2016-09-13: Sailors on Foreign Shores
12-17-2022, 04:59 PM (This post was last modified: 04-16-2024, 01:58 PM by Bob Schroeck.)
12-17-2022, 04:59 PM (This post was last modified: 04-16-2024, 01:58 PM by Bob Schroeck.)
Blossom Apartments, Ottawa, Ontario, Canada
September 13th, 2016
9:20am ET
"Rob-san, I'm bored."
Oh, dear, thought Rob. Kuroko is bored. The last thing I need is her trying to seduce Mikoto - and by "seduce" I mean "make a clumsy and/or boorish pass at". Not her fault - she's barely old enough to know what sex is - but I'm the one who would have to clean up the ensuing wreckage when Railgun rejected her advances yet again.
"Do you have all your purchases sorted yet?"
"Sorted and put in closets or drawers."
Rob recalled that Kuroko had bought the least in the way of clothing while they were out the previous day. "What do you usually do at this time of day?"
"Attend classes."
Rob nodded, and decided to call a few friends of his in the school system.
11:15am ET
"What are these?"
"Practice exams. I want to know what grade each of you should be attending in the local school system."
5:45pm ET
Rob expected nothing less, having heard where students from Ontario often end up being sorted into schools in Newfoundland, and having seen some of the things they discussed in class during the Railgun anime. "I'm not surprised that your weakest subject is Canadian history. Honestly, I'd be more surprised if any of you knew anything about it. Setting that subject aside, do any of you have any problems being the youngest students in your class?" He turned to Mii. "And, given your results, Konori-san, you need to decide which university to attend."
Ruiko grinned. "Are we really that much smarter than the average here?"
"It looks that way to me. Of course, these aren't the official tests. And we need to get school transcripts for each of you. Until the school board gets those, they might not let you attend class."
Kazari frowned. "Our schools are in another universe."
"I know. I've asked people like us living in some other cities whether they can help with that."
"What'll we do until then, Rob-san?"
"I don't know about you, but I'm getting hungry. Anybody want to go out for dinner and see another part of the city?"
ByWard Market, Ottawa, Ontario, Canada
6:20pm ET
"Please stick close to me, ladies," Rob asked while they got off the bus. "The Byward Market is a tourist trap, and I don't want to have to search for any of you."
Kuroko gave him that look. "We do have GPS on our phones."
He nodded. "True, but GPS doesn't tell you which alleys you shouldn't walk down in a busy neighbourhood."
"Point taken. What kind of food are we going to get?"
"I'm thinking going to a buffet will let you sample a lot of different North American foods." Seeing four blank looks, I added, "I think you call it a Viking."
While the group walked past the bookstore, Rob noticed a very pretty Asian girl with short hair that was the shade of black that looked to have blue highlights, probably about Mikoto and Kuroko's age, reading a very thick book. He wondered for a moment where he had seen her before... then hurried to tell Kuroko (who'd taken the lead) to turn right at the corner.
7:55pm ET
"I think I won't be able to eat for a week!"
"Why did we take so much food?"
"And why did they keep taking our empty plates away? I lost track of how much I ate!"
The only one who wasn't complaining about the size of the meal they'd just finished was Mii. Rob stepped closer to her and asked, "What did you think of the buffet?"
"The food had a bit too much starch for my taste."
"They do that on purpose. The food is a set price no matter how much you eat. The drinks are charged by the glass."
"That makes sense. Draw people in with an inexpensive meal, and get them to pay more than they should on extras. Are you sure you can afford this?"
Rob nodded as he replied, "As long as it's just the six of us, I can afford to treat everybody to a meal out once or twice a month."
"So we could do this more often if I found a part-time..." She stopped, because Mikoto had stopped in front of her.
Kuroko noticed, looked where Mikoto was looking, and also stopped.
Ruiko looked puzzled. "What's wrong?"
Mii pointed down the alleyway that the three girls were looking into. "Do you see that mark, Saten-san?"
"It looks to me like somebody burned something against the wall."
Mikoto shook her head. "Sort of. That's an electrical arc burn."
"You're sure?" asked Rob. She just gave him an are-you-really-that-stupid? look. "Of course you're sure."
Kazari cleared her throat. "You haven't been down here lately, have you, Misaka-san?"
"We've been together every time we've left the apartment building, Uiharu-san. I've never been here before. But it does look like something I would have left if I was fighting off an attacker."
"Not quite," Kuroko added. "The angle of the burn on the wall indicates it came from somebody taller than you."
"You're right, it does. That means there's another electrokinetic somewhere nearby."
Rob swore under his breath. He knew how Mikoto thought in this kind of situation: no doubt she wanted to fight whoever this other electrokinetic is, just to see who's stronger. He decided then and there that he had to make sure that didn't happen - at least, not downtown where there were innocent bystanders who didn't know enough to realize they needed to run away from a metahuman battle.
Then he wondered why he was thinking of that Asian girl that he'd noticed at the bookstore. She seemed to be shorter than Mikoto, not taller.
September 14th, 2016
10:10 am ET
Rob kept telling himself that he wasn't shirking his duties, really.
There are some lovely food shops in the ByWard Market, alongside the farmers' stalls. The household needed groceries. Even though Rob could get similar groceries elsewhere in the city at a lower cost, they wouldn't be as good.
More importantly, Rob felt a need to find that electrokinetic before Mikoto did, and he couldn't do that if he wasn't in the right part of town.
But was this still the right part of town? The electrokinetic might have gone somewhere else after that incident.
Assuming there was an incident.
And that there is an electrokinetic.
Every bit of common sense indicated that this was impossible - an incident like that would have been mentioned in the news.
Every bit of common sense also indicated that people from A Certain Scientific Railgun couldn't live in Ottawa.
Rob kept looking for signs of an electrokinetic.
Two bunches of carrots, a basket of tomatoes, and a half-pound of Cheddar later, he noticed the girl that he'd seen at the bookstore a day ago. She was talking with somebody just outside of his field of view - another girl, from the sound of the voice. While he couldn't quite make out what they were saying, Rob could tell whoever the other person was, she was probably English. Received Pronunciation ... wait, no, that was Estuary English, not RP ... is a rather obvious accent, especially in Canada.
His curiosity got the better of him. Besides, there was a tea shop just past the two girls, and the apartment's supply of tea was approaching "none" fast.
The girls split up before he could get close enough to hear what they were saying. The pretty Asian girl headed toward that same bookstore, passing Rob along the way.
He rounded the corner that they were at, and saw another girl walking toward the busker stage near the tea shop.
She was Asian, and just as pretty as the other girl. She also had blonde hair. Down to her waist. Tied with a red ribbon.
Rob thought, It couldn't be.
Then he thought of the girls that he was looking after, and where they came from.
It could be.
He thought to look at his cellphone's contact list, where he discovered that none of the names were obscured any more.
It is. In the name of my own obliviousness, I will punish myself. Later.
Business before self-recrimination. Right now, he needed Mii's help - and she was back at the apartment.
Blossom Apartments, Ottawa, Ontario, Canada
11:45 am ET
"... and that's what I'm expecting to discover, Konori-san," finished Rob.
"I don't like doing that, Rob-san." Mii frowned. "It's an invasion of people's privacy, and I don't have a warrant."
"I know. But as long as we're keeping your existence here secret, we can't just walk up to someone and ask if he's from another universe. Besides, if they are who I think they are, they aren't going to take kindly to meeting others with powers."
Mii nodded. "You're right on that count. I remember reading that manga when I was a little girl. Everyone else with a power was their enemy."
"Here's hoping they're from the anime, not the manga. In the anime, only almost everyone else with a power was their enemy."
"That means we need a reason to visit the bookstore."
He grinned. "That's easy enough. If you're going to be majoring in criminology, you need textbooks. Or at least a copy of the Criminal Code."
"I already found that online."
"They don't know that."
Mii nodded in agreement, then changed the subject. "Are you sure it's them?"
"I'm sure," replied Rob. "My phone is finally showing me the names of the people who should get those other five phones that Ere gave me to give to you." He showed her the list.
"Wow. I recognize every one of those names."
ByWard Market, Ottawa, Ontario, Canada
1:20 pm ET
Once again, just like every time he visited, Rob thought that it was a lovely bookstore. Two stories (in height, there were more than two stories on the shelves), a large selection of less-common books, a separate section just for children, and plenty of comfortable seats.
He and Mii were paying more attention to the seats than to the books.
Finally they found her. Giving her a closer look, Rob thought that she had been wearing the same clothes for a few days - which supported his theory. He pointed her out to Mii.
The girl was reading through a copy of the Oxford Handbook of Clinical Medicine... and a store clerk was walking toward her. By the time Rob reached the corner she was in, the clerk was asking her to either make a purchase or leave the store.
Rob glanced at Mii. She nodded, pointing to her own skirt pocket. She's seen with her x-ray vision what he expected her to see in the girl's skirt pocket.
"Excuse me," interrupted Rob. "Would you have any reference works on the many-worlds interpretation of quantum mechanics?"
The clerk looked puzzled. "I'm sorry, but I don't know what you're asking about."
The girl smiled. "I saw some in the physics section, two aisles from the far wall, on the bottom shelf."
The clerk looked relieved. "Forget what I just said, miss. But please don't still be here in an hour."
As the clerk left, Rob turned to the girl. "As a token of my thanks, may I buy that book for you?"
She looked worried. "I couldn't put you to that trouble. It's an expensive book, mister ..."
"Donaldson. Rob Donaldson."
"Ami Mizuno."
And that clinched it, not that he was expecting anything different. He waved Mii over. "And this is Mii Konori, who is living with me while she applies for admission to university here. Konori-san, this is Ami Mizuno, who was kind enough to tell me where to find the book I wanted."
Mii smiled. "I'm pleased to meet you, Mizuno-san."
After he found a copy of DeWitt and Graham's The Many-Worlds Interpretation of Quantum Mechanics, he added that and the Oxford reference that Ami had been reading to the pile Mii was carrying, and they all went to the checkout. Good thing I can expense all of these books to Funtom, thought Rob. Most of them are expensive.
As the three of them were leaving the store, Rob said, "I don't know about you, Mii-san, but I wouldn't mind getting a drink."
She looked at him sternly. "You have to drive."
"I meant a coffee, or maybe some tea. It's too early in the day for alcohol." He turned to Ami. "Care to join us, Mizuno-san?"
1:45 pm ET
They sat at a table near the door of that tea shop that Rob hadn't visited earlier in the day. Mii ordered Oolong tea, while Rob ordered Earl Grey. Ami asked for a glass of water.
Rob engaged Ami in small talk while Mii looked through the stack of books. Rob was open; Ami was guarded - as she should be.
"Have you been in town long?"
"Only a few days."
"Have you let anyone know you're here?"
"Not yet; I don't know anyone in Ottawa."
"You really should tell somebody that you're here, even if it's only the local police. Oh, but somebody smart enough to make sense of the Oxford Handbook of Clinical Medicine already knows that, I'm sure."
She relaxed slightly after he suggested contacting the police. Mii put the last of her criminology books back in the bag, revealing a copy of The Incomplete Enchanter sitting on top of two other books. Ami smiled when she saw that book.
"Have you read that collection, Mizuno-san?"
She nodded. "Yes, I read it when I was in middle school. And now that I see it, the memories are giving me some comfort."
"I haven't read it yet, so please don't spoil it for me," replied Mii.
Ami nodded again. "I don't know whether that's a good example of the many-worlds interpretation, though," she said to Rob.
Mii and Rob quickly exchanged glances, and he winked. Mii sighed. "I have proof that it might not be correct in particulars, but the general idea is sound." She moved the copy of The Incomplete Enchanter to reveal the last two books in their purchase: the first two volumes of Bishojo Senshi Sailor Moon.
Ami's eyes went wide.
"Would you like to take those with you?" asked Rob. She just nodded. "Then please do. And here's a cellular telephone, with my number and Konori-san's number already programmed into speed-dial. Call us when you want to talk." He slowly pulled the white cellphone with Ami's name on it out of his pocket, and placed it on the table beside the medical reference and the manga.
He looked up and noticed that the blonde he'd seen earlier (who he was certain was Minako Aino) was singing at the nearby busker stage. Mii pointed her out to Ami as we left.
Walking back to the public parking garage, Mii asked, "What do we do now?"
"Now we wait. And now I really want to find that electrokinetic. In all versions of the story, Makoto's a good cook... and I'm pretty sure everybody knows by now that I know almost nothing about Japanese cooking."
Blossom Apartments, Ottawa, Ontario, Canada
September 15th, 2016
8:10am ET
Mii's cellphone rang.
As she excused herself from the table, Mikoto said, "Finally!"
"They're not calling to arrange a duel, Misaka-san." Rob sighed. "They don't even know you exist here, unless Mizuno-san accessed the Internet, looked up Konori-san, and found your Wikipedia article."
"Which she probably could do with the Mercury Computer, or definitely do with the phone that you gave her," added Kazari. "Why are you back to being on a last-name basis with us?"
Rob cocked his head and raised one eyebrow, momentarily puzzled about his own behaviour. "I'm sorry about that. Sometimes I remember that your standards on names are different than mine, and sometimes I don't. But we should make an effort to be reasonably formal when, or if, we go to meet the Sailor Senshi."
"I'm not calling oneesan 'Misaka-san'."
"I wouldn't mind you making the effort, Shirai-san."
"Oneesama!"
Mii gestured to Rob from the hallway. Once he had joined her there, she handed him her phone. "It's Tsukino-san."
He nodded. "Donaldson speaking. What can I do for you?"
"Donaldson-san, my name is Tsukino Usagi. I read the two volumes of manga that you left with Ami ... with Mizuno-san."
"I assume you found them to be something of a shock, Tsukino-san."
"More of a surprise, Donaldson-san. They had the general story right, but the details were all wrong."
So she wasn't from the manga continuity or Crystal, and probably not from the live-action version. "I have some bad news for you, then. Your life story was made into an anime - a very popular anime."
"Just a moment, please."
After a half-minute, Rob heard, "This is Mizuno. Usa... Tsukino-san asked me to speak with you while she went to sit down somewhere."
"I'm afraid that I told her something that she needed to know but wasn't ready to hear. I apologize for that."
"I understand. We called because we wanted to ask for your help." Rob heard a voice say "I don't!" in the background, but Ami kept talking. "We won't be able to stay here tonight."
"How many people are in your group?"
"There are five of us."
"Mizuno-san, I just happen to have more than five empty one-bedroom apartments available here. Each has a small kitchenette and its own bathroom. None of them have very much in the way of furniture, though."
"We would prefer sleeping on the floor to sleeping in an alleyway, Donaldson-san."
"I thought that might be the case, Mizuno-san. I cannot come downtown immediately, because of rush-hour traffic. Shall I meet you at the tea shop at 10 o'clock?"
"We will meet you there, Donaldson-san. Good day."
"Good day." After the call ended, Rob returned Mii's phone to her. "Considering Ami ordered water at the tea shop yesterday and Minako was busking for change, I suspect they have nothing in the way of funds. Mizuno-san very carefully did not tell me that they've been in a homeless shelter for a few days, and that they have to move on. They probably need a proper meal, a decent bath, and a change of clothes."
"How can we help?" asked Kazari, who had joined Mii and Rob in the hallway.
"First, I don't have enough spare towels, soap, and shampoo for all of them."
"I'll go to the mall as soon as it's open."
"Thank you, Uiharu-san. Second, they'll need clothes. I have no business knowing their sizes."
"I'll ask them, then go shopping."
"Come with me and ask on the way back, Konori-san. Uiharu-san, while you're shopping, could you get a pair of jeans, a shirt, a change of underwear, and a pair of socks for each of them, please? We'll call you with the sizes." Rob handed Kazari twenty $50 bills. "That should cover the bill. We'll take them shopping for clothes that they want to wear once they've had a chance to decide whether to stay. Third, they'd probably appreciate something to eat that they recognize."
"I think Saten-san could help there," suggested Mii.
"I'll ask her," Kazari added before going back into the common apartment that they were using practically daily as a dining room.
"Finally, we need to keep Railgun from challenging Sailor Jupiter as soon as she arrives."
"Don't worry," Mikoto said from inside the dining room. "I won't challenge her to a fight until she's at her best."
Rob grinned. "Then I suppose we should go back downtown," he said to Mii. "Shall we?"
They stepped out of the apartment building to discover a limousine parked out front, with Sebastian standing beside it. "You weren't planning on trying to fit seven people into that five-seater of yours, were you?"
"I was going to flag down a taxi and tell him to follow me here."
"That would mean splitting the girls up between two cars."
Rob nodded. "Good point."
Ottawa, Ontario, Canada
8:40am ET
Mii looked around the interior of the limo. Again. "It's convenient having your own car. Could we get one large enough to hold everyone?"
Rob thought about Mii's question for a moment. "I think something with eleven seats needs more than just a general driver's licence to operate in Ontario. It might be better to get a six-seat car to go along with my Mazda 3, but then we'd need a second driver in the building."
Sebastian laughed. "No, your current licence lets you drive a minivan that carries eleven people. You can't drive a twelve-person bus."
"How much can the budget be stretched?"
"Funtom will pay for one van for you, but only one. You're going to need something that big."
Rob was too focused on the people who he was expecting to meet to realize Sebastian's comment probably hid a trap of some sort; demons never gave away anything that easily. He thought for a moment, then said, "In that case, we should look at having two vehicles - the big one for everybody, and my Mazda. We'll still need a second driver in the building if we do that."
Mii looked like she wanted to say something.
Rob waited, then said, "You're old enough to learn how to drive here, Mii-san."
"Could I? Really?"
"It's a long-term project, but yes."
Rob quickly discovered that Mii had a very pretty smile.
ByWard Market, Ottawa, Ontario, Canada
9:45am ET
"Five hundred grams of Ceylon, one hundred grams of Darjeeling, one hundred grams of Assam, two hundred grams of Earl Grey, one hundred grams of Jasmine, five hundred grams of Sencha, one hundred grams of Chamomile, and one hundred grams of Labrador tea, please."
"Five Ceylon, one Darjeeling, one Assam, two Earl Grey, one Jasmine, five Sencha, one Chamomile, and one Labrador. Right away, sir," replied the clerk.
Rob turned to Mii. "I do like the service here."
"Do we really need that much?"
"If it was just the six of us, probably not. However," Rob stopped as the tea shop's door opened. "I hope we'll be doubling our numbers today."
Five girls entered the shop. They looked like they were cosplaying as the Sailor Team just finishing a long ordeal. Only Rob and Mii knew that they weren't cosplaying.
Rob turned back to the store clerk. "Also, a cup of Irish Breakfast, and whatever those five ladies want, brewed to go. And I'll pay for this young lady's tea as well," he finished, motioning to Mii.
"One Masala chai, please."
"Right away, miss and sir." The clerk walked over to the Sailor Senshi, asked what they wanted to drink, and made his way back to the tea selection.
"I hope we didn't keep you waiting long, Donaldson-san," Ami said as she sat down at a table.
"We just got here ourselves, Mizuno-san. I barely had time to place an order before you arrived."
It was pretty easy to tell who was who - their hairstyles were distinctive. Usagi (the shortest of the five girls, with blonde twintails) was the next to speak. "We appreciate you being wiling to help us, Donaldson-san. We're curious why you would want to help us, though."
Rob nodded. "That's a perfectly reasonable concern. Knowing who you are, and what you can do, and that nobody knows that you are here, it would be extremely easy for somebody to force you to do things you would prefer not doing. I give you my word that I am not one of those people."
"And those books you left with Ami show you know exactly who and what we are."
Rob nodded again. "That's correct, Hino-san." Rei was the one with long black hair in a hime cut.
"And what do you get out of this arrangement?"
"The satisfaction of knowing that I'm helping somebody who needs help, a warm and secure place to live, food on the table, and a paycheck."
"What do you expect us to do in return?"
"Go to school, learn, make friends, discover what life is like here, and don't draw attention to yourselves unless you need to save somebody else's life. Oh, and keep your own apartments clean, and help with the household chores."
Mii added, "That's the same deal Donaldson-san made with me and my friends."
"I don't trust you."
"You shouldn't trust me, Hino-san. I could be lying to you all."
"No," Usagi said with conviction. "You aren't lying to us."
"Thank you for trusting me, Tsukino-san."
"You're welcome, Donaldson-san."
As the store clerk came over with the leaf and brewed tea, Rob stood up. "I need to pay for all of this. On my credit card, so there's a record of me being here now. Konori-san, would you show the girls where our ride is waiting, please?"
The store clerk watched as the girls left. "You're making a big deal about making sure they know you've been seen here with them."
"Yeah, but it's the only way to get them to trust me enough to get them off the streets."
"Do you want to leave your address with us, too?"
"Only if you deliver."
Blossom Apartments, Ottawa, Ontario, Canada
12:10pm ET
"Okonomiyaki for lunch?"
"It's better than that soup that didn't have any miso in it."
"It's something I recognize!"
In the common room's kitchen, Rob smiled at that last comment, which came from Usagi. He turned to Ruiko. "Good call, Saten-san."
"I thought they might want something more substantial than curry, but not as heavy as your cooking usually is."
Rob clutched at his heart and made an over-pained face. "Alas! I have been cut to the quick!" Then they both laughed.
"I like you. You're silly."
"That's the nicest thing anybody's said to me since lunchtime, Saten-san."
"Ruiko."
Rob immediately caught the mood shift. "You're sure? I'd say 'only if you call me Rob,' but you already do."
"You did insist, Rob-san."
"True. All right, Ruiko-san. Or should I call you Rui-chan?"
She looked angry. "If you do..." Then her expression changed. "... I'll just have to call you Jiji!"
"I'm not that old!"
"Compared to us, you are that old."
Just then, the door opened behind them. "I'm back!"
"Welcome back, Uiharu-san. Did you have any trouble at the store?"
"No, Shirai-san and I were okay. Oh, the mailman just pulled up, too. He wouldn't just give us the mail, though."
Rob shook his head. "Canada isn't like Japan. He could lose his job if he did that. I'll let all of you go meet your new housemates while I get my mail. If there's any for you, you'll have to get it on your own."
"Oh, I don't mind..." Kazari started to say.
"Uiharu-san, each mailbox is locked and I only have a key to my own."
"Oh. Why do they do that?"
"I'll explain later. Go, meet the others."
1:00pm ET
Rob had gone through the junk mail, the bills, and the personal mail from people who he had given his new address to. That left three large envelopes and one package.
The package had a Vancouver postmark, dated earlier the same day. "Okay, somebody's showing off," muttered Rob as he opened it. "But is that somebody Washuu-chan or Sebastian?"
A few minutes later, he had the contents of the package sorted on his desk. Each of his tenants had a set of school transcripts, health records and a health card, a bank book and an ATM card (with the accounts as evenly divided as possible at the branches of the three major banks at the nearby mall), a bus pass card, ... and a certificate of legal guardianship with Rob as the guardian.
"Aw, man." Thinking the rest, Rob continued, I know I have to be their guardian and not just their landlord, and I know why, but Rei's going to be pissed off. She already doesn't trust me. Mii probably won't like it, either. After a moment, he snickered. Heh. Never been married and suddenly I've got ten daughters. Then he realized what he'd said. Ah, man - that means ten wardrobes to pay for, and that means I'd better take that second job with Funtom that Sebastian mentioned while he was driving. And then there'll be ten boyfriends - no, nine boyfriends and a girlfriend unless Kuroko somehow changes her orientation - to hear the praises about when the relationships start and to hear the badmouthing about when they end, ten worries about whether they're safe ... No, they're Judgment and the Sailor Senshi. I only need to worry about whether Ruiko-san is safe at night. Somehow that lifted the burden of the responsibility from Rob's shoulders, leaving only the determination to be the best guardian he could be to the girls.
Two of the envelopes he left sealed - Rob had only received them because they were sent care of him. He placed the one from Carleton University's Institute of Criminology and Criminal Justice on the pile of paperwork with Mii's name on it. The other envelope, from the University of Ottawa Faculty of Medicine, he added to Ami's document pile. I guess that IQ of 300 bit wasn't hyperbole.
That left the envelope from the local English-language public school board. Much to Rob's complete lack of surprise, it was an set of appointments for the other eight of his tenants to write grade-placement tests. What did surprise him was that the tests were scheduled for the beginning of October... but, reading the cover letter that came with the paperwork, he realized that the school board was so busy with the beginning of the school year that they couldn't schedule the tests any earlier.
He unlocked his office door and poked his head out into the hall. "Girls, I have some paperwork for each of you. Some of it you'll like, some of it you might not like. We need to talk about the one that I think some of you won't like."
1:35pm ET
"I don't want you running my life. Or Usagi's life."
Rob nodded. "I don't want to run your life, Hino-san. It's enough work running my own life."
"Then why have this?" She waved the certificate of guardianship in his face.
"Because it's the only way to keep all of you together. If I'm not your legal guardian, then the court system will appoint guardians for you - and the chance that you'd all get the same guardian that way is so small it may as well be non-existent."
Rei stopped her rant. "So... this is for us?"
Mii nodded. "This is for us, not for Donaldson-san." Then she picked up a pen and signed her own form; an act that would return to haunt her for the rest of the calendar year and make her happy after that. "And I accept that, even though I'm old enough to not need a guardian here."
"Would somebody hand me a pen, please?" Usagi asked from the sofa.
As Mii handed her the pen that she had just used, Rob realized that Rei and Ami had made sure Usagi got to sit on the sofa when they came in. Then he remembered that Ami said she had read The Incomplete Enchanter when she was in middle school - past tense - which implied that she had graduated to high school already. Then he realized where in the story the Sailor Senshi had come from. "You're exhausted, aren't you, Tsukino-san? I'm sorry that I asked you to come to this office instead of going to you."
"Why would you think that?" asked Rei, very quickly.
Usagi giggled, surprising everyone else. "He's read about us, Rei. He's seen the anime. We're anime characters here, remember? He probably knows what I did just before we showed up in Ottawa."
"So, what happened?" asked Mikoto.
Ruiko answered first. "I think episode 200 happened." She turned to Usagi. "You fought Galaxia, right?"
Usagi nodded. "Yes. And I won, and I undid what she did, and there was a flash from the Ginzuisho, and we woke up here."
Rob nodded again. "And what you did to undo what Galaxia did must have taken all of the strength you had left."
"Ano..." Kazari interrupted. "I haven't seen your anime. What did you do?"
Before anyone could answer, Rob said, "Later. Or get the story from Ruiko-san, outside. Let Tsukino-san rest. Hino-san, would you accompany me to a furniture store and help me pick out a bed for Tsukino-san, please? We'll get it delivered immediately, and then she can relax in comfort."
"... All right. Makoto, keep an eye on Usagi for me."
"Of course, Rei," replied the tallest of the Senshi.
As Rob reached for his coat and car keys, he said, "Everyone else, please take your pile of papers to your own apartments and go through them. Read the guardianship forms before you sign them, okay?"
2:20pm ET
"I like the beds you picked out, Hino-san. I think Tsukino-san will like her bed, as well."
"It's the closest I could find to her bed back home."
Rob continued driving back to the apartment building, and Rei sat beside him in silence.
Finally, he broke the silence. "You know that I know things about you that only your family and closest friends should know. What do you want to know about me in return?"
"Nothing."
They passed two intersections.
"Can you tolerate my presence under your roof?"
"It's your roof, not mine."
"All right. Can you tolerate living under the same roof as me?"
They passed another three intersections.
"I think so. But only for Usagi's sake."
"I'll accept that answer. Is there anything that you would like to get on the way back to the apartment?"
"No."
"Not even a different change of clothes?"
"Not from you."
Rob sighed quietly. "The other girls have been here for a few days, and they know where to find some decent clothes. You can blame me for that rather drab outfit you have on - I didn't know what you'd like, so I asked Uiharu-san to get something simple for each of you so you'd have something to wear while your decent clothes were in the wash."
"Really?" It was barely a whisper.
"Really."
After a moment, Rei said, "I guess that was thoughtful of you."
"Oh?"
"You didn't give me no choice but to dress up for you."
As they pulled into the apartment's parking lot a few minutes later, Rei added, "Maybe I can stay here for more than just Usagi's sake."
Rob parked the car, they got out, and he headed for his office - where he found Usagi asleep on the sofa and a neatly-stacked pile of guardianship forms on the desk. Only Rei's was missing - and she had been with Rob.
An hour later, the last signed guardianship form was slipped under his office door.
5:55pm ET
"Ooh! Katsudon!" Rob smiled. "Who do we have to thank for this for dinner?"
Ruiko raised her hand. "Kino-san was still setting up her bed when the time to start dinner came, so I volunteered."
"That was good of you, Rui-chan."
She mock-glared at him across the table. "If you call me that again, I'll just have to call you ojisan."
"And why would I get upset at you calling me 'uncle', Rui-chan?"
Even Rei laughed at that question.
September 13th, 2016
9:20am ET
"Rob-san, I'm bored."
Oh, dear, thought Rob. Kuroko is bored. The last thing I need is her trying to seduce Mikoto - and by "seduce" I mean "make a clumsy and/or boorish pass at". Not her fault - she's barely old enough to know what sex is - but I'm the one who would have to clean up the ensuing wreckage when Railgun rejected her advances yet again.
"Do you have all your purchases sorted yet?"
"Sorted and put in closets or drawers."
Rob recalled that Kuroko had bought the least in the way of clothing while they were out the previous day. "What do you usually do at this time of day?"
"Attend classes."
Rob nodded, and decided to call a few friends of his in the school system.
11:15am ET
"What are these?"
"Practice exams. I want to know what grade each of you should be attending in the local school system."
5:45pm ET
Rob expected nothing less, having heard where students from Ontario often end up being sorted into schools in Newfoundland, and having seen some of the things they discussed in class during the Railgun anime. "I'm not surprised that your weakest subject is Canadian history. Honestly, I'd be more surprised if any of you knew anything about it. Setting that subject aside, do any of you have any problems being the youngest students in your class?" He turned to Mii. "And, given your results, Konori-san, you need to decide which university to attend."
Ruiko grinned. "Are we really that much smarter than the average here?"
"It looks that way to me. Of course, these aren't the official tests. And we need to get school transcripts for each of you. Until the school board gets those, they might not let you attend class."
Kazari frowned. "Our schools are in another universe."
"I know. I've asked people like us living in some other cities whether they can help with that."
"What'll we do until then, Rob-san?"
"I don't know about you, but I'm getting hungry. Anybody want to go out for dinner and see another part of the city?"
ByWard Market, Ottawa, Ontario, Canada
6:20pm ET
"Please stick close to me, ladies," Rob asked while they got off the bus. "The Byward Market is a tourist trap, and I don't want to have to search for any of you."
Kuroko gave him that look. "We do have GPS on our phones."
He nodded. "True, but GPS doesn't tell you which alleys you shouldn't walk down in a busy neighbourhood."
"Point taken. What kind of food are we going to get?"
"I'm thinking going to a buffet will let you sample a lot of different North American foods." Seeing four blank looks, I added, "I think you call it a Viking."
While the group walked past the bookstore, Rob noticed a very pretty Asian girl with short hair that was the shade of black that looked to have blue highlights, probably about Mikoto and Kuroko's age, reading a very thick book. He wondered for a moment where he had seen her before... then hurried to tell Kuroko (who'd taken the lead) to turn right at the corner.
7:55pm ET
"I think I won't be able to eat for a week!"
"Why did we take so much food?"
"And why did they keep taking our empty plates away? I lost track of how much I ate!"
The only one who wasn't complaining about the size of the meal they'd just finished was Mii. Rob stepped closer to her and asked, "What did you think of the buffet?"
"The food had a bit too much starch for my taste."
"They do that on purpose. The food is a set price no matter how much you eat. The drinks are charged by the glass."
"That makes sense. Draw people in with an inexpensive meal, and get them to pay more than they should on extras. Are you sure you can afford this?"
Rob nodded as he replied, "As long as it's just the six of us, I can afford to treat everybody to a meal out once or twice a month."
"So we could do this more often if I found a part-time..." She stopped, because Mikoto had stopped in front of her.
Kuroko noticed, looked where Mikoto was looking, and also stopped.
Ruiko looked puzzled. "What's wrong?"
Mii pointed down the alleyway that the three girls were looking into. "Do you see that mark, Saten-san?"
"It looks to me like somebody burned something against the wall."
Mikoto shook her head. "Sort of. That's an electrical arc burn."
"You're sure?" asked Rob. She just gave him an are-you-really-that-stupid? look. "Of course you're sure."
Kazari cleared her throat. "You haven't been down here lately, have you, Misaka-san?"
"We've been together every time we've left the apartment building, Uiharu-san. I've never been here before. But it does look like something I would have left if I was fighting off an attacker."
"Not quite," Kuroko added. "The angle of the burn on the wall indicates it came from somebody taller than you."
"You're right, it does. That means there's another electrokinetic somewhere nearby."
Rob swore under his breath. He knew how Mikoto thought in this kind of situation: no doubt she wanted to fight whoever this other electrokinetic is, just to see who's stronger. He decided then and there that he had to make sure that didn't happen - at least, not downtown where there were innocent bystanders who didn't know enough to realize they needed to run away from a metahuman battle.
Then he wondered why he was thinking of that Asian girl that he'd noticed at the bookstore. She seemed to be shorter than Mikoto, not taller.
September 14th, 2016
10:10 am ET
Rob kept telling himself that he wasn't shirking his duties, really.
There are some lovely food shops in the ByWard Market, alongside the farmers' stalls. The household needed groceries. Even though Rob could get similar groceries elsewhere in the city at a lower cost, they wouldn't be as good.
More importantly, Rob felt a need to find that electrokinetic before Mikoto did, and he couldn't do that if he wasn't in the right part of town.
But was this still the right part of town? The electrokinetic might have gone somewhere else after that incident.
Assuming there was an incident.
And that there is an electrokinetic.
Every bit of common sense indicated that this was impossible - an incident like that would have been mentioned in the news.
Every bit of common sense also indicated that people from A Certain Scientific Railgun couldn't live in Ottawa.
Rob kept looking for signs of an electrokinetic.
Two bunches of carrots, a basket of tomatoes, and a half-pound of Cheddar later, he noticed the girl that he'd seen at the bookstore a day ago. She was talking with somebody just outside of his field of view - another girl, from the sound of the voice. While he couldn't quite make out what they were saying, Rob could tell whoever the other person was, she was probably English. Received Pronunciation ... wait, no, that was Estuary English, not RP ... is a rather obvious accent, especially in Canada.
His curiosity got the better of him. Besides, there was a tea shop just past the two girls, and the apartment's supply of tea was approaching "none" fast.
The girls split up before he could get close enough to hear what they were saying. The pretty Asian girl headed toward that same bookstore, passing Rob along the way.
He rounded the corner that they were at, and saw another girl walking toward the busker stage near the tea shop.
She was Asian, and just as pretty as the other girl. She also had blonde hair. Down to her waist. Tied with a red ribbon.
Rob thought, It couldn't be.
Then he thought of the girls that he was looking after, and where they came from.
It could be.
He thought to look at his cellphone's contact list, where he discovered that none of the names were obscured any more.
It is. In the name of my own obliviousness, I will punish myself. Later.
Business before self-recrimination. Right now, he needed Mii's help - and she was back at the apartment.
Blossom Apartments, Ottawa, Ontario, Canada
11:45 am ET
"... and that's what I'm expecting to discover, Konori-san," finished Rob.
"I don't like doing that, Rob-san." Mii frowned. "It's an invasion of people's privacy, and I don't have a warrant."
"I know. But as long as we're keeping your existence here secret, we can't just walk up to someone and ask if he's from another universe. Besides, if they are who I think they are, they aren't going to take kindly to meeting others with powers."
Mii nodded. "You're right on that count. I remember reading that manga when I was a little girl. Everyone else with a power was their enemy."
"Here's hoping they're from the anime, not the manga. In the anime, only almost everyone else with a power was their enemy."
"That means we need a reason to visit the bookstore."
He grinned. "That's easy enough. If you're going to be majoring in criminology, you need textbooks. Or at least a copy of the Criminal Code."
"I already found that online."
"They don't know that."
Mii nodded in agreement, then changed the subject. "Are you sure it's them?"
"I'm sure," replied Rob. "My phone is finally showing me the names of the people who should get those other five phones that Ere gave me to give to you." He showed her the list.
"Wow. I recognize every one of those names."
ByWard Market, Ottawa, Ontario, Canada
1:20 pm ET
Once again, just like every time he visited, Rob thought that it was a lovely bookstore. Two stories (in height, there were more than two stories on the shelves), a large selection of less-common books, a separate section just for children, and plenty of comfortable seats.
He and Mii were paying more attention to the seats than to the books.
Finally they found her. Giving her a closer look, Rob thought that she had been wearing the same clothes for a few days - which supported his theory. He pointed her out to Mii.
The girl was reading through a copy of the Oxford Handbook of Clinical Medicine... and a store clerk was walking toward her. By the time Rob reached the corner she was in, the clerk was asking her to either make a purchase or leave the store.
Rob glanced at Mii. She nodded, pointing to her own skirt pocket. She's seen with her x-ray vision what he expected her to see in the girl's skirt pocket.
"Excuse me," interrupted Rob. "Would you have any reference works on the many-worlds interpretation of quantum mechanics?"
The clerk looked puzzled. "I'm sorry, but I don't know what you're asking about."
The girl smiled. "I saw some in the physics section, two aisles from the far wall, on the bottom shelf."
The clerk looked relieved. "Forget what I just said, miss. But please don't still be here in an hour."
As the clerk left, Rob turned to the girl. "As a token of my thanks, may I buy that book for you?"
She looked worried. "I couldn't put you to that trouble. It's an expensive book, mister ..."
"Donaldson. Rob Donaldson."
"Ami Mizuno."
And that clinched it, not that he was expecting anything different. He waved Mii over. "And this is Mii Konori, who is living with me while she applies for admission to university here. Konori-san, this is Ami Mizuno, who was kind enough to tell me where to find the book I wanted."
Mii smiled. "I'm pleased to meet you, Mizuno-san."
After he found a copy of DeWitt and Graham's The Many-Worlds Interpretation of Quantum Mechanics, he added that and the Oxford reference that Ami had been reading to the pile Mii was carrying, and they all went to the checkout. Good thing I can expense all of these books to Funtom, thought Rob. Most of them are expensive.
As the three of them were leaving the store, Rob said, "I don't know about you, Mii-san, but I wouldn't mind getting a drink."
She looked at him sternly. "You have to drive."
"I meant a coffee, or maybe some tea. It's too early in the day for alcohol." He turned to Ami. "Care to join us, Mizuno-san?"
1:45 pm ET
They sat at a table near the door of that tea shop that Rob hadn't visited earlier in the day. Mii ordered Oolong tea, while Rob ordered Earl Grey. Ami asked for a glass of water.
Rob engaged Ami in small talk while Mii looked through the stack of books. Rob was open; Ami was guarded - as she should be.
"Have you been in town long?"
"Only a few days."
"Have you let anyone know you're here?"
"Not yet; I don't know anyone in Ottawa."
"You really should tell somebody that you're here, even if it's only the local police. Oh, but somebody smart enough to make sense of the Oxford Handbook of Clinical Medicine already knows that, I'm sure."
She relaxed slightly after he suggested contacting the police. Mii put the last of her criminology books back in the bag, revealing a copy of The Incomplete Enchanter sitting on top of two other books. Ami smiled when she saw that book.
"Have you read that collection, Mizuno-san?"
She nodded. "Yes, I read it when I was in middle school. And now that I see it, the memories are giving me some comfort."
"I haven't read it yet, so please don't spoil it for me," replied Mii.
Ami nodded again. "I don't know whether that's a good example of the many-worlds interpretation, though," she said to Rob.
Mii and Rob quickly exchanged glances, and he winked. Mii sighed. "I have proof that it might not be correct in particulars, but the general idea is sound." She moved the copy of The Incomplete Enchanter to reveal the last two books in their purchase: the first two volumes of Bishojo Senshi Sailor Moon.
Ami's eyes went wide.
"Would you like to take those with you?" asked Rob. She just nodded. "Then please do. And here's a cellular telephone, with my number and Konori-san's number already programmed into speed-dial. Call us when you want to talk." He slowly pulled the white cellphone with Ami's name on it out of his pocket, and placed it on the table beside the medical reference and the manga.
He looked up and noticed that the blonde he'd seen earlier (who he was certain was Minako Aino) was singing at the nearby busker stage. Mii pointed her out to Ami as we left.
Walking back to the public parking garage, Mii asked, "What do we do now?"
"Now we wait. And now I really want to find that electrokinetic. In all versions of the story, Makoto's a good cook... and I'm pretty sure everybody knows by now that I know almost nothing about Japanese cooking."
Blossom Apartments, Ottawa, Ontario, Canada
September 15th, 2016
8:10am ET
Mii's cellphone rang.
As she excused herself from the table, Mikoto said, "Finally!"
"They're not calling to arrange a duel, Misaka-san." Rob sighed. "They don't even know you exist here, unless Mizuno-san accessed the Internet, looked up Konori-san, and found your Wikipedia article."
"Which she probably could do with the Mercury Computer, or definitely do with the phone that you gave her," added Kazari. "Why are you back to being on a last-name basis with us?"
Rob cocked his head and raised one eyebrow, momentarily puzzled about his own behaviour. "I'm sorry about that. Sometimes I remember that your standards on names are different than mine, and sometimes I don't. But we should make an effort to be reasonably formal when, or if, we go to meet the Sailor Senshi."
"I'm not calling oneesan 'Misaka-san'."
"I wouldn't mind you making the effort, Shirai-san."
"Oneesama!"
Mii gestured to Rob from the hallway. Once he had joined her there, she handed him her phone. "It's Tsukino-san."
He nodded. "Donaldson speaking. What can I do for you?"
"Donaldson-san, my name is Tsukino Usagi. I read the two volumes of manga that you left with Ami ... with Mizuno-san."
"I assume you found them to be something of a shock, Tsukino-san."
"More of a surprise, Donaldson-san. They had the general story right, but the details were all wrong."
So she wasn't from the manga continuity or Crystal, and probably not from the live-action version. "I have some bad news for you, then. Your life story was made into an anime - a very popular anime."
"Just a moment, please."
After a half-minute, Rob heard, "This is Mizuno. Usa... Tsukino-san asked me to speak with you while she went to sit down somewhere."
"I'm afraid that I told her something that she needed to know but wasn't ready to hear. I apologize for that."
"I understand. We called because we wanted to ask for your help." Rob heard a voice say "I don't!" in the background, but Ami kept talking. "We won't be able to stay here tonight."
"How many people are in your group?"
"There are five of us."
"Mizuno-san, I just happen to have more than five empty one-bedroom apartments available here. Each has a small kitchenette and its own bathroom. None of them have very much in the way of furniture, though."
"We would prefer sleeping on the floor to sleeping in an alleyway, Donaldson-san."
"I thought that might be the case, Mizuno-san. I cannot come downtown immediately, because of rush-hour traffic. Shall I meet you at the tea shop at 10 o'clock?"
"We will meet you there, Donaldson-san. Good day."
"Good day." After the call ended, Rob returned Mii's phone to her. "Considering Ami ordered water at the tea shop yesterday and Minako was busking for change, I suspect they have nothing in the way of funds. Mizuno-san very carefully did not tell me that they've been in a homeless shelter for a few days, and that they have to move on. They probably need a proper meal, a decent bath, and a change of clothes."
"How can we help?" asked Kazari, who had joined Mii and Rob in the hallway.
"First, I don't have enough spare towels, soap, and shampoo for all of them."
"I'll go to the mall as soon as it's open."
"Thank you, Uiharu-san. Second, they'll need clothes. I have no business knowing their sizes."
"I'll ask them, then go shopping."
"Come with me and ask on the way back, Konori-san. Uiharu-san, while you're shopping, could you get a pair of jeans, a shirt, a change of underwear, and a pair of socks for each of them, please? We'll call you with the sizes." Rob handed Kazari twenty $50 bills. "That should cover the bill. We'll take them shopping for clothes that they want to wear once they've had a chance to decide whether to stay. Third, they'd probably appreciate something to eat that they recognize."
"I think Saten-san could help there," suggested Mii.
"I'll ask her," Kazari added before going back into the common apartment that they were using practically daily as a dining room.
"Finally, we need to keep Railgun from challenging Sailor Jupiter as soon as she arrives."
"Don't worry," Mikoto said from inside the dining room. "I won't challenge her to a fight until she's at her best."
Rob grinned. "Then I suppose we should go back downtown," he said to Mii. "Shall we?"
They stepped out of the apartment building to discover a limousine parked out front, with Sebastian standing beside it. "You weren't planning on trying to fit seven people into that five-seater of yours, were you?"
"I was going to flag down a taxi and tell him to follow me here."
"That would mean splitting the girls up between two cars."
Rob nodded. "Good point."
Ottawa, Ontario, Canada
8:40am ET
Mii looked around the interior of the limo. Again. "It's convenient having your own car. Could we get one large enough to hold everyone?"
Rob thought about Mii's question for a moment. "I think something with eleven seats needs more than just a general driver's licence to operate in Ontario. It might be better to get a six-seat car to go along with my Mazda 3, but then we'd need a second driver in the building."
Sebastian laughed. "No, your current licence lets you drive a minivan that carries eleven people. You can't drive a twelve-person bus."
"How much can the budget be stretched?"
"Funtom will pay for one van for you, but only one. You're going to need something that big."
Rob was too focused on the people who he was expecting to meet to realize Sebastian's comment probably hid a trap of some sort; demons never gave away anything that easily. He thought for a moment, then said, "In that case, we should look at having two vehicles - the big one for everybody, and my Mazda. We'll still need a second driver in the building if we do that."
Mii looked like she wanted to say something.
Rob waited, then said, "You're old enough to learn how to drive here, Mii-san."
"Could I? Really?"
"It's a long-term project, but yes."
Rob quickly discovered that Mii had a very pretty smile.
ByWard Market, Ottawa, Ontario, Canada
9:45am ET
"Five hundred grams of Ceylon, one hundred grams of Darjeeling, one hundred grams of Assam, two hundred grams of Earl Grey, one hundred grams of Jasmine, five hundred grams of Sencha, one hundred grams of Chamomile, and one hundred grams of Labrador tea, please."
"Five Ceylon, one Darjeeling, one Assam, two Earl Grey, one Jasmine, five Sencha, one Chamomile, and one Labrador. Right away, sir," replied the clerk.
Rob turned to Mii. "I do like the service here."
"Do we really need that much?"
"If it was just the six of us, probably not. However," Rob stopped as the tea shop's door opened. "I hope we'll be doubling our numbers today."
Five girls entered the shop. They looked like they were cosplaying as the Sailor Team just finishing a long ordeal. Only Rob and Mii knew that they weren't cosplaying.
Rob turned back to the store clerk. "Also, a cup of Irish Breakfast, and whatever those five ladies want, brewed to go. And I'll pay for this young lady's tea as well," he finished, motioning to Mii.
"One Masala chai, please."
"Right away, miss and sir." The clerk walked over to the Sailor Senshi, asked what they wanted to drink, and made his way back to the tea selection.
"I hope we didn't keep you waiting long, Donaldson-san," Ami said as she sat down at a table.
"We just got here ourselves, Mizuno-san. I barely had time to place an order before you arrived."
It was pretty easy to tell who was who - their hairstyles were distinctive. Usagi (the shortest of the five girls, with blonde twintails) was the next to speak. "We appreciate you being wiling to help us, Donaldson-san. We're curious why you would want to help us, though."
Rob nodded. "That's a perfectly reasonable concern. Knowing who you are, and what you can do, and that nobody knows that you are here, it would be extremely easy for somebody to force you to do things you would prefer not doing. I give you my word that I am not one of those people."
"And those books you left with Ami show you know exactly who and what we are."
Rob nodded again. "That's correct, Hino-san." Rei was the one with long black hair in a hime cut.
"And what do you get out of this arrangement?"
"The satisfaction of knowing that I'm helping somebody who needs help, a warm and secure place to live, food on the table, and a paycheck."
"What do you expect us to do in return?"
"Go to school, learn, make friends, discover what life is like here, and don't draw attention to yourselves unless you need to save somebody else's life. Oh, and keep your own apartments clean, and help with the household chores."
Mii added, "That's the same deal Donaldson-san made with me and my friends."
"I don't trust you."
"You shouldn't trust me, Hino-san. I could be lying to you all."
"No," Usagi said with conviction. "You aren't lying to us."
"Thank you for trusting me, Tsukino-san."
"You're welcome, Donaldson-san."
As the store clerk came over with the leaf and brewed tea, Rob stood up. "I need to pay for all of this. On my credit card, so there's a record of me being here now. Konori-san, would you show the girls where our ride is waiting, please?"
The store clerk watched as the girls left. "You're making a big deal about making sure they know you've been seen here with them."
"Yeah, but it's the only way to get them to trust me enough to get them off the streets."
"Do you want to leave your address with us, too?"
"Only if you deliver."
Blossom Apartments, Ottawa, Ontario, Canada
12:10pm ET
"Okonomiyaki for lunch?"
"It's better than that soup that didn't have any miso in it."
"It's something I recognize!"
In the common room's kitchen, Rob smiled at that last comment, which came from Usagi. He turned to Ruiko. "Good call, Saten-san."
"I thought they might want something more substantial than curry, but not as heavy as your cooking usually is."
Rob clutched at his heart and made an over-pained face. "Alas! I have been cut to the quick!" Then they both laughed.
"I like you. You're silly."
"That's the nicest thing anybody's said to me since lunchtime, Saten-san."
"Ruiko."
Rob immediately caught the mood shift. "You're sure? I'd say 'only if you call me Rob,' but you already do."
"You did insist, Rob-san."
"True. All right, Ruiko-san. Or should I call you Rui-chan?"
She looked angry. "If you do..." Then her expression changed. "... I'll just have to call you Jiji!"
"I'm not that old!"
"Compared to us, you are that old."
Just then, the door opened behind them. "I'm back!"
"Welcome back, Uiharu-san. Did you have any trouble at the store?"
"No, Shirai-san and I were okay. Oh, the mailman just pulled up, too. He wouldn't just give us the mail, though."
Rob shook his head. "Canada isn't like Japan. He could lose his job if he did that. I'll let all of you go meet your new housemates while I get my mail. If there's any for you, you'll have to get it on your own."
"Oh, I don't mind..." Kazari started to say.
"Uiharu-san, each mailbox is locked and I only have a key to my own."
"Oh. Why do they do that?"
"I'll explain later. Go, meet the others."
1:00pm ET
Rob had gone through the junk mail, the bills, and the personal mail from people who he had given his new address to. That left three large envelopes and one package.
The package had a Vancouver postmark, dated earlier the same day. "Okay, somebody's showing off," muttered Rob as he opened it. "But is that somebody Washuu-chan or Sebastian?"
A few minutes later, he had the contents of the package sorted on his desk. Each of his tenants had a set of school transcripts, health records and a health card, a bank book and an ATM card (with the accounts as evenly divided as possible at the branches of the three major banks at the nearby mall), a bus pass card, ... and a certificate of legal guardianship with Rob as the guardian.
"Aw, man." Thinking the rest, Rob continued, I know I have to be their guardian and not just their landlord, and I know why, but Rei's going to be pissed off. She already doesn't trust me. Mii probably won't like it, either. After a moment, he snickered. Heh. Never been married and suddenly I've got ten daughters. Then he realized what he'd said. Ah, man - that means ten wardrobes to pay for, and that means I'd better take that second job with Funtom that Sebastian mentioned while he was driving. And then there'll be ten boyfriends - no, nine boyfriends and a girlfriend unless Kuroko somehow changes her orientation - to hear the praises about when the relationships start and to hear the badmouthing about when they end, ten worries about whether they're safe ... No, they're Judgment and the Sailor Senshi. I only need to worry about whether Ruiko-san is safe at night. Somehow that lifted the burden of the responsibility from Rob's shoulders, leaving only the determination to be the best guardian he could be to the girls.
Two of the envelopes he left sealed - Rob had only received them because they were sent care of him. He placed the one from Carleton University's Institute of Criminology and Criminal Justice on the pile of paperwork with Mii's name on it. The other envelope, from the University of Ottawa Faculty of Medicine, he added to Ami's document pile. I guess that IQ of 300 bit wasn't hyperbole.
That left the envelope from the local English-language public school board. Much to Rob's complete lack of surprise, it was an set of appointments for the other eight of his tenants to write grade-placement tests. What did surprise him was that the tests were scheduled for the beginning of October... but, reading the cover letter that came with the paperwork, he realized that the school board was so busy with the beginning of the school year that they couldn't schedule the tests any earlier.
He unlocked his office door and poked his head out into the hall. "Girls, I have some paperwork for each of you. Some of it you'll like, some of it you might not like. We need to talk about the one that I think some of you won't like."
1:35pm ET
"I don't want you running my life. Or Usagi's life."
Rob nodded. "I don't want to run your life, Hino-san. It's enough work running my own life."
"Then why have this?" She waved the certificate of guardianship in his face.
"Because it's the only way to keep all of you together. If I'm not your legal guardian, then the court system will appoint guardians for you - and the chance that you'd all get the same guardian that way is so small it may as well be non-existent."
Rei stopped her rant. "So... this is for us?"
Mii nodded. "This is for us, not for Donaldson-san." Then she picked up a pen and signed her own form; an act that would return to haunt her for the rest of the calendar year and make her happy after that. "And I accept that, even though I'm old enough to not need a guardian here."
"Would somebody hand me a pen, please?" Usagi asked from the sofa.
As Mii handed her the pen that she had just used, Rob realized that Rei and Ami had made sure Usagi got to sit on the sofa when they came in. Then he remembered that Ami said she had read The Incomplete Enchanter when she was in middle school - past tense - which implied that she had graduated to high school already. Then he realized where in the story the Sailor Senshi had come from. "You're exhausted, aren't you, Tsukino-san? I'm sorry that I asked you to come to this office instead of going to you."
"Why would you think that?" asked Rei, very quickly.
Usagi giggled, surprising everyone else. "He's read about us, Rei. He's seen the anime. We're anime characters here, remember? He probably knows what I did just before we showed up in Ottawa."
"So, what happened?" asked Mikoto.
Ruiko answered first. "I think episode 200 happened." She turned to Usagi. "You fought Galaxia, right?"
Usagi nodded. "Yes. And I won, and I undid what she did, and there was a flash from the Ginzuisho, and we woke up here."
Rob nodded again. "And what you did to undo what Galaxia did must have taken all of the strength you had left."
"Ano..." Kazari interrupted. "I haven't seen your anime. What did you do?"
Before anyone could answer, Rob said, "Later. Or get the story from Ruiko-san, outside. Let Tsukino-san rest. Hino-san, would you accompany me to a furniture store and help me pick out a bed for Tsukino-san, please? We'll get it delivered immediately, and then she can relax in comfort."
"... All right. Makoto, keep an eye on Usagi for me."
"Of course, Rei," replied the tallest of the Senshi.
As Rob reached for his coat and car keys, he said, "Everyone else, please take your pile of papers to your own apartments and go through them. Read the guardianship forms before you sign them, okay?"
2:20pm ET
"I like the beds you picked out, Hino-san. I think Tsukino-san will like her bed, as well."
"It's the closest I could find to her bed back home."
Rob continued driving back to the apartment building, and Rei sat beside him in silence.
Finally, he broke the silence. "You know that I know things about you that only your family and closest friends should know. What do you want to know about me in return?"
"Nothing."
They passed two intersections.
"Can you tolerate my presence under your roof?"
"It's your roof, not mine."
"All right. Can you tolerate living under the same roof as me?"
They passed another three intersections.
"I think so. But only for Usagi's sake."
"I'll accept that answer. Is there anything that you would like to get on the way back to the apartment?"
"No."
"Not even a different change of clothes?"
"Not from you."
Rob sighed quietly. "The other girls have been here for a few days, and they know where to find some decent clothes. You can blame me for that rather drab outfit you have on - I didn't know what you'd like, so I asked Uiharu-san to get something simple for each of you so you'd have something to wear while your decent clothes were in the wash."
"Really?" It was barely a whisper.
"Really."
After a moment, Rei said, "I guess that was thoughtful of you."
"Oh?"
"You didn't give me no choice but to dress up for you."
As they pulled into the apartment's parking lot a few minutes later, Rei added, "Maybe I can stay here for more than just Usagi's sake."
Rob parked the car, they got out, and he headed for his office - where he found Usagi asleep on the sofa and a neatly-stacked pile of guardianship forms on the desk. Only Rei's was missing - and she had been with Rob.
An hour later, the last signed guardianship form was slipped under his office door.
5:55pm ET
"Ooh! Katsudon!" Rob smiled. "Who do we have to thank for this for dinner?"
Ruiko raised her hand. "Kino-san was still setting up her bed when the time to start dinner came, so I volunteered."
"That was good of you, Rui-chan."
She mock-glared at him across the table. "If you call me that again, I'll just have to call you ojisan."
"And why would I get upset at you calling me 'uncle', Rui-chan?"
Even Rei laughed at that question.
--
Rob Kelk
Sticks and stones can break your bones,
But words can break your heart.
- unknown
Rob Kelk
Sticks and stones can break your bones,
But words can break your heart.
- unknown