The Earth will forgive us
73. “We must win the house lights contest!” for Ari on Plurk whose request was:
I asked for Hyoubu and Fujiko last time...how about Hyoubu and Minamoto, and you just pick whatever you think will be the most disastrous I mean heart-warming?
As befitting of the current age of smart devices, it began with a picture taken on someone's smartphone.
Mio's power was especially suited for taking selfies and she had been more than happy to put it to use to take a picture of the tree in their apartment and the tree in it while all of them sat around it in a circle.
When Hyoubu saw the picture he was smiling. "Looks like all of you had fun."
"Major," Mio said, "why don't we put up a tree too."
He handed her phone back, smile never wavering. "That sounds like an amazing idea."
Later, it was Magi on his phone giving answers like, "yes, I want a twenty feet Christmas tree. Can it be airlifted to--no? Fine. There's a shipping dock we can use. I'll give you the address."
But it was also the age of social media so once they'd decorated their twenty feet Christmas tree, Hyoubu took a picture of it and uploaded it, making sure to share the link with the Children.
The caption read, Best Christmas tree ever! Better than what a government worker could set up in their apartment. with some emoticons tagged on.
To be honest, Minamoto thought it childish (as expected), but he was a little bit worried about how the Children were going to take it.
Shiho was smiling at her phone in a distinctly dangerous way. She didn't lower her phone as she asked Aoi, "What is the largest tree in the world?"
Aoi pushed the bridge of her glasses, "If we're talking about tallest, that'd be the one they call Hyperion. But if we want a tree that is both wide and tall then General Sherman should be our target. We can decide on our way to Comerica where they both are."
"You can't do that!" Minamoto shouted, "those trees are an important part of our Earth's ecological history! You can't cut them down to make them into a Christmas tree! They won't even fit in here!"
"It's fine! The Earth will forgive us!" Was Kaoru because Shiho was calling Kiritsubo about leaving the country and Aoi was checking for the exact measurements and coordinates of both trees.
In the end, unable to convince Minamoto, they convinced Kiritsubo to let them set up a tree at Babel that was thirty feet tall. To decorate it they had to involve most of the espers not currently on a mission.
But it was all for naught because the next thing that Hyoubu uploaded was a picture of the Catastrophe all decked out in shimmering Christmas lights with a seemingly floating light up Santa and reindeers sailing (forzen) accross the deck.
Can't get this view if you live in an apartment!
"This is a matter of national security!" Kiritsubo said, slamming his fist on the table.
"No it's not!" Minamoto said. "Why are you even offended? He's not even talking about you!"
No one was listening though because Shiho was saying, "we have to beat them! We can't let Pandra win!" Like they were discussing something more serious than a pissing contest over Christmas decorations.
"We need to fill Minamoto-han's apartment with so many lights they can see their defeat all the way from the Catastrophe!" Was Aoi and Shiho nodded along like the idea was genius.
Minamoto thumped them both on the head. "That's a fire hazard! And how are we supposed to sleep like that?"
Shiho was rubbing at her head and pouting. "Minamoto-san, of course we thought about that." Then her pout turned into a radiant smile as she pulled out a bottle of sleeping pills. "With my psychometry, I can give you the perfect dosage so you could sleep through even your apartment exploding. I'm kidding." Because Minamoto looked like he was about to actually get mad.
"Leave my apartment alone." He said.
"That's right." Kaoru said, hovering (literally) at Minamoto's shoulder. "We can't trouble Minamoto like this." And she looked so much like a bastion of maturity, in the middle of this whole mess that Minamoto almost teared up.
"So you're saying," Aoi started, "we should just let them gloat?" Because that didn't sound like Kaoru at all (unless she was just trying to act mature to impress Minamoto...)
"Hell, no." Kaoru said, a fire burning behind her eyes. "But we're not going to play by their rules!"
"Well said, Kaoru-chan!" And that was the Director's voice which basically killed any possibility that this wasn't going to escalate further even without her adding, "let's show Kyousuke he shouldn't mess with us!"
In the end, using the combined strength of Babel's espers (mostly Kaoru, Naomi and Fujiko) and helicopters, they built a forty foot tall snowman with extra details to give it a slight resemblance to a certain eighty year old, middleschool uniform wearing esper with a terminal case of chuunibyou. They built it in the mountains of Hokkaido which made for a wonderfully scenic background when they snapped a photo of it and put it on the internet.
Someone's title as the biggest lolicon might be in jeopardy!
And when Hyoubu inevitably came to destroy it in anger things devolved into a giant esper fight, free-for-all.
