I'm back! Wow it has been such a long, long time since I have uploaded something. I apologize for being inactive, but now since it's summer and I am officially a college alumni, I know have time to write more often. Next mission in life: find a job! Lol. Hope you all enjoy the chapter.
Disclaimer: Ouran, characters and plot, belongs to Bisco Hatori. Setsuna and any other character do belong to me. Also, the reference to Setsuna's costume comes from ..
Chapter 35: Down the Rabbit Hole
I was skipping to school this morning; that's right, skipping. The slight cool air hit my legs since I was wearing shorts today to school as I skipped along the sidewalk while wearing my black Chucks. Fuka was right beside me, staring at me as if I was a lunatic.
"What are you so happy about this early in the morning?" Fuka asked with a confused look. "You're normally glaring at everything that passes by you."
I slightly turned my head to look at her and smiled, "You'll understand when you're older."
"I don't think I want to understand since its making you look stupid," she smartly replied back.
A glare was sent towards her, "Don't ruin my morning. Or I'll kill you with my finger poking your stomach and surrounding you with stuffed animals while you sleep."
"You're weird."
"Damn right I am!"
Once Fuka and I arrived at Ouran, we both went our separate ways by shouting to each other phrases like "See you at home, stupid!" or "Don't kill yourself!"
Ah, I love our sisterly love.
I walk into the high school division of Ouran in search for any of the Host Club members. As I walked through the corridors, I took notice that it was still a bit early since there weren't many people hanging outside of their classrooms. I decided to sit next to a window and continue reading my Alice's Adventures in Wonderland book. Knowing them, they would all pop out of nowhere and kidnap me to try on new clothes or something along those lines.
I had barely managed to get three chapters in when I felt a presence approaching me. I looked up from my book and I found Haruhi.
"Ohayo, Haruhi!" I smiled as I closed my book and placed it back in my messenger bag.
"Ohayo, Suna-chan! What were you reading?" The freshman asked as she took a seat next to me.
"Ah, I was just reading Alice's Adventures in Wonderland," a smile appeared on my face. "It's actually one of my favorite books. I guess you got here early too?"
Haruhi nodded her head, "Yeah I got here early since I got a phone call from Hikaru and Kaoru to go the Host Club since we have a meeting."
A blank face appeared as I said, "We have a meeting?"
Suddenly, my phone began to vibrate. I grabbed the little red device out of my pocket and did see that there was a text message. I flipped it open to see from whom it was and I saw that it was from Tamaki. It said we had a meeting that was going to start in five minutes. I closed my phone and sighed.
"It starts in five minutes. We should head out," I told her as I got up from my seat. Haruhi nodded her head and we both made our way towards the Third Music Room.
"Anything new in life, Suna-chan?" Haruhi asked me as we began taking the many flights up of steps up the stairs.
"I have a date," I smiled happily as I swung my arms back and forth. I waited for a few seconds to hear her response, but since I didn't get any, I turned to look at Haruhi only to find that she wasn't walking besides me. In fact, she actually froze in place.
"With who?" She asked after her little phase of being in some sort of shock.
"Takashi."
Again, she froze in place. "Mori-senpai? As in Morinozuka Takashi-senpai?"
All I did was nod my head, "Ah."
"You are talking about the Mori-senpai who rarely talks and is always carrying around Hunny-senpai everywhere."
"Yup!"
"Wow. Congrats, Suna-chan," Haruhi smiled as we were quickly approaching the Third Music Room.
I just giggled, "Thanks, Haruhi! Oh yeah, don't we have a theme today?"
Haruhi placed a finger on her chin and with a pensive tone she said, "Hm, I think we do. Maybe that's what we are going to talk about right now."
"Let's just wait and see, I guess," I told her are we now stood in front of the door. I pushed the doors open and I was grateful not to be hit by those red rose petals that I keep on swearing that I will choke on. Already inside were the Twins, Takashi, Hunny, Kyoya, and the King himself.
"Ohayo, everyone!" Haruhi and I greeted at the same time while walking in.
A chorus of good mornings was heard as we quickly approached the group. Taking the only remaining to seats on near the group, I was next to Hunny and Haruhi was sandwiched between the Twins.
"Ohayo, Suna-chan!" Hunny glomped me as soon as I sat next to him.
"Hi, Hunny!" I hugged the little guy back. I looked above to see Takashi smiling towards me. The memory of last night was still in my head and I was trying really hard to fight back the blush that was creeping on my face slowly. "Hi, Takashi."
Takashi smiled, "Ohayo."
"Now that we are all here, let us begin today's meeting," Tamaki said with an actual calm and not so boisterous manner. "I called you all in today to discuss about new methods that we can actually use towards our customers and make them even happier."
Now this definitely caught my attention. I mean, what else can we do as a group and individually to make these girls happy? They just freaking go kya for anything that is done.
'Oh man, I can feel that the crazy Tamaki is gonna be popping out anytime soon. How the hell am I gonna put up with this, this early in the morning,' I thought to myself as I was beginning to tune out Tamaki.
Apparently I wasn't the only one. Kyoya was too busy looking at his files, most likely calculating numbers and such. The Twins were just picking on Haruhi, telling her about new fashion designs, that they want to try out on her while Haruhi was trying to squirm her way out. Hunny was simply playing with Usa-chan. Takashi was reading one of his books, from what I was able to tell it was a history book.
"And with that said, Setsuna-senpai will be paired off with me today," Tamaki finally finished.
Wait…
"Huh?" We all, minus Kyoya and Takashi, shouted out.
"No offense, Tamaki, but why am I paired up with you? I mean, you already make enough profits for the club by yourself," I both questioned and stated.
I was kinda hoping that Tamaki would reply to my question, but instead Kyoya answered and when Kyoya answers, the reply a person would get is normally something that they wouldn't like.
"You see, Setsuna-senpai, we wanted to make your role in the club to be more, how do I put it, more versatile," his glasses gleamed with the answer.
"A-ah," I was only able to stutter out.
"Well, that is kinda true," Hikaru spoke.
"Since her costume for today does go along with Tono's," Kaoru finished his twin's statement.
"What is the theme for today?" Haruhi asked.
"You should ask Setsuna-senpai. She has been carrying that book around her for quite some time now to the point it got Tamaki interested," Kyoya spoke with his calm attitude.
Hunny turned to look at me and said, "Ne, Suna-chan, what book do you have? Does it have someone like Usa-chan in it?"
Being the confused person I am I started to dig everything out of my messenger bag in search of the book they were talking about.
"History, English, Alice, Math," I was about to place my math book over my Alice book when I finally realized it. "We're doing that!"
A smile was plastered on face when I saw Tamaki, Hikaru, and Kaoru nod their heads. I was about to say something when the bell rang, announcing that it was time to head to class.
"Now remember, please arrive on time so that we can get into our costumes," Tamaki announced as we all got ready to leave for class.
I quickly gathered all my belongings and placed them inside of my messenger bag without a care. This was another thing to add on my list of good things happening during the week. Once that was completed I began walking out the doors of the Third Music Room with everyone besides one another. Once we made it down the staircase, we each bid farewells and went to our separate classrooms.
"Suna-chan, are you excited for today's cosplay?" Hunny asked me as he was in between Takashi and me.
"Un, this has been one of my favorite books for quite a while now. I wonder who they chose me to cosplay as," I pondered as I tapped the tip of my chin. "I kinda have a feeling of who you two might be though."
"Who?" Takashi, with his deep, amazing voice asked.
I made my way in front of them to stop the two from walking. I first pointed at Hunny, "You would most definitely be a rabbit character. In other words, you would either be the White Rabbit or the March Hare."
"I get to be like Usa-chan! Sugoi!" Hunny cheered as he tossed Usa-chan up in the air. Where the rabbit came I don't know.
"Takashi on the other hand would probably be the Knave of Hearts, the Red Knight, or White Knight. It depends on which book they are using," I told the two as I started walking backwards to head to our classroom.
"Wow, Suna-chan! You know a lot about this book, ne?"
I nodded my head with such a passion, "Yeah, it's one of my favorite books. I have the tendency to be a book addict so I like reading a lot. I even sometimes re-read books all over again for fun. Well not all books. I really don't like text books that I find boring."
We made it to class and took our normal seats. The lectures were always the same to me, boring but well informing. To me it felt like a daily routine. Even though everything was the same for me, except that I got called on to solve some math problems. Other than that, it was all normal…not cool.
It was then finally Host Club time. I literally dashed out of the classroom, leaving both Takashi and Hunny behind, so that I can get to the room and see what my costume was going to be. I ran up the steps, tripping once in a while, but once I was outside those doors, I pushed them open.
To my surprise, there were no intricate designs all over the room. No giant mushrooms, no colorful plants, just absolutely nothing. This really caught me off guard to the point that when I stepped forward, I slipped on something causing me to fall face-first to the ground.
"Son-of-a-" I got up slowly from the floor as I rubbed my nose.
"Ah Setsuna-senpai, you're here earlier than usual," I looked towards the direction of the voice. Kyoya was sitting on a chair, his laptop out in front of him on the table as he seemed to be working on some calculations.
"Uh, yeah. Kyoya, where are all the decorations?" I asked him; well stated would be the proper term for me.
He looked towards my direction and just said, "In order for us to have our next theme, monetary actions had to be done. You may want to start getting into your costume, Setsuna-senpai."
'He better be the freaking caterpillar for all I care. Their personalities definitely match in my opinion,' I turned away from him and headed towards the direction of the dressing room.
Opening the curtain to my dressing room, I hoped to find my costume hanging only to find two white boxes and a pair of black ankle heel boots. I sighed and closed the curtain behind me. I remove my black chucks along with my socks and start removing my blazer. I open the first box to find black nylons and a corduroy blue skirt with navy pinstripes.
Taking off my shorts I began with the nylons. Nylons are always a somewhat complicated thing to wear, so I rarely wore it. But once I had them on, I was ready for the skirt. The skirt itself was puffy since it had a grey pettiskirt underneath along with a brown rabbit's tail. Now that I had both items on I opened the next box.
This box had a cream colored with light purple polka dots button up shirt that ended on my elbows with a white frill. The buttons themselves were larger than the polka dots and were the same blue as the skirt. Inside there was also a brown blazer that ended at my waist. The sleeves of the blazer were rolled up so that it ended past my elbows enough to let the frills of the button up shirt be seen.
I finally had my complete outfit on when I noticed the last two pieces of accessories in the last box that I had opened. It was a corduroy bow tie and brown rabbit eats. It was official. I was set to cosplay as the March Hare today. Without placing the last two accessories, I walked out of the dressing room hearing the sound of my footsteps thanks to the heels.
"Oi! Who knows how to tie a bow tie?" I shouted to no one in particular as I walked around the dressing room to see who was there.
"Setsuna-senpai," I heard a voice say.
I turned around and saw that it was Kyoya. And boy did I have to say that I tried not to laugh. Here in front of me, the "Cool" type was dressed in a black dress that had a grey vertical stripe on the side of the black puffy sleeves which had a purple bow. It was the same for the front with a single grey vertical stripe going down. The dress also had a purple cape. His accessories consisted of a fan, purple earrings, and a gold hair band that held his long, black hair. You gotta admit, seeing Kyoya like this is hilarious.
"Kyo-Kyoya? Is that you?" I stuttered at him. "Looking good. Purple definitely suites you."
He gave me a glare for a few seconds before pushing his glasses closer to his brow, "Anyways, what where you screaming about earlier?"
"Oh yeah!" I walked towards him and handed him the bow tie. He simply looked down and raised an eyebrow. "I don't know how to put this on," I simply said.
He simply sighed and began to do the work for me. I just remained quiet and observed him as he quickly and eloquently tied the bow tie.
"Thank you, Kyoya," I smiled at him once he finished his job.
He simply nodded, "You're welcome. Now if you can excuse me, I need to work on some calculations for the club's next event." And with that he walked away.
"It still would have been pretty awesome if he had dressed up as the Caterpillar. I can picture it now, Kyoya holding a hookah thingy in his hands," I chuckled to myself. "Now where is everyone at?" I left the dressing room and walked towards the main room and that's where I found some of my favorite story book characters.
Now the Cheshire cat was one of my favorite characters because of the fact that he was mischievous and that he was helpful every once in a while. Now game time: who would be the best person, or should I say persons, to portray this character? Why no other than our mischievous "Little Devil" types. Hikaru and Kaoru were both wearing a purple and light purple striped long sleeved shirt and black pants and boots. Around their necks was a yellow bandanna and they both hair purple cat ears and black gloved paws.
"Looks like we have something to chase around, ne Kaoru," Hikaru asked as he and Kaoru walked up towards me.
"We most certainly do. But Hikaru, would you rather chase this hare rather than your own brother?" Kaoru looked down in sadness as he fakes tears.
Hikaru then grabbed his brother and held him in his arms, "Never."
"Hikaru."
"Save it for the customers when they get here. Don't wanna see that mumbo jumbo until they get here," I raised my right eyebrow at the two.
"You're no fun!" Kaoru said as he took the rabbit ears and placed them properly on the top of my head and bent the left ear downwards.
"Like I haven't heard that before. Where's Haruhi at?"
"She's taking a small nap right there," Hikaru pointed towards the direction of the young female. She was sitting on a chair and had her head lying down on the table with her arms folded, providing a form of pillow.
I smiled at the sight, "That girl deserves a break. Don't wake her up alright."
"We won't," the two spoke in unison.
"Look Takashi! Suna-chan and I are matching!"
I turned around and found the White Rabbit running towards my direction. Hunny was wearing a light-ish red tailcoat and a light pink button up shirt that had the cuffs pulled over the coat. His pants were a brown color and he had on black shoes. His accessories consisted of a big, and I mean big pocket watch, small round glasses that rested on the bridge of his nose, rabbit paws that covered his hands, and white rabbit ears that had a slight tint of pink.
As he ran towards me, I just stared at Takashi. Leave it to him to be a knight in this whole take on Alice. He had on silver armory and a blue drape that covered his chest. On the drape was a gold colored design of a spade. Underneath his armory, I was able to see that he had one a black long-sleeved turtle neck type shirt since it did cover his neck. His hands were gloved and he had a spear on his right hand and a helmet.
Hunny jumped in an instant which almost caught me off guard. I grabbed onto my fellow woodland creature and just watched him as he gave me the biggest smile yet.
"Suna-chan looks cute with bunny ears, ne Takashi?" Hunny turned to look at his cousin as he just kept smiling.
"Yeah," Takashi said as he blushed.
That's right; the Morinozuka Takashi blushed over the fact that I looked cute with rabbit ears. Wait that just reminded me of something: Hikaru and Kaoru had in fact made me a bunny girl outfit.
'Is he picturing that right now?' I blushed at the thought.
"Where's Haruhi? It's time for her to change into her costume," the Mad Hatter waltzed right in causing my blush to slowly disappear.
Tamaki was wearing a white suit in which under his sleeves held a frill like material like my own around his wrists. Underneath the blazer of his suit was what I believed to be a maroon colored button up blouse. A red elegant bow was placed instead of a regular tie. The last of his accessories consisted of white gloved hands and a white top hat that had a red silk around the bottom. The only difference between this Mad Hatter and the original was that instead of having the ¾ on the hat, he had two red roses.
"Shh, she's sleeping," I whispered to him. "You have to gently wake her up."
"Kaa-san," I heard a sudden whisper in the air. I turned to look towards Haruhi and saw that a small tear fell from eyes.
"Haruhi," Tamaki spoke in a much gentler tone this time. This time, it actually woke Haruhi up. "That's rare; you fell asleep?"
I watched Haruhi rub the sleep away from her eyes and she finally turned to look at us.
"It's almost time for our customers to come. Hurry up and get ready," Kyoya spoke as he held his fan up.
"A dream like a student life, huh? Indeed, there's not much difference between when I sleep and when I'm awake," Haruhi said with a smile and a blush.
'I wonder what she dreamt about that made her say that,' I thought to myself before walking towards the girl.
I held out my hand with a smile, "Come on, Haruhi. Let's get you ready. Especially before those two over there decide to undress you themselves."
Hiakru and Kaoru pouted as still held onto Haruhi's costume, "Aww Setsuna-senpai! We weren't going to do anything bad to her. Honest."
I turned towards them both and just gave them a face, "Uh-huh. And I'm Tinkerbell. Hand over the costume."
The two just looked towards one another and suddenly a brilliant idea popped into their heads.
"Setsuna-senpai would make a pretty fairy, right Kaoru," Hikaru told his twin before handing over the costume to me.
"She would actually. And she would get to show off that body of hers a lot more. Especially her legs," Kaoru smirked in return.
Grabbing the costume and dragging Haruhi along with me, I ran away from the two before other ideas came into mind. I swear those two will be the death of me before I even graduate. As soon as we made it into the safety of the dressing rooms, I released my grip on Haruhi and sighed. Haruhi also sighed with me as well.
I handed Haruhi her costume with a smile and said, "Here's your costume."
It was a pretty dress that followed the original concept of Alice's dress. The only difference was that they added a pink trim underneath some of white apron. I bet her only accessories would be the black headband, black and blue stocking, and black shoes. I'd be a genius if I was correct. Pushing her into the dressing room, I grinned at the thought of how Tamaki is going to react seeing Haruhi in a dress.
"Hurry and get dressed. I wanna see you in that costume already."
"Alright, alright. You're acting just like Hikaru and Kaoru, Suna-chan," Haruhi stated as she walked into the dressing room.
"I can't help it," I told her as I closed the curtain for her. "You're going to be dressed as one of my favorite characters. Sue me for getting excited."
It didn't take long for the girl to get dressed and she came out exactly as how I pictured it. Haruhi simply began tugging the dress, looking as if she was slightly uncomfortable.
"It's the frills huh?" I stated as I fixed her hair to place her headband better.
She just looked at me and nodded her head. Knowing her pain, I shrugged my shoulders and pulled her along back to the others.
"Come on now, cheer up. At least you don't have to wear this short skirt and heels," I tried cheering her up.
"That's true. But you gotta admit, Suna-chan, you look nice in it."
"So do you, Haruhi. I think blue looks really good on you."
"Haruhi!"
We both immediately stepped aside, allowing Tamaki to fall onto the floor. Sweat drops adorned the top of our heads as we saw the Hatter get back up.
"Why won't you let your otou-san hug you? And why can't you dress like this more often?" Tamaki grabbed Haruhi's shoulder and began shaking her back and forth gently.
I groaned before deciding to get into this mix to help Haruhi. Grabbing Tamaki I began to pull him away, "Come on, Mad Hatter. We got work to do. The customers are already coming in."
Right when I said that, we heard footsteps outside of the door. Immediately the three of us froze before we started fixing ourselves into position. Right in the center of the group was Haruhi and on both sides of her were Hikaru and Kaoru, while Hunny was on her lap. The four of them were on the floor. The rest of us were standing. Behind Haruhi, more slightly to her left, was Tamaki who was touching his hat. To his left was me and my pose consisted of holding his left shoulder with my right hand and placing the left hand on my hip. Kyoya was to Tamaki's right and his position was basically him holding his fan open. Besides him was Takashi and he simply posed by holding his spear.
The doors suddenly opened and there was our first batch of customers.
"Welcome."
Immediately once customers began pouring in, I was dragged by Tamaki to our designation spot. It felt weird being next to the "Prince Type" since I was more accustomed to being with my fellow seniors and Haruhi. I swear all the corny pick-up lines that he's using is going to kill my brain cells. I was with Tamaki, talking with the customers that he wasn't paying attention to when I suddenly got called on.
"Setsuna-senpai, you have a set of customers that would like to designate you," Kyoya walked up to Tamaki and mine's spot.
"Really? Oh alright then."
Right when I was starting to get up, I began to hear a familiar voice. Two of them in fact.
"Yup, this is the place!"
"This school is huge!"
"Look at those uniforms. I hope Setsuna doesn't have to wear them."
A mop of brown hair and a light brown hair along with two others caught my attention as I walked to my designation spot. There are only two other people that I knew that had those set of colored hairs and didn't attend this school.
"Kain? Anzu?"
Right when their names slipped out of my mouth, the two turned around while the two other boys looked up at me.
"Setsuna! Wow you sure do make a cute rabbit!" Anzu replied as she got up from her seat and have me a hug.
Even while I was still in a slight state of shock, I gave the girl a hug as well. She looked slightly different from when I last saw her. Her light brown hair was slightly shorter and had layers. She wore a white t-shirt which was under an orange tank top dress.
"Hey, Setsuna!" Kain now took his turn hugging me as well. He looked the same since I last saw him. He wore a red shirt that was under a white button up shirt and had on blue jeans.
We all took a seat and that's when I got a good look at the two boys that was with them. The first one had black, short but messy hair and brown eyes. He was wearing a blue sleeveless shirt along with some black jeans. This guy had a bored look on his face. The last guy had bleach white spiky hair and brown eyes. He was wearing a black button up shirt with some black jeans. His face held a friendly smile compared to the other. He also looked a bit like Anzu.
Kain turned to me with a bright smile and said, "These are our friends. The guy with the white hair is Watari Arashi."
"Watari, ey?" I turned to look at Anzu.
"Yeah, he's my cousin. Same age as us," Anzu replied with a smile.
I faced Arashi and held out my right hand, "Nice to meet you Arashi-san. I'm Ayase Setsuna and no need to be formal. You can just call me Setsuna."
"Just call me Arashi. No need to be formal either, Setsuna," Arashi grinned as he shook my hand. "And this is Takagi Shigeru. Just ignore his grumpiness."
"Yo," was all that Shigeru said.
"So this is the famous Host Club you were talking about and what's with the rabbit costume, Setsuna?" Kain asked me as he began munching on the cookies that suddenly appeared out of nowhere.
'Why is it that I realize all these weird things popping out?' I questioned myself before answering Kain. "Well, today is a theme day so we based it off of Alice."
"This is a sign! I know it!" Arashi shouted with excitement.
"What does that mean?" I turned to look at both Kain and Anzu. What the hell does that mean?
I stayed with the four teens all the way until the end of the Host Club. As I went to change out of my costume to go back into my uniform, I was followed by Anzu.
"This place is really neat. Everything looks so exquisite," Anzu said as she waited behind the curtain for me to change.
I opened the curtain revealing me back into my uniform. As we walked out, Anzu stated that she was glad that I didn't wear those "duck looking" uniform. I laughed at her comment. But once I stepped foot into the main room with Anzu, I froze. The guys, minus Haruhi, were staring at Kain, Shigeru, and Arashi, while the three guys did the same as well.
Haruhi walked up towards me and Anzu sighing, "They've been staring at each other every since you went to change after introducing each other."
Kain turned to look at our direction and grinned, "Finally! Now we can tell you why we came here today."
I raised my right eyebrow questioning what he meant.
"Why did you come here today? Just out of curiosity," Kyoya questioned as he was writing in his little black book.
"Are you trying to take my daughter away? Setsuna-senpai, I won't let you go!" Tamaki dramatically shouted.
"Is he always like this?" Anzu questioned Haruhi and I.
"Yup," we both responded.
"Now that we have your undivided attention, the reason why we are here is because," Arashi started.
"We need you," Kain pointed at me.
"For the Battle of the Bands!" Kain and Arashi said in unison.
"What?"