14 Years Later
"How was your project?" Tetsuya asked, sitting next to the brunette at the library table and offering her a coffee. She put down her book to accept it. The black-haired man read the book's title upside down before taking a contemplative sip of his own liquid refreshment. Saya sighed.
"It was fine, I guess. Professor Imai is really dismissive about the whole myth, so she kept shooting down a lot of my hypotheses. How was the lecture?"
"It blowed. The author didn't show up. He sent his assistant instead, and the guy couldn't answer half our questions."
"College at its finest," Saya muttered, rolling her eyes over the rim of her cup. The librarian at the circulation desk gave her a dirty look for having a beverage within the sacred temple of the written word, but didn't bother saying anything.
"Ooh, are we talking about how much college sucks, because I am so in!" Katsuro chirped, taking a seat across from Tetsuya, a mischievous grin tugging at his lips. Yui appeared with him, colorful beads clicking in her fluorescent hot-pink-dyed hair and on her sunset-orange poncho with a smear of sky-blue paint on one cheek; a look only an art student could pull off.
"I thought your sculpting course was 'a fantastic experience?'" questioned Tetsuya, one eyebrow arching.
"I can still hate college! Plus my instructor is not entirely open to my artistic expression of the human experience," Katsuro explained. Yui flicked him on the forehead.
"He doesn't like you because you sculpted him making love to a well-endowed antelope."
"I sculpt the world as I see it, woman, and I saw the passion in his eyes when someone left a safari magazine on a desk! He can't hide from the truth!"
"You're lucky he didn't expel you," Saya snorted.
"He tried, but then I pointed out that I never said it was him and that if he saw himself in my art it speaks only of his own insecurity."
"Well done." Tetsuya toasted his friend with his Styrofoam cup. Katsuro then snatched said cup and took a gulp of the bitter brew. As the two males fought over the drink, Saya offered Yui some of her own coffee. The pink-haired girl took a glance at the book on the table top.
"You really like the legend of Atlantis, don't you, Saya-chan?"
"Well, yeah, I mean, it's… It's hard to explain why, but I truly think they're could be a specific source for the legend, and it would be worth looking into."
"That's Ikeda-san, always with her pretty little head in the clouds," commented a new voice. Saya mentally groaned as Yottsu Gora slid into view. The young man always annoyed her with his constant following of trends and tag-along disposition. Every time she saw him, he had a new haircut, hair color, and clothing style. He was continuously attempting to force himself into all social circles. Not to mention, he was in her archaeology program and made a point to speak down to her about her Atlantis findings as some strange form of flirting. "Why don't you give up that little fairy tale, and join my group researching the ancient Celts?"
"I'm good. Thanks for the offer."
To her disappointment, Gora did not take the hint to leave and instead took the seat on her left side. To her right, Tetsuya's gray eyes narrowed and he gave her a coded look, silently asking if she wanted him to chase the creep off. Saya gave the most minute shake of her head; the kid wasn't going to kill her with his grating personality.
"How's painting class, Asahina-san?" Gora asked, fixing his dark eyes on Yui. With a small pout, Yui mumbled a response.
"We're sculpting now."
"Ah, well, I'll bet you make the prettiest vase."
"I'm sculpting a replica of a real-life shrine in the Kansai region."
Before Saya could hear Gora's irritating response, her phone vibrated in her pocket. Fishing it out, she glanced at the screen disinterestedly so Gora wouldn't feel the need to pry into what it said.
Aoi: Meet me at the noodle shop in half an hour
Putting both her phone and book into her lavender satchel, she handed her coffee to Yui as she stood.
"Sorry, guys. Got to go. My old man wants to see me."
She turned and waved without looking, hearing her friends sendoffs and Gora's complaining. Her navy flats slid silently across her school's marble flooring. Her own image was reflected at her as she passed several decorative wall mirrors; a brunette woman with honey-colored eyes, hair falling straight to just below her shoulder blades, with straight-across bangs barely hiding her eyebrows, garbed in jeans and a navy tank-top with lacy trimming, and a thick leather wristband on her left wrist. And, of course, a golden, warped bumble-bee with a broken wing resting at the base of her throat.
She was almost off campus when she heard someone calling her name. Stopping by an old tree, she was surprised to see one of her professors, Professor Andou, hurrying towards her. He was an older man, always clumsy and forgetful in class, a person meant for exploring and not really teaching. He was, however, her favorite for these very same reasons, and for never dismissing her Atlantis theories. When he finally reached her, huffing slightly, she greeted him with a smile and a respectful bow.
"What can I do for you, Professor Andou?"
"Ah, I wanted to make sure you were seriously considering the international excavation trip I'm arranging, Ikeda-san. It really is a great opportunity, and you truly seem like an exceptional young mind, with the sort of natural curiosity all the greatest exploring archaeologists have."
"I'll consider it, Professor. I just have never really thought about leaving Japan. I just thought I'd go into a field involving the history of artifacts, not finding the artifacts themselves."
"You mustn't hold yourself back, Ikeda-san. You'll never reach the stars if you are afraid of leaving earth," he advised, sounding all the world like he was quoting a motivational poster. Saya nearly snickered at the thought.
"I understand. But, if you'll excuse me, I have to catch the next train."
"Ah, well then, run along. Have a nice day, Ikeda-san."
"You too, Professor Andou."
As she hurried to the station, Saya thought about the trip. It wasn't like she'd never considered leaving the country. It was just, that when she did, she got a terrible feeling in her stomach, like something bad would happen if she did.
Maybe I'm just an idiot.
…
Ikeda Aoi, her guardian for her last ten years of being a minor, was waiting when she got to their favorite noodle shop. He gave her a look implying her tardiness was not appreciated as she took a seat at the table.
"Sorry. I got caught up talking to a teacher."
"Well, then, it can't be helped."
He'd already ordered her favorite dish, and the waitress delivered it a moment later.
"Thank you for the food!" Saya cried before taking a hearty mouthful of noodles. She took the moment to observe Aoi silently. He looked tired, but he always did, with bags under his eyes and a habitual frown. He had just turned forty, but if one ignored the dusting of gray in his brown hair at his temples, he looked like he was in his early thirties. His attire consisted of a sleek dark-blue suit and a shiny red tie, all impeccably clean and unwrinkled. She swallowed her bite and raised an eyebrow. "So, what did you want to talk about?"
"I haven't seen you for nearly two weeks. That is ridiculous given how close you live."
"Ah, sorry, sorry. I'll visit more often now, I promise. Although," she started, then paused. She pushed on. "My teacher was talking about this trip. It would take two or three months and I'd go to excavation sites in a dozen or so countries."
Aoi observed her over his cup of tea.
"Are you okay with that? Leaving Japan?"
Aoi was the only person she'd told about her discomfort in leaving her nation, even for a short spell.
"That's the problem; I'm not sure if I'm okay with it. My teacher really wants me too, and it would be a great opportunity, but when I think about it too much, the hairs on the back of my neck stand on end, and I feel like I might throw up."
Other patrons, catching the end of her statement, edged away from her table, much to her chagrin.
"Think hard about it," Aoi instructed finishing off his small order of noodles. "The decision is yours to make."
He checked his watch, placed several bills on the table, and stood. Saya stood with him and walked out the door at his side.
"My break is about to end; I must get going."
"Alright, Aoi. See you later."
They parted ways, and Saya headed towards her apartment.
Saya loved her apartment. Some people had asked her why she had moved out of Aoi's house so soon after high school when he lived so near to where she went to college and when the two seemed very close, but Saya had always tried to be as independent as possible, and that meant not bumming everything, including living space, from her guardian. Her apartment, nestled into one of the less-roamed streets of Shizume City, was on the second floor, the door facing out onto a terrace she shared with her neighbor. It had a small kitchenette, room for a bed, an antique wardrobe, two chairs and a small table, with a decent bathroom. She still ran to either Aoi's or a laundromat about once a week to do laundry, as she had neither a washer nor dryer, but it was otherwise perfect for her.
Kicking her shoes off at the door, Saya sunk into one of the chairs and laid her bag on the tabletop. With a sigh, she slid several books out and skimmed through for the one she wanted; this one was bound in splotched leather and held shut with a frayed crème-colored ribbon. The pages within were thin and delicate from once being soaked, but the illustrations and neat writing done in black ink remained. Her father's handwriting was uniform block letters, so straight and even it could have been typed. Gently turning the pages past the introduction and table of contents, Saya flipped to the first illustration. Her eyes went to the caption at the bottom of the page.
The Dresden Slate. Held as a holy relic in Dresden, Germany. The power source for the seven Kings.
The book talked a lot about Kings of varying colors and abilities with Clansmen following their orders loyally. Saya had tried time and time again, but had never been able to narrow down a myth her father could have been thinking of.
Saya still remembered seeing the Slate for herself, though the memory was admittedly a bit fuzzy. Konohana Natsume, a respected archeologist, had been overjoyed to receive approval from some important official to study the Slate. He'd been even more overjoyed when he learned he would be allowed to take his seven-year-old daughter along on one of his trips to the tall skyscraper where the Slate was held. Saya recalled how big and imposing it had been, and how, as her father had been trying to explain something about evolution to her, the Slate had begun to pulse with colorful light. She thought she heard voices, hundreds of them, but either she'd forgotten what they said or had never known to begin with. Then, her wrist had started to tingle, and the symbols, black as tattoos, had appeared.
Saya slipped her leather wristband off and laid it on her bag, revealing the still present marks. Once, in high school, the sleeve of Saya's uniform had ridden up and a teacher, catching sight of the symbols, had scolded her in class for having a tattoo. Frustrated at such occurrences, Saya had begged Aoi to let her get the marks laser-removed. The marks, however, had floated back into existence moments after the procedure was finished.
Saya flipped to one of the notebook's later pages, where her father had done several illustrations of his child's skinny wrist, comparing the seven symbols there to ones present on the Slate. As she read the captions for what must have been the thousandth time, one of the symbols began to glow with an intense crimson light. It tingled, like something on the very edge of being painful. She watched for a minute or two, and the symbol to the red one's right began to glow blue.
This happened sometimes, though she was never sure why. The red and blue symbols seemed to glow the most often. The one that lit up gold went off every now and then, as did one that seemed to illuminate with an almost natural-appearing light. Another had lit with a foggy grayish light several times before the Kagutsu Crater Incident, but never after. Yet another had glowed green while she'd been waiting in the ruins. The last symbol had never glowed to her knowledge.
Ignoring the light and tingle, she turned to the last page her father had written on. There was only one word, a bit messy, like he hadn't wasted time being neat yet still didn't have enough time to put down the rest of his thoughts.
Atlantis.
Half an hour later, the lights faded away, and Saya decided to shower and go to bed. As she lay curled up under her puce-and-pink comforter, purposely bought for how wonderfully hideous it looked, she considered the excavation trip.
"We would go to Germany for week," she mumbled to herself, even as her stomach clenched at the thought of foreign land.
It was hours before she finally fell asleep.
Author's Note:
Okay, so this story is the result of several stories I've had rolling around in my head being combined. I'm not sure how well it will turn out, but I'll try my best. My OC is actually the heroine from the Gakuen K otome game (The Image on this story). I just gave her personality traits based off a bunch of my friends. Also, since I had knee surgery yesterday, as it turns out I was born with defective ligaments and bones, I'll be immobile for a few weeks, so I'll probably update either often or with large chapters for a while. Please enjoy!