"Neo Negima"

"Dancing On The Void"

By Sweet Heavens

Chapter 6: Rock And A Rolling

Disclaimer: If I freaking owned Negima I would also have created Love Hina and if that were the case Mutsumi would have been with Keitaro. I may be a masochist but come on! At least Mutsumi was gorgeous!

Member of "Otaku Town"

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For things to be doing on a Friday night, Negi had a hypothesis that dangling one hundred feet in the air above a busy road whilst illegally modifying a top secret imaging system with weather best described as like raining cats and dogs had to be somewhere low on the list of optimum things to be using your rare free time with.

Negi had a great view of the world tree from where he was hanging from. The green leaves, lit up by powerful spotlights glistened like his state of the art stealth suit, a black mesh number weaved in magi tech fibres designed to refract light with balaclava and night vision goggles sold separately that hugged his entire form and kept the worst of the rain off. But it didn't keep the cold at bay and he was frozen, shivering in fact and it was impeding his task at hand. For god sake his fingers were going blue! Why didn't he just tell Shiori to spend the extra two grand to install the atmospheric array? He was regretting telling her at their last budget meeting to try and skim some off their expenses account.

Anyway he had to focus on the task in front of him and ignore how cold he was feeling. He was currently holding his position to the slimy sandstone wall with his feet and it was an arduous task even with the gravity plates on the soles of his shoes. Down below him were a mass of people going about their daily lives and ignoring the alleyway he was hanging above from, his pitons from his abseiling gear were dug deep into a precariously looking ledge above him. Some were running from the downpour, others tried to beat the water coming hard down on them by using buses or hailing cabs while others looked to have brought umbrellas or simply ignored what was only a splash of harmless liquid and took it like men.

It must be nice for them to have a choice as he had no say in the matter. Negi needed to keep still, the delicate and complex illusion spell he was constantly updating every three minutes as it had told him to do in the scroll needed him to stay as still as possible around the torso region or it would risk flickering and allowing parts of his aura to leak for inquisitive magi to take note of or worse a mundane would see him. The tricky incantation was making up for the fact he couldn't activate the stealth mode of his suit because the hybrid electrical/magical energies that were needed to form a secure invisibility field would register on the panelling of the transmitting device he was tapping into, a pair of blue tubes that flickered on and off in regular intervals and set off a silent alarm.

The imaging relay station, one of nearly three hundred across the city with over two hundred backups was part of what Negi now knew to be called the City Observation And Control Centre or COACC for short the main monitor for which he had seen in Mahora command centre was only a small structure that dangled off the side of a bakery shop that was going through its rush period despite the less than favourable weather with teenagers and out of class students being the most numerous. It was a small thing, no more than two metres across and four metres wide and it had this barrel shape to it that would make it stick out like a sore thumb if it didn't possess a stealth function of its own. Negi had exposed the waterproof circuitry (modern wonder organic circuits) and was cannibalising it slowly while at the same time scanning it with his portable multi spectrum scanner that doubled as a biological scanning device should the need arise. The little device was no bigger than a pocket watch but its holographic display acted like the permeable force field keeping the circuitry he was tinkering with dry when it didn't ripple when water droplets dripping from the ledge above him passed through it.

"And the third band of the security system should be deactivated now Negi," Shiori said into his headset that in turn transmitted to the receiver in his ear canal. Negi scanned over a piece in his hand with a rod like shape with several grooves and was happy with what his read out told him. He carefully clicked it back into place with its three brothers and the entire area inside it began to hum ominously.

"Yeah I think I adjusted the shift compensator right Shiori. What now?" Negi asked. His hand never stopped scanning the entire inside of the tricky defence system these damn modern Valkyrie machines had as standard. He had been at this for twenty minutes already and was slowly getting fed up with the repetitiveness of his action since he had already done this ten times already over the last six hours. The way they were designed created an unprecedented fashion making standardisation something all mundane industry thrived on didn't exist here and Valkyrie created every single transmitter that little bit different each time meaning he had to be talked through the process with Shiori each time and twice he had nearly set off an alarm. Worst of all was the four times a patrol of the Mahora defence force had passed over him, two of which had that bitch they dared call a class president that had not stopped hounding him since the first day of school with them making him have to stop work and engage the cloaking function of his suit so no sharp eyed mage detected the magic he was using for the illusion.

It was getting infuriating and if this rain did not let up anytime soon, if it dared toget any worse or he got another prolonged delay from mishandled mechanical parts or another surprise patrol he would be looking for new businesses to buy his toys from. He hated to admit that he only liked Valkyrie's marvellous creations when they didn't work against him.

"Now you can attach the transmitter and activate its receiver," Shiori instructed.

Negi opened up a hidden pocket on the front of his mesh shirt, pulled out a tiny thimble sized device that he squeezed slightly so a red light would flash on top and clipped it to the blue flickering tubes. He tapped his ear to briefly activate a microphone transmitter, which was seriously struggling to function with the roaring torrent of rain crashing down all around him to hear the little piece of hardware he had just placed inside beeping to indicate the test signal was activating. He absentmindedly watched the 3D image of the section he was working on the scanner and apparently it was still going to plan.

"Are you receiving the signal?" He ran his scanner over the COACC terminal one more time to make sure no security protocols had been tripped and seemed to relax when nothing untoward was detected. He reset the system parameters by tapping the holographic display and it went to standby mode, the default setting spreading its scanning range to full to encompass a full distance of nine hundred metres in all directions and slipped it into his shirt.

"I am receiving the test signal," Shiori said with relief clearly in her tone. "You can finish up."

Negi carefully placed the components he had taken out back into their correct positions then twisted a section of the barrel shaped mechanism counter clockwise and listened to the hiss from the metal plating retracting over the exposed mechanical innards. The mage pressed a hidden button on top of the newly covered section he had been working on and it shimmered as the cloaking device was reactivated leaving nothing but bare masonry.

The black clothed student peeled his left sleeve back to reveal a miniature control panel with a display of his whole body. He tapped a few keys and Negi turned on the optical camouflage. His whole body became the slimy stone wall, rope and pitons included and he triggered the recall command. He obeyed the insistent tugging of the ropes and Negi was soon ascending with ease onto a flat topped roof.

"I have returned to the rooftop." In front of him the roof was bare. It was not in use as the flat square tiled top was mossy and would have been slippery if the gravity plates on his boots were not still active even if they made him feel twenty pounds heavier. He liked to use them for power walking when he felt inclined to exercise. To make sure he was not disturbed Negi had erected an aversion charm on the only access point, a set of rusty emergency stairs that you could not see if you were a normal person. "What is next on the list?"

"Well the next stop will be…," Shiori started to say, reading from the scanned map Negi had e-mailed her last night but an insistent beeping stopped her in her tracks. "That will be Gaia," she stated patiently, the girl had more than enough practice over the years to let the demon have her way. "You better answer her."

God he hated the telepathic interference Mahora city was putting up all around here. Outside of official frequencies all telepathic channels were like listening to a poorly tuned radio unless it was close ranged. He was reduced to giving a butter fingers succubus with a natural sense of carefree bordering on carelessness expensive equipment which he could almost prophesise he would need to repair by the end of the night.

"Change to channel beta," he ordered.

There were a few moments of nothing but the heavy rain lashing down upon him his trusty servant said anything. "Master," Gaia whined.

"What is it?" Negi said, biting his lip to stop the sigh that threatened to come forth. That whiny tone had better not be about the rain. The last four transmissions on their radios had been about the weather and how it was ruining her hair, her clothes, her eyebrows etc basically any excuse to get out of doing her share of the labour and you know what made it worse? The damn things she complained about could be fixed with a tiny spark of her power.

"It is nearly nine. We promised Kotaro-kun we would go see his band play tonight."

Negi took a deep breath and slumped against the ledge of the roof. He had totally forgotten about that damn promise. The damn canine hanyo had been harking at him like a harpy for three days, the entire time he had been here about his latest gig at some club nearby. Negi had prepared for the evening in question and left some clothes at a nearby train station. He had the key to the locker around his wrist!

"Change to alpha channel," he ordered. "Shiori?"

"Yes Negi?" she said faithfully.

"Do we," he sighed when the damn beeping resumed from Gaia, the demon he had dared put on hold while she was having a whining fit. "Do we have enough transmitters for you to build a network within the Mahora COACC system?"

"We might just have enough transmitters to cover the entire city," she said, holding the last word while she checked on her end, "Yeah we will have it working at around eighty percent efficiency but it will be enough if we piggyback and use the remote interlinks on each transmitter to compensate. All I need to do now is build a new CPU to handle the dedicated servers' encryptions and we can use the COACC whenever we want without Mahora detecting us. I will also be able to monitor anyone when I am done that that uses the system suspiciously you know like a spy within Mahora for Seijou and register their log in details."

"Well done Shiori," Negi complimented, imagining the excited look she would have from Negi treating her so well. She was like a little puppy eager for praise and it was one of her many favourable traits about her. "When can this be done?" Negi asked kindly. He turned down the volume of Gaia's incessant beeps or cries for attention as he liked to remind himself.

"Three days I should have it all built if I run a rush on delivery for the parts I will need."

A sudden surge of inspiration hit him. "Would it take longer for you to build in a program that could search and compile any loose information they have on Seijou and Cosmo Entelecheia?" Negi was especially curious about the latter. These rebels mattered little to him outside of his current parameters within Mahora city. He was working with "neutralise on sight" mentality in regards with his mission. The sooner he finished, the faster he could take off the restraining collar around his neck and go back to his mission. And lessening his chances into bumping into the bigger sharks in the pond Seijou were associating with would be nice too.

"No it shouldn't," Shiori said with her usual happy tone. He could imagine the blush on her face from the way he spoke to her. In fact she always blushed when they were making pleasant conversation. That was just Shiori. That pleasant naiveté of her was what made him love her so much.

"Then use the green account and pay for swift delivery. Conscript a legion of demons from the defence force to help you if need be just get it done as soon as possible please Shiori."

"I'll get right on it Negi," Shiori determinedly stated. "I will not stop until it is finished even if I don't sleep for three days."

"Don't overdo it but thanks love. I will speak to you soon." He added absently, "Love you" before ending the transmission and changing channels. "Sorry about that Gaia. We can go to the gig now. I forgot we had made that promise," he pacified her well enough as no whining came despite his little trick with the radios.

"Will you buy me a glass of wine to say sorry?" she pouted. She was so easy to read at times like now when she was practically advertising her desire to get out of the rain as she liked to put up more of a fight than this. Gaia being agreeable always carried an ulterior motive. Mind you Negi likewise grabbed gleefully at the excuse to get out of the rain.

"It's a mundane place where the age limit is twenty and I can't walk in with a glamour spell on since we are meeting Kotaro's band mates." Gaia was stopped in her tracks from rebutting when he concluded with finality in his tone that left no room for argument. "So no you can't have any wine unless you plan to buy it yourself."

"No fun," Gaia declared, "I will meet you at the station then."

"I will be there in ten." Negi deactivated his radio and then began dismantling his abseiling gear. It took some time to clean up the evidence of his tampering of city property requiring spells to cover up the holes made by the pitons on the upraised ledge, an incantation to scatter any stray magical traces from the broken illusion spell and a scrubbing wind spell to remove any exterior traces on the various spells that maintained and hid the COACC terminal.

He needed to avoid letting the dean be aware that he suspected someone within Mahora city was a spy working for the other side for many reason such as he may know about the spy already and was running a counter operation already that Negi might compromise by advertising his suspicions in any forum the spy might have access to. The other was simply with his limited understanding of the dean Negi could not be sure the old man might not take offence with Negi suspecting his people of treason.

It was a bitch working behind the old man with the super powers back but this was why he was being so secretive and doing something so unorthodox never mind illegal and death sentence worthy thing like bugging the most sophisticated tracking hardware in existence. There was an unusually high concentration of omnyou practitioners making Shiori's snooping into the Mahora personnel files pointless since she had nothing to go on with how far she had broken into their firewalls and going any further took the risk of detection and the dean getting pissed at him and Negi did not want to provoke that old man. Shiori had tried to tap into the COACC system before but the girl had almost blown up the entire Sanctuary mainframe from the dedicated programming code Mahora city employed being so incompatible. It was another lovely feature of the deviously intelligent Valkyrie Corporation.

Negi once done with his work pulled off his balaclava and night vision goggles. His long red hair quickly began to stick to his face from the heavy downpour. The red head knew he had little time left so the mage snapped off a cancellation incantation for the aversion spell on the stairs then with a cartwheel jump over the ledge he plummeted to the empty alley below where an extension of his magical barrier head him off to the rubbish covered pathway below to slow his fall to a crawl.

The mage paid careful attention to look like a normal pedestrian by concealing his balaclava and night vision goggles under one arm ahead of Negi slipping into the night crowd, switching off his cloaking device as he did. He behaved like a typical teenager on a weekend, a strangely dressed one but normal enough that he ran through the sidewalk, splashing puddles in his haste to get to his destination without receiving much attention from the public. Negi ducked, weaved and once nearly dived through the congested walkways, earning scowls from the less energised middle aged people, giggles from love sick teens off to karaoke or whatever social activity they had planned and even got a ticking off from a passing traffic cop when he jaywalked across a busy street with a cab rank until he could spot the station up ahead.

The main train station in Mahora city reminded him of a grand old monument that had hit hard times like a Victorian era piece with white washed pillars, a grand marble staircase and an old fashioned ticket office with adjoining automated ticket machines and an alcove that sat the blue foot lockers he was looking for that had been renovated from where the toilets used to be judging from the faded kanji lettering the whitewashed ceiling failed to conceal. There were rail workers in their fancy dress uniforms and caps looking to be helpful and one of them nodded to him when he passed regardless of his unusual attire to open up his locker with his key hidden in his sleeve and took out a holdall. Looking around and feeling like a exhibitionist for a short time, Negi squashed that feeling down hard by distracting his thoughts by whacking another of his infamous aversion spells, commanding it with the instinctual need for all mundane people in the station to never look at the foot lockers and then as casual as one would use a hairdryer the red haired mage used the wind to dry his hair.

His suit came as a one piece so he stripped down to his boxers in one movement and put on a white shirt with a high collar that went well with his dress trousers and jacket. He artfully made up his hair, ironed out any creases with his shirt with another simple wind spell and then put on his leather jacket. Negi slipped on his boots and then dumped his working clothes into his locker and secured it safely with another aversion spell, this time to stop people robbing from it better yet for weak magical entities they would be going anywhere near it.

Negi was just about to slip on his designer motorcycle leather jacket when a wet pair of arms wrapped right around his muscular waist. A mess of wet silver hair nuzzled his shoulder and made a groaning sound of contentment he swore he only ever heard before from Shiori when they were "busy". Negi rolled his eyes, hell it was his standard response with this being as she had deliberately kept the wet look probably to make everyone stare at her soaked see through clothes and get a snack on her way here.

"Hello master," Gaia enunciated into his ear, taking the moment of course to blow on his earlobe. She leaned her bust into his back and dug her delicate equipment into his waist.

"Did you do your quota?" Negi enquired, turning round in her strong grip and stare into her green eyes. He returned her hug briefly to appease her and make her let go. She had chosen attire similar to his uniform and wore her equipment pouch with her scanner and radio headset sat nice and tight across her hip. He had to bite his lip to avoid giving the succubus an aroused reaction to her wet look or Negi wouldn't stop hearing about it all night.

"I did every site on the list Shiori told me to do," Gaia said with her deviously arrogant smirk. "Did I do good master?" Negi collected her equipment belt and examined it for damage. Just as he suspected he took note of a crack on his spare circular scanner, sighed loudly at her blatant vandalism before giving up on handing her a lecture on respecting the tools of his trade and just stuffed it into the holdall and shut the blue door. He tapped his pockets, looking for his keys and wallet until it was thrust in front of him by his faithful ever helpful demon.

"Thank you," Negi said dryly, taking his things back and then clipping a new friend to a set of two keys which marked his motorcycle key, dorm room and now his locker key. He checked his wallet for missing funds and then remembering his cell phone was in the inside pocket Shiori had specially added to this jacket and quirked an eyebrow when it was still there when his light fingered demon had extracted his wallet and keys without him noticing.

"I want to get to the gig! I want to meet the band! I want to…" Gaia was suddenly silenced by a gesture of his hand. She frowned at him and then pushed away his hand to continue her rant. "Can we just go now please?" She started dancing like she had ants in her pants that made her look more like an agitated child needing the bathroom instead of the adult form she was wearing.

Negi chose to bite back a retort and instead removed the aversion spell keeping people from looking at the foot lockers and gestured for her to get moving.

"Move," Negi ordered. The girl demon giggled jovially and took off still looking sexy with her rain soaked clothing.

"You like that spell way too much master," she chided flirtatiously, wagging her index finger. She ducked into a darkened alcove and changed into a red mini skirt and black top with a cut in the middle midriff. Her height rose two inches from her insane heels but she did put on a leather jacket to match her master.

"If it works," Negi shrugged, zipping up his jacket. "Ladies first."

"Thank you," Gaia said with a sway of her hips. She was back in her usual groove; her whole aura seemed to light up and with so many commuters in the station blatantly staring at her back in her element. Negi fell into line close behind with his hands in pockets trying to look inconspicuous but he was getting a fair number of stares as well from the usual crowd of school girls. To achieve maximum impact for the attention seeking demon she put her arm around the poor mage much to his dismay and grabbed an offered umbrella from a balding middle aged businessman in an expensive looking suit. The reason he was so willing was no doubt a blatant manipulation of his emotions.

Negi and Gaia sheltered under the black umbrella close together down the main street. Kotaro had shown Negi how to get to the small underground club in person the previous morning and since they had time before the band were scheduled to perform his succubus appeared to want to make their trip through the biggest shopping district and entertainment complex into a date of sorts. They window shopped, took a look at what movies were playing at the multiplex and had a blazing argument about why his succubus could not browse a lingerie shop that ended up with a tug of war regarding his wallet and only served to get them wet again and the need to buy a cheap new umbrella when Gaia in her infinite wisdom struck him in the head with their old one so hard his individual barrier actually registered the stress impact.

Their final destination took them in a dank little alley with the smell of fish to greet them. All around them was a number of small walkways that fed into a grid of private parking garages for staff cars to the various businesses they served. It was all the same except for the distant sounding thrum of hard rock music next to an underground stairway manned by two unhappy meaty bouncers with pocket lights. As they got closer to the source of the noise they could just pick out just underneath street level a flashing sign stating the name of their club "Icicle" in bright neon blue.

"Kotaro plays at the best joints," Negi commented sarcastically, holding his nose from the smell. "I can only imagine what bad venues he used to play in."

"Maybe his debut was at a public bathroom master?" Gaia japed, tightening her hold on her master, "Or a fish farm?"

"Sorry guys but we just stopped people going in," meat head one said apologetically upon the pair approaching the bouncers. It came out like a seasoned guard dog barking at a cat.

"Look my buddy Kotaro said he was going to let us in." Negi ignored the second meat head's dismissive snort. His partner was speculative until he took the three seconds to check a clipboard he was carrying with soggy paper.

"Name?" he requested.

"Negi Springfield and guest," Negi recited as drilled by the hanyo ten times back in the dorm.

"Code word?" the meat head with the clipboard asked.

Did the dog boy tell him a code word? He had been tuning the guy out while reading some archive footage from the Sanctuary database uploaded onto his laptop. "Gaia what was that again."

"Its doggie," Gaia said, giggling in his head. "He only told you like nine times master."

"The code word is doggie," Negi said. "Kotaro told me to be here."

"Your name is here sir," meat head one agreed, "Go on in." Meat head two encouraged them quickly down the slippery stairs and opened the door for the pair to bombard them with the sounds of solo guitar playing a song he knew from heart including the words…

"Fuck we are so late," Negi mumbled. The aspiring guitarist was not going to be happy with Negi. It was all the damn dog talked about when Negi couldn't tune him out when he was doing his homework, researching information that he was allowed to have from the Mahora city archives or from third party sources and keeping Gaia out of the kitchen. He had only shut up about the damn band watching him read a book to erect some enchantments around the dorm room similar to the ones Negi had built painstakingly at home with his blood as a focus. The mutt added some paper talismans for variety sake and the end product was pretty secure or at the very minimum nobody was going to drop in during the night anymore.

Gaia said something as the stage came into view up front but was drowned out by the thunderous music. The stage was on the lower of two levels with the entrance of the club leading to a balcony with a cubby hole for a bar and place to buy your tickets.

"I doubt he'll be able to tell in this light," Gaia said to Negi mentally like she had been repeating herself a few times. The lights were deliberately few and dim just to keep everyone but the focus, the stage with a topless Kotaro having his little solo with his eyes closed to grab the most attention.

Kotaro Inugami was jamming away on his guitar frantically, the crowd that were all head banging to the song he was singing. The guy was really into it and putting on a good show, filled with his inner passion and moody lyrics. The dog boy had a single spotlight following him when he prowled across the stage with girls screaming out in ecstasy. Negi was enjoying the drums and the awesome bass guitar booming alongside its main star, the parts he had not heard until now, the melody of the booming bass winding and weaving with its friends guitar and drum kit but without it losing its way or being drowned into obscurity.

"Who would have known Kotaro-kun played with such an awesome band," Gaia sighed mentally as she approached the stage next to a woman who stood out in a bad way with a fancy white dress with long blonde hair and a haughty demeanour that reminded him to much of the iincho from hell. Negi paid for the tickets, bouncing his head to the beat to pay the entrance fee to an equally entertained goth girl in black everything from her obvious dyed hair, pouting midnight lips, spider silk thigh height skirt and torn black blouse revealing her ebony bra. It contrasted sharply with her ivory skin. "I love music from this era. I can't believe I once thought Beethoven would be the definitive expression of your species art."

With the way Gaia acted, adapting with the times as if she was born into this timeline, Negi forgot sometimes that she had been around for millennia. But sometimes with dropped comments like they had been around yesterday about famous dead people, long since departed on to the next world for centuries Negi was reminded of how old she was. He had always wondered if his sense of time was barely the sneeze in the bigger picture of this demon and the life she would probably treat like an eternal pleasure cruise with the odd battle in the middle for excitement.

"I much prefer old rock music myself," Negi chortled, standing next to her on the balcony looking down. He had ended up bamboozling the goth girl at the counter so Gaia could eagerly take her glass of wine to his own cola with ice that earned him a kiss on the cheek. He was abstaining since being in Mahora meant being on the job at all times so no boozing for him. Negi would celebrate the completion of this mission with a bottle of his uncle's fresh spring wine. "But this stuff isn't bad either. Nice and moody and it seems to suit Kotaro."

The song came to a climax with a drum solo from a young girl, probably fifteen or sixteen like him with short brown hair tied into a ponytail and beaming brown eyes. Her outfit played to her considerable physical fitness and bust size by being tight as hell. A denim skirt that rid up so you could see her blue striped panties when she kicked the drum pedal and a top that was barely a step away from a washcloth on her stacked frame. Kotaro was playing right beside her as she took the centre of the stage by storm with a lit cigarette dangling from her mouth.

Kotaro approached the microphone centre stage; sweating but happy like someone who had just came out of the gym. It was hot inside the underground room but the sweaty masses were hollering and cheering. The blonde girl next to Gaia was exhibiting unusually possessive actions, kind of like jealousy as she tightly held onto the brass balcony hand rest as if any one step from the girls below to try and touch Kotaro would be dealt with lethal force.

"She is seriously jealous master," Gaia told him excitedly, "I could feed off her all night and her personality wouldn't change one bit." It was fortunate the lighting was extremely poor since her eyes would be all black from the feasting underway. What Gaia was describing was unusually rare. Humans were ambivalent contradictions of emotions, feelings and sensations at all times lacking the ability to stay in one specific feeling as our complex and individual feelings rendered each individual unique. Why one brother from one family could be a hedonistic blasphemous sinner while another brother a simple church going, god fearing puritan. To feel one emotion so intensely made him suspect that this person was the girlfriend Kotaro had spoken about reverently like a minor god was draping his arm.

"Engage her in conversation and find out if she is dating that dog. I want to meet the girl who can manage to keep him to one woman."

"With pleasure," Gaia declared, her gossip mongering skills were coming into their own. She turned round, did that posh trick she knew where she swirled her wine and tasted it like a professional wine taster, a skill she picked up in Italy during the 1700's. It got the out of place rich girl's attention and Gaia began to whisper during the intermission with her new blonde friend.

"Well guys this will be our last song," Kotaro announced to an orchestra of disappointed moans. "But the last song will star our very own idol Akira Okochi!"

What stepped out forward to a plethora of applause was the most beautiful girl he had seen all night. She was tall, slender and built like one who belonged in the sea with a carpet of black hair that ran down to her knees. She wore her long, strapless red number that paid attention to what she was packing out front and slithered its way down to her waist, hanging over with black pants and proper boots. She was decked out in piercings and gave that smouldering stare that stole your breath from you. He caught her eyes, winked and the girl didn't even stop to reflect before returning the wink with a blown kiss. Kotaro had caught the interaction as he gave him thumbs up in his general direction.

"Not to take you away from your blatant cheating on poor Shiori," Gaia said, speaking rather loudly, "But may I introduce you to Kotaro's girlfriend, Yukihiro Ayaka-san."

So it turned out Negi was correct. The girl in question bowed slightly with a refined manner about her that he had before mistaken for being haughty or stuck up. She was a bombshell, a distinguished beauty from up front and personal like an angel trapped in the bowels of hell. Ayaka was the white purity against the darker stained colours of the crowd enjoying the show and performers playing on the stage. She even had a little handbag that could barely hold her keys and cell phone, the picture of the spoiled rich princess rebelling with her choice of boyfriend.

Negi took her dainty hand and shook it firmly. The girl eyed him up closely in all probability making a first impression then shook his hand back. The music started up again by then, the bass guitar commencing the last song with a deep, mellow beat.

"My name is Springfield, Negi," he greeted with a smile, raising the volume of his voice as the drums from the smoking chick kicked in, "I am your boyfriend's new roommate. It is nice to meet you."

She just seemed to relax with the polite introduction. "He has told me about you and your sudden transfer to his high school. It is nice to meet you Springfield-san."

"Call me Negi," Negi exclaimed, spying the bass guitarist properly, a retiring sort of mouse with an attitude since she had her eyes closed and like the drummer a cigarette dangling from her mouth. She was tiny, fragile looking thing but the way she was bashing her cowgirl boots into the floor you could sense a quiet sort of intensity that suited her entirely. She had aquamarine coloured short hair that just caressed her neck in length and her clothing screamed of a hardcore goth. Her top had a devil on the front with swear words in blood red, her skirt was down to her knees which her red striped knee socks overlapped to her boots but it was the frilliest thing he had seen with ruffles and the piercings! She had a chain piercing that clipped to the top and the bottom at the lobe of her ear on both sides, two studs on her nose and when she was doing her brief solo she was displaying the glittering silver on her tongue like her mouth was the inside of a clam.

Then the tall girl began to sing and Negi just lost his sense of the world, ignoring the dog's lady friend to listen in closely to the virtuous but dirty velvety tones that came out of those rouge lips. He developed tunnel vision where people, places and reality blurred except for the junior or maybe high school singer singing. He was reminded about something called a Yamato Nadeshiko he had read in a Japanese guidebook before he had even came to Mahora city in preparation for the Library Island job. Akira Okochi was the pinnacle from his knowledge of that principle.

"Master," Gaia scolded, "That was not nice ignoring Ayaka-chan like that."

"Hello this is Negi's brain talking. I'm not in right now since I am listening to the hot chick sing so please leave a message after the tone." Negi's flippancy earned him a dig in his ribs. He ignored it and was struck again only this time with enough force to send him staggering almost over the edge. Gaia did not look amused at him when he turned to scowl at his petulant demon servant but the blonde woman had a sense of humour unlike a certain other blonde who eerily looked eerily alike Ayaka about his attitude as she was smiling at the way the mage was being scolded for his shenanigans.

"Master," Gaia gasped telepathically.

"I didn't mean it," Negi lied poorly. His demon rolled her eyes, making sure Ayaka saw what she was doing who laughed and bared pearly white teeth."I am sorry Yukihiro-san. I kind of…"

"Don't worry about it,"Ayaka shouted at him when the musical chorus kicked in. The bass and guitar were staring at each other face to face blasting out their hard beat while the tall Akira did this impressive choreographed dance routine."Everyone likes to listen to her when she is performing. Half of the guys here came to see her and Akira-chan is my classmate. I'll make sure to introduce you to her after the show."

Negi must have made his feelings clear about how much he would like to entertain that idea with the latest stab into his ribs from his demon spilling wine on his jacket. "Master," Gaia warned, "Remember Shiori?"

"I'm hardly going to take her back to my room," Negi deadpanned, "I am allowed to admire beautiful women." Negi nodded his thanks to Kotaro's girlfriend and went back to listening to the song that finished a minute later, Akira's voice entrancing everyone in the underground club.

"Are you finished staring at her?" Gaia said disdainfully.

"What worried?" Negi teased. He had been looking a bit more than usual but it was hard not to. He had heard sirens with less enchanting voices than this woman. She had real talent, a proper singing voice like one of those Hellas maidens who sang at their traditional solstice festival who spent their entire lives living pure and untainted lives in the belief they were being examples for the rest of their people.

"More worried about you," Gaia said. "Your emotional energies are saturated in ways that do not bode well with me or Shiori." Gaia's words made him unsettled. He had only been enjoying the show, Kotaro had a great ass kicking band playing music he really liked to immerse in and the highlight was their lead vocalist but succubi understood the human minds in ways man even with magic to aid them had come to understand. The mind, the vessel of the soul was still a great mystery in how it worked exactly.

"I do hope you are not implying I am that way inclined towards her," Negi whispered into her ear. "I will not forget Shiori or our deal Gaia," Negi scathingly added. He beamed at the inquisitive blond and as usual it removed any tension from Ayaka. "We are just having a tiff."

"Well if you two have made up maybe we can go since they are finished now so do you want to follow me backstage?" During their argument the band had packed up and disappeared somewhere backstage. The back wall of the stage, dark from the way the lights aimed at an angle that didn't shine on it turned out on a closer investigation to be a heavy curtain. A new band spilled out of the hidden backstage, a boy band with strange haircuts and gold piercings on their eyebrows.

Negi stepped down the stairs, feeding past a steady stream of people who were standing on them to look at the stage with Gaia leading the way while tightly holding his hand. A brief feeling of guilt dripped into his conscious and Negi squeezed her hand painfully back to show his grievance with her shameless tweaking of his feelings. Ayaka in her heels lagged behind a little until Negi offered his other hand, knowing it was a bit too intimate a gesture for a Japanese woman who was raised more formally but the girl took it with a little almost indistinguishable blush as she took it.

"You might want to let her lead," Negi chided, "Since she knows where we are meant to be going."

Sufficiently corrected of her mistake, Gaia stopped to let Ayaka take the lead who took the passing apology when she passed Gaia and into the mob below that were moshing to the sounds of heavy metal. A member of staff spotted the blonde woman that wasn't hard considering what she had chosen to wear and made a path with his boulder shaped torso into an area with a well hidden back door spray painted "Backstage" in neon green. The man used a card key around his neck to open the door and ushered the trio inside.

Backstage was like staring into the sun. The sudden bright lights and the white walls nearly blinded Negi and he missed the journey to the door to the dressing room, even nearly missed the dressing room door but experience had told him to remember where he had turned left or right until he had a sudden need for the bathroom.

"Well here we are," Ayaka said cheerfully.

"I need to use the bathroom," Negi half said, half asked. Ayaka giggled and pointed down the hall for him.

"Second right," Ayaka directed. "Just follow the signs for the emergency exit and you cannot possibly miss it."

"Thank you and please go on without me," Negi said assuring them both. His first meeting with the pretty singer could wait. Gaia was frowning again but let go of his hand and Negi noticed his hand was all red from how tightly she had been grasping him.

"Don't be long," Gaia hissed to him. The girl did not like being separated from her masters. It was apparently a well founded fear as five of her previous masters/mistresses died when they were out of her sight. Negi waited until she stepped into the room with cheers, second hand smoke and a happy sound from Kotaro before going on his quest for the bathroom.

Negi found it easy enough. He followed the signs for the emergency exit as instructed, checking his red hair and clothes on a mirror he passed. Negi reflected on Gaia's warning and anticipating the meeting with the singer with much relish when he was all cleaned up and did his business. The teenager was just about to open the bathroom door when he was stopped in his tracks by an explosion coming from the open emergency exit he had ignored in his haste to pee.

Some frantic shouting occurred and more explosions rattled the walls, cracking the plaster ceiling with acrid smoke belching into the hallway. Negi blew the smoke back outside with a blast of coned air, pushing his personal barrier completely forward with enough power to block an anti-tank shell and ran to the source of the noise. When he got within range of the door some sort of missile flew into his arms.

It was an older woman, willowy tall compared to Akira's tall muscular form with broken coke bottle glasses. She had the same length of hair as Akira but she had a more homely look with two strands, one on both sides of her hair and she wore more modest attire in a green turtleneck sweater and blue jeans. Scattered around her were several of those paper talismans Kotaro used only torn to pieces.

"All I ask for is one night off," Negi commented. It was just typical for now of all the times for Gaia to be missing. Who was beating shit out of a talisman user? Was it his lucky day and his first encounter with Seijou were to be scheduled for tonight? Or was it those Cosmo Entelecheia bastards… No he was letting his imagination run wild and his adrenaline levels started to rise in anticipation of such an explosive encounter that would shake the very foundations of this city. But these days the once mighty group that had made such a big bang in the last great magical war were reduced to church mice unless in isolated regions where no regional armies could get to them. This was way out of character if this was Cosmo Entelecheia causing the situation.

Negi gently put her down and decided to wait for what was coming because surely somebody had to hear that explosion. His magic started weaving around him, physical reinforcement magic made his body stronger; his unconscious loaded a delayed barrage of darkness arrows in line with the stance he made to pounce forward.

The wait began and like an awkward moment between strangers meeting for the first time it hung in the air like sitting in a freezer butt naked. It tensed every muscle like stone, making him twitchy when nothing happened until finally to his glee almost at getting to hit something a darkly dressed masked shadow man jumped into the hallway with a shundo to meet Negi's super sharp reactions. He focused a darkness arrow lined jumping spiral kick to the side and a barrage of magical arrows that converged on his left palm that blasted the shinobi as they were called in the database article Negi had read on them like a torpedo not so dissimilar from the way the woman that had speared into him out into the back alley. In pursuit of his first potential lead Negi did not forget to secure the woman in case this was an internal thing between members of Seijou by flaring his aura for those sensitive to it to sense it. But it was unnerving how nobody had come to investigate that noise at all. He took time to postulate, performed some basic magical tests too with no conclusive results to find out why until his distracted memory recalled that the girl from her build and the amount of shredded papers could be most likely one of those incredibly rare talisman users, again something he had read from the database the dean gave all his operatives access to when they worked for Mahora who exclusively used these imbued foci in battle.

Negi decided she was unconscious enough not to be a threat to him right now and exited the club into pitch black. The rain had stopped but it was cold outside from all the puddles. He quickly orientated where he was according to his environment which was a large back area used for storage or deliveries. Instead of seeing where his prey was he followed the groans to a spread-eagled ninja with a red hole in his shirt making Negi think he had wounded him badly until he discovered it was only red mesh.

(Latin) "Rastel Maskil Magister, Heaven's voice, blow ill fortune upon the sinners that dwell within your domain. Render body free from soul and shake the foundations of the living. Frost god's shivering breath." A blast of freezing air hit the enemy's body and Negi was sure now that the person was unconscious. He ran his hand over the body from knee to shoulder and ice began to materialise until the enemy was entombed in six inches of frozen water.

Negi secured the area with yet another aversion spell that covered the entire back lot. It was still dark until a light started glittering from the back door where the sleeping beauty that had careered into him was standing there, a wisp of fire around her body. She was still dazed; her cracked glasses looked to be goners but she was not alone.

Kotaro stood with his arms folded and glaring at the shadow man Negi had locked up in a binding of ice while his sexy and enigmatic Gaia was looking frenetic and much less like her usual special self towards Negi like she wanted to run over to her master and embrace him and make sure he was unharmed but she was holding the wounded talisman user over one shoulder. Negi could guess she wouldn't hesitate to drop the spectacled woman if the need was great enough.

"Are you alright, master?" Gaia demanded. "We found Kotaro-kun's friend unconscious in the hall after I felt your aura flare."

"Why didn't you hear the explosion?" Negi asked curiously.

"We felt a rumbling in the dressing room but that always happens when someone is stamping on the stage," Kotaro said, lighting a cigarette from his shirt pocket. He took a puff and exhaled, "But I heard no big bang and my ears can hear a pin drop."

The mystery was not some paranoid fancy of his. He could only trust it was a one off with no magical means of suppressing noise was spotted by his earlier spells. He examined the scene, seeing only way out of the boxed in compound using what the new lighting present. Negi could make out blast marks and the leftovers of more tattered paper. In one corner he could actually pick out a clump of paper at the other end… Negi reacted without thinking, shundo'd and heel kicked the bundle of soaked paper, hitting a solid mass that did not react to the strike suggesting he was dead.

"I killed one of them before the shadow man hit me," the mystery talisman user declared smugly, "They just jumped me while I went out for some air waiting for Kotaro in his dressing room. I merged an explosive to that origami ghost's chest and at that range he should be dead." A drop of the fire broke off from its larger mass and levitated over to where Negi was standing and indeed all he could see was blood and gore that hadn't spattered everywhere suggesting the poor bastard had imploded.

"So who are you then?" Negi asked, not liking the way she enjoyed killing this guy. She reminded him of a proud cat that had just killed a bird and presented it to their master. His angry voice must have startled her and this sent his intent spiking to make the woman freeze and her smug smile turned into a trembling lip. "Are you with us or with them?"

"Gaia told you she is my friend and I can vouch for her Negi," Kotaro declared, moving in front of his friend, "Her name is Chigusa Amagasaki and she just goes to university here. She is with the shinmei-ryu, our side!"

"Master, please behave yourself!" Gaia coaxed gently, "The woman might be arrogant but her heart is pure."

Chigusa looked irked at Gaia's description of her person but was cowed from Kotaro shaking his head. It seemed the woman was a talker who let her mouth flap dangerously.

"My name is Springfield, Negi," Negi introduced as he relaxed his stance. "It isn't the best of times for us to be acquainted but I need someone to contact the man in charge tonight. I can't recall who that is."

"It is Seruhiko-sensei so it's cool," Kotaro said pleasantly, taking out his phone from his pants pocket. He typed in a number, mouthing he could not use telepathy without a specific talisman he didn't have on him at that time and rang out. "Seruhiko-sensei," Kotaro greeted, "Yeah we need a body grabbing squad in the parking lot for the Icicle. Yeah and we need a retrieval team for a shadow man. Make sure to phone Gandolfini-sensei especially for this. Yeah he has wanted to interrogate one for a long time and who caught him? It was Springfield Negi-san, employee type special contractor number one two three beta gamma. Yeah I know he will go crazy it was Negi I know. See you later. An aversion spell is already up to keep the crazies away so take your time. We'll head back to the dressing room so my band mates do not catch on to anything or start asking questions. Yeah I'll get a report from Negi later. Goodbye." He hung up the phone.

"So who is this Seruhiko-sensei guy?" Negi asked. He thought he had memorised the list of staff he was supposed to know already but it seems one had fallen through the cracks.

"He is a good guy who teaches elementary school kids and is a bit more laid back than Gandolfini mind you Seruhiko-sensei doesn't lead one of the nightly patrol teams and special operations units. We better…"

Negi didn't catch the end of whatever the mutt had said because with a sharp kind of pain to his temple, the magic user sensed his aversion field collapse; his instincts told him to dive for cover before a squelching noise from say the blood spattered skull of the shadow man exploding tore through the air. The mage who got back to his feet using only his shoulders and Gaia handing Chigusa to a startled Kotaro immediately searched the skyline, locating on Negi's end four possible areas where a shot could have been taken. There was no point in checking if their captured man was alive or not. A headshot was a kill shot.

"What happened?" Chigusa screamed. Before Negi could stop her, the frightened woman threw some more of those pieces of paper up into the air. They met together then the paper split apart creating a stream of purple energy like lightning from each talisman with one remaining where they had converged to act as a circuit. While she did this she mumbled a very long incantation until the beams of energy vanished but Negi could sense a barrier thick enough to buy any magically inclined warrior enough time to teleport the hell out of there long enough that no traces of would have dissipated. "We're safe now. We are sealed in a dimensional disturbance that doesn't allow…"

"We could have tracked them down," Negi growled, "I am capable of high speed aerial assaults and so is Gaia." Negi enclosed the dead shadow man with a wind field and pulled upright just as Negi encased his hand in a layer of non reactive dark matter to keep the evidence from being contaminated to pluck out a bloody super thin bullet cased in some kind of brown metal. It had small rectangular ridges all along its jacket and a burnt out silver circle like a spell breaker on the tip, just like the explosives he liked to use on heavily shielded objects.

"What is that master?" Gaia asked, examining the object closely, "Is it some kind of bullet?"

"If I had brought my multi spectrum scanner I could tell you precisely but," Negi's roving eyes spotted some markings near the end and aimed them into the light Chigusa's fire stream was still making, "It has a serial number but the company logo is burnt off not that matters since we can probably track down where it was manufactured and who it was sold to. I am guessing its some kind of spell piercing bullet using something like my magical dissipaters do to make an opening in defence fields at high speed to let the bullet travel through to its target."

"You can add this to your report but dude Akira-chan is waiting to meet you man," Kotaro said light heartedly, giving Negi more than enough reason to drop this for now. Any findings would be given to him by the dean anyway on request.

"Why are we still hanging around then?" Negi carefully slipped the bullet back into the poor dead shinobi's head, took one more look around the rooftops hoping in vain to still see the sniper who just added a new twist to the puzzle. From what the Mahora intelligence database emphatically stated Seijou was a small, underfunded terrorist group with ideas above their means to implement them. They were an ideology with an extremist movement but they didn't have the funds to buy sophisticated magi-tech. Cosmo Entelecheia did have the resources to supply Seijou but what Negi knew of them contradicted that argument. Cosmo had fingers in many other pies than just Seijou but they tended to offer passive support like information and the occasional operative to help them on operations that would be impossible otherwise but never equipment that could be traced back to their nests.

"Master?" Gaia queried with concern. She put her hand on his shoulder and made the red haired mage look at him. Her black feeding eyes sampled deeper beyond the surface in a transparent attempt to find out what he was thinking from his emotions.

"It's okay," Negi assured, pushing her hand away. "Let's get to the party. We can't do anything else right now."

They would head back to the party and enjoy themselves. When they got to the dressing room the party was back in full swing. Akira met Negi and Negi met Akira where they hit it off as friends almost instantly when Negi broke the ice by singing the first line of her song badly with a saucy smirk that she luckily took for poor humour. Gaia would later recount it as possibly the worst day of her life as Negi practically left her to her own devices. They would drink (not Negi of course) and the mage would find out quite a lot of things, not the least that the shy, socially awkward Ako seemed to be half feline with the way she cuddled up to Akira and almost purred when intoxicated. Akira didn't drink but was chatting to Negi about school, managing to balance that and trying to calm Ako down.Chigusa turned out to be a drunk that always passed out and Ayaka demonstrated how to control a horny Kotaro Inugami when she threatened to cut off his penis with her fingernails when he tried to grope her while under the influence of half a bottle of vodka.

Not once would the circumstances of this evening cross his mind. The great mage's mind was occupied on other topics but in the future not so long from now he would regret not locating the source of that bullet, he would lament his slowness in reacting as to why he didn't work swiftly on the case.

No he would wake up the next day in his own room alone with the pleasant memory of making the acquaintance of Okochi Akira.

XreviewX

Sorry to rush the ending there, the chapter was running a bit long but that scene didn't really matter as you will all see a bit more of Akira Okochi in the future. Now when do I include her ladyship Evangeline? I have put it off for a bit. Care to help decide if now or later will do? Oh yeah thanks to Maneyan awesome Negima writer that he is for some help with the end of this chapter!