Mahou Sensei Negima! Fan Fiction ❯ The Dreamer ❯ Roomies ( Chapter 3 )

[ T - Teen: Not suitable for readers under 13 ]

-----Author’s note: I do not own Negima!. Seriously. Any other characters and ideas, though, are my own. Enjoy.-----


Kaede Nagase, standing all of six feet tall, knelt down and pressed her ear against her door. She could tell something was going on in there, but she hadn’t been able to make out the words from a distance. One of the voices seemed to be a man’s, she noted.

“No! It hurts! No put in again!” Ku Fei yelped, the sound of something being knocked over resonating through the door.

“I know it hurts at first, but you’ll get used to it. It’s not even that big, damn,” The man’s voice replied with a hint of sarcasm.

“I all wet! Untie me!” The Chinese girl exclaimed loudly.

Kaede’s eyes widened a little bit, bringing them to only slightly open.

“I’d untie you if you’d cooperate, Sunshine, but the only way you let me do this is if I tie you down. You act like this is gonna scar you for life, or something.”

The beautiful ninja flung the door open, leaping across the room and throwing a spinning kick into the man standing over her roommate. Ku Fei gasped, closing her eyes just before Connor took the kick to the face, flying back into the wall, which now sported several deep cracks. He slid down onto one of the beds, rubbing his cheek as it throbbed. His free hand shot up, catching the kunai a couple of inches from his face.

“Stop, Kaede! Is ok, he good guy!” Ku Fei stated, hopping around in her chair to face the new teacher.

Kaede, now full of confusion, turned to look at her blonde friend. “But you told him not to put it in you anymore, and that you were all wet.....”

The brunette ninja now saw that Ku Fei was strapped to the chair with a wet sheet. He had soaked it so it wouldn’t tear under the blonde’s strength. She then looked over to the man in black sitting on her bed, still rubbing his face. The stranger hopped off the bed, dropping the kunai with a groan. He showed Kaede the sewing needle he had been using to stitch up some of Ku Fei’s wounds from the earlier battle.

“Looks like we’ve got ourselves a misunderstanding. First off, there’s a four or five year difference in our ages,” Connor began.

‘That’s never stopped the class rep,’ Both girls thought.

“Secondly, if I wanted to have my way with Sunshine I would have locked the door. Thirdly, if I wanted to have my way with Sunshine I wouldn’t bondage rape her. What kind of a guy do you think I am?” Connor asked, folding his arms and giving the kunoichi a disapproving look.

“I don’t even know you!” Kaede pointed out.

“So you just naturally assume the worst about me? I know you’re the blue idiot, but really.”

“Baka ranger. It’s a.....study group.”

“That what I tell him! He not listen so good,” Ku Fei pointed out. “Fast, untie me!”

Kaede smiled at her friend, taking note of the injuries and the half-finished sewing job. “Actually, I think we should let him finish. You shouldn’t mislead people, Ku Fei.”

“I not know you out there! When I mislead?! This really hurt!”

“Like a kick in the face, right? Life’s a bitch, Sunshine,” Connor grumbled, approaching his whimpering roommate.

**********

Negi rapped loudly on Evangeline’s door, waiting for nearly a minute before repeating. Just before the child prodigy began to suspect that something was wrong, Chachamaru, decked out in her maid’s uniform, opened the door.

“Negi-sensei, good afternoon. If you’ve come to see the master, she is currently taking a nap,” The two bowed to each other as the robot spoke.

“A nap? But it’s.....” Negi cast a glance down at his wristwatch, “9:30. Do you think she’s down for the night?”

“She has been asleep for nearly ten hours, now. I do not know why she is so tired, but I do not believe that she will care for visitors.”

“Ten hours? Is she sick?”

“My scanners show that master’s bodily fluid levels and temperature are within healthy parameters. She is simply exhausted,” Chachamaru stated politely.

“Chachamaru-san, if I don’t see master about this as soon as possible, she’s going to be.....” Negi had several thoughts shoot through his head. Most of them involved large amounts of involuntary blood donation. “She’ll be mad,” He decided to take the simple route of explanation.

With a second bow, the elegant robot stepped aside, allowing Negi inside. “Very well, I will go get her.”

Negi sat down amongst the innumerable stuffed animals that littered Evangeline’s cabin. For someone as infamous as she was, it seemed kind of contradictory for her to have so many cute toys lying around. Negi thought this all the time, but he always reminded himself that as the ‘doll master’, the self proclaimed pure-blooded vampire could make even these cute little guys into evil monsters. He shuddered every time he remembered this.
“Negi-sensei, I cannot wake master. I am now worried,” Chachamaru re-entered the room, this time failing to bow. Her face, unable to show much emotion, was blank.

“She won’t wake up? Take me to her, come on!” Negi jumped up to follow his robotic student.

Chachamaru led Negi to Evangeline’s room, where the vampire appeared to be sleeping peacefully. She looked small and fragile, curled up comfortably beneath her heavy covers.

“Um, master?” Negi mumbled half-heartedly. He slowly approached his sleeping teacher, shaking a little bit as thoughts of her jumping up and biting him continued to flow through his head. “M-Master?” Negi whispered, reaching out an unsteady hand to poke the undead blonde. After a couple of light jabs in the shoulder, the young boy began to feel a little safer.

“I do not understand why she will not wake up,” Chachamaru admitted.

Negi could see her chest rising and falling rhythmically, so he knew she was alright. She looked serene, sort of like a sleeping angel. His hand was already brushing her hair away from her face before he realized he was doing it. As soon as what he was doing registered, Negi jerked his hand away from his master’s face, casting a glance over his shoulder at Chachamaru, who didn’t seem to have noticed he had done anything. He quickly turned his attention back to Evangeline, a faint magic emanating from her finally catching his attention.

“Ch-Chachamaru-san.....” Negi said quietly, looking over at the silent maid behind him.

“Yes, Negi-sensei?”

“Has Evangeline been having nightmares, lately?”

“Master does not have nightmares, Negi-sensei,” Chachamaru stated bluntly.

Negi, however, having been inside the nightmare starring his father, knew this wasn’t true. “With a voice, chasing her?”

“How did you know that, Negi-sensei?”

“Chachamaru-san, please get the headmaster on the phone!” Negi urged the robot to hurry, pointing towards the stairs.

Chachamaru, not one to argue, made her way down the stairs.

Negi looked Evangeline over, the black and purple magic surrounding her. He attempted to dispel it, but found it to be unmovable. Someone knocked on the door downstairs. “Maybe there wasn’t anything I could have done for Takamichi, after all. Why would you both confront the voice?” Negi wondered aloud. This was a stupid question, he knew. Neither of them was the type to run from their problems. Evangeline, after all, was trapped in the Mahora all-girls academy because she had refused to stay away from the thousand master, Negi’s father. The boy heard Chachamaru answer the door before he reacted, “Chachamaru-san, wait!” He yelled, rushing for the door.

The robot maid burst up through the floor in a rain of slivers, momentarily blinding the small teacher. He helped Chachamaru to her feet, looking around frantically for the ones after Evangeline. A black figure jumped up through the gaping hole in the floor, landing on Evangeline’s bed. Before either could help their sleeping master, a blade had been drawn and was plunged through her and the bed.

“Evangeline!” Negi screamed, rushing the cloaked figure.

**********

“It’s not a date,” Connor repeated, shoving his hands in his pockets as he escorted Ku Fei and Kaede off of the Mahora campus and out into the city.

“You’re taking us out for dinner. Sounds like a date to me,” Kaede sneered.

“Tell you what, when I get depressed and stumble across you out in the mountains, we can have a bath together. That’ll be our first date,” The teacher replied nastily.

Kaede wasn’t sure how this guy knew about that time she had spent with Negi, but she didn’t worry about it. She trusted him a little already because of Ku Fei’s explanation on how the fight had gone, earlier. If he wanted to hurt her, he would have just stayed to the shadows.

“What you talk about, bath? That come out of nowhere,” Ku Fei laughed.

“Heh, don’t worry about it, Sunshine. Seriously, this is just so I can straighten everything up with you two. There are some things we need to talk about.” Connor paused for a few seconds before adding, “And for God’s sake, don’t tell the other teachers about breaking curfew, alright?”

Both girls laughed, neither making the promise.

Connor pushed open the door to a little beef-bowl restaurant, his two students following. He dropped unceremoniously into one of the empty booths, sprawling out to take up all the room on his side. Ku Fei had moved to sit beside him, but quickly backed off to sit beside Kaede when she saw there was no room.

The three ordered, then waited for the waitress to leave.

“Why did you bring us here? Not the best place for a date, right?” Kaede nudged Ku Fei, who blushed and smacked her friend upside the head.

“It’s not a date,” Connor repeated for what felt like the hundredth time. “Take a good look around and then tell me why I picked here.”
The girls looked around at the empty restaurant, then back at Connor.

“‘Cause you cheap?” Ku Fei suggested.

“Because it’s empty,” Kaede answered.

“Right. I don’t need everyone finding out about what I need to tell you, so keep it to yourselves, alright?”

“Ok, ok, we get! What you need say?”

“Those guys that attacked you earlier, the ones in the masks. That’s why I’m here,” Connor muttered quietly enough so that both girls had to strain to hear him. “They’ve been attacking people on the campus, and it’s my job to stop them. Sunshine, you’ve been having a dream where a voice tries to catch you in the dark, right?”

“H-How you know that?” Ku Fei stuttered, confused.

“The dream is really a kind of magical targeting system. If the voice doesn’t catch you, it at least leaves a magical aura around you which the enemy picks up on. It’s how they track the people the ringleader wants dead.”

“Who is the enemy?” Kaede asked in a low voice.

“We don’t know. We haven’t been able to track any of the enemies movements, and the only one we’ve managed to capture alive killed himself before we got anything of real use out of him,” Connor grumbled, shutting up as the waitress set down their food.

Once she was out of earshot, Kaede continued, “I haven’t had this dream. Does that mean they don’t want me?”

“Right now that’s about what it amounts to, yeah. Don’t get me wrong, though. They’ll remove you if you get in the way. Right now Sunshine, here, is the only one out of the three of us to be targeted. Since we’ll all be staying in the same room, I thought filling you in,” He gave a tip of his head to Kaede, “Would be the smartest move. I’m not going to be around all the time, so I can’t help everyone who gets attacked.”

“Those guys fight me because I have dream? That not make sense,” Ku Fei said, in-between stuffing her face.

“We don’t know why some people have the dream and some don’t. Really, that redheaded camera girl is kind of a flimsy target, if you ask me,” Connor stated, pulling his bowl closer to start in on it.

“Asakura-san has had the dream, too?” Kaede wondered aloud. She was feeling a little rejected, while at the same time relieved to not have had the dream. “Do we know anyone else who’s had it?”

“Negi’s had it, but those are the only two that I-“

“Negi-bozu have dream, too?” Ku Fei interrupted.

“Has he been attacked, yet? He knows what’s going on, right?” Kaede asked after her boisterous friend.

Connor tried to make eye contact with Kaede, but her eyes weren’t open enough for him to do so. Instead, he decided to try and make eye contact with Sunshine, but her eyes shot away as soon as they connected with his gaze. Her face went beet red. With a sigh, the teacher decided to just focus on his food. “Yeah, he knows. I bailed him and photo-girl out earlier today. He asked me to help watch over you guys.”

“And what did you say?” Kaede wondered, her playful lips curling up into a little smile.

“I’ll do what I want,” Connor replied succinctly.

“You help me, though. So you say yes, right?”

“You’re lucky you’re cute, Sunshine,” Connor held back his grin as his words had the desired effect. Ku Fei didn’t seem able to speak anymore, her eyes wide and her mouth now full as she began to eat to kill any opening that might require her to respond.

“Conduct unbecoming a faculty member,” Kaede reminded Connor with a smirk.

“I’m only a temporary faculty member,” Connor replied with a snicker. “As soon as this blows over, I’ll be out of here.”

“Maybe you’ll want to stay by the time this is over.”

Ku Fei’s eyes lit up as she gave her new teacher a pleading look.

“And maybe the other Chinese kid is a Martian. Not likely,” Connor muttered through a grin.

**********

“Evangeline!” Negi screamed, rushing the cloaked figure.

The scarlet-haired youth took to the air, slamming a kick into the man’s side, sending him stumbling off of the bed. “Rastel maskil magister,” Negi nearly shouted his incantation, thrusting an open palm towards his falling enemy. A surge of light collided with the cloaked man, smashing him through the wall and out into the moonlit ground.

Negi leapt through the new hole in Evangeline’s cabin, and scooped the man up by the collar. A ball of white-hot energy formed in his free hand, which was poised to drill the man’s face. He thrust his hand forward, only to have it come to an abrupt halt just before the man’s masked face. The young teacher looked over his shoulder to find Chachamaru had stopped him from finishing the fight completely.

“Chachamaru-san! You saw what he did! Evangeline-san is.....she’s.....” Negi’s words began to fail him as his eyes watered up and his throat began to swell under the weight of holding back his tears.

“Master is fine, Negi-sensei,” Chachamaru assured her upset instructor. “She cannot be killed by such means. She is, after all, the Undying Mage.”

The magic in Negi’s hand dissolved as he dropped the unconscious assailant to the ground. He heaved a big sigh of relief. Chachamaru was right. When Evangeline had helped him out in Kyoto, the white-haired boy had managed to carve out a large hole in her stomach, only to see it heal almost right away. He looked down at the person he had come dangerously close to killing, then up at Chachamaru, who released his hand.

“I.....I’m sorry, Chachamaru-san,” Negi sniffed, as he slowly stood up. He had almost done something unforgivable: taken another life. A tear slid down his cheek, but he quickly rubbed it, and the ones gathering in his eyes, away. He let out a little gasp as Chachamaru pulled him into a hug. After a couple of seconds of being surprised, Negi returned the gesture, burying his face into Chachamaru’s uniform, muttering he was sorry.

The two eventually broke off the comforting hug, and both were now unsure of what to say. Chachamaru was routing excess energy to her cooling systems, attempting to avoid overheating. Why did Negi-sensei make her feel so off? Negi was still a little shaken up about what he had almost done. He was just glad one of his students had stopped him from becoming a killer. Demons were one thing, but people were another. He’d stick to simply blowing clothes off, occasionally. After all, it had worked up until this point, right?

“N-Negi-sensei, I will take master and this one to the headmaster. He will know what to do with them,” Chachamaru stated, slinging the cloaked man over her shoulder.

“A-Alright, Chachamaru-san. But what will you do, now?” Negi motioned over to the half destroyed cabin. As a light wind breezed through, the cabin made groaning sounds as though it were going to collapse.

“I will stay with master.”

“I don’t know if you’ll be allowed to,” Negi remembered how he hadn’t been told of Takamichi’s condition, and how he had been stored away in hiding until they could find a way to wake him up. The headmaster was probably one of the only people who knew where he was. “You can stay with me and Asuna and Konoka-san! They won’t mind, you can share the loft with me,” Negi suggested happily. Since Chachamaru-san was a robot, it would be ok to sleep with her, he figured. Even Asuna couldn’t argue against that. Not to mention he’d feel a lot safer with the robotic maid around.

“Sh-Share the loft?” Chachamaru felt her circuits overheating, and had to overhaul her coolant flow to keep from crashing. “I-I will consider it,” She muttered, hurrying to retrieve her master.

**********

Konoka yawned, pulling her covers back to hit the sack. Negi was still awake, even though it was past eleven. Normally she couldn’t keep him up that long to save his life. One of the down sides of being ten, she recalled. A knock at the door drew the headmaster’s granddaughter away from her bed. “Who would come over here this late? We’re gonna get in trouble.....”

Konoka opened the door, surprised to find Chachamaru on the other side. “What are you doing here so late?” Konoka asked, forcing down a second yawn.

Negi hopped down from the loft, greeting his new bunkmate with a smile and bow. “I’m glad you came, Chachamaru-san,” He said happily.

“You should have told me you were expecting company so late Negi-kuuuuuun.....” Konoka couldn’t keep down her third yawn.

“Master is performing a task for the headmaster, and will be away for a while,” Chachamaru lied, as was instructed by the headmaster. “Negi-sensei has suggested that I stay here with you three. I have agreed,” Chachamaru stated, bowing in return to her teacher.

“But where will you sleep?” Konoka asked, a finger to her lips as she ushered her robotic classmate inside.

“She’ll be sharing the loft with me,” Negi answered happily.

Asuna rolled over in her bed, as though something that just happened bothered her.

**********

“Mana, huh?” Connor muttered, entering a staring contest with his third roommate, who didn’t care to have him around.

Kaede had already explained everything to her, but the lengthy Puerto-Rican/Japanese girl had yet to lower her gun from her new teacher’s forehead.

“If you really are our new teacher, why aren’t you staying in an apartment, like the other teachers?” Mana asked menacingly.
“I’m only doing as the headmaster tells me to. Besides, I can keep a better eye on Sunshine if I’m here. Negi asked me to watch over his.....obviously-incapable-of-protecting-themselves students, anyway. How could I turn such a little guy down?” Connor asked, paired with a grin and a shrug.

“You sleep on the floor,” Mana lowered her gun, making her way over to the closet they all shared.

“But what if I get lonely?” Connor grinned, catching the blanket thrown at him with his face.

“No have more pillows. You borrow this one, is fine,” Ku Fei offered her pillow to Connor, who accepted it with thanks.

“I like you best, Sunshine,” He leaned in and whispered, “With the grades you’re gonna be getting from me, you won’t be the yellow idiot for much longer.”

Ku Fei smiled happily at being called his favorite, entering the bathroom as Kaede exited it.

Connor dropped the pillow to the floor, and tried the best he could to get comfortable. What was that smell? It smelled like.....nice. Yeah, it smelled like nice. A kind of undescribable nice. The pillow? Connor muffled a snicker with his blanket, rolling over onto his side. ‘Sunshine smells good,’ He laughed to himself. Tomorrow he would have to deal with a class, all while dealing with the ever present threat of an attack by the enemy. He could only hope that the majority of Negi’s students weren’t as nasty as Mana. He at least hoped most of them were normal. Really, what were the odds of all of them having some sort of issue?



-----Author’s other note: It’s true, I looked and looked, but I couldn’t figure out who roomed with who. I think Kaede and Mana are reasonable roommates for Ku Fei, though, since I didn’t want to use Chao Lingshen, for those of you out there who know who that is. Anyway, just bear with the current rooming rosters, even if it seems kind of off. In case anyone’s wondering: Yes, the characters I like will have more prominent roles than ones I don’t like, and yes, Asuna will have lines coming up. Thank you for reading.-----