Chapter 36
Mitsuru's eyebrows shot up as she scanned the page in front of her. In fact, the pages.
Each page contained assorted notes on all sorts of S.E.E.S. related topics, and were neatly outlined in a bullet note style with precise, exact handwriting. Stickers dotted a few notes, with a legend at the upper right of the page denoting what they meant, and page numbers appearing consistently at the bottom of each page. A single staple held them all together, and as she scanned the later pages, she noted that there was also color coding. And an index. Mitsuru had seen end-of-term papers with less thought put into them (especially for a certain boxer that she knew).
There was just one thing that she didn't understand. She looked up at the author - one Arisato Minato, standing expectantly in front of her in the Control Room - with a raised eyebrow.
"Arisato, why are the stickers denoting combat tips in the Dark Hour pink, dancing dogs?"
Minato didn't even bat an eye. "I didn't want to buy new stickers. Hamu has plenty."
Mitsuru hummed, though she had to work to prevent her lips from twitching upwards. Minato's reply also explained why hula-hooping gorillas were attached to "necessary safety gear," and at each mention of a new suggested "training routine," there were skateboarding dinosaurs (wearing backwards-facing baseball hats, sunglasses, and t-shirts emblazoned with the word "RAD!").
Her recent behavior aside… those were Arisato Hamuko stickers if Mitsuru had ever seen them.
But as distracting as Hamuko's choice of paper accessories were, they still took lesser importance to the sheer quantity (and quality, if first impressions were any indication) of Minato's notes.
"Arisato, these notes are quite extensive." She flipped another page, before glancing up at the boy, and trying to keep any exasperation out of her voice. "I must ask - why did you not bring these up earlier?"
Minato shifted his head slightly to the side in a Minato-style shrug (and part of Mitsuru marveled at the fact that she was able to interpret the movement). "I was still getting my thoughts together. I had to speed things up when Hamu announced that we'll be doing more intense Tartarus expeditions soon."
Yes, that announcement had been quite a surprise for everyone present. Just yesterday, it had been a relatively quiet evening in the S.E.E.S. dorms' entry hall, and nothing out of the ordinary was poised to appear… until, of course, Hamuko had arrived.
It had been a normal evening in the dorms yesterday. (In hindsight, suspiciously normal.) Mitsuru was reading class materials in her armchair, while Junpei and Fuuka sat at the table and played a video game on their laptops together. (Normally, Mitsuru may have pointedly directed Junpei towards his classwork, but the warmth Mitsuru felt at seeing their newest team member enjoy time with Junpei made her hold her tongue). Koromaru was sleeping on the couch next to Minato, who was engrossed in a book titled Advanced Programming. As usual, Minato generally seemed to not pay attention to the rest of the world - though he had one hand gently scratching the fur behind Koromaru's left ear. (For such a new addition to S.E.E.S., the dog fit in remarkably well.)
Then Hamuko arrived. When the dorm's front door opened, Mitsuru almost missed it. Not because it was too quiet, but because it was so… normal. It felt like everyone recently had either slammed the door open, or had silently shifted it open, desperate to avoid attention. But this time, it was the most average click Mitsuru could recall in recent memory. So she did not even turn her head to look until she heard Hamuko's familiar voice.
"Everyone?" Hamuko said, voice hesitant but firm. "I have an announcement."
All heads turned, including Mitsuru's. The first thing Mitsuru noticed was that Hamuko looked… different. She still needed a dozen extra hours of sleep, and her clothes needed a wash or three, but Hamuko herself looked more alert. More alive.
More… Hamuko.
"I would like to take a break from Shadow-related activities for the next day or two," she said. "I feel that I've been… pushing myself too hard recently, and I really need to give myself a small break." She swallowed as the rest of the room shuffled about following this statement. "However, after that, I would like to restart Tartarus expeditions with more alacrity. We've got some more ground to cover this month, I'd like to get that started."
Hamuko raised her chin, and looked around at the rest of S.E.E.S. (actually making eye contact with them, Mitsuru noticed). "Any questions?"
No one in the room spoke for a moment, though all eyes remained riveted on Hamuko. Then, Junpei hesitantly raised his hand.
"Er, what's… 'alacrity' mean?" he said, a mystified look on his face.
A tension that Mitsuru had barely noticed in the room suddenly deflated at Junpei's question. Hamuko actually cracked a smile at Junpei's question - and though it looked small and fragile, it was genuine.
"It means faster, Junpei-kun. That's all." Junpei let out a little "Oh!" as Hamuko looked about the rest of the room. "Anyone else?"
No one else spoke, and Hamuko nodded, passing through the room before heading up the steps. Shortly afterwards, Fuuka checked her watch and said that she'd stayed out too late, and needed to get back home. Thankfully, "too late" for her was not actually very late, so Mitsuru had no problem with letting her walk back on her own. (She still sent a text to Ikutsuki to check the Kirijo Group security cameras and ensure she made it home - fortunately, she did.) But when Fuuka left, Mitsuru was struck by the look on her face. Fuuka looked… proud, if Mitsuru had to put a word to it.
Very curious.
On the other hand, Minato had closed his book and followed Hamuko's path up the steps as soon as she had left. And now, holding his meticulous notes in her hands, Mitsuru knew why.
Returning back to the present, Mitsuru flipped the stapled pages back to the front. "Very well - I understand. While I must again request that you mention your ideas earlier, I also wish to thank you, Arisato. These are excellent ideas, and I would be happy to implement them." She glanced briefly down at them again. "I am not sure if we can get all of these materials immediately within Port Island, but I am sure we can gather them together with the Kirijo Group's resources."
Minato hesitated for a moment before nodding once. Mitsuru kept her eyes on the pages for a second before glancing back up, a slight smile on her lips.
"I also must mention… you added a trip to the beach as a required item?"
Minato seemed to have a hint of a smile on his face, to Mitsuru's surprise. He tilted his head in another tiny shrug. "Breaks are important to teams."
Mitsuru was torn between raising an eyebrow and widening her smile. Apparently, he was serious. A trip to the beach was not exactly what Mitsuru had in mind in regards to essential Shadow fighting actions… but this was one of the first times Minato had so openly come clean with all his thoughts. She was not going to immediately turn down the advice of someone who was - how had Junpei put it - "batting a thousand" in regards to Shadow fighting proficiency and intuition. Even though she was starting to have serious questions about how he was so consistently accurate… Mitsuru would not look a gift horse in the mouth.
"Very well, Arisato. Your thoughts are appreciated, and I will take them into consideration." Dismissing him with a nod, Mitsuru carefully put the stapled documents down, next to one of the computers in the Control Room. Minato mirrored her nod as he stood, with a quiet "Thanks, Senpai," as he turned and left the room.
With his back facing her, Mitsuru felt it was safe to raise an eyebrow. He really does appear to be getting more verbal. Her mouth quirked upwards as he opened the door. Slightly, at least.
As the door opened, two noises suddenly pierced the quiet. The first was a ping! from a computer in the Control Room – and as Mitsuru glanced at the computer, she saw it was an email from Ikutsuki, requesting (based on the title) more of Mitsuru's notes, specifically about Dark Hour performances from the Arisatos and Akihiko. In fact, even more specifically, he was requesting specific details about Arisato Minato's performance. An odd request, but certainly not the strangest she'd received from the chairman.
She did not have time to immediately read the email, though. There was a second noise that suddenly became audible as Minato opened the door - the previously masked sounds of someone stomping up the steps. Mitsuru had the time to turn away from the email just in time to see Akihiko storm into the room, nearly bowling over Minato (or so it seemed - Minato slid like water around him) as he slammed the door behind him.
Mitsuru was quiet as Akihiko paced back and forth through the room, watching her old friend expectantly. After observing him for several seconds, Mitsuru turned back to Ikutsuki's email, and dutifully sent over her most recent notes on all three of the requested team members, before looking back to Akihiko, still stamping around the room. It took him a minute or two (or several Angry Akihiko Laps, depending on your time metric) before he finally took a deep breath and released it in a frustrated sigh, sinking down into the sofa near Mitsuru at the same time.
As the sofa's cushions sank beneath him, Mitsuru discretely adjusted herself, and awaited Akihiko's unbiased, factual report.
"Shinji's a goddamn asshole," he spat.
Without batting an eye, Mitsuru hummed. "Is he well?"
"Yeah, more or less. Just being a prick, as always." Unrolling his sleeve and unbuttoning his vest's top button, Akihiko sighed and looked up to the ceiling. "Won't listen to reason, or emotion, or anything other than his stubbornness."
Mitsuru knew better than to respond at this point. Make no mistake - she could order him to go work out in his room to burn off some steam, but she had been through this enough times to know that the most effective way to let Akihiko's Shinji-based-ire die out is to just let him vent about his old childhood friend.
Although he was not always aware of it, sometimes, Akihiko very much needed to talk about his feelings.
Heavens forbid.
"He was just doing his usual crap – hanging out in the alleys, doing whatever he does back there. I made sure he ate some damn dinner." He snorted. "Basically had to shove it down his throat. Nearly started a fight between us, 'cept by that time, we were out in the main streets, and there were a couple kids near us. I think he didn't want to scare 'em."
Akihiko continued, running his hand down his face with a hefty exhale. "But he's doing as well as can be expected, given all his usual… crap. He's still hanging in there."
More words seemed to be on Akihiko's mind, but they didn't pass his lips, and Mitsuru watched his whole being slowly, gradually relax, his high alert mode fading away. Once enough time had passed since his last comment, Mitsuru spoke.
"So, did you get the book that I asked for?"
Akihiko froze.
The analog clock in the room ticked.
Mitsuru steeled herself to keep her smile hidden.
Slowly, inch by inch, Akihiko stiffened in his chair, high alert mode returning with a vengeance. "The… book."
Nodding, Mitsuru slid her hand in front of her mouth, feigning a scratch to hide a smile. "Yes, the one I wanted you to retrieve from Bookworms. Do you have it?"
Akihiko squirmed. "I… may have forgotten." He grimaced, hesitantly making eye contact with Mitsuru, whose expression remained dangerously neutral. Suddenly, he stood, re-buttoning his vest. "I… Look, I'm really sorry, I'll get it right now-"
At that exact moment, the main lights shut off, leaving the room enveloped in darkness. The only light spilling into the room was sickly green, coming through one window and illuminating one eerily stretched rectangle on the ground. The Dark Hour had arrived.
Out of the darkness came Akihiko's voice.
"I, uh, I guess I spent more time with Shinji than I thought."
It took all of Mitsuru's trained self-control, all the years of her life that she'd spent keeping her expression determinedly placid, to ensure she wouldn't burst out laughing. Then, just as expected, the Dark Hour power generator kicked in, and a small row of lights above them both thrummed on. Mitsuru was proud to say that the only things betraying her amusement was some tenseness in her abs and a slight teardrop in the corner of one eye.
"It is alright, Akihiko - truly," Mitsuru soothed. "They will keep the book for the next few days. But do try to pick it up tomorrow, please?"
Mitsuru's internal giggles died down as Akihiko, sheepishness incarnate, slowly took his seat once more. "I… I really am sorry. That's pretty bad, even for me."
Well, in a way, yes... but it was also rather expected. Mitsuru had not expected him to get the book tonight - she had sent him in that direction because she was fairly certain that Shinji was in the area, and it had been a while since the boys had seen each other.
Rather than say that, Mitsuru just hummed in acknowledgement. With her fun done, Mitsuru gave Akihiko a break and turned her attention elsewhere - namely, Minato's list of suggestions.
She plucked it from where she had left it and took a closer look, starting again from page one. There truly were many good suggestions, ones that she should have thought of herself (she flicked away a twinge of annoyance at that thought). For instance, legitimate body armor. She had considered it before, but at the time, the desire to not draw attention to themselves during their walks to various locations before the Dark Hour had overruled that thought. Disguise over safety - how disgustingly naive she had been.
Forcing her focus away from her past failings, she continued down the list, gleaning more and more of Minato's ideas. Several minutes must have passed as Mitsuru fell into her flow, scanning each item and determining pros and cons, until a comment from Akihiko snapped her back to reality.
"Mitsuru, is that your phone ringing?"
Mitsuru glanced up. In her focus, she had missed a faint buzzing coming from her purse, sitting on the desk on the other side of the room. "Akihiko, it is the Dark Hour. I believe my phone-"
Suddenly, Mitsuru flew out of her chair, fast as a bolt of lightning. Her normal phone would be dead, but the other phone... the one that would work during the Dark Hour…!
She tore through her purse, all thoughts of suppressing her bursting excitement far, far away. There were only a few people who had the ability to call her during the Dark Hour, and if she was right, then one person was more likely than most to call her out of the blue, on a night with Shadow activity at a relatively stable level.
Mitsuru felt a phone in her purse and grabbed it, bringing it into the light, revealing… her regular phone. She threw it over her shoulder, and it bounced on the carpeted floor with a dull thud as she kept rummaging, and the buzzing within the purse continued.
Finally, she triumphantly snatched the second phone, feeling it buzzing in her hands, and pulled it out. Sure enough, displayed on the front-facing screen was a name:
Yamagishi Fuuka
Mitsuru, still too thrilled to mask her emotions, turned back to Akihiko with a jubilant smile. He stared back, bewildered, before she spoke.
"Akihiko… I do believe we have our newest team member!"
A grin broke out on Akihiko's face as Mitsuru flipped the phone open and accepted the call, barely remembering to temper her voice for the sake of her new recruit. "Yamagishi, hello. Welcome to the Dark Hour. I presume this answers some of your questions?"
"...s..…s..."
The noise on the other side of the phone was scratchy, difficult to make out. It sounded like someone was trying to talk through a layer of static. As the uninterpretable noises continued, Mitsuru's bubbly positivity started to cool. "Yamagishi? Are you there?"
"S-...npai… House..."
A sliver of ice slid into Mitsuru's heart. "Yamagishi, what's happening?"
"Senpai- something's- my-!"
Mitsuru listened closely. Then her eyes widened.
It took four steps for Mitsuru to reach the dorm's alarm activation system. With her hand clenched hard around her Dark Hour phone, she flipped the safety cover off the alarm button, and without a single moment of hesitation, slammed down on the alarm activation.
Minato was in bed, but he hadn't even gone to sleep when the dorm's alarm system blared through the halls. Terror seized him - but you wouldn't have known it from looking at him.
He immediately leapt out of bed, throwing on street clothes and grabbing his backpack, perfectly prepared and lying in one corner of the room. Slinging it over his shoulder, he grabbed his sword, still sheathed and propped up next to his door. Clutching the sword in his off hand, he opened the door and bolted down the hallway, noting with slight satisfaction that he could barely feel his leg injury anymore.
Slight satisfaction, because most of his thoughts were consumed with:
It's not a full moon yet. Did I change something? Has a Full Moon Shadow appeared early?
What other reason could there be for the alarm? Is someone in danger?
But all of S.E.E.S. is here at the dorm… except Yukari and Fuuka!
Minato burst into the Control Room to see Mitsuru opening up a physical map of Iwatodai. A school directory lay flipped open to her side, and her Dark Hour phone was in between them. Akihiko was missing, but he had clearly been here recently, as his phone was left abandoned on one of the armchair cushions. Striding forwards, Minato's foot bumped into Mitsuru's normal phone, mysteriously lying on the ground. He kicked it to the side of the room as he moved, keeping it out from underfoot.
"What's happening?!" Minato demanded, strapping his sword tightly to himself.
"Arisato!" Mitsuru barked, still unrolling the map. "Do you know where Yamagishi lives?"
"Yes!"
She whipped around. "And the fastest way to get there?"
"Yes! What's happening-"
At that moment, Hamuko dashed into the room, frazzled but ready. "Mitsuru-Senpai! Wh-what's the situation?"
Mitsuru hesitated for just a fraction of a second, staring at (and analyzing, Minato knew) Hamuko. "I'll tell you all shortly. Arisato, what is Yamagishi's address?"
"105-0028 Tatsumi-ken, Iwatodai-Ku, Tsubaki 4-9-5," Minato recited, pointing at the map. Hamuko sent him a quick look of surprise while Mitsuru circled the location on the map.
A moment later, Akihiko burst in - with Koromaru right on his heels - as Mitsuru turned to face them. "I need you all to follow Arisato and go to that address immediately."
"Senpai, what is happening?!"
Minato's frustration, normally a death wish when directed at Mitsuru, this time just got him a look. But Minato knew that look. He knew it because he'd seen it on her, many times before… and he'd seen it on himself. That look held hidden fear and painful uncertainty, coiled tenseness and stress.
It held the responsibility of a leader with someone's life in their hands.
"Yamagishi has awoken during the Dark Hour, and there is a Shadow in her house."
Shout outs to:
Dexenamon, Burah, and DaoAchiever for following;
Kyle(point)r(point)dueck for fav'ing;
RaidouXXV, KageFuego4, and 0lcra for reviewing;
And, of course, my amazing beta Disasternoj for beta'ing!
As ever, thanks for reading, and see you in the next update!
[Next chapter drops on June 25th, 2024!]