A/N: Welp. Here I am starting a fourth SI project. Discovery is still moving, but it's going pretty slow right now, so I'm going to do something silly and contribute to another little-remarked-upon fandom I like. This might not even get published, based on how it goes. I'm not good at writing dialogue into situations like the ones found in this anime. Oh, and if my Japanese is shit, don't harp on me too much. Before I got into anime, my exposure to the language consisted of: Konnichiwa and Sayonara. Well, that, and some phrases from Clavell's masterpiece known as Shogun.
Eclipsed
Prologue: Introductory Remarks
"Well, isn't this quaint," I spoke softly, gazing out and up to the peak of the academy I had just arrived at the base of. "Typical class-based society. Figures that I should have to come here to find out who I am. Isn't that right, Kurai?"
"Surely you mean to find out who we are, Rou. Leaving me out of your ramblings does you no good, considering you're stuck with me." I sighed as my only companion rebuked me. Kurai and I had been together for as long as I could remember – in other words, about five months. My earliest memory was of waking up in some dump with Kurai fastened to my body.
Oh, did I forget to mention it? Kurai is a uniform. Well, I say he's a uniform, but really he's a Kamui. At least, that's what he tells me. Then again, I have yet to actually use him, since we haven't met much resistance in the past five months. It must be the inimitable class of wearing an all-black suit complete with a scarlet bow-tie, one side of which had the pattern of an eye on it.
"Yeah, yeah. So what's so special about this Honnouji Academy? I know it's ruled over by the ever mysterious Kiryuin Satsuki, but I'm not sure of much more than that. Really, I just hope we can discover our identities while we're here. Though I suppose that could take a while if this goes as I expect."
Kurai snorted in bemusement. "I think that's a bit of an understatement, Rou. You might want to look behind us, it appears our bike has just been systematically stolen, dismantled, and sold to the highest bidder." Whirling around, I saw my friend was correct, and cursed the sky for being stuck in such a despicable place.
"Well, whatever. What say we head up to the school proper, yeah Kurai? Not that you have much of a choice in the matter." Kurai growled in annoyance, causing me to laugh aloud. Suddenly, my stomach grumbled in protest, and I grimaced before stopping at a nearby vendor to grab a couple of apples.
Once I had eaten one of the delicious fruits, I started on my way up the road when I felt the other fruit slip out of my pocket. Slightly angry, I turned to find the source of my discomfort only to find a small boy gazing perplexed at the food in his hand. "I thought for sure I had his wallet," he murmured, causing me to roll my eyes.
"I don't have a wallet, moron. Feel free to keep the apple too, you look like you could use the weight, runt." The boy snapped his gaze to mine, anger clouding his eyes visibly. I raised an eyebrow when he tried to storm up to me and chuckled darkly when he patted me down to see if my claim was true.
"Huh, guess you really don't have a wallet. But who you callin' runt, asshole?!" The sudden change in demeanor amused me, and I simply turned around with a jaunty wave and continued up the path. "Hey, don't ignore me, asshole! Come on guys, get him!" I sensed a group of three boys of similar stature to the first running at me with various weapons.
Without even looking back, I kicked out with my right foot and flicked my left hand, flawlessly taking out the kids. What surprised me was the first kid bowing to me after somehow rushing ahead of me. "What's the deal, runt? Why are you bowing now?"
"You're stronger than us. We're only good against those that are weak." I sighed and pinched the bridge of my nose. I should have figured this town would be messed up after seeing how obvious the class separation was. However, before I could respond to the runt, an older girl in a school uniform pounced on him and started to berate him strongly.
"It's too early in the morning to deal with this shit," I whispered to Kurai before stepping over the scuffle and heading further up the hill to the school. My friend laughed at my exasperation, leaving me to sigh again as I finished the trek to the entrance.
(((…***…***…***…)))
Once I walked into my assigned classroom, I knew things were going to be interesting. Right off the bat I could tell that there was more to my homeroom teacher than met the eye, and I was seated right behind another Kamui user, one Matoi Ryuko. What's more, next to Matoi was the girl from earlier, a Mankanshoku Mako. I didn't know how on earth she beat me to the school, but I wasn't about to question things.
When the bell rang for lunch, most of the class left in less than a minute, leaving Matoi, Mankanshoku, and the teacher, Mikisugi, behind. The girl from earlier was fast asleep, and the other two seemed to be arguing about something or another through only their gazes. "Mind telling me why there are two Kamuis in the same room, Mikisugi? I'm getting a weird feeling from you, and typically that means that you know something I don't."
My words startled the two combatants, and Matoi turned to me with an incredulous look on her face. "Easy there, Ryuko," I heard her Kamui soothe, confirming my suspicions about the garments we both wore. "He probably isn't against you."
"Damn right he's not against you. I came here to find out who I am. Well really, who Kurai and I both am. Happy, Kurai? I remembered to include you this time." My partner laughed.
"Yes, Rou, I'm quite happy now. Thank you for your kind words regarding me. Oh, and you might want to address Matoi and her Kamui. They seem to be confused," Kurai replied, reminding me of the reason I spoke out in the first place.
"I suppose I'm not supposed to be able to hear your Kamui, right Matoi? That should be the first clue. The second would be that you can hear mine. Got me so far? Good. Now, let's not do anything hasty, I only want answers from our dear homeroom teacher here. I really want to get rid of this feeling."
"Y-Y-You can hear me?" the other garment asked, and I nodded. "Well, that settles it, Ryuko. We have got to be friends with those two." Matoi's gaze snapped from Kurai and I down to her Kamui then back to us. I sighed and decided to take the initiative, striding forward and holding out my left hand for a handshake. I'd have used my right, but it was covered by a black glove I was supposed to use to stimulate Kurai into his evolved state.
"Name's Rou. Don't have a surname I'm aware of. Mind if I call you Ryuko? Calling you Matoi just seems so rude if we're going to be friends. Oh, and what's your Kamui's name? Mine's Kuraiketsu, or just Kurai for short."
Matoi's hand shook as she reached for mine, and I grinned in what I hoped was a conciliatory manner. All of a sudden, I felt her fist collide with my face quite hard. Rubbing my jaw in pain, I cracked it back into place and wisely backed up a bit. "Ok, so no handshake. Hmmm, so does that mean I should call you Ms. Matoi then? Unless that punch was your way of saying hi. Whatever, I'll just call you Ryuko."
Ryuko shook her head and came at me again once I had gotten up, but I blocked her punch. "Easy there, Ryuko. I'd really rather you didn't try and hurt me every time you saw me. I'm rather delicate, see." My grin said otherwise as I held her fist to my lips.
"How do I know you're not with that bitch Kiryuin?!" Ryuko yelled, and I sighed.
"Why is it that people insist on yelling at this school? Ah, whatever, my answer is that neither of us do. All I want to do is find out who I am – and hopefully find a nice pretty girl to settle down with afterwards. I haven't much else to do since I'm effectively an orphan. Nowhere to go, see."
Ryuko made to punch me again and I darted out of her reach. "Look, if you're so insistent on proving my identity, we can go challenge the esteemed President now. I've never met her, at least from what I recall so far. That's the only way I know of to prove myself, since I don't know anything else about me. That is, unless a certain teacher has the answers," I said, pointing to Mikisugi, who appeared to be creeping away in the midst of our skirmish.
"Ah… uh… I'll be in the faculty lounge. See you after lunch, Ryuko, Rou." Mikisugi sprinted out of the room. Shrugging, I went back to my desk and sat down, groaning when my stomach rumbled unhappily.
"Now I'm hungry again?! Come on, one thing after another with this place. Kurai, you sure there isn't any way for me to avoid both eating and starvation?" I asked my Kamui.
"Not that I'm currently aware of, Rou. Perhaps your new friends would be willing to share?" Kurai replied scathingly. I frowned at his standoffishness, suspecting the cause fairly easily.
"Hey, don't be like that. I'm not going to just abandon you like that. You're still my best friend." Now that was settled, I turned to Ryuko. "So, uh… Could you help me out? I don't want to impose too much on you, so don't feel obligated to give me much, if any. I can survive a couple days without food or shelter, I've certainly done it before."
"As soon as you issue that challenge, maybe I'll take you up on that, Rou," Ryuko said, causing me to groan loudly again. "Oh, don't tell me you forgot?! It was just a minute ago! No wonder you can't remember who you are."
"Hey! I resent that, and I forgot 'cause I'm hungry. And if a challenge is what it takes to get some food, then I'll be glad to. Where can I find this Kiryuin chick, anyway? Will you introduce me?" Ryuko face-palmed and I grinned slightly.
"You're a real pain in the ass, you know that? Whatever, let's go out to the courtyard. Mako, get up, we've gotta go make this fool battle some people." Much to my amusement, the sleeping girl fell over before zipping about the room worriedly, finally settling her gaze on me.
"Oh, you're the new guy, Rou right? Nice to meet you, I'm Mako, hopefully we can be great friends. You've met Ryuko? She's wearing her only uniform, Senketsu. She's a bit weird for speaking to it, and wow you look good in that suit. Is that a new uniform?" The flurry of speech had me gobsmacked before Kurai started laughing uproariously.
"So that's the Kamui's name. Nice to meet you, Sen. Hope you don't mind me dropping the ketsu, not that you can stop me. I love my nicknames, after all. Mako, is it? My suit's name is Kuraiketsu, Kurai for short, and it's my uniform only."
"So you talk to your clothes too? Weird. So what are we doing again, Ryuko? Fighting some more people?" It was my turn to laugh when Ryuko sighed and grabbed her friend by the collar of her shirt, dragging her out the door in the direction of the main courtyard.
Soon enough, the three of us were more or less standing in the center of the massive circular field that was the main courtyard of Honnouji Academy. Suddenly, Ryuko looked toward the tower and shouted some not-so-kind words to get Kiryuin to come out. "Your show now, transfer," she murmured to me before stepping away.
A bright light shone down from the top of the tower, and I supposed it was my turn. "Miss Kiryuin, is it? My name's Rou, and I'm the newest transfer to this school, much as I'd like not to be. Anyway, seems I've got to challenge you to a duel to prove to Little Miss Bitchy behind me I'm on her side. So mind giving me a fight worth my time?"
"Who you calling bitchy, ya bastard!" I heard from behind me even as a set of impossible steps unfolded down to my level. The unmistakable click of heels sounded on aforementioned stairs at the light descended from her tower, stopping a few stairs above me. It was then that I saw the light had quite the body.
I whistled. "Damn, you're a cute one. Well, it's a shame I've got to draw my blades against you. I hate beating up pretty girls." I knew I was pushing it, but didn't have much of a choice if I was going to get my challenge through. Ignoring the large half-black man yelling at me for disrespecting the 'great Kiryuin Satsuki', I held out my hand in what I hoped was a conciliatory gesture.
Slapping my hand away with her scabbard, the girl took the last step down to my level with perfect posture, making me grin in bemusement. "So formal. Well, I've still not heard you say a word. Are you not blinded by my handsome gait?"
The girl snorted. "You're a pig just like the rest, but I suppose I'll have to accept your challenge. No one gets away with calling me something so demeaning as 'pretty.' Prepare yourself, worthless pig."
"At least she's creative," muttered Kurai as I saluted jauntily, stepping back a few paces and pulling my blades from the twin scabbards behind my suit jacket. Two jet black short swords, one brimming with a dark power that evaporated off the tip in an ominous mist. The other seemed to be made of fire, white-hot at that. While the blade itself was still black, the aura surrounding it was the brightest white.
"Oh, you possess the Nisshoku blades? Very good, but you won't last long even with them against Junketsu and Bakuzan." With that, she unsheathed her own sword and flipped the armband I saw on her left arm. Realizing this was my cue to activate my own Kamui, I grinned and pulled a lever on my glove, entering the transformation for only the second time.
Soon enough I found myself in a new form. From the waist down, I was covered by skintight pants, black of course, with jagged streaks of scarlet through the legs. My feet were covered in the usual dress shoes. From the waist up, however, things were much different. My chest was mostly bare, though my upper breast was covered by the expanded 'eyes' of Kurai, which wrapped down and around my sides.
My face was half-obscured by a scarlet mask, leaving only my eyes and cheeks visible, with the straps coming up and over the top of my head. Both arms were coated to the shoulder in black sleeves that ended in a sharp upturn to the back. "Kamui Kuraiketsu!" I shouted for whatever reason. It just felt right.
Even as I transformed the Kiryuin girl was following me, donning her own Kamui. When she settled down across from me, I let out another low whistle at just how little it did for her modesty and unashamedly ogled for a moment before bracing myself for the upcoming battle as she yelled out "Kamui Junketsu!"
"I hope you're ready for the fight of your life, miss. I won't let myself be beaten so easily, and I have a good feeling that this will be quite the battle," I smirked, even though she couldn't see it.
"Ha. We'll see about that, pig. Prepare to die." With that, our conversation stopped as the girl rushed me with her katana, wielding it with an unearthly speed. What really caught me off guard was the shockwave that flew off behind her as she assaulted me with a flurry of blows, leaving me purely on the defensive as I recovered from my surprise.
Suddenly, I felt my feet leave the ground as the Kiryuin slammed her heeled foot into my gut. Luckily, thanks to Kurai, I barely felt the impact, and peeled myself from the wall I had slammed into only to be under attack once more. I sighed at the weariness of it all, lifting the white blade, Sora, in a parry while thrusting with the black blade, Tsuki.
I felt the tip of my blade connect more than saw it, and the prettier one of the two of us widened her eyes in surprise before pressing the attack with an even greater fervor. I smirked under the mask and waited for her to make a mistake, effortlessly controlling the pace of the battle as we destroyed more and more of the walls surrounding the school.
"Alright, well that's enough of that," I spoke at last after Satsuki overextended, leading her off-balance and into a heap on the ground across from me. "Time to go full throttle on your ass. Kurai, ready for Phase Two?" My Kamui made a grunt of acknowledgement as my sleeves lengthened to cover almost the entirety of my blades in a cylindrical armor, creating an effect similar to that of a jet engine with the auras.
"Uchū no Himitsu!" I cried as the auras solidified into spears of white and black, hovering in the air menacingly. Without further hesitation, I slammed them forward into Satsuki, only to find myself lying on my back with her Bakuzan at my neck. "Huh. You blocked or dodged and caught me out because I got too cocky. A loss for me, then?"
"As if you could ever be strong enough to defeat me. Go, pig. I'll even show you the greatest generosity and offer you the same deal I did for Matoi. If you should be able to fight through all in the Elite Four, you'll have your chance at me." I nodded and stood, transforming back into the suit and sheathing my weapons.
"Well, that's that. Ryuko, that enough for you? I'm hungry enough as it is, not to mention beat up from that fight." I turned around, and Ryuko's jaw was hanging open with a slim strand of drool dropping from it. "Uh, Ryuko? You're drooling, and your Kamui doesn't look too happy about getting wet from it."
My words appeared to startle my new friend out of her trance, causing her to glare at me as she blushed and tried to erase the drool from her face. "N-No, I'm not. Do you have someplace to stay while you're here?" I raised an eyebrow at her brashness, and she blushed deeper. I got the feeling she hadn't meant to say that.
Sighing melodramatically, I dropped my head to stare at the ground, scratching behind my ear. "Well, I was going to see if I couldn't make a home for myself in some sewer somewhere, but if you have some better idea I'd be willing to hear it. After all, you're much prettier than our dear President."
Ryuko blushed deeper, if that was even possible, and she punched me in the chest, hard. "Hey!" I protested weakly, but she wouldn't have any of it. "You can come home with Mako and me for the night. We'll see how things go from there." I saw Mako nodding furiously behind her friend and smiled, genuinely this time.
"Thanks. I mean it, and without the usual sarcasm," I said, pulling a clearly surprised girl into a hug. "Oh, and don't mind the hug. I've found that I practically live off this kind of comfort, however few times it actually happens. People don't like touching other people, and it's a damn shame when all you need is a hug sometimes."
Releasing the shocked girl after finishing my ramblings, I snapped in front of her face to wake her up. "Oi!" I called as my stomach rumbled painfully. "I still need my food here, and you might as well help me out there as well, since that's what caused this brawl in the first place."
"U-Uh, yeah, here, it isn't much but you can have the rest…" the girl murmured, and I adopted a look of immense satisfaction at the turmoil I caused. Taking the lunch from Ryuko's unmoving hands, I promptly devoured it in prompt fashion, not caring a jot that the croquettes had not finished wriggling yet. It was still delicious, partly because I had eaten much worse over the months and partly because it was given to me by a friend, and I had better be damned grateful. It probably helped that the food really was good.
"So. Looks like the bell's about to ring. Think we ought to head back to class so we can grill Mikisugi for information? He looked pretty dodgy earlier, and we can probably corner him if we really try." Ryuko took forcible control of herself when I opened my mouth and smirked evilly.
"I'm starting to like the way you think, Rou. You're my kind of guy." No matter how much I tried not to, I still had to look away at the compliment. For all my apparent arrogance and comfortability in such situations, I was still unable to take a compliment very well if it was genuine. The worst part was that I was unsure whether this applied to me all the time or only just since I had regained consciousness.