But since then, she had very few friends. The living and the dead had a great many barriers between each other, even just to sense the other correctly. It took her years just to be able to see her classmates on a regular basis. As far as ghosts went, she wasn't very good. Odd noises in the night still made her jumpy, despite being what most people were afraid would be the source of said sounds. As it was, she could barely haunt her old desk in class. But she supposed that keeping oneself from being sat in was better than nothing.
This is why it was such a shock to her when her newest teacher, ten-year-old Negi Springfield, called her name out of the blue when voting for the class' activity for the School Festival. Even Exorcists had problems sensing her, much less seeing her. She had determined to, if it was the first post-last thing she did, make a friend.
Then the Flu came. The class, even the entire girls' school fell sick. Of course, another illness had already claimed her a long time ago. Little else to do, she followed Negi around as he made his rounds, personally seeing to each of the girls in his class. She thought it was awfully sweet of him to do that.
But for some reason, she had the strangest urge to...
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Negi turned around as he heard what sounded like a faint cough behind him.
"You don't look so good." Evangeline said, smiling as she wrapped her wings around herself. After the initial shock, she seemed oddly at ease with the Succubus form. It may have had something to do with the fact that she no longer needed the assistance of magic not to look like a ten-year-old. Of course, she was now only a teenager, but at least she was mostly through puberty now, even if she hadn't gotten that much taller.
"I-I'm fine." Negi said, rubbing the back of his head. "It's just that with so many of..."
"I wasn't talking to you." Eva said, giving him another heavy-lidded grin, but if you're feeling so well, maybe you can give me a little... something to help me feel better?" Her grin grew, showing off her fangs. With any other person, a line that that would mean something else entirely, had it not be spoken to a ten-year-old boy.
Even so, it had a similar effect on Negi, who wasn't quite sure which meaning she meant, although he had a good idea which. "I think you're healthy enough, Evangeline-san." He replied, blushing. "You will be in class tomorrow, right?" He asked, quickly changing the subject. "Most of the students are feeling better, so the Headmaster will be reopening the school."
Evangeline nodded. "I suppose... but first, I think there's something you should see. Chachamaru!"
"Yes, mistress?" Chahamaru asked as she entered the room. "Oh, Negi-sensei!" She gasped as she realized that Negi was in the room. A slight blush crept across her face.
"Ch-Chachamaru-san!" Negi stammered as he realized that she was, in fact, blushing clear down her neck. As a matter of fact, her entire body, no longer just her face, was covered in very lifelike skin. "But how did you?"
"Chachamaru may be a robot, but she's powered by magic." Evangeline explained. "You know just as well as I do that this is no ordinary flu that's been going around."
"I-I ddn't show any symptoms before," Chachamaru added, "because until yesterday, my body was incacpable of showing them."
Negi quietly nodded, noting that Satomi Hakase would likely be very surprised the next time Chachamaru came in for a checkup. That is, if she weren't still too busy trying out her own systems.
Another cough echoed quietly in the room, followed by a soft moan.
"What was that?" Negi asked.
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Sayo was feeling something she hadn't felt in over sixty years: Heat, and lots of it. Her entire form felt like it was on fire. And she was coughing. Coughing! Ghosts shouldn't cough, they didn't really even have lungs! her vision grew blurry and dark, and she worried if maybe she were finally dying, for good this time...
Magic was a tricky thing to work with. More often than not, a mage often got more than what they bargained for whenever they created something through the use of magic. Especially when said magic ran headlong into someone else's enchantments, protections, or even just the ambient magic of a given area.
Passing through Mahora Academy, and mixing through the body of Negi Springfield and many of his not-so-normal charges, The flu mutated. This time, with a far higher sensitivity to magic and the supernatural. A Phantom Flu that could seek out areas of high spiritual energy and infect it as well as it could flesh. Sayo Aisaka would be the first, but far from the last. Around Japan, and eventually the world, the restless dead would find themselves wide awake, for better or worse.
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Negi turned around, as he noticed a soft glow coming from behind him. He jumped back as a large ball of flame erupted to life on the floor.
Reflexively, he started a spell to extinguish it, but Evangeline held him back. "No, wait!" She said, "Just watch this."
The flame reshaped itself into a female form, two smaller flames breaking off to rest on the floor beside her. Her skin as far paler than it was before, almost seeming transparent. Silvery hair flowed from her head, spreading out over the floor. With the last of her strength, she looked up at him with shiny, black eyes as he cradled her head in his arms.
Sayo Aizaka's first words as a rebirthed living being were: "You have... a kind soul, Negi-Sensei." Then her eyes closed, and she lapsed into unconciousness.
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(Posted Sat, 22 Oct 2005 20:25)
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らんま1/2 © Rumiko Takahashi
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