Well, I took a day off from work and managed to get all the changes and
tweaks done that needed doing.  C & C much appreciated.

Ari
Chapter 4
by Charles Hurst


He awoke in a rush, uncertain of what had woken him.  Then he felt her
presence in his mind.  Her touch was as gentle and lovely as ever.  She
always came when she thought he was asleep, and never in any predictable
pattern.  The clan had bound them together as children, and then again
more permanently when she reached puberty, but its laws kept them apart
until their wedding night. Engaged when he was four and she was three, and
that meeting was the one and only time he had ever seen her.

It was an ancient agreement maintained by the old men and women of the
Clan.  The Clan's women endured the necessity of having their mates chosen
for them to ensure the Clan's genetic heritage, and in exchange they were
allowed complete access to their future husband's mind, from puberty, to
their first meeting at their wedding at age 21, to the day one of them
died.  It was as effective as a knife to the throat for the men of the
Clan, where digression and suppression became words to live by.  An
outsider my wonder why.  It was hard to put into words, but the idea of
the woman you were to marry knowing every stray thought, every dream,
every errant glance made one cautious, to say the very least.  When one's
future bride was a telepath who could broadcast one's memories to the rest
of the Clan . . .  He shuddered.  It was impossible!  He was a teenage
boy, he couldn't stop his dreams, and suppressing the thoughts and
feelings during one's waking hours only made the dreams worse . . .

Ari sighed deeply, and relaxed, letting the tension ease in his neck and
shoulders.  There wasn't anything he could.  He tried to reach back and
touch her, as he always did when he felt her presence, curious to know
what she was like.  But again he failed, as he had grown use to doing.  He
wondered what she found so interesting that she kept coming back.  Other
boys had been surprised that he could sense her visits at all, and also at
how often she came.  Perhaps she was simply curious as to what had
happened to him since last she came visiting.  She was nice enough to scan
lightly, only sampling surface thoughts and recent memories, but it was
disturbing to have someone who could rummage through his mind like she
could.

It scared him to think that someone could do this without his say so.
Every time it happened he added a little more anger and pain to the part
of himself he had hidden away. He knew it wasn't her fault, that she had
had as little choice as he did, but still, it was an intimate violation to
be touched so without permission, and it made his soul seethe with anger.
An anger carefully suppressed while she was present, then sealed away
behind a wall of fonder memories that she had seen before and would pass
over without a deeper glance, or so he hoped.

After a minute or two, he felt her withdraw, fading away into the
distance.  Following their one-sided ritual that only he knew, he went
chasing after her, trying to find out where she was located.  He lost her
as they left his grandfather's house, her gentle presence disappearing the
background noise of millions of people.  He still didn't understand how
she could do that.  He had tracked birds miles up into the sky and hundred
miles away for hours on end, and had simultaneously followed five
different people in different parts of Tokyo mentally for a day without
difficulty, but one girl evaded him without even knowing it.  He had
repeatedly scanned his own mind looking for barriers or buried secrets
placed by the clan elders, but had yet to find anything.

At first, her visits had been quick, almost like she was embarrassed to do
so.  She had restrained herself to emotions and random surface thoughts,
too polite to go any deeper and read his memories.  But after a while, she
grew more daring, and every once in a while, without warning, she would go
further, pulling up older memories, ones he had thought forgotten.  He
wondered if she knew about .  . .  He quickly clamped down on that
thought, rapidly going through the multiplication tables until he felt the
urge to remember go away.

He shivered, slightly.  Could it be the curse?  His grandfather had sworn
it was a story, that it wasn't true.  And he had never been close enough
to actually have kissed her.  How could the ravings of a dying old woman
from 500 years ago affect him?

Ojii-san had been very angry when he found Ari reading the scroll
containing the story, scolding him and then sternly admonishing him to
forget what he had read.  "The 'Juudai na Rei no Heishi', the great spirit
warrior, of the unspoken clan shall never enjoy the touch a woman's lips
without loss." It wouldn't have meant a thing, had he not heard an obasan
of the clan call him by that title when she didn't think he was listening,
and he had read the scroll only days after learning of his mother's death.

His crippled body had tried to kill him a number of times when he was a
baby, and his father had always fondly recounted the stories of how his
mother's gentle breath saved Ari time and again as his body stopped
working.  The kiss of life had been one of her many abilities, and her
mouth over his kept him alive on the long drives to the hospital.

The facts coincided horribly for an eight year old suffering and mourning,
not knowing why the crash had happened, why his family had been ripped
apart so hideously and abruptly.  He had found an old newspaper article
years later about the crash that killed his parents.  He had stopped
talking to everyone for weeks after reading it.  It had been titled
"Lovers' Last Kiss".  They had found his mother, dying, clinging to his
dead father, her mouth pressed desperately against his.

A tear trickled down one cheek.  They were gone -- they were never coming
back.  A terrible emptiness gnawed at his stomach.  Guilt had long since
made the grief permanent inside his soul.

He had delved deeply into the ancient stories of the great spirit warriors
of the clan, immersing himself in their history and personal lives.
Everyone had thought he was preparing himself for his destiny.  They
didn't know his real purpose.  Time and again he found tragedy, 500 years
worth of it.  And then it stopped, and the oldest records had only the
regular problems and dilemmas faced by mortal men, back to the earliest
stories of the clan's founder.  He had never told anyone, but the troubled
looks his grandfather had given him from time to time as Ari read through
the histories left him with the impression that he was not the first to go
looking.

He sighed and sat up, wincing as the blood rushed from his head, leaving
him slightly dizzy.  He began his morning ritual, closing his eyes and
relaxing, letting his body go.  Reaching out, he checked first on Kuriko
and Meiko, his sisters.  They lived now with his aunt, a short distance
away in another part of town.  When Meiko had turned 11 his grandfather
had sent the two girls to live with their aunt, claiming it was best for
two maturing girls to live with a woman, not a withered old man like him.
Ari knew then that his grandfather had lied about not believing in the
curse.

Ari didn't take any chances any more.  He avoided physical contact with
women unless absolutely necessary.  Being with his sisters was the only
luxury he allowed himself, and even then he would have headaches
afterwards from staying constantly on guard.  He knew that most of the
clan knew about the curse, for not one of his various obasans and obaasans
had ever tried to kiss him. Mieko's kiss of several months ago still
horrified him deeply.

The kiss and the resulting feelings inside had so shocked him that he had
completely forgotten about the curse until the next day.  Since that day,
a subconscious part of his mind was always devoted to remaining aware of
her and what was happening to her at all times.

He hoped the penalty was already exacted, that of a forbidden love, but he
doubted it.  He mentally clamped down hard on the memory of the kiss, but
the feel of her lips had never faded away.  Neither had the kisses of his
mother.  When he was very quiet and tried to bring back his memories of
her, the feel of her skin, the faint smell of lavender, the warm air
pushing down his throat to bring him life would come back in a rush.

That's what the last warrior had called the it, the curse of sweet
kissing.  That warrior's parents had died as a freak lightning bolt hit
their home and started it on fire.  His older sister had died when a truck
hit her when she was standing twenty feet away from the road in the front
yard of a friend's house.  Every woman the man had ever kiss had had a
terrible loss associated with or to her or to the warrior in some way.
The other warrior's belief in the curse had been so strong that he had
simply kissed the woman who killed him.

Ari had read the eyewitness accounts with disbelief.  Instead of using
the last of his remaining strength to escape, the warrior had chosen to
die impaled on her sword, kissing her on the lips.  Ari had frantically
read through all the remaining writings of the Clan, looking for what had
happened to the woman, but nothing else had ever been recorded.

He had gotten lucky, then, sensing the touch of the dead warrior in the
diary, finding a thin packet of papers hidden in a fold of power within
the cover of the book.  He had never told anyone of his discovery, and had
resealed it and marked it more clearly so that the one who would come
after him would be able to find it.  It had taken him several years to
find out what some of the words actually meant. The first time he had
asked his aunt about one of them had gotten him a slap from her and a
caning from his grandfather.

He sighed and folded back the blankets.  Time to get up and go to school.
Maybe life would be simpler today.  He laughed at that, a short bitter
laugh that startled him.  His sensei would have his head for allowing
himself to drift so far out of balance.  Ah, well, just one more thing to
throw on the pile.

**********

Jenny glanced over at Harimi and stifled a giggle.  Harimi's head was
tilted forward slightly, and her eyes were closed.  She had been up late
again playing video games, Jenny bet.  Carefully glancing up toward the
teacher, she saw he was engrossed explaining something on the board.  Very
slowly she stretched over and nudged Harimi in the arm with her pencil.
She gave a sudden snort and her head jerked back as she woke up.  Looking
around, she saw Jenny leaning over the aisle shaking her finger at her.
Harimi smiled and sighed, then picked up her pencil and dutifully copied
down what the teacher had written on the board.

Jenny grinned to herself.  One day Harimi would get caught by a teacher
napping in class before a friend could wake her up and then she would be
out in the hallway.  She looked around the room covertly, seeing how the
rest of the people important to her were doing.

Ari sat at his desk, slumped over his notebook, half-heartedly scratching
notes at the page.  There was a weary droop to his shoulders and he would
look up every once in a while to glance quickly at Mieko and then at her.
Every once and a while their eyes would meet and she would smile as he
glanced away quickly.

Mieko had a stiff smile plastered on her face as she industrially copied
down the teacher's equations.  She even waved once when she saw Jenny
looking in her direction.  Jenny could tell that Mieko was pretending,
though.  She wondered at the difference from last night.  Hadn't Mieko
seen her standing beyond Ari?  She stared intently at Mieko for several
minutes. Her patience was rewarded, as Mieko's shoulders momentarily
slumped and Jenny could see that she was shaking slightly.  After a
minute, Mieko's back stiffened and she went back to copying notes.

Jenny sighed.  Knowing what was happening between the two of them had not
really helped all that much.  It had relieved a lot of the fear and
despair she had felt.  At least she was feeling a lot more like her normal
self today.  She had been thinking about it since last night, and had
decided that she would enlist her friends' and Aiya's help.  Aiya and
Karin seemed to have a special bond, so she would tell Karin about it as
soon as the class had ended.

-----

Karin looked thoughtfully out the window, her back to Jenny.  She had been
remarkably calm through the whole story.  She turned to Jenny and gave her a
faintly skeptical glance.

"Are you sure that's what happened, Jenny?  Maybe you dreamed it all after
eating some bad tofu or something."  She hesitated for a second, but
seeing Jenny's determined look, continued.  "I don't really know what I
can do to help, though."

Jenny smiled at that, knowing she had one Karin's support.  "You could
talk to Aiya about it. I always get things confused when I try to tell her
something like this, but she always seems to understand you.  And she
tells you things that she never tells us.  Please, Karin?"

Seen the reluctant look in her friend's eyes, she pouted her lips and
clasped her hands together.  Then she bounced up and down slightly,
opening her eyes wide and batting her eyelashes at her friend teasingly.

"Pretty please, Kari-chan?" she begged, using an old nickname she, Naru
and Harimi had teased the rich girl with since they were little kids
together in grade school.

Karin shrugged uncomfortably, embarrassed by the display.  "All right,
already, just stop that!  You never stop till you get what you want, do
you?"  She smiled and put one hand on Jenny's arm.  "Besides, Mieko is a
friend of mine as well, and whatever has happened to her has to be
terrifying and awful."

*********

Ari leaned back against the rail and glanced at the two girls standing in
front of him.  Karin had a pensive look on her face, and Jenny looked
worried.  Finally Jenny spoke, glancing at Karin before turning to face
him.

"Ari, who are you?"

It caught him by surprise and he laughed out loud.  Jenny looked stricken
and Karin's eyes became cold.  Oh, that was not the right reaction, he
told himself.  Better find a good answer to get yourself out of this one.

"Ari Hisada."

They stared at him expectantly, waiting for more.

"Perhaps if you were more specific I could better answer the question," he
said, wilting a little as the two girls glared at him.

Karin's voice was almost as cold as her eyes.  "Hisada-san, please tell us
what you know about Mieko and explain how you came by your powers.  Is
that specific enough?"

"Well, sort of."  Karin's eyes flared and Jenny stamped her foot.  "All
right, already.  It's not as easy a question to answer as you think."  He
paused to gather his wits.  Perhaps he had better scan the area to make
sure they were unobserved.  It only took a second to discover that no one
was even aware they were up here on the roof of the school.  He sighed and
hunched forward, a pensive look on his face as he began.

"Do you know what a Shadow is?"  Jenny looked puzzled and Karin continued
to glare at him.  "Not like a shadow on the ground, a Shadow."  He
emphasized the first syllable.  Jenny shook her head no.

Ari was puzzled.  Surely their shadow had told them about the others?
E'ani was positive that the terms he had learned from interrogating
Teranimus's foci before killing them were common knowledge among other
shadows.  He sighed again. It looked like he would have to make a longer
explanation than he had anticipated.

He was surprised that E'ani had not forbidden this, but the ever
increasing number of Ter's foci was begin to exceed E'ani's ability to
destroy.  Ari had argued long and hard for trying to find allies, and
after many weeks of nagging had convinced E'ani to allow him to try if the
opportunity presented itself. There was one condition.  E'ani stood ready
to terminate if he felt any risk to himself.

"How much has Aiya told you about herself?"  Jenny brightened at the
mention of her invisible friend.

"Well, she tried to tell me about it, but Karin keeps telling me there is
a problem with me not having a shared frame of reference with Aiya, or
something like that."

Ari shook his head in disbelief.  "You let something run around inside
your head without finding out what it is?"

She slugged him in the arm.  "I trust her!"

"Ouch!  Well, I'll tell you what I know, at least."  He glanced at Karin
and was startled to see a soft green aura surrounding her.  She nodded at
him and motioned him to continue.  He sighed a third time.  Shadows were
paranoid as a species, it seemed, for E'ani wasn't the only one watching
and waiting with power ready.

"A shadow is a term used by Teranimus to describe himself and any other
parasitic/symbiotic intelligent life form that develops in a closely
related group of neural networks.  A foci is a genetically modified,
mobile neural network that can be easily manipulated by a shadow to
interact with the physical universe."

"What?"  Jenny looked him blankly for a second and then slugged him in the
arm again.  "In plain language so I can understand, you idiot!"

"Ow!  Quit doing that!  A shadow is a being that lives in the unused parts
of animal and plant nervous systems.  Your brain, a plant's roots,
probably in a few other weird ways as well.  Any sort of biological
electrical network, um, nervous system can be used, though each shadow
usually, ah, grows up in one particular kind.  There are really only just
two kinds that E'ani has ever observed, animus and lanti.  Animus use
animals, lanti use plants.  Teranimus and E'ani, or Eanimus, are animus,
as their names indicate.  Aiya has another name given her by Ter - Elanti,
since she is the current lanti of Earth."

Karin interrupted with a question.  "If Aiya uses plants, how is it that
she can talk to us?"  Ari smiled.  She was fishing to see how much he
actually knew.

"Eanimus has been watching Elanti for twenty-five thousand years."  There
was a shocked silence.  Karin closed her eyes, conferring with her inner
partner.  Finally, she opened her eyes and smiled at Ari.

"She wants to talk to E'ani directly."

*NO!  She's just asking!* Ari screamed mentally as he felt E'ani twitch at
the lines of power connecting them.  For a breathless moment he wondered
if he would die, but finally E'ani snarled a reply.  *Lanti just happen to
merge through their little 'direct' talks.  You can let her know I know
that as well.*

He shook his head slowly.  "He says he has no desire to be merged into
you."  Karin's eyebrows hunched up in confusion at that comment for a
second, and then smoothed out and she grinned.

"Aiya says they can talk directly without him being assimilated.  She
promises," Karin replied, still grinning.  Jenny smiled tentatively at
Ari, but he could see she was worried by the heated exchange.

*Her promises are worthless!  I am not a fool!* E'ani was back to his
normal paranoid ravings.  *E'ani, is there any possibility she might be
telling the truth?  Has she ever lied as far as you know?* There was a
long silence.

*Yes, there is a way, but I don't think you're going to like it, foci.*
Ari could feel E'ani's invisible leer and he gritted his teeth.
*Whatever, if it doesn't kill me I'll give it a try, but now you owe me!*
he told the mentally smirking shadow.  E'ani slipped his tendrils out and
took control of Ari's body, moving it smoothly across the roof till they
stood directly before Karin.

*What are you going to do?* Ari inquired, grabbing control of the body
back temporarily.  E'ani replied with a mental image that made Ari's
stomach go queasy.  "You've got to be kidding!  I won't do that!" he
yelled out loud, startling the two girls.

The look on Karin's face told him that Aiya had told her the same thing as
well.  In fact, she looked a little panicked and scared.  "Umm, it's okay,
Karin, I won't let E'ani do that to you, so you can tell Aiya to go jump
off a cliff as well.

They'll just have to be content with us talking to one another."  Her face
lit up with a smile of relief at that and she relaxed.

*********

*Report, Heiro,* the dark voice whispered in his head.  He snarled and
spat an oath, startling the man across from him on the train.

*Oh most vaunted one, your humble servant is currently moving from place
to place for fear of his life because his most honored master doesn't have
the courage or strength to STAY AND FIGHT!* Hiero screamed out the last
mentally. After the fight with that runt, Ari, he had spent a considerable
amount of time in the hospital.  Teranimus had decided it was a waste of
energy to heal his body when it would do so naturally, so he had spent
several boring weeks trapped in a hospital bed.  His parents had believed
his story of having had an accident on his motorcycle, fortunately, and he
had faked poor health to talk them into allowing him to travel from to a
nearby health resort.

*Perhaps I should kill you and start again with another,* the voice
replied coolly.  *Perhaps I should just destroy your soul and inhabit your
body, that would work even better.*

Cold fear seized Hiero, but he still seethed with anger as well.  He'd
have an ulcer for sure before he was done, he thought to himself.  *NO!
You promised me power and wealth!  Instead, all I get is beaten up and
nearly killed!*

*Ungrateful human, I will be merciful this once.  And you have plenty of
power and wealth.  Perhaps I should have you kill your parents so that you
will gain full control of your inheritance?*

*No, that won't be necessary,* Hiero said.  Whatever he might be, he
wasn't going to let some monster in his head kill his parents, no matter
how much he personally detested them.  He looked out the window and
watched the countryside fly by.  Just you wait, Ari, he thought, I will
return, and then I will kill you and take Mieko back!

*There is a part of myself at the city you are going to.  You will kill my
other's self's foci and absorb his herd into your own.  Can you handle
that, human?  Or are you going to cry and whine?*

*I hear and obey, Master,* Hiero responded, but was unable to keep a touch
of sarcasm out of his mind.  One day, it would be just him and the shadow,
and then they would see who was really in charge.

*********

Back on the roof, Jenny watched Ari and Karin relax and move apart.  She
didn't understand why they both had gotten so angry.  She'd have to ask
Karin later what Aiya, that is, what the shadows had asked them to do.
Ari grinned.

"Well, anyway, now you know as much as I do, or at least as much as E'ani
is willing to let me tell you."  Jenny smiled back, but she noticed Karin
was frowning.  She was about to ask a question when Ari stiffened and
stumbled forward clutching his head.

"Ne-chan!" he screamed and fell to his knees.  With an explosion of
blazing light and a reverberating boom of displaced air, a large glowing
sphere appeared in the middle of the roof.  Something hurtled out of it
and smashed into Ari, slamming him back into the railing.  There was a
thud that shook the roof and a girl's scream that cutoff as the sphere
vanished.

Jenny and Karin stood frozen with shock.  It had happened almost too fast
to register.  A large oval of roadway sat on the roof, rocking slightly.
A young girl crouched on it, her eyes wide and her arms wrapped around a
book bag. Her mouth was still open, but she had stopped screaming.  She
began to tremble violently then her eyes rolled back in her head and she
collapsed.

There was a large dent in the railing where Ari had collided with it.  His
arms were wrapped around the girl that had crashed into him.  Slowly his
eyes opened and he looked around.  His eyes went wide with shock when he
saw the girl in his arms.

"Ne-chan!  Meiko-imooto!  Are you all right?" he asked frantically as he
gently set her down on the ground.  He winced as he moved, and Jenny could
see a dark stain beginning to grow on one side of his white shirt.

A bit of blood was trickling out of Ne-chan's mouth.  Her right arm was
twisted to one side at a strange angle.  A large dark blood stain was
spreading over her blouse's right side.  Ari checked her pulse and put his
cheek to her mouth to see if she was breathing.  His panic-stricken face
told her the answer.

"No!  You can't die!" he screamed.  His cry freed Jenny from her
paralysis.  She quickly moved to kneel by his side, placing a comforting
hand on his shoulder.

"What happened, Ari?  Is she," she paused, unsure what to ask.  Karin had
quietly moved to stand behind her.

"It was a delivery truck . . . it hit her.  I failed.  I couldn't react
fast enough to stop it!"  Tears began to stream down his face.  "I can't
find a pulse.  She's dying!"  He shook his head, silvery tears falling to
the ground.

"I don't know how to fix her," he whispered, his voice cracking.  "I've
never had that ability.  I could fix it if it was my own body that was
hurt . . ."

He started at that, then leaned forward and placed his hands on the young
girl's forehead.  Karin gasped and grabbed Jenny's shoulder.  Something
shifted in Jenny's mind with that touch, and suddenly she could see what
had startled Karin.

Overlaying Ari's body was a bright aura, a glowing human form.  When she
glanced down at the Ne-chan, she saw another glowing shape that was very
pale and sickly looking.  She could see that it was slowly fading and
diminishing in size.

As she watched, the stronger aura detached from Ari's body and drifted
down into contact with the weaker one.  There was a shimmer and the pale
aura floated loose from Ne-chan's body.  Gently the larger form, Ari's
soul, she guessed, guided the smaller one up into Ari's body.  There was a
flash as the pale aura began to glow brighter and its fading and shrinking
stopped.  The stronger aura jerked suddenly and shrank a little, then it
slowly sank into the girl's body until it completely encompassed it.
Karin let go and Jenny's vision shifted back to normal.  She blinked
several times.

"What was that?" she asked quietly.  Karin only shook her head.  "I think
. . .  I think he switched bodies with her."

*He has lost his connection to his shadow,* said Aiya in her soft voice in
their heads.  *He will not have the energy to fix that body.*

"Can we do anything to help him?"  Jenny leaned against Karin as a wave of
dizziness overtook her.  She felt very strange, like thousands of pins had
lightly touched her all over at the same time.

"Jenny, are you all right?" Karen asked, steadying her with one hand.
Jenny could feel Aiya opening the doorway inside, and soon the shadow's
warm life flooded into her, washing away the trembling and fatigue.

*Jenny, I need your help.  Ari has detached himself from E'ani by
switching bodies with his sister.  He will not be able to heal himself as
he planned. The shock of joining with a body so damaged has left him
unconscious.  We will have to lend him the power he needs.*

"What do I do?" Jenny whispered, kneeling beside Ne-chan's body.

*I am not familiar with E'ani or the way he functions, so I will need to
be in as close contact with Ari's spirit as possible.* The shadow paused
for a moment, then continued.  *That will require you to be in rather
intimate contact with Ari.  Can you handle that?  I will also have to take
control of your body, since you have not yet gained all the necessary
skills.*

Jenny shivered.  Intimate contact?  She put a hand on the Ne-chan's chest.
She could feel it slowly rising and falling.  Absentmindedly she noticed
that her knees were now in the middle of a pool of blood.  "All right,"
she whispered, and with that she felt the tingling of Aiya taking control
and her self being detached from her body.  It was such a strange feeling,
to still be in one's body but not in control of it.  Her senses had an
echo-like quality to them, as if everything was being experienced slightly
after it happened, almost like a dream.

Aiya began to unbutton Ne-chan's shirt.  Methodically she stripped the
younger girl down to her underwear.

*What are you doing?* Jenny screamed as Aiya began to take their own
shirt off.

*I told you it would be intimate,* Aiya snapped as she finished taking the
shirt off.  Jenny mentally fumed as her body stood and began to remove its
skirt.

*Are you going to leave any of my clothes on?  What if someone comes up
here?  I'll die of embarrassment!  And if I don't die, I'll have to kill
myself because of the shame!*

*No, you won't, and don't say things like that.  Be quiet and watch, not
just with your eyes, but feel how I use the power,* Aiya replied calmly.
She lay down on the roof and pulled the younger girl on top of her,
entwining their arms and legs and pressing their bodies close together.
Jenny wished she could blush.  It was a most uncomfortable feeling to need
to blush and not be able to. She imagined closing her eyes, which worked
as it went black, but that was worse, and she frantically commanded her
imaginary eyes to open.

A warmth began to grow inside her body, and the sensations coming from her
skin intensified.  She reached out with her mind and was pulled along with
Aiya into Ne-chan's body.

To be continued in Chapter 5 . . .

Charles K. Hurst - ImageNation Corp. Wage Slave/Employee - RPI graduate-MechE
Chocolate and Anime Forever!  1 year, 5 months a fan and counting.
MI = eps. 96  MB = eps. 76 - 0/0 episodes each to utter boredom or Fushigi!
FY = eps. 28  Escaflowne = eps. 26 - 24/0 to my next bout of depression. ^ ^