The Vapor of Haruhi Suzumiya
Chapter 6: Blind Eye
A/N: Well, since Vapor got removed due to the word "hell" being in the summary (curse you Guidelines I vaguely skimmed!) I noticed people actually care about this story. Odd. Anyways, I thank The Layman and tats magicalmcguffins for actually PM'ing me and asking where the story went! I thank them, and have an increased desire to continue this story!
Another thing, I kind of ran out of things that ended in –tion and sounded good, so the naming convention is changing. xD
Last thing, I promise: This is where it gets absolutely ridiculous. Like, worse than if they enabled Team Killing in very COD public match.
Yeah, that bad.
I bid Emiri goodbye as we went off in separate directions once we made it into the school, after proceeding past numerous security checkpoints that had not been there the day before. When questioned about the checkpoints, a guard gave the stiff reply of "Just a precaution, please move along.", before shooing us past and looking to the next entrants. We exchanged glances, but simply shrugged and continued on.
When Emiri left for places unknown, I began to make my way towards the club building. I passed numerous people along the way, all of whom nodded to me, and I to them. A girl with curly blue hair flashed me a smile and a peace sign, before resuming a conversation with a girl next to her. I thought nothing of it as I entered the building and proceeded to the club room, not seeing a soul in the halls.
Upon entering the club room, I was surprised to see none other than Miss Asahina pinning Emiri to the wall, with a small knife inches from Emiri's neck, glittering with a strange green light. Upon my entrance Mikuru dropped the knife and backed away from Emiri, who simply stood up and retrieved the knife. Walking over to the nearest furnace, she promptly threw it into the flames, before shutting the door. Turning around, she smiled sweetly at Miss Asahina, who was more scared of that than she had any right to be. I mean, Emiri wouldn't kill anybody...I think. Actually, I should rethink that one.
"I doubt it will melt in there, but I doubt you'll try to get that shard of wasted mineral wealth out of there now, hm?"
Emiri stepped around to the door, picked up her discarded weapon from its place on the floor, and leaned against the wall, looking at both of us.
"You know Mikuru, here, I'm part of the SOS. Bet you didn't know that, or the fact that those security checkpoints on the way to school today were put in place because a school-wide bounty was put out on a teacher. Anyone who tries to go after that teacher isn't going to leave the grounds alive...unless they're smart."
With a flourish, Emiri dictated the 'smashing arrival' of Haruhi herself, who threw the door open and ran in with a look of sadistic glee on her face, dragging the collars of both Koizumi and Kyon behind her. Which was rather impressive, considering that Kyon was wearing chain-mail armor and Koizumi still had a large wooden bow affixed to his back.
After being dumped rather unceremoniously at our feet, they picked themselves up with whatever dignity they had (which wasn't much), before going to rest on the wall on opposite sides of Emiri.
Haruhi ran up to a desk and jumped atop it, turning around and dictating to us like so much as a charismatic leader to his people.
"There is a bounty out today, issued by a third party! And we are going to be the ones to claim it! This is going to be tough, as the school itself is attempting to dissuade students from taking this task on, threatening suspension and expulsion. That is due to the fact that the teacher was caught commiting a hate crime, but the school wishes to smooth the event over, as that teacher has tenure!
What did he do, you ask? Well, an elderly British man beat up a boy of Canadian descent, while screaming obscenities to him about him being a worthless colonist who didn't deserve to live, and that the Motherland would never accept a cultural failure like himself in proper society. The British man did this during an after school help session, and several other students witnessed its occurrence." By this point Haruhi was livid, and I could see why.
"That is WRONG, Brigade members! We will NOT stand for this! The target is Mr. Reginald Foster, the old gentleman who teaches the upperclassman's criminal justice classes. The student he brutalized on grounds of race and position is still in the med wing being given a large dose of restorative magic. This was brought to the attention of the school by one of Mikuru's friends, that girl Tsuruya who pranks people with syringes filled with sedatives.
Anyways, this is a high-stakes contract, and failure is not an option. The employers are the boy's parents, willing to pay to any who gives them the proof that they killed the teacher in question. Heads are in this season, so we'll be delivering the fine severed head of this corrupt, uncouth man to these deliciously cultured people. For this purpose, we will be splitting up to ambush him after school ends for the day. He will be surrounded by a security detail when he leaves his classroom at 4 o'clock this evening."
Haruhi pointed to myself and Emiri.
"You two will be positioned on the roof of the adjacent building. When I give the signal, Emiri, you are going to shoot him in the chest with an armor piercing round, which will surely eliminate him in one hit. Yuki will be on hand to protect you afterward."
She then points to Koizumi and Kyon.
"You will be stationed just around the corner from where Mr. Foster's room is. Once he goes down, you will dispatch the members of his security detail. They are mercenaries, so there is no one who needs to be left breathing, if you so choose."
She finally pointed at Miss Asahina and herself.
"After they have been 'forcibly removed' from the area, myself and Mikuru will swing in, take our prize with utmost precision, then use a structural restorative magic to repair any damage that will inevitably occur, as well as clean up any blood. We'll also dispose of all the bodies, then walk out as though nothing happened."
Haruhi nodded to a burlap bag sitting next to the door, her eyes glistening with anticipation.
"We will take the head in that bag to the parents of the boy, who are staying with him in the med wing until he recovers."
She nods her head once and jumps down from the table, looking at each of us in turn.
"This is the biggest job we've had yet. The payout will be almost one MILLION yen. Let's not mess this up, alright?"
Walking over to the burlap sack, she walked out, before stopping and looking back.
"Don't you remember guys? Tuesday is academic day. We've got to get to class!"
With a start, we all looked at each other, shrugged, and then followed Haruhi to the classroom which, up until this entire scenario, had been her homeroom. I never bothered to go to class, but if I had, then I would have been in this room as well, I guess.
We walked into the room in the middle of a lecture, but the teacher simply continued plowing on about the mechanics of a double-action revolver, and how it was one of the most stable and reliable actions for a gunpowder weapon. The students in the seats took notice however of our entrance, and some students moved out of seats in the back and rushed to seats farther in the front.
All of the students had some form of weapon on them, ranging from a pistol or knife hanging from a belt, to one girl in the very back who had a hulking mechanical android sitting on her desk, making clicking sounds as the gears on its shoulders turned a large turret mounted to its shoulder continuously. She gave me a small wave as I walked past her, only to sit down in the seat next to her, watching as Koizumi sat in front of me, Kyon sat to his left, Haruhi in front of her, Emiri in front of her, and Miss Asahina sat behind Kyon, next to me.
As soon as we had settled in, a low murmur began to arise in the room. Discussions on all manner of topics began, and it was soon obvious that almost no one was paying any smidgen of attention to the teacher. One student in the front pulled out several thick books and began to inscribe spell circles on the desk, slowly turning the surface into a bubbling cesspool of acid that began to drip off the sides. Some watched him in interest, but most went about with whatever they were doing before. Haruhi and Kyon began to have a conversation about Haruhi's hair or some matter, and my mind began to wander, as there were no books in front of me to read, and no one around wanted to talk.
I looked over to the girl to the right of me, who had pulled a rather extensive set of tools from somewhere and had an arm of her mechanical construct disassembled on the desk, prying at the inner workings of its finger with a pair of tweezers. I began to watch with great attentiveness, marveling at the sheer complexity of something so small. It was similar to my own interests in computers before. I could easily see myself becoming entwined in the inner workings of a mechanical automaton that was created out of the ingenuity of the human brain. Despite lacking a visible source of electrical power, it still moved constantly and even made moves to swat at a fly that was buzzing around its head, almost as if to suggest that the creation could sense a feeling of touch as well. I was truly amazed by this, and spoke up to the girl to voice my entrapment in her mystical art that, to me, went far beyond any magic that I'd learned in my short time studying it.
"Excuse me...what is that?" I pointed to the entire thing, unsure how I would describe it.
Stopping her work on the arm, she set her tools down and looked up at me. Her dark green hair fell in her face as she reached up to push it behind her ear. She grinned at me, exposing the corner of a tooth on the left side of her face, obviously proud of her work. She waved her hand at the automaton, acting like it was nothing but a thing.
"This? This is my friend TOM-nyoron~. He's a Self Powered Automaton Magicka Mechanicale, or SPAMMY for short. He's a mechanical presence engineered by an Omni mage in Vienna for my birthday when I was just 5 years old. I've built him up from his simple beginnings. When I first got him, he was barely up to my waist, and couldn't speak even 10 words!"
She flipped a switch in the back of his head, which caused his eye sockets to come alight with a shining light. He jerked around, reaching out with one hand to feel for his other hand, which, in a move that surprised me on so many levels, reached up to tap on its still-connected counterpart, which swooped down and pick it up, re affixing itself to the main torso, which secured it with a series of clinking and whirring noises. It patted the girl on the head, who giggled, before standing up off the desk and looking at me.
"Oh I say my young miss, how am I to make your acquaintance? I am TOM Nyoro, an Omni product in possession of Miss Nyoro. I am a general assistant, with combat initiatives when under excess pressure."
TOM flipped his hand over to reveal small blades that were partially exposed on his large metal hands, which sunk back into the metal to be covered by liquid metal, solidifying and appearing as though they were never there at all. He bowed to me, before turning back to his owned, who turned him off, as people were starting to look at us, as it was apparent that large robots weren't common, even now. He curled into the fetal position as the light in his eyes died out slowly, as the girl, now partially identified as Miss Nyoro, sat back down and held a hand out for me to shake.
I did so, and she shook very firmly, almost to the point of breaking some in my arm. She let go and proceeded to properly introduce herself.
"Well, you've met my friend, but you sure don't know me! I'm Tsuruya Nyoro, engineer and medic extraordinaire! I moved up to this level at the beginning of the semester, and I'm a member of the largest mercenary group in the underclassmen group, the Iron Valkyries!" Tsuruya pulled a large metallic cross from underneath her robes, setting it on the desk. It glowed a dim red color before returning to a dull gunmetal gray. Returning it to the folds of her robes, it left a burn mark that was uniform except for the letters IV, marked neatly in the center of the burn.
Her introduction was quite rushed, but I sensed no animosity; it was plainly obvious she was just interested in having fun, judging from how she carried herself. She looked at me with an expectant look, until I sighed, and introduced myself in kind, despite my lack of people skills, and, in truth, my lack of wanting to talk. An interim effect from being an interface, I assumed. She began to speak again while I was sifting through my thoughts.
"And you're Nagato-chan, the Blade of the SOS Brigade, right? You don't seem to be the stoic bad-ass everyone else makes you out to be. You don't have as many animal skulls hanging from your clothes as I expected either, nyoron."
This surprised me, and I quickly whipped my hands out in alarm.
"No, who told you that, I'm not anything like that."
"Well, a bunch of seniors were talking about how you severed this guys arm for tripping you on the stairs."
"I would never-!"
"I found traces of the metal you use in your daggers in the wound when I was cleaning it. I'm a medic, remember?"
Tsuruya adopted a cat face, but simply said "Don't worry, you can't get int trouble for that, he had it coming to him. It's not nice to trip a lady!".
I just kind of shook my head and gave up, and we moved away from the topic to more general things, like how the boy sitting in front of her had one leather boot and one metal boot.
The next several hours passed in a similar fashion, with a myriad of topics coming up, and Miss Asahina joining the conversation after lunch, at which point the connection was made that Mikuru and Tsuruya knew each other very well, as Mikuru giggled when Tsuruya called Mikuru "Hina-sensei-nyan", much to her chagrin.
We all ate lunch together, as Tsuruya summoned a bento for each of us, including Kyon, Haruhi, and Koizumi, using what she claimed to be "the most useful magical art", being that of matter replication through expansion of sub-atomic particles.
Under the laws of psychics I knew, this was impossible, but at this point I simply took it for granted, as free food was free food, and was excellent for having no doubt been nothing more than carbon and nitrogen atoms seconds before.
We departed from the classroom with the 3 o'clock bell, bidding Tsuruya goodbye. She gave Mikuru a hug before dashing off, sitting in TOM's hands as he waded through the crowd of students, his lumbering thuds fading into the drone of voices and footsteps.
We turned to each other as Haruhi began to lead us to the flight of stairs where remedial classes were held. As we neared the top of the flight of stairs, she turned to us, leaning on the banister.
"Alright, we have an hour to get into position. Yuki-chan, Emiri-san, get going to the roof of this building. The entrance is at the end of this hallway."
She pointed through the double doors, down a long hallway, completely devoid of students, or anyone, for that matter.
"The rest of you are going to follow me; we're going to the upperclassman's building, and setting up. Koizumi, grab some disrupting circles from the club room while we're on our way out. Kyon, go with Koizumi and get some smoke bombs, they're in the cupboard above my desk. Mikuru, come on, we've got to set the trap."
As everyone left to do their duties, we approached the double doors, only to discover them to be locked. Not missing a single beat, Emiri headbutted the window, shattering it into thousands of pieces. She leaned through the window, unlocking it from the inside. Looking back to me, she pulled a shard of glass from her forehead, letting a fine trickle of blood drip down to her mouth, which she licked with a wild glint in her deep blue eyes. She held the door open for me, as she wiped the blood on her sleeve, leaving a smear of red on the sleeve.
We headed to the end of the hallway with no further distractions, before coming to a ladder mounted to the wall which led to the roof. I went first, discovering that it too, was locked, and that no amount of head-smashing was going to break through the thick steel manhole of a latch.
Acting unperturbed, Emiri set her cannon down on the ground, and reached into her skirt, pulling out a vial of green liquid. She then pulled out a white handkerchief...which made me wonder why she didn't wipe the blood on the handkerchief, and not her sleeve.
Emiri poured some of the green liquid onto the handkerchief, before quickly climbing the ladder, pressing the cloth against the lock. A sizzling sound was slightly audible, and after a second Emiri's hand disappeared as the metal was being eaten away by the corrosive material on the cloth. She pushed the manhole up, before climbing up onto the roof, turning back to me, and gesturing for her cannon.
I sighed, but accordingly bent over and picked up the heavy weapon. I lifted with my knees, but still felt the weight. I held it by the butt-stock, allowing her to grab it by the barrel and pull it through the hatch with relative ease, leaving me to wonder about her strength. I climbed through the hatch and closed it behind myself, restoring the condition of the metal with a variation of the magic Tsuruya had used at lunch, as it was easy to learn, and she had taught me how to use it on simpler materials. I quietly thanked her in my head.
After my quick fix, I walker over to Emiri, who was setting up her gun on the edge of the rooftop. She was setting it on a bi-pod, and affixing a butt-pad to the rear of it. She then pulled a lever above the trigger, opening the barrel. Grabbing her sling-bag, she opened it, taking out a single, massive round. The bullet itself was much bigger around than Emiri's hand, such that she had to remove it from the bag with both hands. Emiri carefully slotted the projectile into place and closed the barrel with the same lever. She closed the bag, setting it aside, before kneeling down next to the rifle, peering down the sights. She sighed heavily, before turning back to me.
"And now we wait. Take a seat, it's going to be almost half an hour before the fun begins." I sat down cross-legged on the opposite side of her rifle.
She pointed to the other building, where, in the corner of one of the floors, Haruhi and Mikuru could be seen, lighting the whole floor with grids of swirling runes.
"They're setting up a system of spells that, when activated, will place the entire area under a form of time distortion. That means, in our case, anyone who is seen as hostile will not be able to think clearly, as their metaphysical beings will be in an entirely different space as their physical being. It's a bit complicated, but Asahina-san can do it wonderfully, and Haruhi has massive reserves of mana to draw on to exponentially increase the area of effect, as well as its power."
As she finished speaking, a red flash lit the windows on the floor below, drawing our attention. In a flash, Emiri's head was on the sights of the rifle, looking at the disturbance, unable to see much due to the height difference.
"For the love of shaz! That red light was Koizumi's shadow arrow!" She turned to me.
"They must be in trouble. That guy was protected by some mercs, and we need to keep Mikuru casting until we ensnare that Foster guy so I can give him a new breathing tube. Yuki, jump across the gap and crash their party!"
She pointed over the 10 meter gap, which I leaned over, eying the drop with a calculating eye.
"Is that even safe Emir-agghhhhhhh!"
Before my sentence was even finished, Emiri had grabbed me and chucked me out into the empty air like I was a baby pigeon who refused to fly.
As I fell, I thought that Emiri did have good aim, as I sailed straight through the windows that were constantly alight with flashing lights, smashing through the windows, before rolling, then subsequently, jumping to my feet, chakram in my hands, ready to fight off the threats.
And threats they were. Several hulking figures with full face helmets were facing Koizumi and Kyon, who were evading them with the use of smoke bombs and arrows that refracted a distracting dance of shadows all around them. The figures were moving quite sluggishly, as though the air itself was fighting against them, unwilling for them to proceed towards the Brigade members.
'Even with Mikuru's spell, these guys are still a force to be reckoned with.'
Well that was a nasty shock. Haruhi's voice was talking to me.
'Of course I am Yuki! I'm providing support telepathically. Anyways, these guys that have their back to you are called Juggernauts. They're a merc outfit that does security details, and they're pumped full of so many drugs that even with the Seal of Forbidden Continuance, their instincts are still forcing their bodies to move and attack. This is causing some pretty significant nerve damage though, so a quick slice to the back of the knees and neck, after removing the helmet of course, should put them out the action...permanently. I'm sitting in Mr. Foster's office, having a nice chat with our man, and once you're done down there, I'm gonna let Emiri have her fun, then we're out of here.'
This entire speech took mere milliseconds to register in my mind, so these Juggernauts had not realized my presence yet. I lunged for the one closest to me, who was attempting to swing a large claymore at Koizumi, stopping his blade with a sideways hit from my curved blade. The force of my hit knocked the blade out of his hands, but his sheer mass moved into me and sent me crashing to the floor, at an angle where it was difficult to roll, so I settled for flopping down, rolling lengthwise, then scrambling to my feet. I was almost up when I was kicked swiftly in the ribs by another one, as my first fall had sent me into the middle of the crossfire. I was sent careening across the hallway, coming to a rest among the splintered remains of a doorway.
Gathering myself and staggering to my feet, I darted through a cloud of smoke and jumped, catapulting myself onto the face of the Juggernaut who was now retrieving his sword. I didn't give him the chance, grabbing it in the ring of my chakram and wrenching it off, revealing a grizzled face, staring at me with malice. It attempted to bite me with large, tombstone-like yellow teeth, but I just leaned back and slit its throat with the elegant blades.
It kept attacking, only redoubling its efforts after the blood was free flowing. The beast attempted to remove me from its head, but the armor was too large and its hands didn't come within a foot of myself. It tried to stumble towards Kyon, but using my body weight as a counter, I leaned it away from him. I put several more slices on its throat, face, and head, even jumping to its back to plant more on the back of its neck, before I given sage advice by Haruhi.
'Your daggers Yuki! Lodge your daggers in its skull! The clotting agent these guys inject into themselves is corrosive upon contact with air once its mixed into the make-up of the brain cells!'
I grabbed its head with my knees as I swapped the chakram for my weighted daggers with serrated edges, performing a swift overhead strike with them, planting them straight into the roughly shaved scalp, feeling the bone shatter underneath the pressure, and watching the gray brain matter begin to leak out. I rode it for another minute before its strength began to wane, all the while pulling on the daggers protruding from its skull, this way and that, to cause it to stumble in a direction towards other Juggernauts, distracting them enough that Koizumi and Kyon could stop for a minute and regain their stamina. They grinned sheepishly at me, while I just shrugged, finally jumping off the large man as he fell to the ground, moving no longer.
I ran by Kyon, being followed by one of the remaining three Juggernauts, before doubling around to grab my daggers. I wiped them clean of organic matter on the sides of its head, leaving two long red marks that crossed in the center.
As I did this, I watched Kyon and Koizumi with one eye as Koizumi distracted one and Kyon stabbed the other one right through with the sword that the dead one had dropped. It scrabbled at the sword's intersection point in between the intersecting chest plates, but it was no use, and after several seconds, it too weakened and fell to the ground with a grunt of pain.
Planting his foot on its chest, Kyon attempted to remove the massive blade, but it was fruitless. He left it there, propping the man up on it, like a one ton dead weight.
The remaining soldier looked between us, and started to run away, up the stairs. As he cleared the floor's limits, his movements greatly sped up, as he was now outside of Mikuru's enchantment. I heard Haruhi curse in my head, then felt a surge from her, almost like she was waiting for something.
As we turned the corner to give chase, we all got the hint to what this was simultaneously.
Standing down the hallway about 20 meters was Haruhi, holding Mr. Foster in front of her like a human shield, with a large, menacing-looking dagger held millimeters to his throat. The Juggernaut was frozen in place, his legs becoming one with the floor through some sort of magic causing the floor tiles to merge with the metallic boots he wore. No matter how much he struggled, the spell would not give, and his lack of a weapon led him to take off his helmet, before swiftly throwing it directly at Haruhi.
Haruhi ducked, leaving the helmet to smash through the window before falling to earth. The sound of the glass tinkling to the ground brought me to my senses, and I ran up behind the stuck man with my daggers and slit his throat as a ninja would. I didn't even think of doing it, yet I was suddenly on the ground in front of him, staring into the white milky eyes as his throat dangled out, held into the neck by one long strand of sinewy flesh. In the quickly descending silence, Haruhi sighed.
"That was quite a finisher Yuki, but that's neither here nor there. Help me drag Mr. Foster here downstairs, the others will clean up the mess."
I grabbed Mr. Foster by the legs, as he attempted to wrestle free, but Haruhi simply reached down and twisted his arm till it snapped. He screamed in pain and struggled no longer.
I carried hs feet while Haruhi grabbed his arms, so I could see his eyes the entire trip downstairs. His eyes belied stony feelings of acceptance to his fate, while at other times it was simply the unrelenting terror of knowing death was coming, and being unable to stop it. Once we got to the lower floor, I set his feet down gently to the floor, but Haruhi continued, dragging him roughly along on his stomach to the location where a window had been opened. Looking out the open window, I could see the large barrel and cloud of neon green hair on the roof adjacent to ourselves. Haruhi took out her spellbook and flicked through it, before muttering an incantation quickly, before Mr. Foster rose into the air, ropes appearing around his arms and legs. Haruhi leaned him against the wall, then walked away, beckoning to me. I stopped in front of the man looking into his eyes, which were pleading with me.
I stopped for a moment, before taking out a white kerchief, affixing it before his eyes, watching his eyes form into a small smile before hearing Haruhi shout out to me, leaving him behind.
The gunshot was unlike anything I had ever heard, seemingly rocking the world on its axis, and heading back into the hallway to retrieve the "prize", I was sickened by the sight of it. Bones picked clean of flesh lay in piles, the flesh itself spread thinly throughout the whole hallway, creating a sickly red sheen on all it covered. The only intact piece was his head, as Emiri had enchanted her bullet to leave the head intact. It was stuck in a permanent scram of agony, as though its entire world was nothing but an endless tune of pain and sadness.
And who knows? Maybe he had a good reason for what he did. But it didn't matter.
We gave the head to the boy's mother in the medical wing, who gave us a look of gratitude that left me quite conflicted. According to them, this type of renegade justice was the law of the land, and led to a lower crime rate, as those who committed crimes had to be ready to pay the price at any time.
I agreed with this, yes, but deciding the punishment to be death is a little off for me. Though what worries me more is that I enjoyed the exhilarated feeling I attained from being locked in combat with others, where only one person will come out on top, and alive.
I liked it...and I'll definitely follow Miss Suzumiya on her journey's for now.
Maybe, now that I'm not an interface, I can just be a part of this world, and not even attempt to return it to how it "was"? Perhaps this IS the future for us.
I'd like that.
I'd like that a lot.
As I fall asleep tonight, I have a feeling I'll have a smile on my face, thinking these thoughts...
A/N: And THAT, my friends, is how a straitjacket evolves into a Popsicle stick! More on that later.
IF ITS POPSICLE, ITS POSSIBLE! :D
...yeah, that's all I got. What were you expecting, a eulogy for the dude who just got offed by Team Dai-Awesome?...nope. Well, You can have part of his chest cavity, if you really want...
Also, fun little riddle/mystery for ya! In what way is it that out of all the Haruhi characters, I am most like Shamisen, the male calico cat? You get a cookie if you get it right! :3
Tuesday of Week 1 of September, COMPLETE.