Dinner that Monday evening was awkward, even by the Tendos' standards. Kasumi returned from picking up the dishes and asked a question to the certain quiet individual. "So, Leif, would you like to tell us what happened?" With his head pointed downward and his orange locks blocking his dark face as he sat on the end of the table, he said, almost in a stubborn tone of voice "No." Mr. Tendo replied with a "You're not in trouble, are you?" as he rubbed his mustache. "No, just made a fool of myself, that's all." He sighed. "If you change your mind, we're here to listen." Leif let out a small sigh. "Thanks." Akane diverted the conversation. "Anyone want dessert?" Ranma spoke… sarcastically. "You didn't make it, did you?" Akane's face grew a shade of scarlet. "No, Ranma, I did not!" "Hey, hey, I was just asking. You didn't have to go and be un-cute about it!" "Well excuse me for being un-cute!" Ranma muttered "Serves her right; Stupid tomboy," under his breath. Akane leered at him and gave a contemptful "Hum" as she threw her arms down. As Akane stormed out of the room, Genma and Soun got up. "Say, Saotome, how about a game of Shogi? I still have to beat you for last week." Genma belly laughed. "Not if I have anything to say about it, old friend!" Genma sauntered to the cupboard underneath the TV and pulled out the oaken board; Soun moved two cushions into the hallway, next to the patio. No one, save the ever-vigilant Nabiki, had noticed that during this time that Leif had disappeared. An upstairs door slammed. Nabiki spoke "Yep. There's definitely more to this than he's letting on." She smiled. Kasumi tilted her head. "Now, Nabiki, you shouldn't go and pester him, you hear?" The younger smiled saturninely. "Oh, I won't. Not him, anyway."
Leif sat down on the bed, and sighed. He looked outside at the window. He forlornly got up and opened it, letting the night breeze blow inside. He hollowly laughed to himself and then closed it. "Why do I even bother?" Leif walked over to his hiking backpack and unzipped the smallest pocket on the front. He rummaged through it until he found something, and then carefully put that something back, sighing. He picked up some clothes and headed downstairs, meeting Kasumi on the way. "Leif, if you're going to take a shower, Mr. Saotome is in the bathroom now, so you'll have to wait." "Okay." He made an about face, and followed Kasumi back up the stairs. After he went into his room, a sly face appeared, slanted, from her doorway. "I wonder what he had…"
Leif got his clothes as he headed into the laundry room. There was a certain red shirt on the blandly white washer, along with some other cotton clothes, so he laid his light colors on top of it. He locked the door, and walked through the light blue paned sliding door. "That's odd," he quietly said to himself. He set down his toothbrush next to the sink and opened the mirror, giving way to the medicine cabinet. "Aspirin, mouthwash, Band-Aids, Medical tape, syringe, tape recorder—Wait a minute! What is a tape recorder doing here?" He picked up the small black mini-cassette recorder that was currently recording from behind the shaving cream and eyed it. He stopped it, and opened it. On the inside of the lid was inscribed "Property of Nabiki Tendo". He shut the lid, and then the cabinet, grabbed his things, and walked over to the door. He opened it, and walked up to Nabiki's room. "Is this yours?" He tossed the device to Nabiki, who was quietly reclined on her bed, reading, in her favorite shorts and a white shirt that simply read "ON". "It appears so. Thanks." "Don't do that again." "Oh dear, I'm so sorry about that." She grinned. Her statements started out as artificially demure, but turned sarcastically bitter before the end of the sentence. He shut the door behind him. "Of all the nerve…" He walked back the bathroom, and took his shower in peace.
Nabiki awoke at her normal time on Tuesday, the day after what was to be called "The Incident". She ran her fingers through her long brown hair and yawned. Her analog clock read at 5:50. She walked downstairs, and looked in the kitchen. There was no one there, which was to be expected, since Kasumi would not be awake for another ten minutes or so, although she did notice one thing especially peculiar about the kitchen. A single black, non-stick skillet of medium size was in the drain board. Kasumi had run the dish washer and placed all the dishes away. "Well, it looks like little Mr. Early struck again." She inspected the pan and put it under the sink. Nabiki walked into the living room and addressed Soun. "Father, do you know where Leif is?" Mr. Tendo cracked an eyebrow as he drank his morning cup of tea, watching the morning weather, from his morning pillow. "Ah, yes. He woke up early again this morning, cooked breakfast for the both of us, and left early for school. Why?" Nabiki yawned again. "Just wondering; I saw the skillet in the drain board." Soun looked mildly surprised. "A fairly self-sufficient lad, wouldn't you say?" "He most certainly is." Nabiki left the living room, and passed an almost, but not quite awake Kasumi on her way up the stairs. She returned to her room, and gathered her supplies. She got her favorite thinly lined black leather gloves, dropped them into a pocket, and put a pencil in the nook of her right ear. "Can't leave any trace, can I?" She tiptoed in her socks across the hall, and quietly walked down the hall and around the corner, passing the Saotomes' room, of which she heard snoring emanating, and walked to Leif's room.
Nabiki opened the door to Leif's room with a slight creak and flicked on the light switch. The lightly furnished room lay empty. She looked around the room until, between the corner of the bed and the short bookcase, was Leif's backpack. Nabiki checked the room further, eying it quickly. She shut the door as she walked inside. "Time to reconnoiter." She pulled on her soft gloves and flexed her fingers afterwards. After confirming a tight fit, she walked over to the bed and kneeled down. Then, without disturbing the bed or moving the bag, she carefully unzipped the smallest two rectangular pockets. She fumbled her hand through the larger one finding nothing of interest, so she cautiously re-zipped the pocket. But when she put her hand in the smaller pocket… Her face showed a few signs of slight shock as she heard metal jingling. As she grabbed the small object, she brought out of the bag. It was a long medallion of some sort, a rounded rectangle, moderately thick, semi-lustrous, with a small woven metal chain about a foot long connected to the top. "Interesting." She smiled. It was not the object itself that she found interesting, but the fact that some strange script, unknown to her, was inscribed in it, three characters. It was not Japanese of any form, and she did not recognize it as Chinese. Holding it in her right gloved hand, she flipped the item over. It was blank, except for a small area near the bottom, which read "From:" in English and what looked like initials, except that they were in the same odd language as the front was. She frowned as she pulled out her small notebook from her pocket and took the pencil off her ear. She placed the medallion under a blank lined sheet, and rotated the pencil to the blunt side, shading over the exposed area. A faint copy appeared, and as she pressed harder, the image became darker and sharper. Nabiki flipped the trinket over and sketched over the other side. She blew off the dust, and closed the notebook. She placed it back in her pocket, replaced her pencil on her ear, and gently coiled up the medallion, placing in the general position she found it in, closing the pocket afterward. She got up and smiled. "Now to find out what this little thing means."
Leif was lucky; probably too much for his own good. He had woken up even earlier than usual and cooked himself and his host breakfast. "Mr. Tendo, do you have a phone book?" "Sure, it's by the phone." Leif remembered how awkward it had felt, and pondered if this trip was really required. "No, it's not." After answering his unspoken question, he took a Tokyo street map from the right grenade pocket of his pants, checking over the address he had unearthed. He checked his notebook, flipping through the blue-lined pages until he found his latest entry. He flipped it closed, and folded the map as well. He walked down the quiet street, a series of small houses, until he found the right address. He still walked with his staff, with the same barely-noticeable hobble.
He analyzed his target residence, checking it thoroughly. The two front windows were both curtained and shut. A small row of short hedge was off the right of the quaint duplex house. This would be adequate for his plan. He walked up the single step up to the walkway that separated it from the sidewalk. He set down his brown leather school satchel, unsnapping it from his black diagonal sling. (He had brought it with him to Nerima and had found that the strap suited the bag, turning it into a makeshift messenger's bag, which, for him, was much more usable.) He opened the bag, and removed a small tan envelope from it, with a small row of kanji characters on one side, and set it on the doorstep. He shut his bag, replaced it on his shoulder, and then carefully stepped back from the doorway. He gripped his staff, and swung it level to his arms, then carefully used it to ring the doorbell. He rushed to the green hedge, hiding behind it; then he slowly crawled towards the next house.
Mrs. Yamane was inside her home, washing dishes, when the doorbell rang. She set the plate she was drying on the marbleized countertop, and proceeded to the door. She pressed her thumb on the latch and opened it. "Hello?" She eyed the walkway and stepped outside. Mrs. Yamane stepped forward; she stopped suddenly when she realized she stood upon something. She turned and picked up the now-indented envelope that read "To Ms. Hiroko" on it. Hiroko's mother opened it, glanced at it, and then closed it. She gave a small smile and shut the door. "Hiroko! There's a letter for you!" She waited at until she heard her daughter's response. "Coming mother!" Hiroko walked around the corner of the hall, a long handled comb in her hands, as she went arduously through her black strands that extended down her back. Mrs. Yamane handed Hiroko the envelope, as the much-befuddled girl accepted the note. "What's this?" Her mother wagered nothing as a response. "Hiroko's eyes followed the letter, written in kanji, and in exceptional penmanship. "Leif? He…wrote this? But, how could he? I thought that—." She stopped her thought in mid-sentence. "I guess someone who can speak Japanese that well could probably write it." Her mother looked at her daughter, silently remarking about how her black hair was reflected in Hiroko, although she possessed her father's unusual green eyes. She reverted to reality. "So, do you know this 'Leif'?" Hiroko perked up. "Yeah, he's the new kid, from the U.S.. I think he was…trying to apologize." "For what, dear?" "I kinda embarrassed him on his first day of school. I don't really know how. He didn't seem to make a fuss over it." Mrs. Yamane's face transitioned to a thoughtful juxtaposition. "Well, wasn't that still nice of him?" "I guess so…" Hiroko picked up the letter, grabbed her comb, and returned to her room.
Leif arrived at school at precisely 8:10, although that was purely coincidental. His watch was fast, so it read a minute ahead of what the school's clocks read. He quietly walked across the lot, using his staff, and except for the occasional onlooker, he was pretty much ignored. He never stopped, or even looked up. His long orange bangs shaded his face, and when compared with the declination of his neck, appeared to shade his eye cavities almost black. Meanwhile, a certain other resident of Furinkan had an opposing mood. "If he thinks I shall stand for this transgression passed against, he thinks wrongly. Wrongly, indeed." Tatewaki stood with his bokken at the ready, his bangs being blown by the wind, although there was strangely little wind that fine Tuesday. Leif walked towards the main doors of the school. Kuno pronounced his well-rehearsed rhetoric. "Underclassman Zahn, if you think you can—." Unfortunately for him, he was unable to finish, as at this point Leif shut the door behind him without turning around or even seeing Kuno. This left the suavely swordsman getting the door slammed in his face, leaving a red imprint from the glass. "Errr…Gaaahhh!" He barely kept from yelling, trying to keep his irascibility under firm control. "We shall see about this, Zahn." Unbeknownst to both of them, a certain girl familiar with the events of yesterday had seen what had happened to the letter-sender.
Nabiki arrived two minutes later. "Well, my best evidence is shady at best." "Are you sure that's it?" Nabiki's duo of "business associates" checked over the folded carbon copy she made. "I don't take it you know any of this." She waited, pressing her hand on the second-story windowsill. "Nope." "No way." "I'll just go check with the Professor." Her brown-haired friend thought for a moment. "Wait, you mean the guy from the Tokyo University of Foreign Studies?" Nabiki nodded. "Yeah, he's a linguistics professor. Hopefully he'll know." She stretched her arms and examined the shading. The characters was angular, a long vertical stem with various branches extending out at forty-five degree angles. Not that added any meaning to it, of course.
"Professor Arakaki?" A female voice inquired, interrupting the scholarly Arakaki from his books. "Yes?" He turned around to see the short-haired and inscrutable girl. He didn't wear glasses, unusual for someone of sixty-three. His office was cramped, not because it was small, but because it contained six large, oaken bookcases, filled to their brims with tomes of all shapes, sizes, colors, covering everything from Tai to Irish-Gaelic. All of the bookcases' shelves had a penchant to drooping. "What can I do for you, Ms. Tendo?" He sighed as he put down the volume he was currently thumbing through. She frowned as she handed Arakaki the paper. "Does this make any sense to you?" He glowered slightly. "What scheme are you up to this time, Nabiki?" She appealed earnestly to him, with a slightly warming smile. "Nothing …yet. This is on the necklace of one of my friends and I was wondering what it meant. It's some sort of script language, isn't it?" Arakaki burbled a reply. "It appears so. Nothing I know of offhand. Let me check."
He arose from his seat, and proceeded to the pulverulent shelves, taking one book off his shelves. It had a title in English, (An Examination on Ancient Germanic Dialects and Their Evolutions, to be exact) one complex enough to cause the Tendo girl to become temporarily strabismic. The reputable gentleman lifted the tomb, flipping through a few index pages while he set it upon his desk. He leaned over it, inspecting it, until he flipped to a page approximately a fourth through the five hundred and fifty or so pages that it contained. There was a small, black and white picture that appeared in the left hand page, in the bottom right, of a small stone engraved with small, straight-edged symbols. He canvassed the volume, comparing the picture to another one on the next plate of the book, and then flipped a few more pages until he came across a chart, showing the symbols. He took the folded piece of paper and compared it with the chart. "You don't mind if I write on this, do you?" The gaunt gentleman inquired. Nabiki responded…pensively. "Sure, I don't care." Arakaki clicked the top on his ballpoint, then copied the English translation out to the side. "You can read this, can't you?" he broached the topic as he handed it back to her. "Yes, I think so. 'Leif'?" The professor spoke up. "It could refer to Leif Eirikson, the Norse explorer, son of Eirik the Red, who, after arriving in Iceland in A.D. 985 proceeded to purchase a ship and set foot upon the North American continent. Or, after all, it still is a very common Scandinavian name." Nabiki puckered slightly, not one for long explanations of things she already knew the answer to. "That'd be the name of the new exchange student in the sophomore class. But what's this area here on the back?" She pointed to it with her second, effeminate finger. "Sorry; I didn't see that." He took a quick glance and then responded. "That appears to be 'From S' period, 'A' period—possibly the initials of whomever gave it to Leif." Nabiki's face pruned. "I don't know an S.A., so I guess I can just ask him. Thanks for your help, professor." "Any time, any time." Dr. Arakaki replaced the book on the shelf as Nabiki replaced the slip of now-translated paper in her right-front pocket and proceeded out the door. Arakaki mumbled as he went back to his research on the previous arcane book. "Somehow, I have a feeling she's not going to ask that kid anything." He didn't have to grade papers now, or at least he didn't want to. It was his planning period, after all.
"Captain Kuno, sir?" The elder sibling eyed his lieutenant. "What is it?" The boy stumbled a bit; the leer he was receiving didn't help either. "That Gosunkugi kid you wanted is waiting outside for you." "Thank you." He got off his meditation pillows (dark blue; they matched his kendo uniform.) and proceeded outside the practice hall. There stood a slightly wiry, wide-eyed boy with extremely dilated pupils. "You called for me, Upperclassman Kuno?" The seemingly nihilistic and smallish boy craned his neck and blinked, like a demented heron. Kuno skewed his face and eyebrows slightly, and then replied. "There is a new student in your class—Sophomore Class E. Are you aware of this?" Kuno placed his hands clasp behind his back and stood; it was his militarial stance, one of the more subtle ways of intimidation he possessed. Gosunkugi thought for a moment then responded. "You mean the exchange student? The one with the orange hair and the black leather jacket who made a fool of himself yesterday?" Kuno laughed, scoffing at the response. "Good, good. At least those glasses of yours are good for one thing." Hikaru blinked, taking off the said glasses, blowing on them and then replacing them. "Well, actually, sir, it was going around the entire school circles. I've never actually seen him." Kuno soured. "Wonderful. His guile concerns me in several ways, Underclassman..." As Tatewaki trailed off, Hikaru (touching his pointer finger to his sideburns) finished the unspoken request. "And you want me to find a weak point?" "Precisely. Otherwise, I wouldn't waste valuable time dealing with scum of your low caliber. And if you think that rubber snakes will work…" The voodoo kid gulped. "Yes sir." Kuno went back to his… "meditation".
The rabbit-eyed boy unaffectionately known as "Voodoo Spike" spent the first three minutes of his lunch period fumbling in some bushes. The 400 ISA film he had on hand; it was twelve exposure. And always twelve exposures, in case someone confiscated the camera and felt like damaging his film, he could have several rolls of pictures, and hopefully, at least one would survive. His new SLR was nice because it had electronic controls that could be set to automatically take care of speed, f-stop, and flash timing (if necessary) so he could get to his favorite part, the lurking. And besides, the Swiss lenses were sharp and cool looking. With a loud "snap" he finished, as the camera whirred for a short time to prepare the film. Once a green LED light appeared next to the viewfinder, he popped his mop of black hair above the top of the shrubbery, scanning the horizon for trouble. He carefully got up, and proceeded to the back side of the school.
Furinkan looked small, and though it was small in width, it comprised several buildings and went back quite a ways. "Hmm… If Leif was in the same spot today as he was yesterday, that'd put him at the oak tree." Gosunkugi sprinted behind a small row of trees on the side of the tech building. The tech building was originally just a wood shop class that was added on to and updated to have the same architecture as the front of the school. Not only that, but it provided great cover. The problem, of course, were the jocks from said shop class, who just happened to be walking out of the exit and through the permanent awning, presumably to go to the food lines in the main building. Hikaru hid with his back against the wall where the exit jutted out slightly, making an "L" shape. "Yeah, but did'ja hear about the World Cup?" Gosunkugi held his breath and listened further. "Those crazy Europeans. They get so hyped and then they go crazy when Brazil beats them for the zillionth time." "Talk about it." A metal hinge squeaked, followed by the faint hiss of a hydraulic arm until the door jostled shut. There were concrete steps directly ahead of him that could be directly reached from the tech building, although that would put him in the smaller field, out in the open. Gosunkugi instead put his camera on his sling, and while almost whistling, slipped around to the awning and walked down it, as if to go to lunch. His plan was going perfectly…
"Hikaru Gosunkugi, what are you doing here?" A voice asked, without malice. The eternally purpled-lower-eye-lidded guy did an about face to see a certain youngest Tendo behind him. He started to quiver. "Umm…Akane…Tendo?" She blinked. "Yes?" "Well, I was walking to the main building to grab some…lunch. Wh-why should you ask?" Akane smirked confusedly. "I meant with the camera." "Oh, the camera. He he." He smiled weakly while his left hand rubbed the back of his head, rubbing his hair. "Well, next semester, they're starting up a photography club, so I was hoping to get some practice ahead of time on some the harder stuff. You know…framing, changing f-stop ratios for light conditions without a flash, and into-the-sun shots." Akane blinked. "Oh, okay. See you around." She walked off towards the field as Hikaru sighed, half relieved, half euphoric. His half-truth had worked. The school was starting up a photography club, and he was going to practice, just not now or here. "She…talked…to me…again." Hikaru smiled, as he mumbled the sentence. He quickly shook off his spaced-out brain. "I have a mission to complete!" He snuck around to the side of the main building, and found another patch of shrubbery. He checked his watch. He had over another half hour remaining, which should have been sufficient.
Gosunkugi reached into his left pocket, withdrawing a telephoto lens. He twisted off the protective back, and then inserted it into the camera body with a slight "snap". He pulled forward the sun shade, then while looking through the viewfinder, and he pulled out the lens slightly when rotating it counterclockwise. It showed a girl, black hair, who was leaning on the tree, roughly in line with Hikaru. Perpendicular to the girl, about eighty degrees of rotation clockwise was a tall boy sitting, his back against the tree. He was eating something. That wasn't what got his attention. What got his attention was a combed mop of orange hair that would glistened enough to give back lens flare, had the hair not been in the oak tree's shadow. "Well, Leif Zahn, I've…found you." He muttered to himself as he zoomed in, as Leif had started speaking. Of course, he couldn't hear at both the distance and the ambient noise, but of course, Hikaru Gosunkugi was mildly good at lip reading, so he zoomed the lens out to its full 10 magnification capacity, twisting slightly to keep it in focus. He focused on the mouth. Gosunkugi then, in a risky but unnoticed move begin to whisper what he heard. "...and I want you to leave me alone. That note was supposed to have been the last darn communiqué? No, wait, contact." Hikaru pulled back slightly, snapped a picture, moved back to encompass the pair, snapped another three pictures, and another as the girl smirked and walked off. He hastily removed the lens, replaced the wide angle lens, and got up, failing to keep a low a profile as he had wanted. "I wonder…about what note?"
The next order of business was of course, to trail the subject in question. However, that would have to wait until school was out for the day, as Hikaru's watch had beeped—the alarm he had set went off. "Time to go." He took off the telephoto and replaced it with his standard wide angle as the film automatically rewound itself. After a click, he retrieved the film, and placed it in his pocket. He got up; dusting his trousers, then slinked around to the right side of the building. Of course, he had given himself twice as much time was needed to get to class, because, for Gosunkugi, there was a great deal of importance in not being seen.
"Do my ears deceive me? Nabiki Tendo, asking for help?" Tatewaki Kuno stroked his chin thoughtfully, having already straightened his shirt collar. Nabiki frowned. "I was asking what you know about him." Kuno chuckled. "Well, if you wish to know, it shall cost you. What have you been charging me? I think two thousand yen should be sufficient for my services." Nabiki walked to Kuno and whispered in his ear. "How about this. You tell me, now, and I won't not only stop sales, but I'll not find ways of destroying what I've already sold you as well." Kuno got a look of illness on his face. "Fine. I hate you, but fine." He sat back down at his desk, and after looking around quickly, started to weave his tale. "From what I've seen, this Zahn boy is peculiar. He almost disregards me, and yet he has honor towards me. Is his goal to discredit or humiliate me, or is it but to delay or change my mind? I know not, but there is only one thing that truly worries me about him. His eyes. Those sapphires of his burn with untold radiance, they conceal something about him that both drives him and kills him. A passion if you will, of power not seen since the knights of old. Not seen for a hundred—" Nabiki interrupted. "I asked for facts, not a soliloquy." "He's an exchange student from Washington State in the U.S., approximately six foot one or two, a very light build, an injured leg, and obviously in near-manic depression. Is that what you wanted?" Nabiki closed her notebook. "I already knew that. I also know that you hired a sophomore, a Hikaru Gosunkugi to investigate on your behalf." Tatewaki's face cringed for the second time. "Egg… How do you—Ah, well. I sincerely hate you." She just smiled blissfully. "I know." She sat back down. "How do you know that!" Kuno yelled, just as the teacher had reached his podium. Lunch had just ended. "Kuno?" "Yes sir?" "Take your seat…now." Tatewaki gulped and quietly sat down.
The bell signifying the end of class shrieked like a banshee at the appropriate time. Well, it was technically fourteen seconds early, but then again, the students didn't really mind. Before they even reached the hallway, Yuki and Sayuri were already formulating plans for hitting the mall on Thursday or Friday, but Akane was concentrating on a certain flummoxed fiancé. "Ugh… Why the heck did she have to do that? I've still worn out." Akane shrugged. "You were 'misbehaving' again, weren't you?" Ranma cut a frazzled glance. "At least she thought so." Leif, who had been following down the hall at a distance, moved up just slightly behind the couple, people (who had been standing near the lockers) dispersing and moving away at the sight of the red-haired gaijin. "Who made you tired?" Ranma turned around to see an inquisitive faced "gaijin". "Ah, it's just my first hour. 'Ya know, home room? She's a weirdo. A pain in the tail." "I see." Leif then stopped at his locker as he had just passed it. The boys standing to the left side leered and more quietly resumed their conversations. He quickly spun the dial, popped it open, and grabbed the one folder he needed when he stopped for moment. "Something's wrong." He set his satchel on the floor next to the locker below his. He grabbed his staff, and spun around. There stood the boy with the blond-bleached hair and two of his cohorts.
"Well, well, well, if it isn't the little freak gaijin from the other day. I was feelin' like a little bit of a payback for weirding the crap out the school." He withdrew a small shiny, brownish object, and then lunged at Leif. Leif dodged the boy's left hook by ducking and slid his feet counter-clockwise around him. He twirled the staff, the tip impacting the blond's back as he spun around in a circle. The blow knocked the wind out of the aggressor, and as he stood stunned, Leif continued his circle in place by lifting his right knee. Leif then forcefully kicked his shins while sliding his back leg around behind him, simultaneously thrusting the staff into the hip. "Agghhh," was all he gurgled. Leif heard the brass knuckles "ting" when they hit the floor as the punk fell onto the tiled floor. One of his black-haired accomplices rushed up behind him. Leif smiled to himself, then twisted in place, holding his staff vertical, touching the floor. A loud crack was heard as the assailant's attempted chop smacked into cold metal. Leif then rotated his right and upper hand around the pommel, turning the block into a clean, horizontal slice. Leif could hear bone crack. Needless to say, the force of impact threw the boy backwards into the lockers, one of the handles impacting on his spine. "One to go." The last kid, looking slightly more intelligent and wearing a black sport-coat, and thoroughly enraged, grabbed the staff with both hands, intending to push Leif back. Leif lowered his arms while sliding foot-first into the kid, then threw him backwards. A "twang" sounded as he landed in the trashcan, head first. The dyed-haired instigator slowly regained consciousness about three minutes later. "What the hell was that? He does martial arts with that damn thing?" He tried to prop himself on his arms only to yelp in pain. "The little…"
Leif was very wary walking home. His senses poised, he felt something amiss. As he walked through the final turn before the dojo's street, he slipped into an alley on the right side of the street, placing his back against the wall closest to the direction he had came. Soft footsteps… Leif lunged out of the shadows, throwing his shadower against the wood fence with one hand and with the other, held his staff at his stalker's throat. It was Hikaru Gosunkugi. "What the heck are you doing following me?" Gosunkugi pointed at himself, gulped, and started talking. "I was just part of the welcoming committee at school and I was wondering—." Leif noticed the camera. "If I'd like to be followed and photographed? No. Give me that." He scowled. "But…" Leif pored at the boy, who then hastily handed him his camera. Leif skillfully rewound the film via automatic rewind, then popped open the back of the case. He deposited the 35 mm. roll in his navy blue right-front jacket pocket, clicked the SLR body shut, then handed it back to Gosunkugi, withdrawing his staff from the vicinity of his jugular, and setting it beside him.
"Now, what were you going to ask me?" Leif, a bit more lightheartedly asked. "I was trying to give you…these." After rummaging through his coat pocket, Hikaru withdrew two gift certificates and handed to him. "Luigi's Pasta Palace? No thanks." Hikaru blinked as Leif handed the tickets back. "But, they're free, you know, for being an exchange student?" He smiled hopefully. "Nah, I can't stand Italian. Pizza and spaghetti are okay, but it would be silly to go there just for spaghetti." Hikaru relaxed. "He's definitely not a Mafioso!" He thought for a moment, then spoke. "Well, if you like pizza, there's always Ucchan's Okonomiyaki. It's kind of like pizza. You should try it." Leif nodded. "Thanks." Hikaru lifted his finger up in inquisitiveness. "Can I leave without swift, painful death now? Please?" Leif shrugged, then grinned. "Sure, why not?" Hikaru sighed a second time, looking around for a moment. "Well, I was just afraid that—." Leif was already gone by the time he turned his head around. The wooden door to the Tendo yard creaked closed. Hikaru then opened his right hand, revealing his goal. A single strand of medium-length red-orange lay in it. The voodoo kid grinned. He was going to like the next part.
Hikaru walked across town (or rather, across the ward of Nerima) when he reached an oddly large house. To the best of his knowledge, the concrete gated mansion—if it could be called that; it was too big for a house, and too small a mansion—had been the private residence of a German business magnate in the 1970's, while he lived in Japan. After he moved back to his native land, the tile-roofed home was sold…to Miyo's parents. "Come to think of it, I haven't met her." He continued, vocalizing his final word of "Yet". As Gosunkugi opened the iron gate, he noticed a strange piece of stained glass mounted above the front doors—a hexagram.
As he approached the door, it opened before him. Out stepped a girl, about his age, with long bushy brown hair. Normal, except for her eyes. They were almost entirely green, with barely any visible white and no real pupil to speak of; the green wasn't a natural, bright green, but a dank olive. "Well, Gosunkugi Hikaru. I've been expecting you. Always nice to meet someone else in…" she hesitated, "…the art." Hikaru's face tightened. "But I never said I was coming. I never called, I never—." Miyo nodded slightly. "And prognostication is my specialty. Please, come inside." Hikaru noticed another pair of the symbols above the door knob assemblies as he stepped inside. The house was fairly dark, when it was a sunny day outside. The only light that glanced in the room was from what had been an electric chandelier that had later been replaced, as obvious by the irregular flickering. They flickered like candles, but on closer inspection, it still was an electric chandelier, much to Gosunkugi's surprise, given the house's odd décor. It had been designed that way. "Now, whom did you want to know about?" Miyo stared him straight in the eye after speaking her sentence almost monotonically, yet with a hint of mystery; she seemed like perhaps a talking cobra would before it bit you. Gosunkugi slid up to the hexagram-engraved table in a large oaken armchair, albeit rather slowly, before answering the girl's question. "Leif Zahn." Miyo smiled. "Ah, the bisque exchange student. He is…intriguing. Shall we consult…the cards?" Miyo cocked her head every so slightly, giving a lax stare.
Miyo shuffled her tarot deck carefully, until she was ready to make her first selection. She picked up the card carefully, examining it while Gosunkugi examined the strange teal design embossed into the navy back of the card. "Aha, just as I expected. The Magus appears first." She flipped another over. "The Nine of Swords." And another. "The Three of Swords." She laid those cards for Gosunkugi to see as she continued. For a fourth, she drew the Moon card, followed by Ten of Swords. "And for a sixth, what shall it be?" She paused. "What? The Seven of Swords? This is strange. The arcane cards I think I understand, but what do the swords have in connection? And why all of the same suit?" She held up all six cards in a fold, scanning them meticulously. Suddenly, a slight hiss was heard as the cards ignited into an entirely blue flame. "Aghh!" Miyo screamed as she threw the cards on the table, watching as they burned brightly, leaving no trace. "I've never seen this happen! The cards don't know?" She sighed as Hikaru raised his hand. "What does that mean?" Miyo grimaced. "It means I need a new deck of cards. But wait, there's always the ball." As she got up to retrieve the crystal ball, her tetragonal star sapphire pendant emblazed slightly.
"Now this is very strange. It is not a person or a place I see, but an object. A quartz crystal, as pure as glass, but with a strange malformation. Ah, I see. A piece of dark mineral makes the quartz smoky, but only in one sliver that pierces the center. How odd. Normally, I can see things less vague and—." At that point, a "chink" was heard as the crystal ball shattered—into four separate and perfect pieces. "What? Oh no… this is indeed a bad omen…" Miyo lamented the loss of her favorite sphere as she examined the sliced pieces; perfect as if a sliced melon. "And only four pieces. That is unlucky…unless…" Hikaru stared at her. "…Unless what?" Miyo didn't reply. Instead, she went over to a cabinet, opened the drawer third from the top and withdrew a small whiskey compass. She sauntered back over without even the softest sound and held the compass over the broken object in question. "Unless it aligns…with the cardinal directions…" She smiled. "This Leif Zahn is quite fascinating. A mystery, even to my methods. He acts as black ice, and yet is being torn apart. That is all I know. I can't even find out who or what. He is an interesting character. Thank you for bringing him up. I hope we can work together in the future." "Thanks." Hikaru blurted his reply as he quickly vacated the residence of the all too spooky girl. Hikaru thought for a moment. "All I've got now is a pretty good indicator that's he not a Mafioso, and a freaked out fortune teller. I'm dead." He patted his jacket pocket, revealing a cased roll of film. "The pictures!" Hikaru still had the roll with the "incriminating" pictures. "Nothing by themselves, but if Kuno got his crazy sister of his involved, I'm sure they're incriminating." "Perhaps I'm not dead. But Zahn is going to die, one way or another."
