Spring Fever

V. Inui

After the elucidating events of after-school practice, Inui walked down the halls of the school with his ever-present notebook in hand, his mind awhirl with calculations of how long Atobe had to live before Fuji wreaked unholy vengeance upon him. Pure bedevilment shown in his eyes, though no one was likely to see that – they wouldn't have to, since the evil light glaring off his glasses was hint enough.

Yes indeed, today was an excellent day for data gathering, just like he had predicted at the beginning of the month.

Then a slight frown marred his brow. Well, there was one thing that hadn't quite gone right today. Kaidoh hadn't seemed to like the Valentine's Day present he'd given his kouhai. In fact, he'd reacted to it much more aversely than Inui had calculated from his notes on Kaidoh's previous exposures to his concoctions and his estimations of the resulting degree of immunity that Kaidoh should have had. Inui made a mental note to re-investigate the new ingredients he used to make his "Inui Super Distilled Valentine Candy Drops" in order to find out just what exactly the younger boy had reacted to. He was sure Kaidoh wouldn't mind helping him determine any possible allergies he might have – it was for his benefit, after all. But then again… maybe it was better he didn't tell the other beforehand anyways.

Anticipation caused the evil smugness to return to Inui's expression. But before he could indulge in outright mad cackling, just because it seemed the appropriate thing to do, he was interrupted by a beeping from his cell phone.

It was a text message from Renji telling him that his email inbox was full again, plus a small postscript at the bottom wishing him a productive Valentine's Day. Inui sighed in exasperation. That had happened the previous year too. Who knew that there were such perils to having a large number of shy female students in his computer class? Truly, the female computer geek was a creature that must be treated with extreme caution.

Making another mental note to clean his email inbox again, Inui turned a corner and nearly walked into Kaidoh.

"Inui-senpai…" The younger boy greeted softly, eyes darting around as if looking for an escape route.

"Ah, Kaidoh. Are you feeling better now?" Inui continued to walk, knowing from his calculations that Kaidoh would be polite enough to follow until the conversation was over.

"Hai."

"I really didn't expect you to react so strongly to my candy," Inui offered as a partial apology. It was rather embarrassing to have the nurse called in at the end of lunch to revive other boy after he had keeled over from Inui's present. At least Kaidoh wasn't looking green now.

"Hai." Kaidoh's eyes darted around again.

"I'd calculated how much immunity to my mixtures you have gained from the training regimen you've been using, and it should have been well within your tolerances. I must have missed something." Now he was just rambling, as he was sometimes wont to do. He liked having Kaidoh around – just as a willing guinea pig, mind – and he didn't want to scare off the boy now.

"Hai." Was that a glimmer of… something… in the other boy's eyes now? Ii data.

By then they'd come to Inui's locker. Inui casually opened the door and was immediately bombarded with a veritable waterfall of computer chips, calculators, test tubes, chemistry sets, and various electronic devices, all wrapped or decorated in red ribbons. Finally, a huge, full-sized LCD computer monitor with a pink bow attached to it careened out of the locker to land right onto his head.

"I-te."

Kaidoh blinked at the pile of electronics where his senpai had been standing, then stared at the giant tank of nitrogen that was left standing in the locker, before finally his sense of responsibility kicked in and he started to dig through the pile. It took a little while to extricate Inui from the pile of anonymous gifts.

"Well," the bespectacled boy mused as he surveyed the mess. "I suppose this will keep me stocked for the rest of the year."

A small smile of amusement tugged at Kaidoh's lips as he plucked a brightly colored piece of paper out of Inui's hair. It was a discount ad for contact lenses.


Next Up: Kaidoh. Who's having a typical bad-luck day.

Vocabulary:
kouhai - underclassman
senpai - upperclassman
Hai - yes
Ii data. - "Good data"
Ite - owch