Princess Moon CH 1
Finally, all my blabbering about writing Sailor Moon fic has been... well, partially realized at least. With much pride, I present...
Title: Princess Moon, 1/?
“Bad Luck Follows A Black Cat”
Author: hellenelle
Length: 4186 words
Rating: PG
Summary: What if Usagi hadn't been the first Sailor Soldier awakened? What if she'd been captured by the Dark Kingdom, and her Sailor Team was forced to fight without her?
Mizuno Ami is used to life as a simple succession from school to cram school to home; she doesn't have time for black cats, superstitions, or monsters.
Notes: Thanks to my beta reader cosmic_fiction!
The sunlight was the same every morning, streaking in through the kitchen windows in sharp, cruel daggers. It brightened the whole house, window to window until the light was almost unbearable. The glint off of the white counter tops was the first thing that hit Mizuno Eriko's eyes when she walked into the kitchen.
She was dressing as she walked out of her bedroom. She suppressed a yawn and looked around. Everything was in order; the refrigerator was humming, the water taps were off, and her daughter was sitting at the table.
“Good morning,” Ami said. She turned up to her mother, who was still rubbing her dark blue eyes, trying to chase the last traces of sleep away. Her mother mumbled something back to her and slumped over to the coffee machine. It was situated alone on a counter, in its own little shrine of practicality. Ami turned back to the book she was reading; it was spread across the table below her breakfast plates. She read it as she nibbled on eggs and rice. Her fingers traced lightning fast along the page, up and down, tracking the words as she read them.
When she looked up next, her mother was sipping on the first cup of the day, her eyes closed in something close to worship. “Do you have surgery scheduled today?” Ami asked, reaching for her cup of tea. Her mother finished sipping before looking at her across the brim of the cup.
“Knee replacement at twelve,” she answered, after thinking for a moment. The coffee had helped her voice substantially; no longer was it thick and dry with sleep. “And I’m on rounds until late tonight. You know how it is.”
“I do.” Ami replied, sipping. The mist from the hot tea rose around her face, and her mother almost wondered if it didn't hide her daughter's face completely. Kept anyone from seeing what was going on there.
Ami stood as her mother sat, picking up the book and carrying it across the wide room to her school bag. She slipped it inside, and stopped by the entrance to pull her shoes on. Her mother watched, quietly sipping coffee. Sometimes, the older woman wondered if she had been so like her daughter at a younger age. There were remarkable resemblances, of course. The hair - though Ami's was lighter than her mother's, both of them had the same blue hair, and wore it in much the same style. And she was so studious, and so serious. Ami's mother could remember a time when nothing mattered to her more than becoming a doctor. She imagined it was the same for her daughter.
Only, I brought friends home with me once in a while.
But it was a fleeting concern, and Ami straightened. “I'll pick up milk on the way home from cram school, we're almost out.” She said. “I'm leaving,” she added mechanically as she pulled the door open and slipped out into the hallway.
“Come back safely,” her mother said as the door closed.
Ami waved to the woman at the greeter's desk as she left the building. The clean glass doors slid open without a sound, and she stepped into the sunlight. Like always. Well, not always, she corrected. Sometimes it rains.
She didn't afford a glance at the building behind her, because she had studied it long and hard enough to know its every detail. Back when her father thought she might have artistic potential, he used to teach her. Look closely at anything, closely enough, and break it into enough little simple bits, tiny flat shapes. Memorize the world.
It wasn't far, from her apartment building (condominium building, the owners always insisted, as if apartment was a sour insult) to Azabu Juuban Junior High School. Just a few blocks, and Ami had memorized it all. A tree, a phone pole. Past the arcade, where one of the workers was pasting up new posters. 'SAILOR V ACTION GAME!'
Ami passed by, barely noticing. The streets were fairly empty, this early in the morning. Ami was the only student she'd seen so far in a Juuban uniform. It was always like that. Ami liked to allow herself enough time to get to school, no matter what. To be early is to be on time, she told herself. To be on time is to be late. And besides, being early meant time alone in the classroom to read, without the other students, or the teacher, to distract her.
Ami stopped in front of the book store to peer in through the windows. It was closed, dark and welcoming with rows upon rows of books peering out at her. But it was just one thing she was anxious to see. Had they gotten it yet? Received the shipment?
Weeks ago, she had pre-ordered a copy of a new translation of an American science book. The store had said they would have it in by the first of April. And here it was barely days away, and Ami's guts were tying in a knot in impatience. But no, the store was still closed, and if her book had arrived, there was no way she'd find out from staring in the windows and wasting valuable study time.
She turned from the shop window and stopped abruptly. Sitting in front of her on the side walk and staring up at her with large, wild, red eyes was a black cat. Ami jumped back half a step, stumbling in her neat school-mandated black shoes. The cat gave her another glance and, with a single demanding mew, darted away. Ami shook herself. Just an alley cat, right?
She looked after it, a black streak vanishing quickly down the road, and shuddered again. Black cats aren't bad luck, she reprimanded herself. That's a completely unproved, unsubstantiated theory. A superstition.
You don't believe in superstitions.
She was chilled though; was it just her imagination, or did the wind seem colder now? The empty street a little unfriendly? She chided herself again. Superstition has been explained by modern science, she told herself. It's what happens when a result, assigned randomly, is perceived by the subject to have been caused by their behavior. A person hears that bad cats are bad luck. If that person encounters a black cat and subsequently has a bad day, they attribute it to the cat and tell other people; but if the person’s day is good, they don’t associate it with the cats. It’s a confirmation bias, Ami told herself; it’s humanity’s desire to not check whether result y is actually affected by variable x. Superstition is decidedly unscientific.
Still, as she started walking again, shifting the weight of her bag nervously from hand to hand, she couldn't help feeling that it was an ominous omen. A bad way to start the day, if nothing else.
It wasn't until she reached the gates of the school--tall, impressive, rails shaped like thin pencils, that she could have sketched if she had her father's hands--that she saw a single other student in the Juuban uniform. Even past the gates, in the blank, grassless front yard, there were few. Athletes, doing morning workouts. People trudging up to classrooms to set up for the day, assigned an unfortunate early morning duty, groaning and rubbing sleep out of their eyes.
As for Ami, there wasn't any sleep left to rub away, to chase off. She'd been awake most of the night, reading or thinking or staring at the ceiling willing herself to rest. The willing had not worked, and she'd barely closed her eyes before the sun and her mother's alarm clock woke her.
She paused in the front entrance to change her shoes, slipping the black loafers into her slim cubby-hole. As she bent down to slip on her white indoor sneakers, a stitch in her side stung at her. She sucked in breath hastily and stood. The same spot had been hurting for the last three days. She brought her hands to the spot, just a few inches above her left hip, on the front of her body. The pain stung through her again and she bent over the cramped spot. Breathe in, breathe out. She didn't realize she'd dropped her school bag until a voice above her startled her.
“Mizuno-san?”
Her head snapped up, and it took her a moment to stutter a reply.
“I'm fine, just a… Just a cramp.” The girl beside her smiled, but her eyes were still worried.
“Congratulations on your practice exam scores, Mizuno-san,” said the girl in a voice of required politeness, reaching into her own cubby. Ami straightened, as the pain dulled, and looked at the girl for a long moment. Too long a moment, really.
“Thank you.” Ami said, finally, her eyes looking back down to the floor, down to her shoes that were half tied. The girl left, and Ami bent back to her shoes. The pain was almost gone, really. Just a dull ache. Maybe I walked too fast.
By the time she had slid into her seat, the pain was gone. She reached into her bag and pulled out a text book. It was a plain, brown book on comparative governments. Ami ran her finger along the top of it, until she found her bookmark. She flipped it open, and glanced up at the clock. Only fifteen minutes until class began, and less than that until her classmates began arriving and cluttering the air so that she couldn't read quite as well. She had wasted time, then, with the cat and down at her locker.
Well, there's no use crying over spilled milk, Ami told herself, proud that she'd memorized another of the idioms she'd been studying that week. Her teacher at cram school would be pleased. She bent her head and began to read.
She fell into the book easily, and it wasn't until the classroom had almost filled that she looked up again, mildly surprised that so many people had arrived so loudly without her notice. Even the teacher had walked in, an older man who could never seem to control a single student, let alone a whole room of them. Ami felt remotely bad for him, but she knew there was nothing she could do. She managed to read a few more sentences before the teacher cleared his throat and stepped up to the podium.
“Today, if you'll all take out your English texts and turn to chapter five, we'll continue studying introductions.”
The class was already whispering, chattering, lines of low energy running up and down as Ami reached into her bag to pull out her textbook. She sighed, placing it on top of her own book; she'd read this chapter last week, and they'd covered it in cram school two days ago.
Review is always necessary, she chided herself, and began reading. My name is Youko. Nice to meet you. I am Japanese.
When the lunch bell rang, Ami was startled. She'd been working on a math sheet and she’d lost track of time. She looked up, and for just a moment watched the other students move around her. Standing up, talking, shouting across the room, pulling desks together and pulling lunches out.
Ami stood quietly and picked up her school bag. She walked to the front of the classroom, and out into the hallway without even being noticed by the teacher. He was too busy shouting at the other students to stop throwing things. Ami knew it was a cruel thing to regret that Juuban Junior High didn't sort classes by rank, but she regretted it nonetheless.
Out in the hallway, it was quieter. Ami walked, trying to keep her footsteps quiet. It was easier if teachers didn't stop her, after all. What she was doing wasn't exactly against the rules, but it wasn't smiled upon either.
Up ahead, by the water fountain, a group of students were talking. Ami didn't recognize them at first, but as she got closer and turned her face towards the floor--half shy, half sly--and they began to speak, she realized they were from Homeroom One. A boy and a girl; the boy was sniffling, trying to hold back tears.
“The love of my life,” the boy sobbed. He rubbed his fists underneath his glasses. “Out sick, for the third day in a row!”
The girl next to him patted his shoulder awkwardly. “I'm sure she's fine,” she said, offering him a tissue. He grabbed it and blew his nose loudly. “She's probably just skipping to sleep in, anyway.”
“Slander,” the boy muttered, and then Ami was past them and, curious as she was, there wasn't a single reason for her to turn back and listen to the rest of their conversation.
She arrived at the library soon enough, and slid into its dark, quiet, book-filled safety. She set herself down at one of the tables in the back, and pulled out her book again, followed by her lunch box and a tiny bottle of water. She had thirty-three more minutes before class began again; that was ample time to read and eat, free of distractions and stares.
Lunch was over too soon, of course, and Ami returned to class. They got back test scores in the afternoon, and Ami resolved to study harder after school. She had the ability to do better, and she knew it; ninety-eight just wasn't an acceptable grade.
When the final bell rang, Ami was immersed in her text book; she'd lost track of the class, who were mostly clowning around anyway, and the teacher had somehow fallen asleep at his desk.
She rose from her desk slowly, stretching her arms, as her classmates stampeded out into the afternoon. She gathered her books, slipping them into her black bookcase, and, bowing goodbye to the still slumbering teacher, made her way out into the afternoon. The school was, again, deserted. It seemed to Ami that she was the last person to leave. She knew there had to be sports clubs practicing somewhere, though, right? It was a four-minute thirteen-second walk to cram school. She'd timed it one day when there was nothing better to do as she walked. Just in case, she supposed.
Just in case what, a more logical part of her brain laughed, asking what could possibly ever happen that would require her to know exactly how long it took to walk from her school to cram school?
Something black darted out in front of her and Ami yelped. She jumped back, wobbling for a moment, and looked down. There, off to her left, a black cat was sitting on the sidewalk, regarding her. The cat from this morning, Ami realized.
That's preposterous. Cats all look alike, anyway. Ami shook her head; maybe she wasn't getting enough to eat. Malnutrition does funny things to your head, after all. “Be more careful, kitty.” Ami said, reaching out to pet the cat. But before her hand even got close, the cat hissed and scampered away. Feeling rather put out as it was her second cat encounter to end badly that day, Ami continued her four-minute thirteen-second walk.
Although after stopping for the cat, she was going to be late.
Not that, in the end, being late mattered. When she arrived at her classroom, on the second story of a white, glass windowed building in the heart of the Juuban shopping district, she realized that her entire trip had been pointless.
The building itself was new and loud, an eye-catching structure whose entire front face was devoted to advertisement. The enormous, shiny sign read “Juuban Crystal Cram School” in block letters; below, a caption claimed the ability to turn any child into a genius.
The school, like the building, was new and rather brilliant. Ami had switched into this cram school just a month ago, coming from her old one across town. She told her mother it was because the walk was shorter, which would give her more time to study; the truth of the matter, though, was that Ami had found she could solve most of the problems faster than her old instructors, and she'd finished reading their textbook library. It wasn't of any use to her anymore.
Juuban Crystal, though, in addition to being bright and new itself, was full of bright, young instructors that Ami respected, even liked. She slipped into her desk and smiled up at her Monday-Wednesday teacher, Tanemura-sensei.
“Good afternoon, Mizuno,” the teacher, a tall woman in her mid-thirties, greeted, walking over to her. “How is school going?”
“Very well, thank you.” Ami replied, as she began to pull her books out of her bag again, setting them up on her desk. She glanced up at the teacher and smiled. “What are we studying today?”
“English,” Tanemura-sensei said. “Greetings and self descriptions are always on national exams, so we're going to hammer those points home. Not,” she said, laughing a little to herself, “that you need it hammered home.” Ami turned back to her books, afraid she'd blush. She could feel heat spreading across her cheeks, brightening her face at that very second. So, as her teacher continued to talk, she started digging through her bag again, looking for her English text book. “I've had a few students ask if you wouldn't mind tutoring them outside of class, actually. You wouldn't be interested in a part-time job, would you?”
But Ami hadn't heard more than half of her teacher's offer. She was casting about, looking half-frantically for something. “Mizuno?”
“I can't find my textbook, Tanemura-Sensei. I think I must have left it back at school.” Ami mentally cursed her bad luck. “If I run, I can make it there and back in time for the beginning of class.” She turned and headed for the door, as her teacher offered to lend her an extra copy. But Ami was determined to use her own copy and, after bowing at the door and promising she'd be back quickly, she skittered out of the building.
The shopping district had filled up with other students, laughing in arcades and chatting in front of store windows. It was too loud, too cramped, too frantic for Ami, and it made it impossible to run. And she'd have to run, if she didn't want to miss the first half of the lesson. So, when she passed the opening of an alley she knew let out half a block away from her school, she darted into its dark interior.
She started running in earnest, her black shoes slapping against the pavement. The alley was wide, and even though it was full of shadows she didn't have a hard time making her way around the dumpsters and trashcans that lined either side of her path.
But when a black shadow streaked out in front of her feet, Ami didn't have enough time to react. For the third time today, her mind exclaimed as she careened to the ground. She landed on her knees with a shock of pain. She looked back at the cat; it was lying on the ground, mewing faintly. Ami crawled over to it, rubbing a scraped kneecap, and tried to figure out what was wrong. “I'm sorry, kitty,” she said, reaching out to touch its side. It looked beat up, injured in a way that Ami didn't think being tripped over could do; and when she pulled her hand away, there was blood on her fingers. The cat mewed and tried to pull itself to its feet. It was the same cat, with the shiny gold spot on its head in the shape of a crescent moon. Ami was about to reach forward and try to lift the cat up, when she heard a hissing sound coming from behind her.
She looked over her shoulder, and gasped. She'd thought perhaps it was another cat; that this cat had perhaps been in a fight. But what she saw was no cat. At least, no cat that Ami had ever heard of before, and even when she felt humble she would admit that she'd heard of quite a lot.
It was bending over a few feet down the alley, the way Ami had come. It wasn't a person, but it wasn't an animal either. It was, instead, something between the two; it was covered in yellow-green fur, and its eyes were yellow slits. It raised a hand at her and hissed again. It had long, sharp fingers with pointed claws, and Ami couldn't tell where the flesh left off and the claws began. Almost instinctively, Ami shrank backwards and put a hand out behind her. The little cat was cowering at her side, spitting and hissing.
And then, as Ami's heart fluttered, the creature before her opened its mouth and spoke. “Surrender her now, if you know what's good for you.” It said, in a rasping, stupid voice that made Ami shudder. Ami shook her head. A part of her was screaming inside, what are you doing? It’s just a cat! That part of her was listing off a hundred logical reasons why she should just turn her back and go to cram school (it was cram school and she had to go, and it was just a cat, and it wasn’t her concern, and she shouldn’t be risking her life, she had responsibilities) but for the first time in her life, she wasn’t listening to logic.
Instead, she clenched her teeth and shifted her weight slowly; she got to her feet, but stayed in a crouch, watching the monster in front of her. The monster blinked its black eyes and hissed out another breath. Ami shivered, watching it closely, her mind buzzing. What in the world? Why would something like this be going after a cat? But her thoughts were cut short as the monster suddenly sprung at her, its large hind legs extending in a lightning-fast jump. Ami flung herself to the side at the last second, and the monster crashed into the wall. Ami landed on her side next to a stack of trash cans, breathing heavily. She stood and glanced around. The little black cat darted to her side and yowled loudly. Almost as if she wanted attention, Ami fancied, but her mind was jerked back to the present as the monster hissed again.
Ami dashed aside as the monster sprang again, but she realized quickly that she hadn't been the target. It jumped directly at the little black cat, who wasn't as quick as Ami; the monster pinned the cat under one of its clawed hands and growled. Some half-formed words came out, and the cat yowled again.
Ami, for the first time in a long, long time, didn't think at all as she lifted the lid of one of the trash cans next to her, and hurled it at the monster. It struck it on the shoulder, and the monster turned towards her and howled. Ami dashed aside as the beast dived for her and the cat escaped. Ami had been aiming for the monster's head, but a hit was a hit. She looked at the monster where it crouched, exhausted from its spring. They were both panting by now. All three of them if Ami counted the cat, and why shouldn't she?
“Leave this cat alone!” Ami shouted, picking up another lid. The monster growled, rubbing its shoulder with one hand and looking at her with malice. Ami wondered if it was deciding whether to barbecue her or eat her raw.
Ami winced and held out the trashcan lid. It was a resourceful weapon, but it wasn't going to do much good against this large, angry, inexplicable cat-monster. That was when a small, coughing voice spoke up from somewhere below her.
“Aim for his stomach. That's a weak point.”
Before Ami could question the voice--What? Where? And most of all, who?--the cat-monster tensed to spring. Ami flung the trashcan lid like a frisbee and it slammed right into the belly of the beast. The monster hissed and staggered backwards, and Ami looked down.
“Good.” The cat congratulated.
Ami blinked. Cat. The monster yowled again and Ami looked up. It was getting its wind back, and looking powerfully mad. And Ami realized an unfortunate fact: the cat-monster had more claws and teeth than Ami had trashcan lids. In fact, Ami's current weapon count was now zero; there were no trashcan lids within reaching, or even leaping distance of her.
“What now?” She asked the cat as she backed towards the wall. The monster made a horrendous rasping sound somewhere deep in its chest; Ami only realized afterwards that it had been laughter. Ami's back touched the brick wall. To her left, a dumpster. To her right, a stack of trashcans. And in front of her, an advancing monster. Her mind, detached as always, observed that at least in the next life she'd know to avoid crossing paths with a black cat.
Title: Princess Moon, 1/?
“Bad Luck Follows A Black Cat”
Author: hellenelle
Length: 4186 words
Rating: PG
Summary: What if Usagi hadn't been the first Sailor Soldier awakened? What if she'd been captured by the Dark Kingdom, and her Sailor Team was forced to fight without her?
Mizuno Ami is used to life as a simple succession from school to cram school to home; she doesn't have time for black cats, superstitions, or monsters.
Notes: Thanks to my beta reader cosmic_fiction!
The sunlight was the same every morning, streaking in through the kitchen windows in sharp, cruel daggers. It brightened the whole house, window to window until the light was almost unbearable. The glint off of the white counter tops was the first thing that hit Mizuno Eriko's eyes when she walked into the kitchen.
She was dressing as she walked out of her bedroom. She suppressed a yawn and looked around. Everything was in order; the refrigerator was humming, the water taps were off, and her daughter was sitting at the table.
“Good morning,” Ami said. She turned up to her mother, who was still rubbing her dark blue eyes, trying to chase the last traces of sleep away. Her mother mumbled something back to her and slumped over to the coffee machine. It was situated alone on a counter, in its own little shrine of practicality. Ami turned back to the book she was reading; it was spread across the table below her breakfast plates. She read it as she nibbled on eggs and rice. Her fingers traced lightning fast along the page, up and down, tracking the words as she read them.
When she looked up next, her mother was sipping on the first cup of the day, her eyes closed in something close to worship. “Do you have surgery scheduled today?” Ami asked, reaching for her cup of tea. Her mother finished sipping before looking at her across the brim of the cup.
“Knee replacement at twelve,” she answered, after thinking for a moment. The coffee had helped her voice substantially; no longer was it thick and dry with sleep. “And I’m on rounds until late tonight. You know how it is.”
“I do.” Ami replied, sipping. The mist from the hot tea rose around her face, and her mother almost wondered if it didn't hide her daughter's face completely. Kept anyone from seeing what was going on there.
Ami stood as her mother sat, picking up the book and carrying it across the wide room to her school bag. She slipped it inside, and stopped by the entrance to pull her shoes on. Her mother watched, quietly sipping coffee. Sometimes, the older woman wondered if she had been so like her daughter at a younger age. There were remarkable resemblances, of course. The hair - though Ami's was lighter than her mother's, both of them had the same blue hair, and wore it in much the same style. And she was so studious, and so serious. Ami's mother could remember a time when nothing mattered to her more than becoming a doctor. She imagined it was the same for her daughter.
Only, I brought friends home with me once in a while.
But it was a fleeting concern, and Ami straightened. “I'll pick up milk on the way home from cram school, we're almost out.” She said. “I'm leaving,” she added mechanically as she pulled the door open and slipped out into the hallway.
“Come back safely,” her mother said as the door closed.
Ami waved to the woman at the greeter's desk as she left the building. The clean glass doors slid open without a sound, and she stepped into the sunlight. Like always. Well, not always, she corrected. Sometimes it rains.
She didn't afford a glance at the building behind her, because she had studied it long and hard enough to know its every detail. Back when her father thought she might have artistic potential, he used to teach her. Look closely at anything, closely enough, and break it into enough little simple bits, tiny flat shapes. Memorize the world.
It wasn't far, from her apartment building (condominium building, the owners always insisted, as if apartment was a sour insult) to Azabu Juuban Junior High School. Just a few blocks, and Ami had memorized it all. A tree, a phone pole. Past the arcade, where one of the workers was pasting up new posters. 'SAILOR V ACTION GAME!'
Ami passed by, barely noticing. The streets were fairly empty, this early in the morning. Ami was the only student she'd seen so far in a Juuban uniform. It was always like that. Ami liked to allow herself enough time to get to school, no matter what. To be early is to be on time, she told herself. To be on time is to be late. And besides, being early meant time alone in the classroom to read, without the other students, or the teacher, to distract her.
Ami stopped in front of the book store to peer in through the windows. It was closed, dark and welcoming with rows upon rows of books peering out at her. But it was just one thing she was anxious to see. Had they gotten it yet? Received the shipment?
Weeks ago, she had pre-ordered a copy of a new translation of an American science book. The store had said they would have it in by the first of April. And here it was barely days away, and Ami's guts were tying in a knot in impatience. But no, the store was still closed, and if her book had arrived, there was no way she'd find out from staring in the windows and wasting valuable study time.
She turned from the shop window and stopped abruptly. Sitting in front of her on the side walk and staring up at her with large, wild, red eyes was a black cat. Ami jumped back half a step, stumbling in her neat school-mandated black shoes. The cat gave her another glance and, with a single demanding mew, darted away. Ami shook herself. Just an alley cat, right?
She looked after it, a black streak vanishing quickly down the road, and shuddered again. Black cats aren't bad luck, she reprimanded herself. That's a completely unproved, unsubstantiated theory. A superstition.
You don't believe in superstitions.
She was chilled though; was it just her imagination, or did the wind seem colder now? The empty street a little unfriendly? She chided herself again. Superstition has been explained by modern science, she told herself. It's what happens when a result, assigned randomly, is perceived by the subject to have been caused by their behavior. A person hears that bad cats are bad luck. If that person encounters a black cat and subsequently has a bad day, they attribute it to the cat and tell other people; but if the person’s day is good, they don’t associate it with the cats. It’s a confirmation bias, Ami told herself; it’s humanity’s desire to not check whether result y is actually affected by variable x. Superstition is decidedly unscientific.
Still, as she started walking again, shifting the weight of her bag nervously from hand to hand, she couldn't help feeling that it was an ominous omen. A bad way to start the day, if nothing else.
It wasn't until she reached the gates of the school--tall, impressive, rails shaped like thin pencils, that she could have sketched if she had her father's hands--that she saw a single other student in the Juuban uniform. Even past the gates, in the blank, grassless front yard, there were few. Athletes, doing morning workouts. People trudging up to classrooms to set up for the day, assigned an unfortunate early morning duty, groaning and rubbing sleep out of their eyes.
As for Ami, there wasn't any sleep left to rub away, to chase off. She'd been awake most of the night, reading or thinking or staring at the ceiling willing herself to rest. The willing had not worked, and she'd barely closed her eyes before the sun and her mother's alarm clock woke her.
She paused in the front entrance to change her shoes, slipping the black loafers into her slim cubby-hole. As she bent down to slip on her white indoor sneakers, a stitch in her side stung at her. She sucked in breath hastily and stood. The same spot had been hurting for the last three days. She brought her hands to the spot, just a few inches above her left hip, on the front of her body. The pain stung through her again and she bent over the cramped spot. Breathe in, breathe out. She didn't realize she'd dropped her school bag until a voice above her startled her.
“Mizuno-san?”
Her head snapped up, and it took her a moment to stutter a reply.
“I'm fine, just a… Just a cramp.” The girl beside her smiled, but her eyes were still worried.
“Congratulations on your practice exam scores, Mizuno-san,” said the girl in a voice of required politeness, reaching into her own cubby. Ami straightened, as the pain dulled, and looked at the girl for a long moment. Too long a moment, really.
“Thank you.” Ami said, finally, her eyes looking back down to the floor, down to her shoes that were half tied. The girl left, and Ami bent back to her shoes. The pain was almost gone, really. Just a dull ache. Maybe I walked too fast.
By the time she had slid into her seat, the pain was gone. She reached into her bag and pulled out a text book. It was a plain, brown book on comparative governments. Ami ran her finger along the top of it, until she found her bookmark. She flipped it open, and glanced up at the clock. Only fifteen minutes until class began, and less than that until her classmates began arriving and cluttering the air so that she couldn't read quite as well. She had wasted time, then, with the cat and down at her locker.
Well, there's no use crying over spilled milk, Ami told herself, proud that she'd memorized another of the idioms she'd been studying that week. Her teacher at cram school would be pleased. She bent her head and began to read.
She fell into the book easily, and it wasn't until the classroom had almost filled that she looked up again, mildly surprised that so many people had arrived so loudly without her notice. Even the teacher had walked in, an older man who could never seem to control a single student, let alone a whole room of them. Ami felt remotely bad for him, but she knew there was nothing she could do. She managed to read a few more sentences before the teacher cleared his throat and stepped up to the podium.
“Today, if you'll all take out your English texts and turn to chapter five, we'll continue studying introductions.”
The class was already whispering, chattering, lines of low energy running up and down as Ami reached into her bag to pull out her textbook. She sighed, placing it on top of her own book; she'd read this chapter last week, and they'd covered it in cram school two days ago.
Review is always necessary, she chided herself, and began reading. My name is Youko. Nice to meet you. I am Japanese.
When the lunch bell rang, Ami was startled. She'd been working on a math sheet and she’d lost track of time. She looked up, and for just a moment watched the other students move around her. Standing up, talking, shouting across the room, pulling desks together and pulling lunches out.
Ami stood quietly and picked up her school bag. She walked to the front of the classroom, and out into the hallway without even being noticed by the teacher. He was too busy shouting at the other students to stop throwing things. Ami knew it was a cruel thing to regret that Juuban Junior High didn't sort classes by rank, but she regretted it nonetheless.
Out in the hallway, it was quieter. Ami walked, trying to keep her footsteps quiet. It was easier if teachers didn't stop her, after all. What she was doing wasn't exactly against the rules, but it wasn't smiled upon either.
Up ahead, by the water fountain, a group of students were talking. Ami didn't recognize them at first, but as she got closer and turned her face towards the floor--half shy, half sly--and they began to speak, she realized they were from Homeroom One. A boy and a girl; the boy was sniffling, trying to hold back tears.
“The love of my life,” the boy sobbed. He rubbed his fists underneath his glasses. “Out sick, for the third day in a row!”
The girl next to him patted his shoulder awkwardly. “I'm sure she's fine,” she said, offering him a tissue. He grabbed it and blew his nose loudly. “She's probably just skipping to sleep in, anyway.”
“Slander,” the boy muttered, and then Ami was past them and, curious as she was, there wasn't a single reason for her to turn back and listen to the rest of their conversation.
She arrived at the library soon enough, and slid into its dark, quiet, book-filled safety. She set herself down at one of the tables in the back, and pulled out her book again, followed by her lunch box and a tiny bottle of water. She had thirty-three more minutes before class began again; that was ample time to read and eat, free of distractions and stares.
Lunch was over too soon, of course, and Ami returned to class. They got back test scores in the afternoon, and Ami resolved to study harder after school. She had the ability to do better, and she knew it; ninety-eight just wasn't an acceptable grade.
When the final bell rang, Ami was immersed in her text book; she'd lost track of the class, who were mostly clowning around anyway, and the teacher had somehow fallen asleep at his desk.
She rose from her desk slowly, stretching her arms, as her classmates stampeded out into the afternoon. She gathered her books, slipping them into her black bookcase, and, bowing goodbye to the still slumbering teacher, made her way out into the afternoon. The school was, again, deserted. It seemed to Ami that she was the last person to leave. She knew there had to be sports clubs practicing somewhere, though, right? It was a four-minute thirteen-second walk to cram school. She'd timed it one day when there was nothing better to do as she walked. Just in case, she supposed.
Just in case what, a more logical part of her brain laughed, asking what could possibly ever happen that would require her to know exactly how long it took to walk from her school to cram school?
Something black darted out in front of her and Ami yelped. She jumped back, wobbling for a moment, and looked down. There, off to her left, a black cat was sitting on the sidewalk, regarding her. The cat from this morning, Ami realized.
That's preposterous. Cats all look alike, anyway. Ami shook her head; maybe she wasn't getting enough to eat. Malnutrition does funny things to your head, after all. “Be more careful, kitty.” Ami said, reaching out to pet the cat. But before her hand even got close, the cat hissed and scampered away. Feeling rather put out as it was her second cat encounter to end badly that day, Ami continued her four-minute thirteen-second walk.
Although after stopping for the cat, she was going to be late.
Not that, in the end, being late mattered. When she arrived at her classroom, on the second story of a white, glass windowed building in the heart of the Juuban shopping district, she realized that her entire trip had been pointless.
The building itself was new and loud, an eye-catching structure whose entire front face was devoted to advertisement. The enormous, shiny sign read “Juuban Crystal Cram School” in block letters; below, a caption claimed the ability to turn any child into a genius.
The school, like the building, was new and rather brilliant. Ami had switched into this cram school just a month ago, coming from her old one across town. She told her mother it was because the walk was shorter, which would give her more time to study; the truth of the matter, though, was that Ami had found she could solve most of the problems faster than her old instructors, and she'd finished reading their textbook library. It wasn't of any use to her anymore.
Juuban Crystal, though, in addition to being bright and new itself, was full of bright, young instructors that Ami respected, even liked. She slipped into her desk and smiled up at her Monday-Wednesday teacher, Tanemura-sensei.
“Good afternoon, Mizuno,” the teacher, a tall woman in her mid-thirties, greeted, walking over to her. “How is school going?”
“Very well, thank you.” Ami replied, as she began to pull her books out of her bag again, setting them up on her desk. She glanced up at the teacher and smiled. “What are we studying today?”
“English,” Tanemura-sensei said. “Greetings and self descriptions are always on national exams, so we're going to hammer those points home. Not,” she said, laughing a little to herself, “that you need it hammered home.” Ami turned back to her books, afraid she'd blush. She could feel heat spreading across her cheeks, brightening her face at that very second. So, as her teacher continued to talk, she started digging through her bag again, looking for her English text book. “I've had a few students ask if you wouldn't mind tutoring them outside of class, actually. You wouldn't be interested in a part-time job, would you?”
But Ami hadn't heard more than half of her teacher's offer. She was casting about, looking half-frantically for something. “Mizuno?”
“I can't find my textbook, Tanemura-Sensei. I think I must have left it back at school.” Ami mentally cursed her bad luck. “If I run, I can make it there and back in time for the beginning of class.” She turned and headed for the door, as her teacher offered to lend her an extra copy. But Ami was determined to use her own copy and, after bowing at the door and promising she'd be back quickly, she skittered out of the building.
The shopping district had filled up with other students, laughing in arcades and chatting in front of store windows. It was too loud, too cramped, too frantic for Ami, and it made it impossible to run. And she'd have to run, if she didn't want to miss the first half of the lesson. So, when she passed the opening of an alley she knew let out half a block away from her school, she darted into its dark interior.
She started running in earnest, her black shoes slapping against the pavement. The alley was wide, and even though it was full of shadows she didn't have a hard time making her way around the dumpsters and trashcans that lined either side of her path.
But when a black shadow streaked out in front of her feet, Ami didn't have enough time to react. For the third time today, her mind exclaimed as she careened to the ground. She landed on her knees with a shock of pain. She looked back at the cat; it was lying on the ground, mewing faintly. Ami crawled over to it, rubbing a scraped kneecap, and tried to figure out what was wrong. “I'm sorry, kitty,” she said, reaching out to touch its side. It looked beat up, injured in a way that Ami didn't think being tripped over could do; and when she pulled her hand away, there was blood on her fingers. The cat mewed and tried to pull itself to its feet. It was the same cat, with the shiny gold spot on its head in the shape of a crescent moon. Ami was about to reach forward and try to lift the cat up, when she heard a hissing sound coming from behind her.
She looked over her shoulder, and gasped. She'd thought perhaps it was another cat; that this cat had perhaps been in a fight. But what she saw was no cat. At least, no cat that Ami had ever heard of before, and even when she felt humble she would admit that she'd heard of quite a lot.
It was bending over a few feet down the alley, the way Ami had come. It wasn't a person, but it wasn't an animal either. It was, instead, something between the two; it was covered in yellow-green fur, and its eyes were yellow slits. It raised a hand at her and hissed again. It had long, sharp fingers with pointed claws, and Ami couldn't tell where the flesh left off and the claws began. Almost instinctively, Ami shrank backwards and put a hand out behind her. The little cat was cowering at her side, spitting and hissing.
And then, as Ami's heart fluttered, the creature before her opened its mouth and spoke. “Surrender her now, if you know what's good for you.” It said, in a rasping, stupid voice that made Ami shudder. Ami shook her head. A part of her was screaming inside, what are you doing? It’s just a cat! That part of her was listing off a hundred logical reasons why she should just turn her back and go to cram school (it was cram school and she had to go, and it was just a cat, and it wasn’t her concern, and she shouldn’t be risking her life, she had responsibilities) but for the first time in her life, she wasn’t listening to logic.
Instead, she clenched her teeth and shifted her weight slowly; she got to her feet, but stayed in a crouch, watching the monster in front of her. The monster blinked its black eyes and hissed out another breath. Ami shivered, watching it closely, her mind buzzing. What in the world? Why would something like this be going after a cat? But her thoughts were cut short as the monster suddenly sprung at her, its large hind legs extending in a lightning-fast jump. Ami flung herself to the side at the last second, and the monster crashed into the wall. Ami landed on her side next to a stack of trash cans, breathing heavily. She stood and glanced around. The little black cat darted to her side and yowled loudly. Almost as if she wanted attention, Ami fancied, but her mind was jerked back to the present as the monster hissed again.
Ami dashed aside as the monster sprang again, but she realized quickly that she hadn't been the target. It jumped directly at the little black cat, who wasn't as quick as Ami; the monster pinned the cat under one of its clawed hands and growled. Some half-formed words came out, and the cat yowled again.
Ami, for the first time in a long, long time, didn't think at all as she lifted the lid of one of the trash cans next to her, and hurled it at the monster. It struck it on the shoulder, and the monster turned towards her and howled. Ami dashed aside as the beast dived for her and the cat escaped. Ami had been aiming for the monster's head, but a hit was a hit. She looked at the monster where it crouched, exhausted from its spring. They were both panting by now. All three of them if Ami counted the cat, and why shouldn't she?
“Leave this cat alone!” Ami shouted, picking up another lid. The monster growled, rubbing its shoulder with one hand and looking at her with malice. Ami wondered if it was deciding whether to barbecue her or eat her raw.
Ami winced and held out the trashcan lid. It was a resourceful weapon, but it wasn't going to do much good against this large, angry, inexplicable cat-monster. That was when a small, coughing voice spoke up from somewhere below her.
“Aim for his stomach. That's a weak point.”
Before Ami could question the voice--What? Where? And most of all, who?--the cat-monster tensed to spring. Ami flung the trashcan lid like a frisbee and it slammed right into the belly of the beast. The monster hissed and staggered backwards, and Ami looked down.
“Good.” The cat congratulated.
Ami blinked. Cat. The monster yowled again and Ami looked up. It was getting its wind back, and looking powerfully mad. And Ami realized an unfortunate fact: the cat-monster had more claws and teeth than Ami had trashcan lids. In fact, Ami's current weapon count was now zero; there were no trashcan lids within reaching, or even leaping distance of her.
“What now?” She asked the cat as she backed towards the wall. The monster made a horrendous rasping sound somewhere deep in its chest; Ami only realized afterwards that it had been laughter. Ami's back touched the brick wall. To her left, a dumpster. To her right, a stack of trashcans. And in front of her, an advancing monster. Her mind, detached as always, observed that at least in the next life she'd know to avoid crossing paths with a black cat.