The Wavering of Haruhi Suzumiya (7 page)

And just when you think we’ve made it through these pointless scenes, the film flirted with exhaustion yet again as it dredged up the school/love-triangle plot.

Itsuki thus far had remained indecisive on the matter of Mikuru and Yuki, which of course would earn him cries of resentment from all around him—from the other boys, that is. But the Ultra Director who ruled this story like a god chucked all such complaints out of the ring and obstinately imposed her own will.

Which would explain why the story so far had careened out of control, like a chimpanzee playing a racing game, crashing at every corner then rampaging ahead anyway.

But even the Ultra Director eventually realized that despite the
play-it-by-ear philosophy she’d used thus far, if she didn’t wrap things up soon, they’d never get to the ending at all.

Of course, it was already too late, if you asked me.

Anyway, perhaps she realized that at this rate there’d be no story at all, so all the little scenes with the characters doing who-knows-what got forcibly mashed together as we rushed toward the end.

Yuki suddenly remembered her original purpose and informed Mikuru of their final confrontation.

One morning, Mikuru opened her shoe locker to find a note reading
LET’S FINISH THIS
in mechanically written letters that looked like some printer had spit them out.

But still—if Yuki had really wanted to take out Mikuru, she’d had scores of opportunities thus far, and she wouldn’t have had to go to the trouble of informing Mikuru ahead of time. And yet who can fathom the mind of a space alien who goes around pretending to be a normal, expressionless high school student while constantly battling with her opponent? What did she want, anyway?

And who had any idea what Mikuru wanted either? After reading the missive from Yuki, she looked off into space with a steely gaze, gripping the note and nodding decisively as though having realized something. What had she realized? I know I’ve said this before, but I had no idea. The only one who knows won’t ever be on-screen.

As for me, behind the camera, well, comprehension was impossible, but thankfully I knew that everything in this world comes to an end eventually, giving salvation from this eternal hell.

We had arrived at the climax.

Appearing again for another cameo, Tsuruya came up to the troubled-looking Mikuru.

“What’s the matter, Mikuru? You look like you’re worried about some old man stalking you. Did your doctor tell you that you have athlete’s foot or something?”

Crouching in the corner of the classroom, Mikuru replied.

“The time has finally come. I must go and face the final battle!”

“Wow, how ’bout that! I’ll leave you to it, then—Earth’s in your hands!”

Tsuruya kept a straight face when she delivered the line, but then her face twitched and she burst out laughing.

“… I’ll do my best…”

Mikuru’s reply was so soft that the mic could barely pick it up.

Incidentally, although it’s probably pointless to point out any more problems with this terrible story, just when did Mikuru become friends with Tsuruya? Tsuruya’s first appearance was as a mind-controlled puppet in the pond scene, and Mikuru seemed to already know her at that point, which means that she knew Tsuruya even before Mikuru transferred into this school. But if that’s the case, Yuki’s mind-control attack should have happened later. At the very least, the knowledge that Tsuruya and Mikuru were friends would have improved that scene, and the fact that it didn’t play out that way is frankly a mistake.

Of course, the voice of God believed herself to be infallible, and she had no time for such observations, instead pouring all her energy into immediately filming whatever scene popped into her head. With no idea of when her instinct-driven activities might cease, ordinary humans like me were run totally ragged in both mind and body.

Thus did the final battle come to be held on the school rooftop.

During the lunch hour, the black-robed Yuki waited with Shamisen draped over her shoulder.

After a few seconds, the doors to the roof opened and out came Mikuru, dressed in her combat waitress outfit.

“D-did I keep you waiting?”

“Yes.”

Yuki answered honestly. Mikuru had needed to change in a stall in the girls’ bathroom, and while I didn’t know whether that was why she had taken so long, she’d kept the cameraman waiting for quite a while too.

“Well then,” said Yuki.

Her honesty was dispensed with, and she now launched into the lines that had been prepared for her.

“Let us settle this now. We do not have much time. We must end this in a few minutes, at the most.”

“I agree, but… but! Itsuki will definitely choose me! Um… this is embarrassing, but I believe it’s true!”

“Unfortunately, I do not plan to respect his wishes. I require his power, and I will have it. If I must, I will conquer Earth to get it.”

Why couldn’t she just go ahead and conquer Earth, and then gain control of Itsuki after she’d done so? No one would be able to resist her then, and Mikuru would be left to struggle alone as the majority went ahead and handed over Itsuki—not even the loveliest of battle waitresses would be able to stop them.

And anyway, if she had the power to conquer Earth, shouldn’t capturing just one person be no problem?

“I won’t let you! That’s why I’ve come from the future!”

Oh, right. Mikuru was a waitress from the future. That fact had been used hardly at all so far, so I was starting to wonder.

The laser-beam fight scenes between Yuki and Mikuru now started again.

On one hand, you had Mikuru firing beams, trip lines, missiles, and micro black holes while shouting “Shazam!” and “Kapow!” and so on, while Yuki wordlessly waved her wand around.

The word of God came down that there were some effects you just couldn’t do with CG, so a variety of firecrackers were set off
atop the school, and although they were old castoffs from the shopping district’s toy store, they were still plenty loud when lit. The resulting racket attracted the attention of several teachers down below, and we all got an earful.

That’s what happens when you play with fire at school, obviously.

If anything bad was going to go on my permanent record as a result, I’d ask that it instead be attributed to the director. But even if she shouldered Asahina’s, Nagato’s, and Koizumi’s burdens as well, she’d still be able to get by without any problems, thanks to her excellent grades. If she’d just sit down and shut up, nobody would have any complaints about her.

Despite the cameraman’s internal monologue, the battle raged on.

This is thanks to the director’s stubborn assertion that if the teachers forced us to withdraw from the rooftop and abandon this important scene, she would file a claim against the school for trying to stifle students’ freedom of expression.

I was afraid she’d actually do it too.

The teachers retreated from the rooftop with an impotent request to please not play with fire on school grounds, and we were getting more and more of an audience coming up through the roof’s entrance, which made Mikuru even more nervous.

One thing led to another, and Mikuru wound up at the end of her rope. None of her attacks had affected Yuki, and as she’d backed away from the constantly advancing alien sorcerer, she was cornered against the roof’s railing.

“Be at peace. I will carve you a fine epitaph. Be sure and do many good deeds in the afterlife, so as to store up good karma for your next life.” Yuki delivered her parting words as she thrust her wand at the waitress. “Farewell.”

That instant, the Star Ring Whatever lit up absurdly, and there was a cheap flashing effect that flickered several times.

“Eeeeek!”

Mikuru clutched her head and collapsed into a fetal position.

It wasn’t clear what kind of attack Yuki used, but evidently it was very powerful. It may have looked as though it was only causing the screen to flicker, but it was a spell potent enough to disintegrate Mikuru right down to the last atom.

If you don’t get excited here, there’s not going to be any more opportunities for excitement, so thanks in advance.

“Eeeek! Aaaaah!”

Mikuru continued to cry out.

It would be easy to get annoyed at such a totally useless heroine, but she was so cute that all was forgiven.

And even forgiven, she was at this rate about to be erased from the story. If evil triumphed over good, the narrative would become an ironic commentary on the fact that no matter the predominant views on who should succeed, those with power would always win.

“…”

But of course, that is not what happened. The character who stood on the side of justice right up through the very end was not suddenly going to disappear. The hand of an unseen god would move to exterminate evil, allowing a crucial character to appear with unbelievably exquisite timing. That was the scenario the director had dreamed up.

It goes without saying that the deus ex machina that saved Mikuru was none other than Itsuki Koizumi. I mean, of course. Who else would it be? There wasn’t enough time to suddenly introduce another character, after all.

In a flash, Itsuki picked Mikuru up, successfully dodging Yuki’s assault. It was awfully slow, that magical ray of Yuki’s.

“Asahina, are you all right?” said Itsuki, who then turned to face Yuki, holding out his arm. “I cannot allow you to hurt her. Yuki, please stop this.”

Seeing Itsuki’s determined stance in front of the helpless Mikuru, Yuki looked at the cat on her shoulder as if contemplating something. Perhaps she was considering annihilating them both, if she indeed could not have Itsuki.

But the answer came from an unexpected source.

“There is nothing to consider. You have only to steal the boy’s will. From what I’ve heard, you have the ability to control others. Simply take control of him, then, and hide him away somewhere, then deal with the girl at your leisure.”

Shamisen spoke, and I freaked out. I’d told him not to speak, so what the hell was he doing? No dinner for him!

“Understood.”

Yuki, composed as always, bopped Shamisen on the forehead with the star that tipped her wand. The cat shut his mouth. Yuki then spoke again, to nobody in particular.

“That was ventriloquism.”

She then raised the Star Whatever.

“Take this, Itsuki Koizumi. Your will becomes mine.”

A cheap special-effect thunderbolt leaped from the star.

I’m sure it’s obvious what happened next, but I suppose I might as well relate the events of the last battle.

To make a long story short, Itsuki’s potential power was realized. Having found himself in a desperate situation, he activated the latent potency that he never knew he had and his full abilities were unleashed. Such powers are often difficult to control, and Itsuki’s case was no different. The force of his emotion caused his incomprehensible power to reflect Yuki’s attack back on her with incredible energy.

“… How unfortunate.”

“Meeooow—!”

And with that, the mysterious Yuki and Shamisen were blown off into the horizon, leaving behind terribly disappointing final words.

Itsuki watched their demise, then spoke to Mikuru in a soft voice.

“It’s over, Asahina.”

Mikuru looked up tremulously, gazing at Itsuki as though he were a very bright light.

Itsuki put his arm around Mikuru and helped her to her feet, then rested his hand on the roof’s guardrail and looked up to the sky. Mikuru followed his gaze to the clouds as the camera panned up.

It was obvious that the camera panned up any time the connection to the next scene was unclear.

Which brought us to the very last scene.

Despite its being autumn, Mikuru and Itsuki walked along a cherry-blossom-filled road. The degree to which her waitress outfit and his school uniform went together is strangely irritating.

Conveniently, a sudden gust of wind arose, sweeping up the scattered petals into little whirls. This was the only natural scene in the film.

Itsuki smiled as he plucked a cherry petal from Mikuru’s hair. Mikuru blushed bashfully and slowly closed her eyes.

The camera’s focus blurred, then tilted up to capture the blue autumn sky. The sky again? Really?

The intro to the ending theme we stole from somewhere began to play as the credits scrolled.

The voice of God, evidently recorded separately, began to deliver some narration as
The Adventures of Mikuru Asahina Episode 00
came to its conclusion just as confusingly as it began.

Calling a movie filled with such ridiculousness from beginning to end a “movie” is an insult to people who are actually serious about making movies, and yet somehow this wound up being rather popular. The film was supposed to be bookended by features created by the film society, but in the end the audience demand for our film wound up pushing the others aside and
monopolizing the film society’s projector, no doubt because the voice of God had been hard at work hyping the movie, and also because Mikuru Asahina was quite popular.

Evidently the poor film society ended up screening their movies in little spurts whenever the A/V room was free.