Transition And Restart

Noriko didn"t understand why that was important for them, but together with her brother she kept the illusion alive.

Right now another illusion was foremost on her mind, the one about their club. The club that by all rights should have been permanently shut down as soon as Princ.i.p.al Kareyoshi targeted it.

For once she didn"t sit in the inner room at Stockholm Haven café. An outdoors café close to the entrance to Ueno park presented a view of gravel and a line of trees walling off the park from the surrounding city. The gravel ended in a rather ugly fountain with its a.s.sociated rectangular pond. Come summer and the park would be packed with people seeking refuge from the worst of the city heat.

Across the table former Princ.i.p.al Nakagawa sipped a cup of coffee and waited for her to take in what he had just said.

Noriko looked at the older man she really didn"t know all that well. He was the kind of person her father surrounded himself with, or rather the kind of person her mother made certain her father surrounded himself with. Her parents had a peculiar partnership that way, and Noriko never understood who really pulled the strings between the two of them.

When she was done mulling over the bomb Nakagawa sensei had dropped Noriko put down her soda and drew breath.

"You lost control over the school but bought the PTA instead?"

Nakagawa sensei nodded. "We bribed them, yes." Wrinkled hands shook a little when he lifted the cup to his mouth again.

Noriko leaned back in her chair. A draft of wind offered some cool in the pre summer heat. Soon the rainy season would start, and after that Tokyo would become an oven, wind or no wind never mattered.

She took another mouthful of soda. How the old man could drink hot coffee now was beyond her.

"But doesn"t the board of directors have the last say anyway?"

With a thin smile of approval Nakagawa sensei nodded. "A Wakayama through and through. Yes, you"re correct."

"I don"t think dad would do business with you," Noriko said. "If push comes to shove you"re not in control."

Nakagawa sensei shrugged like a westerner. "Having the PTA in our hands bought us some time."

Noriko copied his shrug. "It"s running out."

"Irishima High is our ace in the hole, or rather their affiliated university is."

Noriko knew a little about it. Not really an escalator, but students from Irishima High could enter the university on good grades, and bypa.s.s the entrance exams that way.

"I don"t understand." Underhanded business wasn"t really Noriko"s forte. "Would you please explain?"

"This club of yours is vital. We"re protecting everything exceptional an arrival comes up with. We have reasons to do so."

That made sense. A secret organisation letting a few arrivals play havoc with j.a.panese norms was crazy in itself, but the costs a.s.sociated had to be huge. One way or another there had to be a pay-off.

"So you want to prevent Kareyoshi from shutting it down?" Noriko didn"t even pretend to show her new princ.i.p.al any respect.

She got a grin in return. Her lack of honorifics hadn"t gone unnoticed.

"There will be repercussions, but the club stays one way or another. I can guarantee that."

"How?" What Nakagawa sensei said piqued Noriko"s interest. This was the adult world, and one she needed to learn quickly if she was ever to make Urufu hers.

"Club members with good results will void the entrance exams. I"m not entirely clear how we"ll handle it, but one way or another."

Noriko sucked in some air. Automatic entry into a decent university was a great carrot for most students, or rather for their parents.

"Isn"t that basically declaring war on the Himekaizen headship?"

Nakagawa sensei sipped some more coffee. When he put his cup down on the table a smile ran over his face. "Not really. Not the headship. Kareyoshi only. If the pig wants a revolt we"re giving him one."

Something didn"t ring right. "Kareyoshi could force his staff to give all members horrid grades."

"Perceptive."

Noriko waited for Nakagawa sensei to continue. She had plenty of time before the Sunday date she had coerced Urufu into.

"Almost forgot I have to see Kuri first. Why did she insist on meeting me before my date?"

"With the exception of mister Hammargren and miss Agerman I believe we can have the Irishima High headship rubber-stamp any grades set by the club," Nakagawa sensei said and brought Noriko out of her thoughts.

Then what he had said finally registered and it was enough to force a gasp from her. "Grading ourselves?"

"Almost, but no. Both the princ.i.p.al and the vice princ.i.p.al of Irishima High know about the arrivals. They"ll trust any grading done by the boy you"re so painfully obviously in love with."

"Am I really that transparent?" Noriko felt her cheeks heat up even before she finished that thought. "As if I"m walking around with a sign saying teenager in love."

"But then he really isn"t a boy in the first place," Nakagawa sensei continued relentlessly.

Noriko forced her own embarra.s.sment away. "That"s putting a lot of responsibility on his shoulders."

"That"s making him do what he"d do anyway. He started the revolt in the first place. He should see it through."

That was, Noriko realised, grossly unfair. Urufu hadn"t started a revolt. He lost his entire life just to be dropped into an unfamiliar world, and that was hardly his fault.

"Harsh, don"t you agree?"

Noriko glared at her former princ.i.p.al.
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"He wouldn"t have it any other way. Not here at least. Isn"t that the part of him you fell for?"

On the verge of protesting Noriko recalled a raging spirit with spiky, orange hair. A demon of fury who had come to her rescue that day in middle school. "He didn"t know me. He didn"t even know this j.a.pan, and yet he took on all four of them." Yes, that was the man she had fallen for, a man who acted on injustice. A man with his own sense of absolute integrity. So strong it sometimes made him stupid, and just so much more lovable. "Kuri, you idiot! You let him go. Why?"