Still Waters 3, Book 2, Chapter 17: Darkness: Ayumi
Language/Angst/Stupidity Warning
Somewhere in the midwestern region of the United States, Bethany Stride, Kara Stride's little sister, sat behind a computer, reading the most recent email from her big sister, a smile growing on her face at Kara's childish excitement at having played music up on stage at a big festival with an actual, real life, professional band. Bethany had to admit she felt a little jealous; she had looked up videos of said band, Dekopin Rocket, on certain Japanese websites, and she thought they looked really cool. The idea of her big sister Kara playing in such a setting, however...she couldn't help but grin at the ridiculous image of Kara in her glasses, black slacks, and button up shirt, headbanging with the others, her hair carefully wrapped up in that horrible bun that mother always insisted she use.
"I wonder..." Bethany said, minimizing the window she was reading the email in. She opened up a new one and did a search for 'Mahora Festival 2009', scanned through the Japanese descriptions on the list of sites that popped up only a little more slowly than she would have had they been in English, and quickly found one that mentioned the band Dekopin Rocket. She clicked the link and worked her way through the descriptions under the list of videos, struggling with some of the kanji; she could read the simpler stuff, but her studies had not yet progressed far enough for her to recognize even a third of characters in the Japanese writing system; she was much better at kana. Nevertheless, it was only a short time before she found a video playlist dedicated to Dekopin Rocket's third day performance at the festival.
The first video was a grainy, low quality mess with terrible sound; she could barely even make out who was playing which instrument on stage, though something about the pounding nature of the song had her starting to bob her head with the music. She skipped ahead to the next video, uploaded by someone calling herself 'Nutmeg'. This one was a little closer to the stage, and Bethany was able to recognize the band members for the most part, though she was still peering at the bass player, trying to figure out if it really was her big sister she was seeing, when the video cut off and the next one, uploaded by someone called 'Todai' started playing. This video was much closer to the stage, and showed the band members clearly. The sound was very, very good when compared with the previous two videos as well. Bethany squinted at the screen, trying to see if the bass-playing stranger in the awesome clothes was really her big sister. A moment later, the bass player looked up, almost directly into the camera, and Bethany gaped, her finger tapping the pause button.
Yep, that was her big sis Kara, all right.
Grinning, she restarted the video so she could hear the whole thing, turned her computer's speakers up and, the bass pounding in her head, went back to her email. She had just started a new one telling Kara that she was watching her on Japanese Youtube when her mother kicked the door in and stalked over to the computer.
"Bethany."
Bethany froze up. It was rare for her mother to use that tone, and it was never a good thing. "Y-yes?"
"Where is that music coming from?"
Bethany started sweating. "Um..." She quickly minimized the email window and brought up the video site again, the music suddenly seeming far too loud in her room. "It's this..."
Her mom leaned over Bethany and watched the video for a long, long moment. Finally, she stood up, rubbed her forehead as if she suddenly had a migraine, and muttered a single word.
"Shit."
Bethany gaped. Her mother never cursed. Ever. "...mama?"
"Pack your bags, Bethany," her mother said fiercely.
"What? What's going on...?"
Bethany's mother looked back down at the computer screen where her other daughter was doing a spectacular job in preparing to turn her own life into a short, unpleasant thing best described as a living hell.
"We're going to Japan."
Wednesday, July 8th, 2009, Morning
Sasaki Rina walked into the classroom in a much more subdued manner than she usually did; bypassing the group of girls swapping rumors by the door, she went straight to her table and sat down. Kumiko-chan, who sat beside her, had her head on the desk, apparently asleep, so she didn't bother greeting her. As she plopped down in her own chair, a worried frown marred her otherwise cute face.
Yesterday, Negi-kun had collapsed.
She glanced over at her classmate Ono Ran's seat, which remained empty, like Possum-chan's and Eva-chan's, and Chacha-chan's, among others. Ran-san had done something to Negi-kun yesterday...Rina had watched her do it. It didn't make sense though...Ran had just pointed at him and said 'Bang!', and Negi-kun had collapsed! Things had gotten a little crazy after that, and when Rina had looked for the other girl a moment later to demand an explanation, Ran-san had been gone. Then the janitor had come in and called for help on her radio, and some people had come in and carted Negi-kun away...
Rina shivered. Yesterday had been horrible. She couldn't even remember which teacher it was that had come in to finish up their lesson, or what Seruhiko-sensei had taught them in their math class afterward...it was all a blur; she just kept seeing that horrible moment when Negi-kun's head went back and his eyes rolled up and he fell down as if he had just died. She looked up as Inoue Ai came through the door just ahead of the bell, as always, and took her seat at the empty table in front of Rina. The class fell silent, waiting expectantly for their homeroom teacher; but, instead of Negi-kun, Seruhiko-sensei walked in and went straight to the podium.
"Hello class," Seruhiko-sensei said, a fake grin that fooled nobody plastered across his face as he pretended nothing was wrong. "As some of you may know, Negi Springfield-sensei collapsed yesterday due to overwork; I am sure you will all be pleased to hear that he is currently recovering nicely in a private room at the hospital. The headmaster would like to urge everyone to avoid visiting him for the time being, as he needs all the rest he can get."
Rina could tell Seruhiko-sensei was lying; she'd have to be blind not to, and it made her worry even more.
"Now, you have been assigned a substitute for the time being," Seruhiko-sensei said, turning toward the door. "Mister Hart?"
Rina cocked her head to the side at the sudden gasps from several of the others as a strange foreign man in a suit stepped through the doorway, followed by a tall, thin man with the palest skin Rina had ever seen. She looked away, shivering; something about the pale man's eyes was just wrong, though she couldn't figure out just why that was. She realized Seruhiko-sensei was talking.
"—is Mister Jonus Hart; he is a visiting professor from England and an acquaintance of Springfield-sensei who kindly offered to teach in his place until he has recovered. And this is one of his students, Mister Carrick, who will be acting as his assistant. Does anyone have any questions?" Seruhiko said, sending a quick glance over the class. It was obvious several of the students, notably Mochizuki Kagami, Urashima Taro, and the class rep Nakamura Sachiko, had some very, very important questions, but were unwilling to ask them in front of the other students.
"No?" Seruhiko asked. "Okay then; I have work to do. Good luck Hart-sensei, Carrick-san," Seruhiko said nervously as he hurried to the door.
"Thank you, Seruhiko-sensei," the Great Vampire Lord Jonus Hart, last seen fleeing after a failed attack on the city of Mahora during what amounted to a drunken rampage after drinking the powerful blood of Negi's student Possum Cade, something most of the class was completely unaware of, said as he moved up to the podium. He looked out over the class, and Rina shrank down when his gaze turned her way. She didn't know why, but she really didn't like this 'Hart-sensei' at all. A quick look at her seatmate, Mori Kumiko, showed the other girl to have one hand buried in her bag while clenching her pencil with her other hand so hard her knuckles had gone white and beads of sweat stood out on her forehead.
"Kumiko-chan?" Rina whispered. She had to repeat herself before the other girl tore her eyes away from the substitute teacher and looked at her. "Are you okay?"
Kumiko looked at her blankly for a moment, and shook it off. "Yeah, I'm fine," she said, relaxing her grip on her pencil. She kept her bag sitting up on the table top near at hand, though.
Seruhiko-sensei had just reached the door when someone on the other side opened it again.
Rina looked up at the door and smiled brightly, her mistrust of the substitute and his assistant temporarily forgotten at the sight of a familiar face she hadn't seen since before the festival. She stood up. "Possum-san!"
Possum Cade looked from Seruhiko-sensei's suddenly nervous expression to her classmate Rina, who looked happy to have her back. Possum grinned at her and waved, and started to step into the room, only for Seruhiko-sensei to step in front of her.
"I-I don't think that's a very, uh, a very good idea," he whispered hoarsely to her.
Possum gave him an incredulous look. "Huh? What do you mean? I've missed too much school already and they said it'd be okay for me to go back to class," she said, gesturing back to Chachamaru and Eva, who was standing impatiently behind her.
Eva glared at him. "Move."
Seruhiko's mouth worked silently as he tried to work out a way to keep them out of the room, but Eva stepped around Possum and pushed him aside, leading Possum into the room.
"Ah...! W-wait!" Seruhiko said, but Eva ignored him. Possum gave him an apologetic grin, while Chachamaru gave him a polite bow and entered the room; she almost bumped into Possum, who stood frozen in place, staring wide eyed at the teacher, who looked back at her with real alarm.
Rina watched all of this in clueless fascination from her seat. For some reason, Possum-chan and Hart-sensei seemed almost scared of each other, while Carrick-san, Hart-sensei's assistant, practically cowered behind the teacher. Eva-chan simply cocked an eyebrow, reached up, and grabbed Hart-sensei by the ear before dragging him out into the hallway with Seruhiko-sensei while everyone gaped. Possum quickly found her seat at far side of the room, which left the assistant, Carrick, the center of attention. He looked from face to face, increasingly nervous.
"S-so, how are you all t-today...?" he asked, his voice cracking as he said the last word.
Rina almost felt sorry for him. Almost. He was clearly not cut out to be a teacher, and he was kind of ugly, too.
"...we are fine," the class rep, Nakamura Sachiko said, her voice colder than Rina had ever heard it before.
"Yeah, fine as fine can be," Urashima Taro said sarcastically from her seat in the back by the window, glaring at the man.
Rina noticed several others glaring at him as if they knew him from somewhere, but shrugged it off in favor of trying to hear what was being said in the hallway; somebody sounded angry, but the words were muffled by the door and wall. She couldn't make out anything, but somebody was definitely upset.
Eva glared. "Well?"
Seruhiko wilted, holding his hands up as if to say 'I had nothing to do with this!'
Jonus Hart swallowed, his mouth and throat suddenly dry. "This is not what you're thinking, I promise you that; they asked me to do this," he said nervously, backing up a step to open a little more distance between himself and Eva. Eva took a step forward.
"And what is it that I'm thinking?" she asked coldly.
"That this is some plan of mine, maybe?" he offered.
"Is it?"
"No!"
Eva turned the glare up a notch or two. "Are you sure?"
"Yes! This isn't a plot or anything! Besides, that Reiko girl's got me trapped..." he said, looking away.
Eva cocked an eyebrow. "I see. Well; if Reiko has you trapped, that changes things." She put her hands on her hips and gave Jonus a measuring look. "The Girl's in there. Can you hold back your thirst?"
Jonus looked at the door to the classroom, clenched his teeth, and nodded. "Yes, I've made that decision. Her blood has brought me nothing but trouble; I would never have done what I did to this city if I hadn't been under her blood's influence."
Eva cocked her head to the side. "Is that so?"
Jonus clenched his teeth. "Look, we've known each other for a long time; have I ever done something so stupid before? When have you ever known me to stay in one place long enough to try and take over a city, anyway?"
Eva looked at him for a moment. "That's true; I've never heard of you making such an idiotic move; at least, not in the last six or seven centuries. You did some pretty moronic things when you were first turned, from what I hear." She sighed. "Anyway, if you go after The Girl, if you go after anyone, I will not be happy. Understand?" she said.
Jonus had known Eva for a long, long time. They had never been even remotely close, but they had been aware of each other, as they had both been aware of other strong vampires, through the long centuries. While Eva hadn't been strong at first, that had quickly changed; he reckoned she was one of, if not the strongest vampires in existence at the moment. He was only of middling power himself, though he had lived a long, long life, and was considered that much more dangerous because of it. He himself had managed to kill what was considered at the time to be the fourth strongest vampire of them all, a feat that took him far beyond the level of those who could be challenged to improve one's position. He held a tenuous position with his power as low as it was, but it was a position he had held for centuries...a testament to just how good he was and how well he could plan things.
But Eva? Evangeline A. K. McDowell was the sort of vampire that vampires told scary stories about. Plans? Eva didn't need a plan. If she had an army to face she wouldn't raise an army of her own or put on a disguise to slip in unnoticed, she would just start at the front lines and work her way through to the back. If she had a man to kill, hiding in the deepest, darkest dungeon, she would just tear the castle down around him. There was a reason Eva was the most feared vampire in existence, and Jonus did not want to get on her bad side any more than he was already.
"What about old Zeph Castor?" Eva said. "What if he told you to fight?"
Jonus cocked an eyebrow at her, doing his best not to run away screaming in abject terror at her glare. "If he told me to fight, I'd tell him I'm already a prisoner; he would understand."
"Yes, I suppose he would," Eva said, sighing as she rolled her eyes. "Is he still mooning around in that castle of his?"
Jonus watched her carefully. "Yes; he wants you to join the Great Vampire Lords, McDowell. He won't give up until you do."
Eva rolled her eyes again. "Whatever. I'm not interested, and I hate pretty much all of you anyway."
"Um..."
Eva and Jonus both looked at Seruhiko, who stood watching incredulously off to the side.
"Yes?"
"What?"
"...Class should have started six minutes ago," Seruhiko said nervously. It was rare that he was in the presence of two such powerful beings at the same time; it understandably made him a little jumpy.
"Oh," Eva said. "Come on then," she said as she opened the door and entered the classroom and went to her seat.
Jonus glanced at Seruhiko, who motioned for him to enter the room, and steeled himself for an experience he was quite sure he wasn't ready for.
Wednesday, July 8th, 2009, Afternoon
Ayumi stumbled out of the classroom after what she felt had to have been the longest school day of her life. 'Everything sucks,' she thought bitterly to herself. 'Negi-kun's gone, that bitch Possum's laughing at me behind my back...' She wouldn't even admit to herself that she hadn't actually seen Possum laughing at her; that was unimportant. What was important was that horrified look in Possum's face when Ayumi had pushed—when Possum had tripped backward and fallen down the stairs the other day. For an instant, it had seemed as if the American girl had been reaching for her, but then she had hit the stairs and...
Ayumi shivered.
"Kobayashi-san, are you okay?" someone she vaguely recalled seeing around town from time to time asked; Ayumi gave her a withering glare and trudged on.
"St-stupid Possum," she muttered as she walked down the stairs.
"Hey, watch it!" someone yelled when she bumped into them. Ayumi ignored the other girl and continued on until she was at the ground floor.
As usual after school, the ground floor was a a flood of female students all trying to leave at once. Ayumi shoved her way through the press of the crowd a bit more rudely than she normally would have until she made her way to the shoe lockers.
'Stupid Kara,' she thought, almost randomly. 'Thinks she can take away my favorite band! I'll show her, I'll...' she let that thought trail off; she couldn't think of any good way to punish Kara for her transgression at the festival. Kara had no business playing up on stage with Dekopin Rocket! None! That was something Ayumi should have done, not a girl who hadn't even known about them a year ago...! Not watching where she was going, she almost ran down another girl.
"Hey! Watch where you're going!" Ayumi shouted as she gave the offender a shove.
The other girl looked down at her, grinned, and cracked her knuckles. "Well well, if it isn't the little red haired suckup. How you doin', Suckup?"
Ayumi backed up a step or two, watching the bigger girl and her two friends warily. She hadn't noticed just who it was she was pushing...she would never have done it if she had seen that it was Kohana and her two stooges, Shino and Chihomi. Shino and Chihomi were stupid and mean, but they were Ayumi's own size; Kohana, or 'little flower' as her name translated, was a big, fat, bloated gasbag of a bully who enjoyed pushing others around and was as mean as she was ugly. Ayumi hated her guts.
Shino and Chihomi moved to stand around her, blocking any chance to escape; Shino had her usual ugly buck-teeth sticking out as she grinned stupidly at her while Chihomi just watched her, a predator's grin on her face. Ayumi shrank back from the two of them as well as she could; with the gasbag Kohana in front of her, the bucktooth behind her to the right and the freak behind her to the left, there was nowhere she could go as they forced her behind some bushes off to the side, out of view of most of the other students. The few who saw what was happening ducked their heads and hurried on.
"Come on Suckup, don't you have something to say?" Kohana said, giving her a little shove. "What, no snappy comeback? I'm disappointed in you, Suckup!"
"I'm not a suck up!" Ayumi said through clenched teeth. She wanted to scream; she hated these three...! She wanted to fight back, to hurt them like they always hurt her, knock out Shino's ugly teeth, beat Kohana into a bloody pulp, but most of all, she wanted Chihomi to suffer. The girl was sick and twisted, and she knew just how to hurt another girl, knew which areas were most sensitive to a sharp pinch or a sudden jab; she hated them, hated them all, she wanted to beat them up, to hurt them, but she was just so weak...! She wished she was strong like that tomboy Urashima Taro from class; she hated Urashima too, so much she couldn't stand it!
"O~oh! Suckup's talking back! What should we do about that, huh?" Kohana said, looking at the two flunkies.
Chihomi, her pretty appearance marred by what went on in her head, grinned, showing far too many teeth. "I wonder how well she can take a tongue piercing. Want a tongue piercing, Suckup?" she said, taking a drafting compass and a pair of scissors from her bag. "It's all the rage these days..."
Ayumi shrank back from the crazy girl, terrified as she eyed the pointed end of the compass. Some far off part of her mind absurdly took the time to note that the point looked rusty. "N-no...!"
"Ha ha! Tongue piercing, tongue piercing!" Shino chanted. "Go for it!" she said, grabbing Ayumi's arms from behind.
Ayumi let out a scream and kicked wildly as Chihomi approached; she managed to hit the girl's hand, knocking the scissors out of her grip, but the three girls didn't give her a chance to feel relieved.
Kohana drove her fist into Ayumi's belly as hard as she could, and Shino let go of her, allowing her to fall to her knees, and kicked her in the back, knocking her to the ground. Chihomi knelt down next to her.
"What's the matter, Suckup? Are you scared?" Chihomi whispered into Ayumi's ear, holding the compass with the point uncomfortably close to Ayumi's face. Ayumi, unable to answer, just squirmed on the ground, her arms wrapped around her stomach as she vainly tried to catch her breath after the sudden blow. Chihomi stood up and gave her a sharp kick to the hip and Ayumi cried out, a pitiful little breathless scream while the three bullies walked away, laughing.
The three were long gone by the time Ayumi struggled to her feet, trying to ignore the way her makeup was running from crying and how her stomach felt like she had just been hit by a car. As she gathered her books, which the bullies had dumped out of her bag at some point she couldn't remember, she spotted the pair of scissors Chihomi had been brandishing. They were a full sized pair of shears of the sort used for cutting cloth, and they were ridiculously sharp. Ayumi shivered as she cradled them in her hands. A pair of sewing shears had no right to be so sharp...! And the blades were long, longer than her hand, easily the biggest pair of shears she had ever seen...the heaviest too. They had the feel of an oft-used tool, but Ayumi had a feeling Chihomi had never used these for their intended purpose. The thought was disturbing, but...she really didn't want to let go of it. Holding the dangerous-looking pair of shears made her feel strong, powerful, as if she could take care of herself. She sat there a moment longer, her homework scattered on the grass around her, and quickly stuffed the pair of shears into her bag.
Ayumi stumbled along the sidewalk, barely even seeing where she was going. 'I hate them...I hate them...I hate them...stupid idiots, I hope they die in a fire...' She was tired, her body hurt all over, and she felt mean. What she felt most of all, though, was worry. Why had she taken those shears with her...? They were so heavy, she could feel them there in her bag, within easy reach. All she had to do to pull them out would be to reach into her bag... She shivered as she recalled the look on Chihomi's face as she approached, shears in one hand, drafting compass in the other. She realized she was groping for the shears with her free hand and quickly pulled her hand out of her bag. A few boys from the Boys' Middle School gave her a strange look, so she glared at them. 'Stupid boys, somebody should give them a tongue piercing,' she thought viciously. Her hand worked its way back into her bag again, but she let it stay this time.
'Stupid bullies, they should all die!'
And the girls in her class were all mean, too. They all made fun of her behind her back, she was sure! They just pretended to be nice when she was there, she was quite sure they changed their tune as soon as she had left. The only ones she even halfway liked were Kai and Kara, and she supposed her roommates Miyako and Rosemary were okay too, but they-
Ayumi froze in place on the sidewalk as her hand found not the handles of the pair of shears, but the corner of an envelope she had received in the mail yesterday, hastily torn open. Some idiot blundered into her from behind.
"Hey, watch where you're going!" she said, whirling around to face the idiot.
What stood facing her was a foreigner, an American girl with dirty blonde hair she had let grow too long, so long that her bangs hung over one of her eyes; she swept her hair back out of the way even as Ayumi stared, but it fell back over her eye again, though it didn't stop her eyes from seeming to bore into Ayumi's.
Ayumi's first instinct was to run away, quickly. Whatever else she was, this girl was insane. Her hand however, still in her bag, found the shears, and without even thinking about what she was doing, she yanked them out, holding them shakily in front of her. "G-go away!"
The girl just looked from Ayumi's eyes down to the shears, reached forward, and twisted them out of her hands.
"That's dangerous," she said, her voice low and tired. "If you want to scare someone, try a shovel. Lots of things you can do with a shovel," the girl said, almost to herself as she dropped the shears on the sidewalk and stepped around Ayumi, continuing on her way. "Or a stapler," she added as an afterthought as she trudged away.
Ayumi's heart raced as she watched the lunatic go. She waited until the other girl was out of sight before snatching up the shears and running away.
Ayumi found herself back on the school grounds a short time later, the most recent letter from her very own wicked stepmother occupying her mind. But there would be no handsome prince to save her, oh no; Ayumi was alone, and alone she would stay. Sure, she thought her teacher Negi was the best thing since the cell phone, but she couldn't see herself with him in the future, or any other man. It just...didn't work. She had too many soft spots, she was too fragile to let anyone get close. If she did, she would have to expose her weaknesses, and she couldn't stand to have anyone else know just how weak she really was.
"Not happening," she muttered under her breath, thinking back to her stepmother's letter; this one had been long and winding, and Ayumi got the impression that the money situation back at home was getting very, very tight. The little that her stepmother sent her always went straight into paying off Ayumi's guitar, a beautiful red Gibson SG Standard that she had bought on credit the day she had decided to start her own band. It had been ridiculously expensive, but when she saw it hanging on that hook in the guitar shop that day, it had just been...perfect. She had been trying to pay the thing off for close to two years now, and she honestly wasn't sure just how much she still owed...still, the guys at the guitar shop had done her a favor, and if Ayumi had anything to do with it, she'd at the very least pay off her guitar; though she would never admit it to anyone else, her guitar, her place in the band, was the only thing she had that really seemed real. When she played her guitar with Kara on bass, Kai on drums, and Miyako doing the vocals, she could forget about her wicked stepmother, Kohana and the others, the way her classmates all lied to her face and talked about her behind her back...she just wanted to be happy, but nobody would let her...! Ayumi stomped on a twig that had the misfortune to be in her way on the sidewalk, and sneered at the crunch it made.
"Bunch of idiots," she said aloud. Her stepmother had threatened her again; this time, she had threatened to drive to Mahora and drag her out of the dorm by her ear if she didn't stop wasting money on whatever she thought Ayumi was wasting money on. The threat was scary; Ayumi really didn't want to get dragged around in front of her classmates, not at all! She didn't think her stepmother would actually do it, not in public anyway, but...
Ayumi shivered again. Things were getting bad. No, they were bad before; now, her life was turning into a living hell. The only bright spot was the occasional money she got whenever Miyako painted another picture on a guitar for the guys down at the guitar shop; as the one who had set up that little side job for Miyako, she was entitled to a share of the pay.
She was thinking about this when someone grabbed her around the neck from behind and spun around, dragging her off her feet and slamming her face first into the sidewalk. She let out a strangled cry as she hit the pavement.
"Where is it? I know you have it!" a familiar voice hissed into her ear.
Ayumi's eyes went wide in terror. Chihomi! She had seen her take the shears...!
"Where is it?" the other girl demanded, smacking Ayumi's head into the sidewalk hard enough to make her eyes water as the rough surface ripped into the skin of her forehead. "Tell me!"
"I-I don't know!" Ayumi lied. "I don't even know what you're talking about!" she managed to squeak out. Chihomi banged Ayumi's head into the sidewalk again. "Ah...! Stop it Chihomi! It hurts, it hurts!"
Chihomi stopped banging her head into the sidewalk, but Ayumi got the feeling it wasn't because of what she had said.
"What? Do you have something to say?" Chihomi said, apparently to someone else.
Ayumi moved her head, trying to blink away the blood dripping into her eye from the big scrape on her forehead, and tried to see who was there. All she could see from her position was a pair of skinny legs with black socks and sneakers.
"You shouldn't do things like that..." said a familiar, shy voice.
Ayumi was mortified. The girl standing there, watching her get tortured, was Caro Shaw. The same Caro Shaw who Ayumi routinely took out her frustrations on. The same Caro Shaw she herself had mistreated more than a few times.
She wanted to curl up in a ball and die.
Instead, Chihomi lifted up her head again and smacked it hard against the concrete. Ayumi let out a cry. "Fine, whatever." She turned her attention back to Ayumi, booting her painfully in the side. Ayumi curled up in pain, utterly humiliated. "I'm not done with you," she said to Ayumi, then booted her again.
Ayumi laid there, sniffling, her face a bloody, teary mess and her makeup running all over the place, while Chihomi walked away.
Caro, however, remained standing beside her.
"Do you need help?"
Ayumi lurched to her feet, trying to cover her face so no one could see it. "Go away..."
"Ayumi-san? You're bleeding..."
"Go away I said!" Ayumi said, turning away. She was utterly humiliated; first she had been beaten up and left looking like a mess, and now Caro Shaw of all people had saved her...! 'I would rather be dead,' she thought viciously.
"Ayumi-san...?" Caro said, coming closer. She tried to take Ayumi's arm.
"Get away from me!" Ayumi screeched, giving Caro a shove that knocked her off balance so hard she fell down. Caro started to get up, but Ayumi pushed her down again. 'How DARE she pity me...!'
"Hey...!"
"Shut up!" Ayumi screamed as she gave Caro another push. Caro scrambled back, but Ayumi went after her. 'Stupid bitch,' she thought viciously as she grabbed Caro by the hair. 'She's going to go back and tell everybody about Chihomi, I just know it...!' She yanked Caro to her feet, the shy girl whimpering and trying to feebly loosen Ayumi's grip on her hair.
It was only at this point that Ayumi realized that there were others around, students who had stayed late for clubs or to study, who had only moments before been released for the day. Ayumi let go of Caro's hair and grabbed her by the wrist instead, using her forearm to try to wipe the blood from her face; she only managed to smear it even further. By this point, several drops had fallen on the front of her summer uniform shirt, soaking in and staining the material; combined with the dirt she had picked up and the button that had been ripped off when Chihomi knocked her down, she looked like a mess and she knew it. It only made her state of mind worse. She ran along, dragging Caro behind her.
"W-wait! Slow down, Ayumi-san!" Caro wailed.
"Shut up shut up Shut UP!" Ayumi screamed at her as she headed for what the students all called the New Gym.
The area behind the New Gym was, luckily for Ayumi at least, empty. She yanked Caro forward and tripped her so she fell into the gravel left behind in the bottom of the small water runoff ditch that ran along the wall of the gym. Caro let out a yelp as she fell, but Ayumi didn't care. "You stupid little bitch!"
Caro gingerly pushed herself up on hands and knees, but Ayumi didn't let her get any further than that; she kicked her in the side. Caro fell against the side of the building and sat up, looking at the other girl nervously for a moment before pausing to try and pick a tiny piece of gravel from the palm of her right hand.
"You stupid bitch..." Ayumi repeated again, pacing back and forth. 'Stupid Caro...I HATE her...! I wish she would just die!' Ayumi knew that she wasn't thinking straight, but she just didn't care at this point.
Having removed tiny the pebble from her skin, Caro looked warily back up at Ayumi as the red haired girl paced back and forth, muttering to herself, clenching and unclenching her fists.
Something was wrong; that much was obvious. What it was, though, Caro had no way of knowing short of asking, and Ayumi didn't seem to be in a mood to answer any questions. She was kind of worried for her...Ayumi had always been sort of mean to her, first teasing her and then moving on to trapping her in corners or against a wall and finally progressing to an uncomfortably tight hug, as if she was just a possession like a teddy bear or something, but Ayumi had never hurt her like this, never pulled her hair or shoved her down or kicked her. Caro was tough, she could take it...but it was scary. Caro hesitantly climbed to her feet. "Ayumi-san...?"
Ayumi whirled around, the blood from her forehead already starting to dry into a sticky mess on her face, and Caro jerked back at the wild look in her eyes. "Shut up!" Ayumi screeched.
Caro swallowed the lump in her throat and plodded on. "I...I don't know what happened, but if you need to talk to-"
Ayumi slapped her.
Caro looked at the other girl, wide eyed as she raised her hand up to the side of her face. Her cheek was starting to sting... "Why did you do that? What did I do to you...? I-I just...I just wanted to..." Caro muttered as her eyes started to water. "You're...you're mean..."
This seemed to produce a change in Ayumi, but unfortunately not one for the better. Ayumi got right up in her face, the white of her left eye standing out dramatically from the drying blood on the skin around it. "Shut up! Are you saying I'm a bully? I'm not a bully! You're just an idiot! An idiot!" she said, her voice rising higher and higher as she went on, culminating in her screeching out "I hate you!"
Caro shrank back from the other girl, but with her back to the wall of the gym, she had nowhere to go.
"I hate you I hate you I HATE you!" Ayumi continued to screech, pounding her fist against the wall beside Caro's head. Caro flinched away, and Ayumi grabbed a fistful of hair and yanked her back.
Caro yelped as Ayumi smacked the back of her head against the wall, twisting her fingers in Caro's hair.
"It hurts, Ayumi-san! Please! Please stop!"
"No! Why should I, huh? You're just going to, to-you'll just go back and tell everybody! And-and then what, huh? Answer me that!" Ayumi demanded, making very little sense to Caro.
Caro, her eyes watering from the way Ayumi was pulling her hair, really didn't like the far away look in the other girl's eyes; it was as if she wasn't even really aware of what she was doing. Ayumi brought Caro's head forward and walloped it against the wall again, and Caro let out a cry. Ayumi did it again, and again, that far away, panicky look still in place, and smacked Caro's head against the wall again harder than before.
Caro cried out; that last one had hurt. Ayumi was crying and mumbling and screaming about how she hated people and none of it made any sense, and Caro's instincts were screaming at her to just...run away from the crazy girl. Ayumi chose that moment to give Caro's hair a particularly hard yank. Caro cried out, her hands lashing out of their own accord...and her right ended up with a handful of Ayumi's hair.
Ayumi let out an offended screech. "You little bitch...LET GO OF MY HAIR!" Ayumi howled.
"You...you let go first!" Caro demanded shakily. She had a feeling that if she let go, things would get ugly very quickly.
"You're going to regret this!" Ayumi said, her voice hitching as she grabbed Caro's wrist with her free hand, refusing to let up her own grip on Caro's hair. "Too far! You're taking this too far!" Ayumi squealed, tears starting to fall as Caro gripped her hair even tighter.
And then Ayumi gave her hair the sharpest yank yet and Caro shrieked, letting go of Ayumi's hair before she could stop herself. Ayumi jerked Caro's hair savagely and shoved her back against the wall, finally losing her grip. Ayumi gave her a jerky smack on the side of the head, but it was enough to knock Caro off balance enough to fall clumsily to the ground. She hesitantly brought her hand up to the side of her head, where Ayumi had grabbed her hair. 'Is it bleeding...?' she wondered to herself. It certainly felt like it was bleeding—it felt like Ayumi had pulled out half the hair on Caro's head—but there was no blood she could see.
A rock rolled under Ayumi's foot as she staggered back and she lost her balance, flailing as she fell. Her bag hit the ground and spilled its contents across the grass. Caro's eyes went to the absurdly large set of scissors lying in the grass, and then Ayumi's hand fell and closed around them, and a cold feeling settled in the pit of Caro's stomach.
Ayumi climbed back to her feet, clutching the scissors nervously. "I-I warned you, but you didn't listen! You didn't listen!" she said, her voice going higher and higher. "You went too far! You took it too far!" she screamed, her voice going so high it cracked as she spoke.
Takahashi Shizuko, student number 12 of class 2-A, had been out for a stroll after school when she noticed two first year students hurrying away from the direction of the New Gym with their heads down. Shizuko looked in the direction from which the two nervous girls had come, and frowned. She walked up and pulled one of them aside; the girl looked up at her, her eyes worried and moist, as if she was about to cry. Shizuko's gaze sharpened noticeably, changing the character of her face from open and maybe even a little ditzy to scarily alert. If someone had bullied them...normally a peaceful, quiet person, Shizuko didn't like bullies or anyone else who took advantage of those weaker than themselves, not one little bit.
"What's going on? Is something wrong?" Shizuko asked. The girl glanced back the way she had come, as if debating on whether or not to tell her.
"Well..." the girl said, looking to her friend for support.
"It's that second-year, Kobayashi-san. She's picking on someone," the second girl said, and abruptly clammed up.
"She...she has a pair of scissors this time..." the first girl said nervously. She flinched back at something she saw in Shizuko's eyes.
"Where is she?" Shizuko asked quietly.
The two girls went quiet and looked at each other, then turned to Shizuko. "She's behind the New Gym," the second girl said. "Please, please stop her! She's scary like this, I don't like it..." the girl said, hugging her bag to her chest nervously as she looked at her feet. Her friend put a comforting hand on her shoulder.
"Thank you," Shizuko said, looking over to where the roof of the New Gym could be seen above the treetops.
Caro cringed back as Ayumi put her fingers through the finger holes in the handles of the pair of shears.
"I said stop that! You brought this on yourself! Th-this is your fault! Not mine, yours!" Ayumi said, her voice wavery, almost scared. She grabbed Caro's hair again
"Ah!" Caro cried out. She had been hurt before, sure; one didn't reach her age without a few minor wounds at the very least, but never before this day had she felt the sensation of having her hair pulled out by the roots; it hurt to an absurd degree. Through teary eyes, she could see Ayumi was crying too, clearly terrified at her own actions, but now that she had started, she seemed to have found herself unable to stop. She didn't even seem to know what to do with the shears...absurdly, Caro almost felt sorry for her.
Almost.
All of that was replaced by panic when Ayumi brought the shears closer, her hand shaking. Caro tried to back away, but Ayumi still had a handful of her hair.
"N-no...!" Caro begged.
"Ayumi! What the hell are you doing?!"
Shizuko walked briskly around the last hedge just in time to see her classmate Kara Stride hit Kobayashi Ayumi, already a mess with her dirty uniform and dried blood on her face from an ugly scrape on her forehead, across the face with a backhanded blow that staggered the other girl. Ayumi abruptly let go of Caro and stumbled back, but Kara gave her no time to recover, grabbing her arm and moving around behind her, twisting her arm around and up into a hammer lock, and forcing Ayumi down to her knees.
"Let go!" Kara demanded. "Let go of it NOW!"
And, now that Shizuko was so close, she could see what Kara was talking about: Ayumi held an absurdly large pair of shears in one hand, flailing it around as she wailed in pain. Shizuko's mother had a pair like that; they were big enough to do a lot of damage if used as a weapon. She briefly wondered what had driven Ayumi to such a state; whatever it was, it must have been terrible. Ayumi wasn' the easiest to get along with, but this was worse by several orders of magnitude than anything she had ever done before. She contemplated trying to snatch the shears away, but quickly dismissed the idea. With the way Ayumi was swinging them around, any attempt to get close could get a girl badly cut, if not worse; Kara was lucky she hadn't lost an eye.
"IT HURTS!" Ayumi wailed.
"Then let go!" Kara growled at her, twisting her arm a little further.
Ayumi's screaming went up an octave and she dropped the shears. Shizuko stepped forward and picked them up and put them into her bag. Kara gave her a nod, and Shizuko nodded in return as she quickly slipped back out of Ayumi's reach and went to check on Caro.
Kara let go of Ayumi and gave her a shove, knocking her clumsily into the dirt, crying, her hair all a mess and snot running down her nose. Kara moved to stand in front of her and crossed her arms.
"Ayumi, I have had enough; this is where I draw the line," she said. Ayumi looked up at her, trying to glare through her sobbing and failing miserably.
"Yuh-you're out of the buh-band!" Ayumi wailed, but Kara just looked at her.
"No, we've talked about it, Ayumi. Me and Kai and Miyako, we all agree: you've gone way overboard, ever since the festival. If you can't straighten up, screw that. I'm kicking you out of the band."
And there it was. Kara looked down at Ayumi, trying to school her face into hiding the swirl of emotions she was feeling, foremost among them worry for her bandmate and guilt over lying about what Kai and Miyako had said. She desperately, desperately hoped Ayumi would call her bluff.
Ayumi's eyes went wide and panicky, and Kara wanted desperately to hug her and pat her head and tell her everything would be alright, but her experience with the girl told her that Ayumi wouldn't learn from this experience if she let her off the hook...and Ayumi desperately needed to learn from this experience. Her actions had grown increasingly vicious and self centered ever since the festival, and everyone was sick of it.
Ayumi's mouth started to work as tears started to fall, but the words that came out were not what Kara wanted to hear.
"S-so what!" Ayumi said. "I-I don't c-care about you guys! You're all a...you're just a bunch of sc-scrubs anyway! And your bass playing SUCKS!" Ayumi screeched, her voice cracking as she scrambled to her feet, then turned and ran, sobbing wildly while Kara, Shizuko, and Caro watched her go.
Finally, when the silence had stretched too long, Kara turned to Caro. "I'm sorry; I didn't know it had gotten that bad," she said, referring to Ayumi's constant bullying of Caro. As far as Kara knew, up to this point it had never progressed beyond teasing and occasional grab-hugging on Ayumi's part. This...it was way beyond what Kara had thought Ayumi was capable of.
Caro looked up at her, her eyes wide. "You...you've got to go after her! What about..." she trailed off as Shizuko held out a small hand mirror and she saw her own disheveled appearance.
"Ayumi can take care of herself," Kara said with a finality she didn't feel. "She brought this on herself, so she can deal with it herself." She felt a little petty and bad that she had lied about Kai and Miyako agreeing to kick Ayumi out of the band, but that didn't make it any less true. Kara had been brought up to take responsibility for her own actions, and she expected the same of others. Ayumi would have to take responsibility for what she had done...even though Kara wanted to find her and apologize, Ayumi had gone too far; she would have to make amends before Kara would let her back into the band. Even something like a simple heartfelt 'I'm Sorry' would have worked, but...Kara sighed. She would just have to wait and see.
Shizuko looked off again in the direction Ayumi had fled, and frowned. She had seen the panicked look on Ayumi's face; she didn't like it one bit. For one brief instant, Ayumi had had the look of a drowning man who had been denied rescue. She glanced at Kara and Caro as they talked, then back to where Ayumi had gone.
Thursday, July 9th, 2009, Noon
"Hey, Negi," Asuna said as she entered the private room in the secret hospital under the Mahora Middle School Administration Building and shut the door behind her. The facility had housed everything from youkai and oni to vampires and ghouls and even the occasional human over the years, but now, it held one of the most beloved citizens of Mahora: a young man called Negi Springfield, magic teacher from Wales and almost as famous and well loved as his father, among certain circles. He was kind and well liked by everyone that knew him; to find someone who truly disliked him was extremely rare.
He was lying on a hospital bed, his condition unchanged from the day before.
Asuna sat down in the seat next to the bed, propping her sword up nearby; she never let it out of her sight these days...too many unexpected surprises had popped up since her return to Mahora earlier in the year, not the least of which was the sudden, unexplained collapse of one of the best friends she had ever had.
"How are you doing today?" she asked as she settled in.
Negi just laid there, his eyes not quite shut, staring blankly out at nothing as his chest slowly rose and fell and machinery beeped around him. Negi Springfield had fallen into a coma, and no one knew when—or if—he would ever come out of it.
"I'm tired; the last few days've been rough, you know!" she said in a chiding tone.
Negi didn't respond.
Asuna heaved a sigh. "It seems like every two-bit wannabe has come out of the woodwork all at once to give us a hard time! Don't worry about it though," she added at the end. "Me and the others have been keeping everything normal; even the new kids are helping out! Taro-kun and your class rep Sachiko are doing a great job taking care of the regular kinds, and Kagami's having a blast blasting anything magical that tries to break in. Heh, you should see her when she gets going, she's having the time of her life!"
Negi didn't move.
Asuna settled back in the surprisingly comfortable chair. "And then Kazumi and Reiko are rattling on and on about all the ghosts that are coming into town. There's nothing we can do about that...it kinda bothers me. But Kazumi keeps insisting they're harmless and Reiko's not contradicting her, so I dunno. Still...I hope none of 'em start causing any trouble, you know?" Asuna leaned forward, propping her hands up under her chin. "We all miss you Negi, you brat. Hurry up and get better."
Negi continued to lay there, his breathing slow and steady, an I.V. tube hooked up in his arm, various wires with suction cups attached to his chest and head and another on a clip at the end of one of his fingers. Asuna sat there a moment, watching him for a reaction. She frowned when none was forthcoming. Negi, awake and moving around, was larger than life, a pillar of strength around which his circle of friends moved. He was the life of the group, even when he wasn't there; to see him here, in this hospital bed... Asuna shuddered as she took in his too-lean form, the droopy, sad expression on his face even in a coma, the sickly paleness of his skin. He looked impossibly small, far too frail to be the same energetic teacher who had inspired so many students to greatness. Asuna cracked a smile. 'He also inspired quite a few of them to more questionable things...' Boy was that true...! Her smile widened crookedly as she recalled some of the more notable instances over the years of overactive hormone-driven girls looking to catch a Negi of their very own.
Negi just laid there.
Asuna let out another sigh and looked up at the ceiling, squeaky clean. The whole room was remarkably clean; probably courtesy of some highly specific array of magic circles, Asuna thought idly. She hadn't been lying when she said trouble had been coming out of the woodwork recently; she hadn't gone into detail about it mostly because she didn't want Negi, wherever his mind was wandering these days, to worry about it...and if he heard the details, he would definitely worry about it. One of his students had flipped out and apparently tried to stab several others just the day before, from what Asuna had heard; she didn't know if the details were true...for instance, where would Kobayashi Ayumi have gotten a sword, anyway? But she had only heard of it because Sayo had overheard the rumor in the halls and had told Kazumi about it, but it sounded like things could have gotten ugly very quickly if two other students hadn't gotten involved. None of the students were those she was involved with, so she didn't really know what to think about the incident...she didn't know enough about the situation to make any judgements, and well...everyone had their own circumstances, right? But still, what would drive a girl to try and harm another that way? And then there was the issue of another one of his students, Ono Ran...
Ono Ran had disappeared the day Negi fell into a coma. She had returned to her room in the dorm to get a few things, and then had vanished without even a word to her roommate, a mousy girl called Yoshida Ume. Asuna didn't know either of them either, but it was almost certain Ono Ran was up to trouble, and perhaps had even caused Negi to fall into this...this...whatever-it-was. The girls in Negi's class couldn't or wouldn't tell her much about what happened, but it certainly seemed Ono Ran had done this to him.
Asuna's cell phone beeped at her, so she pulled it out of her pocket to look at the time. "Sorry I can't stay longer today, Negi; I have an appointment. Turns out Yuuna wants to do some experimenting with magic cancel and that weird hoodoo stuff Possum can do, and wants me to help plan it. Well, see ya later, Negi!" Asuna said, leaving the room. The door swung shut behind her, leaving the room once again in silence but for the faint sound of breathing and the beeping of machines.
Friday, July 10th, 2009, Midday
Kara glanced back at Ayumi's empty seat directly behind her for the tenth time in an hour, prompting Urashima Taro, who sat behind Ayumi, to look up at her questioningly. Kara shook her head and looked back at her textbook without really seeing it. Ayumi had been absent from school for the last couple days, ever since Kara had stopped her from doing...whatever she had been about to do to Caro and kicked her out of the band. She felt bad; she couldn't help it. Logically, she knew Ayumi was acting like a total asshole, but that didn't stop her from wondering why. What had set Ayumi off like that? It wasn't as if she had known Ayumi all her life, but even so she felt that the other girl's actions were extremely out of character for her.
Kara looked blankly out the window, not really seeing anything beyond the glass. The whole thing was very troubling...Kara had found herself staring out into space quite often over the past day or so, ignoring everything around her as she thought about her friend. She knew Ayumi didn't get along with her stepmother, and Miyako told her once about a mean-spirited letter from Ayumi's stepmother she had found, tossed behind Ayumi's mirror in the dorm room they shared...had Ayumi's stepmother sent her another? Kara frowned as she propped her arm up on her desk and rested her head on her hand. So, had it been her stepmother, or had it been something else? Could it have been money problems...? Kara knew all about money problems; living in Japan was surprisingly expensive when one had no parents close by to support them.
Kara shook her head to clear it; she had the feeling she was on the wrong track altogether. She wanted the old Ayumi back, the Ayumi that laughed at her own stupid jokes, the Ayumi who loved to make her guitar scream, the Ayumi who liked to sit and talk for hours about anything and everything. Kara liked that Ayumi; it was a side of herself that Ayumi showed to very, very few, and it was the most honest side of her Kara had ever seen. That side of Ayumi knew how to smile, how to laugh, how to act like a total moron without feeling self conscious about it; Kara was pretty sure Ayumi didn't even show that side of herself to Kai or Miyako, and she had known Kai longer and was even Miyako's roommate...!
Kara heaved another sigh while the teacher droned on.
'I really need to fix this...'
"Hey, Ran-chan? I really don't like this..." the president of the Fortune Telling Club, Kotobuki Minami, said as she stood next to Ono Ran in a small otherwise deserted former office building. "This is weird... Those are circles of power, right? Like in that book I found in the library," she said, pointing to the paper printouts Ran had had Minami and their other club member Mari Nichols had been posting up in out of the way places all over town. "And these are something to do with trapping something, right?" she said, holding up a sheet of paper with a different symbol on it. "What exactly are you trying to do here?" she demanded. 'And it better be important enough to justify having me and Mari skip school today,' she added mentally.
Ran looked at her for a moment, then over at Mari, who nodded, looking worried, and sighed. "You're right; what I want to do is weird. But..." she said, trailing off. "But I feel it needs to be done." She turned her attention back to the intricate magic circle she was trying to draw on another piece of paper.
Minami just looked at her for a long moment, then over at Mari, who was checking the copies she had made to make sure nothing had gotten into the wrong stack. "Well, if you feel that strongly about it..." She heaved a much-put-upon sigh. 'Eh, whatever. I'll just make up whatever I missed in school today later.' "Well fine then; whatever you want. We'll help you, but if things get too weird..." She sighed again and shook her head. "We'll have to stop you for your own good. We're friends, aren't we?"
Ran looked at her, her eyes a little wider than normal, and finally smiled; it was small, barely noticeable, but Minami and Mari had known her long enough to recognize it for what it was: a real, honest smile from their friend. "Okay."
Minami grinned back at her. "Okay, it's a promise! Now, how were you planning on carrying these out of here?" she asked, pointing to the large stacks of paper.
Author's Notes: Sorry about the ridiculous two month delay between chapter 16 and chapter 17; this is the start of a rather long arc, and I wanted to get all the chapters finished and edited for the sake of continuity before I started posting them. I must admit Book 2 has given me far more problems than I thought it would; then again, my work situation has been all over the place as well, and I've had to develop new methods for getting my writing done. I know, I know: excuses. Still, I'm working on writing more regularly. My goal is around 3000 words a day, and when conditions are right (work, family interruptions, all the rest), I can actually manage it more often than not. Still, there are far too many days where I barely manage 500...I need to work on that. Chapter 18 will be released within a reasonable time frame, I promise : p