Disclaimed.


Finding Mikan

Chapter Five: The Curse of Time


In Hotaru's opinion, the ugliest point of humans' life was in rage, when smooth facial muscles rippled and morphed them into monsters that could not be recognized. When Natsume's berserk button was pressed, something inside Hotaru also snapped. Some part of her lost hold of the balance and serenity she tried a hundred and ten percent to always uphold. As his face burned and twisted, hers congealed and became as cold as ice.

"So?"

The one world that slipped through her lips was enough to set both of them off completely for a second time.

"You don't care at all?" he accused with a firm, stubborn finger. Natsume's face was rosy and his eyes no longer crimson but a dark, bloody red. Every single one of his words dripped with rage. "So it means absolutely nothing that Mikan is your best friend. It means nothing that she saved you in the Rebellion or that you're alive today because of her. You're telling me that this all means nothing to you?"

Hotaru fidgeted with anger and disbelief as Natsume's words managed to shake her. Truth be told, she always had that little pang of guilt gnawing at the back of her head, always did wonder what it was like back in the days when somebody other than Janine stuck to her side like a pesky but lovable bug. And sometimes, when she saw bits of Mikan in other people, she could not help but avert her eyes guiltily. It was because she did not like to dwell on the past, Hotaru justified to herself. In reality, some part of her still could not let go of this girl she had been such good friends with during childhood. Hotaru had bought those earrings for Mikan, not Janine. The first person she thought of when she saw that warm shade of hazel was Mikan, not Janine.

But she had long forgotten the most important parts of their friendship, and she had long forgotten why she befriended that girl in the first place. And right now Natsume's tantrum, combined with her own guilt that she refused to come to terms with, made Hotaru wrap up her heart in a protective sheet of ice.

Violet eyes sharply snapped to Natsume's face. "You cannot seriously be arguing this."

She was almost afraid of looking into his eyes for fear that she would see flashes of that destructive conflagration again. She hated the feeling of knowing that she would be devoured helplessly by his power had he focused it on her. The only solace came in knowing that he had lost possession of his Alice. Hotaru silently thanked Mikan Sakura for that spur of the moment decision.

"Try me." The words were stony and hard.

But Hotaru Imai would not back down from a challenge. She, too, rose to her feet and defiantly glared up into his face like an eruptive couple before the divorce. "I will hand you the truth in a nutshell. People die and disappear all the time, Hyuuga," for by this time what little respect they had between them was completely flung out the window, "all over the world, each with their own reason. Are you going to chase them all down and demand an explanation? Are you going to put in the time to investigate each little disappearance? Why should Sakura-san be any different?"

"It's Mikan! We owe something to her!"

For once, her voice owerpowered his. "I owe nothing to no one!"

She stunned them both into silence. Face to face, Hotaru and Natsume's chests heaved together rhythmically. They both found themselves out of breath from arguing against each other, though five minutes have yet to pass.

"How are you going to tell me that I owe something to her when she put my life into jeopardy in the first place? I dare you to say it. Say the Rebellion is not Mikan's fault. Say that she is not in any way responsible for the loss of hundreds of lives, that you were not responsible for the men you killed trying to protect her. Look me in the eye, say it with a straight face, and I will believe you."

"It wasn't her fault. You know whose fault it is? A perverse man with twisted, nihilistic ambitions."

Even Hotaru was surprised by the cold laughter that escaped her own lips. "Considering that he was the perpetrator, of course it is a given that Kuonji is responsible in some way. Still, in the big picture he was just one of the few. Do you know how I see it?" The words came raspy and coarse, but they were far beyond the point of no return. "Mikan Sakura endangered everyone in Alice Academy, so it is more than befitting that she was the one who ended the Rebellion."

"You cold, unfeeling bitch."

Her hand instantaneously flew into the air, aching make contact with Natsume's face.

She never resorted to physical violence. There was not one case in fifteen long years where Hotaru inflicted bodily pain upon someone else using her own limbs. Sure she might have used gadgets. Sure she might have used machines. But for her to go out of her way to actually touch another—skin to skin—with the full intent of hurting them was saying a lot for Hotaru's state of mind. She hated feeling of flesh scraping roughly across her fingers. She hated it when her Alice peers slapped at her arm, or in one particular case, her face. So because she hated the feeling, she never tried to use inflict it upon anyone else.

But now she found herself making an exception for Natsume, because Hotaru could not stand being called a derogatory term by someone who was so much lower than her.

"I dare you to repeat that."

Natsume's eyes hardened. "I was a fool."

Still fuming, Hotaru reluctantly lowered her hand and relaxed a little at his strive for redemption.

"I was a fool to ever believe that you, of all people could help me in any way. What was I thinking?" His hand smacked against his forehead, a noise that should not have sounded that loud but did anyways to Hotaru's ears. "I hope you forgive me, Imai. For one moment, I actually thought that you were capable of feeling something."

Hotaru saw red. "Forgive me too, Hyuuga," she managed. "For one moment, I actually thought you rationalized with your head, not your heart." By the sudden drop in volume, it would have been common sense to let the argument lie then and there. Too bad Hotaru's unrelenting pride would not have it. And so round two began with a sharp jab to a fresh wound, "were you there during Haiti? Katrina? Rwanda? Did you paint a city over for them as well?"

He opened his mouth. She cut him off.

"I figured that if you want to play saint, you should go through with it all the way."

Only, she was not the only one who knew how to hit where it hurt the most. "You have no right to condemn me for that when you see those lives as nothing but a statistic. I pity you. You have never loved anyone before, have you?"

She ground her teeth together into very fine powder. "You want to bring love into this now Hyuuga? Do you really think for a moment that you are special because of what transpired between you and Sakura-san a little over a decade ago? Are you really ignorant enough to believe what you had then is the same as what you have now? That is why you want to find her, right? You go to all these lengths, do all these silly things all because you love her?"

"Jealous, Imai?" he gloated, "of the only feeling that you can't empathize—or rather, pretend to empathize with?"

Hotaru would be lying if she said that she did not try to understand love at least once in her life. There were just some things she could not explain—maybe an unusual attachment or an abrupt and eager curiosity in a person or thing. She attributed those feelings to the phenomenon of love. Such was the case of her trophy. Hotaru was obsessed with it for the longest time, yes, but she was also sure that somewhere along the way she had learned to love the object as well. How else could she explain that empty, devastating feeling in her heart when she had relinquished it?

She knew she could never last a second time.

She shut out all prospects of love. She turned a blind eye to the mere idea of it. Love was for other people. Hotaru Imai was an exception.

"Then tell me why my brother, someone who loved his wife with his heart and soul, abhors your very being. Why is Subaru so against the idea of you and that tangerine project of yours? He knew that it was not healthy for you, am I right?"

The rage, along with all blood, was washed from Natsume's cheeks. He blanched a marble white. "That's a completely different matter."

"I believe I have a pretty good idea of what it is. My brother, upon my return asked if I would try to save someone even though I was ninety nine percent sure that they would not survive. Do you see where I am going with this Hyuuga?" He had no visible reaction and so she continued, "Subaru believed that you would put your life to good use—the one life that he took a chance with and preformed a miracle."

"Shut up!" he growled.

"I, too, would be quite enraged if a man I believed would not survive did, only to go down the wrong road and end up barely scraping through his shamble of a life."

"Imai," hyperventilated Natsume, "you leave this instant and never show your face in front of me again."

"And I think that if Sakura Mikan-san were to see you now, she would be equally disappointed in you. That day you put your future in her hands along with your Alice stone, did you not? And now, you remain the same boy you were fifteen years ago."

"GET OUT OF MY APARTMENT."

She did, in fact, quite eagerly. In the process, two slippers were flung somewhere behind her in a flimsy attempt to hit him. She slipped her feet back into her own comfortable shoes, reveling in the twisted thought that what she had was so much better than what he had.

Cruelly, Hotaru's lips warped into a sick smile and her heart filled with malice for the only other being in the room. In the end, it was she who had the power. She could evict him from that petty excuse of a place if she actually tried, because she was the one with important business connections and he was just some hobo chalk painter. And she could cripple him any time she wanted with the bottle of pepper spray inside her bag, but she chose not to because she was such a good Samaritan.

His string of curses was her goodbye. Her slam of the door was his.


The conclusion to Natsume's chapter in her life was carefully timed and planned by Hotaru. Come Monday, she prepared two checks and sought out Hayami during his break. She was aware that the Hotaru Imai of the moment had nothing on the Hotaru Imai of last Tuesday. She entered the door, limp and lifeless, stumbled to the receptionist with dark circles on her eyes and almost sighed wistfully before requesting to see Hayami.

This time, it was not Hiromi who catered to her but rather an older, more professional woman. Less chirpily, she received an a-okay from Hayami and sent Hotaru up without a second glance. For a second, the inventor wondered if Hiromi somehow got reprimanded for the Natsume incident.

It almost made her sick to her stomach how clearly the route to sixteen thirteen registered in her memory. Though she did not encounter the Caucasian man on the elevator again, she almost expected to and was even a little disappointed when she did not. But she was simply sent straight to floor sixteen without any stops. Hotaru snorted. There seemed to be a pattern going on here.

She pulled herself together as she walked down the corridor. This trip had been procrastinated for almost a week now, and there was no doubt that Hayami already heard about the eruptive argument from Natsume. The last thing she wanted to do was make herself a fool in front of him.

Gently, with her fist, Hotaru placed three knocks.

"Imai-san, come in!"

Blue eyes. Blond hair. Her jaw almost dropped when she saw him and the million watt smile he directed at her.

"It is you," exclaimed Hotaru, surprised, "the Snow White kid."

Confusion crossed his facial features before his eyes widened in realization. Quickly, he ushered her in, gushing all the way at how remarkable it was that she remembered such insignificant incidents. A tinge of pink grazed his cheeks as he laughed the embarrassing memory off.

"Imai-san!" Hayami perked up. Instead of his usual position at his desk, he had made a little circle of space in the middle of the room and placed three unfolded chairs there. The blond man took the other and Hotaru presumed the last was meant for her. "Nogi Ruka, Imai Hotaru. Imai Hotaru, Nogi Ruka."

They swapped meek smiles and handshakes. Hotaru noticed that his grip was tentative and hands abnormally soft and warm.

"What a rather extensive network you have here, Hayami-san," she stated coolly.

Ruka warmed the room with a smile. "Oh, it's nothing, Imai-san. Around here, everyone knows everyone. I'm really surprised that you remember that particular play of all things." He fidgeted, having a hard time keeping the smile from twitching off his face. His face darkened a shade as he began rambling, "well, not really, I guess, because you were the one who blackmailed me into the costume so you could take pictures to send to my fanclub, but you know… I thought that you'd remember the Rebellion or something, not that."

Hotaru and Hayami gave him identical blank stares.

Ruka sighed, "what I mean to say is that I thought you'd forgotten everything—or in any case, that's what Sumire-san told me."

Hayami indignantly snorted and shook his head at Ruka's flustered state. "Shouda-san was right in any case. This boring job does have its perks after all. Imagine my surprise when Imai-san came to my office nearly two weeks ago, demanding to know who Hyuuga Natsume is."

"Oh. Well Koko's not going to be happy about this. He made pretty big bets with her."

"Pointless, really," Hayami told Hotaru. "They have a joint bank account."

Her sharp, calculative side got the best of her and she immediately began interrogating, "are they a couple? Married? How many years? They have made divorce and property specifications known to lawyers, have they not? In any case, joint bank accounts are severely risky for any two parties. I have never had one myself. There is always the off chance that one person could run off with most of the money."

The two men exchanged looks of constrained laughter that made Hotaru wonder if she was missing something.

Hayami turned to her with a smile she never thought he was capable of making, "yeah, like that'll happen. She'd sniff out his trail and beat him half to death once she found him."

"Yes, but it is not always the case of men," argued Hotaru. "She could be the one who intends to hoodwink him."

"No, Imai-san," Ruka explained jovially, and Hotaru only noticed now the steaming cup of tea he attained somewhere along their conversation. "Sumire-san can't possibly live without Alices, you see." He took a sip. "She's a little bit too attached to the company of AFO. We do spoil her quite a lot."

"AFO?"

Ruka blinked.

"Oh!" exclaimed Hayami suddenly, jerking his own cup in surprise and almost sloshing tea all over the himself. "Yeah, I forgot to tell you that we haven't gone that far yet. AFO is short for Alice Funding Organization, Imai-san. It's a non-profit organization found by Natsume to support new graduates from Alice Academy. Actually, a lot of our former classmates are in it."

Natsume and Alice Academy in the same sentence. Hotaru's mood went through a double kill. Suddenly, she felt like she had overstayed her visit by quite a large margin. She narrowed her eyes at Hayami and Ruka, chatting animatedly and comfortably to each other. What was she doing here? It hit her mind for the first time that the three of them were hanging out in an office with mugs in their hands as if it were some family gathering from Little House in the Prairie.

As a sharp reminder, the corners of her cheques jabbed at her skin.

Hotaru abruptly rose to her feet.

At the same time, Ruka's eyes strayed from Hayami's face to her figure and he set his mug down on Hayami's table, confused. "Are you leaving, Imai-san?" She caught a slight undertone of disappointment in his question.

Her eyes drifted to her hands. She attentively smoothed out the two cheques with her fingers several times and without looking up, told them, "I just remembered what I came here for. Hayami-san, surely you have already been informed from Hyuuga about our eventful talk."

Ruka quirked a brow as he looked from Hotaru to Hayami, both having donned stiff, poker faces all of a sudden.

"He did drop by once." It was all the answer Hotaru needed.

She held out the two pieces of paper to Hayami, who fingered them delicately. He raised them all the way up to his eyes, staring holes in the paper as if for every second he looked a way a digit would disappear. His finger brushed over her signature briefly before latching a tight grip on the ends of the cheques. The private investigator looked up at her, awestruck.

"T-this—" He could only sputter.

"Five hundred thousand yen for two cases. Consider our business done."

Ruka's own eyes widened to the size of saucers. "Two two hundred fifty thousand yen checks?" he boomed, leaning over on his chair to peer at the pieces of paper in Hayami's hands. Looking quite like he had found the Lost City of Atlantis, his voice dropped to a whisper, "holy smoke, Imai-san. How rich have you become?"

In a deadpan, she revealed casually, "I have about five million American dollars total in liquid and assets. Of course, I plan on at least quadrupling that in the next ten years."

Ruka tried to do the math in his head. He was poorly failing.

Hotaru sighed, "that is, I believe, approximately two hundred ninety million yen in Japanese currency."

"Wow," he seemed to be at a loss for anything else to say. "Wow! I always knew that you were good at business but I never thought that you'd be, well, a millionaire by this age. Although I should have expected it. I mean, back in the Academy there was always a line of businessmen waiting to see your inventions and it was only a matter of time before you really struck gold." He gulped down a large ball of phlegm. "I really don't know what to say. This is truly amazing, Imai-san."

"She's got more money than Akaki," Hayami could only mutter. "Akaki."

Hotaru flinched as she thought of all the sleepless nights, all the anguish that she had to face in order to get from where she had been to where she was now. "It really is not—"

"Don't say that it's not a big deal," Ruka chastised, giving her a sound pat on the back; Hotaru flinched at the contact. "You've come so far! It's almost as if you're a different person!"

Her eyes found the floor. "Thank you Nogi-san, Hayami-san. I should go."

Ruka's eyebrows knitted together at her. "What's wrong? Sorry! Was it something I said?"

She whipped her head up and looked around the room aimlessly. "Uh, no. I just need to fix a time in my schedule to go visit my family. It has been a while." She offered him a meek smile, hoping that he would let her leave with that excuse.

Ruka did not. "Hey, speaking of catching up, why don't you come and have dinner with the crew on at TGIF this Friday? It's this biweekly tradition that Sumire-san came up with. Hey, I bet they'll be so happy to see you again."

On any other day Hotaru would have laughed cynically at her bad luck. Despite her efforts to leave behind the past, she had gotten an express ticket from a puppy-eyed man right back into the fray. The answer was obvious, but for some reason she felt an entire different level of guilt at the thought of saying no directly to his face. Hotaru sighed; she was getting soft. As a last measure, she rejected his offer with a shake of her head.

"Oh, come on," Ruka egged on as Hayami, losing interest in the conversation, went to stash his two cheques somewhere in the photocopying cum storage room. "If this is about Natsume, he won't be there."

He sensed the change in atmosphere before she herself realized it. Ruka took an inconspicuous step back, as if Hotaru had just turned into a time bomb and was now ready to blow any minute. Indeed, she did feel rage swallowing up her entire being but she frowned at his cowardice. Surely he would expect her to have more than sufficient self control over her emotions unlike, say, that wretched hoodlum, Natsume. It only angered Hotaru further.

"And pray tell, how do you know about this incident?"

He opened his mouth and looked down, set on avoiding eye contact. "Actually, he told me himself."

"So now Hyuuga is going around divulging everyone our personal affairs?" she spat, unable to keep the vehemence off of her face.

Ruka looked at her pleadingly. "I'm his best friend."

"I do not care if you are his pet chicken," hissed Hotaru, curving her body forward with two white fists at the ready. "The fact remains that what transpired between Hyuuga and I are of no concern to you." And she did not want anyone to know about the uglier side of herself, because Hotaru completely lost control of her words in that argument and insult after insult had spewed unstoppably from her mouth. She had, for the first time, felt like a dirty swine. "Would it not have been normal to let private arguments lie? Did he have to expose to the whole world of our disagreement like we are still in middle school and searching for peers to take our respective sides?"

Completely at a loss, Ruka suddenly bent forward. It was a full on bow, with his head facing the tiled floor and his hands behind his back.

Hotaru froze from head to toe, completely horrified with herself. In an instant, all anger drained from her body, duly replaced with enough shame to bury herself six feet under. Sorry could not possibly cut it this time. Her eyes stung as tears threatened to build up behind those purple orbs. Had she really become so low of a person or was she like this all along? Ruka was a third party, she knew that. He had no control of Natsume's actions. As the best friend, he had merely lent an ear to Natsume when the latter requested it because it was what best friends did; Hotaru would have done the same for Janine. So why had she ambushed the messenger?

His words only added to the concoction of guilt and shame. "On behalf of Natsume, I apologize. He's a good person, Imai-san. I swear on my life that he didn't mean to personally attack you or anything. And he hasn't told anyone else, just Hayami and I. I know it doesn't have anything to do with me; it must have slipped his mind at the time. I'm truly, sincerely sorry."

Hotaru gripped her fists even tighter. Thankfully she trimmed her nails on a daily basis so they were not sharp enough to cut into her own skin. She felt like all possible bodily fluids were rushing to her face and eyes. "S-stop," she rasped, in an attempt to utter the other, more appropriate S word. "Just stop. Do not bow to me, Nogi-san."

Back remaining bent, Ruka raised his head and strands of hair fell into his befuddled face. Hotaru forced herself to look at him so that he could see what she was really trying to convey. Her eyes silently pleaded for his forgiveness and his eyes widened as he saw her flushed face. Uprighting himself, Ruka allowed her a small nod.

A smile spread across his face. Hotaru did not deserve it.

"So will you come dine with us this Friday?"

Her eyes averted. "Yes…"


"Can I help you?" a waiter asked while tapping a pen repetitively on a notepad.

Another one had asked her the same thing two minutes ago before tucking the writing implement behind his ear and skedaddling away to collect a bill from a nearby table. Quite a few more were flitting around, actually, tirelessly manning the restaurant at the peak of its business. She supposed there was both an upside and a downside to working at a place called Thank God It's Friday.

Hotaru perused the entire restaurant for a blond haired, blue eyed man before allowing him her full attention. "You may, in fact. My name is Imai Hotaru. I am listed under the reservation for Harada Misaki-san."

The waiter picked up a huge reservation book from the podium and flipped through it at a speed that would have rivaled Hiromi the receptionist. Hotaru wondered offhandedly if it was a requirement for every middle class worker to have lightning fingers or if their jobs were just so mediocre that they had nothing else to do but practice.

"Yes, right here please."

As soon as he lead Hotaru to the inner chambers of the restaurant, she immediately picked out the Alice table by their abnormal hair and eye colours. Thirty people looking like characters straight out of an anime were not easy to miss. Thanking the waiter, Hotaru journeyed the rest of the way alone, or had planned to. Not yet halfway across the room, at least ten people rose out of their seats and one person managed to fling her two arms fully around the inventor.

Hotaru patted the woman back awkwardly.

"Hotaru-chan!" The muscular arms were nearly strangling her. At least the Alice had the consideration to let go and grip Hotaru's shoulders before saying anything else. "Remember me? It's Misaki-senpai! Harada Misaki-senpai!"

"Yes, you made the reservation," Hotaru had been about to say but was pulled away by another pair of arms before she could even open her mouth.

The next person who introduced himself was Tsubasa Andou. He was a tall, dark-haired man with a unique star birthmark beneath his left eye. Apparently he was also her upperclassman in Alice Academy. Hotaru preferred not to indulge herself in too many details. She merely smiled and nodded as she was passed from one Alice to another like a hot potato.

She was introduced to a young gray-haired chap, Yuu. A wide-eyed boyish man with glasses called himself Megane the magician. Then there was pink-haired Anna, whose family owned a local bakery that Hotaru "just had to come by and see!" She also met the well-known couple Sumire Shouda and Koko Yome; both had kept their surnames post marriage. Sumire, she was surprised to discover, was the unpleasant girl with the ugly perm in that picture alongside her and Mikan Sakura. The busybody amazingly conjured a billion and one questions for Hotaru in less than a minute before Koko pried her off with a playful wink.

"Have a seat!" one of them—she was not sure which—ushered.

Promptly following, she was ungracefully plopped beside Tsubasa the upperclassman and Ruka.

"Your dress is so pretty!" cooed a navy haired girl who had not yet introduced herself. Her chirpy voice and bright, eager eyes made Hotaru feel like she was suddenly nineteen and part of one of those huge teenage gatherings. "Is it purple silk? I love all the folds! It matches you so much!"

"Thank you, uh—"

"Nonoko, remember? We formed the Three Geeky Sisters with Anna together back in Alice Academy!"

Hotaru's face was a blank piece of paper. How did they all manage to remember those little, insignificant details? "No… I cannot say I do."

"Oh, don't worry!" squealed Nonoko. "We'll jog up your memory in no time!"

But I do not want to remember

She shifted uncomfortably as a menu was suddenly slipped under her hands. Hotaru looked up with every intention of thanking whoever had gotten that for her, only to meet blank space. Well, more precisely, everyone was tending to their own business and it was virtually impossible to distinguish one person out of this animated crowd.

"To reunion!" Koko yelled from across the table, raising his cup of water quite sharply into the air. Several people clanged their own with his and they all swigged their drinks. "Now the only person we have left is Mikan. Misaki, we should have champagne. This calls for a celebration."

"There's no champagne here." Hotaru's ears perked up immediately. No champagne? What was this middle-class sacrilege? "But we can celebrate with a few bottles of wine." Misaki then leaned over to have an animated discussion with Koko about the specific bottles of wine offered.

Meanwhile, the inventor opened up the menu in front of her. A wrinkle appeared between her eyebrows as she examined the foreign dishes in detail. Did she really come to a casual restaurant? All that was there was fast food presented on a plate. Was it really usual for a casual restaurant to serve so much fried and breaded dishes? And there was no crab, Hotaru noticed as she flipped through the seafood section. There. Was. No. Crab.

Ruka, eyeing her perplexed face, leaned over and pointed to number one hundred twenty one. "If it's your first time here, the cajun shrimp and chicken pasta isn't bad. I think you used to like seafood. Correct me if I'm wrong."

"Crab. I like crab."

"This is so interesting," Tsubasa cut in, causing both Ruka and Hotaru to look up at him, startled, "Hotaru-chan and Ruka are having a civil conversation. He used to be so scared of her and all the stuff she did to him."

"She used her baka-gun on like everyone." How Sumire caught ear of the conversation from halfway across the table, Hotaru could not even begin to fathom. "Also, that hoof thingy. I remember her smacking Mikan with it when she first came."

"She hit me with her baka-gun once!" Koko cried. "It really hurt."

He was graced with an eye roll. "Obviously."

Hotaru narrowed her eyes at them all. "I do not know how you all get this foolish notion of me whenever the name Imai Hotaru crosses your mind. Just what on earth is a baka-gun?"

Twenty-something pairs of blank eyes fixated themselves on her. Hotaru almost groaned audibly; the last thing she intended to do was to put herself in the spotlight, but as usual, luck did not seem to be on her side. Disbelief seemed to be the general consensus amongst the Alices. All chatter had ceased and people who were having a merry time seconds ago now clenched their classes nervously.

"A baka-gun, as in—uh—that gun that you shot people with. And it's called baka-gun because you used to shoot people. Like, idiot people—idiots? And it hurt. A lot." Even Tsubasa's explanation was broken and incoherent in his bewilderment.

"The baka-gun!" screeched Sumire, infinitely louder and more demanding. "You invented it! You told us how it worked! You can't just—just forget about it!"

But evidently she did. Hotaru winced as she thought of the Memory Project for the umpteenth time. From across the table, Koko suddenly caught her eye, a graver expression on his face than she had ever seen him make, and gave her a steady nod of understanding.

Then, the smile returned as he exclaimed, "guys, guys, sherry or burgundy?"

Another eruption of voices ensued, earning them all a sharp glare from the waiter with a pen behind his ear. Rolling his eyes, he returned to taking orders from an elderly couple a few tables away. He seemed quite accustomed to this level of noise pollution by now, though she could not understand how. All Hotaru wanted to do was raid the nearest convenience store and demand a pair of high-quality earmuffs.

"Mind reading Alice," Ruka said, and it took a few seconds for Hotaru to realize that he was talking about Koko. "He's been a great help to us over the years actually."

Koko was boisterous laughing with someone who could have been passed for his twin if not for the significantly narrower eyes. Hotaru noticed that another woman made a point of shooting rather scathing glares their way for interrupting whatever she had been doing. They apologized and she went back to her business with a huff. At that point, the inventor almost looked away but then the gray haired woman started jerking her hands and feet sharply in every direction, banging elbows on nearby tables and chairs. The other Alices cleared a meter of space for her deranged rain dance.

"What is she doing?" queried Hotaru.

A forkful of food in his mouth, Ruka lifted his head up. His expression was neutral, as if this were just any normal occurrence. Gulping down the last of his spaghetti, he explained, "that's just Otonashi Yura. Someone must have asked her to do a divination."

The strange woman closed her eyes and lifted a finger into the air, as if hesitant to touch something that she was seeing inside her head. Her mouth opened in a half gasp, and then closed again. Her face started off surprised, slowly morphed into anxious and was in the process of turning into an fretful cringe.

Ruka frowned. "That don't look good."

Hotaru nodded noncommittally.

Somewhere in the middle of no fewer than six Alices locked in a passionate argument over wine selection, Koko perked up and snapped his head in the direction of the podium. "Hey guys!" he exclaimed, "guess who just arrived?"

"No!" This time it was Yura, eyes fully open, alert and blazing. She set down a firm fist on the table. "Somebody go and keep him at bay. Hotaru-chan, duck quickly!"

"Cool blue sky?" squeaked a new voice.

Everyone froze. The table was silent save for the smack of Yura's forehead as it met the table.

"Is it really you?"

Hotaru, unaware that the new voice was addressing her, chewed on a shrimp quite leisurely. By now, she had learned to ignore all unanimous reactions amongst the Alices since mob mentality had always been something she could never understand. She just decided to make a quick trip to the lady's room when the footprints stopped behind her chair. Hotaru turned, standing as she did so, and found herself face to face with a complete stranger.

The lanky man had hair that was somehow too light near the scalp and too dark at the tips. His eyes were disproportional, the schlera being much larger than the pupils and irises. The one thing that irked Hotaru though, besides the fact that he was obstructing her path, was that he arrived in casual garments unlike the rest of the Alices who were at least semi-formal.

One look at Hotaru and his eyes widened, revealing even more schlera. "It is you. I can't believe it. You're really back!"

Ruka looked like he was about to speak up but before he could, this stranger engulfed Hotaru into a hug so tight that all air escaped her lungs like a deflating balloon.


I'm actually pretty satisfied with this chapter too. The dynamics of Natsume/Hotaru, Ruka/Hotaru and Ruka/Natsume relationships seem much more believable than Version 1.0. :P

Thank you MiladyQueenMab for suggesting the restaurant!

As usual, please review, fave, alert!

-IndigoGrapefruit