Omake: Behind the Curtain
I greeted room 102 like an old friend. When I think about it, it's really all that and more--in fact, it wouldn't be wrong at all to say that this room was my first and most loyal accomplice in the art of magic, at least when it came to my schoolyard career. Ever since I'd first heard the magic club met in the adjacent room, 102 had become my personal 'secret lair', the sort I'd prepared near all my favorite haunts in my former life.
After taking the obvious precaution of locking the door, I began my preparations by mentally tallying the items necessary to my most recent trick: touch sensors in the gloves, a carton of dry ice, a large wooden crate packed with props, two collapsible black false-bottomed hats made to resemble Yusuke's, and--the pièce de résistance--the collapsing finger caps made to match the middle finger of my left glove. Pull the tab on it at just the right angle, and voila! I've got myself a decent facsimile of a hat. It's merely a flimsy white cloth held in the shape of a hat by inset wires, then folded and bent around my finger, but it merely needs to pass suspicion until I can swap it out with my real hat afterwards. It's a staple of any disappearing-reappearing hat trick, I have to say.
The touch sensors came first. I'd already calibrated them in advance, but it wouldn't hurt to test them out. At the front of the room I began to pry loose the false boards I'd installed under the whiteboard when I'd first started using this room. Underneath I'd stored several of the devices necessary for my tricks, though only two were necessary for this particular one: the fog machine and the miniature slingshot. Well, there was technically the pulley system and release for the wire I'd be using to snag Yusuke's top hat if he were in his usual position, but I'd already set that up long ago when I performed my "Tsubame Gaeshi" trick. Granted, I wasn't using it to behead a prop "swallow" mid-flight this time, but...
Just in case, I checked. Yep, fishing line instead of razor wire. Perfect.
Turning back to the fog machine, I slid my thumb from the base of my middle finger to the tip, then snapped. Sure enough, it began to come to life; I quickly shut it down before it could start making any noise. Excellent! I needed the fog machine in working order to pull off the quick-change and have time to trigger the wires to snag Yusuke's signature top hat (seriously, he never lets the thing out of his sight). After checking to make sure the tubes leading to the next room were still fully sealed, I loaded in the dry ice and began the next step of my plan: loading the slingshot.
Glancing back, I looked over the crate I'd brought up with me. That was the trickiest thing to sneak in here in broad daylight; standing at two feet by two feet by four, it was just large enough to hold the three mildly sedated animals necessary for the trick, plus the handful of other props I'd be using as well.
Costume, rubber chicken, cat, corgi, balloon dragon, clown mask, rabbit. Costume, rubber chicken, cat, corgi, balloon dragon, clown mask, rabbit. I mentally reviewed the necessary order as I tucked the first folding hat in the side compartment of the miniature slingshot; if all went well, I wouldn't even need to use it.
The second hat was already folded into my costume, which was in turn folded into a neatly usable pile of clothing. I'd have very little time once the fog came up to change into it, so rather than stowing it in the room I'd launch it from the hidden slingshot. After preparing the rest of the slingshot mechanism (really, all I had to do was dust off the hidden panel the props and animals would be launched from, and test the wires connecting the slingshot with the trick floorboard I used to trigger it), I placed the folded pack of clothes in the bed of the slingshot, and the other props and animals one by one into the automatic reload mechanism.
I stowed my other materials away for later retrieval, replaced the false boards on their inset spots in the wall, and brushed myself off. With that complete, the last step was the simplest: myself. One of the more convenient features of yesterday's bizarre events was the effect it had on my appearance: where before I'd need to tease my hair into perfect shape and put on a little makeup if the lighting required it, now it only took a few swipes of the comb to get myself in performing condition. Reviewing myself one final time with my pocket mirror, I gave myself a quick grin and set off for the room next door.
"Showtime."
