Chapter Eight: Stranger Than Ever 陌生人比任何时候都

When I woke up, my head felt like it was going to rupture. I groggily grabbed the alarm clock off my desk.

"Huh? Oh my God, it's twelve o'clock!" I screamed. I am going to be so majorly late for school! …And why do I care so much? It was weird because I had never thought that before. Truthfully, some days I would just skip school. I jumped out of bed and looked for my uniform under the mass piles of junk that littered the floor. My head was pounding and searing with pain, but I had a strong urge to go to school. I heard a faint knock at my door as Ryou and Keiichiro crept in.

"How are you feeling, Komori?" Keiichiro asked pitifully.

"Horrible! I'm majorly late for school!" I panicked.

"Whoa! Slow down there! I think you hit your head a little TOO hard. Get back in bed." Ryou instructed in a motherly tone. He led me back to my bed and forced me to lie down.

"You took quite a spill yesterday." Ryou said.

"Do you remember anything?" Keiichiro asked quietly. I would have told them the story with the bat, but that would convince them that I needed more bed rest. I also would probably get in trouble for going into that locked room...if I even did go in there, that is. But what if it was just a dream? What if I really did just hit my head really hard and the bat was just an illusion?

"Um, no, not really." I said shakily.

"It's all my fault! I shouldn't have left you alone, Komori! I'm so sorry! I came into the café to make sure you had locked up and I found you lying on the floor unconscious!" Keiichiro wailed.

"It's all right, Keiichiro. I probably would have slipped even if you had been there." I reasoned, trying to ease his guilt.

"Well, you need your rest." Ryou said as he and Keiichiro walked out.

"Just scream really loud if you need anything." Keiichiro joked, provoking a snicker from Ryou. I rubbed my head, which was still pounding and managed to lull into an uneasy sleep.

Down in the lab…下面在实验室

Ryou sat at his computer typing while Keiichiro fiddled with a small gadget. "It's really weird how she doesn't remember anything." Keiichiro said.

"Yeah, and what's even weirder is that the security cameras blanked out before then too." Ryou said, still typing.

"Do you think someone breached the security system and hit her on the head to gain access into the lab?" Keiichiro asked.

"The odds of that are almost nil. But just to be sure, I already looked over everything for fingerprints and nothing was stolen as far as I could tell." Ryou continued.

"I don't think I like the sound of any of this." Keiichiro reasoned. Ryou continued typing until a red box popped up on the screen. Ryou gasped, his eyes wide. He solemnly turned to face Keiichiro.

"Our worst fears have been confirmed." Ryou said gravely.

"Which ones?" Keiichiro grinned.

"The ones that involved the aliens returning, Keiichiro. Masha detected alien activity below the Earth's surface just now. The mischievous little imps are planning something…" Ryou said.

"The same race?" Keiichiro said, leaning towards the computer with a new found interest.

"No, the data says it's a different kind than seven years ago. They appear to be a far more advanced race." Ryou explained.

"I guess that means we're going to be busy for a while aren't we?" Keiichiro frowned.

"Yeah, real busy." Ryou sighed, rubbing his eyes.

Back upstairs, at 5:00 PM…回楼下以 5

I woke up again, but my head still hurt as badly as before. I slowly sat up and changed into some clothes, then started to go downstairs (okay, two wrong turns this time, but I had a minor concussion, so give me some credit ). Ryou and Keiichiro were nowhere to be found. They're probably working on some sort of cake recipe. I decided that I was definitely going to school tomorrow, no matter what I felt like or what Ryou said. I felt Takara needed me, somehow. I also wanted to get another glimpse of Kiyoshi. I nabbed a breakfast bar from the kitchen, sat down, and began to munch on it until the doorbell rang. I was startled when I opened the door to find Takara on my doorstep with a small stack of papers in her hand.

"Oh! Hi, Komori! I thought I had the wrong address when I saw the house!" she said, laughing.

"Anyway," she continued excitedly, "I saw you were absent today so I went around and got all the assignments you missed so you wouldn't be behind tomorrow!" She really does talk a lot. She handed me the stack of papers with my name written on them. Yeah, like homework is going to make me feel any better. Oh, well. Better not burst her bubble.

"Oh, wow. Thanks a lot, Takara." I smiled.

"Are you feeling better?" she asked curiously.

"Yeah, I should be able to go back to school tomorrow, if my cousin thinks I'm well enough." I answered, rubbing my head.

"Oh, you live with your cousin?" she pried.

"Yeah, my mom sent me to live here for the school year." I yawned.

"I see… Well, I'd better get going. I hope you feel better!" she smiled and ran off down the sidewalk. It surprised me quite a lot to see that she went through all that trouble just for me. Maybe that's what real friends do. I made a mental note to get her missing assignments if she was ever sick. The next morning Ryou deemed me fit enough to go to school.

"But if you start feeling bad again, just give us a call and we'll come get you." he said. He's acting more like a parent every day. I quickly got ready for school. I didn't think I had ever been so happy to return to school. I arrived at school a little earlier than I did on the first day so I could get a better spot to sit at. Takara was already there, sitting on the steps thumbing through some papers in her bookbag.

"Takara!" I called. She looked up and waved back at me. I ran over to sit next to her.

"Did you just get dropped off in a limo?" she asked with wide eyes.

"Yeah, it's the only car my cousin owns (that I know of, at least). I would have really just settled for any regular old car." I explained, really trying not to come off as snobby.

"Wow!" she said, her eyes getting bigger. I looked around.

"No sign of the Leiko Gang right now." I said cheerfully.

"They wouldn't be caught dead at school this early." she said. I scanned the front of the school to see who else would come to school this early. I noticed that the fencing club was having practice, but other than that we were pretty much alone. Takara caught my gaze.

"The fencing club meets every morning from four to six, rain or shine." she explained.

"Wow, it must be torture having to wake up so early every morning." I said in wonder. We both sat there and watched the fencing club practice. They were really quite good. One player in particular stood out; their form was great and their opponents sword couldn't even manage to make a single hit. Imagine my astonishment when he took off his helmet and I saw that it was Kiyoshi!

"Oh my god, it's Kiyoshi!" I yelled in shock.

"Who?" Takara asked, puzzled.

"A guy I met in the hallway. He didn't really strike me as the athletic type, you know?" I said, turning to her. She looked over at the fencing team.

"Hm, he's pretty good, actually." she observed. We sat there watching them fence and after they left, decided to study. Even thought there really wasn't anything to study. After the Leiko Gang showed up, we moved out of their sight, knowing they would probably come after me after what happened with Takara the other day. Takara and I breathed a sigh of relief when the bell rang and ran inside as fast as we could. I expected today to be just like the first day, but I was wrong. Very wrong.

A lot of strange things happened: First, I kept falling asleep in class (more than I usually did, anyway). And then at lunch, the only thing I would eat was fruit. After munching down all the fruit I could find Takara giggled. "You're going to turn into a fruit, the way you're eating it!"

The second, and last, weird thing was that at night I couldn't get to sleep. At two in the morning I still wasn't sleepy and stayed up until I collapsed around six. I wonder…