Ah My Goddess Fan Fiction ❯ Trial By Tenderness ❯ Part 42 - Sortment ( Chapter 42 )

[ Y - Young Adult: Not suitable for readers under 16 ]

Part 42 Sortment



Skuld fingered the pearl-like smoothness of the precious angel egg mounted on her necklace as Urd related the story of her travels in the TimeStream. She knew that her cherubic Angel, Noble Scarlet, was resting inside of the egg, exhausted from the immense journey. She had done so well! After all, it was sweet Noble Scarlet that guided Urd back to the Present. The overtiredness was wordlessly conveyed to Skuld...she and her Angel were twined around each other as closely as sunset and sunrise. After all the commotion Noble Scarlet caused when she first was birthed into the mortal world...*this* was an impressive achievement for the neophyte Angel.
The four men that Urd retrieved from the past...only barely resembled the young mortals she knew. They were horribly altered in a brutal way; all Skuld had to do was look at their hardened visages to see this. She surveyed them again, especially Tomohisa who seemed completely unrecognizable except for his eyes. A whole different Tomohisa. This wasn't the Tomohisa that kept pestering her to play baseball a few months ago. He looked like one of those samurai on a TV series, except for the scars all over his face. Those looked *real*, she sensed with a shudder.
"How come Urd has all this insane energy?" Skuld wondered as she arranged her hair into three long braids. She put her hair up in two cloth gathers, and then fingercombed the rest back in a long ponytail as Urd chattered on. She knew that her older sister couldn't possibly begin to describe the transit from Then to Now in sensible terms; just as Skuld couldn't adequately enlighten her sisters about how she could explore the Yet-to-Be while physically in the Now.
"But this is Urd...and Urd is as unpredictable as a rabbit," Skuld observed. The dramatic cast of Urd's narrative bordered on hyperbole; Skuld suspected that it was because Urd thought she could milk all the attention she could gather from her two sisters. Which wasn't much, because both she and Belldandy were exhausted.
Their Angels had exerted themselves to the utmost.

* * * * * * * *

"...Well, once I got back there and found the guys, I couldn't believe how freaky they looked! Right then, I decided to knock them out," Urd elaborated. Belldandy's eyes grew wide at this; the image of Urd zapping her beloved Keiichi flashing vividly in her mind's eye.
"D..don't look at me that way, sis! I *had* to do it, y'know! It's bad enough trying to transport a mortal through a TV...but I had to navigate a TimeStream! Forwards! With *four* mortals in tow! But that's why I'm such a kewl Goddess! Because I can do it all...when others can't! It was just another Urd routine. Saving the day and all that!" Urd was punching her fist in the air like a victorious boxer.
"Yeah...whatever. Spare the braggadocio and get to the details," a nonplused Skuld said dryly. She was irked at Urd's stabs at praise-seeking...her Big Sister knew that this was a group effort, rather than a Urd solo shot.
"So, I gathered the four in a shield sphere and released my Angel, so she could get guidance from your baby Angel," Urd continued, looking down at the Temporary License Transfer Token lying on the table. She had returned Belldandy's powers immediately upon their return, lest she be further tempted to retain them.
"Urd..." Belldandy warned, full well knowing how delicately prideful Skuld was about her newly birthed Angel.
"Well, it seemed like I was riding on a ribbon of song...as the 14th century left me away. As it faded into the TimeStream, I could hear our three Angels singing. It was eerily beautiful. Their voices sounded liked a soft hail of velvet to my ears...like a chorus of glass chimes and woodwinds. I *needed* to experience something beautiful after what I saw back then," Urd stated, finishing with a shudder.
Urd had decided to postpone telling the others about the corpse ridden battlegrounds and the devastated castle. Belldandy and Skuld certainly couldn't handle hearing about how had she arrived moments after the four guys died in pitched battle. *She* could barely handle it. Urd noticed Belldandy looking at her with an intent expression.
"What do you mean, what you saw back there?" Belldandy asked, her eyes narrowing. Urd batted her eyes and smiled innocently, trying to deflect the emphasis she heard in her sister's question.
"Ummmh, anyway....then I could see this luminescence emanating outwards from all three Angels. They were holding hands while slowly rotating in a circle. From the center, some kind of energy folded. It flowed outwards...like ribbons in front of a running fan. The light pierced through one of the corridors of the TimeStream, looking every bit like TNA."
"TNA?" Skuld asked.
"Yes. Mortal science identifies the chemical encoding matrix of life as DNA. You know...two strands of nucleotides. Chromosomes and such. But there is a third strand...which remains invisible to them. The Ixodenum matrix. Remember your intermediate metachemistry in FirstTier Inculcation, Skuld?"
"I must have missed it when I was busy chasing bugs 'cause *someone* couldn't keep the Yggdrasil Mainframe from crashing!" she snorted back accusingly.
"Okay, whatever you say...I'm too tired to fight with you tonight, brat!" Urd resigned herself, shrugging her shoulders. Skuld's eyes were half-open as she was seated at the kosatsu with her chin resting on Mjolnir. Seeing her two sisters this fatigued inclined Urd towards feeling her own exhaustion.
"Anyway, we all weaved back and forth through messes of random TimeWeave corridors in the TimeStream. To me, they all looked like the usual infinite labyrinth. You know...how the TimeStream seems to pulse with shifts of energy. But Noble Scarlet seemed to know which passages to explore. Her scarlet eyes were radiating with intensity as she guided all of us. You would be proud of her, even if she *is* a somewhat underdeveloped little seraph! She has such a cute little pink glow when she gets excited...kinda like Rudolf the Red-nosed Reindeer," Urd described, recanting her earlier slurrous opinion.
Skuld smiled at her angel egg and the Christmas reference.
"Then right towards the end, Holy Bell pulls on ahead and floats over to a side passage. By this time, everything was getting foggy and dim. I think that the Goddess powers I borrowed from Belldandy and the nuns were starting to deplete themselves. Holy Bell was definitely in a rush to get us out of the TimeStream. Then she starts singing and gesturing...and I figured that this was the place to go. Funny...for a moment, I thought it looked like she was looking in a mirror...I could see *another* Angel in front of her at the exit she was pointing to. Then *pop*! Here we are."
"That's an incredible tale, Urd. But what I don't understand is how Keiichi got so *old*," Belldandy questioned, her hands splayed tiredly on the table. A lot of things didn't make sense. First, Belldandy had expected that they would all return to the exact point where they had disappeared--the sento that Sayoko had recommended. But instead of ending up in the public baths, *everyone* was unceremoniously deposited on the temple's living room floor. Belldandy was grateful...at least they had their clothes on this time; the same clothes they were wearing at the point when they were snagged back to the present. But the second expectation had burst the moment she turned to see Keiichi and the others...
They looked like soldiers...and they were extremely emaciated. And filthy and disheveled and exhausted and scarred and...
"Yeah! Tomohisa looks like he's a thirtysomething!" Skuld exclaimed with dashing disappointment.
"Tell me about it...Cevn has a bunch of gray hair..."
"And Keiichi has half his head shaved and is sporting some kind of awful...*beard*!" Belldandy finished, stricken by her mortal boyfriend's roguish appearance. "And is that...armor...that they're all wearing? It looks and smells horrid!"
"Well, Holy Bell assured me that once they spend a few days here in the present, their appearances will gradually begin to return to normal as the 'correct' TimeWeave we returned to...the proper 'Present' in the TimeStream…exerts its influence on them," Urd reassured her sisters with a smile. She didn't want to admit it, but she was a bit freaked out at how old Cevn looked with his shock of gray hair. And a stump where one of his hands should be. Would that heal as well? She looked at Belldandy while pouring herself another cup of hot sake.
"But this may only be the cream off the top of our problems," Belldandy said doubtfully. "What if their memories *don't* change? And what about Megumi and Sayoko? They saw a version of the *future*!"

* * * * * * * *

As she sat on her futon, Skuld mentally investigated the possibility that the four men had aged in the past because they arrived at an earlier date...perhaps years earlier than the moment in time that Urd had arrived to in the past, when she found them. According to Megumi and Sayoko, they had been imprisoned by Aoshima-baka for almost 15 months, which corresponded with her own sense of elapsed Future while she and her sisters were confined by the stupid jerk! Tomohisa and the others might have arrived *years* before Urd retrieved them. She didn't believe that the force that transported them back in time was responsible for their drastically altered appearances. The only date that they could rely upon was the one she found in 2050; the date Keiichi had carved into the wooden vehicle being studied by the archaeologists.
"In *that* 2050...not *this* TimeWeave's future," Skuld reminded herself. In *this* present, there was no mysterious "war chariot" buried in a cave somewhere in Japan. Nevertheless, they were here...and Skuld conservatively concluded that somehow they had lived for a period of at least ten years in the 14th century.
When the Goddesses had arrived back at the temple, all the mortals were unconscious...no doubt their minds were strained beyond ken by their travels through the TimeStream. TimeStream travel was a psychosis-inducing experience for any Goddess except a Norn...Skuld could only imagine what it was like for the mortals, even if rendered unconscious. Big Sister had done something right for once by knocking them out. It must have been hard, blindly pushing her way through the TimeStream to the Present with a cargo of unconscious men, guided by a trio of Angels.
But what puzzled Skuld most was how Belldandy, Skuld, Megumi and Sayoko had all been *sucked* backwards in time with the abruptness of a sonic boom the moment Urd had arrived back in 20XX. Urd's arrival in the present had effectively sealed off the alinear chunk of time they were in. As they no longer were integrated in the TimeStream of 2050, they were repulsed. And wound up back where they started, just like Skuld had hoped. They were forcibly converged to the point in Time where Urd returned.
The alinear segment of Time they had inhabited was restored to its rightful corridor of Time. So...somewhen, there was a temple full of nuns with Sora and Chihiro as Abbesses, no longer under the sword of the Almighty's threat to 'depopulate' the Earthrealm.
Skuld lazed in the fact that she was back home, safe and sound.
Well, *almost* back. Skuld was almost out cold the moment she hit her thickly blanketed futon. Her internal sense of Time informed her that they were off by a couple of days when they arrived back home.


* * * * * * * *

Belldandy watched her sleeping sister through half-lidded eyes.
Once they regained their senses upon their return, the three Goddesses had brought out blankets, fresh futons and pillows for all of the unconscious mortals. During Urd's monologue, Belldandy kept looking back over her shoulder to reassure herself that Keiichi was still present in the Present. She saw that he was sleeping, breathing shallowly. She was concerned...his face looked so gaunt, definitely emaciated. All four men looked like they had been starving for quite some time.
Deep in her heart, she yearned for Keiichi to awaken, so she could gather him in her arms. Belldandy thought about how much she missed hearing his soft voice...
"Soon...my love," she said to herself, smiling winsomely.
For some reason, Belldandy thought of Peorth, back in the Earth Helper branch of the Goddess Relief Office.

* * * * * * * *

*a..a..aachoo*
Peorth sneezed with affected delicacy. She was perched on her floating consolechair, looking over various Node monitors that she manned. Most of them measured the flow of wishgranting energy expended by the Ultimate Force and the Yggdrasil Mainframe system status, while a dozen or so monitored the activities of wish candidates and wish recipients.
"Belldandy..." she thought randomly.
Just recently, a deeply instinctual sensation informed Peorth that Belldandy had somehow been *absent* in time. Which was next to impossible, since she was the Norn of the Present. Peorth's realm was Forever, which was as confining as it was revealing. Fortunately, she wasn't a Norn. Yet, she still couldn't figure out Forever's chronological attributes. Most of the time, anyway. It was both Now and All Time. Only Kami-sama knew for sure...and He had refused to instruct Peorth. All He said was Forever existed beyond Now and Eternity. According to the Lord, the truth of Forever was on a need-to-know basis. Which didn't include Peorth, despite the fact that Forever was *her* realm of Time.
She looked wistfully at the network of rose vines encircling the monitors and equipment at her workstation. On impulse, she lowered her consolechair to the floor and then kicked up a flurry of petals with her bare feet. The rainbow of rose petals that carpeted the floor bore little resemblance to those in the Earthrealm. Here, rose florets remained fresh and aromatic for years after they were shed. Although Peorth preferred ruby red roses, she enjoyed a host of other shades of roses around the place. Her fellow workers thought she was crazy...and perhaps they were right. She didn't care a whit about what they thought.
Peorth appreciated the symbolic aspects of the rose. Roses were a visual tropos representing romantic love, purity, sensuous conduct and conduit. As a GRO agent, she served as the conduit between mortals and their wishes. A divine Rose. Even her Angel, Gorgeous Rose, possessed a floral nature. Millions of the wishes she granted had created emotional conduits between mortals...doubtlessly because they were *always* wishing to be in love.
"Urd may be the Goddess of Love...but *I'm* the real love giver," she observed in the privacy of her Node with a self-knowing smile.
Peorth reflected on her long history with the rose. Currently, she and the three sisters used lensing and floral effects as primary teleport transportation gateways. Skuld's was the simplest because she was the youngest...all she had to do was find water and slip through the meniscus. She hadn't chosen a floral gateway as of yet, but that would come in time. But the older Goddesses had to rely on other means to transport until just a few mortal centuries ago. Urd had chosen cherry blossoms, which restricted her to only a few parts of the Earthrealm. Belldandy used sunflowers and trees. Peorth used roses, of course. This was the standard...until the recent inventions of the mirror, the camera and the television. Now, each Goddess had an organic and mechanic means of teleportation portals. Eventually, Skuld would begin to use a technological means of teleportation...Peorth hedged her bets that it would have something to do with holophotic videmeotronics. After all, Skuld was the Norn of the Future.
Peorth still remembered the time a couple of thousand years ago when Belldandy accidentally was observed by mortals in mid-transport through a mirror. That mirror was now locking in a vault in the Imperial Palace in Tokyo. The ancient Japanese mythologized it, regarding that primitive mirror as one of their 'Holy of Holies'. All because of Belldandy.
"Belldandy..." she thought again. "What's with this flush of thoughts about Belldandy, I wonder?"
Peorth revisited her last trip to Earthrealm in her mind...

* * * * * * * *

Following her talk with Belldandy immediately after the 'omiai incident', Peorth had taken a leave of absence from the GRO to seek some much needed R & R. She had to see for herself if she was experiencing Wishout from too many millennia granting wishes. She decided to visit the Orion System in Sector A-Epsi-2378-Durgea-Thon-4114...a solar system within Belldandy's assigned sector where each of the four habitable planets could only host one GRO Goddess at a time. Of course all planets were habitable to a Goddess, but Peorth preferred her planets *alive*. Fortunately, she was able to reserve a week on Orion V, one of her favorites.
There, in total solitude, she read several GRO manuals discussing the dangers of Wishout. She was at her leisure while sunning in the pink and purple sandy beaches. The azure glow of Betelgeuse created a second horizon above that of the sea while she basked in its waning light. Many times larger than the sun of the Earthrealm, the massive blue stellar object prominently filled a good portion of the evening sky as it set. Because the sky of Orion V was orange, the setting sun was bathed in a greenish glow. Having the whole planet to herself, Peorth could sunbathe to her heart's desire, clad only by the oceanside breeze...without the usual skimpy bathing suits she was so fond of.
No tan lines to worry about.
For the remainder of her vacation, Peorth examined her recent wishgranting exploits. Belldandy had offered her opinion that she had become wished out...too emotionally detached from the mortals she was supposed to provide relief to.
She had to grudgingly agree with her friend's assessment.
After the week of reflection and relaxation was up, Peorth checked herself in to an Ethiopsylogic Clinic to undergo treatment for Wishout. It was a blow to her pride, but Peorth knew it was necessary. Despite all appearances to the contrary, Peorth greatly valued her ability to be prepared to contract wishes made by her clients.
There, she underwent a series of rehabilitative exercises. At the end of her treatment, she was told by the Proctors that she needed to limit her wishgranting to once a year...and not to take on difficult wishes.
The Yggdrasil System had logged the aftercare instructions of the Clinic...

* * * * * * * *

So now, here she was.
Back at the GRO, in her personal Node, in the Earth Otasuke Division.
Her holographic nameplate said "Peorth" and something about "Restricted to Limited Duty". That in itself was embarrassing. But beyond embarrassment lay tedium. All Peorth had to do was visit her post on occasion, waiting for the one wish that would be called up to her this year. It was as boring as watching mountains erode.
Peorth thought it ironic that, with her powers unsealed, she could see Forever...but was limited with what she could do in the Now.
"Belldandy..." she thought again. At least she was thinking of Belldandy more than she was thinking of Keiichi. Perhaps her rehab had proven effective.
There were only so many ways she could arrange roses in her workspace.

* * * * * * * *

I woke up groggily, feeling a wave of nausea as soon as my eyes greeted the dawn. There was something *different* about my surroundings. The air was much chiller then I remember, and I couldn't hear any distant warshouting or smell enemy campfires.
My guts still clenched to themselves in starvation mode. I had grown used to feeling the knots of my intestines stretched against my skin, hardened by lack of food. Then I noticed that I was sleeping on something much softer than the hard ground along the castle ramparts. Maybe I was becoming delirious from the hunger. Because of the Imagawa siege on Lord Shimazu's castle, we hadn't had any supplies for a long time. I remembered the last several evenings; Imagawa's troops had made a show of roasting swine and venison right under the castle walls...the odor of cooked meat was intended to weaken our resolve.
I was indoors.
There was something weirdly familiar about this place. It was still dark outside, but as my eyes adjusted to the lack of light, I could see that I was in a futon, inside of a room.
Back at Lord Mori's castle? Keiichi's house in Oita? Impossible...that was *years* ago! When the Imagawa forces captured Lord Mori's land, I learned that they looted his mansion and burned it to the ground, including our compound in Oita. I would have been greatly surprised if they hadn't. There is no psychological victory if a conqueror leaves remnants of the vanquished's familiar environs and homesteads. Not in the Ashikaga Era, to be sure.
"Where am I?" I wondered, feeling panic arise in my throat. I was so scared by this waking dream that I instinctively jerked and curled up into a fetal position.
"Hey...take it easy. You're safe," I heard a soft feminine voice intone. Where did I hear that voice before? It sounded so...soothing. So...benign. So...tender?
The voice of my dreams. Dreams that had become scarcer and scarcer over the hard years...
I looked up...into the face of an apparition.
"U..Urd?"

* * * * * * * *

Rather than going to sleep with her sisters, Urd had decided to keep a nightwatch on the mortals. After all, she felt a sense of responsibility by virtue of the fact that she had risked *everything* to bring the guys back. Somehow, Skuld had figured out that they had 'lost' two days in the process of their time traveling. They had left for the public baths on a Saturday...Keiichi and Megumi had just finished finals. Now it was Tuesday, with Christmas just around the corner.
She sipped on a chilled bottle of Heineken, one of her favorite non-Japanese beers. Belldandy and Skuld had hit the sack a few hours ago...after falling asleep during her narrative of her exploits through Time. Urd was too amused to feel insulted by this.
It would be daylight soon. Urd was drinking...not to get drunk, but just to get a little buzz on. It was her way of unwinding. "Besides, New Year's is coming up! I can really get trashed then! After what I just went through...I think I deserve a drinking bout with Tamiya and Ootaki! I'll drink those two under the table again!" she thought with glee. Just a week and a half...and then she could really cut loose then with some high Richter sake consumption.
As time wore on, Urd thought of all the crazy times she had in 2050. They weren't exactly happy times, but they were filled with excitement...in an insane sort of way. Paint the town with lurid colors. Livid colors of eyegrabbing petulance. Urd still couldn't get the images out of her mind of the streetscene life in the future Tokyo. Or Sora and Chihiro as senior nuns in some sort of Zen convent. Especially the heartwrenching sacrifice of Kodama to free her and her sisters.
It was almost funny when Kodama, Hikari and Senrigan reported to them while they were in the kitchen, totally carried into a panic because they had been gone two days. She, Belldandy and Skuld started crying and Belldandy scooped up a very surprised Kodoma and hugged the little Ninjette tight to her breast, swearing that she would never leave her again.
"Uhmmmm," she heard someone groan. She snapped to alertness. Someone was waking up! She looked over the blanketed mounds...and saw Cevn roll on his back. In a split second, she floated herself over to his side. His eyes were open, but they were confused and vacuous. Then he turned his head over and looked straight at her.
As she heard him gasp out her name, she unknowingly let slip the bottle of beer...

* * * * * * * *

Cevn reached up with his unmaimed hand and tried to touch his fingers against Urd's cheek, just to see if she was really there. The Ultimate Force intervened and his fingers stopped the customary two inches from her. It had been so long...he had forgotten.
"You...brought...us...back," he said weakly, before he choked on astonished tears. He could feel Urd's hot tears dripping on his face...indirect watery kisses of gratitude.
Urd could only stare at him wordlessly, filled with longing and heavyheartedness.
"Another tearful reunion," she noticed as she felt an impulse to hug him to her chest until he smothered in her embrace. Then he said the words that jarred her heart into overload.
"I...I really, really missed you, Urd," he said between dry heaves. Now she wanted to hug herself to his chest, so she could hear the comforting sound of his living heartbeat...

* * * * * * * *

Cevn was just beginning to describe his life in the 1370s when Keiichi woke up. Urd had figured that Keiichi would be the next one awake.
"Belldandy is going to be so happy!" she rejoiced as Keiichi rolled over to look at her. Keiichi weakly stood up, then sat down again, his legs unsteady.
"I. I'm *home*!" he half-shouted in a raspy voice. "This...isn't a dream. This is *real*!!! We made it back alive! I'm *really here*. This is real!" he mumbled.
Keiichi looked at Cevn and Urd, then tried to get up again. He was too weak to stand on his own feet. He could only feel one driving force in his heart right now. All that he could remember was the never-ending hunger that gnawed at his spirit while it consumed his body. Now...he was back where he belonged.
Back where *she* was.
The last thing he remembered was the insane idea of carving his name and a message…in English so that there would be no questioning its authenticity…and then being surrounded by Imagawa forces. Sword glares glancing the sun everywhere, and then a shout and a rainfall of lightning bolts...
"What the *hell* happened to these guys?" Urd said incredulously. Keiichi was wirethin; dressed in some kind of court armor. There was no muscle on his arms, his cheeks were drawn in deeply and his face looked like a skull with a spraypaint of flesh. Just like Cevn and the other two guys.
"Where...is she? Where's Bell?" he asked hoarsely. Urd understood immediately.
"I'll take you to her," she promised. She hovered, comforting him as she gently untied the armor he was wearing. The ties had bored into his skin; they were crusted with blood and gore. Keiichi winced as she pulled off his chest plate...
She suddenly realized that she had completely tuned out Cevn when Keiichi had awakened.
"Oh..my..." Urd muttered, ridden with sudden guilt.
"It's okay. I understand," she heard Cevn say as she turned a stricken face to him.
"Whatta guy," she thought, amazed at his selflessness. She tenderly gathered Keiichi up in her arms.
"You okay?" she asked him as she floated towards the sister's bedroom.
He was already unconscious from his weakened state...

* * * * * * * *

Belldandy stirred in her futon, stretching her long legs under the covers. She felt startled for a moment when one of her feet kicked something under the blanket.
She turned her head and saw *Him*.

*Gasp*

"K..Keiichi," she whispered lovingly, barely holding her shout of joy in check. Her beloved was sound asleep next to her, sharing her futon. Her hands trembled as she stroked his jawline affectionately.
"You're really here with me, aren't you, my love," she softly said to the sleeping figure. Up close, Keiichi looked like a cancer victim in the last days of emaciated struggle. But Belldandy didn't care; she could still make out his firm cheekbones, his smile, his long eyelashes...and that sensual mouth. She trusted her Angel implicitly; Holy Bell had affirmed to Urd that all the men would be back to normal within a few days.
Holy Bell loved Keiichi too.
Belldandy had suffered cruelly during her temporary separation from her Angel. It was as if all her senses had been blunted. But an exhausted Holy Bell had returned with Urd and the others. The first thing her Angel did was embrace her tightly...then tuck herself away in Bell's Soul for a much-deserved rest.
Belldandy felt weak from lack of sleep, but not weak enough to keep from staying up, admiring Keiichi like the rare jewel of a mortal he was.
As softly as she could, she rained kisses on his face while he slept.

* * * * * * * *

Megumi cradled Genji.
As soon as the sun arose, she had awakened. The technodelic futurescape was gone, replaced by more familiar trappings. She felt her mind shifting through a series of mental templates as she tried to sort out where and *when* she was. As she profiled the surroundings with a series of visual snapshots, her caution shifted to joyous amazement as she realized that she was in her *own* living room. Her relief upped itself to a fever pitch when she saw Genji's sleeping form a few feet away; but almost as quickly as it sweetened with the discovery...it soured when she saw his battle-hardened aspect.
He looked much, much older. At least Cevn-sensei's age. He was uncomfortably malnourished. Genji looked like he had been through hell. She and Sayoko had endured their own private hell...but it seemed to pale alongside her imaginings about what had shaped this man...this sleeping Genji in front of her. A man he was; there wasn't a trace of the boyishness of the Genji she had fallen in love with. Her eyes tinged with sympathy as she noticed that his once-smooth face was deeply tanned and scarred; crow's feet wrinkled themselves around his eyes and deep crevasses etching his jaw and mouth. His hands were burly rough and covered with scars.
Genji had a crudely coifed samurai-style hairdo. She remembered a while back in a mall somewhere in Tokyo...Genji had joked about one of his fantasies---starring in a period-piece play as a samurai or lord.
"Well, you've gotten your wish, my love," Megumi said gently, then caught herself, amazed at her light-hearted dismissal of his present bearing. He looked like he had aged twenty years...
"Strange," she observed. "The thoughts that unfurl out of one's mind when they are swept with a joy that is tainted with melancholy." She was too shocked to say anything meaningful to herself, to reassure herself. So her mind was slipping into a dreamlike fugue of salad-like thoughts.
"H..he's so much *older* than me," Megumi observed apprehensively as she peered closer at Genji's face. His eyes were deeper set, and his face had even more wrinkles on closer examination...but he was still very handsome. Mysteriously, he looked debonair, almost noble in aspect. Megumi realized that she was seeing a Genji that was 15 or 20 years older than the Genji she knew.
It didn't make a difference. It *wouldn't* make a difference! If this was the Genji that Urd had brought back from the past, then this would be the Genji she would choose to love in the here and now.
"All of my heart...for you," she whispered as she rested Genji's in her lap, knowing that his ears were deaf to her confession of love. Megumi knew that he knew how she felt, anyway...somewhere in the resting of his soul. His Soul would hear her words...
She wanted to be the first thing he saw when he opened his eyes.

* * * * * * * *

...He felt a stream of cooling wind against his chest as he saw her, standing only a few feet away. 13 years! It had been 13 years since he last saw Bell-chan's face! His nerves felt fiery and uncoiled as he found himself swimming in the ocean of beauty in her eyes, looking closely at her smooth skin. So smooth...
He wanted to stroke it...to touch it...to kiss it.
He wanted to *have* her!
Keiichi noticed the spark in Belldandy's eyes...the unmistakable expression of desire that curved her lips and smile. Moving his eyes down her slender neck to alight on her generous bosom...down further to the sway of her hips.
In his imaginings, he had touched her all over her body, made love to her in all sorts of situations. In his dreams, he had dreamed of kissing the richness of her lips, feeling her sweet breath mingling with his...gloriously kissing on park benches, on blankets in the midst of meadows, in the warm water of a summertime beach resort, in her bedroom, on his futon...
On his futon.
He just wanted to kiss her...no...he wanted to sleep in his futon with Bell-chan next to him...no...he wanted to sleep covered only by a blanket and Bell-chan *naked* next to him...no...he wanted to be fully awake with his body firmly pressed against hers as he made furious love to her...
Keiichi felt a volcano of suppressed lust plume upward, launching ribbons of sexual desire from his loins to his mind as he pulled Belldandy into his arms...
Seeking her mouth with his...kissing her hotly and deeply as he tore at her clothes...
"My dear Keiichi, if you wish for me to be naked, I can simply make these clothes disappear!" Belldandy whispered to him in a sultrysweet breathy gasp.
"No...no! I want to *undress you*, my long-lost Belldandy! I've dreamed of this...it seems like I've dreamed of this *forever*!" he gasped back as he tore open her blouse, kissing her hard in the mouth. Her darting tongue and roving hands told him that she wanted him. She could never match him, could never want him in this moment as much as he wanted her, right now...but her passion clearly matched his.
He felt her reach inside his shirt and run her fingers over his back. She would feel the scar...one of many, but it was the most horrible of the cuts he had endured in the 14th century.
Looking at his chest, he realized that he was no longer emaciated from the months of starvation. His body was firmly muscled, totally at its peak...filled with strength. It was as if the long deathmarch campaign of the past year had never happened.
He was himself again!
"K..Keiichi!" she near-shouted in a stunned voice, her hot breath kissing his ear. He could feel the shock she felt through the touch of her fingers, as they abruptly stopped touching him, momentarily paralyzed...and then her fingers tentatively traced the long rip in his skin that extended from his right shoulderblade to his left hip.
He wanted to tell her about his injury, to tell her how the thoughts of someday reuniting with her were the only hope he had felt in *so long*...to give her every single missing detail of his life...that separate life where he endured the torture of being unloved...the emptiness he felt every day since he was thrust into the past.
Words wouldn't be enough...he could only tell her with his body.
Keiichi reached inside her bra and caressed the soft globes of her breasts...the milk-smooth skin barely remembered by his fingers.
He felt his body pouring into hers as he desperately touched her belly, then reached down...
A few minutes later, he was pouring into her...with hard, hot, deep thrusts. Bell was looking inward, probing far into his eyes as he made love to her. He wasn't being gentle about it...his lust had crawled through every pore of his body as he joined her, firing him to exert every last iota of strength, pounding himself hard against her.
Belldandy was gasping as she met him with her hips, taking everything he had. Keiichi was swept away by the love that shone in her eyes was glazed with the heat of her own arousal, her own passion. Keiichi knew that she didn't mind that he was being so intense, that he wanted to bury all the frustration, sadness and anger that he had felt for all those years...all those moments he was robbed of the presence of her love...to bury them away as he was burying himself deep inside of her...
"Give yourself to me, my darling Keiichi!" she gasped, pulling him tight against her and squeezing his back as hard as he had ever been squeezed...pressing every inch of him against her. Patting his back softly and affirmingly, encouraging him to release...
He felt a nova explode in his chest and groin as Bell-chan shuddered underneath him...everything went blurry as he locked his eyes with hers, feeling an intense discharge of love, a taking in of love through her eyes, the sparkling wonder of the connection, the beauty of her face swarming him with memories of times together with his dear best friend and soulmate...
His wonderful, exquisite Goddess Belldandy...
...........
.......
...
"Keiichi!!!"
He looked up to see Skuld in the doorway, just as everything went tinny as he spent himself.
"*Keiichi*!"
Belldandy was turning a furious red of embarrassment underneath him as he collasped on top of her...
"KEIICHI!"
He looked up at Skuld, who looked more pissed-off and angry than the most vicious Fudo statue he had ever seen. Glowering at him with anger reddened eyes, Skuld readied Mjolnir...swinging it back like a baseball player planning to hit a homerun.
Keiichi couldn't believe his bad luck! Skuld had walked in right as he and Bell-chan had ascended to the summit of their passions...and now she was going to kill him...
She was the very manifestation of Anger...

* * * * * * * *

"Keiichi!"
"KEIICHI!!!"
"Quit snoring!" he heard Skuld shouting, waking him up. He felt a wave of nausea as his sense of his body returned to him. His stomach had been in revolt for the last several weeks of the siege. But in the back of his mind rested the knowledge that he was back *home*, back with his Belldandy. With a flush of embarrassment at his upset stomach and the unabashedly explicit dream he had just been awakened from, he turned his head and saw *her*.
"Bell..." was all he could say until he dry heaved. He sat up quickly and felt his famished stomach spasming, seeing a look of alarm clouding Belldandy's face.
"K..Keiichi?" he heard her ask, her milkwarm voice filled with concern.
"I..I'm all right, Bell," he said. His physical frame shuddered from his nausea, and then Keiichi felt his energy drain itself away. He leaned weakly forward, on the verge of collapse.
Against Bell's bosom.
He felt the cushion of fleshy softness there, as her honey brown hair flitted against his face, tickling his nose. Immobilized for a moment, he could hear her heart beating rapidly. Keiichi felt like he was poised at the bridge...right before passing out.
Then he started crying. He looked up and saw tears welling up in Belldandy's sapphire blue eyes.
"I...love...you. You told me *to live*...and that was the only hope I had at the…end. I love you with all of me," he managed to whisper, then buried his head in her chest and cried. He could feel the hot play of her tears on his cheek as he held onto her for dear life...dear love. It was a triumph, a dream come true. He had given up hope of ever seeing her. Dozens of times. But somehow, he never gave his dreams away completely. Through battles, wars, the 'coughing sweat violence' plague, attacks by brigands...he always managed to marshal his deepest desires; always the desire to see Bell-chan again. At times, his wish to see her again was the only thing he could cling onto. It was still a shock, feeling her milk-smooth skin against his cheek and forehead.
He wavered in emotional disbelief as his mind struggled to grasp the fact that he was home, with Belldandy.
He cried for all of the years that he had held out, hope against hope, that he would be reunited with her.
"Thirteen years," he sobbed, bringing on another wave of retching. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Belldandy move her hands. His upset stomach was soothed in an instant. Keiichi realized that Belldandy must have recovered from the dizzying heights of gratitude, and relieved him of his discomfort.
Her hair...how much he had missed that magnificent hair! Softer than a kitten's belly, as beautiful as pale plum blossoms, distinctively fragrant, glossy as pearls...
He felt her fingers gingerly stoking his disheveled hair, examining his shaven pate. He heard her giggle as she traced over the fuzz that marked his scalp line.
"You aren't going to keep your hair this way, are you?" she teased with mock seriousity. For a moment, Keiichi felt a flash of anger...wondering why she was questioning the established hairstyle for senior samurai retainers. He had *earned* the right to have his hair styled this way!
Then he remembered that he was in 20XX.
Cognitive discordance.
"20XX is the out-of-place time, as far as I am concerned," he realized with shock. "Am I going to have to question *everything* about being back where I belong? How am I going to get along in a society filled with wimpish, child-men? Where am I going to find my heart?"
It had been so long since he had lived his former life with Belldandy. For so many years, life in the 21st century seemed like a distant dream...another lifetime. But now that he was back, he realized that it would be a huge adjustment.
"Will she still love me, now that I'm thirteen years older?" the electricity of his conscience pulled...
Keiichi shook his head "no" to Bell's question about his hairstyle, then pulled himself up and darted a line of kisses on her cheek. He could feel her shaking as he kissed her gently on the lips.
"Welcome home, Keiichi, my love. And yes, I'll love you no matter what," she said, answering his unasked question before kissing him more deeply.

* * * * * * * *

We four guys were pretty much bedridden for three days after our return, as the Present asserted itself upon our bodies with an indifference to the pain it caused us. Already weakened, our human bodies were subjected to rapid physiological changes that simply blew beyond tolerable pain thresholds. We were growing *backwards* in age!
Past and present tore at each other like curtains being ripped in a windstorm as they fought for supremacy in my consciousness. The transformation process was almost trancelike. In the barely reckoned real moments, I was overjoyed to regain the use of my hand; somehow it grew back in the middle of the second night. Because we had starved for so long, we were unable to eat anything except some thin miso soup and watered down fruit juices. Belldandy proved her culinary expertise by making even this Spartan fare taste delicious.

I couldn't believe how calm it was.
I knew that my perspective was forever skewed by 13 years of living in the past. Here I was, a 29-year-old, with the life experience of someone in their mid-40s. Culture shock didn't even come close to describing what I felt. My cultural 'comfort zone' was based on a long-extinct milieu. I had spent almost a third of my life in 14th century Japan. I had a perverse desire to anonymously publish a series of memoirs, just to ignite some controversy among medieval Japan scholars.
I also had a desire to find someone and have a serious jousting match with a longspear. Now that I had both hands, I would be able to seriously kick some ass...
I didn't envy Tomohisa, whose life experience in the past totaled almost half of his life. I knew that his process of adjusting to the present would be far more challenging than the adjustments Keiichi, Genji and I would face. It was almost amusing to see how he reacted to Skuld's attentions with confusion and a lack of empathy. The strength of *her* reaction to his indifference informed me that she had deep feelings of attraction towards him.
I hoped they could sort it out.
Megumi and Sayoko were also in a daze; their fabulous tales of the future Tokyo served up a strong atmosphere of dystopia mixed with sci-fi surrealism.
I compared myself to a POW who had been incarcerated for years, then suddenly returned to an unfamiliar familiarity. Equally hostage to my past...and my *other* past. The familiar settings of the 21st century seemed almost magical in my eyes. My two cats, Pho and Xue Shizi, kept guard on me; chasing off Velsper a few times when he came by to indulge his curiosity. Yet, I was feeling strangely nostalgic about the 14th century.
We all had so much to sort out in the conflict between mind and memory, which made 'debriefing sessions' between the four of us in the garage essential. The first time we went into the garage, minus 10 degrees Celsius in the middle of December, we sat and talked for three hours before noticing there was a space heater we could use to warm ourselves with. We were *that* used to 'roughing it'...and as equally unused to modern technology.
Urd played nurse with an almost exasperating obsession. It was cute, yet it was irritating. I wanted to slap her. She even wore her trademark pink nurse's outfit when she visited...just like in the manga. As she related details of her incarceration at the hands of a future Aoshima, I realized that her stay had been extremely unpleasant as well.
Then Urd had let me in on the *secret* last night.
In order for me to respect that secret, she had insisted that she accompany me on the Christmas shopping expedition. Tomorrow, Megumi and Genji were going to drop us in Tokyo, where we were going to spend the entire day shopping. Almost 12 hours. With Urd.
I didn't know if I could survive a 21st century shopping experience. Or survive her in 'shopping mode'.
So in a few days, I was hurtled through enormous polarities of worldviews. From starving in the 14th century...to shopping for Christmas presents during the busy Roppongi year-end commercial hubbub.

* * * * * * * *

"By the way, how do you plan to get *my* present if we're going to be busy shopping for the others?" Urd asked in a cute-girl falsetto.
"You should have thought about that before you demanded to go shopping with me today, Urd," I said semi-seriously. "Besides, I'm going to get your present in a couple of hours." Urd's bronzed face lit up with this news; her emerald-green eyes glistening with joy...or greed.
"Besides, isn't it enough that we're together?" I added. Urd frowned at this.
"No...you have to prove your love for me," she sang, imitating the old Madonna classic while swaying her hips sensually. Urd was being *really* hyper today...her old self was kicking in a full dose of craziness. Back in the 1370s, women that acted like her would get whipped and thrown out into the rain, until they started showing some respect.
The kind of violence that I had taken for granted for 13 years didn't fit in this century. Everything seemed disorderly. I saw some wannabe tough guy on the escalator give me a disdainful glance, and had to bite my tongue until it bled to keep from leaping onto the other side and beating the shit out of him, just so I could try out my 'new' hand on his face.
Urd started singing "Connected" by Ayumi Hamasaki, and I chided her…"Trauma" was the song that really fit the mood, after what she and I had been through. So she started singing "Trauma" using her skillful vocal impersonating, which turned some heads as we walked near Santa Claus and his stuffed reindeer.
"I hope this doesn't imply that you're warming up for a karaoke bout anytime in the near future," I said warily. I couldn't stand Karaoke...just couldn't get into the 'hamility' factor it demanded. Oddly enough, a nascent form of sing-along existed in the 14th century. Get drunk and howl Chinese songs on the weekend. Of course, I never drank during my stay in the past...but I had found myself in the midst of a fair share of drunken brawls.
Amazing how little things change.
"Well, New Year's *is* just around the corner, y'know!" she said, then continued humming some J-pop ballad that I had heard on the radio, back when I shared an office with several other TAs. It amazed me how Urd knew so many facets of Japanese culture...for someone who was glued to the TV almost all day. I almost never heard her listen to music, except for the so-called 'God's Music' she claimed that I had been composing.
A long time ago...is now. How does one erase 13 years, especially when 13 years both begins and ends with *this* moment? This frame of time?
I wanted to pour forth a series of questions to my companion...but Urd was giddishly silly. She was dressed in a long black Russian fur coat, with one of those fake-sable hats. Under her coat, she was dressed in a funky one-piece suit that looked like a bodysuit, only it was knit like a sweater. A normal mortal would have gone scratchcrazy with this, unless she had long underwear on. But Urd didn't notice in the slightest. She looked like a Bond girl, or Lana from Dr. Zhivago. Despite her classy winter attire, she was behaving like...like Skuld. Bouncy and vivacious and...goofy. I remembered reading in the manga about Urd's relentless lunacy around the holidays; her exuberance was almost discomfiting to me. At least she wasn't wearing one of those silly Santa's Helper hats.
Santa Claus hadn't existed for the last 13 years of my life.
"So what to get everybody?" I wondered, overawed by the huge department stores that looked like giant redwoods in a pine forest...the pines of course being the countless specialty stores and mom-and-pop shops.
Mission Impossible.
The sidewalks were packed with shoppers...and I wished my mind was as equally packed with thoughtful gift ideas...
So I looked at my 'cheat sheet':

For Skuld: The new illustrated edition of "Green Requiem" by Motoko Arai. All the Shio Sato manga collections I could find, to replace the shojo manga Peorth 'borrowed' from her after the omiai incident. I mentally logged a thought that I really should suggest to Skuld that she should build some kind of mecha to safekeep her manga; this was the fourth set of manga that Peorth has made off with. Talking to Peorth about theft would be an exercise in futility.
For Belldandy: She's hard, because she seems to have everything. Or wants nothing...besides Keiichi. The "Love Songs" CD by the Beatles? One of those aprons with pockets and plaid 'piyo piyo'...they're supposedly coming back in style. One of those new tea-milk mixers...I spied her staring at the page in a magazine. I felt guilty, because everything I was getting her was so...domestic. After discussing it with Urd, I settled on the idea of a gift certificate so that she and Keiichi could have their portrait painted. Not by Sayoko's S&M art club, either.
For Keiichi: What to get for a guy who's been missing the 21st century for a dozen years? I ended up getting him a subscription to a Motor Trend and Wheels, two American motor mags that aren't easily available in Japan. And also a Harley shirt...as a joke. But what else? School would start soon, so maybe something for spring break? I finally decided on the obvious...Tokyo Disneyland. I remembered Keiichi saying that he hadn't been there for a long time. Seven centuries, to be exact.
For Megumi: It would be impractical to get her clothes, and too thoughtless to simply get her shopping gift certificates at her fave stores. So I decided to get her one of those lighted "reality mirrors", so she could admire her face...and hopefully not forget to keep taking her beauty adjustment pills. Then, I saw a Swiss imported sweater that seemed to have 'buy me for Megumi' written over it. So I bought it, just to see her reaction.
For Tomohisa: Season tix to the Tokyo Giants? Not quite. What to get for the average 30-year-old teenager? I saw a handbill on a cement pole advertising Kyudo lessons in Chiba. During the last six years of our stay in the past, he became an excellent archer: one of the best in Kyushu. I hedged my bets that Tomohisa would want to continue practicing archery...but only as a hobby this time. He should suitably impress any Kyudo instructor. And I got him those old Sadahara Oh and Mark McGwire/Sammy Sosa card sets I saw at a collector's shop. And a few CDs picked at random.
For Genji: Eiji Yoshikawa's "Heike Story". He should get a kick out of that...especially since we lived through so much of a very similar experience. Train tickets to Nara for the Noh Onmatsuri for next year, since he missed the Dec. 17-18 performance this year due to being stuck in medieval Japan. I saw a humorist's knock off of Musashi's "Five Rings", so I bought that too.
For Sayoko:

.....after lunch

* * * * * * * *

"What are you going to get *me*?" Urd said irritably as she ate her tempura. I was struggling with the bowl of miso and tofu in front of me...my stomach was doing gymnastics since I hadn't eaten real solid food for a long time. I must have been thinking aloud about what I was going to get Sayoko.
"You've bought all this stuff for everyone else...how about me!"
"Shut up!"
"*What?*"
"Urd, I don't know how to deal with you. Women in 14 century Japan...well, they're obedient. They don't go around hounding the men they belong to. Look...I just got back and I'm really feeling fucked up about everything. And furthermore..."
"You expect *me* to be *obedient*?" Urd interrupted, her green eyes wide with incredulity.
"Yes. No. I..don't..know! Okay! Why are you so recalcitrant?"
"I don't care about the 14th century, or how women were back then. Remember, I was *there*! And I went back there to rescue your..."
"...sorry, ass, you were going to say!"
"I was not! Well...I *was* thinking it, to be honest! How do you expect me to act around you? You're caught between two worlds, two centuries, two totally different societies. And you're going to eventually have to shed that macho-bushido crap that you think is so manly! I want my old Cevn back!" she said, sagging resignedly on her side of the booth.
"And I want a Christmas present, too! Honey!" she added.
That again.
"Hmmm. I told you a few hours ago that I was going to get your present. Well...here it is! Tadaaa! Lunch on me!" I joked. Urd glowered at me, her emerald green eyes suddenly burning with indignation. I gulped a spoonful of soup, realizing that she may have been into one of her 'sensitive' modes.
Duh. We were only separated by 700 years and a lifetime of miscommunication, but other than that, she had no reason to be uptight or sensitive, right? And she doesn't see *this* me as the 'me' that she was initially attracted to...
She had been locked up by a sci-fi nightmare version of Aoshima. Aoshima and Tyyr threatened to dissect her Soul with a modified SoulGun! And here I am, worried about whether she can see the real me?
"I'm an idiot!" I thought. To prove my point, Urd's face was rockrigid.
"Ooops," I mentally exclaimed as she decoiled and unleashed...
"You're a miserable excuse for a mortal! Pathetic! I can't believe that you would actually think your little joke was *funny*! Why do you think that I went with you today? I went...so I could make sure that you would get me something! To try and support you emotionally on your first day out in the real world after coming back from 14th century Kyushu! And now I know that it was the right decision, because you weren't planning to buy me a present *at all*! Lunch...hmmph!" she shouted with both barrels blasting ire.
"URD!" I shouted back, pounding the table with my 'new' hand so hard I knocked every cup of tea and bowl of soup over that was on the table. I realized that the occupants of several nearby booths and tables suddenly went quiet. This tweaked me even worse than Urd's idiocy.
I stood up, ramrod straight, raging at their ill-manneredness.
"You can all now return to your banal chitchat! It's pretty lame to get all hushy when a couple is arguing! You would think that normal people would talk *louder* when others are in heated discussion nearby...but you all decide to zip your lips like a bunch of freshly fed seals! I should cut every one of you down for your gross insolence!" They looked at me stupidly. Then I recognized that I was so angry, I had shouted at them in 14th Century Kyushu military dialect. Urd looked at me with a mixture of disbelief and amusement, then smiled broadly.
"So that's how you learned to deal with problems in the 14th century! Well...I'll forgive you this time, since you said that we're 'a couple'!"
"That's not all that I meant! Urd, Christmas presents are supposed to be a *surprise*. How can I surprise you when you're watching me like a hawk eyeing a mouse? And where do you get off thinking that I would ignore you for Christmas? Why don't you just go somewhere. Just go home, and let me get you something, okay?" I said irritably.
Urd only heard the "go home" part.
"Your wish is granted. But remember this...I'll have my revenge!" she said with a gleam in her eye. She stood up, stuck out her tongue at me, and then walked out without a word.
Great. And here I was poised to pour a bowl of miso over her head, since I couldn't slap her.
I oughta buy her a case of sour cream and Limburger cheese for Christmas.
And some prune juice...

* * * * * * * *

Sayoko saw Cevn across the street, walked over behind him and covered his eyes and shouted "Surprise!" He whirled around and almost decked her. Fortunately, she had a black belt in Karate, so she was barely able to duck his rapid swinging punch...
And then he had her in a chokehold headlock.
"What do you think you were doing?" she gasped. She couldn't believe how fast he moved! The punch he had thrown was a decoy, thrown to make her vulnerable, not to injure her.
"What the hell do you think you're doing? Lemme go!" she gasped again. Cevn's face went rigid for a second, and then he released her.
"What'd I do to him to make him just go off like that!" she wondered, shocked by his reaction. A deep part of her sensed that his reaction wasn't defensive...it was lethal. She could see conflict written all over his face. His strident response totally unnerved her.
"What the fucking hell is the matter with you? You tried to take my head off!" she shouted angrily.
"Look...I'm sorry, Sayoko. But you're really lucky that I didn't break your neck. I'm not myself right now. Probably the result of years of fighting and war and assassination attempts, a plague that nearly killed me, having my hand skewered by a katana..."
She listened in amazement as he detailed some of the experiences he had in medieval Japan. Genji had been completely close-lipped to her about his years in the past.
"My God! If my brother had to live through this..." she said in an even voice when Cevn finished his short summary of life in 14th century Kyushu. She reminded herself to handle her brother with kid gloves for the next several weeks. Perhaps in doing so, he may feel comfortable enough to confide in him.
"These guys are going to need major therapy from someone!" she realized. She said a silent prayer that the Goddesses could restore their minds with the same completeness with which they healed the men's bodies.
"Tell me about it!" she ventured. "Being locked up in a room with no windows, strapped to a bed for weeks. Then I look out the window and it's 2049! Arcologies and thousand-storey tall megastructures all over! Human beings becoming the property of corporations, used for organs and then added to food! I didn't see a single human being for over a year, except Megumi! Then these robots were going to chop us up like lab monkeys..."
Cevn listened to her description of being trapped in a dystopian future that made Akira look like a cakewalk. A year confined in a hospital with only her and Megumi? He realized that her experience was just as harrowing as his and the other guys...the part about humans being used as food was really unsettling. Thankfully, he had just eaten.
Sayoko had been trying to decompress from her experience in the near future, so she decided upon retail therapy. A reliable tactic to move a girl from deep reflection to a light-heartedness. Running into Cevn was totally unexpected...Megumi had told her that he had left with Urd to go shopping. So where was Urd?
She had already amassed a bundle of Christmas gifts, which of course she made Cevn carry as they walked towards the Axis Building. She started talking about NA, recovery talk and how she thought she was going insane while confined. Cevn admitted that he had been force-fed some kind of strong shochu-type booze to keep from dying while they amputated his hand and fixed him up. Of course, Sayoko teased him about relapsing.
"Y'know, it's funny. Since I spent thirteen years in the past, I now have 24 years clean," Cevn commented when the two were talking about their recovery issues.
"So what? I got clean in 20XX, and was clean in 2050. So I have over 40 years clean! You better get used to calling me 'sempai', Cevn-sensei!" she said with a smile.
"Well, if you're going to be that way, then I have 700-plus years clean, since I was clean in 1371," he said light-heartedly.
"Can't you add?” Sayoko teased as she corrected his math. “Besides, that was actually in the past, so it counts as negative years. So you have negative 720 and some years clean.”
“Okay! You win!” Cevn admitted, feeling troubled by his math error. He realized that he was more than just a little upset at Urd's sudden departure. Running into Sayoko had been a godsend...and he had tried to break her neck less than ten minutes ago.
“Are we ever going to get back to normal?” Cevn asked.
"Hee hee, you always tell me 'what is normal?'...now it's my turn. So, what *is* normal?" Sayoko replied gleefully, earning a frown. "We're all lucky in a sense, because we shared the timewarp experience with someone else. When I feel all freaked out, Megumi's just a cellphone call away."
"Did they even have cellphones in 2050?" Cevn asked. "All we had was signal fires, rocks and…"
"Hey, let's just forget about it and shop!" Sayoko interrupted. She pointed out the Axis Building and gave Cevn a rundown on all the good stores to buy gifts while avoiding 'Santa's Elves'. After shopping the Axis Building, Sayoko suggested ice cream.
"So what do I do?" he asked, after explaining the lunch incident.
"Hmm. You insulted her, made light of her Christmas gift, argued with her, and then told her to go away. That adds up to four...no, five apologies," Sayoko reasoned with feminine insight. Cevn shrugged his shoulders.
"Hey, you only listed four things I screwed up!" Cevn argued.
"The fifth apology is because you're a guy! Didn't you learn anything? I suggest that you get her an apology gift *now*, plus a card," she said, smiling at his predictably masculine awkwardness.
"So how do I go about doing that? You know that I'm inept with these kinds of things. I was single for so long, I've probably forgotten the chivalric artistry of apology. The idea of a man apologizing to a woman...is so *foreign* to me. It just didn't happen when I was living in Oita back then..."
Sayoko considered for a moment.
"Hmm... I got it! What is one of the things you despise the most, yet Urd likes a lot?" she asked, a look of devilish mischief on her face.
"Karaoke," Cevn said without a moment's hesitation.
"You're sooo weird! I *love* Karaoke!" Sayoko said with delight. She then started singing a song, right there on the street. She noticed Cevn looking huffy and indignant, which brought her to a bevy of giggles.
"So..uh...what's the deal?" Cevn asked. Sayoko assumed a lecturing tone.
"To make a proper apology to a girl, you need to combine two important elements. Sacrifice and supplication. Sacrifice means that you give up something you value; which in this case means you have to suffer your aversion to Karaoke. Supplication means groveling; which in this case means that you indulge Urd at your expense with something she really loves," Sayoko explained. Cevn looked miserable at her suggestion, which was amusing her to no end.
"Karaoke would be *perfect*! We'll love it! And I know just the place!" Sayoko said as she pulled out her cellphone, now fully absorbed with the idea...not to mention the look of male squeamishness all over Cevn's face. She *loved* planning parties! It would be perfect, since everyone needed to unwind from being scattered across the centuries...
"*We*?" Cevn said incredulously, interrupting her reverie.
"Yeah! Don't be an idiot! And don't just sit there and let your ice cream cone melt!" she added. "What did you think? That it would be fun with just the two of you? Besides, I'm dying to hear how awful your voice is..."
"Thanks a lot, Sayoko," Cevn said in a resigned monotone, as Sayoko packed her phone away in her purse, linked her arm in his, and marched him to the next department store.

* * * * * * * *

At home, Urd paced around the house. Normally, she would float, but she had picked up the human habit of pacing when agitated. Which was a dead giveaway to Belldandy that her sister had fought with Cevn.
"Urd...what's wrong?" Belldandy asked. Which brought out a verbal lashing of invective towards men in general and one man in particular. Belldandy could identify with her older sister's feelings...Keiichi had been rough with her a few times since he arrived from the past. Her mortal boyfriend had been argumentative, edgy, controlling and indifferent in the past several days. She *knew* that it wasn't Keiichi's fault, but that knowledge didn't provide her much comfort when he was in one of overbearing moods. She would just have to be patient and work with him.
Apparently, Cevn was acting the same way. However, she knew her older sister well...Urd didn't have the kind of patience that she did.
"Urd...you should know better. Yes, he definitely owes you an apology, but you must realize that he was in the right as well. One of the things I've learned in my time with Keiichi is...that when a couple fights, both are wrong and both are right. If you focus on what's wrong at the expense of what's right, then you tend towards becoming bitter. But if you focus on what's right, then you can ascend the ladder towards greater harmony between the two of you. You should really give this some serious consideration...and try and be patient with him. Look what he's been through..." she counseled.
Urd wanted to argue with her, but decided that it would be better to brood, so she checked in on Skuld.
Skuld had been extra attentive to both Banpeis since her return from the future. Urd noticed that she was upgrading Mini-Banpei with some of the components she brought back from her stay with Mother and Father on Yggdrasil.
"Better leave her in peace," Urd thought. She went to her room and worked on something to help the mortals with their memories.
Mortals. They were oh-so all mixed up.

* * * * * * * *

Sayoko drove me home after we finished shopping sometime around midnight. I couldn't believe it...I had survived both Urd's fit and Sayoko's kinetic shopping. She was definitely the 'little rich girl'; she had a string of credit cards and the discerning eye of an expert shopper. I had often availed to the typical male stereotype of women being all self-obsessed when they went shopping for clothes; but this was once again disproved. Sayoko was very intent on giving thoughtfully to those around her. It was her first Christmas holiday clean from drugs, so she wanted to be generous in her gifting. She kept querying me about her planned purchases, which was fun in a certain way.
Sayoko also admitted to me that she had been knitting a scarf...
"Good luck with Urd," she said with a chuckle as I trudged the long snowy path towards the door.
"Hi Cevn. Do you want some tea to warm up?" Belldandy asked as I padded into the living room. Keiichi was reading about a new motorcycle engine...it was still strange to see him without his samurai's topknot.
I politely declined, then asked where Urd was.
"Oh, she's in her room," Belldandy replied, a look of concern on her face.
"Good luck, Cevn. Have fun," Keiichi added, then returned to his motorcycle catalogue.

* * * * * * * *


*Knock knock*

"Who is it?" I heard from inside.
"It's me...can I come in?"
"Yeah...whatever," a stonecold voice answered. I slid the shoji door open and then walked in. I could tell in an instant that Urd was into some kind of project...her room looked like an apothecary.
"What are you doing?" I asked with what I hoped to be sincere interest.
"Nothing that you need to know about," she said icily.
Time to grovel.
"Look, Urd. I'm *really* sorry about what happened at lunch. I totally made a mistake, making light of something you obviously have invested so much importance in. Being a mortal and all that, I'm prone to imbecility sometimes..." Urd didn't move an inch. Floating with her back to me, I couldn't tell what she was feeling.
"I owe you a couple of apologies. And it's hard for me, because all those years I lived in the past are telling me to fight with you. But I'm going to set them aside...and try harder to be a good boyfriend. So...Urd, I'm truly sorry," I added.
"And???" she asked expectantly, playing the part of Queen Elizabeth to perfection. Which she could do, because she had all the leverage in this situation. She was the Queen of my heart.
I swallowed the lump that formed in my throat.
Now came the hard part.
"A..and...I wanted to give you an early Christmas present."
"Oh really?" she said in a passe voice. The slight shiver up her spine revealed that she was excited, despite her efforts to cover it up with feigned nonchalance. I only wished I could see her face.
"I wanted you to know that. Uuh. I..I..reserved a Karaoke club for us for Christmas Eve. I'm going to invite everyone...t..to come and join us for a party," I blurted out. Urd spun around in midair, her face filled brilliantly with surprise and joy.
"Cevn, I thought you said you 'hated' Karaoke..." she teased, and then her face lit up with sudden insight.
"Oh...now I get it!"
"Get what?" I asked.
"Apology accepted," she said as she floated swiftly towards me, arms outspread. Which landed both of us on the floor, due to the Ultimate Force. It seemed that while the UF didn't allow us to touch, it would repulse any attempts with equal energy. Urd and I literally bounced off of each other like two marbles.
"Oops!" she said. Her interjection was followed by the crash of a glass beaker falling into her sink as she banged into the wall.

* * * * * * * *

Christmas Eve was a day that Keiichi hoped he would never forget. It was almost like an end-of-the-year party, and *everyone* was coming. Half the excitement was in not knowing what would happen when so many combustible and complementary personalities were massed into one drinking room, and then fueled with an abundance of sake, snack trays and a loud Karaoke system.
Five minutes after they arrived, Mara showed up. This really freaked out Keiichi and several others, until Belldandy explained that the Demons had to respect mortal holidays due to some faraway long-ago obscurely ancient agreement with the Gods. She added that a lot of mortals were going through the extremes of having their deepest wishes granted (presents and reunions) or suffering untold grief (family, in-laws and holiday drunk drivers). So the holidays were a reprieve for GRO and DGO agents, since much of their duties were already being carried out by the natural flow of mortal life.
Yet Keiichi felt that Mara's dropping in on the party was a bad omen, nonetheless. But true to her word, Mara didn't cause *too* many problems. She mostly pestered Urd all night and flirted with most of the single guys from Whirlwind and the N.I.T. Motor Club.


* * * * * * * *

"Hahhahhhah Haha Ha!" Megumi and Sayoko were laughing uncontrollably at Sora and Chihiro.
"WHAT?" the two N.I.T. Motor Club members asked, irritated at the fact that they were being laughed at.
"You..teehee..wouldn't believe it if we told..hehhee..you," Megumi said, then leaned shoulder-to-shoulder with Sayoko and gasped with riotous giggling.
"What is *wrong* with you two?" Chihiro asked.

* * * * * * * *

Keiichi commiserated with Cevn. It seemed that he, Cevn and Skuld were the sole holdouts against the Karaoke craze that filled the rented party room. All three were uncomfortable with singing...Keiichi even more so because he didn't want to embarrass himself *and* Belldandy.
He was already on a tight string with Bell-chan. He had been short with her quite a few times. Normally, he would expect her to deal with it, since she had the patience of an artist...but he sensed that she wasn't going to put up with much more of it.
Every night since he returned, Keiichi wanted to make love to her, as soon as his strength returned. But he didn't, because he was worried that his moodiness would somehow translate into a roughness in the bedroom. He praised himself for his restraint; at least he was doing *something* right.
He, Genji, Tomohisa and Cevn...just weren't themselves any more.
Even the music felt alien, as his years of maturity had been coaxed by the sounds of live itinerant musicians who played on natural, unamplified instruments. He longed for Cevn's shakuhachi playing...a single flute and a moonlit night. He and his friends had spent many a night in their compound in Oita listening to the serene, soulful music of Cevn's flute and Genji's singing.
And then everything came undone at the seams with the Imagawa invasion. It felt disconcerting to Keiichi...the fact that he had no Lord to serve any more. No Lord to protect...
Skuld was more concerned with the audio equipment than anything else; Keiichi had to restrain her from creating another 'karaoke contest song meter' mecha. So he zealously hovered over her as she examined the karaoke machine. Suddenly, she shifted her attention to the doorway.
"Banpei, what are you doing here?" Skuld asked as the robot rolled into the room. Mara reacted with predictable alarm, which amused Skuld to no end.
But still, Skuld thought his presence here was quite odd...she definitely *didn't* summon Banpei-kun...
An hour into the party, Urd and almost everyone else was drunk or on their way to intoxication. Tamiya and Ootaki had smuggled a package of "Antarctic Ice", supposedly shipped frozen from its namesake continent. This ice was fashioned with frozen compressed air or dry ice trapped in the cubes; every ten seconds or so, a loud half-firecracker strength *POP!* would crackle the air, followed by peals of laughter. Or a sudden bubbling as the dry ice emitted a fog which spilled upwards out of someone's glass. Of course, the two sempai had kept this a secret from everybody except Keiichi. Working as a team, Tamiya would engage the victim in conversation while Ootaki would 'cube' them.
Their first victim was Chihiro, of course.
Even now, he saw Ootaki drop an icecube in Megumi's drink while grinning pranksterishly. Of course, Ootaki *always* seemed to have a prankster's grin...Keiichi chuckled as the cube exploded and Megumi eek-flinched with a full body jerk.
Keiichi was a little tipsy himself, possibly due to the fact that he had lost 30% of his body weight...resulting in 1/3 more intoxication per glass of sake. After a few glasses of sake, he felt a flush overcome him. He noticed that Genji was fast on the path to inebriation...and Tomohisa wasn't far behind. At first, he rankled at the idea that his younger cousin was getting drunk, but then he realized that Tomohisa was an adult in a 16-year-old's body. Back in Kyushu, he had shared cups with Tomohisa hundreds of times. But then, his cousin had the body and mind of someone in their late 20s. Now, he looked like a normal high school student. Keiichi knew that that Tomohisa wouldn't become too irresponsible by acting the part of a juvenile.
Belldandy had imbibed a whole six-pack of Coke, which caused her to become silly-drunky. In contrast to Urd's drunken boisterousness and randomness, Belldandy was simply funny in her own naive way; overly jovial and *very* talkative. Still, she was very pleasant to everyone...still a calming influence. Keiichi had only seen her cut lose like this a couple of times before...which resulted in a series of bizarre actions by his divine girlfriend which rivaled the worst of the craziness that followed the birthing of Noble Scarlet. His face flushed with embarrassment as he recalled both instances.
Genji was up on the table, doing a swaggering drunken fan dance he learned from the 14th century. They had all learned many arts in their 13 years in the past, many of which passed for 'skills' and 'tricks' here. Keiichi watched as Genji seemed to clear his mind long enough to capture a grave face. Then he performed what Keiichi recognized as one of the most difficult tessenjitsu dance forms...a 'false drunk' form. Keiichi was filled with admiration for Genji as he precisely executed the difficult martial art of fan combat. The effect was immediate and profound as the revelers suddenly hushed themselves, absorbed by the serious effort Genji was putting into his performance. At the end, Genji paused and executed a fairly good mie. He held his eyes cross-eyed in the classic Kabuki style for almost a minute and then bowed to a round of applause. Keiichi glanced at Tomohisa and Cevn, knowing that the other two were the only ones in the room that recognized that Genji's 'act' was in fact a martial arts survival skill in enclosed room close-quarters combat.
Eventually, the more drunken participants pestered Keiichi into singing. With Chihiro, Tamiya and Ootaki 'inviting' him...he couldn't refuse. Wrestled up to the front by his two sempai, coached by Chihiro while she poured a can of Budweiser over his head to 'christen' him, Keiichi grudgingly sang several songs by the Carpenters that he learned a year (or was it 14 years?) earlier...thanks to another one of Skuld's inventions gone awry.
But instead of bolstering his courage with support, the room was filled with raucous howls and disparaging remarks. For his own satisfaction, he rocked out with a rousing version of two of his hallmark songs: Deep Purple's "Highway Star" and Loudness's "Road Racer". Keiichi thanked the gods for Karaoke-on-demand as he sat back down and poured himself a stiff drink.
"So much for them being good sports," he complained to Skuld after the riotous laughter died down.
"Of course not...they're adults. Which makes them idiots when they drink. What'd you expect?" Skuld replied. Keiichi's eyes went wide at her off-the-cuff remark.
Then Urd invited Skuld to sing next. Skuld slowly backshuffled herself in the corner as shouts of "sing Skuld, sing!" filled the party room. It was obvious that Urd was relishing every bit of Skuld's squeamishness, grinning with the ostentatious malignancy that accompanies a good headful of liquor. It seemed to Keiichi that Urd resembled a lioness hunting prey; her narrow light green eyes were glazed over with a feline expression. Finally, Skuld briefly flashed a Skuld-device that looked like a bomb...and Urd relented with a dissatisfied scowl, much to Keiichi's relief.
"How does she do that?" Urd grumbled as she walked back and sat down on a cushion while Belldandy fitfully laughed at the scene between her two sisters.
Keiichi noticed that Cevn was keeping close company with Sayoko; probably because she was the only other person that wasn't drinking...besides Skuld. Cevn wasn't as uptight as he expected, but he was still pretty quiet, more of an observer than a participant. Also, it appeared that he was avoiding Urd.
Which could be trouble...if Urd swam too deeply in her rice wine.
Keiichi stood up and publicly lauded Cevn for putting up with a bunch of drunken Goddesses and college students...which motivated the partygoers to select their next victim.
They hauled Cevn up and pressed the microphone on him, which seemed to make him nervous just by its presence. Keiichi laughed at his sudden loss of composure. Cevn sang several American songs, including Enya's "Orinocco Flow." His singing was *terrible*...much worse than Keiichi's...or even Tamiya's grating yowls, which his sempai passed off as 'singing'. Keiichi suddenly realized that Cevn was *deliberately* singing poorly, just as Sora and Megumi started tossing miso-soaked napkins at their N.I.T. sensei. Urd looked like she was going to kill him when he was done, so Keiichi engaged her in conversation to try and cool her down.
Then the troubles began.
Mara and Belldandy got into a yelling match over who was better at VR hanetsuki. Keiichi never could have imagined that they played Japanese badminton up in Yggdrasil and Vanagdrasil. As they shouted at each other, Keiichi picked up bits and pieces of the story. It turned out that the Gods and Demons would play VR games as kids, much like match play over the Internet for hundreds of computer games. Since Demons and Gods rarely met in real life, VR competitions were heavily heralded in both realms. Evidently, Mara and Belldandy had been in a tournament as children, and had even competed in championship events. *Numerous* championship contests. Keiichi was more amazed to learn that every match resulted in a draw...even their last one, which had been played at for seven mortal years.
"Let's settle it, right here! Face to face in real life!" Mara challenged, fangs aglistening.
"Yeah...let's!" Belldandy said excitedly, smiling innocently but with serious intent in her eyes. Which were through and through glazed over and reddened.
"Oh great! Bell's *really* drunk!" Keiichi noted with despairing frustration, astonished by his girlfriend's unusual combination of moods.
In a flash, brightly colored hagoita appeared in each girl's hand. Without a word or warning, the match began. A glowing shuttlecock materialized in midair, then everybody dashed for cover as the two began batting it at whistlesnap speed. To Keiichi, it looked like a hyperfast game of handball, only with battledores and an energy ball and some kind of glowing forcefields to keep it from smashing through the walls. Several of the unwilling spectators got nailed by stray shots, producing stinging welts and bruises. After a half-hour of commotion, not to mention totally immobilizing the party...both Belldandy and Mara collapsed to their knees, their chests heaving heavily with the glow of exertion.
"I..hunh..hnn..didn't know that this..pant..gasp..physical manifestation...would tire out so quickly. I guess it's a draw," Mara admitted.
"Yes...this time. Bu..huut...wait...until next time, Mara!" Belldandy responded warningly.
As soon as things calmed down from the "Match of the Millennium", Urd decided to spring a massive jealousy fit, because Sayoko was keeping close company with Cevn. Cevn tried to explain to her that he was keeping close to Sayoko in order to help himself and her...since being around a bunch of people who were drinking was still difficult for Sayoko; who was still fairly new to recovery. It made full sense to Keiichi...and *no* sense to Urd. Especially since this was a full-blown drinking party under the guise of being a Karaoke contest.
Keiichi grimaced as Cevn's explanations only compounded Urd's ire. Urd continued to argue with Cevn; then in a fit of callous resentment, she brandished him a drink, then splashed it in his face when he refused. Keiichi recalled the last time this happened...it wasn't a pleasant memory. In 1379, one of Lord Mori's junior retainers got drunk and did the same thing that Urd had done.
In front of Lord Mori and all the clan.
Cevn had stood up and cut him down without saying as much as a word. The junior retainer ended up being carried out in a shroud. In like circumstances, Keiichi or any other one of Lord Mori's retainers would have done the same. But this wasn't Lord Mori's castle...and Urd was a Goddess and girlfriend.
Keiichi hoped that Cevn would keep his cool...
Sayoko intercepted Urd's next offering of sake and knocked it to the floor. Then she and Urd got into a screaming match, while Cevn slipped out into the hallway unscathed but emotionally rocked. Keiichi excused himself, and ended up spending the better part of an hour talking about "drunken Goddesses" and "disrespectful modern women".
He and Cevn returned to the party, and continued to remain in the background. Fortunately, Sayoko and Urd's shouting match had been joined by Mara, who sided with Sayoko, and Belldandy, who sided with Urd. The presence of four yelling women made the shouting match run its course much more quickly...Belldandy and Mara were silently giving each other stinkeye and Sayoko and Urd were winding down their arguing.
Then the room burst forth in a spray of rose blossoms.
"Oh...great," Keiichi moaned as the Fourth Goddess showed up.
Urd and Sayoko's harsh arguing was stifled by Peorth's sudden arrival. Tamiya instantly went sillysally with desire when he realized it was Peorth, complete with her scanty Goddess outfit. Keiichi knew that his sempai hadn't recovered from Peorth's deliberate flirtation with him during her first visit...but this time, Tamiya was wasted on sake. Once more, Keiichi suspected that Peorth had cast some kind of spell on him.
"Peorshh-channn!" Tamiya shouted with a gleeful grin.
Keiichi watched Peorth's eyes bug out as the sempai staggered towards her, sake bottle in hand. He couldn't help himself...he burst into hysterical laughter as she screamed with fright when Tamiya smothered her with a bearhug. Peorth was getting her just desserts for all the times she hassled Keiichi, not to mention playing around with Tamiya's affection. Chihiro looked amazed...she had always thought that Tamiya had a crush on *her*. But then, she had never met Peorth.
"Go get 'er!" Mara and Urd drunkenly encouraged, suddenly best buddies again; arms leaning on each other's shoulders, sake bottles in hand. Another blast of roses showered the room as Tamiya clutched Peorth. Belldandy shuffled over and whispered a few words in his ear, which seemed to calm him down. As Tamiya released Peorth, something which Keiichi wouldn't have ever dreamed of...happened.
His jaw figuratively arced towards the floor as Sayoko went ballistic!
"LEAVE HIM ALONE!!! You...whatever you are!" Sayoko screamed in a deadly serious voice, hands on her hips. If looks could kill, Peorth would have been melted away in the light of the furious glare Sayoko shot her. Taken aback, Peorth looked at Sayoko with a deadpan "what the hell is going on?" painted all over her face. The only other time he had seen Peorth look so surprised was when she got 'splashed' by a swimming pool full of water after taking Keiichi out on a 'date' almost two years ago.
Sayoko looked murderous...then she turned her ire towards a shocked Tamiya. Keiichi blinked in shock as he thought he saw a distinct look of *fear* on his sempai's face; which was almost unheard of...and laughably unbelievable.
Especially at 3am in the morning.
"Hey...check *this* out!" Mara chuckled, sensing a 'scene' in the making. She and Urd leaned closer to get a full view of the action.
"Why can't you leave her alone, you big lug? *Who* is she to you, anyway? Not that it matters to me...you can do what you want! No...that's not true! No...wait! You *can't* do what you want! You've got me. Remember all the letters you wrote *me* this summer? Remember all the talks we had this fall. About us. We talked about *everything*! Didn't that mean anything to you? Don't you realize that I'm *in love with you*, you thick-headed big-hearted road maniac!"
The room choked dead with silence.
In his mind, Keiichi imagined that this was like one of those moments in an anime movie where everyone would suddenly collapse with facefallen expressions, contorted into all sorts of improbably akimboed positions. Once more, alcohol had proven to be the ultimate truth serum. But then Keiichi remembered that Sayoko couldn't...and wouldn't...have touched a drop!
So it *was* the truth!
Sayoko turned beet red and covered her mouth with her hands, then glanced at the floor, hands clasped in front of her in the manner of a junior high school girl's innocent embarrassment.
Belldandy flashed Keiichi a warm look that disclosed that her own romantic sentiments were being aroused, then settled down next to him and leaned her head on his shoulder.
"Let's see what happens now, my dear," she whispered excitedly in his ear.
"Wow!" Urd and Mara said in sync, their mouths agape.
Mara thought that she knew Sayoko through and through. Sayoko was almost like a mortal 'familiar' for Mara...her resentment for Belldandy mirroring Mara's own enmity. Drawn to Sayoko several years ago by this resentment, Mara had coopted her for several attempts on Belldandy's wellbeing. But after the Lord of Terror Incident, the N.I.T. Castle Incident, not to mention several other collaborations between her and Sayoko...Mara was still surprised by this young mortal woman who styled herself "Queen of N.I.T." But this scene...was too...cute...for Mara to be angry over. In fact, it was hilarious! Sayoko in a rage...over Tamiya? Sayoko...pissed off at Peorth?
"Interesting," Mara observed casually. Urd nodded and poured her another glass.

*Pop*

An icecube burst in her glass, punctuating the tense silence.
"Y..y..y..yuh really mean it?" Tamiya stuttered out, his face filled with a flurry of emotions.
"Of course I do, Tamiya! I just said it in public, didn't I? Why would I lie in front of all my friends! And why would I lie *to you*!" Sayoko said semi-sarcastically. "Come here, big guy!"
Tamiya staggered over to her. Sayoko stood up on tiptoe and planted a deeply passionate kiss on his lips, shocking everybody in the room. Especially Tamiya.

*Clap clap clap clap!*

Someone started clapping, and then applause filled the room in reaction to the sudden burst of passion between Tamiya and Sayoko. Tamiya looked at Keiichi, his face filled with a mixture of astonishment, sheepishness and relief. Keiichi instantly regretted that he forgot to bring his camera.
Ootaki was actually crying with joy for his best friend, in between quick gulps of some kind of clear liquor, Keiichi noticed.
A roomful of broadly smiling Goddesses and mortals cheered them on as Tamiya swept Sayoko off her feet and kissed her back.
"Tamiya Toraichi, aged 25, N.I.T. grad student...is in luv! Oh...it's good ta be youffful! It's beautaful ta have a poetic heart!" he shouted, bullhorn loud.
"This is just too *rad*!" Ootaki commented in dazed wonderment.
"This is just too...mortal!" Skuld said disgustedly.
"You're just too much of a curmudgeon!" Urd scolded Skuld.
"This is too sickeningly sweet!" Mara growled, her eyes betraying her appreciation of the romantic affinity between the two mortals. Love was much more complicated between Demons than between mortals; a fact that Mara regretted...sometimes. This was one of those times.
"This is too insane!" Sayoko thought as she yielded to her passions, kissing him again with her arms wrapped tightly around his broad shoulders.
"This is just too awesome!" Tamiya dazed with a mental gasp...he had dancing stars and hearts and Sayoko in his eyes.
Keiichi noticed that Skuld still harbored distaste towards the whole idea of mortal romance and relationships. He imagined that she was probably thinking something like "those damned mortals and their insane love affairs." Even now, she was shaking her head in disappointment.
Without a word, Tamiya carried Sayoko out of the room.
"Off to the love hotel!!!" Ootaki managed to shout after them before being peppered with wet napkins, eggrolls and icecubes by almost every woman and man in the room.
Her entrance upstaged by the scene between Tamiya and Sayoko, Peorth stood in the doorway, hands on hips. Once she realized that she was totally ignored by the recent rash of newfound love, Peorth seized the moment and hopped up on the table before the party could swing into action again. Sensually dancing her body provocatively, she roused catcalls from all of the single men at the party.
Keiichi grumbled something under his breath about "Peorth being a showoff." She was making so much spectacle that the room became quiet...her antics were becoming supercilious as she imitated a salon stripper. Then she stopped and surveyed all the faces in the room.
"Bonsoir, mon amis! *HEY* you guys?!! Now that I got your attention...which one of you made the wish?"