Sleepless Nights (5)

"Mii chan? Why aren't you asleep yet?"

Fuuka asks, concerned.

Mizuki who had just bolted into her body a second ago jumped a bit as Fuuka taps on her shoulder. Like getting spooked while daydreaming.

"Ah yes M-mom! W-what is it... did you need my help with anything?"

Her

"Listen Mii chan, I know this has been tough for you... but if you're having a rough time, you can just share with me, okay? I don't mean to punish you, I'm just very worried about you"

Fuuka explains, hugging her daughter.

"No Mom, I got it okay! You don't have to feel so bad about it. I understand, really!"

"Then why do you look so tired... so sad... were you... crying last night..."

Fuuka asks, concerned.

"I... what?"

Mizuki's even more confused.

"No no like I'm telling you I'm doing fine! You can go rest in your room now!"

She said while desperately pushing the woman out her door.

"I guess it can't be helped. Just go to bed, I'll take you out in that form again. She won't see us"

"Daisuke san?!"

Mizuki reacts to the voice entering her head, luckily the reaction also happens inside.

"Stop! stop! stop! Can't we wait until after my mom leave?!"

"No time for that, our thief is here!"

He explains, brief but urgent.

"Get on the bed!"

While her mom is still worried and actively observing her, waiting for a response. Mizuki just abruptly jump over to her bed face down. As her face touches the pillow, Daisuke in his SP form follows behind her, pushing Mizuki's astral body forward as she lands. They both went through the floor and pushes over some stuff in the kitchen directly under. Strangely enough, they still interact with the physical material around even if only for half the effects.

Hearing the noise downstairs, Fuuka can't help but rushes down to check out what's going on.

"What's-?! you stay here Mi chan!"

Still surprised by Mizuki's sudden action but also too protective to ignore the strange noise, she head down alone.

Meanwhile, Daisuke and Mizuki's already outside, on the chase for the thieving ghosts.

"You found our criminal?"

Mizuki curious.

"Let's just say, they found us. Or rather, our trap"

He flashes a proud grin.

They arrived at the location and find several toddler sized goblins, riddled with eyeballs throughout their body, struggling to move around inside a thick misty area. Mizuki observes closely the mystifying substance trapping them in place

"These are..."

"Yes, the spray we've been using throughout the neighborhood. It's not too sticky to trouble our movement but just thick enough to cause our little friends some delay."

Daisuke explains. He then hands a few palm sized bottle to Mizuki.

"Now help me bottle them up before they escape"

"I guess those spray weren't completely useless"

Mizuki slightly impressed

"Ack! Though the smell is still just as bad..."

She gags as she approaches them. Seeing her come up close also agitates the goblins, they started to growl and struggles even more violently.

"Idiot! Don't make any sudden movement, you'll scare them!"

Daisuke warns.

But she's way too focused on their strange look to hear him. Each eyeballs lodged into their skin shivers and rotates the other way as she bring herself closer. Their stature resembles that of a toddler, but with the complexion of anything but human. From gray to bluish to green, they come in various colors. Their eyes glowing in the dark, their teeth gnarled and yet razor sharp. Ready to bite at whatever comes close, though only half of them are that aggressive. Every one of them carrying bags of stolen coins.

As she's too busy investigating their odd appearance, she forgot to trap them inside the ghostly prison Daisuke gave. Enough time for one of them to break free from the gooey mist restraining their movement. Ducking under Mizuki's poor attempt at capturing it.

"Oyy what are you doing?!"

Daisuke sees the little guy escaping and rushes to finish off what Mizuki couldn't. Grabbing his sword and stabbing it on the ground

"Shihai Shunk-"

Before he could finish his chant, the nimble creature also managed to get past Daisuke's CM (Coded Moves).

"It seems I failed to calculate the speed of my articulation to outspeed their velocit-"

"Is now really the time for that?!"

Mizuki interrupts his nerdy character schtick.

"Don't worry..."

He pushes his glasses lightly, the eyewear that comes out of nowhere.

"There's a reason we've been spraying all over the town these past couple nights"

After a while of running around, the goblin finds every exit within sight already filled with the gooey mist.

"If you can't catch up to your enemy, you simply have to slow them down"

He reveals his plan proudly.

"So... why did I collect all those samples if this is their real purpose..."

Mizuki a bit dissatisfied.

"In order to trick the enemy, you first have to trick yourself"

Still keeping his proud brainy attitude.

"Cut that out! And stop pointing at me when you say that" She retorted.

As they're reveling in their triumph, the other goblins Mizuki haven't yet capture also escapes the mist.

"Ack I totally forgot about them. You go after that guy Mizuki-kun, I'll get the rest of these guys"

Daisuke instructs.

After some distance of running in her astral form, Mizuki notices the mist surrounding the area slowly closing in on her like it's slowly swallowing the path ahead. Until she reaches a narrow dead end with the escaped goblin at it's deepest edge.

"S-so this is where you are..."

Seeing how desperate the thing is up close, she starts to get nervous herself.

"I didn't think about it on the way here but... this thing seems quite dangerous on its own..."

It started violently scratching at it's own head first, then turns to her, baring it's teeth, ready to attack.

"A weapon! I have to find a weapon. That's right Daisuke-kun already taught me!"

She tries to calm herself down and focus on creating something. All the while the little demon is getting more and more agitated in the corner. When she finishes her creation

"A jar? This is all I've learnt to create these past few nights!!"

The goblin finally cave in, cornered and provoked, responding to her loud voice, it throws itself violently into her direction. To which Mizuki just reflexively throw the jar to it's face while she runs the other way.

"This is bad! This is bad! This is bad! I need something stronger to defend myself with"

As she's running for her life, she brings her hand together in hope of somehow being able to create a solid weapon to fend off the ghastly beast. But it's either a jar or not a jar, the other alternatives besides the jar that she can successfully create is a sticky gooey, a failed attempt at creating a jar.

"No good! Jar is all I can create right now!"

In her panic, she create as many jar as she can, as fast as she can and throw them into the goblin to slow it down. Some of them breaks on its face, some of them misses, most of them are unfinished raw material that have yet to transform fully. A gooey transitional form from raw SP (Spiritual Properties) to replication of real world matter like the glass of the jar.

After a full minute of not hearing the angry growl of the creature, Mizuki turns behind her to find it not following her anymore. A brief hesitation at first, but then she slowly retrace her track to find where she lost the creature. An empty road with what looks like a melted glassworks stands in the middle of the road. A former glass prison that restrained the goblin for a while, evident by it's silhouette still stuck on the hardened glass prison. But only the silhouette, the shape.

Suddenly a sharp pain bites into her shoulder. She grunts heavily from that attack, or at least it feels like she imagined it. Unlike with her normal SP form, this form doesn't have too long of a phantom pain, instead her body is losing more balance as a whole. The goblin is not going down without a fight, it's body covered in what looks like a half frozen liquid glass. Mizuki is still holding onto her shoulder from the attack, she doesn't feel pain but she can tell her body is falling apart.

"W-what do I do...? Daisuke kun is still far away... and I don't have anything to defend myself with..."

The desperate creature continues growling at her. Instead of trapping it with her, she's now trapped with the angry beast. A single wrong step was all it take and the goblin darts in her direction, grazing her calf this time. The instantaneous phantom pain disrupts her balance and she fell into the misty area to her side while recovering from the fall.

'I'm losing consciousness. Which is crazy because this body makes me feel like I'm dreaming. But it feels like I'm waking up more with each attack.'

On the ground and having lost her footing, she's not able to evade anymore oncoming attacks but instead, after struggling to approach her, the goblin simply left her alone.

"Huh it's... going away...?"

Puzzled.

"Could it be-?!"

As the night grows older. The mist that was sprayed on the very first day is starting to dissipates, opening up some path. Soon enough, the lone goblin finds it's way into this cleared up path. Treading carefully, looking left and right before advancing. As it walks some good distance in and starts to observe around it less and less, it started picking up speed. Which is when

"Ha got you!"

Mizuki shows up in front of it. A smirk on her face.

Agitated yet again, but no longer afraid. The goblin simply charges straight at her. But having predicted it's action, Mizuki throws a single jar to stop it. But a filled jar, a smoke bomb, a mist bomb. It was filled with the gooey mist that the creature so desperately avoids. Just for good measures she throws two more to stop it's movement completely. But this time they're not filled, they're not even a finished jar, an unfinished product. The gooey raw SP. It helps restrain the goblin's movement even more on top of the thick mist. Perfect capture.

A clap.

"Good job, Mizuki-kun!"

Daisuke shows up. Behind him, more bottles filled with the other goblins.

"That's a passing grade for tonight!"

"D-Daisuke kun! Did you see that? How was that? I captured him all on my own!"

Excited to show off the fruit of her labor, she jumps at the sight of him.

A triumphant victory to end this case.

The next day at school.

"Kitahara san, a moment please"

Hirase calls out to Mizuki as she's getting her stuff to head back after school. The young teacher have a concerned look on her face, and for good reason. She has been receiving complaints from other teachers about Mizuki's lack of focus. But despite all that rumors and concern, this Mizuki in front of her looks nothing out of the ordinary.

"Are you having trouble in class this week?"

"Umm no! Not really..."

Swiftly Mizuki answers.

"Are you getting in trouble?"

Hirase shots another question, eyebrows raised.

"That's... eehehe..."

A guilty grin covers her entire face. Acting cute even under prosecution.

Hirase can only response with a weak smile, understanding very well what that face mean.

"I'll be honest, your mother asked me to check up on you, again this month. She said you've been quite down lately, is there anything else you want to do after school?"

"I... not really... I'm.. I'm not sure..."

Hesitant. Mizuki looks down, as if trying to look inside her for the answer.

Hirase let's out a sigh, not that of annoyance but rather because she had anticipated that answer.

"I can't really help you go against your mother, but I can suggests for you to join a club. That way you have a good reason to stay after school."

Mizuki's face lights up, it never occurred to her that she have that option. But still unsure of the next step.

"A club? I.. don't... know. Maybe I-"

"Even if there's no club you're interested in right now, you can also join the club with people you're interested in"

Hirase winks at her, implying an underlying meaning.

"That way you have more chance of approaching those people, or even, that person."

Mizuki realizes what her teacher is trying to say

"Eehh? N-no, what do you mean, Sensei??"

She looks the other way while partially covering her face. Trying to hide her reactions.

"Whatever reason you may have-"

Hirase teases, lightly pinching the maiden's cheek.

"Club activities are one good way to make more friends. You'll appreciate them in the future, trust your Onee Chan!"

She pats her on the head.

"How about it? Want Onee chan to help you pick a club?"

Mizuki panics

"Ehh?? No no wait Onee- Hirase sensei! I haven't-"

While she appreciates the idea, she's not sure how it'll affect her new routine.

"Don't worry we can go over them one by one"

Hirase holds both her shoulder, encouraging.

"I don't think I can add anymore work for my current- I mean, I'm quite busy with..."

Flustered, she can't even finish her sentence without being halted by another excuse popping in her head.

"Oh you're already busy with something else? After school?"

Hirase inquires, catching onto what little Mizuki can relay but still only half believing.

"Yes! I mean N-No.. I-I.."

Her head starts spinning, frantically scrounging for the next excuses until they all clash together and freezes her train of thought. Empty.

"Because she's already in a club with me, Sensei"

A familiar boy's voice answers.

"Yes yes! Ehh??!" Mizuki surprised.

"Is that so.." Hirase curious.

"Right, Mizuki-kun?"

Daisuke assures.