Transfer Student

Chapter 1

Netto was in high school now, he could choose his own place to live as far as his father cared, but his mother had other ideas. She wanted her little boy to stay at home more and stay with her for the remaining days she might have. After her stroke at the foot of the stairs the teen had suddenly taken on a whole new prospective of the world. His mother was so delicate now; she had to take medication to try to prevent any future seizures. He had to help her around the house, holding her hand and supporting the one side that would just suddenly give. He would spend sleepless nights trying to calm her from her crying fits because her husband could not be there for her and she believed that she was ruining her son's life. The brunet would tell her over and over again that it was not that way. That he wanted to be here helping her each and every minute of the day while he home schooled. Finally, after his freshman year in high school she had enough. She wanted to go back to her hometown out in the country, where she would move into the home that her mother and grandmother had spent their last days; a nice little two-bedroom house with no stairs. He had readily agreed, not wanting to leave her by herself. Over night he had packed all of their things, made sure she was covered with a warm shall before putting everything into the rented car. The service driver took them in the early morning, on a drive that took over a day and half the night to make. He did not have enough time to tell his friends he was leaving, he needed to do all of the work himself while his mother rested. His time with her was limited. He would call his friends when he got to their destination and unpacked everything.

Rockman did not have it easy either. He had to keep medication current, he needed to contact the hospital and doctor's office and gather together all of the medical records for his family and transfer all of that data with as much care as possible to the place they were going to. He also needed to make hard copies and digital copies of all of Netto's school records. He secured all of the net appliances and switched on their security systems then cut them off of their internet interface sealing them from probable virus attack while they lived somewhere else. Once he was done he barely had enough time to send an Email to Netto's father what was going on before he had to hop into his PET and they were in the car. When they got to their destination he was instantly sent into the interface to prepare the house while Netto and the driver unpacked the boxes. Once that was done the driver left receiving a gracious tip for being so kind and of his good service.

Netto took out all of his mother's bedding first and found the master bedroom, making the bed he then set her down where she took her medication and fell into a deep sleep. While she slumbered he unpacked everything setting them where he thought they would be best appreciated to be, before passing out on the bare mattress of what was to be his new bed.

He slept for a full day.

When he got up his mother was moving around, happy and busy body like she used to be when he was a little kid. The fresh country air doing her wonders. She had even cooked him breakfast after three years of getting gradually worse. He was so happy to see her doing better that he cried silently while eating the pancakes. After breakfast he had given her a long soft hug before throwing his backpack over one shoulder and heading out. He still needed to transfer his records and sign up for his classes. So here he was walking down the dirt road from his house trying to find his way to the school. He had stopped several times asking for directions from people who were either sitting on their porch or walking their dog.

When he finally reached the place he was surprised at how small the school was, it had only a few rooms, one room for all of the elementary grades, another for the middle school, and third that high school shared. There was a staff room that was also a nurse's office and a small hole in the wall where only two people sat behind a counter with files filled the back for an office.

"I'm… I'm here to…" he felt a bit intimidated by the looks of the elderly man and woman who sat there.

"Transfer?" the old woman spoke with such a soft voice.

"We know," the man nodded his head while finding a blank paper and held it out to Netto. "Write your name, age, grade level, and address on this."

The brunet took the paper, digging out a pen from his bag, he did as he was told. Once he was done he handed it back only to be told to go home and that class started at seven in the morning. He was a bit weirded out about how simple it was and how there were so many files behind them piled in tied bundles all neat and tidy. If all they needed was that one paper per student then… what were the others for?

"Netto?"

The youth looked up from his path and turned to the familiar voice. His face lit up at the sight of dark skin and glimmering eyes. "Dingo!"

The boy laughed throwing an arm around his friend's shoulder happy to have someone familiar there with him in the tiny village. "Man am I glad to see you! You live in this village or something?"

"Sort of," the boy smirked a bit before stepping back before Netto spazed out any more on him. "I'm actually here on business."

"Business?"

The native American nodded, "Yeah, you see there's supposed to be some sort of treasure here in the Shinto shrine here. I was asked by someone to come give it a look see."

"That sounds a bit shady though, Dingo."

"It should but don't you think this place is a bit shady itself?"

"What do you mean?"

"Netto-kun," Dingo's eyes grew hard. "I think it might be in our best interest to watch each other's backs."

"Dingo that's not…" Netto stopped when he was cut off.

"Netto-kun, do you recall how you found out how to get here?"

"Yeah, I looked it up on a…" he placed a hand on his forehead. No that wasn't right, he didn't find it on a map. Hinamizawa was not on a map. His mother didn't give any direction as to where to find it and the driver… the driver didn't even ask. How did they find their way to this place?

"Not only that, but there is no contact to the internet. Only houses have an interface to plug in your PET, the school have them banned. Phone lines don't lead out side the village."

"Dingo… how do you know all this?"

"He knows because we've been here for a week," Tomahawkman spoke up from the PET. Using the hologram program he showed on up on his operator's shoulder, "It only gets weirder as you stay. I think it would be a good idea for us to stick close to one-another."

To Be Continued…