Part 112 Jingle Hells THERA: Belldandy was beat-exhausted; her head was banging from the inside...as if she had stayed up all night at one of those Shinjuku raves in Tokyo. The raves that she *used* to go to, before she moved into the Women's Dorm at Chiba Poly and got stuck house-sitting on on a regular basis during the weekends...while her sempai went out for a night of partying, dancing and karaoke clubbing on the town. The pulsing endured...a beat-box metallic sort of drumming, keeping a vicious rhythm to the throbbing, gristly migraine she was enduring. Yet, it was only 5pm in the afternoon...and Belldandy knew that practice would last another two hours. For some sadistic reason that would only make sense to a former member of Japan's Olympic Women's Volleyball team, Chiba frosh Belldandy Morisato was running "10s" under the ever-watchful eye of her coach, Chihiro Fujimi. Coach Chihiro...who adamantly resented being called by her last name for some reason...had decided on a particularly cruel and unusual punishment; all because Belldandy had arrived at today's practice ten minutes late. Hence, Belldandy was running the "10s": ten laps around the 440m track. Timed laps. Coach Chihiro had clocked her time when she finished the first set of ten laps, and then told Belldandy that she would have to run "10s" until practice was over, unless she knocked 30 seconds off her initial 10-lap time. If she managed that, then she could rejoin the team in the gym for "hustle and dig" scrimmages. What kind of nut makes her player jog laps around the track in mid-November? And how could Coach Chihiro monitor her running so closely, while supervising scrimmages as well? Belldandy felt confined, as she was wrapped double-layer with two thick cotton track outfits, gloves and a scarf around her neck. In her migraine- moderated flights of abstraction, she imagined that she must look like a jogging penguin as she rounded towards the straightaway on the Chiba Poly track... "What the hell..huff huff..does she think I'm doing here? Trying out for the..ghasp!..Chiba Polytech track squad?" Belldandy groused as she turned the corner on her ninth lap. Of course, she knew that she could easily make the track team if she wanted to, as she had placed rather high on the Chiba Prefectural track meets in each of her high school years. "She's not a coach; she's a drill-instructor Demoness from the Self Defense Force, posing in disguise as a college volleyball coach!" "" a voice said in her ear. Senbei. "Waaaa!" she shouted, noticing the small translucent cloud floating over her shoulder, fog-shaped in the likeness of that poser Demon weirdo! "Shut up! You're bothering me, you little foy-boy!" she shout- hissed. "What was that, Morisato?" Coach Chihiro hailed, her eyes narrowed suspiciously as she tucked her glasses down her nose. Belldandy's already sweaty body seemed to big sweat...she had cursed out Senbei while running right past the Coach... "I said 'What's the clocking speed, oiy?'...as in how's my time doin'!" Belldandy shouted the lie, almost gasping for effort. Running 4km time trials in the hibernal chill air didn't exactly leave a lot of lungpower for idle conversation... It wasn't enough that she had been saddled with God in the past several weeks. Now, she was also saddled with the Devil. Take two shitheads and mix them together, and a girl's life becomes as messy as a clogged toilet. Belldandy didn't know which was worse: Senbei's efforts to plague her with bad luck, or Keiichi's efforts to try to be kind to her. Or the mix of the two... It was like mixing fleas and ticks. Or having two boyfriends at once, with none of the romance and all of the drama. It seemed that Senbei's efforts to create bad luck in her life usually resulted in Belldandy being caught in some kind of accidental whacky-ecchi situation involving Keiichi. These mishaps kept recalling to her the kinds of 'fan service' shenanigans in the old turn-of-the-millennium Love Hina series, ala Naru and Keitaro. Unfortunately, she couldn't punch Keiichi in the jaw and send him into low orbit. Belldandy's mind flashed back to a memory held crisp in her mind, if for anything, for the sheer bungee-jump rush of discord and chaos it had presaged. It had all started so inconspicuously... Soon after she and Keiichi had 'inherited' the old wreck of a temple, Keiichi had fixed it with his Divine powers. A few days later, she kept getting the 'vibe' from him that she should pitch in and do something towards the temple's upkeep: after all, they had promised the elderly priest that they would tend to the temple and its grounds. Since Keiichi had 'fixed' the temple and all the environs, that left the grounds. Deciding that she might as well mow the lawn one last time before it snowed, she walked around the quadrangular yard, policing it for trash objects and other discards. The intent was to clear it out before she started mowing it. The compound's lawns and gardens were over an acre in size, which was immense by Chiba standards. Her task would be worsened by the fact that she would be stuck mowing the lawn with the antique gas mower in the shed, instead of a rider mower. The mower in the shed looked as old as the priest who had formally tenanted the Buddhist temple as caretaker. Hoping for the best, Belldandy asked 'God' if he could deign to fetch her a rider mower; Keiichi's reply was "that's a whim, not a true wish"... And then he went off somewhere in the temple, probably to loaf around...leaving Belldandy all alone to wonder why he suddenly seemed to have 'gone on strike' in terms of granting wishes. Sighing with disappointment, Belldandy tried to make good out of ill. Mowing a huge enclosed 'mini-park' of a lawn would probably be a good physical workout for a Sunday... As she cleaned up the yard's rubbish, Belldandy noticed a glimmer under the shrubbery that skirted the squat Bell Tower to the north of the temple. When she squatted down to peer underneath the bushes, she found an unopened bottle of Ramune soda. Belldandy pulled it out of the ground, curious as to why a bottle of Ramune soda was half-buried near the temple's Bell Tower. How could the elderly priest have missed something so obvious? As she looked it over, she could discern from the faded label that it was one of those 1990s types; Peach-flavored with the trademark 'face' at the top of the bottle. But the shape of the face seemed awfully familiar...and when she turned it over, she noticed a promotional sticker featuring one of the ghostly 'chibi-kodoma' tree- spirits from Mononoke Hime. Her heartpulse quickened, because she was now holding in her hands a genuine collector's item! Visions of yen danced through her head. Since this year was the 10th anniversary of the release of Mononoke Hime, the media were hyping up a 'mini-fad' for Mononoke movie collectibles. "I'm rich! Or at least a little rich! Some fanboy will pay a *fortune* for this!" Belldandy happily announced to herself, pleased at her good hazard. But the bottle was muddied by its decade-long stay on the ground; it would have to be cleaned carefully and thoroughly before she could sell it. So she took it over to one of the spigots on the main temple house, so she could at least rinse it off. She was so excited, she used her own t-shirt to carefully dry the bottle after thoroughly rinsing it...after all, she had dressed in her grubbies especially because of the yard-chores she had planned to do that afternoon. Somehow, while drying the top of the bottle with a ginger touch, Belldandy managed to *accidentally* peel off the seal, lift off the cap, and push down the center...releasing the opener. How this happened was of no importance. Belldandy was too shocked to say a word as, incredibly, the marble popped *out*, instead of sinking down into the bottle... Belldandy had opened her fair share of Ramune soda pops in her 18 years of life; and nothing like this had *ever* happened to her! Her face figured with misery as she realized that she had just lost a month's worth of shopping-mall money. And just like in the proverbial Arabian Nights, she ended up releasing an evil genie. The bottle spat out a ethereal cloud of purplish gas...which formed into a tall young man and small woman who sat on his shoulder, Barbie-doll sized. The man looked dashingly handsome at first, a blonde contrast to Keiichi's dark looks. But once Belldandy met his eyes, she sensed something unpleasant...something malevolent and mischievous...that completely unscrewed her nerves. "Here we go..." she sighed in resignation as the Devil Senbei along with his miniature side-kick Mara the Demoness announced themselves. After offering her a name-card, which she politely declined, Senbei the Devil promptly told Belldandy they had been assigned by Windowsill or whatever to cause her bad luck. Belldandy almost giggled at him, because he spoke in some kind of garbled pidgin-Japanese that sounded like he was from the very 'rural' parts of Okinawa. Or that he was from Korea, and just learning Japanese. In any case, her urge to laugh was choked down as the realization lit a fire of recognition in her mind. *This was the Devil Himself she was talking to!!!* Caught between disbelief and cursing, Belldandy quickly explained to the pair that she was already plagued by bad luck in the form of God. The curly-haired Devil...who was dressed in some kind of gauche livery which made him look like a cross between Michael Jackson and a hotel bellhop...momentarily was possessed of an expression of panic. Then he recovered himself, clapped his hands and gleefully shouted "Splendid!" Belldandy fidgeted with the now-empty Ramune bottle as the Devil started laughing his lungs out. Mara tugged at his sleeve, and he sudden halted in mid-guffaw, and then started, muttering "Blessit! I just drew his attention!" Comedic elements aside, this weirdness only added to Belldandy's confusion and consternation. Senbei quickly informed Belldandy that he and Keiichi were now in 'competition' for her soul or something. A tingling, thrill-gone-bad chill seized her as Senbei then bowed politely to her and promised to "wreak havoc" in her life at a later date with the aplomb of a character straight out of Hamlet. Right before the pair vanished into thin air, his side-kick Mara suggested to Belldandy that she take the rest of the day off and take a bath... Or else. Thoroughly bamboozled and distraught by what had just happened, Belldandy thought the suggestion sounded reasonable enough, even if it came in the form of a threat from the lips of Devil's blonde-haired assistant. What could be safer, now that she was the subject of some freak-ass Faustian drama between God and the Devil? She noticed that she was sweating just as bad as if she had already been mowing the lawn for an hour or two... So bath-time, it was! Ever since she wound up cohabitating with a male in the Buddhist temple, Belldandy had endeavored to take all the necessary precautions...including hanging a prudently visible wooden "Occupied!" sign on the door of each of the temple's bathrooms. Just in case. There was a small outdoor hot springs nestled in the middle of a brake of pine trees behind the temple...but there was no way she was going to use that while Keiichi was around. The three bathrooms were relatively clean; the main one even had a large wooden furoba of the quaint, antique kind, complete with mountain scenery muraled on the walls and a wooden stove to heat the water. Naturally, she doubted that Keiichi would ever use one of the temple bathrooms; after all, he was God... But a girl could never be safe. And from the very first moment she had met him, Keiichi already had established a proven track record for callously invading her privacy. His actions had already set off a chain of events...which was why she was living in the temple in the first place, instead of the Girl's Dorm with her teammates. A few minutes later, she nearly drowned in the furo. While she was twiggling her toes in the soothing heat of the water, the wooden door to the inner bathroom creaked open... As soon as she heard the door-sound, Belldandy instantly sucked her breath in and held it as she totally submerged under the bath water, not knowing what else to do. Keiichi had *walked in on her while she was taking a bath*! She counted to 70, after which she couldn't keep her breath in any longer...and then she 'surfaced', praying that Keiichi was gone. He was. She had explicitly warned him at least a dozen times to never enter any of the temple's bathrooms at all, especially if she was in them. And in true Keiichi fashion, he had ignored her instructions completely! Angrily plotting revenge, Belldandy hopped out of the furo, not even bothering to towel herself off. She grabbed the nearest long bath towel and quickly wrapped herself tightly in it. Snagging a second towel, she dipped it in the furoba until it was good and wet. With an angry grin, she coiled up the wet towel. She was going to put an end to the favors of misfortune that seemed to tenure her whenever Keiichi was around! No excuse would allow him to shirk responsibility! God or not, he was going to get it for walking in on her while she was luxuriating in the wooden furo... Once Belldandy walked out into the hallway, she noticed that the sign that normally read "Occupied!" now read "DeMonS InSIdE!". The idiot had actually fallen for it! "Keiichi no Bakaaaaa!!!" she screamed, every muscle in her body taunt. Belldandy was so livid, she was seeing red. Her Divine roommate-slash-adversary-slash-pest did one of those magical 'appearing out of the wall' type things in response to her summons. Wasting no time, Belldandy dashed up to him while he was half-out of the hallway wall, fully intent on snapping him with her towel. But funny things happen when you combine Demons and Ramune bottles... The Ramune bottle Belldandy had left outside...had unexpectedly wound up under her left foot. With a wrench, her footing suddenly was totally unspun-uneven, the kind of gyro-turmoil she had experienced several times when had stepped on a teammate's foot during a v-ball game or a practice. Completely thrown off balance, Belldandy flailed to gain purchase by grabbing onto something, anything. Instead, her hands slapped furtively against the flat of the wooden wall as she tumbled to the ground, her momentum converted from a sprinting dash towards Keiichi to a full cartwheel. Something else was also thrown off as well... In less then a second, Belldandy watched helplessly as the bath towel she had wrapped around herself went sailing into the air amidst a blur of limbs. With a deft motion, Keiichi caught it as it flagged towards his chest, a pink-colored cloth butterfly. With nothing to cover her besides her long lengths of auburn hair, Belldandy wordlessly stared at Keiichi, who was wordlessly staring at her nakedness. If Time was a flowing stream of water, then that few seconds would have been frozen as snug as glacier! Belldandy was almost certain that she saw a smile tucked within the blush to his cheeks...and then she aimed the wet towel she still had in her hands at his face. As Keiichi got a face-full of sopping- wet bath towel, Belldandy had just enough time to sprint back into the safety of the bathroom before she started screaming. Mirthful giggles in her mind punctuated her screams of dismay, punching home the truth that Senbei was a force to be reckoned with. After the calamity had drained her throat hoarse, Belldandy almost felt regretful that she had taken out her anger on Keiichi once she realized that the whole incident had been obviously orchestrated by the Devil Senbei. But since Keiichi was God, she figured that He could probably handle some misdirected anger. But even though she knew that he was God, Belldandy was completely red-faced when she emerged from the bathroom and saw him for the first time after the ecchi incident... She certainly had never lived under the same roof with a guy who had just seen her *naked*. Then there was the time a couple days later when someone had stealthily concealed mud in her futon during a particularly nasty set of mid-term exams at school. Tests had been coming her way like freight trains; half-exhausted, Belldandy had pulled aside the blanket and collapsed on her bedding...only to get liberally plastered with wet mud. So she went to the laundry room to soak her jeans before the foul mixture of mud and grease set in...and while in a state of undress, Keiichi just happened to walk in on her. The door had been glowing red... Or that time last week when half her bras somehow got starched in the wash because the laundry detergent had been screwed with. The other half, supposedly 'safe' in the dryer, somehow got 'burnt' because the rickety machine overheated. And the single bra that Belldandy was wearing had snapped its clasp, so it was worthless. Belldandy had no choice but to rewash all of her remaining bras. Either that, or suffer through a bad case of the itchies the next day. That time, she had assumed that she could get from the laundry room to her room without being spotted walking around the temple with no bra underneath her t-shirt. Just a 15-second walk to her room, where she could put on a sweatshirt to cover-up until the wash was done. But somehow, the ceiling sprinkler system activated the moment she left the wash-room, and she was instantly soaked...and Keiichi was instantly there in the hallway with her, asking her why she set off the indoor sprinklers and why she wasn't wearing a bra. Sprinklers?! Belldandy could swear that she had never seen them in the month or so that she had been living in the temple. And to add ire to ire, Senbei had tartly suggested that she should enter a 'wet t-shirt' contest, so she could earn some extra cash and replace her missing lingerie! And then the rest of her bras ended up getting 'burnt' in the dryer... Finally, there was today's 'stunt'. An 'attack' by Senbei that had caused her to run into Keiichi at a full sprint while he was polishing one of the Buddhas in the main hall. Senbei had startled her by changing one of the Buddhas, the Miroku Buddha, into a lucky badger statue, surrounded by snakes. Even though Belldandy immediately knew who the culprit was, her mind was outwitted by her not-so-subtle terror of snakes. Shrieking bloody murder, she dashed into the main hall as fast as her feet could wing her...when she stepped on a oiled dustrag someone had dropped on the floor. Sliding across the floor like a skateboarder, she crashed full flat against him, knocking him off the footstool... The metal polishing oil ended up spilling all over her front. And Keiichi was all over her front as well, having landed on her. Just like before, when she had first fainted against him in the Girl's Dorm, Belldandy was glowing with an embarrassed blush. Even though she was shocked by the sensation of his body pressed against hers, even though she was pinned to the ground underneath him...part of her didn't mind it at all. Which made her even more angry. She quickly wrestled herself out from under him and then scooted against the wall, pulling her knees up against her chest and touching her index fingers together in the well-known "I'm totally embarrassed" gesture. Keiichi didn't seem embarrassed at all; he kept asking if she was okay. His inquiries about her welfare made Belldandy feel more awkward, so she pleaded with him to dismiss himself from her presence. Then she hunkered down in the bathroom to wash the smelly oil-goo off of herself. It took a brush, which no doubt didn't help her complexion any. So she had shown up 10 minutes late, despite sprinting to school. ...which was why, in the present moment, she was running these worthless laps around the track while her teammates were honing their volleyball skills, just because she had ended up getting soaked in oil. And she was still angry at Keiichi, because he had wormed his way into her heart just enough for a tiny part of her conscience to brazenly interpret the mishap with a "it was all worth it!" The windless November air seemed to shrivel her lungs; but she also felt a warmth inside as she remembered how it had felt to briefly be pinned underneath him. She had expected him to crush her with her weight, but instead, his firm body had only blanketed her with a lightness...and a flicker of pleasure... "Life sucks! I live with God...and he can't even keep the Devil at bay!" Belldandy groused, her words rhythmed by the crispy sounds of her footfalls on the frigid cinder track... "What'd you say, Morisato?" * * * * * * * * "Keiichi, can't you *do* something about Senbei and Mara? I'm sick of getting caught up in these idiotic disasters that usually wind up with you gawking at my panties..." "Belldandy, there's nothing I can do about Senbei at the moment. And I would never dream of gawking at your panties! Besides, if I really wanted to gawk at your panties, do you think you could do anything to stop me?" he answered. Great. Just what was needed...an assurance veiled within a threat. Belldandy felt a crock in her neck as she bowed her head in exasperation. Keiichi didn't even really understand what he had just said... God was an ignoramus! "Thanks *a lot*!!!" she shot back, her words an aegis of irritation. "Aren't you supposed to be God or something, Keiichi? Aren't you supposed to be omnipotent and all that? That's what they teach us in our freshman humanities classes! So why don't you *do* something about all this Devil and Ms. Mara crap?!" Keiichi simply shook his head sadly...and Belldandy suddenly got a brainstorm. "Sooo," she said slyly. "You said you came here to grant my wish, didn't ya?" When Keiichi nodded "yes", her smile broadened. She had him!!! "Okay, I've come up with a wish! My wish...is for you to get rid of Senbei!" "Can't do," Keiichi quickly answered. While Belldandy mouthed a silent "I can't believe this!", he explained his refusal. "You see, the reason Senbei's here is because of *you*..." "That's so...full of bullshit!" she answered, filled with indignant vim. "That's so...you. You can't handle it down here, Keiichi. So what do you do? You blame it on the lowly Earthrealm mortal! You say it's *her* fault!" Keiichi grimaced in the face of her vehemence. "Just for the record, I had absolutely *nothing* to do with that retard Demon or Devil or whatever he is being here!" Belldandy shouted, clarifying what was obvious to her. "I didn't ask for you, and I didn't ask for him either! Now I'm stuck with both of you...and it's driving me crazy. Another week of this and I'm going to shave my head and become and nun and move to a cave in Hokkaido!" "" "Senbei, shut up already!" she heard herself shout...in unison with Keiichi. "Look, Belldandy," Keiichi said, clearing his throat. "The reason I'm still here is because you won't make a wish. And that's why Senbei remains here as well. It's really complicated! But to put it simply, when I received your wish proposa...er, your wish request, Senbei also was contacted. He works for the Demon Grief Office, which has two purposes. Their main purpose is to cause grief and chaos in people's lives. Their secondary endeavor is to frustrate the wish requests we receive from you mortals." "O..office?" Belldandy asked, sounding confused. Her mind filtered through all the images of the Devil sitting in an office, counting out souls, promoting Demons, assigning punishments to sinners, etc. A Demonic Trickster archetype, like Susa-no-o...or a King Yama magisterial type, presiding over a sea of souls under the shadow of Celestial Hall of Purgatory on Mt. Tai-yama. It almost sounded too hokey. When the mist of her astonishment cleared, she realized that Keiichi wasn't pulling her leg with some kind of bogus idiocy. Why would God lie about the Devil? "You really don't know anything, do you?" Keiichi observed. Belldandy felt her whole body stiffen up...she *really* hated being called ignorant... "Well forgive me for not being an all-knowing, semi-omnipotent Being like you!!! Who's also stupid, wishy-washy, lecherous, intrusive, ignorant and idiotic!" she shouted, almost screaming in his face. "Whoa! Slow down and listen, will ya?" Keiichi requested. "This is for your own good, it's really important! What you need to know is this: as long as you don't make a wish, then it's undecided between us. Which means that, right now, Senbei has the potential to lay a curse on you. Try to think of your situation in terms of as an airplane taxing around in a holding pattern, waiting to decide on which runway it'll land. You can either land on the 'wish' runway, or you can land on the 'grief' runway." "Th..that doesn't make any sense, because it's something that only an imbecile would come up with! You expect me to believe that the Divine world...which is supposed to be all holy and divine and shit...operates on some stupid notion of fighting over people's souls?" Belldandy stammered. "Uh huh!" Keiichi affirmed. "That's...*idiotic*! How come Senbei gets to be here, and I didn't even phone him? I had to phone you to get you to come here! I didn't 'summon' him at all; he just popped out of a Ramune soda bottle I found in the yard...and whammo!...my so-called life gets totally fucked up!" she observed angrily. "Yes, however..." "And I didn't summon you either, but yet here you are!!! It's so *totally* unfair!" "Actually, it isn't unfair, Belldandy. It was no accident that fate had bound us together," Keiichi said calmly. "But sometimes, I have to wonder why..." "Yep! Me too!" she agreed. "That single phone call caused all of this shit! I wish the telephone had never been invented! Life is just too unfair! I should be using the phone to talk to my sweet, shaggy-hair, cool-acting boyfriend. Instead, I called...and *you* answered! I get kicked out of the Women's Dorm! I almost get kicked off the *team* for being late to so many practices! I have to spend my days off cleaning this antique temple...and I have to sneak home food from the university cafeteria half the time, because I'm too tired to cook! And you! You've actually kissed me and seen me naked!" "...and I'm also going have to take you to task about that tongue of yours! You swear like an Osaka grrl..." "KEIICHI!!!" Belldandy boomed a threatening growling scream. Now he was trying to correct her speech! What the hell does he think he's doing? She wondered if there was some silly prohibition against swearing, like people being banned from swearing in Windowsill, on pain of death or something... Keiichi's question alighted her on the more important onus; Belldandy sensed that the lingering doubts she had about why Fate had bound her up with Keiichi was probably the only thing she had in common with him. Still, he had to live with her in the same house until she made her wish. Even though she could kill two birds with one stone...get rid of Keiichi and Senbei by making a single wish...she couldn't think of what to wish for. If she was going to have a wish, she wasn't going to waste it! And Keiichi had pretty much laid out a moratorium on what he interpreted as 'whimsical wishes'. Belldandy schemed a little scheme. Perhaps she could use this wish thing to manipulate Keiichi... What if he got homesick, but in spite of his feelings, he still had to remain on the Earthrealm with her because she wouldn't make up her mind about her wish? If this was the case, she could earn some hard-fought leverage over him. What 18-year-old university freshman girl *wouldn't* want to have God Himself under her thumb? "I've decided on my wish!" she announced. "Really?" Keiichi replied, his youthful face brightening up with excitement. "Yep! And it's going to remain a secret!" Belldandy treasured the look on Keiichi's face when she said *that*... * * * * * * * * A couple months pass rather quickly when a girl is living with God and being plagued by the Devil... Christmas was rolling around, and Belldandy decided to go out shopping with her teammates. Earlier in the week, she had purchased some knick-knack gifts for everybody at some of the discount stores. But now, she faced the task of picking out the *important* gifts; presents for her mother and stepfather. Since she was going to be out in public with her friends, she insisted to Keiichi that he take every precaution to keep Senbei away from her and her 'tribe'. The last thing she needed was to be in the changing room at her favorite clothing store in the middle of an earthquake...or something as simple as a broken door hinge... Not being the kind of girl that indulges herself by making lists, Belldandy sauntered around with Captain Tamiya, Captain Ootaki, and several of the other girls in the big nine-story shopping mall. The air was electrified with Christmas carols, the buzz of excited conversation, squeals of delight from young children, the smells of candy and ice cream, and numerous flashing lights from all the seasonal displays at the various specialty shoppes. Going shopping with the girls was always fun, especially when Captain Ootaki was acting as ringleader. Captain Ootaki was renowned for her razor-sharp wit and acrid comments. Once can be sure that going shopping with Ootaki would result in at least a couple laugh riots... "Look at those two!" Belldandy heard the spiky-haired senior announce, pointing at one of the more visible couples from their school. "I bet she's the kind of old-fashioned girl who goes to college to look for a husband. He's a hundred years too late to be considered much of a looker, with those thick glasses of his!" "Yeah, but I bet he's a pervert!" "Hmm...what kind of pervert do you think he is?" Captain Tamiya asked slyly. "Probably the kind that invites his girlfriend to spend the evening with him when his parents are away from his house, and then 'invites' his girlfriend to cook dinner wearing one of those kitchen aprons...and nothing else!" "Ah...truly a case of the salaryman-in-training, you mean?" Captain Ootaki said with a giggle. Belldandy found herself cracking up at the old joke...after all, it was the *way* that Ootaki had offered her punchline that made the whole thing so funny. "Yeah. Chiba Poly's supposed to be a good school, but I bet she's joined one of those cosplay clubs..." "Which cosplay club? You know there's only one!" "Huh?" Belldandy asked. "Yeah, the salaryman's wife-in-training dress up club!" Captain Ootaki said, her face all serious. "No way!" Belldandy ferreted. "You mean to tell me that there's actually a student club named..." Her comment was interrupted by giggling; and Belldandy blushed with embarrassment, knowing that she'd been had. How would she know anything about this goofy experience called Chiba Polytech? All the students were crazy...and the faculty were a bunch of eccentric young guys or lecherous old farts. She didn't even bother to go out and explore the booths during the schools Fall Cultural Fair...so she had no idea what kinds of clubs there were. The blood rushing to her cheeks reminded Belldandy about the fact that Captain Ootaki's wit could turn into a sword bringing down embarrassment on anyone, at any time. Just as Belldandy wished that she was as smart as Captain Ootaki, she heard Ootaki whoop and point at another couple. "Look! A two-person 'banana'!" she shouted. Belldandy followed her gesture and saw a gaijin woman walking with a middle-aged Japanese man... "Yep! I wonder what kind of ugly kid's *they* have..." "Hssst!" Belldandy shout-whispered. "Stop it right now!" "Why? We're just getting started..." Captain Tamiya protested, grinning evilly. "Because that's my mom and my stepdad!" Belldandy said, half- embarrassed, half-angry. She paused to savor the shocked looks on the faces of her teammates. This situation was too good to be passed up, and she was going to milk it for all the guilt-trips she could dish out... "HONEY!" her mom hailed, waving her arm high above her head. So much for the milking. Her mother was dressed in one of those OL-type business suits that looked at least 10 'style years' younger than her age. Belldandy fretted that Ootaki's tongue would lash around this, but fortunately her team captain had the good sense to keep her mouth shut. "Ah, Belldandy!" her mother announced, animated joyfully in 'mother mode'. "What a pleasant surprise! How's my little girl doing?" Belldandy scowled as she heard tittering from behind her. Ignoring the clowning with some effort, she walked up and hugged her mother, and then bowed curtly to her stepdad. "We're just finishing up our Christmas shop...ulp!" she started to answer. Her words were black-holed halfway out of her mouth, because she saw Senbei and Mara hovering behind her parents, surrounded by some kind of dark purple cloud. Bewildered, she glanced over her shoulder at her teammates, worried that they might be seeing the pair of Devils... But they obviously didn't. Each of her teammate's faces was wrinkled with the twin postulates of trying to keep from laughing, and trying to behave respectfully in the presence of her parents. As her mother talked about how good it was going to be to have her home for Christmas, and her dad talked tidbits about his job, Belldandy watched as a 'battle' unfolded between Senbei and Mara vs. Keiichi. It seemed to be going on invisibly; at least invisibly as far as everyone else was concerned. But she could half-see see the cosmic-scale explosions going off between the three combatants. It was as if the bouting was happening in another dimension, but a dimension that she was privy to witness. Once in a while, it seemed like Senbei would try to 'break through'...possibly into *this* dimension, she realized with absolute panic...but then Keiichi would restrain him with some kind of magical hand gestures. Senbei would 'push' the air with his hands, which would distort like clear plastic wrap being stretched by a piece of food... He was trying to get out, get out into *her* world! "How's life at the Girl's Dorm?" her mother asked. "Are they keeping you out of trouble there?" That was the last thing that could possibly have ever happened during the time she was living in the run-down apartments of the Girl's Dorm. She didn't *have* time to get in trouble back then! Actually, it was the other way around...her sempai were always getting into trouble, and she was kept out of it totally. They had all the fun, while she had... "Actually, she isn't living with us any..." Belldandy felt her face go white with panic. In the past two months, she had concealed everything that related to her expulsion from the Girl's Dorm! Not to mention that she was living in a refurbished Buddhist temple with a *guy*! If her parents found out about *that*, she could kiss her college career goodbye! "Oh shit!" she exclaimed silently. To her surprise, Keiichi reacted as if he had *heard* her desperate thoughts...and in the middle of a tight quarters 'magical swordfight' with Senbei, he managed to point a finger at her crew and flick a small globe of light towards them. Before Captain Tamiya could finish her sentence, she started sneezing. In fact, all five of her teammates started sneezing... She looked up at Keiichi, just as Senbei hit him in the chest with a blast of energy. He was propelled clear through the roof of the shopping mall. Senbei turned and grinned evilly at her, and then 'stretched' the air behind her parents, trying to break out into the *real* world. Just before he managed to break on through to the other side, Keiichi reappeared, rocketing downwards like a lightning bold. Unseen by Senbei but standing behind the Devil from Belldandy's perspective, Keiichi swiftly pulled the kerchief that he kept wrapped around his neck. Belldandy had assumed all along that the scarf was just some fashion accessory; but as he loosened it, Keiichi seemed to *glow* with a blue energy. The sight suggested to her mind a character blowing up qi in one of those Chinese animes... Balling up a globe of energy in his hands, Keiichi cast it out at Senbei and Mara. It expanded from a hurl of light into a intricate 'net' of glowing filaments...and it quickly surrounded Senbei and Mara. Caught in the snare, the mesh collapsed inwards; forcing Senbei and Mara to shrink along with it. Senbei turned and gave Keiichi the finger, and then he and Mara 'vanished' themselves out of it before they got crushed. "...oh, and don't forget that I've made your favorite hot cocoa mix. I even bought imported European dark chocolate, your favorite!" her mother said, completely oblivious to the battle that had taken place behind her. "Cool!" Belldandy shouted, doubly pleased. Mom's hot cocoa was the best thing under the sun...it even made the snow feel less frigid. And Keiichi had rid her of those two pesty Devils. Her parents both bowed slightly towards her teammates, and then wandered off. Even if her mom was Euro and her stepdad was Japanese, Belldandy felt comforted by the fact that they were still so much in love. So many of her friends had watched their parent's marriages dissolve into bitterness; Belldandy had luckily been spared this. Somehow, her folks had kept the fires alit; this was obvious when she saw how mom unhesitantly hooked her arm with her stepdad's as they walked away, walking close together like high school sweethearts. Belldandy was reminded that some of mom's European traits had rubbed off on her stepdad...her mom was naturally touchy-feely already, much more so than what was acceptable in Japanese culture. Her stepdad had taken it in stride; as she grew up, she noticed her stepdad actually becoming more affectionate towards her and mom with each passing year. "Why can't I have something like that?" Belldandy thought enviously as she watched her parents walk away. She momentarily crafted a romantic whimsy, but the ambrosia of her imaginings was quickly despoiled. Reality was, the only touchy-feely thing on the minds of the guys her age was sex...and little else. She regarded her teammates, who were all snotty-nosed and red- eyed from their sudden 'mysterious' sneezing fit. Belldandy was grateful she had run into her parents at the beginning of her shopping trip; if she had seen them towards the end of her Christmas shopping, they might see the presents she was going to give them. Not to mention that they might reduce her living allowance, figuring that she was more well-off than they had imagined. One good thing about residing in the temple was that it was *free*; she didn't have to pay 'dorm fees' or any other related living expenses. Keiichi had kept his promise to her... * * * * * * * * When she arrived back at the temple from shopping, Keiichi was nowhere to be found...at first. After the fight he had put up against that poser Senbei, Belldandy expected him to greet her at the door, acting self-important and pleased with himself. Setting down her many bags and boxes, Belldandy walked by one of the Buddha statues, which she had irreverently decorated by putting a Christmas cap on the Enlightened One's curly-knotted head. "Where is he?" she asked the muted statue. Unexpected, Belldandy's emotions began to waver towards panic. Normally, if she called on him, he would do that 'popping out of the wall' thingy almost immediately. What if he had decided to leave anyway, without granting her wish? She checked the kitchen, and then started a thoroughgoing exploration, searching through the rooms one by one. She found him in the temple's scriptorium, slumped against one of the bookshelves. "Oi!" she shouted. "Keiichi, get up!" He didn't move... "C'mon! I just wanted to thank you for what you did at the mall! You don't have to make a game of it, Mr. God!" she explained, assuming that he was flirting with her by playing at being asleep. Still, he didn't answer her... Belldandy walked up and leaned over him, making a study of him. Keiichi's face was soaked with sweat, his forehead beaded with little rivulets of it. His forehead...in fact, his whole face...was beet- red. Belldandy knew enough about first aid to realize the signs of heat stroke. Her high school coach had made certain to drill her and her teammates on the subject, a necessary precaution considering that heat stroke was an infrequent but ever-present cause of accidents, injury and even death among high school athletes. Even standing a half-meter away from him, she could almost feel the heat emanating from his body. Completely forgetting the fact that he was God...even as she was amazed and a little humbled by the notion that God could get sick...she rested her hand on his forehead to check his temperature. "Dammit!!! Jesus, Keiichi...you're burning up! You're really *are* sick!" she blurted in a vale of exasperation, her voice loud enough to stir Keiichi to semi-consciousness. He opened his eyes briefly and regarded her, his face flushed and weak. "Are you okay, Belldandy?" he asked in a thin, gasping voice. "Can you move?" she asked, ignoring his question. Keiichi slowly shook his head "no". Belldandy thought quickly. Keiichi was over two meters tall, which made it completely impractical for her to move him to another room. She could assist him into the bathroom, perhaps get him in the showering area so she could spray him with cool water... She blushed deeply, briefly embarrassed by the thought of being in the bathroom with him. Unheralded, a mind-vision of having to take his clothes off to cool his body temperature down flashed through her consciousness. Startled by the unexpected mental imagery, Belldandy jogged her head to try and clear the intrusive thoughts. Dashing off to the kitchen, she concluded that if she couldn't get him to a bedroom, then she'd bring one to him. Hurriedly filling a bag with icecubes and water, Belldandy grabbed one of the kitchen towels and wrapped it. Then she ducked into the nearest room and grabbed a futon and a light bed-sheet. Returning to the temple library room, she set the futon down next to Keiichi, and then rolled him over on top of it. He seemed to be as limp-limber as a sleeping cat. Trying to swallow her embarrassment at being so close to him, Belldandy set up the little hoist over his head, so she could hang the icebag to rest on his forehead. He was still sweating profusely, even though she was fanning him as he went to sleep... The presents! "I've gotta get ready to go to my parents. You're such a bother, Keiichi..." she said...but he was fast asleep. Belldandy still had to wrap the remaining gifts, shower, and dress in some Christmasy clothes. It would be many hours before she would make the call from the train terminal in Choshi to have her stepdad pick her up. * * * * * * * * The mid-afternoon train from Choshi to Chiba was crowded with waygoers, but the people congestion in the train car was nothing in comparison to the crowding of regrets, worries, and confusions in Belldandy's mind. Christmas had come and gone; her visit with her mom and stepdad had turned out to be really fun. Both Mom and Dad were filled with questions about how her college life experience was going. But despite the two nice dinners at the fancy restaurants, the night she went karaokeing with some of her old high school friends, and the nice winter jacket her parents had bought her...Belldandy felt a foreboding. From time to time, her thoughts would hail back to the temple...and Keiichi. During high school, she was always totally in the groove with her own sports career. Mixing sports with cramming for the college entrance exams and enjoying the calm of her home life...Belldandy was rarely bothered to think twice about guys. Belldandy felt safest when she was at a dance club, dancing away with some hot guy who had caught her eye. But the conversation afterwards was always an awkwardness; especially since she wasn't born and raised with the language. And then, late in the evening, most guys she met would try and steer her towards a 'private' karaoke session...or even a love hotel. At this point, Belldandy would give them the "fuck off" treatment and go her own way. It was either that or she'd end up trying to manipulate the guy in some way, whether she had intended to or not. Unfortunately, the only tried-and-true method of turning men into mush that she knew of was to lure them with sex. And Belldandy wasn't the kind of girl who could 'fake' the seductress... So she recognized that she wasn't very experienced with having to worry about a guy. As the train clattered down the elevated tracks, Belldandy scowled to the window, as they passed an old-looking temple building...and her thoughts once again turned towards Keiichi. All the symptoms were there. The day after Christmas, she was hanging out with her mother, enjoying a mother-to-daughter conversation in Norwegian...when her thoughts were drawn open like curtains, pulling back to the pitiful sight of Keiichi laying in the scriptorium. Dinner with Mom and Dad at the fancy steak restaurant was interrupted by worries about whether Keiichi was well enough to eat something. At karaoke, she was singing Morning Musume's "Love Revolution 21"...and when she got to the lyric "Falling in love/working/my history's carved into the Earth", Belldandy forgot the rest of the song, because she was thinking about *him* again. "Could this be love?" she muttered to herself, trying to diagnose her symptoms. If it was 'spring fever', then it was three or four months too early! She couldn't shed her mind of Keiichi, no matter how hard she tried. Belldandy tried to reassess the situation; after all, she had lived with him for almost two months. It was reasonable to assume that he would pop up in her thoughts from time to time because of this. When she was living in the Girl's Dorm, she would recall a conversation with her roommate on occasion, especially during boring classes. Or she would think "which guy is Captain Ootaki going to try and hook up with *this* week?" And Coach Chihiro was a ever-haunting presence in her mind; whenever Belldandy would pass by a shoe store at the mall, a mental impression of Coach Chihiro would almost always follow. "So it really doesn't have anything to do with Keiichi!" she mumbled to herself. "It could be *anyone*...and I'd still have flash- thoughts about he or she on my mind once in a while. I'm thinking about him only because I've spent some time with him over the past two months. Nothing more! And it's not like I hang onto the guy, or something..." One of the salarymen standing next to her cleared his throat, pointedly encouraging Belldandy to keep her thoughts to herself. "Whew!!!" she sighed to herself with relief. All this thinking about Keiichi was *normal*...it wasn't some kind of love! * * * * * * * * "Keiichi! I'm home!" Belldandy shouted, pleased that she had proven to herself during the train ride that being concerned about him didn't equate with being in love with him. Confident that her greeting wasn't housewife-ish, that she was simply announcing herself, Belldandy waited for him to do his flowing-out-of-the-wall thing. When he didn't come, she walked back to the scriptorium room... In the middle of the musty, book-filled room, Keiichi was sound asleep, curled up on the futon she had spread out for him five days earlier. Belldandy ran her fingers through her hair, completely mystified. It looked as if he hadn't moved from his bedding during the entire time she was away! Shaking her head, Belldandy pulled the covers back over his recumbent form, not wanting to wake him. Naturally, anyone else who had slept in the same clothes for five days would smell like dogshit; yet, Keiichi's divine nature kept him from smelling dirty at all. Belldandy sniffed the air as she tucked him in, smelling the fragrant odor of his body. His "physical manifest"... Even as Keiichi lay sleeping, she marveled at the fact that he was consciously reconstituting billions of atoms to retain his form. She wondered once again why he had chosen such a kawaii form to visit her in. He could have appeared as a kappa, or a sheik, or some kind of apostolic old guy with a beard. But he had chosen *this* form to appear in. Why was he still sleeping? Why was she fawning on him? "What the hell am I doing?!" Belldandy shouted. "I just got home five minutes ago, and now I'm playing *nurse* with this guy?! This really hurls! What am I turning into...his girlfriend or something?" There. Despite the congress she had held in her mind on the way home from Choshi, she had said it. Belldandy quickly covered her mouth, feeling the burn of her words. And Keiichi was awake. "Do you want to have sex?" Belldandy feelings blurred, her thoughts instantly became a museum of confusion. She wanted to shout back "say what?"...but she was certain that she had heard him right the first time. Keiichi had actually *propositioned* her! No...*God* had just came on to her! She balled her fists and held them tight over her chest, not knowing what else to say or do. Even though he was God, this was one of those moments when he seemed to have the maturity of a 14-year-old boy. He had actually mentioned *sex*! The words exasperated her, stumbling her poise like a karate chop to the head... She was too shocked to be angry with him, too caught off guard to feel insulted. Just like that, he had asked her if she wanted to be intimate with him! "M..m..maybe..." she stammered. "Maybe?" "M..mm..maybe you're still ill!" Belldandy finished. "I'm not going to pretend that I didn't hear what you just asked. But I am going to pretend that I heard it, on account that you're sick...er, I don't mean *that* kind of sick! Uh, I meant to say that you're feeling ill, and obviously saying things that you really don't mean to say..." "Just...resting," Keiichi said with a nod, his eyes half-lidded. "Christmas...present...in the next room..." Christmas present?! "But you're *sick*!" Belldandy fluted. "How could you have possibly gotten me a Christmas present? You've been in bed all this time!" "Next room," he repeated, glancing to his left. Belldandy looked to the door, and then back at Keiichi. "First he wants sex...now he's giving me a Christmas present? Why would God give a girl like me a Christmas present? What if God wasn't Christian? If so, then what would be the point of him giving a present to me? What kind of Christmas present could Divine Boy give me?" Belldandy wondered. Knowing Keiichi...*anything* could be in that room! In the past couple months, Belldandy still didn't know when Keiichi was coming across as "him" or "Him". The sex thing...well, that was definitely a "him" sorta moment. This talk of a Christmas present...it could be either "him" or "Him". If it was "Him", then it would either be totally groovy, or totally rank! Curiosity rolled through her mind, like white muffin clouds passing in the sky over dun pastures. Belldandy wanted to ask Keiichi if it was safe to look at her 'present'...but he was already back into la-la land, burr-snoring away. "Oh well! So much for asking him about it!" Belldandy said to herself with a shrug. She knew that this was one of those moments where her 'uppity' nature could get her in trouble. Occasionally, Belldandy was inclined to wonder if all the mishaps she had encountered in life were simply the result of her personality. As she was much more headstrong that the native-born Japanese girls, Belldandy's tomboyish nature often placed her square in the middle of some crazy situations. The patterns of risk repeated themselves, melting into the surface of the moment... She got up and walked to the room next door. Feeling like she was toeing the edge of a promentory high above a turbulent ocean, Belldandy eyed the shoji door warily. After a full minute, she nodded her head "ummn!" and slid the door open. Gazing inside, Belldandy felt all her breath being drawn into the room as she recognized her present... "T..T...T...TIIIIGGGGGEERRR!"