Wednesday afternoons were the part of the week students looked forward to most: a chance to slip free of a crushing course load and rest for a whole afternoon — or so nearly every student believed right up until Wednesday afternoon actually arrived.
Because once it did, a great many of them discovered a mountain of homework waiting, and could only groan their way back and forth through the Library.
A model student like Dark, who almost never let an assignment sit until tomorrow, was generally spared that particular misery.
Even so, once the lunch break ended, he went to the Library anyway.
Senior Pandora and Ms. Bella were behind the counter, talking in low voices.
The moment Dark appeared in the doorway, Pandora spotted him. She said something to Ms. Bella, picked up her bag, and came around the counter.
"Why come all the way to the Library?" Pandora asked, smiling. "I thought we said the usual place."
Dark smiled back. "It's more convenient this way. Which laboratory?"
Pandora fished a ring of keys out of her pocket and spun it around one finger. "The usual place."
The usual place — which meant, of course, the laboratory they had borrowed while researching the "Fusion" Magic Guide Card.
Remembering that stretch of time when his knowledge had grown by leaps and bounds left a small warmth in Dark's chest.
Last time he had stood there as the pure beneficiary. This time the roles were reversed, and he hoped he could be at least some help to his senior.
Not that assisting with a fourth-year honor student's experiment wasn't enormously to his own advantage as well.
They talked as they walked, and soon reached the old laboratory.
"So what exactly is this experiment?" Dark asked again, only once they were inside.
Pandora had been keeping him in suspense the whole way, and even now she only blinked at him. "Guess."
"There's nothing to guess about." Dark rolled his eyes. "If you're calling me in as an assistant, it has to be something to do with Fusion."
"Clever boy." Pandora reached out a slender, snow-white index finger and tapped him lightly on the forehead, then laughed. "I want to find out what the actual difference is between Magic Guide Spirits that can fuse and Magic Guide Spirits that can't."
Dark thought about that for a moment. "So — you're trying to work out the secret of why only some Magic Guide Spirits can serve as Fusion Material?"
Pandora nodded. "You could put it that way."
"Senior," Dark asked, curious, "don't you have any Magic Guide Spirits of the fusible type yourself?"
Pandora looked him in the eye. "Of course I do. Why?"
Dark shook his head quickly. "Nothing. What do you need me to do?"
Pandora considered. "Just perform a single Fusion Summon at the moment I tell you to."
"That's it?" Dark said.
"That's it," Pandora said, smiling.
Dark turned it over. "Easy enough. But you said you have fusible Magic Guide Spirits too, didn't you?"
Pandora shook her head and picked a reason. "They won't do. The ones in my hands that can serve as Fusion Material are too big, and after fusing they get bigger still. Very inconvenient to study."
"Fair enough, I suppose that counts as a reason." Dark didn't press further. "So when do we start?"
Pandora made a small gesture. "Right away. But first you're going to help me set everything up."
"Sure thing, Senior."
…
Pandora had clearly prepared in advance. Out of her bag came an entire row of pre-mixed potions along with a great heap of implements, and within moments a whole table was covered.
"In the name of Pandora Dragon — Magic Guide Summon!"
With everything laid out, she went straight into a summon, activating the Magic Guide Spirit Card in her hand.
A summoning circle appeared, and out of it rose a Magic Guide Spirit about the size of a basketball.
Dark studied it with interest. It was obviously a Mechanical Species — it looked like a tiny mechanical dragon, four clawed feet, a round little belly, its silhouette not unlike Pandora's familiar, the Young Wyvern. But set into that metal-plated belly was an antique clock face.
"This is the Clock Dragon."
Pandora put out her hands and caught the Clock Dragon, which clearly wasn't light, and stroked its spine.
"The Clock Dragon's body is built out of countless gears. It's extremely sensitive to time, so it can help me with precision work."
Then she drew another Magic Guide Card and summoned a second Magic Guide Spirit.
This one's shape was rather stranger.
Its body was like a small lizard, but on top of its head it carried a disc larger than the body itself, and across that disc were engraved bizarre, tadpole-like glyphs.
"The Runescript Lizard," Pandora said once the summon finished. "A very peculiar and rare kind of Magic Guide Spirit. It converts fluctuations of aura into specific patterns and script. If you ever get the chance, I'd recommend refining one of these yourself."
"Clock Dragon, Runescript Lizard…" Dark tapped his own skull. "I've heard something about the Clock Dragon, but is the Runescript Lizard so rare that ordinary reference works don't even record it?"
Pandora laughed. "More or less. I only refined mine by sheer accident. It really is wonderfully useful."
That said, she carried the Runescript Lizard to the middle of the laboratory, set it on the floor, then reached out, laid a finger on the disc atop its head, and pressed down hard.
In the next instant the Runescript Lizard's body deflated as if someone had let the air out of it, collapsing with a soft pop into a single sheet of paper.
The disc, meanwhile, expanded all at once, pressing flat against the floor and becoming a strange magic circle.
While Dark was still peering at it, Pandora pulled a sheet of paper from her bag and handed it over, then pointed at the implements on the table. "Follow the diagram on this page and lay all of that out for me."
Dark took the paper and glanced at it. What it showed was a complex array diagram centered on the Runescript Lizard's disc.
The outer edges of the array were assembled from a mass of metal discs, metal beads and metal tubes, and the whole thing radiated a profound sense of mystery.
"The Barrosnangel Array Diagram. You'll learn it eventually."
Pandora tossed the words off lightly and set to work.
Dark gathered his own share of the metal discs, beads and tubes from the table and began building the array outward from the Runescript Lizard's disc.
The layout alone consumed a full half hour.
Only when the two of them had completed the final fine adjustments according to the diagram did they straighten up and let out a breath.
Pandora's cheeks were faintly flushed as she rose. "That was a huge help. Without you, this array by itself would have taken a full hour to lay out."
"It's nothing." Dark looked at it, curious. "Is this a magnetic-field apparatus?"
Pandora went still for a beat, then said in surprise, "You know the Barrosnangel Array Diagram?"
Dark shook his head. "No. It just looked like one to me."
Pandora made an admiring sound. "Anyway, get yourself ready. All you have to do next is perform a Fusion Summon on the Runescript Lizard's disc."
"No problem," Dark said with a grin.
By this point he had a broad idea of Pandora's method.
The whole experiment had to revolve around the Runescript Lizard, that rare Magic Guide Spirit able to translate fluctuations of aura into pattern and script.
As for the so-called Barrosnangel Array Diagram, it might be an amplifier, or a stabilizer, or a filter.
In any case, once a Fusion Summon was performed inside the Runescript Lizard's disc, the lizard would convert the aura fluctuations it produced into script. Compare that against the script produced by the fluctuations of an ordinary summon, and the difference between the two would emerge.
A simple method of comparison.
Of course, since the Magic Guide Spirits being compared were not the same creature, plenty of differences would show up even if both were summoned by identical means.
Which meant the experimenter needed an exceptionally deep foundation of knowledge, plus a great many control groups and follow-up trials, before she could isolate and lock down that one thread of difference that belonged to "Fusion" alone.
The experiment that followed ran much as Dark had imagined.
At Pandora's signal, he summoned Gatomon into the Runescript Lizard's disc, then Black Gatomon, and then played that one card: "Fusion."
And so Bastemon made another entrance!
Because Dark had given Gatomon and DemiDevimon their instructions beforehand, it didn't go running off once it appeared. It sat obediently in the middle of the disc and waited.
As Dark began the summon, the Barrosnangel Array Diagram ringing the disc released a magnetic field visible to the naked eye.
Across that field, patterns and script of staggering complexity took shape, shifting without pause.
The Clock Dragon, seated on the workbench, narrowed both eyes, snatched up a pen, and reproduced every single shifting figure on paper with flawless precision.
"That's enough," Pandora said once the Clock Dragon had finished recording.
Dark recalled Bastemon.
Sure enough, Pandora then began summoning Magic Guide Spirits onto the Runescript Lizard's disc herself.
But she didn't stop at the Normal Summon. She used Sacrificial Summoning, Ritual Summoning, Reverse Flow Summoning, and a range of other summoning arts besides.
And thereby harvested a mountain of control data!
Then Pandora spread every sheet out across the floor and studied them with fierce concentration.
One glance was enough to convince Dark that, at his current level, there was no chance he could pick out the so-called "difference."
But after nearly an hour and a half of study, Pandora seemed to strike gold at last.
She shot to her feet, strode to the workbench, and started mixing with the potions she had prepared in advance.
Each time she produced a new magical draught she poured it over the Runescript Lizard's disc, recorded the script the resulting fluctuations produced, and ran another comparison.
Throughout, Dark quietly took on the job of cleaning up the spent potions.
At first he handled it himself.
But as Pandora's mixing grew faster and faster, he simply summoned the "Trash Slime" and let it shine in the one field where it truly excelled.
By now Pandora had thrown herself body and soul into the work, wholly oblivious to the passing hours.
Dusk crept up on them; sunset light came pouring in.
Dark snapped out of it and realized how late it had gotten.
Slightly dazed, he summoned Ditto as well, ordered it to clean up the potions alongside the Trash Slime, and slipped quietly out of the laboratory.
There was Astronomy class tonight.
Otherwise he might have stayed and kept her company the whole evening.
…
In Astronomy class, Professor Medea showed no sign of being affected by the Blood Princess affair. She taught her astronomy as she always had, supplementing it with material on astrology.
And Dark, as usual, brought Eevee-chan along to listen.
To boost Eevee's learning efficiency, he sometimes used "Pride III" to evolve it into Espeon.
Once it became Espeon, its "divination talent" shot upward, and grasping astrological knowledge came far more easily.
Even after it reverted to Eevee, that knowledge and understanding remained.
By this method, Eevee-chan's long and painful road of study had finally smoothed out, and by now it could just about claim a foundation of sorts.
From seven-thirty to nine, the hour and a half of Astronomy class came to an end.
Dark gathered his textbooks and hurried straight back to the laboratory.
But when he pushed the door open, Senior Pandora was still cycling through the same loop — compare and analyze, mix a draught, record the script, compare and analyze — like the most precise machine ever built, her thinking untouched by boredom or lapse despite the endless repetition.
"You've been working hard."
Dark gave Ditto, which had been ferrying the Trash Slime around all evening, a pat on the head, and took the job back over.
While the Trash Slime cleared the potions off the disc, he watched Senior Pandora.
Chances to observe her quietly like this were rare.
He looked at the light shining across her face.
His thoughts drifted away from the experiment, and he found himself remembering how he and Senior Pandora had first met — and how, over the course of it all, she had changed, little by little.
In the beginning her smiles had so often hidden something perfunctory and false. Later they had grown more and more genuine.
The change in her was, in truth, unmistakable.
Around the Christmas holiday especially, her state of mind had been visibly different.
Dark was hardly arrogant enough to believe he had caused that change.
He sifted through the past piece by piece, and without noticing it, he had assembled a far more complete picture out of the scattered clues.
Then, prompted by everything he'd run into recently, a thought surfaced — one that, for reasons he couldn't articulate, felt absolutely right.
"Senior Pandora — could it be that she found her mother too?"
…
Once the thought arrived, there was no putting it away.
Pandora had gone to the Exile Forest to mourn right after Christmas — and that stretch of time was exactly when Bastia Prison had been broken open.
The escapees from that prison certainly hadn't been limited to Ophelia Brad…
It struck Dark that he might well have just seen straight through his senior's secret!
"Even if it isn't her mother, it has to be family — someone very close by blood."
…
"Dark. Dark."
"Mm — hm?"
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