Written: 5/7/24
Word Count: 1,835

I swallowed, hesitating slightly before taking the plunge. "So if she doesn't want to hide...what does she want?"

"To rule it all," Bella said, blowing a strand of hair from in front of her eyes. The grimace aligned perfectly with what I felt inside.

I'm sorry. Did I casually wander into an Avengers movie? How could anything in real life ever have the answer of: to rule the world?

"That's ridiculous," I said. I tucked my creeping hand against my chest, trying to ignore the warmth tingling on both sides of my body as I was wrapped in the heated embrace that was Kakashi Hatake. Not one to be outdone, however, Kakashi's free hand grabbed mine, cleanly pulling it back to his thigh.

Then he let go.

And for the first time, like the severe opposite of being dunked in a tub of water, I had the thought: why is he suddenly being way more touchy than he was before?

"I don't see how I factor into all of this," Sam piped up. Her arms crossed over her chest in an angry pout.

Kirishima cleared his throat, the teenage husk of his voice not budging an inch. "What even is this spell? Am I—am I even real?"

All the warmth from cuddling on the couch with Kakashi left me, and I sprang up to the edge of the cushion, watching in growing horror as Kirishima's eyes flicked all around the room, not once alighting on anything for more than the briefest glimpse. He cradled Hable in his hands, the orange kitten letting out the most delicate yawn before nuzzling into his hold.

Horror clogged up my throat as a teenager who had been hiding all of the fear and uncertainty inside of him finally spoke some of the truth tearing at his brain. I couldn't form a single sentence. Never had I questioned whether or not they were real. The moment I'd met Kakashi's smiling-not-smiling eyes on the front step of my apartment, I'd accepted the idea that the fundamental principle of one of my favorite teenage book series was true: all the stories are real.

After reading so many different types of fantasies, from transmigration of people to another world, to overlapping universes existing next to one another, to the breadth and scope of how far this universe expands, I wasn't one to turn away from even the most miraculous possibility. It's just that, before Kakashi, I'd never thought it could be real.

How could I look at Kakashi, a seated furnace beside me, that damn beauty mark on his chin, giving me those heavy-lidded eyes that looked like they should be immortalized in a magazine shoot, and not think he was real? How could I possibly deny it at this point?

But it was my privilege to already exist in this world. It wasn't me whose entire being had been thrown into something I'd never known. Sure, I was affected, but I wasn't the one who'd been displaced. I couldn't believe I'd never considered the possibility that Kakashi and Kirishima would struggle with this strange dichotomy.

I tilted my chin down a bit, daring a glance at the silent shinobi behind me. "Do you..."

Kakashi's ungloved hands were almost more scandalous than the beauty mark on his unmasked face. Kakashi's soft hair hung down, not pushed up by his headband. There was just something so warm, so inviting in all of that showing skin. Or it could be the deep gaze shadowed beneath his arched brows. His eyes had been on me even before I'd dared look up at him.

One hand played with the ends of my hair, callused fingertips brushing up against the back of my neck. "I know I'm real."

"Yeah," I breathed, clearing my throat, then clearing it again when it seemed I would choke on all the sudden phlegm inside my larynx. Like a creaky, wooden puppet, I slid off the couch, gathering onto my knees before the redhead.

Kirishima wouldn't look at me. With a dawning sense of shame, I realized most of my time had been about Kakashi. My thoughts always returned to the silvery ninja, leaving the far more fragile teenager a quiet mess right in front of me.

Sam wasn't the only at-risk child in my vicinity. Here was another one who had a wealth of pain inside of him, a wealth he'd only let slip tonight. What did I know about Kirishima, anyway? What had I discovered about him that wasn't part of the series I knew and loved? I knew of his insecurities and inferiority complex, his tepid bravery and machismo idolations...all from the series. I hadn't learned any of those things from being face to face with him.

"Why do you question whether you're real?" I asked, but before I could start, Bella interrupted.

"Listen, people are going to start questioning where I am," she said, not unkindly. She slid off the chair. "I thought you cared about the spell, not some therapy session for displaced kids stuck in the wrong world. Listen," she held up a hand as I opened my mouth, "just let me do what you asked. I'm already done with the lot of you."

A hot breath escaped me while I tried to figure out where my priorities should be. I felt like an inconsistent cow. How many times had I waffled between finding answers and pretending everything was normal? It was like I couldn't stick to one train of thought before racing after a different, shinier, one. How embarrassing.

Clamping down on my frustration, I scooted over a bit so that I could play with the still-brawling Sintar at Kirishima's elbow. I couldn't just touch the poor boy for no reason, but I didn't want to leave him completely alone right now. I made a mental note to drag him off to the side later to give him the opportunity to share his feelings. I stared at Hinnie's little paws, each claw digging into the sensitive skin beneath my fingernails, hoping my silence was enough of an answer for Bella to continue.

"I think you guys already know about as much as me for what the spell actually does," Bella said, ignoring Sam's noise of disagreement. "I'm not an expert, okay? I'm only here because I'm annoyed. So just deal with it."

"It's a spell that takes a specific person from a different world and brings them to this one?" Kakashi clarified. Bella nodded, shrugging at the same time.

"I guess so," she said. "I've never seen it done before, actually, so maybe the scope of it isn't clearly known. Just think about it. You mentioned there was another summon that acted differently, right? How could the summoning be different for each try? Which one is the correct form of the spell? A person in control of their faculties," a nod to Kakashi and Kirishima, "or the more obedient objects of destruction?"

My heart went numb at the implication. If Rengoku and Itachi were the correct forms of the spell, then that meant...

"She's using anime characters to hurt people?" Sam scoffed, voice ringing loudly in this small room. She paced back and forth, crossing the linoleum lip and back onto the carpet, again and again. One step silent, the next clacking flatly on the shiny kitchen floor. "Ridiculous. So ridiculous."

"I think she started with an experiment to test if she could really pull a being from another universe," Bella continued, completely ignoring her coven's heir. "At first, I'm sure it was meant to make you obedient. You're not exactly the most docile and focused witch-in-training. Anyone with eyes can tell the Boss has big plans for you, so I honestly think this was a way to try to get you to fall in line. The carrot, if you will."

Using her child's fangirl tendencies against her? That was...creative. Diabolical, but not without a hint of genius.

Most mothers couldn't actually summon their daughters' objects of affection from other worlds, though.

"You said 'at first'," Kakashi prodded.

I dared not look at him, watching instead the vivid reactions crossing Kirishima's face at each new word from Bella. The teen had no control over hiding his emotions, and it twisted the knife of guilt deeper and deeper into my heart. How had I not noticed how much he was struggling? Why had I taken advantage of his heroic side to ignore the fact that the ground beneath him had quite literally been swapped out for something new and terrifying?

Bella scoffed. "Yeah, I'm sure this was an experiment intended to keep Little-Miss-Heir happy and quiet. But after the first attempt, I think her vision changed. Until they put them in our world with an entirely different magical structure, there was no guarantee any powers or magic from their original worlds would still be there once coming here. But it did. It stayed. I think that opened a lot of possibilities, and from what it sounds like, the Boss and Ginnie have probably already experimented on how to create obedient soldiers on top of the interdimensional kidnapping."

"Ginnie?" Sam echoed, face turning pale. Even surrounded by the dim atmosphere of my apartment, her freckled cheeks bleached of color. "You think she's in on it?"

At last, Bella turned her attention to Sam, hands on her hips as she considered the teenager. She blew out a breath, fitting her jean jacket straighter on her shoulders. "I need to get going. You should know, though, these two weren't the first attempts."

And the horror was back. My fingers clenched into the strands of my carpet, knuckles tensed and straining against my skin like at any moment, my bones would burst from my flesh and take flight.

Kakashi and Kirishima...weren't the first?

"You don't mean Rengoku or Itachi that I mentioned at the bar?" I asked.

Without turning to look behind her, Bella hummed in agreement. "Mm. This happened a while back. Actually, almost a year ago."

"What?" Sam whispered, too shocked to speak normally. "Who?"

"Listen, I really have to go," Bella sighed. "I'm closing tonight. They'll have noticed my absence by now."

"Wait," Sam said quickly, reaching out for the edge of Bella's shirt as the witch tried to pass. "Don't go yet. You can't...This wasn't..."

"I'll reach out to someone who was there, if she's still alive," Bella said shortly, snapping her shirt cleanly out of the teenager's grasp. "She can tell you more about how all that turned out. It's too dangerous for me to say more right now. Be ready to respond when I text because I'll be deleting it soon after sending."

"But, Bella—"

"If anyone knows how to send otherworlders home, it's her," Bella said, opening my door with one glance at the shocked faces arrayed in my living room. "The one who came here was sent back. So, it's possible."

Then, Bella the witch left, letting the door close softly behind her.