Baka-Tsuki - User contributions [en]

The Longing Of Shiina Ryo:Volume1 Chapter 1: Ryo

2010-10-03T23:23:29Z

RCG M3tal: /* Part 2 */

== Part 1 ==
For the very first time in my life I was woken up by a common electronic alarm clock.

This might strike you as odd because you probably are someone who had the chance to lead a common life so far, but till now I have been woken up by the weirdest things, including the deathly elbow blows of my female cousins, by the screams of classmates and neighbours and there was even this time a maid walked in and...

…never mind.

Quick as something very quick, I opened the curtains and promptly let the sunshine in. With the open windows it was easy to see that I wasn't paying much attention during the move yesterday; this city seems to be really awesome. I have been in many, many places around the world (probably more than most TV channels, including the cable ones), but I still think this place looks great especially because of its simplicity.

It kind of reminded me of a small rural village I had the chance of visiting once. It seemed really peaceful at the start, but after a festival to one of their local gods, I suddenly found myself trapped into a mysterious murder case. A brutal one. With time loops.

Maybe I am not that fond of simple places after all...

Still half asleep I slowly crawled out of my bed and did my best to dodge the several randomly placed closed boxes on the floor on my way to the flat’s kitchen, and if we just ignore that surprisingly tricky last box it will be obvious to anyone that I managed to complete said task marvelously. I wonder if there is a world record on that.

While the water boiled, lazily as if it was too tired to respect or even consider the laws of Thermodynamics, I too did something without giving that much attention to that action: brushing my teeth. Having such a distracted mind in the early morning could give me enormous problems in a not so distant future. Most of them involved dental care.

However, to find myself in numb state was not something usual to me (which is a great thing, considering that at the very least it postpones some rather painful visits to dentists); at that moment there was something deeply disturbing me: it's incredibly really hard to get used to the silence when you were surrounded by noise your entire life. Actually, the absence of noise is not pleasing in said circumstances, but truly unsettling.

As you can already imagine by now, this is the first day I'm living on my own.

It's pretty unusual for a teenager to do that, especially with their parent's consent (and I guess in my case, I could safely say "relief"). I don't blame them or feel angry about it. It's better for everyone, hopefully.

We have moved around many, many times and still, this force I like to call Mystery always managed to find me. They eventually got tired of being in a different town every month and if I hadn't left, they'd probably grow tired of each other. I couldn't let that happen, not when they gave up so much for me. So, I asked for their permission to live by myself. I wasn't expecting them to like the idea, though.

Which leads us to my first solo flight and the awkward taste it leaves on my mouth. No, wait, I can actually explain the awkward taste. Distracted as I was, I managed to mistake two things that were not similar at all and ended up brushing my teeth with soap. Well, I suppose it could be worse; at least my teeth are clean.

The tea kettle eventually became too bored of that slow heating and after making up with Physics, caused the water to quickly reach the proper temperature and whistled in an earsplitting high frequency that interrupted the house’s maddening silence all of a sudden.

Ignoring the shiny and nearly bubbly reflection of my teeth in the mirror, I ran to the kitchen to turn off the stove. After adding the hot water to the instant noodle cup, I look at my new whole-floor apartment through the kitchen bar. It seems really big, especially because I am fully aware there will be only a single person living here.

My first breakfast alone was both silent and simple, and it tasted a little bit like solitude. And soap.

“I really need to stop doing this.” I said to the air, oxygen and carbon being my only companions. No, that was quite imprecise; I’d better take that back before the rest of the Periodic Table elements that can be found in my house start feeling uneasy. “Living by myself can be a good experience for me, and I might grow up a lot because of this situation. This self-pity thing is not good for me, and I'm certainly not going anywhere thinking like that...”

If reality was a perfect place, that would be the moment an incandescent light bulb would have magically appeared over my head mostly for comedic effect (thankfully, since I assume the sudden materialization of an object above my body for other purpose other than comedy would be rather terrifying).

“...wait a second.” My monologue went on, finally bringing some action into such a monotonous setting. “That is probably the solution; I need to go out! Yes, going out does sound like a fabulous idea to get rid of those unneeded feelings. The timing for that is also perfect: I have a new city to explore and I bet there are many places worth visiting here.”

It sounded like a plan to me at the time. A much better plan than spending the day tidying the place up, which seemed quite pointless to me considering I wasn’t expecting any visits. It was a Sunday, for crying out loud. Sundays are for rest.

Surrounded by countless boxes I still needed to unpack but didn’t felt like doing so at the moment, I quickly finished that flat’s soundless inaugural meal.

A few minutes later, I started my amazing journey through unknown city streets. There was a lot of green on them, but not enough to classify it as a rural town (hopefully). I could see some fancy shops and a few restaurants of famous franchises and then realized that I had probably moved to a developing city. My parents surely did a great job by buying real estate here, since its value will only rise as the city grows.

I can’t help but wonder what they are doing right now.

The streets were surprisingly calm, even for a Sunday morning. Keeping in mind that the schools were closed, I supposed the city manages to be a look more crowded on the other days.

Without a proper destination, I walked through the streets and saw several great places to spend and, if it comes to that, kill time. It occurred to me that I could and presumably would bring my friends to some of those cafes and shops. As soon as I made some new friends, that is. Anyway, I guess hanging around in this city will be nice.

''Before you manage to ruin everything up again, right?''

The mysterious yet recurring voice at the back of my head just spoiled the whole moment for me. It's really hard to be optimistic about your future when the one pointing the flaws in your plans is yourself. Especially because you alone can't argue with your own life experience and every single discussion is pointless because it is nothing but a poorly written monologue in the end.

No, I won't let myself surrender to pessimism so easily. You can only fail if you stop trying, or so I heard. Obviously, I have heard a lot of sayings that didn’t actually worked on real life, but that’s certainly not the point. If you haven't stopped trying, every apparent failure is just a step in your journey to victory. Perhaps just another failure, making it a series. Or just adding new elements to an existing set. Anyway, I won't allow myself to succumb to such a fate without even trying!

“Take that, mysterious voice!”

With my self-confidence reaching a high level, I kept walking aimlessly until I approached a bridge that directly connected the residential side of the city to the commercial one. Oh, so there were the big stores, the important buildings and probably the schools. Maybe this city isn't that small, after all. Which is a great thing, since big cities are less prone to unfortunate things such as, say, time loops than rural villages. That’s common sense, right?

When I was just about to cross the bridge and resume my exploring journey, I was stopped by a magnificent, overwhelming vision.

Next to the bridge, the most beautiful girl I had ever seen was staring directly at me.

Her long, golden hair moved like flames due to that precise, perfect action of the wind that we only get to see in ads and fiction. The frilly one piece dress she was wearing was crimson red and along with her beach sand coloured skin, made her look like the sun itself. Wait, why do I feel so poetic?

She, whom I could easily mistake for a Greek goddess statue, suddenly started moving and I felt my own heart clearly skipping a whole beat. No, that's way too cliché and imprecise; actually my heart had a syncopated pause, to be more exact, a dotted eighth rest which marked a drastic change in the time signature of my heartbeat. Now that I think about it, ‘you make my heart go prog’ sounds like a fairly decent pick-up line for musicians. I can even picture it as a popular t-shirt stamp.

It skipped, anyway.

As she sweetly came in my direction, I noticed that I couldn't move or look around; it was like her innocent face (that for some unknown reason matched perfectly her well developed body) was made of quicksand, and I took way too long to realize that I was sinking in.

She stopped in front of me, close enough for me to feel her delicious scent, the scent of raw sunflower seeds. The Sun smiled to me and tried to tell me something, but I was deeply lost in the smooth movement of her cherry lips. Once she stopped talking, I realized that I was missing something.

"I'm sorry, what did you just said?"

Now, I need to confess; I understood what she said, I really did. It would be weird if, after paying such devoted attention to her beautiful lips, I hadn't read what they were trying to say. However, I really wanted to see them moving one more time. Call me what you want, I don't mind. You'd have done the same thing, or wished you had.

"I said 'excuse me, what time is it?'" 
"Oh, let me see..." I looked at my cell phone screen. "Exactly 11:45."

She smiled, looking so radiant I was afraid I could go blind.

"Thank you very much." She started walking away, then turned and waved to me. "Bye bye!"

I never saw her again.

Just like that. I know, it sounds unfair and kind of dull, but so is life. We could have been through many adventures or solved mysteries or even have common, peaceful high school years together. We'd probably face the possibility of being torn apart at one point, but just to set the scene and build a decent literary climax.

Yeah, a solid climax. If this was a manga or some sort of fiction, we'd probably have a dramatic reencounter under the rain (maybe snow, it depends on the author) with generic sad piano background music and a dialogue that involved the word "promise". No, a whole dialogue ''based'' on the word "promise". Yeah, that’s much better.

That was the shipwreck of our romance, I suppose: the fact that it never happened. I believe they call this tragedy.

Back to the story.

I still had a smile on my face (especially because I didn't knew that I'd never see her again at that moment) when the cell phone in my right hand started to vibrate. As the dog biting The Fool in Tarot's Major Arcana, that message worked as call of the real world to me. It reminded me of something that I was so used to that I didn't even needed to think about it; it was like a built-in mechanism, something that it was hard to believe that wasn't there from the start.

It was Ryo, and I shouldn't be surprised; she did know that I was supposed to arrive in her city yesterday and I forgot to send her a message telling that I was already here. Anyway, I was so tired from travelling yesterday that I just entered the apartment and slept, without even looking at it. Yeah, I'd better use that excuse.

With that in mind, I pressed the button to read the message.

<pre>
Where are you?
We haven't talked yesterday, you know ._.
</pre>

My smile was so wide at that moment that my jaw hurt a little bit.

She usually talks like a guy and I blame the internet for her manners, so seeing her act in such a cute way sure is good for my self-esteem; it's nice to have a friend that actually worries about you. Also, she has a decent reason for being worried. Since we met we have been texting each other every single day without taking breaks. Sometimes I wonder if the day will come when we won’t have anything to say to each other.

For a reason I don't know why, I feel that I need to make it up for her. I cannot just say ‘I was tired, lol’ or something like that. It would be really inconsiderate of me, and we know each other for a while. I need to think something quick, before she starts to think that I'm ignoring her or something.

I looked around, searching for an epiphany or at least, something that I could use to avoid that topic for now. OK, I'm next to a bridge; there are a few shops over there, a French-themed cafe...

What comes next can be very, very dangerous. Don't try it at home, kids.

<pre>
Hey, I'm hungry: do you want to eat something?
Right now I'm in front of a cafe called Le Ciel Bleu.
</pre>

Wait, what on Earth am I doing?

Realizing what I had just written I tried to delete that message, but my attempt to do so failed in the most miserable way possible; my fingers betrayed me and pressed the SEND button on their own. How could you do that, I trusted you!

…

OK, so the message was sent; big deal, there's no reason to panic. Don't panic. I said don't panic, damn it!

Fine, I just (technically) called a girl I only know on the internet out and despite talking to her for a whole year I can't help but feel nervous. Not only because I just happened to walk through half of the city and I think I'm starting to sweat, but also because I'm afraid to meet her and see that she might be not exactly like the persona she represented on the net. There must be a way out of this. I just need to relax and think about it. Think, think...

From the moment my cell phone quivered in my hands, I felt like its vibration had spread through my whole body. It's interesting to think that vibration in English is also a slang for aura, atmosphere. Possibly, that slang started when someone was in the same situation as me. Yes, someone who also has endured the massive, dark wave of dismay that is receiving a text message from a girl you just called out.

I know I can't run away now. If I choose to ignore her message, I might have to move away from this town. The reason for that is because I am supposed to attend my first day at her school tomorrow; even if I decide to pretend I never got the message, I'll probably have to face a questionnaire at school. And that would probably mean the end of our friendship, because despite my reputation, I just can't lie.

With another movement of my untrustworthy fingers, I pressed the READ button and face my destiny. It just occurred to me (a few milliseconds before the screen finished loading the message) that she could reply by saying that she didn't wanted to meet me or that she was busy (which, according to centuries of mankind's knowledge and experience, most likely meant that she really, really didn't want to meet me). That hypothesis hurt my pride a little bit. Fine, not only a bit.

Don't you dare say you can't come!

<pre>
Oh, I know that place.
Get us a table next to the windows; I'll be there in 15 min.
</pre>

Thank goodness, she is coming. No, wait. DARN, SHE IS COMING!

''Would you please decide whether you want her to come or not?''

It's not as easy as it sounds. You see, both sides have bad points. Lots of 'em. Therefore,
while I myself have excellent reasons to want to avoid both sides, I also know that as long as I'm in this town, I can't avoid an encounter (not even by using a repellent spray while walking on the tall grass, since this is probably a boss battle, most likely necessary to plot advancement), which leads me to a dilemma and...

...wait a second. Why is there a mysterious voice that speaks in underlined italics inside my head? I know that "speaking in italics" is an idiomatic expression that implies the use of tone to emphasize certain words, but how come does one actually ''speaks'' in underlines?

''Does it really matter? You'd better use your time on getting a table like she told you instead of wasting it on pointless videogame references or discussing linguistics with me.''

Unfortunately, the voice was right; I didn't have much time. The Rubicon was crossed and now I had got no choice but to face the resulting responsibility of my betraying fingers' actions.

I must enter that cafe, get a table and patiently wait for Ryo to show up, even if it kills me.

''My hero.''

Oh, shut up.

As I walked toward the cafe's door, I saw mischievous words engraved in a banner. From the moment I read them, I found it hard to conceal my anxiousness and keep moving forward easily. Deep into my heart that is engulfed by despair, I know that it had "Welcome!" written on it but the banner meant "abandon all hope, ye who enter here".

Bravely I opened the door and walked straight into the endless darkness.

== Part 2 ==

tick

The absolute worst case scenario: the awfully bad situation I avoided and had nightmares about since I was little and dreamed of being on spaceships (which didn't work out because my father opposed my career as a space marine). However, even creatures from outer space and other dimensions sound like a great idea compared to this. I mean it. Words fail to describe the horror, the absolute dismay I'm feeling at this very moment.

tick

This is just dreadful. I don't believe in ''karma'' or past lives, but if I did (and I'm not saying I do), I would probably have been (and I'm not saying I am) a really mean, distrusted and hated person. Probably a soccer referee.

''It's just a maid cafe, stop being such a drama queen.''

tick

Just a maid cafe, you say. I swore to myself that I'd never enter that kind of place. Will you look at the waitress? She thinks she is still a teenager, but anyone can see the wrinkles on her face! That horrible makeup isn't helping at all! This is outrageous, almost an insult for those who were once in the presence of a true maid!

''Meanwhile, could you please tell the "fake maid" that you're not going to order now? She keeps staring at you with that "I don't get paid to stand here and look at you" look.''

tick

Against my will I turned around and saw the eldritch, I mean, elder abomination looking at me. Oh my, she was actually trying to look cute. That was really, really lame. She was probably in her 30's, and shouldn't have to put up with this anymore. I wondered if she hated her job. I certainly did.

"May I serve you, master?" 
"No."

Silence ensued.

tick

"I mean, I intend to order, but right now I am waiting for someone."

She probably did not realize that she was making an awkward face, feature which in her case was not a challenge at all.

"Oh, I see." The maid said, without much conviction. I cannot even blame her, since she probably deals with hardcore otaku every single day. She gave me a cheap, fake smile and tried to talk in a high pitched voice. "Just call Myu-chan when you're ready to order, myu~~"

tick

Just at that moment I realized that the maid assigned to my table was the only one that wore cat-ears. Great, a cat-maid; I must be the unluckiest person on Earth. When I thought it couldn't get any worse, a song that I could only believe that came from some anime filled the room.

tick

I couldn't recognize the song, but I guessed it was an anime opening because of the overused structure and the shrieking child-like voice of the singer/voice actor/whatever you kids call it these days. The synthesized bass was steady but clearly uninspired, which hurt my pride as a bass player. And when I looked to my cell phone, I noticed that Ryo was already seven minutes late.

Heavens, what am I doing here?

''You know, that's an interesting question that intrigued the humanity since the beginning of time. There is a great deal of people that believe that the mysterious reason of the existence will only be unfolded when we reach a definitive conclusion about the creation of say, everything. Some believe that gods created the universe, and others that everything began because of a random explosion of nothingness.
Fascinating subject, no matter how you approach it.''

tick

...I didn't mean it like that. I was just wondering how my life reached this point. It's always been weird (really weird, for honesty's sake), but not anything like this. I'm used to deal with "supernatural" weird, or "murder case" weird, even "space monsters" weird; I just don't know how this people manage to deal with "normal" weird. I mean, it's my first day in town and I've already broke a promise to myself and thought about my maid.

''Since the subject is breaking promises and maids, you also swore that you would bring her favorite ribbon back when you were kids. Instead, you mixed things up and mistook her for her sister.''

tick

Wait, I did return that ribbon; in one of the routes, at least. And they were identical twins, so no one can blame me for being confused. That doesn't matter, anyway. Discussing my past won't change the fact that I have to wait in the most hideous place on Earth for a girl I'm not sure I want to meet in real life because if I do and she is different from the girl I've met on the Net, I won't have any friends left. No one should have to face such a crisis.

''Crisis, which comes from the Greek ‘krinein’, ‘to separate’. Which is funny because you do feel like you're being torn apart, right?''

That's not funny at all!

tick

...

tick

...

tick

...

''...oh, c'mon, it's not that bad.
She might be different, but in a good way.''

Like what?

''Well, she could be a guy.
You wouldn't feel so awkward to wait for a guy, right?''

I'm not sure; it would depend on the guy and...

tick

... just wait a second. What are you insinuating?

''Oh, nothing.
Nothing at all.''

The mysterious voice coughed nervously, and I wasn’t even sure if it was a possible feature for someone who doesn’t have a body because it involved stressing the throat and such.

''...anyway, it's not like people lie on the internet or anything like that. I mean, there is no way someone would set up an offline meeting with you just to make you wait for a long time and make you feel like an idiot.''

tick

Well...

''Nah, no one would do that.''

I sighed in relief.

''It's too simple, way too simple.
Unless...''

tick

...what? Unless what?

''...unless they were recording your reactions to post the movie on the internet later. It sounds like a fine reason to set up a date instead of just saying they couldn't come.''

Why are you assuming that Ryo is a "they" or a "he" instead of a "she"? Why do you need to make me feel more paranoid about everything, when it's not like I need your help to ruin my self-esteem? Why the heck don't you just leave me alone?

...

tick

The awfully loud music that seemed to fill every space in the room, but my mind was completely silent. However, that was only the calm before the storm. The peace only lasted for a blink and after that, I was thrown into the deep well of agony once again.

It was like someone made an enormous hole in the submerged submarine that was my mind and the unfounded theories (but not impossible to practice) were the black waters of the ocean that surrounded it. They found their way in and they were filling me, making me too heavy to keep floating.

tick

What if the voice was right? What if every message, every single word she typed was a big fat lie? It's not like I never considered that hypothesis myself, anyway. Darn, I wished I had talked to her on the phone. Once would have been enough, at least to destroy my doubts. At that moment, they were crushing me.

tick

The agony suddenly transformed into white anger. I was suddenly mad at everything. At myself, for being such a fool and talking to someone for so long without knowing simple details about her, which is practically a requirement in healthy human relations. At her, him or they for making me wait for so long. At the waitress, for being so old (she was probably not much happy about that too). At the clients, for repeating what seemed to be the same song over and over again. At the voice, for ruining my day. Especially at that voice.

tick

I listened to the piercing sound of laughs. Laughs of many, I'm completely sure of that. The mysterious voice was right! Surrounded by hunters, the white beast of Rage wanted to reverse to its previous state but failed and stayed in the middle of the road between Anger and Agony, becoming a creature with features of both and decent Special Attack stats.

As I stood up, I heard the table shaking and the chair I was sitting on quickly falling on the floor; I felt my eyes twitching and my head hurt, but I ignored it and focus on the sounds around me. The laughing ones are...

...on my right!
''...on your left side!''
...right there!
''...on the ceiling!''

"I'M IN DESPAIR!"

Just a moment after screaming that, I realized that the clients were laughing of an anime scene on the widescreen television. However, after my performance, I manage to finally become what I was afraid of being from the start: the center of their attention.

tick

I lowered my head and grabbed the chair that was on the floor, ignoring the infinite sounds hovering around me. I sat on it again, not only because I was finding it hard to stand, but also because I was too confused to run. I covered my face with my hands. Have I gone completely insane?

''Listen..''.

What? Are you going to mock me by saying "good job!" or something like that? Save it, I don't need your offensive remarks to feel bad about myself. I'm only glad that I hadn't ordered coffee or anything when my burst of despair occurred, or it would have fallen on the floor and I'd be even more embarrassed than I am right now, and I’m not quite sure if that is possible.

''Shut up. Now, pay attention to the people around you.''

For some reason, I did. They were not only laughing.

''How often have you seen bullies clapping their hands in ovation to the weak kid?''

When I looked at them, I saw that the voice was right. The clients were on their feet, smiling and screaming and clapping their hands like there was no tomorrow. For some reason, they weren't laughing of me, but with me. Technically, since I wasn't laughing. The point is, I was not being mocked of.

It felt warm.

"That was a nice performance, and your voice does resembles Teacher's" There was a small pause, and I could hear a rasp in her breath. "...however, it would have been much more effective if you had done it while wearing a hakama and glasses. A great performance, nonetheless."

I turned around to see where that voice was coming from. A pale, geeky girl with pitch black hair watched me with interest. It took me a little while until I realized who I was talking to.

"Y-you...!"

tick

== Part 3 ==

(sorry about that cliffhanger)

Her silky long hair.

Her expressive eyebrows.

Her dark-grey eyes and that stupid yet cute cat-like grin of hers.

She seemed to know everyone in here and everyone seems to be watching us. I'm not being paranoid now; since we sat down and started staring at each other in silence, I can feel the gaze of the whole cafe. Everyone here seemed to want to know about Ryo, and while being popular can be nice I was only worried that her fandom was composed only of people significantly older than her.

The maid that insists on calling herself Myu-chan coughed and brought an end to the empire of silence.

"S-so, are you guys going to order now myu~~?"

I heard a small dosage of despair in her words. Everyone in the cafe seemed to hold their breaths, just like the crowd waiting for the gunslinger's duel to start in a Wild West movie. I unintentionally move my fingers in the air next to my chair, like I'm getting ready to draw my gun.

We stare at each other for what seems to be an eternity. Suddenly her face changed from unique cuteness to mad anger and before I could react, she rose up and hit the table with her hands.

"OBJECTION!" She pointed to something behind me. "I do realize that we're having a Grand Duel tense moment, but is that rolling ball of hay really necessary? We're still on a maid cafe and that doesn't even make any sense!"

I looked behind to see the ball of hay along to the rest of the customers, just to find out that there was absolutely nothing like that there: then I turned around just in time to see Ryo calmly sitting in her chair again, ordering two portions of ‘the usual’ from the maid like nothing happened. She tricked me, and it worked out just as she planned.

As the maid scurried away and the mood in the cafe lightened up, I relaxed my shoulders and gave up on the whole tense scenario. I still tried to sound grumpy, but mostly for comic effect.

"You're late." 
"But I came just in time for your anime impression show, right?" She blinks and smiles. "I'm sorry for taking so long. I was just reading an article on Hikkipedia for a novel I’m writing, and you know how those things work; you decide to read just one small article, then a related one and when you finally notice what you’re doing several hours have passed since you started researching, the daylight is gone and the cat either needs food or to be buried."

I released a big sigh; she did not even going to lie about being in front of the computer when she was supposed to meet me and it's really hard to get mad at someone that's being genuinely honest because there are not many of those these days and we all have the duty of protecting endangered species. Take that, mysterious voice; not only she is a girl, she is also honest.

"Don't worry..."

Now that the whole scene was gone I got to look properly at her

Her white baggy t-shirt and khaki jeans failed to hide her developing body, but her long hair managed to attract the attention of those who looked at her(at least for a while). Her medium-sized eyeglasses look big on her petite face and she seems oddly familiar to me, despite the fact that I never saw a picture of her before or something like that.

Too familiar, actually; it's exactly like I have seen her face my whole life, but I'm unaware of details such as where I could have seen her before or whose face she resembles. The fact that I've met thousands of people in the last years doesn't help at all. Technically, it should, since my travels around the world could count as a decent reason for having a "been there, done that" attitude. However, my memory is not that good in every aspect; while I remember every single little thing about the situations I've been in, I often forget people.

…

Wait. Where is the mysterious voice now? I'm pretty sure that it was time for some mean comment or paranoid idea.

Now that I think about it, I can't hear that voice for a little while now...

...whatever. I need to focus on the important things. I'm here, Ryo is here. We're in a cafe and the awful music is gone, so I'm probably going to have a fine day. The first common day in my brand new common life. That's all that matters, right?

Right?

I shook my head to get rid of the thoughts about the voice. Fading back to Earth, I noticed that Ryo was typing on her cell phone furiously. She probably started it while I was daydreaming.

The only thing that stopped the Empire of Silence from striking back is the sound of her little fingers pressing buttons in an unreasonably fast tempo, and when I say fast I mean it; she is using both thumbs to type alternately, using a technique similar to a drummer's blast beat masterfully. Such precise movements...

If only she was doing it with her feet, I bet she'd be a great jazz musician. Maybe the world's most amazing cyclist, or a dance machine master, or just a weirdo stomping her own cell phone. It's only a matter of perspective. Or a matter of what have you got your feet on.

She stopped typing and looked at me with a curious face.

"It's getting cold."

I was going to argue and say that the day is actually pretty hot, and the sunlight is usually stronger by the lunch time. There's Ultraviolet radiation in sunlight and it can give you some problems. So, if you're on a beach, don't sunbathe next/during mid-day or you'll get sunburnt. Stay in the shade!

Judging by Ryo's skin, I came to the conclusion that she took this "avoid the sun" policy seriously. Far too seriously. She looks a little bit like a ghost. Not that this is a bad thing, you know. I've met some really nice ghosts and I learned to respect people that float and haunt places for a living. Hah, a ghost doing something for a living. That was a good one.

Unintentionally I blinked and brought myself back to reality.

"W-what?" 
"Your coffee, it's getting cold."

She pointed to the table and I noticed that there was, indeed, a mug of coffee there. Myu had probably left it here while I daydreamed and... oh my.

Ryo came to meet me, and I kept daydreaming over and over again. I was so lost in thought that I haven't even seen the waitress bringing us the coffee; I have probably ignored Ryo as well.

I could feel the gaze of everyone in the cafe. There was a big chance no one was looking directly at me that time, but I had a bad feeling about this. No, my danger sense told me it wasn’t just my paranoia talking; they were waiting for me to do something. Ryo seems to know every one of those guys, and from what I saw I can judge that she is the little sister they never had. And I'm the jerk that ignored her after calling her out.

"Have you finished reading it?" Without any ideas left, I tried to redeem myself by making conversation.

She touched her lips with the tip of her index finger and raised an eyebrow.

"What?" 
"The article." 
"Which one?" 
"The Hikkipedia one."

She looked away, not paying much attention to me.

"I'm reading it right now."

Which means she is so bored that she'd rather be doing what she always do instead of being here with me. I'm used to talking to girls and I know that when they stop paying attention to you, you'd better get it back quickly and...

...the voice should have pointed that if I'm such an expert in girls, I could have avoided this situation merely by paying attention to her. And if I could hear it right now, it would tell me that I am doing the exact opposite by thinking about it and...

Control yourself! It doesn't matter if you're nervous or not; Ryo probably waited for this day as much as you did. Now you'd better find a way to make this day amazing, or I won't forgive you (and by that, I mean you won't forgive yourself)!

I used my fingers to type in my cell phone as fast as I could, and instead of betraying me, they joined me in this special attack; our synchronization rate was now absurd and I could feel a great energy emanating from my body and flowing through me. The opening song I could listen to in my heart told me that it was a decisive moment, and it wasn’t nearly as bad as the one that was playing when I got here.

I won't let you down, Ryo! Behold my new power!

<pre>
┌───────┐
| SORRY |
└──y────┘
∧___∧
（,,ﾟДﾟ)
| つつ
| |
~∪∪
</pre>

With my ASCII art piece finished, I pressed the SEND button; Three seconds later her cell phone beeped, and she immediately looked at me. I tried to smile at her, but she gave me a cold stare that didn’t fit her and then her gaze went back to her mobile phone.

Now I could only wait for her reply.

She sighed and started typing again. Not as fast as before, and certainly not as furious. Ryo seemed pretty normal to me at that moment; she was just a teenager messaging someone (and not a girl with a mob-like fan base and machine gun fingers).

<pre>
／l、
(ﾟ､｡７ - don't you dare ignore me again.
l、 ~ ヽ
じしf_, )ノ
</pre>

Her ASCII art is much better than mine, but that was not the point. If you filter the harsh part of message, you’ll notice that the ‘again’ implies that I would have another chance to ruin everything again and therefore I also have the chance to make things right. There’s also a cute ‘drawing’ of a kitten, and you can’t send something like that to someone you’re genuinely angry at.

Everything was alright.

When I looked at Ryo, she was giving me another of her cat-like smiles, and only then I noticed that I was actually enjoying myself. Despite the little things, I realized that I liked this place and I could see myself actually living here as a normal person. I could even get used to the atmosphere of this cafe and even with its customers. Not to that song, I’m afraid, but I suppose nothing is perfect.

We kept on chatting so happily it was like nothing bad has occurred to us in our entire lives.

Living here with Ryo could be really nice. Just being here with her right now is amazing, and from the things she told me on the net, nothing supernatural or mysterious ever happened in this town; I might be finally able to have peaceful high-school days along with a good friend like I always wanted tp. It feels like I died and went to heaven, except I feel alive and I’m pretty sure heaven would have better music...

The thought of leading a common life got me in a good mood that accompanied me through the rest of that day.

...

From that point on, the day was pretty much perfect. Oh, contradictions. Right, I just said nothing is perfect. Yet, I also claimed the day I spent with Ryo was perfect. Ergo, this day would be the same as nothing, logically speaking. But not to me.

Anyway.

We laughed a lot and talked about random things like we did every day online. Somehow, it was much better than our previous conversations.

Ryo took me to some stores and parks and despite the fact that I had already visited most of them, I decided to don't say it out loud; she was so happy to show me her town that I couldn't bring myself to spoil her fun.

Then Time passed, against our will.

The twilight sky looked absolutely beautiful from the spot we were sitting, and I must admit that I had planned that much based on my earlier visit to the park. There seemed to be no one else but us in the park or in the infinite Universe, and a different kind of silence kept waving in the air. We were both enjoying a calm and motionless moment after a full day that resembled anything but a storm, but I found myself also wishing that very moment to last forever.

The sudden spring rain that fell upon, on the other hand, seemed to want the opposite.

It was a big surprise, because the day had been bright and sunny till that point. When I was about to start running away from the bench and look for shelter under the trees, Ryo pinched the sleeve of my shirt to attract my interest. My eyes met an object I knew she was carrying the whole time, but hadn't paid any special attention to: a white lace parasol.

"Shall we?" She instantly hid me under it and grabbed my arm tightly.

So, here comes a philosophical question for you: at which point does a parasol becomes an umbrella?

Her parasol was way too small for two people, so we were about as wet as if we didn't had anything to cover us at all. Not that it meant much to us at the time, anyway. We ran under the rain, laughing and singing and completely ignoring the prospect of catching a cold before my first day in school. I don't regret it at all, because it felt right.

We went in direction of her home, because it was both closer to the park and because she told me that I could borrow the parasol after I dropped her home. I knew that it was practically useless, but I walked (technically "ran") her home anyway.

Then we arrived at her building and I was truly glad she didn't invite me in because it's always weird when you meet someone's parents, especially weirder if you both of you just got your clothes completely drenched while running on the rain despite the fact that this someone had a parasol. She let go of my arm and looked at the lobby.

That was it.

In the end, I wasn't sad; the perfect day was over indeed, but we would still have tomorrow, and the day after, and so on. What started as a perfect day could easily become a perfect week, a perfect month, a perfect year and I know I am being utterly pretentious but I can even wish for it to become a perfect life. My perfect life.

Despite it being unrealistic, this was still what I truly hoped for.

When I was about to say "goodbye" and go back to my place the expression in her face stopped me.

"Look!" Ryo pointed to something behind me, and I instinctively turned around to see it in a blink. That action brought instant results, and none of them was regret. "It's so... beautiful..." 
"Whoa..."

During the rain, a rainbow had formed in the skies above us. The rain was still really strong, but we ignored it for a while and kept watching the palette of pigments painting the sky. The sunset made its colors surreal, but we both knew that those were the true colors of the rainbow.

And then I realized that this day, so rich in events and full of interesting moments was coming to its end. I had no regrets, but I already missed it. There might not exist a day like this in my life again, or even on Earth; and even if the years pass me by and I die only to reborn again in this world, I will never forget the vivid colors of the rainbow I saw with Shiina Ryo.

I looked at her, and she was smiling like a child with a new toy.

"We need to do this again." 
"What, hang out?" I laughed honestly. "I am going to live here now, you know. I'm sure we'll have plenty of time to do that." 
"No, I mean we must watch the rainbow together again." Her voice had a serious tone now, and for some reason it made me happy. "Promise me we will..."

<noinclude>
{| border="1" cellpadding="5" cellspacing="0" style="margin: 1em 1em 1em 0; background: #f9f9f9; border: 1px #aaaaaa solid; padding: 0.2em; border-collapse: collapse;"
|-
| Back to [[The_Longing_Of_Shiina_Ryo:Volume1 Prologue|Prologue]]
| Return to [[The_Longing_Of_Shiina_Ryo|Main Page]]
| Forward to [[The_Longing_Of_Shiina_Ryo:Volume1 Chapter 2: Reikoku|Chapter 2: Reikoku]]
|-
|}
</noinclude>

The Longing Of Shiina Ryo:Volume1 Chapter 1: Ryo

2010-10-03T23:14:09Z

RCG M3tal: /* Part 1 */

== Part 1 ==
For the very first time in my life I was woken up by a common electronic alarm clock.

This might strike you as odd because you probably are someone who had the chance to lead a common life so far, but till now I have been woken up by the weirdest things, including the deathly elbow blows of my female cousins, by the screams of classmates and neighbours and there was even this time a maid walked in and...

…never mind.

Quick as something very quick, I opened the curtains and promptly let the sunshine in. With the open windows it was easy to see that I wasn't paying much attention during the move yesterday; this city seems to be really awesome. I have been in many, many places around the world (probably more than most TV channels, including the cable ones), but I still think this place looks great especially because of its simplicity.

It kind of reminded me of a small rural village I had the chance of visiting once. It seemed really peaceful at the start, but after a festival to one of their local gods, I suddenly found myself trapped into a mysterious murder case. A brutal one. With time loops.

Maybe I am not that fond of simple places after all...

Still half asleep I slowly crawled out of my bed and did my best to dodge the several randomly placed closed boxes on the floor on my way to the flat’s kitchen, and if we just ignore that surprisingly tricky last box it will be obvious to anyone that I managed to complete said task marvelously. I wonder if there is a world record on that.

While the water boiled, lazily as if it was too tired to respect or even consider the laws of Thermodynamics, I too did something without giving that much attention to that action: brushing my teeth. Having such a distracted mind in the early morning could give me enormous problems in a not so distant future. Most of them involved dental care.

However, to find myself in numb state was not something usual to me (which is a great thing, considering that at the very least it postpones some rather painful visits to dentists); at that moment there was something deeply disturbing me: it's incredibly really hard to get used to the silence when you were surrounded by noise your entire life. Actually, the absence of noise is not pleasing in said circumstances, but truly unsettling.

As you can already imagine by now, this is the first day I'm living on my own.

It's pretty unusual for a teenager to do that, especially with their parent's consent (and I guess in my case, I could safely say "relief"). I don't blame them or feel angry about it. It's better for everyone, hopefully.

We have moved around many, many times and still, this force I like to call Mystery always managed to find me. They eventually got tired of being in a different town every month and if I hadn't left, they'd probably grow tired of each other. I couldn't let that happen, not when they gave up so much for me. So, I asked for their permission to live by myself. I wasn't expecting them to like the idea, though.

Which leads us to my first solo flight and the awkward taste it leaves on my mouth. No, wait, I can actually explain the awkward taste. Distracted as I was, I managed to mistake two things that were not similar at all and ended up brushing my teeth with soap. Well, I suppose it could be worse; at least my teeth are clean.

The tea kettle eventually became too bored of that slow heating and after making up with Physics, caused the water to quickly reach the proper temperature and whistled in an earsplitting high frequency that interrupted the house’s maddening silence all of a sudden.

Ignoring the shiny and nearly bubbly reflection of my teeth in the mirror, I ran to the kitchen to turn off the stove. After adding the hot water to the instant noodle cup, I look at my new whole-floor apartment through the kitchen bar. It seems really big, especially because I am fully aware there will be only a single person living here.

My first breakfast alone was both silent and simple, and it tasted a little bit like solitude. And soap.

“I really need to stop doing this.” I said to the air, oxygen and carbon being my only companions. No, that was quite imprecise; I’d better take that back before the rest of the Periodic Table elements that can be found in my house start feeling uneasy. “Living by myself can be a good experience for me, and I might grow up a lot because of this situation. This self-pity thing is not good for me, and I'm certainly not going anywhere thinking like that...”

If reality was a perfect place, that would be the moment an incandescent light bulb would have magically appeared over my head mostly for comedic effect (thankfully, since I assume the sudden materialization of an object above my body for other purpose other than comedy would be rather terrifying).

“...wait a second.” My monologue went on, finally bringing some action into such a monotonous setting. “That is probably the solution; I need to go out! Yes, going out does sound like a fabulous idea to get rid of those unneeded feelings. The timing for that is also perfect: I have a new city to explore and I bet there are many places worth visiting here.”

It sounded like a plan to me at the time. A much better plan than spending the day tidying the place up, which seemed quite pointless to me considering I wasn’t expecting any visits. It was a Sunday, for crying out loud. Sundays are for rest.

Surrounded by countless boxes I still needed to unpack but didn’t felt like doing so at the moment, I quickly finished that flat’s soundless inaugural meal.

A few minutes later, I started my amazing journey through unknown city streets. There was a lot of green on them, but not enough to classify it as a rural town (hopefully). I could see some fancy shops and a few restaurants of famous franchises and then realized that I had probably moved to a developing city. My parents surely did a great job by buying real estate here, since its value will only rise as the city grows.

I can’t help but wonder what they are doing right now.

The streets were surprisingly calm, even for a Sunday morning. Keeping in mind that the schools were closed, I supposed the city manages to be a look more crowded on the other days.

Without a proper destination, I walked through the streets and saw several great places to spend and, if it comes to that, kill time. It occurred to me that I could and presumably would bring my friends to some of those cafes and shops. As soon as I made some new friends, that is. Anyway, I guess hanging around in this city will be nice.

''Before you manage to ruin everything up again, right?''

The mysterious yet recurring voice at the back of my head just spoiled the whole moment for me. It's really hard to be optimistic about your future when the one pointing the flaws in your plans is yourself. Especially because you alone can't argue with your own life experience and every single discussion is pointless because it is nothing but a poorly written monologue in the end.

No, I won't let myself surrender to pessimism so easily. You can only fail if you stop trying, or so I heard. Obviously, I have heard a lot of sayings that didn’t actually worked on real life, but that’s certainly not the point. If you haven't stopped trying, every apparent failure is just a step in your journey to victory. Perhaps just another failure, making it a series. Or just adding new elements to an existing set. Anyway, I won't allow myself to succumb to such a fate without even trying!

“Take that, mysterious voice!”

With my self-confidence reaching a high level, I kept walking aimlessly until I approached a bridge that directly connected the residential side of the city to the commercial one. Oh, so there were the big stores, the important buildings and probably the schools. Maybe this city isn't that small, after all. Which is a great thing, since big cities are less prone to unfortunate things such as, say, time loops than rural villages. That’s common sense, right?

When I was just about to cross the bridge and resume my exploring journey, I was stopped by a magnificent, overwhelming vision.

Next to the bridge, the most beautiful girl I had ever seen was staring directly at me.

Her long, golden hair moved like flames due to that precise, perfect action of the wind that we only get to see in ads and fiction. The frilly one piece dress she was wearing was crimson red and along with her beach sand coloured skin, made her look like the sun itself. Wait, why do I feel so poetic?

She, whom I could easily mistake for a Greek goddess statue, suddenly started moving and I felt my own heart clearly skipping a whole beat. No, that's way too cliché and imprecise; actually my heart had a syncopated pause, to be more exact, a dotted eighth rest which marked a drastic change in the time signature of my heartbeat. Now that I think about it, ‘you make my heart go prog’ sounds like a fairly decent pick-up line for musicians. I can even picture it as a popular t-shirt stamp.

It skipped, anyway.

As she sweetly came in my direction, I noticed that I couldn't move or look around; it was like her innocent face (that for some unknown reason matched perfectly her well developed body) was made of quicksand, and I took way too long to realize that I was sinking in.

She stopped in front of me, close enough for me to feel her delicious scent, the scent of raw sunflower seeds. The Sun smiled to me and tried to tell me something, but I was deeply lost in the smooth movement of her cherry lips. Once she stopped talking, I realized that I was missing something.

"I'm sorry, what did you just said?"

Now, I need to confess; I understood what she said, I really did. It would be weird if, after paying such devoted attention to her beautiful lips, I hadn't read what they were trying to say. However, I really wanted to see them moving one more time. Call me what you want, I don't mind. You'd have done the same thing, or wished you had.

"I said 'excuse me, what time is it?'" 
"Oh, let me see..." I looked at my cell phone screen. "Exactly 11:45."

She smiled, looking so radiant I was afraid I could go blind.

"Thank you very much." She started walking away, then turned and waved to me. "Bye bye!"

I never saw her again.

Just like that. I know, it sounds unfair and kind of dull, but so is life. We could have been through many adventures or solved mysteries or even have common, peaceful high school years together. We'd probably face the possibility of being torn apart at one point, but just to set the scene and build a decent literary climax.

Yeah, a solid climax. If this was a manga or some sort of fiction, we'd probably have a dramatic reencounter under the rain (maybe snow, it depends on the author) with generic sad piano background music and a dialogue that involved the word "promise". No, a whole dialogue ''based'' on the word "promise". Yeah, that’s much better.

That was the shipwreck of our romance, I suppose: the fact that it never happened. I believe they call this tragedy.

Back to the story.

I still had a smile on my face (especially because I didn't knew that I'd never see her again at that moment) when the cell phone in my right hand started to vibrate. As the dog biting The Fool in Tarot's Major Arcana, that message worked as call of the real world to me. It reminded me of something that I was so used to that I didn't even needed to think about it; it was like a built-in mechanism, something that it was hard to believe that wasn't there from the start.

It was Ryo, and I shouldn't be surprised; she did know that I was supposed to arrive in her city yesterday and I forgot to send her a message telling that I was already here. Anyway, I was so tired from travelling yesterday that I just entered the apartment and slept, without even looking at it. Yeah, I'd better use that excuse.

With that in mind, I pressed the button to read the message.

<pre>
Where are you?
We haven't talked yesterday, you know ._.
</pre>

My smile was so wide at that moment that my jaw hurt a little bit.

She usually talks like a guy and I blame the internet for her manners, so seeing her act in such a cute way sure is good for my self-esteem; it's nice to have a friend that actually worries about you. Also, she has a decent reason for being worried. Since we met we have been texting each other every single day without taking breaks. Sometimes I wonder if the day will come when we won’t have anything to say to each other.

For a reason I don't know why, I feel that I need to make it up for her. I cannot just say ‘I was tired, lol’ or something like that. It would be really inconsiderate of me, and we know each other for a while. I need to think something quick, before she starts to think that I'm ignoring her or something.

I looked around, searching for an epiphany or at least, something that I could use to avoid that topic for now. OK, I'm next to a bridge; there are a few shops over there, a French-themed cafe...

What comes next can be very, very dangerous. Don't try it at home, kids.

<pre>
Hey, I'm hungry: do you want to eat something?
Right now I'm in front of a cafe called Le Ciel Bleu.
</pre>

Wait, what on Earth am I doing?

Realizing what I had just written I tried to delete that message, but my attempt to do so failed in the most miserable way possible; my fingers betrayed me and pressed the SEND button on their own. How could you do that, I trusted you!

…

OK, so the message was sent; big deal, there's no reason to panic. Don't panic. I said don't panic, damn it!

Fine, I just (technically) called a girl I only know on the internet out and despite talking to her for a whole year I can't help but feel nervous. Not only because I just happened to walk through half of the city and I think I'm starting to sweat, but also because I'm afraid to meet her and see that she might be not exactly like the persona she represented on the net. There must be a way out of this. I just need to relax and think about it. Think, think...

From the moment my cell phone quivered in my hands, I felt like its vibration had spread through my whole body. It's interesting to think that vibration in English is also a slang for aura, atmosphere. Possibly, that slang started when someone was in the same situation as me. Yes, someone who also has endured the massive, dark wave of dismay that is receiving a text message from a girl you just called out.

I know I can't run away now. If I choose to ignore her message, I might have to move away from this town. The reason for that is because I am supposed to attend my first day at her school tomorrow; even if I decide to pretend I never got the message, I'll probably have to face a questionnaire at school. And that would probably mean the end of our friendship, because despite my reputation, I just can't lie.

With another movement of my untrustworthy fingers, I pressed the READ button and face my destiny. It just occurred to me (a few milliseconds before the screen finished loading the message) that she could reply by saying that she didn't wanted to meet me or that she was busy (which, according to centuries of mankind's knowledge and experience, most likely meant that she really, really didn't want to meet me). That hypothesis hurt my pride a little bit. Fine, not only a bit.

Don't you dare say you can't come!

<pre>
Oh, I know that place.
Get us a table next to the windows; I'll be there in 15 min.
</pre>

Thank goodness, she is coming. No, wait. DARN, SHE IS COMING!

''Would you please decide whether you want her to come or not?''

It's not as easy as it sounds. You see, both sides have bad points. Lots of 'em. Therefore,
while I myself have excellent reasons to want to avoid both sides, I also know that as long as I'm in this town, I can't avoid an encounter (not even by using a repellent spray while walking on the tall grass, since this is probably a boss battle, most likely necessary to plot advancement), which leads me to a dilemma and...

...wait a second. Why is there a mysterious voice that speaks in underlined italics inside my head? I know that "speaking in italics" is an idiomatic expression that implies the use of tone to emphasize certain words, but how come does one actually ''speaks'' in underlines?

''Does it really matter? You'd better use your time on getting a table like she told you instead of wasting it on pointless videogame references or discussing linguistics with me.''

Unfortunately, the voice was right; I didn't have much time. The Rubicon was crossed and now I had got no choice but to face the resulting responsibility of my betraying fingers' actions.

I must enter that cafe, get a table and patiently wait for Ryo to show up, even if it kills me.

''My hero.''

Oh, shut up.

As I walked toward the cafe's door, I saw mischievous words engraved in a banner. From the moment I read them, I found it hard to conceal my anxiousness and keep moving forward easily. Deep into my heart that is engulfed by despair, I know that it had "Welcome!" written on it but the banner meant "abandon all hope, ye who enter here".

Bravely I opened the door and walked straight into the endless darkness.

== Part 2 ==

tick

The absolute worst case scenario: the awfully bad situation I avoided and had nightmares about since I was little and dreamed of being on spaceships (which didn't work out because my father opposed my career as a space marine). However, even creatures from outer space and other dimensions sound like a great idea compared to this. I mean it. Words fail to describe the horror, the absolute dismay I'm feeling at this very moment.

tick

This is just dreadful. I don't believe in ''karma'' or past lives, but if I did (and I'm not saying I do), I would probably have been (and I'm not saying I am) a really mean, distrusted and hated person. Probably a soccer referee.

''It's just a maid cafe, stop being such a drama queen.''

tick

Just a maid cafe, you say. I swore to myself that I'd never enter that kind of place. Will you look at the waitress? She thinks she is still a teenager, but anyone can see the wrinkles on her face! That horrible makeup isn't helping at all! This is outrageous, almost an insult for those who were once in the presence of a true maid!

''Meanwhile, could you please tell the "fake maid" that you're not going to order now?
She keeps staring at you with that "I don't get paid to stand here and look at you" look.''

tick

Against my will I turned around and saw the eldritch, I mean, elder abomination looking at me. Oh my, she was actually trying to look cute. That was really, really lame. She was probably in her 30's, and shouldn't have to put up with this anymore. I wondered if she hated her job. I certainly did.

"May I serve you, master?" 
"No."

Silence ensued.

tick

"I mean, I intend to order, but right now I am waiting for someone."

She probably did not realize that she was making an awkward face, feature which in her case was not a challenge at all.

"Oh, I see." The maid said, without much conviction. I cannot even blame her, since she probably deals with hardcore otaku every single day. She gave me a cheap, fake smile and tried to talk in a high pitched voice. "Just call Myu-chan when you're ready to order, myu~~"

tick

Just at that moment I realized that the maid assigned to my table was the only one that wore cat-ears. Great, a cat-maid; I must be the unluckiest person on Earth. When I thought it couldn't get any worse, a song that I could only believe that came from some anime filled the room.

tick

I couldn't recognize the song, but I guessed it was an anime opening because of the overused structure and the shrieking child-like voice of the singer/voice actor/whatever you kids call it these days. The synthesized bass was steady but clearly uninspired, which hurt my pride as a bass player. And when I looked to my cell phone, I noticed that Ryo was already seven minutes late.

Heavens, what am I doing here?

''You know, that's an interesting question that intrigued the humanity since the beginning of time.
There is a great deal of people that believe that the mysterious reason of the existence will only be unfolded when we reach a definitive conclusion about the creation of say, everything.
Some believe that gods created the universe, and others that everything began because of a random explosion of nothingness.
Fascinating subject, no matter how you approach it.''

tick

...I didn't mean it like that. I was just wondering how my life reached this point. It's always been weird (really weird, for honesty's sake), but not anything like this. I'm used to deal with "supernatural" weird, or "murder case" weird, even "space monsters" weird; I just don't know how this people manage to deal with "normal" weird. I mean, it's my first day in town and I've already broke a promise to myself and thought about my maid.

''Since the subject is breaking promises and maids, you also swore that you would bring her favorite ribbon back when you were kids.
Instead, you mixed things up and mistook her for her sister.''

tick

Wait, I did return that ribbon; in one of the routes, at least. And they were identical twins, so no one can blame me for being confused. That doesn't matter, anyway. Discussing my past won't change the fact that I have to wait in the most hideous place on Earth for a girl I'm not sure I want to meet in real life because if I do and she is different from the girl I've met on the Net, I won't have any friends left. No one should have to face such a crisis.

''Crisis, which comes from the Greek ‘krinein’, ‘to separate’.
Which is funny because you do feel like you're being torn apart, right?''

That's not funny at all!

tick

...

tick

...

tick

...

''...oh, c'mon, it's not that bad.
She might be different, but in a good way.''

Like what?

''Well, she could be a guy.
You wouldn't feel so awkward to wait for a guy, right?''

I'm not sure; it would depend on the guy and...

tick

... just wait a second. What are you insinuating?

''Oh, nothing.
Nothing at all.''

The mysterious voice coughed nervously, and I wasn’t even sure if it was a possible feature for someone who doesn’t have a body because it involved stressing the throat and such.

''...anyway, it's not like people lie on the internet or anything like that.
I mean, there is no way someone would set up an offline meeting with you just to make you wait for a long time and make you feel like an idiot.''

tick

Well...

''Nah, no one would do that.''

I sighed in relief.

''It's too simple, way too simple.
Unless...''

tick

...what? Unless what?

''...unless they were recording your reactions to post the movie on the internet later.
It sounds like a fine reason to set up a date instead of just saying they couldn't come.''

Why are you assuming that Ryo is a "they" or a "he" instead of a "she"? Why do you need to make me feel more paranoid about everything, when it's not like I need your help to ruin my self-esteem? Why the heck don't you just leave me alone?

...

tick

The awfully loud music that seemed to fill every space in the room, but my mind was completely silent. However, that was only the calm before the storm. The peace only lasted for a blink and after that, I was thrown into the deep well of agony once again.

It was like someone made an enormous hole in the submerged submarine that was my mind and the unfounded theories (but not impossible to practice) were the black waters of the ocean that surrounded it. They found their way in and they were filling me, making me too heavy to keep floating.

tick

What if the voice was right? What if every message, every single word she typed was a big fat lie? It's not like I never considered that hypothesis myself, anyway. Darn, I wished I had talked to her on the phone. Once would have been enough, at least to destroy my doubts. At that moment, they were crushing me.

tick

The agony suddenly transformed into white anger. I was suddenly mad at everything. At myself, for being such a fool and talking to someone for so long without knowing simple details about her, which is practically a requirement in healthy human relations. At her, him or they for making me wait for so long. At the waitress, for being so old (she was probably not much happy about that too). At the clients, for repeating what seemed to be the same song over and over again. At the voice, for ruining my day. Especially at that voice.

tick

I listened to the piercing sound of laughs. Laughs of many, I'm completely sure of that. The mysterious voice was right! Surrounded by hunters, the white beast of Rage wanted to reverse to its previous state but failed and stayed in the middle of the road between Anger and Agony, becoming a creature with features of both and decent Special Attack stats.

As I stood up, I heard the table shaking and the chair I was sitting on quickly falling on the floor; I felt my eyes twitching and my head hurt, but I ignored it and focus on the sounds around me. The laughing ones are...

...on my right!
''...on your left side!''
...right there!
''...on the ceiling!''

"I'M IN DESPAIR!"

Just a moment after screaming that, I realized that the clients were laughing of an anime scene on the widescreen television. However, after my performance, I manage to finally become what I was afraid of being from the start: the center of their attention.

tick

I lowered my head and grabbed the chair that was on the floor, ignoring the infinite sounds hovering around me. I sat on it again, not only because I was finding it hard to stand, but also because I was too confused to run. I covered my face with my hands. Have I gone completely insane?

''Listen..''.

What? Are you going to mock me by saying "good job!" or something like that? Save it, I don't need your offensive remarks to feel bad about myself. I'm only glad that I hadn't ordered coffee or anything when my burst of despair occurred, or it would have fallen on the floor and I'd be even more embarrassed than I am right now, and I’m not quite sure if that is possible.

''Shut up.
Now, pay attention to the people around you.''

For some reason, I did. They were not only laughing.

''How often have you seen bullies clapping their hands in ovation to the weak kid?''

When I looked at them, I saw that the voice was right. The clients were on their feet, smiling and screaming and clapping their hands like there was no tomorrow. For some reason, they weren't laughing of me, but with me. Technically, since I wasn't laughing. The point is, I was not being mocked of.

It felt warm.

"That was a nice performance, and your voice does resembles Teacher's" There was a small pause, and I could hear a rasp in her breath. "...however, it would have been much more effective if you had done it while wearing a hakama and glasses. A great performance, nonetheless."

I turned around to see where that voice was coming from. A pale, geeky girl with pitch black hair watched me with interest. It took me a little while until I realized who I was talking to.

"Y-you...!"

tick

== Part 3 ==

(sorry about that cliffhanger)

Her silky long hair.

Her expressive eyebrows.

Her dark-grey eyes and that stupid yet cute cat-like grin of hers.

She seemed to know everyone in here and everyone seems to be watching us. I'm not being paranoid now; since we sat down and started staring at each other in silence, I can feel the gaze of the whole cafe. Everyone here seemed to want to know about Ryo, and while being popular can be nice I was only worried that her fandom was composed only of people significantly older than her.

The maid that insists on calling herself Myu-chan coughed and brought an end to the empire of silence.

"S-so, are you guys going to order now myu~~?"

I heard a small dosage of despair in her words. Everyone in the cafe seemed to hold their breaths, just like the crowd waiting for the gunslinger's duel to start in a Wild West movie. I unintentionally move my fingers in the air next to my chair, like I'm getting ready to draw my gun.

We stare at each other for what seems to be an eternity. Suddenly her face changed from unique cuteness to mad anger and before I could react, she rose up and hit the table with her hands.

"OBJECTION!" She pointed to something behind me. "I do realize that we're having a Grand Duel tense moment, but is that rolling ball of hay really necessary? We're still on a maid cafe and that doesn't even make any sense!"

I looked behind to see the ball of hay along to the rest of the customers, just to find out that there was absolutely nothing like that there: then I turned around just in time to see Ryo calmly sitting in her chair again, ordering two portions of ‘the usual’ from the maid like nothing happened. She tricked me, and it worked out just as she planned.

As the maid scurried away and the mood in the cafe lightened up, I relaxed my shoulders and gave up on the whole tense scenario. I still tried to sound grumpy, but mostly for comic effect.

"You're late." 
"But I came just in time for your anime impression show, right?" She blinks and smiles. "I'm sorry for taking so long. I was just reading an article on Hikkipedia for a novel I’m writing, and you know how those things work; you decide to read just one small article, then a related one and when you finally notice what you’re doing several hours have passed since you started researching, the daylight is gone and the cat either needs food or to be buried."

I released a big sigh; she did not even going to lie about being in front of the computer when she was supposed to meet me and it's really hard to get mad at someone that's being genuinely honest because there are not many of those these days and we all have the duty of protecting endangered species. Take that, mysterious voice; not only she is a girl, she is also honest.

"Don't worry..."

Now that the whole scene was gone I got to look properly at her

Her white baggy t-shirt and khaki jeans failed to hide her developing body, but her long hair managed to attract the attention of those who looked at her(at least for a while). Her medium-sized eyeglasses look big on her petite face and she seems oddly familiar to me, despite the fact that I never saw a picture of her before or something like that.

Too familiar, actually; it's exactly like I have seen her face my whole life, but I'm unaware of details such as where I could have seen her before or whose face she resembles. The fact that I've met thousands of people in the last years doesn't help at all. Technically, it should, since my travels around the world could count as a decent reason for having a "been there, done that" attitude. However, my memory is not that good in every aspect; while I remember every single little thing about the situations I've been in, I often forget people.

…

Wait. Where is the mysterious voice now? I'm pretty sure that it was time for some mean comment or paranoid idea.

Now that I think about it, I can't hear that voice for a little while now...

...whatever. I need to focus on the important things. I'm here, Ryo is here. We're in a cafe and the awful music is gone, so I'm probably going to have a fine day. The first common day in my brand new common life. That's all that matters, right?

Right?

I shook my head to get rid of the thoughts about the voice. Fading back to Earth, I noticed that Ryo was typing on her cell phone furiously. She probably started it while I was daydreaming.

The only thing that stopped the Empire of Silence from striking back is the sound of her little fingers pressing buttons in an unreasonably fast tempo, and when I say fast I mean it; she is using both thumbs to type alternately, using a technique similar to a drummer's blast beat masterfully. Such precise movements...

If only she was doing it with her feet, I bet she'd be a great jazz musician. Maybe the world's most amazing cyclist, or a dance machine master, or just a weirdo stomping her own cell phone. It's only a matter of perspective. Or a matter of what have you got your feet on.

She stopped typing and looked at me with a curious face.

"It's getting cold."

I was going to argue and say that the day is actually pretty hot, and the sunlight is usually stronger by the lunch time. There's Ultraviolet radiation in sunlight and it can give you some problems. So, if you're on a beach, don't sunbathe next/during mid-day or you'll get sunburnt. Stay in the shade!

Judging by Ryo's skin, I came to the conclusion that she took this "avoid the sun" policy seriously. Far too seriously. She looks a little bit like a ghost. Not that this is a bad thing, you know. I've met some really nice ghosts and I learned to respect people that float and haunt places for a living. Hah, a ghost doing something for a living. That was a good one.

Unintentionally I blinked and brought myself back to reality.

"W-what?" 
"Your coffee, it's getting cold."

She pointed to the table and I noticed that there was, indeed, a mug of coffee there. Myu had probably left it here while I daydreamed and... oh my.

Ryo came to meet me, and I kept daydreaming over and over again. I was so lost in thought that I haven't even seen the waitress bringing us the coffee; I have probably ignored Ryo as well.

I could feel the gaze of everyone in the cafe. There was a big chance no one was looking directly at me that time, but I had a bad feeling about this. No, my danger sense told me it wasn’t just my paranoia talking; they were waiting for me to do something. Ryo seems to know every one of those guys, and from what I saw I can judge that she is the little sister they never had. And I'm the jerk that ignored her after calling her out.

"Have you finished reading it?" Without any ideas left, I tried to redeem myself by making conversation.

She touched her lips with the tip of her index finger and raised an eyebrow.

"What?" 
"The article." 
"Which one?" 
"The Hikkipedia one."

She looked away, not paying much attention to me.

"I'm reading it right now."

Which means she is so bored that she'd rather be doing what she always do instead of being here with me. I'm used to talking to girls and I know that when they stop paying attention to you, you'd better get it back quickly and...

...the voice should have pointed that if I'm such an expert in girls, I could have avoided this situation merely by paying attention to her. And if I could hear it right now, it would tell me that I am doing the exact opposite by thinking about it and...

Control yourself! It doesn't matter if you're nervous or not; Ryo probably waited for this day as much as you did. Now you'd better find a way to make this day amazing, or I won't forgive you (and by that, I mean you won't forgive yourself)!

I used my fingers to type in my cell phone as fast as I could, and instead of betraying me, they joined me in this special attack; our synchronization rate was now absurd and I could feel a great energy emanating from my body and flowing through me. The opening song I could listen to in my heart told me that it was a decisive moment, and it wasn’t nearly as bad as the one that was playing when I got here.

I won't let you down, Ryo! Behold my new power!

<pre>
┌───────┐
| SORRY |
└──y────┘
∧___∧
（,,ﾟДﾟ)
| つつ
| |
~∪∪
</pre>

With my ASCII art piece finished, I pressed the SEND button; Three seconds later her cell phone beeped, and she immediately looked at me. I tried to smile at her, but she gave me a cold stare that didn’t fit her and then her gaze went back to her mobile phone.

Now I could only wait for her reply.

She sighed and started typing again. Not as fast as before, and certainly not as furious. Ryo seemed pretty normal to me at that moment; she was just a teenager messaging someone (and not a girl with a mob-like fan base and machine gun fingers).

<pre>
／l、
(ﾟ､｡７ - don't you dare ignore me again.
l、 ~ ヽ
じしf_, )ノ
</pre>

Her ASCII art is much better than mine, but that was not the point. If you filter the harsh part of message, you’ll notice that the ‘again’ implies that I would have another chance to ruin everything again and therefore I also have the chance to make things right. There’s also a cute ‘drawing’ of a kitten, and you can’t send something like that to someone you’re genuinely angry at.

Everything was alright.

When I looked at Ryo, she was giving me another of her cat-like smiles, and only then I noticed that I was actually enjoying myself. Despite the little things, I realized that I liked this place and I could see myself actually living here as a normal person. I could even get used to the atmosphere of this cafe and even with its customers. Not to that song, I’m afraid, but I suppose nothing is perfect.

We kept on chatting so happily it was like nothing bad has occurred to us in our entire lives.

Living here with Ryo could be really nice. Just being here with her right now is amazing, and from the things she told me on the net, nothing supernatural or mysterious ever happened in this town; I might be finally able to have peaceful high-school days along with a good friend like I always wanted tp. It feels like I died and went to heaven, except I feel alive and I’m pretty sure heaven would have better music...

The thought of leading a common life got me in a good mood that accompanied me through the rest of that day.

...

From that point on, the day was pretty much perfect. Oh, contradictions. Right, I just said nothing is perfect. Yet, I also claimed the day I spent with Ryo was perfect. Ergo, this day would be the same as nothing, logically speaking. But not to me.

Anyway.

We laughed a lot and talked about random things like we did every day online. Somehow, it was much better than our previous conversations.

Ryo took me to some stores and parks and despite the fact that I had already visited most of them, I decided to don't say it out loud; she was so happy to show me her town that I couldn't bring myself to spoil her fun.

Then Time passed, against our will.

The twilight sky looked absolutely beautiful from the spot we were sitting, and I must admit that I had planned that much based on my earlier visit to the park. There seemed to be no one else but us in the park or in the infinite Universe, and a different kind of silence kept waving in the air. We were both enjoying a calm and motionless moment after a full day that resembled anything but a storm, but I found myself also wishing that very moment to last forever.

The sudden spring rain that fell upon, on the other hand, seemed to want the opposite.

It was a big surprise, because the day had been bright and sunny till that point. When I was about to start running away from the bench and look for shelter under the trees, Ryo pinched the sleeve of my shirt to attract my interest. My eyes met an object I knew she was carrying the whole time, but hadn't paid any special attention to: a white lace parasol.

"Shall we?" She instantly hid me under it and grabbed my arm tightly.

So, here comes a philosophical question for you: at which point does a parasol becomes an umbrella?

Her parasol was way too small for two people, so we were about as wet as if we didn't had anything to cover us at all. Not that it meant much to us at the time, anyway. We ran under the rain, laughing and singing and completely ignoring the prospect of catching a cold before my first day in school. I don't regret it at all, because it felt right.

We went in direction of her home, because it was both closer to the park and because she told me that I could borrow the parasol after I dropped her home. I knew that it was practically useless, but I walked (technically "ran") her home anyway.

Then we arrived at her building and I was truly glad she didn't invite me in because it's always weird when you meet someone's parents, especially weirder if you both of you just got your clothes completely drenched while running on the rain despite the fact that this someone had a parasol. She let go of my arm and looked at the lobby.

That was it.

In the end, I wasn't sad; the perfect day was over indeed, but we would still have tomorrow, and the day after, and so on. What started as a perfect day could easily become a perfect week, a perfect month, a perfect year and I know I am being utterly pretentious but I can even wish for it to become a perfect life. My perfect life.

Despite it being unrealistic, this was still what I truly hoped for.

When I was about to say "goodbye" and go back to my place the expression in her face stopped me.

"Look!" Ryo pointed to something behind me, and I instinctively turned around to see it in a blink. That action brought instant results, and none of them was regret. "It's so... beautiful..." 
"Whoa..."

During the rain, a rainbow had formed in the skies above us. The rain was still really strong, but we ignored it for a while and kept watching the palette of pigments painting the sky. The sunset made its colors surreal, but we both knew that those were the true colors of the rainbow.

And then I realized that this day, so rich in events and full of interesting moments was coming to its end. I had no regrets, but I already missed it. There might not exist a day like this in my life again, or even on Earth; and even if the years pass me by and I die only to reborn again in this world, I will never forget the vivid colors of the rainbow I saw with Shiina Ryo.

I looked at her, and she was smiling like a child with a new toy.

"We need to do this again." 
"What, hang out?" I laughed honestly. "I am going to live here now, you know. I'm sure we'll have plenty of time to do that." 
"No, I mean we must watch the rainbow together again." Her voice had a serious tone now, and for some reason it made me happy. "Promise me we will..."

<noinclude>
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|-
| Back to [[The_Longing_Of_Shiina_Ryo:Volume1 Prologue|Prologue]]
| Return to [[The_Longing_Of_Shiina_Ryo|Main Page]]
| Forward to [[The_Longing_Of_Shiina_Ryo:Volume1 Chapter 2: Reikoku|Chapter 2: Reikoku]]
|-
|}
</noinclude>

Suzumiya Haruki no Seitenkan:Volume2 Chapter1

2010-08-09T23:54:26Z

RCG M3tal:

Our school, just like any other stereotypical public school in Japan, likes to host a variety of schoolwide events at random points in the year. Such as last month, where Haruki indefinitely proclaimed that the SOS Brigade would be participating in a relay for North High's athletic festival. Now, I can't say I wasn't expecting him to do something strangely bizarre like that, but I certainly wasn't expect us to blow away the track team and rugby team. Haruki took up lead in the anchor position, finishing around 13 meters in front of the 2nd place runner. As a result, Haruki's club, the SOS Brigade (that I totally am not in), grew.

Let's just say that our reputation went from being a small candle of interest, to spreading like wildfire over the school. We won basically every event that we participated in the athletic festival, with Haruki's athletic body being the cause. The second runner, Nagato, also shares the blame. I certainly hadn't expected him to run as fast as he did. I still don't know if I should compare him to a comically fast running bird straight from a cartoon, or an alien who used teleportation. Please Nagato, tell me before you do something like that okay?

After the race when I asked Nagato what sort of magic he used, he replied unenthusiastically using terms like "quantum leap" and "enhanced energy measures". While I appreciated his dumbed down explanation, I still didn't quite get it. Looks like I won't be choosing science and liberal arts as my field of expertise. Oh well.

When the athletic festival ended, I gave a sigh of relief in hopes that this girl wouldn't have to do any more strenuous tasks the following month. I was sadly mistaken. North High had decided to host a cultural festival, complete with public access to school grounds. At this very moment, the entire school is preparing for such an event; the word "entire" being an over-exaggeration since the only ones actually doing work are teachers, cultural club members, and the student council.

The SOS Brigade still hasn't been officially recognised as a club, so we really had no reason to do anything. Knowing Haruki, he probably would have wanted to display some stray cat in a cage and call it an "extraterrestrial creature"; knowing full well that such an embarrassing joke would be scowled upon by those who don't get it. At least doing that doesn't put anyone's sanity and/or body on the line, so if Haruki did actually decide to cage up an animal I wouldn't mind as much.

By the way, Haruki and my class, Class 1-5, decided to do a simple survey. With so many people just wanting to get the cultural festival over with in a simple, tireless manner, no one even proposed an idea. We didn't even know what we were going to make the survey on. Regardless of the content, no one would care about it anyways. Work hard people, and maybe we won't appear like a worthless group of idiots to the other bustling classes.

The lack of an exciting event, of course, knocked Haruki's patience off balance. This was causing him to grumble while we walked to the clubroom later that day.

"Surveys are useless." He gave a face that looked like a 12 year old would have given if his parents bought clothes for Christmas presents instead of some new toy.

'Give it a break. If it's so boring, then why didn't you speak up when we were proposing ideas for it?' In all seriousness, you should have... Okabe-sensei looked like she was ready to rip her hair out from the lack of ideas. That would not be pretty...

"I don't want to do anything with this class. It's full of boring people."

Boring people? Realize that you're apart of the class, meaning you just called yourself boring. And hold up. Aren't these the same boring people that you won the relays for in last month's athletic festival? Or was that someone else named Suzumiya Haruki?

"That's completely different?"

Sigh. Might I ask how?

"This is the cultural festival. It is the pinnacle of our school; the most exciting time of the year for its students."

It is?

"It is!" Haruki puffed up his chest in excitement, preparing to decree his word. To me. Alone.

"This is why the SOS Brigade will be doing things far more exciting and fun!" His face shone like Xerxes' when a battle was won during the Persian Wars.

----

The smile was deceptive; to the average standbyer, Haruki's face just looks like someone who was happy. I knew otherwise.

During our time in the SOS Brigade, Haruki's 'fun' events were never fun. Ever. In fact, every instance was tiresome. Myself and Asahina-sempai can attest to that. Given we were always the ones who were being acted upon, but we're still human. I highly doubt Koizumi's passive behaviour counts as normal, and Nagato is an alien so he's not exactly capable of showing his exhaustion. But if he were human (with emotions), he would probably be in the same boat as this normal girl and the timetraveler.

The things I would do with timetravel... I'd love to prevent myself from meeting Haruki. That would save me from the amount of psychological trauma he oh-so-indirectly put me through. I definitely, without a doubt, don't want to go through what happened 6 months ago. That bunch of nonsense is so utterly stupid that -someone quick, give me a wall, door, or other flat-surfaced object- I want to repeatedly smash my face against anything. Well actually, there are plenty of walls around me right now...

I devised ways to completely destroy any thoughts regarding the SOS Brigade without completely terminating my number of braincells. Whilst doing so, I didn't regard any of the blabbering idiot's comments.

"Oi! Kyonko, are you listening to me?"

'No. What were you saying?'

"I was talking about the cultural festival."

'Oh... right.'

"Kyonko! Snap out of it!" Haruki yelled, yanking my hair back. As my eyes watered up from the pain, I turned to look at Haruki with now-undivided attention. "This is the cultural festival, you should be more excited!"

Easy for you to say. I rubbed the back of my head while he continued.

"You're only a first year once. Your first cultural festival is something to look forward to. It's not a cultural festival if it's not something worth going crazy over. I hear about tons of things that happen in other schools' festivals."

'So I guess your middle school was like that?'

"Nah, that was boring. We didn't do anything even remotely fun. This is why our high school experience should be something to enjoy! We get to choose what makes it fun!"

'That's not grounds of fussing over it.' I said. My hairtie ended up coming loose, so I pulled it off.

"Aha, but that's where you're wrong Kyonko." Haruki wagged his finger at me. "Festivals are the most active in the school. For that, you need to pay attention to cool things."

Like what? A motorcycle driving through the halls?

"Well if the motorcycle doesn't have a driver, then yeah! Something like that!" Haruki nodded. "Or maybe haunted houses having real monsters jump out, or ghosts actually appearing behind fortune tellers. Stairs to climb, that you walk up forever, or eagles nesting on a teacher's head. Or even better, a school gets put under attack by a mecha pilot!"

Haruki's continued ramblings eventually lost my interest around the fortune teller part. Can I get someone to send me an email containing the rest of his ideas? I'd really appreciate it? Sorry I can't give anything back in return though.

"Alright whatever. When we get to the clubroom, I'll tell you more about it."

The magical inspiration that sparked Haruki's interest had now simmered down. We continued our walk in silence, reaching the club room door in a matter of minutes. The Literature Club's number plate hanging above the door had been replaced by a piece of paper which Haruki scrawled SOS Brigade on top of. "We've been residing in this room since the school year started. It belongs to us now." With that, he replaced the plate before I could stop him. Not that I would have stopped him, since it'd take too much effort to drag out a chair, climb on it, take the scrap paper off only to have it replaced another day. In fact, standing on a chair would probably just give Haruki some stupid ideas.

Yeah. ''Those'' stupid ideas.

----

Haruki pushed the door open, giving anyone inside no time to hide anything embarrassing. Of course, the person inside wasn't able to do anything about that... he'd been forced into embarrassing costumes time and time again. Back when Haruki adopted Mitsuuru as the club's 'project' he had forced him into a ridiculous maid outfit. Thankfully, the maid outfit has since been replaced by a butler's uniform, which was what he was currently wearing. My eyes met his, and my heart skipped a beat. Asahina-sempai's face donned a smile upon seeing me. Dusting the bookshelves with a feather duster presumably got from his home, he worked like a cute little elf.

Asahina-sempai has dressed up in a number of outfits, each one more ridiculous than before. Chippendales, nurse, and even a cheerleader with a skirt. How this manages to make him more 'manly' defies all logic, but it still doesn't change his metamorphosis from student to cosplayer every day just after school in the club room. I have to say that my favorite would be the butler outfit. It's somewhat flattering towards him, and isn't at all suggestive. I'd rather not have to deal with the cheerleading outfit again though.

"Mitsuuru! I thought I told you already to wear the maid outfit! A butler is too plain."

"Eh, but I-..."

"No 'buts' about it. Get changed! Here, let me do it."

My feet quickly turned around and walked my person out the door. I wasn't going to spectate Haruki's scary actions. Through the door, I could hear Asahina-sempai's protests, but to no avail. Forcing him into a maid uniform is just weird Haruki... just about as weird as getting me that stupid bunny girl outfit.

"We're done!"

I walked back inside. Mitsuuru wore the maid outfit as expected, though he looked a little red in the face. All other comments aside, this pointless outfit just managed to make him look cuter.

"Um, I'll just-... I'll get the tea prepared then."

I watched as he nervously grabbed cups from the shelf and started heating up water. Then a sharp pain met my head, namely my scalp. Apparently Haruki yanked on my hair again. "Hmm... your hair isn't a pullstring? Oh, and you're drooling."

I scowled at him, wiping the drool off my chin.
"Better." Haruki said, walking to the computer desk and putting on his red armband labeled "Chief". He sat down at the rolling computer chair and stared across the room.

So now I know that I naturally drool when staring at Asahina-sempai too long. Even if there were other girls that would do the same, I found myself slightly embarrassed. Drooling is reserved for my pillow when I sleep, and solely for my pillow alone.

Realizing his other comment about my hair, and not wanting him to think that I was "seeing Nagato" again, I quickly tied my hair up. The world ending is a bad thing... I don't want to have to do that stupid thing with Haruki again in Closed Space.

The alien which I was supposedly seeing (according to Haruki and my little brother, but believe me I wasn't) in question was sitting down, reading a book in his designated corner.

"..."

Reading a thick covered book, this person was rigidly posed, examining every word on the page (and possibly even the pages themselves) in a relatively quick manner. He was none other than Nagato Yuuki, SOS Brigade saviour and full time watchdog over Haruki for the alien Data Integrated Sentient Entity. Strangely, his background makes more sense than Haruki's which makes no sense at all. This alone just confuses my mind, so I'll stop talking about that for now. It's better to just believe Haruki's mindset of him being a quiet bookworm that excels in many things.

Though from my viewpoint, I can't help but laugh at that stupid description. It's whatever.

"Hey, where's Koizumi-san?"

Haruki shot Mitsuuru a glare. The maidboy instinctively flinched.

"I-I'm not sure. I haven't seen her. It's not like her to be late."

While he started changing tea leaves in the automatic dispenser, I followed Haruki's example and started surveying the room. My eyes eventually met the costume rack. The bizarre sight held a froghead, (dreaded) bunny costumes, cheerleading outfits, a number of capes, a nurse, summer variations of the butler's outfit, and a few other articles of clothing that I had never really paid attention to.

All of these outfits had at least one of us (Asahina-sempai, me, or Koizumi) in them at some point in time. Wow, there's a lot of clutter here. Why does Haruki have two spare maid outfits? Is he going to force Asahina-sempai to do some spring cleaning next year? Wait, spare maid outfits?! No way am I wearing that. You can't treat me like a doll!

"Mitsuuru, where's that tea?"

"Ah, right. Coming right up."

The pseudomaid quickly poured tea in a plastic teacup with "Haruki" written on the side. He then placed it on a tray and walked over to Haruki and placed it on the desk.

"Incorrect!"

"E-eh?"

"Our contingency plan! You also need to learn the basics of becoming a passable woman, in case our attempts at making you manly fail."

"What? B-but I-"

"A proper maid would trip over herself and spill her tea just as she comes in close proximity of the person she serves. It's pure common knowledge that maids, waitresses, and hostesses are clumsy."

"Uh, right. Sorry."

'What sort of contingency plan is that? And Mitsuuru don't listen to him, not every girl is clumsy. Haruki's just using one of his ludicrous jokes."

"I'm not joking. In fact, Kyonko! Demonstrate for him."

"What?! No way. You can't make- hey!"

My protests didn't reach him. He pulled me to my feet and made Mitsuuru take my spot. Then he placed an apron over my head and handed me a tray with a teacup in one swift motion. He tapped the back of my head rather hardly, causing me to fall over on top of Asahina-sempai. I instinctively said sorry for spilling hot tea on him, but there wasn't anything to be sorry for... Haruki had used an empty teacup.

((INCOMPLETE))

<noinclude>
{| border="1" cellpadding="5" cellspacing="0" style="margin: 1em 1em 1em 0; background: #f9f9f9; border: 1px #aaaaaa solid; padding: 0.2em; border-collapse: collapse;"
|-
| Return to [[Suzumiya_Haruki_no_Seitenkan:Volume2_Prologue|Prologue]]
| Forward to [[Suzumiya_Haruki_no_Seitenkan:Volume2_Chapter2|Chapter 2]]
|-
|}
</noinclude>

Suzumiya Haruki no Seitenkan:Volume2 Chapter1

2010-08-09T23:45:40Z

RCG M3tal:

Our school, just like any other stereotypical public school in Japan, likes to host a variety of schoolwide events at random points in the year. Such as last month, where Haruki indefinitely proclaimed that the SOS Brigade would be participating in a relay for North High's athletic festival. Now, I can't say I wasn't expecting him to do something strangely bizarre like that, but I certainly wasn't expect us to blow away the track team and rugby team. Haruki took up lead in the anchor position, finishing around 13 meters in front of the 2nd place runner. As a result, Haruki's club, the SOS Brigade (that I totally am not in), grew.

Let's just say that our reputation went from being a small candle of interest, to spreading like wildfire over the school. We won basically every event that we participated in the athletic festival, with Haruki's athletic body being the cause. The second runner, Nagato, also shares the blame. I certainly hadn't expected him to run as fast as he did. I still don't know if I should compare him to a comically fast running bird straight from a cartoon, or an alien who used teleportation. Please Nagato, tell me before you do something like that okay?

After the race when I asked Nagato what sort of magic he used, he replied unenthusiastically using terms like "quantum leap" and "enhanced energy measures". While I appreciated his dumbed down explanation, I still didn't quite get it. Looks like I won't be choosing science and liberal arts as my field of expertise. Oh well.

When the athletic festival ended, I gave a sigh of relief in hopes that this girl wouldn't have to do any more strenuous tasks the following month. I was sadly mistaken. North High had decided to host a cultural festival, complete with public access to school grounds. At this very moment, the entire school is preparing for such an event; the word "entire" being an over-exaggeration since the only ones actually doing work are teachers, cultural club members, and the student council.

The SOS Brigade still hasn't been officially recognised as a club, so we really had no reason to do anything. Knowing Haruki, he probably would have wanted to display some stray cat in a cage and call it an "extraterrestrial creature"; knowing full well that such an embarrassing joke would be scowled upon by those who don't get it. At least doing that doesn't put anyone's sanity and/or body on the line, so if Haruki did actually decide to cage up an animal I wouldn't mind as much.

By the way, Haruki and my class, Class 1-5, decided to do a simple survey. With so many people just wanting to get the cultural festival over with in a simple, tireless manner, no one even proposed an idea. We didn't even know what we were going to make the survey on. Regardless of the content, no one would care about it anyways. Work hard people, and maybe we won't appear like a worthless group of idiots to the other bustling classes.

The lack of an exciting event, of course, knocked Haruki's patience off balance. This was causing him to grumble while we walked to the clubroom later that day.

"Surveys are useless." He gave a face that looked like a 12 year old would have given if his parents bought clothes for Christmas presents instead of some new toy.

'Give it a break. If it's so boring, then why didn't you speak up when we were proposing ideas for it?' In all seriousness, you should have... Okabe-sensei looked like she was ready to rip her hair out from the lack of ideas. That would not be pretty...

"I don't want to do anything with this class. It's full of boring people."

Boring people? Realize that you're apart of the class, meaning you just called yourself boring. And hold up. Aren't these the same boring people that you won the relays for in last month's athletic festival? Or was that someone else named Suzumiya Haruki?

"That's completely different?"

Sigh. Might I ask how?

"This is the cultural festival. It is the pinnacle of our school; the most exciting time of the year for its students."

It is?

"It is!" Haruki puffed up his chest in excitement, preparing to decree his word. To me. Alone.

"This is why the SOS Brigade will be doing things far more exciting and fun!" His face shone like Xerxes' when a battle was won during the Persian Wars.

----

The smile was deceptive; to the average standbyer, Haruki's face just looks like someone who was happy. I knew otherwise.

During our time in the SOS Brigade, Haruki's 'fun' events were never fun. Ever. In fact, every instance was tiresome. Myself and Asahina-sempai can attest to that. Given we were always the ones who were being acted upon, but we're still human. I highly doubt Koizumi's passive behaviour counts as normal, and Nagato is an alien so he's not exactly capable of showing his exhaustion. But if he were human (with emotions), he would probably be in the same boat as this normal girl and the timetraveler.

The things I would do with timetravel... I'd love to prevent myself from meeting Haruki. That would save me from the amount of psychological trauma he oh-so-indirectly put me through. I definitely, without a doubt, don't want to go through what happened 6 months ago. That bunch of nonsense is so utterly stupid that -someone quick, give me a wall, door, or other flat-surfaced object- I want to repeatedly smash my face against anything. Well actually, there are plenty of walls around me right now...

I devised ways to completely destroy any thoughts regarding the SOS Brigade without completely terminating my number of braincells. Whilst doing so, I didn't regard any of the blabbering idiot's comments.

"Oi! Kyonko, are you listening to me?"

'No. What were you saying?'

"I was talking about the cultural festival."

'Oh... right.'

"Kyonko! Snap out of it!" Haruki yelled, yanking my hair back. As my eyes watered up from the pain, I turned to look at Haruki with now-undivided attention. "This is the cultural festival, you should be more excited!"

Easy for you to say. I rubbed the back of my head while he continued.

"You're only a first year once. Your first cultural festival is something to look forward to. It's not a cultural festival if it's not something worth going crazy over. I hear about tons of things that happen in other schools' festivals."

'So I guess your middle school was like that?'

"Nah, that was boring. We didn't do anything even remotely fun. This is why our high school experience should be something to enjoy! We get to choose what makes it fun!"

'That's not grounds of fussing over it.' I said. My hairtie ended up coming loose, so I pulled it off.

"Aha, but that's where you're wrong Kyonko." Haruki wagged his finger at me. "Festivals are the most active in the school. For that, you need to pay attention to cool things."

Like what? A motorcycle driving through the halls?

"Well if the motorcycle doesn't have a driver, then yeah! Something like that!" Haruki nodded. "Or maybe haunted houses having real monsters jump out, or ghosts actually appearing behind fortune tellers. Stairs to climb, that you walk up forever, or eagles nesting on a teacher's head. Or even better, a school gets put under attack by a mecha pilot!"

Haruki's continued ramblings eventually lost my interest around the fortune teller part. Can I get someone to send me an email containing the rest of his ideas? I'd really appreciate it? Sorry I can't give anything back in return though.

"Alright whatever. When we get to the clubroom, I'll tell you more about it."

The magical inspiration that sparked Haruki's interest had now simmered down. We continued our walk in silence, reaching the club room door in a matter of minutes. The Literature Club's number plate hanging above the door had been replaced by a piece of paper which Haruki scrawled SOS Brigade on top of. "We've been residing in this room since the school year started. It belongs to us now." With that, he replaced the plate before I could stop him. Not that I would have stopped him, since it'd take too much effort to drag out a chair, climb on it, take the scrap paper off only to have it replaced another day. In fact, standing on a chair would probably just give Haruki some stupid ideas.

Yeah. ''Those'' stupid ideas.

----

Haruki pushed the door open, giving anyone inside no time to hide anything embarrassing. Of course, the person inside wasn't able to do anything about that... he'd been forced into embarrassing costumes time and time again. Back when Haruki adopted Mitsuuru as the club's 'project' he had forced him into a ridiculous maid outfit. Thankfully, the maid outfit has since been replaced by a butler's uniform, which was what he was currently wearing. My eyes met his, and my heart skipped a beat. Asahina-sempai's face donned a smile upon seeing me. Dusting the bookshelves with a feather duster presumably got from his home, he worked like a cute little elf.

Asahina-sempai has dressed up in a number of outfits, each one more ridiculous than before. Chippendales, nurse, and even a cheerleader with a skirt. How this manages to make him more 'manly' defies all logic, but it still doesn't change his metamorphosis from student to cosplayer every day just after school in the club room. I have to say that my favorite would be the butler outfit. It's somewhat flattering towards him, and isn't at all suggestive. I'd rather not have to deal with the cheerleading outfit again though.

"Mitsuuru! I thought I told you already to wear the maid outfit! A butler is too plain."

"Eh, but I-..."

"No 'buts' about it. Get changed! Here, let me do it."

My feet quickly turned around and walked my person out the door. I wasn't going to spectate Haruki's scary actions. Through the door, I could hear Asahina-sempai's protests, but to no avail. Forcing him into a maid uniform is just weird Haruki... just about as weird as getting me that stupid bunny girl outfit.

"We're done!"

I walked back inside. Mitsuuru wore the maid outfit as expected, though he looked a little red in the face. All other comments aside, this pointless outfit just managed to make him look cuter.

"Um, I'll just-... I'll get the tea prepared then."

I watched as he nervously grabbed cups from the shelf and started heating up water. Then a sharp pain met my head, namely my scalp. Apparently Haruki yanked on my hair again. "Hmm... your hair isn't a pullstring? Oh, and you're drooling."

I scowled at him, wiping the drool off my chin.
"Better." Haruki said, walking to the computer desk and putting on his red armband labeled "Chief". He sat down at the rolling computer chair and stared across the room.

So now I know that I naturally drool when staring at Asahina-sempai too long. Even if there were other girls that would do the same, I found myself slightly embarrassed. Drooling is reserved for my pillow when I sleep, and solely for my pillow alone.

Realizing his other comment about my hair, and not wanting him to think that I was "seeing Nagato" again, I quickly tied my hair up. The world ending is a bad thing... I don't want to have to do that stupid thing with Haruki again in Closed Space.

The alien which I was supposedly seeing (according to Haruki and my little brother, but believe me I wasn't) in question was sitting down, reading a book in his designated corner.

"..."

Reading a thick covered book, this person was rigidly posed, examining every word on the page (and possibly even the pages themselves) in a relatively quick manner. He was none other than Nagato Yuuki, SOS Brigade saviour and full time watchdog over Haruki for the alien Data Integrated Sentient Entity. Strangely, his background makes more sense than Haruki's which makes no sense at all. This alone just confuses my mind, so I'll stop talking about that for now. It's better to just believe Haruki's mindset of him being a quiet bookworm that excels in many things.

Though from my viewpoint, I can't help but laugh at that stupid description. It's whatever.

"Hey, where's Koizumi-san?"

Haruki shot Mitsuuru a glare. The maidboy instinctively flinched.

"I-I'm not sure. I haven't seen her. It's not like her to be late."

While he started changing tea leaves in the automatic dispenser, I followed Haruki's example and started surveying the room. My eyes eventually met the costume rack. The bizarre sight held a froghead, (dreaded) bunny costumes, cheerleading outfits, a number of capes, a nurse, summer variations of the butler's outfit, and a few other articles of clothing that I had never really paid attention to.

All of these outfits had at least one of us (Asahina-sempai, me, or Koizumi) in them at some point in time. Wow, there's a lot of clutter here. Why does Haruki have two spare maid outfits? Is he going to force Asahina-sempai to do some spring cleaning next year? Wait, spare maid outfits?! No way am I wearing that. You can't treat me like a doll!

"Mitsuuru, where's that tea?"

"Ah, right. Coming right up."

The pseudomaid quickly poured tea in a plastic teacup with "Haruki" written on the side. He then placed it on a tray and walked over to Haruki and placed it on the desk.

"Incorrect!"

"E-eh?"

"Our contingency plan! You also need to learn the basics of becoming a passable woman, in case our attempts at making you manly fail."

"What? B-but I-"

"A proper maid would trip over herself and spill her tea just as she comes in close proximity of the person she serves. It's pure common knowledge that maids, waitresses, and hostesses are clumsy."

"Uh, right. Sorry."

'What sort of maid does that? Mitsuuru don't listen to him, no girl is like that!'

"Kyonko! Demonstrate for him."

"What?! No way. You can't make me do- hey!"

My protests didn't reach him. He pulled me to my feet and made Mitsuuru take my spot. Then he placed an apron over my head and handed me a tray with a teacup in one swift motion. He tapped the back of my head rather hardly, causing me to fall over on top of Asahina-sempai. I instinctively said sorry for spilling hot tea on him, but there wasn't anything to be sorry for... Haruki had used an empty teacup.

((INCOMPLETE))

<noinclude>
{| border="1" cellpadding="5" cellspacing="0" style="margin: 1em 1em 1em 0; background: #f9f9f9; border: 1px #aaaaaa solid; padding: 0.2em; border-collapse: collapse;"
|-
| Return to [[Suzumiya_Haruki_no_Seitenkan:Volume2_Prologue|Prologue]]
| Forward to [[Suzumiya_Haruki_no_Seitenkan:Volume2_Chapter2|Chapter 2]]
|-
|}
</noinclude>

Suzumiya Haruki no Seitenkan:Volume2 Chapter1

2010-08-09T23:45:04Z

RCG M3tal:

Our school, just like any other stereotypical public school in Japan, likes to host a variety of schoolwide events at random points in the year. Such as last month, where Haruki indefinitely proclaimed that the SOS Brigade would be participating in a relay for North High's athletic festival. Now, I can't say I wasn't expecting him to do something strangely bizarre like that, but I certainly wasn't expect us to blow away the track team and rugby team. Haruki took up lead in the anchor position, finishing around 13 meters in front of the 2nd place runner. As a result, Haruki's club, the SOS Brigade (that I totally am not in), grew.

Let's just say that our reputation went from being a small candle of interest, to spreading like wildfire over the school. We won basically every event that we participated in the athletic festival, with Haruki's athletic body being the cause. The second runner, Nagato, also shares the blame. I certainly hadn't expected him to run as fast as he did. I still don't know if I should compare him to a comically fast running bird straight from a cartoon, or an alien who used teleportation. Please Nagato, tell me before you do something like that okay?

After the race when I asked Nagato what sort of magic he used, he replied unenthusiastically using terms like "quantum leap" and "enhanced energy measures". While I appreciated his dumbed down explanation, I still didn't quite get it. Looks like I won't be choosing science and liberal arts as my field of expertise. Oh well.

When the athletic festival ended, I gave a sigh of relief in hopes that this girl wouldn't have to do any more strenuous tasks the following month. I was sadly mistaken. North High had decided to host a cultural festival, complete with public access to school grounds. At this very moment, the entire school is preparing for such an event; the word "entire" being an over-exaggeration since the only ones actually doing work are teachers, cultural club members, and the student council.

The SOS Brigade still hasn't been officially recognised as a club, so we really had no reason to do anything. Knowing Haruki, he probably would have wanted to display some stray cat in a cage and call it an "extraterrestrial creature"; knowing full well that such an embarrassing joke would be scowled upon by those who don't get it. At least doing that doesn't put anyone's sanity and/or body on the line, so if Haruki did actually decide to cage up an animal I wouldn't mind as much.

By the way, Haruki and my class, Class 1-5, decided to do a simple survey. With so many people just wanting to get the cultural festival over with in a simple, tireless manner, no one even proposed an idea. We didn't even know what we were going to make the survey on. Regardless of the content, no one would care about it anyways. Work hard people, and maybe we won't appear like a worthless group of idiots to the other bustling classes.

The lack of an exciting event, of course, knocked Haruki's patience off balance. This was causing him to grumble while we walked to the clubroom later that day.

"Surveys are useless." He gave a face that looked like a 12 year old would have given if his parents bought clothes for Christmas presents instead of some new toy.

'Give it a break. If it's so boring, then why didn't you speak up when we were proposing ideas for it?' In all seriousness, you should have... Okabe-sensei looked like she was ready to rip her hair out from the lack of ideas. That would not be pretty...

"I don't want to do anything with this class. It's full of boring people."

Boring people? Realize that you're apart of the class, meaning you just called yourself boring. And hold up. Aren't these the same boring people that you won the relays for in last month's athletic festival? Or was that someone else named Suzumiya Haruki?

"That's completely different?"

Sigh. Might I ask how?

"This is the cultural festival. It is the pinnacle of our school; the most exciting time of the year for its students."

It is?

"It is!" Haruki puffed up his chest in excitement, preparing to decree his word. To me. Alone.

"This is why the SOS Brigade will be doing things far more exciting and fun!" His face shone like Xerxes' when a battle was won during the Persian Wars.

----

The smile was deceptive; to the average standbyer, Haruki's face just looks like someone who was happy. I knew otherwise.

During our time in the SOS Brigade, Haruki's 'fun' events were never fun. Ever. In fact, every instance was tiresome. Myself and Asahina-sempai can attest to that. Given we were always the ones who were being acted upon, but we're still human. I highly doubt Koizumi's passive behaviour counts as normal, and Nagato is an alien so he's not exactly capable of showing his exhaustion. But if he were human (with emotions), he would probably be in the same boat as this normal girl and the timetraveler.

The things I would do with timetravel... I'd love to prevent myself from meeting Haruki. That would save me from the amount of psychological trauma he oh-so-indirectly put me through. I definitely, without a doubt, don't want to go through what happened 6 months ago. That bunch of nonsense is so utterly stupid that -someone quick, give me a wall, door, or other flat-surfaced object- I want to repeatedly smash my face against anything. Well actually, there are plenty of walls around me right now...

I devised ways to completely destroy any thoughts regarding the SOS Brigade without completely terminating my number of braincells. Whilst doing so, I didn't regard any of the blabbering idiot's comments.

"Oi! Kyonko, are you listening to me?"

'No. What were you saying?'

"I was talking about the cultural festival."

'Oh... right.'

"Kyonko! Snap out of it!" Haruki yelled, yanking my hair back. As my eyes watered up from the pain, I turned to look at Haruki with now-undivided attention. "This is the cultural festival, you should be more excited!"

Easy for you to say. I rubbed the back of my head while he continued.

"You're only a first year once. Your first cultural festival is something to look forward to. It's not a cultural festival if it's not something worth going crazy over. I hear about tons of things that happen in other schools' festivals."

'So I guess your middle school was like that?'

"Nah, that was boring. We didn't do anything even remotely fun. This is why our high school experience should be something to enjoy! We get to choose what makes it fun!"

'That's not grounds of fussing over it.' I said. My hairtie ended up coming loose, so I pulled it off.

"Aha, but that's where you're wrong Kyonko." Haruki wagged his finger at me. "Festivals are the most active in the school. For that, you need to pay attention to cool things."

Like what? A motorcycle driving through the halls?

"Well if the motorcycle doesn't have a driver, then yeah! Something like that!" Haruki nodded. "Or maybe haunted houses having real monsters jump out, or ghosts actually appearing behind fortune tellers. Stairs to climb, that you walk up forever, or eagles nesting on a teacher's head. Or even better, a school gets put under attack by a mecha pilot!"

Haruki's continued ramblings eventually lost my interest around the fortune teller part. Can I get someone to send me an email containing the rest of his ideas? I'd really appreciate it? Sorry I can't give anything back in return though.

"Alright whatever. When we get to the clubroom, I'll tell you more about it."

The magical inspiration that sparked Haruki's interest had now simmered down. We continued our walk in silence, reaching the club room door in a matter of minutes. The Literature Club's number plate hanging above the door had been replaced by a piece of paper which Haruki scrawled SOS Brigade on top of. "We've been residing in this room since the school year started. It belongs to us now." With that, he replaced the plate before I could stop him. Not that I would have stopped him, since it'd take too much effort to drag out a chair, climb on it, take the scrap paper off only to have it replaced another day. In fact, standing on a chair would probably just give Haruki some stupid ideas.

Yeah. ''Those'' stupid ideas.

----

Haruki pushed the door open, giving anyone inside no time to hide anything embarrassing. Of course, the person inside wasn't able to do anything about that... he'd been forced into embarrassing costumes time and time again. Back when Haruki adopted Mitsuuru as the club's 'project' he had forced him into a ridiculous maid outfit. Thankfully, the maid outfit has since been replaced by a butler's uniform, which was what he was currently wearing. My eyes met his, and my heart skipped a beat. Asahina-sempai's face donned a smile upon seeing me. Dusting the bookshelves with a feather duster presumably got from his home, he worked like a cute little elf.

Asahina-sempai has dressed up in a number of outfits, each one more ridiculous than before. Chippendales, nurse, and even a cheerleader with a skirt. How this manages to make him more 'manly' defies all logic, but it still doesn't change his metamorphosis from student to cosplayer every day just after school in the club room. I have to say that my favorite would be the butler outfit. It's somewhat flattering towards him, and isn't at all suggestive. I'd rather not have to deal with the cheerleading outfit again though.

"Mitsuuru! I thought I told you already to wear the maid outfit! A butler is too plain."

"Eh, but I-..."

"No 'buts' about it. Get changed! Here, let me do it."

My feet quickly turned around and walked my person out the door. I wasn't going to spectate Haruki's scary actions. Through the door, I could hear Asahina-sempai's protests, but to no avail. Forcing him into a maid uniform is just weird Haruki... just about as weird as getting me that stupid bunny girl outfit.

"We're done!"

I walked back inside. Mitsuuru wore the maid outfit as expected, though he looked a little red in the face. All other comments aside, this pointless outfit just managed to make him look cuter.

"Um, I'll just-... I'll get the tea prepared then."

I watched as he nervously grabbed cups from the shelf and started heating up water. Then a sharp pain met my head, namely my scalp. Apparently Haruki yanked on my hair again. "Hmm... your hair isn't a pullstring? Oh, and you're drooling."

I scowled at him, wiping the drool off my chin.
"Better." Haruki said, walking to the computer desk and putting on his red armband labeled "Chief". He sat down at the rolling computer chair and stared across the room.

So now I know that I naturally drool when staring at Asahina-sempai too long. Even if there were other girls that would do the same, I found myself slightly embarrassed. Drooling is reserved for my pillow when I sleep, and solely for my pillow alone.

Realizing his other comment about my hair, and not wanting him to think that I was "seeing Nagato" again, I quickly tied my hair up. The world ending is a bad thing... I don't want to have to do that stupid thing with Haruki again in Closed Space.

The alien which I was supposedly seeing (according to Haruki and my little brother, but believe me I wasn't) in question was sitting down, reading a book in his designated corner.

"..."

Reading a thick covered book, this person was rigidly posed, examining every word on the page (and possibly even the pages themselves) in a relatively quick manner. He was none other than Nagato Yuuki, SOS Brigade saviour and full time watchdog over Haruki for the alien Data Integrated Sentient Entity. Strangely, his background makes more sense than Haruki's which makes no sense at all. This alone just confuses my mind, so I'll stop talking about that for now. It's better to just believe Haruki's mindset of him being a quiet bookworm that excels in many things.

Though from my viewpoint, I can't help but laugh at that stupid description. It's whatever.

"Hey, where's Koizumi-san?"

Haruki shot Mitsuuru a glare. The maidboy instinctively flinched.

"I-I'm not sure. I haven't seen her. It's not like her to be late."

While he started changing tea leaves in the automatic dispenser, I followed Haruki's example and started surveying the room. My eyes eventually met the costume rack. The bizarre sight held a froghead, (dreaded) bunny costumes, cheerleading outfits, a number of capes, a nurse, summer variations of the butler's outfit, and a few other articles of clothing that I had never really paid attention to.

All of these outfits had at least one of us (Asahina-sempai, me, or Koizumi) in them at some point in time. Wow, there's a lot of clutter here. Why does Haruki have two spare maid outfits? Is he going to force Asahina-sempai to do some spring cleaning next year? Wait, spare maid outfits?! No way am I wearing that. You can't treat me like a doll!

"Mitsuuru, where's that tea?"

"Ah, right. Coming right up."

The pseudomaid quickly poured tea in a plastic teacup with "Haruki" written on the side. He then placed it on a tray and walked over to Haruki and placed it on the desk.

"Incorrect!"

"E-eh?"

"Our contingency plan! You also need to learn the basics of becoming a passable woman, in case our attempts at making you manly fail."

"What? B-but I-"

"A proper maid would trip over herself and spill her tea just as she comes in close proximity of the person she serves. It's pure common knowledge that maids, waitresses, and hostesses are clumsy."

"Uh, right. Sorry."

'What sort of maid does that? Mitsuuru don't listen to him, no girl is like that!'

"Kyonko! Demonstrate for him."

"What?! No way. You can't make me do- hey!"

My protests didn't reach him. He pulled me to my feet and made Mitsuuru take my spot. Then he placed an apron over my head and handed me a tray with a teacup in one swift motion. He tapped the back of my head rather hardly, causing me to fall over on top of Asahina-sempai. I instinctively said sorry for spilling hot tea on him, but there wasn't anything to be sorry for... haruki had used an empty teacup.

((INCOMPLETE))

<noinclude>
{| border="1" cellpadding="5" cellspacing="0" style="margin: 1em 1em 1em 0; background: #f9f9f9; border: 1px #aaaaaa solid; padding: 0.2em; border-collapse: collapse;"
|-
| Return to [[Suzumiya_Haruki_no_Seitenkan:Volume2_Prologue|Prologue]]
| Forward to [[Suzumiya_Haruki_no_Seitenkan:Volume2_Chapter2|Chapter 2]]
|-
|}
</noinclude>

Suzumiya Haruki no Seitenkan:Volume2 Chapter1

2010-08-09T22:51:35Z

RCG M3tal:

Our school, just like any other stereotypical public school in Japan, likes to host a variety of schoolwide events at random points in the year. Such as last month, where Haruki indefinitely proclaimed that the SOS Brigade would be participating in a relay for North High's athletic festival. Now, I can't say I wasn't expecting him to do something strangely bizarre like that, but I certainly wasn't expect us to blow away the track team and rugby team. Haruki took up lead in the anchor position, finishing around 13 meters in front of the 2nd place runner. As a result, Haruki's club, the SOS Brigade (that I totally am not in), grew.

Let's just say that our reputation went from being a small candle of interest, to spreading like wildfire over the school. We won basically every event that we participated in the athletic festival, with Haruki's athletic body being the cause. The second runner, Nagato, also shares the blame. I certainly hadn't expected him to run as fast as he did. I still don't know if I should compare him to a comically fast running bird straight from a cartoon, or an alien who used teleportation. Please Nagato, tell me before you do something like that okay?

After the race when I asked Nagato what sort of magic he used, he replied unenthusiastically using terms like "quantum leap" and "enhanced energy measures". While I appreciated his dumbed down explanation, I still didn't quite get it. Looks like I won't be choosing science and liberal arts as my field of expertise. Oh well.

When the athletic festival ended, I gave a sigh of relief in hopes that this girl wouldn't have to do any more strenuous tasks the following month. I was sadly mistaken. North High had decided to host a cultural festival, complete with public access to school grounds. At this very moment, the entire school is preparing for such an event; the word "entire" being an over-exaggeration since the only ones actually doing work are teachers, cultural club members, and the student council.

The SOS Brigade still hasn't been officially recognised as a club, so we really had no reason to do anything. Knowing Haruki, he probably would have wanted to display some stray cat in a cage and call it an "extraterrestrial creature"; knowing full well that such an embarrassing joke would be scowled upon by those who don't get it. At least doing that doesn't put anyone's sanity and/or body on the line, so if Haruki did actually decide to cage up an animal I wouldn't mind as much.

By the way, Haruki and my class, Class 1-5, decided to do a simple survey. With so many people just wanting to get the cultural festival over with in a simple, tireless manner, no one even proposed an idea. We didn't even know what we were going to make the survey on. Regardless of the content, no one would care about it anyways. Work hard people, and maybe we won't appear like a worthless group of idiots to the other bustling classes.

The lack of an exciting event, of course, knocked Haruki's patience off balance. This was causing him to grumble while we walked to the clubroom later that day.

"A survey is so boring" He gave a face that looked like a 12 year old would have given if his parents bought clothes for Christmas presents instead of some new toy.

'Give it a break. If it's so boring, then why didn't you speak up when we were proposing ideas for it?' In all seriousness, you should have... Okabe-sensei looked like she was ready to rip her hair out from the lack of ideas. That would not be pretty...

"I don't want to do anything with this class. It's full of boring people."

Boring people? Realize that you're apart of the class, meaning you just called yourself boring. And hold up. Aren't these the same boring people that you won the relays for in last month's athletic festival? Or was that someone else named Suzumiya Haruki?

"That's completely different?"

Sigh. Might I ask how?

"This is the cultural festival. It is the pinnacle of our school; the most exciting time of the year for its students."

It is?

"It is!" Haruki puffed up his chest in excitement, preparing to decree his word. To me. Alone.

"This is why the SOS Brigade will be doing things far more exciting and fun!" His face shone like Xerxes' when a battle was won during the Persian Wars.

----

The smile was deceptive; I knew that it was a bad omen.

During our time in the SOS Brigade, Haruki's 'fun' events were never fun. Ever. In fact, every instance was tiresome. Myself and Asahina-sempai can attest to that. Given we were always the ones who were being acted upon, but we're still human. I highly doubt Koizumi's passive behaviour counts as normal, and Nagato is an alien so he's not exactly capable of showing his exhaustion. But if he were human (with emotions), I'd think he would probably be in the same boat as the normal girl and the timetraveler.

The things I would do with timetravel... I'd love to prevent myself from meeting Haruki. That would save me from the amount of psychological trauma he oh-so-indirectly put me through. I definitely, without a doubt, don't want to go through what happened 6 months ago. That bunch of nonsense is so utterly stupid that -someone quick, give me a wall, door, or other flat-surfaced object- I want to repeatedly smash my face against anything. Well actually, there are plenty of walls around me right now...

I devised ways to completely destroy any thoughts regarding the SOS Brigade without completely terminating my number of braincells. Whilst doing so, I didn't regard any of the blabbering idiot's comments.

"Oi! Kyonko, are you listening to me?"

'No. What were you saying?'

"I was talking about the cultural festival."

'Oh... right.'

"Kyonko! Snap out of it!" Haruki yelled, yanking my hair back. As my eyes watered up from the pain, I turned to look at Haruki with now-undivided attention. "This is the cultural festival, you should be more excited!"

Easy for you to say. I rubbed the back of my head while he continued.

"You're only a first year once. Your first cultural festival is something to look forward to. It's not a cultural festival if it's not something worth going crazy over. I hear about tons of things that happen in other schools' festivals."

'So I guess your middle school was like that?'

"Nah, that was boring. We didn't do anything even remotely fun. This is why our high school experience should be something to enjoy! We get to choose what makes it fun!"

'That's not grounds of fussing over it.' I said. My hairtie ended up coming loose, so I pulled it off.

"Aha, but that's where you're wrong Kyonko." Haruki wagged his finger at me. "Festivals are the most active in the school. For that, you need to pay attention to cool things."

Like what? A motorcycle driving through the halls?

"Well if the motorcycle doesn't have a driver, then yeah! Something like that!" Haruki nodded. "Or maybe haunted houses having real monsters jump out, or ghosts actually appearing behind fortune tellers. Stairs to climb, that you walk up forever, or eagles nesting on a teacher's head. Or even better, a school gets put under attack by a mecha pilot!"

Haruki's continued ramblings eventually lost my interest around the fortune teller part. Can I get someone to send me an email containing the rest of his ideas? I'd really appreciate it? Sorry I can't give anything back in return though.

"Alright whatever. When we get to the clubroom, I'll tell you more about it."

The magical inspiration that sparked Haruki's interest had now simmered down. We continued our walk in silence, reaching the club room door in a matter of minutes. The Literature Club's number plate hanging above the door had been replaced by a piece of paper which Haruki scrawled SOS Brigade on top of. "We've been residing in this room since the school year started. It belongs to us now." With that, he replaced the plate before I could stop him. Not that I would have stopped him, since it'd take too much effort to drag out a chair, climb on it, take the scrap paper off only to have it replaced another day. In fact, standing on a chair would probably just give Haruki some stupid ideas.

Yeah. ''Those'' stupid ideas.

----

Haruki pushed the door open, giving anyone inside no time to hide anything embarrassing. Of course, the person inside wasn't able to do anything about that... he'd been forced into embarrassing costumes time and time again. Back when Haruki adopted Mitsuuru as the club's 'project' he had forced him into a ridiculous maid outfit. Thankfully, the maid outfit has since been replaced by a butler's uniform, which was what he was currently wearing. My eyes met his, and my heart skipped a beat. Asahina-sempai's face donned a smile upon seeing me. Dusting the bookshelves with a feather duster presumably got from his home, he worked like a cute little elf.

Asahina-sempai has dressed up in a number of outfits, each one more ridiculous than before. Chippendales, nurse, and even a cheerleader with a skirt. How this manages to make him more 'manly' defies all logic, but it still doesn't change his metamorphosis from student to cosplayer every day just after school in the club room. I have to say that my favorite would be the butler outfit. It's somewhat flattering towards him, and isn't at all suggestive. I'd rather not have to deal with the cheerleading outfit again though.

"Mitsuuru! I thought I told you already to wear the maid outfit! A butler is too plain."

"Eh, but I-..."

"No 'buts' about it. Get changed!"

My feet quickly turned around and walked my person out the door. I wasn't going to spectate Haruki's scary actions. Through the door, I could hear Asahina-sempai's protests, but to no avail. Forcing him into a maid uniform is just weird Haruki... just about as weird as getting me that stupid bunny girl outfit.

"We're done!"

I walked back inside. Mitsuuru wore the maid outfit as expected, though he looked a little red in the face. All other comments aside, this pointless outfit just managed to make him look cuter.

"Um, I'll just-... I'll get the tea prepared then."

I watched as he nervously grabbed cups from the shelf and started pouring tea. Then a sharp pain met my head, namely my scalp. Apparently Haruki yanked on my hair again. "Hair needs to be a pullstring again. Oh, and you're drooling."

I scowled at him, wiping the drool off my chin.
"Better." Haruki said, walking to the computer desk and putting on his red armband labeled "Chief". He sat down at the rolling computer chair and stared across the room.

So now I know that I naturally drool when staring at Asahina-sempai too long. Even if there were other girls that would do the same, I found myself slightly embarrassed. Drooling is reserved for my pillow when I sleep, and solely for my pillow alone.

Realizing his other comment about my hair, and not wanting him to think that I was "seeing Nagato" again, I quickly tied my hair up. The world ending is a bad thing... I don't want to have to do that stupid thing with Haruki again in Closed Space.

The alien which I was supposedly seeing (according to Haruki and my little brother, but believe me I wasn't) in question was sitting down, reading a book in his designated corner.

"..."

Reading a thick covered book, this person was rigidly posed, examining every word on the page (and possibly even the pages themselves) in a relatively quick manner. He was none other than Nagato Yuuki, SOS Brigade saviour and full time watchdog over Haruki for the alien Data Integrated Sentient Entity. Strangely, his background makes more sense than Haruki's which makes no sense at all. This alone just confuses my mind, so I'll stop talking about that for now. It's better to just believe Haruki's mindset of him being a quiet bookworm that excels in many things.

Though from my viewpoint, I can't help but laugh at that stupid description. It's whatever.

"Hey, where's Koizumi-san?"

Haruki shot Mitsuuru a glare. The maidboy instinctively flinched.

"I-I'm not sure. I haven't seen her. It's not like her to be late."

((INCOMPLETE))

<noinclude>
{| border="1" cellpadding="5" cellspacing="0" style="margin: 1em 1em 1em 0; background: #f9f9f9; border: 1px #aaaaaa solid; padding: 0.2em; border-collapse: collapse;"
|-
| Return to [[Suzumiya_Haruki_no_Seitenkan:Volume2_Prologue|Prologue]]
| Forward to [[Suzumiya_Haruki_no_Seitenkan:Volume2_Chapter2|Chapter 2]]
|-
|}
</noinclude>

Suzumiya Haruki no Seitenkan:Volume2 Chapter1

2010-08-09T22:48:43Z

RCG M3tal:

Our school, just like any other stereotypical public school in Japan, likes to host a variety of schoolwide events at random points in the year. Such as last month, where Haruki indefinitely proclaimed that the SOS Brigade would be participating in a relay for North High's athletic festival. Now, I can't say I wasn't expecting him to do something strangely bizarre like that, but I certainly wasn't expect us to blow away the track team and rugby team. Haruki took up lead in the anchor position, finishing around 13 meters in front of the 2nd place runner. As a result, Haruki's club, the SOS Brigade (that I totally am not in), grew.

Let's just say that our reputation went from being a small candle of interest, to spreading like wildfire over the school. We won basically every event that we participated in the athletic festival, with Haruki's athletic body being the cause. The second runner, Nagato, also shares the blame. I certainly hadn't expected him to run as fast as he did. I still don't know if I should compare him to a comically fast running bird straight from a cartoon, or an alien who used teleportation. Please Nagato, tell me before you do something like that okay?

After the race when I asked Nagato what sort of magic he used, he replied unenthusiastically using terms like "quantum leap" and "enhanced energy measures". While I appreciated his dumbed down explanation, I still didn't quite get it. Looks like I won't be choosing science and liberal arts as my field of expertise. Oh well.

When the athletic festival ended, I gave a sigh of relief in hopes that this girl wouldn't have to do any more strenuous tasks the following month. I was sadly mistaken. North High had decided to host a cultural festival, complete with public access to school grounds. At this very moment, the entire school is preparing for such an event; the word "entire" being an over-exaggeration since the only ones actually doing work are teachers, cultural club members, and the student council.

The SOS Brigade still hasn't been officially recognised as a club, so we really had no reason to do anything. Knowing Haruki, he probably would have wanted to display some stray cat in a cage and call it an "extraterrestrial creature"; knowing full well that such an embarrassing joke would be scowled upon by those who don't get it. At least doing that doesn't put anyone's sanity and/or body on the line, so if Haruki did actually decide to cage up an animal I wouldn't mind as much.

By the way, Haruki and my class, Class 1-5, decided to do a simple survey. With so many people just wanting to get the cultural festival over with in a simple, tireless manner, no one even proposed an idea. We didn't even know what we were going to make the survey on. Regardless of the content, no one would care about it anyways. Work hard people, and maybe we won't appear like a worthless group of idiots to the other bustling classes.

The lack of an exciting event, of course, knocked Haruki's patience off balance. This was causing him to grumble while we walked to the clubroom later that day.

"A survey is so boring" He gave a face that looked like a 12 year old would have given if his parents bought clothes for Christmas presents instead of some new toy.

'Give it a break. If it's so boring, then why didn't you speak up when we were proposing ideas for it?' In all seriousness, you should have... Okabe-sensei looked like she was ready to rip her hair out from the lack of ideas. That would not be pretty...

"I don't want to do anything with this class. It's full of boring people."

Boring people? Realize that you're apart of the class, meaning you just called yourself boring. And hold up. Aren't these the same boring people that you won the relays for in last month's athletic festival? Or was that someone else named Suzumiya Haruki?

"That's completely different?"

Sigh. Might I ask how?

"This is the cultural festival. It is the pinnacle of our school; the most exciting time of the year for its students."

It is?

"It is!" Haruki puffed up his chest in excitement, preparing to decree his word. To me. Alone.

"This is why the SOS Brigade will be doing things far more exciting and fun!" His face shone like Xerxes' when a battle was won during the Persian Wars.

----

The smile was deceptive; I knew that it was a bad omen.

During our time in the SOS Brigade, Haruki's 'fun' events were never fun. Ever. In fact, every instance was tiresome. Myself and Asahina-sempai can attest to that. Given we were always the ones who were being acted upon, but we're still human. I highly doubt Koizumi's passive behaviour counts as normal, and Nagato is an alien so he's not exactly capable of showing his exhaustion. But if he were human (with emotions), I'd think he would probably be in the same boat as the normal girl and the timetraveler.

The things I would do with timetravel... I'd love to prevent myself from meeting Haruki. That would save me from the amount of psychological trauma he oh-so-indirectly put me through. I definitely, without a doubt, don't want to go through what happened 6 months ago. That bunch of nonsense is so utterly stupid that -someone quick, give me a wall, door, or other flat-surfaced object- I want to repeatedly smash my face against anything. Well actually, there are plenty of walls around me right now...

I devised ways to completely destroy any thoughts regarding the SOS Brigade without completely terminating my number of braincells. Whilst doing so, I didn't regard any of the blabbering idiot's comments.

"Oi! Kyonko, are you listening to me?"

'No. What were you saying?'

"I was talking about the cultural festival."

'Oh... right.'

"Kyonko! Snap out of it!" Haruki yelled, yanking my hair back. As my eyes watered up from the pain, I turned to look at Haruki with now-undivided attention. "This is the cultural festival, you should be more excited!"

Easy for you to say. I rubbed the back of my head while he continued.

"You're only a first year once. Your first cultural festival is something to look forward to. It's not a cultural festival if it's not something worth going crazy over. I hear about tons of things that happen in other schools' festivals."

'So I guess your middle school was like that?'

"Nah, that was boring. We didn't do anything even remotely fun. This is why our high school experience should be something to enjoy! We get to choose what makes it fun!"

'That's not grounds of fussing over it.' I said. My hairtie ended up coming loose, so I pulled it off.

"Aha, but that's where you're wrong Kyonko." Haruki wagged his finger at me. "Festivals are the most active in the school. For that, you need to pay attention to cool things."

Like what? A motorcycle driving through the halls?

"Well if the motorcycle doesn't have a driver, then yeah! Something like that!" Haruki nodded. "Or maybe haunted houses having real monsters jump out, or ghosts actually appearing behind fortune tellers. Stairs to climb, that you walk up forever, or eagles nesting on a teacher's head. Or even better, a school gets put under attack by a mecha pilot!"

Haruki's continued ramblings eventually lost my interest around the fortune teller part. Can I get someone to send me an email containing the rest of his ideas? I'd really appreciate it? Sorry I can't give anything back in return though.

"Alright whatever. When we get to the clubroom, I'll tell you more about it."

Whatever sparked Haruki's interest had now simmered down. We continued our walk in silence, reaching the club room door in a matter of minutes. The Literature Club's number plate hanging above the door had been replaced by a piece of paper which Haruki scrawled SOS Brigade on top of. "We've been residing in this room since the school year started. It belongs to us now." With that, he replaced the plate before I could stop him. Whatever, it's not like I want to climb on top of a chair to change it or anything. In fact, standing on a chair would probably just give Haruki some stupid ideas.

Yeah. ''Those'' stupid ideas.

----

Haruki pushed the door open, giving anyone inside no time to hide anything embarrassing. Of course, the person inside wasn't able to do anything about that... he'd been forced into embarrassing costumes time and time again. Back when Haruki adopted Mitsuuru as the club's 'project' he had forced him into a ridiculous maid outfit. Thankfully, the maid outfit has since been replaced by a butler's uniform, which was what he was currently wearing. My eyes met his, and my heart skipped a beat. Asahina-sempai's face donned a smile upon seeing me. Dusting the bookshelves with a feather duster presumably got from his home, he worked like a cute little elf.

Asahina-sempai has dressed up in a number of outfits, each one more ridiculous than before. Chippendales, nurse, and even a cheerleader with a skirt. How this manages to make him more 'manly' defies all logic, but it still doesn't change his metamorphosis from student to cosplayer every day just after school in the club room. I have to say that my favorite would be the butler outfit. It's somewhat flattering towards him, and isn't at all suggestive. I'd rather not have to deal with the cheerleading outfit again though.

"Mitsuuru! I thought I told you already to wear the maid outfit! A butler is too plain."

"Eh, but I-..."

"No 'buts' about it. Get changed!"

My feet quickly turned around and walked my person out the door. I wasn't going to spectate Haruki's scary actions. Through the door, I could hear Asahina-sempai's protests, but to no avail. Forcing him into a maid uniform is just weird Haruki... just about as weird as getting me that stupid bunny girl outfit.

"We're done!"

I walked back inside. Mitsuuru wore the maid outfit as expected, though he looked a little red in the face. All other comments aside, this pointless outfit just managed to make him look cuter.

"Um, I'll just-... I'll get the tea prepared then."

I watched as he nervously grabbed cups from the shelf and started pouring tea. Then a sharp pain met my head, namely my scalp. Apparently Haruki yanked on my hair again. "Hair needs to be a pullstring again. Oh, and you're drooling."

I scowled at him, wiping the drool off my chin.
"Better." Haruki said, walking to the computer desk and putting on his red armband labeled "Chief". He sat down at the rolling computer chair and stared across the room.

So now I know that I naturally drool when staring at Asahina-sempai too long. Even if there were other girls that would do the same, I found myself slightly embarrassed. Drooling is reserved for my pillow when I sleep, and solely for my pillow alone.

Realizing his other comment about my hair, and not wanting him to think that I was "seeing Nagato" again, I quickly tied my hair up. The world ending is a bad thing... I don't want to have to do that stupid thing with Haruki again in Closed Space.

The alien which I was supposedly seeing (according to Haruki and my little brother, but believe me I wasn't) in question was sitting down, reading a book in his designated corner.

"..."

Reading a thick covered book, this person was rigidly posed, examining every word on the page (and possibly even the pages themselves) in a relatively quick manner. He was none other than Nagato Yuuki, SOS Brigade saviour and full time watchdog over Haruki for the alien Data Integrated Sentient Entity. Strangely, his background makes more sense than Haruki's which makes no sense at all. This alone just confuses my mind, so I'll stop talking about that for now. It's better to just believe Haruki's mindset of him being a quiet bookworm that excels in many things.

Though from my viewpoint, I can't help but laugh at that stupid description. It's whatever.

"Hey, where's Koizumi-san?"

Haruki shot Mitsuuru a glare. The maidboy instinctively flinched.

"I-I'm not sure. I haven't seen her. It's not like her to be late."

((INCOMPLETE))

<noinclude>
{| border="1" cellpadding="5" cellspacing="0" style="margin: 1em 1em 1em 0; background: #f9f9f9; border: 1px #aaaaaa solid; padding: 0.2em; border-collapse: collapse;"
|-
| Return to [[Suzumiya_Haruki_no_Seitenkan:Volume2_Prologue|Prologue]]
| Forward to [[Suzumiya_Haruki_no_Seitenkan:Volume2_Chapter2|Chapter 2]]
|-
|}
</noinclude>

Suzumiya Haruki no Seitenkan:Volume2 Chapter1

2010-08-09T22:47:06Z

RCG M3tal:

Our school, just like any other stereotypical public school in Japan, likes to host a variety of schoolwide events at random points in the year. Such as last month, where Haruki indefinitely proclaimed that the SOS Brigade would be participating in a relay for North High's athletic festival. Now, I can't say I wasn't expecting him to do something strangely bizarre like that, but what I can acknowledge as being surprising is that we blew away the track team and rugby team, with Haruki heading in the anchor position, finishing around 13 meters in front of the 2nd place runner. As a result, Haruki's club (that I totally am not in) the SOS Brigade, grew.

Let's just say this. Our reputation went from being a small candle of interest, to spreading like wildfire over the school. We won basically every event that we participated in the athletic festival, with Haruki's athletic body being the cause. The second runner, Nagato, also shares the blame. I certainly hadn't expected him to run as fast as he did. I still don't know if I should compare him to a comically fast running bird straight from a cartoon, or an alien who used teleportation. Please Nagato, tell me before you do something like that okay?

After the race when I asked Nagato what sort of magic he used, he replied unenthusiastically using terms like "quantum leap" and "enhanced energy measures". While I appreciated his dumbed down explanation, I still didn't quite get it. Looks like I won't be choosing science and liberal arts as my field of expertise. Oh well.

When the athletic festival ended, I gave a sigh of relief in hopes that this girl wouldn't have to do any more strenuous tasks the following month. I was sadly mistaken. North High had decided to host a cultural festival, complete with public access to school grounds. At this very moment, the entire school is preparing for such an event; the word "entire" being an over-exaggeration since the only ones actually doing work are teachers, cultural club members, and the student council.

The SOS Brigade still hasn't been officially recognised as a club, so we really had no reason to do anything. Knowing Haruki, he probably would have wanted to display some stray cat in a cage and call it an "extraterrestrial creature"; knowing full well that such an embarrassing joke would be scowled upon by those who don't get it. At least doing that doesn't put anyone's sanity and/or body on the line, so if Haruki did actually decide to cage up an animal I wouldn't mind as much.

By the way, Haruki and my class, Class 1-5, decided to do a simple survey. With so many people just wanting to get the cultural festival over with in a simple, tireless manner, no one even proposed an idea. We didn't even know what we were going to make the survey on. Regardless of the content, no one would care about it anyways. Work hard people, and maybe we won't appear like a worthless group of idiots to the other bustling classes.

The lack of an exciting event, of course, knocked Haruki's patience off balance. This was causing him to grumble while we walked to the clubroom later that day.

"A survey is so boring" He gave a face that looked like a 12 year old would have given if his parents bought clothes for Christmas presents instead of some new toy.

'Give it a break. If it's so boring, then why didn't you speak up when we were proposing ideas for it?' In all seriousness, you should have... Okabe-sensei looked like she was ready to rip her hair out from the lack of ideas. That would not be pretty...

"I don't want to do anything with this class. It's full of boring people."

Boring people? Realize that you're apart of the class, meaning you just called yourself boring. And hold up. Aren't these the same boring people that you won the relays for in last month's athletic festival? Or was that someone else named Suzumiya Haruki?

"That's completely different?"

Sigh. Might I ask how?

"This is the cultural festival. It is the pinnacle of our school; the most exciting time of the year for its students."

It is?

"It is!" Haruki puffed up his chest in excitement, preparing to decree his word. To me. Alone.

"This is why the SOS Brigade will be doing things far more exciting and fun!" His face shone like Xerxes' when a battle was won during the Persian Wars.

----

The smile was deceptive; I knew that it was a bad omen.

During our time in the SOS Brigade, Haruki's 'fun' events were never fun. Ever. In fact, every instance was tiresome. Myself and Asahina-sempai can attest to that. Given we were always the ones who were being acted upon, but we're still human. I highly doubt Koizumi's passive behaviour counts as normal, and Nagato is an alien so he's not exactly capable of showing his exhaustion. But if he were human (with emotions), I'd think he would probably be in the same boat as the normal girl and the timetraveler.

The things I would do with timetravel... I'd love to prevent myself from meeting Haruki. That would save me from the amount of psychological trauma he oh-so-indirectly put me through. I definitely, without a doubt, don't want to go through what happened 6 months ago. That bunch of nonsense is so utterly stupid that -someone quick, give me a wall, door, or other flat-surfaced object- I want to repeatedly smash my face against anything. Well actually, there are plenty of walls around me right now...

I devised ways to completely destroy any thoughts regarding the SOS Brigade without completely terminating my number of braincells. Whilst doing so, I didn't regard any of the blabbering idiot's comments.

"Oi! Kyonko, are you listening to me?"

'No. What were you saying?'

"I was talking about the cultural festival."

'Oh... right.'

"Kyonko! Snap out of it!" Haruki yelled, yanking my hair back. As my eyes watered up from the pain, I turned to look at Haruki with now-undivided attention. "This is the cultural festival, you should be more excited!"

Easy for you to say. I rubbed the back of my head while he continued.

"You're only a first year once. Your first cultural festival is something to look forward to. It's not a cultural festival if it's not something worth going crazy over. I hear about tons of things that happen in other schools' festivals."

'So I guess your middle school was like that?'

"Nah, that was boring. We didn't do anything even remotely fun. This is why our high school experience should be something to enjoy! We get to choose what makes it fun!"

'That's not grounds of fussing over it.' I said. My hairtie ended up coming loose, so I pulled it off.

"Aha, but that's where you're wrong Kyonko." Haruki wagged his finger at me. "Festivals are the most active in the school. For that, you need to pay attention to cool things."

Like what? A motorcycle driving through the halls?

"Well if the motorcycle doesn't have a driver, then yeah! Something like that!" Haruki nodded. "Or maybe haunted houses having real monsters jump out, or ghosts actually appearing behind fortune tellers. Stairs to climb, that you walk up forever, or eagles nesting on a teacher's head. Or even better, a school gets put under attack by a mecha pilot!"

Haruki's continued ramblings eventually lost my interest around the fortune teller part. Can I get someone to send me an email containing the rest of his ideas? I'd really appreciate it? Sorry I can't give anything back in return though.

"Alright whatever. When we get to the clubroom, I'll tell you more about it."

Whatever sparked Haruki's interest had now simmered down. We continued our walk in silence, reaching the club room door in a matter of minutes. The Literature Club's number plate hanging above the door had been replaced by a piece of paper which Haruki scrawled SOS Brigade on top of. "We've been residing in this room since the school year started. It belongs to us now." With that, he replaced the plate before I could stop him. Whatever, it's not like I want to climb on top of a chair to change it or anything. In fact, standing on a chair would probably just give Haruki some stupid ideas.

Yeah. ''Those'' stupid ideas.

----

Haruki pushed the door open, giving anyone inside no time to hide anything embarrassing. Of course, the person inside wasn't able to do anything about that... he'd been forced into embarrassing costumes time and time again. Back when Haruki adopted Mitsuuru as the club's 'project' he had forced him into a ridiculous maid outfit. Thankfully, the maid outfit has since been replaced by a butler's uniform, which was what he was currently wearing. My eyes met his, and my heart skipped a beat. Asahina-sempai's face donned a smile upon seeing me. Dusting the bookshelves with a feather duster presumably got from his home, he worked like a cute little elf.

Asahina-sempai has dressed up in a number of outfits, each one more ridiculous than before. Chippendales, nurse, and even a cheerleader with a skirt. How this manages to make him more 'manly' defies all logic, but it still doesn't change his metamorphosis from student to cosplayer every day just after school in the club room. I have to say that my favorite would be the butler outfit. It's somewhat flattering towards him, and isn't at all suggestive. I'd rather not have to deal with the cheerleading outfit again though.

"Mitsuuru! I thought I told you already to wear the maid outfit! A butler is too plain."

"Eh, but I-..."

"No 'buts' about it. Get changed!"

My feet quickly turned around and walked my person out the door. I wasn't going to spectate Haruki's scary actions. Through the door, I could hear Asahina-sempai's protests, but to no avail. Forcing him into a maid uniform is just weird Haruki... just about as weird as getting me that stupid bunny girl outfit.

"We're done!"

I walked back inside. Mitsuuru wore the maid outfit as expected, though he looked a little red in the face. All other comments aside, this pointless outfit just managed to make him look cuter.

"Um, I'll just-... I'll get the tea prepared then."

I watched as he nervously grabbed cups from the shelf and started pouring tea. Then a sharp pain met my head, namely my scalp. Apparently Haruki yanked on my hair again. "Hair needs to be a pullstring again. Oh, and you're drooling."

I scowled at him, wiping the drool off my chin.
"Better." Haruki said, walking to the computer desk and putting on his red armband labeled "Chief". He sat down at the rolling computer chair and stared across the room.

So now I know that I naturally drool when staring at Asahina-sempai too long. Even if there were other girls that would do the same, I found myself slightly embarrassed. Drooling is reserved for my pillow when I sleep, and solely for my pillow alone.

Realizing his other comment about my hair, and not wanting him to think that I was "seeing Nagato" again, I quickly tied my hair up. The world ending is a bad thing... I don't want to have to do that stupid thing with Haruki again in Closed Space.

The alien which I was supposedly seeing (according to Haruki and my little brother, but believe me I wasn't) in question was sitting down, reading a book in his designated corner.

"..."

Reading a thick covered book, this person was rigidly posed, examining every word on the page (and possibly even the pages themselves) in a relatively quick manner. He was none other than Nagato Yuuki, SOS Brigade saviour and full time watchdog over Haruki for the alien Data Integrated Sentient Entity. Strangely, his background makes more sense than Haruki's which makes no sense at all. This alone just confuses my mind, so I'll stop talking about that for now. It's better to just believe Haruki's mindset of him being a quiet bookworm that excels in many things.

Though from my viewpoint, I can't help but laugh at that stupid description. It's whatever.

"Hey, where's Koizumi-san?"

Haruki shot Mitsuuru a glare. The maidboy instinctively flinched.

"I-I'm not sure. I haven't seen her. It's not like her to be late."

((INCOMPLETE))

<noinclude>
{| border="1" cellpadding="5" cellspacing="0" style="margin: 1em 1em 1em 0; background: #f9f9f9; border: 1px #aaaaaa solid; padding: 0.2em; border-collapse: collapse;"
|-
| Return to [[Suzumiya_Haruki_no_Seitenkan:Volume2_Prologue|Prologue]]
| Forward to [[Suzumiya_Haruki_no_Seitenkan:Volume2_Chapter2|Chapter 2]]
|-
|}
</noinclude>

Suzumiya Haruki no Seitenkan:Volume2 Chapter1

2010-08-09T22:46:21Z

RCG M3tal:

Our school, just like any other stereotypical public school in Japan, likes to host a variety of schoolwide events at random points in the year. Such as last month, where Haruki indefinitely proclaimed that the SOS Brigade would be participating in a relay for our school's athletic festival. Now, I can't say I wasn't expecting him to do something strangely bizarre like that, but what I can acknowledge as being surprising is that we blew away the track team and rugby team, with Haruki heading in the anchor position, finishing around 13 meters in front of the 2nd place runner. As a result, Haruki's club (that I totally am not in) the SOS Brigade, grew.

Let's just say this. Our reputation went from being a small candle of interest, to spreading like wildfire over the school. We won basically every event that we participated in the athletic festival, with Haruki's athletic body being the cause. The second runner, Nagato, also shares the blame. I certainly hadn't expected him to run as fast as he did. I still don't know if I should compare him to a comically fast running bird straight from a cartoon, or an alien who used teleportation. Please Nagato, tell me before you do something like that okay?

After the race when I asked Nagato what sort of magic he used, he replied unenthusiastically using terms like "quantum leap" and "enhanced energy measures". While I appreciated his dumbed down explanation, I still didn't quite get it. Looks like I won't be choosing science and liberal arts as my field of expertise. Oh well.

When the athletic festival ended, I gave a sigh of relief in hopes that this girl wouldn't have to do any more strenuous tasks the following month. I was sadly mistaken. North High had decided to host a cultural festival, complete with public access to school grounds. At this very moment, the entire school is preparing for such an event; the word "entire" being an over-exaggeration since the only ones actually doing work are teachers, cultural club members, and the student council.

The SOS Brigade still hasn't been officially recognised as a club, so we really had no reason to do anything. Knowing Haruki, he probably would have wanted to display some stray cat in a cage and call it an "extraterrestrial creature"; knowing full well that such an embarrassing joke would be scowled upon by those who don't get it. At least doing that doesn't put anyone's sanity and/or body on the line, so if Haruki did actually decide to cage up an animal I wouldn't mind as much.

By the way, Haruki and my class, Class 1-5, decided to do a simple survey. With so many people just wanting to get the cultural festival over with in a simple, tireless manner, no one even proposed an idea. We didn't even know what we were going to make the survey on. Regardless of the content, no one would care about it anyways. Work hard people, and maybe we won't appear like a worthless group of idiots to the other bustling classes.

The lack of an exciting event, of course, knocked Haruki's patience off balance. This was causing him to grumble while we walked to the clubroom later that day.

"A survey is so boring" He gave a face that looked like a 12 year old would have given if his parents bought clothes for Christmas presents instead of some new toy.

'Give it a break. If it's so boring, then why didn't you speak up when we were proposing ideas for it?' In all seriousness, you should have... Okabe-sensei looked like she was ready to rip her hair out from the lack of ideas. That would not be pretty...

"I don't want to do anything with this class. It's full of boring people."

Boring people? Realize that you're apart of the class, meaning you just called yourself boring. And hold up. Aren't these the same boring people that you won the relays for in last month's athletic festival? Or was that someone else named Suzumiya Haruki?

"That's completely different?"

Sigh. Might I ask how?

"This is the cultural festival. It is the pinnacle of our school; the most exciting time of the year for its students."

It is?

"It is!" Haruki puffed up his chest in excitement, preparing to decree his word. To me. Alone.

"This is why the SOS Brigade will be doing things far more exciting and fun!" His face shone like Xerxes' when a battle was won during the Persian Wars.

----

The smile was deceptive; I knew that it was a bad omen.

During our time in the SOS Brigade, Haruki's 'fun' events were never fun. Ever. In fact, every instance was tiresome. Myself and Asahina-sempai can attest to that. Given we were always the ones who were being acted upon, but we're still human. I highly doubt Koizumi's passive behaviour counts as normal, and Nagato is an alien so he's not exactly capable of showing his exhaustion. But if he were human (with emotions), I'd think he would probably be in the same boat as the normal girl and the timetraveler.

The things I would do with timetravel... I'd love to prevent myself from meeting Haruki. That would save me from the amount of psychological trauma he oh-so-indirectly put me through. I definitely, without a doubt, don't want to go through what happened 6 months ago. That bunch of nonsense is so utterly stupid that -someone quick, give me a wall, door, or other flat-surfaced object- I want to repeatedly smash my face against anything. Well actually, there are plenty of walls around me right now...

I devised ways to completely destroy any thoughts regarding the SOS Brigade without completely terminating my number of braincells. Whilst doing so, I didn't regard any of the blabbering idiot's comments.

"Oi! Kyonko, are you listening to me?"

'No. What were you saying?'

"I was talking about the cultural festival."

'Oh... right.'

"Kyonko! Snap out of it!" Haruki yelled, yanking my hair back. As my eyes watered up from the pain, I turned to look at Haruki with now-undivided attention. "This is the cultural festival, you should be more excited!"

Easy for you to say. I rubbed the back of my head while he continued.

"You're only a first year once. Your first cultural festival is something to look forward to. It's not a cultural festival if it's not something worth going crazy over. I hear about tons of things that happen in other schools' festivals."

'So I guess your middle school was like that?'

"Nah, that was boring. We didn't do anything even remotely fun. This is why our high school experience should be something to enjoy! We get to choose what makes it fun!"

'That's not grounds of fussing over it.' I said. My hairtie ended up coming loose, so I pulled it off.

"Aha, but that's where you're wrong Kyonko." Haruki wagged his finger at me. "Festivals are the most active in the school. For that, you need to pay attention to cool things."

Like what? A motorcycle driving through the halls?

"Well if the motorcycle doesn't have a driver, then yeah! Something like that!" Haruki nodded. "Or maybe haunted houses having real monsters jump out, or ghosts actually appearing behind fortune tellers. Stairs to climb, that you walk up forever, or eagles nesting on a teacher's head. Or even better, a school gets put under attack by a mecha pilot!"

Haruki's continued ramblings eventually lost my interest around the fortune teller part. Can I get someone to send me an email containing the rest of his ideas? I'd really appreciate it? Sorry I can't give anything back in return though.

"Alright whatever. When we get to the clubroom, I'll tell you more about it."

Whatever sparked Haruki's interest had now simmered down. We continued our walk in silence, reaching the club room door in a matter of minutes. The Literature Club's number plate hanging above the door had been replaced by a piece of paper which Haruki scrawled SOS Brigade on top of. "We've been residing in this room since the school year started. It belongs to us now." With that, he replaced the plate before I could stop him. Whatever, it's not like I want to climb on top of a chair to change it or anything. In fact, standing on a chair would probably just give Haruki some stupid ideas.

Yeah. ''Those'' stupid ideas.

----

Haruki pushed the door open, giving anyone inside no time to hide anything embarrassing. Of course, the person inside wasn't able to do anything about that... he'd been forced into embarrassing costumes time and time again. Back when Haruki adopted Mitsuuru as the club's 'project' he had forced him into a ridiculous maid outfit. Thankfully, the maid outfit has since been replaced by a butler's uniform, which was what he was currently wearing. My eyes met his, and my heart skipped a beat. Asahina-sempai's face donned a smile upon seeing me. Dusting the bookshelves with a feather duster presumably got from his home, he worked like a cute little elf.

Asahina-sempai has dressed up in a number of outfits, each one more ridiculous than before. Chippendales, nurse, and even a cheerleader with a skirt. How this manages to make him more 'manly' defies all logic, but it still doesn't change his metamorphosis from student to cosplayer every day just after school in the club room. I have to say that my favorite would be the butler outfit. It's somewhat flattering towards him, and isn't at all suggestive. I'd rather not have to deal with the cheerleading outfit again though.

"Mitsuuru! I thought I told you already to wear the maid outfit! A butler is too plain."

"Eh, but I-..."

"No 'buts' about it. Get changed!"

My feet quickly turned around and walked my person out the door. I wasn't going to spectate Haruki's scary actions. Through the door, I could hear Asahina-sempai's protests, but to no avail. Forcing him into a maid uniform is just weird Haruki... just about as weird as getting me that stupid bunny girl outfit.

"We're done!"

I walked back inside. Mitsuuru wore the maid outfit as expected, though he looked a little red in the face. All other comments aside, this pointless outfit just managed to make him look cuter.

"Um, I'll just-... I'll get the tea prepared then."

I watched as he nervously grabbed cups from the shelf and started pouring tea. Then a sharp pain met my head, namely my scalp. Apparently Haruki yanked on my hair again. "Hair needs to be a pullstring again. Oh, and you're drooling."

I scowled at him, wiping the drool off my chin.
"Better." Haruki said, walking to the computer desk and putting on his red armband labeled "Chief". He sat down at the rolling computer chair and stared across the room.

So now I know that I naturally drool when staring at Asahina-sempai too long. Even if there were other girls that would do the same, I found myself slightly embarrassed. Drooling is reserved for my pillow when I sleep, and solely for my pillow alone.

Realizing his other comment about my hair, and not wanting him to think that I was "seeing Nagato" again, I quickly tied my hair up. The world ending is a bad thing... I don't want to have to do that stupid thing with Haruki again in Closed Space.

The alien which I was supposedly seeing (according to Haruki and my little brother, but believe me I wasn't) in question was sitting down, reading a book in his designated corner.

"..."

Reading a thick covered book, this person was rigidly posed, examining every word on the page (and possibly even the pages themselves) in a relatively quick manner. He was none other than Nagato Yuuki, SOS Brigade saviour and full time watchdog over Haruki for the alien Data Integrated Sentient Entity. Strangely, his background makes more sense than Haruki's which makes no sense at all. This alone just confuses my mind, so I'll stop talking about that for now. It's better to just believe Haruki's mindset of him being a quiet bookworm that excels in many things.

Though from my viewpoint, I can't help but laugh at that stupid description. It's whatever.

"Hey, where's Koizumi-san?"

Haruki shot Mitsuuru a glare. The maidboy instinctively flinched.

"I-I'm not sure. I haven't seen her. It's not like her to be late."

((INCOMPLETE))

<noinclude>
{| border="1" cellpadding="5" cellspacing="0" style="margin: 1em 1em 1em 0; background: #f9f9f9; border: 1px #aaaaaa solid; padding: 0.2em; border-collapse: collapse;"
|-
| Return to [[Suzumiya_Haruki_no_Seitenkan:Volume2_Prologue|Prologue]]
| Forward to [[Suzumiya_Haruki_no_Seitenkan:Volume2_Chapter2|Chapter 2]]
|-
|}
</noinclude>

Suzumiya Haruki no Seitenkan:Volume2 Chapter1

2010-08-09T05:00:58Z

RCG M3tal:

Our school, just like any other stereotypical public school in Japan, likes to host a variety of schoolwide events at random points in the year. Such as last month, where Haruki indefinitely proclaimed that the SOS Brigade would be participating in a relay for our school's athletic festival. Now, I can't say I wasn't expecting him to do something strangely bizarre like that, but what I can acknowledge as being surprising is that we blew away the track team and rugby team, with Haruki heading in the anchor position, finishing around 13 meters in front of the 2nd place runner. As a result, Haruki's club (that I totally am not in) the SOS Brigade, grew.

Let's just say this. Our reputation went from being a small candle of interest, to spreading like wildfire over the school. We won basically every event that we participated in the athletic festival, with Haruki's athletic body being the cause. The second runner, Nagato, also shares the blame. I certainly hadn't expected him to run as fast as he did. I still don't know if I should compare him to a comically fast running bird straight from a cartoon, or an alien who used teleportation. Please Nagato, tell me before you do something like that okay?

After the race when I asked Nagato what sort of magic he used, he replied unenthusiastically using terms like "quantum leap" and "enhanced energy measures". While I appreciated his dumbed down explanation, I still didn't quite get it. Looks like I won't be choosing science and liberal arts as my field of expertise. Oh well.

When the athletic festival ended, I gave a sigh of relief in hopes that this girl wouldn't have to do any more strenuous tasks the following month. I was sadly mistaken. North High had decided to host a cultural festival, complete with public access to school grounds. At this very moment, the entire school is preparing for such an event; the word "entire" being an over-exaggeration since the only ones actually doing work are teachers, cultural club members, and the student council.

Of course, the SOS Brigade still hasn't been officially recognised as a club, so we really had no reason to do anything. Knowing Haruki, he probably would have wanted to display some stray cat in a cage and call it an "extraterrestrial beast"; knowing full well that such an embarrassing joke would be scowled upon by those who don't get it.

By the way, Haruki and my class, Class 1-5, decided to do a simple survey. With so many people just wanting to get the cultural festival over in a simple, tireless manner, no one even proposed an idea. We didn't even know what we were going to make the survey on. Regardless of the content, no one would care about it anyways. Work hard people, and maybe we won't appear like a worthless group of idiots to the other bustling classes.

The lack of an exciting event, of course, knocked Haruki's patience off balance. This was causing him to grumble while we walked to the clubroom later that day.

"A survey is so boring" He gave a face that looked like a 12 year old would have given if his parents bought clothes for Christmas presents instead of some new toy.

'Give it a break. If it's so boring, then why didn't you speak up when we were proposing ideas for it?' In all seriousness, you should have... Okabe-sensei looked like she was ready to rip her hair out from the lack of ideas. That would not be pretty...

"I don't want to do anything with this class. It's full of boring people."

Boring people? Realize that you're apart of the class, meaning you just called yourself boring. And hold up. Aren't these the same boring people that you won the relays for in last month's athletic festival? Or was that someone else named Suzumiya Haruki.

"That's completely different?"

Sigh. Might I ask how?

"This is the cultural festival. It is the pinnacle of our school; the most exciting time of the year for its students."

It is?

"It is!" Haruki puffed up his chest in excitement, preparing to decree his word. To me. Alone.

"This is why the SOS Brigade will be doing things far more exciting and fun!" His face shone like Xerxes' when a battle was won during the Persian Wars.

----

The smile was deceptive; I knew that it was a bad omen.

During our time in the SOS Brigade, Haruki's 'fun' events were never fun. Ever. In fact, every instance was tiresome. Myself and Asahina-sempai can attest to that. Given we were always the ones who were being acted upon, but we're still human. I highly doubt Koizumi's passive behaviour counts as normal, and Nagato is an alien so he's not exactly capable of showing his exhaustion. But if he were human (with emotions), I'd think he would probably be in the same boat as the normal girl and the timetraveler.

The things I would do with timetravel... I'd love to prevent myself from meeting Haruki. That would save me from the amount of psychological trauma he oh-so-indirectly put me through. I definitely, without a doubt, don't want to go through what happened 6 months ago. That bunch of nonsense is so utterly stupid that -someone quick, give me a wall, door, or other flat-surfaced object- I want to repeatedly smash my face against anything. Well actually, there are plenty of walls around me right now...

I devised ways to completely destroy any thoughts regarding the SOS Brigade without completely terminating my number of braincells. Whilst doing so, I didn't regard any of the blabbering idiot's comments.

"Oi! Kyonko, are you listening to me?"

'No. What were you saying?'

"I was talking about the cultural festival."

'Oh... right.'

"Kyonko! Snap out of it!" Haruki yelled, yanking my hair back. As my eyes watered up from the pain, I turned to look at Haruki with now-undivided attention. "This is the cultural festival, you should be more excited!"

Easy for you to say. I rubbed the back of my head while he continued.

"You're only a first year once. Your first cultural festival is something to look forward to. It's not a cultural festival if it's not something worth going crazy over. I hear about tons of things that happen in other schools' festivals."

'So I guess your middle school was like that?'

"Nah, that was boring. We didn't do anything even remotely fun. This is why our high school experience should be something to enjoy! We get to choose what makes it fun!"

'That's not grounds of fussing over it.' I said. My hairtie ended up coming loose, so I pulled it off.

"Aha, but that's where you're wrong Kyonko." Haruki wagged his finger at me. "Festivals are the most active in the school. For that, you need to pay attention to cool things."

Like what? A motorcycle driving through the halls?

"Well if the motorcycle doesn't have a driver, then yeah! Something like that!" Haruki nodded. "Or maybe haunted houses having real monsters jump out, or ghosts actually appearing behind fortune tellers. Stairs to climb, that you walk up forever, or eagles nesting on a teacher's head. Or even better, a school gets put under attack by a mecha pilot!"

Haruki's continued ramblings eventually lost my interest around the fortune teller part. Can I get someone to send me an email containing the rest of his ideas? I'd really appreciate it? Sorry I can't give anything back in return though.

"Alright whatever. When we get to the clubroom, I'll tell you more about it."

Whatever sparked Haruki's interest had now simmered down. We continued our walk in silence, reaching the club room door in a matter of minutes. The Literature Club's number plate hanging above the door had been replaced by a piece of paper which Haruki scrawled SOS Brigade on top of. "We've been residing in this room since the school year started. It belongs to us now." With that, he replaced the plate before I could stop him. Whatever, it's not like I want to climb on top of a chair to change it or anything. In fact, standing on a chair would probably just give Haruki some stupid ideas.

Yeah. ''Those'' stupid ideas.

----

Haruki pushed the door open, giving anyone inside no time to hide anything embarrassing. Of course, the person inside wasn't able to do anything about that... he'd been forced into embarrassing costumes time and time again. Back when Haruki adopted Mitsuuru as the club's 'project' he had forced him into a ridiculous maid outfit. Thankfully, the maid outfit has since been replaced by a butler's uniform, which was what he was currently wearing. My eyes met his, and my heart skipped a beat. Asahina-sempai's face donned a smile upon seeing me. Dusting the bookshelves with a feather duster presumably got from his home, he worked like a cute little elf.

Asahina-sempai has dressed up in a number of outfits, each one more ridiculous than before. Chippendales, nurse, and even a cheerleader with a skirt. How this manages to make him more 'manly' defies all logic, but it still doesn't change his metamorphosis from student to cosplayer every day just after school in the club room. I have to say that my favorite would be the butler outfit. It's somewhat flattering towards him, and isn't at all suggestive. I'd rather not have to deal with the cheerleading outfit again though.

"Mitsuuru! I thought I told you already to wear the maid outfit! A butler is too plain."

"Eh, but I-..."

"No 'buts' about it. Get changed!"

My feet quickly turned around and walked my person out the door. I wasn't going to spectate Haruki's scary actions. Through the door, I could hear Asahina-sempai's protests, but to no avail. Forcing him into a maid uniform is just weird Haruki... just about as weird as getting me that stupid bunny girl outfit.

"We're done!"

I walked back inside. Mitsuuru wore the maid outfit as expected, though he looked a little red in the face. All other comments aside, this pointless outfit just managed to make him look cuter.

"Um, I'll just-... I'll get the tea prepared then."

I watched as he nervously grabbed cups from the shelf and started pouring tea. Then a sharp pain met my head, namely my scalp. Apparently Haruki yanked on my hair again. "Hair needs to be a pullstring again. Oh, and you're drooling."

I scowled at him, wiping the drool off my chin.
"Better." Haruki said, walking to the computer desk and putting on his red armband labeled "Chief". He sat down at the rolling computer chair and stared across the room.

So now I know that I naturally drool when staring at Asahina-sempai too long. Even if there were other girls that would do the same, I found myself slightly embarrassed. Drooling is reserved for my pillow when I sleep, and solely for my pillow alone.

Realizing his other comment about my hair, and not wanting him to think that I was "seeing Nagato" again, I quickly tied my hair up. The world ending is a bad thing... I don't want to have to do that stupid thing with Haruki again in Closed Space.

The alien which I was supposedly seeing (according to Haruki and my little brother, but believe me I wasn't) in question was sitting down, reading a book in his designated corner.

"..."

Reading a thick covered book, this person was rigidly posed, examining every word on the page (and possibly even the pages themselves) in a relatively quick manner. He was none other than Nagato Yuuki, SOS Brigade saviour and full time watchdog over Haruki for the alien Data Integrated Sentient Entity. Strangely, his background makes more sense than Haruki's which makes no sense at all. This alone just confuses my mind, so I'll stop talking about that for now. It's better to just believe Haruki's mindset of him being a quiet bookworm that excels in many things.

Though from my viewpoint, I can't help but laugh at that stupid description. It's whatever.

"Hey, where's Koizumi-san?"

Haruki shot Mitsuuru a glare. The maidboy instinctively flinched.

"I-I'm not sure. I haven't seen her. It's not like her to be late."

((INCOMPLETE))

<noinclude>
{| border="1" cellpadding="5" cellspacing="0" style="margin: 1em 1em 1em 0; background: #f9f9f9; border: 1px #aaaaaa solid; padding: 0.2em; border-collapse: collapse;"
|-
| Return to [[Suzumiya_Haruki_no_Seitenkan:Volume2_Prologue|Prologue]]
| Forward to [[Suzumiya_Haruki_no_Seitenkan:Volume2_Chapter2|Chapter 2]]
|-
|}
</noinclude>

Suzumiya Haruki no Seitenkan:Volume2 Chapter1

2010-08-09T03:25:04Z

RCG M3tal:

Our school, just like any other stereotypical public school in Japan, likes to host a variety of schoolwide events at random points in the year. Such as last month, where Haruki indefinitely proclaimed that the SOS Brigade would be participating in a relay for our school's athletic festival. Now, I can't say I wasn't expecting him to do something strangely bizarre like that, but what I can acknowledge as being surprising is that we blew away the track team and rugby team, with Haruki heading in the anchor position, finishing around 13 meters in front of the 2nd place runner. As a result, Haruki's club (that I totally am not in) the SOS Brigade, grew.

Let's just say this. Our reputation went from being a small candle of interest, to spreading like wildfire over the school. We won basically every event that we participated in the athletic festival, with Haruki's athletic body being the cause. The second runner, Nagato, also shares the blame. I certainly hadn't expected him to run as fast as he did. I still don't know if I should compare him to a comically fast runner straight from a cartoon, or an alien who used teleportation. Tell me before you do something like that, okay?

After the race when I asked Nagato what sort of magic he used, he replied unenthusiastically using terms like "quantum leap" and "enhanced energy measures". While I appreciated his dumbed down explanation, I still didn't quite get it. Looks like I won't be choosing science and liberal arts as my field of expertise. Oh well.

When the athletic festival ended, I gave a sigh of relief in hopes that this girl wouldn't have to do any more strenuous tasks the following month. I was sadly mistaken. North High had decided to host a cultural festival, complete with public access to school grounds. At this very moment, the entire school is preparing for such an event; the word "entire" being an over-exaggeration since the only ones actually doing work are teachers, cultural club members, and the student council.

Of course, the SOS Brigade still hasn't been officially recognised as a club, so we really had no reason to do anything. Knowing Haruki, he probably would have wanted to display some stray cat in a cage and call it an "extraterrestrial beast"; knowing full well that such an embarrassing joke would be scowled upon by those who don't get it.

By the way, Haruki and my class, Class 1-5, decided to do a simple survey. With so many people just wanting to get the cultural festival over in a simple, tireless manner, no one even proposed an idea. We didn't even know what we were going to make the survey on. Regardless of the content, no one would care about it anyways. Work hard people, and maybe we won't appear like a worthless group of idiots to the other bustling classes.

The lack of an exciting event, of course, knocked Haruki's patience off balance. This was causing him to grumble while we walked to the clubroom later that day.

"A survey is so boring" He gave a face that looked like a 12 year old would have given if his parents bought clothes for Christmas presents instead of some new toy.

'Give it a break. If it's so boring, then why didn't you speak up when we were proposing ideas for it?' In all seriousness, you should have... Okabe-sensei looked like she was ready to rip her hair out from the lack of ideas. That would not be pretty...

"I don't want to do anything with this class. It's full of boring people."

Boring people? Realize that you're apart of the class, meaning you just called yourself boring. And hold up. Aren't these the same boring people that you won the relays for in last month's athletic festival? Or was that someone else named Suzumiya Haruki.

"That's completely different?"

Sigh. Might I ask how?

"This is the cultural festival. It is the pinnacle of our school; the most exciting time of the year for its students."

It is?

"It is!" Haruki puffed up his chest in excitement, preparing to decree his word. To me. Alone.

"This is why the SOS Brigade will be doing things far more exciting and fun!" His face shone like Xerxes' when a battle was won during the Persian Wars.

----

The smile was deceptive; I knew that it was a bad omen.

During our time in the SOS Brigade, Haruki's 'fun' events were never fun. Ever. In fact, every instance was tiresome. Myself and Asahina-sempai can attest to that. Given we were always the ones who were being acted upon, but we're still human. I highly doubt Koizumi's passive behaviour counts as normal, and Nagato is an alien so he's not exactly capable of showing his exhaustion. But if he were human (with emotions), I'd think he would probably be in the same boat as the normal girl and the timetraveler.

The things I would do with timetravel... I'd love to prevent myself from meeting Haruki. That would save me from the amount of psychological trauma he oh-so-indirectly put me through. I definitely, without a doubt, don't want to go through what happened 6 months ago. That bunch of nonsense is so utterly stupid that -someone quick, give me a wall, door, or other flat-surfaced object- I want to repeatedly smash my face against anything. Well actually, there are plenty of walls around me right now...

I devised ways to completely destroy any thoughts regarding the SOS Brigade without completely terminating my number of braincells. Whilst doing so, I didn't regard any of the blabbering idiot's comments.

"Oi! Kyonko, are you listening to me?"

'No. What were you saying?'

"I was talking about the cultural festival."

'Oh... right.'

"Kyonko! Snap out of it!" Haruki yelled, yanking my hair back. As my eyes watered up from the pain, I turned to look at Haruki with now-undivided attention. "This is the cultural festival, you should be more excited!"

Easy for you to say. I rubbed the back of my head while he continued.

"You're only a first year once. Your first cultural festival is something to look forward to. It's not a cultural festival if it's not something worth going crazy over. I hear about tons of things that happen in other schools' festivals."

'So I guess your middle school was like that?'

"Nah, that was boring. We didn't do anything even remotely fun. This is why our high school experience should be something to enjoy! We get to choose what makes it fun!"

'That's not grounds of fussing over it.' I said. My hairtie ended up coming loose, so I pulled it off.

"Aha, but that's where you're wrong Kyonko." Haruki wagged his finger at me. "Festivals are the most active in the school. For that, you need to pay attention to cool things."

Like what? A motorcycle driving through the halls?

"Well if the motorcycle doesn't have a driver, then yeah! Something like that!" Haruki nodded. "Or maybe haunted houses having real monsters jump out, or ghosts actually appearing behind fortune tellers. Stairs to climb, that you walk up forever, or eagles nesting on a teacher's head. Or even better, a school gets put under attack by a mecha pilot!"

Haruki's continued ramblings eventually lost my interest around the fortune teller part. Can I get someone to send me an email containing the rest of his ideas? I'd really appreciate it? Sorry I can't give anything back in return though.

"Alright whatever. When we get to the clubroom, I'll tell you more about it."

Whatever sparked Haruki's interest had now simmered down. We continued our walk in silence, reaching the club room door in a matter of minutes. The Literature Club's number plate hanging above the door had been replaced by a piece of paper which Haruki scrawled SOS Brigade on top of. "We've been residing in this room since the school year started. It belongs to us now." With that, he replaced the plate before I could stop him. Whatever, it's not like I want to climb on top of a chair to change it or anything. In fact, standing on a chair would probably just give Haruki some stupid ideas.

Yeah. ''Those'' stupid ideas.

----

Haruki pushed the door open, giving anyone inside no time to hide anything embarrassing. Of course, the person inside wasn't able to do anything about that... he'd been forced into embarrassing costumes time and time again. Back when Haruki adopted Mitsuuru as the club's 'project' he had forced him into a ridiculous maid outfit. Thankfully, the maid outfit has since been replaced by a butler's uniform, which was what he was currently wearing. My eyes met his, and my heart skipped a beat. Asahina-sempai's face donned a smile upon seeing me. Dusting the bookshelves with a feather duster presumably got from his home, he worked like a cute little elf.

Asahina-sempai has dressed up in a number of outfits, each one more ridiculous than before. Chippendales, nurse, and even a cheerleader with a skirt. How this manages to make him more 'manly' defies all logic, but it still doesn't change his metamorphosis from student to cosplayer every day just after school in the club room. I have to say that my favorite would be the butler outfit. It's somewhat flattering towards him, and isn't at all suggestive. I'd rather not have to deal with the cheerleading outfit again though.

"Mitsuuru! I thought I told you already to wear the maid outfit! A butler is too plain."

"Eh, but I-..."

"No 'buts' about it. Get changed!"

My feet quickly turned around and walked my person out the door. I wasn't going to spectate Haruki's scary actions. Through the door, I could hear Asahina-sempai's protests, but to no avail. Forcing him into a maid uniform is just weird Haruki... just about as weird as getting me that stupid bunny girl outfit.

"We're done!"

I walked back inside. Mitsuuru wore the maid outfit as expected, though he looked a little red in the face. All other comments aside, this pointless outfit just managed to make him look cuter.

"Um, I'll just-... I'll get the tea prepared then."

I watched as he nervously grabbed cups from the shelf and started pouring tea. Then a sharp pain met my head, namely my scalp. Apparently Haruki yanked on my hair again. "Hair needs to be a pullstring again. Oh, and you're drooling."

I scowled at him, wiping the drool off my chin.
"Better." Haruki said, walking to the computer desk and putting on his red armband labeled "Chief". He sat down at the rolling computer chair and stared across the room.

So now I know that I naturally drool when staring at Asahina-sempai too long. Even if there were other girls that would do the same, I found myself slightly embarrassed. Drooling is reserved for my pillow when I sleep, and solely for my pillow alone.

Realizing his other comment about my hair, and not wanting him to think that I was "seeing Nagato" again, I quickly tied my hair up. The world ending is a bad thing... I don't want to have to do that stupid thing with Haruki again in Closed Space.

The alien which I was supposedly seeing (according to Haruki and my little brother, but believe me I wasn't) in question was sitting down, reading a book in his designated corner.

"..."

Reading a thick covered book, this person was rigidly posed, examining every word on the page (and possibly even the pages themselves) in a relatively quick manner. He was none other than Nagato Yuuki, SOS Brigade saviour and full time watchdog over Haruki for the alien Data Integrated Sentient Entity. Strangely, his background makes more sense than Haruki's which makes no sense at all. This alone just confuses my mind, so I'll stop talking about that for now. It's better to just believe Haruki's mindset of him being a quiet bookworm that excels in many things.

Though from my viewpoint, I can't help but laugh at that stupid description. It's whatever.

"Hey, where's Koizumi-san?"

Haruki shot Mitsuuru a glare. The maidboy instinctively flinched.

"I-I'm not sure. I haven't seen her. It's not like her to be late."

((INCOMPLETE))

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|-
| Return to [[Suzumiya_Haruki_no_Seitenkan:Volume2_Prologue|Prologue]]
| Forward to [[Suzumiya_Haruki_no_Seitenkan:Volume2_Chapter2|Chapter 2]]
|-
|}
</noinclude>

Suzumiya Haruki no Seitenkan:Volume2 Chapter1

2010-08-09T03:16:00Z

RCG M3tal:

Our school, just like any other stereotypical public school in Japan, likes to host a variety of schoolwide events at random points in the year. Such as last month, where Haruki indefinitely proclaimed that the SOS Brigade would be participating in a relay for our school's athletic festival. Now, I can't say I wasn't expecting him to do something strangely bizarre like that, but what I can acknowledge as being surprising is that we blew away the track team and rugby team, with Haruki heading in the anchor position, finishing around 13 meters in front of the 2nd place runner. As a result, Haruki's club (that I totally am not in) the SOS Brigade, grew.

Let's just say this. Our reputation went from being a small candle of interest, to spreading like wildfire over the school. We won basically every event that we participated in the athletic festival, with Haruki's athletic body being the cause. The second runner, Nagato, also shares the blame. I certainly hadn't expected him to run as fast as he did. I still don't know if I should compare him to a comically fast runner straight from a cartoon, or an alien who used teleportation. Tell me before you do something like that, okay?

After the race when I asked Nagato what sort of magic he used, he replied unenthusiastically using terms like "quantum leap" and "enhanced energy measures". While I appreciated his dumbed down explanation, I still didn't quite get it. Looks like I won't be choosing science and liberal arts as my field of expertise. Oh well.

When the athletic festival ended, I gave a sigh of relief in hopes that this girl wouldn't have to do any more strenuous tasks the following month. I was sadly mistaken. North High had decided to host a cultural festival, complete with public access to school grounds. At this very moment, the entire school is preparing for such an event; the word "entire" being an over-exaggeration since the only ones actually doing work are teachers, cultural club members, and the student council.

Of course, the SOS Brigade still hasn't been officially recognised as a club, so we really had no reason to do anything. Knowing Haruki, he probably would have wanted to display some stray cat in a cage and call it an "extraterrestrial beast"; knowing full well that such an embarrassing joke would be scowled upon by those who don't get it.

By the way, Haruki and my class, Class 1-5, decided to do a simple survey. With so many people just wanting to get the cultural festival over in a simple, tireless manner, no one even proposed an idea. We didn't even know what we were going to make the survey on. Regardless of the content, no one would care about it anyways. Work hard people, and maybe we won't appear like a worthless group of idiots to the other bustling classes.

The lack of an exciting event, of course, knocked Haruki's patience off balance. This was causing him to grumble while we walked to the clubroom later that day.

"A survey is so boring" He gave a face that looked like a 12 year old would have given if his parents bought clothes for Christmas presents instead of some new toy.

'Give it a break. If it's so boring, then why didn't you speak up when we were proposing ideas for it?' In all seriousness, you should have... Okabe-sensei looked like she was ready to rip her hair out from the lack of ideas. That would not be pretty...

"I don't want to do anything with this class. It's full of boring people."

Boring people? Realize that you're apart of the class, meaning you just called yourself boring. And hold up. Aren't these the same boring people that you won the relays for in last month's athletic festival? Or was that someone else named Suzumiya Haruki.

"That's completely different?"

Sigh. Might I ask how?

"This is the cultural festival. It is the pinnacle of our school; the most exciting time of the year for its students."

It is?

"It is!" Haruki puffed up his chest in excitement, preparing to decree his word. To me. Alone.

"This is why the SOS Brigade will be doing things far more exciting and fun!" His face shone like Xerxes' when a battle was won during the Persian Wars.

----

The smile was deceptive; I knew that it was a bad omen.

During our time in the SOS Brigade, Haruki's 'fun' events were never fun. Ever. In fact, every instance was tiresome. Myself and Asahina-sempai can attest to that. Given we were always the ones who were being acted upon, but we're still human. I highly doubt Koizumi's passive behaviour counts as normal, and Nagato is an alien so he's not exactly capable of showing his exhaustion. But if he were human (with emotions), I'd think he would probably be in the same boat as the normal girl and the timetraveler.

The things I would do with timetravel... I'd love to prevent myself from meeting Haruki. That would save me from the amount of psychological trauma he oh-so-indirectly put me through. I definitely, without a doubt, don't want to go through what happened 6 months ago. That bunch of nonsense is so utterly stupid that -someone quick, give me a wall, door, or other flat-surfaced object- I want to repeatedly smash my face against anything. Well actually, there are plenty of walls around me right now...

I devised ways to completely destroy any thoughts regarding the SOS Brigade without completely terminating my number of braincells. Whilst doing so, I didn't regard any of the blabbering idiot's comments.

"Oi! Kyonko, are you listening to me?"

'No. What were you saying?'

"I was talking about the cultural festival."

'Oh... right.'

"Kyonko! Snap out of it!" Haruki yelled, yanking my hair back. As my eyes watered up from the pain, I turned to look at Haruki with now-undivided attention. "This is the cultural festival, you should be more excited!"

Easy for you to say. I rubbed the back of my head while he continued.

"You're only a first year once. Your first cultural festival is something to look forward to. It's not a cultural festival if it's not something worth going crazy over. I hear about tons of things that happen in other schools' festivals."

'So I guess your middle school was like that?'

"Nah, that was boring. We didn't do anything even remotely fun. This is why our high school experience should be something to enjoy! We get to choose what makes it fun!"

'That's not grounds of fussing over it.' I said. My hairtie ended up coming loose, so I pulled it off.

"Aha, but that's where you're wrong Kyonko." Haruki wagged his finger at me. "Festivals are the most active in the school. For that, you need to pay attention to cool things."

Like what? A motorcycle driving through the halls?

"Well if the motorcycle doesn't have a driver, then yeah! Something like that!" Haruki nodded. "Or maybe haunted houses having real monsters jump out, or ghosts actually appearing behind fortune tellers. Stairs to climb, that you walk up forever, or eagles nesting on a teacher's head. Or even better, a school gets put under attack by a mecha pilot!"

Haruki's continued ramblings eventually lost my interest around the fortune teller part. Can I get someone to send me an email containing the rest of his ideas? I'd really appreciate it? Sorry I can't give anything back in return though.

"Alright whatever. When we get to the clubroom, I'll tell you more about it."

Whatever sparked Haruki's interest had now simmered down. We continued our walk in silence, reaching the club room door in a matter of minutes. The Literature Club's number plate hanging above the door had been replaced by a piece of paper which Haruki scrawled SOS Brigade on top of. "We've been residing in this room since the school year started. It belongs to us now." With that, he replaced the plate before I could stop him. Whatever, it's not like I want to climb on top of a chair to change it or anything. In fact, standing on a chair would probably just give Haruki some stupid ideas.

Yeah. ''Those'' stupid ideas.

----

Haruki pushed the door open, giving anyone inside no time to hide anything embarrassing. Of course, the person inside wasn't able to do anything about that... he'd been forced into embarrassing costumes time and time again. Back when Haruki adopted Mitsuuru as the club's 'project' he had forced him into a ridiculous maid outfit. Thankfully, the maid outfit has since been replaced by a butler's uniform, which was what he was currently wearing. My eyes met his, and my heart skipped a beat. Asahina-sempai's face donned a smile upon seeing me. Dusting the bookshelves with a feather duster presumably got from his home, he worked like a cute little elf.

Asahina-sempai has dressed up in a number of outfits, each one more ridiculous than before. Chippendales, nurse, and even a cheerleader with a skirt. How this manages to make him more 'manly' defies all logic, but it still doesn't change his metamorphosis from student to cosplayer every day just after school in the club room. I have to say that my favorite would be the butler outfit. It's somewhat flattering towards him, and isn't at all suggestive. I'd rather not have to deal with the cheerleading outfit again though.

"Mitsuuru! I thought I told you already to wear the maid outfit! A butler is too plain."

"Eh, but I-..."

"No 'buts' about it. Get changed!"

My feet quickly turned around and walked my person out the door. I wasn't going to spectate Haruki's scary actions. Through the door, I could hear Asahina-sempai's protests, but to no avail. Forcing him into a maid uniform is just weird Haruki... just about as weird as getting me that stupid bunny girl outfit.

"We're done!"

I walked back inside. Mitsuuru wore the maid outfit as expected, though he looked a little red in the face. All other comments aside, this pointless outfit just managed to make him look cuter.

"Um, I'll just-... I'll get the tea prepared then."

I watched as he nervously grabbed cups from the shelf and started pouring tea. Then a sharp pain met my head, namely my scalp. Apparently Haruki yanked on my hair again. "Hair needs to be a pullstring again. Oh, and you're drooling."

I scowled at him, wiping the drool off my chin.
"Better." Haruki said, walking to the computer desk and putting on his red armband labeled "Chief". He sat down at the rolling computer chair and stared across the room.

So now I know that I naturally drool when staring at Asahina-sempai too long. Even if there were other girls that would do the same, I found myself slightly embarrassed. Drooling is reserved for my pillow when I sleep, and solely for my pillow alone.

Realizing his other comment about my hair, and not wanting him to think that I was "seeing Nagato" again, I quickly tied my hair up. The world ending is a bad thing... I don't want to have to do that stupid thing with Haruki again in Closed Space.

The alien which I was supposedly seeing (according to Haruki and my little brother, but believe me I wasn't) in question was sitting down, reading a book in his designated corner.

"..."

Reading a thick covered book, this person was rigidly posed, examining every word on the page (and possibly even the pages themselves) in a relatively quick manner. He was none other than Nagato Yuuki, SOS Brigade saviour and full time watchdog over Haruki for the alien Data Integrated Sentient Entity. Strangely, his background makes more sense than Haruki's which makes no sense at all. This alone just confuses my mind, so I'll stop talking about that for now. It's better to just believe Haruki's mindset of him being a quiet bookworm that excels in many things.

Though from my viewpoint, I can't help but laugh at that stupid description. It's whatever.

"Hey, where's Koizumi-san?"

Haruki shot Mitsuuru a glare. The maidboy instinctively flinched.

"I-I'm not sure. I haven't seen her. It's not like her to be late."

Suzumiya Haruki no Seitenkan:Volume2 Prologue

2010-08-09T03:09:24Z

RCG M3tal:

Haruki seems like the kind of guy who wouldn't let anything bother him. But he is. The only thing that bothers him is that "this world is too damn ordinary!"

To him, the "extraordinary things" are supernatural phenomena of any kind, meaning that he often thinks weird things like "I can't believe I can't even find half a ghost anywhere!"

I should also let you know that the word "ghost" can be replaced with "alien", "time traveler", or "esper." However, it's common knowledge that things like that only appear in fiction. They simply don't exist in reality. Which means as long as Haruki continues to live in this world, he will continue to be bothered by this fact. The world is supposed to be like this; absolutely nothing out of the ordinary.

However, recent events in my life have made it very hard for me to believe these things I normally insist upon; in other words, I'm also bothered.

Because I know that aliens, time travelers, and espers do exist.

----

The following is a dialogue between Haruki and myself:

"Haruki, listen to me for once. I need to tell you something very important."

"What?"

"You've always wanted aliens, time travelers and espers to exist, right?"

"Yeah. So what?"

"And the purpose of our SOS Brigade is to find those kind of people, right?"

"Yeah, but remember, it's not enough just to find them, we have to be able to hang out together too. I wanna play the main role, not just sit on the sidelines like a good little boy."

"That's pretty much the exact opposite of what I want... sigh, whatever. Anyway, have you ever thought that those aliens, time travelers, and espers might actually be surprisingly close?"

"‘Surprisingly close?’ You’re not talking about Yuuki, Mitsuuru-kun, or Koizumi-san, are you? Because if you were, it wouldn’t be much of a ‘surprise’ then."

"Um, well... actually, I did mean to tell you that it was them all along."

"What are you, stupid or something? It can't be that easy."

"Yeah, that would be too simple by normal standards."

"Then tell me, who's the alien?"

"You probably already guessed. Nagato Yuuki is the alien. Um, how did it go again? He’s part of the… Integrated something entity... or Data something entity... something like that. Basically, he was created by aliens and given a body."

"Hmm... and what about Mitsuuru-kun?"

"He’s from the far-off future, a time-traveler."

"Then how many years into the future is he from?"

"Well, he didn't tell me that."

"Oh. I see."

"Really? You do?"

"So that means Koizumi-san is an esper?"

"Yeah, yeah! That's right!"

"Ah." Haruki's eyebrows were twitching as he spoke. He slowly stood up and then, in one quick movement, slammed his palms down on the table:

"Don't. Mess. With. Me!"

Just like that, Haruki completely discarded the truth that I had put so much effort into getting out. Oh well, I had expected this of him. Even after the three of them showed me that they were indeed an alien, a time traveler, and an esper, I still had trouble believing them. So considering that he hadn't seen what I had seen, making Haruki believe what I said was almost impossible.

What could I say, though? I’m a credible-looking person, right? And I’m only trying to tell the truth! People should believe the stuff I say!

Although, Haruki wasn't at fault here. If a nice girl came up to me and said "This person you know is actually someone unbelievable..." I'd probably also lose my temper and start yelling. If that girl said that kind of stuff to me with a straight face, I would probably think that her brain had been infected by some virus, or been addled by deadly neurotoxin. Perhaps I'd even feel sorry for her, but in any case, I don't think I would continue to talk to that girl.

Hey, right now, isn't "that girl" me?

"Listen up, Kyon, and listen carefully." Haruki stared at me with fire in his eyes, his face three inches away from mine. "It doesn't matter whether it's an alien, a time traveler, or a esper, they're not going to casually appear in front of us just like that! Do you know how precious they are? If we find them, we have to grab them by the neck, tie them up, and hang them up so they can't escape! The people that I randomly grabbed off the streets to join our club can't possibly be that rare and precious!"

Wow, Haruki actually made sense for once. Ironically enough though, they really are supernatural. In fact, I'm the only normal human in the club.

Sigh, why does this moron only have common sense when it comes to strange topics? If he'd only believe me, everything would be much simpler. At least this bogus “SOS Brigade” could disband, since it was formed for the sole purpose of finding aliens et al for Haruki. Once he finds those things, there wouldn't be any point in keeping the club around. After that, he can play with those unnatural beings all he likes, and maybe, just maybe, I’ll stay backstage and catch a few laughs.

I really hope this happens soon, because, right now, I feel like an animal trapped in a circus...

Though, if Haruki had any clue what was really going on, I don't know what the world would be like.

Oh, right. I should let you know when this dialogue took place. It happened during our second "SOS Brigade Wandering Around In The City (Temporary Name)” club event, when I talked with Haruki inside the restaurant by the station. It was my only opportunity to tell him about all the unbelievable things happening around him and he didn't take me seriously at all, but I'm fine with that. Whoever believes in that stuff so readily need to have their brain examined anyway.

I didn't bother to tell him the specifics, since too many details about something like this would only make him suspicious. Besides, I didn't understand most of the unclear explanations I heard in Nagato's apartment anyway.

"I just don't ever want to hear lame jokes like this again, okay?" Haruki drained his coke in one gulp. “Anyway, let's go! We can't separate into two groups today, so let's just wander around!”

I can't imagine where Haruki will drag me today, nor do I want to.

“Oh yeah, I forgot to bring my wallet today, so could you pay? Really? Thanks!" Completely ignoring my sputters of protest, Haruki shoved the bill towards me. “I’ll pay you back!”

No, you won’t.

While I was still staring at the eight hundred and thirty yen bill, thinking about how to protest this latest atrocity, Haruki grabbed my coffee and finished it in one gulp too. He then marched towards the exit of the restaurant, turned around, and put his hands on his hips.

“Well? Aren't you coming? Time's a-wastin'!”

I glared at him.

Half a year has already passed since then. Now that I think about it, I seem to have experienced a lot of weird stuff during these past six months. The SOS Brigade's official name is still "The Save the world by Overloading it with fun: Suzumiya Haruki's Brigade" which gives me the creeps. I have no idea where in the world this club brought fun to. I think only Haruki really felt any excitement this entire time. Plus, the club's raison d'etre is still a mystery. The original goal was something about playing with aliens, kidnapping time travelers, and battling alongside espers. However, from Haruki's perspective, this goal still hasn't been reached.

That's is because Haruki believes he hasn't met any aliens, time travelers or espers. I've tried my best, but there was nothing else I could do. I've already told him the other three members' true identities, but of course, he wouldn't believe me. So this shouldn't be my responsibility anymore, right?

Even though the SOS Brigade has failed to reach its intended goal and lost its primary reason for existence, it still hasn't been disbanded. Even now, this unrecognized organization still secretly exists in the Old Shack.

Of course, our five members, including myself, still choose to hang out in our clubroom every day. The student council, after several meetings and different levels of analysis, seems to have decided to ignore us. They didn't approve our club initiation documents, but they didn't say anything regarding our forced takeover of the Literature Club either. Maybe it's because the club's only member, Nagato Yuuki, has no problem with us being here. However, I personally believe that the student council simply does not want to get into an argument with Haruki, so they've decided to feign ignorance.

I don't think anyone in the world would intentionally step on something that says "Warning: Explodes When Stepped On" in red neon lights. And yet somehow I managed to. If I had only known all this would happen, I would not have talked to that stubborn, angry boy who put up that unfriendly expression every single day.

A normal high school girl who accidentally pressed a button that activated a time bomb, and is now being forced to carry that bomb around like some moron - that's me. And worst of all I have no idea when this time bomb named “Suzumiya Haruki” is going to explode, how much damage it will cause, or what else is inside. Even more importantly, I don't even know if this bomb is real. Maybe it's just a toy used to fool little kids.

Sigh... What am I going to do?

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| Return to [[Suzumiya_Haruki_no_Seitenkan|Main Page]]
| Forward to [[Suzumiya_Haruki_no_Seitenkan:Volume2_Chapter1|Chapter 1]]
|-
|}
</noinclude>

Suzumiya Haruki no Seitenkan:Volume2 Chapter1

2010-08-09T03:06:25Z

RCG M3tal: New page: Our school, just like any other stereotypical public school in Japan, likes to host a variety of schoolwide events at random points in the year. Such as last month, where Haruki indefinite...

Our school, just like any other stereotypical public school in Japan, likes to host a variety of schoolwide events at random points in the year. Such as last month, where Haruki indefinitely proclaimed that the SOS Brigade would be participating in a relay for our school's athletic festival. Now, I can't say I wasn't expecting him to do something strangely bizarre like that, but what I can acknowledge as being surprising is that we blew away the track team and rugby team, with Haruki heading in the anchor position, finishing around 13 meters in front of the 2nd place runner. As a result, Haruki's club (that I totally am not in) the SOS Brigade, grew.

Let's just say this. Our reputation went from being a small candle of interest, to spreading like wildfire over the school. We won basically every event that we participated in the athletic festival, with Haruki's athletic body being the cause. The second runner, Nagato, also shares the blame. I certainly hadn't expected him to run as fast as he did. I still don't know if I should compare him to a comically fast runner straight from a cartoon, or an alien who used teleportation. Tell me before you do something like that, okay?

After the race when I asked Nagato what sort of magic he used, he replied unenthusiastically using terms like "quantum leap" and "enhanced energy measures". While I appreciated his dumbed down explanation, I still didn't quite get it. Looks like I won't be choosing science and liberal arts as my field of expertise. Oh well.

When the athletic festival ended, I gave a sigh of relief in hopes that this girl wouldn't have to do any more strenuous tasks the following month. I was sadly mistaken. North High had decided to host a cultural festival, complete with public access to school grounds. At this very moment, the entire school is preparing for such an event; the word "entire" being an over-exaggeration since the only ones actually doing work are teachers, cultural club members, and the student council.

Of course, the SOS Brigade still hasn't been officially recognised as a club, so we really had no reason to do anything. Knowing Haruki, he probably would have wanted to display some stray cat in a cage and call it an "extraterrestrial beast"; knowing full well that such an embarrassing joke would be scowled upon by those who don't get it.

By the way, Haruki and my class, Class 1-5, decided to do a simple survey. With so many people just wanting to get the cultural festival over in a simple, tireless manner, no one even proposed an idea. We didn't even know what we were going to make the survey on. Regardless of the content, no one would care about it anyways. Work hard people, and maybe we won't appear like a worthless group of idiots to the other bustling classes.

The lack of an exciting event, of course, knocked Haruki's patience off balance. This was causing him to grumble while we walked to the clubroom later that day.

"A survey is so boring" He gave a face that looked like a 12 year old would have given if his parents bought clothes for Christmas presents instead of some new toy.

'Give it a break. If it's so boring, then why didn't you speak up when we were proposing ideas for it?' In all seriousness, you should have... Okabe-sensei looked like she was ready to rip her hair out from the lack of ideas. That would not be pretty...

"I don't want to do anything with this class. It's full of boring people."

Boring people? Realize that you're apart of the class, meaning you just called yourself boring. And hold up. Aren't these the same boring people that you won the relays for in last month's athletic festival? Or was that someone else named Suzumiya Haruki.

"That's completely different?"

Sigh. Might I ask how?

"This is the cultural festival. It is the pinnacle of our school; the most exciting time of the year for its students."

It is?

"It is!" Haruki puffed up his chest in excitement, preparing to decree his word. To me. Alone.

"This is why the SOS Brigade will be doing things far more exciting and fun!" His face shone like Xerxes' when a battle was won during the Persian Wars.

----

The smile was deceptive; I knew that it was a bad omen.

During our time in the SOS Brigade, Haruki's 'fun' events were never fun. Ever. In fact, every instance was tiresome. Myself and Asahina-sempai can attest to that. Given we were always the ones who were being acted upon, but we're still human. I highly doubt Koizumi's passive behaviour counts as normal, and Nagato is an alien so he's not exactly capable of showing his exhaustion. But if he were human (with emotions), I'd think he would probably be in the same boat as the normal girl and the timetraveler.

The things I would do with timetravel... I'd love to prevent myself from meeting Haruki. That would save me from the amount of psychological trauma he oh-so-indirectly put me through. I definitely, without a doubt, don't want to go through what happened 6 months ago. That bunch of nonsense is so utterly stupid that -someone quick, give me a wall, door, or other flat-surfaced object- I want to repeatedly smash my face against anything. Well actually, there are plenty of walls around me right now...

I devised ways to completely destroy any thoughts regarding the SOS Brigade without completely terminating my number of braincells. Whilst doing so, I didn't regard any of the blabbering idiot's comments.

"Oi! Kyonko, are you listening to me?"

'No. What were you saying?'

"I was talking about the cultural festival."

'Oh... right.'

"Kyonko! Snap out of it!" Haruki yelled, yanking my hair back. As my eyes watered up from the pain, I turned to look at Haruki with now-undivided attention. "This is the cultural festival, you should be more excited!"

Easy for you to say. I rubbed the back of my head while he continued.

"You're only a first year once. Your first cultural festival is something to look forward to. It's not a cultural festival if it's not something worth going crazy over. I hear about tons of things that happen in other schools' festivals."

'So I guess your middle school was like that?'

"Nah, that was boring. We didn't do anything even remotely fun. This is why our high school experience should be something to enjoy! We get to choose what makes it fun!"

'That's not grounds of fussing over it.' I said. My hairtie ended up coming loose, so I pulled it off.

"Aha, but that's where you're wrong Kyonko." Haruki wagged his finger at me. "Festivals are the most active in the school. For that, you need to pay attention to cool things."

Like what? A motorcycle driving through the halls?

"Well if the motorcycle doesn't have a driver, then yeah! Something like that!" Haruki nodded. "Or maybe haunted houses having real monsters jump out, or ghosts actually appearing behind fortune tellers. Stairs to climb, that you walk up forever, or eagles nesting on a teacher's head. Or even better, a school gets put under attack by a mecha pilot!"

Haruki's continued ramblings eventually lost my interest around the fortune teller part. Can I get someone to send me an email containing the rest of his ideas? I'd really appreciate it? Sorry I can't give anything back in return though.

"Alright whatever. When we get to the clubroom, I'll tell you more about it."

Whatever sparked Haruki's interest had now simmered down. We continued our walk in silence, reaching the club room door in a matter of minutes. The Literature Club's number plate hanging above the door had been replaced by a piece of paper which Haruki scrawled SOS Brigade on top of. "We've been residing in this room since the school year started. It belongs to us now." With that, he replaced the plate before I could stop him. Whatever, it's not like I want to climb on top of a chair to change it or anything. In fact, standing on a chair would probably just give Haruki some stupid ideas.

Yeah. ''Those'' stupid ideas.

----

Haruki pushed the door open, giving anyone inside no time to hide anything embarrassing. Of course, the person inside wasn't able to do anything about that... he'd been forced into embarrassing costumes time and time again. Back when Haruki adopted Mitsuuru as the club's 'project' he had forced him into a ridiculous maid outfit. Thankfully, the maid outfit has since been replaced by a butler's uniform, which was what he was currently wearing. My eyes met his, and my heart skipped a beat. Asahina-sempai's face donned a smile upon seeing me. Dusting the bookshelves with a feather duster presumably got from his home, he worked like a cute little elf.

Asahina-sempai has dressed up in a number of outfits, each one more ridiculous than before. Chippendales, nurse, and even a cheerleader with a skirt. How this manages to make him more 'manly' defies all logic, but it still doesn't change his metamorphosis from student to cosplayer every day just after school in the club room. I have to say that my favorite would be the butler outfit. It's somewhat flattering towards him, and isn't at all suggestive. I'd rather not have to deal with the cheerleading outfit again though.

"Mitsuuru! I thought I told you already to wear the maid outfit! A butler is too plain."

"Eh, but I-..."

"No 'buts' about it. Get changed!"

My feet quickly turned around and walked my person out the door. I wasn't going to spectate Haruki's scary actions. Through the door, I could hear Asahina-sempai's protests, but to no avail. Forcing him into a maid uniform is just weird Haruki... just about as weird as getting me that stupid bunny girl outfit.

"We're done!"

I walked back inside. Mitsuuru wore the maid outfit as expected, though he looked a little red in the face. All other comments aside, this pointless outfit just managed to make him look cuter.

"Um, I'll just-... I'll get the tea prepared then."

I watched as he nervously grabbed cups from the shelf and started pouring tea. Then a sharp pain met my head, namely my scalp. Apparently Haruki yanked on my hair again. "Hair needs to be a pullstring again. Oh, and you're drooling."

I scowled at him, wiping the drool off my chin. Pulling the hairtie from my pocket, I quickly tied my hair up again.

"Better." Haruki said, walking to the computer desk and putting on his red armband labeled "Chief". He sat down at the rolling computer chair and stared across the room.

So now I know that I naturally drool when staring at Asahina-sempai too long. Even if there were other girls that would do the same, I found myself slightly embarrassed. Drooling is reserved for my pillow when I sleep, and solely for my pillow alone.

Realizing his other comment about my hair, and not wanting him to think that I was "seeing Nagato" again, I quickly tied my hair up. The world ending is a bad thing... I don't want to have to do that stupid thing with Haruki again in Closed Space.

The alien which I was supposedly seeing (according to Haruki and my little brother, but believe me I wasn't) in question was sitting down, reading a book in his designated corner.

"..."

Reading a thick covered book, this person was rigidly posed, examining every word on the page (and possibly even the pages themselves) in a relatively quick manner. He was none other than Nagato Yuuki, SOS Brigade saviour and full time watchdog over Haruki for the alien Data Integrated Sentient Entity. Strangely, his background makes more sense than Haruki's which makes no sense at all. This alone just confuses my mind, so I'll stop talking about that for now. It's better to just believe Haruki's mindset of him being a quiet bookworm that excels in many things.

Though from my viewpoint, I can't help but laugh at that stupid description. It's whatever.

"Hey, where's Koizumi-san?"

Haruki shot Mitsuuru a glare. The maidboy instinctively flinched.

"I-I'm not sure. I haven't seen her. It's not like her to be late."

Suzumiya Haruki no Seitenkan:Volume1 Chapter1

2010-05-23T21:26:34Z

RCG M3tal: Reinsertion of the "Marry Me" quote. It may be retarded, but later chapters have parts that make no sense without. The Russian connotation "comrade" is equally stupid, and doujinshi used "bride" line?

And so, I entered the senior high school in my area.

At that point, I’d already begun to regret this decision. My new school sat on top of a very high hill, and, even in the spring weather, students would become hot and sweaty just from climbing the steep road. Looks like I won’t be able to leisurely walk to school as I was planning to. Every time this thought rose to my head, along with the fact that I would have to walk up this hill every day for the next three years, I became tired and depressed, which is why I overslept a bit today. I was beating myself over the head for not studying harder in middle school. Had I done so, I might have gotten into a better school that was not at the top of Mount Everest. I suppose this is why people in fiction invent teleporters. All of this was just too depressing.

All this was part of the reason for my lone grim face in the, pointless, time-wasting entrance ceremony. Everyone else in the room had that "starting a new journey" look on their face; you know, the unique "hopeful, yet filled with uncertainty" look that every new student wears when they enter a new school. Honestly though, they look kind of stupid with those sparkling eyes. As for me, I had no strange ideas — a lot of my old classmates from my junior high school were also coming to this school. Added to that, a few of my friends were also here. As a result, I didn't look as worried, or excited, as other people.

The guys were wearing the more modern sport jackets, and we, the girls, were wearing the traditional sailor uniform, a pretty weird combination. Maybe some of the teachers standing behind the snore inducing, boring-as-hell principal giving a speech on the stage had some sort of fetish for sailor uniforms. At this point, I really wished that I had gotten into a school that had business suits as the girl's uniform instead. Maybe I should organize a petition and get all the other girls to sign it… no, that’d be too much work.

As I was thinking about these useless things, the boring ceremony finally ended, (why do we need to sit through these things again?) and I, along with my not-so-willing new classmates, entered the 1-5 classroom.

Our homeroom teacher, Okabe-sensei, with her practiced-for-an-hour-in-front-of-a-mirror smile, walked to the front of the class and gave a self-introduction. She first said that she was a PE teacher, and was the managing teacher for the girls’ handball team. Then she moved on to stuff like how, back when she was in university, she used to play on the women's handball team, and even won the championship, and that this school seriously lacked handball players, so whoever entered the team would become a regular instantly. She sounds really desperate. Guess there’s not much support for handball here... She went on to say stuff like how handball was the most interesting sport in all the world and on and on. Just when I thought that the mind-numbing handball dialogue would never end, she suddenly blurted out:

"Now, let's all introduce ourselves!"

This kind of thing was pretty much the norm, though, so I wasn't surprised at all.

One by one, the people on the left side of the class started to introduce themselves. They raised their hand, announced their name, the name of their old school, and other inconsequential stuff, such as a hobby or favorite food. Some people mumbled their way through it, a few had some pretty interesting introductions, while some tried to tell lame jokes that suddenly made the temperature in the classroom drop. As the people in my row started to introduce themselves, my turn was approaching. I couldn’t help it, I was starting to get nervous.

After I managed to finish my carefully planned, minimal-length introduction without faltering over my words too much, I sat down, feeling the relief you get after having finished something unpleasant but necessary.

------

I will never forget these next few moments, no matter how hard I try.

------

The person behind me stood up for his turn said the words that would be the topic of conversation at North High for quite a long time to come.

"My name is Suzumiya Haruki. I graduated from East Junior High."

Up to this point, the introduction was still normal, still ordinary, so I saw no point in turning around to look at him. I just stared at the front and listened to his deep, clear voice.

"Normal humans do not interest me! If anyone here is an alien, a time traveler, a slider, or an esper, then come! Be my bride! That is all." 

Eh?

What's this… so early in the morning?

Upon hearing something as off-the-wall as that, there’s no way I couldn't help but turn around.

He was tall, not gigantic, but he stood out. He had long dark hair that came down past his neck. His angular face was filled with daring and challenge as the rest of the class stared at him. His seriousness and zeal shone through his cold, glinting eyes and long eyebrows. His lips were tightly pursed in a frown.

This was my first impression of Suzumiya Haruki.

Haruki, with eyes of cold fire, scanned the class slowly, stopped to glare at me (my mouth was hanging open), and then sat down and crossed his arms without so much as a smile.

Was he trying to be dramatic? But it sounded more like he was challenging someone to a duel... Did he overdose on shounen manga?

At that moment, I believe everyone there had the same question: "Is he serious? Should I laugh?" No one really knew.

Well, I guess he wasn't trying to be dramatic or funny, as Haruki always has that somber face on.

He is always serious.

This is based on experience—I can't be wrong.

After the mythical fairies of silence danced around the classroom for thirty-something seconds, the homeroom teacher, obviously flustered, signaled the next person to continue, and the tense atmosphere, thankfully, lifted.

------

That’s how we met.

How entirely unforgettable that was. Given the choice, I really want to believe that this was all just a coincidence.

------

After grabbing everyone's attention on the first day, Haruki reverted to being an ordinary high school student.

This was only the calm before the storm. Looking back, I finally understand it all.

Everyone here at this school came from one of the four junior high schools in the city— people with average grades. This, obviously, included East Junior High; so there should be people in the class who graduated with Haruki, who knew what his stoicism symbolized. Unfortunately for me, I did not know any former East Junior High students. No one could have explained to me how serious the situation really was. As a result, a few days after that explosive introduction, I did something I would never forget—I tried to talk to him before class.

My metaphorical dominoes of misfortune had begun to fall, and I was the person who pushed the first block! All of this is my fault!

Because, you see, when Haruki sits in silence in his seat, he looks just like a normal, good-looking guy. Besides, he seemed interesting enough, and sitting in front of him was a good enough reason to strike up a conversation. Argh, I’m so naïve! Somebody, anybody, please, slap some sense into me!

Of course, I started the conversation with that incident.

"Hi!"

I casually turned my head around, with an airy smile all over my face.

"The stuff you said, back in your introduction, was all that serious?"

With his arms crossed on his chest, lips pursed together, Suzumiya Haruki kept his posture, then stared right into my eyes.

"What 'stuff in my introduction'?"

"The stuff about the aliens."

"Do you happen to be an alien?"

He looked very serious.

"Well, um... No."

"If you are not, then what business do you have with me?"

"...N-Nothing."

"Then don't bother talking to me. You are a waste of time."

His glare was so cold that I found myself stuttering "sorry" before realizing it. Suzumiya Haruki then removed his glare from me, contemptuously and, looking up, started to frown at the ceiling.

I had considered trying to whip back a line or two, but I couldn't think of anything good to say, especially after being called a “waste of time”. Thankfully, at that moment the homeroom teacher came into the classroom and saved me from thinking about it any longer.

I turned my head back to my desk, full of melancholy, and noticed that a few people were staring at me with looks of great interest on their faces. This, obviously, made me feel pretty annoyed and slightly on the embarrassed side. After I stared back at them, however, I noticed that they all had the same, feeble-looking expression on their faces. Some even nodded at me with sympathy.

Like I said, at first I felt pretty damn irritated, but later on I learned that all those people graduated from East Junior High.

Given that my first encounter with Haruki had ended horribly, I figured that I should keep my distance from him for now, for the sake of both my safety and my dignity. With that precaution on my mind, a week passed by.

But, just as I was still part of this class, there were always people who wanted to talk to the eyebrow-locking, shut-mouthed, glowering Haruki. Sucks to be them.

Most of the people were sports-obsessed, delinquent-looking guys; I guess they saw a fellow kinsman in the tall, well-built Haruki. This would be perfectly fine if Haruki actually was a sports-maniac or a delinquent.

"Hey, did you see the game last night? The one that went on for an hour without a single goal scored?"

"No."

"Eh, but, why?"

"I do not know."

“Aw, that’s too bad. You should check out the game next week, though. I hear they’re really going—“

"Go away! You are annoying!"

That's how it went.

Couldn’t he just answer “no” with that poker face on? No, he had to show his lack of patience in both his expression and his voice. This only made his victim believe that they did something wrong. At the end they could only say "I see... then I'll just...", and ask themselves "What did I say that was so wrong?" and slink away.

Hey, don't look so sad; you didn't say anything wrong. If you ask me, the problem here is with Suzumiya Haruki's brain, not yours.

------

Even though I don’t mind eating alone, I didn't want others to think that I was some loser girl that nobody liked when everybody else was cheerfully eating their lunch with their friends. That's why, even though I didn't care if others didn’t understand, I ate my lunch together with my junior high school friend Kunikida and an East Junior High graduate named Taniguchi, who sat close to me.

We started to talk about Haruki.

"Did you try to talk to Suzumiya?" Taniguchi asked, a deceptively innocent smile on her face. I nodded.

"And then he said some crazy stuff and really you didn't know how to react?"

"That's what happened."

Taniguchi put her sliced boiled egg into her mouth, chewed, and said:
"Well, he wouldn’t be interested in you anyway, considering your figure. Personally, I advise you to give up! Not even pretty girls can attract the attention of this guy."

Excuse me?

Isn't there a saying, "With friends like these..."?

"I was in his class three years in a row; I know how he is." She used this line as the beginning of her speech. "He always does the weirdest things. I thought he’d at least tone it down a bit when he got into senior high; apparently, he hasn't. You heard him in his introduction, right?"

"You mean the alien stuff?"

Kunikida, who had been picking bones out of her fried fish, looked up, intrigued.

"Yeah, that. Even back in junior high, he always said and did lots of bizarre stuff. For example, there was the School Vandalization Incident!"

"What happened?"

"You know that one thing that that uses plaster dust to draw lines on the sports field? Um… what was it called again? Anyway, he sneaked into school late at night and, with, that, um, whatever it was, drew a huge, huge symbol in the middle of the field."

Taniguchi had an impish smile on her face— she was probably remembering the incident.

"It was so amazing. I went to school early that morning, and all I saw were big circles and triangles. I couldn't figure out what they were supposed to be, so I went up to the fourth floor to get a better view. That didn't help— I still didn't know what that symbol was."

"Ah, I think I saw that before. Didn't the newspaper have a story on it? It even had a helicopter view of it! The symbol looked like a broken Nazca pictogram," Kunikida said.

...I don't remember hearing about that.

"I saw the article, I saw it. The headline was something like 'Mystery Vandal Strikes Junior High At Night,' right? Well, care to guess who pulled that stunt?"

"It was him, right?"

"He admitted it himself. There's no mistaking it. Naturally, he got called into the principal's office. Every teacher was there, questioning him on why he did it."

"Why did he do it, then?"

"I have no idea," Taniguchi answered flatly, as she tried to swallow a mouthful of rice. "I heard he refused to say anything. You’ve seen what he’s like... he never says anything unless he considers it important. Someone said that he drew the symbol to call out to UFOs, others said that it was a magic symbol and was used in summoning monsters, or that he was trying to open a portal to another world, and so on... There were a lot of rumors, but as long as Suzumiya himself refuses to talk, we may never know if they’re true or not. To this very day, it's still a mystery."

For some reason, the picture of Haruki, with his straightforward look, drawing strange shapes in the middle of the school field at night, floated into my mind. He definitely prepared the drawing tools and the limestone powders beforehand in the storage room; maybe he even bought a flashlight! Under its dim yellow light, Suzumiya Haruki looked very serene and tragic, his head thrown back, look up at the sky, just waiting and waiting...

No, that’s just my imagination going to a weird place.

Really, Suzumiya Haruki was probably really doing it to summon UFOs or monsters, or even a portal to another world. Maybe he wanted to fight whatever showed up? But after all that work, nothing came of it, and he must have been left with feelings of boredom and melancholy. That’s what I thought.

"And that's not the only thing he did!" Taniguchi continued to gobble down her lunch. "This one time, I came to the classroom in the morning and discovered that all the desks were moved outside, or that there were these printed stars on the school roof. Another time he was going around the school slapping O-fuda onto the walls and ceiling... you know, those Chinese ones where you put the paper talisman on a vampire's forehead. I totally don’t get him."

Suzumiya Haruki was not inside the classroom at this point, or else we probably wouldn't have been having this conversation. But then again, even if he did hear us, he probably wouldn't have cared. Usually, Suzumiya Haruki marched out of the classroom immediately after fourth period, then came back right before the fifth. He didn't seem to have a lunch box, so I had assumed that he went to the cafeteria to eat; but it doesn't take the whole hour to eat lunch, does it? Furthermore, he vanishes right at the end of every period. Where the heck does he go...?

"He’s still pretty popular, though!” Taniguchi winked. "He’s athletic, smart, and pretty cute too. Even if he’s nuts, some girls think that makes him mysterious or something. And his 'lone wolf' attitude adds plenty of points too." 

"So how do you know all of this?" Kunikida asked, with her lunch box twice as full as Taniguchi's. 

"Well, for a while, he randomly started asking girls out, non-stop. From what I heard, the longest relationship lasted a week, the shortest one ended 5 minutes after he asked her. In addition, the only reason Suzumiya gave for dumping his girlfriends was 'I don’t have time to socialize with ordinary humans! You're a waste of time!’"

That line again, huh? That guy really has no sense of tact, does he? If it's any consolation to those countless broken hearts, they're not missing out on much.

Taniguchi seemed to be speaking from experience. After she noticed my stare, she blushed and sputtered.

"I heard all of this from other people! I’m not lying! I-It’s just, for some reason, he just asked out girls at random! But by the third year, everyone had finally started to stay away from him; so no one got asked out anymore. Although, I have a funny feeling that history will repeat itself in senior high… I’m warning you now, Kyon, stay away from him! This is coming from someone who was in the same class as he was."

Say whatever you want. I’m not interested in him anyway. Besides, aren’t I “not good looking enough”, according to you?

Taniguchi put her empty lunch-box back into her bag, and let out a giggle.

"Now, if there's one guy I'd like to date, it'd be him, Asakura Ryou."

Taniguchi nodded towards a group of guys a few desks away. In the middle of the conversing group, with a calm, pleasant smile on his face, was Asakura Ryou.

"Judging from my inspection, he definitely enters my 'Top Ten Hottest First Year Guys' list."

"You have a list?" I asked, incredulous.

"I group guys into A to D categories and, believe me, I only pay attention to the A guys. You only get to go through high school life once— I want mine to be as fun as possible."

"Then that Asakura Ryou is an A then?" Kunikida asked.

"He's an AA+! Come on, just look at his face, his personality must be first class! I even hear he's in the kendo club! Plus, he's got a great butt, too."

I really don't need to hear this... or rather, I don't need you to tell me...

But Taniguchi was right, you couldn't deny that Asakura Ryou was a different kind of guy than Suzumiya Haruki was.

First and most obviously, he was very handsome; and he always smiled, giving off the impression of great compassion towards everybody. Second, Taniguchi's description of his personality was actually pretty accurate. These days no one dared to talk to Suzumiya Haruki anymore, except for Asakura Ryou. No matter how rude Suzumiya Haruki was, Asakura Ryou still tried to talk to him from time to time. He was so fervent in the matter that he almost acted like the class president. Third, from the way he answered teachers' questions in class, you could see that he was very smart. He always answered the questions correctly — in the eyes of the teachers he was probably a model student. To top it off, he was looked up to by many of the male students. The term had only been going for a week, and he was already well on his way to becoming the idol of all the guys, who seemed to think of him as their feudal lord. I think the Greeks had a word for that kind of adoration... I can't remember.

Asakura Ryou was one of the few guys I’d ever seen who looked like the stereotypical 'handsome prince' from the cartoons I’d watched as a little girl. That charming smile, that calm appearance… Compared to him, Suzumiya Haruki was just a science fiction obsessed weirdo.

I guess it’s a good thing I don’t have magical powers. If I did, Suzumiya would probably carry me off to be his bride... 

------

It was still April then, and Suzumiya hadn't started acting up yet. Which meant there was still a month of peace and relaxation. Unfortunately, I didn’t know I only had a month left before Haruki would start going off his rocker.

Even during that short time, though, I'd already observed some of Haruki’s more eccentric behaviors.

Attention! The following is a list of Haruki's Peculiarities.

Peculiarity #1: Every day, his hairstyle changed. Added to this, from my observations, there was sort of a weird pattern to it all. On Monday, Haruki would come to school with his hair down. On Tuesday, there’d be a single spike gelled up on the back of his head. On the next day, there'd be two spikes, the day after, three; by Friday, there were four spikes, one on each cardinal direction of his head. Was that supposed to signify something?

So Monday, zero. Tuesday, one. Wednesday, two...

As the day of the week increased, so would the number of hair spikes; by next Monday, the whole crazy process would start again. I couldn’t see any reason for it. Following that pattern, he should have six spikes on Sunday...

...I suddenly wanted to see how his head looks then. Probably like some typical shonen anime character.

Peculiarity #2:For Phys Ed, classes 1-5 and 1-6 would combine and have Phys ED together. When we changed clothes, the girls would go to the 1-6 classroom, and the boys would go to the 1-5 classroom; meaning at the end of the period, the girls from our class (1-5) would move to the other room to change.

Unfortunately for my poor sanity, Haruki would completely ignore these conventions and start stripping before the girls had even left.

Wearing his usual scowl, he’d just start taking off his shirt, before pulling off his pants and getting into his gym gear. He would ignore us all, as if we were just trees and bushes.

Most of the girls were completely confused, while a shameful few couldn’t help but squeal in delight. It was up to Asakura Ryou to escort all the girls, myself included, out.

According to gossip, the other guys in the class led by Asakura Ryou attempted to talk Haruki out of that kind of behaviour, but he ignored them. Something about “the male body being nothing to be ashamed of”. Every PE lesson, Haruki would totally ignore everyone else and take off his clothes without so much as a glance. So, in order to preserve the purity of our maiden eyes, we girls would leave the classroom as soon as the bell rang.

Seriously, though, Haruki is pretty well built... argh, what am I saying?

Peculiarity #3: At the end of every period, Haruki would go missing. When the school bell came rolling around, he’d immediately grab his school bag and march out of the classroom. I’d have thought that he’d go straight home; but to my amazement, he joined and quit every single club in the school. One day, you’d see him shooting hoops in the Basketball Club, and the next you’d see him making an urn in the Pottery Club. The following day, you might see him waving a stick at the opposing team in the Hockey Club, or smacking home runs in the Baseball Club. Now I can see why those sports jocks tried to talk to him... All the clubs tried to persuade him into joining them permanently, but he turned each and every one of them down. His explanation went along the lines of "Doing the same thing every day is boring! I need new experiences!". So in the end, he didn't join any of the clubs.

What exactly is he trying to do?

Thanks to this kind of stuff, gossip about the "bizarre first year guy" spread throughout the school almost instantly. Within a month, there wasn't a single person in our school who didn't know who Suzumiya Haruki was. By May, people might still not have known the name of our principal, but Suzumiya Haruki had practically become a household name.

So, with all this kind of stuff going on— and Haruki always at the root of it all— May arrived.

------

When it comes to fate, I'm more inclined to believe in the existence of the Loch Ness Monster. You see, unlike some girls I know, I don't think that there's a red string of fate tying me to my one true love, nor do I like reading my fortunes in magazines. Nevertheless, if destiny is actively influencing human lives, my metaphorical wheel of fate had probably begun to turn.
…No, that’s just stupid.

After the end of the vacation for Golden Week, I trudged off to school, not sure what day of the week it was. The unnaturally bright, sunny weather blasted my skin and made me drip with sweat— I had already had a shower this morning and already I wanted another one. This stupid hill the size of Kilimanjaro just makes it worse; it never seemed to end. Why does the Earth make me suffer so? Haven't we stopped sacrificing young girls in the name of natural forces a long time ago?

"Hi, Kyon!"

Somebody hugged me from behind. It was Taniguchi. Her uniform was untidy and looked like it hadn’t been ironed or washed in a while, and she didn't even bother to tie her collar ribbon.

"Where did you go for Golden Week?" she asked casually.

"My parents took me and my little brother to see my grandpa in the countryside."

"That’s boring!"

"Fine, then what did you do?" I retorted.

"I got a part-time job."

Probably at a brothel somewhere. "Really? Working doesn’t seem to suit you at all."

"Kyon, you’re in senior high now— why do you gotta go with your little brother to see your grandpa and grandma? You should be hanging out with your girlfriends or something."

Kyon, by the way, is my nickname. A few years back, my long-time-no-see good-for-nothing uncle suddenly said to me "Wow, look at you, Kyon-chan! You’re all grown up!" Could he have thought of anything more embarrassing? My little brother thought it was funny and also started to call me Kyon. After that, the rest is history— my friends, upon hearing my brother calling me Kyon, decided to follow his lead. From that day on, my name became Kyon. Damn it, my brother used to call me "Onee-chan"!

"It’s a tradition of ours to have a family reunion during Golden Week." I responded indifferently as I scaled Mt. Aconcagua.

Taniguchi, full of hot air as always, boasted about how there were so many cute guys at her workplace, and how she planned to use the money she made to buy new clothes for the summer. To me, stuff like that, along with telling people about your dreams or how amazing or cute some pet is, are the dullest possible topics in the world.

So as I wondered if this was how Haruki felt when people talked to him about football, we arrived at the school gate.

------
Suzumiya Haruki was already in his seat, staring at the ceiling, when I entered the classroom. Two spikes protruded from each side of his head. I guess that means today is Wednesday. After I sat down— for some incredibly stupid, unknown reason (the only explanation being that I had completely lost it...)— I found myself once again talking to Suzumiya Haruki.

"The hair spikes, are they some sort of way to contact the aliens?"

Slowly, mechanically, Suzumiya Haruki lowered his head downward, and stared at me with deep, piercing eyes. It was actually a little frightening.

"When was it that you noticed?" His tone was so cold, I could feel the temperature drop.

I paused a while, trying to think of my answer under that glare.

"A-awhile ago, I think."

"Well..."

Haruki tipped his chair back and put his hands behind his head, looking both annoyed and bored.

"Each day of the week gives off a different image."

Is… is this the first time we’re actually having a conversation?

"Monday is yellow, Tuesday is red, Wednesday is blue, Thursday is green, Friday is gold, Saturday is brown, and Sunday is white."

I sort of understand what he’s trying to get at here.

"So that means, if we use numbers to represent each color, Monday would be zero and Sunday six, right?"

"Yes."

"Shouldn’t Monday be one, though?"

"Who asked you?"

"…Um, yeah. Right."

Haruki glared at me. I guess he wasn’t exactly pleased with my answer. As for me, I just sat there, uncomfortable under his stare.

"Have we ever met before? Long ago?"

"No, I don’t think so…"

After my answer, Okabe-sensei entered the classroom, and our first real conversation ended.

------

Though our first conversation really wasn’t anything special, it might just have been the turning point I’ve been looking for.

Of course, the only chance I could talk to Haruki was the short bit of time before home room session, as he’s never in the classroom during breaks. But, since I sit in front of him, I have a better chance of talking to him than anybody else.

What shocked me the most is that Haruki actually answered my question. I just thought that he’d go all like, “Silence! You’re a waste of time!” Am I weird enough for him to talk to or something?

So when I came to school the next day and discovered that, instead of gelling up three spikes, Haruki had gotten a haircut, I got quite depressed.

Even though he looks better without the weird spikes, he changed his hairstyle right after I talked to him about it! Just what is that supposed to mean!

However, when I asked him why, he said:

"No reason, whatsoever."

He answered with that trademark annoyed tone, but he didn’t look angry or anything. I guess he just wasn’t going to tell me his reasons.

That’s what I expected, though. So it’s all right.

------

"Is it true that you really tried to join all the clubs?"

From then on, I fell into the routine of talking to Haruki in the few minutes before homeroom. Obviously, if I didn't try to start a conversation, Haruki would just sit in his chair and stare at the ceiling. Also, were I to try to talk to him about how last night's TV show was, or how the weather is, etc.— boring topics— he’d just ignore me. With that in mind, I chose the topic of conversation carefully.

"So did you find any fun clubs? If there is, I think I’d consider joining it myself."

"None." Haruki answered, flatly. "None at all."

He emphasized this, and then slowly let out a breath. A sigh?

"My assumption was that high school wouldn’t be waste of time. Ultimately, it's just the same as mandatory education. Nothing here ever changes. Nothing here is interesting. I joined the wrong school."

Exactly what criteria did you have in mind when you decided what school to attend?

"Sports clubs and cultural clubs are exactly the same. They’re all boring. If there was some unique, exceptional club in this school, then I might consider joining. "

"Who put you in charge of deciding what clubs are interesting or not?"

"Silence! If I like a club, then it's unique; otherwise, it's plain. A waste of time."

"I knew you’d say that."

"Mmm.”

Annoyed, he looked back up at the ceiling, marking the end of the day's conversation.

On another day:

"I, um, overheard something the other day... It's not very important, but... did you really dump all your girlfriends?"

"What does it matter to you?"

He flipped a lock of hair out from in front of his face, and stared at me with those bright, cold eyes. Doesn’t his face have any other expressions besides “Angry” and “Bored”?

"Did that one girl tell you? Taniguchi, right? Why is that girl in the same class as me year after year? I hope she isn't one of those stalking psycho girls...”

Don't think so.

"I do not know what you heard, but it does not matter. Most of it is true, in any case."

"So you never met a girl you ever wanted to have a serious relationship with?"

"Not one!"

He seems to totally dismiss everything.

"Every single one of them was silly and childish! I cannot engage in a serious relationship with any of them! Each one expects to be taken out to dinner with candles! Often a sappy romantic movie beforehand, for a 'heart-pounding experience'! And at the end of the day, all they’d say is a shy 'see you tomorrow' and then walk away!"

"I don’t see much that’s wrong with that," I thought to myself; but there’s no way I’d say that out loud. If Haruki says it's bad, then it’s bad. No exceptions.

"Then, without fail, they would confess their deep love and adoration over the phone. Why could they not tell me something that important to my face?!"

I can understand how those girls felt, though. Making such an important― to them, at least― confession to someone with this strong a personality would probably make anyone feel uneasy. They probably lost their nerve just from seeing your expression, Haruki. I really hope I never have to date a guy like that.

"Yeah, you’re right. I’d ask the guy up to the school rooftop or something and tell him there."

"Who said anything about you?"

What? Did I say something wrong again?

"What I want to know is, are all girls so dimwitted and annoying? This question has been bothering me since junior high."

Hey, don’t forget who you’re talking to!

"Then, what kind of girl would be ‘interesting’ to you? An alien?"

"I am fine with aliens or similar things as long as they are not normal. Be they male or female."

"Why is it so important that they not be human?!"

Haruki looked down at me like I was a fly he wanted to squish.

"Because ordinary humans are no fun at all!"

"That’s… well, you could be right..."

I have to agree with Haruki on this one; if it turns out that some cute transfer student is half earthling and half alien, that’d be pretty cool. If Taniguchi, currently sitting next to me and stealing quick glances at Haruki and me, was secretly a magical girl who fought evil in the shadows alongside a talking lizard, it’d be even cooler. If Asakura Ryou, who for some reason keeps smiling at me, was a super-powered prince from a long-forgotten kingdom, then my school life would be as exciting as it could get.

But there’s no way that could happen— no aliens, time travelers, handsome princes, or magical powers exist in this world.

Even if they did exist, they wouldn’t just appear right in front of average people like me and go "Hello, I'm actually an alien!"

"THAT'S WHY!"

Haruki suddenly stood up and knocked his chair backwards, causing everyone to turn and look at him.

"THAT'S WHY I'M WORKING SO HARD!!" 

"Sorry I’m late!"

The always-optimistic Okabe-sensei, who looks out of breath, rushed into the classroom. When she saw the whole class looking at Haruki standing, his fists clenched, eyes closed, she became just as surprised and just stood there.

"Er... Homeroom is about… to start…"

Haruki sat down immediately and glared at the corner of his desk. Thank god…

I turned around, the whole class followed suit and turned their heads as well. Then Okabe-sensei, obviously disoriented by the commotion, wobbled to the front of the room and let out a soft cough.

"I, um, apologize for being late. Eh... Then let's begin!"

She repeats again, and the class atmosphere finally reverts back to normal— though this is the sort of atmosphere that Haruki hates the most.

Maybe that’s just the way life is?

To be honest, however, inside my heart I'm pretty jealous of Haruki's attitude towards life.

He still has the hopes that I abandoned long ago, the vain hope that he’d meet someone magically special, and he enthusiastically tries to achieve his dream. ‘If sitting around waiting is not going to achieve anything, let's meet them ourselves’! That’s why Haruki does strange things like drawing white lines on the school field, painting symbols on the school roof, and pasting cursed paper talismans everywhere.

Sigh...

I wonder when Haruki started to do weird stuff that made others brand him as an occultist? I guess he was thinking something like ‘Waiting achieves nothing, so why not perform some weird ceremonies to call them out?’ In the end, however, nothing happened. Is that why Haruki always has that "screw-everything" look on his face...?

------

"Hey, Kyon."

After class, Taniguchi, with an utterly baffled face, tried to corner me.

Taniguchi, you look like a total moron with that expression.

"Shut it! That’s not important right now. What kind of spell did you cast?"

"Spell? What spell?"

I once heard that highly advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic. I remember this as I reply. She then jabbed her finger at Haruki's empty seat.

"I’ve never seen Suzumiya talk to anybody for that long! What did you find that could possibly interest him?"

That, eh, what did we talk about? I just asked him some normal questions, that's all.

"I can’t believe it!"

Taniguchi put on an awed expression full of sarcasm. Kunikida popped out from behind her.

"It’s nothing new... Kyon has always liked weird guys like that."

Hey, wait a minute! Don't say things that'll cause a misunderstanding!

"It doesn't matter if Kyon likes weird guys, that’s not my point. What I can't understand is why Suzumiya would want to talk to Kyon! I don't get it at all."

Is no one listening to me? Hey!

"Maybe Kyon is as weird as he is?"

I am not! Stop talking about me like I’m not here.

"Probably. I mean you can't expect someone with a nickname like Kyon to be normal."

Stop calling me Kyon, Kyon, Kyon! Can’t you people use my real name instead of that overly cute nickname? At the very least, I want to hear my brother call me ‘Onee-chan’!

"Actually, I’d like to know the reason as well."

A cheerful, melodious voice came out of nowhere as a hand touched my shoulder. I lifted my head and saw Asakura Ryou's handsome smiling face.

"I tried talking to Suzumiya-kun a few times already but nothing came of it. How do you get him to talk to you so easily?"

I was so surprised that I didn't even think about his question at all.

"I dunno."

Upon hearing this, Asakura smiled.

"I feel relieved that at the very least Haruki won't go on being isolated from his classmates, so it's great that you've become his friend.”

Asakura Ryou behaves like the class president because, well, he is our class president. He was elected in our last lengthy home room session.

"F-friend, huh?"

I shook my head uncertainly. Is he really my friend? The only expression Haruki gives me whenever I talk to him is that scowl!

"You need to continue helping Suzumiya-kun so that he can get along with the rest of us. We are the same class, so I’ll be counting on you."

Even if you say that, I don’t know what I’m supposed to do!

"If there is anything I need to tell Suzumiya-kun, I’ll just ask you to pass on my message."

Wait one minute! I don’t want to be his personal secretary!

"Please?" he asked, lightly putting his palms together.

Faced with a request in that manner, the only thing I could do was give vague, uncomfortable responses like "erm" and "ahh...". Asakura took that as a yes and rewarded me with his charming, sunlight-like smile, and then went back to his desk. After noticing that a lot of the girls in the class were staring at me with angry eyes, my heart fell to the bottom of a canyon.

------

Apparently, somebody decided that the students should change seats every month. Therefore, Asakura Ryou wrote all the seat numbers onto little pieces of paper, placed them in a cookie tin, and let each of us draw from it. This could be my chance to get away from Haruki forever!

In the end, I got the seat in the second to last row next to the window that overlooks the courtyard. Guess who took the last seat right behind me? That's right. It's the ever-scowling Haruki.

Just my luck...

"Why won’t anything interesting happen here?!” He’s complaining again. “Like little grade school kids disappearing one by one and their bodies being found in the river, or maybe some teachers getting murdered inside a locked classroom! Something exciting like that!"

"Stop saying that kind of scary stuff."

"I joined the Mystery Study Group."

"Oh? What happened?"

"Nothing interesting! Furthermore, all the club members are detective novel fans but there isn't anyone there that resembles a detective!"

"Isn't that normal?"

"I actually had some hope for the Supernatural Study Group."

"Really?"

"However, they all turned out to be a bunch of occult maniacs.”

Sounds like you’d fit right in.

“Does that sound fun to you?!"

"Not really."

"Everything is too boring! Why does this school not have any decently interesting clubs?"

"Well, I guess there's not much you can do about that."

"I thought after I graduated to senior high I would encounter some good clubs, but this, this is like trying to get into the Major Leagues but then discovering that the school you're attending doesn't even have a baseball team!"

Haruki looked as if he were some sort of spectre ready to go to a hundred Buddhist monasteries to lay some curses. He stared out at the sky with utter disdain and let out a huge sigh.

Should I feel sorry for him?

I don't know what sort of clubs Haruki likes. Maybe even he doesn't know the answer. He just wants to "do something interesting." What, then, is "something interesting?” to him? Does that involve solving a murder mystery? Searching for UFOs? Or maybe even exorcism? I don’t think he has any idea either. He just wants something different in his life.

I know how that feels.

"I think it can't be helped if there aren't any."

I decided to express my opinion.

"Judging from our history," I began, "Humans are usually satisfied with the way things are at the time. However, those who aren’t will try to invent or discover something to advance their civilization. Someone wanted to fly so they invented airplanes. Someone wanted to travel easily so cars and trains were made. Those things, however, were created by people who possessed special talents. Only a genius can convert their imaginings into reality. We ordinary people should just live out our ordinary lives in an ordinary fashion. It’s not our job to act on impulse just because we feel bored." 

"Silence!"

Haruki just cut off what I thought was a really great speech, and turned his head away from me. Looks like he's in a really bad mood right now. But then again, when isn't he? I’m used to it already.

Haruki probably doesn't care about anything— unless it involves supernatural powers far surpassing reality. The world doesn't have those, however. No, really. I should know, I looked for any sign of the impossible for years.

However, I must give thanks to the laws of physics! Thanks to you, we humans can live in peace. Though I doubt Haruki would give you his gratitude.

I am normal, right?

------

Something must have triggered it.

Maybe it's the above conversation?

Because, unfortunately for me, I never saw it coming.

------

It was warm and sunny outside, so everyone in the class was getting sleepy. Just as I was nodding my head and going to sleep, a powerful force suddenly grabbed my ponytail and pulled backwards. The pain woke me up, and I instinctively grabbed my ponytail and held on tight. Awkwardly, I turned my head around, all the while trying to pull my hair back. It hurt so bad that my eyes started to tear up.

"What the hell do you think you’re doing!?" Are you in elementary school or something? Let go already!

From the edge of my field of vision, I saw Haruki, one hand grabbing my hair, smiling a big smile that was as bright as the desert sun — this is the first time I've seen him smile. If smiles can be measured in terms of temperature, then his smile was as hot as the Sahara desert.

"I got it!" 

Hey, don't spit all over me! And let go!

"Why didn't I think of this before?"

Haruki's eyes shone as brightly as the stars.

He stared at me pointedly. More worried about my hair than where this was leading to, I asked:

"What is that you finally thought of?"

"If it doesn't exist, I can just create one myself!"

"Create what?"

"A club!"

My head suddenly hurt and I don't think it had anything to do with my hair nearly being ripped out.

"Really? Wow, that’s a really excellent idea. Can you let go of my hair now?"

Haruki lessened his grip of my hair but not his excitement. 

"What's with that attitude? You should be waaay happier about something like this!"

"Look, we can talk about your wonderful idea later. Right now, I just want you to think about where we are, and then you can share your incredible joy with me. But just calm down first, okay?"

"Why? What d'you mean?"

"Class is still on."

Haruki finally let go of my ponytail. I rubbed the back of my aching head and turned around slowly. I noticed that the whole class looked completely awestruck. The freshly graduated newbie English teacher, with his chalk in his hand, stared at me and looked as if he was ready to cry.

I signaled Haruki to sit down quickly and bowed politely towards the poor teacher.

Please continue with the lesson.

I heard Haruki grumble about something and sat down unwillingly. The teacher then resumed his writing on the board...

Create a new club?

Hmmmm...

Don't tell me I'm already a member?

My aching scalp just serves to increase my feeling of unease.

<noinclude>
{| border="1" cellpadding="5" cellspacing="0" style="margin: 1em 1em 1em 0; background: #f9f9f9; border: 1px #aaaaaa solid; padding: 0.2em; border-collapse: collapse;"
|-
| Return to [[Suzumiya_Haruki_no_Seitenkan:Volume1_Prologue|Prologue]]
| Forward to [[Suzumiya_Haruki_no_Seitenkan:Volume1_Chapter2|Chapter 2]]
|-
|}
</noinclude>

Suzumiya Haruki no Seitenkan:Volume1 Chapter1

2010-05-23T21:01:43Z

RCG M3tal: There was a repeat "Haruki let go of my ponytail..." "He finally let go of my ponytail". Changed it so the first one is "lessened grip"

And so, I entered the senior high school in my area.

At that point, I’d already begun to regret this decision. My new school sat on top of a very high hill, and, even in the spring weather, students would become hot and sweaty just from climbing the steep road. Looks like I won’t be able to leisurely walk to school as I was planning to. Every time this thought rose to my head, along with the fact that I would have to walk up this hill every day for the next three years, I became tired and depressed, which is why I overslept a bit today. I was beating myself over the head for not studying harder in middle school. Had I done so, I might have gotten into a better school that was not at the top of Mount Everest. I suppose this is why people in fiction invent teleporters. All of this was just too depressing.

All this was part of the reason for my lone grim face in the, pointless, time-wasting entrance ceremony. Everyone else in the room had that "starting a new journey" look on their face; you know, the unique "hopeful, yet filled with uncertainty" look that every new student wears when they enter a new school. Honestly though, they look kind of stupid with those sparkling eyes. As for me, I had no strange ideas — a lot of my old classmates from my junior high school were also coming to this school. Added to that, a few of my friends were also here. As a result, I didn't look as worried, or excited, as other people.

The guys were wearing the more modern sport jackets, and we, the girls, were wearing the traditional sailor uniform, a pretty weird combination. Maybe some of the teachers standing behind the snore inducing, boring-as-hell principal giving a speech on the stage had some sort of fetish for sailor uniforms. At this point, I really wished that I had gotten into a school that had business suits as the girl's uniform instead. Maybe I should organize a petition and get all the other girls to sign it… no, that’d be too much work.

As I was thinking about these useless things, the boring ceremony finally ended, (why do we need to sit through these things again?) and I, along with my not-so-willing new classmates, entered the 1-5 classroom.

Our homeroom teacher, Okabe-sensei, with her practiced-for-an-hour-in-front-of-a-mirror smile, walked to the front of the class and gave a self-introduction. She first said that she was a PE teacher, and was the managing teacher for the girls’ handball team. Then she moved on to stuff like how, back when she was in university, she used to play on the women's handball team, and even won the championship, and that this school seriously lacked handball players, so whoever entered the team would become a regular instantly. She sounds really desperate. Guess there’s not much support for handball here... She went on to say stuff like how handball was the most interesting sport in all the world and on and on. Just when I thought that the mind-numbing handball dialogue would never end, she suddenly blurted out:

"Now, let's all introduce ourselves!"

This kind of thing was pretty much the norm, though, so I wasn't surprised at all.

One by one, the people on the left side of the class started to introduce themselves. They raised their hand, announced their name, the name of their old school, and other inconsequential stuff, such as a hobby or favorite food. Some people mumbled their way through it, a few had some pretty interesting introductions, while some tried to tell lame jokes that suddenly made the temperature in the classroom drop. As the people in my row started to introduce themselves, my turn was approaching. I couldn’t help it, I was starting to get nervous.

After I managed to finish my carefully planned, minimal-length introduction without faltering over my words too much, I sat down, feeling the relief you get after having finished something unpleasant but necessary.

------

I will never forget these next few moments, no matter how hard I try.

------

The person behind me stood up for his turn said the words that would be the topic of conversation at North High for quite a long time to come.

"My name is Suzumiya Haruki. I graduated from East Junior High."

Up to this point, the introduction was still normal, still ordinary, so I saw no point in turning around to look at him. I just stared at the front and listened to his deep, clear voice.

"Normal humans do not interest me! If anyone here is an alien, a time traveler, a slider, or an esper, then come! Be my comrade! That is all." 

Eh?

What's this… so early in the morning?

Upon hearing something as off-the-wall as that, there’s no way I couldn't help but turn around.

He was tall, not gigantic, but he stood out. He had long dark hair that came down past his neck. His angular face was filled with daring and challenge as the rest of the class stared at him. His seriousness and zeal shone through his cold, glinting eyes and long eyebrows. His lips were tightly pursed in a frown.

This was my first impression of Suzumiya Haruki.

Haruki, with eyes of cold fire, scanned the class slowly, stopped to glare at me (my mouth was hanging open), and then sat down and crossed his arms without so much as a smile.

Was he trying to be dramatic? But it sounded more like he was challenging someone to a duel... Did he overdose on shounen manga?

At that moment, I believe everyone there had the same question: "Is he serious? Should I laugh?" No one really knew.

Well, I guess he wasn't trying to be dramatic or funny, as Haruki always has that somber face on.

He is always serious.

This is based on experience—I can't be wrong.

After the mythical fairies of silence danced around the classroom for thirty-something seconds, the homeroom teacher, obviously flustered, signaled the next person to continue, and the tense atmosphere, thankfully, lifted.

------

That’s how we met.

How entirely unforgettable that was. Given the choice, I really want to believe that this was all just a coincidence.

------

After grabbing everyone's attention on the first day, Haruki reverted to being an ordinary high school student.

This was only the calm before the storm. Looking back, I finally understand it all.

Everyone here at this school came from one of the four junior high schools in the city— people with average grades. This, obviously, included East Junior High; so there should be people in the class who graduated with Haruki, who knew what his stoicism symbolized. Unfortunately for me, I did not know any former East Junior High students. No one could have explained to me how serious the situation really was. As a result, a few days after that explosive introduction, I did something I would never forget—I tried to talk to him before class.

My metaphorical dominoes of misfortune had begun to fall, and I was the person who pushed the first block! All of this is my fault!

Because, you see, when Haruki sits in silence in his seat, he looks just like a normal, good-looking guy. Besides, he seemed interesting enough, and sitting in front of him was a good enough reason to strike up a conversation. Argh, I’m so naïve! Somebody, anybody, please, slap some sense into me!

Of course, I started the conversation with that incident.

"Hi!"

I casually turned my head around, with an airy smile all over my face.

"The stuff you said, back in your introduction, was all that serious?"

With his arms crossed on his chest, lips pursed together, Suzumiya Haruki kept his posture, then stared right into my eyes.

"What 'stuff in my introduction'?"

"The stuff about the aliens."

"Do you happen to be an alien?"

He looked very serious.

"Well, um... No."

"If you are not, then what business do you have with me?"

"...N-Nothing."

"Then don't bother talking to me. You are a waste of time."

His glare was so cold that I found myself stuttering "sorry" before realizing it. Suzumiya Haruki then removed his glare from me, contemptuously and, looking up, started to frown at the ceiling.

I had considered trying to whip back a line or two, but I couldn't think of anything good to say, especially after being called a “waste of time”. Thankfully, at that moment the homeroom teacher came into the classroom and saved me from thinking about it any longer.

I turned my head back to my desk, full of melancholy, and noticed that a few people were staring at me with looks of great interest on their faces. This, obviously, made me feel pretty annoyed and slightly on the embarrassed side. After I stared back at them, however, I noticed that they all had the same, feeble-looking expression on their faces. Some even nodded at me with sympathy.

Like I said, at first I felt pretty damn irritated, but later on I learned that all those people graduated from East Junior High.

Given that my first encounter with Haruki had ended horribly, I figured that I should keep my distance from him for now, for the sake of both my safety and my dignity. With that precaution on my mind, a week passed by.

But, just as I was still part of this class, there were always people who wanted to talk to the eyebrow-locking, shut-mouthed, glowering Haruki. Sucks to be them.

Most of the people were sports-obsessed, delinquent-looking guys; I guess they saw a fellow kinsman in the tall, well-built Haruki. This would be perfectly fine if Haruki actually was a sports-maniac or a delinquent.

"Hey, did you see the game last night? The one that went on for an hour without a single goal scored?"

"No."

"Eh, but, why?"

"I do not know."

“Aw, that’s too bad. You should check out the game next week, though. I hear they’re really going—“

"Go away! You are annoying!"

That's how it went.

Couldn’t he just answer “no” with that poker face on? No, he had to show his lack of patience in both his expression and his voice. This only made his victim believe that they did something wrong. At the end they could only say "I see... then I'll just...", and ask themselves "What did I say that was so wrong?" and slink away.

Hey, don't look so sad; you didn't say anything wrong. If you ask me, the problem here is with Suzumiya Haruki's brain, not yours.

------

Even though I don’t mind eating alone, I didn't want others to think that I was some loser girl that nobody liked when everybody else was cheerfully eating their lunch with their friends. That's why, even though I didn't care if others didn’t understand, I ate my lunch together with my junior high school friend Kunikida and an East Junior High graduate named Taniguchi, who sat close to me.

We started to talk about Haruki.

"Did you try to talk to Suzumiya?" Taniguchi asked, a deceptively innocent smile on her face. I nodded.

"And then he said some crazy stuff and really you didn't know how to react?"

"That's what happened."

Taniguchi put her sliced boiled egg into her mouth, chewed, and said:
"Well, he wouldn’t be interested in you anyway, considering your figure. Personally, I advise you to give up! Not even pretty girls can attract the attention of this guy."

Excuse me?

Isn't there a saying, "With friends like these..."?

"I was in his class three years in a row; I know how he is." She used this line as the beginning of her speech. "He always does the weirdest things. I thought he’d at least tone it down a bit when he got into senior high; apparently, he hasn't. You heard him in his introduction, right?"

"You mean the alien stuff?"

Kunikida, who had been picking bones out of her fried fish, looked up, intrigued.

"Yeah, that. Even back in junior high, he always said and did lots of bizarre stuff. For example, there was the School Vandalization Incident!"

"What happened?"

"You know that one thing that that uses plaster dust to draw lines on the sports field? Um… what was it called again? Anyway, he sneaked into school late at night and, with, that, um, whatever it was, drew a huge, huge symbol in the middle of the field."

Taniguchi had an impish smile on her face— she was probably remembering the incident.

"It was so amazing. I went to school early that morning, and all I saw were big circles and triangles. I couldn't figure out what they were supposed to be, so I went up to the fourth floor to get a better view. That didn't help— I still didn't know what that symbol was."

"Ah, I think I saw that before. Didn't the newspaper have a story on it? It even had a helicopter view of it! The symbol looked like a broken Nazca pictogram," Kunikida said.

...I don't remember hearing about that.

"I saw the article, I saw it. The headline was something like 'Mystery Vandal Strikes Junior High At Night,' right? Well, care to guess who pulled that stunt?"

"It was him, right?"

"He admitted it himself. There's no mistaking it. Naturally, he got called into the principal's office. Every teacher was there, questioning him on why he did it."

"Why did he do it, then?"

"I have no idea," Taniguchi answered flatly, as she tried to swallow a mouthful of rice. "I heard he refused to say anything. You’ve seen what he’s like... he never says anything unless he considers it important. Someone said that he drew the symbol to call out to UFOs, others said that it was a magic symbol and was used in summoning monsters, or that he was trying to open a portal to another world, and so on... There were a lot of rumors, but as long as Suzumiya himself refuses to talk, we may never know if they’re true or not. To this very day, it's still a mystery."

For some reason, the picture of Haruki, with his straightforward look, drawing strange shapes in the middle of the school field at night, floated into my mind. He definitely prepared the drawing tools and the limestone powders beforehand in the storage room; maybe he even bought a flashlight! Under its dim yellow light, Suzumiya Haruki looked very serene and tragic, his head thrown back, look up at the sky, just waiting and waiting...

No, that’s just my imagination going to a weird place.

Really, Suzumiya Haruki was probably really doing it to summon UFOs or monsters, or even a portal to another world. Maybe he wanted to fight whatever showed up? But after all that work, nothing came of it, and he must have been left with feelings of boredom and melancholy. That’s what I thought.

"And that's not the only thing he did!" Taniguchi continued to gobble down her lunch. "This one time, I came to the classroom in the morning and discovered that all the desks were moved outside, or that there were these printed stars on the school roof. Another time he was going around the school slapping O-fuda onto the walls and ceiling... you know, those Chinese ones where you put the paper talisman on a vampire's forehead. I totally don’t get him."

Suzumiya Haruki was not inside the classroom at this point, or else we probably wouldn't have been having this conversation. But then again, even if he did hear us, he probably wouldn't have cared. Usually, Suzumiya Haruki marched out of the classroom immediately after fourth period, then came back right before the fifth. He didn't seem to have a lunch box, so I had assumed that he went to the cafeteria to eat; but it doesn't take the whole hour to eat lunch, does it? Furthermore, he vanishes right at the end of every period. Where the heck does he go...?

"He’s still pretty popular, though!” Taniguchi winked. "He’s athletic, smart, and pretty cute too. Even if he’s nuts, some girls think that makes him mysterious or something. And his 'lone wolf' attitude adds plenty of points too." 

"So how do you know all of this?" Kunikida asked, with her lunch box twice as full as Taniguchi's. 

"Well, for a while, he randomly started asking girls out, non-stop. From what I heard, the longest relationship lasted a week, the shortest one ended 5 minutes after he asked her. In addition, the only reason Suzumiya gave for dumping his girlfriends was 'I don’t have time to socialize with ordinary humans! You're a waste of time!’"

That line again, huh? That guy really has no sense of tact, does he? If it's any consolation to those countless broken hearts, they're not missing out on much.

Taniguchi seemed to be speaking from experience. After she noticed my stare, she blushed and sputtered.

"I heard all of this from other people! I’m not lying! I-It’s just, for some reason, he just asked out girls at random! But by the third year, everyone had finally started to stay away from him; so no one got asked out anymore. Although, I have a funny feeling that history will repeat itself in senior high… I’m warning you now, Kyon, stay away from him! This is coming from someone who was in the same class as he was."

Say whatever you want. I’m not interested in him anyway. Besides, aren’t I “not good looking enough”, according to you?

Taniguchi put her empty lunch-box back into her bag, and let out a giggle.

"Now, if there's one guy I'd like to date, it'd be him, Asakura Ryou."

Taniguchi nodded towards a group of guys a few desks away. In the middle of the conversing group, with a calm, pleasant smile on his face, was Asakura Ryou.

"Judging from my inspection, he definitely enters my 'Top Ten Hottest First Year Guys' list."

"You have a list?" I asked, incredulous.

"I group guys into A to D categories and, believe me, I only pay attention to the A guys. You only get to go through high school life once— I want mine to be as fun as possible."

"Then that Asakura Ryou is an A then?" Kunikida asked.

"He's an AA+! Come on, just look at his face, his personality must be first class! I even hear he's in the kendo club! Plus, he's got a great butt, too."

I really don't need to hear this... or rather, I don't need you to tell me...

But Taniguchi was right, you couldn't deny that Asakura Ryou was a different kind of guy than Suzumiya Haruki was.

First and most obviously, he was very handsome; and he always smiled, giving off the impression of great compassion towards everybody. Second, Taniguchi's description of his personality was actually pretty accurate. These days no one dared to talk to Suzumiya Haruki anymore, except for Asakura Ryou. No matter how rude Suzumiya Haruki was, Asakura Ryou still tried to talk to him from time to time. He was so fervent in the matter that he almost acted like the class president. Third, from the way he answered teachers' questions in class, you could see that he was very smart. He always answered the questions correctly — in the eyes of the teachers he was probably a model student. To top it off, he was looked up to by many of the male students. The term had only been going for a week, and he was already well on his way to becoming the idol of all the guys, who seemed to think of him as their feudal lord. I think the Greeks had a word for that kind of adoration... I can't remember.

Asakura Ryou was one of the few guys I’d ever seen who looked like the stereotypical 'handsome prince' from the cartoons I’d watched as a little girl. That charming smile, that calm appearance… Compared to him, Suzumiya Haruki was just a science fiction obsessed weirdo.

I guess it’s a good thing I don’t have magical powers. If I did, Suzumiya would probably carry me off to be his bride... 

------

It was still April then, and Suzumiya hadn't started acting up yet. Which meant there was still a month of peace and relaxation. Unfortunately, I didn’t know I only had a month left before Haruki would start going off his rocker.

Even during that short time, though, I'd already observed some of Haruki’s more eccentric behaviors.

Attention! The following is a list of Haruki's Peculiarities.

Peculiarity #1: Every day, his hairstyle changed. Added to this, from my observations, there was sort of a weird pattern to it all. On Monday, Haruki would come to school with his hair down. On Tuesday, there’d be a single spike gelled up on the back of his head. On the next day, there'd be two spikes, the day after, three; by Friday, there were four spikes, one on each cardinal direction of his head. Was that supposed to signify something?

So Monday, zero. Tuesday, one. Wednesday, two...

As the day of the week increased, so would the number of hair spikes; by next Monday, the whole crazy process would start again. I couldn’t see any reason for it. Following that pattern, he should have six spikes on Sunday...

...I suddenly wanted to see how his head looks then. Probably like some typical shonen anime character.

Peculiarity #2:For Phys Ed, classes 1-5 and 1-6 would combine and have Phys ED together. When we changed clothes, the girls would go to the 1-6 classroom, and the boys would go to the 1-5 classroom; meaning at the end of the period, the girls from our class (1-5) would move to the other room to change.

Unfortunately for my poor sanity, Haruki would completely ignore these conventions and start stripping before the girls had even left.

Wearing his usual scowl, he’d just start taking off his shirt, before pulling off his pants and getting into his gym gear. He would ignore us all, as if we were just trees and bushes.

Most of the girls were completely confused, while a shameful few couldn’t help but squeal in delight. It was up to Asakura Ryou to escort all the girls, myself included, out.

According to gossip, the other guys in the class led by Asakura Ryou attempted to talk Haruki out of that kind of behaviour, but he ignored them. Something about “the male body being nothing to be ashamed of”. Every PE lesson, Haruki would totally ignore everyone else and take off his clothes without so much as a glance. So, in order to preserve the purity of our maiden eyes, we girls would leave the classroom as soon as the bell rang.

Seriously, though, Haruki is pretty well built... argh, what am I saying?

Peculiarity #3: At the end of every period, Haruki would go missing. When the school bell came rolling around, he’d immediately grab his school bag and march out of the classroom. I’d have thought that he’d go straight home; but to my amazement, he joined and quit every single club in the school. One day, you’d see him shooting hoops in the Basketball Club, and the next you’d see him making an urn in the Pottery Club. The following day, you might see him waving a stick at the opposing team in the Hockey Club, or smacking home runs in the Baseball Club. Now I can see why those sports jocks tried to talk to him... All the clubs tried to persuade him into joining them permanently, but he turned each and every one of them down. His explanation went along the lines of "Doing the same thing every day is boring! I need new experiences!". So in the end, he didn't join any of the clubs.

What exactly is he trying to do?

Thanks to this kind of stuff, gossip about the "bizarre first year guy" spread throughout the school almost instantly. Within a month, there wasn't a single person in our school who didn't know who Suzumiya Haruki was. By May, people might still not have known the name of our principal, but Suzumiya Haruki had practically become a household name.

So, with all this kind of stuff going on— and Haruki always at the root of it all— May arrived.

------

When it comes to fate, I'm more inclined to believe in the existence of the Loch Ness Monster. You see, unlike some girls I know, I don't think that there's a red string of fate tying me to my one true love, nor do I like reading my fortunes in magazines. Nevertheless, if destiny is actively influencing human lives, my metaphorical wheel of fate had probably begun to turn.
…No, that’s just stupid.

After the end of the vacation for Golden Week, I trudged off to school, not sure what day of the week it was. The unnaturally bright, sunny weather blasted my skin and made me drip with sweat— I had already had a shower this morning and already I wanted another one. This stupid hill the size of Kilimanjaro just makes it worse; it never seemed to end. Why does the Earth make me suffer so? Haven't we stopped sacrificing young girls in the name of natural forces a long time ago?

"Hi, Kyon!"

Somebody hugged me from behind. It was Taniguchi. Her uniform was untidy and looked like it hadn’t been ironed or washed in a while, and she didn't even bother to tie her collar ribbon.

"Where did you go for Golden Week?" she asked casually.

"My parents took me and my little brother to see my grandpa in the countryside."

"That’s boring!"

"Fine, then what did you do?" I retorted.

"I got a part-time job."

Probably at a brothel somewhere. "Really? Working doesn’t seem to suit you at all."

"Kyon, you’re in senior high now— why do you gotta go with your little brother to see your grandpa and grandma? You should be hanging out with your girlfriends or something."

Kyon, by the way, is my nickname. A few years back, my long-time-no-see good-for-nothing uncle suddenly said to me "Wow, look at you, Kyon-chan! You’re all grown up!" Could he have thought of anything more embarrassing? My little brother thought it was funny and also started to call me Kyon. After that, the rest is history— my friends, upon hearing my brother calling me Kyon, decided to follow his lead. From that day on, my name became Kyon. Damn it, my brother used to call me "Onee-chan"!

"It’s a tradition of ours to have a family reunion during Golden Week." I responded indifferently as I scaled Mt. Aconcagua.

Taniguchi, full of hot air as always, boasted about how there were so many cute guys at her workplace, and how she planned to use the money she made to buy new clothes for the summer. To me, stuff like that, along with telling people about your dreams or how amazing or cute some pet is, are the dullest possible topics in the world.

So as I wondered if this was how Haruki felt when people talked to him about football, we arrived at the school gate.

------
Suzumiya Haruki was already in his seat, staring at the ceiling, when I entered the classroom. Two spikes protruded from each side of his head. I guess that means today is Wednesday. After I sat down— for some incredibly stupid, unknown reason (the only explanation being that I had completely lost it...)— I found myself once again talking to Suzumiya Haruki.

"The hair spikes, are they some sort of way to contact the aliens?"

Slowly, mechanically, Suzumiya Haruki lowered his head downward, and stared at me with deep, piercing eyes. It was actually a little frightening.

"When was it that you noticed?" His tone was so cold, I could feel the temperature drop.

I paused a while, trying to think of my answer under that glare.

"A-awhile ago, I think."

"Well..."

Haruki tipped his chair back and put his hands behind his head, looking both annoyed and bored.

"Each day of the week gives off a different image."

Is… is this the first time we’re actually having a conversation?

"Monday is yellow, Tuesday is red, Wednesday is blue, Thursday is green, Friday is gold, Saturday is brown, and Sunday is white."

I sort of understand what he’s trying to get at here.

"So that means, if we use numbers to represent each color, Monday would be zero and Sunday six, right?"

"Yes."

"Shouldn’t Monday be one, though?"

"Who asked you?"

"…Um, yeah. Right."

Haruki glared at me. I guess he wasn’t exactly pleased with my answer. As for me, I just sat there, uncomfortable under his stare.

"Have we ever met before? Long ago?"

"No, I don’t think so…"

After my answer, Okabe-sensei entered the classroom, and our first real conversation ended.

------

Though our first conversation really wasn’t anything special, it might just have been the turning point I’ve been looking for.

Of course, the only chance I could talk to Haruki was the short bit of time before home room session, as he’s never in the classroom during breaks. But, since I sit in front of him, I have a better chance of talking to him than anybody else.

What shocked me the most is that Haruki actually answered my question. I just thought that he’d go all like, “Silence! You’re a waste of time!” Am I weird enough for him to talk to or something?

So when I came to school the next day and discovered that, instead of gelling up three spikes, Haruki had gotten a haircut, I got quite depressed.

Even though he looks better without the weird spikes, he changed his hairstyle right after I talked to him about it! Just what is that supposed to mean!

However, when I asked him why, he said:

"No reason, whatsoever."

He answered with that trademark annoyed tone, but he didn’t look angry or anything. I guess he just wasn’t going to tell me his reasons.

That’s what I expected, though. So it’s all right.

------

"Is it true that you really tried to join all the clubs?"

From then on, I fell into the routine of talking to Haruki in the few minutes before homeroom. Obviously, if I didn't try to start a conversation, Haruki would just sit in his chair and stare at the ceiling. Also, were I to try to talk to him about how last night's TV show was, or how the weather is, etc.— boring topics— he’d just ignore me. With that in mind, I chose the topic of conversation carefully.

"So did you find any fun clubs? If there is, I think I’d consider joining it myself."

"None." Haruki answered, flatly. "None at all."

He emphasized this, and then slowly let out a breath. A sigh?

"My assumption was that high school wouldn’t be waste of time. Ultimately, it's just the same as mandatory education. Nothing here ever changes. Nothing here is interesting. I joined the wrong school."

Exactly what criteria did you have in mind when you decided what school to attend?

"Sports clubs and cultural clubs are exactly the same. They’re all boring. If there was some unique, exceptional club in this school, then I might consider joining. "

"Who put you in charge of deciding what clubs are interesting or not?"

"Silence! If I like a club, then it's unique; otherwise, it's plain. A waste of time."

"I knew you’d say that."

"Mmm.”

Annoyed, he looked back up at the ceiling, marking the end of the day's conversation.

On another day:

"I, um, overheard something the other day... It's not very important, but... did you really dump all your girlfriends?"

"What does it matter to you?"

He flipped a lock of hair out from in front of his face, and stared at me with those bright, cold eyes. Doesn’t his face have any other expressions besides “Angry” and “Bored”?

"Did that one girl tell you? Taniguchi, right? Why is that girl in the same class as me year after year? I hope she isn't one of those stalking psycho girls...”

Don't think so.

"I do not know what you heard, but it does not matter. Most of it is true, in any case."

"So you never met a girl you ever wanted to have a serious relationship with?"

"Not one!"

He seems to totally dismiss everything.

"Every single one of them was silly and childish! I cannot engage in a serious relationship with any of them! Each one expects to be taken out to dinner with candles! Often a sappy romantic movie beforehand, for a 'heart-pounding experience'! And at the end of the day, all they’d say is a shy 'see you tomorrow' and then walk away!"

"I don’t see much that’s wrong with that," I thought to myself; but there’s no way I’d say that out loud. If Haruki says it's bad, then it’s bad. No exceptions.

"Then, without fail, they would confess their deep love and adoration over the phone. Why could they not tell me something that important to my face?!"

I can understand how those girls felt, though. Making such an important― to them, at least― confession to someone with this strong a personality would probably make anyone feel uneasy. They probably lost their nerve just from seeing your expression, Haruki. I really hope I never have to date a guy like that.

"Yeah, you’re right. I’d ask the guy up to the school rooftop or something and tell him there."

"Who said anything about you?"

What? Did I say something wrong again?

"What I want to know is, are all girls so dimwitted and annoying? This question has been bothering me since junior high."

Hey, don’t forget who you’re talking to!

"Then, what kind of girl would be ‘interesting’ to you? An alien?"

"I am fine with aliens or similar things as long as they are not normal. Be they male or female."

"Why is it so important that they not be human?!"

Haruki looked down at me like I was a fly he wanted to squish.

"Because ordinary humans are no fun at all!"

"That’s… well, you could be right..."

I have to agree with Haruki on this one; if it turns out that some cute transfer student is half earthling and half alien, that’d be pretty cool. If Taniguchi, currently sitting next to me and stealing quick glances at Haruki and me, was secretly a magical girl who fought evil in the shadows alongside a talking lizard, it’d be even cooler. If Asakura Ryou, who for some reason keeps smiling at me, was a super-powered prince from a long-forgotten kingdom, then my school life would be as exciting as it could get.

But there’s no way that could happen— no aliens, time travelers, handsome princes, or magical powers exist in this world.

Even if they did exist, they wouldn’t just appear right in front of average people like me and go "Hello, I'm actually an alien!"

"THAT'S WHY!"

Haruki suddenly stood up and knocked his chair backwards, causing everyone to turn and look at him.

"THAT'S WHY I'M WORKING SO HARD!!" 

"Sorry I’m late!"

The always-optimistic Okabe-sensei, who looks out of breath, rushed into the classroom. When she saw the whole class looking at Haruki standing, his fists clenched, eyes closed, she became just as surprised and just stood there.

"Er... Homeroom is about… to start…"

Haruki sat down immediately and glared at the corner of his desk. Thank god…

I turned around, the whole class followed suit and turned their heads as well. Then Okabe-sensei, obviously disoriented by the commotion, wobbled to the front of the room and let out a soft cough.

"I, um, apologize for being late. Eh... Then let's begin!"

She repeats again, and the class atmosphere finally reverts back to normal— though this is the sort of atmosphere that Haruki hates the most.

Maybe that’s just the way life is?

To be honest, however, inside my heart I'm pretty jealous of Haruki's attitude towards life.

He still has the hopes that I abandoned long ago, the vain hope that he’d meet someone magically special, and he enthusiastically tries to achieve his dream. ‘If sitting around waiting is not going to achieve anything, let's meet them ourselves’! That’s why Haruki does strange things like drawing white lines on the school field, painting symbols on the school roof, and pasting cursed paper talismans everywhere.

Sigh...

I wonder when Haruki started to do weird stuff that made others brand him as an occultist? I guess he was thinking something like ‘Waiting achieves nothing, so why not perform some weird ceremonies to call them out?’ In the end, however, nothing happened. Is that why Haruki always has that "screw-everything" look on his face...?

------

"Hey, Kyon."

After class, Taniguchi, with an utterly baffled face, tried to corner me.

Taniguchi, you look like a total moron with that expression.

"Shut it! That’s not important right now. What kind of spell did you cast?"

"Spell? What spell?"

I once heard that highly advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic. I remember this as I reply. She then jabbed her finger at Haruki's empty seat.

"I’ve never seen Suzumiya talk to anybody for that long! What did you find that could possibly interest him?"

That, eh, what did we talk about? I just asked him some normal questions, that's all.

"I can’t believe it!"

Taniguchi put on an awed expression full of sarcasm. Kunikida popped out from behind her.

"It’s nothing new... Kyon has always liked weird guys like that."

Hey, wait a minute! Don't say things that'll cause a misunderstanding!

"It doesn't matter if Kyon likes weird guys, that’s not my point. What I can't understand is why Suzumiya would want to talk to Kyon! I don't get it at all."

Is no one listening to me? Hey!

"Maybe Kyon is as weird as he is?"

I am not! Stop talking about me like I’m not here.

"Probably. I mean you can't expect someone with a nickname like Kyon to be normal."

Stop calling me Kyon, Kyon, Kyon! Can’t you people use my real name instead of that overly cute nickname? At the very least, I want to hear my brother call me ‘Onee-chan’!

"Actually, I’d like to know the reason as well."

A cheerful, melodious voice came out of nowhere as a hand touched my shoulder. I lifted my head and saw Asakura Ryou's handsome smiling face.

"I tried talking to Suzumiya-kun a few times already but nothing came of it. How do you get him to talk to you so easily?"

I was so surprised that I didn't even think about his question at all.

"I dunno."

Upon hearing this, Asakura smiled.

"I feel relieved that at the very least Haruki won't go on being isolated from his classmates, so it's great that you've become his friend.”

Asakura Ryou behaves like the class president because, well, he is our class president. He was elected in our last lengthy home room session.

"F-friend, huh?"

I shook my head uncertainly. Is he really my friend? The only expression Haruki gives me whenever I talk to him is that scowl!

"You need to continue helping Suzumiya-kun so that he can get along with the rest of us. We are the same class, so I’ll be counting on you."

Even if you say that, I don’t know what I’m supposed to do!

"If there is anything I need to tell Suzumiya-kun, I’ll just ask you to pass on my message."

Wait one minute! I don’t want to be his personal secretary!

"Please?" he asked, lightly putting his palms together.

Faced with a request in that manner, the only thing I could do was give vague, uncomfortable responses like "erm" and "ahh...". Asakura took that as a yes and rewarded me with his charming, sunlight-like smile, and then went back to his desk. After noticing that a lot of the girls in the class were staring at me with angry eyes, my heart fell to the bottom of a canyon.

------

Apparently, somebody decided that the students should change seats every month. Therefore, Asakura Ryou wrote all the seat numbers onto little pieces of paper, placed them in a cookie tin, and let each of us draw from it. This could be my chance to get away from Haruki forever!

In the end, I got the seat in the second to last row next to the window that overlooks the courtyard. Guess who took the last seat right behind me? That's right. It's the ever-scowling Haruki.

Just my luck...

"Why won’t anything interesting happen here?!” He’s complaining again. “Like little grade school kids disappearing one by one and their bodies being found in the river, or maybe some teachers getting murdered inside a locked classroom! Something exciting like that!"

"Stop saying that kind of scary stuff."

"I joined the Mystery Study Group."

"Oh? What happened?"

"Nothing interesting! Furthermore, all the club members are detective novel fans but there isn't anyone there that resembles a detective!"

"Isn't that normal?"

"I actually had some hope for the Supernatural Study Group."

"Really?"

"However, they all turned out to be a bunch of occult maniacs.”

Sounds like you’d fit right in.

“Does that sound fun to you?!"

"Not really."

"Everything is too boring! Why does this school not have any decently interesting clubs?"

"Well, I guess there's not much you can do about that."

"I thought after I graduated to senior high I would encounter some good clubs, but this, this is like trying to get into the Major Leagues but then discovering that the school you're attending doesn't even have a baseball team!"

Haruki looked as if he were some sort of spectre ready to go to a hundred Buddhist monasteries to lay some curses. He stared out at the sky with utter disdain and let out a huge sigh.

Should I feel sorry for him?

I don't know what sort of clubs Haruki likes. Maybe even he doesn't know the answer. He just wants to "do something interesting." What, then, is "something interesting?” to him? Does that involve solving a murder mystery? Searching for UFOs? Or maybe even exorcism? I don’t think he has any idea either. He just wants something different in his life.

I know how that feels.

"I think it can't be helped if there aren't any."

I decided to express my opinion.

"Judging from our history," I began, "Humans are usually satisfied with the way things are at the time. However, those who aren’t will try to invent or discover something to advance their civilization. Someone wanted to fly so they invented airplanes. Someone wanted to travel easily so cars and trains were made. Those things, however, were created by people who possessed special talents. Only a genius can convert their imaginings into reality. We ordinary people should just live out our ordinary lives in an ordinary fashion. It’s not our job to act on impulse just because we feel bored." 

"Silence!"

Haruki just cut off what I thought was a really great speech, and turned his head away from me. Looks like he's in a really bad mood right now. But then again, when isn't he? I’m used to it already.

Haruki probably doesn't care about anything— unless it involves supernatural powers far surpassing reality. The world doesn't have those, however. No, really. I should know, I looked for any sign of the impossible for years.

However, I must give thanks to the laws of physics! Thanks to you, we humans can live in peace. Though I doubt Haruki would give you his gratitude.

I am normal, right?

------

Something must have triggered it.

Maybe it's the above conversation?

Because, unfortunately for me, I never saw it coming.

------

It was warm and sunny outside, so everyone in the class was getting sleepy. Just as I was nodding my head and going to sleep, a powerful force suddenly grabbed my ponytail and pulled backwards. The pain woke me up, and I instinctively grabbed my ponytail and held on tight. Awkwardly, I turned my head around, all the while trying to pull my hair back. It hurt so bad that my eyes started to tear up.

"What the hell do you think you’re doing!?" Are you in elementary school or something? Let go already!

From the edge of my field of vision, I saw Haruki, one hand grabbing my hair, smiling a big smile that was as bright as the desert sun — this is the first time I've seen him smile. If smiles can be measured in terms of temperature, then his smile was as hot as the Sahara desert.

"I got it!" 

Hey, don't spit all over me! And let go!

"Why didn't I think of this before?"

Haruki's eyes shone as brightly as the stars.

He stared at me pointedly. More worried about my hair than where this was leading to, I asked:

"What is that you finally thought of?"

"If it doesn't exist, I can just create one myself!"

"Create what?"

"A club!"

My head suddenly hurt and I don't think it had anything to do with my hair nearly being ripped out.

"Really? Wow, that’s a really excellent idea. Can you let go of my hair now?"

Haruki lessened his grip of my hair but not his excitement. 

"What's with that attitude? You should be waaay happier about something like this!"

"Look, we can talk about your wonderful idea later. Right now, I just want you to think about where we are, and then you can share your incredible joy with me. But just calm down first, okay?"

"Why? What d'you mean?"

"Class is still on."

Haruki finally let go of my ponytail. I rubbed the back of my aching head and turned around slowly. I noticed that the whole class looked completely awestruck. The freshly graduated newbie English teacher, with his chalk in his hand, stared at me and looked as if he was ready to cry.

I signaled Haruki to sit down quickly and bowed politely towards the poor teacher.

Please continue with the lesson.

I heard Haruki grumble about something and sat down unwillingly. The teacher then resumed his writing on the board...

Create a new club?

Hmmmm...

Don't tell me I'm already a member?

My aching scalp just serves to increase my feeling of unease.

<noinclude>
{| border="1" cellpadding="5" cellspacing="0" style="margin: 1em 1em 1em 0; background: #f9f9f9; border: 1px #aaaaaa solid; padding: 0.2em; border-collapse: collapse;"
|-
| Return to [[Suzumiya_Haruki_no_Seitenkan:Volume1_Prologue|Prologue]]
| Forward to [[Suzumiya_Haruki_no_Seitenkan:Volume1_Chapter2|Chapter 2]]
|-
|}
</noinclude>

User:RCG M3tal

2009-07-17T23:00:18Z

RCG M3tal: New page: Yo... That is all.

Yo...

That is all.

Toradora! ~Adaptation~:Volume1 Chapter1

2009-07-15T01:06:31Z

RCG M3tal: /* Chapter 1 */

<center>''There is something in this world which no one has ever seen.''

''Something soft and sweet.''

''If it is spotted, everyone will want to have it,''

''This is why no one has ever seen it.''

''The world has hidden it so well, so well to make it difficult to obtain.''

''But there will come a day when it is discovered,''

''And only those who should obtain it will be able to find it.''

''That is all.''</center>

***

"Damn it!" It was seven-thirty in the morning. It was a fine day outside but dim inside my home. I lived on the upper floor of a two story town house. My home has two bedrooms, a combined kitchen-living room, and a south-facing window and balcony leading out from the living room. Rent was roughly eighty thousand yen but the railway station was a ten minute walk away.

"I give up," I said to myself. I wiped the mist from the mirror with a frustrated hand. The bathroom was still warm and foggy from my early morning shower so the mirror fogged up again almost instantly. There's no point in taking out my anger on the mirror no matter how frustrated I was so I just continued to mutter to myself. "I just can't get this right. This stuff is just a rip-off anyway."

I picked up the men's fashion magazine. On the cover were the words Give yourself a gentle look with soft, floating bangs. My bangs were soft and floating. I followed the instructions within the article word by word: I pulled the bangs out, blow-dried them upwards from below, and then gently rubbed them to the side with some hair gel. I woke up a half-hour early to make my hair look just like the cover model's. Despite all the work I sighed and berated myself. "It was naive of me to think that changing my bangs could change anything else about how I looked."

Taking out my frustration on the mirror wouldn't have been a good idea. However, I didn't think it'd be any trouble being a little violent to the magazine--which took me quite a lot of courage to pick up from the stand and hand over to the cashier--so I chucked it into the garbage bin. Unfortunately I was wrong: my aim was off, the magazine smacked into the edge of the bin, knocked it over, and scattered trash everywhere. Among the strewn trash the magazine laid open to a page that read Gentle or wild? There's still time to begin your journey towards modeling before the start of school.

I didn't care about modeling, I just wanted to change how I looked. I wet my hands in defeat and ran them through my hair to go back to my usual, plain straightened hair style. After wiping my hands on a hand towel I knelt down to clean up the spilled trash. Just before I put the garbage bin back in its place, however, I frowned when my eyes spotted the dark green mess along the bottom of the wall.

"More mold," I groaned. Even though I wiped away the steam after every shower, I just couldn't win in this horribly humid house. Getting rid of the mold was never easy either. I would have to buy some more strong cleaning agents to deal with the mold later on when I had the time.

I gave the bathroom one more wipe down before I made my way to the living room and the cloth covered birdcage in the corner. "Hey, Inko-chan!" I said out loud towards the cage.

"Ah..." A high-pitch voice responded from within the covered birdcage.

Good, he's awake. I grabbed some bird feed and spare newspapers from the kitchen. I returned to the cage to remove the cloth and greeted my cute pet budgie with a smile. I've been told by that "cute" isn't the best word to describe Inko-chan but I've got no idea what those people are talking about. Frankly, I felt lucky that I found Inko-chan in the pet shop. After all, there was a large seventy-percent off hanging on his cage and the pet shop owner offered even more discounts on bird supplies when I hesitated for just a little bit.

As I replaced the bird feed and newspaper lining the bottom of the cage, I talked to Inko-chan as usual. "Inko-chan, can you say let's eat?"

"L--let's...! E--eat...! Let's! Eat!"

I smiled. Inko-chan's been at it for almost a month now and he's almost able to say it without struggling. "Inko-chan, can you say your name?"

"I...! In...!"

Inko-chan jerked his head left and right and flapped his wings a few time. He continued repeating the first syllable of his name in a high-pitched whistle but it looked as if that worm-like gray tongue of his froze up in his beak. "Okay, okay. That's enough Inko-chan. Rest now and eat your breakfast." I can't blame a bird for having a brain weighing about a single gram.

As I began putting away the bird feed and spoiled newspaper, I heard my mother's sleepy voice come from behind the sliding paper door of her bedroom. "Ryuu-chan, are you going somewhere?" her bedroom door slid open and she looked around the living room with sleep-filled eyes while still lying on her back on her futon. "Eh, how come you're wearing your school uniform?"

"It's because I'm going to school," I sighed and shook my head slightly. "I told you yesterday that school's starting, didn't I?"

"Ah..." she looked at me with a slightly lost expression on her face before she started wailing in a panic. "Ah! But, what about my lunch? Did you make anything for Ya-chan?"

I love my mother and think the world of her for providing as much as she can for me but sometimes she does act like another bird in the house that needs help feeding herself. "I didn't make you anything but I'm only heading to the school term's opening ceremony and homeroom. I'll be back by the time you wake up in time for lunch."

My mother stopped her wailing and gave me a warm, wide smile. She rolled onto her stomach and elbows clapped her feet together in the air. "'Grats! Ryuu-chan's in second year from now on, huh?" As silly as it looked and sounded, I could tell she was proud of me.

I nearly smiled in return but frowned when I noticed that she still had make-up on. "Didn't you say you'll remove your make-up? Please don't tell me it rubbed off on the pillow!"

She looked down at her pillow before lifting her head to give me a meek and guilty look. "Sorry!"

I sighed for who knows how many times this morning. This is my mother: Takasu Yasuko. She prefers to call herself Ya-chan to seem younger than she really is. She tells everyone that she's twenty-three so I'm likely the only one who knows she's really a decade older than that. Though I suppose I can see how people would believe her considering the undergarments I see her shamelessly wearing like a teenage girl as she lies on her futon. Then there's her long blond hair, stylish fingernails, childish speech, very young looking face, and figure. I'm not ashamed of my mother, I just don't want to think about what teenage guys or old men think of her. It doesn't help that she works as a hostess at Bishamontengoku (translate this?), the only bar in town with the stage name "Mirano", but considering how she's able to afford this expensive home despite that sort of work I guess she's really does work hard.

"Ah, I'm so sleepy, I think I just came back an hour ago or so," Yasuko yawned as she rubbed her eyes. "Oh, Ryuu-chan, I bought some pudding for us."

I continued to put away the things from feeding Inko-chan as Yasuko pulled out a plastic bag from somewhere within her room and brought it out to the table in the living room. "Huh, I can't find the spoon."

"Did the store clerk forget to give it to you?"

"I saw him put it in," she upended the bag and began looking through the contents on the table. "It's so dark in here, can you open the curtains?"

"They're already open." I sighed again and this time my mother joined me in doing so.

"Oh, yeah," she turned her head towards the south-facing window. We've been living here for six years and the south-facing window provided us with the bright light and warm glow of the sun such that we hardly had to make use of electrical lighting or heating for a good majority of the year. All of that came to an end last year when a ten-story luxury apartment building was raised to the south. I hated that building. Not only did the building block out the sunlight but its long, dark shadow increased the humidity: the laundry dried poorly; the tatami mat flooring warped, mold grew easily, the wallpaper started peeling, and the temperature dropped so far down that I dreaded the coming of autumn and winter. I try to tell myself that we're just renting this place, but even though we don't own this house, I have to force myself not to get angry by how my home is affected.

"Good thing I sleep during most of the day," Yasuko admitted.

"There's nothing we can do," I muttered in response. "Our rent's already been lowered by five thousand yen anyway."

I checked the clock and grabbed my school uniform jacket. "Well, I've got to get going." Right, there's no point in complaining about the apartment building's shadow. A new school term was beginning today and there's no reason to getting off to a bad start. Despite this positive attitude I still felt a slight worry within me. After the opening ceremony the new classes are announced. As I paused at the door with one hand on the handle, I asked myself: did my image change at all since last year? Am I going to have to deal with the same problems all over again?

"Hey, Ryuu-chan!" That cheerful, childish voice startled me out of the dark reverie. I looked over my shoulder to my mother who was waving to me energetically from the living room. "Good luck and do your best! You're a second year now, something I've never been!"

My mother dropped out of her first year of high school to give birth to me. Remembering this suddenly made me feel worse than I did a few moments ago when I was asking myself those questions. I gave my mother a slight smile and a small wave with a lifted hand.

In response she suddenly let out an excited yelp and began giggling like a little school girl. "Oh, Ryuu-chan, you look so cool! You're looking more and more like your dad now!"

It took every ounce of my self-control to look away from her before grimacing. I quickly opened the door and stepped outside and began walking towards school. That was the last thing I wanted to hear. Especially today. My mother didn't realize how what she said affected me but I couldn't help resenting those words. Those questions I was worrying about before I stepped outside, why I worry about my image, why I try to change my image, all because of him: my father.

When I look at pictures of my father, what stands out the most are his eyes. My father had the eyes of a vicious beast. They were large and angled sharply but held small, focused pupils. He always looked like he was grimacing, frowning, or glaring. His eyes are my eyes. His eyes are why I developed a habit of constantly pulling down on my bangs in an attempt to hide my eyes. Of all the things I inherited from my father, I was dealt the worst of luck to have inherited my father's vicious looking eyes.

My mother never had a single bad thing to say about my father. She'd swoon as she described how he looked like a hotshot gangster wearing expensive gold jewellery and Rolex watches. She'd giggle as she praised how cool he was and how he'd line his back with thick magazines in case somebody tried to stab him from behind. She'd blush when she spoke about how such a gentle man he was who wouldn't hurt a normal person. I had no reason not to believe what my mother told me, but none of that changed the eyes that he passed down to me.

Because of his eyes, other people feared me. Though I suppose my recent growth spurt and growing up in the neighbourhoods I did doesn't help. Still, I can tell that it's when others look into my eyes that they start becoming afraid: teachers think I'll talk back to them; people I bump into think I'll shake them down for cash; girls just out-right avoided me in any way possible. Naturally those who've become afraid of me don't stay quiet about it. Just by walking through the school hallways I could hear the rumours heard about me getting into fights or being a delinquent punk. And I'm going to have to deal with that all over again this year aren't I?

My grades are decent. I'm never late or absent from school. I've never been in an argument, let alone a fistfight. I'm just another decent teenage guy. None of that stops the whispers and rumours though. Not all of them at least. It took a whole year in one classroom to convince my classmates I'm not anything like the rumours they've heard about me. But now am I going to have to start all over again with a new class and new classmates?

I let out a sigh and hefted my book bag slung over my shoulder. With all of these thoughts running through my mind, I couldn't help but slump my shoulders slightly. But my feet didn't slow down and my steps didn't falter. There was still something good to look forward to with this new school year and new classmates.

"Hey, Takasu!" A voice called from behind me. I looked over my shoulder and smiled at the sight of a familiar friend walking on the sidewalk across the road. "Morning! Looks like a great day, doesn't it?"

I nodded in response and waved. "Kitamura. Morning!" I considered crossing the street to join him, but there were a few other students walking nearby with him as well. If I go to join him, I'll likely end up scaring away all of those other students and that's not the kind of impression I wanted to make on this first day of school. No, Kitamura's a good friend, I'm sure he wouldn't mind or take offense. There'll be other chances for us to meet up and chat.

Despite all the worries that burdened my mind, I lifted my head and looked up into the sky. Kitamura was right. It was a great day. There wasn't the slightest of a breeze in the clean air. The cherry blossoms were wilting and fell softly and silently from the branches.

Tormenting worries or not, the weather was perfect for today's opening ceremony.

* * *

Takasu Ryuuji. Right after the opening ceremony I made my way to look at the new class roster and found my name listed under 2-C.

I braced myself as I walked into the classroom, trying to seem as calm and collected as possible. The hushed whispers still came, however, and from the corner of my eyes I could see groups of students huddle closer together as I made my way to a desk near the front of the room.

"We're in the same class as Takasu? You've gotta be kidding me!"

"He sure looks intimidating and scary!"

I sat down with my back to the other students in the class room but at this point I knew I didn't look calm or collected. As the whispers reached my ears I felt disheartened. My eyes dropped to the desk in front of me and I started bouncing my right knee nervously. I felt horrible but to anyone else, I probably looked like a vicious carnivore waiting to pounce on the next weak prey to walk by.

A warm hand landed on my shoulder. "Same as before, huh?" I turned my head to see Kitamura Yuusaku giving me a warm smile. He glanced over his own shoulder to look at the other students. "Looks like there will be some jumping to conclusions about you in ths class as well. But I'm sure it will be sorted out in a while. Besides, a few of our classmates from last year and myself are here with you."

I felt myself calming down and returned Kitamura's smile with a nod. "Don't worry about that, I don't really mind," I partly lied. I do mind, but I try not to. Kitamura also made me realize that things weren't as bad as I thought they were. I can't believe I forgot there were good people like him who aren't afraid to approach everyone with a smile.

Now that Kitamura had cheered me up quite a bit, I took a quick look around the classroom. I had been looking forward to something all morning and maybe I might have missed it when I got distracted by the whispering in the classroom. There was one thing that would absolutely make my day even if I were just to catch a quick glimpse.

I heard her with my ears before I saw her. "Oh! Kitamura-kun! We're in the same class this year!" But it still had the same affect on me. Apparently there's very little difference between the euphoria of hearing an angel's voice than seeing the glow of an angel's beauty.

"Huh? Ah! Kushieda," Kitamura turned around to face a young girl who had approached the two of us. "You're also in this class?"

"Eh? You just found out now? How cold," she smiled brightly as her sweet voice danced around. "You should check the class roster on the first day of school!"

"My bad," Kitamura chuckled in return and continued the friendly chatter. "Hey, this means we'll have more time to sort out our club meetings."

"That's right!" she suddenly turned her eyes from Kitamura towards me. "Oh, Takasu-kun, right? Do you remember me? I appear around Kitamura-kun every now and then."

Crap! Was I staring at her?! Wait, what did she just say to me? Idiot! I shouldn't have been spacing out! I opened my mouth to respond but shut it quickly after realizing that my mouth was already opening. Was I gawking at her?! My heart was pounding and my cheeks felt warm.

She tilted her head slightly, still smiling. "Ah, is it alright if I call you Takasu-kun?"

Stop gawking you fool! Say something! I swallowed slightly before I finally managed to speak. "Yeah, that's alright. And you're Kushieda Minori, right?" Damn it! That sounded awful. My voice came out so cold, so disinterested.

Kushieda's smile widened and her face lit up even brighter than the cheerful expression it held just before. "Wow! I'm glad you remembered my full name! Oh?" Somebody else within the classroom had called out to her. "Looks like there's a bunch of others I need to say hello to. Kitamura-kun, I'll see you in the first club meeting later on. And I'll see you again sometime, too, Takasu-kun."

She turned around to move on. I raised a hand slowly to wave goodbye but she was already lost in a crowd of other students. She said she was glad. She said she'll see me again sometime. Kushieda Minori. Today was an amazing day. An incredibly amazing day.

"Takasu?" Kitamura startled me so that I jerked my chair back slightly. "Hey, what're you grinning at?"

I guess I was day dreaming. "Oh, it's nothing," I managed to say.

"Oh, really? If you say so." Kitamura pushed the frame of his glasses up with a finger. Now that I think about it, Kitamura's probably the only person in this whole world who could tell when I was genuinely smiling. I'm lucky to have him as a friend. I must never forget that.

"Hey, Kitamura," my words fumbled slighty as I came to realize the topic I was steering the conversation towards. "You've always been good with talking to girls." Like Kushieda-san, I added silently.

"Huh? What do you mean?" I could tell he was being surprised rather than humble by the slight widening and confused look in his eyes so I just dismissively shook my head instead. Just because he's my friend doesn't mean I can't be envious, right? I'm always struggling to do something as simple as giving Kushieda a smile in the hallways or making idle conversation with her. Yet, Kitamura is able to have such natural conversations with her--every girl, actually--so easily and effortly. Not only that, but he's also in the softball club with her! I should be careful or else my subconscious might lead me to punch him across the face when I mean to pat him on the shoulder.

But it's because of him that I even know Kushieda. It was from watching his natural and effortlress conversations with Kushieda that made me realize what I liked about her. Her various cheerful expressions. Her delicate figure and exaggerated movements. Her innocent smile and clear voice. And she's never been intimidated by my eyes or the rumours spoken about me. That's what so wonderful about her: she's filled with a kindness that she isn't afraid to energetically direct towards others.

"What're you talking about?" Kitamura continued on. "It's always the girls who start conversations with me. You've seen it haven't you? I don't think I'm any good with them. I'll probably never have a girlfriend."

At this point, I didn't just subconsciously want to smack him in the face. I wanted to tell him how wrong he was, but looking up at my noble friend in front of me, I wasn't sure if he'd understand just how different the two of us were.

Whether he believes it or not, the girls seem to adore him. They've even given him a nickname: Maruo, after the typical nice guy character from the old television show Chibi Maruko-chan. With his good grades and straight forward personality, he's a typical hard working student. So what sets him out from the rest of us? Maybe it's because the girls don't find him threatening since he never flirts. He says the girls tease him but it's not because they hate him. You wouldn't be last year's class representative, vice president of the student council, or the next president of the softball team if you had problems with that many other students.

As the beginning of class approached a few more students began filing into the room. Those who glanced towards me had a look of shock and fear flash across their face. Sure enough, most of them were quick to begin whispering to one another. I was able to catch a few words and phrases talking about whether or not that pissed off looking guy with the scary eyes was the Takasu guy everyone's afraid of.

I thought to myself that I should go freshen up in the washroom before the teacher arrived but I knew that was just a cover to hide from the attention for a little bit. I lifted myself out of the chair and began walking towards the exit. "Hey, Kitamura," I said to him as I passed by. "I'm just going to head to the washroom."

I should have looked where I was going. Since my head was turned to look over my shoulder at Kitamura, I didn't realize that something was coming through the classroom door as I was walking out. I bumped into something but when I turned my head forward all I saw was a crowd of people outside in the hallway. Why were they looking so scared? It wasn't just my eyes scaring those people. I looked over my shoulder and the students inside the classroom also had a fearful yet strangely expectant expression on their faces.

A few tense whispers reached my ears. "They're already getting into a fight? I knew this class was going to be trouble when I saw Takasu-kun's name on the roster. But this class is going to be hell with the Palmtop Tiger in it, too." I continued looking around in confusion. Palmtop Tiger? What were they whispering about? Then I realized that I didn't need to look forward ahead of me. I needed to look down.

"Shouldn't you apologize when you bump into someone?" The short girl before me spoke in a cold voice that just barely covered the anger hidden beneath a thin layer of ice. The girl in front of me had long, fluttering, light brown hair that cascaded over her shoulders and around her petite body. She looked so much like a doll that I had to blink my eyes a few times to make sure she was a real, living person.

The awkward, tense silence was bewildering. I couldn't stand it. I spoke my next thoughts outloud instead of thinking silently, "Are you the Palmtop Tiger people are ta--"

The girl suddenly jerked her chin up and stared me full in my eyes with her own. The ice cracked and a tiger's furious roar shattered through.

* * *

I'm not really sure what had happened. I was on the ground. Apparently I fell backwards onto my ass. The surrounding crowd of students had moved back as far as possible, some of them had stumbled to the ground as well. What just happened? I looked up to see the girl standing in the same spot a few seconds ago, her arms crossed over her chest with her hands rolled up into fists. Did she punch me? I moved my jaw around. No, nothing's hurt. Or at least broken as I realized that I felt numb all over.

"Pathetic." The girl nearly spat between her cherry-coloured lips as she stared at me with two large, contempt-filled eyes. Those eyes! I suddenly felt as if I knew what one experiences when they look into my eyes and feel fear. She narrowed her own brown eyes, bringing her soft eyelashes closer together, as she looked down on me. She unfurled a fist and used the hand to sweep back some of her long hair over her shoulder. "A dragon? How lame."

I looked down at myself. My school uniform jacket had been pulled open during my fall, revealing the image of a dragon on the front of my t-shirt. I normally wouldn't wear something like this but my mother bought it for me and I resorted to wearing it during laundry days. I quickly tried to pull my uniform jacket closed.

"Hey, I just wear this when--" I stopped short when I looked back up and saw the girl glaring at me. Her eyes were like those of a raving, hungry beast. Though most guys would probably think she's cute--I would have thought so myself if I wasn't too busy recovering from that recent bout of sheer terror--she was covered in an aura of complete ferocity. The expression on her face gave the impression that she wouldn't think twice about tearing you apart in seconds. She was short and small and cute, but she carried herself like a tiger that was proud of what its claws and fangs could do.

She is the Palmtop Tiger.

I thought I was going to be stuck sitting on the floor, pinned by her glare but a sweet, angelic voice called out and saved me from that fate. "Taiga! You're late!" It was Kushieda Minori. "You didn't even show up for the opening ceremony did you?"

The girl looked away from me and it seemed as if all of her ferocious aura dwindled away as she appeared to forget all about me and made her way to Kushieda. "I overslept," she explained. "I'm glad I'm in your class this year, Minorin."

Minorin? Is that a nickname? I wondered as watched Kushieda pat and rub the top of the girl's head while replying with a cheerful, "Me too!"

After blinking away the shock, I pushed myself off the floor and made my way towards my desk. The other students were whispering again.

"Looks like Palmtop Tiger Aisaka won that much, huh?"

"Seems Takasu only looks scary. He sure didn't act like a punk delinquent."

Huh. Well, I guess one good thing did come out of that mess.

* * *

Later on, I realized that rumours of my punk delinquent reputation weren't the only thing spread by whispered voices in the halls of my school--how's that for a strange case of narcissism? The Palmtop Tiger apparently had a more feared and widely held reputation than me. By walking through the school hallways, I was able to pick up quite a bit of information about her. Her real name is Aisaka Taiga. She is one hundred and forty-five centimeters tall.

Rumours of her father ranged from him working as a fixer to being the leader of the criminal underworld. It's also said that she is a skilled martial artist but was expelled from her dojo after attacking her teacher. When she first entered this school a lot of guys were instantly enchanted by her beauty and cuteness. Many confessed romantic feelings for her but they were all rejected--violently. It seemed where ever Aisaka went, she left a trail of blood-soaked, heart-crushed male student corpses behind her.

Considering my experiences with rumours, I realized that the accuracy of the information beyond her name and height were likely questionable if not entirely made up. None of the obviously exaggerated things bothered me. What did was the plain fact that Aisaka Taiga and Kushieda Minori were really good friends.

* * * * *

Toradora! ~Adaptation~:Volume1 Chapter1

2009-07-15T01:06:10Z

RCG M3tal: /* Chapter 1= */

<center>''There is something in this world which no one has ever seen.''

''Something soft and sweet.''

''If it is spotted, everyone will want to have it,''

''This is why no one has ever seen it.''

''The world has hidden it so well, so well to make it difficult to obtain.''

''But there will come a day when it is discovered,''

''And only those who should obtain it will be able to find it.''

''That is all.''</center>

==Chapter 1==

"Damn it!" It was seven-thirty in the morning. It was a fine day outside but dim inside my home. I lived on the upper floor of a two story town house. My home has two bedrooms, a combined kitchen-living room, and a south-facing window and balcony leading out from the living room. Rent was roughly eighty thousand yen but the railway station was a ten minute walk away.

"I give up," I said to myself. I wiped the mist from the mirror with a frustrated hand. The bathroom was still warm and foggy from my early morning shower so the mirror fogged up again almost instantly. There's no point in taking out my anger on the mirror no matter how frustrated I was so I just continued to mutter to myself. "I just can't get this right. This stuff is just a rip-off anyway."

I picked up the men's fashion magazine. On the cover were the words Give yourself a gentle look with soft, floating bangs. My bangs were soft and floating. I followed the instructions within the article word by word: I pulled the bangs out, blow-dried them upwards from below, and then gently rubbed them to the side with some hair gel. I woke up a half-hour early to make my hair look just like the cover model's. Despite all the work I sighed and berated myself. "It was naive of me to think that changing my bangs could change anything else about how I looked."

Taking out my frustration on the mirror wouldn't have been a good idea. However, I didn't think it'd be any trouble being a little violent to the magazine--which took me quite a lot of courage to pick up from the stand and hand over to the cashier--so I chucked it into the garbage bin. Unfortunately I was wrong: my aim was off, the magazine smacked into the edge of the bin, knocked it over, and scattered trash everywhere. Among the strewn trash the magazine laid open to a page that read Gentle or wild? There's still time to begin your journey towards modeling before the start of school.

I didn't care about modeling, I just wanted to change how I looked. I wet my hands in defeat and ran them through my hair to go back to my usual, plain straightened hair style. After wiping my hands on a hand towel I knelt down to clean up the spilled trash. Just before I put the garbage bin back in its place, however, I frowned when my eyes spotted the dark green mess along the bottom of the wall.

"More mold," I groaned. Even though I wiped away the steam after every shower, I just couldn't win in this horribly humid house. Getting rid of the mold was never easy either. I would have to buy some more strong cleaning agents to deal with the mold later on when I had the time.

I gave the bathroom one more wipe down before I made my way to the living room and the cloth covered birdcage in the corner. "Hey, Inko-chan!" I said out loud towards the cage.

"Ah..." A high-pitch voice responded from within the covered birdcage.

Good, he's awake. I grabbed some bird feed and spare newspapers from the kitchen. I returned to the cage to remove the cloth and greeted my cute pet budgie with a smile. I've been told by that "cute" isn't the best word to describe Inko-chan but I've got no idea what those people are talking about. Frankly, I felt lucky that I found Inko-chan in the pet shop. After all, there was a large seventy-percent off hanging on his cage and the pet shop owner offered even more discounts on bird supplies when I hesitated for just a little bit.

As I replaced the bird feed and newspaper lining the bottom of the cage, I talked to Inko-chan as usual. "Inko-chan, can you say let's eat?"

"L--let's...! E--eat...! Let's! Eat!"

I smiled. Inko-chan's been at it for almost a month now and he's almost able to say it without struggling. "Inko-chan, can you say your name?"

"I...! In...!"

Inko-chan jerked his head left and right and flapped his wings a few time. He continued repeating the first syllable of his name in a high-pitched whistle but it looked as if that worm-like gray tongue of his froze up in his beak. "Okay, okay. That's enough Inko-chan. Rest now and eat your breakfast." I can't blame a bird for having a brain weighing about a single gram.

As I began putting away the bird feed and spoiled newspaper, I heard my mother's sleepy voice come from behind the sliding paper door of her bedroom. "Ryuu-chan, are you going somewhere?" her bedroom door slid open and she looked around the living room with sleep-filled eyes while still lying on her back on her futon. "Eh, how come you're wearing your school uniform?"

"It's because I'm going to school," I sighed and shook my head slightly. "I told you yesterday that school's starting, didn't I?"

"Ah..." she looked at me with a slightly lost expression on her face before she started wailing in a panic. "Ah! But, what about my lunch? Did you make anything for Ya-chan?"

I love my mother and think the world of her for providing as much as she can for me but sometimes she does act like another bird in the house that needs help feeding herself. "I didn't make you anything but I'm only heading to the school term's opening ceremony and homeroom. I'll be back by the time you wake up in time for lunch."

My mother stopped her wailing and gave me a warm, wide smile. She rolled onto her stomach and elbows clapped her feet together in the air. "'Grats! Ryuu-chan's in second year from now on, huh?" As silly as it looked and sounded, I could tell she was proud of me.

I nearly smiled in return but frowned when I noticed that she still had make-up on. "Didn't you say you'll remove your make-up? Please don't tell me it rubbed off on the pillow!"

She looked down at her pillow before lifting her head to give me a meek and guilty look. "Sorry!"

I sighed for who knows how many times this morning. This is my mother: Takasu Yasuko. She prefers to call herself Ya-chan to seem younger than she really is. She tells everyone that she's twenty-three so I'm likely the only one who knows she's really a decade older than that. Though I suppose I can see how people would believe her considering the undergarments I see her shamelessly wearing like a teenage girl as she lies on her futon. Then there's her long blond hair, stylish fingernails, childish speech, very young looking face, and figure. I'm not ashamed of my mother, I just don't want to think about what teenage guys or old men think of her. It doesn't help that she works as a hostess at Bishamontengoku (translate this?), the only bar in town with the stage name "Mirano", but considering how she's able to afford this expensive home despite that sort of work I guess she's really does work hard.

"Ah, I'm so sleepy, I think I just came back an hour ago or so," Yasuko yawned as she rubbed her eyes. "Oh, Ryuu-chan, I bought some pudding for us."

I continued to put away the things from feeding Inko-chan as Yasuko pulled out a plastic bag from somewhere within her room and brought it out to the table in the living room. "Huh, I can't find the spoon."

"Did the store clerk forget to give it to you?"

"I saw him put it in," she upended the bag and began looking through the contents on the table. "It's so dark in here, can you open the curtains?"

"They're already open." I sighed again and this time my mother joined me in doing so.

"Oh, yeah," she turned her head towards the south-facing window. We've been living here for six years and the south-facing window provided us with the bright light and warm glow of the sun such that we hardly had to make use of electrical lighting or heating for a good majority of the year. All of that came to an end last year when a ten-story luxury apartment building was raised to the south. I hated that building. Not only did the building block out the sunlight but its long, dark shadow increased the humidity: the laundry dried poorly; the tatami mat flooring warped, mold grew easily, the wallpaper started peeling, and the temperature dropped so far down that I dreaded the coming of autumn and winter. I try to tell myself that we're just renting this place, but even though we don't own this house, I have to force myself not to get angry by how my home is affected.

"Good thing I sleep during most of the day," Yasuko admitted.

"There's nothing we can do," I muttered in response. "Our rent's already been lowered by five thousand yen anyway."

I checked the clock and grabbed my school uniform jacket. "Well, I've got to get going." Right, there's no point in complaining about the apartment building's shadow. A new school term was beginning today and there's no reason to getting off to a bad start. Despite this positive attitude I still felt a slight worry within me. After the opening ceremony the new classes are announced. As I paused at the door with one hand on the handle, I asked myself: did my image change at all since last year? Am I going to have to deal with the same problems all over again?

"Hey, Ryuu-chan!" That cheerful, childish voice startled me out of the dark reverie. I looked over my shoulder to my mother who was waving to me energetically from the living room. "Good luck and do your best! You're a second year now, something I've never been!"

My mother dropped out of her first year of high school to give birth to me. Remembering this suddenly made me feel worse than I did a few moments ago when I was asking myself those questions. I gave my mother a slight smile and a small wave with a lifted hand.

In response she suddenly let out an excited yelp and began giggling like a little school girl. "Oh, Ryuu-chan, you look so cool! You're looking more and more like your dad now!"

It took every ounce of my self-control to look away from her before grimacing. I quickly opened the door and stepped outside and began walking towards school. That was the last thing I wanted to hear. Especially today. My mother didn't realize how what she said affected me but I couldn't help resenting those words. Those questions I was worrying about before I stepped outside, why I worry about my image, why I try to change my image, all because of him: my father.

When I look at pictures of my father, what stands out the most are his eyes. My father had the eyes of a vicious beast. They were large and angled sharply but held small, focused pupils. He always looked like he was grimacing, frowning, or glaring. His eyes are my eyes. His eyes are why I developed a habit of constantly pulling down on my bangs in an attempt to hide my eyes. Of all the things I inherited from my father, I was dealt the worst of luck to have inherited my father's vicious looking eyes.

My mother never had a single bad thing to say about my father. She'd swoon as she described how he looked like a hotshot gangster wearing expensive gold jewellery and Rolex watches. She'd giggle as she praised how cool he was and how he'd line his back with thick magazines in case somebody tried to stab him from behind. She'd blush when she spoke about how such a gentle man he was who wouldn't hurt a normal person. I had no reason not to believe what my mother told me, but none of that changed the eyes that he passed down to me.

Because of his eyes, other people feared me. Though I suppose my recent growth spurt and growing up in the neighbourhoods I did doesn't help. Still, I can tell that it's when others look into my eyes that they start becoming afraid: teachers think I'll talk back to them; people I bump into think I'll shake them down for cash; girls just out-right avoided me in any way possible. Naturally those who've become afraid of me don't stay quiet about it. Just by walking through the school hallways I could hear the rumours heard about me getting into fights or being a delinquent punk. And I'm going to have to deal with that all over again this year aren't I?

My grades are decent. I'm never late or absent from school. I've never been in an argument, let alone a fistfight. I'm just another decent teenage guy. None of that stops the whispers and rumours though. Not all of them at least. It took a whole year in one classroom to convince my classmates I'm not anything like the rumours they've heard about me. But now am I going to have to start all over again with a new class and new classmates?

I let out a sigh and hefted my book bag slung over my shoulder. With all of these thoughts running through my mind, I couldn't help but slump my shoulders slightly. But my feet didn't slow down and my steps didn't falter. There was still something good to look forward to with this new school year and new classmates.

"Hey, Takasu!" A voice called from behind me. I looked over my shoulder and smiled at the sight of a familiar friend walking on the sidewalk across the road. "Morning! Looks like a great day, doesn't it?"

I nodded in response and waved. "Kitamura. Morning!" I considered crossing the street to join him, but there were a few other students walking nearby with him as well. If I go to join him, I'll likely end up scaring away all of those other students and that's not the kind of impression I wanted to make on this first day of school. No, Kitamura's a good friend, I'm sure he wouldn't mind or take offense. There'll be other chances for us to meet up and chat.

Despite all the worries that burdened my mind, I lifted my head and looked up into the sky. Kitamura was right. It was a great day. There wasn't the slightest of a breeze in the clean air. The cherry blossoms were wilting and fell softly and silently from the branches.

Tormenting worries or not, the weather was perfect for today's opening ceremony.

* * *

Takasu Ryuuji. Right after the opening ceremony I made my way to look at the new class roster and found my name listed under 2-C.

I braced myself as I walked into the classroom, trying to seem as calm and collected as possible. The hushed whispers still came, however, and from the corner of my eyes I could see groups of students huddle closer together as I made my way to a desk near the front of the room.

"We're in the same class as Takasu? You've gotta be kidding me!"

"He sure looks intimidating and scary!"

I sat down with my back to the other students in the class room but at this point I knew I didn't look calm or collected. As the whispers reached my ears I felt disheartened. My eyes dropped to the desk in front of me and I started bouncing my right knee nervously. I felt horrible but to anyone else, I probably looked like a vicious carnivore waiting to pounce on the next weak prey to walk by.

A warm hand landed on my shoulder. "Same as before, huh?" I turned my head to see Kitamura Yuusaku giving me a warm smile. He glanced over his own shoulder to look at the other students. "Looks like there will be some jumping to conclusions about you in ths class as well. But I'm sure it will be sorted out in a while. Besides, a few of our classmates from last year and myself are here with you."

I felt myself calming down and returned Kitamura's smile with a nod. "Don't worry about that, I don't really mind," I partly lied. I do mind, but I try not to. Kitamura also made me realize that things weren't as bad as I thought they were. I can't believe I forgot there were good people like him who aren't afraid to approach everyone with a smile.

Now that Kitamura had cheered me up quite a bit, I took a quick look around the classroom. I had been looking forward to something all morning and maybe I might have missed it when I got distracted by the whispering in the classroom. There was one thing that would absolutely make my day even if I were just to catch a quick glimpse.

I heard her with my ears before I saw her. "Oh! Kitamura-kun! We're in the same class this year!" But it still had the same affect on me. Apparently there's very little difference between the euphoria of hearing an angel's voice than seeing the glow of an angel's beauty.

"Huh? Ah! Kushieda," Kitamura turned around to face a young girl who had approached the two of us. "You're also in this class?"

"Eh? You just found out now? How cold," she smiled brightly as her sweet voice danced around. "You should check the class roster on the first day of school!"

"My bad," Kitamura chuckled in return and continued the friendly chatter. "Hey, this means we'll have more time to sort out our club meetings."

"That's right!" she suddenly turned her eyes from Kitamura towards me. "Oh, Takasu-kun, right? Do you remember me? I appear around Kitamura-kun every now and then."

Crap! Was I staring at her?! Wait, what did she just say to me? Idiot! I shouldn't have been spacing out! I opened my mouth to respond but shut it quickly after realizing that my mouth was already opening. Was I gawking at her?! My heart was pounding and my cheeks felt warm.

She tilted her head slightly, still smiling. "Ah, is it alright if I call you Takasu-kun?"

Stop gawking you fool! Say something! I swallowed slightly before I finally managed to speak. "Yeah, that's alright. And you're Kushieda Minori, right?" Damn it! That sounded awful. My voice came out so cold, so disinterested.

Kushieda's smile widened and her face lit up even brighter than the cheerful expression it held just before. "Wow! I'm glad you remembered my full name! Oh?" Somebody else within the classroom had called out to her. "Looks like there's a bunch of others I need to say hello to. Kitamura-kun, I'll see you in the first club meeting later on. And I'll see you again sometime, too, Takasu-kun."

She turned around to move on. I raised a hand slowly to wave goodbye but she was already lost in a crowd of other students. She said she was glad. She said she'll see me again sometime. Kushieda Minori. Today was an amazing day. An incredibly amazing day.

"Takasu?" Kitamura startled me so that I jerked my chair back slightly. "Hey, what're you grinning at?"

I guess I was day dreaming. "Oh, it's nothing," I managed to say.

"Oh, really? If you say so." Kitamura pushed the frame of his glasses up with a finger. Now that I think about it, Kitamura's probably the only person in this whole world who could tell when I was genuinely smiling. I'm lucky to have him as a friend. I must never forget that.

"Hey, Kitamura," my words fumbled slighty as I came to realize the topic I was steering the conversation towards. "You've always been good with talking to girls." Like Kushieda-san, I added silently.

"Huh? What do you mean?" I could tell he was being surprised rather than humble by the slight widening and confused look in his eyes so I just dismissively shook my head instead. Just because he's my friend doesn't mean I can't be envious, right? I'm always struggling to do something as simple as giving Kushieda a smile in the hallways or making idle conversation with her. Yet, Kitamura is able to have such natural conversations with her--every girl, actually--so easily and effortly. Not only that, but he's also in the softball club with her! I should be careful or else my subconscious might lead me to punch him across the face when I mean to pat him on the shoulder.

But it's because of him that I even know Kushieda. It was from watching his natural and effortlress conversations with Kushieda that made me realize what I liked about her. Her various cheerful expressions. Her delicate figure and exaggerated movements. Her innocent smile and clear voice. And she's never been intimidated by my eyes or the rumours spoken about me. That's what so wonderful about her: she's filled with a kindness that she isn't afraid to energetically direct towards others.

"What're you talking about?" Kitamura continued on. "It's always the girls who start conversations with me. You've seen it haven't you? I don't think I'm any good with them. I'll probably never have a girlfriend."

At this point, I didn't just subconsciously want to smack him in the face. I wanted to tell him how wrong he was, but looking up at my noble friend in front of me, I wasn't sure if he'd understand just how different the two of us were.

Whether he believes it or not, the girls seem to adore him. They've even given him a nickname: Maruo, after the typical nice guy character from the old television show Chibi Maruko-chan. With his good grades and straight forward personality, he's a typical hard working student. So what sets him out from the rest of us? Maybe it's because the girls don't find him threatening since he never flirts. He says the girls tease him but it's not because they hate him. You wouldn't be last year's class representative, vice president of the student council, or the next president of the softball team if you had problems with that many other students.

As the beginning of class approached a few more students began filing into the room. Those who glanced towards me had a look of shock and fear flash across their face. Sure enough, most of them were quick to begin whispering to one another. I was able to catch a few words and phrases talking about whether or not that pissed off looking guy with the scary eyes was the Takasu guy everyone's afraid of.

I thought to myself that I should go freshen up in the washroom before the teacher arrived but I knew that was just a cover to hide from the attention for a little bit. I lifted myself out of the chair and began walking towards the exit. "Hey, Kitamura," I said to him as I passed by. "I'm just going to head to the washroom."

I should have looked where I was going. Since my head was turned to look over my shoulder at Kitamura, I didn't realize that something was coming through the classroom door as I was walking out. I bumped into something but when I turned my head forward all I saw was a crowd of people outside in the hallway. Why were they looking so scared? It wasn't just my eyes scaring those people. I looked over my shoulder and the students inside the classroom also had a fearful yet strangely expectant expression on their faces.

A few tense whispers reached my ears. "They're already getting into a fight? I knew this class was going to be trouble when I saw Takasu-kun's name on the roster. But this class is going to be hell with the Palmtop Tiger in it, too." I continued looking around in confusion. Palmtop Tiger? What were they whispering about? Then I realized that I didn't need to look forward ahead of me. I needed to look down.

"Shouldn't you apologize when you bump into someone?" The short girl before me spoke in a cold voice that just barely covered the anger hidden beneath a thin layer of ice. The girl in front of me had long, fluttering, light brown hair that cascaded over her shoulders and around her petite body. She looked so much like a doll that I had to blink my eyes a few times to make sure she was a real, living person.

The awkward, tense silence was bewildering. I couldn't stand it. I spoke my next thoughts outloud instead of thinking silently, "Are you the Palmtop Tiger people are ta--"

The girl suddenly jerked her chin up and stared me full in my eyes with her own. The ice cracked and a tiger's furious roar shattered through.

* * *

I'm not really sure what had happened. I was on the ground. Apparently I fell backwards onto my ass. The surrounding crowd of students had moved back as far as possible, some of them had stumbled to the ground as well. What just happened? I looked up to see the girl standing in the same spot a few seconds ago, her arms crossed over her chest with her hands rolled up into fists. Did she punch me? I moved my jaw around. No, nothing's hurt. Or at least broken as I realized that I felt numb all over.

"Pathetic." The girl nearly spat between her cherry-coloured lips as she stared at me with two large, contempt-filled eyes. Those eyes! I suddenly felt as if I knew what one experiences when they look into my eyes and feel fear. She narrowed her own brown eyes, bringing her soft eyelashes closer together, as she looked down on me. She unfurled a fist and used the hand to sweep back some of her long hair over her shoulder. "A dragon? How lame."

I looked down at myself. My school uniform jacket had been pulled open during my fall, revealing the image of a dragon on the front of my t-shirt. I normally wouldn't wear something like this but my mother bought it for me and I resorted to wearing it during laundry days. I quickly tried to pull my uniform jacket closed.

"Hey, I just wear this when--" I stopped short when I looked back up and saw the girl glaring at me. Her eyes were like those of a raving, hungry beast. Though most guys would probably think she's cute--I would have thought so myself if I wasn't too busy recovering from that recent bout of sheer terror--she was covered in an aura of complete ferocity. The expression on her face gave the impression that she wouldn't think twice about tearing you apart in seconds. She was short and small and cute, but she carried herself like a tiger that was proud of what its claws and fangs could do.

She is the Palmtop Tiger.

I thought I was going to be stuck sitting on the floor, pinned by her glare but a sweet, angelic voice called out and saved me from that fate. "Taiga! You're late!" It was Kushieda Minori. "You didn't even show up for the opening ceremony did you?"

The girl looked away from me and it seemed as if all of her ferocious aura dwindled away as she appeared to forget all about me and made her way to Kushieda. "I overslept," she explained. "I'm glad I'm in your class this year, Minorin."

Minorin? Is that a nickname? I wondered as watched Kushieda pat and rub the top of the girl's head while replying with a cheerful, "Me too!"

After blinking away the shock, I pushed myself off the floor and made my way towards my desk. The other students were whispering again.

"Looks like Palmtop Tiger Aisaka won that much, huh?"

"Seems Takasu only looks scary. He sure didn't act like a punk delinquent."

Huh. Well, I guess one good thing did come out of that mess.

* * *

Later on, I realized that rumours of my punk delinquent reputation weren't the only thing spread by whispered voices in the halls of my school--how's that for a strange case of narcissism? The Palmtop Tiger apparently had a more feared and widely held reputation than me. By walking through the school hallways, I was able to pick up quite a bit of information about her. Her real name is Aisaka Taiga. She is one hundred and forty-five centimeters tall.

Rumours of her father ranged from him working as a fixer to being the leader of the criminal underworld. It's also said that she is a skilled martial artist but was expelled from her dojo after attacking her teacher. When she first entered this school a lot of guys were instantly enchanted by her beauty and cuteness. Many confessed romantic feelings for her but they were all rejected--violently. It seemed where ever Aisaka went, she left a trail of blood-soaked, heart-crushed male student corpses behind her.

Considering my experiences with rumours, I realized that the accuracy of the information beyond her name and height were likely questionable if not entirely made up. None of the obviously exaggerated things bothered me. What did was the plain fact that Aisaka Taiga and Kushieda Minori were really good friends.

* * * * *

Suzumiya Haruki no Seitenkan:Volume1 Chapter6

2009-07-02T18:57:02Z

RCG M3tal:

I found another letter in my shoe locker today. What was it with letters in shoe lockers, anyway? Didn't anybody know how to use e-mail?

This letter felt different to the other one, though. For one thing, it wasn't just a scrap of folded paper without a name. It was in a plain white envelope, like one of those ones that they sell in 'business packs' in bookstores, and on it was written a single name.

''Asahina Mitsuuru.''

I shoved the envelope roughly into my bag and rushed to the girls' washroom to open it. The message was written on a plain white piece of paper, meandering a bit when it reached the end.

''I'll be waiting for you in the club room during lunch break.

- Asahina Mitsuuru''

After what happened yesterday, my notion of reality had changed dramatically. I never wanted to go through anything like that ever again.

And yet... there was no way I could turn this down. I couldn't imagine Asahina-senpai even ''thinking'' about doing anything improper to me, and even though I had no proof that this letter was indeed sent by him, I didn't doubt its authenticity. He seemed the sort to go through such indirect, old-fashioned means. The mental image of Asahina-senpai slowly writing every word down with great care, his face locked in concentration, made me smile. Besides, if we're meeting in the club room, then Nagato should be there as well, and he'd protect me if anything really happens.

----

During break, though, I began to have my doubts. What if Nagato wasn't there? What if it was’t Asahina-senpai after all? What if it's another alien like Asakura, out to murder me to 'provoke a reaction' in Haruki?

My hair was in my eyes, so I brushed it back, remembering why I kept it back in a ponytail in the first place. And as my hand touched the back of my head, I remembered why I was wearing my hair down at all.

For a moment, I felt like a ancient peasant farmer who had been dutifully stacking sod and straw, only to be surprised by a flash flood.

Just for a second, I was there again, in this very classroom. Unable to move. Hearing Asakura say: " I have always wondered what you would look like with your hair down…" Feeling the rush of air of the katana near my head, but unable to dodge. The brief tug at my hair.

And then, back in reality, something else tugged on my hair.

I was dimly aware of two things. The first was a voice saying: "What are you doing, spacing out and playing with your hair!?" The second was my hand suddenly on my bento box.

The next moment, I found myself standing upright, looking down at the desk behind mine. My heart was racing and I felt completely out of breath. Haruki was sitting there, blinking with surprise, a small trickle of blood running from his nose. My lunch was splattered all over him, and everyone else in the classroom was staring at me in shock.

W-wha? I... clocked you in the face with my lunch, Haruki? How did that happ-?

Taniguchi told me what happened later on. Why do I have to rely on such a questionable witness, though? Come on, brain, cough up the facts! What else are you hiding from me...?

At any rate, according to Taniguchi, Haruki had reached out and yanked - wasn't it just a tug? - on my hair while I was looking off into the distance. I screamed "really loudly", so Taniguchi assumed that he must've pulled too hard on my head. I didn't bother correcting her.

Some pressuring was needed to make Taniguchi reveal what it was that I had screamed, exactly. Apparently it was a simple "No". Next, she saw me "shoot" out of my chair and smack Haruki in the face with my lunchbox, "All in one movement". Come on, haven't we established that I'm not an action hero?

The next thing ''I'' remember, Okabe-sensei was dragging me to her office and I had to spend the rest of recess assuring her that I was just startled because Haruki disturbed me while I was nodding off. It was just a bad dream that I continued into wakefulness. Really!

Please don't make a bigger deal out of this than it already is, sensei! I'm going to have to apologize to that idiot, especially since they dragged him off to the guidance counselor’s office. He didn't even show up for next period, which was a mixed blessing: on the one hand, I felt embarrassed about the whole thing, but on the other hand, ''I'' was now the object of everyone's attention. Besides, his schoolbag was still there, so he hadn't been sent home.

Urgh. I felt mortified. And it all happened just because I couldn't find a tie for my damned hair.

Haruki didn't show up for the period after that, either.

----

When lunchtime finally rolled around, I was immediately surrounded by a gaggle of idiots, wanting to know what really happened during break. I suppose that’s better than being asked what I was doing with Nagato in the classroom yesterday.

I was surprised that Taniguchi hadn't spread the word about what she saw yesterday all over the school like the gossip she was. Maybe she wanted to get the story straight out of my mouth.

Yeah, like she'd believe the truth anyway. Seeing her coming over to me, I ducked out of the crowd surrounding me. Right now, being stabbed to death would be better than having to deal with airheaded gossips!

…Well, no, I don’t really mean that. Besides, without a lunch, there’s no real point in waiting around here.

I headed towards the clubroom.

------

It was only May, and already the sun was smothering us with overbearing warmth. When summer actually comes, Japan will be a natural sauna. I was already sweating just by taking a few steps.

When I arrived at the club room door, I knocked first.

"Please, come in."

The voice was unfamiliar, and I hesitated. Was that really Asahina-senpai in there? If I really strained my mind, I could make myself believe that I could hear a bit of Asahina-senpai in there, but it was too deep to be his normal voice. He sounded friendly enough, but Asakura was friendly yesterday too, just before he tried to kill me.

I steeled myself. Even if it was someone dangerous, Nagato would come and help me, right? He came last time without me calling for him. He’s dependable. He’ll save me no matter what.

I opened the door.

Nagato wasn't there.

The person sitting inside wasn't Asahina-senpai either, and I actually took a step backwards before stopping myself. He was sitting in my usual chair, leaning back, and looking up at the ceiling. He was wearing a loose white shirt and tight black business pants, plus the slippers made for school visitors. His long brown hair was tied into a ponytail down his back.

He wasn't Asahina-senpai, but he looked a lot like him. The Asahina-senpai I knew wasn't that tall, and he looked more like a cute little boy than this handsome guy in front of me now. This guy looked like he was in his twenties, and gave a completely different feel than the middle-schooler-like Asahina-senpai.

But he resembled Asahina-senpai too much to be a coincidence.

"It's been a long time, Onee-chan," the man said, grinning at me.

…Onee-chan?

I heard a whistle.

“Ah, the tea’s ready,” he said, getting up. “Sit down, make yourself comfortable.”

I hesitantly took a few steps into the room, still trying to figure out who this guy was.

“Want sugar? Or milk?” he asked, though he was putting plenty of milk in already.

It hit me. Could he be... "Are you, um, Asahina-senpai's... brother?"

He blinked in surprise, and then chuckled. His smile made him look even more like Asahina-senpai. "No, no, Onee-chan! It's me! I'm Asahina Mitsuuru, except that I come from further into the future. I've been waiting for a long time to meet you again."

I can't imagine the stupid expression on my face then. After what Asahina-senpai had told me in the park, I could accept that this person was himself from the future, and I took a few more steps into the clubroom to get a closer look at him. He had really grown handsome in the years to come, and he'd probably have a huge following of potential girlfriends, if he was still single.

"Oh, you don't believe me? Well then, I'll have to show you proof, right?" He began to unbutton his shirt.

Wait wait wait! I'm not ready for this! Aren't we moving a bit too quickly?

He revealed his chest to me without any trace of embarrassment. "Look, can you see this star-shaped birthmark? You can touch it if you want to."

There was indeed a star-shaped birthmark on that muscled chest. I shook my head slowly, feeling the heat on my face, my heart beating faster. I don't really remember if Asahina-sempai had a birthmark on his chest, even when I’d seen him changing outfits some time ago.

Wait, if this Asahina-senpai had grown so much, could it be that he had also grown in... what was I thinking? I shouldn't have such bad thoughts! Bad brain! Bad!

"Hm, that's strange," Asahina-senpai said, buttoning up his shirt again. "If you hadn't told me that I had this birthmark, I wouldn't have noticed it myself." His eyes grew wide. "Or could it be that I— t-this wasn't supposed to happen yet! We still haven't..." His flustered look made him seem just like the Asahina-senpai of this time. "Please forget what I just said!"

Easier said than done. I don't think I want to forget the sight of that chest, anyway.

…Bad brain!

"I'll believe you for now," I said. "Right now, after what happened yesterday, I'll believe anything."

The Asahina-senpai from some point in the future quickly regained his composure. "So do you really believe that I've come from the future to this temporal plane?"

"Of course. Wait, does that mean that there are now two Asahina-senpais in this time?"

"Right, Onee-chan. The me from the past is now sitting in his classroom, eating lunch with his friends."

What’s with the Onee-chan?

"Does he know that you're here?"

"No, he's from my past."

…I see.

"I had to tell you something, so I got permission from the higher-ups to let me come to this time. Also, I've asked Nagato-kun to leave us for now."

Nagato probably didn't even bat an eyelid when he saw this Asahina-senpai. "Do you know who Nagato-kun is?"

Asahina-senpai smiled. "Classified information," he said playfully. "Heh, I haven't said that in such a long time."

"Actually, I just heard you say that a few days ago."

"You're right." Asahina-senpai winked at me. Then he suddenly looked serious. "I can't stay here for too long, so I'll get right to the point. Have you heard of The Frog Prince?"

"Well, yeah."

"Whatever you'll face from now on, no matter how bad, I hope you'll remember that story."

"The Frog Prince, right? The one where the handsome prince is turned into a frog and the princess has to kiss him to change him back?"

"That's the one."

"I've already experienced something bad yesterday."

"This is worse than that. I can't tell you the details, but Suzumiya Haruki will be at your side."

Worse than yesterday? And Haruki? By my side? You mean we'll both be involved in something horrible? Did he start it?

"Suzumiya-kun won’t find anything wrong with it, but for the rest of us, it's a very complicated problem."

"You can't give me any details at all?"

"I'm sorry, I can only give you hints." Asahina-senpai looked so apologetic and serious. I could definitely imagine the younger Asahina-senpai looking like that.

"Like the story of The Frog Prince?"

"Yes."

"I'll remember it."

"Thank you." Asahina-senpai walked around the clubroom, and stopped before the clothes rack, looking at the maid outfit.

"Ah, I remember this.” He said, looking uncomfortable. “Well, I guess there’s no way I’d pass off as a girl while wearing it now, huh?”

That’s definitely true. "What sort of other stuff did Haruki make you wear?”

"I'm not telling," Asahina-senpai said shortly, but with a smile on his face. "It's really embarrassing. Though, it was kinda fun…."

He had a sort of sad, distant look in his eyes when he said that.

"So then, Onee-chan." Asahina-senpai walked towards me, and placed his hands on my shoulders. He seemed to be looking for something to say. "I'll… be going now, then."

Seeing him so hesitant, I thought that maybe I should give him a hug. However, just as I was about to embrace him, he backed off.

"I have one more request to make," Asahina-senpai said. "Please don't get too close to me." He put his hand on the doorknob.

“Ah!” He exclaimed. “That’s right. I have this to give to you.”

From his pocket, he pulled out a yellow ribbon.

Seeing my confused look, he explained. “For your hair. Looks like you need it, anyway.”

“T-thanks.” I said, grateful. I guess there’s no need go buy hair ties now.

“Oh, don’t thank me,” he smiled. “Thank yourself. You were the one who gave that to me.”

“What?”

He grinned again, reminding me a little of Haruki. “Drink your tea, it’s getting cold.”

He turned to leave.

"I-I have one more question for you!" I blurted out. Asahina-senpai stopped, and looked at me questioningly. "A-are you seeing anybody right now?”

"That," he said, putting his finger to his lips and grinning wider than ever, "is classified information."

----

Just like that, the door closed behind him. I couldn't have done anything even if I had tried.

Wow. I can’t even believe how good-looking Asahina-senpai became when he grew up. I suddenly thought of the first thing he said to me. ‘It's been a long time, Onee-chan.’ Obviously, it’s been quite some time since he last saw me.

The future Asahina-senpai must have returned to his distant future, and then spent a few years there, before reuniting with me on this “time plane” again.

So how long has it been for him? He’s grown a lot… maybe five years? Of course, it could be less. Some guys go through huge growth spurts after they graduate. My cousin was like that. When he was in high school, he had always been this short, weak, studious kid. Then when he entered university, he grew nearly a foot and became the object of about a hundred girls’ affections.

Because of all this, though, I’m confused as to what his real age is. Is he really 17?

…I’m hungry. I think I’ll go back to the classroom and see if I can get Kunikida to share some of her lunch with me. She always brings too much anyway.

But as I opened the door…

"..."

Standing there was Nagato Yuuki, who was wearing his usual well-preserved cold face, but as he wasn't wearing glasses today, he stared at me with a naked glare.

"Oh! Hi, Nagato-kun! Did you just see someone who looked like Asahina-senpai passing by?" I asked, half-jokingly.

"I had seen Asahina Mitsuuru's differential temporal clone already this morning."

Nagato silently sat down in his seat and then placed his book on the desk and opened it.

"He is no longer here, and has departed from this timeframe."

"Can you travel through time as well? With that Data Entity thingy?"

"I cannot. However, temporal movement is not as difficult as one would think; it is just that humans have yet to grasp its basic principles. Time is like space; moving through it is very simple."

"Then could you teach me?"

"That is a concept that cannot be conveyed in speech, so you would not understand even if I explained it."

"That so?"

"Yes."

"I guess that's too bad, huh?"

"Too bad."

It was pointless trying to talk to such a wooden person, so I decided to go back to the classroom. I hope still have time to eat something…

"Nagato-kun, thanks for yesterday."

His wooden expression moved slightly.

"There is no need to thank me. Asakura Ryou's actions were my responsibility. I was careless with my supervision."

His hair parting swung softly.

Was he trying to bow and apologize to me?

"You know, you definitely do look cooler without your glasses."

He didn't reply at all. The tea Asahina-senpai had brewed for me was still on the table, so I picked it up and had a sip.

Blech! Too much milk…

----

As I was rushing back to the classroom to scrounge up some lunch, I ran smack dab into Haruki. Could this be fate? It seems I've reached the point where I can see through all karma.

I remember what I did to his face during break.

"Listen, I -" I started to say, but he cut me off. Have some manners, you lout! Let a girl apologize when she feels she has to.

"Try not to space out in class," he told me in a superior tone of voice. Your nosebleed's stopped, I see. And you managed to get the egg out of your shirt. "You act even more stupid than usual when you're sleepy, it seems."

So, it seems your feelings weren't hurt, as you're still capable of spouting nonsense.

"Anyways, where did you run off to? I thought you'd be back sooner. I didn’t even eat lunch because I was waiting for you!"

Good, you can share some with me. It’s your fault I don’t have any, in any case.

"Don't just stand there like an idiot! Follow me!"

Haruki, in his usual fashion, picked me up off the ground and carried me towards the dark staircase.

Oh, no… put me down and let me go eat! I’m hungry!

"After I finally got out of the counsellor’s office, I went to ask Okabe in the staff room. The teachers only learned about Asakura transferring this morning. Early in the morning, someone claiming to be Asakura's mom called, saying they had to move due to some emergency. And you know where they're moving? Canada! How can this be possible? Why the hell would anyone move to Canada? There’s something going on here, I know it!"

"Really now?" I said, trying to fill my response to the brim with sarcasm. Of course, it’s wasted on Haruki.

"After that, I said I was a good friend of Asakura’s and wanted to ask the teachers if how could contact him."

Oh please. I don’t think you ever spoke more than a few words at a time to him when he was still around.

"And you know what the teachers said? They say they didn't know. Normally, if someone were to move, wouldn't they usually leave some sort of contact information? I’m telling you, there’s something weird going on here!"

"No, there isn't!"

Haruki just steamrolled over me as usual. "So I asked for Asakura's old address from before he moved. I'm gonna go there and have a look after school. Maybe we can find something there."

Forget it. I'm not going to stop him. In the end, the one wasting his time is Haruki, not me or anyone else.

"You're coming too."

"What!? Why!?"

Haruki puffed up his shoulders, and then, like a dragon huffing and puffing before firing its breath, he shouted at a volume the whole school could hear.

"BECAUSE YOU'RE A MEMBER OF THE SOS BRIGADE!!!"

I retreated frantically, complying with Haruki’s unreasonable orders. I went to the clubroom to tell Nagato that neither Haruki nor I would be showing up for club activities today. I also instructed Nagato to relay the message to Asahina-senpai and Itsuko as soon as they arrived, but I didn't know if the silent alien would even say anything, so, just to be safe, I took a felt pen and wrote on the back of one of the SOS Brigade flyers.

"There are no activities today for the SOS Brigade. - Haruki".

I don’t suppose it will matter in the least to Itsuko, but at least I can save Asahina-senpai from having to wear his maid outfit.

The bell for fifth session rang as I finished writing and pasted the note to the clubroom door. Because of this, I was forced to run all the way to class.

----

If I said I never wanted a guy to walk me home from school like on TV dramas, I’d be lying. But now that this dream has become a reality, I’m far from happy. For obvious reasons, of course.

"Did you just say something?" Haruki asked while walking on my left side, striding with large steps, carrying a piece of notepaper. I automatically interpreted his question as ‘You got a problem?’

"Nope, nothing at all."

We walked down the hill and followed the railway line. A little bit further on would be Koyouen Station.

Just as I was thinking that we must be near Nagato’s place, we arrived there. I’d never have guessed that this was where Haruki was heading.

"Asakura seems to live in Room 505." Haruki said.

"No wonder."

"What do you mean 'no wonder'?" He glanced sideways at me.

"No, nothing. Oh yeah, how do you expect to go in? Look, even the gate is locked." I said as I pointed to the keypad by the intercom. "You need to enter the correct code to open the door. Do even you know it?"

"Nope! Fortunately, I have a plan. We might just have to wait a while, though."

Waiting? What are we waiting for? As it turned out, we didn’t end up waiting long. At that moment, a middle-aged man in a business suit opened the gate from inside, looking like he was just about to go into the office. He looked at us for a while with a questioning glance and then walked off.

Just as the gate was closing, Haruki rushed forward and put his foot in between it to stop it from opening.

Good idea, but that’s trespassing.

"Hey! Hurry up!” Haruki yelled at me and pulled my hand. Like that, I was dragged into the entrance hall. The first thing I noticed wasn't the chique decor, but the loud music. Why is someone playing foreign music so loudly in a semi-public space, and if they must play music, why Cher? Ignoring this assault to my ears, Haruki dragged me into the elevator, which had stopped at the ground floor. It’s just simple manners to stare silently at the floor numbers when riding an elevator, but…

^ Don’t know about this… I mean I’ve never heard of such manners when you’re in an elevator with friends, so it might just be me, but it seems weird.

"That Asakura..."

Simple manners are wasted on someone like Haruki.

"It’s not just this transfer that’s fishy. He didn’t attend a local junior high either."

Well, that’s to be expected, really.

"I’ve done my research, see. He supposedly transferred to North High from another town. It’s just too suspicious. North High isn't some famous school or anything, just a normal local high school. Why would he go through so much effort to come from another town just to attend our school?"

I shrugged. I’ll just let Haruki go on with his rant for now.

"Yet he lives near the school, and it's one of those apartments paid by cash and not by rent. The price here must be insanely expensive. Could he have been going from here to his junior high on the train for the past three years?”

"I told you I don't know." Why are you asking me?

"I guess we need to find out when Asakura started living here, then."

The elevator stopped at the fifth floor. We got off and found Asakura’s apartment.

Room 505.

For a few minutes, we just silently stood and looked at the door. The name board by the door had been removed, indicating this was an empty apartment.

Looking at this door brings back memories of that battle in Class 1-5. Asakura’s last words echo in my mind.

''You'd better be careful, though. I’m not the only one with a dissenting opinion.

And who knows, even those who control Nagato-san might change their thinking and decide to kill you instead.''

Asakura may be gone, but that doesn’t mean I’m safe. One of his friends might decide to assassinate me as I sleep. Even Nagato, who saved me…

I shivered involuntarily, which, unfortunately, Haruki noticed.

“You okay?” He asked, looking at me strangely.

I lied. “I’m fine. Don’t you feel that draft?”

“…Weirdo.” Haruki tried to turn the doorknob, but as expected, it’s locked.

Haruki stood with his arms crossed, trying to figure out how to get inside the apartment to investigate, while I tried to figure out why I was here wasting my time in the first place.

“Ah!” Haruki snapped his fingers "Let's find the caretaker!"

"I don't think she'll lend us the key."

"No, I'm thinking of asking her when Asakura started living here."

I sighed. "Just forget it, Haruki! What can we do even if we did know? Can’t we just go home?”

"No." With that short, simple answer, Haruki pulled my arm again.

We took the elevator and returned to the ground floor, and went to the caretaker's post at the entrance hall. That music was as loud as ever, and even got louder the closer we got to the post. Soon enough, I spotted a radio behind the glass, and… something weird. At first, I thought some kind of malformed sweater or stuffed pet had been left in the caretaker’s seat. When we pushed the buzzer, however, it turned out to be a freakishly high, curly black wig on top of a little old lady in a dress much too colorful for her, who slowly rose like a vengeful ghost.

It wasn’t something I wanted to see on a daily basis. I don’t know how she was keeping her job.

She blinked owlishly and scrabbled at her desk, eventually taking out a pair of butterfly glasses. Haruki then began to bombard the old woman with questions before she could even speak.

"Excuse me, we're friends of Asakura-san. He suddenly said he was moving without even leaving his new address, and we don't know how to contact him. Could we please ask if you know where he moved to? And, could we please know when Asakura-san started living here?"

I was amazed at how Haruki can actually use such normal, polite language, but the old lady seemed to be hard of hearing as well as half-blind. She kept replying with, "What?", "Come again?", and so on. Though I should say it was either that she was hard of hearing, or her attention was wandering; she was all smiles with her eyes firmly on Haruki. Hey, grandma! What’s with that twinkle in your eye?

Despite that, Haruki still managed to learn from the old lady that she too was surprised at Asakura suddenly moving out. (I didn't even see the movers come, yet all the furniture inside was gone. It still gives me the creeps.) He also learned that Asakura had moved in three years ago. (I remember the handsome young lad giving me a box of treats that day!) Also, instead of paying in installments, the apartment had been paid for in one single down payment in cash. (I guess they must be very rich!)

I’m impressed, Haruki! You could be a detective at this rate!

The old lady seemed rather pleased to be talking to a good-looking guy like Haruki.

^ Previous iteration didn’t make much sense and was kind of repeating earlier creepiness from old lady.

"Come to think of it, although I've often seen that handsome young boy, I don't recall ever seeing his parents. I remember the fine young man's called Ryou. Such a nice name. I was hoping he would at least come and say goodbye... it's such a pity. I forget how many times I invited him over for tea and a chat. But y’know, you're not bad yourself!”

When the old lady began to talk about stuff like that, moving a little closer to the window to get a better look at him, Haruki determined he could no longer extract any more information from her. He bowed to the old caretaker politely and said, "Thank you very much for your help."

He then motioned for me to leave. I didn’t need any urging at all, since I was eager to get far, far away from this apartment building. I hope I would never have to come back here again.

"Hey, little lady!" the caretaker called to me only loud enough for me to hear. “That boy’s a looker,” she whispered, “he’ll grow up to be a nice man. If I was just my granddaughter’s age, I’d go for him in a heartbeat, so don’t let him get away! Tame him, and you’ll be set for life.”

^ Previous iteration was Ew. Old People Dirty Talk is no good.

The old woman was obviously senile. What I was worried about was what sort of terrible reaction Haruki, who might have overheard all that, would have. Yet he silently continued moving forward, and so I remained silent as well and followed him out of the building.

A few steps from the gates, we bumped into Nagato, carrying his schoolbag and some plastic grocery bags. For Nagato, who would usually be in the clubroom reading until the school closed, to be here at this time would mean that he had left soon after we did.

"Ah!” Haruki said, surprised. “You live here too? That’s a coincidence!”

Nagato nodded his pale white face. Please, how can this be a coincidence?

"Have you heard anything about Asakura?" Haruki asked.

Nagato shook his head.

"I see. Right, well if you hear anything about Asakura, let me know, okay?"

He nodded his head. Are those the only responses you’re capable of?

I noticed some food cans and vegetables inside his grocery bags. I guess he does need to eat after all.

Haruki had noticed one thing that was different about Nagato today. "What happened to your glasses?"

Nagato didn't directly answer the question but only silently looked at me. I panicked a bit being stared at by him like that, while Haruki, not expecting him to answer at all, simply shrugged his shoulders and walked off without looking back. I lifted my arm and waved goodbye to Nagato.
As we walked past, Nagato whispered, "Be careful."

Be careful?! Of what? But as I was about to turn around and ask him, he had already vanished into his apartment building.

Geez… You’re going to make me paranoid!

----

I followed Haruki, who was walking aimlessly along the railway line, always remaining two to three steps behind him. Walking this way would lead me further and further from home, so I asked where we were going.

"Nowhere.” he replied dully.

“Then can I please go home now?” I asked as I looked up at the back of Haruki’s head.

At that point, Haruki stopped dead, and I walked straight into his back.

He turned and looked at me with a gloomy look, his face as pale white as Nagato’s.

"Do you ever get the feeling you're just an insignificant speck on the face of the planet?”

Without waiting for my answer, he continued. "I have, and I'll never forget it."

Haruki stood by the railway tracks and began to talk.

"When I was in sixth grade, I went with my family to see a baseball game. I wasn't really interested in baseball. But when I went there, I was shocked. Everywhere I looked there were people all around, everywhere. The people at the opposite end of the stadium looked like grains of rice, all of them in constant motion. Back then, I thought that everyone in Japan had gathered to watch that game. So, I asked my mom how many people were at the stadium. She said as it was full that day, there were about fifty thousand people.

"After the game, the roads were packed with those people. Seeing all of this, I was completely stunned. There were so many people here, yet they were only a tiny fraction of the whole country. I had read in geography class that Japan had a population of a hundred million, so I went home and did the math. I found out that fifty thousand was only one out of two thousand of the total population. I was stunned again. I was only a small part of so many people in the stadium, and that many people again were only a small part of the whole country.

"Before that day, I had always thought that I was special. I was happy with my family, and I felt that the world’s most interesting people were in my class. Slowly, I began to realize the truth. The things that I experienced in school that I had thought were the happiest, most wonderful things in the world, happened in every school. For the whole country, the whole planet, they were just everyday occurrences. The whole world around me started to lose its color. I brush my teeth and go to sleep, then wake up and have breakfast. It’s the same, day after day, after boring day.

"My life became boring when I realized everything I did was just a part of everybody’s ordinary life. Since there are so many people in this world, there has to be someone who's living an extraordinary, exciting life. Someone out there has to be fighting aliens, rescuing princesses, and slaying giants. Why couldn't that be me?

" I thought all about it before I graduated from elementary school. When I entered junior high, I decided to change myself. I'd show the whole world that I'm not someone who’s content to just sit and wait. But even after I’ve tried my best… everything is still the same. And now I'm in high school, still hoping for something to change. But, at this rate, it’s never going to. Never."

Haruki said all this without pause. When he finished, his face twisted into an expression of regretting saying so much, and just stared at the ground in silence.

A train passed rapidly by us. Thanks to the rumbling noise, I had time to consider what I should do next. Should I come up with something philosophical and inspiring? Should I say something to make him laugh?

However, as I watched the train leave behind its Doppler Effect sound, all I could muster was an “Is that so?” I feel really bad at only coming up with such a simple, useless reply. What am I supposed to do, though? Hug him?

Haruki turned around declared, “Let’s go!”

He strode back the way we came. Though I could reach home faster if I went after him, I somehow got the feeling he didn’t want me to follow. I stayed where I was and watched Haruki walk off until he disappeared from my sight.

Just what the hell have I been doing all this time?

When I came home, I found Itsuko waiting by my front door.

"Hi!" Her smile was the sort of smile you would usually use to greet an old friend, but it was still as fake as ever.

"I want to keep the promise I made to you earlier. That’s why I've been waiting for you here, but I never thought you would return so quickly!" She said heartily.

She was still wearing her uniform and carrying her bag, apparently she just left the school.

Itsuko continued with her ever-present smile. "Do you have a moment? I'd like to take you to see a certain place."

"Something to do with Suzumiya?" I asked.

Itsuko’s smile grew wider. "Something like that."

I opened my door and placed my bag in the hall. After telling my brother, who had just appeared, that I was going somewhere again tonight, (“With a guy again?” “Shut up.”) I went back outside to Itsuko.

A few minutes later, we went for a ride.

----

Itsuko flagged down a taxi that had stopped near my place, and we rode off along the main road, heading eastwards. Itsuko told the driver to go to a large city outside the prefecture. It’d be cheaper to go by train, but since Itsuko was the one paying, it didn’t matter to me.

"Right,” I began, “What was the promise you said you were going to keep?"

"You don’t remember? Weren’t you the one who wanted to see proof of my esper powers? Well, now’s your chance!" Itsuko said cheerfully.

"Do we really have to travel this far?"

"Yes. I can only use my powers under specific places and conditions. The place we're headed to fits those conditions."

"So, you still believe Haruki is God?"

Itsuko, sitting together with me in the back seat, glanced sideways at me. "Have you ever heard of the Anthropic Principle?"

"Nope."

Itsuko sighed and smiled again, "Basically, it's a theory that states 'If something must be true for us, as humans, to exist, then it is true simply because we exist.'"

Huh? I don't get it.

"The universe exists simply because it is there for us to observe. In other words, the intelligent lifeforms known as humans learned of the existence of the universe through observing how the universe was formed by the discovery of the laws of physics. If humans had not evolved to their present level, then observation would be impossible, and they would never learn of the existence of the universe.

“This means whether the universe exists or not, for a human who hasn't completely evolved, it wouldn't make much of a difference. It is because of the presence of us fully-evolved humans that the existence of the universe is widely accepted. This is the method of thinking from the humans' point of view."

"…That’s an stupid way of thinking. The universe exists regardless of whether humans exist or not!" I retorted.

"You're right, and that's why the Anthropic Principle is not completely scientific, just a philosophical concept. However, from this theory, something interesting comes into view."

The taxi stopped at a red light. The driver just kept staring at the road, never bothering to turn around and look at us.

"Why did the universe come to be in a state suitable for human habitation? A minor change in the gravitational constant would mean a completely different universe from the one we're in. Other sets of rules such as Planck's Constant or the mass ratio of atomic molecules seem to be designed specifically so that humans can live in this universe. Don't you find this incredible?"

My head hurts. The stuff Itsuko said sounds like one of the rhetorical flyers given out by those newly formed religions whose founding principles are based on scientific theories.

"Relax! I don't believe in the existence of an ‘Almighty God’, or the ‘Ultimate Creator’ that breathed life into the first human. And many of my companions share this sentiment. Yet, there's one thing that bothers us."

Which would be?

"Are all the things that we do as foolish as a clown doing a handstand by the edge of a cliff?"

The expression on my face right now must have been very strange, or Itsuko wouldn't have laughed as loud as she did.

"Ah-hohohoho! I was kidding, kidding!"

H-hey, you… "I really don’t know what the hell you’re talking about…"

What I really want to say is, I don't have time to play some stupid jokes with you. Can you let me off? Or driver, do you mind turning around? If possible, I'd prefer the latter.

"I was just using the Anthropic Principle as a comparison. We still haven't touched on the subject of Suzumiya-san."

This is just too weird! Why are you, Nagato and Asahina-sempai all so infatuated with Haruki?

"Well, I think that he’s very charming and charismatic, but let’s leave that aside for now. Do you still remember me saying that this world had probably been created by Suzumiya-san?"

I didn’t like what she was saying, but I did remember it having come up.

"He has the ability to realize dreams." Itsuko said.

Can you not be so conclusive for once?

"I can’t, because it’s true. Right now, this world is being guided by Suzumiya-san's wishes."

…How, exactly, is that possible?
"Suzumiya-san has always believed aliens existed, which is why Nagato Yuuki appeared. Similarly, he wanted to meet time travelers, so Asahina Mitsuuru appeared as well. And I appeared before him for the same reasons as well."

Didn’t he have marriage plans in there somewhere…?

"And how do you know that?" I asked.

"It was three years ago..." Itsuko began.

Three years ago again! I'm sick of hearing that already! Why is it always three years ago?

"One day, I suddenly realized I possessed a certain power, and for some reason, I fully understood how to use this power. At the same time, I also discovered others like me had also gained certain powers, and that these powers were granted by Suzumiya Haruki. I can't go into the details. All I can say is that I know these things while not being able to explain them."

"Alright, look. Even if I believe you have these powers, I still can't believe Haruki can have the power to warp reality."

"Neither could I. A mere schoolboy having the ability to change the world -- sorry, I guess it should be more like the ability to create worlds, huh? The scary thing, though, is that this boy now finds the world he's in to be boring."

"Why is that scary?"

"Didn't I say tell you? If he can create worlds at will, then naturally he can make this world disappear without a trace and then restructure it according to his wishes. Then, in a literal sense, the world will have come to an end. We can't determine whether this theory is correct or not; who knows, the world which we believe to be unique has probably been recreated many times before already."

The number of times I have used the word “unbelievable” in the past 10 minutes only proves that I need a thesaurus.

"If that's really the case, why don't you just tell Haruki who you really are? Let him know that espers really do exist. I bet he’d be really happy to hear that.” He’d probably ask you to marry him. “Maybe then, he wouldn't want to try and destroy the world!"

"That would pose an even greater problem. If Suzumiya-san believed the existence of espers to be a very normal thing, then it would become a very normal thing. All the laws of physics would be distorted-- the Molecular Constant, the Second Law of Thermodynamics, and the rest of the universe would all descend into chaos."
"There's something I don't understand." I said, "I remember you saying it was Haruki's longing to marrymeet aliens, time travelers and espers that caused you, Nagato-kun, and Asahina-sempai to appear before her?"

"Yes,” she replied.

"Well, then why hasn't Haruki noticed anything yet? Isn’t it a little strange that it’s just you and me who know everything instead?"

"You find it inconsistent? It isn’t, really-- the real inconsistency is within Suzumiya-san's heart."

…Could you say something I can understand for once, please!?

As I was about to respond with some sharp retort, the driver said suddenly, "We're here."

The car came to a stop and the door opened. I stepped into the crowded street with Itsuko. When the driver drove off without even charging any fare, I wasn't at all surprised.

If people in this area wanted to go shopping, this would be the place for them to do so. This is the typical local metropolis with the railway interchange, as well as all sorts of department stores and complex architecture. The sunset bathed the bustling street full of pedestrians a glowing orange. When the lights at the intersection ahead turned green, the road became occupied by a sea of people in an instant. We were separated for a while by this wave after we got off by the sidewalk.

"So what were you saying?" I asked, as I caught up to Itsuko.

We headed towards a nearby shopping centre as she talked. "Ah, yes, Suzumiya-san’s inconsistent heart. He does hope for the existence of aliens, time travelers, and espers. His common sense, however, is telling him that these things don't exist, and this creates cognitive dissonance. Though he may be eccentric in his actions and speech, his thinking is still no different from an ordinary person. His stormy enthusiasm has slowly calmed down in the last few months. We were glad to finally see him stabilize, but a tornado-like change has suddenly occurred."

“What change?"

"It's all because of you." As we passed through the doors of the shopping centre, Itsuko stopped walking and turned towards me. "If you hadn't given Suzumiya-san certain… funny ideas, we would still be observing him from behind the scenes right now."

"What!? What did I do!?” I had nothing to do with anything! It’s all Haruki’s fault anyways!

"It was you who encouraged him to form that weird club. All because of a conversation he had with you, he came up with the idea of forming a club to gather us all together. Therefore, you must carry full responsibility for all of this. It is because of you that the three groups most concerned with Suzumiya Haruki have now gathered in the same place."

Oh. That. “T-that’s not fair!" I still decided to defend myself unconvincingly
.
Itsuko only smiled and continued, "But that's not the only reason…”

“Hey,” Itsuko suddenly broke out into a grin as she caught something in the corner of her eye. “That dress…” She pointed at a flowing yellow one, up at some clothing store’s display case. “It’d look really good on you, wouldn’t it?” She turned back to me, smiling wider than ever. “Want to go and try it on?”

I put my palm against my face and sighed. “…Wasn’t there something you wanted to show me?” I asked, exasperated.

At my response, Itsuko looked a bit sheepish. “Ah, yes, that. But after we finish, we’ll come back to try it on, okay?”

“…Fine.”

^ Original seemed WAY out of place and definitely a bit random.

As we walked towards an open area in the middle of the shopping centre, Itsuko looked at me and said, "There's still time for you to change your mind, you know. It’d probably be simpler just to go back and try on the dress."

"Shut up about the dress. I'm already here anyway, so let’s cut to the chase."

Walking beside me, Itsuko suddenly grabbed hold of my hand. Hey, what do think you're doing!?

"Sorry, but could you please close your eyes for a while? This won't take very long.”

What won’t take long? Hey! I dodged to avoid a consumer from bumping into me.

Fine, fine. I obligingly closed my eyes. I could still hear the many footsteps of the shoppers, the endless chatting, the dull roar from the cars outside, and all sorts of noises.

Under Itsuko's guidance, I walked ahead one step, two steps, three steps, and then I stopped.

"You can open them now."

I slowly opened my eyes.

The whole world fell into a shade of grey.

All the bright colors in the store windows were gone and on the neon signs advertising fifty percent off sales had turned dull grey The lights on the ceiling had gone out, stranding Itsuko and me in near-darkness.

There were no people at all.

Besides Koizumi and I, the bustling crowd of evening shoppers that was here before had now vanished without a trace. The ever-present hum of machinery that fills the background noise in cities was gone. It was so quiet that you might wonder if the Earth had stopped spinning as well.

"We're now in a gap within a cross-dimensional faultline; this is Closed Space, a place that is completely cut off from the world we live in."

Itsuko's voice became particularly clear in the silence.

"The centre of this courtyard falls right by the ‘Wall’ of this Closed Space. Look, just like that."

Itsuko's outstretched arm stopped in midair, as though blocked by something. I tried to do the same and stretched my arm towards that direction; it felt like touching cold, washed vegetables. My hands pushed through the surface of an elastic invisible wall, but I couldn’t extend any further beyond ten centimeters.

"This Closed Space has a radius of five kilometers. Usually, it's impossible to enter using normal physical means. However I have a certain ability that allows us to enter."

"Where is this place?" I asked. Wait, no, the question ought to be more like “What dimension is this?”

"I'll explain as we move along,." said Koizumi casually. “We should go outside, where you can really see the true extent of this place.”

As we headed out through the back entrance, I couldn't help but lift my head towards the sky. The glowing orange sun was nowhere to be seen, and the sky was covered by gloomy grey clouds. Were those really clouds? The flawless dark horizon stretched endlessly ahead in every direction. The only thing that stopped this world from falling completely into darkness was a weak glow in the sky that had replaced the bright sun.

This place… it’s creepy.

"I'm not too sure about the details, but this is a dimension located not far from ours... Let's put it this way, a cross-dimensional faultline just appeared right over there, and we have entered through the gap. At this moment, the outside world is still going on with its everyday life. It's nearly impossible for normal humans to stumble upon this world by accident." She continued to talk as we crossed the street, heading towards an apartment complex. "Imagine an inverted bowl-like, egg-shaped dimension, and this place is its interior."

We entered the multi-story apartment complex, but not a single person could be seen, not even a speck of dust.

"Closed Space occurs randomly. Sometimes it appears once every other day, and sometimes it appears once every several months. Yet, one thing's for sure..."

We climbed up the stairs, although it was dark inside. If I hadn't been following Itsuko closely, I would've tripped.

"Whenever Suzumiya-san is in a mentally unstable condition, this space will appear."

We arrived at the rooftop of the apartment block.

"Once Closed Space appears, I will be able to sense it. So too can my companions. How do we know, you ask?”

I didn’t ask.

“Frankly, even we don't know how. In any case, we just know when and where Closed Space will appear, and how to penetrate it. I can't describe this feeling in words."

I held the rooftop fence and looked towards the sky; no breeze could be felt.

"So you brought me here just to see this? There's not even anybody here!" Can I go home now?

^ I think it would be better to not mention the dress at all in this crazy esper scene. It distracts and right now I can’t figure out a way to naturally fit the reference to it.

"No, the real fun will begin soon. It's about to start."

Quit joking around! Itsuko, however, pretended not to notice my sour expression.

"My abilities are based around detecting Closed Space and penetrating it, but that’s not all they can do. I can even sense Suzumiya-san's state of mind. This space is a representation of Suzumiya-san's emotional state and my comrades and I are in charge of maintaining it. I guess you could say that when Suzumiya-san’s mind gets to the point where it becomes indigested, I’m the medicine sent in to cure it."

"…Your metaphors are a little hard to understand."

"People often tell me that. Anyway, are you feeling all right? I guess it’s to be expected, but you seem a bit freaked out by this place."

“It’s nothing, nothing…” It’s just that… this place reminds me a little of the space Asakura created a few days ago. Gah, I've had enough of these crazy experiences already!

Suddenly, Itsuko lifted her head and looked in the opposite direction I was facing..

"Seems like it's begun.” She said, suddenly serious. “Turn around and look behind you."

I saw it.

Standing between the tall buildings in the distance was a glowing red giant.

It was taller than a 30-story building by a head's length. Its slim, deep crimson-shaded figure seemed to contain some sort of material that allowed it to glow from within. Since it was too dark, I couldn’t see its outline clearly, and besides the eyes and mouth, which seemed to be an even darker red, its face didn't seem to have any other features.

What… what on earth is that?

The giant slowly lifted its arm and then swung it down like an axe, and the building beside it was smashed in half; then, as if in slow motion, the concrete, wires, and debris made a deafening noise falling to the ground.

Itsuko was talking again, but I could barely hear her over the destruction "We believe these to be the manifestation of Suzumiya-san's frustration. Every time his inner conflict reaches a certain limit, these giants will appear and destroy everything around them to relieve pressure. We cannot allow these things to have their way in our reality, or they'll cause widespread death and destruction. That is why this Closed Space is created, so that they can wreak their havoc inside. You understand?"

Every time the glowing red giant waved its arms, the buildings would be sliced in half and collapse. The giant would then continue forwards, stepping on the debris.

Surprisingly, I could only hear the sound of the buildings collapsing, but not the footsteps of the giant.

"According to the laws of physics, it should be impossible for a giant like him to be able to stand, due to his weight. Yet he is able to move around freely in a weightless condition. Though destroying a building involves a change in molecular structure, these rules don't seem to apply to him. Not even an army would be able to stop one of these giants."

"So… we can’t do anything?"

"No, and that is why I exist. Please look closely."

Itsuko pointed towards the giant. And I looked again to notice a few glowing blue dots that had just appeared and were flying around the giant. Compared to the large red giant, the blue dots were like sesame seeds. There were five of them in total, but because they were flying so fast, my eyes couldn't catch up with them. Like satellites, the blue dots orbited around the giant as though trying to stop the giant from moving further ahead.

"Those are my companions, who, like me, have obtained their powers from Suzumiya-san. We are warriors in charge of hunting down these giants."

The giant made a lazy swing to swat away the tiny blue pests, but they skillfully dodged the giant's attacks and swiftly changed their flight path. They came around a second time and attacked the giant's body. The giant, however, seemed to be made of gas, since the blue dots simply flew through it.

The giant, after deciding that it was too troublesome to fight, simply ignored the blue dots and their attacks and raised its arm again to smash another department store building.

No matter how the blue dots attacked, the giant didn't seem to be stopping. Blue laser-like beams now penetrated the giant's body non-stop, but since I was too far away, I couldn’t figure out the extent of damage it had sustained. One thing was for certain: the blue beams didn't create any holes in the giant's body.

"Right, I think now would be an excellent time for me to join them."

Itsuko's body started to glow blue, and a blast of force erupted from her which drove me a few steps back and caused her clothes to flutter. As she started to glow blue, Itsuko briefly turned to look at me and smiled a little strangely.

"How embarrassing, I think my skirt went up for a moment," she said with a small giggle, “You didn’t see anything, did you?”

Who would be looking up your skirt at a time like this?!

Soon, her glowing body was covered in a blue glowing sphere. Standing before me was no longer a human girl, but a large glowing ball.

This is getting ridiculous. I may need a thesaurus again at this rate.

As if making a signal, the glowing sphere started to rise and then flew straight towards the giant at an incredible speed.

Since the blue spheres never stopped flying, I couldn't figure out how many there were in total, but I don’t think there could have been more than ten, including Itsuko. They bravely flew towards the giant's body, but all they could do was fly through it. The giant was barely, if even, hurt. But just as I was thinking that, one of the blue spheres suddenly approached the giant's wrist and circled it.

The next moment, the giant's hand was sliced off. The masterless hand fell towards the ground and gave out a mosaic glow, started to become transparent, and then disintegrated like snow melting under the sun. I guess the red smoke coming out of the giant's severed wrist must have been its blood. This really is the stuff of fiction.

The blue dots seemed to have changed their attacking style of charging towards the giant. They approached the giant like a bunch of fleas surrounding a dog. The blue beams sliced through the giant's face, and its head came falling down; after that, its shoulder fell as well, followed by its upper torso, leaving behind a strange shape. The falling bits began to give out the characteristic mosaic glow, then disintegrated and vanished.

As the giant was standing in a large piece of land without any obstacles around, I was able to see the whole process from beginning to end. When the giant's upper torso fell off, its remaining body also began to disintegrate, finally dissolving into beads smaller than dust and spreading over the debris.

Once the blue dots floating above made sure their work was done, they started flying off in all directions. Most of them disappeared at once; only one flew towards me, finally landing at the rooftop of the apartment complex. The blue sphere slowly lost its glow, and finally Itsuko stood before me, flipping her hair pretentiously with her usual plastic smile.

"Sorry to keep you waiting." She sounded very calm, and not exhausted at all.

"Before we go, I'd like to show you one more interesting thing."

Itsuko pointed towards the sky. I half-suspiciously raised my head, and in the gloomy grey skies, I saw it!

Right above where the giant first appeared was a crack, like that of a hatching bird trying to break through its eggshell. The crack began to spread rapidly like a spider web.

"Following the red creature's destruction, the Closed Space will also be destroyed. Believe me you won’t want to miss it.”

As Itsuko finished her explanation, the large cracks now covered the skies above, like a metallic net. The net margins started to narrow until they became as small as black curvy lines. Then, at that moment, CRACK!

Actually, I didn't really hear any sound. It was just my brain trying to simulate the sound of glass cracking. Anyway, a light penetrated from a spot in the sky, spreading out in all directions. I felt the light shower downwards. No, that's not the right word for it… it was more like the opening of the retractable roof of the Tokyo Dome stadium, all within a few seconds. The difference is that this roof covered all the buildings under it.

A loud noise started to rumble in my eardrums, and I covered my ears instinctively. It was because I had been in a world of silence for so long, the usual bustling noise in the streets and mechanical hum of white noise had seemed deafeningly loud.

The world had reverted back to its original state.

There were no collapsed buildings, no grey skies, and no glowing blue spheres flying through the air. The road was full of vehicles and people. A familiar orange glow could be seen through the gaps between the buildings. The world seemed grateful at the reception of such warmth and left long shadows behind.

The breeze blew softly.

----
"Well then," Itsuko said. "Shall we go back?"

Is it really okay to be this calm right now? Weren't you just in life-or-death battle?

"Of course I was," she replied, her smile faltering for only a moment before it resumed full-force. "But you must understand, I have been in these fights before."

What's with those unreadable expressions?

"I find," Itsuko said as she guided me back down the stairs, towards the shopping centre, "that though these battles need to be taken very seriously, they should not be dwelled on. When the fight is won, one should take a moment to enjoy the simple things in life. Like this one."

At this point, we were at the shop that had the yellow dress... Itsuko, predictably, made me try it on and despite my protests, it did look good, so I bought it. I might've thanked her if she hadn't been so persistent about me trying it on, even if she was right.

^ Too much Yuri-ness, must be more subtle

----

"Now do you understand, though?" Itsuko asked me as we boarded a taxi, which seemed to magically stop before us after we left the shopping centre. When I looked, I realized it was the same driver as before.

"I don't get it at all." I answered truthfully.

"I knew you'd say that, hoho." Itsuko laughed. "Those red giants, we call them Celestials, but, as I've told you already, they are greatly related to Suzumiya-san's mental condition. We're the same, of course. Once Closed Space appears, once the Celestials begin their movement, we're able to use our powers. We can only use those powers within Closed Space; right now, I’m totally powerless."

I silently glanced at the driver's back. All that is related to Haruki’s mental state? What is he, a teenage girl?

"I don't know why it's just us who have these powers, but I don’t think it has anything to do with our identities. It's like winning the lottery: even though the chances may be low, there's bound to be someone who wins. I just happened to be the one to be stabbed by the random spear. Ah, how unlucky I am!" Itsuko smiled forcefully. I remained silent because I didn't know what I should have said. Unlucky? Who are you to say that?

"We cannot allow the Celestials to move freely. Why is that, you ask? Because the more damage these Celestials cause, the larger the sphere of the Closed Space becomes. The one you just saw was one of the smaller ones. If we leave them unattended, it will continue to grow until it covers the whole country, even the whole world, and finally, that alternate grey world will completely replace the world we're living in."

I finally opened my mouth. "How come you know so much?"

"I told you, I just know, it can't be explained. All the espers associated with The Organization are the same. One day they just suddenly knew everything about Suzumiya-san and how he could affect this world, as well as realizing that since they now had supernatural powers, they couldn't just allow Closed Space to continue expanding untouched. When normal people learn about something like this, they’d normally want to see if they could be of any help, right? If we hadn't done anything about it, the world as we know it would have been destroyed. And that, of course, would be a bad thing."

Itsuko fell silent after mumbling those last words.

For the rest of the journey, we just looked in opposite directions, watching the scenery pass by.

----

The car stopped in front of my house, and as I got out, Itsuko spoke again.

"Please pay attention to Suzumiya-san's actions. His supposedly stable mental state has now begun to show signs of rapid deterioration. It's been quite a while since something like this has happened."

Look, even if I was to pay more attention to him, what difference can I possibly make?

"Honestly, I have no idea. But I think you are the right person to entrust this matter to. Some of my colleagues tend to overthink matters ... or not think enough."

Before I could reply, Itsuko drew her head back inside the open car and closed the door.

I stood there for a moment, watching what I was now sure was Itsuko's - or rather her Organisation's - private taxi disappear into the distance. As I watched the legendary phantom taxi drive off into the distance, I began feeling rather like an idiot, and went inside.

My little brother was waiting at the door, looking disappointed. What? Did you think you were going to score even more free candy by blackmailing your big sister? What kind of a heartless individual is our father raising here?

"Shut up!" he pouted. "Anyway, you have no right to call me heartless, I do lots of nice things around the house. I wake you up every morning, so you don't arrive late at school."

Having said so, the miniature wrestling fanatic who practises his combat moves on me in the mornings to wake me up ran off into the living room.

I need a shower ...

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| Return to [[Suzumiya_Haruki_no_Seitenkan:Volume1_Chapter5|Chapter 5]]
| Forward to [[Suzumiya_Haruki_no_Seitenkan:Volume1_Chapter7|Chapter 7]]
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