Unequally Rational and Emotional

Mahou Sensei Negima and all related elements and characters are the property and creation of Akamatsu Ken, and the author of this piece has made no material profit from it, and never will do.



Any similarity between the characters and events of this story and anyone or anything ever actually seen in real life is a pure coincidence.



Again, thanks to everyone who continues making this project possible with their support.



UNEQUALLY RATIONAL AND EMOTIONAL.



One Year Later:



"HAKASE!" The girl with the long brown hair yelled for the third time that morning. "Hakase, wake up!"



Her roommate only replied with a vague snore and a wave of a hand, turning her back on her and rolling aside so she was facing the wall now.



The standing girl fumed angrily. Fed up with it, she roughly grabbed the prone teenager and lifted her slim body up easily, forcing her to sit up.



"You shouldn\'t do that..." Hakase Satomi yawned loudly, keeping her eyes still closed. "Serious studies have proved that abrupt interruptions of the sleep periods can cause harmful effects on—".



"Forget those studies! Our studies are what matters now!" Chisame barked at her, perching her hands on her own hips in a challenging manner. "Today\'s the first day of the new term, remember?"



Hakase mumbled with a nod of her head. Her eyes still remained closed.



"Then stand up already, dammit!" Piping mad, the taller girl grabbed the mad genius and dragged her out of the lower bunk of their bed, making her to moan in incoherent displeasure. "Or I swear to God I\'ll leave you behind!"



Satomi whined sleepily as Hasegawa Chisame made her to raise her arms up to pull her pajamas\' shirt off, then tugged her pants down. By now, the black haired girl had gained some more self awareness, though, and she was able to finish stripping while her roommate began unbuttoning her own pajamas.



"Do I really need to go?" Hakase asked lazily. "First days are nothing but useless introductions. I\'m sure it won\'t make any difference if I stay here finishing—".



By then, Chisame already was fully naked, grabbing her by a hand, and interrupting her by dragging her out of the room and into the small shower cubicle.



The sudden hot waterfall on her body shook Satomi further out of her stupor, but Hasegawa wouldn\'t take any chances. She started to rub the shampoo on her hated roommate\'s scalp herself, washing her hair down like a pro.



"You don\'t need to do that, either..." Hakase yawned again, then coughed as water poured into her mouth.



"Oh, yes, I do!" Chisame insisted. "Because if I don\'t, you\'ll walk out of here with shampoo still on your hair, wearing your skirt backwards, and without your tie on! I won\'t march all the way to the classroom with a walking disaster area!"



The taller female idly wondered what had she done to deserve that as she soaped the shorter girl\'s back down. She hoped she\'d never have to bear a child, but if she ever did, she was sure she\'d get tons of prior experience by living with Hakase. That nerd was as hopeless with everyday life as she was bright with academics.



There were a few good things about rooming with her, of course. She was a great help with homework and study sessions; Chisame\'s grades had gone up from somewhat below the average to quite above it since she had moved with her. She also was always quick to fix her computers in any case she needed it (even when some malcontent troll or ill-loser competitor sent her a virus even she couldn\'t detect ror neutralize in time), something Chisame was certainly, all in all, thankful for (and part of the reasons why she was tolerating having to wash her back off now).



But mostly, Hakase kept the peepers away. Not intentionally, of course; but Hasegawa had quickly learned it paid off to allow her to use the living room for anything she wanted. The mere sight of that horror, that maelstrom of half finished mechanical abominations and discarded clothes, eternally with the stench of oil and rust floating all over it, was enough to prevent anyone from stepping further inside.



So Chiu had her privacy.



In turn, Satomi had learned to leave the rest of the dorm for Chisame to handle. She was no domestic expert herself, but compared to Hakase, she was Martha Stewart. If Martha Stewart were a cosplaying hacker.



That was another good thing about Satomi; she simply had no interest on Chiu\'s affairs. She didn\'t mock them, but she didn\'t fawn over them either. The first time she had put her eyes on the webpage, she only gave it a brief disapproving glare before turning away without saying a word. And that was it. She had as much interest on criticizing or praising Chisame\'s cosplay habits as Chisame had on analyzing or disassembling her stupid gizmos.



And they both liked it that way. It was a happily unspoken topic between them.



Now they were fully clothed and eating breakfast. Chisame had cooked, of course; again, she was no master cook, but necessity had taught her. Her roommate was unable to cook anything that didn\'t smell like a broken radiator and looked even worse.



She was slow as hell to eat, too. Except when she was in a hurry to finish some darn machine. She still had a piece of bacon in her mouth by the time Chisame had enough and pulled her out with herself.



"Come on! We\'re going to be late!"



"Wait, wait... Eating too fast, not to mention running so shortly afterwards, is unhealthy, didn\'t you know? Specialists from Toudai University have determined that—".



Again she was dragged along, a huffing Chisame keeping her firmly grabbed by a hand. Hakase had to run after her to keep her pace. Barely.



Even so, they still were the last two to make it to the classroom, although luckily for them, the teacher had not arrived yet, either. Obviously, Hakase didn\'t mind one way or another; like always, the first thing she did was to rush over to Chachamaru, to start the routine questioning on her latest developments and incidents, quickly taking notes, all under the blond Evangeline\'s indolent glare.



Chisame, like every other day, sat down next to the ever quiet Ayase Yue, both girls merely exchanging a brief \'Good morning\'.



The hacker actually almost liked Yue. At the very least, she was respectful and mindful of her privacy. True, there had to be something deeply wrong with someone who kept such low grades despite reading so much (and always displaying a stunning intellect when asked about anything), not to mention her despicable tastes in juice flavors, but that still was small potatoes compared to the issues of the rest of the class.



Yue\'s pal Saotome Haruna sat next to a window, frantically doodling obscene sketches on a notebook, biting her lower lip.



Hakase\'s friend Chao Lingshen and her portly partner in crime Yotsuba Satsuki were selling hot meat buns along the desks.



The redheaded Kagurazaka Asuna fumed madly in her seat, with a large group of girls gathered around her listening avidly. Although too steamed up to explain herself clearly, she seemed to be saying something about someone replacing Takahata-sensei for that year. So Takahata was leaving the class, Chisame thought. A pity. He actually was one of the most normal teachers around. She truly hoped they wouldn\'t get Itoshiki-sensei instead.



Shiina Sakurako and Akashi Yuuna were distracting the Class Rep while the tomboyish Kasuga Misora and the tiny Narutaki twins set a standard foolish trap at the door. Chisame sneered. It was to be expected from the childlike twins, but Kasuga definitely should have known better by now, after her latest few stays at detention.



Her errant thoughts were interrupted by Konoe Konoka\'s perky and happy voice.



"Hey, hey, Chisame-chan!".



She gave the Konoe heiress a neutral look. The black haired girl could be annoying at times, but looking at those huge and cheerful dark eyes, it was nearly impossible to feel angry at her.



"What do you want?"



"I\'m reading everyone\'s future! You want to know what\'s waiting for you in this new period, don\'t you?" Konoka giggled, then grabbed Chisame\'s right hand without really waiting for a confirmation. Yet her attitude was never pushy or rude, but simply too eager and fast to avoid. Hasegawa couldn\'t do anything but wait as Konoka kept looking at her palm, carefully, long and hard, making slight humming sounds every so few seconds. Until she finally let the hand go and merrily exclaimed. "You\'re in luck today! This is the day you\'re going to meet your fated love!"



Chisame couldn\'t help but violently jerk back with a full facial blush, even as she heard some other girls laughing at her reaction. "D-Don\'t say such stupid things!"



"It\'s okay! She\'s just joking" Kakizaki Misa waved a hand around. "That\'s the very same thing she just told me".



"Me too" the short haired Izumi Ako added, with a gentler, softer short laugh. "Konoka-san is truly a kidder!"



Konoka made the most adorable pouting face. "I\'m not kidding! My predictions don\'t ever fail!". Instantly, she perked up again, looking at one of the seats at the back rows. "Ne, ne, Setchan! Don\'t you want to know your destiny in love, too?"



The thin and pale girl she was addressing looked aside with an indifferent expression.



"Not interested" she icily said.



Konoka\'s face fell down for a moment, but then she, along with most of the others, was startled by the sounds of nervous chattering right outside their door.



"It\'s them!" Misora grinned, with an evil spark in her eyes. Rushing back to her chair, she kept her vision fully focused on the door, like a hawk eyeing a mouse.



The door started being pushed open from the outside.



A small head peeked in carefully, looking inside with large chocolate eyes not too unlike those of a deer. It looked like, of all things, a boy. A child. Tiny bifocal glasses were on the bridge of his diminutive nose, and his dark brown hair seemed to have been combed as well as possible, only to fail at avoiding conveying its own unruliness.



He stared at them, and all of them stared back, suddenly gripped by an uneasy silence.



Then the eraser set on top of the door fell down towards his head.



It all happened in the blink of an eye, but Chisame still could notice it.



The boy had tensed up in alarm, and then, for some reason, the eraser stopped in midair for half a second. Only to reassume its fall just another split second later, and only after the kid stared up at it with a face of... guilt, actually. As if he had just done something he shouldn\'t have.



It wasn\'t until then that the eraser hit his head down, showering him with chalk dust.



But that wasn\'t the end of it, oh no. Misora was a craftswoman, a master of her technique. A simple eraser would never suffice. So, as the boy coughed, stumbling inside, his right foot clashed against a tightly tensedwire. Naturally, he fell down on his face, just as a bucket full of water fell onto his head, and several arrows with suction cup points were shot from the walls and all over his body.



Wile E. Coyote would have clapped.



But 2-A, even Misora herself, had gulped in horror as a single woman. All of them but Evangeline and Zazie Rainyday, always silent, always stonefaced.



The boy just laid there, pitifully, as soft sobs could be heard from inside the bucket. Behind him, right at the doorway, Minamoto Shizuna stared, wide eyed, until she focused her view narrowly into her usual main suspect.



"Kasuga-san..." the adult woman said.



Misora looked aside nervously. "I didn\'t do it, no one saw me doing it, you can\'t prove anything!"



The Class Rep already was crouched down at the boy\'s side, carefully removing the bucket from his head, lovingly drying his tears with her soft and skilled fingers. "Oh dear! I\'m so very sorry! It\'s my fault! I should have checked!".



"Sorry, sorry!" Narutaki Fumika hyperventilated. "We thought you\'d be our new teacher!"



"It\'s only a child..." Sakaki Makie once again showed her talent for the obvious.



"No way! He must be a circus midget!" Narutaki Fuuka gasped.



Well, you should know a few things on the matter, Chisame thought cynically.



"Actually, he indeed is your new teacher" Shizuna replied, helping him to stand up. "Negi-sensei, please introduce yourself".



"Y-Yes!" wiping his face as clean and dry as he could with a fine tissue the Class Rep had offered him, the child faced his dazzled audience and cleared his throat. "G-Good morning, everyone! Pleased to meet you! My name is Negi Springfield, and starting today, I\'ll teach you mag— I mean, English, as your homeroom teacher! Please, let\'s all do our best here!"



For a moment, you could have heard a needle falling at the classroom. All the girls seemed to have turned into salt statues.



That was until Haruna sprang up with a high pitched squeal.



"HE\'S SO CUTE!".



That was the go sign for more than half of the class to charge forward and pounce onto him, tackling him against the teacher\'s desk and burying him into a cascade of hugging bodies. Even the normally reserved and stoic Ookuchi Akira had joined them, with a blush running over her cheeks.



Still firmly planted at her chair, Chisame took a look at the few others left behind. Yue shrugged her shoulders indifferently, then pulled one of her infernal juice boxes out and took a first sip from it.



Hakase just stared vacantly at the front of the room, as if her brain was in a rebooting. Her face betrayed no emotion at all, and for once, Hasegawa found her absolutely impossible to read.



Evangeline seemed to scowl a little, but then again, that was her overall attitude towards everything.



Chachamaru took readings of the scene through her now slightly glowing green eyes, and you almost could hear the little beepings and boopings going on inside of her head.



Setsuna was simply looking out a window.



Zazie had pulled a few balls out of her handbag and was now juggling them, oblivious to everything around herself. For the first time in her life, Chisame envied her.



The hacker made her way to the vaguely amused Shizuna. "Sensei" she humorlessly told her. "This is a joke, right?"



"I\'m afraid not" Shizuna said. Chisame hated that tone in her voice. It was the very same one she had used when she had stuck her with Hakase little more than twelve months ago.



"How old are you?" the scarlet-haired Asakura Kazumi had swiftly reentered her class reporter mode, fishing a microphone out of her backpack and pushing it against the kid\'s mouth.



"Ehhh!" he blinked. "Oh, well, I\'m ten!"



"Where are you from?" Murakami Natsumi asked. "You sound like a foreigner".



"I... I come from the mountains of Wales..." he blabbered nervously.



"That\'s near Spain, right?" Makie wanted to know.



"Where do you live now?" Kugimiya Madoka spoke next.



"I... It hasn\'t been decided yet..."



Right then, however, a taller, stronger girl pushed Madoka aside and grabbed the boy his shirt, pulling him face to face with herself. He was looking at a mismatched set of a blue eye and a green one now. Asuna.



"You, brat!" she barked. "What was that thing you just did with the eraser?"



"... What?" he yelped.



"Don\'t play the fool!" she shot back. "We all saw it, didn\'t we? No matter how you look at it, it\'s simply impossible!"



Chisame found herself nodding at it. For once, Asuna was right. She had noticed it too. Hadn\'t the others...? They couldn\'t not notice it, right? But looking at Satomi\'s clueless face, it was painfully clear that yes, some of them had missed the detail.



"It must have been a freak breeze" Misa piped in.



"INSIDE OF A BUILDING?" Asuna noted.



"It\'d get in through a window" Naba Chizuru opined.



"NOT MOVING ANYTHING BUT AN ERASER?" Asuna claimed.



"Asuna-san, please!" the blonde Class Rep raised her voice, slamming a hand down on the desk a few times. "Let our teacher go right now!"



The redhead growled at her. "I\'d be very happy to let him go for good, yes!"



The elegant, refinated class president huffed at her. "As expected from a violent maniacal ape like you. You show no respect neither for authority, nor for the defenseless".



A vein popped into Asuna\'s forehead. "Maniacal... ape...?"



"You have not evolved beyond that" the Iincho was unfazed. "Clearly, the young gentleman you are manhandling is a prodigy of his field. We all should feel honored to have him here. Perhaps he could achieve the miracle of teaching you anything other than the alphabet".



Asuna let the child go to face her natural nemesis. "What\'s with you now, being so sure about this twerp?"



"Hm... It\'s painfully obvious for anyone with a few working brain cells" the blonde casually brushed a lock of golden hair off her own forehead. "Mahora Academy only employs the best of the best, and for some foreign youngster to be working here, he must be nothing but the pinnacle of precocious experience".



Asuna chuckled knowingly. "Yeah, right, I\'d bet you want to have some precocious experience with him".



The Class Rep narrowed her eyes, as if she had felt something biting her. "What do you mean with that?"



Asuna said only one word. "Shotacon".



That had done it.



"WHAT?" the refinated girl stopped being so refinated as she jumped straight for Asuna. "Take that back, you... you... graverobber! It\'s not my fault you can\'t realize your dreams of hitting on every elder man that walks your way!"



They started struggling with each other, as the girls around them cheered on wildly, and Shizuna and the child made their best to keep them apart from tearing themselves into pieces.



"AT LEAST I LIKE THEM OF LEGAL AGE!".



"YES, IT\'D WORK FINE IF YOU WERE OF LEGAL AGE TOO! SHAMELESS LOLITA!"



"I\'LL GET OLDER, BUT YOU\'LL NEVER GET AS YOUNG AS THE BABIES YOU HARASS!"



"YOU\'LL NEVER GET OLDER IF I HAVE ANY SAYING ON IT!"



Chisame buried her face into her hands. Even Itoshiki-sensei would have been better than that.



LATER.



The fact Chisame had learned how to cook due to the circumstances of her life with Hakase still didn\'t mean she liked to do it. So, whenever they had enough money, they would go have dinner at the Chao Bao Zi. The small restaurant\'s owner, their class\' own Chao Lingshen, was Satomi\'s closest research colleague, so they always got a special discount. And there was no point on denying the food was delicious.



So, that evening, they had ended up there as well. Chisame wasn\'t in the mood to cook at all. They sat together eating their bowls of ramen at the counter bar, while Chachamaru and Yotsuba served the tables and Chao herself counted the night\'s income at the register box.



"So, what do you think about the new teacher, neh?" the fair skinned Chinese girl finally asked them.



"I think it\'s a mistake" Chisame spoke coldly. "What can a freaking child teach us?".



"Oh, I don\'t know. His first class today was rather good and to the point-yo..." Chao mused quietly. "As soon as he finally could separate Asuna and the Iincho..."



"It\'s all the same for me" Hakase answered with a very short shrugging of her narrow shoulders. "In any case, I\'ve never met any teacher who knew more than me, child or adult".



From the mouth of anyone else, it\'d have sounded as a hideous, megalomaniacal boast, but somehow, Hakase made it to sound simply like a matter of fact devoid of any emotion. Mainly because it was completely true.



Chao hummed to herself as she closed the register. Something was wrong with her, Chisame suspected. She seemed unusually introspective and calmed after joking with the others about Negi, and since the day\'s class had finished. Not like Chisame cared, of course.



Of course.



Later, as she and Satomi walked back to their dorm, she, for once, felt tempted to ask the scientist a personal question.



"Hakase?"



"Yes?"



"Didn\'t you notice anything strange with Lingshen today?"



"What? Huh, no. I don\'t think so. Why do you ask?"



"It\'s nothing. Forget it".



"Oh, sure".



She had sounded almost too happy to say that. And it was true. If there was something Hakase could be trusted on, that was on her forgetting anything not related to science.



However, Chisame\'s temporal peace of mind was soon shattered once more while approaching their dorm. There was someone inside, since there was light coming out of one of their windows. But how...? Chisame ran fearfully to the door, dreading the end of her golden Internet empire. If anyone had learned her secret, she would never live it down. She\'d lose the perfect balance she had fought so hard to achieve!



She was mildly relieved to see it was Shizuna-sensei inside, and not any of her classmates. Then her spirits sunk back down when she saw him with the woman, both of them sitting at the couch, watching TV.



The brat.



"My, my, you two sure took a long time to arrive!" Shizuna greeted the girls. "Sorry for intruding, but we waited outside for too long, so I decided to use the master key".



"Good evening" Negi bowed respectfully.



Chisame hoped she wasn\'t as pale with shock as she felt. If only she could look as unaffected as Hakase was... "Wh-Why did you two \'need\' to get in here?"



"Well, you will see, Dean Konoe gave a special instruction for Negi-sensei to move here until we can find a permanent place for him" Shizuna informed.



"I\'m sorry to be a bother" the boy apologized.



"What?" Chisame snapped. "He\'s supposed to be a teacher, isn\'t he? Why can\'t he stay with any other teacher?"



"Most of us either live too far, or have children of their own, or simply have far too small living quarters" the beautiful blone explained patiently. "He can\'t live alone, and your other classmates are too... enthusiastic or too... complex for a child to be trusted to them".



Chisame made a face. How desperate they had to be for the two of them to be their best hope? In any instance, it was logical to guess the old man wouldn\'t dump that load on his beloved grandaughter. Damn favoritisms.



Satomi didn\'t look too shaken by the news, but still seemed wary in her own way. "I don\'t think I could carry my experiments with full freedom if I have him running around" she informed dutifully.



"You shouldn\'t be carrying experiments here in the first place" the adult reminded her.



Hakase sighed. "It always has to be that loophole, doesn\'t it?"



Negi lowered his gaze to the big travel bag laying at his feet, looking humble and saddened.



"In any case, it\'s a direct command from the Headmaster himself" Shizuna insisted. "There\'s no use on trying to refuse it".



"But, if there\'s no place for me—" Negi started.



"There it is" Minamoto stated conclusively.



Chisame grumbled. At the very least, all her Chiu wardrobe and related items were safely stocked into her special closet, away from indiscret eyes for the moment. "How long will that take?" she wanted to know.



"As long as a better arrangement can be found" the woman said.



In Mahora Academy burocratic terms, that meant, \'It\'s intended to be permanent, so you\'d better shut up and take it\', as Chisame knew from experience. It was the same reply she got back when she first attempted to file a petition to be transfered to a solo room all those months ago.



Both girls looked at each other\'s eyes, and found no clear answer, but still, Chisame decided not to delay the unavoidable anymore. "Okay" she gave a sigh. "He can stay. For now".



The child beamed up a huge, cheerful smile, as bright as the Sun, hated bane of any reclusive hacker. "Thank you very much!" he chirped joyfully.



Good Lord, he was so sickeningly sweet. Was he for real? Chisame already had her strong doubts.



But mostly, she was terrified about what new roommate would they give her the NEXT year.



ELSEWHERE AT MAHORA:



The bedroom Chao Lingshen shared with Yotsuba Satsuki was completely silent save for the plump girl\'s soft dreamy breathing on the bed\'s lower bunk. Chao couldn\'t help but smiling as she looked down at that innocent and full face, so unsuspecting, so blissful.



The Chinese girl sat by her desk near the bed, breathing deeply before taking her gaze apart from her roommate and opening her secret journal. Sometimes, such a primitive, normally laughable medium was the best option for filing information. It couldn\'t be hacked into. It was completely private, and fully unexpected from someone with her preferences.



And it was fully written in code. Her own code. Only she knew about it, or about the journal\'s very existence; she had memorized the whole code and left no decoders anywhere. No Rosetta stones to unearth, ever. No one would even know about their existence. Not Satsuki. Not Chachamaru. Not Satomi. Certainly not Ku Fei, who wouldn\'t have been able to even begin to understand her writings if left with a full manual to decipher her clues, that poor wonderful soul.



It was her own, exclusive and most valued secret. The whole, full weight of it all was her own cross to carry. No one else\'s.



\'Entry: Day One-Stage One-Attempt Number (CLASSIFIED)\'.



\'The main subject, Negi Springfield, arrived today as expected. No major departures from prior iterations were observed in Class 2-A\'s reactions to his appointment. The subject also seems to follow the same behavioral and ethical patterns experienced in prior repeats of the procedure. (FURTHER RESEARCH REQUIRED)\'.



\'However, my family tree has changed again\'.



\'The \'branches\' are still basically the same, but their order has shifted once more. As long as I keep the same core DNA makeup and upbringing background, I should be okay. But I cannot keep doing this for much longer. Soon, I will age enough to make for an unconvincing student for this class\'.



\'I might have to start looking into developing a permanent extract derived from the Age Deceiving Pills. However, such a change is difficult to hope to achieve even with my current resources. Not even Mc Dowell has managed to perfect any sort of magic that can grant her a permanent physical age different from that she had upon reaching her current status. As a human, I am unlikely to achieve what she couldn\'t in that regard\'.



She looked at her face in the desk\'s mirror. The secondary effects of constant time travelling had been kind to her. She still looked the same as always, didn\'t she? Yes, she did, Chao decided. At least she hoped so; betting on the memories from prior loops once their events had been overwritten was always a risky gamble. She still could pass as a fourteen years old for a few iterations more, although she truly wished it wouldn\'t be needed. It was getting harder and harder to keep the facade... not the physical one, but the emotional one... with each passing try.



She went back to her writing.



\'My sources have informed me the subject will be designated to cohabit with Hasegawa Chisame and Hakase Satomi for this occasion. This could be useful; proximity through Satomi could allow me to keep a closer watch on him than before. By now, I am convinced that might be the key to my success\'.



\'Then again, proximity to him could also be my undoing\'.



\'I write these lines as a future reminder to myself, to not get emotionally involved beyond the limits that have been proved being hazardous to the mission in the past. Emotional links are always a need in the context of the situation at hand, both for the sake of my own mental health and my interactions with the subjects, but I cannot allow myself more mistakes born out of my subjective feelings. Time and time again I have failed, both when I try to get too involved, and when I try to get too distant. Why? Where, do I wonder, is the perfect point to access the desired result? Is there such a thing in the first place?\'



\'Am I afraid of leaving again? Do I want to belong so much? Am I so afraid of going through the heartache one more time? Of fighting him yet again? And of seeing my efforts ultimately failing once more no matter if I defeat him or not?\'



\'Exactly what do I need to do that I haven\'t done before? That is the question I need to answer to solve this riddle.\'



\'I am so tired of trying, and yet I cannot quit it. Is the future impossible to change? No. I cannot allow myself such expressions of selfdoubt and despair. Not when I might be so close to a breakthrough\'.



\'That is why I keep writing this\'.



\'I trust we will find a way. With any luck, it will happen in this very same loop\'.



\'There ARE a few things I have not tried yet. Perhaps, it is a matter of attempting another approach. A different angle\'.



\'Hopefully, the new factors added to the continuum in this repeat of the overall situational frame will grant me the chance to actually make a difference now\'.



She closed the journal with a sigh, locked it down at its secret place, and kissed the sleeping Satsuki\'s forehead lightly. She climbed up into her bunk with an athlete\'s agility, slipped the blankets over herself, and tried to sleep.