"Hi, I'm home," muttered Alicia Testarossa sullenly as she entered the unkempt house, her feet making loud clacking noises on the wooden floor.

"Alicia, dear, how was your day?" asked Precia, coming out of the kitchen with a warm expression, looking quite motherly in an apron with a spoon in one hand. "I was just making a snack," she explained at Alicia confused stare.

"But you hate cooking," said Alicia, not even caring enough to give Precia more than another confused look.

"Well, I thought you'd be hungry, since you skipped breakfast,"

Alicia shrugged. "I guess. Not now, though," she noticed that Precia hadn't asked about Fate yet, and said, "Fate's over at a friend's house,"

Precia stiffened for a moment, but relaxed quickly. "Oh, that's lovely," she said in a fake, sugary voice that made Alicia want to gag. "Is she coming home soon?"

"No," Alicia answered dully. "She's sleeping over,"

"Oh, I should have brought her some things," said Precia, again with the fakeness, only this time feigning concern rather than glee.

"Whatever," said Alicia heavily. "I'm going up to study, I have a ton of work to do," she said, and stomped upstairs to her room, where she slammed the door and pulled out her homework with dileberate force.

Downstairs, her mother was still cooking, but with a thoughtful, hard expression on her face. "So, Fate told someone…" she mused aloud, her features transforming into something not quite human, animal-like, almost. Ugly. "She'll have to be punished," the thought seemed to cheer Precia up. "She'll have to come back eventually, she can't avoid this house forever…I can always call the police on her, she wouldn't dare tell,"

Precia laughed, a quick, out-of-control, horrifying sound, and went back to cooking, silently stirring pieces of vegetables into a watery soup, a slight smile on her face.

***

"Wow, your house is…"

"Small?" Nanoha supplied, throwing open the door to her room, revealing a bed and a desk strewn with papers.

"No," said Fate defensively. "I was going to say neat, but now that you look at it…"

"Mom will clean it tomorrow," Nanoha explained, shrugging. "It doesn't really matter to me, although now that you're here…" she eyed her friend sheepishly.

"It's fine,"Fate assured her. "I just keep my room clean, so Mother won't have another reason to…scold me,"

"You mean beat you," Nanoha corrected, sitting cross-legged on her carpeted floor, her blue eyes flickering. She brightened immediately, though, returning to her happy self with ease. "Come on, let's start our homework," she suggested to Fate, who nodded.

"Do you want to copy my math homework? I did it already," Fate offered.

Nanoha grinned. "You're a life-saver, Fate-chan," then she paused. "Can you help me study for the test, too?" she pleaded.

Settling herself beside Nanoha, Fate laughed. "Of course I will,"

"Yay!"

"Now, start copying, or else Kuro-sensei will bite you!" teased Fate.

"Yes, Fate-sama," Nanoha said, saluting her best friend, then leaned down to begin to fill in answers hurriedly.

Fate took out her notebook and began to write the essay due for English class the following day, but was interrupted by Nanoha almost immediately.

"Mou, Fate-chan, I can't read what you wrote here," she complained.

"Oh, that's a 395.3014," explained Fate. "Because you round up the probability of getting a 4 out of the number set and…"

"Okay, okay!" Nanoha said, scribbling down the answer. "I got it,"

"Sure, Nanoha," Fate rolled her eyes and returned to her essay. "We'll study later, okay?" she added, in case Nanoha was offended by her sharp retort.

"Hai, hai," the brunette agreed, but before she could continue her work, her cellphone rang. She grabbed it and flipped it open. "Hello?" There was a buzz on the other line. "Ehh…? Alicia-chan? Fate-chan? Okay, sure…Eh…Maybe…Here," Nanoha handed the phone to Fate, mouthing the words, 'It's Alicia'.

"Hello?" asked Fate into the phone.

"Mou, Fate-nee…Are you okay?" asked Alicia.

Fate laughed. "We've only been apart for around an hour," she told her twin sister.

"Well…it's not my fault Mom is totally weirding me out by cooking soup. Think she put glass in it?"

Fate shrugged, but then remembered Alicia couldn't see her. "I don't know." She figured it was best not to mention the time that Mother had given her some food that turned out not to be food at all, but actually some kind of drug that Fate didn't even want to think about.

"Anyway, watch out, 'cause Mom—Mother—says that she's gonna come get you tomorrow if you don't come home. And DON'T come home, Fate. If you put one foot inside this door if you trick your way past Nanoha, I will literally put you in a garbage can and bring you back to the Takamachi house. 'Cause you're not going to get hurt like that again,"

"Right," muttered Fate. "Ehh…"

"What is it?"

"Are you okay, Alicia? You sound a little stressed," Fate said tentatively.

"Well," sighed Alicia. "It's so booring here—and it's a little weird to be around Mother now that I've heard about…well, you know,"

"Sorry,"

Fate could practically feel Alicia roll her eyes. "Oh, I'm sooo heartbroken, you know! I'm just sooo sad about my fulfilling relationship with Mother, and now you've ruined it!" she said sarcastically.

"Glad you're not upset," Fate replied, matching Alicia's sarcasm with her own. She wasn't usually this way with anyone but Alicia—because they knew eachother so well, it was easy to joke. "So…"

"Oops, gotta go, someone's on the other line," piped up Alicia. "See you tomorrow!"

"Yeah, see you," agreed Fate.

One Day Later

"Fate-chan…Nanoha-chan…" Hayate called, running after her two friends, who were walking down the school hallway. "Do you want to eat lunch with us?" she asked as they turned.

Fate smiled. "Sure, Hayate-chan," she said. "Nanoha?"

"Mm!" Nanoha agreed, nodding her head. "I'd like to see Vita-chan!"
"Okay, follow me!" Hayate giggled, and flounced off down the hall, earning herself a sigh and a few rolls of the eyes from both girls.

Downstairs, Vita was leaning on Shamal's shoulder, while Signum was munching delicately on a rice ball, all of them sitting around a wooden table laden with food.

"Mi~nna!" trilled Hayate, flopping down to join them. "Fate-chan and Nanoha-chan are joining us today!"

Vita reached out and snagged a large roll from the center of the table. "Better eat now, otherwise Nanoha will eat it all," she explained.

"Vita-chan!"

Vita sniggered into her roll while Nanoha put her hands on her hips. "Mou, Vita-chan, that's not very nice!"

"It's the truth," Vita defended herself, her mouth full of bread.

Fate settled herself beside Signum and opened her lunch, pulled out her chopsticks and began to eat quickly.

"Abandoning me?" asked Alicia, coming up suddenly behind Fate and leaning on her shoulde and grinning down at her twin.

Fate looked up sheepishly. "Sorry," she said. "I forgot…"
Alicia stuck her tongue out at Fate. "So much for sisterly love, eh?"

"Pretty much," agreed Fate, resisting the urge to blush furiously and hide under the table.

"So, you wanna come over after school?"

"You guys don't live together?" asked Hayate curiously, squinting at the two.

"Long story," Alicia said. "But Fate's on extended leave with Nanoha for now,"

"Oooh, sounds delicious," said Hayate, licking her lips with her I-smell-juicy-gossip expression on. "Nanoha and Fate, neh?"

"No, I'm just sleeping over," Fate said hurriedly.

"And one thing led to another…" said Signum, surpressing a smile herself. Shamal and Vita laughed out loud.

"That's the bell," observed Alicia, ignoring Fate's ostritch impression. "Come on, everyone,"

"Coming over, tonight, Alicia?" asked Fate as they slowly walked back to the school, and Alicia shook her head.

"No, sorry—I was asked to do a club activity here for the track team,"

"Oh, okay—Come on, Fate-chan. Do you want to hit the new movie after school?" Nanoha opened the door to the school as she turned towards Fate, waiting for the answer.

"Don't we have an English exam tomorrow?" asked Fate as they walked up the stairs.

"Maybe…" Nanoha answered evasively. "But…please?"

"No way, you're gonna fail school if you get less than a 60 on your test again," Fate said sternly.

Nanoha crossed her arms. "Study THEN a movie?" she asked pleadingly. "I really wanna see this new thing…"
"What's the movie?" asked Fate with a sigh,"
"Um...Raging Heart?" Nanoha said, peeking through her hands to view Fate's reaction.

"And it's about…" Fate asked leadingly, leaning against the wall outside their classroom.

"Mahou shojo or something," Nanoha shrugged. "I dunno…but please? I really, really, really wanna see it!"

Fate sighed. "Okay—but only if you can write "Hello my name is Nanoha and I am thirteen and live in Japan with my mother, father, two siblings and my best friend's name is Fate," ten times properly,"

"All that?!" Nanoha gasped, then relented. "Fine,"

"Okay—study then movie it is," Fate said, grinning at her best friend.

"Meanie,"

"Come on, let's go,"

***

"Okay, wait…'My name is Nanoha, and…I am thir…teen and live in J-apan with my mother, father two siblings and my best friend's name is Fate," Nanoha recited quickly.

"Now write it," instructed Fate.

"Hai, Hai. Fate, will you check downstairs and see if we have any snacks?" asked Nanoha, fixing Fate with her super-bambi-eye-attack.

Fate sighed. "Okay," she agreed, and headed down the staircase and into the kitchen. Just as she found a bag of cookies, the doorbell rang.

She headed to the door, assuming it was Momoko, Nanoha's mom, or one of her siblings. Opening the door, she found it was exactly the opposite.

"Hello, Fate," said Precia Testarossa, smiling at her daughter with a dark glint in her eyes. Fate stumbled backwards a few steps and headed toward the stairs, but Precia grabbed her arm before she could get far.

Fate tripped and fell out of Precia's grab, falling to the floor with a hard crash.

"Fate-chan?" Nanoha called from upstairs. "Did you break something? Mom's not gonna be happy…" she added warningly.

"Um…Nanoha…"

Precia covered her mouth.

"Hm, Fate-chan?"

There was no answer. Nanoha stood up quickly and pattered down the stairs to find nothing but a wrinkled rug, an open door, and a single black ribbon.

"Fate-chan?"