The flyer on the library bulletin board was a death sentence written in cheerful, brightly colored font. My sisters' smiling faces beamed down at me, advertising not just a concert, but the public execution of my quiet life. Mikuyi, headlining the Tech-Fest closing ceremony. At my university. I felt a cold, creeping dread that was all too familiar.
"Isn't this great?" Nami said, her voice a beacon of pure, unadulterated enthusiasm that was completely at odds with my internal screaming. "We can volunteer, get extra credit, and see your sisters perform. It's a perfect plan!"
"Perfect' is not the word I would use," I muttered, my mind already racing. There was no way out of this. The extra credit for Professor Aoki's class was too valuable to pass up, especially with a project as demanding as ours. To refuse would be academically foolish. To refuse Nami, after she had signed our "peace treaty," would be a declaration of war. I was trapped by my own diplomacy.
"Come on, it'll be an adventure," she coaxed, already pulling a pen from her bag to sign our names on the volunteer sheet tacked to the board. "Takeshi Kitamaki and Nami Tanaka. The Quantum Duo. We'll be unstoppable."
I just groaned and let it happen. The ink drying on the sheet felt like a contract sealing my fate.
The walk home was heavy with the weight of impending confrontation. I had to tell them I knew. More than that, I had to tell them I would be there, not as a spectator, but as an active participant in the day's events, alongside Nami.
I opened the apartment door to find them in the middle of a dance practice in the living room, the coffee table pushed to the side. They moved in perfect sync, a whirlwind of focused energy. Hina paused the music when she saw me, wiping a bead of sweat from her brow.
"Welcome home, Takeshi-kun. How was the library?" she asked, her breathing barely labored.
"Productive," I said, dropping my bag. I decided to rip the band-aid off. "I saw the flyer for the Tech-Fest. The one where you're the headline act."
Silence. Ayumi froze mid-stretch, her eyes wide. Izuwa stopped toweling her hair and looked at me, her expression unreadable.
"Oh, that," Hina said, her voice a little too casual. "It was a rather last-minute booking. A great opportunity for campus outreach. We were going to tell you tonight at dinner."
"You were going to tell me that you're turning my university into your personal concert venue, again?" I countered, my voice flat.
"Don't be so dramatic, Onii-chan!" Ayumi chirped, bouncing over to me. "It's going to be so much fun! You can see us perform for real this time, not just a boring rehearsal. You'll be so proud!"
"That's another thing," I said, steeling myself. "I'm not just coming to watch. I'll be there all day."
"All day?" Ayumi's face lit up like a Christmas tree. "Really? You're going to be there to support us from the beginning?"
"No. I'm going to be there because Nami and I signed up to run the Quantum Computing booth for the Engineering Faculty," I clarified. "For extra credit."
The temperature in the room dropped by ten degrees. Ayumi's brilliant smile faltered. Hina's welcoming expression turned into one of polite, intense scrutiny. Izuwa raised a single, perfectly sculpted eyebrow. The Sister Council was back in session.
"You're… volunteering?" Hina asked slowly, as if the words were foreign. "With Nami-chan?"
"She's my project partner. We need the extra credit," I repeated, feeling like a defendant on trial.
"How convenient," Izuwa murmured, a cynical smirk playing on her lips. "The non-threatening 'friend' just happens to be ensuring she spends the entire day by your side at the biggest campus event of the year. She's a better strategist than I gave her credit for."
"It's not a strategy, it's extra credit!" I exclaimed, exasperated. "Can you please, for once, accept that my life contains normal student activities that don't revolve around you?"
"Of course, Onii-chan!" Ayumi said, recovering and latching onto my arm. Her grip was tight, possessive. "And we will be there to support you in your normal student activities! We'll have some downtime before the concert. We can come visit your booth! We can learn all about… quantum… stuff!"
I looked at her, then at Hina's thoughtful frown and Izuwa's suspicious glare. I knew exactly what this was. This wasn't an offer of support. This was a threat. They couldn't openly object to Nami anymore, not after the peace treaty. So they were moving to the next phase: active surveillance. They were going to "support" me by forming a perimeter around my booth, a glamorous, high-security prison of sisterly affection.
"That's… really not necessary," I said weakly.
"Nonsense," Hina said, her leader-mode activating. "It's important that we show an interest in your academic pursuits. We'll make time in our schedule. It will be our pleasure to see you and Nami-chan in your element."
The way she said Nami's name was laced with a chilling sweetness. The Hot Pot Summit had ended one war, but the Tech-Fest flyer had just become the declaration of a new one. This wouldn't be a covert operation fought through catfishing and text messages. This was going to be a direct, face-to-face conflict, fought on my turf, with quantum mechanics as the battlefield. And I, along with my unsuspecting friend Nami, were stuck right in the middle of the blast zone. My only hope was that the principles of quantum superposition would somehow allow me to be in two places at once: one suffering at the booth, and the other, far, far away.