Demon in the Snow, Heather Fledderus [rainbow fish read aloud .TXT] 📗

Of course, what most Ippans couldn't see was the shield of Zenonar energy that covered the property like a dome. The others had challenged Nate to see if he could get through it, testing their theory that he was part demon, part human. Apparently, considering the ease with which he had jumped over the wall and through the shield, he had failed to meet their expectations.

Nate stretched a hand out and a dry towel flew into it, promptly becoming damp with his sweat as he used it to wipe away the moisture from his face. They were in an outdoor courtyard- at least that was what it looked like. In reality, they were in a massive underground chamber, a natural cave that the mansion had been built on top of. The cave had been remodeled, painted and adjusted so that it looked like the middle of the desert in Ko-ha. Apparently, it had taken them only a night to build it- they couldn't during the day because of nosy house-keepers from nearby houses.

Outside the dome and above ground, it was August, a fact that seemed to work it's ways through unseen cracks to mess with the normally cool temperature of the room. They had it climate controlled so that they could build various scenarios, from battling faux snow and ice demons to fire-bending elemental class 4 T demons, and anything in between.

Sora tossed Hannah a water bottle, “We are going to look so bad-ass when we get back.”

Nate's ears perked up. Over the last few days, the other three had been talking about 'going back'. He figured that they meant back to school, but his gut told him that he was wrong. Hannah was in it for kicks, and technically, she and Chad had graduated, technically, even though none of them had bothered going back to school.

“Who's going to take over for us?”

“Ten-ten.”

“Those idiots who got drunk the same night they were supposed to take off?” Chad asked.

Sora shrugged, “Pretty much.”

The three seemed to realize that Nate was there and listening. Hannah bit her lip, “Hey, Nate, we need to talk to you about something.”

“Believe me, it'll be a a lot better to deal with this over a meal,” Sora cut in quickly, “I don't know about the rest of you, but the past five hours have worked up quite the appetite.” He burped.

Hannah laughed, crossing over to a small raised platform with the rest of them. The platform glowed blue under their feet, acknowledging the weight. “Kitchen,” Hannah ordered.

Nate saw, rather than felt, the world around him disappear in a whirl. The next thing he knew, he was on a platform in a corner of the kitchen. His stomach flip-flopped, but quickly settled down. He glanced up to see Chad studying him. “What?”

Chad shrugged, “Just watching. At first, you seemed unusually good at this, but you don't seem to have improved much.”

“Shove it.” Nate watched as Hannah strode over to a wall in which dozens of what looked like mini ovens had been embedded in the plaster. She tapped a button and a keyboard slid out.

“What should we have?”

Sora shrugged, “It's eight, so we might as well make it a full-blown meal.”

Nate cringed inwardly at the rate at which Hannah was typing. The mini-ovens were like food replicating machines. You insert a specific order, ten seconds later the atoms are all assembled to form a meal. That, mixed with the transportation pad they had to carry them through the house had called for several discreet Star Trek jokes, none of which the others had caught, rendering the point of the jibes dull.

The food always looked and smelled great, but the taste seemed off. The chicken always tasted like fish to him. The others couldn't taste the difference, but they were the ones that mentioned how strong real food tasted. Turns out that Hannah had always brought a bagged lunch of replicated food to school- the flavours of the real stuff seemed to mess with their concentration.

Within seconds, a laszanga was pulled from a replicator and placed on the table. Hannah used her bare hands- the pot itself wasn't hot, but the food was steaming. Sora rubbed his hands together gleefully as he sat down. Nate grabbed some plates and glasses from one of the cupboards as Chad liberated some juice and ketchup from the spacious fridge.

Nate watched in silent amusement as Sora packed piece after piece away. When he had first come here, he had tried to match Sora bite for bite, only to end up with a massive stomach ache. He dumped a liberal amount of ketchup on his own six pieces- it was the only real flavour he could actually taste.

Hannah cleared her throat, “So, Nate. Any plans for the fall?”

Nate's mind raced to see what her motives were. “Not really. You guys are leaving soon to go back to Ko-ha, right?”

The three nodded softly. Nate shrugged, “Probably get a job. I doubt the team replacing you guys will want to work with me.” It wasn't much of a guess. If it weren't for Hannah, the other two might have killed him by now. To the extent of their knowledge, he was a part demon after all.

“So no real major plans?”

Nate shook his head, “Nope. I'll probably take down demons when I see 'em, but other than that, I'll probably just lie low.”

“We should tell him about Section 39,” Sora said to Hannah quietly.

She nodded. “Well, we've been meaning to tell you. We haven't actually been fully trained yet.”

Nate hid his smirk. He knew that much already. A fully trained team was able to deal with a B-class demon easily. But he wasn't about to let them know about his little midnight forays into the compound's vast library, researching powerful demons and whatever else he could find out. “Never noticed. You guys seem to get the job done. What kind of training could you still need?”

Hannah dipped her head, embarrassed at his praise, “Well, we've been working together since we were kids. But the fact is that we haven't trained enough. Sora's good with illusions, but you can always tell when he springs them up, and I only know a few of the spells. So, we have to go back.”

“Sounds great,” Nate interrupted, having a bad feeling where this was coming. There were exceptions to the rules about killing half-humans, but he had to draw the line somewhere. “Hope you guys have fun.”

Hannah and the others shared a look. She shifted uncomfortably, “Well, we've been talking, and...-”

“-and were wondering if you'd like to come with us.” Sora finished for her quickly, stringing all his words together.

Nate blinked once. He hadn't been seeing that one coming at all. The exception he had read about was if the hybrid was half-human, half-demon-slayer, and had proved themselves to be an actual advantage to have in the field. Come to think of it, it had been a section listed in the thirties.

“I... what?”

Hannah sighed, “We were thinking that maybe you could enroll in school too.”

Nate cut her off quickly, “I'm pretty sure I'm not cut out for a Slayer school.”

Hannah placed a sheaf of papers on the table between them all, and shoved them in his direction, “The Council disagrees.”

Nate studied the documents. One of the demons inside of him was good with languages- an ability he found retarded for a human-eating beast to have. What was the demon supposed to do: read a map that lead to the humans?

It was an acceptance letter. He had seen enough of them in the possession of others at school to know what it looked like. He began to read aloud:

“We approve the applicant Nathan Hitagashi to be enrolled in the Majutsu Academy of Demonic Arts as a Summoning Major, under Section Thirty-Nine, Paragraph C, Anecdote Seven. Nathan Hitagashi is hereby protected under the laws and regulations dictating the treatment of Demon-slayer hybrids.”

Nate glanced up, “I thought you guys said that I was a demon hybrid?”

Hannah shrugged, a little sheepishly, “One little mistake...”

“So,” Sora interrupted, his eyes shining, “You in? The place is massive, and maybe you can figure out what kind of demon you are. The library's practically devoted to classifying them.”

Nate sighed as he took in the hopeful faces. The library would be handy... “Guess who's going to Slayer school this fall?”

12. Funerals Happen Twice

The rest of the week was a flurry of activity as the others reprogrammed the house, grinning devilishly whenever Nate asked what they were doing. It didn't take long after getting toothpaste shooting out the faucet instead of water to realize that they were booby-trapping the place, setting every operating system to malfunction.

“It's a tradition,” Hannah had explained, “It messes with their heads, and they have to try to put their skills to the test. It happens to every rookie team.”

“Aren't you guys a rookie team already?”

Sora pulled a face, “Yeah,  we got shafted on that count. They get to prank us twice in the end- when we first got here the place was an absolute mess.”

“Seems kinda counter-productive to me. You guys spend more time cleaning up than actually doing any demon-slaying.”

Hannah laughed, “Yeah, but it's fun. Besides, most of it are just illusion and Caster spells mixed. The actual mess is from the Pyro, and that normally is kept to the lower levels in the training ground.”

“So that's where Chad has been all this week?”

“Uh-huh. He's got to do us proud, so he's reshaping the place, fixing up what we broke and then messing with it, building trap doors and stuff. No two training grounds are ever the same that way, and you can create so many more scenarios.”

“Like I said, you guys seem to spend more time training than any actual slaying.”

“That's because this is an easier sector. Not much to attract the level of demons that the Yukicharo registers.”

An insistent beeping made them all turn their heads to  face the video screen by the door to the kitchen. Chad's face twisted into focus. “It's time.” His voice echoed from room-to-room as each gave the broadcast. It was one of the two systems that they didn't mess with, even with an illusion.

The three of them trooped over to the Pad. Nate's stomach twisted in knots, “You guys should invest in a staircase. All this being beamed from one place to another sucks.”

The kitchen disappeared, only to be replaced by absolute chaos. Sulphur's acrid stench stung his nostrils. Piles of rock gave off gray smoke, all of it gathering at the top of the cavern. Beside him, Hannah coughed, “I think you went overboard Chad.”

Chad grinned, one of the few times Nate had seen any sort of expression on his face. “I only made it look the way it did when we got here.”

Sora covered his hand with his mouth while the world shimmered and a Sora clone appeared. “What kind of setting did you get this thing on?” The clone asked, unperturbed by the world around it.

“Burning Asherah.” Apparently, that was supposed to mean something, because both the Soras and Hannah nodded sagely.

Nate began to step off the Pad, but a wall of flame shot up directly in front of him. He raised an eyebrow at Chad. Chad grinned again,