The Sigh of Haruhi Suzumiya (11 page)

“Hmph.”

Haruhi, still in my grip, turned to the side and sniffed. “I obviously know that much.”

I released my grip. Haruhi tapped the back of her neck with the megaphone.

“I was telling her to use as much effort as it would take to shoot out beams. Since she has so little drive, it’s hard to believe she’s the leading actress. You really can’t take a joke, can you?”

The problem would be that your jokes end up being anything but. What if Asahina really ends up being able to fire beams?

… She can’t, right?

Worried, I gave Asahina a sideways glance. She looked up at me with tears flowing from her heterochromatic eyes, then blinked and tilted her head. It would appear that my eye contact didn’t get the message through to her. That was when Koizumi popped out and admonished Haruhi.

“Perhaps we can use CG effects after we’re done filming to handle that section.”

Koizumi, with a tissue box in hand, flashed a friendly smile like a con artist and handed the box to Asahina.

“Wasn’t that your intention to begin with, Suzumiya?”

“It sure was,” said Haruhi.

Sure it was, I thought.

Asahina wiped away her tears with the tissues and blew her nose while looking suspiciously at Haruhi and me.

Nagato remained standing in the wind, looking like an overly conspicuous stagehand. Can’t the sun set already? I can’t wait for it to become too dark to film anymore.

“That was no good. We’re doing a retake,” Haruhi said and began brainstorming a signature pose with Asahina. “Put your hand like this as you shout ‘
Mikuru Beam!
’ ”

“Something like this…?”

“No, like this! And shut your right eye.”

Apparently, a beam fires from her eye when her left hand displays a victory sign next to her left eye while winking.

“Mikuru, try saying it.”

“… Mi-Mi-Mi-, Mikuru Beam!”

“Louder!”

“Mikuru Beam!”

“Don’t be shy about it!”

“Hee… Mikuru Bea… m!”

“Shout from your belly!”

Is this some kind of comedy act?

Asahina was shouting until she was red, coerced into diaphragmatic breathing by Haruhi. The stares from the wandering kids and families around were painful. I wanted to tell them that this wasn’t a show for them to watch, but since we were shooting a movie, we were technically putting on a show. Maybe we could just film the making of scenes. I don’t know what a Haruhi-style happy story would be like, but we’ve got more than enough for a Mikuru Asahina promo.

Eventually, Asahina and Nagato were back standing on their respective cross marks, Koizumi was holding the reflector board in a touchdown signal, Haruhi was reclined next to him, and I had circled around two meters behind Nagato, garbed in black, to film Asahina over her shoulder. This camera angle was per Haruhi’s instructions.

An abrupt transformation soon followed.

“Okay, fire the beam now!”

In response to Haruhi’s shout, Asahina uncertainly struck a pose.

“Mi… Mikuru Beam!” she shouted adorably in a forced falsetto with an obvious look at the camera.

In that instant, the camera viewfinder suddenly went pitch dark.

“Ah?”

I couldn’t understand what had happened. I thought the camera had malfunctioned. I removed my eye from the finder to find an ominous-looking black pointy hat.

“…”

Nagato had her hand in a fist before my eyes. Nagato’s right hand had covered the lens and made it dark.

“Huh?” said Haruhi, whose mouth was wide open.

The cross mark Haruhi had drawn was two meters in front of me. Nagato had been standing there just a moment ago. When Haruhi had yelled action and Asahina had shouted, Nagato’s black silhouette had definitely shown up on camera. And not even a second later, Nagato was, for some reason, standing silently with one arm raised, gripping something in front of my face. The only explanation I had was that she warped.

“What?” Haruhi said. “Yuki, when did you get over there?”

Nagato didn’t respond, but instead kept her bead-like eyes on Asahina. As for Asahina, she had her eyes open wide in surprise. And then she slowly blinked—

Nagato’s hand once again moved at the speed of light. She made a grabbing motion in the air as though she were catching a mosquito. What happened to the star-tipped antenna she was supposed to carry?

Huh? I just heard a weird noise. Like a lit match falling into a ditch with running water. A sound like that.

“Huh…?”

The puzzled voice belonged to Asahina. She must not understand the situation. I don’t either. What’s Nagato trying to do?

Asahina, seeking salvation, turned to the side—and an unnatural sound came from where Koizumi was. A sound that could not be mistaken, like air escaping from a punctured tire…

The reflector board that had been raised above Koizumi’s head—just a cheap piece of Styrofoam covered by a sheet of thick white paper—had been severed at a diagonal angle. Koizumi, at a loss for words for once, stood stunned as he watched the top half of the reflector board slide off. But I didn’t have the time to enjoy such a rare sight.

Nagato moved. Nagato alone.

A dark shadow leapt from the ground and landed right in front of Asahina. Nagato’s right hand reached out from under her black mantle and grabbed Asahina’s face. Her slender fingers covered Asahina’s eyes, and her fingertips drove into Asahina’s temples.

“Ahh… Na-Na-Na-Nagato…”

Nagato paid no heed and threw the star waitress to the ground. Looking like the Grim Reaper riding on top of that ample bosom. Asahina screamed and grabbed Nagato’s slender arms, locked in an iron grip.

“Ah!”

I finally came to my senses. What was that? It looked like Nagato had teleported over to interfere with the filming, but then Koizumi’s reflector board split in half, and then the alien attacked the time traveler. When did Haruhi tell the two of them to act out this scene—or I guess that’s not possible. The director, along with Koizumi and me, was also at a loss. And the two of them didn’t look like they were acting.

“… Cut, cut!”

Haruhi stood up and whacked her chair with the megaphone.

“Hey, Yuki. What are you doing? That wasn’t part of the plan.”

Nagato remained silent, riding on the struggling Asahina, whose white thighs were half-exposed.

Upon hearing a soft murmur, I turned to find Koizumi staring at the severed edge of the reflector board with a grimace on his face. He then noticed my gaze and gave me a strange look. What’s that supposed to mean?

Or no, who cares about Koizumi’s meaningful looks. Right now, I have to do something about Nagato’s all-out martial arts antics. I ran, with camera in hand, toward the jumbled waitress and black-garbed mage.

“What are you doing? Hey, Nagato.”

The wide-brimmed hat slowly turned toward me. Nagato’s black-hole-like eyes looked up at me and her thin lips parted.

“…”

My expectations that she would say something were shot. Nagato silently shut her mouth with a look on her face suggesting that she couldn’t find the appropriate words for this situation, before gradually standing up from the mount position. With a jerk of her black-mantled right shoulder, her arm withdrew under her outfit.

“Hah… Hah…”

Asahina was lying on the ground faceup, trembling in fear. Well, yeah, of course she’s scared. If Nagato charged over with that emotionless look and threw me to the ground, I’d be shaking in my boots. Especially since in her current getup, she looks like some kind of dark wizard that you really wouldn’t want to bump into in the middle of the night. Might even make some fainthearted preschooler wet his pants.

“…”

Nagato, eyes covered by the oversize pointy hat, didn’t move an inch. She just stared at me.

I gently helped the sniffling Asahina stand up. The sight of those long eyelashes, bordering gorgeous eyes brimming with tears, only served to make her even more attractive… Huh?

“Man, what are the two of you doing? Please don’t do stuff that isn’t in the script.”

The director who hadn’t even written down the script walked over and went “Huh?” in a dubious voice, just as I had.

“Mikuru, what happened to the contact?”

“What…”

Asahina, clinging to my arms in tears, moved her finger below her left eye.

“Huh?”

The three of us could only stand around looking puzzled. In these situations, you’re supposed to consult the person who has a firm grasp on the situation.

“Nagato, do you know what happened to Asahina’s color contact?”

“Don’t know,” Nagato replied in a flat voice. Pretty sure she’s lying.

“Maybe it fell out during the tussle,” Haruhi guessed incorrectly and began searching the ground. “Kyon, you help look. That wasn’t cheap. It cost quite a bit.”

I joined the scampering Haruhi and got on all fours. Even though I told her it was useless. I had a feeling that I’d seen Nagato’s right hand holding something when she got off Asahina. And that hand had been attached to Asahina’s face when they were tangled together.

“Why can’t we find it anywhere?”

My apologies to the duck-billed Haruhi, but I wasn’t looking very hard. I turned to find Koizumi playing with the pieces of the reflector board, attaching and separating them. You pretend to look, too.

Koizumi smiled.

“It may have blown away in the wind. Since it’s light.”

He was saying irresponsible things as he displayed the remains of the reflector board.

Haruhi jumped up and took them from him. “What happened? It split in half? Hmm, it was cheap anyway. Well, can’t expect anything more from our photography club. Koizumi, tape it back together in the back.”

And with those careless remarks, she turned her crocodile-like gaze back to Asahina, who was spaced out after having finally stopped crying.

“We can’t continue filming without the color contact. What do we do?”

She appeared to be thinking. Eventually, she snapped her fingers as though a lightbulb had gone off in her head.

“That’s it. We’ll say that the eye color changes after she transforms.”

“T-transforms?” said Asahina.

“That’s right! It wouldn’t be very realistic if you were always wearing that costume. That costume will be what you’re wearing after you transform. You’ll usually be wearing a more normal outfit.”

There’s something wrong with people trying to make fiction too realistic, plus I think she just admitted that dressing up as a waitress wasn’t normal.

Asahina was rapidly nodding her head up and down. “I-is that really okay? I really want to wear normal clothes. Really.”

“Which is why Mikuru’s normal outfit will be a bunny girl!”

“Huh? Wh-wh-wh-why?”

“Because that’s the only one I brought. Your usual regular clothing would look too dull on the screen. Wait! I just came up with a backstory. Basically, Mikuru normally acts as a bunny girl attracting customers for the shopping district. When she senses danger, she immediately transforms! She turns into a combat waitress. Well, isn’t that perfect?”

Didn’t you just say something about being realistic?

“Then let’s get started.”

Haruhi smiled a dangerous smile that looked like a crescent moon as she pinned Asahina’s arms behind her back. “Ow, ow, ow,” cried the waitress as she was taken into the woods.

Hmm.

… Well, I guess that’s fine. I can only pray for Asahina, but it is very convenient for me if Haruhi runs off right now. Her sacrifice will not be wasted. And I can’t wait to see her in a bunny suit.

… And that worked out well since I had something to ask Nagato.

“So what was with the improvisation back there?”

Nagato impassively pressed down on the brim of the pointy hat, leaving most of her face covered by its shadow, and slowly extended her right hand. The outfit was just something on top of her uniform, so her right sleeve was that of a sailor uniform. She then flipped her right index finger so it was facing upward. A blue contact lenses was resting atop it.

So you snatched it after all.

“Here,” Nagato murmured. “Laser.”

And with that, she shut her mouth.

“…”

You know, it’s been on my mind for a while, but your explanations don’t even satisfy the bare-minimum requirements. You could at least try talking for ten seconds at a time.

Nagato stared at her own finger.

“Invisible coherent light possessing a high level of directivity.”

She spoke in an excruciatingly slow voice. I see. Invisible coherent light…

Sorry, I know even less now.

“Laser?” I said.

“Yes,” said Nagato.

“That’s quite a surprise,” chimed in Koizumi. He picked up the contact in his fingers and observed it through the light. “It looks like an ordinary contact lens.”

He sounds like he’s really impressed. I couldn’t figure out what to be surprised about, let alone be impressed.

“What’s this all mean?”

Koizumi chuckled.

“Could you show us your right palm? No, not you. Nagato.”

The black-garbed girl directed her gaze to me as though she were asking for permission, so I nodded. Upon confirmation, she unclenched the remaining three fingers and thumb on her hand, at which point I stopped breathing.