[FFML] [xover][Kodocha/Alice Academy/RoD] Sana's Alice, Chapter 2, part A.

[Henry Cobb]

[xover][Kodocha/Alice Academy/RoD] Sana's Alice, Chapter 2, part A.
By Henry J. Cobb

Gakuen Alice is the creation of Higuchi Tachibana.  Kodomo no Omocha is the
creation of Miho Obana.  Read or Dream is the creation of Hideyuki
Kurata. This parody is not intended to cause any damage to these
properties.

Chapter two: Paper kitten

[This chapter was running a bit long so I split it into two parts.]

"Is this close enough for you?"

I opened my eyes and saw a pair of violet eyes looking at me from
centimeters away.  It was that girl Hotaru and worse yet I had an arm
around her.

"I'm sorry! I'm sorry!"  I rolled away from her and saw that we were still
in her bed, in her room.  The events of the past night flashed through my
head, "Close enough?  It's Mr. Narumi.  He made us do this."

"As I said last night, he can't make me do anything I don't want to do."

"You wanted to sleep with me?"

"I wanted to try something out, but it didn't work."

"Uh, what?"

"Your sister Mikan could ease all my pains with a smile."

"Like this?"  I smiled at the awkwardness of the moment.

"Yes, nothing.  You're useless to me," Hotaru got out of bed, put on a pair
of bear slippers, took some pills out of the pile of medicine bottles on
her dresser and swallowed them down with a bottle of water from her
mini-fridge.

"What's the matter, do you have cancer or something?"  I mentally kicked
myself and was glad that Babbit didn't pop up to point out how close that
was to my line from the TV movie.

"Oh, how I wish.  They can cure cancer here.  Don't tell anybody outside
about that.  It's an Alice and not something they can bottle, yet.  It's
just that I overused my Alice last night."

"But all you did last night was talk to me.  Well, I did most of the
talking.  Wait, did you use your Alice on me?"

"But of course."

"You wanted me to sleep with you.  Do you have a mind control Alice like
Mr. Narumi's?"

"No, something far more useful.  I have a design Alice.  It lets me start
with a crude mental sketch and then quickly resolve it into a working model
under the constraints I impose."

"That doesn't sound like something you could use against somebody else."

"Designing gadgets is easy," Hotaru waved her hand past the piles of
electronic and mechanical parts scattered on the tables and shelves in her
room, "Building a model of how a human mind thinks is much harder."

"You're trying to frighten me."

"Go ahead and fear me.  It will give me an additional prod to move you
around."

"Why bother with me?  I'm not that rich or famous and my Alice doesn't do
very much."

"I'll leave it to you to figure that out.  Now hurry up Sana, If you're
late to class on your first day they'll withdraw your application."

"In that case I'll sleep in.  Wake me at lunchtime."

"Just kidding.  The only way you'll get out of here before you graduate is
in an urn and yes cremation is mandatory for dropouts."

"Now you're kidding."

"Oh, how many superpowered delinquents wandering loose on the streets of
Japan have you heard about?  Now get out of my bed you slacker.  You don't
want to know about the things they do to misbehaving students here."

Hotaru was changing in front of me, so I doffed the pajamas I had borrowed
from her and changed back into the school uniform I had worn briefly the
previous night.

"Go get your schoolbag."

"What?"

"Do you know where your room is?  You'll have one of these in there."

"Oh, right!"  I ran off to my room and by the time I got outside I saw that
Hotaru was riding a skateboard with a swan's head handlebars and was racing
down the path from our dorm.

I ran after her as quickly as a I could, "I still can't believe I let you
talk me into your bed so easily.  Oh Akito, I'm such a dreadful
girlfriend!"

"Whoever this Akito person is, they must not be very important because you
didn't mention them at all last night."

I stopped.  She was right.  In my haste to update Mama's story with the
details of my Alice I had neglected to add back in the personal friends
Mama had left out.

When I looked up again Hotaru was gone so I settled down to a walking pace
and continued in the direction she had been going.

A boy ran up to me.  He was around the same age as me and wore a very
similar school uniform, only with shorts instead of a skirt and a shorter
trianglar collar.  He had brown eyes and light brown hair and wore granny
style glasses, "Good morning, have you seen your sister?"

"No, I --"

"She's supposed to be starting classes today.  Let's see if Mr. Narumi's
found her," he grabbed my hand and we dashed back the way he came.

"Uh, I," I decided to just tag along as he seemed to know where he was
going.

Mr. Narumi was waiting just a bit further down the path and waved when he
saw us.

"I'm sorry sir," the boy stopped in front of the teacher, "but I wasn't
able to --"

"I see you've found her."

"What?"

"Yuu Tobita, this is Sana Kurata, our new student.  As you can see, she's
not just Mikan's sister, but she's also an identical twin."

"No way," Yuu adjusted his granny glasses, "Pleased to meet you Miss
Kurata.  Sorry about before."

"No problem, no harm done.  I'm pleased to meet you Yuu."

"Well now that we've all met, let's move a little ways off the path so that
Yuu can show you the Academy."

"Yes,"  Again I felt that unnatural urge to please Mr. Narumi and be with
him.

"Could you close your eyes for a moment Sana?"

"Okay."

"And you can open them again."

We were floating a few hundred meters above the school.

"Eeek!  Don't drop me!"  I grabbed Yuu and wrapped myself around him.

"Sana," Babbit popped up, "This is an illusion."

"Yes, this is Yuu's illusion power," Mr. Narumi didn't seem bothered at all
to be floating in midair.

I turned to Babbit, "Are you sure this is an illusion?"

"Yes Sana, I can see you three standing exactly in the same place as a few
moments ago.  I don't see Yuu's illusion at all, but I can see it in your
memories."

"That's odd," Yuu looked closely at Babbit.

"Sana's Alice is a little strange, but now we'll have the chance to make
sure she's propely trained."

"Yeah, that's my Alice, his name's Babbit."

"Pleased to meet you Yuu.  Now Sana, can you feel the ground under your
feet?"

"Yes," I put out a foot and stepped away from Yuu on what seemed to be an
invisible ledge.

"I'm sorry I frightened you like that.  I didn't know you were afraid of
heights."

"Sana isn't afraid of heights," Babbit explained, "So long as there's
something solid under her.  She always asks for the window seat when
flying.  What she is afraid of is falling."

"Well, why don't we continue this tour on the ground Yuu?"

Yuu nodded at Mr. Narumi's request, blinked and we returned to the ground.

I almost stumbled at the abrupt change in apparent location.  Babbit seemed
to be hiding a smirk behind his wing so I banished the little demon.

Yuu motioned with his hand and a table appeared in front of us with a scale
model of the Academy on in.

There was a beep and Mr. Narumi removed a cellphone from his pocket," Oh it
seems that something has come up.  Can you finish the introduction then
show Sana to class Yuu?"

"Yes sir."

"Be seeing you," Mr. Narumi waved and walked off.

I found my arm waving back to him and yanked it down.

Yuu pointed to the table, "The Academy is surrounded by a wall and inside
that is a forest and the Academy buildings are in various clearings inside
that."

"How did they find so much forest inside Tokyo?"

"Oh the Academy's been here a long time.  The Academy is divided into three
schools, the Elementary branch with class A for ages 3 to 9 and class B for
ages 10 to 12.  The Middle School covers ages 13 to 15 and the High School
covers ages 16 to 18."

"No college?"

"Don't worry, they have an excellent placement program.  Alice students are
just about guaranteed to be admitted to any University in Japan.  Now
here's the Elementary dorm,"  The model on the table zoomed in to one
building."

"That's where I stayed last night."

"And then here is the Elementary school proper," The model zoomed down the
path I had taken then zoomed out to cover the entire Academy as Yuu
continued, "And these are the Middle and High schools.  This is Central
Town, which is a kind of shopping mall on campus."

"And what's this?"  I pointed at a small log cabin in the woods north of
the Elementary school as I attempted to lean on the edge of the table, but
I fell into the table instead and landed on my face.

"Oh, sorry about that.  But why would you assume that something that
appeared out of thin air was solid?"

"Of course creations are solid!"  I jumped up, summoned a two-handed mallet
and bonked him on the head.

"Oww! That hurt.  What's it made out of?"

"It's a thin layer of plastic, but it's mostly just full of hot air, like
Babbit.  It's harmless, see?"  I handed the mallet to Yuu.

"This is neat.  So what else can you make?"

"Oh, just things," Crude plastic things like the mallet or Babbit and
nothing to match Yuu's effortless masterpieces.  My things looked and felt
fake or plastic while his illusions seemed to capture details too small to
really see.  I snapped my fingers and made the mallet disappear with a pop
before he could think to wield it against me.

A bell rang in the distance and Yuu looked up from his empty hands, "We'd
best be getting to class now.  I'm the class president and most of the
students call me Mr. President."

"That's so cute Yuu," I glanced at his collar as he passed me then I tagged
along, "So you've got three stars.  Does it go from one to five stars or
something?"

"No, the only higher rank is the special star and there's only one
Elementary student at that level.  He's our branch representative,"  Yuu
looked back at me for a moment then continued, "It's unusual for a new
student to start with two stars.  Did you have really good grades at your
old school?"

"No, not really."

"Then it must be your Alice," Yuu held the school door open for me, "Even
when you were off balance you managed to project an image to talk yourself
out of the problem.  I couldn't do anything like that.  Well, here we are,"
Yuu pointed to a door with wooden sign with the English letter B carved
into it, "Let me introduce you to the class."

As we stepped into the classroom I saw so many strange things that I
couldn't focus on just one.  Students where floating in midair, surrounded
by crude drawings and strange sounds, while others chatted and one gray
haired woman in a student uniform was dancing on a desk.  How many years
had she been held back?

Then it all stopped.  The two floating boys and the one standing on the
wall jumped down to the floor and the images faded away as the entire class
turned to me, except for Hotaru who was reading a book.

"Good morning class," Yuu said, "I'd like you to greet --"

"Two stars!" A green eyed girl with dark green hair that had those silly
curled bangs stalked towards me from the back of the class, "You killed a
teacher and they gave you two stars?  Do you know how hard it's been for me
to get to two stars?  It's beause you're Mr. Narumi's pet, isn't it?  What
did you do, sleep with him?"

"Miss Shoda," Yuu moved between us, "This is Sana Kurata, she's Mikan's
twin sister.  And I'm sure that neither one has slept with older men."

"If you don't count Rei,"  Did I think that or did a boy in the class say
it?

She shoved him out of the way then dropped to all fours as dog ears popped
up through her hair and six long whiskers sprang from her cheeks,
"Impossible!"  She sniffed at the hem of my skirt, "She smells exactly the
same as always."

"I've seen dogs sniff at your leg Sana," Babbit popped up, "But other
girls?"

She fell backwards and sat on the floor, "What's that?"

"That's my Alice, Babbit."

"Pleased to meet you Miss Shoda."

"Don't try to fool me Yuu," She stood up, swept her hand just in front of
Babbit and he popped, "That was solid."

She haddn't touched Babbit, had she?  And he wouldn't have popped from a
glancing blow at such a low speed, so what was wrong with my Alice?

"Like she said, it's her Alice.  This isn't Mikan."

"Have your fun Mikan, but I'm not fooled.  I'll be watching you and when
you slip up you are going to be in such big trouble,"  She returned to
human form, crossed her arms and walked back to her seat.

"That's a strange girl.  Her name's Sumire.  Thanks, wait, are you reading
my mind?  Yes," A boy with a frizzy dark blond afro stood up, "Don't worry,
she's not Mikan, her mind's different.  Thanks for that at least.  Will you
stop this please?"

"Don't worry Sana," A girl with wavy light red hair spoke up, "Yome does
this with every new student he meets.  It's kind of a nervous habit."

"Thanks, uh"

"Her name's Anna.  Anna, is she from Europe or America?  Will you stop
that?  Okay, be that way.  You think you're so special just because you've
got an Alice that can blab out my innermost secrets?  Well I've already got
one of those, so you're nothing new under the Moon."

"You mean under the Sun," Babbit popped up over Yome's head, "Especially as
it's daytime at the moment.  Wait, do I still have to correct Sana when
somebody else is talking for her?"

"Well Son,"  Another Babbit, with a mustache and three piece suit popped up
behind a tiny desk floating in midair, "Your contract does say all verbal
utterances originating from Sana.  It doesn't mention anything about her
saying them herself."

"But she's had a worldwide TV show and millions of people have been exposed
to her errors."

The lawyer Babbit and desk vanished as the generic Babbit sobbed.

"Why can't I feel you telling them to say those things?  Babbit's got a
mind of his own.  But I can't feel that either."

"You can't read animals," Hotaru put down her book, "Can you Yome?"

"Or crazy people and some Alices like yours or Mikan's can block mine, but
Sana's mind is open and there's nothing there."

I could hear Sumire giggling from the back of the class at that last
comment.

"One way to settle this," Hotaru turned around in her seat, "Babbit, what
do you think of that poor blond boy sitting all alone and neglected at the
back of this class?"

"This guy?"  Babbit flew back to a blue eyed blond boy who was holding a
rabbit, "He smells real good."

"Good.  Now Ruka, order Babbit to kill Sana."

"What!  Are you nuts?"  Ruka pointed at Babbit, "Go away."

"Whatever you say Ruka dear,"  Babbit vanished.

"That settles the question.  Babbit is a talking animal, just like Sumire."

"What?  Why you--"

"Okay, let's put Sumire down as a maybe on the talking part."

"How did that boy control my Alice?  Oh this again?  Are you really going
to repeat everything I think?  Fine.  There was a young lady from Brazil,
whose suitors all fell deadly ill.  You're not going to make me say that
one are you?  Go ahead and finish it.  No I won't.  Then shut up.  Okay I
will."

"That was brillant Sana," Anna said, "But what would you have done if he
had said it?"

"Well he'd be the one saying it, not me."

"Oh, you think you're so smart," A boy with a buzzcut got up and started
walking towards me.

"Don't do it Moju."

"Why not?"  Moju turned to Hotaru.

"Sana has a phobia about falling."

"Then why shouldn't I bounce her around a bit?"

"She also has a much stronger Alice than yours.  If her panic response
trashes the classroom then I'll make sure that you fix everything that
breaks."

"Those little bats are stronger than my Alice?  You are nuts."

"Last warning Moju.  Return to your seat now.  You'll get your chance to
bungie her later outside."

"Whatever," He turned back, "I don't take orders from you."

"Let me make one thing clear," Hotaru got up and stood next to me, "This
girl is also my property.  If you think she needs to be punished then tell
me about it and if I think it's warranted I'll punish her myself.  But if
your suggestion is sufficently amusing I'll let you watch," she took her
seat again, "That's enough fun for now.  Let's get class started.  Yuu?"

"Yes miss Imai," Yuu opened the door and said, "Sir, you can come in now."

"Thank you Yuu," A man in his early twenties with glasses and his dark hair
tied back in a ponytail entered, "You are Miss Kurata, correct?"

"Yes sir."

"Please write your name on the blackboard then.  I see we have three
absences today, Miss King?"

"She still has a cold sir," Anna answered.

"And Mr. Hyuuga and Miss Sakura are still missing."

My sister was missing?  What had happened to her?

"Class, we have a new student joining us today.  Her name is Sana Kurata
and as you can see she is Miss Sakura's identical twin sister, though they
were raised separately.  Miss Kurata, could you tell the class a little
about yourself?"

"Well I'm just an ordinary girl.  I was the co-star of the weekly
television show Kodocha, I've been in made for TV movies, I had a single
that hit number fifty on the Japanese pop charts last year and my mother
wrote a book about my life that was the best seller in Japan all through
September."  I looked at the blank expressions on the faces of most of the
students.  I had somehow landed in the one spot on Earth where nobody had
heard of Sana Kurata and it was inside Tokyo.

"Now where should you sit?"

"Teacher, the seat in front of Mr. Nogi is free."

"Yes Miss Imai, she can have the seat her sister used to have before she
moved next to her partner," he pointed at the seat right in front of that
blond boy who had controlled my Alice.

As I walked to the back of the class, I found that Hotaru had returned to
reading her book and the gray haired woman was just a girl no more than a
year older than me, with a youthful face and eyes that seemed to look down
on me from ages of wisdom.  Anna was sitting next to a blue haired girl and
I wondered what country she must be from.  Sumire glared at me and I caught
this Ruka Nogi staring at me, but he turned away and blushed when I caught
his gaze.  I sat down and tought I could feel his breath on the back of my
neck.

The seat next to me was empty, who was that third absence the teacher had
mentioned?

"Miss King," Yome smiled at me.

I turned away from him and looked only at the teacher as he began the
language lesson.

The second session teacher asked to see my ID before begining his lecture
on science.

The third session teacher glared at me then began a lecture on math.  He
wrote down two equations then said, "Miss Kurata, what is the common
solution to these two equations?"

"Uh."

Babbit popped up, "X is 29 and Y is 65."

"I did not ask your Alice Miss Kurata.  Please do not interrupt class with
such displays again."

"Mr. Jinno," Hotaru stood up, "Please accept Babbit as a part of the
class."

"Preposterous."

"Miss Kurata has a learning disability and is severely delusional.  By the
laws governing education in Japan you must make resonable accommodations
for her special needs.  She uses an imaginary friend as a crutch and her
Alice animates it.  It's really no different than allowing students to use
perfect recall or telekinetic writing during class."

"Very well, but I will allow no disruption of class.  Mr. Babbit, can you
write with a pencil?"

"Yes sir."

"Then take Miss Kurata's notes for her."

That was something I hadn't thought of before and I watched as Babbit wrote
for the rest of the class, filling in extra detail for concepts that I had
trouble grasping.  Since this was math there was a lot of those.

There was only one further interuption that class when I caught Babbit
looking back at Ruka.  I poked Babbit on the top of his head with my
finger.

"Is there some problem Miss Kurata?"

"No sir."

When the bell rang the students got out of their seats and headed for the
door.

I caught up with Anna, "What's up?"

"It's lunchtime and we're heading down to the cafeteria.  This is Nonoko,"
She indicated the girl with long blue straight hair.

"Pleased to meet you."

"Gee," Nonoko said, "You've really had it rough today."

"Yeah,"  Anna said, "Hotaru's been really grouchy and bossy ever since your
sister left, but this is a bit much even for her."

We went through the line and collected our lunches.

"How come you two got less than I did?  Are you both on diets?"

"No Sana, Anna and I are both one-stars, so we get less."

"That's so unfair.  I've got plenty so you're welcome to some of mine."

"Thanks, but that's not allowed.  Actually we should go on diets.  You see
Anna is allowed to cook as much as she likes and I'm always helping her eat
the results."

"When I've made a batch of singing and dancing cookies we really do have to
eat all of them.  When they go bad they're a bit much to handle."

"That sounds interesting."

"You're more than welcome to join us.  Anita's been sick these past few
days so we've had to struggle to take up the slack."

"So what is my sister like?  Did she really kill a teacher?"

"Persona wasn't really a regular teacher," Anna looked around then
continued, "He was more like the manager for the Dangerous Ability
students."

"Dangerous Ability?"

"It's a fifth group of students.  Nonoko and I are Techincal Ability
students."

"And I'm Special Ability."

"Just like your sister started out as.  I don't know why you're in that
category.  Most of the students who animate things are considered Technical
Ability.  Well anyway, your sister had recently transfered to the Dangerous
Ability students and one day Persona walked up to Mikan and Natsume and she
had an argument with him.  I don't know what it was about but at the end
she pointed at him, shouted `Die!' and he was disintegrated.  Then she and
Natsume ran off and it's been all hush hush ever since."

"Natsume?"

"Natsume Hyuuga," Nonoko explained, "He's the boy who sat next to your
sister.  He was her partner and trainer and maybe her boyfriend."

"Trainer?"

"When Mikan joined our class, Natsume's gang ran the place and bullied the
other students.  She thought he was evil and he thought that she was naive
and stupid."

"So she challenged him to an athletic competition for control of the
class?"

"Have you heard this before?"

"Just a lucky guess," Actually I had lived it before with Akito.

"So he won and she agreed to do whatever he wanted."

"What!"

"He turned away from his gang and devoted the time he had between missions
to training her.  At first her power wasn't much but she kept getting
stronger and stronger.  So it wasn't much of a surprise when she could kill
somebody with her Alice."

"Do you think Mikan nullifed the molecules in Persona's body?"  Anna asked
Nonoko.

"I suppose it is possible, but I don't know much about the Nullification
Alice, as my Alice is more passive."

"What was that about missions?" I asked.

"The Dangerous Ability students were set up to do missions outside the
Academy, but Natsume never told us what he did on them."

The bell rang and the students all headed back to their classrooms.

I caught up with Hotaru at the end of classes, "Why didn't you or Yuu run
when you thought I was Mikan?"

"That's an excellent question," she smiled, "We all saw Mikan commit
murder in front of our eyes and it didn't change our opinions of her at
all.  What kind of person do you think your sister must be like to cause
that?"

"She must be a very nice person."

"So now you know what your sister is like and what she looks like.  Any
other questions?"

"Her power, she has an Alice that heals and kills?"

"No, that's my brother's power."

"If your own brother has a healing power then why did you bother to sleep
with me?"

"Oh, I'm going to be the one to sleep with my darling big brother," Hotaru
stopped, crossed her legs, leaned her head against her folded hands, closed
her eyes and smiled again, but it wasn't as nice of a smile this time, "No
thanks.  He's a creep and his power can't help with my problem.  Now, why
are you following me?"

"I don't know, where are you going?"

"To my Alice class, with the other Techincal Ability students.  You need to
get to your class.  Look, there's a girl from Special Ability, she can show
you the way."

The girl was slightly older than me with a blue skirt and tie rather than
the red of the Elementary branch.  She had shoulder length redish brown
hair and brown eyes.  She saw me and walked up, "Hi, good to see you're
back.  Have you seen your sister?"

"No, I..."

"Well I guess it's okay for you to hang around with us today.  I hear that
your group is still recovering from that mess you left.  Let's head back to
my group while the rest of me looks for your sister."

I decided to follow along and play dumb, to test Hotaru's theory that the
way people treated me when they thought I was Mikan would tell me what
Mikan was like.  I wanted to ask what she meant by the rest of herself, but
figured that if I asked I would blow this chance.

"This is such a nuisance.  They never tell the new students where to go.
The other groups have plenty of students so they can just follow them
around but we've only got a handful of Special Ability students in
Elementary.  And Mr. Noda's gone missing again.  If you sense him going by
could you reach out and grab him to now?"  We entered another building,
that was slightly larger than the Elementary branch school, "Well, here we
are.  I'm sure that everybody will be happy to see you again," She opened
the door labeled Special Ability group, "Hey gang, look who's come back for
a visit."

A boy of around the same age as the girl who brought me, lifted the black
knit cap away from his eyes and took out the lollypop from his mouth,
"Hello Sana."

"What?" The girl looked behind us, "Where is she?"

"She's right next to you."

"No," suddenly there was two of that girl, looking at me from both sides,
"Way."

"Hi," I waved to the group of Elementary and Middle School students, "I'm
Sana Kurata."

"Pleased to meet you Sana, I'm Tsubasa Andou and those girls who brought
you here are Misaki Harada.  As you can see her Alice is a lot like yours."

"Oh", I looked at the two Misaki who were studying my face.

They turned to Tsubasa, "How did you know she wasn't Mikan?"

"Sana has two stars.  Mikan still only has one, if she isn't demoted again
when they finally catch her."

"Pleased to meet you Sana."  "So, you have an Alice like mine?"  Another
Misaki appeared, "You can make multiple copies of yourself?"

"Not quite," A Babbit popped up in front of each Misaki, "She can make
multiple," "copies," "of," "me."  "This guy's name is Babbit."  "And he's
Babbit also."

"They're illusions?"

"No, they're solid enough.  Go ahead and grab them."

"Oh, this is interesting," the three Misakis grabbed the three Babbits, "We
have students who can summon solid things."  "And students who can animate
things."  "But the only other student who does both is me."  "And I only
make more me."  "How many of these can you make?"

"More than I can count," I looked around at the decorations, food and
drinks, "Is this a party?"

"Yes," Tsubasa waved a hand at the other students, "We're a small group in
a big school so we stick together.  We all want to meet you."

"In that case," I closed my eyes, "Why don't I meet everybody all at once?"
When I opened my eyes again there was a Babbit in front of each student.

I grabbed a glass of punch and a slice of cake then went around the room as
the Babbits each introduced me to the student they'd been talking to.

An hour later as the party was breaking up Misaki walked over to me, "Can I
show you back to your dorm?"

"Sure, if you don't have anything else to do."

"That really isn't ever a problem, since I've always got enough me to go
around.  That's some amazing control you've got there.  What sort of
meditation do you use?"

"Meditation?"

"You know, the duct tape to hold your mind together after you split it into
a bunch of parts and then sholve them all back into one pile at the end."

"But I don't split up my mind."

"I saw your Babbit puppets talking with a bunch of different students at
the same time.  How could you possibly keep track of all of that?"

"But I don't.  That's just Babbit."

"Don't you see what he sees and hear what he hears?"

"No.  But if he finds something interesting he'll pop up and tell me about
it, when I need it."

"So you don't just remember everything Babbit does?"

"No, but he remembers what I do and when the Background Babbit is awake his
memory is one hundred percent accurate.  Otherwise his memory of what
happens to me is no better than my own."

"Background Babbit?"

"That's what I call it.  It never speaks to me, but I can feel it in the
back of my mind.  It used to be a struggle to have even one Babbit at a
time, but one day the Background Babbit woke up and now I can just think at
it when I need some Babbits and it's all handled offstage.  When I want
objects I can just create them myself, but Babbit's actions are complex so
I need the help."

"You can create objects as well as Babbit?"

"Sure," I summoned up my Babbit styled keyboard and sang, "Sana used to be
a star, but now she's just an ordinary, uh, Special Ability Student."

"That's astounding."

"No, it sucks.  Usually I do better at coming up with lyrics."

"I mean that you can create something so complex so quickly."

"It took me months to come up with the design.  At first I had it float in
midair, but I get a better touch response by wearing in on a strap.  It's
just a thing, unlike Babbit, so it just sits there unless I play it."

"You said you had a TV show?"

"Once a week, just after class."

"That explains why we haven't seen it.  Only a fool would skip Alice class
to go watch TV,"  Misaki stopped when we heard a sneeze from the Elementary
dorm, "That sounds like some cold.  Well, catch you tomorrow," She waved,
wavered, then vanished.

A robot was waiting inside the door, It had an egg shaped body with metal
accordion style arms and legs, "Welcome back miss Sakura.  Correction, you
are miss Kurata."

"Uh, hi?"

"My name is Takahashi.  I am the matron of the Elementry school dormitory.
Please obey my instructions as you would obey the instructions of the
teachers.  If you strongly believe that my instructions are in error you
may appeal to any teacher, but they are usually very busy so please do not
bother them with trival matters."

"Did Hotaru make you?"

"While miss Imai's intentions are quite extraordinary, I am almost as old
as she is.  I was created ten years ago by another student who now works
for a major Japanese company.  I am not allowed to divulge anything further
about my creator.  Let me show you to your room."

"Thanks, but I've already seen it."

"I am sorry that I was not available last night as I was taking care of a
sick student."

"If she's that bad then why isn't she in a hospital?"

"While the Academy's hospital is the best facility in the world for
treating Alices, the best treatment we can offer for the common cold is bed
rest and proper nutrition and our students can receive these with the least
stress in the familiar comforts of their own rooms.  Do not be alarmed as I
have taken care to disinfect myself since seeing the student in question."

"Do you mean Anita?"

"I am not permitted to divulge health details on specific students without
permission.  Here is your room.  Dinner will be served in thirty two
minutes and fifteen seconds in the cafeteria on the ground floor at the
north end of this building."

"Yes, I went there for lunch..."

But Ms Takahashi was already walking away.

==============================

To be continued in chapter two, part B.