2016-09-09: Moving Days, Part I
06-14-2023, 08:21 PM (This post was last modified: 10-22-2023, 08:40 PM by Bob Schroeck.)
06-14-2023, 08:21 PM (This post was last modified: 10-22-2023, 08:40 PM by Bob Schroeck.)
(Author's note, October 22, 2023: If you're wondering why this just came back up on your radar, I've changed -- or rather, added on to, the ending. The story now ends on the arrival of the second merry band of refugees at Douglass Gardens.)
Douglass Gardens Apartments,
Somerset, NJ, USA
Friday, September 9, 2016
I'll say this for Funtom -- their movers were damned efficient. Peggy and I went from a good-sized ranch house at maximum between-seasonal-cleaning entropy into two moving vans in less than four hours. Five hours later (allowing for lunch) we were completely re-established in a two-floor apartment that had been a one-floor place when we'd met Hemera and Geras in it two days earlier. Almost everything fit, too, and what little didn't had been boxed for long-term storage and tucked away into a well-constructed, secure room in the building basement. (And as far as I could tell, the movers were completely normal -- despite their speed and efficiency, no magic or Celestial powers of any sort seemed to be involved.)
Meanwhile, the rest of the complex looked like one of those HGTV let's-remodel-your-home-in-a-weekend shows on steroids and speed. Dozens of contractor trucks. Eighteen-wheelers full of supplies in and out all day long. So many nail guns firing it sounded like a gang war. Even so, I was impressed by the rate at which the rebuild was progressing -- in just a matter of days the building in which our new home was located had been almost completely redone, and its mirror-image counterpart across Annette Court was half-done, maybe a little more. The closer end of it to us, right across Annette, was being converted into what on the plans I'd seen had been called a "community center", which required a lot more work than simply updating the existing apartments in our building did; from what I'd been told it wouldn't be done until the middle of next week.
One thing caught my eye as it was unloaded and carried into the future community center -- soundproofing and electronics for a recording studio. Thanks to my uncle Arthur I was more than familiar with that kind of equipment, even if my personal experience with actually using it was thirty-five years or so out of date. I went back to our copy of the blueprints and confirmed: Yes, a recording studio and three rehearsal/practice rooms. Just who were they expecting would be moving in? Funtom and the Celestials behind it clearly knew more than they were sharing with us.
Anyway, the plan was that as each building was finished, the remodeling crews would pick up and move to the next one further down Annette on the same side of the street. Since the number and sizes of the buildings on each side didn't match, the crew on the "short side" would wrap around and start on the last building across the street. As planned, it would take close to a month to revamp the entire complex, especially since some of the units were being upgraded from one- and two-bedroom apartments to three bedrooms and larger. But there was apparently no rush, there, either. In addition to Peg and me, the building we were in could house some fifty or so people already, more if they were friendly; in five days the other one would be able to house another thirty. Unless there was an outright flood of refugees in the first few days, we'd be fine.
In the meantime, we had units to furnish. Our budget was large, to match the size of the complex, but not infinite nor immediately refilling; Funtom's communications (signed by someone named Sebastian Michaelis) made it clear that even with the amount of money they were providing we had to make economical choices for furnishings. (And file the receipts with the head office.) We were also to limit our purchases to furniture, kitchen equipment (including, among other things, microwave ovens), drapes and blinds for windows as needed, lighting, and a bare minimum of linens. No TVs, radios or other personal electronics. The idea was turnkey and comfortable, but not luxury by any measure.
Interestingly, we were explicitly told that bedrooms should include desks suitable for students. Another clue that they had some idea who was inbound.
After an afternoon of research followed by a long discussion-turned-argument, Peggy and I finally settled on doing as much of our buying from IKEA as we could. They had a store only thirty minutes away in Newark, just outside Newark Liberty Airport and practically sitting on the Turnpike, making it convenient for short-notice bulk purchases. Under normal circumstances just buying bulk wouldn't save us any money, but we also set up an "IKEA Business Network" account for the complex, which promised us at least a few discounts plus a lot of support that we wouldn't get if we just schlepped in off the street.
One quick rental of a truck from U-Haul later, and we were in business.
Over the next couple days we got Busy with a capital "B". (Which rhymes with "D", which stands for "Deadline"...) While I made multiple runs up to the IKEA and back again, Peg oversaw a several teams of handymen that Funtom had hired and dispatched to do the heavy lifting for us. Under her watchful eye, they would unload the truck, move all the flatpacks and boxes into their intended units, and while I was on my way back to Newark for the next load do all the assembly and installation. Like all the other people hired by Funtom, they were fast and efficient, somehow managing to finish up each truckload just in time to take on the next. They were also willing to work overtime -- said willingness reinforced when we bought them dinner both days.
(And yes, we saved the receipts for that, too, and sent them off to Funtom.)
To our complete and utter surprise, we actually managed to furnish all the finished apartments by the evening of the 11th, mainly by dint of the two of us handling all the soft furnishings like window treatments, linens and towels until well after midnight both nights and all day the following day. Which was a good thing, because we turned out to need them almost immediately thereafter.
Douglass Gardens Apartments
Monday, September 12, 2016
When I'd lost my job a month and some earlier, I didn't change my daily routine too much. On weekdays I was up at 7:00, as was Peggy. So we were both awake an hour later when the "manager phone" rang.
This was something that shouldn't have happened because it was an "internal" line and there was no one in the complex yet to call us on it.
I glanced at my wife. "You think...?" I murmured as I trotted across the room to the phone that sat on the desk which made up our "office" and took the handset out of its cradle. It rang a second time as Peggy shrugged. I took a deep breath and hit the "answer/on" button. "Yes?"
"Um..." A girl's voice, youngish sounding. Maybe teen-aged? "Is this the manager?"
"One of them, yes," I answered. "Can I help you?"
"Oh, I hope so," she said in an uncertain tone of voice. "I... we... all of us, me and my friends and... we just woke up with all our stuff in your living room. And we don't know how we got here." A chorus of shaky voices made agreeing noises in the background behind her.
Uh-huh. "Okay, relax, you're not in trouble or anything. Just a moment, okay?" I pressed "mute" and turned to Peggy. "I think our first displacees just showed up in the community center and they sound freaked. Can you call Funtom's support line while I run over there and calm them down?"
She nodded. "The number's in the phone, right?" she asked.
"Yeah, and their card is pinned to the bulletin board, and it's also written down in the contact book."
"Okay, got it." She crossed over to the desk next to me.
I took the phone off mute. "Hi, you still there?"
"Afraid so," the girl on the other end said with a burbly little giggle.
"Okay, let me just make sure you're where I think you are -- you're in a big room with a massive sectional couch that fills up about half the space, with a TV at one end? One wall is more of a big opening to a dining room? There's another couple doors and a mirror on the other walls? And a stairway going up?"
"Um." She was silent for a couple moments, I guess as she looked around, and I could hear at least half a dozen different voices talking and arguing. "Yes," she finally said.
I nodded to myself. "Okay, you're in our community center. I'll be there in literally a minute or two, okay? Try to keep calm, all of you, please?"
Another little giggle. "We'll try."
"Okay, then. See you in a minute. Bye." I hung up the call, and dropped the handset back into the cradle. Then I looked over at Peggy, who had seated herself at the desk. "Wish me luck," I said, then bent down to give her a peck on the lips.
"Have fun," she said with a faint smile. Then she bit her lip as something occurred to her. "They're going to want breakfast, aren't they?"
"Yeah, probably," I replied. "Let me see how many there are and we can do a Grubhub order from the diner or IHOP for them. And bill it to Funtom of course."
"Of course." Peggy grinned. "Sounds good."
As I stepped out the front door of our new home, I spotted a black cat sitting calmly to one side of the narrow concrete walkway that led to the sidewalk and Hamilton Street beyond. I was about to shoo the obvious stray away (a reflex developed over thirty years of marriage to a woman profoundly allergic to cats) when a thought struck me, and I paused. It was a thought inspired by some two decades of reading fanfiction, and one I would never have seriously entertained before. I took a longer look at the cat (which calmly looked back at me) and said, "If you happen to be Toltiir, I'm probably going to run screaming. Not from you, everything I've read suggests you're pretty damned cool, but from what the world has become."
I wouldn't swear to it in a court of law, but I'm pretty sure the cat rolled its eyes before getting up and strolling off, tail and nose both in the air. I watched it go for a moment, then shook myself. I had more important things to attend to.
I dashed across Annette Court to the front door of the community center and let myself in with my key. (No, the door wasn't unlocked. We weren't in a bad area, but no point tempting fate. It was still technically an urban neighborhood, and while the next few blocks over in New Brunswick certainly weren't the worst part of town, they weren't high-end by any measure either.) I trotted through the little foyer-coat room-windbreak arrangement we had right on the other side, then stepped into the community center proper. As I did, I could hear a female voice confidently declare, "We'll just pay off the kidnappers and everything will be fine." Then I got my first look.
My god, it's full of girls, was my first thought.
As best as I could tell amongst the bustle there were maybe a dozen or so young women in their late teens, all Asian of some stripe. Darting to and fro among them was a motherly-seeming woman, also Asian, in both glasses and her twenties, who seemed to be engaged in keeping everyone calm. Piles of backpacks and overnight bags were stacked around the sectional, and I spotted several soft- and hard-sided guitar cases among them, along with something that looked like cases for a set of drums.
Well. That answered that question.
No one had noticed me come in yet, the foyer having blocked the sound and sight of my entrance, and as I paused for just a moment to get my bearings, a girl with her brown hair tied back emerged from the dining room/kitchen area with a tray on which sat several stacks of teacups and a steaming pot. As she navigated into the center of the sectional and laid the tray on one of the coffee tables, another girl who looked to be high school age, with black hair and wearing glasses, emerged from the doorway to the rehearsal rooms and studio. "You've got to see this!" she exclaimed. "There's a whole recording studio back here!"
The not-insubstantial natter of a dozen voices suddenly increased noticeably as a fair number of the girls decided to swarm the door.
"Um, excuse me?" I said loudly, with no apparent effect. "Hello?" I said, significantly louder. "Hey!" I bellowed.
The room went absolutely still.
Two dozen or so eyes suddenly fixed on me.
I took a deep breath and made sure I was smiling.
"Good morning, ladies. I'm Bob Schroeck, I manage this establishment along with my wife Peggy. Someone among you called our office just a few minutes ago?"
A hand went up in the middle of one clump of girls and I acknowledged its owner -- a college-age girl with short brown hair and red half-frame glasses -- with a nod. "Thank you for doing so."
"Where are we?" the twenty-something demanded. "And how did we get here?"
I stepped closer to the groups, swallowed, and hoped that I'd handle this right. I took a deep breath and began, "This is going to be hard to believe, but you're in a different universe."
Instant uproar.
I raised my hands. "Okay, okay, calm down, let me explain. First off, there's more than one universe. There's a multiverse. Second, It's been hit by some kind of disaster. We haven't been given all the details, but it's bad. I got the impression that some universes are getting destroyed outright. Third, and this is where you guys come in, as a result of this disaster people are getting ejected from their universes. When they do, they end up here."
"And where is 'here'?" the twenty-something pressed while the clumps of girls murmured to each other.
"'Here' is a universe they're calling Refuge, or 'the' Refuge," I said. "This is a low-energy timeline, maybe even the lowest-energy timeline. We're about the most boring universe you can imagine -- we don't have magic, or super-powers, or psionics, or weird stuff out in space, or giant monsters in the Pacific." I took another deep breath. "What we do have is a strange attraction for refugees from other universes, what my bosses call 'displacees'. No matter where they -- you -- come from, you end up here.
"Now, more specifically, you're in the United States, in Somerset, New Jersey, not far from Rutgers University, if you've ever heard of it. Even more specifically, you're in Douglass Gardens Apartments, an apartment complex that was bought and set up by my bosses specifically to house displacees."
The twenty-something crossed her arms across her chest and glared at me over her glasses. "You don't expect us to believe that, do you?"
I shook my head. "Not without proof, no. Fortunately, it's not hard to get you that proof, Ms. ...?"
"Yamanaka Sawako," she spat.
Now that was a name I recognized. "Yamanaka Sawako? You're a teacher at Sakuragaoka High School in Japan, aren't you?" I grinned. "AKA Sawa-chan-sensei?"
I heard a few squeaks that sounded suspiciously like muffled giggles from some of the girls, while Ms. Yamanaka just glared at me harder. "Yes," she ground out, lowering her head such that the lenses of her glasses suddenly reflected the light from the overhead fixture.
Wow. I'd never seen Scary Shiny Glasses in the real world before. Pretty cool. But sorry, Sawa-chan, not scary enough to affect me. "And I'd guess that behind you somewhere among all those lovely young ladies is Hokago Tea Time?"
She tilted her head and narrowed her eyes while behind her five of the girls waved, both vigorously and not. "Yes."
I nodded. "Okay, in that case, I have that proof for you." I walked over to the end of the sitting area where the TV hung on the wall, carefully avoiding any of the girls. Sawa-... um, Ms. Yamanaka pivoted to keep her eyes on me at all times. I plucked the remote out of the little felt bag we'd pinned to the wall next to the set, stepped back a few feet, and turned it on.
A minute or so later I had navigated to Netflix and, once there, to K-On! Well, actually, K-On!! with two bangs -- I started up the first episode of the second season, since it featured not only the original girls, but gave screen time to some of the "next gen" girls as well. Netflix's title card for the series showed all five members of Hokago Tea Time plus Yamanaka-sensei, and the moment it appeared, most of the girls crowded around the set. I faded back out of their way after launching the episode, removing myself to just outside the sectional, where I studied the lot of them.
It wasn't much work to map out who was who in the frontmost row. Between hair colors and styles and relative heights I quickly had all five members of HTT pegged. I was actually surprised at how closely they resembled their animated counterparts, after allowing for things like eye size and other stylistic affectations. Once I'd identified Yui, Ui wasn't hard to find -- she was the tea-maker. Of course. The girl with the fuzzy buns had to be Jun... oh, and the second blonde was the allegedly Anglo-Australian Sumire -- who didn't look any less Asian than any of the other girls. Two of the girls had glasses, which meant they had to be Nodoka and Nao. Nao, identifiable by her barrettes, was the younger one who had been checking out the studio. And Nodoka had been the one to call the office.
And with Sumire and Nao there, I realized the entire crowd had to have come from the K-On! High School and College manga period. Which meant that the three girls who hung back while Yamanaka-sensei drifted closer to the TV set could only be the other band that Hokago Tea Time had met in their dorm -- OnNaGumi, if I remembered correctly.
Which certainly explained the sour looks they shared when the show jumped directly from animated!Yui patting her face and exclaiming "Breadcrumbs!" to the opening credits and the slam start of "Go! Go! Maniac" with Aki Toyosaki's voice front and center. I was pretty sure I recalled them being somewhat dismissive of HTT when they first met -- discovering that they were at best supporting characters in the story of four girls they didn't really like couldn't've been pleasant. Watching them watch the too-crisp CGI instruments and the dizzy-making orbital shots revolving around the band as the members of HTT in front of me sang along with the theme song, I wondered if I wasn't looking at the birth of some kind of trouble between them and the others.
(Even as I worried, though, I couldn't help noticing that Yui doing the jazz-hands "Hah!" thing in real life was just as adorable as it was in the anime.)
As the crowd around the TV settled in to watch the episode proper (with squeaks, giggles, chirps of "I remember that!" and the like every once in a while), I faintly heard the front door open. There was only one person it could be, so I wasn't surprised when Peg quietly slid up beside me. As I put my arm around her she pecked me on the cheek and murmured, "I reached Funtom, and let them know we had some displacees show up. They'll be sending someone shortly with paperwork for them."
I nodded. "That just proves that they already knew who we were getting if they have paperwork assembled for them already," I murmured back. "Not to mention these folks are why we have the rehearsal rooms and recording studio."
"Mm?" she said absently, then took a closer look at both the crowd and what they were watching. "K-On!? Really?"
I glanced over at her, grinning. "Yeah, really. And they're from the college manga period, because we got the other bands as well."
Peggy looked at me curiously. "What other bands?"
I was expecting this question because I had the K-On! College and K-On! High School manga on my Kindle, and I knew she hadn't read either of them. "Well, first there's the band that Azusa formed for the Light Music Club after the other girls graduated at the end of the anime. It's got Yui's sister Ui on keyboards and Ui's friend Jun playing bass. You remember them, right?"
She nodded. "Jun quit the Jazz Club, then?"
"Yeah, she got tired of always being second string and never getting to perform." I gestured with my chin. "The blonde who isn't in the front row? That's their drummer Sumire. And one of the girls in glasses is Nao, who's their songwriter and... I guess 'producer' is the best term. They're both from the K-On! High School manga." I chuckled. "Sawa-chan gave them another tea-based name -- Wakaba Girls."
"'Wakaba'?" Peg shot me a curious glance. "Isn't that a character from 'Utena'?"
I shrugged. "Yeah, but if I remember right, in this context it means 'green tea'."
"Okay," she said. Then, after a moment, she asked, "What do they sound like?"
I chuckled. "I have no idea. As of the last bits I read, they were still getting their act together. Ui's never played keyboards before, but the way she learns stuff..."
Peg nodded. "Yeah."
"And Sumire took up drums just to join the club, so she's probably not all that good yet." I nudged her, grinning. "Not like I can tell from the manga, anyway."
She snorted. "And who're they?" she then asked, nodding toward the last three with their sour looks.
I sighed. "That's OnNaGumi, they're from K-On! College. I can't remember their names, but they're freshmen along with Yui and the gang. They're supposed to be good, but again, manga have sucky soundtracks."
Peggy snickered. "They don't look too happy," she added after a moment studying them.
"Yeah," I agreed, but didn't elaborate. I settled my left hand at the very familiar point where her hip began to swell out of her waist and we just stood there, watching them watch the rest of the episode. When the closing credits began, I let go of Peg and trotted over into the middle of the sectional to grab the remote again and exit back out to the episode list. "Okay," I said a bit loudly to get the attention of the girls, who were all frantically murmuring among themselves. "If that's not enough, I can show you pages about you on a couple of wikis out on the Net, and the last couple volumes of your manga."
Sawa-chan-sensei (yeah, I knew I shouldn't think of her that way; I'd need to train myself to be more respectful) grimaced, then glanced at the girls. "No," she said slowly. "I think I'm convinced. But what happens now?"
"Well, the next thing you need to know is it's 2016. That's, what, six or seven years in the future from where you were your timeline?" She nodded thoughtfully. "Right. And like I said, you're in the United States, and probably will be staying here at least for the immediate future."
"Mou..." Ritsu, who was easily identifiable by her hair band, moaned. "How'm I going to manage? I'm lousy at English!"
I shared a grin with Peggy. "Are you, really?" I asked. "Because I only know about a dozen words in Japanese and I probably say them all wrong."
"Huh?" Ritsu frowned, obviously thinking hard. Some of the other girls were also frowning. "But I..." she began, then halted, frowning harder. "I..." Next to her Yui's eyes suddenly went wide as her mouth formed a little "o". "I," Ritsu declared firmly, and then said, slowly enunciating each syllable, "Wa-ta-shi." She looked back up at me. "Nante kotoda, watashi wa eigo o hanashite iru nda!" she blurted, followed by, "Holy crap, I'm speaking English!" A smile lit up her face. "And I don't sound like a complete idiot!"
"Don't worry, Ritsu," a classic Japanese beauty who could only be Mio muttered sotto voce, "You'll always sound like an idiot."
An explosion of laughter erupted from the girls as Ritsu drove her elbow into Mio's side, and even Yamanaka-sensei (see? I can learn!) smiled, before turning her attention back to us. "How is this possible?" she demanded.
"Our bosses did it, to make things easier on you," Peggy said.
Yamanaka-sensei's smile vanished, replaced again by a scowl. "That's the second time you've mentioned your bosses. Just who are they?"
Well, Fate clearly knows an entrance cue when it hears one, because at that moment the mirror in the sitting area began shining brightly. By the time everyone else in the room had noticed and turned toward it, a female figure in voluminous (and colorful) robes with ankle-length ash-blonde hair and blue marks on her face was already halfway through it. I recognized who it was immediately, even though I'd never met her before, and involuntarily murmured, "Holy..." before glancing at Peggy, who was wide-eyed and barely breathing.
"Nice timing," she finally said as our newest visitor fully exited the mirror and gently drifted to a bare-toed touchdown on the carpet.
I nodded. "'I continually marvel at the efficiency of the gods'," I replied, quoting Kaylith Macrevan, the cleric our friend Kat has played in my AD&D campaign for the last thirty years. Peggy suppressed a snicker.
The girls had cleared a wide area around the mirror and were watching silently as our visitor landed. I dashed over to it, with Peggy close on my heels, and stopped several feet away to bow respectfully. Peg followed my lead a moment later. "Lady Belldandy, welcome to Douglass Gardens Apartments," I said, and a susurrus of whispers arose among the girls. "You honor us with your presence."
When we were standing up straight again, we were graced with a smile like a klieg light. "Robert," Belldandy said, nodding to me. "Margaret," she continued, nodding to my wife. "It is I who am honored. Thank you both so much for taking on this task for us." Behind her, Jun had sidled over to the mirror and was poking it experimentally, leaving fingerprints on the glass.
"How could we refuse when things were explained to us?" I replied, ignoring Jun. "And please, it's Bob and Peggy. You of all beings need not be formal with us."
Another brilliant smile. "In that case, please call me Bell." She glanced around at the nearly two dozen women and girls surrounding us. "I am here to deliver all the paperwork your new guests will need to live in this timeline during the current crisis. We have IDs, academic and medical histories, and all other necessary documentation. We have also arranged enrollments for everyone in the proper academic programs at both Franklin Township High School and Rutgers University, as appropriate." She turned to Sawa-chan-sensei. "Ms. Yamanaka, we've arranged for a job interview for you, also at Franklin Township High School. You are not obligated to actually make use of it, but we strongly recommend it."
Sawako was blinking, open-mouthed. "How did you... You can't possibly be..."
"Sawako Yamanaka-san," I said softly, "please allow us to introduce to you to the goddess Verthandi of the Norse pantheon, also called Belldandy Wishbringer and Odinsdottir, Norn of the Present... and goddess of fidelity, if I'm not mistaken?" I added, looking to her for confirmation. Around us, the girls broke out in another round of whispers and murmurs.
Belldandy nodded. "In this and numerous similar timelines," she said. ""Odinsdottir' is, however, somewhat figurative, referring to the place my sisters and I voluntarily take in the Celestial hierarchy rather than literal descent."
Sawako said nothing, simply staring for a moment, before whirling on us. "This has to be some kind of trick!"
Belldandy sighed. "Oh, dear. I see I'm going to have to prove who I am."
"It certainly saved time with us for Hemera and Geras," I muttered, and Belldandy glanced over me, her eyes twinkling.
"This is true," she said, and with a smile added, "Far be it from me to break with such a long-standing tradition."
I had just started to snort in amusement when she did what Peg and I later came to call just "The Thing" -- where she released the barest sliver of her true Celestial nature to unmistakably, undeniably establish that she was Who she said she was.
In his novel Lord of Light, Roger Zelazny wrote "Being a god is the quality of being able to be yourself to such an extent that your passions correspond with the forces of the universe, so that those who look upon you know this without hearing your name spoken." The Thing is something like that, making it all but impossible for those looking upon the Celestial doing it to deny the essential identity of the Being behind the avatar they are inhabiting in the physical world. Having been exposed to a double dose of it during our "job interview", it seemed Peggy and I had acquired a bit of a resistance to The Thing, or maybe just enough familiarity with its effect, such that we were only slightly staggered by the brief glimpse of the Goddess Behind.
Sawako, on the other hand, ended up on her knees, eyes wide and mouth moving soundlessly for several seconds. Being somewhat insulated by distance, the girls were a bit less affected, but were still clearly stunned. At least until Azusa seemed to shake herself awake before literally hurdling the sectional to slide to her knees at Belldandy's feet.
"Is it my fault that we're here? Please tell me it isn't my fault!" she blurted. "I don't want it to be my fault that we're all in a different reality..." she pleaded with big, tear-filled eyes.
Belldandy looked down at her; already tiny, on her knees Azusa seemed almost toy-sized. "What do you mean, dear?"
She bit her lip and then said, "When everyone graduated a few months ago, I wished as hard as I could that they could stay with me and wouldn't leave me behind. And now we're all back together." Tears finally began spilling out of her eyes and down her cheeks. "It's not my fault, whatever's happening that sent us here, is it? I'm not responsible, am I?"
Comprehension swept across Belldandy's face. She dropped to her knees and embraced Azusa. Kissing the girl on the forehead, Belldandy said, "No, Azusa, you are not responsible for the disaster. No one in either Heaven or Hell would have set it in motion in response to your wish. We have found many possible causes, but I tell you truth: your desire to stay with your friends was not one of them."
"Really?" Azusa sobbed.
Belldandy nodded, smiling gently. "Really. But I will tell you what you are responsible for."
Azusa hiccuped. "What?" she whispered.
"For inspiring such great love in the hearts of your friends." And with that Belldandy smoothly stood and stepped back as the rest of Hokago Tea Time swarmed their youngest member, followed moments later by the other Wakaba Girls. The three members of OnNaGumi hung back, looking visibly uncomfortable; Sawako had gotten back to her feet and now stood protectively over the huddle.
I leaned in toward Belldandy, and in a low voice said, "Maybe we should let them have some private time together. Would you care to join us in the kitchen for some tea?"
She nodded without taking her eyes off the massive group hug in front of us. "Yes, I believe I would."
"Please follow me," I murmured. "Peg, could you ask those three girls to join us?"
"Right," she said, and as I led Bell through the dining room into the kitchen proper, Peg made her way over to the members of OnNaGumi.
Well, we made a point of staying in the kitchen, seated in its "breakfast nook", for as long as it took everyone to comfort Azusa, which was not quite half an hour -- enough time to set a kettle to boil, select teas (Peg and I are tea aficionados, and we stocked the CC kitchen with dozens of varieties and blends), steep, and finally start drinking. In the process we started to lay the groundwork for what looked to be a solid friendship with Belldandy, and at the same time got to know Sachi, Akira and Ayame. The girls of OnNaGumi were still suffering a blend of shock from the transition and mixed resentment/dismay at discovering that their role in their old world was basically to give Yui et al. someone to bounce off of while at college.
My suggestion that this was only the case in our timeline, and that by the Law of Big Numbers there inevitably had to be universes out there where they were the focus of a popular franchise and Yui's gang were their supporting characters sadly didn't help as much as I thought it might.
Belldandy's irresistible aura of contagious serenity, not to mention a good cup of tea each, seemed to take the edge off their emotional state but I resolved to keep an active eye on them and how well they adapted to their new world. In the meantime, Peg and I tried to draw them out and learn more about them -- the one volume of K-On! College I had didn't really flesh them out all that much -- which got us an approving smile and nod over her teacup from Belldandy.
As the conversation progressed, I found myself paying attention to their voices. Sachi was something of a shrinking violet, for all that she was the most prominent of the three, and unless you really engaged her in something that excited her (at which point her soprano became very noticeable) she tended to speak in a whisper/mumble. Akira was an alto, and snarly to boot -- she was easily the most hostile of the three, even in the face of Belldandy's aura. Ayame, another soprano, had the closest to what I would consider a normal conversational tone. She also seemed the least distressed of the three at their displacement.
(Belldandy, I might note, sounded like a cross between Kikuko Inoue and her first North American voice actress from back in the 90s, Juliet Cesario. Another soprano, with sweet, almost musical tones. I could listen to her speak -- or sing the Egg Song -- all day.)
Jun eventually showed up at the entry to the kitchen. "Things seem to have calmed down," she said with a little smirk, then glanced back over her shoulder. "Yeah, looks like."
Belldandy took one last sip of her tea, set the cup down on the table, and then smiled brightly at all of us sitting with her. "Well. We do have a bit of business to get through. Shall we?"
I nodded as Peggy said, "Yes." Sachi, Akira and Ayame made various noises of agreement as well, but by that point, Bell was already out of her seat and majestically sailing toward the "living room". Trotting slightly to keep up, it occurred to me how rarely you got to see her just walking from place to place in the anime. Her body language as she strode forward was very different from The Chef or The Racer or the other roles her animated counterpart took on around Keiichi -- very regal and thoroughly no-nonsense -- and I wondered if we were finally seeing The Goddess and not (just) Keiichi's Girlfriend.
We were only a few feet behind her, but by the time the five of us reached the seating area, Bell was already handing out manilla envelopes that seemed to appear out of nowhere when she reached off to her side, as if Harry Potter were there under his invisibility cloak, handing them to her one at a time. (And honestly, given everything we'd experienced in the previous week, I wouldn't've been in the least surprised if he had been.) Azusa, still looking a little teary-eyed, was sat firmly on Yui's lap, her head on her sempai's shoulder as Yui's arms wrapped protectively around her. On the sofa next to them were two envelopes, clearly theirs.
Long story short, as Belldandy distributed her packets of documents (that were no doubt appallingly genuine, for all that they were essentially forgeries) and gave explanations and details as required by their recipients, Peg ordered in breakfast from IHOP through GrubHub. Monday morning being a slow time, IHOP assembled more than a dozen assorted meals with an unexpected alacrity, and they arrived just a few minutes before Bell finished up. I carried the bags into the dining room and then began setting things out buffet-style. Glancing at the TROMMA wall clock (courtesy of IKEA, of course), I saw it wasn't yet 9:30 AM. Wow. Felt like it should be almost noon.
When Belldandy finished up, Peg said, "We've got breakfast set up for everyone in the dining room. Would you like to join us, Bell?" She stumbled a little over the diminutive, or maybe the name itself. I know that I wasn't as blase about being on a familiar basis with Belldandy as I was trying to act, and I suspected Peg felt the same, and I was both surprised and proud that she was handling things so well.
I glanced through the archway separating the dining room from the sitting area as Belldandy replied, "Thank you for the invitation, but I'm afraid I have to decline. Not only do I have other tasks that I must attend to, I'm also on Tokyo time, so it's well after dinner for me."
"Another time, maybe," Peg said. "You're always welcome here."
"Definitely," I added from where I stood in the archway. "Our doors -- and mirrors -- are always open for you." Not that we could possibly keep you out, I mused to myself with just a little bit of a smirk. But honestly, what were the odds we'd ever actually see her again, given her importance?
She giggled at that, then smiled that spotlight smile of hers again. "Thank you both so very much. I can't promise anything at this time, but you may see me again sooner than you might expect." Then to my surprise she embraced Peggy. When Belldandy released her and glanced towards where I stood several yards away, I bowed to her, and she returned it. Then she crossed to the mirror through which she had made her entrance. She touched a finger to it and it began to glow a brilliant white. Gracefully she lifted up off the ground, her toes pointed like a ballerina, as a hush fell across the room at the sight. Then she looked back at everyone, and gave a little wave. "Good-bye all! Good luck, and please don't worry!" she said, eliciting a chorus of farewells from all the girls as well as Sawako, before turning back to the mirror and sliding silently through it as though it were a sheet of mist instead of glass.
The room remained silent for almost a full minute after Belldandy's departure, until I grinned at Peggy and announced, "Well! That was a thing!" Then I looked out over all our brand-new friends and said, "Let's eat. And after breakfast, we'll get your living arrangements sorted out."
"Oh, yeah!" Jun cheered, pumping a fist in the air.
"Wait!" Yui cried. "I just realized -- if we're all here, who's going to take care of Ton-chan?"
"Well," I said as I toed off my sneakers at the front door. "That took less time than I expected."
Peggy, doing the same, murmured, "Yeah." We had quickly finished parceling out apartments from among the finished units to all our new residents and helping them move their stuff in. The whole thing took only a couple hours once breakfast was done, because everyone pretty much already knew who they wanted to bunk with. However, in the process it became obvious that our tenants had arrived with only the bare minimum of clothes and toiletries -- enough for a weekend trip at most. We were going to have to arrange one or more shopping runs, probably to Brunswick Square Mall down Route 18, over the next couple days. Fortunately, one telephone call later and Funtom let us know that transportation would be provided, as long as we gave them at least a day's notice.
Which we did.
Meanwhile, once everyone had gotten moved in, there had been a mass migration back to the community center for lunch -- pizza ordered in from one of the places we use near the Rutgers campus. As everyone ate their fill, they also explored the center and its facilities -- including the rehearsal rooms and the studio. I wasn't too surprised to find Nao drooling almost as much over the control panel as she did over the pizza, and we quickly had to drag her out before imposing a "no food" rule for the studio. It didn't take too much more time before everyone ate their fill, and as we cleaned up and put the few leftovers in the fridge in the kitchen, I noticed that various musical instruments had started (re)appearing around the sectional. Color me surprised. A jam session was already starting in one of the rehearsal rooms when we took our leave of our new neighbors -- in the process confirming that Funtom had sprung for the good soundproofing.
"What'd you think about meeting Belldandy for real?" I asked as I tossed my shoes on the boot tray. "And getting basically on first-name basis with her?"
She just laughed. "Wow."
I grinned. "Yeah." Stepping out of the foyer and into our new living room, I dropped into my favorite chair. "You know what? If we ever see her again we should set up a meeting between her and Kat. They could practically be sisters, after all." I thought for a moment then added, "You think they're all going to be okay?"
Peggy curled up at one end of the leather couch and pulled out her cell phone. "Our new tenants? I hope so. I'd probably be a mess in their situation, but they mostly seem to be in good spirits and determined to come through it all."
I nodded. "Yui and Ui are used to being on their own, the only big adjustment for them will be going from their house to an apartment. Most of the others are college students who were already on their own, too. It'll probably hit them eventually, but not right away." I laughed as a thought struck me. "Mugi's probably thoroughly delighted that she's now an effectively anonymous girl of limited means and has to do all those 'ordinary people' things for real."
Peg barked a laugh. "She would, too, wouldn't she?"
"Yup." I chuckled to myself. "Bet you ten bucks she gets tired of it before the end of the first week."
"I don't know," she replied. "She stuck with that fast food job in the anime for how long?"
"Mm. You may be right." I chuckled as a mildly evil idea occurred to me. "I gotta find the right moment to go 'Tetsuoooooo!' at Akira."
She looked up from her cell phone. "Tetsuo?" She furrowed her brow for a moment, then her eyes widened. "Oh, god, Bob, that's awful. And you know, she's probably heard that like a million times already."
"Maybe, maybe not," I said, still chuckling. "It's, what, a twenty-five-year-old movie even in her time. What're the odds?"
She just rolled her eyes and went back to her phone. "Just don't do it while I'm around."
"No guarantees," I replied, and she rolled her eyes again. "So. I think we handled that pretty well given that we had no idea what we were doing."
Peg chuckled. "I don't think anyone Funtom's hired really knows what they're doing. Not yet, at least."
"True that. You'd think they'd have done up a guidebook, or at least a 'welcome' pamphlet for the managers," I said. "And maybe one for the displacees, too," I added after a moment's thought.
"That's not a bad idea," she said.
I hopped up out of my seat as another thought struck me.
"Where are you going now?" Peg demanded.
I gestured up the stairs. "I'm going to let the other managers know our first displacees arrived. Plus I just thought of something I want to ask them."
Douglass Gardens Apartments
Thursday, September 15, 2016
Yui stopped short upon entering the community center after the last class of the day, causing Ritsu and Mio to almost run into her and each other. "Look!" she cried.
"Whoa," Ritsu murmured. "Is that...?"
Before she could finish, Yui had dropped her bookbag and dashed across the large, open room to press her face up against an aquarium that hadn't been there the night before. "It is!" she declared, her diction someone impaired because of the glass flattening half of her face. "It's Ton-chan!"
"Huh," Ritsu said, glancing at Mio. "Whaddaya know. I'd'a never guessed our pet turtle was important enough to merit a rescue, too."
Douglass Gardens Apartments
Friday, September 16, 2016
Peg and I were in the middle of breakfast when we got another 8 AM call on the internal "Manager" phone. We looked at each other across the corner of the table where we sat at right angles to each other.
"You don't think...?" I began, a forkful of scrambled egg still in my hand halfway to my mouth.
She sighed. "Probably."
I put my fork back down on my plate, pushed my chair back and got to my feet. "Care to take a wild guess who it might be?"
"No," she declared, making a "don't be stupid" face at me.
The phone kept ringing as I left the dining room and stepped into the "office" area. Suppressing a perfectly reasonable sense of deja vu, I picked up the handset, hit the "answer/on" button and said, "Yes?"
"Um, I'm sorry, but my friends and I just woke up in, um, in your sitting room?" said a girl's voice, very formal and upper-class in tone.
Oh, yeah. Here we go again.
Moving Days, Part I
A "ManaChara" Story
by Robert M. Schroeck
A "ManaChara" Story
by Robert M. Schroeck
Douglass Gardens Apartments,
Somerset, NJ, USA
Friday, September 9, 2016
I'll say this for Funtom -- their movers were damned efficient. Peggy and I went from a good-sized ranch house at maximum between-seasonal-cleaning entropy into two moving vans in less than four hours. Five hours later (allowing for lunch) we were completely re-established in a two-floor apartment that had been a one-floor place when we'd met Hemera and Geras in it two days earlier. Almost everything fit, too, and what little didn't had been boxed for long-term storage and tucked away into a well-constructed, secure room in the building basement. (And as far as I could tell, the movers were completely normal -- despite their speed and efficiency, no magic or Celestial powers of any sort seemed to be involved.)
Meanwhile, the rest of the complex looked like one of those HGTV let's-remodel-your-home-in-a-weekend shows on steroids and speed. Dozens of contractor trucks. Eighteen-wheelers full of supplies in and out all day long. So many nail guns firing it sounded like a gang war. Even so, I was impressed by the rate at which the rebuild was progressing -- in just a matter of days the building in which our new home was located had been almost completely redone, and its mirror-image counterpart across Annette Court was half-done, maybe a little more. The closer end of it to us, right across Annette, was being converted into what on the plans I'd seen had been called a "community center", which required a lot more work than simply updating the existing apartments in our building did; from what I'd been told it wouldn't be done until the middle of next week.
One thing caught my eye as it was unloaded and carried into the future community center -- soundproofing and electronics for a recording studio. Thanks to my uncle Arthur I was more than familiar with that kind of equipment, even if my personal experience with actually using it was thirty-five years or so out of date. I went back to our copy of the blueprints and confirmed: Yes, a recording studio and three rehearsal/practice rooms. Just who were they expecting would be moving in? Funtom and the Celestials behind it clearly knew more than they were sharing with us.
Anyway, the plan was that as each building was finished, the remodeling crews would pick up and move to the next one further down Annette on the same side of the street. Since the number and sizes of the buildings on each side didn't match, the crew on the "short side" would wrap around and start on the last building across the street. As planned, it would take close to a month to revamp the entire complex, especially since some of the units were being upgraded from one- and two-bedroom apartments to three bedrooms and larger. But there was apparently no rush, there, either. In addition to Peg and me, the building we were in could house some fifty or so people already, more if they were friendly; in five days the other one would be able to house another thirty. Unless there was an outright flood of refugees in the first few days, we'd be fine.
In the meantime, we had units to furnish. Our budget was large, to match the size of the complex, but not infinite nor immediately refilling; Funtom's communications (signed by someone named Sebastian Michaelis) made it clear that even with the amount of money they were providing we had to make economical choices for furnishings. (And file the receipts with the head office.) We were also to limit our purchases to furniture, kitchen equipment (including, among other things, microwave ovens), drapes and blinds for windows as needed, lighting, and a bare minimum of linens. No TVs, radios or other personal electronics. The idea was turnkey and comfortable, but not luxury by any measure.
Interestingly, we were explicitly told that bedrooms should include desks suitable for students. Another clue that they had some idea who was inbound.
After an afternoon of research followed by a long discussion-turned-argument, Peggy and I finally settled on doing as much of our buying from IKEA as we could. They had a store only thirty minutes away in Newark, just outside Newark Liberty Airport and practically sitting on the Turnpike, making it convenient for short-notice bulk purchases. Under normal circumstances just buying bulk wouldn't save us any money, but we also set up an "IKEA Business Network" account for the complex, which promised us at least a few discounts plus a lot of support that we wouldn't get if we just schlepped in off the street.
One quick rental of a truck from U-Haul later, and we were in business.
Over the next couple days we got Busy with a capital "B". (Which rhymes with "D", which stands for "Deadline"...) While I made multiple runs up to the IKEA and back again, Peg oversaw a several teams of handymen that Funtom had hired and dispatched to do the heavy lifting for us. Under her watchful eye, they would unload the truck, move all the flatpacks and boxes into their intended units, and while I was on my way back to Newark for the next load do all the assembly and installation. Like all the other people hired by Funtom, they were fast and efficient, somehow managing to finish up each truckload just in time to take on the next. They were also willing to work overtime -- said willingness reinforced when we bought them dinner both days.
(And yes, we saved the receipts for that, too, and sent them off to Funtom.)
To our complete and utter surprise, we actually managed to furnish all the finished apartments by the evening of the 11th, mainly by dint of the two of us handling all the soft furnishings like window treatments, linens and towels until well after midnight both nights and all day the following day. Which was a good thing, because we turned out to need them almost immediately thereafter.
Douglass Gardens Apartments
Monday, September 12, 2016
When I'd lost my job a month and some earlier, I didn't change my daily routine too much. On weekdays I was up at 7:00, as was Peggy. So we were both awake an hour later when the "manager phone" rang.
This was something that shouldn't have happened because it was an "internal" line and there was no one in the complex yet to call us on it.
I glanced at my wife. "You think...?" I murmured as I trotted across the room to the phone that sat on the desk which made up our "office" and took the handset out of its cradle. It rang a second time as Peggy shrugged. I took a deep breath and hit the "answer/on" button. "Yes?"
"Um..." A girl's voice, youngish sounding. Maybe teen-aged? "Is this the manager?"
"One of them, yes," I answered. "Can I help you?"
"Oh, I hope so," she said in an uncertain tone of voice. "I... we... all of us, me and my friends and... we just woke up with all our stuff in your living room. And we don't know how we got here." A chorus of shaky voices made agreeing noises in the background behind her.
Uh-huh. "Okay, relax, you're not in trouble or anything. Just a moment, okay?" I pressed "mute" and turned to Peggy. "I think our first displacees just showed up in the community center and they sound freaked. Can you call Funtom's support line while I run over there and calm them down?"
She nodded. "The number's in the phone, right?" she asked.
"Yeah, and their card is pinned to the bulletin board, and it's also written down in the contact book."
"Okay, got it." She crossed over to the desk next to me.
I took the phone off mute. "Hi, you still there?"
"Afraid so," the girl on the other end said with a burbly little giggle.
"Okay, let me just make sure you're where I think you are -- you're in a big room with a massive sectional couch that fills up about half the space, with a TV at one end? One wall is more of a big opening to a dining room? There's another couple doors and a mirror on the other walls? And a stairway going up?"
"Um." She was silent for a couple moments, I guess as she looked around, and I could hear at least half a dozen different voices talking and arguing. "Yes," she finally said.
I nodded to myself. "Okay, you're in our community center. I'll be there in literally a minute or two, okay? Try to keep calm, all of you, please?"
Another little giggle. "We'll try."
"Okay, then. See you in a minute. Bye." I hung up the call, and dropped the handset back into the cradle. Then I looked over at Peggy, who had seated herself at the desk. "Wish me luck," I said, then bent down to give her a peck on the lips.
"Have fun," she said with a faint smile. Then she bit her lip as something occurred to her. "They're going to want breakfast, aren't they?"
"Yeah, probably," I replied. "Let me see how many there are and we can do a Grubhub order from the diner or IHOP for them. And bill it to Funtom of course."
"Of course." Peggy grinned. "Sounds good."
As I stepped out the front door of our new home, I spotted a black cat sitting calmly to one side of the narrow concrete walkway that led to the sidewalk and Hamilton Street beyond. I was about to shoo the obvious stray away (a reflex developed over thirty years of marriage to a woman profoundly allergic to cats) when a thought struck me, and I paused. It was a thought inspired by some two decades of reading fanfiction, and one I would never have seriously entertained before. I took a longer look at the cat (which calmly looked back at me) and said, "If you happen to be Toltiir, I'm probably going to run screaming. Not from you, everything I've read suggests you're pretty damned cool, but from what the world has become."
I wouldn't swear to it in a court of law, but I'm pretty sure the cat rolled its eyes before getting up and strolling off, tail and nose both in the air. I watched it go for a moment, then shook myself. I had more important things to attend to.
I dashed across Annette Court to the front door of the community center and let myself in with my key. (No, the door wasn't unlocked. We weren't in a bad area, but no point tempting fate. It was still technically an urban neighborhood, and while the next few blocks over in New Brunswick certainly weren't the worst part of town, they weren't high-end by any measure either.) I trotted through the little foyer-coat room-windbreak arrangement we had right on the other side, then stepped into the community center proper. As I did, I could hear a female voice confidently declare, "We'll just pay off the kidnappers and everything will be fine." Then I got my first look.
My god, it's full of girls, was my first thought.
As best as I could tell amongst the bustle there were maybe a dozen or so young women in their late teens, all Asian of some stripe. Darting to and fro among them was a motherly-seeming woman, also Asian, in both glasses and her twenties, who seemed to be engaged in keeping everyone calm. Piles of backpacks and overnight bags were stacked around the sectional, and I spotted several soft- and hard-sided guitar cases among them, along with something that looked like cases for a set of drums.
Well. That answered that question.
No one had noticed me come in yet, the foyer having blocked the sound and sight of my entrance, and as I paused for just a moment to get my bearings, a girl with her brown hair tied back emerged from the dining room/kitchen area with a tray on which sat several stacks of teacups and a steaming pot. As she navigated into the center of the sectional and laid the tray on one of the coffee tables, another girl who looked to be high school age, with black hair and wearing glasses, emerged from the doorway to the rehearsal rooms and studio. "You've got to see this!" she exclaimed. "There's a whole recording studio back here!"
The not-insubstantial natter of a dozen voices suddenly increased noticeably as a fair number of the girls decided to swarm the door.
"Um, excuse me?" I said loudly, with no apparent effect. "Hello?" I said, significantly louder. "Hey!" I bellowed.
The room went absolutely still.
Two dozen or so eyes suddenly fixed on me.
I took a deep breath and made sure I was smiling.
"Good morning, ladies. I'm Bob Schroeck, I manage this establishment along with my wife Peggy. Someone among you called our office just a few minutes ago?"
A hand went up in the middle of one clump of girls and I acknowledged its owner -- a college-age girl with short brown hair and red half-frame glasses -- with a nod. "Thank you for doing so."
"Where are we?" the twenty-something demanded. "And how did we get here?"
I stepped closer to the groups, swallowed, and hoped that I'd handle this right. I took a deep breath and began, "This is going to be hard to believe, but you're in a different universe."
Instant uproar.
I raised my hands. "Okay, okay, calm down, let me explain. First off, there's more than one universe. There's a multiverse. Second, It's been hit by some kind of disaster. We haven't been given all the details, but it's bad. I got the impression that some universes are getting destroyed outright. Third, and this is where you guys come in, as a result of this disaster people are getting ejected from their universes. When they do, they end up here."
"And where is 'here'?" the twenty-something pressed while the clumps of girls murmured to each other.
"'Here' is a universe they're calling Refuge, or 'the' Refuge," I said. "This is a low-energy timeline, maybe even the lowest-energy timeline. We're about the most boring universe you can imagine -- we don't have magic, or super-powers, or psionics, or weird stuff out in space, or giant monsters in the Pacific." I took another deep breath. "What we do have is a strange attraction for refugees from other universes, what my bosses call 'displacees'. No matter where they -- you -- come from, you end up here.
"Now, more specifically, you're in the United States, in Somerset, New Jersey, not far from Rutgers University, if you've ever heard of it. Even more specifically, you're in Douglass Gardens Apartments, an apartment complex that was bought and set up by my bosses specifically to house displacees."
The twenty-something crossed her arms across her chest and glared at me over her glasses. "You don't expect us to believe that, do you?"
I shook my head. "Not without proof, no. Fortunately, it's not hard to get you that proof, Ms. ...?"
"Yamanaka Sawako," she spat.
Now that was a name I recognized. "Yamanaka Sawako? You're a teacher at Sakuragaoka High School in Japan, aren't you?" I grinned. "AKA Sawa-chan-sensei?"
I heard a few squeaks that sounded suspiciously like muffled giggles from some of the girls, while Ms. Yamanaka just glared at me harder. "Yes," she ground out, lowering her head such that the lenses of her glasses suddenly reflected the light from the overhead fixture.
Wow. I'd never seen Scary Shiny Glasses in the real world before. Pretty cool. But sorry, Sawa-chan, not scary enough to affect me. "And I'd guess that behind you somewhere among all those lovely young ladies is Hokago Tea Time?"
She tilted her head and narrowed her eyes while behind her five of the girls waved, both vigorously and not. "Yes."
I nodded. "Okay, in that case, I have that proof for you." I walked over to the end of the sitting area where the TV hung on the wall, carefully avoiding any of the girls. Sawa-... um, Ms. Yamanaka pivoted to keep her eyes on me at all times. I plucked the remote out of the little felt bag we'd pinned to the wall next to the set, stepped back a few feet, and turned it on.
A minute or so later I had navigated to Netflix and, once there, to K-On! Well, actually, K-On!! with two bangs -- I started up the first episode of the second season, since it featured not only the original girls, but gave screen time to some of the "next gen" girls as well. Netflix's title card for the series showed all five members of Hokago Tea Time plus Yamanaka-sensei, and the moment it appeared, most of the girls crowded around the set. I faded back out of their way after launching the episode, removing myself to just outside the sectional, where I studied the lot of them.
It wasn't much work to map out who was who in the frontmost row. Between hair colors and styles and relative heights I quickly had all five members of HTT pegged. I was actually surprised at how closely they resembled their animated counterparts, after allowing for things like eye size and other stylistic affectations. Once I'd identified Yui, Ui wasn't hard to find -- she was the tea-maker. Of course. The girl with the fuzzy buns had to be Jun... oh, and the second blonde was the allegedly Anglo-Australian Sumire -- who didn't look any less Asian than any of the other girls. Two of the girls had glasses, which meant they had to be Nodoka and Nao. Nao, identifiable by her barrettes, was the younger one who had been checking out the studio. And Nodoka had been the one to call the office.
And with Sumire and Nao there, I realized the entire crowd had to have come from the K-On! High School and College manga period. Which meant that the three girls who hung back while Yamanaka-sensei drifted closer to the TV set could only be the other band that Hokago Tea Time had met in their dorm -- OnNaGumi, if I remembered correctly.
Which certainly explained the sour looks they shared when the show jumped directly from animated!Yui patting her face and exclaiming "Breadcrumbs!" to the opening credits and the slam start of "Go! Go! Maniac" with Aki Toyosaki's voice front and center. I was pretty sure I recalled them being somewhat dismissive of HTT when they first met -- discovering that they were at best supporting characters in the story of four girls they didn't really like couldn't've been pleasant. Watching them watch the too-crisp CGI instruments and the dizzy-making orbital shots revolving around the band as the members of HTT in front of me sang along with the theme song, I wondered if I wasn't looking at the birth of some kind of trouble between them and the others.
(Even as I worried, though, I couldn't help noticing that Yui doing the jazz-hands "Hah!" thing in real life was just as adorable as it was in the anime.)
As the crowd around the TV settled in to watch the episode proper (with squeaks, giggles, chirps of "I remember that!" and the like every once in a while), I faintly heard the front door open. There was only one person it could be, so I wasn't surprised when Peg quietly slid up beside me. As I put my arm around her she pecked me on the cheek and murmured, "I reached Funtom, and let them know we had some displacees show up. They'll be sending someone shortly with paperwork for them."
I nodded. "That just proves that they already knew who we were getting if they have paperwork assembled for them already," I murmured back. "Not to mention these folks are why we have the rehearsal rooms and recording studio."
"Mm?" she said absently, then took a closer look at both the crowd and what they were watching. "K-On!? Really?"
I glanced over at her, grinning. "Yeah, really. And they're from the college manga period, because we got the other bands as well."
Peggy looked at me curiously. "What other bands?"
I was expecting this question because I had the K-On! College and K-On! High School manga on my Kindle, and I knew she hadn't read either of them. "Well, first there's the band that Azusa formed for the Light Music Club after the other girls graduated at the end of the anime. It's got Yui's sister Ui on keyboards and Ui's friend Jun playing bass. You remember them, right?"
She nodded. "Jun quit the Jazz Club, then?"
"Yeah, she got tired of always being second string and never getting to perform." I gestured with my chin. "The blonde who isn't in the front row? That's their drummer Sumire. And one of the girls in glasses is Nao, who's their songwriter and... I guess 'producer' is the best term. They're both from the K-On! High School manga." I chuckled. "Sawa-chan gave them another tea-based name -- Wakaba Girls."
"'Wakaba'?" Peg shot me a curious glance. "Isn't that a character from 'Utena'?"
I shrugged. "Yeah, but if I remember right, in this context it means 'green tea'."
"Okay," she said. Then, after a moment, she asked, "What do they sound like?"
I chuckled. "I have no idea. As of the last bits I read, they were still getting their act together. Ui's never played keyboards before, but the way she learns stuff..."
Peg nodded. "Yeah."
"And Sumire took up drums just to join the club, so she's probably not all that good yet." I nudged her, grinning. "Not like I can tell from the manga, anyway."
She snorted. "And who're they?" she then asked, nodding toward the last three with their sour looks.
I sighed. "That's OnNaGumi, they're from K-On! College. I can't remember their names, but they're freshmen along with Yui and the gang. They're supposed to be good, but again, manga have sucky soundtracks."
Peggy snickered. "They don't look too happy," she added after a moment studying them.
"Yeah," I agreed, but didn't elaborate. I settled my left hand at the very familiar point where her hip began to swell out of her waist and we just stood there, watching them watch the rest of the episode. When the closing credits began, I let go of Peg and trotted over into the middle of the sectional to grab the remote again and exit back out to the episode list. "Okay," I said a bit loudly to get the attention of the girls, who were all frantically murmuring among themselves. "If that's not enough, I can show you pages about you on a couple of wikis out on the Net, and the last couple volumes of your manga."
Sawa-chan-sensei (yeah, I knew I shouldn't think of her that way; I'd need to train myself to be more respectful) grimaced, then glanced at the girls. "No," she said slowly. "I think I'm convinced. But what happens now?"
"Well, the next thing you need to know is it's 2016. That's, what, six or seven years in the future from where you were your timeline?" She nodded thoughtfully. "Right. And like I said, you're in the United States, and probably will be staying here at least for the immediate future."
"Mou..." Ritsu, who was easily identifiable by her hair band, moaned. "How'm I going to manage? I'm lousy at English!"
I shared a grin with Peggy. "Are you, really?" I asked. "Because I only know about a dozen words in Japanese and I probably say them all wrong."
"Huh?" Ritsu frowned, obviously thinking hard. Some of the other girls were also frowning. "But I..." she began, then halted, frowning harder. "I..." Next to her Yui's eyes suddenly went wide as her mouth formed a little "o". "I," Ritsu declared firmly, and then said, slowly enunciating each syllable, "Wa-ta-shi." She looked back up at me. "Nante kotoda, watashi wa eigo o hanashite iru nda!" she blurted, followed by, "Holy crap, I'm speaking English!" A smile lit up her face. "And I don't sound like a complete idiot!"
"Don't worry, Ritsu," a classic Japanese beauty who could only be Mio muttered sotto voce, "You'll always sound like an idiot."
An explosion of laughter erupted from the girls as Ritsu drove her elbow into Mio's side, and even Yamanaka-sensei (see? I can learn!) smiled, before turning her attention back to us. "How is this possible?" she demanded.
"Our bosses did it, to make things easier on you," Peggy said.
Yamanaka-sensei's smile vanished, replaced again by a scowl. "That's the second time you've mentioned your bosses. Just who are they?"
Well, Fate clearly knows an entrance cue when it hears one, because at that moment the mirror in the sitting area began shining brightly. By the time everyone else in the room had noticed and turned toward it, a female figure in voluminous (and colorful) robes with ankle-length ash-blonde hair and blue marks on her face was already halfway through it. I recognized who it was immediately, even though I'd never met her before, and involuntarily murmured, "Holy..." before glancing at Peggy, who was wide-eyed and barely breathing.
"Nice timing," she finally said as our newest visitor fully exited the mirror and gently drifted to a bare-toed touchdown on the carpet.
I nodded. "'I continually marvel at the efficiency of the gods'," I replied, quoting Kaylith Macrevan, the cleric our friend Kat has played in my AD&D campaign for the last thirty years. Peggy suppressed a snicker.
The girls had cleared a wide area around the mirror and were watching silently as our visitor landed. I dashed over to it, with Peggy close on my heels, and stopped several feet away to bow respectfully. Peg followed my lead a moment later. "Lady Belldandy, welcome to Douglass Gardens Apartments," I said, and a susurrus of whispers arose among the girls. "You honor us with your presence."
When we were standing up straight again, we were graced with a smile like a klieg light. "Robert," Belldandy said, nodding to me. "Margaret," she continued, nodding to my wife. "It is I who am honored. Thank you both so much for taking on this task for us." Behind her, Jun had sidled over to the mirror and was poking it experimentally, leaving fingerprints on the glass.
"How could we refuse when things were explained to us?" I replied, ignoring Jun. "And please, it's Bob and Peggy. You of all beings need not be formal with us."
Another brilliant smile. "In that case, please call me Bell." She glanced around at the nearly two dozen women and girls surrounding us. "I am here to deliver all the paperwork your new guests will need to live in this timeline during the current crisis. We have IDs, academic and medical histories, and all other necessary documentation. We have also arranged enrollments for everyone in the proper academic programs at both Franklin Township High School and Rutgers University, as appropriate." She turned to Sawa-chan-sensei. "Ms. Yamanaka, we've arranged for a job interview for you, also at Franklin Township High School. You are not obligated to actually make use of it, but we strongly recommend it."
Sawako was blinking, open-mouthed. "How did you... You can't possibly be..."
"Sawako Yamanaka-san," I said softly, "please allow us to introduce to you to the goddess Verthandi of the Norse pantheon, also called Belldandy Wishbringer and Odinsdottir, Norn of the Present... and goddess of fidelity, if I'm not mistaken?" I added, looking to her for confirmation. Around us, the girls broke out in another round of whispers and murmurs.
Belldandy nodded. "In this and numerous similar timelines," she said. ""Odinsdottir' is, however, somewhat figurative, referring to the place my sisters and I voluntarily take in the Celestial hierarchy rather than literal descent."
Sawako said nothing, simply staring for a moment, before whirling on us. "This has to be some kind of trick!"
Belldandy sighed. "Oh, dear. I see I'm going to have to prove who I am."
"It certainly saved time with us for Hemera and Geras," I muttered, and Belldandy glanced over me, her eyes twinkling.
"This is true," she said, and with a smile added, "Far be it from me to break with such a long-standing tradition."
I had just started to snort in amusement when she did what Peg and I later came to call just "The Thing" -- where she released the barest sliver of her true Celestial nature to unmistakably, undeniably establish that she was Who she said she was.
In his novel Lord of Light, Roger Zelazny wrote "Being a god is the quality of being able to be yourself to such an extent that your passions correspond with the forces of the universe, so that those who look upon you know this without hearing your name spoken." The Thing is something like that, making it all but impossible for those looking upon the Celestial doing it to deny the essential identity of the Being behind the avatar they are inhabiting in the physical world. Having been exposed to a double dose of it during our "job interview", it seemed Peggy and I had acquired a bit of a resistance to The Thing, or maybe just enough familiarity with its effect, such that we were only slightly staggered by the brief glimpse of the Goddess Behind.
Sawako, on the other hand, ended up on her knees, eyes wide and mouth moving soundlessly for several seconds. Being somewhat insulated by distance, the girls were a bit less affected, but were still clearly stunned. At least until Azusa seemed to shake herself awake before literally hurdling the sectional to slide to her knees at Belldandy's feet.
"Is it my fault that we're here? Please tell me it isn't my fault!" she blurted. "I don't want it to be my fault that we're all in a different reality..." she pleaded with big, tear-filled eyes.
Belldandy looked down at her; already tiny, on her knees Azusa seemed almost toy-sized. "What do you mean, dear?"
She bit her lip and then said, "When everyone graduated a few months ago, I wished as hard as I could that they could stay with me and wouldn't leave me behind. And now we're all back together." Tears finally began spilling out of her eyes and down her cheeks. "It's not my fault, whatever's happening that sent us here, is it? I'm not responsible, am I?"
Comprehension swept across Belldandy's face. She dropped to her knees and embraced Azusa. Kissing the girl on the forehead, Belldandy said, "No, Azusa, you are not responsible for the disaster. No one in either Heaven or Hell would have set it in motion in response to your wish. We have found many possible causes, but I tell you truth: your desire to stay with your friends was not one of them."
"Really?" Azusa sobbed.
Belldandy nodded, smiling gently. "Really. But I will tell you what you are responsible for."
Azusa hiccuped. "What?" she whispered.
"For inspiring such great love in the hearts of your friends." And with that Belldandy smoothly stood and stepped back as the rest of Hokago Tea Time swarmed their youngest member, followed moments later by the other Wakaba Girls. The three members of OnNaGumi hung back, looking visibly uncomfortable; Sawako had gotten back to her feet and now stood protectively over the huddle.
I leaned in toward Belldandy, and in a low voice said, "Maybe we should let them have some private time together. Would you care to join us in the kitchen for some tea?"
She nodded without taking her eyes off the massive group hug in front of us. "Yes, I believe I would."
"Please follow me," I murmured. "Peg, could you ask those three girls to join us?"
"Right," she said, and as I led Bell through the dining room into the kitchen proper, Peg made her way over to the members of OnNaGumi.
Well, we made a point of staying in the kitchen, seated in its "breakfast nook", for as long as it took everyone to comfort Azusa, which was not quite half an hour -- enough time to set a kettle to boil, select teas (Peg and I are tea aficionados, and we stocked the CC kitchen with dozens of varieties and blends), steep, and finally start drinking. In the process we started to lay the groundwork for what looked to be a solid friendship with Belldandy, and at the same time got to know Sachi, Akira and Ayame. The girls of OnNaGumi were still suffering a blend of shock from the transition and mixed resentment/dismay at discovering that their role in their old world was basically to give Yui et al. someone to bounce off of while at college.
My suggestion that this was only the case in our timeline, and that by the Law of Big Numbers there inevitably had to be universes out there where they were the focus of a popular franchise and Yui's gang were their supporting characters sadly didn't help as much as I thought it might.
Belldandy's irresistible aura of contagious serenity, not to mention a good cup of tea each, seemed to take the edge off their emotional state but I resolved to keep an active eye on them and how well they adapted to their new world. In the meantime, Peg and I tried to draw them out and learn more about them -- the one volume of K-On! College I had didn't really flesh them out all that much -- which got us an approving smile and nod over her teacup from Belldandy.
As the conversation progressed, I found myself paying attention to their voices. Sachi was something of a shrinking violet, for all that she was the most prominent of the three, and unless you really engaged her in something that excited her (at which point her soprano became very noticeable) she tended to speak in a whisper/mumble. Akira was an alto, and snarly to boot -- she was easily the most hostile of the three, even in the face of Belldandy's aura. Ayame, another soprano, had the closest to what I would consider a normal conversational tone. She also seemed the least distressed of the three at their displacement.
(Belldandy, I might note, sounded like a cross between Kikuko Inoue and her first North American voice actress from back in the 90s, Juliet Cesario. Another soprano, with sweet, almost musical tones. I could listen to her speak -- or sing the Egg Song -- all day.)
Jun eventually showed up at the entry to the kitchen. "Things seem to have calmed down," she said with a little smirk, then glanced back over her shoulder. "Yeah, looks like."
Belldandy took one last sip of her tea, set the cup down on the table, and then smiled brightly at all of us sitting with her. "Well. We do have a bit of business to get through. Shall we?"
I nodded as Peggy said, "Yes." Sachi, Akira and Ayame made various noises of agreement as well, but by that point, Bell was already out of her seat and majestically sailing toward the "living room". Trotting slightly to keep up, it occurred to me how rarely you got to see her just walking from place to place in the anime. Her body language as she strode forward was very different from The Chef or The Racer or the other roles her animated counterpart took on around Keiichi -- very regal and thoroughly no-nonsense -- and I wondered if we were finally seeing The Goddess and not (just) Keiichi's Girlfriend.
We were only a few feet behind her, but by the time the five of us reached the seating area, Bell was already handing out manilla envelopes that seemed to appear out of nowhere when she reached off to her side, as if Harry Potter were there under his invisibility cloak, handing them to her one at a time. (And honestly, given everything we'd experienced in the previous week, I wouldn't've been in the least surprised if he had been.) Azusa, still looking a little teary-eyed, was sat firmly on Yui's lap, her head on her sempai's shoulder as Yui's arms wrapped protectively around her. On the sofa next to them were two envelopes, clearly theirs.
Long story short, as Belldandy distributed her packets of documents (that were no doubt appallingly genuine, for all that they were essentially forgeries) and gave explanations and details as required by their recipients, Peg ordered in breakfast from IHOP through GrubHub. Monday morning being a slow time, IHOP assembled more than a dozen assorted meals with an unexpected alacrity, and they arrived just a few minutes before Bell finished up. I carried the bags into the dining room and then began setting things out buffet-style. Glancing at the TROMMA wall clock (courtesy of IKEA, of course), I saw it wasn't yet 9:30 AM. Wow. Felt like it should be almost noon.
When Belldandy finished up, Peg said, "We've got breakfast set up for everyone in the dining room. Would you like to join us, Bell?" She stumbled a little over the diminutive, or maybe the name itself. I know that I wasn't as blase about being on a familiar basis with Belldandy as I was trying to act, and I suspected Peg felt the same, and I was both surprised and proud that she was handling things so well.
I glanced through the archway separating the dining room from the sitting area as Belldandy replied, "Thank you for the invitation, but I'm afraid I have to decline. Not only do I have other tasks that I must attend to, I'm also on Tokyo time, so it's well after dinner for me."
"Another time, maybe," Peg said. "You're always welcome here."
"Definitely," I added from where I stood in the archway. "Our doors -- and mirrors -- are always open for you." Not that we could possibly keep you out, I mused to myself with just a little bit of a smirk. But honestly, what were the odds we'd ever actually see her again, given her importance?
She giggled at that, then smiled that spotlight smile of hers again. "Thank you both so very much. I can't promise anything at this time, but you may see me again sooner than you might expect." Then to my surprise she embraced Peggy. When Belldandy released her and glanced towards where I stood several yards away, I bowed to her, and she returned it. Then she crossed to the mirror through which she had made her entrance. She touched a finger to it and it began to glow a brilliant white. Gracefully she lifted up off the ground, her toes pointed like a ballerina, as a hush fell across the room at the sight. Then she looked back at everyone, and gave a little wave. "Good-bye all! Good luck, and please don't worry!" she said, eliciting a chorus of farewells from all the girls as well as Sawako, before turning back to the mirror and sliding silently through it as though it were a sheet of mist instead of glass.
The room remained silent for almost a full minute after Belldandy's departure, until I grinned at Peggy and announced, "Well! That was a thing!" Then I looked out over all our brand-new friends and said, "Let's eat. And after breakfast, we'll get your living arrangements sorted out."
"Oh, yeah!" Jun cheered, pumping a fist in the air.
"Wait!" Yui cried. "I just realized -- if we're all here, who's going to take care of Ton-chan?"
"Well," I said as I toed off my sneakers at the front door. "That took less time than I expected."
Peggy, doing the same, murmured, "Yeah." We had quickly finished parceling out apartments from among the finished units to all our new residents and helping them move their stuff in. The whole thing took only a couple hours once breakfast was done, because everyone pretty much already knew who they wanted to bunk with. However, in the process it became obvious that our tenants had arrived with only the bare minimum of clothes and toiletries -- enough for a weekend trip at most. We were going to have to arrange one or more shopping runs, probably to Brunswick Square Mall down Route 18, over the next couple days. Fortunately, one telephone call later and Funtom let us know that transportation would be provided, as long as we gave them at least a day's notice.
Which we did.
Meanwhile, once everyone had gotten moved in, there had been a mass migration back to the community center for lunch -- pizza ordered in from one of the places we use near the Rutgers campus. As everyone ate their fill, they also explored the center and its facilities -- including the rehearsal rooms and the studio. I wasn't too surprised to find Nao drooling almost as much over the control panel as she did over the pizza, and we quickly had to drag her out before imposing a "no food" rule for the studio. It didn't take too much more time before everyone ate their fill, and as we cleaned up and put the few leftovers in the fridge in the kitchen, I noticed that various musical instruments had started (re)appearing around the sectional. Color me surprised. A jam session was already starting in one of the rehearsal rooms when we took our leave of our new neighbors -- in the process confirming that Funtom had sprung for the good soundproofing.
"What'd you think about meeting Belldandy for real?" I asked as I tossed my shoes on the boot tray. "And getting basically on first-name basis with her?"
She just laughed. "Wow."
I grinned. "Yeah." Stepping out of the foyer and into our new living room, I dropped into my favorite chair. "You know what? If we ever see her again we should set up a meeting between her and Kat. They could practically be sisters, after all." I thought for a moment then added, "You think they're all going to be okay?"
Peggy curled up at one end of the leather couch and pulled out her cell phone. "Our new tenants? I hope so. I'd probably be a mess in their situation, but they mostly seem to be in good spirits and determined to come through it all."
I nodded. "Yui and Ui are used to being on their own, the only big adjustment for them will be going from their house to an apartment. Most of the others are college students who were already on their own, too. It'll probably hit them eventually, but not right away." I laughed as a thought struck me. "Mugi's probably thoroughly delighted that she's now an effectively anonymous girl of limited means and has to do all those 'ordinary people' things for real."
Peg barked a laugh. "She would, too, wouldn't she?"
"Yup." I chuckled to myself. "Bet you ten bucks she gets tired of it before the end of the first week."
"I don't know," she replied. "She stuck with that fast food job in the anime for how long?"
"Mm. You may be right." I chuckled as a mildly evil idea occurred to me. "I gotta find the right moment to go 'Tetsuoooooo!' at Akira."
She looked up from her cell phone. "Tetsuo?" She furrowed her brow for a moment, then her eyes widened. "Oh, god, Bob, that's awful. And you know, she's probably heard that like a million times already."
"Maybe, maybe not," I said, still chuckling. "It's, what, a twenty-five-year-old movie even in her time. What're the odds?"
She just rolled her eyes and went back to her phone. "Just don't do it while I'm around."
"No guarantees," I replied, and she rolled her eyes again. "So. I think we handled that pretty well given that we had no idea what we were doing."
Peg chuckled. "I don't think anyone Funtom's hired really knows what they're doing. Not yet, at least."
"True that. You'd think they'd have done up a guidebook, or at least a 'welcome' pamphlet for the managers," I said. "And maybe one for the displacees, too," I added after a moment's thought.
"That's not a bad idea," she said.
I hopped up out of my seat as another thought struck me.
"Where are you going now?" Peg demanded.
I gestured up the stairs. "I'm going to let the other managers know our first displacees arrived. Plus I just thought of something I want to ask them."
Bob Schroeck, 1:31 PM Wrote:Well. No one appears to be in the chat channel right now, so I'm posting an announcement here. Our first residents arrived this morning -- the cast of "K-On!". And not just the anime but the "College" and "High School" manga, too, which means we got the whole junior varsity band as well as the "rival" band OnNaGumi from the former's storyline. Oh, and Sawa-chan, of course. <grin> Plus a special guest appearance by none other than Belldandy, of all beings, who was playing courier with their paperwork for some reason. Probably because she was the only one available -- I doubt we'll ever see her around these parts again, given her importance.
Anyway, three whole bands and Sawa-chan pretty much explains why Funtom sprang for rehearsal rooms and a recording studio. They clearly knew who was incoming. Which leads me to an uncomfortable question. Everybody else who's shown up on the Managers' Board so far is managing a small residence -- a dozen or twenty rooms or so, something like that, right? Usually something run down that needs work, so Funtom got it on the cheap. So why the hell did they buy an entire garden apartment complex that can house hundreds of people here? Why are they dumping money into it for renovations it really doesn't need, especially when compared to your places? What in (any) god's name is heading our way?
I really had a fun morning meeting everyone despite a little drama, getting them settled in, and then having a pizza party. I really didn't need to end the day by wondering about things like this. I'm probably not going to sleep well tonight.
Meanwhile, I've just realized we need to organize a grocery run. Ah well. No rest for the wicked.
Rob Donaldson, 2:26 PM Wrote:Sorry I missed you, Bob. It was my turn to wash up after lunch. Re your complex that's larger than anybody else's, I hope that this means you're going to be the designated get-together site and you need the rooms for guests to crash in. You know, five or six dozen people come over each week for a V&V session that runs into the late evening. <grin> Better get a few extra beds from IKEA or somewhere, just in case.
Although now I'm worried, too. I have room for two dozen residents, but there are only five people here besides me. When am I going to get more tenants? I already have cellphones for five of them, but for Reasons-with-a-capital-R I can't read the owners' names yet.
If your resident bands decide to make use of the recording studio, put me down for two copies, one for me and the other for Saten-san. (That girl downloads more music than she'll ever be able to listen to.) Of course I'll pay for them.
And don't be so sure about never seeing Belldandy again. Skuld showed up for a couple of minutes during my job interview, and she said she'd show up again. She didn't say when, though.
Heather Raven, 3:08 PM Wrote:Umm, hi? I just got recruited for this project and told about this board.
I'm managing a church in Philadelphia that's been converted into apartments. There are sixty-three units between it and the rectory next door. Well, I guess sixty-two are available since I'm moving into one of them.
So, it's not that tiny but doesn't seem to be as big as Bob's place.
No tenants yet, but it sounds like I may not have a lot of time to prep. Thankfully, my budget includes funds for the purchase of a vehicle. I'm gonna need it.
Douglass Gardens Apartments
Thursday, September 15, 2016
Yui stopped short upon entering the community center after the last class of the day, causing Ritsu and Mio to almost run into her and each other. "Look!" she cried.
"Whoa," Ritsu murmured. "Is that...?"
Before she could finish, Yui had dropped her bookbag and dashed across the large, open room to press her face up against an aquarium that hadn't been there the night before. "It is!" she declared, her diction someone impaired because of the glass flattening half of her face. "It's Ton-chan!"
"Huh," Ritsu said, glancing at Mio. "Whaddaya know. I'd'a never guessed our pet turtle was important enough to merit a rescue, too."
Douglass Gardens Apartments
Friday, September 16, 2016
Peg and I were in the middle of breakfast when we got another 8 AM call on the internal "Manager" phone. We looked at each other across the corner of the table where we sat at right angles to each other.
"You don't think...?" I began, a forkful of scrambled egg still in my hand halfway to my mouth.
She sighed. "Probably."
I put my fork back down on my plate, pushed my chair back and got to my feet. "Care to take a wild guess who it might be?"
"No," she declared, making a "don't be stupid" face at me.
The phone kept ringing as I left the dining room and stepped into the "office" area. Suppressing a perfectly reasonable sense of deja vu, I picked up the handset, hit the "answer/on" button and said, "Yes?"
"Um, I'm sorry, but my friends and I just woke up in, um, in your sitting room?" said a girl's voice, very formal and upper-class in tone.
Oh, yeah. Here we go again.
-- Bob
I have been Roland, Beowulf, Achilles, Gilgamesh, Clark Kent, Mary Sue, DJ Croft, Skysaber. I have been
called a hundred names and will be called a thousand more before the sun grows dim and cold....
I have been Roland, Beowulf, Achilles, Gilgamesh, Clark Kent, Mary Sue, DJ Croft, Skysaber. I have been
called a hundred names and will be called a thousand more before the sun grows dim and cold....
