The school bell rang and Watanabe rushed into the journalism club blasting past other students.
“Finally!” she said. “Spring break is over! I’ve got so much work to do!”
Jirogame ran in after her, “You’re happy Spring break is over?”
“Well…I was too busy watching wrestling…I mean, watching naginata fights, to get anything done over it,” Watanabe replied.
“Don’t worry, Watanabe-chan,” Chitose entered. “No matter what’s blocking our path, we’ll be able to blast through it now that Akechi’s out of the way!”
She nodded, “I don’t know what Baba Haru did, but I’m glad he was able to solve that problem. The school festival is a week from now.”
“That’s when it is?” Jirogame turned pale. “Do we have enough time to prepare?”
“I hope so. A lot of the clubs got ready over Spring break. We’ll just have to work hard!”
“Didn’t the others work hard too? How will us working hard make a difference?” Chitose wondered.
Watanabe said, “Well, if they worked hard, then we’ll have to work harder! And if they worked harder, then we’ll have to work even harder. And if they worked…”
Michi ran inside, “Okay, we get it! Our biggest issue is finding stories for the school festival. Maybe we can see what other clubs are doing?”
“That’s a great idea! Jirogame, get started. I’ll catch up with you later. We need to design our stall.”
Haru and Keiko walked out of the school together. Glares shot out at Haru; however, the two ignored them.
“The school festival is coming up,” Keiko said.
He replied, “I know, but I’m not attending it.”
“That’s not the issue,” she stated. “Haru-kun, I’m worried that the teachers might try to make you attend. They expect everyone who can to go.”
“Then we’ll have to think of some excuse. If anyone asks, I’m fighting a pack of mutant jerboas,” Haru stated.
Keiko chuckled, “That’s your excuse, but what’s mine?”
“You’re fighting a pack of deranged mutant snowmen.”
They both laughed at that.
“But we really might need an excuse,” Keiko pointed out.
Haru agreed, “You’re right, Keiko-chan. The festival’s over a weekend too, so we’ll need to think pretty hard.”
“Excuse me!” Jirogame rushed past them. “Moving through!”
He ran over to a stall and said, “Hey, can I interview you?”
“Not now. We’re busy,” a girl stated.
The student ran over to another stall.
“Can I have a moment of your time?”
“Later. We still have a lot of work to do.”
Jirogame walked away and sighed, “Dammit. Why are all the clubs too busy?”
Haru and Keiko kept walking. Jirogame noticed them.
“Hey, you two! Can you help me?” Jirogame asked.
“Why would you want me to help you?” Haru narrowed his eyes in suspicion.
“Because you helped us before with Akechi,” Jirogame said. “You’re scum, but you’re not as scummy as most people think you are.”
He stated, “Let’s get out of here, Keiko.”
They started to walk away again, but Jirogame got on the ground and grabbed their legs.
“Please help me! We only have a week to get ready for the festival, and we haven’t gotten any stories!”
Keiko asked, “By ‘we,’ you mean the journalism club, right?”
“Yes,” Jirogame nodded.
“If you can’t think of a story, just make one up,” Haru suggested.
“I’m not doing that,” he replied. “I’d be a disgrace to journalists everywhere!”
“What do you want us to do?”
Jirogame said, “Help me interview people?”
“Haru-kun can’t do that,” Keiko stepped in. “He’s very busy.”
“With what? He isn’t in any clubs.”
Haru stated, “It’s none of your business. I’m not helping you interview people.”
“Then can Keiko do it?” Jirogame asked.
She answered, “I’d rather not, but I still know some of the people from various clubs. They just don’t like me as much as they used to.”
“Thank you so much!” he smiled. “I promise I’ll pay you back for this somehow!”
The journalist club member ran off.
“Great,” Haru sighed. “We’ve been roped into something annoying.”
“It might be best if you stayed out of this, Haru-kun. With your curse, you won’t enjoy it and it’ll hurt my efforts,” Keiko stated.
He said, “That’s fine with me. Just be careful, Keiko-chan.”
Worry flowed through her, “Why do I need to be careful? Is something magical happening? Are a horde of demons about the burst from the ground and kill everyone?”
“No, nothing like that. There’s probably no danger. I’m just being paranoid,” Haru assured her.
“Oh, that’s good,” she breathed a sigh of relief. “You be careful too, Haru-kun. I won’t be around to bail you out if your curse acts up.”
“Don’t worry, I’ve been dealing with this for my entire life,” he stated. “And if you ever need me, you have my number.”
Elsewhere, Jirogame was running around in a circle on the dirt. There was a line where he had been running.
“Dammit! Dammit! Dammit! Dammit! I couldn’t find a single club to interview! How can I face Watanabe-san with this failure?”
He remembered Haru’s suggestion and thought, “Maybe I should just make something up? No, I can’t do that! But…what if I didn’t make something up and pass it off as journalism? What if I made satire, perhaps of the school? Akechi isn’t going to stop me, and I could make something funny. That might be my best shot.”
Jirogame ran into a room and racked his brain. Images of old political cartoons he saw on the internet came to mind. The boy drew as fast and as hard as he could. Then Jirogame ran back to the club room.
“I figured it out!”
“You figured what out?” Watanabe asked.
She and the others were still designing the stall.
He answered, “We can do satire! You know, make fun of things!”
Eikoh said, “That doesn’t sound right.”
“I think it’s a good idea,” Watanabe stated. “We can have some comics if nothing else.”
Jirogame breathed a sigh of relief.
“Yes!” he thought. “Now they won’t notice that I messed up!”
“Are you sure about this?” Michi wondered.
Watanabe smiled, “Of course I am. We’ll still do our regular stories. This’ll just give something funny to add to it.”
“I already made a few pictures,” Jirogame stated.
“Then let’s see them.”
She looked at the first and Watanabe’s face turned white. The picture was of her as a Mexican luchador pile driving the school. Watanabe turned to the next image, and she saw a picture of her dressed as an American pro wrestler wearing a mask and Irish whipping a school bus. The girl felt like she was about to bust a vein.
“Those are pretty cool,” Himari said. “How did you come up with them?”
Jirogame decided to hide that they were the first thing that came to mind, “I thought about how tough and awesome Watanabe-san is and drew these.”
“Well, they’re awesome!” Chitose declared.
“This is…this is…great,” Watanabe forced a smile. “We’ll put these in the newspaper.”
She was screaming inside, “Dammit! If this gets out, people might figure out that I’m into pro wrestling! Then I’ll never get a boyfriend! I can’t tell him to not publish it. That violates my principles of freedom of the press. What can I do?”
A realization came to her and she ran out of the room.
“I’ll go and get a copying machine,” she said but she thought. “I can get Baba-san to help me. He’s smart, so he’ll know what to do!”
Ved'ma Story 