All Purpose Negima Fanfiction Thread

Traverse Town:

"Okay, Naba," Chisame said, crossing her fingers together and staring at the girl sitting across the small table of the bedroom she had been sharing with Satomi over her last few days there, "now talk. And I'd better like what I hear. I know it won't happen, but it would be nice."

"Why did you take me away from the others?" a confused Chizuru asked.

"Because—" Chisame tersely began explaining...

—-

"— by now, we know all too well how these things go, Mikado-sensei," Itoshiki told Ryoko, who sat across the small table of the bedroom he and Keiichi had been sharing. Which made the woman slightly uncomfortable, not because she was in the bedroom of two guys with both of said guys, that was actually rather common fare for her, but because neither of those guys with her were any particularly appealing to her. "If we start questioning all of you together, at the same time, you'll start engaging into colorful squabbling dialogue with each other. That will lead the girls to start bickering with you as well. And in the end, we won't go too far in the resolution of this mystery."

"Which would be very despairing," said Keiichi, standing behind Nozomu's chair.

"Quite indeed," the older man nodded.

"Believe me, it's still as much of a mystery for me as it is for you guys, if not more," Mikado claimed. "And shouldn't you two be questioning Akashi-sensei instead? Two guys alone in the same room as a gorgeous maiden still in her underwear! How indecent!"

"That won't work, Sensei," Itoshiki patiently explained. "All females in this company are well aware of how emasculated we are as roles of traditional male dominance. They won't think badly of us over this, at all."

"Hey!" Keiichi gasped.

The teacher looked back at him. "Well, it is true, or isn't it?"

Keiichi almost sniffled. "Perhaps, but you don't have to put it that way!"

"Either way," Itoshiki's attention returned to Mikado, "despite your ample, succulent womanly charms in shameless display, we still remain in control enough as to assure you, if this is any sort of trickery, we will be able to respond as necessary."

"Then why do you sit with your legs crossed like that, and why Morisato-kun makes a point of hiding his crotch behind your back?" the school nurse asked.

"I, I don't!" protested Keiichi.

"And this is my usual way of sitting," Itoshiki blankly lied. "That you would suggest otherwise, implying lascivious intent on my part, fills me with great hopeless despair! I'm in despair! Being mistaken for a pervert has left me in despair! Now please start telling in detail, all that has been happening around you ever since this confusing and convoluted tragedy began..."

—-

"We only were filming a movie, really," Sasaki Makie insisted, looking away from Yuuna's angry stare. She just didn't get it. After everyone in Ala Alba, Yuuna-chan included, had insisted so much on her saying that whenever their magic was found out, why was Yuuna-chan now upset at her when she did just that?

"When," Akashi-sensei ignored her and asked his daughter, now they sat in the room she had come to share with Makie, "did this start?"

"Hey," Yuuna pouted. "I thought we were the ones doing the questioning here!"

"I'm the father here, not you, young lady!" he sternly reminded her.

"We still haven't fully singled out if you're my papa or not!" Yuuna protested. "Eva-chan's warned us, demons often can read minds, take over people's memories, that kinda stuff! And don't bother to threaten me with revealing my secrets again! Now we're alone with Maki-chan, and I've been an open book to her!"

"Really, with everything?" her father questioned. "Does she even know about the incident with the car, the porcupine, and your mother's—"

Yuuna blushed and made an anguished face. "Please, Dad!"

"Um, well," Makie intervened. "You see, it was something we decided just last week, while trading ideas on what to do for the festival, and Madoka-chan was nearby, and commenting on how Sarumiya-sempai was thinking of making a student movie, so we thought-"

"Don't give me that 'we were filming a movie' old excuse, Sasaki-kun!" the teacher warned.

Makie sobbed. "But even the Headmaster told us to use it when found! And he outranks you, Papa-san...!"

Wataru gasped. "The Headmaster?!"

"It began during the trip to Kyoto," Yuuna sourly, grimly replied, not meeting her father's gaze. "It's a very long story, but the basic gist is, Konoka was kidnapped and a few of us set out to save her. It was then where I learned Negi's secrets and I had to make a Provisional Alliance with him."

"Yuuna-chan!" Makie gasped. "How can you say those kind of bold faced lies to your own dad!"

"Maki-chan, please," Yuuna groaned bitterly. "Just stop it already, alright?"

"I see," Professor Akashi said, just as grim and sourly. "But, about the Headmast—"

Now Yuuna lifted her face just enough as to look at his face. "What are you expecting? An apology? I did what I had to do. Much like yourself, I guess, right?"

"I can't say I'm pleased, do you think you really can blame me?" her father exhaled deeply. "Yuuna, what do you think will happen to you and Negi when the Headmaster inevitably hears about this? Do you think that doesn't worry me more than anything else, included what will happen to myself?"

"Um, he already knows, if that's what worries you," Yuuna said.

Wataru paused. "Excuse me?"

Yuuna nodded. "He already knew everything by the time we made it back from Kyoto. Was very thankful, too. Even gave us some money."

"WHAT?!" Makie screamed. "He never gave ME any money, that cheeky old cagey grandpa!"

Yuuna shrugged. "Maybe he only repaid those who were partners with Negi-kun?"

"That's unfair!" Makie whined. "Is it because I kissed a girl instead? He of all people shouldn't complain about girls who kiss other girls!"

"So.. Sasaki-kun wasn't just saying it to...?" Akashi-sensei was staring into the distance, or rather the wall, blankly now. "He knew... And he never told me... What, this, why this... betrayal..."

"Will you stop worrying more about whatever the Principal will think than about what your own daughter thinks when she learns you've been dating and playing magical wargames with someone named 'the Witch of Betrayal'?" Yuuna cried.

Akashi-sensei's eyes pierced further into the wall, as he slumped down flaccidly in place. "So, wherever I look, it's all the same, everyone was keeping secrets about my flesh and blood from me..."

"Well, that might be simple karma at work," Yuuna mumbled under her breath.

Makie discreetly pinched her arm. "Yuuna-chan! That was mean and uncalled for!"

Yuuna just took it like a woman while wrinkling her nose.

"I mean," Makie added, "Any girl would be upset at learning her parents would be keeping secrets from them, I can understand that! Like, let's say, I'd feel betrayed if my moms told me they are retired Magical Girls, and they dropped my twin sister in another dimension, but I still wouldn't lash out at them over that!"

Yuuna blinked. "That was a very specific scenario. Exactly what were you talking about with your moms last week, again...?"

Her father suddenly sprang up on his chair. "One second, why did you call Caster 'the witch of betrayal'? Not only she hates being called that, not only you never were interested on mythology, but it took her weeks for her to trust me enough as to tell me she was—"

—-

"Medea of Colchis," Saber clenched her teeth coldly, pacing slowly around Caster, who stood at the middle of the large house's shed, leaning ahead while her hands remained bound by an Itoshiki-lent rope that hung from the ceiling. "We know your secrets, we know of your ways, so don't even try escaping us and your judgment. Fate delivered you to us, so don't even think of cheating your way out, as Casters are prone to do!"

"What a classist, stereotypical accusation to lightly throw around!" the cheating witch said lifting her nose high. "Who is cheating here, Saber? Not only you separate me from my Master while keeping yours by your side, but you choose me leaving me restrained in this humiliating, borderline abusive fashion!"

Saber paused, briefly wondering if Caster wouldn't have a vestige of a point somewhere in that tirade. "That... That is not cheating, that is merely a valid part of the strategies to hold captives of war... Besides, this somehow simply seemed like the correct thing to do to you! I have the strongest feeling you would do the same thing to me, or far worse!"

"I wouldn't, I'd be completely civil and gentle to you," Caster said. "Why, I'd even make sure of giving you something very nice to wear..."

"She might be right, Saber," Shirou argued. "This feels more like we're the bad guys! How can you say she's a prisoner of war when she gave up without a fight? And why to bind her hands in the first place, she can just go intangible and free herself at any moment, this is not only wrong but dumb! That is, I'm untying her..."

"Actually, no, that won't be necessary," Saber quickly stopped with a short shake of her head and a faint blush on her cheeks. "In all honesty, I believe I'm beginning to enjoy this treatment, Master of Saber..."

"Why do you keep adressing him as my Master?" Saber frowned. "I haven't said he is yet."

"Oh please, why else would you keep such a plain, unremarkable, dumb looking person around your majestic, powerful and domineering figure?" Caster pointed out.

Saber paused again, impressed despite herself. "I will admit, for all the evil wiles of Casters, their insight and cleverness cannot be denied..."

Shirou huffed. "I don't know, I'm starting to think maybe you were right on being harsh on her..."

—-

"Couldn't I be answering to Ayaka instead?" Chizuru asked, hands on her own knees, eyes awkwardly shifted down, "Because no offense intended, but I believe I'd feel more comfortable around her..."

"And that's why we're handling you instead," Matoi told her, merciless. "Because Iinchou-san clearly cares a lot about you, and she would be naturally inclined to believe anything you say no matter what, and— Ohhh, what the heck!" she pointed a finger accusingly at Chizuru. "We know that story you told us was a vile lie! Stop pretending, Cow-san!"

"... Matoi," Chisame said, "No matter how you feel about Naba's figure, that's no reason to insult her like that. For the last time, I don't like big breasts, the women attached to them, or women in general, really..."

Chizuru smiled. "Oh, never mind that, Chisame-san. Actually, I feel reinvindicated in that at least one of you feels that way about me, after all. Could you please mention that to Lightyear-san afterwards, please?"

"You're weird, Naba," Chisame decided. "What a shame, I used to think you were one of the few normals..."

"See that's why I don't think you should trust her words at all, Chisame-sama!" Matoi claimed. "I mean, who could ever trust a suspicious acting woman with an obvious unhealthy crush for another female?"

Now Chizuru and Chisame stared blunt and silently at her.

"What, isn't it obvious?" Matoi protested to Chisame. "She isn't a part of our Society, but I've still spent long around your classroom as to realize she's holding a torch of DEEP LOVE over—"

"Chizuru-san!!" Ayaka suddenly ran past her after breaking through the bedroom's door— almost literally— and going over to give Chizuru a big hug that was promptly returned with a warm smile. "Oh, I'm so glad you are alive and well! Thank the heavens! Poor Chizuru-san, you must have suffered so much! What I heard from Sora-sempai sounded so absolutely grievous!"

"Hey, now wait a minute, Iinchou," Chisame interfered. "You may be the supreme authority at the classroom, but here you need telling me exactly why are you so sure this is the real Naba Chizuru before accepting her as such..."

Ayaka broke the hug, keeping her hands on Chizuru's shoulders, before sniffing back at Chisame. "Hasegawa-san, how little you know! You still aren't aware of the perfect bond a good Class Rep keeps with their classmates? I could perfectly tell any of you apart from any impostors with no effort at all! That is the Gift of the Iinchou!"

Chisame blinked. "No, let's be serious, until Kagurazaka comes back and sees if she can dispell anything these guys have on them, we can't say for—"

"I can!" Ayaka claimed. "A Class Rep knows! I've made a driven, honest effort out of learning all your quirks and flaws, the better to recognize any of you anywhere and helping you accordingly! That's how I could learn your secrets so quickly! Why, I even know what Akashi-san once did with her father's car, a porcupine and her mother's—"

"Okay, fine, I'm convinced," Chisame interrupted, holding a hand up to silence Ayaka and dearly hoping Chiu didn't fall under that weird radar of hers. "Just don't complete that sentence, please. I have the strangest sensation I'd only be traumatized by it..."

Mahora of Darkness:

''—iomya-sempai, wake up. Wake up."

She could hear it now through the thick haze of her stupor. A young woman's voice, yet rather husky, soft and polite but with a harsh edge to it, as well. Shiori, always a loner and social misfit, dimly chose to ignore the voice for now, as she was still so tired and any request not directly related to books tended to make her far too nervous for her to deal with them...

And then she was slapped across the face.

Now that woke her up.

"Oh, you're awake," spoke the dark skinned, black haired young woman in priestess robes sitting before her, towering over Shiori's prone form in all of her curvaceous, tall statuesque. Shiori recognized her immediately as a classmate of the 3-A Library Explorers, the girl who always borrowed books on foreign weaponry and gunfire theory. She sounded so casual and almost surprised by Shiori's awakening, too, despite still holding her open hand a couple of inches away from Shiori's stinging cheek. "Well then, please get up. You're leaving."

"... ah...?" Shiori said weakly, blushing and almost weeping while pulling herself up to a sitting position on the black futon under her, rubbing her struck cheek and looking in confusion to her surroundings. The room where they were was crowded with all sorts of people, which only made Shiomiya even more nervous and scared. Several of them were also 3-A students, including those troublesome twins who always would try using the library's most distant passageways to defile them doing things not involving any books at all, but there were a few Sempais as well, and even a few younger girls, including Yuuki-san, who always would borrow books on cooking, home economics, and the occasional Brocon Light Novel.

Tatsumiya-san looked out a window while readying a massive rifle in a hand and making Shiori shriek briefly. "It's almost here now. No more delays. We're leaving."

"Where?" curtly asked the girl with short red hair who stood by Yuuki Mikan's side, her cousin Nao. They'd been the first to arrive shortly after King Mickey and the others left the temple, along with Inugami Kotaro and his two Class 3-F roommates. For once, she wasn't passively texting while ignoring everything around her, at least not anymore, instead holding an arm wrapped zealously around Mikan's shoulders, her eyes cold and narrow.

Mana paused, staring into the night, where Illya, Berserker, the Sailor Senshi, Nodoka and Kotaro were stepping out to wait for the incoming intruder, the dark haired boy grinning and chuckling as he crackled his knuckles together. Mana briefly closed her eyes and thought of a short prayer for them.

Then she turned back to the group of fugitives who'd taken refuge at her adoptive family's shrine. "I can take you to.. a place where you should be safer than here. Then, I want you to stay there no matter what, while I come back to help the Senshi and the others. And no, for the last time, they aren't insane cosplayers, they are the real Sailor Senshi."

At this last part of her explanation, several hands in the small crowd were quickly lowered.

"Are you thinking of taking them to the old gate?" asked a voice at the back door of the wide room, making the gathered students and random muggle teachers look back and gasp. The small figure hooded in all concealing black spoke directly to Mana, dead serious despite the almost comical high pitch in their voice. "That won't work. You know it's been sealed for too long."

Mana frowned at the newcomer. "Where are Ku-san and the rest? And how do you know about the gate?"

"For now, they should be safer than anybody else at this campus. I made sure of that," the stranger replied over the confused murmurs and hushed questions of the refugees. "As for the gate, I knew enough about this place to come here for help in the first place. My Master told me everything there's to know about Mahora."

"Your Master?" asked a frustrated Fujimura Taiga, standing up from her sitting spot, rolling her striped sleeves back up and taking aim with her shinai. "Okay, mister, or lady, whatever, you've got a lot of explaining to do. You can't just show up here like that in the middle of this nonsense and—!"

Mana silently held a hand up and stared at her, with such fierce intensity even the fabled Tiger of Mahora had to momentarily stop and fall silent. Then Tatsumiya asked the hooded one, "Then what do you suggest? What else should I do?"

"Take them to the gate," the mysterious person said.

"But, you just said—" Mana began objecting.

"I said it wouldn't work if you took them there on your own. The gate won't open for you. It won't open for anyone, not anymore."

And then he hefted his Keyblade vigorously.

"Unless they have one of these, that is!"

"Why did you have a garage behind your sacred temple?" asked Momioka Risa as she stood, along the rest of the refugees, behind Mana while the miko knelt down to unlock said large garage's door.

"Why wouldn't we have one?" Mana answered calmly without looking back at the sandy blonde. "Just because we are in communion with the spirits, it doesn't mean they'll make deliveries for us."

"Why hadn't we ever seen that you had a huge garage behind your sacred temple?" further asked Sawada Mio, Risa's bespectacled partner in fondling crime, as she stood by her extremely close friend's side.

"When," Mana asked back, easily pushing the heavy unlocked door up with a single hand, "was the last time you visited this temple for purification of the soul, Sempai?"

"Don't give me that," Mio snapped, "I come here every New Year to pray for a boyf—" Then she stopped, gasping in awe at the sight of what he had been revealed for all of them. "Oooohhhh!"

Soryu Asuka Langley picked up the figurative baton, frowning and asking, "And why in the world do you have your humongous garage stocked up with enough guns as to overthrow the government? How many laws are you breaking here, Miko-san?"

"Tons, I imagine," Mana shrugged while walking in and patted a side of her truck, gave the collection of guns imported from all around the world lined up along her walls a brief studious look, and then finally looked back at the assembled students and teachers. She counted them all once again to make sure she hadn't lost any during their escape from the shrine proper to the garage, and finally it hit her, there were thirty one of them, not counting herself.

Oddly fitting, in a way.

"Okay," she said, "who here has any experience with guns and ammo?"

The short, fat, slightly disbeheveled sixteen-old boy with glasses at the back of the group snapped at last from his entranced spell, forced his fascinated stare away from Mana's gun pornography collection for a moment, and eagerly waved a hand up. "Oh! Oh! Me, me, me! Last summer, Dad took me to America for a month, and we spent almost all of it at the shooting range with his pals at—!"

"Nice to hear that... Hirano-sempai, right?" Mana coldly asked, gesturing at him to go and select something from her inventory. "Find something you find yourself comfortable with and make us proud. Somebody else?"

He blinked, blushed in a way that would have been adorable in a little girl but was just dorky in someone his age, and cooed, "She knows my name...!!" before eagerly rushing him to go look all over the massive collection, like a child high on sugar rummaging through a candy store.

As Mana sighed, a dark haired shapely woman standing close to Soryu and her mother raised her hand. "I have a license, but I must tell you, I've never been good at the long range. Besides," she smiled as she pulled out a Heckler & Koch USP handgun, causing several students to gasp, "I carry mine all the time."

"It won't hurt stocking on more short range, if that's your thing, Katsuragi-san," Tatsumiya told her, gesturing for her to help herself. "Go on, it'll be a free loan unless you break them. And in that case you'll have better things to worry about."

"What... What kind of person are you?!" Asuka asked, bewildered.

"The kind who survives. I hope you're the type too," Mana dismissed the question before staring at the tall, scrawny teacher clothed in solid black, with the round bottle bottom glasses, the messy light hair, and the cawing crow perched on his shoulder. "Rance-sensei? Come on, no need to be shy now. You're from Gotham, right?"

The man pushed the glasses up his nose with an icy sneer. "What an unfortunate stereotype. I never ever mentioned to any of you I was from Gotham, actually, but even if I were, that wouldn't mean I would be a brutal mad shooter—"

"You do a good job at disguising the accent, but the way you pronounce the 'r's gives you away," Mana simply stated, tossing him a revolver. "This should suffice, unless you want something that shoots 'BANG' flags instead?"

The America professor scowled viciously, but then swung the gun around expertly before holding it by a side.

"You call yourself a survivor and you just gave a Gothamite a gun, Mana-chan?" Asakura Kazumi snarked with a dry, low chuckle.

"Gothamites are also smart," Mana replied very seriously, "and this is a situation where, no matter what, nobody can turn on the others and hope to survive. Okay, everyone, go into the back, no time for more discussions! I'll drive. Rance-sensei, I want you by my side, in the event—"

"Hold a sec there," Katsuragi Misato said. "How old are you, again? I'll drive, I have tons of—"

"NO!" Asuka and her mother screamed both at once. "NOT YOU!"

"Oh, come on!" Misato groaned. "You know I only go a little bit crazy during emerg— okay, maybe you've got kind of a point there, but I promise—"

"NO MEANS NO!" Asuka and Kyoko shouted at her, really meaning it, too.

"It's here," Mana said, looking at the mammoth-sized beast towering over the temple, less than a block away, as most of the students panicked and began stuffing themselves into the truck, even if Hirano Kouta still kept on picking assault rifles and Smith & Wessons as happy as obliviously. "Let's just go already!" she commanded, gesturing vigorously with an arm as she leapt into the driver's seat. "Come on, come on! Do you want to live long enough to see tomorrow? I know you do!!"

She only hoped she could help them to actually get there.

Oh, it's based on Jack and the Beanstalk... only it involves a whole land of giants rather than just one

For the first time, the Holy Grail formerly of Fuyuki, now corrupted and displaced onto Mahora instead, feared.

The sentient force of Angra Mainyu, the root of all of mankind's evil, stirring within the Grail could feel the slow but firm onslaught of a dark force to rival if not surpass its own. The Grail had become of embodiment of Evil as a destroying force, but now it faced, as everyone and everything else, the possibility of destruction by a different type of force: Darkness itself, beyond the concepts of human right or wrong.

The Grail wished for the annihilation of mankind, but in its own terms. The brand of destruction over existence assimilation by Darkness implied went against its nature, even if the ultimate results would basically be the same. That didn't matter to Angra Mainyu. Angra Mainyu knew it couldn't reason with or manipulate Darkness.

Angra Mainyu knew it was just another target of consumption for Darkness.

Already, its Grail War had lost two soldiers, the Saber and the Caster. On its own, without someone to activate it, the Grail had no way to fight back. So it would have to resort to a last resource it never wanted to employ before.

The Grail needed to play its final desperation card. A Servant to call its own, without the need for a human middleman.

And so, the unholy thing called for something holy, to fight Darkness in terms another force of decay and ruin couldn't supply itself.

The Holy Grail called for its Ruler.

—-

Traverse Town:

"So, how it's been going?" Suzushiro Haruka, who had been all but forced to stay outside Saotome's room, angrily chewing on her knuckles while constantly wondering if she was doing the right thing, eagerly asked when a mildly disturbed Haruna exited the bedroom they had been sharing over nearly a week now. "What did she say? Do you think she's really—"

Haruna supported herself against a wall, a thick eyebrow twitching. "I think… she's saying the truth, she's Ku-chan, she's gotta be, she knows things only my roommate would know..."

Haruka sneered. "Things no man or woman is prefated to know, I'm sure. Poor girl, you should've let me questionate her after all. Why are you so shaken, then?"

Haruna gave her a haunted look and weakly said. "Those things... the damn Heartless, they're running fucking wild all over Mahora, they come in droves to no end, they even ran the girls out of the dorms, and... and..."

"I'm sorry your room and all the erotic perfidation drawering material there were destroyed by those beasts, then," Haruka offered, sounded half honestly sympathetic and half cruelly happy. "But Mahora shall rise back, stronger than ever, our souls are that brave, of that I have no—"

Haruna held a hand up to stop the Vice President's incoming hot blooded cheer speech. "Thank you, that was a really bad blow, yeah, but that's not why I'm... like this."

"Oh, come on, Miyazaki-san and Ayase-san surely will be okay, you said it yourself before, they are far more capa-able than they—"

"Please listen to me!" Haruna hissed. "This is about Konoka-chan!"

Haruka blinked. "What does Konoe-san have to do with this?"

"Ku told me, Yue and Nodoka told her, before they split ways..." the mangaka sighed heavily, "they saw that albino girl from Kyoto, the water and ice mage, commanding the Heartless, and, worse of all... looks like she froze the Headmaster alive."

Haruka took a hand to her own mouth, blue eyes widening. "Oh! Y-Yes, I can see why that poses a problem with Konoe-san, now..."

"Listen," Haruna tightly grabbed Haruka by a sleeve, holding her in place as Ku Fei peeked out of the room and muttered something about having some food, being completely ignored by the Haru duo, "not a single word of this to Konoka-chan until we've figured out how to break the news, okay? You have no tact whatsoever, and I'll admit that's not my field of expertise either..."

Haruka scowled. "What are you saying? I'm a social swan, capa-able of giving the worstest news to anyone maginificently! My father entrustated me with telling Aunt Kimiko she had only a week to live! Even if she died the next day instead. I wonder why, and why she died saying such awful things about me, when I only did her a favor..."

Haruna breathed out harshly. "No, Sempai, and I mean it! Let's, hm, let's consult it with Setsuna-san first, she's the husband after all, and if anyone's got a right to know, that's—"

"Konoka, hello again, aru!" Ku said carelessly, walking past them and waving while Haruka and Haruna nearly jumped out of their skins. "Why looking so happy, aruyo?"

"Oh hey, guys, you finished with the session already? That's great!" an obliviously merry Konoka waved back as she approached the three, having completely missed the tail end of the Harus' conversation, much to their shared sighing relief. "I hope everything's cleared out by now and we can leave this guessing game nonsense behind? Because we've got to go greet Asuna and Negi-kun! Asuna and Negi-kun are back, they'll be so glad to see you, Ku-chan!"

Haruna sighed again and put two fingers on her own forehead. "I really wish Nodoka were here. If she made a Pactio like Psycho Purple-chan's, it'd be a great help with this…"

"Uh?" Konoka blinked. "Why would you say that, Paru-chan?"

Paru forced a shaky smile and waved a hand. "N-Nothing, don't you worry about that now, Kono-chan! So, let's just go see what new Ministra did Negi-kun bring along, okay?"

Haruka glared at her. "Don't even joke about that!"

"I'm not joking," Haruna replied. "I'm fully serious and willing to back it up. Wanna bet?"

Haruka opened her mouth angrily, began saying an irate, "What do you have left here to bet anyw—!" and then murmured a sour, "I wouldn't acceptionate that bet anyway."

Konoka giggled. "My my, by now we know Negi-kun all too well, don't we?"

"Nah, I think they're just being paranoid," Misora shrugged over the few snacks they were sharing over the house's main table. Rations were still relatively scarce and they had to be consumed quickly before Saber would find them. "The Lord works in mysterious ways, but I still trust Him enough to guess he wouldn't throw us that bad a curveball after all we've gone through."

"Trust her," Cocone quietly told Aerith and Cid, "if she isn't freaking out in fear, then she's really sure about it..."

"Quiet, youuuuu," Misora said, reaching over to pinch and tug on one of the cheeks of the small girl sitting by her side. "Anyway, it doesn't even make sense to send someone to infiltrate us! If those aliens had spaceships that powerful, and they knew we were here, they could've just bombarded us from above and saving themselves that much trouble! Right?"

"I guess you're right, yeah," Cid pondered, taking a sip from his stale beer jug and once again inwardly thanking any powers above none of the newcomers, except that Saber woman, had a taste for liquor. Those were the only ones of his provisions not currently menaced by all of the new mouths in town. "Still, one never can be all too sure on anything."

"It'll be all right," Misora waved a hand carelessly, then looked towards the cheer trio, sitting by Cocone's opposite side. "You tell them, Sakurako, what's your gut instinct when betting on them being the real deal or not?"

Sakurako beamed a huge cheeky grin and gave a thumbs up. "True-blue, tested and approved, gut-feeling-sanctioned, honest deal Real Mc Coys!" she chirped loudly.

Aerith and Cid, sitting opposite the students, traded short puzzled glances before Aerith told them, "I'm sorry, but I'm not understanding this. Are you some sort of seer, Miss Sakurako?"

"She's lucky," Madoka summed up.

"Very lucky," Misa added.

Misora nodded. "Make a bet with her on anything, and the first thing that comes to her mind will give you the answer you need! That kind of lucky."

Aerith and Cid both gave Sakurako a silent, long, dubious stare, and then Aerith smiled and grabbed her hands. "Flash test! Please tell me right now, will I ever find Cloud and then—"

"No!" Sakurako quickly blurted out, and then blushed, slammed a hand on her own mouth, and went from cheerfully positive to horribly embarrassed in the blink of an eye.

Aerith, who still was holding her other hand, became a statue of white marble with a hideous anguished expression. Cid, the cheerleaders and the pseudo-nuns shared a collective wince of awkwardness.

"And that," Madoka eventually said uneasily, "is why they don't dare asking them on the subject of Negi-kun. They couldn't deal with it if she told them—"

"I refuse to believe that!" Aerith protested, letting go of Shiina's hand at last, her eyes turning into spirals. "I, I won't let the cold, sharp sword of defeat pierce through my chest! That, that's magic from another world, it couldn't possibly work in this one!"

"It's not magic, at least I don't think it is, it's just Sakurako's weirdness, but anyway, what does being from another world have to do with—" Misora began before being interrupted by somebody else's arrival.

Kaga Ai had just shyly peeked in. Aerith gave an instinctive pull back, calming herself down somewhat. "Hm, everyone? I, I'm so, so sorry about disturbing your emotional outbursts with this, but, but, Yukihiro-san thought you should know…"

"What happened, Sempai?" Misa frowned at her, tapping her fingers on the table.

Ai swallowed and then answered, "Karakuri-san got signals from the Gummi Ship's return, ma'am! It looks, it looks like Negi-sensei and the others are back!"

"Negi-kun!" Misa literally sprang up from her chair. "Oh, my Negi-kun's back, why hadn't you said that before!"

Cid, Aerith and Ai all stared at her as she bolted out past them, giddily giggling as she did so.

"See?" Madoka coolly asked her. "She just couldn't take the truth from Sakurako-chan's lips."

"Oh, I don't know," Sakurako said, slowly getting up herself while Misora raced after Misa, catching up and past Kakizaki almost immediately. "To be perfectly fair, while Negi-kun's love life is one of the few things I won't bet on one way or another, I'd say Misa's still got a chance."

Then she laughed. "Oh, who am I fooling, I'm sure Satomi-chan and I will get him! Because I'm just that lucky!"

"Okay, I've changed my mind," Cid said. "The weird girl with antennae and glasses isn't the creepiest of you guys after all..."