‘Hm, yes. Why don’t you keep it?’ Mitsuko said.
‘What?! I couldn’t!’
‘You could and can. You think it’s short on you? Imagine it on me.’ Apparently, Melissa did as Mitsuko asked, because her cheeks reddened. ‘I seem to recall that I bought the wrong size. Or maybe I thought a robe which barely covered my dignity was a good idea. Either way, it fits you better and you look good in it.’
‘But–’
‘No buts.’
‘I think it’s thinner than the red one,’ Nava observed. Mitsuko flashed her a glare which probably meant something like ‘You weren’t supposed to mention that.’
‘Thinner?’ Melissa asked, frowning. She looked down. Her frown deepened. Then her cheeks got redder.
‘We’re all girls here,’ Mitsuko said quickly, ‘and you’re just out of the shower. Take the robe, Melissa Connelly. It’ll give me more room to buy one that fits me.’
Melissa’s fists clenched and she stood there trembling for a couple of seconds. Watching her was kind of a nail-biting experience: would she or would she not? ‘I am going to be adult ab-bout this, Mitsuko T-Trenton. You s-saw me n-naked in the b-bathhouse.’ She was losing it and she paused to gather her resolve. ‘I thank you for your lovely gift. I would be honoured to accept it.’
‘In that case, I think we can dispense with the formality. Please call me Mitsuko. No, call me Suki. My friends call me Suki.’
Nava had been granted the privilege the night before, sometime just after Mitsuko’s second orgasm, if she remembered correctly. It was a relief that she would not need to keep using the formal form of address in front of Melissa from now on. ‘The robe does look good on you, Mel,’ Nava said. ‘You have nothing to be ashamed of.’
‘I’m not ashamed,’ Melissa said quickly. ‘I’m shy. Please, Suki, you must also call me Mel, if we’re friends now. You wanted to practise your speech?’
‘Yes,’ Mitsuko said. ‘I really should give it one more read through…’ She waved Melissa to take a seat beside Nava and then paced for a few seconds as she collected her thoughts. Then she turned to her very small audience and opened her mouth to begin. She closed it again and frowned.
‘Is something wrong?’ Nava asked.
‘I was always told that, if you are nervous about speaking in front of an audience, you should imagine them all naked.’
‘Really?’
‘Yes. It has to be the stupidest advice I’ve ever heard.’
~~~
Courtney was on the stage of auditorium one when Nava arrived with Mitsuko and Melissa. The SSF captain was watching a couple of students as they went over the lectern for any signs of tampering. She glanced at the trio and then went back to watching the workers, though her commentary was clearly meant for Nava and Mitsuko.
‘They’re from the Magitech Club. Two of the best technicians they’ve got. I couldn’t find anyone with demolitions experience, but these two’ll know if there’s anything out of place in here. And I got a couple of people who can cast Sorcerer’s Eye to check the cabling void under the stage.’
‘You still haven’t figured out how they got the device into auditorium two, so you’re taking no chances here,’ Nava said. It was not a question; she was summarising her thoughts and figured Courtney would object if she was wrong.
‘That about covers it,’ Courtney said. ‘We’ve been over the security recordings millimetre by millimetre. There’s no way someone got that bomb into that podium without being seen. And yet, they did.’
‘C-could they have t-teleported it in somehow?’ Melissa asked.
Courtney looked around at the timid redhead, who appeared to shrink on the spot. ‘Not an easy trick to pull off, Melissa Connelly. It would take someone with pretty impressive skills to teleport an explosive device into another object with that kind of pinpoint accuracy.’
‘Oh w-well, I’m s-sorry–’
‘On the other hand, they couldn’t have done it any other way either, so we checked the magic sensors. All the cameras are fitted with sensors to detect quintessence surges. The original idea was that it would be used to spot problems quickly by alerting security to impending magical arguments.’
‘Went off all the time?’ Mitsuko asked.
‘Whoever thought something like that would work in a magic school was an idiot. So, the automated alerts got turned off, but the data is still recorded. Normally, we ignore it due to all those false alarms, but there was no sign of anything like translocation magic being used in auditorium two prior to the meeting. So, Melissa Connelly, nice try, but no, they couldn’t.’
‘I believe I could have planted a device there,’ Nava said. ‘It’s extremely difficult to detect invisibility effects without specifically looking for them. Your terrorist was probably invisible.’
‘You can cast– You know, I’m just not going to ask you things like that anymore. I’ll just assume that you can cast every spell in the databases and you can correct me when I’m wrong.’ Nava opened her mouth to object, but Courtney just kept on speaking. ‘Invisibility is a possibility I can’t discount. It might explain how the sniper got away from me after the first attack too.’
‘There’s nothing in here that isn’t supposed to be, Courtney Martell,’ one of the two techs said. The other was busy bolting the access panel back onto the lectern.
‘Thanks,’ Courtney replied. She turned her gaze toward Mitsuko. ‘Now it’s up to you not to die on stage.’
‘Thank you,’ Mitsuko replied with a small grimace. ‘I’ll try to get to the end of my speech without the need for life support.’
~~~
Nava had read that people had once expressed their displeasure with political candidates by throwing rotten fruit. It was better than rocks or bullets, she supposed. Mitsuko appeared to be in no danger of getting her dress soiled by tomato juice, or blood for that matter. No one had even thrown an insult thus far and she was wrapping things up. Nava kept watching the audience anyway,
