Chasing After Rainbows

The electrical appliances seem a bit more recent than the others: the TV displays were still of those bulky square-ish screens that were common until the past 10 years. Only a small number of them used the more recent widescreen flat screen TVs, which I assume were replacements of broken screens. The computers were provided by the prefectural government, so those are the only recent ones as they are standard issue across all schools in the prefecture. The location of vending machines may seem odd, but since the school is known for vandalism and violence by the male students, they are strategically placed at locations where there is a recording security camera nearby like the main entrance of the building, or where several staff working nearby could see and hear people using it, like at the cafeteria and outside the teacher's room. The school board has warned on removing most of vending machines when there are any damages to them that would render it inoperable or theft to the con...

After what seemed like an eternity for an oddly short walk from the park, we arrived at Yosaka Middle and High School. I was not expecting both the middle and high school education levels together, which is quite rare in this country. Well, those large academies in this region do have those two in the same campus, but those two are treated separate and are not counted. Immediately as soon as I could see the front courtyard of the school, I could already see how much I appreciate that I am not sent to this school. The state of the school building and the greenery alone has seen better days with those looking no different from an abandoned place with noticeable damages to some facilities. Well, I am not saying the school is really in that bad state, but certainly not as maintained as the schools I have been to. There were students still in the school. Some of them stared in our direction, not because of me, but how glaringly obvious Saeko's Mizuho uniform sticks out. A uniform of...

We walked towards the local school together with Nishizawa and Saeko. Nishizawa revealed to me that Saeko is like a programmable robot that is immortal, but defenceless, with an actual person's soul inside. Right now, Saeko has been put on the command to behave like a high class hotel receptionist serving important guests, which is so unnatural from Saeko's usual behaviour. I wonder if Saeko is cringing in her mind with this forced behaviour, or has she been brainwashed to behave as such? If it is the former, maybe I can make her say or do something that would make this obvious. The tricky part is with the presence of Nishizawa, who made her behave as such, and not being obvious that I wanted to check on Saeko. Me: "How did the school turn out to be this bad? Surely the education ministry or the city mayor would have done something about it." This town does not have a town hall, so all admin matters fall in the charge of the nearest city, which is where ...

Woman: "Ah, I almost forgot. There are several spare uniforms at the staff room you can wear. We keep spares in case our students stained theirs with paint or blood, or gets torn apart. Wait inside the girl's toilet of the nearby park. You will attract attention if you don't change." Why are they keeping spares at all? Why at the staff room instead of the storeroom? What is with the mention of blood and tears? Why wait inside the park toilet instead of the outside? This sounds very wrong, even for a school away from the city. Me: "Is the bullying that bad?" She had an odd expression on her face when I said that. Woman: "Not all the families of the students can afford the uniform, and you know, bullying cases where they tear them apart. Some are... Left behind by students. There's a set prepared in the first cubicle in the toilet." Why did you already prepare the uniform when I had only just met you? I felt that the conversation was...

With my brother being magically turned into a girl from visiting Mizuho, the two of us looked like each other again just like in the old days, but how we are alike wasn't what I expected: as two young women instead of as two boys. It was right after the quake that I first saw him as a girl, though it was earlier that I first saw the picture of him as a girl on his student ID. I really thought it was someone else and wondered why the unknown girl used familiar terms to me and got angry when I tried to be polite. No matter how hard you try to look when he becomes a girl, you can't see him in any other way than as a real girl and an older version of me. No matter how hard I hit and shake his protruding chest, it simply jiggles around without ever falling off or going out of shape, and although it fells soft to touch, he showed discomfort as I touched them, which happens to me too when I touched mine. The sad part is that it can't be removed. Also, when I looked under his ski...

With the overseas school trip behind us, I am hoping to put behind the bad memory of being very lost and crying about it behind. I try to remember the other things about the trip, but that scary moment of being lost is hard to mentally disassociate with the trip. I wished I had not become so scared and frightened back then, but that was how I reacted naturally to the situation. Looking back, I should have been able to keep calm, but my body felt fear that became a part of my emotions before I was even able to think of keeping calm. You might have heard from my brother about how much we both look and think alike that we are practically twins, and how we eventually grew to be different. My current behavior is completely different from how I behaved when I was younger, and I'm very much aware of that. I don't like how girls behave, but the problem here is I am biologically a girl myself and there's some kind of unbreakable mental barrier that is forcing me to not be abl...

My name is Isaka Tsukasa (井阪一), 2nd year student of Kobayagawa High School. Although there's nothing wrong with the characters of my name, I don't like my parents for choosing Tsukasa as a way to pronounce it, as it sounds like a girl's name to me. I prefer my friends to call me Hitoshi instead, which can also be written with the same character, so they would never suspect that until a relative call me by my name in front of my friends who are used to the other name. I am a member of the chess club that forms one of the many small clubs in the school, and not much large ones. This is partially because joining a club itself in my school is not mandatory. The larger clubs are typically pretty much what you would expect any school would have: art, music, swimming, baseball, soccer, and so on. This school is an average school with several other schools in this city: including Kamisugi High (上杉高校) and Kaisei Junior High (海星中学). The well-known Mizuho Girls' Academy (瑞穂女子...

Hisakawa seemed to have problems with the people with a certain group of people in an area near where we are now. Quite a number of people have seen her at Powell Research's official events in that Mizuho uniform, enough times for people to see it as her "trademark" outfit. This means that she would be recognized instantly. For her to get into a disguise is nearly impossible as her Mizuho uniform can't be removed, including the name tag that has a completely different name written on it. The shape of that name tag, and her (larger-than-average) breasts, could still be seen even with multiple layers of clothes worn over it. She added that she hates wearing skirts, which is ironic as she's wearing one now and is never seen wearing anything else. Hisakawa is such a beautiful and elegant woman that I can't ever imagine her as a man. Hisakawa's phone started ringing. She answered it, but not long after, she started crying. Hisakawa: "What do you mea...

I felt uneasy about Hisakawa-san telling me to meet her at the lowest level of the basement car park of a nearby shopping center. It almost feel like I'm walking into a trap. Am I really walking into one? The location of the meeting place alone seems suspicious enough to me. I was already scared enough for today from being lost in a foreign land all by myself, and again when my phone rang even though I thought it had no cellular coverage here when I checked. I checked again now: there is currently no signal again. The area where Hisakawa asked me to wait has a lot of cars parked near there, but otherwise void of people. The only sound here are from the cars driving around and some ventilation machines. Not long afterwards, I saw Hisakawa sticking her head out, calling out to me, as though she does not want to be seen by others. She seemed to have tried to crossdress like a man, but the shape of her body is too feminine to be able to pass of as a man, especially with that larg...

On one of those days my group visited a place somewhere that is quite some distance away from the city center. Not sure where, but I do know that most of the way there has nothing but high-rise apartments. Unfortunately, I got separated from them while figuring out on getting around at an unfamiliar place. I don't know how it happened, but it did. I'm kind of scared to approach anyone, who are already looking at me. My uniform kind of stands out as there aren't any schools in this country that has a similar design, judging by the students that I had seen. My mobile phone doesn't seem to work while overseas. Payphones are nowhere in sight and, even if I do find one, I don't have the coins for it. Also, I don't remember the numbers to dial to contact people who might be able to help me. People were already looking at me because the design of school uniform I'm wearing is not used in local schools. The fact that people are even looking at me makes me scared...