My first disclaimer...

I do not own Rosario + Vampire or any of its relations, the only thing I own are any original characters of my own tripe-ridden mind I inserted into this fanfic. Assorted merchandising, if any such exist, are also not mine, ergo, I do not expect to gain any royalties from this story, seeing as the legal trash following that would be more of a hassle than it's worth. And considering I am doing this solely to sate my depraved mind of its need to... drabble I would ask that no-one flies of the handle and try to hack my head off with an axe. After all, what fun is there in garrotting a newbie?

Wishing you... I don't know, slippers or something.

-The as-of-yet aspirant author

P.S. If I missed anything whatsoever that should be included in a fanfic disclaimer, please tell me.

-Hehe, dashes...-

Chapter 1: The taste of beneficial idiocy.

"You don't know the value of something until you've lost it, so who knows the true value of life?" –unknown

Mark was quietly reading in his room, intently studying the paragraphs of information lain out across the snow-white paper, absorbing the concepts put to parchment as best he could.

He was 15 years old, with Caucasian features and skin, a compact, short build and wasn't what most people would call 'physically attractive'. In addition to this, his notoriety as a bookworm, a nerd, a devout Christian, slight misanthrope and pessimist marked him as the polar opposite of what generally passed for popularity. It didn't bother him, though, not one bit. After all, popularity was simply the result of insecurity gravitating towards confidence, just basic physics. Unfortunately he was the equivalent of a neutron in this comparison and though he didn't desire to be a jock or pretty-boy, a complete lack of friends, a love life, or any extra-familial relations that weren't business-like in the extreme had left him feeling somewhat desolate in times past and present.

Sighing, he slid a bookmark in between the pages and placed the thick volumeon his bedside table. Besides being a prodigy, he was also what one could call a philosopher, a person who made theories on the way the world works and didn't bother proving or disproving them. He got off his bed and walked over to his writing desk, opening a drawer he pulled out a leather bound book. It had no writing on the outside, intricate patterns adorning the cover being the only thing to distinguish it as special. A slightly nostalgic smile played on his lips as he opened the old tome. The inside was filled with canvas pages, a very rare thing in this day and age, and many were littered with cursive borne of fancy.

'Well ... here I am again.'

Pulling out a pen, Mark started to drag its tip across the woven surface, leaving his thoughts in its wake.

'It's been several days since my last entry, and I'd hope it's obvious why. If not, it's because there's so little to write about. My parents keep on talking about my "bright future", and how proud they are of their "prodigy", and when I ask them why I can't seem to attract anybody's attention or make any friends, they always say the same thing: That one day I'll be in demand. That one day, women will be falling over themselves to get with me. Men of note will want to be my best friends and the world will be my oyster.

Yeah, right.

One day I'll be coveted perk, women will see a bottomless bank account, and men of note will see a good business asset, and the world? My oyster? Maybe if I'm willing to tear out a couple thousand innards to keep it that way, sure. Bah! It's days like these that I wonder if suicide would be preferable to my current choice, can't be any worse than knowing that one day you're going to be a beneficial object rather than a person. But anyways, I gripe too much, there are, after all, so many good things in life, like...'

The pen went still and after about a minute of attempting to think of something really good in his life bar God, he conceded that here were none. Feeling quite disgruntled with existence in general at this revelation, he jabbed the page to mark that he was finished thinking.

Closing the book and returning it to its rightful place Mark got up and stalked off to the kitchen, to make an extensive field study of whether or not the mixture of Coke, chips and television had any effectiveness with curing mild depression. As he entered the area that served as kitchen cum dining room cum atrium, he found his parents sitting at the table, their expressions a meld of excitement and concern.

'Good news son!' they said simultaneously.

Mark felt a single, glacial shiver of dread sprinting down his spine. He knew those words, those very same words had played harbinger to the assorted tragedies and embarrassments that peppered his life like fleas on a mangy hound. Suppressing his overwhelming compulsion to flee, Mark replied with as level a voice as he could manage.

'And what exactly might that be, dearest parents?'

'Well' his father started, oblivious to the terror his son was oozing, 'you know how you always said that you could never seem to fit in?'

'Yes...?' he replied uncertainly, praying that his parents hadn't done something surpassingly stupid in an ineffectual bid to remedy his distinct lack of a social life, as they had done countless times before.

'So, we started thinking, maybe we were going about this the wrong way.' His mother continued.

'No brainer.' Mark thought with a hint of bitterness.

'Maybe, instead of changing you for your environment, we should put you in an environment that suits you!'

He was liking where this was going less and less, it smacked of disaster and his guaranteed subjection to it.

'And that means...?'

'Well, we thought that a change of scenery would be good for you.'

'Conclusion still absent...'

A sudden grin split his father's face like a guillotine, a sure sign that 'the good part' ,as he'd grown to call the proclamation of the method of execution, would be unveiled in the next sentence.

'We decided that we were going to enrol you in a new school!'

Mark's expression was one of a person who'd expected obliteration at the hands of an infernal beast of unspeakable horror and had received a flick to the forehead.

'That's it?' he asked in a voice neutral owing to the shock.

'Yep.'

'Okay, where to? Northern province? Jo'burg? Kwa-Zulu?'

'Japan.'

'Oh, Japan.' Mark repeated.

It took a few moments before his jaded condition had diminished enough for his brain to process the data. The far-off sound of a bolt popping and ricocheting off of metal at a blinding speed announced that his cognitive functionality had recovered sufficiently, and that his mental gears were spinning wildly.

'Japan?' Mark asked in a voice of strained calm with a smile that seemed to crack his face.

'That's what we said.' His painfully ignorant parents replied, undaunted by his barely reigned rage.

For a few more moments, Mark held his curious semblance, teetering on the isthimus between composure and fury, and for a second, it appeared as though he would proceed with rationality and logical, calculative argument and debate.

But then...

'Of all the stupid, half-witted idiocy's you could conjure, you decided to export me to Japan!' he screamed at them, hell-bent on reprimanding their stupidity with unequalled ardour.

'I mean, what the hell is wrong with you people? Honestly, what possessed you do go through with this... this... stupidity?'

'Well, a school did offer you a bursary.'

'And where will I stay, hmmm?' he continued undaunted by the detail, his blind fervour throwing any chance of care straight out the window.

'It's a unisex boarding school.'

The unexpected answer had caught him off-gaurd, and he found his chagrin gradually devolving into a feeling of fear. He knew that he would have to tread carefully if he wished to keep himself from emigration.

Running every possible loophole through his mind he found that only one way of escape remained open and in a last ditch effort to emancipate himself, he began hesitantly.

'What about legal matters?' he asked, lacing it with a silent prayer to God.

But sometimes God let's the bad happen to make us better.

'Already done. I.D., passport, visa, the works.'

Knowing well that his sentence had been irrevocably passed and resigning himself to the fact, Mark's shoulders slumped in dejection.

'Well at the very least, let me know where I'm being carted off to.' he said in a morose voice.

His father smiled and jammed his hand into his pocket where it began rummaging and after a few moments reappeared with a piece of paper, which he promptly handed to his son.

It was a pamphlet of about A-5. Scan reading the writing it proved that most of the page was completely illegible to him considering his complete ignorance considering the Japanese language, though two English words printed over the much larger Japanese rendition caught his eye.

'Youkai Academy.' Mark mouthed the words out loud.

The entire feel that the images on the pamphlet gave off was one undoubtedly gothic, and though he held nothing against Goths, the thought of lodging in a place whose central theme was darkness and shadow didn't strike him as the best way to spend his remaining scholastic years.

'Lacta alea est.' Mark thought bitterly as he examined the kanji scrawled across the rest of the page in some hope that a tiny bit of it would make itself understandable.

'Okay, you win,' he threw his hands up in a sign of submission. 'just one last question.'

'Okay, shoot.'

He drew a deep breath, already knowing what the most probable answer was.

'When do I leave?'

'Tomorrow morning, 7am.'

No surprise registered on his features, and the only sign of acknowledgement was a small nod affirmative.

With the final bit of of information as he turned and started making his way back to his room.

'Where are you going son?'

'To bed.'

Ignorant of the hopelessness in his voice his parents called their respective cheery 'Goodnight!'s at him.

Reaching his door Mark mused weakly 'It's days like these that I'm sure God has a sense of humour.'

He turned his door handle.

'Or that Satan's very busy.'