Disclaimer- I do not own Soul Eater or any of the characters from the series and will never claim them as my own. The only character I own is Leni Stark.

A/N- I often don't put my author's note at the beginning of a chapter, but I feel that I should do so for this story simply because there are things that I will need to explain at the beginning of some chapters. As for this "chapter", it's simply a sort of prologue told in the first person. Please don't chew me out if the characters are OOC, either, or for anything else that happens in this story. I already know. I do my best most of the time.

Please don't take any offense to the stuff written in this story. It's just a story and I'm not trying to clash with your beliefs by anything that gets written. Also, before reading the actually story, I'd like to let you in on a little info about Leni. Her last name supposedly means "strong" or "brave", so I gave it to her for ironies sake because she's a very weak and cowardly woman. There will never be a point in this story that she is not weak because the whole plot revolves around her fears and weaknesses and such.


Androphobia is the fear of men. Maybe it could be confused with hating men, but I don't hate men. They just…. I don't even know. They're stronger and smarter and generally taller than women, so I guess that's something to be afraid of. Maybe it's because I'm smaller and weaker than most women. I-I'm really not sure.

"Hey, I haven't seen you before. Are you lost? Don't worry! The Great Black Star will help you!"

I turned to face the young man who had addressed me. A couple more inches and he'd be taller than I was, which wasn't a very comforting thought at all. He seemed nice enough, maybe just a little egotistical if I went off of how he introduced himself, but I couldn't get that through my head. He wasn't going to hurt me or anything, that I knew of, so I really had nothing to be afraid of. Even so, I found myself taking a few steps back. I didn't want to be near him at all.

'He's still just a child, what are you so afraid of?! Get you act together and accept his offer!'

It didn't matter how many times I repeated that in my head, I couldn't stop myself from turning and running away. I expected him to follow me and, at first, it seemed like he was going to because he called after me, but that was all. Still, I couldn't stop running no matter how much I wanted to. So I kept running without even thinking about whether I was getting farther away from my destination or closer to it. I just wanted to put as much distance between that child and me as I possibly could.

But it was because of that that I nearly collided with someone. I wasn't sure how I managed to do it, but I sort of spun around him, if that makes any sense. It was at that point that I actually managed to slow myself down. Though, it was only to give myself time to apologize to the man. Even with the tiniest glimpse I caught of him I could tell he was a very strange man.

He scared me more than any of the people I had seen before and I had no idea at the time that I'd be thanking myself so many times later that I'd met him. In fact, he was only one of two people that I had met that day that I could honestly say I was glad to meet. The next was someone I was about to run into.

I started running again to get away from him. It felt like my whole body was shaking and I was afraid my knees were going to give out on me. If I were to collapse anywhere, I would rather it be somewhere where there were no men. That would only make the situation far worse than it already was and I didn't want to cause too much trouble. Though, I guess it was a little late for that.

'Why am I even here? Of course, I'm here to help out in the infirmary, but I'm at a school and schools have male students and teachers. This is all just to get rid of this stupid, silly fear of mine. That's why I'm here.'

I was so distracted by me own thoughts that I wasn't able to stop myself from running into someone this time. We both fell back from the impact and I tried to get up quickly to help her and apologize, but my legs finally decided to give and I slipped back onto the floor in an instant. Much to my surprise, she was the one offering a hand to me. I was hesitant to accept her help at first because it was my fault we fell, but her smile was big enough to make me take her hand and let her pull me up.

"S-Sorry!" I stuttered. "I'm so sorry! I wasn't paying attention and I running and I ran into you and I'm so sorry!"

"It's alright." She said, her smile never fading once. "I just want to know what you were running from. You looked like you were really spooked."

"That is…" I paused. I really wasn't sure how to explain it. I really wasn't comfortable talking to someone I just met about my problems, so it was hard trying to figure out an excuse. "I just felt like running, you know? Because it's good for your health, right? A little exercise it good for you, you see!"

'What a stupid excuse. Why couldn't you come up with anything better than that?'

She laughed, but it was still obvious that she was concerned. There was no way I was going to get around that. I wanted to tell her the truth, but I couldn't make myself do it. Eventually, I would probably be able to make myself tell her, but not right now. I couldn't do that now.

"I wasn't running from anything back. Really, I wasn't. So don't be bothered by it."

"Alright," She said, but her eyes were still full of questions. "I don't think I've met you before, though. My name is Marie Mjolnir."

"I-It's a pleasure meeting you!" I said, extend my arm to shake hands. "I'm Leni Stark."

"Oh! Are you the new nurse?"

"Y-Yes. That's right. I'm really not sure where the infirmary is, though. I think I may have passed it on accident. Could you show me where it is?"

"Of course! It's this way."

I wish I had known that she was just as lost as I was when I asked her for help. It might have saved me a great deal of time. Though, I really can't say it was all that bad being lost with her. She was the only person at that time that made me want to smile as much as I was. It was almost impossible not to smile when I was around her.

After walking around for who knows how long, we finally made it to the infirmary. I was very surprised, to say the least. I wouldn't have to ask for help again tomorrow because I knew where I was going now. Or, well, I kind of knew where I was supposed to go. I would just have to pay attention to what rooms were around me when I left.

I waved goodbye to Marie before entering the room. There was a woman seated at the only desk in the room flipping through some files. I really didn't want to bother her because she looked busy, but it didn't seem like I had much of a choice when she looked up at me.

"Hello…" I said as I gave a sort of half wave. "Are you Mira Nygus?"

"Yes." She replied, giving me a questioning look. "May I help you?"

"S-Sorry!" I stammered. "I'm Leni Stark. I'm supposed to be helping you out from now on here in the infirmary."

"Oh! You're the new nurse, then. You couldn't have come at a better time. I need to step out for a little bit. Can you look after everything for me for a while?"

"Yes! Of course!"

The moment she left I collapsed into the chair by the desk. It was one of those rolling chairs that you could make spin around, so it was kind of fun to sit in. I really had nothing to do and no one appeared to be coming in anytime soon, so I amused myself by making the seat of the chair go from side to side. I wanted to spin around in it, though, but I didn't because I didn't want to get dizzy or anything like that. I slowly began to let my mind wander away from me as I sat there.

I found myself thinking about that man I almost ran into. If I'd hit him I would have fallen for sure and he would probably get mad or something. He wasn't someone I wanted to have going around hating me. Maybe I was imagining things, but I thought I saw a bolt in his head and he had stitches on everything. It was like something out of a horror film.

I had no right to judge him before I met him, but I did and I should have felt awful for doing it. Even if he was a nice guy, which I'm not really sure he was, he could be hiding something. He could be just like those men, wanting nothing more than to beat me up just because they were told to. He could be like everyone else who wants to get rid of me because I'm nothing.

'I'm worthless, nothing more than trash. I don't deserve to be here.'

I heard someone grab the doorknob and looked up as they stepped into the room. It was one of the female students. Blonde hair pulled into pigtails, big green eyes, cute face. It took me a minute, but I managed to get myself back into a more stable state of mind. I planned on thanking her later for helping me snap back into reality even if she didn't understand what I was talking about.

"Can I help you?" I asked, forcing a smile.

The expression on her face said she wasn't buying it. I wasn't surprised. It wasn't hard to see through an expression that wasn't sincere. So I just stopped smiling and motioned for her to come into the room.

"Is Nygus-sensei not here?" She asked.

"She went somewhere a little while ago. Is it something I can help you with?"

There was a moment of silence, like she was thinking about what to do. She was wary of me and it wasn't hard to tell. She hadn't met me before, so she had no idea who I even was. Even so, it was a little heart-breaking to have someone try to decide whether they could trust you or not.

"No, it's fine." She said. "I'll just talk to her later."

"A-Alright."

She left the room and I was alone again. It was a little nerve-wracking being alone in such a place. I started moving the chair back a forth again and suddenly realized how quiet it was. The only sound I really heard was from the squeaking noise the chair made every time it moved. It was like being at home, but there was no music.

It was only a few minutes later that Nygus actually came back and told me I could go home. Every time I think about it, I hate myself more because I felt relieved about leaving. It wouldn't have hurt to take a few minutes to introduce myself to everyone else, but I wasn't thinking about that at the time. I just wanted to get home, but I honestly didn't think I was going to be so down when I got there. It was nice being around people, even if I was afraid, but I wouldn't have been able to convince myself of such things then.