I have no excuses.

I spent two years, on ONE chapter. One.

I need to work. Seriously.

There is nothing more I can say except sorry, and I hope you enjoy this chapter that sat in my computer for ages, slowly getting updated bit by bit by bit.

Disclaimer: I DO NOT OWN DETECTIVE SCHOOL Q.

Chapter 10: So it Begins

Ryu pounded on Shizuko's door at first, but then lowered it to a reasonable knock. He tapped his foot impatiently as he heard the girl mumble a reply that sounded a lot like, "I'm coming, darn it…"

Shizuko opened the door, glaring at him. "What is it? In case you haven't noticed, it is—" Shizuko checked her watch. "—eleven o'clock in the evening."

"You lied to me."

"About what?"

"What happened outside?"

"Nothing. I needed air."

"The truth, Miyahara-kun."

Shizuko felt herself recoil. Ryu had not called her Miyahara-kun in a long while. And judging by the serious glare at her, he meant business.

"What do you know already, Amakusa-kun?" she shot back.

"I saw someone outside."

Her eyes widened.

"So it is someone you know." Ryu sighed. "It doesn't take a genius to figure it out."

"So typical of Amakusa-sensei," Shizuko said, rolling her eyes.

"I want answers, RIGHT N—" Ryu got cut off as Shizuko slapped her hand over his mouth.

"Eleven-oh-three in the evening. Class Q. Asleep. Your voice. Loud." Shizuko hissed through gritted teeth. "Get in here."

Without waiting for Ryu to answer, she pulled him inside her room and closed the door.

Ryu found himself slammed into Shizuko's desk chair rather forcefully. He mentally thanked the rich club for giving the chair a fairly good cushion.

"You saw him?" She said rather hysterically. "I told him to leave ASAP!"

"Shizuko-san, you have a lot of explaining to do. And I think it's time you let Class Q know—" He found himself gripped rather firmly by his shirt front. His eyes widened as Shizuko pulled him towards her.

"Ryu-kun, no! I don't want anyone to know I'm involved with someone from the case. It's bound to cloud their thoughts about my decisions."

"But aren't your decisions affected already?"

"Nothing's wrong with my sense of judgment. Rest assured that if he does have something to do with the case, I'm not there to protect or defend him."

He sighed heavily. "This changes nothing, though. We have a case here, Shizuko-san, and frankly, your issues are not helping."

"I promise to settle my problems as quickly and as painlessly as possible. Allow my past to remain unknown for a while. I am not ready to reveal this much to Class Q, all at once." She loosened her hold on his shirt front, and Ryu tried to smooth out the creases that her hands had left behind.

"I am still curious as to his agenda earlier this evening," he continued in a more businesslike tone. He raised a cool gaze at her. "This didn't have anything to do with what he asked of you this morning, did it?"

For some reason, Shizuko flushed. Ryu only raised his eyebrows at her, as if to say, "Well?"

". . . "

"Miyahara-kun." She could hear the frown behind his words. The girl gritted her teeth and whipped her head around to face him.

"You two were that close, so why refuse him now, Shizuko-san?"

"I swore to leave my past behind, Ryu-kun. Fujiwara Kenichi is part of it. I got so far along in my dreams by walking away from him, so I will be glad enough to keep walking away. I don't want to go back."

Ryu mulled over his thoughts the next morning. Judging by Shizuko's apparent dislike for Fujiwara Kenichi, he was someone to stay away from. But at the same time, he couldn't help feeling curious. It was another mystery he had on his hands, all right, and he was already grateful that he had just been granted access, in a sense. Perhaps he could look up information on his own. However, if Kazuma couldn't find information on the younger Fujiwara, he wasn't sure whether there was much hope. Abandoning the idea for the meantime, he descended the staircase leading to the lower floor.

When he got downstairs to meet with the others in order to go to the main building for breakfast, he was met with a bunch of very annoyed faces.

Kinta, Kazuma and Megumi were sitting around the kitchen table. Kinta was looking murderous. Kazuma, as usual, looked uninterested in the killing aura. Megumi was looking from one to the other nervously.

"…What's happened?" he asked Kinta, who already had several veins threatening to pop at his temple.

"What's happened?! I'll tell you what's happened!" Kinta bellowed, banging his fist on the table. "Some punk put a bunch of itchy leaves in my bed!"

"Itchy leaves…?"

"I think it's poison ivy," remarked Kazuma, looking bored.
"Of course you know it's poison ivy, you did it!" Kinta continued to yell, pointing directly at the younger boy.

"What do you mean that I 'did it', I never went near your pigsty of a bedroom, you—"

"Who's got a pigsty bedroom?"

Megumi covered her ears, wincing. "You can always go to the infirmary, Kinta."

"I'm not exposing my—"

"…oh, so it's in an area you don't normally reveal to the public, eh?" a slightly dazed voice mumbled from the doorway.

Everyone turned to look at Shizuko, who evidently had just woken up and was just about finished dressing. She was doing the last couple of buttons on her cardigan and looking at everyone with a mildly bemused expression. "What's going on?"

"Someone put poison ivy in Kinta's bed," Megumi supplied.

Ryu shook his head. "It can't be poison ivy. It only grows in North America."

"He's right," Shizuko added. "Kinta, was there anything else in your bed aside from leaves?"

"A couple of branches," he muttered. "It was kind of sticky under the sheets though…"

Shizuko shuddered. "You're sure you're not sticky from…" Her face contorted into a slightly sickened expression.

Kinta looked ready to burst again, though this time from embarrassment. "NO!"

Megu pushed him back into his seat gently. "Relax, Kinta." She turned to the other girl. "What do you think it could be?"

"Something similar to the poison ivy," Shizuko replied. "Have you ever heard of the Japanese Lacquer tree?"

"You mean the tree which sap is used for lacquerware?" Ryu nodded. "Yes, I've heard of it."

"The tree sap contains an allergenic compound," Kazuma said. "It's all right here. Pretty strong stuff."

"It could be the substance found in Kinta's bed," Shizuko continued. "Kinta, maybe you really should go to the infirmary."

"How do you know this?" Megumi asked. "Don't tell me you used to work with trees."

"No, I didn't, but I did do research about poisons and irritating substances at one time," Shizuko said. "My grandfather's files were extensive."

"Your grandfather?" Megumi asked.

"Yeah. He was a criminal investigator back in New York, didn't I ever tell you guys?" she replied, surprised.

"Oh. That explains a lot."

"Yeah." Shizuko shrugged it off. "Well, I'm hoping that this is just some random—"

"AAAAAAAAAAAAAARGH!"

Everyone looked around. "What was that?"

Kyu ran out of the bathroom clad in several towels. "What's this?"

Megumi covered her mouth and tried her hardest not to laugh.

The rest of class Q (save for Ryu, as usual) started laughing. The reason?

Kyu's hair had been dyed a magnificently bright shade of PINK.

He could actually almost match Megumi's hair.

"Come on guys, it's not THAT funny!" Kyu flailed his arms around slightly. "What am I going to do?"

"I think everyone else's shampoo was safe," Ryu said, now trying hard to keep a straight face. "Maybe you should borrow some other shampoo."

"Yeah, I'm sure that rinses out, Kyu," Shizuko added between giggles.

Kyu retreated to the bathroom, his ears looking almost as pink as his hair.

As amusing as the morning's events were, Shizuko was secretly not happy about it, and Ryu could see that. He thought about it as he started picking out his choices from the morning buffet. Kinta, of course, had been sent to the infirmary, but only after Shizuko had convinced him that there was probably an attractive lady nurse who could help him.

He mulled things over. He could only deduce that there was only one person behind both tricks, and that was Fujiwara Kenichi. He wondered to himself whether to tell Class Q or not about the connection between their classmate and the boy, but decided against it for the time being. Perhaps after some time in the club, it would then become necessary to actually be acquainted with the blonde punk.

His thoughts were interrupted by Kyu, whose hair was now very much free of any trace of pink. "What do you think we should be up to today, Ryu?" he asked. "We don't have much to go on."

"That's true," Ryu agreed. "While your theories regarding Asano-san, the stable boy, are useful, we can't seem to get the investigation going due to lack of information."

"The club members Kazuma found may all be suspects, but unless we can narrow them down, we're lost," Megumi admitted. "There's got to be something better we can do."

Shizuko seemed thoughtful. "We don't know much about horses."

"Well, there's a useful thought," Kazuma said sarcastically.

"No, really, think about it," Kyu said, understanding. "We've never really thought of how horses by themselves could affect this case."

"What are you suggesting, Kyu, that we go ride horses?" Megumi asked.
"Yeah! And anyway, it'd be fun!"

"…I knew it," Kazuma muttered.

"Come on, he does have a point," Ryu said.

"Ever the considerate one, Ryu-kun," Shizuko said. "But I say why not? It's probably a good idea to go once Kinta's back from the infirmary."

"And it'll give us a good opportunity to see Asano-san again," Megumi added. "I say we go. Then you guys can all meet him."

They headed for the stables soon after breakfast. Kinta hadn't taken long at the infirmary—apparently a pretty female nurse hadn't been available, so he had been tended to by a male doctor. They snickered among themselves as they arrived at the area, Asano waving a hand enthusiastically at Kyu and Meg as they neared him.

"So these are your friends, huh?" Asano said when everyone had caught up.

Kyu grinned. "Yeah. We want to try going for a ride at least once here."

"Nice to see you all. Asano Hisashi, at your service. First off, have any of you ever ridden a horse before?" He asked, looking all of them over.

"I have," Shizuko replied. "My grandfather made me take riding lessons."

"Ah, good, at least you can help the others as well. We'll get started as soon as we—"

The thump of riding boots on dirt brought everyone's attention to the person who had suddenly arrived. Megumi bristled ever so slightly. It was Jeppensha Eriko, the red-headed girl from the day before. She took no notice of the tension in the air and went right into the stables.

"Good morning, Ojosama," Asano greeted her politely as she passed.

Eriko, who seemed mildly irritated, stopped and waved off the greeting. "Good morning, Asano-san. Can I get my usual horse this morning?"

"Yes. You need me to saddle and prepare him for you?"

"No need, I can do that myself," She replied rather quickly. "Thank you."

She went into the further areas of the stables and disappeared among the stalls in a matter of minutes.

Asano shrugged off the briskness of their conversation and went back to speaking to Class Q. "Anyway, we'll get started as soon as we pick out your horses. Of course, none of you can ride on the show horses, but some horses towards the middle should be good enough for beginners, and they're mighty friendly. Come on, I'll show you around."

He led them inside, explaining about each horse as he passed. "Some of them have English names; some have Japanese, depending on who sold them to us. Some of these were bred from horses sent over to us, from Europe and America. They do a lot of trade anyway, and sometimes even horses from the Middle East get here. We even have miniature horses," he said, pointing to a distant stall where distinctly smaller horses were kept. "They have horse shows too, but they're not strong enough to carry riders—older riders, I mean—over long distances. They're led over obstacles and stuff by their trainers."

"I never knew there was so much to learn about horses," Kinta said.

"Oh, taking care of them is a serious business. Trust me, it took a while before everything started to come naturally. Horses in general tend to be a little frisky, but once they know you, you'll get along just fine. Just don't do anything stupid like pull out their hairs or stay near them with sharp things."

As they walked through the stables, they met Eriko going in the opposite direction, leading a saddled and bridled horse. Without giving them any attention, she continued moving, leading her horse out into the open and riding it as soon as she got out.

Asano led them to some stalls, where some horses were actually already saddled and bridled as well.

"Well this will be more convenient," Asano said, making his way towards the animals. "I'm gonna show you anyway how to saddle and bridle them yourselves, so that you guys won't have to ask me so often." He grinned. "It really pays to know, so here's a crash course."

Within a few minutes, Class Q had learned how to properly fold a horse blanket, set the saddle on their horses, and attach the bridles to the horse's muzzle. The basics at least.

"Now, you have to know that the proper bridle is important for each and every horse," Asano warned. "The bridles have different bits depending on the horse. The wrong bridle on a show horse can change how you control it. Anyway, I won't pressure you any further, so let's lead these babies out into the wide open air and take a ride!"

It became obvious that not everyone in Class Q was up for horseback riding. Shizuko, of course, didn't have much of a problem, but Kyu was one overexcited little boy. He'd barely gotten on his horse before falling off it. Ryu, of course, took it all in stride, and soon enough, he was sitting atop his horse quite comfortably. Kinta didn't have too difficult a time getting up on the horse, nor did he have trouble keeping his balance, but he had to watch out at least for Kazuma, who, being too short, had needed help mounting, even though his horse was slightly smaller than the others.

That just left Megumi, who was thankfully wearing pants that day. Her horse, while friendly, didn't seem to take to being ridden quite so well. As soon as she got on the horse, however, trouble began.

She applied the slightest weight on the saddle, and suddenly, the horse brayed! It threw its front legs into the air and began neighing wildly.

Megumi screamed and instinctively held on to the horse's neck, clutching on for dear life.

"Down, Shiro, down!" Asano called to the horse, trying to reach for the horse's reins, but the animal wildly swung its head away from Asano and bolted away, taking a frightened Megumi with him.

"Pull on the reins, girl!" Asano yelled after her.

"It's not working!" Megu called back at the stableboy.

"Megu!" Kyu yelled, trying to steer his horse towards the fleeing one. Unfortunately, his efforts were useless—while his horse was reacting, it did not seem to want to pursue the other horse. Megumi was already starting to get further away from them, and the horse was going in a wild zigzag towards the forest nearby. Asano cursed under his breath and swung himself onto his horse in one smooth motion. "Hang on tight there!"

"Shizuko-san, what are you doing?" Ryu's voice suddenly rang out.

As the rest of Class Q turned to look, Shizuko had already whipped her horse into a gallop and was hot on Megumi's trail. Asano, of course, had flicked his own reins and set off after the two girls.

Megumi was screaming as the horse wildly tried to toss her off, yet continued to gallop at the same time. Her arms were clinging around the horse's neck, no longer trying to control the animal, but holding on for dear life and trying not to fall out of the saddle.

Meanwhile, Shizuko had caught up to Megumi, Asano following very keenly behind her. She reached Megumi's side first, and galloped next to the horse's right side. She yelled in order to be heard over the pounding of hooves. "Are the reins working?"

"I pulled on them several times, but it's not working!" Megumi yelled back. "Something's wrong!"

"Hold on!" Shizuko reached forward with her left hand, and held on to her own reins with her right. "I can't swing you off that horse, but try not to apply pressure on the saddle!"

The reins were swinging back and forth from the horse's mouth. Shizuko took a swing at the reins, but missed. However, she attempted a second time, risking a fall out of her own saddle, but as soon as she felt the leather straps in her palm, she grasped and pulled both Megumi's and her reins at the same time, as strongly as possible.

Megumi's horse seemed to protest, but slowed and stopped after a few meters, still neighing in irritation.

Luckily, Shizuko's horse stopped at the merest pull, and slowed as well. Both horses had reached a full stop when Asano had arrived, looking breathless. "You…crazy…girl…" he said, addressing Shizuko.

"Sorry," she replied, looking ever so slightly sheepish.

"Get off that horse," he instructed Megumi quickly. "Something's up."

Without further objection, Megumi scrambled off the horse, perhaps a little more roughly than she had meant to, because it gave a frustrated neigh. Asano came closer to the horse, speaking soothing words and stroking its mane while checking the saddle and underneath it. He eased the saddle off the horse and lifted the blanket. To their surprise, there was a burr under the blanket!

"Who saddled this horse without checking the blanket?" Asano wondered out loud. "I know there are Agrimony plants around this area but why would someone intentionally place one of the barbed seeds underneath a horse's blanket?"

"Maybe they wanted someone to get hurt," Shizuko said darkly. Asano shook his head. "This is just a disgrace. I at least hope that this is just a one-time prank. I'll do a check on all the horse blankets later."

"I wonder if that girl earlier had something to do with it," Megumi mumbled, still slightly shaken.

"Who, Jeppensha Eriko?" Asano said, giving them a look of surprise. "You seen or encountered her before?"

"She tossed oatmeal on Megumi once," Shizuko said.

"What? Why didn't you say so?"

"We didn't want to cause trouble," Megu said meekly.

"And besides, there was no way of telling in advance what horse Megumi would be riding," Shizuko said, getting off her own horse. "It could still be anyone."

"This is still important. I'll report this to Sakagami-sama right away. I'll have to inspect the horses tonight."

"Asano-san, look at this," Shizuko said. She had come closer to Megumi's horse and was looking at the bridle. "Megumi said she was pulling on the reins but it didn't work. Does it have nothing to do with the bit on the bridle? I can't tell them apart, so—"

"This isn't Shiro's bit," Asano said suddenly, interrupting her sentence. "That's not…This is a snaffle. Shiro always uses a curb bit because he has a strong mouth."

Megumi looked stunned.

"This is more than just an accident, this is sabotage," Asano let out a snarl. "They won't get away with this. I'm not sleeping a wink tonight!"

"So that's what happened," Kyu said later, once Megumi had told her story. "You're lucky you weren't thrown! Two things out of place on one horse…"

"Even then—Shizuko-san! That was a reckless move," Ryu reprimanded. "You're lucky you didn't fall, or worse!"

Shizuko only looked mildly put out. "What does it matter how reckless the move was as long as it got the job done?"

"It matters," Ryu said fiercely. "Do you think Principal Dan would appreciate it if one of his students suffered an accident?"

Shizuko opened her mouth to protest, but Kinta clapped a hand on her shoulder. "He's right. While you're lucky you weren't hurt, it might not be next time. All of us can attest to that."

Shizuko slumped. "Sorry," she mumbled. "I thought I could do something, so I did."

Kinta interrupted before Ryu could open his mouth to say something in response. "What's important right now is that everything is fine."

"Yeah. We've got a lot of work ahead of us, so doing it is a better idea," Kyu added. "Still though, this is one bad morning."

It was indeed one of the worst mornings that Class Q had ever gone through. In between pranks, stress and horseback accidents, it was no wonder that they were grateful for the setting of the sun. They all sat down on the beach sand while Kinta attempted to teach Kyu how to skip rocks on the ocean surface.

Thankfully, they hadn't encountered any other problems after the riding fiasco, even though they had to carefully tread around the regular clients staying at the hotel. They had actually come across the other girl at the club that Kazuma had researched—Alexandra Swift. However, there was nothing they could find that could connect her to the disappearing horses, and that put them quite at a dead end.

Sadly, the next morning could only get worse. The absence of clues wouldn't be their only problem in the case, and the pranks wouldn't be their only source of stress.

Things were about to get rather tricky around the polo club, in more ways than one.

Rants: I know. It's been a long time. I'm sorry.

I cannot make excuses for myself, so I will just apologize.

And hope that the next chapter will NOT take two years. Or more.

Reviews are appreciated, and reprimands accepted.