Story:

Footsteps approached.

Bill entered first. Shiori followed on one side of him, Miffy on the other.

Peach stared. For a brief, absurd moment, seeing familiar faces made her want to call out for help.

Then Bill smiled.

The impulse died before it reached her mouth.

Shiori’s gaze passed over the four girls on the floor. Miffy stayed half a pace behind Bill, her hands folded in front of her uniform.

Peach could not make the scene fit together.

These were people she knew.

School corridors. Messages about homework. Ordinary conversations that should have belonged to a world where somebody would already have called a teacher.

Yet her wrists were cuffed. The sisters could not use magic.

And Bill was walking across the gymnasium as though someone had arranged a pleasant surprise for him.

For an instant, his face blurred in Peach’s mind.

Another smile. Another place where someone else had decided what would happen to her.

Bel.

The memory of the Vampire Lord in that other Japan struck so vividly that her stomach turned.

Bill was still Bill when she blinked. His familiar school uniform only made the resemblance harder to bear.

He stopped in front of Reika. “There you are.” Reika said nothing.

Bill crouched, then settled onto one knee, bringing himself closer to her eye level.

“I didn’t intend for things to go like this.”