to solo on mainstream patients."
"Ahn, OK. I thought it wouldn't be nice if you went to work drunk. Well sake isn't that strong anyway."
"What was that about unorthodox?"
"The methods I used on Tak... they're applicable to non-CMI patients..."
"CMI?"
"What did you use on Tak?"
"Cybernetic mental illness... combination of sensory deprivation, psychoactive drugs and plain ol' counseling..."
"Sensory deprivation?"
"Now THIS sounds interesting... keep going."
"Think we can adapt it, Hime?"
"Maybe."
Nakita shook his head.
"Anything wrong?"
"I used it to treat CMI... not to turn someone on..."
"Well, what are the effects?"
"Temporary deepening of CMI... violent outbursts..."
"Freaky... how does that help?"
"Removes basic inhibition, allowing the basic hatred of humanity to be safely expressed."
"Isn't that dangerous?"
"Better than bottling the hatred up and waiting for it to explode."
"Got it..."
"Still, I wonder how Tak reacted."
"Tied 4 inch thick steel bars into complicated pretzels."
The siblings just nodded in response, forgetting the idea.
"Now... we going to eat?"
"You said it."
Nakita fixed his breakfast, and dug in. The other two did the same, in a less starved fashion.
Kojirou being the first to finish, he said the traditional gochisoosama before leaving for his bedroom.
A little grin played across Nakita's face. Shifting his voice to match Hime's as well as he could, Nakita half-muttered: "Spend enough time in bed?"
Kojirou turned back at what he thought was his sister voice. "What do you mean with that?" Nakita kept a perfectly straight face and replied in his own voice, "What does she mean with what?"
"Sis just said something about me spending enough time in bed... didn't she?"
"Dunno... you say anything, Hime?" The glint in Nakita's eyes asked Hime to play along.
She looked awkwardly at Kojirou. "I didn't say anything."
Kojirou scratched his eyes. "Yeah, so you didn't..."
"I mean it!"
"You must be hearing things... getting enough sleep?"
"I guess so... I don't have to sleep much."
Nakita slipped into his "doctor" mode... "Any... weird dreams or... stuff like that?"
"Weird dreams... not really. Y'know, the usual..."
"Kojirou, our usual is weird..."
"Well... yeaown, it is."
"OK... weird for you, then..."
"No, you got it wrong. Normal for me, weird for others."
"Feverish nightmares, asleep and awake." Hime helped.
"So nothing unusual in the dreams department?"
"Nothing. And I've been sleeping quite a lot, also."
"That unusual for you?"
"A bit."
"As you know, Nakita, we can stay open all night long here."
"Speaking of which, is Kannai coming in this week?"
"I think. He said he'd be here, tomorrow or Saturday."
"Why you ask?"
"Every night he's available.... I get double the amount of referrals from here. I need to know so I can clear my schedule."
"Ah... oh damn... ahn, nee-chan?"
"Don't even look at me. That kid's too unpredictable." after some pondering, she added "But I don't recall anyone complaining about him, actually."
"His clients say he's a subzero sadist... but that's what lights their fires... bisexual to boot..."
"Subzero... the word kinda fits him."
"He's quite a pain machine."
"Yeah? Sounds like the standard sadist... gets off on hurting people..."
"Yeah, but that doesn't really describe Kannai."
"We can't see if he's really excited. But..."
"Judging from how well he does it, he must like."
"Why don't you tape him and check his crotch out?"
The proposition quite startled the two.
"Well... we could..." Hime started, which Kojirou ended "but it's really anti ethical."
"Just tape two sessions... then after you've answered the question... remove the concealed camera, and destroy it and the tapes."
"Maybe he doesn't want us to find out."
"And part of the canon here is that everything must be consensual."
"Or... ask him... he might want to analyze how he performed."
"Yeah, that works. We can ask him, if he agrees than it's done."
"Ah, by the way, sorry if he's causing you trouble." Kojirou said in a tone Nakita couldn't identify as polite or sarcastic.
"No trouble... he's just increasing the size of Hime's bill."
"Excuse me? My bill?"
"It's on firm time using firm resources."
"Ahn, explain this better."
"Well... the people that the Mansion refers to me are... talked to... at the firm's offices on the firm's time..."
"Explain literally." Kojirou helped.
"I can't talk to them for free."
"OK, I'm not following. Yeah, we do refer people to you, and sure enough you won't talk to them for free, but... where does 'my bill' fit all that?"
"As of now... eighty accumulated hours at two hundred US dollars per hour... is owing to the firm."
"But why are you supposed to charge us?"
"And not the people who go there? We won't take responsibility for that."
"You got their names filed?"
"In a way... they've already paid for it... Kannai charges... six, seven hundred US per hour?"
"Yeah, about that... sometimes depends on who's involved."
"And he personally gets around thirty percent of that?"
"Thirty five, that's what his contract says. Varies."
"OK... so it costs around 220 US an hour to the Mansion in direct labor... and indirect costs?"
"Like what?"
"Rooms, equipment, insurance, etc..."
"Say that comes out to another hundred... therefore Kannai makes you 320 US an hour in gross profit."
"We don't know the numbers exactly."
"They're filed in Hime's computer."
"I was working with rough figures."
"Or... amortize the cost among all of the Mansion's employees."
"Nah, not that."
"Not much fair. And for what you're saying we don't have to do anything, right? Or I missed something here?"
"Well... the Mansion refers clients to me as an SM-positive psychologist, correct?"
"Precisely."
"Therefore, in my professional capacity, I am providing a service to the referred clients?"
"Yeah, keep going..."
"Since the firm is providing the service, should it not be compensated for it?"
"Uh-huh..."
"Hime, you discuss that with Nakita, I'll hit the bed, alright?"
"Kojirou, that's really not the behavior for the Mansion's future owner."
Kojirou sighed in response. "I'm sorry, but not this time."
Nakita let the exchange pass without comment.
"This time, alright. Feverish dreams."
"Thanks."
Hime turned to Nakita, waiting for him to finish his chain of thought.
"Or... track the hours that each employee generates... charge that against their gross profit. We track both ends... from the Mansion and from the firm..."
"Yeah, that we could do."
"Hours that can be specifically charged to an employee are done so... the others are spread across all employees."
"Can you access the firm's files from here?"
"To give you some round numbers to work with... the employees are Kannai, your sexy self, Dom A, Sub B and Switch C. Forty hours have been referred... and no, I cannot..."
"Forty hours... bloody hell. You have an idea when this started?"
"It's just an example... let me continue... ten hours cannot be directly attributed, so 2 hours are charged against each employee's gross margin. Kannai has generated fifteen of the remainder, so another 15 hours are charged against his gross margin. You generated five, so five hours are charged against your gross margin.... the dom has generated 3... three hours charged against his margin... the sub and switch have generated 3 and a half hours each, so that's what's charged against their margins."
"I do understand, but... it doesn't sound fair. Later you tell me the people's names, that works better. Won't charge my employees with something that isn't their responsibility, ne?"
"In a way, it is their responsibility... and I have client doctor privilege to maintain."
Hime shook her head "No, it's not. I can understand that you have their privacy to keep and all, but if they can't handle what they start, that's not Kannai or anyone else's fault."
"True... and they are out to me.... but I can't record any real info at the firm..."
"Something has to be done... and, damn, I'm in the dark as for what."
"For the moment, pay the aggregate charge..."
"Have an idea how much it is?"
"Eighty hours at two hundred US an hour... 16 thousand US dollars."
"Bloody hell. I wonder how it came to this point."
"The senior partners kicked up."
"Hm?"
"If this account wasn't paid, I would lose their professional support, especially with the CMI treatments."
"Sigh... yeah, that we don't want to happen. Well, we are gonna pay... might take a while, though."
"They want it within thirty days. That's the best I could plead for."
Hime rested her head against her right hand, lost in thought. "Thirty days... well... alright. You can trust me to handle this."
"It's the best I could get... how much could you pay today?"
"I don't know... right now, maybe... one fifth of everything."
"Great... that'll get them off my back... and yours..."
"Wonderful. I'll be right back." with that the maiden stood up and went for her bedroom.
A few minutes later, she returned with a NAVI in her hands. "You remember the firm's account number?"
"Yeah."
"KK, I'm transferring then. 16 thousand, one fifth... that's ... 32 hundred, right? Yeaown, give me the number and I'll send the money to them."
Nakita gave her the number and in seconds the transfer was done. "They'll send them a confirmation of that. And I do think I can get the rest in thirty days."
"Great..."
Hime nodded in response. "You finished your breakfast?"
Nakita looked down at the remains... "Yeah..."
She got his plate and took it to the sink. "I'm gonna take a cold bath. Want to come along?"
"Yeah... sounds like a good idea."
"Wonderful. Let's go." without waiting for an answer Hime grabbed Nakita's hand and lead him upstairs. Nakita followed... having learned to expect the unexpected... "I hope the bath is just filled with water..."
"This time, yes." Hime answered with a malicious grin.
Nakita wasn't reassured until Hime opened the bathroom door for him. "See? Water."
Nakita checked it... sniffed it... seemed like water... but... we are dealing with Hime here...
Hime tapped her foot on the floor. "Nakita, get your hot ass inside, will you? What are you worried about anyway?"
Nakita let that one pass... he shucked his clothes, barely realizing when Hime slipped out of her nightgown. "Now, then... are you coming?" Not waiting for an answer, the maiden stepped inside the cold water, pulling Nakita by the shoulders with her.
The cold water sent a thrill through Nakita... he had an incongruous thought...
/Tak would cause a tidal wave... like the time Tak did a bomb from the five meter platform... water absolutely everywhere...
That thought didn't pass unnoticed by Hime, as she was looking directly into his eyes. Noticing his zoned out face, she invited him "A kiss for your thoughts, Nakita. And they better be the same as mine."
"Nah... just remembering when Tak did a bomb dive from the five meter platform..."
"Too bad, you get no kiss... ... ah, what the hell." barely saying that Hime crawled closer to Nakita, sitting on his lap. She turned her head backwards and locked her lips against his.
Nakita returned the kiss, having nothing better to do... or so he thought as she took his hands and placed them over her breasts.
Keeping the hands in place... Nakita shrugged and started slowly kneading, which he knew was eliciting moans from Hime, but these were muffled as she hadn't yet broken the kiss. Nakita interspersed nipple flicks delivered by his thumbs with the kneading, to the point that Hime couldn't stand it anymore. She took Nakita's left hand down to her thighs, while rolling her hips and adding her own hands to his. She finally broke the kiss, and her pleasure became more evident as her moans escaped her.
Nakita wasn't out of breath... "Enjoy that?"
Hime's answer first came in the form of a long, low moan. When it ended, she turned to face him, and, receiving Nakita's manhood in her, let out a sibilating "yessssss", which Nakita took as the answer to his question. He kept up the work with his hands.... and silenced the moan by kissing Hime again, which might have been a mistake by him, since now that she couldn't express her pleasure with moaning anymore, Hime hugged him and buried her fingernails into Nakita's back. She didn't mean to, but ended up drawing blood. Tak had caused worse injuries during their sparring bouts... so Nakita shrugged it off... and pinched... hard... once again Hime broke their kiss, this time jerking her head back and letting out a short, but loud yelp. When she opened her eyes again, everything seemed blurry...
"If I'm going too far... you can always safeword..."
"Mostly... mmmm... you're not... ahn... aaaahnnn... if ever.... *pant*... *pant*..."
Nakita squeezed again and twisted the nipples outwards...
"Yes... ahhh... keep on doing it... mmmmmm..." Hime grabbed Nakita's head and pulled his face against her breasts. Her whole body shook, far beyond her control.
Indulging his sadistic tendencies... Nakita stopped all stimulation... and placed his hands around Hime's throat and ... gently ... ever so gently... squeezed...
She wasn't running out of breath just yet, and kept on grinding herself against him, even with the slight frustration of Nakita stopping. In a matter of seconds, though, she was starting to run out... as Hime ran out of breath, Nakita stopped the squeeze.. and kept the hands there anyway...
A close look would have been able to notice Hime's slight smile... she closed her eyes again with her irresistible "kiss me" face. Nakita kept one hand supporting Hime's neck.... the other snaked to her engorged clitoris... and pinched that for good measure, breaking the "kiss me" face as her as eyes opened wide. Her lips burned for Nakita, but she didn't mind. Every touch in her clitoris sent spasms through her body, and soon she was adapted to that, and moaning loudly as the waves of pleasure swept her.
Nakita stopped that... lowered Hime's face to his to silence the moans... she guessed it as her time to play hard to get... or something along these lines. Instead of kissing his lips again, she snaked her face down to Nakita's neck, licking and sucking it restlessly. But not for long as the hand at her neck squeezed... dragging the pair's mouths together...
Who says she didn't enjoy being submissive? She accepted Nakita's violent kiss, and stretched her hands out to play with his nipples. Nakita let up on Hime's clitoris... then squeezed with all the power his right hand could generate....
That' was some kind of unnatural impact for Hime, meaning one she wasn't much adapted to just yet. Yet she didn't say a word, she kept on kissing Nakita and started again rocking her hips. Finally... he let himself go... not before moving his hands so they didn't threaten Hime's life. Nakita's hands around Hime's shoulders convulsed in time with his body and through acquired timing, hers. Maybe the only difference at that moment was that Hime seemed to make a point to scream her heart out.
***
Maybe because of her more delicate body, but Hime was still swept when Nakita got up from the bath. She groaned something and gestured for him to go, cause she'd be out shortly. Nakita climbed out, lifting Hime with him... he toweled the pair of them dry...
By the time he'd finished, Hime was more on the awake side. Yet, she let her body fall on his, smiling at Nakita. He shrugged back into his clothes... Hime's weight was easily carried.
Nakita kissed her. "Y'know... I've found the perfect guy to test out restraints and fittings..."
Hime's eyes focused on Nakita, while her ears seemed to twitch like a cat's. "Keep on talking..."
"Yeah.. Tak. Not gonna find many people stronger or heavier than him..."
"True, but... is he willing?"
"Don't know... haven't asked him... but... compensate him for his time and any injury he does himself..."
"Seems to work, but, again, you know the canon here. Part of it says that everything must be consensual, and everyone involved, fully aware of it."
"Put him down as a structural testing contractor. And make plans to rebuild tested rooms that don't come up to scratch."
"You just hit the nail here... what if he thrashes the rooms he tests?"
"They ain't strong enough... you rebuild and strengthen them at your expense."
"Yeaown, that makes sense... not always doable, but reasonable still."
"If Tak can't cause restraints and fittings to fail... your average customer doesn't stand a chance..."
"Yeah, I know... if he can, odds are that my regular customers can't anyway, but yeaown, I like the idea, and I have to try it, right? So, you ask him. If he's willing, we might put him to test the rooms."
Nakita found the phone and gave his brother a buzz... yes... Tak was interested... yes... Tak was doing sweet foxtrot alpha at the moment... hell yes... Tak is on his way....
"He's coming..."
"Ah, so he wants to do it... good, good!"
***
"Kojirou, can you see who it is?"
"Yeah... I had enough sleep already..." the boy went to the kitchen, and looking down he saw a huge body with fluoro green hair on top. "Nakita, there's a huge green haired guy out there... related to you?"
As they talked, the door rattled in its frame...
"Yes... let him in before you need a new door..."
Tak's knocking was a heavy rhythmic pounding delivered with his right hand.
"Alright, calm down!" Kojirou pressed the intercom button, unlocking the door. A few more thumps would have rendered the intercom buzzer redundant. "Come in."
***
The wooden gates were open as he drove up on his Vespa. As he stepped in, it seemed as he was stepping back into a time past. Blue eyes scanned the landscaping. Layers upon layers of green greeted his eyes and the sounds of a soft backyard waterfall hit his ears. Suddenly, the serenity of the scene was broken by the loud laughs of teenage girls.
Adam Langley carefully stepped on the round stones that guided his way to the shoji screen door. On the wooden front porch, he reached and grabbed a silk rope which aided in ringing a large bell. The hollow ringing was sorrowful.
He looked down as the screen slid open slightly to reveal the face of a short Asian girl.
"Oh... I'm sorry, I thought this was the Tsugoyaki residence." Adam said in English, as his Japanese was less than perfect.
The girl smiled blankly at his statement then a twinkle of recognition shone in her eyes.
"Tsugoyaki! Tsu..." she stopped as she slid open the door.
Standing in a room about twenty feet away was a short girl. She was near a small glass table. Her auburn hair fell down to her mid-back, a mixture of soft waves and curls. Her back was to him, but he could see that she was clad in a kimono. She turned, her hair lifting slightly off of her back, to look at him with dark eyes.
"Caomei, this is Adam Langley." she said in soft, articulate Japanese.
Adam walked to the room to shake her hand, but stopped when he looked out past the room. Beyond the room was another room composed entirely of glass with water running over it and below it. Waterfalls fell all around the room. Beautiful mist rose from the yard below. His awe was interrupted by a cold hand on his shoulder.
"You failed to remove your shoes, Mr. Langley," Eiri said, flicking a curl behind her shoulder. "That's not very polite."
"Sorry, I'm not... used to that custom."
She paused to look up at his face, which was a good eight inches above her own. The hand lifted from his shoulder and pointed to a short set of stairs heading to some unknown room.
"Your room is up there. Breakfast is at 7:00, I expect that you shall be down here by then. Caomei will be with us as her mother is out of town. She will be sleeping in the extra futon in my room, so she will not bother you. She does not know English, so don't expect any responses from her unless you speak in Japanese or Chinese," she looked down at the floor. "Perhaps we will get to know each other better."
"I do hope so, Miss Tsugoyaki." he said, taking her hand and kissing it lightly. Her face turned pink and she looked away from him.
Adam walked away from her and up the stairs. When he reached the top, he walked into the small room and dumped out a bag of files about Eiri...
"He's cute." Caomei said, giggling.
"That he is," Eiri said, laughing and then snorting.
"I see good things in your future with him!"
"Funny, Caomei."
Caomei grabbed a chunk of curls and started dragging Eiri to the kitchen, deciding it was time to prepare breakfast for the new arrival.
***
After the phone call from Nakita via Hime, Tak slammed the phone down as was his wont.
The apartment the brothers shared was a perennial low branch problem for Tak - it was built for average size Japanese people... and Tak was most definitely NOT average size.
Standing slightly above 220 centimeters and tipping the scales just short of 200 kilograms, Tak was barely a month past his sixteenth birthday. No one ever believed that at a first meeting.
After two intersections with low doorways, Tak made it to the bathroom and stooped to look in the mirror. As usual, his fluoro green mop was a stubborn mess that resisted any and all attempts to reform it - Tak had long since given up on that project. He had never suffered much in the way of acne - just a zit here or there.
/ Now for the shower... / Due to his size and the lack of size of the shower stall, Tak washed his body by sections.
When he was sitting down in the shower, letting the water rinse the soap off his torso... the voices returned...
...why do you persist in remaining ? ...
/ Not a fuckin' gain... / Although Tak didn't know it... the voices had become more frequent since the suicide of one Yomoda Chisa.
...why do you remain while we are rootless? ...
/ Shut the fuck up. I survived because I WANTED to. /
... you managed to escape your body? Why did you make it only temporary ? ...
/ SHUT THE FUCK UP! I SURVIVED, YOU DIDN'T! YOU'RE DEAD, SO ACT LIKE IT! /
...yet you cannot remain entirely. You have to make brief periodic returns, or retreat from consensual reality completely...
/ I bodydump because I damn well want to, not have to. /
...but how can you do it without any connection to the Wired? ...
/ Satellite uplink. /
...is that the real, whole truth? ....
The voices they have pissed off.
/ Too fuckin' weird... what in the fuck WAS that thing ten years ago? /
Tak finished rinsing himself and cautiously got out of the shower. After dressing, he powered up the NAVIs mounted in his forearms to check his mail.
"Any mail?"
"Fuck all, dipwad."
That was the major benefits of the forearm NAVIs - they were portable, could connect from anywhere and ran off the bioelectricity generated by the user. Tak had programmed his to be insulting. Absolute sons of bitches to upgrade, though.
After fueling his huge frame, Tak had nothing to do, as per usual. Surfing the Wired was boring, working out mindlessly repetitive. On paper, not going to school or having a job looked great, but palled after time.
So he called an escort agency, hiring the services of a lady named Ichiko for an hour.
***
Like it always was with escorts, sex was cold, passionless, mechanical and barely satisfying. It worked off some energy - that was about it.
Locking the apartment up, Tak went for a fifteen mile run to help pass time and burn calories.
Twenty minutes after he got back, his brother called.
***
Adam looked at the girls with an almost morbid fasination. They stood in the entry hall, laughing about some joke that Adam only understood two words of. Adam focused his vision on the ends of the soft pleated skirts, perhaps hoping for a peek at the lacy thong that Eiri wore. He grinned, and unfortunately that was the moment that Eiri and Caomei decided to look up to say their good-byes.
After a shoe had flown through the air and slammed him in the face [and Eiri had retrieved her beloved shoe...], the girls stormed out, leaving a dazed Adam sitting at the top of the stairs rubbing his face. Eiri locked the wooden gate, and after admiring the black Vespa, she ran to catch up with her friend.
As they had missed both the bus and train to school, the girls decided to walk to school. Their walk led them through both downtown and the more suburby places. Both girls stopped to stare at the Dark Mansion, admiring it from across the street, and fearing the green- haired man who was pounding the door. When he was let in finally, they felt that they could speak safely.
"I've heard that there's a woman in there who beats all others in beauty." whispered Caomei in awe.
"Really? I've heard that really odd things happen in there at night." Eiri said dryly.
"Oh really... odd things happen at a place that revolves around S&M. Who knew?" Caomei mentioned sarcastically.
Eiri shot daggers at her friend, then looked at her watch.
"We better get going, or we're going to be late to school!" said Eiri urgently.
Both paused to look at the building one last time before starting the sprint to school. The tapping of their shoes echoed off the buildings before mixing with the sound of passing traffic on a nearby road.