Kyoko was appalled as Chou so violently reacted towards the Reaper. How were they going to protect humanity if the AST themselves became monsters? This was not something she signed up for. Suddenly things got a whole lot hotter as a group of people fired missiles and other weapons... at the AST team. Why were humans helping Spirits? The Spirits only caused damage, even if they didn't mean to. Kyoko was fortunate enough to not be noticed by the militia that had formed simply because they were looking up and not at ground level. She kept low as she departed to retreat with her sisters-in-arms.

She felt sad and frustrated about the entire situation. She did everything she needed to in order to stave off the bleeding from the wound she received from the Reaper. She finally became fully airborne when she was far enough from the new enemy and regrouped with the others. She glared daggers at Chou. "I joined this team to stop people from getting hurt, not watch my own comrades kill each other. How do you justify sacrificing people when plenty of them die to those things every time they visit?"

As far as she was concerned the question was entirely rhetorical and she flew into formation with the group further up.

---

Suichiro nodded as the Commander berated them, still embarrassed over the things he said while dealing with the Spirit. Whisker rubbed her head against Suichi's chin and purred loudly to express her happiness over their survival. Suichi was too far stuck in his head to realize that he still held onto Mayumi's hand. He finally tuned in when the other crew members were patting their backs. He blinked and realized that he was still holding Mayumi's hand and quickly let go while blushing. He looked at her not really sure how she'd react. "Mayumi... thanks for your backup."

In spite of Kasumi's frustration at their late departure, Suichi felt like the mission as a whole while sloppy was a success. Even if they found a different Spirit than might have been intended things had worked out somewhat. He looked at Chitose and smiled. "Y-yeah I could do with a bit of rest. A bit of coffee or tea sounds nice."

He looked back at Mayumi to wait for her response, but in his head he went back to the concert. He hoped the girl in the yellow jacket was OK. He hoped that he would see the Spirit again. Although he dreaded answering to her if she ever brings up his asking her to a date. Whisker stretched out on his shoulders partly bringing him back to reality as he shook his head to express his irritation over the oddball cat.

Mayumi absentmindedly listened to the Commander as she scolded them, her face not betraying a hint of emotion. She vaguely registered the speech ending when the other members on the ship congratulated them. She felt Suichi let go of her hand; her fingers twitched, as if wanting something. She turned to look at him when he thanked her.

"Ah... no problem," she replied flatly.

She looked back at Chitose, the only person left standing with them. She asked them if they wanted to go to the canteen. Mayumi however, needed to get something out of the way.

She grabbed at her head, leaning onto Suichi. She wrapped her arms around his shoulders sloppily and willing her legs to weaken.

"Ahh... suddenly I don't feel so well. Suichi, I... take me to the infirmary... please?"

She gave him the biggest puppy-eyed stare she could.

"I made a calculated plan to attempt and provide an opening for the captive agent to vet out of the spirit's arms by forcing it to protect itself with its scythe. I didn't wish to make it appear as if I was willing to sacrifice the other agent, as it was quite the opposite. I didn't believe it would be a valid option to follow what a spirit says and then believe that she would just let the other agent go without harming her, seeing she believes that all humans need to die."

Chou said all of these while activating her protective territory. Unfortunately, due to her explaining more than paying attention to the incoming rockets, a rocket struck her protective territory and made it shatter, as well as send her forward. She then realised that explaining herself at this moment wont be the wisest of idea's, and went into focusing on dodging the other rockets by flying further away from the other AST agents, where she had the space, instead of risking bumping into another agent and then making them both exposed to incoming attacks.

She then just barely noticed the unbelievable. The spirit had released the AST agent on the ground beneath them. This made her shocked for one moment too many and another rocket exploded near her, with the explosion damaging her CR unit. Slowly Chou saw herself going down towards the ground, until she was near the red haired agent who was just released "I'm sorry." She told the other agents before moving to lay still on the ground, feeling that her arm might have a fractured bone and didn't want to risk making it worse.

---

Yoshikuni raised an eyebrow. So he wasn't a local, but he was raised there. That was interesting. Shen gave him a little smile "A native, but also not. Thats interesting. And as for me, well, I tend to be a bit curious about things that others are merely talking about. So I had to go and investigate." She told him.

She took a glance at the direction of the girl from before. Yoshikuni felt a bit bad for suddenly leaving the way she did, so she considered going back before seeing a young girl approach her. Deciding she will be just fine, she returned to look at the man "Even if you were a bad man, I would'vd been just fine. I know how to handle myself just fine." She added, speaking in a light tone while noticing her shadow was touching his, even if it was just barely. This made her nice.

Suichi felt a bit flustered as Mayumi leaned against him. Had he been some out-of-shape weakling he might have lost his balance, but thanks to a lot of physical labor at the flower shop he was fairly sturdy on his feet. Whisker was a bit surprised as Mayumi's arm wrapped around Suichi's shoulders and hopped off in her surprise. She looked up at Mayumi and yowled as if she were complaining.

Suichi responded with a slightly nervous. "Y-yeah sure." He wrapped his arm around Mayumi's back for support and walked with her to the infirmary. Along the way Whisker followed closely behind. Suichi glanced at Mayumi with a slight expression of concern. He wasn't entirely sure how to feel about her sudden weariness. Perhaps the events of today finally caught up to her and she felt a bit like he did? "Are you alright?" His tone of voice was calm and kind. He truly was concerned about his partner.

"Thaaaaaanks," Mayumi said wearily, as they walked towards the infirmary.

Once inside, Mayumi sat down on the bed. Her serious expression returned and she looked at Suichi with a stern expression on her face.

"Thanks, boy. Listen... anything I'm about to say... please don't say anything about it to anyone else."

She looked at the pillow on the bed.

"Mayumi's going to wake up soon..." she whispered. She took her shoes off with her feet and moved her legs onto the bed.

"It's been tough for her, you know? She's had so many bad things happen to her..."

She looked pained, but she held a tragic smile on her face.

"Please treat her as you've always done. She considers you one of her best friends, you know?" she looked at Suichi, with an almost pleading look.

"Don't tell her about me... it'll bring up too many bad memories."

She lied down on the bed.

"I guess that's it. Until next time... goodbye."

She closed her eyes.

......

.....

....

...

..

.

---

"Eh, huh?" Kouhime said, as she felt a tugging on her sleeve.

She looked down to see a young girl beside her. She was asking about her headphones.

"Ah... no, these are..." she tried to explain, but the little girl kept talking, and Kouhime decided it was better to just let it happen.

Her reward was pudding.

"Th-thanks, little girl," she said, smiling slightly, accepting the pudding.

There were very few times where Kouhime's expression wasn't decidedly neutral, but any time she got to eat something sweet, those around her would be treated to a rare sight.

And as she scooped the first spoonful of pudding into her mouth, her expression changed to one of pure bliss.

The afternoon sun had dipped just below the buildings of the city, and soon it would be night. Normally, the Spirit code-named Reaper would be preparing for her nightly spree around the town, searching for those humans she needed to steal away into Death. But now, standing in her regular school clothing in the dark alleyways, she hesitated.

Those two from earlier...friends she called them, were very strange. Killing was bad? What was bad then? And what was good too for that matter? "I don't understand..." Shaking her head, Reika began to stare at the wall blankly for...well, who knows how long. Long enough for something of interest to occur.

"Friends....I have friends....what are friends...do they judge each other Mr. Wall?"

The wall remained silent to her questioning. Reika flicked the hard surface.

"Mr. Wall is baka."

At the Park

With two AST agents down, although only one of them had been shot down - the other had been put there by the spirit - the ground-force was in high spirits. The fact that the rest of the AST force had to fly up and regroup was an added bonus, howeever, that was also where the boon ended. With the element of surprise gone and the AST no longer having to focus on the Reaper, the mysterious attackers soon found themselves the victims of gunfire and magical sword-slashes.Realizing quickly that their equipment and training were no match for the professiona military prowess of the AST, the call to fall back was sounded by the militia.

As smoke grenades and flash bangs were thrown in order to conceal and cover their tracks, the AST captain barked orders to go check on Chou and the other girl, to make sure they were fine. She also ordered her girls not to let the enemy retreat and to capture them. Unfortunately, the ground-force was very familiar with the layout of Tenguu City it would seem, and they quickly scurried below the surface, vanishing like scattering rats. Clicking her tongue in frustration, the captain called for everyone to sign in and verify that they were alright.

With the exception of Chou and the red-head though, it didn't seem like anyone else had suffered any major injuries - a few scrapes, grazes or cuts here and there, but nothing life-threatening at the least. Sighing in a mix of relief and frustration, the captain landed next to the two girls who had been first on the ground. She first checked the red-head, she appeared to be in shock as she was just staring blankly off into space - straight ahead - with a befuddled expression on her face. She then looked at Chou, sstill lying on the ground. She scoffed.

"Whatever you believe you could or couldn't have done, you will never open fire in the same direction and vicinity as your fellow team-mates ever again. Understood, Chou?" The Captain was giving her the eye, complete with folded arms and all. There was no room for arguing. "And next time-" She added, turning on her heel to go talk to her second-in-command. "-wait with explaining your reasoning until after the fight, okay? I don't wanna see you get hurt by something this stupid ever again, got it?" The captain was harsh and firm, but a hint of concern tinged her words - she didn't want Chou, or any of her girls, to get hurt at all, if possible.

With that, the battle ended. The AST saw to their own injuries and the team medic scampered over to check on Chou's arm. The girls were left to patrol and investigate the surrounding area, tasked with finding out who - or if there were any leads to - the mysterious attackers who had ambushed them. There didn't seem to be much though. Since none of the enemies had been shot down, and they hadn't left anything behind, it was really hard to find clues.

Just who wered those strange spirit-supporters?

---

On board the Ratatoskr Command Ship

"Weren't you a little hard on them, Commander?"
"If I'm to lenient, they'll just het hurt needlessly, or run head-long into messes they can't handle."
"Yeah, I guess... But they did manage to make contact with a spirit. They even talked to it."
"And then that same spirit almost killed them both and they could have been caught by the AST."
"But-"
"Enough, Lieutenant We got other things to talk about right now."
"... You mean the strange group that attacked the AST after Mayu and Su-chan teleported on board?"
"Yeah.... They seemed to be helping the Spirit, but why? And who were they?"
"Hmm... I dunno, but maybe if they're helping Spirits, we could become allies?"

The commander narrowed her eyes.

"Anyone who doesn't even hesitate the pull the trigger at another human isn't someone I'd want as an ally in a hundred years."

The two kept watching the footage, rewinding it and then replaying it - going over data as it appeared.

---

At the Shelter

"Hahaha." The man chuckled in amusement. "Brave words, brave words. But you know what they say about curiosity and cats, little kitten." He wagged his finger, winking with a smirk. "Ah, but I do believe it's time." He then suddenly said, abruptly as he looked upfrom the girl he was talking to.

The speakers in the shelter crackled and then a slight rinign noise followed. A pre-recorded voice sounded through the shelter's PA system, letting everyone know that the spacequake was over and that the city would now begin resurfacing, meaning that in a few minutes everyone could finally leave. The man in the suit looked pleased, for some matter, as if had accomplished something despite having just been sitting there, reading his paper and talking to this high schooler. He turned his head to her again.

"Well then, little kitten." He said friendly, standing up and pgrabbing his briefcase leisurely. "It seems the crisis has been averted and we all get to live another day." He was being sarcastic, obviously. "It was a pleasure talking to you, Ms. Curiosity. Stay safe and keep out of trouble now, you hear? Good day." As he said this goodbye, he gave her a slight raised hand, as a partial wave of sorts.

Just as he did so, a woman in a very formal business-wear, navy blue in color, with her hair tied up in a bun strode up and stood at the man's side.

"The car's here and waiting for you, Chief."
"Thank you, Sachiko-kun. Let's be off."
"Yes, sir."

The two left, the man in the white suit walkign a bit ahead of the woman, who followed him closely like a tail, or trained dog. They were heading for the nearestexit - which had just been unlocked and opened. It seems they were a pair with very good timing.

Meanwhile...

"Ahah~! You smiled! You smiled!" The girl shouted happily, clapping her hands together and bouncing up and down joyously.

It would seem that for whatever reason, seeing the headphones-wearing girl smile and enjoy the pudding had given her great happiness. She didn't say anything else though, instead she remained at the older girl's side, watching her eat. That is, to say, until an arm suddenly reached out and grabbed the child's shoulder, pulling her backwards.

"UwAAAaAAOOOOoAah~!?"
"Mai! How many times must I tell you not to bother strangers!" A woman's voice chided the girl. "I'm so terribly sorry if my daughter caused you any inconveniance." A woman in her early thirties spioke to the pudding-eater, bowing in an apologetic fashion, while holding her little girl in place - who for the record was flailing wildly with her arms and protesting vehemently about her mother's actions.

---

In the allyway

"Ohh~? You shouldn't say thhat. After all, walls have ears, not mouths~"

From the wall, or at least, the direction of the wall, a voice called out to Reaper. It was the voice of a woman, or perhaps a girl, yet it sounded strange and distant, like it had been spoken in a tunnel from far away, as there was a slight echo to it.

Still there was nobody else there but Reaper and the walls of the buildings. Not even a stray cat rummaging through the dumpsters or rats and cockroaches climbing in and out of the metal bins. Not even a homeless hobo or scavenging pigeon was around to be seen in the slowly darkening alley. With the afternoon now having turned into evening, light was quickly vanishing from the area, casting long, deep shadows and covering corners and gaps in murky... murkiness!

"What are friends? What are they, indeed~?" The voice echoed Reaper's question. "Maybe you're asking the wrong questions, Shinigami-san~?"

As her captain came and scolded her, Chou merely listened for a few moments and waited for her to finish "I understand captain. I won't repeat either of those things again." She said and then watched as the medical team came and treated her. She was wondering who were the spirit supporters that took shots at them, but felt a bit of pain that made her ache a bit as the medical team warpped some bandages around her arm, assuring her she will be fine and her arm did not have a fractured bone.

Getting up, she looked at her bandaged arm and then turned to look at the red haired agent. Chou looked at her for a moment before speaking "I apologize for my actions before. They were based more on emotions and less on proper thinking." She said and gave her a short bow before walking away from the spot. She managed to easily spot her Murakumo on the ground not too far away. She grabbed a hold of it and then went back to the rest of the AST agents, hoping they will be departing soon.

---

Yoshikuni was somewhat surprised. She didn't know the man and he had given her a nickname. Not that she minded the nickname, but it was still somewhat odd. His words made sense, except she wasn't sure what he meant about cats and curiosity. Maybe he meant something with the fact those started with the same letter? She had no idea.

Watching him accurately guess when the announced message was heard, saying everyone could now get ready to leave the shelter, and afterwards walk outside with a woman that came and left with him made her more curious than before. But Yoshikuni knew that if she followed him more then it would become from curious to stalker like, and she had no particular reason to do so other than being plain curious. So she got up and walked outside after a moment, wondering where she should go next.

Upon noticing that it was becoming evening, Yoshikuni smiled and licked her lips before looking at the many people leaving besides her as she stood at the exit from the shelter. Their shadows were splitting due to the streetlights that were turning on to light the streets from the darkness, and she felt like if she could just bind all of them, then she would be satisfied for life. But at the same time, she realised that doing such a thing with the AST just barely finished taking care of one spirit won't be smart. So instead she turned away from the direction of the park and walked away, whistling as she made her way in the street, keeping on eye on every single shadow her eyes noticed.

Suichi felt a bit frazzled about this other personality of Mayumi. He didn't expect someone who seemed to have such energy and happiness to develop other personalities. He sat down in the bed next to hers and spent the next few moments in his own head. He didn't feel right just leaving her, so he decided to keep her company until she woke back up. He felt a bit back about causing Chitose to wait for them, but he suspected she'd understand.

Whisker yowled in his ear and he winced since the cat was so close to his head. "Can you go bother someone else please?" The cat responded by shoving her face against his neck causing him to sigh. "Silly cat. You're mental." Which only resulted in a loud purr.

---

Kyoko felt optimistic about her injury now that she was being tended to by one of the medics. Unfortunately this day had been difficult and a wild ride to boot and all of it suddenly hit her. It didn't feel like the right time to do so, but with the Spirit escaping, Chou apologizing for her mistake, and the militia that surprised them by helping the Spirit. She felt quite helpless from all that was happening. She looked towards the Captain for direction with a worried expression. "Captain, what do we do now? The Reaper has escaped... and those militia... what do we do about them?"

Reika slowly blinked once at the voice coming from near the walls....the only indication that she was surprised at all. Bringing her face closer to the bricked texture, she began to lightly poke the wall repeatedly out of sheer curiosity too...and maybe some boredom too. "Mr. Wall is a Ms. Wall. That means you are Wall-chan. If Wall-chan doesn't know the answers, doesn't that still make Wall-chan a baka? Baka, baka Wall-chan."

As she said this, the Spirit continued to poke the wall. To any onlooker, this would have been a...rather strange scene indeed.

.

..

...

....

.....

......

Mayumi started awake, leaping into a sitting position on the bed.

She looked around, confused.

"H-Huh? Where... the infirmary? Um..." she stammered, then noticed Suichi in the bed next to her.

"Suichi-kun? How did we get here? What happened? Is... is that girl okay?"

She was obviously talking about the Spirit.

She turned, before shakily getting up and sitting down on Suichi's right.

"I feel really tired, for some reason..." she mumbled, leaning her head on Suichi's shoulder, smiling slightly as she did so.

Suichi smiled as Mayumi woke up, he was glad she was alright even if a little confused. He wrapped his arm around her shoulders to comfort her as she leaned against his shoulder. "Things worked out... somehow. It took a lot of talking. The AST made it there before we could get out, but we managed. I hope she made it out fine." The memory of what he did and said while that happened came back and he blushed embarrassed. "I said some really embarrassing things..." He would have bumped his head into the wall if it were right there in front of him.

Whisker yowled and purred and hopped off of Suichi to brush up against Mayumi. Suichi pointed at the fat cat. "I've had the pleasure of having a conversation with the cat while you were resting. I assure you... it was enlightening." His tone was lightly sarcastic.

He then looked at Mayumi. "I was planning on going to the cafeteria for some coffee or tea. If you're not feeling up to moving around I can come back with some for you."

Over at the park-area

The captain sighed in exchaustion. Today had not been a good day, and there would be tonnes of paperwork and inquiries by the brass to deal with once they got back and she filled out the report for today's mission. As she heard the questions from her subordinate though, she turned back and gave her a confident face, not a smile, but a confident face.

"Not much we can do here, doesn't seem like they left a trail and the Spirit went and vanished too." A brief pause, she looked to both sides of her, as if to confirm that there was nothing around. "We'll head back to base. You can all make it back there on your own, can't you? I need to stay and confirm a few things, as well as get some of the recordings we can get our hands on." She stated, before turning to her vice-captain and nodding.
"You heard the cap'n, girls! Head back to base, put away yer gear'n hit the showers before you go home!" The Osaka-native vice-leader of the team shouted in her distinct dialect.

The girls looked at each other and then, slowly, one by one, took off into the air and began heading back towards HQ at their own pace. It didn't seem there'd be anything more to do this evening, so everyone could just take it at things at their rate and then head home.

In the alleyway

"What a rude girl~" The "wall" said in mock anger. If it had had cheeks, it likely would've puffed them up, but being a wall it lacked such features and thus remained rather flat and expressionless."I nver said I didn't konw the answer, you know? I said you were asking the wrong question." The wall re-buttled to the Reaper, implying that the faux death-god was actually the real idiot here.

Suddenly though, there was a ripple along the surface of the wall, like how a placid lake is disturbed and forms rings when you throw a small stone into it. Of course, brick and cement being a non-viscuous and rather solid material, this looked quite strange to say the least. Before much else could be done though, a small tear appeared in the wall, as if someone had pulled down a zipper. There was a hole... Or, perhaps not? There was light coming from, white and pristine light that was quite bright - far too bright to be a mere lamp or street-light.

If you squinted, you could see - through this newly opened gap that seemed to lead into a world of light - a dark figure standing some distance inside. It was holding its hand out, as if reaching for something. The face, clothes and overall color of the person was completely obscured, as the light seemed to come from behind them and thus, caused their silhouette to appear as just a black, mysterious shape.

But then... The voice from the wall came once more, but this time sounding much closer and without the echoing effect. It came from the hole.

"If you want answers, maybe you should come with me~?" The voice beckoned, as did the outstretched hand. "Choose quickly though, I'm afraid I don't have time to sit around and wait for you to think this offer over for long." This last part sounded far more smug than usual, as if it was taunting the Reaper with a 'Come now, or you miss out'-sort of proposal.

"Wall-chan is the one being Baka by making Reika think she's the Baka, when it's actually Baka of Wall-chan to trick Reika like she's a Baka when Wall-chan is the Baka, Baka."

Regardless of her words, as spoken in her usual monotone, she did blink her surprise at the sudden entrance into the wall. A figure seemed to be waiting on the other side for her, presumably the enigmatic and almighty Wall-chan.

Without thinking of rhyme or reason, not to mention that Wall-chan seemed kind enough, Reika entered through the portal and follwed the sound if Wall-chan's voice.

"Does Wall-chan....like to be judged or-"

Something felt wrong. Something about the situation and strange talking walls suddenly began to click for Reika that this was abnormal...and that was enough to make the Spirit hesistate and falter in her steps.

"Ah, yeah, uh... um, no, it's okay, I can walk fine."

To prove it, she stood up and circled around the bed and spun in a circle.

"See? So, uh... let's go together, okay?" she said, slightly emphasizing the word "together". Even though she'd just woken up, and even though she felt sleepy, she still couldn't shake her habit of teasing everyone she knew.

She didn't think to ask him what had happened to her, and why she couldn't remember what had happened just several minutes ago. As far as she was concerned, she was fine, and Suichi was fine, so what was there to worry about?

She turned to Suichi, grabbing his hand and pulling him off the bed.

She practically dragged him to the cafeteria.

The AST

Wuth orders given and nothing further to do, the AST soldiers began to return to their batracks. Once there, they locked up their gear, hit the showers and changed into their usual, everyday-wear before going back to their respective homes. The captain and vice-captain stayed behind at the scene of the battle, investigating and confiscating any footage and/or other media that had captured the battle and could be used as reference-material. Largely though, nothing major or too important was found and once they returned to base, the captain was immediately summoned by the brass to give a fully detailed report on what had happened.

Mountains of paperwork awaited her after this and the poor woman ha to spend a good portion of the night at her desk before she was finally allowed to go home herself, several hours after her troopers had gone home to their snuggly bed. As she walked the empty and quiet streets of the night-covered city, many thoughts and questions spun in her mind. Who were those strange spirit-sympathizers? Why hadn't Reaper killed the girl she took as a hostage? How had that militia known exactly when and where to attack? Were they going to be a recurring issue from now on? The young woman sighed, reached into her pocket and retrieved a pack of cigarettes. Lighting one, she took a deep draw and let out a heavy sigh.

"Piles on piles of problems, eh..." She muttered, furrowed her brow and continued on home.

Ratatoskr airship

Mayumi and Suichi eventually showed up at the cafeteria on board the ship, where they were greeted by a upbeat and happy-to-see-them Chitose. After taking their orders and giving them something to drink and eat, Chistose sat down with the two and discussed non-essential and trivial everyday matters, making sure to leave out any conversation about the encounter with the Spirit, AST or Mayumi's strage behavior. It was just casual, friendly talk that didn't really go anywhere, and after a while Chitose was called upon - through the PA system - to report back to the bridge. With a cutesty salute and a mischievous "Enjoy your alone time~", the bright and energetic girl left the pair, and cat, alone.

Sadly, Suichi and Mayumi didn't get the time to enjoy their time alone for long, as the ship soon passed over Suichi's residence and forcefully had him transported down to outside the flower shop. Nobody warned him or even mentioned that he'd be teleported, he just found himself on the pavement outside his home all of sudden. After this, the sky-ship went ahead and cruised on over to Mayumi's neighbourhood, where it equally unceremoniously dropped the young woman off as well. Nigel, on the other hand, was kept on board, as he was still being treated for the pummeling and assault he'd suffered earlier that day.

But with their field agents out of the way, Kasumi and her officers held a meeting where they discussed the events at the park. It was a tense but short meeting, as even though they had seen the events unfold, they didn't have much information to go on. People were given tasks and orders, both to investigate and gather information, but largely nothing major was decided, aside from trying to assert who these mysterious spirit-supporting gunmen were.

Streets of the city

Apart from some homeless hobos and some slimy, shady or seedy characters, there wasn't really muchof anyon outside during these late hours. The shadow-spirit would find that pickings for 'food' were slim, less she was willing to invade the homes of sleeping citizens. Tenguu City wasn't really a city that never slept, and these late hours were nothing interesting - more so now as it was turning to Monday and people would be sleeping on preperation for going to work or school the next day.

The luminous room

As Reaper had stepped into the light, she soon came to realize that the hole behind her had closed almost instantly, leaving her trapped in this strange place. It was a room, or space, compoletely made of light - yet it wasn't blinding or oppressive. It was remeniscent of fluorescent lights, except the walls were made entirely of them, making light shine from all directions... Come to think of it, there might not have actually been any walls... Just light... There didn't appear to be any floor or ceiling either, and while she was certainly standing on something that felt solid, there was nothing there... Invisible ground perhaps?

But none of this mattered, for there was only one thing and one thing alone that stood out in this realm of light, and that was the young girl standing a bit away, further inside the space. She was dressed in an elaborate black dress and had short, silvery hair - her physique was slender and femenine and she looked to be no older than maybe 15 or 16 years old. Around her floated strange, jewel-like discs with silvery-metal-like frames - giving the strange items the appearance of eyes or something similiar. In total there were 15 of the things and they all hovered - seemingly on their own - around the girl, slowly rotating as if she was the sun and they were planets in orbit around her. She turned towards Reaper, facing her with a slightly amused smile on her face and a decadent, haugghty look in her eyes.

"Do I like being judged, you ask?" She said, even with the distance between them her voice could still be heard clearly as if she stood right next to Reika. "Should I ask you the same thing, perhaps? How does Shinigami-san feel about being judged, hmm?" Her tone was playful and clam as she placed a hand on her cheek and tilted her head slightly.

The Next Day

Sunrise was upon the city and birds started chirping to greet the new day. It was now monday, meaning that students would need to go to school and adults would need to go to work. It was an unassuning day, like the one before it, and apart from the ruckus at the park, nothing was out of the ordinary. It was almost as if the little incident from yesterday hadn't even happened and people slowly went about their business and routines for waking up and getting ready for whatever today held. With a new day fresh on it's way, the possibilities for fateful encounters and new adventures were on the rise!

... Well, at least if you didn't have somewhere you had to go...

Reika titled her head and looked around to take in her new surroundings. She was hesitant as to whether the girl in front of her meant any immediate harm or not, and so she tensed just in case, ready to summon her Angel if need be. This girl...she looked strangely like Reika herself, and the Spirit couldn't help but take a step closer to her in curiosity.

"Is...Wall-chan just like Reika?" She was implying if the girl in front of her was indeed a fellow Spirit. Reaching out towards the mystery girl's face, Reika reeled back...and began to lightly poke the girl's cheeks.

"Wall-chan has a soft face.....Reika thinks this is funny. Reika is expressing great amusement right now."

Her expression remained stoic. Amusement. Right.

Suichi felt the unwelcome feeling of being teleported suddenly without warning and found himself seated on a bench just outside of his father's shop. He blinked a few times before Whisker yowled loudly and unhappily in his ear causing him to wince and swipe his hand at the cat, but not actually make contact. "Don't do that!" Whisker yowled again as he stood up. "I know you like it up there. Shush." He then entered the shop, which was now closing up. "I'm back."

Dad looked at him with a smile as he worked on closing the register. "Welcome home. Did you have fun?"

Suichi looked around the shop while thinking that it might have been better for his health if he stayed in the shop. "The concert was stopped early, but it was alright until then."

Dad chuckled. "Yeah, that's right the spacequake alarms went off. I'm glad you made it to safety."

Suichi nodded and checked the flowers in the shop for disease as he usually did. "Yeah, so am I."

Dad closed the register with a snap and grabbed a mug from the counter that was steaming with tea. "Don't need to do that, son, I already checked them all." He paused briefly. "Did you meet any girls?"

Suichi began to move for the back of the shop with Dad where the stairs were. "Yeah. There were a couple nice girls. I hope to become friends with them."

Dad gave Suichi a thumbs up. "Good luck."

Suichi chuckled. It felt nice to be able to talk with Dad like this as always. Things that he felt uncomfortable talking with his friends, he knew Dad always would support him. Even nerve-wracking things like girls. "Thanks, Dad. I'm going to be in my room. I'm pretty tired."

Dad nodded once. "I'll let you know when dinner is."

....

Morning was a typical one. Get up. Have breakfast. Go to school after watering the plants. The walk to Raizen High School was uneventful and classes began. The teacher frowned at Whisker and Suichi considering how pets inside school buildings is frowned on, but incidents caused by forcibly separating the cat from the boy caused for an exception in his case. Suichi cringed a bit as he knew the teacher hated cats. Something told him that today would be different from normal.

---

Kyoko returned to her apartment after receiving medical treatment for her injury in the battle against the Reaper. She turned on her TV and the flopped onto her bed listening to the noise emanating from the device. She didn't understand why people were trying to protect or care for Spirits. All they did was cause pain, even if they don't want to. Some even loved hurting others. She covered her face with a groan as she gave up even trying to fathom the reasons. Not long after, she fell asleep.

....

She woke up to the sound of an explosion as an early morning cartoon went off with a bang from her TV. The noise caused her to quite literally jump from her bed. She then saw the TV and blushed, embarrassed. She took a shower and got changed after turning the TV off and made herself toast. She checked her injury and sighed. "How am I going to explain that scar when I'm changing for soccer?"

She shook her head and grabbed her backpack before grabbing her toast and heading to her university.

Yoshikuni was still heading back, She found the walk back to be rather boring and uneventful, and she eventually decided to just go ahead and vanish before she would accidently cause another mess which might attract the AST.

...........

The morning after Yoshikuni came to Raizen highschool as if nothing happened in the day before. She let out a small yawn, feeling a bit peckish but knowing that it was still too early to do anything, as well as the highschool would be an extremely bad place to do anything. The AST would be there sooner than she could even finish feeding on a single shadow. She let out a sigh as the classes begun, and she attended them as usual.

But this time something managed to catch her eye.

Suichi-kun was sitting in the same class. She had never noticed it before because she had never taken any interest in him, but now, after he tried to talk to her before the eventful day yesterday, she had noticed him. Smiling, Yoshikuni waited for the class the end. A couple of moments after the bell rang and the other students begun to get out of the classroom, she stood up and walked to his desk before placing her right hand on his left shoulder from behind.

"Hey, Suichi-kun. I never expected for us to be in the same class, seeing I never noticed you before. This is a very nice coincidence, don't you think?" Yoshikuni spoke to him with her hand still on his shoulder, but she moved to stand in front of him. She gave him a wide smile and moved her hand from his shoulder, and played a bit with her long, pink hair.

---

Chou wasn't punished. She had been extremely lucky to not recieve any kind of punishment, other than being told to not repeat the same thing as she had done and to think about her actions a lot more carefully. After arriving at her home, she went into the shower and turned on the water while still fully clothed. She moved to kneel and stare at the wall in front of her, thinking a lot more carefully on what she could've done. She nearly brought to the death of someone who worked with her. That was not what she wanted. She wanted to save all of them from the spirits. Closing her eyes, she decided that the next time she will encounter a spirit, she will ensure all of her comrades will be safe before attempting to make any kind of move against the spirit, but still carefully make a plan.

After getting out of the shower and changing to her Pj's, she went to sleep, wondering if tomorrow will be an average day at school. Another day which she will wait to pass before being able to go and train.

...........

It was yet another average school morning for her, and Raizen highschool have been boring as usual. Chou nearly fell asleep in the classes, and also noticed someone was being told that bringing cats to the school wasn't something he should do. The moment the bells rang, she placed her head against her hands on the table and closed her eyes. As long as they had a break, she figured she could take advantage of it, not caring for anything else that happened around her.

Mayumi was pretty much asleep as soon as her head hit the pillow.

......

Mayumi was still yawning during the math lecture. She knew that she needed to take down the notes that her professor was writing on the board, but between still being sleepy from yesterday, and the thoughts about the Spirit still wandering through her mind, she found it hard to concentrate. It wasn't long before the lecture was over and Mayumi left the lecture hall, looking at her notes and trying to make sense of the scrawl she wrote down.

---

Meanwhile, at another part of the campus, another class had finished at about the same time, and Kouhime walked out of the campus building with her uPod in hand. There was still an hour until her next class, and so she headed to the student center, music playing through her ears again, and sat down on one of the couches. She pulled out the novel she was reading, and resumed the story where she left off.