Disclaimer: I own...nothing! Big surprise there, huh?

Chapter 1: Familiar Faces?

History

History is filled with lies and stupidity, consequently written by liars and idiots. However, the following story is to be blamed on the latter party.

Idiots are not a rarity in any sentient race. Each one has to deal with their own slew of buffoons, trudging on in irritation to get past that which makes no sense.

History written by a fool is not history at all. At most it is just another legend with more skewed details added into it. But when one piece of information is forgotten...

It can come back to bite you.

The Springtime Familiar Summoning for the second year students was not an event to be taken lightly. This would determine what creature would become a mage's lifelong partner, till death do them apart. It was a traditional and exciting rite of passage for any young aspiring mage. And these children were making a mockery of it.

As the flow of time went along its merry way, one being looked down in irritation until it was hit with a thought: 'Why not send my champion?'

Needless to say, it seems that things were going to be exciting once more in the land of Halkeginia.

Tristain Academy of Magic

Tabitha watched on with a look of indifference as the proceeding of the Familiar Summoning went along. Though she couldn't really bring herself to be more excited about it, there was no doubt that she was at least the tiniest bit interested in what she might summon. There may have been some common familiars-Montmorency's frog, or that one boy's cat for example-but her friend Kirche had managed to bring forth a Salamander. That may have been impressive alone, until the girl Louise had summoned herself a human being, a commoner boy, sure, but a human nonetheless.

So it was with a bit of anxiousness that Tabitha set forth to summon her familiar. She knew that she was powerful in her own right, so she knew that she had to get a familiar that would compliment her abilities. And what a creature it was.

She knew that the dragon that stood before her was very special. She immediately recognized it for what it really was, and Tabitha was adamant on never letting anyone find out the truth about her familiar. Once she was finished with making her contract, she promptly turned to make her leave. But...

"Hey, what's that!"

Everyone, human and familiar alike, turned toward the spot that was pointed out, and were astonished to see a glowing circle appear on the ground. The light appeared to grow in intensity and few noticed that it was due to a pentagram and various mystical arrays that appeared to be slowly drawn out on the circle.

"Professor! What's happening!"

Colbert's eyes were instantly on Tabitha, who had been watching on with wide eyes, for she was the last one to summon her familiar. "I don't know, but perhaps it has something to do with Miss Tabitha!" he shouted over the wind that began to push out of what was now a cylinder of unknown magic.

An ethereal glow was now present in the cylinder, first flying about in its closed space before spiraling around and finally rotating in a vaguely humanoid shape. Then everything just stopped.

The wind died down so fast that it took most of the students a couple moments to stop shielding their faces. When they finally looked back to the source of the commotion, they could only be shocked once more. A glowing being now stood in its circular cage, head cocked to the side as if in observation of the students. Many shouted and jumped back as the ghost of light walked to the edged of its confines and moved its hands along the walls, obviously looking for a way out. It was not disappointed when the the cylinder began to sink toward the ground.

As the top of the barrier passed its head, and further, the observers finally got to see the true form of the one that had disrupted the days merrymaking (Louise's explosive summoning did not count). A young man of black hair and eyes stepped forth from light, adorned with a scarf of white whose single loose end fell along his back. He wore a sleeveless white shirt, a single bar of black running down his front, and his pants and shoes were of a black just as dark. The only noticeable things after these were a pair of gloves connected to some small arm guards that covered gray arm-warmers.

His look of apathy was suddenly replaced with anger and confusion as he took a battle stance, facing Professor Colbert who had taken to pointing his wand at him. The professor didn't even twitch when the unknown person glared at him with such fierce intensity. Flames began to coalesce wand and arm as he asked his question.

"Who...or what are you?"

Today had started out as another ordinary day for me. I looked out the window of my house and sighed as I contemplated what I saw. 'I wish everyday were as nice as this. Still, I wouldn't mind a little rain now and then,' I thought to myself. As this was occurring, my hands had made no move to stop as they flew over the keys of my laptop's keyboard, words and sentences running down the screen to tell some sort of intelligible nonsense. I had to find some way to entertain myself on a day such as this.

Everyone had left the house and I was stuck here by myself, no mode of transportation to take me anywhere, no friends that had any off-time on a workday, and definitely no significant other for me to get cozy with. It was just me, myself, and the electronic world of my choosing. it just so happened that, instead of playing video games or watching anime, I had decided to write more dumb stories to relieve my brain of. Today's story was about the loyal servant to the universe's most powerful being.

It was at that moment that a green opaque mirror decided to show itself to the young me that was sitting comfortably in my dining room. I had read enough light novels, mangas, blurbs of physics, and fanfiction to see where this was going. So I decided to sidestep the intrusive oval and make my way to the fridge for a snack or two.

'Man, I really need to stop reading fanfiction, it's starting to affect my perception of reality now!' I thought to myself while munching on a cupful of cereal. Now if I wasn't so enthused by the thought of my new snack, I may have noticed the small tendrils that were slowly making their way toward me. So it was no surprise that I started to scream when the Japanese-inspired torture devices wrapped their lengths around me.

"What the-RAPE! RAPE! RAAAAAAAAAAAAAPE!"

As embarrassed as I was at my outburst, it did nothing to stop me from struggling to the best of my ability out of the possible loss of my innocence. My eyes widened in realization when they saw that I was being dragged back to the portal.

"Oh no you don't you little-" I fought harder still as I was futilely dragged back near my laptop...wait, my laptop! I looked down under the table and found my pack of personal items, which, unbelievably, held some very dangerous items. Don't ask.

With my free arm, I made one final snatch at the bag before I was pulled in.

Between and Betwixt

'Where am I?' I thought to myself, as I finally felt myself being released from my bonds. God I hope that that never happens again. Wait a minute, I think that I just jinxed myself. Crap!

"You are in a gap between dimensions, a crossroads from one world to the next."

I whirled around in the...air? Well, I spun around in place in order to meet the owner of the voice. There was no one there. "That's a lie!" I shouted in defiance. "If this is truly the Dimensional Gap, then why is there no big red dragon roaming about! At the very least, there should be a goth loli in here!" Damn, I'm starting to panic. C'mon, deep breaths, deep breaths.

"They are not here because this is my personal realm here. A space within space, if you will."

"Closed space, huh?" I said to myself. As far as I knew, those were only made by...godlike...entities. My face reflected the pure horror in my heart and mind as I dared to speak once more.

"Err, you don't happen to be...Suzumiya...Haruhi...do you?"

"No."

"And you're not some apathetic being that might cause the end of my world either, right?"

I could feel the eye roll that the being had in its voice. "Again, no."

"Instead, you can call me the God's Gift. Tome-sama will do." the voice said. "I have chosen you to be the champion of your fellows."

"Fellows?" I questioned the invisible being.

"You'll understand soon enough. In the meantime, you're welcome for the new clothes, mortal. But then again, you might not choose to stay that way for long."

"Wait, what do you mea-" And I 'pwinked' out of existence.

The being turned its non-visible head to see if any trace of me was left, before it sighed in relief. "Geez, it never gets easier talking to the same person, does it? Then again, at least this one seemed a bit smarter than some of the other versions." it mused to itself.

Back in the Present

'Okay mind, work fast! Where am I, who are these people, and what am I supposed to be doing here right now?'

In case anyone forgot, I just happened to appear in the castle grounds surrounded by a bunch of kids, one pissed off looking balding man, and a bunch of mythical creatures. Yeah, that was totally normal.

"Alright, who are you and where am I?" I asked in a deep voice. It was my natural response to not act/sound the way that I usually do. Instinct dictated that I not reveal my true self to complete strangers, which I believed was the way most people are supposed to.

[Who are you! And what are you doing here!] the older man yelled at me. Okay so I don't understand a thing that he said. Probably something about my mother, the mean old man. I looked around and began to make a mental list of people I noticed. Let's see, we got: two blondes, one dumb-looking, the other hanging on to the first; a very well-endowed tan female; a boy and his pink haired master, stupid SM couple; and the last one kinda looked like-

"She's the one."

I had already recognized where I was when I saw my surroundings, but until I saw the main characters, there was no way for me to actually believe my eyes. I watched on in rapt attention, all signs of my aggression now gone, as the small light blue-haired Tabitha made her way toward me with little resistance from the others. Colbert made to stop her, but he was ignored as she finally stood in front of me.

'She's a lot tinier than I thought,' I mused to myself. Of course, there was no reason for me to antagonize a girl who could probably thrash me on her worst day anytime soon. And that wasn't even mixing in the dragon, Sylphid or Ikurukuku or something, into the mix.

She stared into me with uncaring eyes, but I could see how her hands tensed as she grew closer. Hell, she tensed even further when she saw that I was observing her actions. So instead we stared into each others eyes, each trying to find what the other was thinking, or perhaps experienced. I knew that there was sadness in my eyes; I already knew her story, and I felt that in itself was a betrayal of her trust. On my end, I couldn't even see a hint of her pain and grief that she hid so well. I wondered if that made me a cruel, naive person, or perhaps an uncaring, oblivious individual. Since i had always viewed myself as both, I wondered if there was even a difference anymore.

[Who are you?]

Her voice startled me out of my thoughts, and I focused back on my surroundings. Professor Colbert still had his wand pointed at me, and several of the students had, surprisingly enough, emulated his actions. It seemed that I would need a way to save myself from elemental/explosive death (Louise had also pulled her wand at me). So I did the only thing that seemed would work.

I heard a few gasps of surprise as I went to kneel before my new master. My eyes were on Tabitha as I went down; I saw that even she was a bit startled by my actions. And so I waited.

And waited.

...and waited.

Finally, it seemed that she made up her mind. With a few words that I couldn't decipher, let alone hear, her face finally drew closer to my own, and I felt contact being made as the contract was sealed.

'Her lips are so soft,' was my first thought to myself. The second thought was not so pleasant. 'Oh crap, does this make me a pedophile now?'

When she drew back, I was a little shocked to see the infinitesimal blush that was on her cheeks. 'Oh my God, what have I done to this poor girl?' I quickly made to apologize, but stopped myself short when I realized that no one here understood me or Saito.

:Hey! Wait up! I don't even know what's going on anymore!?: Okay, I lied, I did understand Saito to a small extent, but only the bare minimum.

I turned to his direction And said the only word that could possibly catch his attention.

"Baaaaaka."

He immediately rounded on me and gripped me by my shoulders, futilely questioning me in Japanese. Thankfully for me, he was speaking in a dialect that I was more familiar with. Who knows what would happen if he spoke to me in Kansai.

Basically, Saito wanted to know what was going on. So I tried to simplify it in small words.

"Bessekai." I gestured all around. "Mahou shoujo," I said with a snicker as I pointed to the various mages surrounding us, all of them watching our strange interlingua exchange. "Tsukaima." At this I put an arm around his neck while waving a hand at the magical creatures. My pointing finger finally stopped on Louise so that I may finish damning him to his fate. "Ma-su-ta."

Saito's jaw dropped lower and lower with each new piece of information given to him. When he finally regained control of his senses he turned to me and asked, :Who are you then?:

The brilliant smile I gave him was the most protagonist/idiot-worthy that I thought I had ever made. "Gaijin-sama!"

That was the final straw for poor Saito, and he promptly fainted on the spot. Not surprising when the only person that you could probably relate to brings the whole world crashing down on your head. While the other students seemed slightly shocked by his sudden drop to unconsciousness, I was trying to refrain from laughing outright at the boy'a misfortune. I was miserably failing, if my quivering form and stifled giggles were anything to go by.

I watched in amusement as Louise was somehow able to conscript Guiche into the task of levitating our native Nipponian protagonist to, what I assumed, her room. When they were gone I proceeded to watch as the rest if the students filed back into the castle. When all was still, I finally noticed my new master watching me with her full attention.

"Er, hello master, I-"

Pain.

Severe pain.

It's all over, why does it hurt so bad.

Painpainpainpainpainpainpainpain

Whywontitstopwhyisthishappening

Prickstabtearripevisceratecorrodekill

Killkillkillkillkillkillkillkillthepaintillitstops

StopstopstopstopstopstopstopstopSTOPSTOPSTOPSTOPSTOPSTOP

"It is done."

"GASP!"

I greedily gulped in the cool night air as I sat up straight on my bed. Eyes closed, my hand clutched the shirt at my chest, while the other ran its fingers through my hair. "My god, that was a terrible end to a dream-"

"Alright?"

I froze on the spot as I heard her voice. Slowly opening my eyes, I was assaulted with an environment that proved my thoughts. 'This isn't my room.' I turned my head and, sure enough, I beheld the spectacle of a pajama clad Tabitha, complete with night cap. That's when I decided to voice another thought I had.

"Did I just understand what you said? You did say 'alright', right?"

Her eyes widened ever so slightly as she gave me a curt nod. That was strange. We shouldn't be able to communicate with each other unless... "Say, you didn't happen to use magic on me while was...out, did you?"

She nodded at this. "Healing." Huh, I didn't know she could do that. She then pointed at me. "Screaming. No sound. Why?"

This kept getting better and better. I'm barely here for a few minutes, and something already wants me dead. I mean, what reason would there be that covers intense bodily pain...for...

Tabitha observed, confused when she saw her second familiar smacked himself in the face, the palm staying there after impact. "Stupid, stupid! Familiar runes hurt when they appear, as far as humans are concerned..." I muttered softly to myself

"Human familiars before?" Curse my big mouth. Tabitha knew for a fact that I never witnessed Saito getting his familiar contract, so unless I knew something, I had no basis for the claim that I made. So Plan B, then.

"I don't know, maybe?" I replied with eyes closed in deep, false thought. "I'm human, and it hurt me, and the fact that the other familiars didn't seem to be pissed off seems to be a logical path to follow." Pretend observation, whattayaknow, I can be deceitful when I try to be!

Tabitha continued to scrutinize my face, probably looking out for any tells to reveal if I had been misleading her. A moment later and she turned away, curious, if not satisfied. She seemed to be lost in her thoughts about something.

I shrugged at the lack of attention and proceeded to scour my body for any new bodily tattoos that I might have gotten whilst passed out...that really didn't sound good. Fortunately, I was able to find it in a matter of seconds. Unfortunately, the symbols weren't runes at all.

"What...the...hell...?"

My master and I both studied the strange tattoo-like chains that circled around my wrists and, what seemed to me, a pair that crisscrossed my chest. Further observation on my part caused me to widen my eyes at what I saw next.

'They're moving...!'

Tabitha frowned at the chains, almost as if there was something there that was bothering her. I guess I couldn't blame her. To me, the links symbolized the shackles placed on a prisoner that is forced to be in his confinement against his will. An eery parallel to the relationship of master and servant. Or her role as the, what was it again? Dog of the Northern Parterre, or something?

I made to comfort her, but was interrupted by shouting outside. "Oh, what now?" I said irritably.

As soon as I stuck my head out the window I sighed in defeat. Saito was suspended high in the air by Guiche, who must have been levitating him for Louise. Again. Well, I guess everything seemed to be proceeding as it should. That was good to know.

"Hey! New guy!" I yelled out to Saito.

"Wait, we can understand each other too?!" he yelled back.

"Yup!" I pointed up. "So did'ya notice the moons, or was I able to explain it to you beforehand?"

"You're crazy! You people are all insane!"

"I know! I kinda get that a lot!"

"Shut up, you stupid familiars!"

"Up yours, you overpowered, S-oriented tsun-loli!" I turned away with a huff as I got in the last word at the little spitfire. I just made a very stupid decision today, and perhaps enemies out of the two main characters. Still totally worth it.

"Tsun-loli?" Well, crap. At least she didn't mention 'overpowered'.

"Haha, funny story actually...the term is coined from two foreign words: tsundere and loli. The first is to describe a girl that uses anger and violence to hide her true feelings, while the second is used to describe a girl usually under, let's say eleven? It mostly have to do with the short stature and the lack of perceived signs of puberty." I deliberately avoided saying anything that had to do with flat chests. That was just asking for an icicle to the face.

She nodded at my words before pausing. "Foreign words?" Huh, I guess everyone speaks...French? Frenchanese? Something that I didn't know. Well, guess I might as well tell her now and get it out of the way.

"Right. My name is Jin le Pont de la Fluers, and me and my fellow human familiar come from another world." I paused for a bit. "Have you seen my bag?"

Author's Notes:

Alright, so I'm back! (Avoids a tomato) Yeah, yeah, my bad, my bad. So, I finally got a new computer, a hand me down, and I can now continue to write with vigor! JSTC and Crossing will be postponed, due to mourning of lost chapters, but I have started rewriting what I could. However, I make no promises.

Anyone want to guess where I pulled the name from? I broke a real one down, but seriously doubt anyone would figure it out.

Enjoy the day!