March 16
The next few days for Madran were filled with Philemon forcing her to take a break, so she simply hung out with everyone outside of school and worked as hard as she could in school, as to alleviate boredom. On the fourteenth, Madran had coordinated with all of her teachers that they would hold onto her schoolwork until she got back on the 21st, and she said goodbye to anyone that she could. By some odd occurrence, the planners for the panel had allowed anyone who was given an official invitation to bring two other friends along. However, dogs weren't given a free pass, so Chicory had to stay behind whilst Madran and Suga accompanied Sheila. She wasn't able to convince Ann to bring Chicory along, which saddened her. After that, Elia had told Madran how the trip would be going down.
"Ok, so, Madran, Sheila's mom will be picking you and Suga up. Once you get to the train station, meet up with the others who are going to the trip. And, make sure you're packed!"
Madran had taken the last part of the briefing with some salt, and, by the 16th, she was fully ready. She then waited with Elia and Chicory outside for Sheila, Suga, and her mom to arrive.
"I'll miss you."
"Don't forget to text me every night, and, if anything... persona-y happens, let me know."
"Gotcha! Also, Chicory..."
Madran pet Chicory for a bit.
"Be nice to mom. If anything happens, I can probably configure with Margaret or Elizabeth to transport you to where we'll be staying."
Chicory seemed to react happily to this, and Madran wondered if he wished that something odd would happen. Then, after sparse chatter and much waiting, Sheila and her mom arrived. Madran hugged Elia and Chicory goodbye, put her duffel bag in the trunk of the car, and got in.
"Hi, everyone!"
"Hello, Madran-chan. Nice to see you again."
Madran looked up to the driver's spot to see Sheila's mom, Kinaru. She looked to just be an older version of Sheila, with Asian features, a slim face, brown eyes, and long, black hair. A large difference between her and Sheila, however, was that she had shorter bangs and wore her hair often in a bun, while Sheila liked to wear her hair down, and had noticeably long bangs.
"Hello, Inan-san! Hi Sheila and Suga."
Madran buckled herself in and looked to see a very excited Sheila and a rather bored Suga.
"So, how is everyone?"
"Oh, we're doing great. Well, Suga almost fell down the stairs when she was going down to see us, according to Herupā-san."
"Hey! It's not funny."
Suga frowned.
"Oh, well, anyways, let's go."
Kinaru began driving to the train station and began to chat with everyone again.
"So, aside from your resounding success against that mean lady, how has your week been going?"
Suga was the first to speak up.
"Well, ballet practice went well. Being able to stand on my toes is helpful on snatching things up high."
Kinaru chuckled and turned to Sheila.
"Well, Sheila's been very excited about this trip, and has only grew more so after you all assisted her with Shiini. Goodness, and to imagine I was so blind..."
"It's ok, mom. Also, are you feeling well? I heard you coughing a lot last night."
"Oh, I had a glass of water, and I tried to breathe it."
Madran snickered.
"Well, Madran-chan, how about you?"
"Um, you can just call me Madran. Anyways, school's been a lot of fun, aside from Mr. Kamoshida glaring at me a bunch, and I've become great friends with that editor and reporter lady from Coolest."
"Oh, Maya Amano? Yes, she is quite the dazzling soul. I heard that she and her friend, Yukino Mayuzumi, got an official invitation to the panel as well."
Madran's eyes widened.
"Really? That's neat."
The small group then arrived at the train station and everyone got out of the car and got their bags. Sheila ran over and grabbed a cart, which allowed for much easier steering and not as much effort out into carrying the bags. Once everyone piled their bags onto it, Sheila and the rest went to the platform and met up with Ann and a friend.
"Hiya, Ann!"
Madran waved to Ann, and she came over.
"Hello! How are you?"
"Good. We need, uh, a bit of help with our bags."
Ann nodded and turned back to face what Madran assumed was Ann's friend from the volleyball team. This girl was thin, short, and had brown eyes, black hair tied with a pink hairtie into a ponytail, and wore a soft cream shirt and a skirt.
"Hey, Shiho? I need some help."
Shiho turned back from chatting with a few other girls and went to help out Ann and everyone else.
"Oh, hi, Shiho! How are ya?"
Shiho smiled, and Madran could feel her heart melt slightly from how adorable she was.
"I'm good. I like how your hair is."
Shiho gestured towards Madran's hair and Madran smiled back.
"Aww, thanks! I think that your ponytail looks fab as well."
Shiho smiled, and helped Kinaru with her bag. Madran then got hers up, and Suga picked her bag with no help. Then, Ann helped Sheila with her bag, and they loaded everything up on the train.
"We're going to leave in about 10 minutes, so, if anyone has to use the restroom, now's the time!"
After that, Kinaru hurried off to where Madran thought the bathroom was. Suga shrugged, and Madran decided to go. After that, everyone picked seats on the train, and Madran sat down next to someone.
"Oh boy, Inaba..."
Madran looked over to the person, and saw that they were sitting with a hat on.
"Hmm. Something feels familiar about this guy."
"I think the hair gives it away."
The man smiled.
"Oh boy, Inaba, indeed."
"Ok, yeah, this guy gives me the deja vuus."
"The whats?"
"Hush, Nightingale."
"Say, have we met before? I swear I recognize your voice."
Madran looked confusedly at the man. He appeared to be of Thai heritage, with light brown skin, very long black hair, a slim, bony face, and a very defined chin. He wore a yellow, long-sleeved business suit with black gloves, purple spectacles, and had two blue hoop earrings.
"Um, I've been recognizing a lot of random people lately that I have no idea about. Anyways, I'm Madran Farjis. Nice to meet ya."
"I'm Baofu. Pleasure to meet you as well."
Madran and Baofu shook hands, and they both looked at each other. However, Madran regretted that, as the colors around her inverted and she saw an image of Baofu and a weird man being sandwiched by two rocks behind him.
"Uh..."
Madran blinked a bit. Baofu looked concerned.
"Are you the... daughter of Elia?"
"Yep."
"And, Elia knows Maya?"
"Yep yep."
"And, Maya knows you?"
"Ding ding ding."
"And, if I recall, I called Maya with Katsuya, and I met you."
"Oh, so you're him! Goodness, you look a lot different than how I imagined you."
Baofu chuckled.
"Well, I got dragged into this panel thing because of Maya inviting me along with Katsuya. In fact, she, Yukino, Eikichi and Lisa all dragged me and the rest of our friends into this."
"Goodness, that sounds like a hassle."
"Yep."
Suga turned around, and shuddered once she and Baofu locked eyes. After that, she spoke up.
"Oh, so, do you run that website?"
"The information one? Yep."
"That one's Suga. She's my friend of nine years."
"Hi."
"Oh, nice to meet you. And, no, I haven't found anything out about Mitsuru, yet."
Madran looked around, and saw that Sheila, Shiho, and Ann were talking quietly together. The train ride had just begun, and Madran was pushed back into her seat by pesky inertia.
"Hey, did we say bye to Philemon?"
"Yeah. How did you forget?"
"Eh, whatever. I'll text him in a bit."
Madran, after sitting idly in her seat for a few minutes, pulled her phone out and went to text Philemon.
Madran: Hiya
Madran then awaited a response. However, she began to grow worried after around 10 minutes, so she tried again.
Madran: Hello?
Philemon: Busy
Madran sighed, and responded.
Madran: I just wanted to say bye
Philemon: I'll see you soon
Madran put her phone down and went to read a few books. Thankfully, doing so quickly passed the time. However, she finished one out of the four books she got, due to it only having a simple 100 pages left, so she went to chat with her friends, who were scattered about the various seats.
"Hey, Suga."
Madran tapped one of the spiky parts of Suga's hair. Her hair reminded her a lot of the visual kei artists, who would often experiment with different hairstyles and makeup, as a form of expression. However, she shook those thoughts off when Suga turned around to face her.
"Hey. What's up?"
"Nothing much. I just finished a book."
"Ooh, can I see it?"
Madran passed her book up to Suga and she read it.
"Hmm, a warrior queen out for revenge? That's cool."
"You can read it. I have the next two books in the series and our class reading as well."
"Ok!"
Suga began to read Madran's book, and she decided to nap. However, after only 30 minutes, the train stopped, and the conductor's voice rang throughout the train.
"Last stop to Inaba. Last stop to Inaba."
Madran and anyone else going to the panel stood up, gathered their bags, and quickly filed off of the train. Once there, Madran looked around, and tugged on her bag. It then flipped over, and Madran spent the next few seconds fixing it so that it would move around correctly.
"So, Madran, what do you think?"
Madran looked over to see Kinaru standing with Sheila. Madran then looked out along the train platform and towards the town. It appeared to be built at the base of a mountain, with a noticeably large residential section and a larger business section. However, Madran couldn't shake a weird, desolate feeling from looking out at Inaba. Kinaru then pointed towards a large building.
"We'll be staying there, at the Amagi Inn. Some people coming here also have relatives or friends living here, so they won't be as crowded. Speaking of which..."
Kinaru watched a car slowly pull up to them. It was a large SUV, with one person driving it.
"Who's she?"
"She is my sister, Arah Kusino. She'll be driving us around, so that we don't have to take the, well, spotty taxi service."
Arah rolled the window down. She appeared to look very much alike to Kinaru, aside from a slightly rounder face, red hair dye streaks, and a tattoo on her hand.
"Shisutā, are these the guests coming over?"
"Weren't we going to the Amagi Inn?"
"Yes. I work there."
Madran looked at Arah and nodded.
"Oh, sorry, um..."
Madran thought for a bit.
"Arah-san will suffice."
"Ok! Gotcha."
After a bit of messing around, Madran turned over to Ann and Shiho.
"Um, do y'all need a ride?"
"Oh, no, we're fine."
After a bit, Ann hailed a taxi, and got in. Madran also got in and sat next to Sheila. Suga then got into the third row.
"So, five days, huh?"
"Yep. I dunno what's going on during those days, though."
Kinaru handed Madran a brochure from the dashboard. Madran then read through it.
"Um, so tomorrow, we have a meet-up, Wednesday is a fan meet, wait, wouldn't it be better to have both of those on one day?"
Arah shrugged.
"The curators aren't the smartest, apparently."
Madran chuckled.
"And, Thursday and Friday are the panel days, and Saturday is when we go."
Arah nodded. Sheila smiled.
"Well, Ara-san, how's the inn business going?"
"Oh, it's fine. Yukiko-sama is very excited to see some of her friends again. Although, I am very confused about why they would hold it in Inaba."
"Maybe, one of the planner's friends, like, lived here?
"Possibly."
Arah sighed and cleared some hair out of her face.
"Oh, and Madran, one more thing."
"Yeah?"
"I'm sure that Kinaru-chan and Sheila-chan have already done this, but, thank you for your meddling in Shiini's case. I honestly had no idea what we could have done without you and your supernatural, uh, lady, but both the Kusino and Inan families extend their gratitude to you."
"Wait, did you tell all of them about, um, Nightingale and the rest?"
"No, we simply made the cover story that you and Suga exposed him via social media."
Madran instantly felt very relieved.
"Oh, ok, good."
"Yes. You seem to have good skill with the flail."
"Oh, really, it's kinda easy, you just swing it back and forth and hit enemies with it."
Arah laughed a bit.
"Well, I guess that I should be more surprised about Sheila-chan's skill with the spear. How did you get so good at that, Sheila?"
"Oh, well, actually, Nefertiti kinda helps."
Suga then spoke up from the back.
"Yeah, it's the same with Bubonia and me."
Arah nodded.
"Well, we're here."
Arah then parked the car, and everyone got out. Arah did as well, and Madran was guided to their room. She passed by many other rooms along the way, noting how the hotel resembled a very old style of building, with many materials such as bamboo decorating the halls. She then went into a room with two beds and a sofa bed. Madran set a bag down and sat on a bed.
"Wow, this place is cool."
Kinaru smiled.
"My room's connected to yours. Please, don't cause any trouble."
Kinaru then went into the room next to theirs, and Suga looked annoyed.
"Why was she looking at me? She should be more concerned about Madran!"
"Well, whatever."
Madran sat down.
"So, let's just, uh, find something to do?"
Sheila shrugged, and turned the TV on. Suga then continued reading the book that Madran had given to her, and Madran went to text Elia of their arrival in Inaba.
END OF CHAPTER 53
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That's all for this! Now, everyone's in Inaba. What could possibly happen? I do feel that we'll figure that out soon. I hope that you all enjoyed! I'll see all of you guys next time. Bye!