Its been a while since I've posted a piece of fiction to the FFML, probably
getting on four years now.  Now that I've graduated college, however, I've
found more time to devote to my fiction writing.

This piece of work, although original, is heavily anime-inspired.  It's also
rather 'shot-from-the-hip' so to speak, so I'm very interested in everyone's
opinion on it.  Is it interesting?  Do the characters work?  Who do you
hate/love?  I'm just looking for any opinion here to know if I should
continue this or not.

Thanks in advance for your help! :)

--Adam Leigh
tempest@mail.com
http://www.rogue-penguin.com

-----------------------------------------------------------

The Blends Part 1
-------------------------

     I believe I've successfully atomized my wife.
     My hands still shake when I think about it.  I didn't
want to do it.  My god, I love my wife more than anything in
the world... except our daughter, and that's who she was
experimenting on.  I couldn't believe it when I saw it.  No,
that's not true.  I knew she was a lightweight and the power
we'd unlocked made her drunk in a second.  I only wish we'd
never discovered the Cosmic Source.
     I don't think Amanda knows what happened, and I'm sure
she'll probably blame me for this, years from now, but if
that is how it must be to protect her, to protect the world,
I don't mind.  Perhaps we can patch things up in the next
life, assuming I'm heading towards heaven.
     My doctor was almost too horrified to tell me.  I've
got cancer, he said. Not in my brain, or in my lungs or
bones.  Everywhere.  Systemic cancer.  I just nodded and
smiled and thanked him for his time.  I knew something was
wrong, and it didn't change anything to know what it was.
The explosion wracked my body with the same radiation I used
to kill my beloved wife, but it was the only way to be sure.
     I feel the most sorry for my daughter.  She will never
know her parents.  But at least she'll never see the monster
her mother turned into because of our ambition.  I've made
preparations, a good family here in Japan, to take care of
her starting tomorrow.  I have to say goodbye to her tonight
so she won't see me later, when I'm sick.  The doctor
suspects that it will be quick though, there is only so much
longer my body will last.
     I will say goodbye here as well, and burn this journal
so nobody can follow our foolish footsteps and tap into the
Cosmic Source again.
     To my dearest daughter, Amanda: May you live a life
divorced from your parent's decisions, a life that will
never make you choose between your children or your beloved
spouse.
     To my beloved wife, Calypso: Forgive me for my actions,
I lost you to power long before I did what I had to do.  I
hope when we meet again you understand.  I always loved you.

--The final entry in the journal of Dr. Jonathan Veers
(Found near his body on November 1st, 1993)

-------------------------
Ten Years Later

     Aurora waited patiently in the plain meeting room that
she'd been brought to by the nice but rather strange
Principle Genji almost twenty minutes ago.  She was led to
believe it would be a brief wait and while she didn't want
to make a bad impression by standing up and pacing around
the room, she was staring to believe her legs were going to
cramp up if she didn't move them soon.  The four whitewashed
walls and simple brown sliding door provided little means of
distraction as the minutes crept on and eventually she was
forced to turn to her old standby when bored: leafing
through the Book.
     The old tome rested to her right, silently screaming
out in a voice no one could really hear but her.  The worn
leather spine reflected decades or possibly centuries of age
and no matter how many times Aurora had gone through it,
there always seemed to be remaining dust between the pages
that would plume up and cause her to cough.  Running her
hand over its ruddy surface, she felt the warm cover and
slipped her fingers along each imperfection and slight
tears.
     It was alive.
     She could feel it pulling at her all the time, tempting
her.  The power was vast and unimaginable, and yet hers to
control if she was brave enough.  If she was strong enough
and willing to do what--
     No.  That was the book's thoughts again.  She knew that
its power had to be tempered, resisted, or it would consume
her, as it did her predecessor...
     "I'm sorry for being so late," a voice broke into
Aurora's reverie.  She jumped and pushed the book nervously
behind her.  A tallish man with dark hair that covered his
eyes slouched into the room.  He was wearing a long white
coat, like a science teacher, with a blue shirt, tie, and
navy slacks beneath it.  Aurora tried to look him in the
eyes as she stood but couldn't find them.
     "That's okay," Aurora began in English, then stopped,
and started again in Japanese.  "I don't mind.  I'm Aurora
Sayre."  She bowed slightly.  "Are you Katsuragi-sensei?"
     The man nodded.  "I am.  I'm pleased to meet you,
Aurora, and I'm glad you'll be able to join our class this
year.  I understand you're from New York?"
     Aurora shook her head.  "Ohio, actually," she admitted.
"A small city called Elyria, which is probably only
noteworthy because it has an exchange program with Japan."
     Katursagi smiled.  "Well, I hope you enjoy your time at
Viridian Cross High School.  Principle Genji probably told
you I'm going to be your homeroom teacher.  Would you like
to meet the rest of your class now?"
     Mustering a smile, Aurora nodded.  Katsuragi opened the
door and led her out, closing it behind them.
     On the floor, the Book tried to rest sinisterly, but
rolled a 1 and botched and was forced to merely appear
disgruntled.

-------------------------

     "You can take the seat next to Hatoyama-san," Katsuragi-
sensei said from the front of the classroom.  The new
exchange student, Aurora, nodded quietly and walked down the
center of the classroom and sat next to Kimiko and was
immediately pummeled by quiet inquires as to her hobbies and
family and if everyone in America really owned a gun.
     Amanda Veers sighed quietly and rested her head on her
hand.  The girl looks normal enough, she thought, if a
little introverted.  But normal is hardly normal here
anyway.  I should just corner her now and ask if she
worships a dark deity or wishes to steal the world's supply
of bubblegum to save time.  Half of all the exchange
students here end up being servants of evil anyway.
     "Psst!"  Amanda turned and saw her best friend Mayu
gazing blankly forward at Katsuragi-sensei while
emphatically wiggling a small piece of paper by her side.
Amanda stared for a second then quickly reached out and
snatched the paper as Katsuragi-sensei was organizing his
teaching material.  Glancing around once, she held the paper
beneath the edge of the desk and read it.

     She looks interesting.  I hope
     she doesn't turn out to be evil.

     Amanda nodded weakly.  She tried to imagine what
monstrous form Aurora could be hiding and concluded the most
likely was 'Evil-Dark-Repressed-Nerdy-Girl-Beast' and
wondered if anyone else had to put up with a life that was
so insane.

-------------------------

     Whitefire liked to believe she lived in a normal-ish
world.  She knew, of course, that in a normal world, she
wouldn't be lurking in a dark and dank subterranean lair,
and that she would have hobbies like tennis or sewing and
certainly not monster farming.  But outside of her somewhat
irregular, and she had to admit villainous, activities, she
did go to school and talk with her friends and dream about
cute boys, so as long as you ignored her nightlife, it was
kinda normal.  Maybe.
     Whatever.
     Finishing watering her fuzzy little monster plants, she
stood and straightened her black and grey uniform, smoothing
out the wrinkles at her sides.  Dropping the watering
bucket, the sounds of sloshing water echoed throughout the
dark cave being light dimly by phosphorescent moss growing
on the walls in a myriad of colors.  The moss, too, was
grown by her, and represented one of the few benign
creatures she'd created.  She was quite proud of the little
creeping plant and even had it decorating her 'normal'
life's room.
     "Whitefire," a voice echoed in the dark.  Ah, great,
she thought.  A summons.  Doesn't he ever get tired of his
own voice?
     "No, I don't," came the reply.  Sighing, Whitefire ran
out of the cave and upstairs.
     The throne room was a much larger cavern than the
monster farming rooms, at least fifty feet tall and
stretching out far beyond the dozens of candles in the
center of the room could light.  Behind the candles,
opposite the stairs, sat a large stone throne crudely shaped
and housing a short man wearing a red cape.  The man had
dusty brown hair and wearing black plated armor beneath the
red cape.  He looked rather bored, and rose his reddish eyes
to look at Whitefire as she approached him.
     "I have a plan," he said in monotone, then added, "WE
have a plan."
     "Is it better than the last one, brother?" asked
Whitefire.  "Those monsters I'm growing down there are very
hard to clean up after when magical girls make them explode.
I spent all of last Friday night washing ichor out of my
hair instead of going on my date with Hibiki-kun."
     "OF COURSE IT'S BETTER!" he stood and yelled.  "DO YOU
THINK I WOULD INTENTIONALLY CREATE A WORSE PLAN THEN ONE
BEFORE?"
     Whitefire yawned.  She was never very impressed with
capitals.  "Quite possibly."
     "Well, it IS a better plan," the armored man said,
sitting once more and looking significantly deflated.  "I
shall need some of your intelligence stealing monsters
prepared immediately!"
     "Whatever, Lord Melodramatic.  Are we going with the
egg model or perhaps the playing card one?"
     "The name is," he paused and built up his voice. "LORD
JOSH!"  He paused.  "Or would you rather have me call you by
your 'real' name?"
     Whitefire raised her hands.  "PLEASE, no.  The last
thing I need is for people to find out I'm associated with
your lame-ass plans.  I'd never get a date for the winter
dance."
     "Then you'll do as I command."
     "Yah, sure, whatever.  So what do you want the monster
to look like this time?"
     Lord Josh grinned evilly (as all dark masterminds
should).  "We'll be sneaky this time and strike where we'll
never be--"
     "What.  Form.  Do.  You.  Want?" interrupted Whitefire.
      "A loaf of BREAD! Bwhahahah!"
     "Ugh, I need a new family."

-------------------------

     Unable move, see, talk... or pretty much live since it
wasn't alive, the Book was very irritated that it had been
unknowingly left behind.  Or it would have been, but it
didn't really have a consciousness at all, just a sort of
aura of desire and hatred that all sufficiently powerful
weapons of mass destruction seemed to possess.  The book
flexed that aura for an instant hoping to reach Aurora or
any weak minded soul to wield it but came up a big short, as
nobody was within 86 micrometers.  A little bit of evil went
much further back in the old days.
     Without notice, a man appeared, dressed in a simple
grey suit and striped tie and just enough hair on his head
to keep the shine from being distracting.  He had a calm
look with just a slightly nervous glance to the left and
right just after arriving.
     "This isn't the cafeteria," he mused and checked his
watch.  "Whoops, I'm going to be late to that teacher's
meeting."  He turned to head towards the door and his foot
brushed against the Book.  Satisfying the 86 micrometers
requirement, the Book reveled in its power and reached out
its tendrils to infect this new host with it's dark
motivations, ready to twist and bend his will into a sick
caricature of it's original--
     "Oh, one of the students must have left this behind.
I'll bring it to the library lost and found."  The man
picked up the book and, three minutes later, it was sitting
on a shelf among a host of other volumes, including
'Doraemon and Nobita's Big Adventure.'
     The Book wept, and then went to sleep.  There was
clearly a conspiracy against it, but nobody knew it existed,
so it had a bit of trouble justifying that statement.

-------------------------

     "May I join you?" asked the tall, American-looking girl
with short brown hair and blue eyes as she approached
Aurora's table.  She was followed close behind by a very
reserved-looking native girl with long black hair tied in a
braid behind her.  The difference between the two was
startling.  Whereas the tall girl was a little sloppy and
clearly athletic, the shorter Japanese girl had the most
pressed, clean looking uniform than anyone she'd seen at
Viridian Cross yet.
     Nodding slightly, Aurora turned her attention to less
confusing things, such as her peanut butter and jelly
sandwich.  The slight scraping of desks later and her lunch
table was two desks larger.
     The tall girl motioned to the smaller one.  "This is
Mayu Watsurabi and I'm Amanda Veers."
     "Hello," replied Aurora.  She restrained her instinct
to reach out a hand.  I'm not in America anymore, she chided
herself.  "I'm Aurora Sayre, but I guess you know that
already."
     Amanda smiled and nodded.  "How are enjoying yourself
so far?"
     "It's ... different," said Aurora, taking a bite of her
sandwich.  She noticed Mayu unpacking two bento boxes and
handing one to Amanda, who opened it immediately, revealing
one of the most impressively designed bento she'd seen in
Japan yet.  "It seems that I'm a little behind everyone, I
didn't realize I'd be coming in halfway through the school
year."  She eyed Amanda. "I'm sure you know that the school
system in America starts in Fall and goes until Summer, I
just expected it to be the same here."
     Amanda nodded but said, "I've heard that.  I've never
been to America, though."
     "I'm sorry, I just assumed... I should have asked."
     "It's okay," Amanda waved her hand.  "Everyone is going
to assume you're American too, they'll just be right."
     Aurora smiled partly but began to feel nervous.  I need
to make a good impression, she thought.  I've heard stories
about people who don't fit into the social structure in
Japanese schools and suicide was the happier end.  That
crazy guidance counselor said everything was more extreme in
this school as well.  I hope I don't end up hanging from the
flagpole with my insides on the out.
     She reached into her bag and idly searched around.  She
liked to have the Book in her hands when she felt nervous.
It made her feel stronger, with less to be afraid of.  She
knew it was a false sense of security, and that if she
indulged in that strength she could start down the path that
Wanda did and ended up who knows where.
     When she didn't find the book in her bag she began
looking around the area and in her desk.
     "So have you thought about what clubs you're going to
join?" asked Mayu, demonstrating that she did, in fact, have
a voice.  "There are quite a lot to choose from."
     "Do you have any hobbies?" added Amanda as she dug into
her lunch.  The smile on her face made it clear her bento
tasted as good as it looked but Aurora missed it as she
began frantically looking around the classroom. "What's
wrong?"
     She had to look twice to be sure, and quickly emptied
her entire bag, stacking the contents on the floor beside
her.  There had been more than one occasion that she'd
passed right by the Book without noticing it, as if it was
trying to hide from her.  When the bag was bare, she stood
and tried to keep herself from panicking.
     "It's gone..." she whispered then fell back into her
chair.

-------------------------

     "Hmm, that's interesting."
     "What is?"
     "This old book, it feels warm and looks to be ages
old."
     "I didn't know we had any antique books in the
library."
     "Me neither.  Hey, look at this!  It's filled with
notes and drawn diagrams.  It's not even printed!"
     "It must be a mistake, someone must have left it here
by accident."
     "Nope, look, it's got a checkout number.  Lets take
it!"
     "Whatever, I doubt it'll be useful in our science
project.  Let's see if we can find that book on
photochemistry."
     "Okay."
     The Book snored, but in a way that no human could ever
hear.

-------------------------

     "It was just a book," consoled Amanda as they left the
school.  "I'm sure you can get a new copy of it."
     Aurora shook her head.  "It was a one-of-a-kind,
actually.  It must still be around the school somewhere, I
just have to find it."  She looked back at the building with
a frown.
     "You checked the room you were in?" asked Mayu, who was
walking on the other side of Amanda from Aurora.
     "Three times.  It's not a very big room."
     "Maybe one of the teachers took it?" offered Amanda.
She swung her bag over her shoulder.  "Katsuragi-sensei or
Iitaka-sensei?"
     "I asked Katsuragi-sensei and he asked the other
teachers about it but they hadn't seen anything."  She
looked forward again and continued walking.  "I feel like an
idiot."
     "Don't beat yourself up," said Mayu.  "People make
mistakes all the time.  What kind of book was it?"
     "It was... uh," Aurora hesitated.  "Instructional.  A
guide."
     "And there aren't any copies?" Amanda asked,
incredulously.
     "It was hand written, and probably about four centuries
old.  It was... special."
     Just out of sight, Amanda and Mayu exchanged concerned
glances, then switched back.  "How was it special?" asked
Amanda.
     "It contained... notes.  Uh, notes on farming
techniques."
     Amanda stopped.  She was about to stand tall and
declare Aurora an agent of evil but was now confused and had
to think for a few minutes.  Either Aurora was evil or she
was crazy.  Or, she was evil and crazy.  Or, she was a very
obsessive farmer.  Mayu grabbed the arm of the stunned
Amanda and dragged her along.
     "In any case, I really need to get it back," continued
Aurora.  "Do you have any ideas?"
     "We could put up flyers," said Mayu.  "Around the
school or in town incase someone visiting picked it up."
     "I would prefer not to attract too much attention,"
Aurora admitted.  "It's not really the kind of book I want a
lot of people to know about."  She paused.  "You know,
'cause those are like, trade secrets of farming.  Not
everyone is... uh, ready for them."
     Definitely crazy, thought Amanda.  "Well, I'll check
again with a few people tomorrow morning, just in case they
saw anything."
     "Thanks."

-------------------------

     Whitefire stalked around the dark halls of Viridian
Cross, silent as a ninja.  She knew the halls well and
easily slipped from wall to wall, avoiding the moonlight
streaming in from the windows.  There were a few students
and teachers still around, undoubtedly working hard on their
summer assignments which they had left to the last minute,
but they were easily avoided as they tended to be paying
more attention to books than living things, even if those
living things were dressed all in black with a gray trim and
carrying an oversized loaf of pumpernickel bread.  At this
school, she remembered, that was borderline normal.
     Stalking into the cafeteria she found her way to the
pantries and opened one, staring through the dim light to
find the stacks of rolls, already prepared for tomorrow's
lunch.  Many schools bought their lunch breads from nearby
bakeries but Viridian Cross had an arrangement where they
made their own.  It saved on time and money and the local
bakeries didn't have to worry about being pulled into the
latest escapade at the school simply through relation.
     Whitefire scanned the shelf carefully and picked out an
ideal location to place her monster.  It would certainly not
be picked first and stood a good chance at going stale if it
was a normal loaf of bread.  This loaf, however, would emit
pollen that would quietly attach itself to the other breads
in the pantry and cause anyone who ate them to begin sending
their intelligence to the Master Loaf where it could be
harvested.  The design was quite ingenious, and Whitefire
prided herself on having developed the pollen that caused
intelligence to actually collect in pores and be released
into the environment.
     Smiling, she closed the pantry and gleefully stalked
off into the darkness...
     ...running right into another girl walking in.  Both
girls stumbled and fell to the ground, their respective
possessions going flying.  Whitefire looked up slowly,
embarrassed that she'd probably just blown her cover to a
student.  Instead, she saw a short dark haired girl,
probably in first year, wearing a long brown dress and a
black three-quarters length coat with a green trim reaching
for a couple of books she was holding, completely distracted
from Whitefire entirely.  Not one to look a gift-horse in
the mouse, Whitefire picked up her source-stone, which
resembled an Onyx crystal with a blue-green glow in the
center, and pocketed it silently.
     "Are you all right?" Whitefire asked, standing and
offering a hand to the younger girl.  "I wasn't looking
where I was going."
     The girl collected her books and stood up quickly
before noticing the outstretched hand.  She shook it
awkwardly and Whitefire decided to retract it after a
second's hesitation.  She blushed and looked down in what
Whitefire decided was probably a brief bow.  "It's my fault,
I was distracted," she said.  The girl had a slight accent,
and Whitefire decided she was probably American.  "Are you
hurt?"
     "No, I'm fine," said Whitefire, smiling and tapping her
chest.  "Well, if everything's okay, I'll be going."  She
turned and walked off, stopping by the exit only briefly to
glance back.  The girl was looking strangely at one of her
books and then glancing at the floor, facing away from
Whitefire.  Then, suddenly she bent down and placed her hand
over a seemingly non-descript section of the floor until
Whitefire realized that was exactly where her source-stone
was lying when she picked it up.
     Unnerved, Whitefire forwent the door and simply
teleported away.

-------------------------

     "I dunno, I think she's just obsessed," commented
Amanda to Mayu as they sat in the latter's room that night
doing homework.  Some of their teachers were obsessed too,
and had assigned them quite a bit of work for the first day
back after summer break.  "Most of the evil demons we've
come across had better excuses."
     "It's strange," said Mayu, chewing on her pencil for a
second, then nervously catching herself and hiding the
evidence.  "She seems nice enough, if a little quiet, but I
wonder what's really in that book she lost.  Or if she even
lost it."
     "You think she's lying about losing the book?"  Amanda
turned to Mayu, her homework forgotten.
     "Maybe, or maybe she thinks she's lost the book but has
actually hidden it somewhere her conscious mind can't
recall.  You remember last spring with Kim-san, he had three
personalities in there and only one was really clueless
about the earthquake."  She thought for a moment, then
added, "He was also an exchange student."
     "He was also floating by the end of it all and had
glowing blue eyes, a couple other telltale signs that we
missed."  Amanda shrugged.  "It would have helped if we were
in the same class as him, of course."
     "The point is we can't be sure of anything except that
the book is important to her."
     "Maybe we're overreacting.  I mean, everyone has things
they'd rather not talk about and there are lots of perfectly
normal students at Viridian Cross."  Mayu raised an eyebrow.
"Well, there are more than a couple."
     "You're right," nodded Mayu.  "She is a nice girl.  We
can't just assume she's evil just because we can't decide
one way or another.  Lets see what we can do about finding
her book and see what happens from there."
     "Agreed," Amanda said with a decisive head nod.  "Now,
can you help me with this equation?"  She pointed at the
first problem on the page.  Mayu looked at the clock.  At
this rate, she thought, we'll finish this assignment just in
time for Christmas.

-------------------------

     Aurora clutched the little spiral bound, miniature
notebook closely to her chest as she walked down the morning
sun-streaked halls of Viridian Cross.  Despite her best
efforts the previous night, she'd been unable to locate the
Book and it was making her more and more nervous.  There had
been other occasions where the book had gone missing for a
short while, somehow managing to be coincidentally nudged or
misplaced on a trip of a hundred hands to get away from
Aurora, but she always found it in the end.  After the first
time she lost the thing though, she got resources to track
it.  Last night, however, they turned up at dead ends.
     Making her more anxious, however, was the growing
feeling that something bad was happening.  It started last
night when she felt a glimmer of the presence of the book
after running into that woman in the halls.  When she
examined further she realized it was different, but no less
unsettling.  Something with malicious intent existed in the
school, Aurora was positive now, but finding out what it was
would be difficult without closely examining every person in
the school.  Also, she couldn't decide if she wanted to find
the evil thing, or avoid it entirely.
     Something grabbed her shoulder suddenly and she leaped
in fright.
     "Woah!" came Amanda's voice and Aurora froze.  "Wound a
little tight, are we?"  Aurora slowly turned herself around
and forced the agonizing look on her face to relax as she
saw Amanda and Mayu standing behind her, the latter with
raised eyebrows.  "Good morning, Aurora," Amanda finally
said waving her hand innocently.
     "Good ... morning," Aurora eked out, still a little
tense.
     "Are you all right, Sayre-san?" asked Mayu quietly.
     "Yes," Aurora nodded and finally relaxed.  "I'm just
jumpy in the morning," she forced herself to say with a
laugh.
     "Oookay."  Amanda walked past Aurora slowly and
continued on towards their homeroom.  Mayu and Aurora
eventually followed.  "So how did you do on that homework?"
Amanda asked after a moment of silence.
     "I completed it," replied Aurora.  Then added, "I'm
good at math."
     "Really?" Amanda smiled wildly.  "Then maybe you should
join our homework sessions and help me out with it."
     "Um, okay," said Aurora with a shrug.
     "By 'help', you should know, she means 'do it for
her'," supplied Mayu with a slight smile.  "The way I 'help'
her with some of her Literature assignments."
     "You do not do my Literature assignments for me,"
retorted Amanda.
     "You're right.  I don't do them," Mayu admitted.
     "There you go."
     "I let you do them, and then correct them when they're
horribly wrong."
     "Hey!"
     Mayu turned to Aurora.  "One time she wrote a report on
how 'The Tale of the Heike' was about a war between armies
of crabs."  Aurora looked back blankly.  "A Heike-gani is a
type of crab."  Blank looks continued.  "The Tale of the
Heike is actually about the Genpei War between the Taira and
Minamoto clans."  Mayu was beginning think if her friends
had gone catatonic.  "Well, it was amusing to me."  She
blushed slightly.
     Aurora blinked and continued walking.  Amanda glanced
down at the notebooks books in Aurora's arms.  "What're
those?" she asked.
     "Er, well, they're some copies I have notes on," she
replied awkwardly.
     "Copies of what?"
     "The Book I lost yesterday."
     "Oh.  So it isn't such a loss after all then?" Amanda
asked.
     Aurora shook her head.  "They are incomplete copies for
my reference, I still need the original book to make
complete sense of these.  I'm hoping I have enough here to
piece together some bits from the Book but I'm not sure.
I'm going to check during lunch."
     Amanda nodded.  "Sounds like fun," she said in a way
that conveyed the total opposite.

-------------------------

     It wasn't fun, just as Amanda had expected, although
she had made some progress and was at least relieved that in
combining the copies she had, most of the first part of the
Book she had completely recovered.  The content of the pages
was almost nothing without the Book itself, but it was a
start.  She didn't make as much progress as she'd hoped
because Amanda kept interrupting her with questions about
the Math assignment that she apparently hadn't gotten around
to finishing the previous night.
     Amanda was fun, Aurora had to admit.  She didn't expect
to make many friends in Japan, or any at all really, but
here she was spending time with a couple of classmates that
both seemed relaxed and responsible at the same time.
Aurora couldn't figure out how, but she knew that Amanda's
causal attitude was almost like an act to cover up a much
more responsible side she kept hidden from view.  She
wondered if Mayu had ever seen that part of her personality
since it appeared they were so close.
     Mayu was much harder to figure out than Amanda,
although she was just as fun.  Mayu clearly was brought up
to be a respectable, mature, proper Japanese woman.  She
knew all the 'traditional' practices (as Amanda had called
them) such as the tea ceremony and how to wrap a Kimono
perfectly, and certainly wasn't very obvious with her
emotions.  As with Amanda, however, Aurora got the hint that
there were deeper waters to Mayu's personality she kept away
from the light.
     I guess everyone has their secrets, thought Aurora as
she sat in class getting ready for the Math class that
Amanda had so dreaded.  Their Math instructor was already
ten minutes late and the students had decided to use the
extra time to catch up on their gabbing and giggling.
Aurora hadn't remembered so much of the latter going on
yesterday, but there wasn't as much free time the day
before, so she figured her classmates were just happy.
     Suddenly the classroom door opened and a tall, blond
haired woman with big brown eyes and wearing a white lab
coat walked into the room and over to the teacher's podium.
She looked out over the room and appeared to almost freeze
in fright.  Amanda, not much for awkward silences, rose her
hand.  Almost instinctively the woman pointed at her in an
acknowledging way.
     "Futabatei-sensei," Amanda said.  "Where is Arishima-
sensei?"
     "He's not... er," she glanced around for a moment as if
searching for the answers in the corners of the room.
"Feeling well.  Apparently something he ate disagreed with
him, so I'm here to take over for him."
     Several students in the classroom gasped and began
chattering with the people next to them.  Amanda looked at
the other conversations that suddenly sprung up and then up
at Futabatei-sensei again.  "And you weren't able to treat
him?" she asked with definitely more confusion than Aurora
believed that statement warranted.
     The teacher shook her head and looked down at the
podium.  Amanda sat down in shock and Aurora couldn't take
any more of this and turned to Mayu.  "What's the big deal?
Teachers aren't allowed to get sick?" she asked.
     Mayu shook her head then quietly whispered, "Futabatei-
sensei is the school nurse and they say there's _nothing_
she can't heal in under an hour.  No student has gone home
with a physical ailment since she came to work at Viridian."
     "Wow," said Aurora and quite meaning it.  She turned
just as Futabatei-sensei held up the lesson plan and began
asking about the homework.  Amanda remained in her shocked
state but Aurora imagined it wasn't because of the teacher
being sick anymore.
     "Kajahara-san," the nurse said.  "What did you get for
question number four?"
     A boy with short spiky hair and an unbutton collar
stood up with his homework in hand and scrutinized it.
After a moment or two he looked up at Futabatei-sensei and
then down at his homework again.  Two more iterations of
this later and he said, "Sixteen?"
     Futabatei-sensei looked at the lesson plan and shook
her head.  "No, the answer was the 'rectangular coordinate
system.'  Did you do the right problem, Kajahara-san?"
     The boy laugh embarrassingly and said, "I must have."
He sat down quickly and looked at his homework like it was
from Mars.
     The nurse called another student to answer question
five.  "What is, uh, K-Kramer's Law?"  "No, the answer is
two.  Have you all done your homework?"  Many students began
waving their assignment sheets in the air defensively.  A
girl sitting next to the second student looked over at her
homework, as she too was waving it in the air, and widened
her eyes.  "You put down 'two'!  Why didn't you read it?"
"I must have gotten confused."
     Several students began examining each other's homework
and, despite the fact that three more replies were
completely unrelated to the question at hand, most had done
their assignment correctly.  Futabatei-sensei wilted as her
class descended into chaos before her.
     Aurora simply frowned.

-------------------------

     For the rest of the day the same pattern continued.
People would get easily confused and just start making up
things while others would get dreadfully silent and then
flee in terror down the halls when called on to answer
questions.
     "They're normally bright students," commented Mayu at
the end of the day.  "I don't understand what happened."
     "They must have snapped from the pressure," said Amanda
casually.  "It's only two more years until college-exams."
     "I don't think college-exams have anything to do with
this," Mayu replied quickly.  "You're just relieved nobody
asked you about your homework."
     "That I am," nodded Amanda, then turned to Aurora who
had paused midway through packing her bag.  "Oh, no, not you
too."
     "Hmm?" said Aurora, broken from her reverie.  "Ah, no,
I'm fine.  I'm just trying to figure out the pattern.
Unfortunately, I don't really know enough yet to piece it
together."
     "Pattern?" asked Mayu.
     "Something happened to the class at some point between
yesterday and today that caused everyone to go crazy.  If we
can figure out what all the people have in common, we might
be able to undo it."  Aurora paused.  "Or at least keep it
from happening to us."
     "Ah, just like in that American show," said Amanda.
Mayu and Aurora stared at her.  "CSI."
     "I wouldn't necessarily say they went crazy," said
Mayu.  "It's more like they suddenly became four-year-olds."
She shook her head.  "Or at least were reduced to the
intellect of one."
     "The change happened today after lunch, so it could
have been something they were exposed to as late as this
morning, depending on how long it takes to effect people."
Aurora paused then finished packing up her bag.  "I need to
look into something.  I'll meet you at your house later to
work on homework, okay?"
     Mayu nodded.  Amanda looked at Aurora and said, "What
are you going to do?"
     Aurora tossed her bag over her shoulder.  "Just
checking something out that bothered me last night."  She
quietly walked off towards the classroom door.  Amanda
watched her leave and then Mayu tapped her on the shoulder.
     "You should probably follow her, she might get hurt,"
said Mayu, motioning after Aurora.  "Hopefully we'll find
out whether she's someone to be afraid of or not."
     "I hope she's not involved in this," said Amanda
softly.  She reached into her own bag and pulled out a
simple pendant with three emeralds placed in the center in a
pyramid formation.  "I was really starting to like her."

-------------------------

     I hope I'm not the cause of this, Aurora thought to
herself as she walked towards the cafeteria, flipping
through her notebooks.  I probably am, though, it's just my
luck as soon as I find a new place and new people to be with
that damn Book causes trouble again.  I wish I could just
dump it without the repercussions echoing back to me.
     The pages in the notebooks were very worn and
demonstrated how many times she'd used them for references
when dealing with the Book.  She hadn't written all of them.
Many, in fact, she had inherited with the Book from her
predecessor when she... departed.  She had added to the
notebooks, however, copying diagrams and lists and all the
critical information for a variety of topics in the Book as
she sought to better understand and control its power.  Now
they were all she had left of the passages contained in the
ancient tome and she hoped they would be enough to correct
the damage.
     The feeling she had felt last night was definitely
evil, and she had silently desired to avoid it as long as
she could, but now that it had manifested and started
affecting the students, she couldn't ignore it any longer.
She was forced to accept the truth that she hoped so much
not to be true: The Book had found a new owner.
     It was her fault the book ever came to the school and
it was her responsibility to find it and get it away before
any lasting damage was done.  Her predecessor had been
lucky, in Aurora's opinion.  Although the Book destroyed her
life and the lives of those around her, it had been largely
localized, and in the end, Wanda had ended up very happy.
Aurora's experience with the book had been much more
harrowing.  Every time she used it, she felt the temptation
to fall over the edge into the darkness and each time she
had resisted it.  If it had found a new owner, she could
only assume they were not so strong.
     That was, of course, was misleading, because if there
was one thing the book did grant, it was strength.
Superior, lasting, supernatural strength over, not just
their body, but the world itself.
     Aurora tried not to think about it and felt herself
getting sick as she approached the cafeteria.  Inside it was
strangely empty and dark, as if the students had
subconsciously decided to avoid it, and it only further
convinced her that the book was involved.  She'd found that
humans can sense excessive malevolence, no matter what its
form, and if they were wise enough, could avoid it without
having even consciously known it was there.
     She pushed on the door and found the unwise lying in
the corners of the room outside the view of the window on
the door.  Something was alive here and aware that bodies
would attract attention.  Aurora blanched, and then flipped
through one of her notebooks quickly.
     "Evil, reveal thyself," she said, waving her hand in a
specific pattern.  The air around her suddenly got thicker
and changed slightly red like a bloody mist.  Parts were
thicker than others, showing concentrations of evil
energies, but the thickest part was centered on the pantry.
She kept moving forward, despite ever nerve in her body
telling her to retreat, that, without the book, she stood no
chance against it.  Her sense of responsibility prevailed
and she moved to the pantry door and opened it.
     Thick mist rolled out into the cafeteria, covering the
ground in a bloody fog.  Behind the red waves, she saw it,
the blood red object that the clouds were emanating from.
She frowned.  It couldn't be what she thought it was.
     As she pondered the quandary of the source, she felt a
wall of air strike her in the chest and threw her back into
the center of the cafeteria, knocking chairs and tables onto
their sides.  Her head smacked the edge of a table and her
vision got blurry.  Pain shot through her body and crept
around her eyeballs.  She looked up at what hit her and
could no longer ignore what she saw.  "Dispel!" she cried
with a wave of her arm and the red mist evaporated
instantly, leaving behind the floating, oversized loaf of
pumpernickel bread.  Only the seriousness of the situation
kept her from breaking out into giggles.
     Then the loaf grew arms.

-------------------------

     Whitefire watched carefully at the events unfolding in
Viridian Cross High School.  She had placed her carefully
concealed Pumpernickel PerpetratorTM Monster in a variety of
schools in the area, but this was the first to be discovered
by someone, and, lo and behold, she was a sorceress.  Or a
witch, Whitefire could never tell the difference.  She had a
feeling that witches spent most of their time in front of a
cauldron and this girl was clearly of the spellbook-carrying
variety.
     Lord Josh arrived in the throne cave to find Whitefire
sitting on his throne and using his crystal ball (despite
the fact it was actually a television and that Whitefire had
built it, he still claimed dominion over it, as he did over
all things on Earth).  "What have I told you about my
chair?" he said angrily.  Whitefire looked back at him and
didn't move a muscle to get up.
     "Nothing appreciative, I'll tell you that," she
replied.  "It took half a dozen of my monsters to carve this
thing, and that was only after you rejected the previous
four incarnations.  The least I would think you could muster
would be a 'thank you.'"
     "This is my throne room and my chair, only I get to sit
on it."
     "Geeze, possessive aren't we?  What, do I have another
extravagant chair carved just to watch TV with you?"
Whitefire motioned to the 'crystal ball'.
     "You may have your own throne, as I share my dominion
with you," Lord Josh admitted in a surprisingly friendly
way.  That ended quickly.  "But it must not be taller than
two-thirds the size of my chair and you can't have any text
engraved onto it, like, Whitefire, Ruler of Prussia or
anything."
     "Prussia?" questioned Whitefire.  "Isn't it just called
Germany now?"
     "Well, then you can't have 'Whitefire, Ruler of
Germany' on it either!"
     "What about, Whitefire, Monster Master?"
     "No text at all!"
     "Hmph," pouted Whitefire. "You brought it up anyway."
     "All I brought up was that you're on my throne and I
want it back!" said Lord Josh, exasperated.
     "Fine, take the stupid thing," Whitefire yelled back,
resorting the ultimate in sibling arguing techniques:
rendering the object in question 'stupid.'  She stood and
stormed off across the cave and down the stairs out of
sight.
     Lord Josh stepped around to the front of his throne and
sat down, pleased with himself.  Then he looked into the
crystal ball and thought for several seconds.
     "Whitefire?" he called out experimentally.  "How do I
change the channel on this thing?"
     "I hate you!" came the hollered reply.
     "Okay," said Lord Josh and settled down to watch...
whatever was on.

-------------------------

      Aurora felt awful.  Part of it was the 'Stasis' spell
she tried to conjure that backfired and gave her nausea, but
the other half was the twisty feeling in her stomach that
she was nothing without the Book.  Actually, that latter
half might have been from the spell too, it was hard to
tell.
     The loaf of bread had turned out to be a rather tall if
lanky beast that was hell-bent on either turning Aurora into
a croissant or removing all witnesses to its existence.
Either way it was trouble and the simple shield she had
erected was only going to keep the bakery product from
getting to her for so long.  Already the micro-thin barrier
had begun to fracture despite Aurora's attempts to reinforce
it.
     I relied on it too much, she thought.  The Book granted
me power that was easy, if corrupt, and my own ability had
wasted away while I borrowed its strength.  I knew I'd have
to ditch the thing someday, I just thought I'd get some
advanced notice.  I hope Amanda and Mayu don't worry too
much about me when I'm gone.
     But then, it would go after them next and they wouldn't
even know.  Aurora had figured out what happened, even if
she didn't understand how or why.  The bread was breathing
out a strange gas or pollen that was landing on all the
other food in the pantry, burrowing its way through any
wrapping or container, and infecting the lunch breads.  She
imagined the kids that were affected were the ones who had
eaten bought lunches instead of bringing their own, which
explained the predominance of boys that been affected.  Male
students rarely made their own lunches.  Because Mayu had
brought bento for herself and Amanda and because Aurora had
a sandwich from home, they were spared the effect, but the
others in the class were not so lucky.
     The shield cracked again, creating a spider web of
lines across the glowing blue dome.  A couple more hits
would be all it could take.  Aurora imagined herself back at
home, in Elyria, Ohio.  It wasn't the nicest place in the
world, and school was hell, but there were beautiful fields
and trees and sometimes she could just escape from it all
into the library and be anywhere in her imagination.  Then
there was that day the tall, young, dark haired girl walked
in with the most interesting Book in her hands...
     "RADIAL FLAME!"
     Aurora looked up as she heard the cry and saw a red
ball of fire explode in front of the bread beast and expand
in a globe of reddish energy throwing the creature across
the cafeteria into a pile of chairs.  The flame was
deflected by her shield but immediately after the blue
barrier shattered leaving only a fine blue mist on the
ground which quickly dispersed.  Aurora searched for the
source of the voice.
     A girl landed nearby wearing a stylized version of the
blue-white uniforms in the school and a blue mask that
covered the area around her eyes down to the tip of her nose
and then extended out past her ears to look like spiraling
tails out past the back of her head.  Her hair was black
with blue highlights and she wore low-heeled white boots
that ran up to her knees.  She look up at Aurora and smiled.
"Feelin' all right?" the masked girl asked.
     Aurora's eyes widened and she almost smiled before
looking back at the bread creature pulling itself up out of
the pile of chairs.  "I'm all right.  Thank you."
     The Masked Girl looked at the creature as well.  "What
is that thing?"
     "A demonic creature, probably created by someone who
likes sandwiches a lot."  The girl looked at Aurora out of
the corner of her eye with a raised eyebrow.  "It wasn't
me," Aurora said defensively.
     "You should get out of here.  Let me take care of
this."
     "Let me help," Aurora said, flipping through her
notebooks again.  She wished she'd copied out some of the
more useful spells in addition to the complex, hard to cast
ones.
     "I don't want you to get hurt," the Masked Girl
replied, looking at Aurora and her notebooks and noticing
the runic symbols and ancient diagrams.
     Aurora simply kept paging through her books.  "I may
not have created that thing, but I'm responsible."  She
looked up at the girl.  "I have to help."
     "How are you responsible?"
     "It's a long story," said Aurora, finally finding the
page she was looking for and reading the scratched script on
the page.  "Here.  If I conjured a spear, could you throw
it?"
     "Sure, but it's not necessary.  I can--"
     "We have to undo whatever that bread thing did to those
students before destroying it."  She held up her notebook to
the open page.  "This spear will make it release all its
energy and cause it to go to all the sick people and undo
the effects."
     The Masked Girl looked at the notebook with a frown,
but eventually nodded.  Aurora knelt down and laid the book
out, reaching into her bag.  "Hold it off for a few moments
while I do the spell."
     "Hold it off?" asked the Masked Girl.  "I'm more of the
shoot-'em destroy-'em type of magical girl."  Aurora already
had several packets of spice out and a couple stones with
symbols carved in them spread across the ground in front of
her.
     "Improvise," she said, and began waving her hands over
the stones.  The Masked Girl glanced around as the bread
began stalking forwards.  She stepped over to a nearby desk
and flung it with all her might, clobbering the creature and
knocking it to the ground again.  The girl smiled, pleased
with herself.
     "Okay, done," she said, dusting her hands off.  Light
began to fill the room and the Masked Girl looked at Aurora
just in time to see it coalesce in her hands and take the
form of a glowing javelin.  The throwing weapon hovered in
mid air as the magical girl walked up.  "Do I have to do
anything special," she said.
     "Just hit it," Aurora said with a determined nod.  The
Masked Girl grabbed the spear and was surprised when it
suddenly had weight in her hand.  She held it ready and
turned to the creature who was standing already.  It hadn't
failed to notice the lightshow and looked to be standing on
guard, ready for the attack.  Frowning, she brought the
weapon to her side and began charging.
     The bread creature let out a roar with a mouth neither
girl had noticed before but the Masked Girl kept running,
finally bringing the spear around for a swipe when she was
within range.  The creature dodged back, and the girl
followed it with a kick to the... loaf, which it didn't see
coming.  As the bread staged a step, she flung the weapon
into it's chest and it exploded into a brilliant display of
colored light sending bolts of energy off into the school
where they couldn't see.
     The Masked Girl shielded her eyes until there was
nothing left of the creature but a few caraway seeds.  She
turned to see Aurora already packing her things back into
her bag, only seconds afterwards.  She closed and latched
the top of the brown bag and walked up to the costumed
warrior.
     "I'm sorry for the trouble," she said and turned to
leave.
     "This wasn't the first time this has happened, you
know," the Masked Girl called after her.  Aurora stopped and
turned slightly.  "There have been lots of monsters long
before you came to this school.  I doubt you've been
responsible for them all."
     "What's causing them?" asked Aurora.
     "I'm not sure," admitted the girl with a shrug.  "This
making people dumb thing is a new, though.  Why do you think
you caused this?"
      Aurora considered her responses for a moment, trying
to decide how much to reveal.  She never got the chance to
say anything, though, because a short-black hared
bespectacled teacher suddenly walked into the cafeteria and
asked what was going on.
     Aurora suddenly spun to face away from the newcomer and
the Masked Girl laughed nervously and suddenly picked up
Aurora and ran to a window.  The teacher, noticing the
unconscious students lying in the corners of the room,
called after them, but not before they had leapt out the
window and into the sky.  The teacher fumed and began
running towards the students to see if they were alright.
     As she was shaking one decidedly tired but ultimately
alright student, another girl appeared in the cafeteria,
picked something up off the ground, and then vanished.  The
teacher never saw her.

-------------------------

     Ryota Katsuragi stood outside the cafeteria watching as
Fuchida-san nudged the students awake and told them that
sleeping in the cafeteria was not acceptable behavior.
Ryota didn't care about the students or what the teacher was
saying to them, however.  He was too busy scribbling
everything down into her notebook.
     She showed up again, he thought to himself.  The Blue
Masked Warrior.  This is much more convenient than running
around to every school in the district.  I wonder what that
new student, Sayre-san, was doing here.  Is she involved in
the monsters or the warrior?
     When the crowd of students began to grow, Katsuragi
decided it was time to move on and stuffed his notebook into
his pocket and casually walked off.  He'd have to learn more
the next time she surfaced.

-------------------------

     Lord Josh looked evenly at Whitefire with a look of
contempt.  She was smirking, of course, as she did when she
had the upper hand in their arguments.  Josh was older than
Whitefire, and he felt that gave him the birthright to win
their fights, not to mention the advantage he had of
possessing the power of a dark lord, but for some reason she
wouldn't secede and it both frustrated and confused the hell
out of him.
     "What do you want?" he growled out evilly.  Whitefire
was playing idly with a handful of caraway seeds which Lord
Josh knew were the remains of the loaf of bread he had told
her to send to the school.
     "A throne."
     Lord Josh flinched as if hit.  "Fine."  He held out his
hand.
     Whitefire shook her head.  "With writing on it."
     "What. Kind?"
     She tilted her head as if thinking about it for a
second but he knew it was an act.  "Whitefire, Moster
Master."
     "Go right ahead," Josh said between grit teeth.  "Hand
them over."
     Whitefire held out her palm but retracted it slightly
when Josh went to grab it.  "What about a picture of a
rose?" she asked.
     Lord Josh quickly darted out his hand and snatched up
the seeds.  "Absolutely not!" he bellowed as he turned to
sit on his throne.  Whitefire simply crossed her arms behind
him as if he ruined her game, which, he hoped, he had.
     Sitting on the throne, he held his hand before him and
then quickly crushed the seeds in his fist, releasing a
black cloud that hovered for a moment and then rushed
towards him entering his body through his eyes and mouth.
Seconds later, it was gone and he was sitting with his head
limp against his body.  Whitefire frowned and cautiously
stepped closer.  "Are you alright?" she asked.
     His head snapped up suddenly and he opened his eyes,
where were mere pits, black as night.  Whitefire backed up
quickly.  She hated it when he looked like that.  He opened
his mouth and spoke, and instead of his normal voice coming
out, deep rumbling words dribbled out.  "Oh yes, WE'RE
fine," it said.  "And we REMEMBER."
     Whitefire backed up to the staircase nervously and
dashed down it as she heard him begin to laugh loudly.

-------------------------

     Flying through the evening sky was actually much less
frightening than Aurora had always suspected it was.  Of
course, she was being held by a masked, magical girl whose
grip was far stronger than it looked, and they weren't
really flying so much as leaping very far distances, but she
suspected the feeling was similar to flying, with the
exception of the brief and sudden landings before jumps.
Even enjoying the air wasn't enough to take her mind off of
what had just happened though.
     "Perhaps we can stop running now and talk," she
suggested to the Masked Girl, who had apparently gotten
caught up in the act.  The girl blushed beneath her mask and
landed on the next rooftop.  Aurora was placed gently down
and she took stock of her things, just to make sure she
hadn't dropped anything in the scramble to leave the school.
     "Sorry about that," the Masked Girl admitted with a
smile.  "I don't like hanging around to chat with teachers."
     "I understand," nodded Aurora.  "I prefer to remain low-
profile as well."  She paused and tried to organize her
thoughts and eventually gave up.  "Look," she said finally.
"I don't know how or why you're like this, but we might as
well get out of the way that I know who you are, Amanda."
     The Masked Girl jumped in alarm and glanced around.  "I-
-what, what are you talking about?  Amanda?  Who's that?  I
look nothing like her!"
     Aurora tried to hold it in, but with the release of the
tension of nearly dying at the hands of the pumpernickel
dough-boy, she couldn't help herself and began laughing.
She'd feel bad about laughing at Amanda later, but right now
she just had to unwind.
     "What you laughing about?" asked the Masked Girl.  The
edge of her mouth started to curl up despite her best
efforts.  "Stop that!" she said while trying to contain
herself.  "It's not -- heheh -- funny!" She started laughing
too and for a moment, the two girls were just that, and
nothing more.
     Several minutes later they both managed to calm down
enough to continue their conversation, but Aurora summed it
up quickly.  "It's an excellent disguise, I definitely would
have been fooled, especially by the hair, but you forgot to
change your voice and you have a very distinctive way of
talking."
     The Masked Girl blushed again.  "I do not!"  Aurora
nodded with a smile.  "Hmph," Amanda pouted as green
energies began swirling around her, changing her clothes and
the length of her hair, and gently nudging her body shape
until she looked like the student Aurora met her as.  "I
don't see why you saw through it when nobody else, not even
our classmates saw through it."
     Aurora's smile faded, but only slightly.  "Probably
because I already know what's possible with magic."
     "As long as we're being honest with each other," said
Amanda.  "What's the deal with that book you were looking
for?"
     "It is a long story, as I said before," admitted
Aurora.  "Basically, the Book is a Grimore, essentially a
wizard's reference guide, but it's very evil and powerful.
Possibly even alive, too."
     "What were DOING with it, then?" asked Amanda, clearly
stunned at Aurora's somewhat blas, revelation.  "Are you--
are you evil?"
     Aurora looked at her like she had four heads.  "No!"
she said.  "Not only are things usually divided into shades
of grey instead of black and white stuff like good and evil,
I couldn't just get rid of the book once I had it.  Trust
me, I would have if I could."  No, you wouldn't have, a
voice in her mind said, tauntingly.  You loved the power but
were too much of a coward to indulge.  Aurora tried to
ignore its words and pressed on.  "The Book horribly
corrupts unknowing people, it makes their simplest whims
lifelong obsessions.  If I had just thrown it away someone
else could have picked it up and done something awful with
it."
     Aurora grimaced and turned to stare off into the
setting sun.  Beautiful reds and oranges spread out across
the cloudless sky.  "Trust me, please.  I don't want to go
into the details but there was nothing I could do with it."
     "I trust you," Amanda said, walking up behind her and
placing a hand on her shoulder.  "Believe me, I know what
it's like to have to bear a difficult burden alone."
     Aurora could only nod, she didn't like thinking about
these things.  Most days she just pretended the book was
just one of her textbooks and ignored it, she wasn't used to
this pressure.
     She looked down off the side of the building and almost
swooned from the height.  "Uh, how do we get down?" she
asked.
     Amanda blinked.  "Oops, I transformed back too early."
     "Then just transform again," said Aurora simply.
     "Actually," Amanda rubbed the back of her head and
looked to the side.  "I can only do it once a day."
     Aurora rolled her eyes.

-------------------------

     Mayu looked around and noticed she was standing outside
the cafeteria.  Nearby several students were watching as
teachers examined the mess and tried to sort out what had
just occurred.  Mayu tried to remember what had happened in
the last twenty minutes but couldn't.
     "So," she said sadly. "It's begun."

          -[End Part 1]-


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