Missing in Action

I do not own any of the characters of Full Metal Panic all though I wish I did. They are property of their bad ass creators.

o-O-oThe only sounds that could be heard from room 312 of Jindai High School was the sound of paper delicately being lifted and placed on a pile. As well as the sound of a graphite pencil making it's marks on a worksheet…and not an easy worksheet. Well, it was probably easy for anyone else. His steel grey eyes shifted back and forth frantically reading the 'fill in the blank' question located directly after the bolded number ten on the paper. He was at a loss, and he didn't dare ask the teacher. This assignment should have been done last night. He looked up at the teacher taking a quick glance, she was leafing through and grading tests from the previous day and lightly placing them on a growing pile to her right. 'I can't let myself get distracted…' He thought as he rested his pencil in writing position on the paper, right on the line that followed that question.

"Sagara Sousuke…" The teacher stopped and looked up at him. She put her red pen down and watched him. Sousuke looked up at her hoping she didn't notice the paper in front of him. He and Kaname had come in early for a student council meeting and afterwards he had reported to the room of their first period class to complete his homework before class as well as the fact that he had a morning detention for some issues involving weapons on the school grounds, sadly the completion side of that idea wasn't going in Sousuke's favor.

"When you are done writing there can you please go down the hall to the main office and ask them for more sheets to take attendance on? I have run out and didn't realize it until now." She said as she flipped open her leather bound binder with pages full of names, circles, X's and numbers.

"Yes Ma'am" Sousuke replied quickly. 'A chance to get out…no…I have to finish this.' He stared at the paper now. The black text seemed like it was beginning to mock him. Oh, how he hated Classical Japanese, the subject itself seemed so useless. Where would he ever use this in life? Where would anyone? He looked back at the paper despising every piece of black print on it, even the box that had a space for his name and the date. He stared, almost in a daze, that number ten was the only thing keeping him from being finished with this paper and handing it in.

A bag was plopped down on the chair next to him and a pile of books dropped carelessly on the desk top. A very tired Kaname Chidori who never would be a morning person looked around the room it was nearing the end of the school year and the posters on the walls were beginning to disappear. She looked at Sousuke and slightly over his shoulder and then sighed. He told her he was going to have that worksheet done for today.

"So I don't get a Hello or a Good Morning?" She sat down lightly on the desk top pushing the books backwards. Sousuke blinked zoning back in the once almost jumbled looking print fell back into a straight line again.
"Hello Chidori." He said looking up to her he put his pencil down.
"So I guess you didn't do it last night huh?" She asked nodding to the paper. He blinked and picked up his pencil again.
"I had an important call…the captain called and ordered that we go through the inventory of ammunition and fire arms I have in my possession, as well as bombs and trap setting items, by the time we finished speaking I completely forgot about the assignment."

Kaname sighed looked up at the teacher and then to his paper. She ensured the teacher wasn't watching and slipped the paper off his desk. Over her time helping him with this class and even doing the favor she was doing now more than once she had learned how to match his handwriting. She wrote the answer down on that one blank line and slid it back to his desk. Sousuke looked up at the clock there were ten minutes until class began and he had to go get those attendance sheets.

"I will return Sensei. I am going to retrieve your attendance sheets." He got up pushing his paper and book into a neat pile on his desk. The teacher had looked up to him and nodded.

Sousuke left the room with the hall pass since he knew he might need it. The main office wasn't very far away just a few rooms down the hall. Upon arriving there the secretaries had told him to check a box in the file room. He rested his hands behind his back and made his way to the file room.

It didn't take Kaname long to be out the classroom door and too the office through the smoke and the group of employees that were gathered outside the office with the faces in their shirts to avoid breathing in the smoke. She ran through to the file room in the back where she knew they kept the attendance sheets and immediately spotted him crouched in the corner of the room, more so taking cover. The faded white walls were clouded by the grey smoke that was still filtering out of the room. The door wide open, Kaname walked over to him…halisen in her hand.

"What happened this time?" She asked between gritted teeth. Her free hand clenched in a tight fist.
Sousuke didn't dare look up, he knew what was coming if he gave her the wrong answer…though in any situation like this he always failed to surface with the 'right' answer.
"I heard a mysterious noise and to eliminate any intruders I took the appropriate action." He replied quickly. The second he had finished saying the word action there was a loud smack and he was laying flat on the floor from his kneeling position. Kaname pulled the halisen back towards her glaring at him.

"Do you have any idea how important the files are in this room?!" She yelled.


"I'm so sick of you destroying everything! Don't you get it? When is the last time someone who didn't belong in this school was here?! Nothing is ever going to happen to me. I don't need you here! I'm the one who always has to be partly responsible for your actions and I will have no part in this! I don't need you or anyone to guard me get out of my life!" She yelled and turned away from him mildly coughing from the still air and smoke in the room.
Sousuke sat up a hand rested in his hair over the spot where the halisen had struck him. His shoes squeaked on the tile floor as he stood up.
"But Kaname I can't do that…you are my miss-" He started but was interrupted.
"I don't want to hear it! I know I'm your mission! I know that because that is all I will ever be to you and really…I am sick of being your mission I was right….you make it really easy to hate you. Don't talk to me!" She kicked an empty box that had been blown to the floor during the explosion. Underneath was a mouse sitting on its hind legs looking at both of them. Its little pink nose moving back and forth rapidly as it sniffed the air.
"Oh…be careful Sousuke! He might try to kidnap me!"

She ran out of that room, and the office, through the drab green hallway and all the way back to the Classical Japanese classroom. Sousuke sighed and picked up the envelope of papers he needed for the teacher. He tucked them under his arm and slowly walked out of the office, avoiding the looks from the teachers and other staff that were crowded out in the hall.

Sousuke went to each class that day but no matter what …she avoided him. By the end of the day he had nearly given up. He stepped on the train that would take them back to Safe House and sat down in the only available seat left in the back of the train.

It seemed to be the longest ride he ever had on that train. He hadn't been able to get Kaname's words out of his head, and now that he had a chance to sit down alone they were the only thing in his mind. He thought back to the date Melissa and Kurz had set them up on. The dinner, she was so happy. Their first kiss leading into much more than a first kiss should. He woke up to her the next morning with a smile on her face curled up close to him.

He couldn't help but to wonder how he ended that happiness so quickly. Now he had to gain her trust in letting him guard her back. He looked up as the doors opened. He got up and off the train not realizing that this wasn't the stop he was supposed to get off at. This was the one with the cherry blossom tree's and the benches…the one he had jumped out of the train at when Kaname had gotten off to see how far he would go to follow her. He took a look to his left and right before he sighed dropping his bag with his books in it onto the petal filled sidewalk and sat down on the bench. Sure Kaname had been mad at him before, but this time it felt different…so different. He couldn't get his mind off of it. The pain he felt of her being angry with him, felt even worse than the hardest hit he had ever received from her halisen…