2016-10-14: A Serotinal Frolic

[Bob Schroeck]

A Serotinal Frolic
A "KanriKyara" Story
by Brent Laabs

Chapter 1 - Planning
1.1 - An Alarming Development

Friday, October 14, 2016

It was a few minutes to eleven when I heard a knock on the door to the apartment manager's office. I took my time getting up to answer, so the knocking grew louder, more insistent.

"Hi, can I help?" I looked down to notice my visitor, a Japanese girl in blue jeans and an Godzilla-branded oversized tee, tied in a knot above the midriff. "Oh. It's you." The pest had come to visit me again.

"I'm having a problem with my computer, Brent."

"Uh huh."

"The interface is too complicated. Can I get a Chobit instead?"^[1]

"We don't have those. Not invented yet."

"Okay, how about a boomer?"

"It's 2016, not 2040."

"Well, what do you have?" Tomo pushed her way inside my apartment, and ducked into the office. She declared, "Aha, look at that, two monitors!" as if it was proof.

I sighed. "My setup is even older than yours, Tomo. You don't need to hack the Gibson, and neither do I."

"But what about this thing," she pointed to a keypad and a set of blinkenlights in the wall.

"That's the security system Washuu-chan installed last night. I guess it has some sort of space-grade security, so there are probably force fields or floating column things. But mostly it's just to let other apartments know so we can be good neighbors if something goes wrong."

"Ah, a Good Neighbor System."

"Sure, I guess you could call it that. Whatever." It was yet another weird nickname from Tomo. I picked up the security system's manual, "Actually, I was just trying to figure out how it all worked."

I had actually meant to talk to her about how it worked at the time, but even as Washuu-chan and her robots installed the system around the property, she spent the rest of her time convincing me of the benefits of being her guinea pig. I got out of the conversation with all of my body parts intact, and a with a lot more help for my residents.

We were one of the very first residences to get the security system installed, because I had pressed for it after hearing that a God-damned Predator had shown up in Canada. None of my residents stood a chance in combat among a wide variety of scaries in fiction, being completely normal human beings (and a Mars cat), so I wanted to be able to call for backup. At that point, as far as I knew, it only connected to the Masaki residence, but that was plenty. If you could call in Tenchi and Ryoko for backup, there'd be no need for panic.

Tomo asked me, "So what does this red button do?"

"That's the panic button. If we're under attack or see something big, it calls for help."

"Oh, cool."

I looked back to the book.

"So uh, how do you turn the panic button off?"

I glanced over — a red light started flashing on the device, and the panic button itself was glowing a nice warm red. "What did you do?"

"Well, the button looked so big and red, it was basically asking me to push it!"^[2]

"Tomo, you idiot!"

"Don't mind, don't mind. Just turn it off."^[3]

I flipped through the manual. I quoted, "Enter the DAC, then hold PANIC and RESET for three seconds. What the hell is a DAC?"

"Don't look at me!"

I started flipping through pages at random, trying to figure out what to do next.

Tomo declared, "I'm just gonna try the Panic and Reset button thing." Three seconds later, and a flashing blue light joined the urgent red lights. "I don't think that worked."

"What now?" I read the display, "What's 'Crisis Mode'?"

It turned out that the panic button really lived up to its name, in terms of the amount of panic we were feeling. "I don't know, but what are those things coming out of the ceiling?"

Rotating beacon lights, from the look of it. The room took on a rosy glow, which was not how I was feeling, "Tomo, I turn my back on you for ten seconds, and you cause this? What the hell is wrong with you?"

"Hey, it's not my fault you don't know how to work your security system," she countered.

I yelled back, "Even an idiot knows not to push buttons randomly. What are you, three?"

I could see Tomo say something angry in reply, but I couldn't hear it over the klaxons going off.

"What's going on?" The door to my apartment slammed open as Akira came in, with Alicia following in her wake.

"Technical difficulties," I screamed over the klaxons.

In the corner of my bedroom sat a full-length mirror. I saw the glass of the mirror begin to shimmer, then distort, as a woman in elaborate robes flew through the mirror as if it were a portal to another world.

"Can I help?" Belldandy asked.

Not even realizing who it was, I yelled, "Yeah, you can help by shutting off the alarm that this idiot set off."

"If you had read that book better we wouldn't be in this situation," Tomo said, sticking out her tongue.

"You think this is all a big joke, don't you? You really are a fucking moron!"

"Maybe we need a better manager."

"Maybe it's time I throw you out on the streets."

"You wouldn—"

"You alway—"

Belldandy simply said, "Silence", and everything, everyone was quiet, including the alarm. She picked up the book, and quickly keyed in the code for a false alarm.

By this time we had attracted a crowd of residents trying to figure out what was going on. The first to get her voice back was Osaka. "Who's she?"

By now Tomo and I had actually looked at our new guest, and realized who exactly she was, but she introduced herself to the group anyway. "Good morning, I'm Belldandy, Goddess First Class, unlimited. I've been hoping to visit you, but I've been very busy lately with the… situation."

"Oh, that's okay." Osaka replied. "Ganbare ne."

Tomo began, "Belldandy-sama, I–"

"Tomo, it's okay to be funny, but doing things that inconvenience a lot of other people isn't very polite. I'm disappointed in you."^[4]

"I'm— I'm really sorry!" Tomo bowed deeply to Belldandy, then turned towards the rest of us and bowed once again. "I'm really really sorry, okay?"

Yomi looked at everyone else in the room with a look of incredulity. "Wha? Are you seeing this?" she whispered.

Chiyo just shrugged in reply. Tomo's apologies were a rare event indeed.

"And Brent," Belldandy turned to face me. "It works best if you're calm in a crisis — and there's never an excuse to berate your tenants. I expected more from our valued apartment managers."

It was phrased really politely, but it struck me like a shot to the heart. I could feel the clear timbre of every one of her words in my brain. And I could see the truth: I had screwed up badly, enough to annoy Her Holiness.

It was like a weight crushing my heart, making the words just tumble out my mouth, "I'm sorry Miss, uh, Lady Belldandy. I didn't realize — not that it's an excuse — I behaved poorly to both you and Tomo, and I, uh, apologize to both of you. I'm really sorry, Tomo."

It took all my willpower just to keep my eyes off the ground.

Belldandy had just said I was valued, so no matter how worthless I felt right then, I knew I couldn't trust that emotion. But I knew I could do better. I don't know if what I felt then was magical or just Belldandy being herself — and her being a goddess, I'm not sure that there's a meaningful distinction.

She smiled at us, with that graceful mien, and it felt a lot better. "Well, that's settled." She turned to the crowd that had assembled in the hallway outside the manager's office, and asked, "Is there anything else that needs to be addressed here?"

Most everyone outside was still in awe of what had happened. Akari's mouth was agape in that expression she always did when something unexpected happened. As it happened, after plenty of silence, Osaka was the first to react, "Why'n'cha stay for lunch? I'm baking a soufflé right now."

Yomi turned to Osaka and murmured incredulously, "You are?"

"I'm sorry, I'd really like to stay, but I have to attend to some important matters."

"Ah well, another time!" Osaka spoke with her drawl.

"Of course. Good-bye, all!" Belldandy re-entered my bedroom, then stepped into the mirror and out of our plane of existence.

Akari said, "What the heck just happened?"

"Just stupid people being stupid," Yomi said in a fake aside: quietly, but loud enough so that everyone could hear anyway.

"No, the lady, was she... really?"

Chiyo said, "She says a goddess first class, and it sure seemed like that to me."

Akira said, "For sure. There's something in the way she moves that calls to you."

"I wish I could be so graceful," Akari said.

"Good news then, Single! It's time for more practice!"

"Hahi!"

Osaka interrupted, "Oh! My baking!" Osaka immediately exited outside to climb the building's outer stairwell.

Through all of this, Tomo and I just kind of stood there, looking shell-shocked. Yomi finally broke it up, "Oh-kay, show's over. C'mon Tomo, you've caused enough damage today."

As Yomi grabbed Tomo's hand to lead her away, she whimpered, "I'm sorry."

---

Only a few minutes later, I heard a knock at my door again. I checked the peephole just to be sure it wasn't her. I just wasn't ready to face Tomo yet, not after I acted that way. To my relief, it was just a lone Osaka, holding a plate, staring off into space as she waited for me. I took a breath, and opened the door.

"Hi Brent. I had some extra soufflé, and Ah thought you might be a mite peckish." She thrust the plate forward with both hands, offering it in the Japanese style. A cheesy, eggy, savory smell filled the hallway of my apartment.

"Thanks. I guess I am a little hungry, now that I've smelled that." I tried to take the plate from her, but somehow managed to pull her inside the apartment along with the food.

Osaka slipped by me and headed towards my dining table. "Aw, it fell already," she said, inspecting the slice of her soufflé, which was bit flatter than she had hoped by the time she made it downstairs.

I simply sighed and followed her.

"Now, Don't be all down in the dumps, hun." she said, in her mysteriously Southern America accent. Osaka, for all that she was offbeat and quirky, was quite the straight-shooter. "We all know what a... a bitch Tomo can be. I mean, not like a bitch in Japan, that's different, that kind's one of them, uh..."

"Sluts." I knew a little Japanese — I learned all of the worst words first, naturally.

"That's it. She's not a slut. Anyway, Tomo can be a right American bitch. From Japan."

"I know, but I'm twice her age. I shouldn't—" I trailed off.

"Everyone falls down, once in a blue moon. Just like my soufflé. Eat it anyway." She set the food down on the tabletop like a waitress serving an imaginary customer, "Here ya go."

"Alright." I took a fork from the drawer beneath the kitchen counter, sat down, and took a bite of Osaka's baking. "Mmm... Hey, this is pretty good."

"Ah used three different cheeses to broaden the flavor."

"Whatever you did is pretty good."

"Aw shucks." Osaka talked while I finished the lunch she had brought me. "Ya know, I don't think no one was acting their best this mornin'. Like take, f'r'instance, in the case of Belldandy: She seems pretty darn stressed. Ah mean, she's so pretty an' all, but she really looked like she needs a vacation."

I asked, "Do goddesses even take vacations?"

"Of course! Amaterasu did!"

"Does that count?"

"Yup. Oh, and Persephone, too."

I gave in under the weight of her "logic," before I managed to start a row over something even stupider. "Sure, why not."

"Anyway, y'all oughta make up. Tomo's a barrel o' fun, most of the time." Osaka picked up the plate she had brought, now empty.

I didn't have the appetite to see Tomo any time soon. "I don't know, I don't think it'll help."

As she walked out of my apartment, she reiterated, "You should make nice with Tomo, and that's a grain of truth!"

But I didn't go see her. I just threw myself into quiet work for a while, organizing some papers. Letting people know about the false alarm earlier. That kind of stuff. Whatever I could do to avoid people for a while.

1.2 - Arrested for Tagging

A couple men knocked on the door of Kagura's apartment, who announced themselves as: "Mattress delivery!"

"Aw sweet. I can finally get rid of that soft bed! Come on in!"

A couple signatures later, and the deliverymen were back down to carry up Kagura's new bed. This was actually one of their easier jobs, as the mattress could fit in the elevator.

While Kagura removed all of the sheets off her old bed, Osaka went to the door to let them carry in the new mattress. Pretty soon, Kagura was testing out her new bed and the deliverymen left; little did they know that the apartment door was left open.

"Ah, finally. Much better for my back!" Kagura enthused.

Osaka decided, "The new bed doesn't look so comfy. I like a bed you can really sink down inta, ya know? Like you can be all wrapped up in a fluffy world at night."

Kagura wiggled around a little, and caught a bit of a distracting rustle from the end of the bed. "Well, I like it, but it needs one thing."

She walked over to the desk, picked up a pair of scissors, and made for the end of the bed.

"Nooooo!" Osaka dramatically leapt across the floor and wrenched the scissors out of Kagura's hand. Or so she planned; what actually happened resembled nothing more than a short-range belly-flop on dry land.

A couple squeezes of the shears later, Kagura declared, "All done!" The offending mattress tag held in her hands.

A voice came from the floor, "What have you done!?"

"Um..."

Osaka slowly got herself up, and dusted off her dress. She took a long look at Kagura, then snatched the slip of fabric out of her hands. Holding it in front of Kagura's face, Osaka said, "You can't cut the tag off a mattress! It's a crime!"

Kagura read the tag, "Oh, huh. Weird."

"I can't imagine, Kagura living a life of crime. I guess you'll be on the run from the law now, livin' life on the lam. When you're out there riding the rails from town to town, hiding from the lawman, I hope you remember me fondly."

"What?"

"If you leave now, you can still escape the fuzz, but ya gotta hurry!"

"It's really not that big of a deal, Osaka."

A woman's voice called through the still-open door of the apartment, "FREEZE, POLICE!"

"Oh crap!"

"Too late now," Osaka drawled.

"Tag cutting is forbidden! Surrender now, or… or else!" the voice called out.

Another woman spoke, with a little less enthusiasm, "You're in mega trouble now."

"It was just a mattress tag!" Kagura trembled, too afraid to look into the hallway to see her accusers.

"Save it for the judge," the first voice insisted.

"I'll be visitin' you in the big house, Kagura."

Kagura crept out of her room into the hallway of her apartment, hands above her head. She turned her head, and saw Aika poised towards her, her fingers pointed in the shape of a gun.

Aika got out, "Book 'em, Alice", before cracking up completely.

"You two are really mean," Kagura accused.

"You two are mega idiots," Alice confirmed.

1.3 - Double Iniquity

Around dinner time, I slipped out to eat some fast food. I had Subway, of course, because sometimes you want a sandwich as sad as you feel.^[5] By the time I got back, the sun's light was a dim pink glow off a few clouds to the west, and Tomo was waiting outside of the door to number 1. I had to hand it to her — she was much braver than I.

Tomo walked up to me, "You know, I'm still really sorry about earlier."

I returned her apology, "Me too. More sorry than you can imagine. Well, maybe you can imagine."

"Yeah..."

"Well, you don't deserve my temper. No one does."

"She told me off too, even worse. I'm like a hundred times more sorry than you!" Tomo declared.

"Is it a competition?"

"Yeah, for worst person in the world. You'll never catch up."

"It was just a lapse in judgment."

"I do that all the time, though. And the insults, I'm like…" Tomo shivered instead of finishing her thought.

"I think that trick of hers, the way she made us feel — it wouldn't have worked if we weren't good people. Like, you compare yourself to the way you want to be. You're a good person, Tomo Takino."

"As are you, Brent Laabs." She jumped on me and gave me a hug. And for the first time that day, I felt content.

We kept the embrace for far longer than I expected, over a couple of minutes, neither of us wanting to let go of the peace we found.

I finally broke the silence, "I think I know why people in the Bible always feared the angels at first."

Tomo agreed, "I know, right? If that's what self-reflection feels like, I'm gonna stick with consumerism and pop culture."

I tapped her on the head. "Idiot", I called her, snickering.

---

Saturday, October 15, 2016

The next morning, there was a knock on my door. And there she was again. Quelle surprise.

Tomo said, "Hey, I need some help with my ceiling fan."

"Oh, okay. Not working?" Finally a real issue!

"Yeah, it's going too fast, and I want it to go really slow so you can see it, like in film noir."

I slapped my hand to my forehead. "Really?"

"This is L.A. right? What if I need to catch a dame for life insurance fraud?"^[6]

"Actually, how do fan speed regulators work anyway?"

Tomo offered, "Wanna find out together?"

---

Yomi walked into her apartment, and tried to make sense of why the ceiling fan was disassembled. "What are you two up to?"

I set down my soldering iron to tell her, "We're trying to make the fan run slower."

"Oh, I see," Yomi said. "May I ask why?"

"Because a moll like me needs to have the right mood, see?" Tomo declared.

"Oh, the film noir thing again. Up to no good, I see."

"Doll, I'm always up to no good."

"Don't complain to me when you get too hot, okay?"

I said, "Don't worry, it's almost the rainy season. It will start getting cold pretty soon."

Tomo said, "It still feels summery now."

"Not for too much longer," I said. "Around here, it starts to get cold by the end of the month, at least in the nights."

Yomi inveighed, "That's totally unfair."

"Huh?"

"We never got a summer this year, and I completely missed summer diet season. Now I'm just going to get even chubbier with the winter weight!" she grumbled.

"That is totally unfair! Missing the summer of the full flower of our youth!" Tomo despaired.

Yomi moped, "Rest in peace, my precious summer days, you left before your time."

People think of Koyomi and Tomo as opposites, but then there are these times when they're on exactly the same wavelength. "Oh, come on! You get a whole new world of the future, and like, we have smartphones, and like, remote-control ceiling fans and stuff!"

"That hardly makes up for the dwindling summer days."

"At least it's still warm now." And then Tomo got a look on her face. "Hey, I know, we need to have a summer festival while it's still summer! Let's roll Tanabata and Obon and a beach party all in one!"

"All together?" Yomi asked.

"Sure, why not, it will be mega fun!"

"Okay, 'Alice.' Well, we are at the beach, after all." Yomi looked at the weather forecast on her phone. "It's going to be a hot day tomorrow, so we better do it then. Looks like it starts to cool off after that."

"See, smartphones!" I tried to stick up for my era.

Ignoring me, Yomi pointed out, "We don't have beach gear. Or swimsuits."

"We better get crackin' then!" Tomo cheered, "Let's go!" She bounded out the door, while Yomi and I followed behind.

1.4 - Boys and Girls

Yomi knocked on the door to Apartment 11; Tomo found the door unlocked and simply charged in, calling, "Hey, gals, we're going shopping for swimsuits. C'mon! You gotta look your best for the beach party!"

"What beach party, again?" asked Osaka, who just assumed she had forgotten.

"The one we're throwing tomorrow," Yomi said.

"I already have a swimsuit," Kagura noted. In fact, she had asked me for a drive to the sporting goods store to get a proper competition suit, cap, and goggles on the third day here. She easily would have had the title of the apartment's water fairy, except for those six undines who claimed it first.

Tomo shook her head, "Not that kind of swimsuit, a cute one!"

"Can I?" Kagura pleaded, looking at me, "You've been so kind of us already."

I thought about who my boss was, and how I didn't want to make false moves. "Yeah, of course!" Kagura in a two-piece would inspire lust, which was probably on Sebastian's list of acceptable uses. "The sexier the better, probably."

Yomi looked at me with half-lidded eyes. "Brent..."

"Okay, I was just thinking about what my boss would think and —ow!" Yomi reached up and offered a quick karate chop to the head. Yeah, I had earned that. In retrospect, I think this was the first time she called me by my given name, and her first tsukkomi for me too. Neither would be the last. Oh, far from it.

They headed downstairs to informed the rest of the residents about the plan, and were lucky enough to find the six undines just returned from an excursion of their own. They quickly drafted Athena to drive Rocinante^[7] , or whatever we were going to name the van, to take them all to mall.

A few minutes later, everyone was ready, and Osaka called out "Operation Beachwear, assemble!" By this point, everyone but Kaorin had already assembled; she arrived about a minute later wearing a fresh layer of make-up.

As they made their way to the van, they began discussing all of the other things they would need for a party, like drinks, beach blankets, watermelons, and the like.
On her way out the door, Yomi called back to ask me, "Hey Brent, can you take care of that mess the two of you made in our apartment?"

"Yeah, sure." I mean, I didn't have anything better to do with everyone gone, and electronics work would probably go faster without Tomo hovering over me anyway.

And just like that, they were all gone. I wasn't invited to the swimsuit shopping expedition, sadly. They didn't even need me along to pay for things, since Alicia got the company card.

Everything I had learned about anime girls suggested that swimsuit shopping would be a fanservice-laden affair, which is probably why I got the boot, along with my dumb mouth. Damnit. At least, unlike Rob's group, there wouldn't be any boa constrictors involved in my group's swimwear shopping.

Actually, poor Rob. It was probably snowing up there in Canada, and here we were planning a beach party in California's serotinal days.

And had Snake Girl even shown up in the Frozen North? I knew there were a swarm of Index characters in Ottawa but I couldn't remember if that particular one had shown up. What was her name? Oh right, Kongou, like the warship.^[8] That anime had too damn many espers coming out of the woodwork to keep track of everyone.

I hopped on my computer to search the forums for her. If this many people were going to keep showing up, I mused, we'd probably need more than a forum, we'd need a wiki to keep track of them all.

And looking at the size of my apartment building, I might need a page just to keep track of my own residents. Sure, the remodel wasn't finished, but was Heaven going to have empty rooms in their divine plan? Would my demonic boss waste money on empty rooms? I mean, inshallah our folks could go back to their own universe before it became an issue, but if God is having trouble willing things, who knows?

I distractedly wondered who would come to live with us in the future. Maybe Anthy Himemiya? Now that was a girl you trust to only bring smaller reptiles, like garden snakes, on a shopping trip. Much more sensible, that one.

I took the time to reassemble the fan, and tested out the new speed. I pointed a floor lamp at the fan, and watched the shadow of the blades make a lumbering arc across the ceiling. It was nice and atmospheric. Finally, I took a permanent marker to the fan's remote control, labeling the buttons, "UP HIGH", "DOWN LOW", and "TOO SLOW".

With that done, the apartment building suddenly felt very quiet. With our construction crews gone for the weekend and most of the residents away, it felt a little lonely. The low afternoon sun flooded through the windows, and I realized how long they had been shopping. Well, that was fine. Anyway, if all of the girls were gone, I was going to have my very own sausage party right here with all of us guys left behind. After a quick trip to the kitchen, I came out with a tray and headed to the other end of the hall.

After knocking, I called out, "Hey Aria, you want a bite of some summer sausage?"

I heard an encouraging "Punyuu" from the other side of the door, followed by the latch unclicking. I have no idea how that white cat could open the door, but he did enjoy the sausage. "Come on, let's grab Tadakichi and head out on the town."

I wouldn't say our walk around the neighborhood was as fun as my imagination of that bathing suit shopping trip, but it was probably more fun than the reality. And Tadakichi-san definitely had more fun sniffing random trees and nibbling on sausage bites than he would had in a clothing store, that was for sure.

---

1. BL: While American fans picked up the term "persocom" from Chobits, that's just the normal Japanese word for PC, their shortening of "personal computer." The translation effect doesn't translate fandom mistakes.
   
2. BL: Pushing the big red button is something Tomo did in canon in her dreams, but how it turned out in reality looks dangerously like character development.
   
3. BL: This is Japanese English (wasei-eigo), where they use donmai as short for "I don't mind", which can sometimes be used in a "don't worry" context. Your main exposure to this word is likely through Danbooru.
   
4. BL: This section is inspired by that one chapter of the Symphony of the Sword where Corwin said that Belldandy disappointed is even worse than her being upset.
   
5. BL: I stole this joke from my ex-girlfriend, who I believe wrote it originally (and probably meant it literally).
   
6. BL: Tomo liking film noir is probably a carry-over from my last major fic, Interpol Manzai. But early Lupin III (green jacket) is rather noir, as are Jigen-focused episodes, so it's not that much of stretch from canon. The movie she's referencing about insurance is Double Indemnity, which is a true classic.
   
7. BL: Don Quixote's horse, but also the name of John Steinbeck's truck camper, the latter of which is inspiring me here.
   
8. BL: Her name just sounds like the warship. Her surname means "marriage-queen", the warship means "vajra".
   

[Norgarth]

But I didn't go see her. I just through myself into quiet work for a while, organizing some papers.

typo, should be 'threw' rather than 'through'

Not familiar with the characters so I can't tell if you're getting the personalities down or not.

[Bob Schroeck]

Huh. I have that fixed on the AO3 copy, how'd I miss that here? Oh, well, fixing now. Thank you, Norgarth.