"Honestly, Mika, did you think to even check what sort of area Abydos is like now?" Fanning herself futilely, Nagisa tried to ignore the beads of sweat going past her eyes, as Mika turned back to face her, her cape in her arms as she tried and failed to keep a smile up despite her hair being matted with sweat.

"I didn't expect it to be this hot! I mean, what kind of weather is this even! I didn't realise desertification could change the climate of the entire region!"

"No one knows what desertification does! Because Abydos is the only place in Kivotos going through this!" She opened the thermos of tea she brought, but upon raising it to her lips found it empty. "Gah. Honestly, why did I even come with you?! I should've just stayed with Seia!"

"Because you love me, Nagi~" Nagisa gagged a little at that. "No, because I don't trust you to go alone by yourself to investigate this without setting Trinity-Abydos relations back by twenty years!"

Ignoring Mika sticking her tongue out at her, Nagisa thought back to the real reason they were here…

Hearing what Mika was saying, Nagisa couldn't help but put her cup down. "Sensei hasn't been responding to your messages?"

"That's right!" Gesturing wildly, Mika started yapping. "You know, I was asking him about what kind of perfumes he would like, because I was reading this magazine the other day and it had an article about the kind of man your man is based on the smells he likes" - Nagisa made it a point to ignore that part - "and I wanted to know what kind of smells he likes! But he didn't respond for a whole day!"

Nonchalantly sipping at her cup, Seia just rolled her eyes. "Couldn't it be that he's just busy? I heard the General Student Council is having an audit coming up."

Mika slammed her hands on the table, causing Nagisa to quickly hold her cup to prevent it spilling. "That's the thing!" Ignoring Nagisa's side-eye, Mika continued. "I asked Koharu about it too, and apparently Sensei's been leaving them hanging too!"

"He's ignoring the Make-Up Work Club too?... Now that is unusual." Draining her cup dry, Seia reached across the table for a victoria sandwich. "I don't see how that is our problem, though. In any case, he usually goes above and beyond for us students, and maybe prioritising us over his work has finally got to him…"

"Sensei isn't that kind of person!" Slamming on the table again, Mika ignored Seia as she fell face first onto the jam. "And besides, I think I actually know why!"

"Oh? And what could this be, pray tell?"

As Seia did her best to strangle Mika, the pink-haired student started jibber-jabbering. "We~ll, have you heard the rumours about Sensei having a child?"

"Why should those rumours prevent me from strangling you like a chicken?!"

Nagisa sighed, and got up to drag Seia off of Mika. "Come now Seia, you will never be able to beat her and you know it. Please continue, Mika." The short fox pouted, and started cleaning her face.

"Well, actually, you know how I slept with Sensei?" Only for Nagisa to spit-take right at her.

"NAGISA!" "Sorry Seia! But Mika, what the heck do you mean by that!"

The pink-haired agent of chaos just tilted her head. "Did I never mention this? Ah, wait, it's technically against the rules, eh-heh~"

Narrowing her eyes, Nagisa's voice took on a sharp edge."What did you and Sensei do, Mika?"

"My, is Naginagi thinking of something dirty~? All I meant was that Sensei slept over at my place, nothing more, nothing less~"

"You little…" She let it go. If she kept responding to every little thing Mika did, they would be here for hours.

"As fun as it is to see Nagisa spit tea everywhere, could you cut to the chase?" Seia now had her face covered in cranberry jam, earl grey tea and spit, and her eyes showed her mood.

"Ah, sorry, Seia…"

"You better be."

Taken aback by that, Mika stuttered "W-well, it turns out, Sensei actually sleep talks!... and when he was sleeping, he kept saying a name!"

""A name?"" The other two Trinity students leaned in to hear what Mika had to say.

"He kept calling out for a person called Yume! And, using my patented search methods, I managed to find a list of students with both that name and his surname, and found a match!"

"'A' match, you say? While his surname isn't very common, you would think there would be more people matching that than one person…" Skepticism reigned as Nagisa thought about the matter. Yume isn't an uncommon name, and while Sensei's surname isn't a particularly common one, you would think that there would be more people with a name than one… this seems too convenient to be true.

"Well, it has to be this, because I found a picture of her! Look!" She took out a printed piece of paper with an image on it, a selfie showing a girl with long teal hair and massive assets - both Nagisa and Seia looked down at their own modest chests and shared a scowl - beside a girl with messy short hair that seemed to be angry at the idea of taking pictures, and from the angle of the selfie, much shorter than the former.

As she looked at the image, Nagisa found something familiar in the taller girl. "Hm. I'm guessing this one is Kuchinashi Yume then. She does have Sensei's eyes." And his smile. The girl had a massive, open smile that reminded Nagisa of the sometimes awkward, sometimes professional, always happy Sensei that made her heart flutter - quick, think about something else!

"Yes," - Nagisa silently thanked Seia - "she does look a lot like Sensei. There might be something to this rumour after all."

"Right? You two think so too right? The only problem is, I can't find more about this girl! It seems like she just dropped off the face of the earth two years ago, and never came back!" Mika's cheeks puffed up in frustration. "I tried looking everywhere! Chipa, Momogram, Angeltube, I checked them all! But nothing besides the Talkbook page I found this picture on!"

"Curiouser and curiouser…" Seia took out her phone. "Kuchinashi Yume on Talkbook, right?" Tapping away at her phone, she brought up said page. "Hm, it says she's a student at Abydos."

Nagisa started thinking out loud. "Abydos? Isn't that the school that Sensei spends quite a lot of time at? I seem to remember Hifumi telling me that she met him there once."

Seia leaned back on her chair. "It's been suffering from desertification the past few years. Remember how big it used to be?"

"Ah! I remember watching the Halo Games with Nagi when we were younger! Abydos would always have a lot of students winning!" Resting her head on her hands, Mika tilted her head. "But this year there were only five of them? What happened?"

"Desertification happened." Speaking in a low voice, the atmosphere around Nagisa changed dramatically. "No one has found a reason for its cause, but the effects brought Abydos to bankruptcy and ruin. From what Hifumi told me, the school is facing a massive debt crisis, and there's only five students left in the school…"

Mika slammed down on the table again, and both Seia and Nagisa caught their cups in time. "Eeeeeh?! You mean, those five students were the entire school?!"

"That's right. From what I heard though, Hifumi has a very high opinion of them, both morally and physically." Finishing her cup, Nagisa moved to pour another one. "Apparently their eldest member is a combatant on par with Tsurugi."

"Heeeeeh~" Mika leaned in, intrigued by the idea. "Tsurugi is pretty strong though? Which one of those girls was it?"

Nagisa took out her phone and opened Momotalk. "She sent me a picture she took with them, let me see if I can find iiiiiii-" Her eyes widened as she looked at the picture.

"Nagisa?" "Nagi?"

She stared at the image. "This is remarkably two, take a look at this picture." She turned her phone over, showing the other two the image on the screen.

Leaning in, Mika squinted her eyes to spot what had taken Nagisa by surprise. "What are you- oh."

There in the image, was a girl, the spitting image of the pink-haired girl that was standing beside Yume. "Hifumi called her Hoshino. What are the odds that this is the same person as in that image?"

"Very high." Seia covered her mouth with her hand, a habit that told the other two that she was in deep thought. "I think I know what you're thinking about Mika, and let me state for the record that I think it's a bad idea."

Mika leaped out of her seat to hug Seia. "Come on, Seia~ aren't you curious to find out more about Sensei's daughter?" Rubbing her cheek against Seia's, she gave the smaller fox-girl an uncomfortably close view of her bosom.

"Mika, I think you're suffocating her." She ignored Nagisa, while Seia's face contorted into a long suffering frown. Nagisa hid a smirk with long practised manners. "Still, I have to agree with Mika. While it's not necessarily a pleasant thing to do, this could give Trinity a leg up in dealing with Sensei - bribery was looked down upon, but small gifts and such were considered good manners - and as well, it would help in getting to know Senseis private life better…

The other two jumped as Nagisa suddenly slapped herself. "Nagisa? What on earth…" Seia trailed off as Mika shushed her, and whispered into her ear "Let's just leave it."

"A-anyways, I do think that an investigation would be best, but we would have to keep it low-profile."

Mika raised her hand. "I volunteer!"

"What?" Thoughts started floating in her head of Mika going to Abydos, starting a duel with Hoshino, blowing up buildings, causing a diplomatic disaster…

Talking to Sensei's daughter before her…

Knowing Sensei's preferences before her, knowing what kind of behaviour he showed at home before her...

"Not alone you aren't!"

"I'm such an idiot!" Her screams of frustration echoed throughout the desert, stopping Mika and a passing cyclist in their tracks.

"Nagi?! Are you okay?" Mika's eyebrows jumped as she heard the screaming of her childhood friend.

Nagisa waved her concerns off. "I'm just angry at myself, nothing to worry about. How much longer do we have to get to Abydos?"

Whipping out her phone, Mika consulted the map app. "It says we have about-" "Ten and a half kilometres to go, nn." "No, about half a kilometre. Wait, who?" Mika turned towards the unfamiliar voice, which turned out to be a grey-haired student.

"You're going to Abydos? The location online is wrong, it's telling you to go to the old location. The new one is about ten and a half kilometres that way." She pointed towards the direction the two Trinity students had been walking from.

"Wait, so we've been walking the wrong direction the whole time?!"

"Where did the two of you come from?"

"The train station!"

She nodded. "Then you have. There's a bus that goes to the school from there that you could've taken."

Nagisa slumped. "We thought it was mislabeled because the map told us to go the other direction and it was marked as a branch school…"

"The current location used to be a branch of the main school, so when we moved they just renamed the route." The wolf-girl took a look at the two of them, then at the road. "I'm going to Abydos now. Do you want to follow me?"

"Ah, really?" The two of them took their first good look at their saviour. Despite it being a desert, she was wearing a scarf around her neck, matched with the blazer of Abydos High School.

"Nn. It's not the first time I've found people lost in the desert." She held out her hand. "Sunaookami Shiroko, second year."

"Kirifuji Nagisa, third year." "Misono Mika, third year as well~"

The two of them, plus their guide, were making good time to Abydos. At least they assumed so - all the dunes in the desert looked the same to them.

Shiroko wasn't much one for small talk though, which caused some surprise when she started musing out loud. "Hm. Why are two Trinity students going to Abydos?" Her eyes lit up. "Are you transferring here?"

Embarrassed, Nagisa shook her head. "Nothing that drastic, I'm afraid. Just had some business with, um, Takahashi Hoshino."

The wolf cocked her head to the side in befuddlement. "Business with Hoshino-senpai?"

"Yes. We just wanted to talk to her on certain matters."

"Hm. Alright."

She was silent until they reached the gates of Abydos.

"Shiroko's late…" Ayane stared out the window, waiting for the final member of the Foreclosure Task Force to appear.

"Uhe~ It's fine, she might've just gotten distracted by her hobbies." Hoshino laid her head forward on the table, chin resting on her whale plush.

Leaning dangerously back on her chair, Serika couldn't hide her worried expression even as she spoke with an angry tone. "She better not be doing anything stupid!-"

Just then, the door opened with a slam, and Shiroko walked in along with two Trinity students, all of whom ignored Serika writhing on the floor in pain.

"Shiroko-senpai?! Who are those students-" Ayane was cut off by Hoshino. "Uhe~? It looks like little Shiroko has finally become a kidnapper~" She wiped tears from her eyes. "Ah, they grow up so fast."

Nonomi clapped her hands together. "They really do~, remember when we found her, senpai?" She tittered.

"Ah, she was just the cutest thing then, so small… where have the years gone?" Getting up from her seat, Hoshino walked over to Shiroko. "But you know Shiroko, we can't keep them-"

Nagisa finally snapped, and shouted out. "Hold on, what are you all going on about?!"

A look of befuddlement crossed Hoshinos face, but her eyes showed amusement. "Well, we thought she'd kidnapped you two to boost our enrollment numbers?" Yawning, she turned to face them. "Then, who are you and why are you here?"

Nagisa bowed and introduced herself. "I am Kirifuji Nagisa, and this is-" "Misono Mika, hi~" "and we came here to ask a few questions."

Hoshino seemed taken aback. "Wooooooow, so that's Trinity manners huh? I'm Takanashi Hoshino."

"Izayoi Nonomi, nice to meet you two!" She raised her hand in greeting.

"Ah, uhm, I'm Okusora Ayane, n-nice to meet you two!" Bowing, her glasses came askew.

Serika dragged herself up from the floor, flopping onto the table. "K-Kuromi Serika here…"

Clapping her hands together again, Nonomi beamed. "Now that the introductions are done, how about we go and have breakfast?"

"N-Nonomi-senpai! We haven't even started the meeting yet!"

"Ah, don't worry Ayane. We have guests here anyways. We can leave it for another day." Walking back to the table, Hoshino grabbed her shotgun and shield. "Besides, our guests look exhausted."

"Oh, please don't feel any need to accommodate us, we-" Nagisa's attempt at demurring failed as she was struck by a sudden wave of giddiness.

"Here." Hoshino held out a bottle of water- taken from where? -that Nagisa took gratefully. "Did you even take breakfast before you two came here?"

"Nope! Nagi-chan thought we might be able to find a place in the city to eat, but everything was closed!" Partway through that sentence, she'd thought about shutting Mika up, but the taste of water on her tongue was too great for anything else. She settled for giving her the dirty eye.

"Oh dear… that won't do now!" A passion came over Nonomi, one best likened to that of a grandmother dealing with hungry grandkids. "Come on, let's go and get something to eat! There's a great ramen place in the city that we go to!"

The two Trinity students, with nary a protest, followed Nonomi out the door.

Leaving the Abydos students alone.

Ayane was the first to speak. "Those are members of Trinity's Tea Party right?!"

Hoshino nodded. "Kirifuji Nagisa… that's the one Hifumi called her friend right?" She slung Eye of Horus onto her back. "A friend of Hifumi is a friend of ours. Right?"

She got three nods in response.

"They said they were here to talk to you, Senpai."

"Oya? Well then, let's see what they have to say after breakfast." She glanced at the clock. "Or lunch."

"Delicious!" Forgetting or ignoring the manners instilled into her, Nagisa slurped ramen from the bowl, the taste, enhanced by her hunger, carving its own niche in her taste buds.

Mika had already finished hers. "Seconds! Could I get the special with rich soup?"

"Uhe~ You two really must have been starving." "I know! Look at these poor things!"

Shiba Seki may no longer have had a permanent location, but the ramen was still as good as it had always been.

The master laughed. "With how much they're eating, I probably will need to close early! And that's a good thing," he quickly added, "means less work for me!"

Sipping at her tea, Serika looked at the growing pile of used bowls worriedly. "Are you sure you don't need my help?"

"I can't ask a girl showing friends around to work now, can I?"

"The master is worried about you overworking too, Serika~" Hoshino raised an eyebrow. "Are you going to waste his concern for you?~ Man, she's at that rebellious age already, huh?"

The master melodramatically shaked his head. "Ah, it's fine, this old man will just deal with the heartbreak of watching my finest worker collapse from overwork…"

"I'm your only worker!"

Listening to the backchat between the Abydos students and the proprietor of the ramen stand, Nagisa couldn't help but give a little smile.

Sitting beside her, Ayane mistook it for something else, and started apologising. "Sorry about this, they're like this normally, but you're probably used to quiet in Trinity…"

"Don't worry~" Leaning over, Mika gave Ayane a pat on the back (knocking her glasses loose and the air out of her lungs). "It's not like we hate it, we just aren't used to it! Right, Nagi?"

Without missing a beat, she replied. "Maybe you aren't, but I'm definitely used to it with how much time I spend around you."

"See?" Mika gave a hearty laugh. "We don't mind at all! We may be members of the-" Nagisa quickly slammed her mouth shut with a bamboo shoot.

The Abydos students had brought Nonomi up to speed, and they collectively decided to pretend they hadn't heard anything. That just meant they watched as Nagisa tried to dig herself out of a hole that was exposed to the whole world.

"S-so, she meant, uh, the, the Tea Club! That's right! She meant the Trinity Tea Club! Right Mika?" Sweat fell from her brows not just due to the Abydos heat as she tried to blag her way out of Mika's misspoken word. But as she continued, her red cheeks and confused eyes did nothing else than inspire sympathy in the Abydos students.

Finally, Hoshino interrupted her. "Don't worry about it, we already knew you were from the Tea Party."

"…heh?"

"Hifumi told us about you before. Miss Nagisa of the Tea Party, who always gave her quality teas and quality advice." She gave her a warm smile. "And who also lent her the artillery of Trinity to fire on a spot in the Abydos desert when we needed help. We never got to thank you for that."

Nagisa couldn't suppress the smile that crossed her lips from the praise. "Yes, well, they needed to get some practise out, and Abydos does have some wonderfully isolated desert for firing… no need to worry about any rounds going off course."

"It really did help us though! You know-"

"Wait wait wait!" Mika loudly interrupted. "When did this happen?"

"A while back."

"And I never knew?!"

"You must've been busy preparing your coup, Miss Mika ." Taking a drink from the cup given to her, Nagisa was amused to see Mika shrivel slightly.

Firing back, Mika replied. "W-well, isn't it overstepping Trinity's bounds to fire in another district?!"

"Oh," said Hoshino, "we don't actually mind. In fact, if you wanna do it more often just tell us. Although, there's some legal obstacles like us technically not owning the land-" "Wait, what?" "Oh, nevermind that little detail." Making a money symbol, she smirked. "Just pay us in cash and you can do whatever you want!"

The Abydos students stared in wonder as the two members of the Tea Party started giggling, then laughing, before joining in the laughter.

The rest of the day was filled with more fun.

"Goodbye!" Waving to the rest of the Abydos students, Nagisa quickly hurried to rejoin Mika and Hoshino as the shorter Abydos student showed them the way to the train station.

It was becoming sundown, and if they wanted to return to Trinity before it got dark they would need to catch the next train.

"That was fun right, Nagi? When was the last time we went out like this?"

"Oh gosh, when was it? Must've been over a year by now at least!"

"Wow, you two really must be busy." Hoshino stretched herself out. "Maaaaaan, you two really are incredible! This old man wouldn't be able to keep up with that kind of workload."

Nagisa tittered. "Oh nonsense, you're a very capable person Hoshino! I don't think either of us could deal with the sort of stress that comes with dealing with such a large debt."

In front of her, Hoshino looked at her out of the corner of her eye. "Heeeeeh~? Flattering this old man? So you still have things to discuss with me then?"

"Dis- oh, we completely forgot about that!" She gave a suspicious glare to the pinkette. "How did you know that?"

"I have my means~ Well, go ahead you two, this time of night Abydos doesn't have anyone around."

Nagisa shared a look with Mika, before turning back to Hoshino. "We actually came here to ask… do you know the current location of Kuchinashi Yume?"

Suddenly, the atmosphere around Hoshino changed. As she turned to face the two, her spine stood straighter, her eyes more upturned, and her ever-present smile disappeared, replaced with a ferocious growl. On reflex, Nagisa's hand moved closer to the pistol at her side, and she could see Mika reaching for her submachine gun.

" Where did you hear that name. "

"W-we went digging, after hearing the rumours of Sensei's… well, Sensei's daughter! Mika had heard something before, so we did some digging and found an image of you and her together!" Trying to defuse the situation, Nagisa added, "We just want to ask her about Sensei! Nothing else."

They stood there in tense silence, before Hoshino deflated. "Heheh, looks like you girls are speaking the truth." Turning around, she continued.

"If you want to speak to her, then let's take a little detour."

They had taken the train to an area within the D.U, and walked further on, the crowds of people thinning out further until they'd reached an empty park.

Without thinking, Mika said out loud. "Wow, she lives in a pretty deserted area, huh?"

"She does."

"Uhm, Hoshino, do we really have to walk through a cemetery to go to where Miss Yume lives?…"

"Haha. Well, don't worry you two." She turned back to face the two of them, one hand pointing to the left. "We're right here."

"But this is a ceme-…" Nagisa's voice trailed off as she read the text on the gravestone Hoshino was pointing towards.

"Oh."

Hoshino gave her a sardonic smile. "Oh, indeed."

"I didn't mean to…" Mika was in near tears as they sat on the train back to Trinity.

And if she was being honest with herself, Nagisa completely understood why. "She knew that too, Mika, don't worry. It might've seemed like she was mad, but she wasn't, alright?""

Death as a topic was uncommon in Kivotos. The simple fact of the matter was that while some outliers existed, most students were well protected from harm by their halos, and for the most part the only things that could really cause long-term damage was through sicknesses or internal injuries, something that medical advancements made a rarity.

And yet, Hoshino had lost her senpai.

That meant that something must've happened to her in those categories. Hoshino herself was reluctant to say, but out of all those possibilities there were some that she definitely would much rather tick off.

A shiver went down Nagisa's spine. Beyond that… she'd made it very clear that Abydos was only the two of them at one point, and it was obvious how close they were.

If someone close to her died, and if she had to find them like that…

She glanced at Mika's defeated form. What if Mika…

The thoughts followed her all the way home.

"Haaaaah… Do you think I was too harsh on them, Yume-senpai?" The pictures in the album were unable to speak, but Hoshino felt she could hear words from them anyways.

"Yeah, maybe I should apologise… What would you do if you were here?" Inside her heart, she already knew the answer. She'd have taken them out for lunch, showed them around Abydos, and then showed them off at the train station - all the things they had done today, except without showing them the final resting place of the departed. Because she'd still be around.

But she isn't around, is she?

She heaved a deep sigh, and held the album to her heart. If Yume was still around, would she still be like this to Sensei? Would she still have little flutters in her heart whenever he was around, whenever he showed that silly smile of his? Maybe not. Somewhere deep inside, she knew she was just using him to fill in the parts left empty by Yume.

Maybe I wouldn't have felt like this since he's her father… Still, to be depressed for this long…

Flipping the album open to a page rendered supple by countless flippings, she stared at the picture on the page. One of the last in the album.

Maybe Yume-senpai would cheer me on, she resolved, and placing the book gently on the bedside table, she skipped over to the closet to take out an old dress she hadn't worn in two years.

Yes, she decided, she would pay him a visit tomorrow.

Authors Notes:

No, I'm not leaving Mika and Nagisa sad and depressed. Tea Party chapter in n+2 weeks. Set an alert for this fic to be notified of when I update!