Sadly for Makoto, it'll take more than a little hazing like that before she cn get used to Mahora...Hell Takamichi's been there for YEARs and he STILL hasn't gotten used to it.
Anyways, lets get this party started shall we?
HEAVEN OR HELL?
LET'S RAWK!
33rd period.
Kuwabara sat at the table, looking over the newspaper as he chomped away at a slice of buttered toast. It was a weekend, so there was little worry about classes, though he still made a note to check in on Negi and Konoka if he had the chance, the former out of concern for his fellow sensei, the other out of fear, and guilt, over what had happened in Kyoto, though Sakurazaki seemed to be sticking to her like glue so there was little fear of another kidnapping attempt.
He looked up as Makoto stumbled down the stairs, her hair and pajamas rumpled adorably as she tried to comb the tresses into her usual ponytail. "Mornin" he called out, earning a bleary yawn for his trouble "Rough night?"
"So stiff…" Makoto groaned, slumping onto the table bonelessly, eyeing him from beneath her brown tresses with a neutral glare "How can you be so chipper?"
"Coffee." Kuwabara replied sagely, holding up his 'Do I look like a F%#$ing people person?!' mug, which was filled to the brim with piping hot liquid soberity and caffeine "Lots n' lots of coffee."
"Well fork me over some." Makoto growled, though there was a note of humor in her tone as she watched her fellow sensei go about pouring her a cup "By the way, I didn't see our roomies."
"Eva-chan and Chachamaru are out at the moment." Kuwabara replied with a grin, having see off the pair about half an hour ago, Eva claiming she had things to do around town and Chachamaru tagging along as always "They'll be back later."
"So we're alone are we?" Makoto asked, looking the taller sensei over as she accepted her cup of coffee, chugging back a mouthful, heedless of how her pajama top had come partially undone, earning a spit-take from Kuwabara as he caught an eyeful of her unbound breasts "What?"
"NOTHING!" Kuwabara choked, blushing furiously and wiping his chin with his tie, averting his eyes from the brunette's assets "Just…coffee's a bit too hot s'all..."
Makoto quirked an eyebrow but said nothing, merely sipping away at her own cup, before stepping up and making for the stairs "I'll be in the shower." She warned, sending Kuwabara a good-natured frown over her shoulder "No peaking!"
"As if I would." Kuwabara scoffed, returning the look with a smirk of his own as he tidied up the clutter left on the table "I like being able to pee standing up."
Makoto snorted, before heading up the stairs with a sigh, slipping into the bathroom and out of her nightclothes, letting the hot water wash away the previous days dirt. As she rinsed out her hair, her mind wandered to the meeting she'd arranged with Chibi-Usa and Hotaru later that day. The two of them, or Usa anyways, wanted her to treat them as a teacher no doubt.
By the time she'd finished, dressing in a casual blouse and jeans before coming down the stairs, she'd found the kitchen long since deserted, a note from Kuwabara explaining that he'd stepped out for a while, a plate of buttered toast and the morning paper on the table.
'Same old Kuwabara.' The brunette noted with a smile, shaking her head at the man's thoughtfulness 'Just like he was back in college, a real rock to lean on.
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"Well it looks like everyone's in good spirits." Kuwabara noted, walking along the streets of Mahora, noting several members of 3-A about town as well, waving at them and declining their offers to join them for karaoke or the like "After all, I got somewhere to be!"
Which is why we find the tantei literally skipping down the street towards Genkai's hotel, a bouquet of flowers in one hand and a tub of ice cream under the other, the Koorime's favorite flavor to boot.
"Yukina-chan!" he called out, racing up the steps three at a time, coming to a halt in front of the door and ringing the bell, fixing his appearance as he waited for the door to open, smiling as Genkai's wrinkled face came into view "Yo, Genkai-baasan."
"You're early, even for you." Genkai noted, letting the tantei in and quirking an eyebrow at his aura "and I see that trip to Kyoto did you some good after all."
"Huh? Oh…yeah…" Kuwabara muttered, recalling exactly WHO he'd been training with while there, and wondering how the knowledge of this would affect the psychic. After all, Toguro and Genkai had been a couple before the former sold his humanity to become a demon, just how would Genkai react to him being trained by her lover's ghost?
"Give the Shinmeiryuu their due," Genkai chuckled, smirking wryly "they may be a bunch of traditional old fogies, but at the very least they know how to sharpen people's skills."
"Right…" Kuwabara muttered, looking around distractedly, trying to pinpoint his beloved's gentle youki within the structure and blinking as he came up empty handed "Ara? Where's Yukina-chan?"
"A missive came from her people while you were away." Genkai replied, lighting up a cigarette and walking over to an armchair "She had to go back for a few days, family matters apparently." She smirked as the tantei slumped pathetically "Now don't go making me feel wanted."
"Sorry, baasan," the tantei apologized, sighing explosively before straightening himself out, setting the tub of ice cream and flowers on the table and offering an apologetic smile "Didn't mean to come off as a jerk."
"Hard to match Yusuke's standards I know." Genkai offered, the two of them snorting at the memory of her disciple's infamous foot-in-mouth disease, which had gotten into hot water with more than a few people, but usually Keiko. "Now," she muttered, smiling up at the tantei "What do you say to a quick test of your abilities?"
"Ready and waiting ba-chan." Kuwabara replied, clenching a fist and grinning at the old psychic confidently "I ain't the same guy I was before."
"We'll see." Genkai countered, smirking at the man in a way that reminded him that it wasn't all that long ago she could kick Urameshi's ass from here to Makai and back "Oh yes indeed."
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"So since Mamoru figured my folks sent me back here to learn, he pulled some strings and enrolled me here at Mahora." Usa revealed, slurping down a strawberry milkshake at a café, Hotaru doing the same with her chocolate one.
"And how'd Usagi take it?" Makoto asked, referring to the pinkette's future mother, the only one of their group to not get into Todai. She hadn't seen the blonde for some time since graduation either, and was generally worried about her.
"Well…she moved in with Mamoru after she graduated." Chibi-Usa admitted, earning a quirked eyebrow from the brunette "Daring I know, but seeing as she couldn't get accepted into any universities with her grades, her mom finally threw her out for good."
"That's Ikuko-san for you." Makoto chuckled, recalling Usagi's long-suffering mother with a weak smile. The poor woman had been driven to her wits end trying to make a respectable lady out of the blonde disaster area, ignorant the whole time of her moon-lighting as one of Juuban's defenders, Sailor Moon.
Of course, it was better that way for most of them, as with the exception of Makoto, most of the scouts had families to worry about. Makoto, being an orphan, could afford to let her guard down around her apartment, but the others couldn't even use their communicators unless they were absolutely certain they weren't being spied on.
"So in any case, what's the scoop between you and Kuwabara-sensei?" Chibi-Usa asked, grinning mischievously as Hotaru blushed at the insinuation "You two seem to know each other rather well!"
"Kuwabara?" Makoto repeated, raising her eyebrows in surprise at the pinkette's boldness, no doubt inherited from her mother "He's an old friend from Todai, he was Ami and my neighbor."
"Really?" Usa smirked, earning a tentative look from Hotaru, who didn't like where the conversation was going "I'll admit he ain't the prettiest tool in the shed, but according to the grapevine he's pretty cool over all." She winked at Hotaru "And according to the local paparazzi, he's pretty built too."
"If Mamoru heard you talking like that he'd have a coronary." Makoto pointed out, her tone serious, though there was a slight blush to her cheeks as she recalled that disastrous first morning in the shower. 'Pretty built indeed.' She admitted, flushing slightly and shaking her head to ward off the image. "In any case, how's Dan been doing?"
"Hibiki-san entered a martial arts competition a while back." Hotaru replied, referring to a certain, pink-clad martial artist that had helped the senshi out long ago "He keeps in contact, and Sakura-sempai usually covers for him when he comes to visit."
"Have you been keeping up with your practice?" Makoto asked, looking the duo over, glad that the conversation had changed "Maybe we can have a quick spar for old times' sake."
"Against you?" Usa chuckled, quirking an eyebrow sardonically, a trait she most definitely inherited from her father "No offence Makoto, but I choose life."
"Wise choice." Makoto chuckled, ruffling the pinkette's hair, earning a giggle from the girl as she flagged down another strawberry milkshake.
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Kuwabara swept low, aiming to take the diminutive psychic off balance, but Genkai merely leapt upwards, hands clasped behind her back and an almost bored expression on her face as she flipped easily through the air with grace that'd make trained acrobats weep for joy.
"You're faster, I'll give you that." She allotted, sweeping under his strikes with an approving look despite her perpetual frown "And you use a lot less unnecessary movement, I'm actually having to dodge instead of stepping out of the way now."
"What's the difference?" Kuwabara grunted, his fists a blur, shifting from regular punches to knife-strikes, from inch-punches to paw-fists, as he endeavored to at least make the psychic sweat a little. He might outrank her in regards to strength and Reiki, especially considering she'd bequeathed most of her power to Yusuke, but Genkai had more battle experience than anyone else he knew of, even Tsuruko had spoken highly of her during their conversations in Kyoto.
As it was, the goal of this exercise was simplicity itself, all the tantei had to do was knock Genkai's hat from her head to end the match. Even touching it would earn him a minute's reprieve to catch his breath, something he'd made good use of, as Genkai was as slippery as a greased eel, and could fight dirtier than Urameshi ever imagined, as she'd apparently been around when the book was written…and had supplied a lot of the material.
"The difference," the psychic explained, getting inside his guard and sending him flying flat on his back with two fingers to the chest and a burst of reiki "Is that before now I could've done that ten times from the offset." She watched the man sit up with a grunt "Now I can barely see any openings at all, and your strikes are more precise, I actually felt a few graze me when I dodged."
"So all that means is that I'm higher than your shoes." Kuwabara muttered, a self-mocking smirk on his face as he sat up, one leg crossed beneath him, the other pointing upwards as he leant against a tree "Taku…and here I thought I'd made a leap."
"Don't deride yourself, that's my job." Genkai chuckled good naturedly, earning a snort from the man as he shook his head "And you have advanced, if this fight weren't limited to simple hand to hand combat then doubtless you'd have prevailed long ago." She frowned "however, one of the failings in my lessons with Yusuke is that I couldn't pass on the full benefits of my tutelage, namely how to handle challenges from fighters that don't rely on reiki or youki, but are nonetheless capable of putting up a decent fight." She smirked "Like a certain Kyoto kunoichi and blonde kempo practitioner you know so well."
Kuwabara winced, recalling how Ku Fei and Kaede had kept popping up at random intervals between classes ever since returning from Kyoto. The former, with bluntness fitting of her Baka Yellow title, kept challenging him to fights in public, which for some reason always attracted a crowd that made escaping difficult. Kaede, fortunately, was less direct in her approach, and seemed to be testing herself by trying to sneak under his Reikan to get close enough to surprise him. Though the fact she'd have the odd kunai about her made the tantei question what would happen if she DID sneak up on him.
"By the way, what's the situation with Evangeline?" Genkai asked, catching the man's attention with her question "judging by the fact you're not running around terrorizing the public, I'm guessing she hasn't made another attempt to convert you."
"Had ta bring that up didn't ya?" Kuwabara muttered with a wince, though he really had no one to blame but himself for falling into that trap "And naw, she's teaching Negi-bozu a few tricks ta being a magi." He smirked at Genkai's cocked eyebrow "Yeah, surprised me too."
"Wrangling tutoring from the maga nosferatu herself…quite a talent that boy has." Genkai noted, shaking her head in disbelief at Negi's daring, clearly a genetic trait "Be that as it may he made a good choice, out of all the magical practitioners currently in Ningenkai, there's probably none that can match her in terms of might and skill." She smirked wryly "Plus she's been around longer than I have, so she's sure to have picked up a thing or too." She looked over at the tantei with a calculative expression "Maybe you could stand to learn a thing or two yourself."
"Me?" Kuwabara stammered, pointing at his face as his eyes widened at the thought, as it had come completely out of left field "But…I'm no mage! I can't use magic!"
"Most people have some innate form of magic about them." Genkai countered, her hands behind her back "However, most mundanes live through their whole lives without realizing it, and those that do usually don't have enough that it requires formal training." she nodded towards the tantei "You can materialize your reiki into tangible blades, that in itself is a form of magic, albeit an obscure one, more creditable to your abnormally high Reikan than any magical proficiency."
"So what, you think I should pick up a few spells or somethin'?" Kuwabara asked, wondering when the hell his life had become a fantasy RPG, complete with overpowered lollita schoolgirls.
"Not really, though perhaps they'll give your brain something to do while you train your body." Genkai quipped, though the humor in her tone was good-natured, even if her smirk set the man on edge "After all, you're that girl's minister now, right?"
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"What was that?" Makoto wondered, looking up in confused alarm as the dieing echoes of a frustrated scream faded away, the residents of Mahora not giving it a second thought.
"Sounds like someone's sleeping on the couch tonight." Usa joked, earning a mortified flush from Hotaru and a stern look from Makoto, though the brunette couldn't help but snort at the innuendo.
"C'mon let's get you back to the dorms." She muttered, leading the way with both girls nattering away about campus life at her sides, discussing the madness that was Mahora with eagerness.
"Makoto." Usa asked suddenly, looking up at the brunette with a serious expression that reminded Makoto of her mother whenever she was arguing with Rei "Listen, you know how we were talking about Kuwabara-sensei a while back?" she pressed on despite Hotaru's imploring look "Well…how is it you're so familiar with him? You two used to date or something?"
Makoto was silent a moment, the pinkette wondering if she'd crossed some sort of line with her mother's friend, only to blink at the expression on the woman's face, a far off look that was part sad, part happy.
"Kuwabara…helped me through a really rough patch." Makoto admitted, gripping her elbow as she looked out at the campus from atop the walkway, her smile wistful "It happened while we were at Todai…I wish I could say it wasn't my fault, but I'd probably be wrong."
"Makoto-san…" Hotaru began, her tone laced with concern for the older woman, only for the brunette to turn, a beaming smile on her face as she ruffled their hair.
"Enough reminiscing!" she chuckled, pushing them along by their shoulders "Time to get you delinquents back to the dorms before curfew!"
Hotaru said nothing, a stark contrast to Usa, who was fighting to escape the taller woman's clutches, insisting there was no curfew. The purple-eyed girl was watching the brunette carefully, a hint of concern in those eyes as she noticed the smile on her friend's face seemed a little false. Clearly, whatever it had been that transpired at Todai between Makoto and Kuwabara-sensei, calling it a 'rough patch' didn't do it justice.
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"Tadaima…" Kuwabara called out, slipping into the cottage, only to blink as the telltale sound of voices from upstairs reached his ears "Oiiii, Eva-chan?"
"Who're you calling Eva-chan so familiarly?!" came the enraged reply, Evangeline sliding down the banister to glare at him like an annoyed cat, looking oddly adorable in a pair of half-moon spectacles and slight blush.
"Wari-Wari…" Kuwabara offered with a chuckle, slipping out of his jacket and tie as he drew closer, smiling at the vexed magi, "So what's the party for?"
"The boy and Konoka needed some after class tutoring." Evangeline muttered, leading the way back upstairs and nodding towards a waving Konoka and a distressed looking Negi, who was squatting on the floor tracing circles in the wood and weeping humorously "That is, if SOMEONE would snap out of his funk long enough to pay attention!"
"Awoo…Asuna-san's mad at me…" Negi sobbed, looking so lost and distressed that the collective females, sans an annoyed Evangeline, felt the urge to cuddle him "What'd I do?"
"Lover's tiff?" Kuwabara asked, earning a confused look from Konoka, a mortified look from Setsuna, Nodoka and Negi, a blank stare from Chachamaru and a cackle of amusement from Evangeline.
"Close enough." The lolita snorted, smirking at the mortified face of her disciple as she reclaimed her seat in front of a blackboard, on which were drawn crude images of Negi and Konoka, bulging like over-filled gummy bears with magical energy "It seems boya here and Kagurazaka got into a bit of a fight over his leaving her out of some exploration with the library duo."
"Y-Yue and I convinced Negi-sensei to check out one of the underground passages his father had listed on the map the elder gave him." Nodoka admitted, Kuwabara looking intrigued at the news "We went down there without telling anyone, then the dragon chased us out and we…"
"Wait th' HELL?!" Kuwabara baulked, eyes widening in disbelief at what the shy librarian had just told them "A Dragon?! There's a Goddamned DRAGON on th' campus?!"
"Under it actually." Chachamaru supplied, drawing everyone's attention to her "It appears to live in the underground tunnels, no doubt guarding the rare tomes that exist deep within the confines of Library Island."
"That's one hell of a hall monitor." Kuwabara muttered, earning a nervous giggle from Nodoka and a scoff from Evangeline, before turning to address the still weeping Negi, who still hadn't stopped his antics "Anyways kiddo, why don't you tell me what happened?"
Two minutes later, and the tantei had to use every ounce of self-control he'd learned to keep from falling on his ass from laughing so hard. But he just couldn't help it, as prim and proper as Negi was, it was heartening to know that he was still a ten-year old, capable of saying inappropriate things without full knowledge of their repercussions.
"F-first off, I'd apologize for the 'Paipan' bit," he chuckled, coughing into his fist to compose himself "Dunno if it's the crux of th' matter, but saying something like that out loud's gotta be one hell of an embarrassment for a girl." He smirked and ruffled the boy's hair "But give 'er some space ta cool off first…I know from experience that women tend to be pretty catty after being embarrassed."
Negi nodded, looking up at the older sensei with appreciation, before rushing off with a blurted apology to Evangeline, nearly knocking Hakase down as the bespectacled girl climbed up with a toolbox under her arm, no doubt to check on Chachamaru.
"Looks like you can say the right thing from time to time." Evangeline noted with a wry smirk, looking at the lanky professor over the rim of her glasses, before nodding to Konoka "I need to speak with you about developing your magic…" she eyed Kuwabara uncertainly "I suppose you'd better tag along too." She smirked at his look of surprise "You need to know exactly what you've gotten yourself into."
Kuwabara blinked, looking over at an equally confused Konoka, before leading the way down the stairs after Evangeline, the Dean's grand-daughter following with a concerned Setsuna on her tail. Evangeline gestured for them to find a seat, the trio complying by pushing several of her dolls out of the way tentatively. After all, most of them were a lot bigger than Chachazero, and that particular Doll was deadly enough on her own.
"Now, Eishun's stupidity aside," Evangeline began, earning a stern look from Setsuna for her referring to Konoka's father as such "You really should have begun mastering your magic long ago. It's not uncommon for people with high levels of magical energy to give off bursts of unintentional magic."
"Like in the Potter-san Stories?" Konoka asked, earning a look from the magi as she held up a first edition hardback of the first book, seemingly from out of nowhere.
"Yes…and no." Evangeline muttered, frowning slightly in annoyance. "I'll admit that Rowling woman covered some pretty good points, far too many for her to be a mundane in my opinion, but she glossed over some pretty key areas." She held up a finger "For example, Giants are not gormless mountains of muscle, they're simply really big people with a high resistance to magic, and Dragons are usually quite intelligent, though it varies per species." She smirked at the enawed look on Konoka's face "Also, it's quite rare, but in cases such as yours and the boya's, lack of training can cause the subject to explode."
The nosferatu cackled at the look of alarm on Kuwabara and Konoka's faces, though they paled in comparison to the look of horror on Setsuna's. The kendo-ka looked like the world was about to implode that second. "Relax, the healing you gave Sakurazaki and the pactio with the boya evened out your magical core." Evangeline assured them, nodding towards Konoka as she spoke, earning an explosive series of sighs from the group, Setsuna in particular "Which brings me to my next topic, namely your pactio with Sasquatch here."
Kuwabara glared at the blonde, to which Evangeline merely smirked, before gesturing for them to pull out their Pactio cards, the tantei blinking at the sight on the card in confusion, that of a silver garbed highwayman "Th' hell? Where am I?"
"You're there you cretin." Evangeline shot back, her arms crossed "Sometimes the Artifact bequeathed doesn't have to be a weapon, like Miyazaki's book or Konoka's fans." She nodded to Konoka, who held up her own Pactio from Negi eagerly "Either way, you need to practice using them to get the feel of them…" she glared at Konoka, who looked decidedly eager "But not in here! Wait till we're at the training field I showed you today!"
Kuwabara chuckled, noting the disappointed pout on the girl's face with bemusement, only to blink as he sensed a surge of unusual energy, which he now recognized as magic, occurring right outside the cabin. Leaping to his feet, not willing to put anything to chance so soon after the trip, he raced for the door, channeling reiki into his fists as he burst through it just as Negi's summoning spell deposited a naked Kagurazaka Asuna right in front of him and a startled Takahata T. Takamichi.
"This won't end well." The tantei muttered, even as Asuna's scream of humiliation filled the air, shattering the near silence of the woods "At least it can't get any worse."
"Kuwabara?" a stunned voice choked out, the tantei whipping round to find a mortified looking Kino Makoto gaping at the sight before her, having apparently just stepped on the scene as Asuna attempted to throttle Negi with her towel, heedless of the onlookers in her ire "What on earth-?!"
And somewhere, in a pocket dimension of his creation, the Demon God Murphy laughed so hard he split his sides.
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Cue the Nadesico music.
Narrator: Aloha!
Kuwabara: What the hell? Where are we-?!
Narrator: Our heroes once again set out on a journey of love and recovery!
Ayaka: Negi-Sensei! Come to my arms!
Narrator: Will this summertime romance bring old loves together once more?
Makoto: WE'RE NOT-OHMIGAWD IS THAT A SHARK?!
Negi: HAAAALLP!!!
Narrator: Next time on Reikai Sensei Kuwabara; SUN! SAND! SHARKS?!
Butler: Martini on the rocks? Anyone?
R&R!!!