IS: Filling in the plot holes

Chapter 1

Author's Note: Hello and thanks for taking the time to read this 12 chapter long epic. Little backstory for you guys, this is a present to somebody. A little while ago, I made this mistake of showing my friend a piece of the light novel I was working on back in college. Fortunately, she liked it. Unfortunately, she liked it so much that she tried to commission one from me. As a total pushover for women, I told her that I couldn't write a light novel for her, but I can write you some stories every once in a while. So then she suggested writing a fanfiction for her using one of her original characters from a comic she wanted to make. I buckled and wrote this.

Now, first and foremost I dislike writing original characters for fanfiction. I find it incredibly hard to get them away from Mary Sue or Boring Invincible Hero tropes so I hope this attempt doesn't make them Sue-y. Oink.

Secondly, this fanfiction is meant to be read either after the same numbered episode, or concurrently. Basically, each chapter is sort of an expanded view (or another viewpoint from the OC of each episode). I like to call it plausible reality. I think that a lot of what happens in the anime is incredibly contrived and wouldn't happen unless Lady Luck herself was in love with Ichika (but then again which lady isn't?). It takes the events of Infinite Stratos the anime as full canon, mainly because I can't read the Japanese light novels, nor can I make sense of the parts of the 6th that Baka-Tsuki translated. However, via viewpoint of the OC I attempted to justify or at least explain these events. Those that know the official media will probably know the reasons behind these events, but as I said I don't know Japanese. I'll use the IS wikia, Wikipedia page, and TVTropes websites as reference as closely as possible, but if I get anything wrong, or if anything is contradicted by the anime, please let me know so I can fix it.

Finally, this chapter is the present to that girl, the other chapters are me taking this premise and running with it. Before I give it to her, I'd like to get a bit of feedback from the community on my writing style, as well as some impressions of the story itself. I don't want to give her something she'll get bored of halfway in. Judging from the reviews of my favorite epics, the majority of the community can give some great tips and advice for aspiring writers.

I hope you find this tale as fun to read as it was for me to write.

Author's other note FROM THE FUTURE!: Ate is tagalog for "Big Sister", like Oneechan and the like. Can't believe I didn't mention that sooner.

Story Start

Huge. That's the first thought I had after disembarking the monorail. I wanted to stop and admire the size of the building in front of me, but I was immediately shoved forward by a herd of young women in white blazers with long sleeves, neckties of various colors, and their luggage. With no desire to get trampled beneath their feet, I stumbled/hobbled diagonally towards the edges of the mob, collapsing with relief as I escaped the mass of white. I was careful to fall onto my luggage, as to avoid getting dirt on my own white blazer, blue necktie, and black trousers. I sucked in air at a slow pace, breathing with my gut to use the full capacity of my lungs to obtain oxygen. A practice I adopted after reading an article in my old health class, I found it also helped me relax, calming me down much faster than a cool drink of water would. However, as soon as I caught my breath, I heard a voice call out, "Ate!" With a sigh, I plunged back into the thinning herd of women and grabbed the hand of a small girl crouched down and using her own luggage as a shield. She immediately uncurled and followed me back to where I deposited my own luggage, in the middle of the monorail platform yet off to the side. Still holding on to her hand, I used the other to upright my luggage, brush off the dirt and extend its handle. I squeezed the girl's hand and told her, "Nefer, we should probably get to our room. Class will start soon."

Nefer squeezed back, somehow twisted her arm around mine and replied, "Sure, Ate. Let's go."

We entered the dormitories located directly under the classrooms we'd be using for our studies. "1026, according to the acceptance letter," I told Nefer. Nodding her head, she pulled out the keycard we would need to open the door, but try as we might, we couldn't locate a slot to swipe it through. Another girl with a long ponytail, probably noticing our trouble, approached us from Nefer's blind side. A horribly bashful girl, as soon as she noticed her approach, she jumped behind me and decided to use me as a shield. I would compliment her on her awareness, if she noticed the ponytail girl before she tapped Nefer's shoulder. And if she didn't yelp while hiding behind me, I'd even pat her head. Instead I added more things to a mental list to tease her about behind closed doors.

"All you need to do is hold the card up to the knob. The door will open automatically," she informed me in formal Japanese.

"Ah, thank you very much," I replied back in stuttering, broken Japanese.

"I see you aren't a Japanese person," the ponytailed girl noticed, switching to more elementary words. "My name is Shinonono Houki. You can call me Houki."

Remembering a bit of Japanese culture, I managed to say, "Nice to meet you, Houki-san. I'm Sever Panganiban. This girl back here," with a thumb behind my back,"is Nefer. Say 'Hello,' Nefer." I felt the wind from her shy wave over my shoulder. I thought to myself that I should really introduce her to some people later.

"I'd like to chat more, but we have class soon. Don't be late," the pony-tailed girl named Houki reminded me. After pointing out the elevator at the end of the hallway, she bowed us a farewell and waited for the next car.

I opened the door as she taught me and placed our luggage on the beds, then grabbed Nefer's hand to lead her towards the elevator. I saw the elevator doors open, saw Houki enter them, saw her give a small cat-like smile, and then saw the elevators close on our faces. Hmm, she's a bit meaner than I thought.

"Houki..." A masculine voice behind me droned in a tired manner. As before, Nefer jumped behind me as I faced the owner of that low-pitched voice. A tall man wearing a white blazer with the buttons reversed from my own extended his hand to me. "Sorry about that, it seems you suffered from her little prank as well." At least, judging from what I could understand, that's what he said. He spoke fluent Japanese at a speed I could barely follow. Nefer's small, breathless whisper from behind told me that he's apologizing for Houki's actions.

With my own meager understanding of the language, I told him, "It's fine. I have friends back home who do things like that to me." With those last words, I attempted to shake his hand when a hard poke in the side told me how Nefer felt about that half-lie. A friendly hand shake turned into a partial Hokey-Pokey as I danced around, trying to get away from Nefer's Finger of Judgment. The man chuckled, withdrew his hand and introduced himself as Orimura Ichika. Since he didn't offer his first name, I addressed him as Orimura-san and bade him goodbye as the elevator car returned.

"It seems like you're in my year," Orimura called out, placing his hand on the door so it couldn't shut. "We should go together to the classrooms."

"Hmm, sure I suppose, but then who would go with the Houki that came down on the other side?" Orimura spun around and peered across the long hallway while I calmly pushed the door close button. Orimura spun back to me just in time to see the despondent, please-forgive-me look on my face, reinforced by the pleading pyramid of hands pose as the doors closed.

"Thanks," a voice significantly louder than that small whisper in the hallway spoke up. "I'm not quite so good with dealing with men." The elevator we rode was a quite spacious cargo elevator, easily able to hold at least 20 adults at once. With the man safely on the dorm floor, Nefer gave me a quick hug and relaxed at my side, waiting to reach the 6th floor where our 4 first-year classrooms and labs were set up. We did a few I checked my watch, noting that we had ample time to make our way to our classes before the bell rung. Once the elevator doors opened, Nefer latched onto my hand with an extremely strong grip. Failing to hide my discomfort, I turned to meet Nefer's eyes and voice my displeasure. Nefer's eyes refused to meet mine while the rest of her deliberately tried to impede my advancement towards my classroom. With a twist of my hand, I escaped her vice-like grip and forcefully pushed her to her seat in class 1-2. With gentle pressure, I forced her to sit and messed with her short hair.

"I'll come get you after our classes and we can tour the campus for the rest of the afternoon. Until then, be good." I turned on her desk for her then left for my own classroom.

Nefer was the only person who knew me here at the Infinite Stratos Academy. I'm sure I'm the only person she knew here as well. Nefer had always been a very private girl, burying her nose in books and studying with various tutors, all older men and women. As such, she could never relate nor even converse with people her own age, until she met me. Ever since then, she's stuck to me like glue, although judging from the earlier two encounters she's getting used to other people. I assume the shock of getting separated from me in that monorail full of people before we arrived forced her to be a little bit braver. I don't fault her for shielding herself with the briefcase though; that was a better option than getting trampled by all those excited girls.

Thanks to Nefer's actions, I entered Class 1-1 with minutes to spare and sat at my assigned desk behind Orimura, the person before me according to roll. At least, I attempted to but that desk was occupied by a cute, bespectacled girl with a serious gaze affixed on the only male in the class. I sighed, tapped Orimura on the shoulder as a greeting, and then took the plastic triangle that served as my identification from the desk I sacrificed to Glasses-Girl's romantic exploits. I tapped Glasses-Girl's shoulder, whose owner spent a microsecond acknowledging my action, pulling out her own triangle and then re-engaging her staring contest with the back of Orimura's head. Noticing something familiar about his head, I knelt down to eye-level with Glasses-Girl and looked at where she was looking. Unlike my desk usurper, I allowed my eyes to unfocus and slowly rose. About halfway back to my upright position, for a fleeting instant I noticed the optical illusion the swirl of his hair made. I smiled, wondering if anyone else noticed the joke Orimura's last barber inscribed on his head. Walking to the only empty desk in the room, which just so happened to be furthest from the Y chromosome carrier, I inserted the ID triangle into the vacant cavity in the corner. I powered up the desk's display and used my precious few minutes before class to review the history of the academy.

Infinite Stratos (IS) was created 10 years prior to the creating of this reference. (At this point, I looked for a year of copyright or year of writing, but found none. Apparently, the exact date of the creation of IS is a guarded secret). Shortly revealed to the world afterward, representatives of the countries of the world quickly convened in Alaska to create a treaty relegating the use of IS. This speed was necessary due to the fact that IS are basically powered armor with enough strength to make the country's owner the world superpower. This was proven with the "White Knight Incident" where over 2000 missiles were launched at a small island in the Pacific. The first IS codenamed "White Knight" used its particle cannon and broadsword to disable, detonate, or destroy each missile, regardless of its armed status. Just as suddenly as it appeared, it disappeared, leaving a feeling of safety in the hearts of the common people, and a feeling of fear in the public leaders. After meeting in Alaska, the representatives of the world forged the Alaska Pact with four specific terms:

_IS are prohibited from being employed in any war. IS are allowed to be armed as a deterrent for war.

_Any research and development for IS is to be made available to all countries, including any field testing of said R&D.

_R&D done by IS Academy (Term 4) are allowed to be kept confidential.

_Trade of IS cores is strictly prohibited under any circumstances.

Japan will be responsible for the creation and maintenance of an IS pilot training facility and is required to allow pilot candidates of any foreign country, provided they are endorsed by their legitimate government body or foundation.

As alluded to in the corollary to Term 2, IS Academy is the IS pilot training facility Japan created to educate IS Pilots. Due to the majority of pilots with high sync rates being teenagers, IS Academy was structured after a typical Japanese High School or College, my understanding of them being fairly similar to each other. Pilot candidates of an older age were given their own program, tailored to be similar to US college programs.

BRINGGG!

The bell rung and I looked up from my desk to witness a cute woman in her early 20's at least enter the room and introduce herself as "Yamada Maya", the deputy homeroom teacher. The board behind her displayed her name in Kanji, while my screen displayed her name and position in Kanji, Hiragana, and English. I suppressed a giggle when I realized her name in Hiragana read the same forwards and backwards. After congratulating our enrollment to the academy, she proceeded to introduce us to how our life over the next three years was going to be. As explained to us in the material accompanying our acceptance letters, the school would be our home for the next three years unless we withdraw or were dismissed for whatever reason. We would stay on campus for the 6 days a week of classes, and be allowed to go the port city on Sundays. From the port city, we are allowed to visit anywhere we would like, as long as we receive permission from the Academy and return before midnight. As for meals, the school would provide, however the kitchens will be open to students who would like to prepare their own food for whatever reason. Apparently she was waiting for a reaction, because she hesitated before asking for a roll call, a bit of wind out of her sail.

Never really a social type of person, I ignored the introductions made, only focusing on the roll number so I knew when to introduce myself. After number 14, I waited for number 15 to take their turn, but was surprised when that person didn't respond. "Ichika-kun. Orimura Ichika-kun!" Yamada called out to the tall man sitting in the seat in front of my former one.

"H-Hai!" the spaced-out boy stuttered.

"Sorry for shouting," Yamada apologized, then leaned over to a more comfortable position, resting both of her forearms onto the lectern. "But we started with 'A', and now we're on 'O'. Could you introduce yourself?" I think she asked.

Rising to his full height, he started off with a shaky, "I'm Orimura Ichika. Nice to meet you all!" A simple greeting, and my signal to start once he sat down. However, he hesitated and looked at the eager eyes of his classmates, expecting a more robust introduction. He took a last ditch glance at Houki, who I just realized sat at the far left corner of the class, two columns from Orimura. When denied, he let his head fall forward in depression. I could almost see the gears in his head as he tried to come up with a suitable introduction that would satiate the expectant girls. The girls all leaned in their seats to better hear what he was about to say. He took a deep breath and forcefully informed us, "That's all."

Simultaneously, the entire class of students lost their balance, the most extreme case falling on the floor face down. I picked myself off the floor and hurriedly rubbed the red off my face so that I could introduce myself when an older woman in black dropped a heavy fist onto the back of Orimura's head. "Ow...Ugh, Chifuyu-nee!"

The fist returned with improved aim, hitting Orimura in the soft of his skull. "Call me Orimura-sensei at school."

Yamada spoke up, "Is your meeting over, Sensei?"

"Yea, Yamada-kun. Sorry, I left the greeting to you." Orimura-sensei took her place at the head of the class placed a hand on her hip and introduced herself, "Everyone! I am your homeroom teacher, Orimura Chifuyu. My job is to make you first-years useful in a year."

A loud cheer arouse from my class: a loud, high-pitched, obnoxious cheer I should be used to by now instead penetrated my throbbing head and drowned out all other sound. I think I heard "Chifuyu-sama!" multiple times, all said by loud, high pitched voices, although I'm not quite too sure of it. I forced myself to look up and saw Orimura-sensei rest an exasperated head on her uplifted hand. I'm sure she was lamenting the idiotic idolization of my class. Sure enough, the cheers grew louder as I stuffed my fingers in my ears.

Shortly after the cheering died down, I recovered enough to witness Orimura get slammed into his desk for mistakenly calling her his big sister again. I overheard the two girls in front of me gossip in soft whispers, "You think that's why he can use IS? Because he's Orimura-sensei's brother?"

The girl returned her whisper with, "I don't know, but he's the only man in the world that can use an IS."

For whatever reason, only women could use IS. At first, rich and powerful men attempted to obtain and use the powerful devices. The former was easy, considering their influence, however when they discovered their inability to use it, they handed it down to their daughters, wives, mistresses, or whoever they thought could use it. Amazingly, only the women were able to move the machines, whereas the teenaged girls were able to move them without any effort at all. It was theorized that the best IS pilots would be teenaged girls, although there were a few oddballs that had high sync rates even as middle aged women. However, the single unifying fact was that IS could only be piloted by women. With this discovery, countries urged their women to birth girls, in an effort to get more IS pilots. In addition to this, schools started focusing on more practical matters for the females, such as physics, math, and such, at an earlier age to prepare them for IS Academy. Males were allowed to attend the same classes, but did not get the same support females got and typically underachieved academically. It seemed Orimura was of this category.

Orimura-sensei explained to us that her lesson plan consisted of learning the basics within six months, then practical training for the next six, vacation for the last week of each month. Short and simple for a syllabus; until I realized that the basics consisted of the giant paperweight weighing down the luggage in my dorm.

Yamada started explaining the history of IS to us, but a lot of it was almost word for word from the data display on my desk. I tuned out a lot of what she said; taking notes with my stylus when she said something not written down, or was driven off track by an errant question.

After the lecture, homeroom had a 10 minute break before starting out first formal class. I waded through a deep pool of women of different classes and years, all obviously looking for a glance of at least one of the Orimura siblings. As for me, I had a different goal in mind. I somehow wedged my way into class 1-2 to see how Nefer was doing. She sat the same way as I left her. Arms down, stiff as a board, and looking straight ahead. I glanced down at her desk and noticed that she at least took copious notes. I marveled at the organization of her notes, and how she even managed to make the stylus write different colors to code different notes a certain subject. She finally noticed my presence and after looking at my smile to verify who I was, she grabbed me bodily and threw her face into my bosom. She didn't say anything, and she didn't weep, so I laid my arms around her and praised her with, "Good girl." After spending a good amount of time in my pillows, she let go and told me she was fine. I left the room and headed to the vending machine near the elevators. I pulled out my ID triangle as well as Nefer's triangle, pocketed during her little episode. Inserting it into the triangle cavity, I ordered a cafe au lait with Nefer's ID and an orange soda for me. I ducked into 1-2 to give Nefer her favorite drink and her ID back, giving me a grateful nod for the former and an angry glare for the latter. Seconds before the sensei arrived, I took my seat and nodded my drink to her. She approved with a slight tilt of the head.

The first class was a basic terminology course to get us used to the various words used to describe IS. It consisted of memory drills and sample readings of the various research our home countries performed on IS. The only highlight of the day came when Orimura vindicated my opinion of him and admitted to understanding nothing. As expected, Orimura "accidentally" threw his textbook away as soon as he got it and read nothing. As if expecting the deluge of girls offering Orimura their textbooks to read with him, Orimura-sensei informed her brother he would get a copy and that he was to read it in a week. His complaints regarding the short timeframe were quickly silenced with sensei's raised fist. The class continued until lunch recess, and by then everyone had their fill of IS.

I left the room much easier than before. It seemed the novelty of the only male student in school quickly faded after witnessing his academic ineptitude. Grabbing my ID, I met Nefer outside her classroom, a welcome change from having to actually enter her class. Linking arms, we walked down to the cafeteria, located at ground level near the first-year dorms. Using the IDs we ordered lunch, refreshingly prepared by cooks and servers. It was more like a self-serve bar, but we could see exactly how the food was prepared and how the dishes were cleaned. I could even see students in the back preparing their own food at smaller cooking stations, equipped with small sinks, burners, and even an oven. I ordered a bowl of Pho, which they had as a special today, while Nefer ordered a pork cutlet with noodles (katsudon they called it). Looking at the dishes, we concluded with a heavy sigh they were basically the same thing with different noodles and meat. I made it a resolution to visit the kitchen later tonight and make something a bit more distinct. We dutifully finished off our meals, which weren't that bad, thanked the cook with a handshake and smile (or at least I did, Nefer hid behind me as always) and got him to give me access to the kitchen's stock of food with the condition I call him when I finish cooking. Apparently, he was the one to fight for the individual kitchen stations to be able to taste the foods of different cultures. As such, he kept the kitchen stocked with all sorts of meats and veggies, and would even send out for exotic ingredients when needed.

Armed with a goal, I returned back to my class after dropping off Nefer at her door. It seemed she was getting more and more used to me not being there, though I worried for her social life. From what I could tell, she hasn't attempted to make any friends, and she had this aura of animosity that repelled the less adventurous girls of the class; which seemed to be all of them at a glance. Well, I couldn't exactly stay long enough to introduce people to her, so I left her there with a smile, entered my own classroom and relaxed in my seat.

After a few more hours of lessons I slept through, I was awoken with my own love tap to the back of my head. Apparently Orimura-sensei doesn't forget to display her affection for her students, just delays them until an appropriate time. In this case, it was after the other students left early due to Sensei's accelerated teaching pace.

"Sever," Orimura-sensei read off my ID triangle, "Come with me."

"Is this about my acceptance into IS academy?" I inquired.

"Yes." She gave a small half-smile eerily similar to Houki's earlier. "We'll meet you in R&D room 12."

"Fine," I responded. "Let me type up a quick message to my roommate."

Accepting my request with a curt nod, she spun on her heel and walked out the door near me, obviously heading for R&D 12. As for me, I turned to my desk and typed out: Nefer, I have some IS Academy business to take care of. Can you get back to the dorm and unpack everything for me? I slept through classes and I'm going to have to make up quite a bit. Hopefully, she thought I just got in trouble instead of why I'm really breaking my promise to get her after class.

Due to Alaska Pact Term 4, Japan was responsible for the creation and maintenance of IS Academy, and forced to open the doors to any eligible pilot candidate from any nation. That also meant that Japan was financially responsible for this global IS school, something that the Japanese knew was unfair. Therefore IS Academy played a different tactic. By introducing tariffs and fees for visitors to Japan, they were able to mitigate the cost of IS Academy a bit. However, by using carefully worded statements, they were able to push off more than ¾ of the maintenance cost of IS Academy onto the United Nations and Nations of the world. Statements like "in the case of minors staying 1 year or longer" or "in the case of multiple candidates from foreign countries" or some such. These fees dissuaded countries from sending so many candidates that the school over inflated, or sending in a bunch of students to tip the balance of the student body nationality majority. Due to these fees, IS Academy not only easily controlled the number of students enrolled, but controlled the culture of the student body. This year, more than 95% of all the students were Japanese. Candidates from other countries were forced to become the best of the best, while the countries themselves were forced to allocate trillions of yen for the training of these IS Pilots.

I was not able to obtain these trillions of yen to be able to attend IS Academy. However, taking the acceptance test was free, and so I took it, testing high on xtradimensional physics as well as information technology. Noting the ridiculous scores IS Academy offered my admittance with full lodging under three caveats.

I was to keep a record of my daily happenings, calling to attention unusual events in the day. After reviewing my miserable attempt of a report, I was allowed to write it in the form of a story, provided I write it in a manner a complete novice would be able to follow.

I stopped in front of the door to R&D 12. With a wave of my ID, it granted me access into the IS repair bay. Racks of mass-produced IS with the express purpose of training surrounded me, dim yellow lights highlighting a path through the maze of machina. I followed the path of light to a laboratory table, Orimura-sensei gesturing to lie down. With a sigh, I patted down the sheet of paper that served for sanitation, laid down and allowed the NO2 to bring me to a sweet unconsciousness.

I was to allow IS Academy to test new technology on me. This technology was not meant to cause me harm or shorten my life, and will be reversed at the end of my three years. As this technology falls under the Alaska Pact's Term 2 Corollary, I was not to share knowledge of this caveat nor the research I was assisting with unless declassified by Orimura-sensei.

I awoke in the infirmary, feeling a bit light-headed. Orimura-sensei sat near me, and waited patiently for my head to clear.

"So should I expect something like this regularly?" I asked Sensei.

"No," her voice stern, but soft. "We will contact you whenever a new experiment is ready to be tested. We may also call you in to assist with calculation regarding xtradimensional space however, so review that whenever you get a bit of time. Now, allow me to explain the surgery you just received. Put on this choker."

From her pocket, she pulled a box containing a red pendant hanging from a silken ribbon. I took the jewelry and placed it around my neck, the choker formed comfortably around my throat. I had no problems breathing, and the pendant seemed to be attracted to my chest. I breathed experimentally to see if the weight would bother me, then hopped around to see if I could dislodge it from its current position. The pendant wouldn't move.

"The pendant is attracted to the implants we grafted to your nervous system. The pendant is a key to your implants that will allow you to access and use the IS Artificial Reality display, even without an IS. If you touch your thumb to the tips of your fingers in succession from your pinky to your index, you can pull up an Artificial Reality display that only you can see, similar to the IS AR displays. You can open up to four different displays by repeating the motion, and dismiss them by touching your thumb to the relevant fingertip twice. You'll see what I mean after you train with it later. Other functions will be controlled exactly as how you will control an IS AR system, even following vocal commands. Also, you have full permission to modify and create new programs and macros as long as you submit them to us before use. As long as you are on campus, the technology will be powered wirelessly, but if you are off campus, you will have only 24 hours before the system enters emergency standby."

"Yes, Sensei." I tested the system by touching the fingers on my right hand as she instructed. A translucent display appeared before my eyes, shading a small window of my vision in pale blue. I turned my head, the window moving with me. I focused my vision on Orimura-sensei, and was rewarded with the abbreviated personal profile IS Academy kept on her. To maintain the screen's focus, I curled my middle finger, then tried to use my pinky to scroll down Sensei's bio before she grabbed me by the pendant, lifting it off my chest and forcibly shutting down my interface.

"I see you can't wait to start experimenting with it," Sensei observed, a twisted smile appearing on her face. She released the pendant, letting if fall perfectly back into its original position. She picked up a fairly large stack of papers form behind her and dumped them in my lap. "This is homework regarding the IS AR system for the next three months, as well as the work you slept through today. I expect this all to be finished by this week. Also, there will be a test on IS history tomorrow. Needless to say, if you come in with that pendant on you'll be zero'd immediately and on the wrong end of my fist." The smile appeared in full force, which I ignored in favor of her tightly clenched fist.

"Yes, ma'am." I brought up the AR screen again, careful not to focus on Sensei. "Time," I ordered, and the screen displayed the date and time to the second. "Sensei, if that's all, may I be allowed to get some dinner?" Sensei gave me an irritated look as I realized I spoke in English accidentally. Luckily, the display showed me a translation for what I said, and with a high degree of accuracy as my mediocre studies could tell. I repeated what I said in Japanese, to which Sensei remarked, "Looks like the translation function works fine. Although you may not want to depend on it. You actually said, 'May I have you for dinner?'" That clarification made me flush with red. Sensei left me to my shame, while I desperately tried to calm down my heart. After taking about 10 minutes to do so, I headed to my dorm to pick up Nefer and attempt to make up with her.

Waaaaaaaahhhhh!

I grabbed the door frame as if my life depended on it as my tiny roommate latched onto my waist and started thrashing about. The girls on my floor silently witnessed this display of immaturity while I tried not to let my face color like before. All of a sudden Orimura exited the dorm next to me, followed by multiple piercing strikes through the door by a wooden sword and the craziest show of agility I've ever seen a man perform. The girls switched their attention to Orimura, giving me an opportunity to knee Nefer in the stomach, bow out of the room gracefully, and shut the door behind me: another thing to apologize to Nefer for later. I observed Orimura shamelessly beg to be let back in, ending the night's shenanigans. The girls all left for their own dorms, save three who unabashedly used the door's recent ventilation to peep inside. Too tired to be polite, but curious enough to keep my voice light, I asked the three, "What the hell just happened?"

"Apparently, Orimura's shacked up with Shinonono, and she's having the typical tsundere response," the tallest girl answered with a knowing smile.

"At the very least she looks pissed," added the middle girl.

"Yea," said the shortest girl unhelpfully. I guess she didn't want to be left out.

"Huh," I responded, and then appropriated my own peep hole.

I was just in time to watch Houki stutter out, "D-d-d-d-did you ask for this rooming arrangement? To share a room with me?"

Orimura condescendingly replied, "That's stupid."

I immediately brought my face into my palm, prompting the other three voyeurs to shush me into silence. Looking back through the hole, I saw Houki in kendo garb attempting to cleave Orimura in two, Orimura just barely able to hold the blade between his hands. She started muttering under her breath something I couldn't make out, when the girls decided to save him. They opened the door a smidgen and called in, "Ah, we found Shinonono-san!"

"Don't go jump on him by yourself", the middle girl added.

Houki gasped and retreated back to the far side of the room.

"Oh, it's over," the middle girl continued.

"It looked like things were going really well," the tall girl remarked, before Houki crossed the room and shut the door in their faces. Not like it deterred the girls in the slightest, they simply reassumed their original peeping positions. I peeped into my own dorm to check in on Nefer. She was struggling valiantly to recover her breath, so I looked back into Orimura and Houki's room. Orimura crossed the room with surprising speed and grabbed the other sword in Houki's bag. Upon seeing the hitchhiker on the sword, the five of us save Orimura gasped simultaneously. Odd-man-out Orimura did the stupidest thing I could think of at the moment and started examining the brassiere hanging off the tip of the sword. Before blood could be spilled, I shooed the three voyeurs back to their dorms and barged into the room, just in time to see Houki fling her sword into Orimura's face. Orimura went down fast, luckily falling onto his back. After checking for injuries, I assisted Houki in moving Orimura's unconscious body onto his bed. Before leaving, I gave a Houki a friendly smile and told her, "Give me a call if you need any help transporting the wounded, okay? I'm just next door. You know what, here's my number. Nice to meet you, neighbor!"

After exchanging phone numbers with the violent feisty girl, I finally went back to my own room and checked Nefer for any injuries. I didn't exactly aim to harm, but I did knock the wind out of her. As she wheezed in and out, I sighed and punched up a recipe for pad thai on my AR display. I studied the recipe as best I could while I waited for Nefer to recover, then walked to the kitchen with Nefer twisting my arms painfully behind my back.

As expected, Nefer had forgiven me now that her stomach was full. On a side note, the cook now considered me a master chef, due to the ease I had in finding and using the ingredients. This ease came from me using the AR displays to gauge every step of the dish. I felt a bit guilty for using this experimental system for cooking so simple a dish, but a hungry, angry Nefer was a serious threat to my mental stability. However, a full Nefer was a happy, competent Nefer, and so reinforced that thought by helping me with the studies I slept through, even though she was in a different class. At the end of the impromptu study session, I felt like I actually understood everything we went over. Her task complete, Nefer sleepily changed into her PJs and crawled into her bed. I poured myself a cup of coffee and started working on my other homework, coding a few more macros and programs into my AR interface.

The next day, I made sure to come to class without my choker on. Instead, I kept it on my wrist like an oversized charm. With an approving smile, Orimura-sensei started the test, which I came out feeling really good about. We broke for lunch, myself picking up Nefer and heading to the cafeteria. We grabbed a decidedly mediocre lunch (the cook shooting me a guilty look) and returned to the classroom after working off the calories a bit by jogging. On the way back, I stopped by the bathroom to double-check my appearance in the middle. My tall figure stared back at me, examining my black trousers, white blazer and blue necktie, which I adjusted to look straight and crisp instead of droopy. I combed my fingers through my short black hair, stopping at the start of my braided ponytail. At this point, my hair abruptly switched from black to orange, the result of a botched bleach job before I arrived at the Academy. I got some weird looks, but that problem was solved when I stuck the ponytail into the back of my blazer, the high collar hiding the color shift. To finish up my beautification, I removed my choker from my wrist and returned it to its proper location.

After finishing the once over, I entered through the back door of my class in time to hear Orimura-sensei announce the inter-class match taking place in two weeks. She went on to explain that not only would the class representative compete in the match, but would also attend student council meetings and committee meetings. In short, a normal class rep who happens to compete in a combat tournament between all of the classes. As expected, some random girl I didn't recognize nominated Orimura the younger. This was quickly seconded, ignoring Orimura's confused grunt. Taking it in stride, Orimura-sensei asked for other nominations. Orimura started to contest the nomination when a haughty voice from the back yelled, "I can't accept this!"

She spoke with a weird form of Japanese. I pulled an AR display up and used a series of taps to silently load a translator program to translate the spoken words into terms I could understand.

"I don't accept an election like that!" the blonde girl continued. "It would be a shame for a man to represent our class. Are you telling me that I, Cecilia Alcott, must live in shame for a year?"

I opened a new display and focused on the whining girl. Curling my finger to lock the display in front of me, I started reading her profile:

Cecilia Alcott, 15 years old, IS Representative Cadet of England

_Personal IS: Blue Tears

_Current equipment: Starlight Mark III Laser Rifle

_Blue Tears UAV Package

I dismissed the profile and display, and rejoined the conversation. I took a quick look at the log on the translator and saw that Cecilia insulted Japan by calling it an underdeveloped country. I snickered quietly, thinking "You silly girl, Japan made IS. They're more developed than your country by far."

Orimura retorted, "England doesn't have much to brag about either. How many years have you won the world's most disgusting food championship?"

With a gasp full of indignation, Cecilia blurted out, "We have plenty of delicious foods! Do you dare insult my nation?"

Orimura stayed silent, a good call on his part.

The silence hung in the air for an uncomfortably long time. It was thankfully broken with Cecilia's demand, "I challenge you to a duel!"

Orimura quickly responded, "Sure. It's easier than debating this." I'm sure he was waiting for this challenge.

Cecilia continued her demand, "If you lose to me on purpose, I'll make you my servant. No, my slave, actually."

Orimura offered, "How much of a handicap?"

This statement confused the heck out of the class. Cecilia seemed to take it as a form of surrender, asking Orimura, "Oh, you're begging already?"

"No, I'm wondering how much of a handicap I should take," he answered honestly.

This drew polite laughter from the class, as if he made a funny joke.

A few statements I couldn't hear from my place back in the class were made, but it seemed the Orimura understood that the duel would be settled with IS.

"Truthfully, I'm debating if I should take some handicap for your sake or not," Cecilia taunted. "Japanese men are funny."

The glasses-girl who took my seat advised the lone man, "Orimura-kun, it's not too late. Ask for a handicap." Remembering her profile, I nodded my head in agreement.

Orimura looked the girl straight in the eyes and firmly told her, "A man can't take back what he said." Turning back to Cecilia, he said, "I don't need any."

Glasses-girl responded, "You're underestimating her too much."

Orimura-sensei, probably finished having fun at her brother's expense, finally took charge by confirming, "Looks like it's settled then. The duel will take place next Monday at the third arena. Orimura and Alcott, prepare yourselves."