Chapter 9: Let Me Smash
"Alright, men, listen up!" Kazuma said, pacing back and forth on the rooftop of the school.
"Um, but we're all girls?" Mikuru said, glancing at Yuki and Aqua who sat beside her on the bench.
"Look, that's not important," Kazuma said dismissively, raising a finger in the air. "What is important is that today, after school, we are pulling off a heist."
"I-I'm not supposed to break the law," Mikuru whimpered, cringing away from Kazuma.
"It's only against the law if you get caught," Kazuma explained patiently. "We won't get caught."
"Oh. Um, I guess that makes sense?" Mikuru said, looking to Aqua and Yuki.
"Kazuma Sato and Aqua Mizu must pass the trials. Therefore, we must alter the trivia cards to ensure their passage," Yuki stated.
"Don't sweat it! I know he looks like a hikiNEET, but Kazuma's actually a super skilled," Aqua declared. "So what's the plan?"
"First, we need to lure Haruhi away from the club room. To do that, we must initiate Operation Pest Control. Now, Haruhi seems like an overly energetic Otaku at heart. As such, what we really need is some otaku bait. And there is NOTHING more otaku baity than hot girls in cosplay and video games."
"Um, I don't know...Haruhi only ever played the one video game that I know of…" Mikuru whimpered.
"Which is why you need to hit it out of the park with the cosplay. My partner in crime has created suitable outfits for you," Kazuma said, gesturing for Aqua, who sprang up and rummaged through her back to pull out five outfits.
"I made them just like Kazuma said! I have a Princess Peach gown, a Princess Zelda dress that you can turn inside out to make into Sheik's ninja gear, a Mario outfit, and a Ness costume, and a Kirby costume!" Aqua held up the clothes in question, which Mikuru took with a confused expression, while Yuki accepted the Kirby outfit with stoic calm.
"How did you fit it all in your bag?" Mikuru wondered, peering at Aqua's ordinary sized backpack.
"Oh, it was too small, so I made it bigger," Aqua explained, though that didn't really answer the question at all.
"Now, the plan is simple. I have created posters for a Smash Brothers Tournament that is to be held at Kouyouen, that school for try-hard no-lifers."
Yuki's head snapped up at the mention of the rival high school. "We will be traveling to Kouyouen?"
"That's the plan," Kazuma agreed. "It's across town, so it will give Aqua and I at least a few hours to modify all the trivia cards and rig the game in our favor."
"I will do this," Yuki agreed, nodding slightly.
"Well, um, if Yuki thinks that it's a good idea, then...I guess I'll do it too?" Mikuru hesitantly agreed.
"Great! Take your costumes and make sure you tell the Chief I made them! I'm like, super good at sewing," Aqua said proudly.
Kazuma made a rude noise and shook his head. "You're the goddess of arts and crafts, why wouldn't you be?"
"I am not the goddess of arts and crafts!" Aqua snarled, her hands clenching into fists as she stood on her tiptoes and tried to glare down at Kazuma. "I am a Muse of the Arts! And that just happens to INCLUDE arts and crafts!"
"Muse of Arts and Crafts, got it," Kazuma agreed. "Come on, we've got to get back to class. Don't want anyone to get suspicious when we pull off our heist."
"Right!" Aqua agreed, grinning, her tantrum forgotten. "Wait until Eris hears about this! She always did like shows like Lupin III and The Sting."
The rest of the day was boring, as usual. Kazuma only half paid attention to what the teacher was going over in both History and Japanese Literature. The only literature he cared about were light novels and manga. Who cared about some boring old crap written decades before he was born? Though the matter of exactly when that had happened had become slightly confusing.
At last, school came to an end, and Kazuma and Aqua scurried to an out of the way broom closet. After a careful scan to make sure no one was nearby, Kazuma and Aqua hurried in, and Aqua dug out the carefully crafted disguises.
Originally, Aqua had wanted to dress them like stereotypical ninjas with face masks and black body suits. Kazuma had nixed the idea. They would stand out like sore thumbs if they looked like actual thieves. Instead, they had a pair of blue jumpsuits that workers wore, along with clipboards and cannistres and sprayers that looked like the sort that fumigators would wear. The suits had the company logo of "Silver Masked Pest Control'' and they had ball caps to go with it, along with simple face masks and eye protection such workers would wear.
As they changed, Kazuma noticed Aqua was eyeing him oddly. "What?"
"Nothing," she said, hastily pulling on her own jumpsuit. "You just look funny, that's all."
"What do you mean, 'I look funny?"' Kazuma demanded, stopping in his boxers and undershirt.
"It's just, I don't remember you looking like this back in Belzerg. It's weird. You must be getting fat or something because you're a lazy NEET," Aqua huffed. "Now stop staring at me!"
"As if I would ever perv on you," Kazuma grumbled, fixedly not looking at Aqua in her own state of undress. She was the one who looked weird. "And if I am getting fat, it's your fault!"
"Why is it my fault!?"
"Because you keep cooking a bunch of junk food! If I keep eating that crap then I'm going to get fat, and so will you!"
"I can't get fat, I'm a goddess! And you haven't exactly been cooking health food either! If it wasn't for me, we'd never eat any vegetables at all!"
As they were finished changing, Kazuma and Aqua stepped out of the closet. She had her hair done up in a bun and mostly concealed by her hat, as Kazuma had pointed out that blue hair was not exactly common. However, just because they were out in public did not mean they stopped arguing.
"They don't count as vegetables if you deep fry them and coat them in mayo! That's just as unhealthy as if you didn't bother with vegetables at all!"
"Well, you're the one who won't make anything without rice, and that's a bunch of carbs! Maybe you should cut back on that and all the greasy meats!"
"At least rice is cheap! If we just ate what you wanted to, we'd go broke within a day or two!"
"Well at least I make things from scratch! You keep wanting to buy premade stuff, which is way more expensive!"
"Hey, instant ramen is a perfectly acceptable meal, and it's cheap!"
"No, it's totally not! We'll get. like, sick and stuff if all we eat is that premade garbage! At least put a little more effort into things and save some money, you're a great cook when you want to be!"
"Oh, rich, coming from the patron saint of debt herself! You couldn't save money if it were trapped in a fire!"
The argument ground to a halt when there was a cough behind them, and Kazuma and Aqua spun to find a frowning teacher glaring at them. "Can I help the two of you?"
"Oh, yeah, we're here to spray in room E-38," Kazuma said hurriedly, holding up his clipboard as Aqua held up her sprayer.
"I see," the teacher peered at the board, then nodded. "I'll show you where it is. You told the office you were here?"
"Yeah, we called ahead and stuff," Kazuma lied, but the teacher didn't question them, just lead them to the SOS brigade club room.
"Husband and wife team?" the teacher asked as they walked.
Aqua gasped, but Kazuma elbowed her, and thankfully the teacher didn't see. "Er, yeah. How can you tell? Just married, you know."
"Well, from the way you talk, you couldn't be anything else," the teacher chuckled.
"Oh, er, yeah, I do love my sweetie," Aqua said, laughing in a strained tone. "We just, you know, fight sometimes."
"I understand. But such things should not be done while you're on the job," the teacher said acidly, glaring over his shoulder.
"Sorry sir!" the two miscreants chorused.
Once they arrived at the room, Aqua put up some safety tape they'd stolen from a construction site the night before.
"Don't let anyone in here for a couple hours, they said there's an infestation and we'll need to spray for it, then let it sit for a few hours," Kazuma told the teacher.
"Sure, sure. Most of the students have gone home for the day. That's just a club room, but I think that band of troublemakers have left to participate in some interschool competition. If they come back and give you trouble, call administration. That Suzumiya girl is a real handful."
"Yeah, I bet," Kazuma agreed, and the teacher departed. Hastily Kazuma shut the door, taking off his mask as Aqua sprayed a few spritzes of the smelly mixture of vinegar and lemon juice. It was harmless, but should give the impression that someone was using chemicals.
"Where are those trivia cards," Kazuma muttered, searching through the room. It didn't take long for them to locate the plastic tote that held the various materials for the final trial.
"Yeah, these are not going to work," Kazuma muttered. The questions were a mixture of impossibly difficult math questions, home economics trivia, open ended philosophy questions, social engineering junk disguised as harmless jokes, and an erratic collection of pop culture quizzes from all across history and the world.
"I don't know hardly any of these!" Aqua complained, rifling through the cards.
"That's fine, we're gonna fix that," Kazuma said. He took a card, and muttered a hasty spell, which wiped the writing off it. He took out a sharpie, and wrote down a far easier question.
"Who was the mangaka of Dragonball?" he said as he wrote.
"Um, I dunno," Aqua admitted.
"What?! How can you not know who Akira Toriyama is!" Kazuma demanded. "He's the most famous mangaka ever! What did you put down?"
Aqua held up her card, which she had cleaned with a quick spell as well. It read, "What is the first commandment of the Axis Scriptures?"
"You can't make that a question! There is no Axis Cult here!" Kazuma ranted.
"There is too! Mikuru is my High Priestess, so there is totally an Axis Cult, Japanese Mission."
Groaning, Kazuma scrubbed his hands through his face. "This is crazy. How are we going to come up with questions that both of us will get right?"
The two of them sat and pondered for a moment, until they both gasped and looked up at the same time. "Video game trivia!"
Meanwhile, Kyon was pondering which goddess had blessed him in particular this day, all the while doing his best to maintain a sour disposition. That was a challenge, as he had not one, not two, but three girls cosplaying as video game characters on the train next to him.
Mikuru was both cute and badass as Sheik (though no one could ever imagine she was anything but abundantly and obviously female), with the option to quick-change into Zelda, while Yuki was looking adorable and cuddly in a Kirby costume. For her part, Haruhi was rocking the pink dress as Princess Peach, especially with the low bust line on the outfit.
The one downside was that Kyon was forced to dress up as Mario, and the mustache positively itched. Koizumi looked a bit odd in his Ness getup, though he'd had to tell Kyon it was a specific character, as he looked like a random kid with his ball cap, striped shirt, and shorts. Kyon was a Playstation and Sega man himself, and didn't usually bother with the Nintendo stuff. Though, of course he recognized the flagship characters, like any good high schooler would.
Absently, Kyon wondered what it meant that Haruhi had demanded that she get the Peach outfit while he had to play Mario. Koizumi seemed to think it a great joke that he was being forced to dress up as Ness, which Kyon didn't understand. He leaned over to Yuki, who was standing stoically despite being dressed as a grinning pink blob.
"Do you get why it's funny that Koizumi is dressed up as Ness? What game is he from, do you know?" Kyon whispered.
"Ness is from Super Smash Brothers Melee, though he originally appeared in the game Earthbound, the second entry in the Mother series. Itzuki Koizumi dressing as Ness is humorous due to the fact that Ness could be classified as an esper, as he possesses PSI abilities," Yuki answered in her usual deadpan voice.
Kyon grunted and nodded. "Well, I guess that makes sense. I wonder if Haruhi has ever played those games."
"Unknown. Kyon, I have a request."
"Oh? What is it, Nagato?"
Yuki looked up into Kyon's eyes and blinked once. "Will you extract me if I become unable to continue in this mission? It's completion is of maximum importance."
"I...what? Nagato, we're just going to play some video game! Is there more here going on than I know of?" Kyon hissed.
"Unknown. Extraction may be required. Will you be willing to facilitate this?"
"Nagato, if something goes wrong, tell me. If there's danger here, let me know! I'll talk Haruhi out of his stupid tournament. We could play Marvel Vs Capcom or something back at my place," Kyon whispered.
"Negative. This mission is of maximum importance."
"Well, alright. But I'm keeping an eye on you," Kyon said, feeling nervous. If there was something here that could take Nagato out...the only thing he could think of was that bastard alien entity, the Data Overmind. What else but Nagato's superior could threaten her?
When the train stopped, Kyon caught Koizumi's eye and jerked his head towards the toilets.
"Excuse me a moment, Miss Suzumiya, I need to use the restroom," Koizumi said, and joined Kyon in the restroom.
In a grievous and near unforgivable breach of Male Restroom Etiquette, the two of them actually stood at adjacent urinals as they spoke.
"Nagato's worried about something," Kyon said quietly as they stood at the urinals. "I'm not sure what. She just asked me to get her out if something happens."
Koizumi froze, his genial smile slipping from his face, and a look of genuine concern replacing it. "Nagato is worried? I've never seen her worried about anything, not even the world practically ending on top of us. If this concerns her...did she say what it was?"
"No, but I have my guesses. There's only one thing that has ever even slightly inconvenienced her. It has to be the Data Overmind."
"Or another humanoid interface, or a being of equal power," Koizumi muttered. He nodded. "I'll pass the word to Miss Asahina if Haruhi ever lets her get more than six inches away from her."
"That could be a problem," Kyon muttered. The entire ride over, Haruhi had been fussing with Mikuru's outfit and fawning over the other girl, going on about how she hadn't known Mikuru was a "gamer girl" or that she was so skilled at making cosplay outfits.
"This can just be the start! I've always wanted to dress up as Terra Bradford! Oh, you could be Celes! Man, I've always loved Final Fantasy, what about you?!" Haruhi had been saying as the boys had scampered away to the restroom. Poor Mikuru looked like a deer caught in the headlights.
Outside the restroom, Haruhi stalked over to Kyon and Koizumi, looking irritated and upset. It was hard to take her seriously though, with the silver tiara and frilly pink dress on she looked like a spoiled princess instead of just a spoiled brat.
"Checking out the plumbing, Mario? I'm going to give your cake to Mikuru if you hold us up! Come on, we have to win this tournament" Haruhi declared, grabbing Kyon by the gloved hand and dragging him forward. She suddenly paused, dropping Kyon's hand and making a face. "Did you take your gloves off? I don't want to-"
"Yes! Do you think I'm some sort of barbarian?!" Kyon demanded. "I'm not some neolithic savage, I took them off, and I washed my hands, thank you very much!"
"Good. Now hurry up! Quick, everyone tell me, who do you main in Smash?" Haruhi demanded as they walked.
"I'm afraid I don't know what you're talking about," Koizumi said, laughing and shrugging slightly. People were staring as they hurried out of the train station, dressed like a bunch of otaku headed for a convention.
"Um, well, I played it one time, and, um, I liked the pink ones?" Mikuru said, sounding very unsure.
"I dunno, Mario I guess, I played a few of his games," Kyon said with a shrug.
"My preferred character is Captain Falcon, but as this is a competitive event, I shall use Fox as he is statistically the most powerful character," Yuki stated matter of factly, drawing looks from her compatriots. "Will we be using items? This changes the game state. I prefer to play with items off. I suggest we stick to Battlefield, Dream Land, Fountain of Dreams, and Yoshi's Story as they contain the least random elements that can interfere with skill based single elimination matches."
"Well, we'll have to see what the TO's decide, but I like to play with items! It keeps things interesting!" Haruhi laughed. "Good to see we have at least one of us who isn't' a total noob. I've played a little bit but I'm only OK with Princess Peach."
"Wait, when did you play Smash?" Kyon burst out, staring in shock at Yuki.
Nagato blinked at him as she waddled along in her Kirby costume. "With friends. I have logged many hours. Mikuru Asahina has played with me on one occasion."
"What, I didn't know you had a Gamecube, Yuki! You'll have to bring it to the club room, we could use something to do besides watch those two sticks in the mud play Othello over and over," Haruhi commented.
"We could play The Day of Sagittarius," Yuki suggested, a sudden gleam entering her eyes. "I would like to attempt new strategies I have postulated."
"Ha, you think your fleet is worthy of facing the queen of the stars? We'll have to try it sometime! I didn't know you were so into gaming, Yuki! Is this just a hint that you're even more of a shy nerd girl that I could have guessed?"
Nagato didn't respond to that, but what she had already said was far more than Kyon typically heard from her in a day, so he had to wonder if this "mission of utmost importance" had her nervous. Just what, exactly, where they getting into? And why was this so vital?
"Ok, so, who are the three starters in Pokemon Yellow?" Kazuma asked.
"Ha!" Aqua grinned and wrote down the question. "That's a trick! Everyone knows that in Pokemon Yellow you get pikachu, who is an adorable fuzzball, instead of the typical starter choices! Hmm, ok, my turn. Oh, what was the name of the Shopkeeper in Animal Crossing?"
"Geeze, another Animal Crossing question? Ugh, it's Tom Nook, anyone would know that. Ok, let's see. Ever played the Mother series?"
"Of course! Who doesn't love games where you can fight sentient poo?"