#halcyonwish

Shima’s voice was the best at squeezing through the truck’s barely open service window, especially when he was excited. “But why would they be targeting this series? It doesn’t have anything to do with that weird Cyberse stuff—” A yelp drew Kusanagi’s gaze back over his shoulder and was followed by a small, metallic ting. “Ah, crap!”

“I told you to watch it!” Aoi’s voice, low and snapping.

“You got it on the keyboard.” Yuusaku was definitely scowling.

“My bad! I’ll clean it up—”

An electric crackle sounded, and Yuusaku’s last words were a quiet, “What the—?” before a BOOM rattled the truck on its wheels. Smoke billowed through the service window’s gap, and Kusanagi winced.

Oh, yeah. He’d forgotten about that.

The window flew open under Aoi’s hands, and smoke poured around her as she stuck her head outside to cough. A second plume appeared at the truck’s back end as Shima threw the door open.

“Shima!” Aoi leaned out further to look towards the back door. It was doubtful she could make eye contact with him from that angle, but he flinched anyways. “How many times did I tell you to keep that can away from the computer?!”

“Sorry, sorry!” With two exits available, the worst of the smoke had cleared, so Shima looked back into the truck. “Fujiki, are you all right?” He frowned. “What are you doing?”

Aoi glanced back too, and when they both retreated into the truck, Kusanagi closed his borrowed tablet and approached the now wide-open window to look inside. Standing before the computer, Yuusaku pressed a paper napkin over his nose and mouth with one hand and typed on the keyboard with the other. Error messages crowded the screens, but he ignored them the same way he ignored the two people behind him as he muttered, “This doesn’t make sense…”

“What happened?” Kusanagi had to bite the inside of his mouth to keep his expression neutral as the three teenagers turned around—Shima’s face red, Aoi’s arms holding each other across her stomach, and Yuusaku’s eyes narrow above the napkin.

Aoi stepped forward. “I’m sorry, Kusanagi-san. Shima spilled a can of soda on your computer—”

“I didn’t know it would have a meltdown, okay?” Shima said. “My tablet never does this no matter what gets on it!”

Aoi turned on him. “It’s common sense to keep liquids away from computers—”

“But it shouldn’t have reacted like this.” Yuusaku lowered his napkin. “First, not even the cheapest computer out there should internally explode because a little soda got spilled on its keyboard. Second, this one was built to survive in a working food truck. Third, even with all this smoke, the smoke detector hasn’t gone off, and I know it’s working because we checked it yesterday.” His eyes flicked from Aoi to Kusanagi. “What is going on, Kusanagi-san?”

“Let me have a look.” Kusanagi set the tablet on the counter, headed around to the back door, and stepped up into the truck. Aoi and Shima moved back to clear his way to the computer, and he held down the power button as he typed on the keyboard. Working against time to remember the right combination, his actions were slow, but as soon as he finished the sequence, the smoke still pouring from underneath the keyboard stopped. The screens cleared with the air to reveal windows of information and forum debate on a new line of Dueling cards. Kusanagi turned from the computer to find three pairs of eyes staring at him.

Yuusaku raised an eyebrow. “That was a trap.”

“Kind of.” Kusanagi ignored the glare he got for that by looking at Aoi and Shima. “When we first installed this computer a few years ago, Yuusaku kept having drinks around it no matter what I said, so one day I rigged it to fake a ‘meltdown’ if anything liquid was spilled on its keyboard while in use.” A small hmph came from Yuusaku, and Kusanagi chuckled. “Well, to be fair, Yuusaku never triggered it, so I’d mostly forgotten the trap was there.”

Aoi’s eyebrows furrowed. “That…sounds like a bit much.”

“Yuusaku’s stubborn,” Kusanagi said, earning him an even more sour look from the boy in question. “It needed to be something drastic to affect him, so I was hoping a little classical conditioning would get him to stop.” He grabbed a rag from a shelf and wet it at the sink. “In any case, that soda still needs to be cleaned up before it dries—” He rung out most of the water. “—and I’m not doing it.”

Shima spoke a little too quickly. “Shouldn’t Fujiki be the one to clean it? After all, it was because of him you installed that trap—”

“So what? You did it.” Kusanagi offered him the rag, and, despite his grumbling, Shima took it. “Hurry, please. I need to set my truck up for the big Duels soon, or I won’t make any money today.”

Aoi blinked, then slipped past Kusanagi to where the school bags had been set in the space under the computer and knelt to dig out her phone. After checking the time, she relocked the screen and stood. “Kusanagi-san, can you take me home from here? I have a Duel tonight I need to get ready for.”

“We have an access point here in the truck,” Yuusaku said, but she shook her head.

“My brother won’t be happy if he comes back to our apartment to find I’ve logged in from somewhere else. He says it’s too dangerous, so I have to go home now.”

How nice it was to see someone who actually listened—well, kind of listened. The Charisma Duelist Blue Angel wouldn’t exist if Aoi obeyed all of Akira’s commands, but at least she acted considerate sometimes.

“Okay,” Kusanagi said. “Go get in the cab, and I’ll take you to your place in a minute.”

As Aoi left the back and Shima scrubbed soda from the keyboard and floor, Yuusaku grabbed the empty can, dropped it into the trash, and retrieved his tablet from the counter. He opened it and tapped on the screen, apparently returning his attention to his own matters, but when Kusanagi turned to leave, Yuusaku stopped him with a low, “Kusanagi-san.”

“What?”

“You rigged your computer like that. The one we do all our work with. The one we use to fight Hanoi.” He looked up, his eyes expectant, but Kusanagi offered a mere shrug in response.

“Maybe one day you’ll listen to me when I tell you not to do something, eh?”

Yuusaku turned away. “You also drained my tablet’s battery and used up a chunk of my data. Please stay close enough to use the truck’s Wi-Fi next time.” He closed the tablet, grabbed his bag from under the computer, and headed towards the door. “I’m walking home.”

“All right. Stay safe,” Kusanagi called as Yuusaku went out. Glancing away from the door, he noticed Shima looking around with the dirty rag in his hand and a question on his face and waved towards the sink. “Just drop it in there. I’ll take care of it later.”

“Oh, okay. Thanks.” After disposing of the rag, Shima grabbed his books and bolted out. “Wait up, Fujiki!”