Part 68 Disequilibrium Keiichi stowed his pencil, texts and notebook in his bookbag after his class 'ended'. According to Chihiro, Professor Yayoi had earned a reputation as a very roupy and dry lecturer...a rep that he was certainly stepping up to today. Once the classroom clock reached 2:50pm, Dr. Yayoi literally stopped his lecture in mid-sentence. With a quick shrug of his shoulders, he quietly started to put away his lecture notes with an air of indifference. There was no other indication that the professor had dismissed the class. "How animated can one get about fourth-year engineering physics?" Keiichi wondered as his fellow students started piling out of their chairs. Observing the frail professor, Keiichi thought that Dr. Yayoi seemed the very stereotype of an engineering math savant: dour and stuffy, dressed rather dumpy, his hair disheveled, asocial and aloof in his manner. There would certainly be *no* humor in this class... However, being in grad school had some perks, like the reduced class sizes and the air-conditioned lounge on the 6th floor reserved for the exclusive use of graduate division students and junior faculty. Like the undergrad math lab, the grad lounge had a few cartoons and jokes posted on the walls...these were intended to create an atmosphere of casual easygoingness. Instead, Keiichi thought this was a lame attempt by virtue of its incompleteness. Many of the cartoons were copied out of engineering journals and textbooks routinely assigned for graduate course study. However, one poster in the lab distinguished itself in Keiichi's mind. The poster...hand drawn by an N.I.T. faculty member with no small artistic talent...presented a manga-ish caricature of Albert Einstein. The physics domo was depicted with a Kirin beer in hand and his feet resting on his desk, his typical mismatched socks clearly visible. The accompanying word balloon stated something about "the superiority of math classes is evidenced by the fact that they do not require a term paper." The old joke sat morosely with Keiichi...especially in light of how he had spent the last several weeks of his summer vacation. As he zipped his bookbag shut and started to shoulder it, Keiichi's thoughts were interrupted by a strident voice... "Mr. Morisato?" Setting the bookbag down on the desktop, Keiichi glanced over to see the eldergrey professor walking towards him. Feeling both nervous and impressed by the fact that Dr. Yayoi knew him by name after only one class session, Keiichi tried to smile innocuously. "I believe this is yours," Dr. Yayoi noted dryly as he handed Keiichi a light green envelope. Without even waiting for a reply, he turned around and shuffled towards the door at the front of the class, tucking in his white shirt as he left the room. "Ch-eez," Keiichi muttered under his breath at the departing professor. *This* was highly irregular! Someone had left a note for Dr. Yayoi to pass onto him after class. No wonder Yayoi-sensei was peeved! The guy was practically an emeritus professor...and yet he had been tasked to be a message-boy for one of his students! Quickly opening the envelope, Keiichi withdrew an official- looking stationary with what appeared to be a handwritten message. He gulped in his breath as he read the letterhead. "Office of the President, Nekomi Institute of Technology" was boldly grammed at the top center of the page. His hands started shaking as he realized that this was a message from Dr. Kintaro himself! "Keiichi Morisato, You are to report to my office at 4pm today. Dr. Toshiro Kintaro, President of Nekomi Tech." "That's it?!" Keiichi wondered, scratching his head with piqued anxiety. The brevity of the message was enigmatic in the highest degree! In this case, less meant more. Less clues...more worrying... * * * * * * * * "Don't get paranoid, Keiichi! This might be a good thing! It might really be a good thing!" he said aloud to himself, trying to calm his nerves against the storm of doubts as he stood in the empty hallway. His head whirled around a psyclone of possibilities. At least he had received the note after his final class of the day; thus being spared an entire day's worth of fretfulness. In a daze, he started walking briskly...and collided with Sayoko Mishima. Her silken hair shocked out with the force of his collision; whatever it was that she was carrying, it was now on the floor. "Keiichi? Are you all right?" she asked. Keiichi flinched, expecting Sayoko to fire off on him for almost knocking her on her ass. Sayoko looked up at him with a mystified expression as she knelt down to retrieve her notebook and a text on Transitional Analysis. Scanning his face, she stood up and repeated her question...when he didn't respond, she waved her free hand in front of his face. "Soooo...Dr. Kintaro wants to see you!" Sayoko said, her voice tinged with a mix of worry and surprise as she straightened out her skirt and ruffled her blouse back into place. "H..how did you know? How *could* you know?" he stuttered, realizing that she had somehow guessed what was on his mind. "Well, you were holding *this* in plain view," she answered with a wink, grinning as she poked him in the chest...poking the letter he held plastered to his breast. Oft times, now that she had cleaned up from drugs...Sayoko seemed to strike Keiichi as a hawk-girl. Like her avian counterpart, she was very genki, poised and observant. She just didn't swoop-pounce with deadly force any more, like she used to when she was getting high. This was one of those times where her vigilance seemed to border on the supernatural. "Are you in trouble?" Sayoko joked. "Not one bit. I had some...difficulties...turning in my final paper from last semester. But now, everything is all smoothed out," he answered somewhat defensively. "So any guesses about why the *president* of N.I.T. wants to meet with you, Keiichi?" she asked. "Actually...I don't have a clue!" Keiichi exclaimed, frustration written on his face. She eyed him for a moment, and then seemed to arrive at some private decision. "Well, let's get going to the Admin Bldg!" Sayoko said playfully as she punched him in the shoulder. Keiichi looked at her askance until she explained that her schedule was open until 4:30pm. She added that he looked as nervous as the lead actor in the new movie. "*What* new movie?" he asked. Sayoko described the new comedy in an animated voice. The plot centered around a young piano tutor, just out of the Berkeley Institute, who had signed up to prepare a 17-year- old girl for her first formal concert recital...only to learn that he was in love with her, she was infatuated with him. And that she was the only daughter of a yakuza overboss. "Did they get together?" he asked. "Don't be so useless! Go take your fiance to the movie and find out for yourself!" Sayoko teased back. With mention of Belldandy, Keiichi ardently wished she was here to accompany him...but having Sayoko to keep him company was a good second best. Hopefully, Sayoko's usual confident poise would rub off on him during the ten minutes it would take to walk from the hall to the Admin Bldg. In just five minutes, his world felt like it had been ruffled like a pair of gardener's gloves after an afternoon of weeding the yard... * * * * * * * * "Mor..." "Excuse me, did you say something?" Dr. Kintaro inquired politely, looking up from the ever-present mound of paper work on his desk. Both visitors shook their heads. The utterance was half-heard...maybe it was his imagination, he thought. Adjusting his reading glasses, Dr. Kintaro again reflected on the strange circumstances that surrounded the presence of these two visitors who were sitting on the antique Biedermeier sofa in his office. He directed his thoughts back to early this morning. First, the couple had arrived unannounced at 9am. Normally, Dr. Kintaro kept a tight rein on his personal schedule. Anybody who wanted to meet with him had to be screened by one of his secretaries. Despite the fact that he didn't have a clue about the identities of these two...had never even *met* them...his secretary insisted that they were scheduled to meet with him this afternoon. She even showed him the notation in the appointment book she kept for him. Second, the two visitors had traveled all the way from *Norway* to meet with him. With *him*! They could have visited Keio or Waseda or one of the other more prestigious educational institutions in Tokyo. But...as they later explained...they had chosen N.I.T. precisely because it *wasn't* one of the top schools. Yet, the fact that a student team of racers from N.I.T. had won the Le Mans...*this* event had certainly put it on the map, as far as Europe was concerned. He suspected that the middle-aged couple were nothing more than jetsetter racing fans seeking a few autographs...until they presented him with a name card. Their card introduced them as Eldon and Greta Thorgarssun, Chair and Vice-chair respectively of the Regents of the University of Oslo. Dr. Kintaro was astute enough to remember that the Univ. of Oslo was the largest research institute in Scandinavia...it was the 'Tokyo University' of Norway. It was very unusual for a husband and wife to *both* be elected to a Board of Regents of a major academic institute. Beyond this was the fact that they were the top officials of said Board. Dr. Kintaro felt a wave of intimidation as he realized that they could accomplish such a feat only by possessing a very savvy nature as far as university politics were concerned. He would have to keep his guard up. During the course of their first meeting, the two explained...in fluent Japanese no less!...that they wanted to conduct a meeting with a 'typical' N.I.T. student. On the surface, this seemed to be an odd request; yet Dr. Kintaro could understand the motive factors supporting it. The Northern European university system was reputed to be hidebound by the presence of certain...institutional archaisms...that significantly impacted the competitiveness of their professional graduates once they entered the global engineering talent pool. Perhaps they were researching for more progressive means of providing educational services by interviewing a typical Japanese student about their educational experience at N.I.T. As he looked at Eldon and Greta, he became more and more curious. They were both in the prime of maturity; strong of body and very charming to the eye. He estimated them to be in their late 40s. The man was a behemoth, standing over 2 meters in height. His wife had striking hair, unusually long for a woman her age. "Why did these two regents have to travel to Japan *personally*? Why not send a university official instead?" he wondered privately. During their first meeting, Dr. Kintaro had noted that N.I.T. enrolled about seven hundred students. He had jokingly suggested that they select a student at random, so as to prevent any predisposition towards a hazarded or biased interviewee. To his surprise, the visitors readily agreed to his suggestion. Calling his head secretary into his office, Dr. Kintaro had asked her to voice in a random student ID number. Once she called it out to his computer's voiceboard, the name "Keiichi Morisato" popped up on the screen. This was conspicuous, as Keiichi Morisato certainly was one of the most high-profile students in the whole student body! Surveying his desk for a report on next year's Culture Day budget, Dr. Kintaro smiled as he remembered the victory at the Solar Federation race. Once he found the report, he glanced out the window at the new research building taking shape in the upper campus...the result of the generous cash prize awarded to N.I.T. by the Solar Federation. In a sense, he was relieved. Keiichi Morisato was a good student who hadn't caused too much trouble during his enrollment here. True, there had been a *few* behavioral incidents that had been brought to his attention...but overall, Morisato's record was good, both in academic performance and other areas. He would have rather preferred that they had picked an outstanding student like Sora Hasegawa, or even Keiichi's sister, Megumi. Those two girls would both add an element of youthful charm to their interview...which would lend itself to creating a better impression with the Norwegian visitors. Glancing at his desk clock, it was almost 4pm. He smiled at the two Drs. Thorgarssun, waiting amiably in his office. "Morisato better not be late!" Dr. Kintaro thought to himself. Things could have been worse...their chance effort could have resulted in the selection of one of the 'crazies', like Tamiya or Ootaki! The club Keiichi Morisato belonged to was filled with eccentrics... *That* would have been a nightmare! A few moments later, his secretary knocked on the door and announced that Keiichi Morisato was waiting in the reception area. * * * * * * * * Sayoko decided to wait with Keiichi in the President's Office, hoping that her presence could take the edge off of his trepidation. He was *so* nervous... She had always considered Keiichi to be at his cutest when he was wound up. But this meeting would doubtlessly be a very important one, if it involved the President of the school. Of course, if she were in his shoes, Sayoko admitted that she would be wiping around on the verge of paranoia. Unlike Keiichi, her past record *wasn't* so good. True, her grades were top notch...but she had been on report many times for intoxication on campus and other troublemaking. And during the last semester of her active drug use, she had totally screwed up every area of her life. "One can never erase the jaded past they trail behind when they're an active drug addict. Better you than me," she confided to Keiichi in a quiet voice. As they waited in the office, she talked Keiichi up; reminding him that he was a good student, an all-around nice guy, a natural competitor...etc., etc. * * * * * * * * Belldandy sipped the sun tea, savoring the fragrant aroma. Skuld was nowhere to be seen...she was probably spraying down "Betty". The huge Triceratops needed to be sprayed down with a hose at least twice a day; the arid September heat was drying up her skin. Hopefully, it would rain over the weekend. One of Belldandy's guilty pleasures was reading the bridal magazines that Megumi had brought her. In one sense, she had 'graduated' from "Modern Woman" to "Sweet This Year's Bride", as far as her reading preferences went. She could absorb all the information of all the magazines ever published in Japan in less than an hour, but Belldandy liked the mortal method of leisure reading. Things were finally getting back to normal. Now if she could convince Urd to pay a visit... "They're here!" Skuld announced as she darted in the front door. Stamping the water off her bare feet, she sprinted into the dining room. As Belldandy looked at her younger sister; she wondered if Skuld had gotten more water on herself than on Betty... "Who's here?" "Mom and Dad!!!" Skuld answered excitedly, secretly pleased that this announcement would shock her older sister. If this were an evening 'dorama', Belldandy would have spat her tea out on the floor to demonstrate her shock. Instead, she noticed a sudden tingling in her shaking hands. "Are you *sure*?" "A-1 totally transmission received sure!!! The Ninjettes informed me while I was washing Betty. They were checking up on Keiichi...and they saw them at N.I.T." "Mom and Dad went to Keiichi's school! Why? Why didn't they come here first..?" Belldandy wondered aloud, fixing her gaze on Skuld's walnut brown eyes. Extending her senses, Belldandy felt a Mephistophelean shadow forming on the horizon... This was *bad*! Her inborn ability to detect disastrous circumstances...the 'Goddess Intuition' that allowed her to hone in on a threat like an Earthrealm radar...was sirening her like an alarm clock that wouldn't shut off. * * * * * * * * "You have nothing to worry about! It's all in your head, Keiichi! This meeting is just part of the natural flow of life. If you haven't done anything wrong, all this probably means is just that you're going to get recognized for something good!" she asserted. She put a comforting hand on his as the door to the President's Office opened up... * * * * * * * * "S..something terrible is happening!" Belldandy shouted, clasping Skuld on both shoulders and peering deep into her eyes. "What could be terrible about our parents coming here to visit?" Skuld asked, mystified by her sister's frenetic reaction. Belldandy's eyes were wide with fear...and with a flash of insight, Skuld realized why. Mother and Father weren't *here*! They were *there*...with Keiichi! When Keiichi proposed to Elder Sister after winning the Le Mans, Skuld noticed the look of approval on her parent's faces. Yet, there was something else she glimpsed that night. She personally thought that Keiichi had made a big mistake by not formally asking Mom and Dad if he could marry her sister. True, they were in Yggdrasil and he was here on the mortal's Earth...but still, he could have asked Belldandy to arrange a meeting. His proposal was goofy and miscalculated and impulsive...and maybe, just a little bit romantic. Totally what she had expected from someone like Keiichi. He could be so mindlessly inept sometimes... But her sister loved him with all her being, a fact that still mystified Skuld from time to time. Obviously, Mom and Dad had come to the Earthrealm to visit him and have a talk. But what kind of talk? And why was Elder Sister so worried? "I'm going to him! I know my darling Keiichi means well...but I sense that he *really needs me* right now!" Belldandy announced. Walking over to the mirror on the living room wall, she tried to jump into it... *bdumbp* Skuld gasped as Belldandy bounced off of the glassy surface and fell to the floor in an undignified heap. Dumbfounded, her sister tried to gain her stealth form...and failed. "*They* did it! Mother and Father must be responsible for this!" Skuld realized with a start. Whatever it was that they wanted to discuss with Keiichi, they wanted to discuss it *privately*. As the Head of the Yggdrasil Energy Guild, Father could have easily put a block on some of the energy transmitted to her from Yggdrasil Mainframe...effectively stranding Belldandy in place! Of the trillions of ionic interchanges traveling between her and Yggdrasil, Father could have selected the very 'beam' of arcane force that allowed her to freely travel. There was nothing she could do about it. Belldandy looked at Skuld, the expression on her older sister's face seemed beggared with disbelief at her inability to travel. "I'll go!" Skuld suggested, heading for the kitchen sink. A moment later, she was sitting on the kitchen floor with pots and pans and water all around her. *She* was also unable to travel by Divine means! The resultant spill of water over the kitchen sink covered most of the tiled floor. Good thing Skuld was already soaked from watering the dinosaur... "This could only mean one thing," Belldandy noted. "Mom and Dad are going to have a *serious* talk with my darling Keiichi about his plans for our married life." "Which could be a disaster..." Skuld added. She instantly regretted her remark...it had visibly drained any hope that remained on her sister's face. Skuld wanted to hit herself on the head with Mjolnir, her mallet. "How could I be so *stupid*!" she accused herself as Belldandy looked helplessly at her. She was just a few cm shorter than Belldandy, which still took some getting used to at times. She no longer had to look up to the two older sisters that she had looked up to for so long. She was eyelevel with Belldandy...and feeling miles away from being the equal of her sister. As Skuld was feeling at a loss on how to comfort her sister, Belldandy suddenly sprung forward, clinging onto her with a desperate hug. It felt strange; this was the first time she had been hugged by her older sister since she had 'transformed' from a 12-year-old to a 16-year-old. "This...is almost like hugging Urd," Belldandy said with a wan smile, weakly trying to lighten the depressing atmosphere. Her whimsical remark briefly thrilled Skuld. Belldandy obviously needed some major comforting...and a moment later, Skuld was gently soothing down her hair, fingerbrushing the soft tresses at the back of her head. Keiichi was on his own. Usually, Keiichi did very well on his own. Whenever he raced, despite all the combined efforts of his teammates, he was on always on his own. Singularly responsible for the outcome of his driving performance...and the race. Belldandy admitted to Skuld that she felt ashamed of herself; she should have more confidence in her fiance. But Skuld could sense that dark presence...an ethereal dread hovering fringe-edgy in her consciousness; a threatening aspect that reminded her of the Reaper when He arrived ready to claim a Soul. That disturbing mask of doubt that shadowed her sister's heart...also filled Skuld with anxiety. It could only be the result of her parents being *angry* and disappointed. This conclusion only served to flourish her reservations. Skuld felt so inept... "He's going to be all right," she said softly into Belldandy's ear. She felt a comforting squeeze on her shoulder. She was grateful that Belldandy was at least trying to appear confident. But how could anyone be confident when her parents, both Senior First Class Licensees, were having a discussion with an Earthrealm mortal. Keiichi was on his own...and there was nothing she or Belldandy could do to help him... * * * * * * * * "Eeep!" Keiichi exclaimed, pulling his hand out from under Sayoko's as if his friend's hand was a bright-red stove element. "Shit!!!" would have probably been a more apt exclamation, he noted to himself...but he was too freaked out in that instant to gasp out anything else. Standing next to Dr. Kintaro was a giant of a man, dressed in a navy blue 'power' business suit. At his side was a graceful tall woman with long blonde-platinum hair... The eyepatch was unmistakable. Sayoko cringed next to him, noticing the sudden look of angry surprise on the face of the tall bearded gaijin. "Go!!!" Keiichi whispered to her. "Huh?" Sayoko whispered back. "Go! Leave! Get the hell out of here!" Keiichi shot back in a low voice. Feeling wounded at his sudden dismissal, Sayoko stood up and left wordlessly. As she walked out into the hall, completely confused...she stopped in midstep as a funny notion struck her. That woman that she saw in Dr. Kintaro's office...somehow, she bore more than a passing resemblance to Belldandy! In fact, the resemblance was strong! If Belldandy's hair was much lighter, wavy- curled... If Belldandy was just 5Kg heavier and was 20 years older... If Belldandy had Skuld's dun-brown eyes instead of her own... "S..Skuld's *eyes*!?" Sayoko thought, her chest clenching itself into a gasp as she was emotionally heaved by her trail of observations. "OHMYGODDDD!!!" * * * * * * * * Keiichi wanted to crawl up and die. Despite the facade of cordiality maintained by 'Dr. and Dr. Thorgarssun' in the presence of Dr. Kintaro...he could sense the seething disappointment and resentment in their bearing. It wasn't anything like it looked! The moment Sayoko had rested a comforting hand on his, the N.I.T. chief's door opened up...a figurative iron door that creaked open to unleash a Pandoran plague of troubles upon him. It couldn't have been worse! "Well, we *certainly* have a lot of questions for this young man! We should be going," 'Greta' explained to Dr. Kintaro, sotto voce. Keiichi felt like he was on the verge of being dragged out of the office by his ears, he was so cowed by the circumstances. Indeed, the three left the office wordlessly. The silence was killing him...but he was too afraid to speak up. * * * * * * * * "Explain yourself!" Odeyn said, swiftly discarding all pretenses of civility as he yelled in a commanding voice once they emerged from the Admin Bldg. A group of students nearby were queuing, were staring... "Wait, husband! Not here! We need to go to someplace less conspicuous so we can yell louder," Freiija interjected, tugging at Odeyn's sleeve while glaring stinkeye at Keiichi. "Agreed!" Odeyn said with a nod. He snapped his finger... In a flash, Keiichi found himself standing in the middle of a vast desert expanse. There were no defining geographical features, except for the gentle contours of sand dunes that stretched in every direction as far as the eye can see. The light brown gray ocean of sand threatened to swallow him like a hungry wolf... The heat was stifling; it ripped into his lungs and nostrils like the sudden airtemper of an open oven door... "It's like one of those sci-fi movies, where in a flash, you're transported to a completely different place," Keiichi observed to himself as he adjusted to sudden shift in surrounding. The sky was light blue and cloudless; the overhead sun made the sand so bright his eyes hurt. He felt a brief pang of relief...at least there was *one* sun in the air. He just hoped that he was still on the planet Earth. "EXPLAIN YOURSELF!" Odeyn shouted, floating a meter above the sand, arms folded across his broad chest. He was no longer dressed like an Earthrealm businessman; he was dressed in the same raiment that he wore when Keiichi first met him. His shout jet-engined deafening in Keiichi's ears. "E..explain what?" Keiichi stammered, feeling smothered by the intensity of grueling environment and the forceful interrogative. "Explain what you were doing with that Earthrealm wench whose hand was in yours. Explain the meaning of this, when you claim to be engaged to our daughter. Explain why you're having an affair behind our backs...behind precious B'Dandy's back!" Freiija replied, her accusations snapping like cannonfire. "T..there's nothing to explain. She's a friend," Keiichi answered nervously, feeling an impulse towards laughing in crazed incoherence in response to the ludicrous accusations. Freiija spun in a circle as she hovered...just like Urd did when she was miffed. "That's so...'what they always say'...as you Earthrealm would mortals term it," she noted with icy exasperation. Keiichi had to grant her this point. But this was one argument he wasn't going to lose, even if the examiners *were* Bell-chan's parents. He was innocent. "But it's true, goddammit! Belldandy isn't the only woman in my life..." Keiichi said defensively, then immediately regretting the words as soon as he had uttered them. Just like his fiancee, he had impugned himself with an ambiguous gaffe... "So that's it! He brazenly admits to his infidelity..." Freiija said with angry delight. Keiichi felt like a moth in the clutches of a cat... In contrast to her haughty accusatory attitude, Odeyn scratched the back of his head. Keiichi's remark *might* mean something entirely different. Verily, the young mortal man was terrified out of his wits. But upon examination, his terror didn't seem to possess the shadings of the affright of one who was troubling themselves to conceal guilt. Of course, Odeyn could 'read' Keiichi and know the truth in a flash. But he and his wife agreed that this interview mustneeds be conducted in such a manner as to afford Keiichi an opportunity to defend himself. It was time to calm the wife down, or kill the mortal. No...Odeyn knew that Gods weren't permitted to take the lives of mortals without express authorization from Kami-sama. This fact was a major distinction between the Gods and the Demons. But if this mortal has been two-timing Belldandy... "I want you to clarify what you just said, Keiichi. And be sure you tell the truth, young mortal, rather than following the duplicitous example of our oldest child. If we catch you trying to hide within a Bastille of deceit..." Odeyn said, crossing his throat with his hand in an unmistakable gesture. Despite being embraced by the murk of anxious fear, Keiichi snickered at the reference to Urd. "First off, aren't I the 'test mortal'? Haven't the two of you been monitoring what is going on down here? With me? Because if you did, you would know that Sayoko is nothing more than a friend..." "She seems to gaze upon you with a quite a bit more than the embers of friendship in her eyes..." Freiija observed. "Yes. Her eyes, in fact her whole being, suggests that she was fawning upon you," Odeyn added. "Well..uh..the operative word here is 'was'. Sayoko *used* to like me at one time. Before I met your daughter. And after your daughter and I fell in love, Sayoko *still* wanted me... She was infatuated with me," he answered. "Which you no doubt enjoyed and encouraged!" Odeyn noted. "I did *not*!!! Well, to be honest, I did enjoy it a little...after all, Sayoko is a beautiful woman, by my standards! But I never even considered leaving Belldandy for her. I'd be an idiot to choose a mortal babe over a *Goddess*!!! Not to mention her boyfriend, Tamiya, could pound me into a pulp without breaking a sweat! I swear...I never did *anything* with her..." Keiichi countered. "Then why don't you trouble yourself to explain *this*," Freiija replied with rueful sarcasm. In the air above him, a scene formed. A scene from his and Belldandy's first vacation to a beach resort. A scene he remembered all too well... His shoulders slumped as he watched a younger version of him trying to kiss Sayoko in a narrow twilight-lit hallway. Sayoko was screaming and resisting...and then she was backed up against the wall in the hallway. He shook his head as he watched his younger self staring at Sayoko with lust-filled lovestruck eyes. "Stop it! You have Belldandy, don't you?" "Nope! You're wrong! I want *you* to be near me..." Then the scene shifted to Belldandy, looking on from the end of the hallway, her frame solid against the orange glow of the setting sun. Bell-chan's eyes were downcast with sorrow, tears forming along their eyelashes. Keiichi almost wanted to cry with her; he could empathize so strongly with her sense of disappointment... "T..that was *Urd's* doing! I wasn't in control of myself!" he shot back indignantly. "Obviously so," Freiija remarked snidely. "No...this isn't right! It's unfair to show me this! Back then, all I wanted was to have Belldandy fall in love with me. A..actually, I wanted to *touch* Belldandy," Keiichi stammered, and then blushed deeply as Freiija smirked at his disclosure. "Great...now I've gone and done it! I just basically admitted to Bell's parents that I want her body..." he observed despondently. Everything was spiraling into a doom-blackened abyss! "Go on...this is getting interesting," Freiija noted icily. This mortal was tactlessly hoisting himself on the banner of disfavor, as far as she was concerned. Her husband Odeyn was sullenly silent, leaving her to prosecute this mortal for his misbehavior... "B..but things got screwed up when I spilled the suntan lotion that Urd gave me. The lotion was supposed to make Belldandy all 'mellow mellow'...uh, you know what I mean..." "Please, don't stop now on account of being embarrassed," Freiija interjected, causing Keiichi to blush even deeper. "...so Urd kept meddling. She gave me some love potion she cooked up, to increase my courage so I could tell Belldandy how I really felt. She claimed that it would increase my courage a hundredfold, and the next person I saw after taking the potion...well, I would become a 'love warrior' or something like that. I would be able to tell her anything. And I wanted to tell Belldandy exactly how I felt! But the first person to come to the room was Sayoko..." Keiichi explained anxiously. "So why did she come to your room in the first place?" Odeyn asked. "Years later, I found out why. Sayoko admitted that she came to my room that afternoon...because she wanted to apologize for getting me out into a boat when she knew that I couldn't swim. Sayoko *wasn't* coming to the room to make out with me or anything..." Keiichi answered. "Hmmm. Be that as it may, it still doesn't begin to justify your actions then...and now. With the same Earthrealm woman, too!" Freiija said. "Gimme a break! Can't I even have a friend of the opposite sex? There was nothing between us. Sayoko is a *friend*...nothing more! Nothing more then...and nothing more now! She decided to hang out with me at Dr. Kintaro's office because I was freakin' out! I was scared, y'know!!! It'd be like one of you...suddenly being called to meet with the Almighty!" Keiichi explained, hoping the metaphor would clarify why he possessed such an anxious state of mind. If they believed that, then they might believe that Sayoko's holding his hand was innocent...just an act of a close friend being supportive. "And you should know this. Urd made that love spell *unbreakable*, because she intended it for me and Bell-chan. *She* knew I was in love with Belldandy and not Sayoko! But once I was infected by her infernal magicks, and I saw Sayoko...I was stuck. According to Urd, I should have never recovered from that spell. But then Belldandy broke it...with a kiss! *She* kissed me, on her own initiative! And if I didn't have such deep feelings for Bell-chan back then, I would have been doing much more than just holding hands with Sayoko for the past four years! Just think about that! Something true and wondrous had to happen between Bell and I, otherwise, I would have never have been able to fall for your daughter!" Keiichi argued, shifting to the offensive. "Are you claiming that Urd's spell made you believe that you were in love with this Sayoko woman, and then Belldandy was able to overcome it?" Freiija said, admitting aloud her incredulance. A supposed unbreakable spell was...well, it was warranted to be unbreakable *for a reason*! Even if it was concocted by Urd... "Exactly! If I loved Sayoko and not Belldandy, then how do you think Urd's spell could have been thwarted? Don't you think that my *heart* had something to do with it? And if it hadn't...wouldn't that mean that I'd still be with Sayoko...and not Belldandy!" Keiichi asserted. Both Gods nodded at this. Keiichi realized that he was gaining some persuasive momentum. "Where are we, anyway?" he asked, sidestepping his trepidation for a moment. "We have transported ourselves and you to the middle of the Earthrealm's Sahara Desert," Freiija explained. "And unfortunately for you, you will experience 'conveyance illness' for the next few days. Consider it the price you pay for appearing to be fooling around." "I never fooled around with Sayoko! Not once!" Keiichi shouted. "I seem to remember a certain mortal dressed in a dog costume paying homage to a certain queen..." Freiija said, her face pulled into an expression of schoolmarm strictness and censure. "Oh great! Now you have to bring up *that* horrible mess..." Keiichi grumbled, turning two shades of rouge under the hot desert sun. He looked at Freiija, who stared reprovingly at him for a moment, and then winked at her husband. She relaxed her face into a wisp of a smile... Keiichi sighed with relief; this was Bell's Mother's kooky way of letting him know that he was off the hook. "You know, you really gave us a start back there in that office," Odeyn said calmly. "Where's Bell-chan? Where's my fiancee? Why isn't she here?" Keiichi asked. The calm that seemed to descend on Bell's parents only served to heighten his anxiety. "Because we're here to visit *you*. Having B'dandy come along...would only interfere. It would not bode well for purposes of the trial we have created for you," Freiija explained. **TRIAL?!** "But first, we need to attend to another important matter. We need a concise explanation as to why you deemed it necessary to propose to our daughter without coming to us first," Freiija asked. "Cripes! I had a lot on my mind!!! It wasn't exactly planned, either. Besides, I thought you both already approved...after that episode with Tyyr. If *that* didn't prove that Bell and I belong together, then I give up!" Keiichi answered. Expecting more arguing from Bell's parents, he found the arid air to be wrapping itself around a sullen silence. Freiija had to acknowledge to herself that he was right. She remembered how tenaciously he fought for Belldandy during the slotcar race. She didn't want to believe it then...but later she realized that this mortal *was* madly in love with her precious B'dandy. "I will admit that this meeting has some elements of possibly being missearchen. However, young mortal, you must understand that Belldandy is the first of our daughters to be married. In a sense, we're losing her to you. God or mortal...the giving away of a child is a grave moment. We were at fault for letting our anxieties best us. Consider this the mistake of overly-concerned parents," Odeyn explained. "Apology accepted," Keiichi said promptly, smiling for the first time since he had encountered Bell's parents. "Now...as to the Ritual of Preparedness. Despite the fact that you are a worthy, there has been no formal omiai between parents. Ofttimes, we in Yggdrasil expect a certain level of...ability...to be proven before we cast our affirmation of a marriage proposal. Normally, after the engagement has been approved by both parents, there is a period of tests to confirm the durability of the heartbond. Since there has been no formal meeting of parents, nor any performance of ability on your part...we have decided to assign a mission for you in lieu of this, in keeping with the traditions of Yggdrasil. A 'trial', as your Earthrealm language would term it. You are granted 30 days to complete your task. And complete it you must. Otherwise we will forthwith withdraw our permission for you to marry our daughter, because you will have been proven to be incompetent by our standards," Odeyn explained. "W..what? You mean that I have to..? You mean that you can..? But Bell and I are already engaged!" Keiichi stammered. He couldn't believe it! His brain was saturated with bitter balsams of disbelief; his fears were enclosing him like a densely forested bamboo grove. Bell's parents were basically saying that they would cancel his engagement with her if he didn't meet their conditions. "Do not question us on this matter! We would have made an exception because of your mortal status, but you went ahead and proposed to our daughter without observing the proper forms, Keiichi. Now, we are honorbound to observe our marriage traditions. Especially so, as I am the Goddess of Marriages," Freiija noted officiously. "You can't! Bell and I..." "It is *not* up to debate...and it is certainly not up to a mortal whelpling like you to decide! What we do...is for the protection of our daughter!" Odeyn interrupted sternly. Keiichi waited for a moment for his anger to recede. It always seemed that life itself conspired to keep him and Belldandy apart! Every time things seemed to relax into a calm, there arose some new tribulation, some new challenge to be met. Now, he had to face some stupid trial *after* he proposed to Belldandy! After her parents gave their approval. It was so idiotic! Keiichi looked at Freiija, whose frown readily disclosed that his thoughts weren't harbored only in his mind...no doubt, she had sensed his strong disagreement to his current situation. "Remember who you are dealing with, young mortal man!" she admonished in an even voice of displeasure that could have melted cactus. This one was different from the usual predicaments that troubled his relationship with Belldandy. This one came directly from Bell- chan's parents. This situation...couldn't be trifled with. "What do I have to do?" he asked meekly, surrendering to the obvious. Each word of the tongue soiled his confidence... "It's very simple. We want you to find the Key to Belldandy's heart. It is somewhere on this planet, and it's entirely within your means to locate it," Odeyn explained. "You...gotta...be...kidding!!!" Keiichi shouted, forgetting his place. Odeyn and Freiija both flinched in disappointment at his rambunctious outburst, then patiently waited for him to relax his emotional exertions. "No, we're in earnest. Deadly earnest. Speaking strictly as the Goddess of Marriage...if you cannot discover the Key to our daughter's heart...then what use is it to aspire to be a lifemate for her? *What* could you possibly offer in substitute?" Freiija pointed out bluntly. *That* one drove a leaden spike into his heart! "As a matter of fact, it may be best for us to dismiss ourselves, so that we can leave you to your begin your search immediately," Odeyn noted as he waved his hand in a circle. "But it's the middle of the freakin' Sahara desert!" Keiichi shouted at the fading apparition-like images of Bell's parents. * * * * * * * * Last night, when Belldandy informed me about Keiichi...I was riveted with disbelief. Her parents had stranded Keiichi in the middle of the Sahara desert, somewhere in Africa! At least...and it was a paltry 'at least'...they had been merciful enough to inform Belldandy about where Keiichi was and why he was there. Belldandy had a brief-but-spirited argument with her mother before slamming the phone down in a fit of spite that was incongruent with her gentle manners. Skuld was even more vocal in her anger... More and more, I was beginning to think that these Gods were insane; miscerebate beings with a fickle randomness to their officious 'administration' of humankind...unbalanced to an extreme that the gods of the Olympian pantheon could never approach. If we were created in God's image, as the Christians claimed...and the Goddesses confirmed...then this fanaticism in the Yggdrasilian Divines would explain the insanity of our human race. Or quite possibly, they were the most malicious of Cosmic Jokers... "Why don't they just snuff out the Northern Lights, just to create some attention or something?" I muttered as I corrected assignments from my Intermediate Greek class. This was getting me nowhere. Not only was I having difficulty remembering Greek...my thoughts kept returning to Keiichi. With a "slap", I smacked the stack of homework down on my desk. Once again, my thoughts drifted towards the question of how Keiichi was going to survive this one. A few years ago, 'reality-TV' survivor shows were in vogue in America. Actually, the idea had originated in Japan and Europe...whose networks had been producing 'reality-TV' shows for a long time. I thought the survivor TV shows were stupid and inane...trying to cast the illusion of risk from the bravery of being out of range. I never watched them; I had too much studying to do. But millions of my peers were fascinated by them. Anything to amuse the bottom-feeders... My idea of a survivor show was to take 20 people from the suburbs of Dallas or some other American city and drop them en masse into the middle of an Algerian ghetto with no money, weapons or credit cards. Whoever was still alive at the end of the month would be hailed as a 'survivor'. All cynicism aside, I was genuinely worried about Keiichi's chances at making it out of the desert alive. What he was facing made my little whimsical scenarios run towards the cheap. He was in a *real* live-or-die situation. I fought to keep my thoughts private; the last thing I needed to do was truthfully assess his situation around Belldandy and Megumi. Belldandy probably already knew how grave his circumstances were, and Megumi was far too gripped by fear and worry to be bothered with facts about the odds he faced. Poor Megumi! She was worried sick about her brother! I could only imagine the depths of her concern: take my concern and amplify it within the critical realm of siblingship... And Belldandy was an emotional mess! None of Skuld's surveillance devices could locate Keiichi...which angered the teenaged Goddess almost as much as her parent's actions, I suspected. Skuld tried all night to utilize the same procedure of hack-and-spy that she employed so successfully to locate Urd in China last year. It was daylight in Africa whenever it was night here. But she had no results for her efforts. Skuld finally resigned herself to the fact that her parents must have put some kind of shielding spell to prevent her from locating him by means of technology. Bell's parents had obviously thought of everything to isolate Keiichi away from Bell...and the rest of us. For the year-and-a-half that I knew him, Keiichi certainly never struck me as the outdoors type. Sure, he had climbed to the top of Mt. Nantai with Belldandy last year...but that hike only required moderate exertion. Physically, he wasn't stocky or buff. He couldn't swim, he rarely exercised...and I doubted that he knew any survival skills. Excepting his racing skills, Keiichi was decidedly non- athletic. Marriage trials have been deeply ingrained within the traditions of so many cultures on the Earth. Everything from impossibly high bridal dowries, to physical mutilation, to ordeals of physical endurance or intellectual cleverness, to a total submission to the whims of the husband's parents...this was the legacy surrounding the lifebonding of man and woman. In the 21st century, the institution of marriage had weakened considerably, due to our spectacular loss of moral fabric and the rapid evolving of indistinct social ingrouping of the species. Beyond all the anthropological aspects, much of this struck me as wretched. "Would I have to undergo some kind of 'trial' if I were to marry Urd?" I asked myself. The thought left me dry-mouthed. There was going to be no Urd. There wasn't going to be any self-glorification; the sense of glory a man felt in the presence of a beautiful woman. I sensed that I would never again revel in the joybliss of her emerald eyes. Urd has been gone out of my life for almost two months. Strangely enough, I didn't recluse into falling-to-pieces crazed desperation over her absence. I was occasionally submerged in a malaise over her abrupt departure...but my heart wasn't torn apart by any means. My emotional resilience continually surprised me in bursts of recognition...until Belldandy or Skuld would blithely remind me that I was actually being cold-hearted. True to her word, Mara arrived yesterday and removed the shield spell. Belldandy asked the red-eyed Demoness if Keiichi's predicament was her doing, which only brought Mara to the brink of laughter. Mara noted the sheer irony of it all...Bell's parents were plaguing Belldandy with grief to a degree that she was incapable of. Then she added that the Dark Lord Himself had prohibited her from interfering in Keiichi's ordeal. Belldandy looked like she was going to have a heart attack with *that* disclosure. The coy, beguiling face that Mara pulled after she finished her work made me want to cringe. She made it very obvious that I would have to honor our agreement with her. In one sense, Mara now owned me...owned me for a night. I hated it; that smug look on her face. There was nothing I could do to back out of her terms... At least yesterday wasn't a total waste. Skuld had employed her special brand of genius, announcing that she had designed the Dinoplex AuralSakutron Mk. III. She explained, with her typical technobabblish zeal, that it was a "dinosaur alarm". Whenever Betty would roam too close to the front gate or one of the temple buildings or walls, a soundless siren would sound. The alert would be inaudible to human ears; but to the hearing of a dinosaur, it would be resemble a roaring cacophony of ambient bursts of pink noiseloops. In other words, very uncomfortable to the ears of a Triceratops. Belldandy was despondent... * * * * * * * * Sand...in seemingly infinite vistas... Keiichi heard a pharyngeal rasping as he breathed; the result of his painfully dry throat. The night air whistled its shrill dirge over the shifting sands. Looking over the dunes, Keiichi imagined that he was he was perched upon the tip of an enormous finger; the undulating warps of sand suggesting its 'fingerprint'. The gibbous full moon was hazed over by airborne wafts of dust and sand, creating an eerie orange glow on the sand. But otherwise the night was welcome to him. Nighttime had brought a marked cooling to the air. But in compensation for the relief, the winds picked up. He already felt beaten. Once Odeyn and Freiija departed, Keiichi had stood in disbelief for a long time. Finally, he started wandering to the west. He had decided that the only reliable direction would be the setting sun. Remembering his geography classes from junior school; he recalled something about how desert sojourners following the sun often wound up traveling in circles. He would have to chance it...walk opposite the sun in the first half of the day, then walk towards it in the afternoon. As this was the Sahara Desert, he was worried that the sun would rise quickly overhead; he would lose his chance if he slept in. His legs ached. Each footstep seemed to sink a foot into the sand, making the simple act of walking very strenuous. He quickly learned that it was easiest to walk on the 'rim' of the sand dunes...the sand was firmest there. Sleep was a joke. The sand was a million creeping fingers, probing itself into every nook of his clothes. He resigned himself to the fact that he would just have to live with it. "Why did Belldandy's parents do this to me?" he sighed once again, flinging a handful of sand at the moon. The erosional agents had been at work for so long here, there weren't even any rocks for him to throw. He had earned Bell-chan's love and trust over the years. But apparently, this wasn't enough. She had never broached the subject of parental objections to his romance with her. Now that he had officially declared that he was going to marry her...all hell had broken loose! "But why? When Bell's parents were considering Tyyr as a possible marriage candidate for her, did they envision some kind of quest for *him* to undertake, like they're forcing upon me?" he shouted at the rabbit in the moon. The whole thing reeked of medievalism; the kind of chivalric fantasy that populated the fancy of Europe in the Middle Ages. If so, was he playing the part of the harlequin? It struck him that, as the so-called 'test mortal', wouldn't there be some sort of Divine sanction against abuses to his person? Or did Odeyn and Freiija have enough clout in Yggdrasil to convince the Almighty Kami-sama to let them strand him here in the middle of nowhere? With no food...no water...no compass...and no direction home. Death was armed with an arid windtunnel... The chilling realization that the Earth was no longer his friend gripped him as he beheld the empty membranes of desert expanse. For the whole course of his life, Keiichi had lived in a part of the world where the natural environments were accommodating, sometimes intimidating, but never overtly threatening. True, there had been Supertyphoon Akira a year ago...proof that nature could fashion a destructive bent across moments of time. But that infamous storm was an exception to the rule. Most of the year, he could walk outside, safe in the knowledge that the weather, or the climate...wouldn't put him in mortal danger. It was safe! But places whose existence alone could claim a man's life...were always *somewhere else*. Viewed from the safety of a TV. Places like the Antarctic. Mt. Everest. The Dead Sea. The Marinas Trench... The Sahara Desert. It always happened to someone else. Each year several homeless streetdwellers would freeze to death in Tokyo; their deaths would usher in a few moment's consciousness of 'man's inhumanity to his fellows' in the form of a handful of letters submitted to the editors of the various dailies. But whenever Winter clawed its frosted hand through the Boso Peninsula and Makuhari, Keiichi was always comfortable...always *inside*. Warmed, he could look out the window at the snow and never have to worry about freezing. He was used to be protected from the severities of the weather. Here, there was no shelter...no hiding...no protection. This was one of *those* places. A killing place. He had roughed it before, back when he, Genji, Tomohisa and Cevn were mysteriously transported back to 14th century Japan. There, he and his friends had endured 13 years of hardship. The lack of modernity was extremely uncomfortable at first...Keiichi remembered the first time he used a roadside ditch as a 'latrine'...but he eventually got acclimated to the primitive conditions. Yet, *this* situation wasn't just about roughing it. It was about survival. Keiichi guessed that he would have to find a human habitation within two weeks, or he would die here. Beyond the immediate issue of survival was the quandary surrounding his 'assignment'. He had to find the Key to Belldandy's heart, whatever that was. At the moment, it seemed as remote as the fabled lands of Shangri La or Quixote's La Mancha. As if surviving these harsh conditions wasn't enough, he had to search for a mysterious quintessence as well. How could something be the Key to Bell-chan's heart? * * * * * * * * "It's for you!" Belldandy shouted with a worried expression. Skuld stopped nibbling on her pastry in mid-bite and looked at me with concern. Everybody knew that the inevitable would come to pass... This was the phone call I had been dreading. "H..Hello?" "Hi Cevn! This is Mara. About our date..."