Karen: Because of the chaos that has been the last few disclaimers, I decided to allow only polite, quiet and respectful characters to do them from now on.

Jyou: Finally, our personalities are appreciated. They called us boring, but we knew we’d show them one day.

Koushirou + Iori: About time too.

Karen: So . . . ummm . . . what do you three think about Daikari vs Takari?

Jyou: I am fully in favour of Takari, if only because it’ll make Mimi realise she doesn’t have a chance with Takeru and my little, pink cowgirl will come running into my arms for consolation.

Karen: Sweet lord. The name Michael mean anything to you?

::Jyou turns to stone and moss grows up him::

Karen: Well, he’s still quiet and he’s decorative, so I guess that’s fine. What about you, Koushirou?

Koushirou: Let me explain this in terms of a scientific formula. I find it works better than more emotional, subjective means. Hikari + Takeru - Daisuke = Good.

Karen: Uh, that wasn’t very scientific. That was downright sad, actually. Iori, what’s your take on whom Hikari should be with?

Iori: Daisuke! She loves him! She adores him! She can’t sleep for thinking about him! She is going to become Mrs Motomiya one day!

::Karen and Koushirou peer suspiciously at Iori::

Koushirou: There is something familiar about that Iori . . .

Karen: I don’t remember Iori ever wearing goggles . . .

Koushirou: That’s because it’s DAISUKE!

Daisukei: Heh heh heh.

Karen: You’d better go read the story now, because there isn’t anything polite, respectful or quiet about what I’m about to do to him. . . .

****

Educating Mr Motomiya

Part 13

As Mr Ishida read the scores off his monitor, Daisuke slumped down in his seat, and wondered if it would be too obvious if he just slipped beneath the bank of buzzers and crawled out of the studio. He didn’t even want to look at Hikari and Takeru. The top students in his class, they had yet to get a question wrong between them. All the members of Tamachi’s team had done equally well - with the result that Odaiba were now fifty points behind them. He sunk his head in his hands. It’d be a major miracle if Hikari ever spoke to him again. He knew how much winning the Brainbuster Challenge had meant to her, and they didn’t have much of a chance of that now.

“Don’t worry about it, Daisuke,” he heard a cheerful voice say from beside him, “We’ll make it up on this round.”

He peered through a lattice of fingers to see Takeru smiling at him. The younger boy even managed to look sincere doing it, which he had to admit he might have been. Daisuke might not have liked him very much, but Takeru was one of the nicest people he knew. Sitting on his other side, Hikari did not look so happy or so forgiving. Her arms were stretched out in front of her and she was drumming an irritated beat with her fingertips on the table. I really screwed things up for her. There was only one way to make things right with her, as difficult as it would be for him.

“You two take the questions in the next round,” he said slowly, “It’s the only way we’ll do it.”

“Are you sure, Daisuke?” Takeru asked him, “I mean, we are a team.”

“Yeah, I’m sure.”

“He’s sure, Takeru,” Hikari added impatiently, “I’ll handle the sciences. You take the rest. We still can win this thing.”

Daisuke felt a dull pain in his chest. Hikari had been awfully quick to accept his suggestion, and she didn’t even seem to care how hard it had been for him to make it. He knew he wasn’t good at being humble, or at admitting his weaknesses. After all, he was in this mess because he liked to believe he could do anything and do it well. That, and he was in love with the girl seated two seats away from him. Other people might have called it a crush or an infatuation, but he knew it was the real deal. He could feel it in his gut.

Sighing, he looked past Takeru to where Hikari was sitting. She had a determined expression on her face, her jaw firmly set and her eyebrows drawn together. For the first time, he realised exactly how much like Taichi she was. He had seen that same expression on his team-mate’s face a hundred times before a big match. She wants to win almost as much as he would. He had always thought the two siblings could not have been more different, but the truth was that both of them were strong-willed, competitive people who knew what they wanted and went for it with a single-minded determination. (1) He could more than identify with that himself. Maybe that’s why we don’t work. Because opposites attract, don’t they?

Frowning, he shifted his attention to Takeru. The blond boy was looking at Hikari with a troubled expression on his face, as if he did not agree with what they were doing. He couldn’t understand it. If he had been in Takeru’s shoes and given a chance to shine in front of the girl he loved, he knew he would have taken it in a second without any doubts and without a thought for his rival.

“Well?” she prompted, “You obviously want to say something, so say it.”

Takeru opened his mouth to reply, but a sudden burst of music from the speakers drowned whatever he had been going to say. When it faded, the lights came up to show Mr Ishida standing beside two, enormous brains, wearing academic caps. One was painted blue, the other green, and each of them was divided into six parts. There was a light-bulb in the middle of each section. Takeru’s father had the good sense to look embarrassed, as he rested his hand on the one closest to him.

“We now move onto the second round of the Brainbuster Challenge. As I explained earlier, this consists of each teams answering six questions from six different categories. Namely, history, geography, literature, maths, science and foreign languages. The first team to get right answers in all six categories wins the round and 100 points,” he patted the brain beside him, “As they get a question in a category right, the bulb in the corresponding section will light up. If everyone is quite clear, let’s begin!” he tapped his stack of cards against his thigh, before glancing at the one on top, “As Tamachi is ahead, Odaiba will go first. So, for Odaiba, what are the two particles at the nucleus of an atom?”

Hikari rapped the buzzer, then leant forward to speak into the microphone, “Protons and neutrons.”

“Correct,” one of the blue brain’s lightbulbs blinked on, as he spoke, “For Tamachi, what is the S.I. unit for current?”

The small, pale girl answered for her team, tossing back her dark plaits, “Ampere.”

“Correct.”

The corresponding bulb on the green brain lit up in response.

“For Odaiba, which character in Shakespeare’s As You Like It delivers the speech about the Seven Age of Man?”

Looking slightly nervous, Takeru chewed his bottom lip. Daisuke watched him, caught between two, completely different emotions. On the one hand, it would be sweet to see the team’s golden boy make a mistake for once in his life. On the other, he wanted to lose the competition as much as Hikari did - to be exact, not at all. Suddenly, the other boy smiled and hit the buzzer, before saying in a confident voice, “Jakes.”

As a second light bulb began to shine on the blue brain, Mr Ishida beamed at his son, “You’re right. The next question goes to Tamachi: which British poet laureate recently died in 1998?”

Ken barely paused before tapping his own buzzer, “Ted Hughes.”

Mr Ishida nodded, while another segment of the green brain lit up to add its own confirmation that the answer was correct. He cleared his throat and neatly squared off his cards before proceeding to the next question, “Odaiba, what is the square root of sixty-four?”

“Eight,” Hikari replied quickly, “Eight is the square root of sixty-four.”

“Absolutely correct,” Mr Ishida turned his gaze to the other team, as another light came on next to him, “Now, Tamachi, can you tell me the first prime number?”

The permanent grin on the face of the red-haired boy broadened, as he pressed down hard on his buzzer, “That’s easy. One.”

As the words came out of his team-mate’s mouth, Ken seemed visibly disturbed. His eyes narrowed and his mouth opened as if to correct him, but he shut it and shook his head. Daisuke gave his best friend a puzzled look. Sure, the only primes he knew about were ribs and steaks, but he did know that the kids at Ken’s school were genii and that the three sitting opposite him were the best of the best. It was impossible one of them could have made a mistake.

A barely-disguised smile on his own face, Mr Ishida shook his head, “I’m afraid not. A prime is defined as any number that is divisible by itself and one. Two is the first number that fits those criteria.” (2)

A shocked mumur passed around the audience, and Daisuke sat up straighter in his seat, his hands gripping the bank in front of them. It might have been impossible, but it had happened. Beside him, he saw Takeru and Hikari look at each other and nod. Just like him, they knew they had been given a lucky break and were determined to take it. If they answered the following, three questions correctly, they would be in the lead as they went into the final round.

The next, few minutes passed in a blur of noise and light for Daisuke. His entire attention was focussed on the blue brain in front of them, as one after another bulb came alight on it. On the edge of his consciousness, he was vague aware of the electronic blare of the buzzers and of his team-mates shouting out the answers. Buzz. “China”. Buzz. “Coffee with milk”. Buzz. “Gulf of Mexico.” (3)

Stunned, he suddenly realised that all the light-bulbs on the blue brain were shining and that Odaiba had won the second round. Shock turned to excitement in an instant. They’re ahead! We’re ahead! We have a chance! I might have a chance! Yes! Yes! YES! Grinning, he turned to congratulate Takeru and Hikari, and the words dried up in his mouth. She was grinning happily at the other boy, her hands clasped in front of her, and the look in her eyes was unmistakable. Daisuke himself might have been a chair or a table for all the notice she paid to him.

And, amongst the sweetness of knowing they were in the lead, was the bitterness of knowing he had lost her for good. . . .

****

Join us for the final round (and the penultimate chapter) next time!

****

NOTIES:

(1) People might doubt this, but, interestingly, the character trait which Toei’s official profile highlights is Hikari’s iron will and determination.

(2) Absolutely true. As to how Keisuke got that one wrong, here’s some anecdotal evidence: I have one-and-a-half years of University maths under my belt, got A’s for all of those courses, and that still stumped me when I was watching a game-show the other night. ^.^

(3) For those who are keeping tabs, the questions were: “What country had the greatest, historical influence on Japanese language and culture?” “What is cafe au lait?” and “Into what gulf does the Mississippi flow?”