When James arrived at the PMC table, he was surprised to see Mitsue already there ahead of him.

  “Are you thinking about joining?” he asked.

  “I have already signed up,” Mitsue said, handing a form to the older teenager in a white uniform sitting at the desk. The teen looked familiar to James, but he couldn’t quite place it…

  “Are you related to Midoriko-senpai? Suki asked, and the resemblance clicked into place for him.

  “Ah! Yes! She is my older sister,” the youth said. “I am Shimoyanagi Yoshiki.”

  “Ikari Suki,” she responded. “This is my boyfriend, James St John.”

  James thought she might be overusing the boyfriend word, but he couldn’t find it in him to object. He returned Yoshiki’s bow.

  “You should join as well,” Mitsue said. “As Professor Toei suggested, being allowed to carry a weapon openly would be quite useful.”

  “I don’t think he used those exact words,” James said, giving Mitsue a bit of side-eye. He knew for a fact that Mitsue was carrying about two swords’ worth of metal weapons on his person. And Suki didn’t let the fact that she couldn’t carry a sword openly stop her from producing one at a moment’s notice.

  He made a note to ask her later, exactly how she did that.

  “I’m still getting used to the idea of a club that just hands out swords to students,” James said. “No offence,” he said to Yoshiki.

  “None taken,” Yoshiki assured him. “That would be foolish. We only award a sword to a student who has proved himself through rigorous training and testing.”

  “I’m not sure I want to spend the entire three weeks on this,” Mitsue said. “I was hoping I could bypass at least some of it, with Midoriko-senpai’s recommendation?”

  “You’ve trained with Onee-sama?” Yoshiki asked. “Well… we’ll have to see what she says. It might be possible. What about you, St John-san? Would you like to sign up?”

  “Can I think about it?” James asked.

  “Of course, but training sessions start in a few days,” Yoshiki said. “Starting late would put you… wait. You!”

  Yoshiki dashed out from behind the table and lunged at a student who was passing by.

  “Eek! Help! Someone call the PMC!” the girl he had grabbed shrieked.

  It was Harue.

  “I am the PMC, miscreant!” Yoshiki yelled. “You’re the one who’s been putting up these posters!”

  “That’s not true!” Harue wailed. She thrashed and struggled in his grip, but curiously displayed none of the strength that James had seen when she dented armour plate with a punch. “No one saw me do it! You can’t prove anything!”

  “Stand still, girl!” Yoshiki roared, and Harue meekly obeyed. Yoshiki took a deep breath.

  “You’ve been caught red-handed,” he growled. “There’s a stack of posters under your arm right now.”

  It was true. The wad of photocopied posters was greatly reduced from the ream that Harue had been showing off at breakfast, but it was still substantial.

  “That’s because I’ve been removing them whenever I see them, as is the duty of every well-behaved student,” Harue said reasonably.

  Yoshiki’s eyes narrowed. “If that were the case, then you would have thrown them in the garbage,” he said.

  “I couldn’t do that!” Harue protested. “I was collecting them as evidence, which I was just about to hand over to the PMC! When you accosted me!”

  Yoshiki took another deep breath. They were beginning to draw a crowd.

  “Are you not,” he said carefully, “The Kuzahana Harue whose name and phone number are written on this poster?”

  “Well, yes,” Harue said. “I made the original poster and submitted it to the Student Council, following the process to get it placed on the notice boards.”

  “Then—”

  “But I didn’t photocopy it!” she protested. “My submission is still with the Council! Someone on the Council must have decided to sabotage my application for a new club!”

  There was a collective gasp from the crowd.

  “That’s a serious accusation…” Yoshiki said weakly, trying to take control back.

  “Who else could have done it?” Harue demanded. “Check my library card, you’ll see that I haven’t used the photocopiers!”

  Her voice wavered. “I was just trying to minimise the damage, but I got accused of the very crime that I was trying to prevent!”

  “That’s not fair!” someone called out from the crowd.

  “Well, uh—we’ll take your statement under advisement,” Yoshiki said quickly. “I’ll confiscate—um, collect— this evidence and we will get back to you with the results of our investigation!”

  “Don’t let them cancel Idol Club!” Harue called out, and a few voices in the crowd took up the cry.

  “Idol Club! Idol Club!”

  “We’ll look into this as a priority,” Yoshiki promised. With a sick look on his face, he grabbed the stack of papers and rushed off, leaving his table unattended.

  There was a cheer from the crowd, which Harue gracefully accepted.

  “Whoo hoo! Idol Club!” she shouted, jumping and waving her hands in the air. Seeing that the show was over, the crowd started to disperse. Harue jumped again, turning in the air to face James and Suki.

  “Hi, guys!” she said brightly. “How’s your club day going?”

  “Good!” Suki said, speaking before James could get his brain into gear. “There certainly is an eclectic group of clubs here.”

  “Ready to sign up for Idol Club yet?” Harue pressed. “I’ve signed up three people so far, I just need one more to put the application in.”

  “What—What was that?” James finally managed to say.

  “Oh, you mean my unjust treatment at the hands of the law?” Harue said, grinning. “Shocking, isn’t it? Signs of corruption in the institution!”

  “I have applied to join that institution,” Mitsue said mildly. “I’d appreciate it if you didn’t commit any obvious crimes in front of me.”

  “No one saw me do it,” Harue said with a wink.

  “We all—” James lowered his voice and looked around to see if anyone was listening. He didn’t want to get Harue in trouble, even if she deserved it. “We all saw you with those posters this morning!”

  “Aw, you’re not gonna tell on me, are you?” Harue said, batting her eyes at him.

  “No, but you definitely put them up, no matter how stealthy you were. Why did you—” James stopped, the realisation hitting him. “You walked past Yoshiki deliberately, didn’t you? Practically waved those posters at him. Why?”

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  “Well, the thing is,” Harue said, turning serious. “It’s all about the First Rule of Idol Club.”

  James held back his response, sensing a trap. Mitsue, though, had no such concerns.

  “And what is the first rule of Idol Club?” he asked.

  “The First Rule of Idol Club,” Harue said, “is that everyone has to talk about Idol Club.”

  James groaned. Suki considered the statement thoughtfully.

  “I suppose it is a good rule for promoting the club,” she said. “And to answer your question from earlier, I suppose I will join your club.”

  “Yay!” Harue said, pulling out a pen and a sign-up sheet. “A bit more enthusiasm, though? I can get Kana to make five if you don’t want to.”

  “It’s fine, Suki said. “I was hoping to join a more traditional performance club, but there doesn’t seem to be one.”

  “Yeah, I heard the music club got shut down last year,” Harue said. “Something about too many members? Or too much screaming? I don’t know.”

  She turned around to let Suki brace the paper on her back. “It’s gonna be so much fun!” she exclaimed.

  “I’m looking forward to it,” Suki said. “Do you want to keep looking at clubs?” she asked James.

  “Yeah, let’s,” James replied. “They can’t all be that crazy.”

  “Then we shall take our leave,” Mitsue said. “Perhaps I can supervise Harue while she removes the remaining unauthorised posters.”

  “Didn’t you hear?” Harue said. “I almost got arrested for doing that!” Laughing, she let Mitsue drag her away.

  “Excuse me, James St John-san?”

  James turned to see who had addressed him. It turned out to be a male student. He was wearing the Aramara uniform, but looked too young to be a high school student.

  “Um, can I help you?” he asked.

  “Yes, I was hoping you would escort me to the Occult Club presentation room.”

  “The Occult Club?” James asked, looking in the direction that Harue had gone. “I don’t actually… know where that is,” James said, confused.

  “Oh, I know where it is,” the young boy stated. “It’s just that I’m very small, as you can see.”

  “I can see that,” James said slowly. “Are you actually a student here?”

  “I was brought forward a year,” the boy said, matter-of-factly, without any obvious pride. “And I’m not very athletic. My name is Miyamoto Sora, by the way.”

  “Nice to meet you, Miyamoto-san,” James said automatically. “Do I need to introduce Ikari Suki-san, or do you know who she is already?”

  “I am very pleased to meet you both,” the boy said, bowing. “As I was saying, I am very small, and I’m concerned that without a larger boy behind me, I will get swarmed and crushed by the throng when we get there.”

  “Why do you—no wait, how do you know about me in the first place?” James asked.

  “I know many things,” Sora said. “Which is the answer to your other question as well. Will you help me?”

  “I guess? We were going to check out the other clubs as well, but… why?”

  James didn’t think he was that big. Bigger than Sora for certain and larger than the average Japanese teenager, perhaps. But he had noticed a few kids here who were taller than him.

  Sora gave him a small smile. “I thought we should meet as soon as possible,” he said. “And putting myself in your debt means you’ll be more likely to seek me out when you need to. And I really don’t want to be trampled.”

  “What’s that supposed to mean?” James asked. He looked at Suki helplessly.

  “I suppose we should expect a member of the Occult Club to be mysterious,” she said.

  “That’s exactly right,” Sora said. “It’s this way, can we go?”

  “Fine,” James said. The three of them started walking in the direction indicated. “So what does the Occult Club do, anyway?”

  “Do you not have them in America?” Sora asked.

  “Maybe in some schools, but not any that I’ve been in,” James said. He looked at Suki.

  “My schooling was decidedly non-traditional,” Suki said. “This is my first school.”

  “I see,” Sora said. “Well, an Occult Club exists to promote the interests of the club members… which tend to be wide-ranging. My own interest is in divination methods, for example.”

  “Like fortune telling, astrology and stuff?” James asked. “Does that even work?”

  Sora paused before answering carefully. “For some people, it works some of the time,” he said. “The trick is finding the right person, and finding the right time.”

  “Isn’t that the same as saying some people get lucky and make a correct guess?”

  “Many see it that way,” Sora agreed. “But luck can be quantified. What lies beyond that enumeration… that is what occultists seek.”

  “Uh-huh. What other… interests are there?” James thought back to what the Fundamentalists back home ranted about. His parents hadn’t been much for church, which fit with what he now knew. “Um, demon summoning?”

  “It’s not common, but there’s always one teenager in the club trying to summon a succubus,” Sora said.

  “Do they ever succeed?” Suki asked.

  “I haven’t heard of any successful cases, no,” Sora replied. “Another common interest is reports of cryptid sightings.”

  “Cryptids?” James asked.

  “It’s a generic term to refer to all kinds of supernatural beasts and intelligent creatures that prefer to stay hidden,” Sora said.

  “Oh, so like—” Don’t say Kitsune or Dragons. Or Vampires. James thought, “—Ghosts and goblins and such?”

  “And such,” Sora agreed, smiling widely. “There are countless examples from both Western and Eastern folklore.”

  “I guess… so there are sightings?” James asked. That makes sense. It’s not like any of the cryptids I know make much of an effort to conceal themselves.

  “Oh, many sightings. Most of them are discredited, but there are a few that can’t be easily dismissed… Ah, we’re getting close. Brace yourself.”

  James could see their destination now. A table draped in black cloth with embroidered silver pentagrams. Flickering LED candles. The table was blocking the entrance to a classroom that the club seemed to have been assigned. James could see a poster with I Ching hexagrams and strange kanji printed on it stuck to the classroom door.

  As they approached, the door was flung fully open, and a female member poked her head out. James could tell she was a member because she was wearing a loose black robe over her school uniform. It looked cheap, like a bad Harry Potter cosplay.

  “He’s here!” she shouted, looking at Sora. “He’s really small!”

  Suddenly, black-robed cultists—er, students—we pouring out of the room, shouting and screaming things like “The Chosen One!” The first few clambered over the desk, but it was soon pushed aside by the tide of eager teenagers.

  Sora made a frightened eep sound and hid behind James. The wave of students crashed against James. Not literally, no one ran into him, but they dodged to the side or fell back as if they had.

  “A gaijin beast-king!” one of them shouted.

  That’s just rude, James thought. He was about to say something when a girl started shouting at the crowd from behind.

  “You idiots! Stop crowding him and get back inside!”

  Everyone started shouting or running in circles. “Ah! Ah! The mistress is displeased!” was one of the cries he could make out. Before too long, at least before James could make heads or tails of what he was seeing, they had disappeared back inside the classroom, leaving just the shouting girl remaining. She wasn’t wearing the same robes as the others, but she was wearing a tall, pointed black hat with a wide brim.

  “Hey, sorry about that,” she said. “Miyamoto Sora-san, I presume?”

  “Yes,” Sora said, bowing. Introductions were made. The girl introduced herself as Laurent Yumi.

  “Laurent?” James asked.

  “My father is French,” she said. “Everyone gets all sorts of confused about which way to put my name, but either way, you’re not going to confuse my family name with my personal one.”

  She looked behind her, into the classroom.

  “You can come in now. They’ve calmed down, somewhat.”

  Sora gave a sigh, squared his shoulders and marched forward. James followed. He wasn’t really interested in the club, but he was a little worried about letting Sora go in there alone.

  He needn’t have worried. All the cultist students were sitting on the floor. When Sora entered, they all raised their arms up, shouting, “All hail President Sora!”

  Yumi handed Sora a club sign-up sheet on a clipboard.

  “He hasn’t signed up, but he’s already the President?” James asked.

  “There was a vote,” Yumi said.

  “Okay, but why was he even on the ballot?”

  All speaking at once, the cultist students tried to answer him.

  “Yumi told us to!”

  “It was prophesied!”

  “We obey the Mistress!”

  James looked at Yumi, who seemed irritated by the chorus. “Why are they all doing what you say?”

  The chorus tried to answer again. This time they were more unified, most of them going with, “She’s a witch!” with only one calling out, “She has a pointy hat!”

  “Sorry about these doofuses,” Yumi said. “They’ve gotten overstimulated by the thought of new members. They’re not normally quite this crazy.”

  “If you say so,” James said dubiously. “So are you the vice president?”

  “Oh, no, I’m just a… consultant,” Yumi said. “We don’t have a vice president.”

  “I thought club positions were required?” Suki asked, speaking up for the first time in a while.

  “President is the only mandated position,” Yumi told her. “You have to have at least three more, but they don’t have to be the default ones. Most people do, but these guys… see for yourself.”

  She took back the clipboard from Sora and flipped over a few pages to show James and Suki the club’s officer list. President was there, but the rest of the positions were difficult for James to read.

  “I don’t know all these kanji,” James said. Suki studied the list intently.

  “They are quite rare,” she said. “I believe this first one is Grand Wizard of Light and Darkness?”

  At Yumi’s confirming nod, Suki continued down the list. “I believe this one is Keeper of the Unseen and Esoteric Tomes.”

  “We keep a library,” Yumi said. “It’s mostly old magazines.”

  “Um,” Suki continued. “Guardian of the Lustrous and Blasphemous Tokens?”

  “Treasurer,” Yumi said shortly.

  “Then this one must be the secretary. Scribe of Secrets Both Eldritch and Profane.”

  “That’s me!” one of the students cried, jumping to her feet. She was wearing a black eyepatch, James noted, like at least three other students there.

  “Well, that certainly is very interesting,” Suki said, handing the clipboard back. “But I think we must be going now.”

  “You’ll be all right?” James asked Sora.

  “I’ll be fine, now. Thank you for your help,” Sora said. “Oh, and some advice as a thank you.”

  “Advice?” James asked.

  “Hmmm. Don’t worry about the bomb, it’s too small to hurt anyone, not even Matsuri. And Harue can handle the octopus.”

  “Uh, what? That doesn’t make sense.”

  “It will when the time comes,” Sora said. “Until then.”

  James was going to say more, but two of the cultists jumped up.

  “The President must speak to his people now!” one of them yelled. “Unbelievers must leave!”

  The other tried to get between James and Sora, holding his robe up to block the view. “Booga booga!” he shouted.

  “Is that supposed to frighten me?” James asked, but the unnamed student just kept babbling. “Fine, I’ll go,” he said.

  The cultists closed the door behind him. James and Suki stared at the poster covering the door for a moment.

  “Well,” Suki said. “That was odd.”