Shoujo Kakumei Utena

Waiting Still

part 2

This day isn't starting out too badly. In spite of threat of intrigue, in spite of the fact that I'm more of a spy than a student, I have to admit that so far this is a really pleasant mission to be on.

The weather's gorgeous; just warm enough that I appreciate being inside an air conditioned train for the journey, and by the time I reach Ohtori I'm feeling very optimistic about my plans. I eat my lunch in the train station, going over my notes and making sure all my papers are in order; then, I go to the school.

...wow. This place is huge.

I had no idea Ohtori was really a zaibatsu. I mean, I knew it was large; I'd seen the blueprints before, and I had the map in my knapsack, but those things failed to prepare me for the real magnitude of this place. I've never SEEN anything like it; marble everywhere, bridges, fountains, humongous sports fields and an observatory I'd give my front teeth to use. Not to mention the music halls, the empty fields with only fruit trees and thoughts for company, the swimming pools - and the Ohtori rose seal branding absolutely everything.

Since it IS a zaibatsu, it has pretty much anything that anyone could ever need; there are movie theatres and hospitals and general stores. As focused as I am on my Mission, I have to admit... this place looks utterly great. I'm wearing a smile as I follow my map to the registrar's office.

The problem is, I can't find it.

The registrar's office is not where it's supposed to be. I know I'm where I should be; I have the map with me, printed off my own computer and highlighted for clarity. I'm standing across from the gymnasium and practically underneath the observatory, just where the map says, but there's no registrar to be seen; just a great big ugly fountain. Ooookay; so maybe their database map was a little outdated.

That happens. Nothing to be upset about.

I figure someone in the teacher's offices could tell me where the registrar was, so I head down that way, following directions, only to find a building where there should be a road. Correction: the blank brick wall of a building, no doors. Not even a window. No signs on it, either, so I have no idea just WHAT this buliding is.

Well, that's no good. I'm running out of choices now, so I decide the administration offices are next best bet.

I look.

And I look.

And I look and I look some more, and after forty-five minutes of wandering around aimlessly I finally decide that my map is full of horse hooky and this is a grand cosmic joke. What in the world is the MATTER here? Who drew this thing, an expelled student? Almost NOTHING is where it's supposed to be, and although I hate admitting it, I'm going to have to ask for help.

Okay, fine. There are lots of students everywhere, talking, laughing, ignoring me (nothing new there), on their way to or from class. Help, help, help - ah. SHE looks nice enough to help me without giving me one of those "you SO suck" expressions.

She's coming this way. It's now or never.

"Excuse me, I'm sorry to bother you, but could - "

And she walks right past me like she never even heard me speak.

Okay, that was a little cold. I stick my tongue out at her back, then look for someone ELSE who looks nice. I think I'll ask that kid. "Pardon me, I'm sorry to bother you, but - "

Argh. He walks past me too, almost running me over in the process.

Geez... what is going ON here? All these "perfect" students, streaming past me, and not one of them is polite enough to offer me some help? RIDICULOUS. No one's even looking in my direction! Their gaze just... passes right over, like they're seeing through to the walkway behind me, like I'm invisible. I'm NOT invisible; and I'm not rude, either, although I'm beginning to get close.

Yeah, right.

Now that I'm feeling really uncomfortable and even less popular than usual, I finally zero in on one kid sitting by the ugly rose fountain, reading a book and not walking anywhere. Well, see if this one gets away so easily.

"Excuse me," I say, walking toward him.

Nothing.

Oh, come ON... "Excuse me."

Still nothing. He turns the page; and well, it's been a really long day for me, and I'm not in the mood for this, so I do what anybody in my position would do. I reach over and touch his shoulder.

"Hey."

The kid jumps. He gasps. He looks back and forth, then up at me, and his eyes go wide. He gapes like I am THE freakiest thing he ever saw, and then before I can ask him what the heck is wrong, he suddenly throws his book in the air and screams bloody murder.

"Gaah!" he cries, and stumbles backwards, his book - Black Beauty, my shocked brain observes - splashing into the fountain, and of course I'm go "gah!" and stumble back as well. And because I'm going backwards and he's going backwards, neither of us is looking where we're going and I run smack into a girl.

"EEEEEEE!" she screams, staring at me, ALSO stumbles backwards, and flings her bookbag right at my head. I duck, but it turns out I needn't have bothered; it goes flying past me - she doesn't have very good aim - and smacks straight on into another student.

Naturally, he's surprised. "What do you think you're DOING?" he shouts, snatching up her pack, and marches straight for her - and plows right into me instead, like he couldn't see me standing there. Suddenly, he's screaming, just as loudly as she was, and both his bookbag and hers fall to the ground as he just turns and runs like hell.

Okay, I lied. He didn't JUST run.

"GHOOOOST!" he bellows at the top of his lungs, and suddenly everyone in the entire place is staring right at me.

Screams erupt. Bags fall, feet scurry, lunchboxes go flying through the air - it's a stampede.

This could not possibly get worse. Everyone's hollering, everybody's panicking... and then suddenly, some random person grabs my arm and hauls me up to look him RIGHT in the face.

"Who the hell are you?" he frowns, and I have just long enough to think that he has more red hair than I've ever seen in one place in my life, when some panicking student with better aim than the first one screams, "KIYRUU-SAMAAA!" Apparently thinking that the ghost is going to hurt her Kiyruu-sama, she hurls a hard-back textbook right at my head.

This one connects. Everything goes quickly, mercifully black.

When I wake up, I have no idea where I am.

I'm lying on something that reminds me of a doctor's office; it's hard, with just enough padding on it to make me wish it was softer, and there's a bright light shining right in my face.

I make a noise and reach up to push it away.

"He's moving."

Yeah, go me, I'm moving; it doens't seem to be doing any good. I feel like I'm trying to swim to the surface in a well of molasses. After a moment or two, I give it up and go still.

"...I don't think he's really awake," says somebody else, and another person - maybe the first, who knows - grunts in agreement. Then there's quiet for a minute. I have time to reflect that this is maybe the most embarassing thing that has ever happened to me in my life, and I'm just deciding whether to "wake up" or stay out of it when they start talking again.

"So who do you think he is?"

"Kisho Kaido," somebody reads in a soft voice, maybe a girl's, and I am NOT happy. They have my wallet; which means they searched my bag. What else did they do while I've been snoozing?

At least I didn't wake up naked.

"And?" says the first guy.

"And somehow, he's here," says someone else, and this one sounds familiar. I think he's the one who asked me who the hell I was before I conked out.

"Impossible. He can't be here," states another girl, which statement makes little sense considering she's speaking right over me.

"You're an idiot," one of the others replies, and I stifle an urge to laugh because I'm inclined to agree.

"But what do we do with him?" says the one I thought was maybe a girl - although now I'm not so sure. "There's no way he could have gotten in here, and yet he's HERE - he can't possibly know what he's..."

What I've what? WHAT? That's annoying enough that I'm tempted to 'wake up' and ask him, but I don't get the chance to. There are footsteps outside the door, and then things just... change.

...someone is coming.

A feeling like... something, like warm oil, like scented honey and tingling fire suddenly races over my skin, and I know I'm not the only one who feels it because everybody gasps when I do. We're all completely still; I don't think anyone is breathing, or wants to, because anything might break the spell and none of us want to lose this feeling.

And then comes a Voice.

"I see. So here is the problem." And the Voice speaks like magic in my body, in my mind - and I don't even remember I'm supposed to be unconscious, and let myself shiver.

"Interesting," says the Voice. No one asks him what he thinks is interesting - in fact, nobody moves at all - but he answers anyway. "I do not know this boy."

Is that bad? Or good? I can't make up my mind. Fear is creeping in now, little by little, because I have no idea why I suddenly feel so good or why my body is...um...

....oh, SHIT. No no no BAD time for a woody -

"He came on his own," says the Voice, maybe a little surprised - it pleases me, and scares me, that I should cause surprise in that voice - and his hand sort of moves over my face, then checks the pulse in the curve of my throat. I shiver again; his hand is warm. I think my face turned toward his touch.

"He's awake," says the Voice, mildly, and one of the others curses; but He's not upset. He's not upset at all. "What an interesting possibility...."

And suddenly, I'm on the train to Ohtori academy, because I haven't arrived yet, and I was asleep.

...wait a minute, I WAS?

I jump up suddenly, dropping my notebook and copy of the campus map onto the floor, startling the old lady across from me.

"Whaaaat...?" I say softly to myself, looking around wildly, and she hunches a little like she thinks I'm going to attack her. I should apologize; or something. I can't.

Rude? Me? Try going into shock.

I look out the window. Land flies by, in-between land as I always thought of it, not quite city, not quite country, and it's exactly as it was in my dream. Exactly the way it was when I arrived at Ohtori - in my dream this morning. Or... my dream's morning. Or...

...oh my word, I'm so confused.

I sit back down again, just... plopping into my seat and staring at my hands. This can't be right. I KNOW I was there. KNOW it. I dream; and I've dreamed weird dreams, but I know how I dream, and this wasn't a dream. But it has to be a dream. It's only eight a.m. according to my wristwatch, only eight; and this... this madness had to have happend after noon, because I ate my lunch in the train station at noon before going up to see the campus for the first time.

My lunch -

I fling myself to the floor - grinding my knee into my notebook as I do - and grab under the seat, pulling out my tiny knapsack because I KNOW I ate my lunch and it's -

It's -

...still there. The banana, the oniigiri, the yakosoba... it's all still there. My apple juice is even still cold.

I sit there, staring at it, while the old lady sits in HER seat and stares at me like I'm crazy. She's probably thinking of moving to another car; maybe she should. For the first time in my life, I feel like I'm crazy.

My food's all here. I dreamed it.

But I can actually feel where the Voice touched my throat. I didn't dream it.

It's only eight a.m. I must have dreamed it.

But I smelled that place and saw everything in color, which I don't when I dream, so it was real.

But -

....there's a ring on my finger.

The moving train, the old woman next to me, the binder rings digging into my knee... all these things just suddenly go pale to me and no longer matter at all as my mind's spotlight focuses on this damned ring. Utena... Utena, I wish you were here, because I'm sure you'd get a real kick out of this, or at least know how nuts this makes me. There's a ring on my finger, and it's exactly like yours.

I sort of laugh like a weirdo and yank it off. Yes; yes, it comes off, doesn't just stick on like my panicked brain thought it might, because it's just a ring. nothing more. I calm down enough to put it back on and sit back in my seat.

The old lady watches me cautiously as I do. Any second now, I expect her to ask me if I'm on drugs.

We stare at each other; I try to grin at her and rub my neck where the Voice touched me. "Sorry. I had a bad dream."

She just nods. If I'd grown a second head, she'd be looking at me the exact same way.

"I'll, um, not bother you any more," I tell her, and hide behind my campus map. My possibly-useless campus map. My possibly-useless, outdated, dream-ruined campus map. She doesn't say another word, and neither do I.

Before we get to the train station, I come to the realization that if I wanted to leave, I could. Just turn around and go back home, attend the school my mother wanted me to, put this all behind me. But by the time we arrive, I know just as well that I can't because quitting isn't an option. It's not an option at all.

...I think I'm gonna be sick.

Ohtori campus is exactly the way it was in my dream, except that the buildings are where they're supposed to be and everyone can see me.

The fountains are still just as ugly. The marble is just as prevalent, and I feel a whole lot sicker than I did the first time, but at least people can see me. And the buildings are where they should be. I said that, didn't I?

Of course, this is proof that I dreamed it. Right? Buildings don't move, regardless of conspiracies. Right? And I know better than to believe in dreams. I really do.

Right.

The sign-in and class assignment go without a hitch. Nobody gives me any hassle or weird looks, my schedule looks perfectly normal, and I'm staying in the Blue Rose dorm. Orientation for new students just flies by; I have no idea what anyone said, so I hope it wasn't important. I follow my not-dream-ruined campus map to my dorm, and it's pretty much a given that I'm not going to leave my room for the rest of the night, or at least until I no longer feel my pulse in my fingertips.

My room is on the third floor. Good for burglars, bad for emergencies - I can't jump out from that high, and even thinking about mad escapes like that says to me that I'm still shaken. I walk down the balcony, staying away from the balustrade even though I'm sure it's perfectly stable, and follow the room numbers until I come to my own.

Another name is under mine; Kaoru Miki. Roommate. Great. Just when I couldn't possibly feel LESS sociable -

He suddenly opens the door, on his way out, and looks more surprised than I am to see me.

"Oh! I... hello, I'm Miki," he says, and holds out his hand, his eyes still a little bit wide. Well; why not. I take his hand and shake.

"Kisho Kaido. Just call me Kaido," I say, aware I'm blowing formalities but not capable of caring less. "I'm really, really tired, and I know this is rude, but I want to just unpack my stuff and go to bed. Is that okay?"

He immediately swings into action. I think I pressed a button.

"Oh, of course, let me help you! Here, I hadn't chosen a bed yet, but they're both made so you can pick whichever you want - is that your suitcase? Here, let me take that for you, and would you like some tea?"

I'm not up to making decisions. At all. I just sort of walk over and flop onto the bottom bunk, face-first.

"Oh, Kisho-kun... are you all right?" Suddenly he's caretaker, not happy host, and dropping my things by the desk he stands by the bed, bending down.

"Yeah," I mutter into the pillow. "I'm sorry, Kaoru-sempai. I... really need to sleep." And a good cry, I think, but I don't say that and I'm damned well not going to give in to that urge.

He's nodding; I can hear the material of his collar crinkling. "Then sleep. We can meet each other again tomorrow." And before I can protest, he's pulled the blanket at the foot of the bed up over my body, and walked away.

The light flicks out. He was leaving anyway, so he does that now; the door locks behind him.

Silence. I'm falling asleep.

....

....

....

My shoes. I forgot to take off my shoes.

Worse things have happened.