Chapter 8: Slave
"Am I doing this right?"
"Ah, a little more to the right... Yes! Yes! Right there!"
Chie swung down the wooden sword in her hands and slaughtered the unfortunate watermelon. Giggling, Aoi took off the blindfold that was covering her girlfriend's eyes and handed back her glasses. "You are so bad at this. I can't believe you missed three times."
"So says the one who tripped and ate sand." Chie sat down and picked up a chunk of her kill. Aoi blushed and sat besides her girlfriend. "That's because you gave bad directions."
"Did I really? But I don't remember telling you to trip over the watermelon and fall on your face." The grey-haired girl grinned smugly at her girlfriend and got a light hit on the shoulder for making fun of her.
"Ok, ok. Watermelon, my beautiful princess-sama?" She offered the half-eaten fruit to the girl as a token of truce, which the brown-haired girl gladly took a large bite of. "Ah, messy eater. You got seeds on your face." Said the grey-haired girl.
Aoi quickly touched her cheeks. "Where?"
"Here." The suave devil pecked her girlfriend's lips.
Aoi thought for the thousandth time how glad she was for listening to her handsome girlfriend's suggestion and quitted her part-time job this summer. Instead of working, they were spending quality time on the beach and simply enjoying each other's company.
"Say, would you stand over there and let me take a picture? I want to have one with you in a swimming suit."
Aoi giggled. "Perv."
Chie took out her infamous camera phone and winked. "Just the way you like it."
Aoi stood ankle deep in sea water, her long brown hair waving freely in the warm summer breeze. "Need me to give you a sexy pose?" She laughed and blew kisses at her girlfriend, who was grinning like an idiot.
"All right! Say cheese." Chie raised her camera phone and aimed for the perfect shot. However, the goofy grin that always seemed to decorate her face suddenly disappeared and was replaced by a frightened look. Her precious camera phone dropped carelessly on the ground, Chie ran to the brown-haired girl and grabbed her hand, pulling her out of the water.
"Chie-chan?"
"Don't move." Chie dragged the girl under the beach umbrella and shielded her within her arms. Aoi was beyond confused by her girlfriend's odd behaviour, but her confusion turned to fright when she saw the 'thing' in the sky.
It was a dragon. No, it was a giant robotic monster with wings and claws, and it was coming at them. Aoi almost screamed out loud if not for Chie's hand covering her mouth just in time. "Shhh... It hasn't seen us yet." The grey-haired girl whispered to the trembling girl.
Now that the moment of shock had passed, Aoi observed the flying monster with a calmer mind and realized that the thing was not coming at them at all. It merely flew overhead. They hid and waited anxiouly until the monster finally went away.
"I thought we were done for." Chie let out a relieved sigh and loosened her iron grip on her girlfriend. "Are you alright?"
"I think so. But what on Earth was that flying thingy? Did you take a picture?"
Chie picked up her discarded phone and gave Aoi a victory pose. "I got it." She frowned deeply at the photo and raised her head to scan the ocean. "This is bad. We can't go back to Fuuka now."
"Eh? Why?"
"Look at this." Chie showed the brown-haired girl the picture on the screen. On the right side of the picture was Aoi with her sexy pose, on the far left there was the flying monster they saw, but in the middle of the picture, there was a black dot of what looked like a ship on the horizon.
"Yeah? I see a... boat?" Aoi strained her eyes on the tiny picture.
"Not a boat. It's a war ship. Just like the ones we saw a while back... You were still in the hospital so I guess you didn't see it, I was so glad that you weren't there for the blood test and strip search. But you should remember the bridge bombing incident, we witnessed it first hand in Fuuka Shrine."
How could she not remember? She just didn't want to, like the memory of the vampire attack she had been so desperately trying to forget. She lied about not remembering anything from that night, but the truth was, she remembered everything. If she had told anyone about the blood-sucking moth monster, she probably would've been sent to a mental ward.
"Chie-chan, we have to call Mai."
The grey-haired girl agreed. "You're right. The war ship is probably here to attack our school again. We have to warn everyone."
"No, Chie-chan." Aoi shook her head and averted her gaze. "I'm sorry I lied before, I didn't want you to worry. But you have to believe me now. Don't call anyone else, just call Mai. She'll know what to do, they are special. Others are better off not knowing."
"Aoi..."
"Please."
"I understand. You don't have to apologize." The glass-wearing girl gave her girlfriend a supportive hug before she dialed Mai's number.
10:30 am.
Mai opened her bloodshot eyes and groaned. She did not sleep well last night. The orange-haired girl turned and looked the bed next to hers, Mikoto was still curled up in a tiny ball, pretending to be asleep. Mai let out a heavy sigh and reminded herself to give Nao a good beating the next time she saw her.
Thanks to the big-mouth delinquent, she and Mikoto had a huge fight last night. Nao somehow tricked Mikoto into thinking that 'kissing' was something delicious... Well, technically Nao wasn't completely wrong, but putting that idea into an innocent child's head was downright criminal.
Mikoto had been trying to kiss her the whole day yesterday. No matter how she explained that kissing was only for two people who love each other, the feral girl just couldn't seem to grasp the concept. Then she said something really stupid and upset her young friend. She told the girl she didn't want to kiss her.
And all hell broke loose.
The young girl interpreted her unwillingness to kiss as a lack of love. "Mai doesn't want to kiss me, Mai doesn't love me." So said Mikoto, who was crying her eyes out at the time. The girl was so upset, that she wouldn't let Mai touch her. She even refused food!
"Mikoto, are you awake? I'll make you ramen, please don't be upset." Mai knew the girl was playing possum, but even with her favourite food as bribe, Mikoto still wouldn't respond. Note to self, kick Nao's sorry ass. Mai was at her wit's end. If food wouldn't cheer Mikoto up, nothing could.
"Mai, you there? Open the door." The sound of someone yelling and banging at the door made her narrow her eyes.
Speaking of the devil.
Mai opened the door and was ready to unleash her anger at the redhead. However, it wasn't just Nao at the door, Alyssa and Miyu were also there. "Alyssa-chan? Miyu-san?" Mai watched with mild surprise as her three guests strolled in.
"Good day." Alyssa greeted. Her guardian came in with armful of luggage that only her android strength could manage. "Tokiha-san, we will be staying here for a while. Thank you for your hospitality."
Mai reflectively responded with a polite bow. "You are very welcome... Heh? Why are you staying here?"
"They are helping us. Fujino asked them to research on Searrs' plan for us HiMEs, but their resident got trashed by the Kuga double, so they are staying here." Nao explained. "Oh, by the way, Kuga called. Fujino went to see her."
Information overload. Mai felt dizzy. "Wait, wait. Natsuki called? Is she alright? Fujino-san went... Where is Natsuki now? And what's with the Kruger girl?"
The redhead shrugged indifferently. "Who knows. Fujino didn't say anything before she took off. At least now we know the brat is not dead. As for the double, she pulled a magical girl and went berserk."
"Magical girl?"
"She transformed into a costume and gained superpower." Alyssa added, her baby blue eyes sparkled a little too brightly.
Mai sweatdropped. Alyssa's explanation made her recall Midori's rant about HiME Rangers and many other crime-fighting, justice-serving, monster-ass-kicking animes.
While the orange-haired girl was trying to make sense of all the information she received, someone was knocking at the door again. Mai quickly answered the door. "Yes? Youko-sensei!"
"Hi." The school nurse saw the crowd inside and smiled at the girl. "Having a party with your friends?"
"Not really. Please come in." Mai stepped away from the door and let her new guest come through. "What brought you here?"
Youko scratched her head. "Actually, I just got off the phone with Fujino-san. She asked me to take a look at Natsuki-san's injuries. She also asked me to bring along some of Natsuki-san's clothings, and I remembered you have a spare key to her room."
"Yes, just let me go fetch it for you." Mai said that and went off to the kitchen.
"You hide the key in the kitchen? What else do you hide in there? Wait, don't tell me, I don't wanna know." Nao shook her head and crossed her arms. "Forget the key, I say we let Kuga heal on her own. You can't kill a cockroach that easily."
The school nurse raised an eyebrow. "And here I thought you were the one person who spent the most time combing the streets, searching for that cockroach friend of yours."
The redhead jumped at the remark. "I was out PLAYING! I don't care about that idiot!" Her cheeks flushed hotly.
"Unsteady breathings, faster heartbeats, increased amount of perspiration. Yuuki-san is lying." Miyu commented in her usual monotone.
"Ahhhhh! Shut up! Shut! Up!" Nao glared at the expressionless android, who stared back at her with apathetic red eyes. "I do NOT care about anyone! Especially not HER!"
Rowdy as ever. Mai shook her head and continued her search. When the busty girl found the spare key from under a sauce pan, her cellphone rang.
Viola easily located the church ruin from the sky. It took her a while to find this place because she had to de-materialize her robe once every minute to avoid being tracked by Searrs. After several repeats of de-robing and re-robing, she finally landed in front of the fallen structure.
This place seems deserted. She thought, examining everything with great care. The edges of the broken pieces looked too smooth, as if they were sliced through by a very sharp blade. It's my girl's handy work. She is near. The thought of it brought a smile to Viola's face.
But the problem was, where did Kruger go? And why did she even bother to tear down this building in the first place?
The only logical explanation was that she was fighting someone in this place. Either it was because her opponent was so strong, that the building went down as a collateral damage, or Kruger destroyed the building on purpose.
This does not look good.
While she was scanning for clues of her girl's whereabouts, a sudden pressure of some eerie presence made her snap back to attention. Something is coming. "Materialize!" The Otome transformed and leapt into air, dodging the surprise attack that was meant for her demise.
Viola locked her crimson glare on her enemy, and an involuntary gasp escaped from her.
"Slave!"
"Get away from there! Now!" Mai's urgent scream came through Chie's cellphone.
The grey-haired girl blinked and answered. "O...k. But where to? We can't go back to the dorm, the monster is heading to Fuuka, so are the ships. Where do you suppose we should go?"
"Let me think... Alright, listen. We are heading out to a safe house, I'll give you the address. We will meet up there."
"Safe house... got it. What the... Holy shit! What is THAT?" Chie stared with an open mouth as a black humanoid flew overhead with stunning speed. She pushed her glasses up and crinkled her eyebrows in concentration. "It's a plane..."
Aoi strained her eyes. "It's a bird..."
"It's..."
TBC
Author's Notes:
1.The robotic flying monster Chie and Aoi saw was an Aerial Type 4 Slave.
2.Maybe it's just me, but I think it's cute to make Alyssa a closet fan for magical girl shows. In the anime she had the ability to summon Orphan (Youma!), that's where I got the idea. ;D
3.About the Superman line, yeah... I HAD to use it.
4.I got a beta!!! Thank you Graceful Amethyst!!!