Okay, I would apologise, but I realise that any apology I make will be so ridiculously inadequate , so I think I'll skip it for now and go straight to my excuses T.T
I am in my final year of high school and I did just finish my last midyear exam yesterday (It was three hours long!)
But still, I will, as ever, strive to be better...
Okay, Reviewers!
Mandy xx
stars-dream18
pwenie
bunnyjumps
Chronos Conspiracy CK
moonacre99
Kylee-Cat
Thanks as always to all of the reviewers, who take the time to provide feedback! Here is the next chapter ^_^
Drowning Out the Echoes
XI
~Raised Stakes~
When Mikan was safely back in her room she took the crumpled document out of her pocket and smoothed it out over the kitchen bench.
Anjo,
In regard to your request, I do not believe it is possible to reverse the decision. The Department of Family Issues has made it clear that they believe Eito Azumi's claim for the guardianship of Mikan Azumi to be legitimate. Although, as you correctly pointed out, Kazu Yukihira is also a close relation and therefore a possible candidate for guardianship of said girl, there is, as of yet, no proof that Izumi Yukihira and Yuka Azumi were in any form of a legally binding relationship. In a case such as this, custody will, by default, go to the mother, or, in the case of the mother's passing, the mother's remaining family.
If you find the decision reached to be undesirable, I suggest you lodge a formal complaint with the relevant department.
-T.M
Mikan read over the letter twice, coming to the same conclusion each time; she had at least two remaining relatives, one, Eito Azumi, who wanted to adopt her. Kazu Yukihira...someone related to her father, someone who Narumi wanted to adopt her. She pondered why Narumi seemed so set against Eito Azumi adopting her. And why had she not been aware of any relatives until now? Why had Eito Azumi waited until now to attempt to adopt her?
Her mind briefly considered the letter her mother had sent Narumi. It had seemed cryptic, almost as if she was afraid to mention too much. Was it possible that they were in hiding? And there was that mention of an old man sniffing around, barely a sentence long. And if Mikan's mother knew Narumi, did that mean she had an Alice too?
There were too many questions, and no answers in sight. She needed more information...
"What is it?" snapped an irritable Hotaru through a half closed door. Whoaa, Mikan hadn't been expecting such a fierce reaction. "I'm in a bad mood right now." This was apparently as close to an apology for being irritable as the dark haired girl was prepared to give.
"Umm, it's fine. I just wanted to know something. If I needed to find out about some people, where should I go?" asked Mikan, realising that she should get to the point as she was not being invited in off the balcony.
Hotaru paused briefly to think before answering. "The intranet, probably. Though your unit wouldn't have been connected yet."
"Does yours have it?" Hotaru nodded hesitantly. "Then can I use yours?"
"No." Mikan grimaced at the absoluteness of the denial. Then a small smile spread across her face.
"Hotaru...are you sure? I mean..." Mikan slowly reached into her pocket and withdrew the small gold 1 rabbit coin. "I was just thinking of giving you this..."
"Mikan." Hotaru's expression didn't change, "Do I look like a beggar to you?"
"Okay, I'll admit I was a bit of a long shot but..." Mikan assumed her very best 'I'm a puppy dog feed me' expression. It wasn't entirely appropriate for the situation, but it would suffice. Hotaru rolled her eyes before stepping aside and letting Mikan in.
"Way to make me feel like a puppy kicker." she muttered as Mikan flounced past her.
"How do you use this thing, Hotaru. Oh, is this the on button? Why isn't it...Stupid thing!" Hotaru couldn't stand Mikan's rough manhandling of her precious technology and pulled Mikan away from the desk before sitting at it.
"Who was it you wanted to find out about?" asked a clearly irritated Hotaru. Mikan's face brightened.
"Oh, you'll do it for me? I wanted to know about Eito Azumi and Kazu Yukihira...and Yuka Azumi and Izumi Yukihira too." Hotaru's fingers paused over the projected keyboard.
"Kazu Yukihira? You've met him. He's the High School Principal." Mikan's mouth dropped open. Hotaru smirked. "You are such an idiot."
"The High School Principal..." Mikan was mouthing to herself in disbelief. It was a moment before she recovered. "And Izumi Yukihira?" Hotaru shrugged, rapidly typing and hitting enter.
"He was a student here, and judging by age he could be the principal's younger brother, but that's all there is on him." Mikan scowled.
"Eito and Yuka Azumi?" As Hotaru typed Mikan looked over her shoulder. Mikan growled in frustration when it turned up blank for Eito. Hotaru brought up a new tab for Yuka, but her search yielded no results either. "This sucks, right, Hotaru?" Hotaru was silent, considering the blank search results. Abruptly she brought up a program, coderay v.5.1.
"I knew it. Someone's restricting the access." Hotaru sounded neatly smug. "Well, of course it was unnatural for nothing to come up in a search. Usually at least a few sites show, even if they only have a few letters in common with the input."
"Sorry, but what?" asked Mikan. Hotaru sighed.
"This is what happens when you try explaining something to an idiot. The point is that the information is there somewhere, we just have to dig a little deeper to get to it."
"Oh...that's great then!" Hotaru began to roll her eyes, but stop, realising that she had been rolling her eyes a few times too many recently.
"Come on, we're going."
"Huh, where?"
"Answers."
Mikan found herself in a part of the school she had never been to before. A tall brick apartment building rose up before her, uniforms hanging on lines on the small balconies.
"Welcome to the single star accommodation." The contrast between the building before her and her own unit in the upper quarters rendered Mikan speechless for a moment. Whereas her unit looked like something that would be featured in a real estate magazine, this looked like some kind of public housing complex. Hotaru noticed the look on Mikan's face. "What did you expect? They're scholarship students; the school pays for their tuition fees, uniform, books, living costs and," she gestured towards the bare building, "housing costs." Mikan nodded her head slowly, and followed Hotaru into the building.
The interior of the building seemed to be kept reasonably clean, considering the heavy usage that was evident in the long lines of students at the elevators.
"Why are they all staring at us?" asked Mikan, nervously eyes the chattering groups of single star students. Hotaru motioned to the badge on her uniform, a golden star in a circle.
"Because we're in a totally different class to them." Mikan's eyebrows rose at the underlying snobbery of the statement; she herself had been in a class even lower that this not too long ago, but thought she could forgive it, considering it was Hotaru who delivered it. As they entered the elevator, Mikan marvelled at the effect that badge had on people; it was almost as if there was a bubble surrounding them, two metres wide, that no one would dare invade.
"Here we are." said Hotaru, sharply rapping on an innocuous wooden door halfway down a corridor lined with door exactly like it. After a moment the door was jerkily opened by a boy who looked to be around seventeen. A look of mild distaste graced his somewhat western features.
"You." was evidently his idea of a greeting.
"Were you going to let us in?" asked Hotaru clippingly. The boy reluctantly moved away from the door, retreating into his dark dorm room.
Mikan looked curiously at the young boy with dark hair in a state of disarray. He hadn't bothered changing after class, and the uniform itself was more wrinkled that a ninety year old.
"Imai. Your dog's staring."
"I'm not paying you to make witty comments about who I do or don't choose to bring along with me." the boy shrugged at this. Between the two, Mikan couldn't tell who was more nonchalant. Hotaru motioned to the boy. "Mikan meet Wolfgang. Wolfgang, meet Mikan."
"Wolfie." corrected the boy.
"Wolfgang." replied Hotaru pointedly.
"Fucking bitch." He muttered under his breath, before sauntering away to a computer in the corner of his room. "What did you want this time?" he called out.
"Restricted information on a certain Eito Azumi and Yuka Azumi."
"Give me ten minutes, in the meantime..." he waved his hand lazily, as if to say 'make yourselves at home', but with a fraction of the effort.
"Who is he?" Mikan whispered in Hotaru's ear. Hotaru didn't even try to lower her voice when she replied.
"He has the Cyber-Network Alice. If the information's there he'll find it." Mikan watched his fingers move rapidly over the keyboard and was impressed at his absolute concentration. She took the opportunity to observe the room. It was a frugal room, with a generic wooden table on one side and the desk at which Wolfie was sitting at on the other side. Two doors led farther into his living quarters, one presumably leading to his bedroom and the other to a bathroom of some sort. Remnants of afternoon light peeked out from under one door, probably the bedroom. For free school housing, it was actually pretty decent. Hotaru had a mild look of distaste on her face. A curse from the corner of the room brought Mikan's attention back to Wolfie. The speed at which his fingers danced over the keyboard had multiplied and seemed almost frantic. Hotaru moved over and looked over his shoulder.
"What's go-" started Mikan, but she was silenced by a quick shush from Hotaru. Mikan, curious, moved to see what was happening on the screen. She almost gasped when she saw the impossible darkness of the computer screen, like a black tunnel into darkness, filled with miniscule flashing ones and zeros that seemed to rearrange themselves every time she blinked. Wolfie's typing seemed to falter for an instant, before resuming faster than ever.
"Hotaru," he said, eyes still focused on the screen, "the plug." Hotaru's eyes darkened for a moment before she knelt down and wrenched the plug out of the power supply. Without a moment's hesitation Wolfie grabbed the computer modem, threw it on the ground, and put his foot through it. Hotaru moved in with an electrically charged probe her bangle had twisted into and jabbed it into the hole Wolfie's foot had made, turning the unfortunate modem into a torrent of white sparks so bright they left purple marks in Mikan's vision.
As Mikan watched Wolfie and Hotaru rapidly destroy the computer, there was only one word going through her head; overkill.
"Put it in the oven." Hotaru suggested once she deemed it sufficiently smashed up.
"I don't have an oven," he said through gritted teeth as he turned the taps in the bathroom on at full power, "we're not all as rich as Miss Privileged. Help me get this shit into the bath."
When the twisted, smashed, burnt, melted remains of the computer were sitting in five inches of water, Mikan felt that would be the end of it, but Hotaru decided the stick her probe into the water for good measure.
Panting heavily, Wolfie dusted his hands clean. Hotaru stared at the sediment in the bottom of the bath that was once a computer.
"You owe me a new computer." she commented.
"You owe me a new computer."
"I've already given you a computer."
"And where is it now thanks to someone's stupid request." Hotaru grinned sheepishly.
"I guess it was a bit of a long shot. Mikan; your request, your fault. You owe Wolfgang a new computer."
"I hate my name." muttered Wolfie. Mikan was still watching the sediment in the bathtub in disbelief.
She finally swallowed her shock and asked the obvious question. "Why did you destroy it?" Hotaru and Wolfie exchanged glances.
"My hack was detected." explained Wolfie. "That was some security system; if we hadn't destroyed the comp as quickly as we did, the trace would have got me."
"Mikan." barked Hotaru. "When we get back to the upper quarters you're going to tell me exactly why you need to find out about Eito and Yuka Azumi. That was dangerous; if the trace had reached us Wolfgang could've died."
How was it? I know, no Natsume in this chapter either. This story seems to be turning more and more into a mystery...maybe I just can't bring myself to write a full on romance?
I get bored easily (she says, as if that explains away all her inadequacies)
Review?