[b]“Do you think Haruka and Toby are okay?”[/b]

“Mm?” Sho paused just as he began to open the door. “Yeah, probably. I don’t think they’d be dumb enough to go back into that… Meat World.” [i]And yet here you are looking for another potential way into that same Meat World,[/i] a small voice chided him in the back of his head.

[b]“Sho, what happened back there? Why did we all leave?”[/b]

“You’re telling me you don’t remember anything?” Sho blinked at her. “Anything at all?” For a fleeting moment he toyed with the idea of not telling Suzume about her crazy manic episode. But then again, what good would that do? “Um, well… you kinda had a panic attack. Must’ve blacked out since you don’t remember, ‘n all... Haruka and I got you out when…” He figured it best to leave out the detail of the meat-man-come-to-life. “Er, nevermind. Basically you started screaming, so we decided it was time to go.”

Sho shuffled his feet uncomfortably as he returned his attention to his hand resting on the door handle. If this was just another entrance to that flesh-place, he might just scream as well –but more so out of frustration than anything else.

[i]Here goes…[/i] He pushed the door the rest of the way open. He gaped at the sight that awaited them on the other side. It looked like someone had gone through and scribbled on [i]everything[/i]. No… it was more than that. The room was made of pencil marks crudely outlining a garden in a cityscape.

Just when he thought this school couldn’t get any weirder.

Curiously, Sho crouched down and traced a finger across the grass. Well, look at that. It felt like graphite, too. He had a residue of silvery gray on his finger when he pulled away. It reminded him of the smudge marks he got on the side of his hand when he sketched or doodled in his notebooks for school. He wiped it off against his pant leg and stood up again.

Then he saw the girl. She looked like she was also made of graphite –reason number one for being cautious. He tried to make out the girl’s features, but she had her back to them –reason number two for being cautious.

“Uh, hello?” Sho called out. Then he paused, unsure of why he just did that. What if the girl turned around and revealed herself to be some sort of freaky monster? He glanced at Suzume. By her earlier reaction to the meat world, she probably wouldn’t do well with any more surprises like that.

“Look,” Sho said more quietly to Suzume. “It’s like a world made by a little kid. I think we got lucky. I mean, how bad could it be?” [i]Very.[/i] “We even landed in a garden. That’s pretty nice, huh?” He hoped he sounded more confident in that statement than he felt.