[DONE][AQ] By the book (Nana/Ai)

[Ai]

SPOILER: Click to show

{AQ INFO}The Heart’s Egg
+ Description: There’s a book on campus about all this egg business… it’d help you out a lot if you could find it to learn about everything. It might be in the library, or left in a common room; someone else might be looking for it though, or maybe you could look for it with a friend--maybe a friend even already knows about it and its whereabouts!
+ Follow Prompt: +1 Guardians, +1 Faberge, +1 Roost
+ Requirements: None
+ Submitted by Pai

With the start of a new semester, Ai found himself again in the library. The poor guy had kind of... just neglected his student duties in favor of things like band practice and helping around the Faberge building, in general.He was still far from failing any class, thanks to being gifted with good brains, but he'd probably still drop to 3-C next year if he doesn't make an effort. Funny thing, Ai always used to be the top student before getting seriously into music. Now school barely even mattered anymore for him. The only thing he wanted was to make it far with his band. Oh, sweet priorities.

That aside, there were certain reasons which made Ai want to at least keep his grades above average, such as making his parents proud and having teachers acknowledge him. The boy just really wanted to be liked by everyone. It certainly took a toll on his free time, which by this point was non-existent, but he just needed to catch up with a few things for the upcoming tests, mostly. Ah, and the cultural festival was coming up soon too, he almost forgot. The last festival he took part in was at his old school in West Oto, which had their festival in the same day as Seiyo. Hmm, he wondered if anyone from West Oto would show up... that would be troublesome.

Anyhow, the boy was looking for some history books. That subject was one of his least favorites and possibly the hardest for him to study for. The second year hated learning things by heart... math and physics were so much easier. In his quest of finding that certain manual, Ai stumbled upon a book he hadn't seen in ages. He gave a thoughtful 'hmmm' before pulling it out of the bookshelf, staring at its intricate cover. Ai remembered reading it before his guardian even hatched... it certainly gave him an insight to what this guardian business was all about. Though there were so many things not explained in there... and that nobody knew of, really. The whole egg business was shady, overall.

Nana Takeuchi

[Nana Takeuchi]

Nana didn't have a real reason to visit the library, or at least, none that were related to her grades and education. She wasn't specially smart, but she wasn't an airhead either; Nana attended a cram school a couple of days a week to focus on her admission exams for college applications, and while it gets tiring and boring, it also keeps her grades afloat in class 3-B. Just like any other girl from her homeroom, whom went to the same cram school at night and earned the same grades that she did. Everything on her was predictable and to some degree, boring. It was something that she wanted to change.

Nana recalled wishing for something like that only a few days prior. Sitting by her desk, checking her school notes, the girl came to realize that there was nothing particularly special about her: she was perfectly normal and common for a girl her age, she didn't have cool hobbies, or eccentric friends, and she was so plain in looks that most classmates forgot who she even was. Nana was in dire need to improve as a person: to become a trendsetter, someone who foes what they want, a girl who can shine.

Such wish gave birth to an egg that sat on top of her notebook the day after, and ever since, she had wondered what was that strange thing. That was, until her ears caught the rumor of a book about the subject in the school's library. What a coincidence, right? To have an answer for her questions in her own school. Weird.

Nana wandered around the building, carrying the egg on her Cardigan's pocket. A book about eggs... Where would she find that? A guy, much taller than her, happened to be browsing for books in her same area.

"Can I have a moment?" She called politely, "do you know about some book about colored eggs? Not easter eggs— it's kinda weird, hahah. I can't seem to find it." Marin

[Ai]

Ai could still picture that day clearly in his head. Meeting Ji-Yoo, having to make a compromise and exchange his math books for this one... it was funny really, how time flew by so quickly. He'd since then gotten closer to the girl, albeit she seemed out of it recently. He was supposed to protect her, or at least so he'd promised, but things kept on getting in the way. She hasn't been attending school either so meeting her wasn't exactly easy. But one of these days, he promised to go see her with Demi. The two had a hunch she might have gone X, and in that case, they should prepare themselves for the worst.

But thinking about that only brought his mood down, so he decided to just focus on finding his books and getting some studying done. The word itself sounded so foreign now, after finding out there was more to life than just school, but whether he liked it or not, there was still 1 year and a half left of his high school student career, so he might as well... enjoy it? He'd made some friends, a girlfriend, things were going well, on the most part. That is, if you overlooked the guardian character happenings, which brought quite a negative touch to his life.

Suddenly, Ai was snapped out of his trail of thoughts by a small voice. Upon glancing to his left, he saw a girl, cute and much shorter than him. Ah... was she really... talking to him? Ai grew so used to being avoided, especially by the female population of Seiyo. With his unconventional and rather scary looks, basically everyone mistook him for a delinquent, including the teachers. It was sad and the boy was still struggling to live with it. Though the wish that everyone would see him in a more positive light grew stronger by the day.

"Ah, hello!" He smiled to the other, kindly and cautiously, as if to say, 'talk to me, I swear I'm approachable.' "Colored eggs?" He seemed almost confused for a moment, but eventually figured out what she meant... mostly because of the word 'eggs', heh. " You mean heart's eggs? Do you have a guardian too, perhaps?" His eyes seemed to sparkle a bit as he asked the question.

[Nana Takeuchi]

Was the guy scary? Not exactly, not to Nana's eyes. In appearance, he did look like a delinquent-- but Nana never felt intimidated by flashy looks in scary faces: She knew that the worst delinquents and bullies often looked like the average, friendly person. If anything, he seemed shy and awkward, but who was she to judge? They were in high school, after all.


"Yeah! Colored eggs. Like this one I have here." From the left breast pocket of her cardigan, she picked up a very colorful and shimmery egg, which emanated the energy of a guardian character yet to be hatched. "I read something about it on twitter-- they're talking about it right now! Something about 'x-eggs'?" The girl made a pause, asking for a second, with a hand gesture, to check the school's twitter timeline. Seconds after that, she couldn't help but chuckle, out of nervousness. "
This is so weird..."

As this event was rather new to her, Nana had not bothered to check if there were people who could, and could not, see heart eggs. She merely assumed that the object was tangible and visible for everyone, regardless of its unknown origin. She didn't kill her head over it, either.
 

"Hmm? What do you mean a guardian character? They're talking about that too, they said 'heart eggs' this, 'heart eggs' that. You look like you know a bit about that, don't you?" Albeit confused, she smiled in return to him-- again, nervousness regarding the nature of the situation getting the best of her, but this guy was the first person she has met, in person, who appears to have a grasp of the problem. "Tell me about it, maybe?" If someone asked her, Nana would say it was all too scary, but she had to keep her cool.

[Ai]

The girl didn't seem to be put off by him, so Ai relaxed a little. He'd never thought meeting people would be such a tedious job before Seiyo. Albeit, in West Oto, at his former school, he had rather average looks. It was only when his mom got diagnosed that he truly embraced his love for rock music and entered what would be a more rebellious stage in his life. Well, depends what one would want to understand about a 'rebellious stage'. It was mainly looks-wise.

"Oh, that's it. That's a heart's egg." Ai noted as the girl showed him her newly appeared egg. Ai did feel the presence of an egg thanks to his heightened sense, but Seiyo was full of them, so normally when he was around the school, Ai didn't give the feeling much attention. Unless, well, there was some kind of dark energy involved, which luckily hasn't happened so far. "Ah, you needn't concern yourself with X-eggs now..." Ai gave a dismissive wave of his hand. Well, she probably did, but it was still early and she might get put off by the whole thing.

One day though, Ai would have to make himself a twitter account and see what people talk about there. Just in case he might find some useful information. But with how busy he was, he never got round to doing it."Sure, I'd be glad to help." Ai returned her smile, a more charismatic one this time around. "Also, let me grab this for you real quick." Ai went back a few steps, pulling a book out of the shelf, the one he was looking at before Nana came. "We can go somewhere and talk if you want, not sure if the librarian would be happy with us chatting away here."

[Nana Takeuchi]

Nana managed to switch her attention evenly, from the phone screen, to the guy's face. "Hmm? Look, they're saying something about curing them. Wow, is this some kind of school prank? Like, a viral propaganda?" It was rather rude of her to pay attention to her mobile phone during a conversation, but in her defense, she would argue that she was reading a conversation regarding their subject: Heart eggs. As the twitter thread ended, Nana put her phone back on her skirt's pocket, and brushed the bangs off of her forehead to pay attention to the rebel guy.



The colorful egg bobbed from left to right, like the needle of a metronome, indicating that something was inside and alive, thriving to see the light. While Ai was way more acquainted with this kind of situation; Nana's eyes opened widely, depicting a face that screamed fear. Her stomach became upset, churning her insides as she stared back at the tall guy. "Oh... My goodness. It's moving!" She needed an answer, but he was right about the librarian, "Yeah, yeah, we should totally go somewhere else to talk... Do you promise this isn't a prank? Because it's getting super scary already." With that last statement, and a few nods, Nana agreed to leave the building-- leading the way herself.



Only after they stepped out of the library, she noticed that Ai had taken a book out of the shelves. "Are you going to study or something? Hah hah, ah, right, you said it was for me. Don't tell me that's the book everyone was talking about." This whole ordeal was too elaborated to be a simple school prank: There was no need for her to be the 'one' victim of such an orchestrated joke: Many students talking about eggs ever since she joined the school's twitter; people rumoring about magical eggs; and the huge coincidence of finding someone well versed in the subject. It was giving her a headache, and it was visible that she wasn't feeling physically well about it. 

Nana led the guy to a row of benches nearby the library, but first, she walked a few steps to pick up a drink from a vending machine, to ease her nerves. She took a soda can to her forehead, hoping it would calm down her headache-- as if that'd do anything. "Okay, tell me what you know. What are guardian characters, whatever's their name." 

[Ai]

Seeing that the girl was so incredibly focused on her cellphone screen, Ai couldn't help but take a peek as well. He assumed it was the twitter thing and the boy was really, really curious as to what was going on there. It made him want to make an account now. Had he been missing important things all along? Maybe he should ask Demi or Shun about it, if they had twitter too, that is. As the girl was done using her phone, Ai looked away, his expression stiffening a bit at her next words.

"I can assure you it's not a prank or propaganda..." He offered her an apologetic smile as he paused, briefly, considering his next words. The girl seemed baffled about everything that was going on and he couldn't blame her, for he had been like that as well, at first. His reaction hadn't been as.. outwardly shocked as hers, though. "In fact, nobody really knows anything for sure... about heart's eggs. The purpose and reason for their existence is... in a blur, really." There were plenty of things that Ai DID know about eggs, thought they were just mainly how they worked. There was no answer to the, perhaps more important, 'Why?' question.

He followed the girl out of the library and up to a nearby bench before he proceeded to explain more. "Try not to worry too much and calm down, it's not going to eat you up or anything." Ai just chuckled at her freaking out over the moving egg. Would she faint if it happened to hatch right at that point? Well, perhaps it was better not to find out. "Don't be scared and just let me explain." He gave the other a reassuring smile before handing her the book. "You can keep this for later."

"Well, to put it simply, when someone makes a wish to become someone different than they are, if their desire is strong enough, a heart's egg will be born." How that happens in the first place, nobody knows. Magic? It's a mystery."When that egg hatches, a guardian character will come out and they are the representation of the person you wish to be, your would-be self." Wow, it was his first time having to explain this whole issue and it wasn't easy. Should he go into more complex things like character changes or transformations? It'd be better to wait and see if the girl wants to know more. "They are supposed to um, help you achieve your wish, if I'm making sense."

[Nana Takeuchi]

"...Right, so... Nobody knows what they are, but they look like a hot topic in the timeline. How many guys do you know who have one?" Nana let all the weight of her body fall as she sat down. The more she heard about the eggs this, and eggs that, the worse her headache was turning out to be. She couldn't blame the guy, though, he was being kind enough to go all his way to explain to her what they were about, but it was a little too much for Nana, a regular girl without anything special going with her life. It still sounded like a scam to her, and she was cautious not to be pranked on camera.

Nana received the book with her free hand, examining the cover quickly-- there was no way she was going to open the book right now, what if there was something inside ready to jump at her? Like a bug, or a scary 'jumper' photo. She feigned a polite smile in response, giving him a nod as she put the book in between them. "Okay... Thank you, then. I'll check it out at home or something." But in fact, she was going to take it back to the library as soon as she were done hearing the story. Her nails forced the lid of the can, opening the soda and letting some fizz come out with bubbles. She gave a long sip and crossed her legs, her whole body screaming uneasiness as she listened to the taller guy speak.

Still, something appeared to resonate with Ai's words: she did make a wish some time ago, what a coincidence. Her chest jumped with fast palpitations, as the idea of these magical eggs being real began to take shape as a real, tangible matter. "No offense, but that sounds so embarrassing... A would-be self? It sounds kinda like what you read in comic books." The egg on her pocket started to shake, stirring its insides, and bouncing inside of her cardigan. A nervous chuckle escaped her lips, and Nana felt the urge to drink a longer sip of soda. Her legs crossed to the opposite side and Nana looked up at the guy with worried eyes, taking a hand to her palm with shame. "Oh my god, it's moving again. Wow... Oh, right, what are those guardian characters? Is it some animal? So I have to feed it or something?"

[Ai]

"Ah, well, most of my good friends have one..." Ai scratched the back of his neck briefly, pondering about just how many people he knew who had eggs. There was Demi, Sayuri, Yasuko, Minji, Yuki, he supposed, well a lot of people, overall. Most of his classmates didn't though, he seemed to be the only one with a heart's egg in 2B. It wasn't all that bad, since Ai tried to get along well with everyone regardless. However, he couldn't understand why this girl was so shocked about the matter. Sure, things came off as a surprise to Ai too, at first, but freaking out like that about it was still...

Looking at her as she listened, the girl seemed uneasy and uncomfortable. Ai shifted a bit in his seat, his mood seemingly changing a bit to reflect the other's. Although he wanted to give the girl a more positive view on the matter, Ai found himself overwhelmed when faced with the situation of trying to explain guardian characters. Perhaps he wasn't the best nor most knowledgeable person in the subject, but he tried his best. The little fairies weren't scary nor had bad intentions, unless they were talking about X-eggs and characters. Ai was definitely not going to mention that matter though... more and this girl would probably just run off screaming or faint at his feet... one of the two.

"Well, I suppose it does, now that you mention it..." Ai rubbed his chin, pensively. He didn't read much manga, but the girl had a point. It was like... one of those magical girl things, with transformations and all. How did he not think about it before. "No, no no! They aren't animals." Ai shook his head, shocked at the thought itself. Well, what could he expect, this girl had no idea about anything. "I mean, I could show you mine if you want?" Nagamasa wasn't the kindest nor most polite little guy, so he might not make a good impression on the girl.

[Nana Takeuchi]

"Is that so?" There wasn't anything in the guy that gave Nana the impression that he was lying. Besides, how far could someone go to make a prank? She wasn't used to uniqueness, to special things happening to... Her. Now, she had no option but to deal with some magical creature inside an Easter egg? "Let's... Let's say I'm going to believe you, okay? Sorry for being so skeptical but, you know how it is... I have been told all my life that magic isn't real, so this is a bit too much for me." A nervous hand pulled the hair that covered her left ear while her legs crossed, again, to the oposite side. Amother clear sign of apprehension— she would be fine. How bad could it be? "They sound nice, though, a little thing that will help you become a better person? Sounds like fairies and angels from fantasy books— see? It does sound like a comic book. But still..."

There was a big difference between allowing herself to assimilate the concept of magic being real, and a whole different one was to accept it with her eyes. "Ah, I... Think I'll pass. It's kinda spooky, hahah..." Once more, the idea of all of this being a prank was itching on the back of her ear. Nana looked down at her breast pocket, watching the sparkly egg shake softly. "In case that something happens, would you help me out with the egg?" She was rather embarrassed to say it; this was all a stupid joke, she was sure— if it were, he would go down with her as well!

Nana sighed, and pulled out a tiny notebook with a pen, just as small, attached to it. On a piece of paper, she wrote her LINE ID, followed by her phone number. Her free hand instinctively picked up the book between them, while the other gave the guy the note with her contact info. "Text me later and we can talk more about the eggs, okay? You were a good help but I have something to do." Despite her uneasiness about egg magic, Nana exuded confidence, and was 'sure' that Ai would message her as she told him.

"I'll be waiting for your message, okay?" Getting up from the bench, Nana waved a small goodbye accompanied by a nod. She seemed to be in a hurry. A hurry to go back to the library and read the book thoroughly.

[Ai]

Ai had no reasons to lie to this girl. In fact, he despised lies with a passion but between lying and hiding things there was a difference. He chose not to reveal the entire story bout heart's eggs to this girl right now, for her own good. She might find out sooner than later, but when she does, Ai hoped she'd be able to cope with it. "At the end of the day, you can believe what you want." Ai smiled softly. "But if your egg eventually hatches, you'll see with your own eyes. I understand this came out of nowhere and you have all the reasons to be scared, but stay strong. There are a lot of people who would be willing to help you out, myself included."

When she refused to see Nagamasa, Ai released a breath he didn't know he'd been holding in. Perhaps it was for the best. The boy was always rather aware of how his guardian character, well, scratch that, his would-be-self, might appear to others. Not that he was ashamed of it, just... concerned. And now Ai felt especially so since he'd have been the first guardian she ever saw. "No problem, I guess you'll see yours when it hatches." The second year shrugged, but turned back to the girl when she asked whether he'd help her if needed. "Of course!" He smiled, offering her a reassuring pat on the shoulder. Though he sincerely hoped she wouldn't have the problems that he did with Nagamasa. That would be just sad.

Ai then watched as the other scribbled something on a piece of paper and handed it to him. It seemed like a phone number. Oh... but it just crossed his mind that they never actually introduced each other. He took the paper and was about to say something but the girl left in a hurry. "Hey I didn't get your..." He called out but the other was already out of sight. "...name.." Ai sighed, but then laughed to himself. Well, this would be interesting. If he did call her, would she remember? With that, Ai too, took his leave. He really needed to get some studying done.