I don't even know what this is supposed to be. Don't try to make sense of the plot, please.
I went severely off track when I was writing a more "sad" story involving NeruXHaku as the main couple. But something really strange happened when in that story Teto (31) made an appearance to cheer up Neru after something happened. I don't know what happened after that. But I believe I became really interested in the idea of NeruXTeto. It may sound a little weird, but I think it's something new for me to try out.
Neru in this story is 17 years old, and Teto is...*sigh* 15. I've written a story with a large age gap before, so I wouldn't mind making Teto 31 here. But if I did, I'm sure someone would say that's "disgusting". Despite of course, the alterations in legal age across the world. *Rolls eyes*
Anyway, that's all of the description we need. Let's see if I don't horrifically suck at writing a story...! We're going in 3...2...1...begin!
DISCLAIMER TIME – I'm not musically-savvy, so it's not possible for me to have created Vocaloid or its characters. And whatever it was that created Teto Kasane and her gang.
From The Opposite Side
Chapter 1: "Prologue"
( A Vocaloid fanfiction typed entirely by The Chosen Storyteller )
Neru Akita didn't think of herself as the kind of person to care about the rest of the world. She wasn't like the rest of the teenage population; she was content with not making an effort. After all, a her age she still had all of the time in the world to give in to her parents' demands and attend a college.
She just wanted to live in the present. If she felt too tired to walk to school, she shouldn't have to bother. If that alarm clock continued to ring, all she would do is unplug the beast all while cursing the idiot who invented digital ones. That meant she had to walk across the room to unplug it.
But when that was over, the lazy girl would pull the blankets aside and slip back underneath. The clouds and light continued to shift outside of her window, eventually leading into the remains of the day. Neru wasn't very fazed by waking up at one in the afternoon; she was at least rested.
If there was any time left in the day, she would slip on some casual clothes and fix herself some simple sandwiches. While feasting on that, she would pop in a movie or video game she liked while her rear stayed in the same position for hours.
That was pretty much how she spent her days. But when her mother was especially unstable about the idea of her daughter becoming a freeloader, she would throw the uniform to her bed and shout in her ear until she dragged herself out of bed. Really though; was school that important? Did she really have to go through all of this suffering for some information she would more than likely forget come summer?
Teto Kasane thought she was as much of a regular person as anyone else. She had the humanoid appearance despite her pink hair, red eyes, and pale skin. Otherwise she had all of the normal body parts and senses. When she looked at herself in the mirror she thought she passed as a typical teenage girl. It didn't seem fair how she had to be cooped up inside of this dump.
Teto did on the other hand have some things the regular people did not. When she was too angry or too happy, bat-like wings would sprout from her back and she could use them to hover at great speed. She could also run fast if she wanted; if there was anywhere to run other than this dump. Perhaps less interesting, a tail also sprouted from her rear. But people usually just stared at her obvious wings.
The workers here always led her back to the room with a promise of either food or a hot bath prepared for her. But she didn't like to stay here. If she was just as human as the nervous and sweating ladies who escorted her back...why couldn't she have contact with the rest of this "hospital" as they called it?
The average idiot may think there's no hope in ever escaping, but the trapped girl didn't despair. Each attempt that fell on its ass motivated her to continue. For as long as she could remember they acted nervous in her presence or gasped when wings sprouted from her skin only to fall back with no damage. But she would change that someday.
That was how she spent her days. But she didn't lose the faith something would change.
What Neru thought would be another lame day changed dramatically. It all started when she was literally dragged by her feet out of bed. She didn't even say goodbye to her mother after scarfing down breakfast and slipping on her shoes. She just sulked out of the door, wondering why it was so important for her to get this 'high education'.
From her personal point of view: high school wasn't worth attending.
She didn't hate the idea of school. If there was one thing she wanted to accomplish in her life – it was proving to her family and her peers that she was not a freeloader who wouldn't be able to live unless people dropped coins on the train.
What did they know about her? Of course she was suitable for a job – there was something for everyone in the world! She was simply...not eager to make a living at seventeen. She felt like she still wanted to be young and have no responsibility looming over her head. She wanted to be able to lounge in the family room with some junk food.
Was that too much to ask for?
The world didn't want her to have a fun walk to school, apparently. She had been nearly pummeled by two wayward soccer balls, run over by a bicycle out of control, stepped in gum and ultimately had to leave her left shoe behind, and she was damn certain that the man cleaning off the broom as he swept intended to get the dust all over her head.
When the modest, silver-colored walls of the school came into her view she almost threw her arms to the sky with happiness. But there was not a chance she would sink as low as to love this dump. All it was good for consisted of was being a waste of her time. She never learned anything, and the teachers still looked at her disapprovingly from time to time just because she fell asleep often in class and drooled over school property.
But the most annoying part about school was that she was not the kind of girl to wander into the background. She didn't intend to make friends, but these persistent girls Rin and Miku continued to plea for her to at least give them each a chance to be friendly with her. The two seemed nice, but if she wasn't going to keep in contact with them by the time she was finished with studying for the rest of her life then...what was the flipping point?
She wished they wouldn't throw themselves at her and look so adorable while requesting friendship. Miku was attractive to begin with, and her voice getting chirpy when she talked to her only made her more attractive in a weird way. Rin on the other hand was more cute than actually hot. But she was still attractive, and she obviously knew gender wasn't stopping a lot of people in the school from fawning over her.
Sometimes it wasn't easy being attracted to the same sex.
Yeah, that was another little issue in her life. The school was stocked with a lot of single and very attractive girls, and of course she had to be targeted to join a social circle with two of the most pined for. Neru didn't think of herself as strictly into girls, because there had been times she would appreciate and indulge in male eye candy.
Considering Neru didn't have a way with people, she often tried to ignore she could feel attraction. Maybe there was a closet she was stuffed inside, but she really didn't give a damn. If someone could drag her out, that would be the same person she'd marry. But of course...not that she had made that a literal...she didn't want to marry so early!
Oh well. As Miku and Rin continued to try and befriend her and some of the boys flirted, she just claimed her usual seat in the middle row and buried herself in drawing characters from manga.
Teto believed another uneventful day would pass at the "hospital", and she was bored for the beginning of it. There were no visitors to play with. The only people who stopped into her room were two of the robots: Momo and Defoko.
Considering that her own being was described as "not of this world" by the staff, she found it odd that robots had been crafted somewhere, shipped here, and due to extremely humanoid looks functioned as cleaning and cooking like they were part of the staff. No one even used names for them when addressing; they called them by numbers.
In Teto's point of view they were not merely numbered staff members. Momo expressed emotions near constantly, and Defoko could be nice when she wasn't tormenting Momo from time to time. After one year from the date they arrived at the hospital, the three formed bonds. Even with a little tormenting from the more stoic Defoko's side.
They hadn't checked in all morning, however. When Teto asked some of the more nervous staff who gave her the usual breakfast, she mentioned through thick layers of sweat over her mouth that insert rude numbers here had been drained of energy and needed to be among the sunlight in the lobby to charge.
Well, that sucked. It wasn't the first time she heard of their internal batteries going to zero. Momo did this almost constantly because she found joy in working more than necessary. The fact that Defoko needed to charge was baffling – she was usually taking more breaks than needed.
After the unnecessarily-nervous woman left, Teto found herself sitting down on the floor and reaching for the music player that often kept her some form of entertainment. She didn't even know why she was given this a few years ago, but she didn't mind turning it on from time to time and even requesting for more sings to be included.
The one she immediately chose to play was a very upbeat, pop tune that never failed to bring her back to her spirits. Lost in the trance by the singer's cutesy voice and the guitars, she didn't even realize she was bobbing her head to it. The way music worked never seemed logical to her, but often the boring days seemed to go by quicker when she had this stuff to fast forward.
A few moments later, she even jumped to her feet and started dancing about the room. It was a little cramped, but the lack of personal furniture helped provide the space needed...especially when her wings happily burst from her back and unfolded while she lost herself entirely in the guitars and drums eventually fading. Then a harder song began to play, and the guys' raspy voices infiltrated her soul and was yet another magical experience to make the day slip away.
During lunch, Neru usually went to the front steps of the building to eat. She didn't think she was breaking any rules by doing this seeing as couples usually went to the roof to lick food off each other all the time.
A common belief was that eating alone meant that person was a freak. But Neru didn't consider herself resemble something like that. Okay, she did like a little manga in her spare time and often danced to anime soundtracks in her spare time.
Otherwise, Neru thought of herself to be sane. When she ate alone, she was only doing this because having so many people talking at once instead of feeding themselves was annoying as hell. She liked peace and quiet more than the average person.
Plus, eating alone offered the opportunity to reflect on life. Maybe she would think about the past. But not at the moment.
At the moment, her head was racing with the memory of a conversation she heard Rin and Miku having after class was over. She couldn't help but be slow in shoving her stupid books back into her almost never used bag, and things fell out anyway. As she lingered to collect everything, the two ate their lunch and babbled.
The conversation was actually worth listening to when Rin mentioned she had the opportunity to get a part time job. Apparently, she was struggling with money and the place hiring was desperate for workers. Even if the new employee in question looked younger than seventeen. Neru wouldn't have cared, but then the overly-chirping girl described the atmosphere.
Most importantly: her workplace was a mental hospital. Apparently, it has been around for quite a lot of decades now. The mental hospital was always coming and going with staff because most of the newbies were disturbed by the fact the atmosphere was so cheerful.
They were scared of a house of insanity just because the patients in question were cheerful.
What the hell?
Neru thought that was the dumbest thing she ever had the pleasure to hear, and while rising back to her feet had to leave a palm to her face.
Rin admitted she was almost prepared to run for her life when one of the patients tried to cut her hair with an old samurai sword just...because. And there were stories of one of the patients being locked here because she was a doorstep baby, and maybe not even of this world. These things caused her to spend two weeks debating the benefits and the cons.
But Miku encouraged her to go for it. But hey; Miku was surrounded by a blue-haired Otaku, a pink-haired queen of ice and stoicism, and two girls who were both abnormally huge in the chest location and drank obsessively. It wasn't hard to believe she was perfectly fine with the thought of her best friend risking her life at a mental hospital.
Their lack of concern for the possible danger was yet another reason for Neru to carve on the list of "why I'm not going to enter their social circle anytime soon". By the time she gathered her pencils and snacks, the topic was already changed to some sporting event they were going to obsess over later that week. Meh.
Neru left the classroom after this, and thought about what the squeaky girl had mentioned. This mental hospital sounded like something out of a manga, and somehow that made it extremely interesting. For this kind of plot to work however, you'd need a group of stereotypical girly girls who follow a handsome detective guy to investigate crime there. It could work with some tweaks, and bold artwork.
Maybe she'd even write that idea down. A smirk tugged on her lips as to consider the idea, but ultimately that thought fell out of her head when she realized it was almost time for lunch.
So this brought her to the eating alone, and recapping the moment. It was so strong in her mind that she almost felt prompted to ask Rin about her new workplace in even deeper detail. Why, she hadn't a clue. But if she checked this place out herself, maybe an answer would open up.
And so it continues on...
I have to admit: the plot of this story was thrown together last minute. When it comes to Neru pairings, I'm picky about them. But when I read a few stories for this one, I thought it would be fun to mix things up. I still want to write a NeruXHaku story sometime, but that won't be at the moment.
This was merely the prologue for the story. I specifically wrote this chapter without dialogue because I wanted to keep it short and simple. But the next chapters will have dialogue; don't worry. All you have to cross your fingers and worry about is my lack of skills in believable conversation! *Laughter* Can't wait...!
Anyway, I also want to mention that despite this story taking place in an unmentioned country that we're all going to assume is Japan despite no evidence...I'm not going to insert really embarrassing random outbursts of Japanese. You know; when someone relies on Google to give them a string of nonsense in a sentence, or constantly has the girls squealing that a friend's new hairclip is "super kawaii desu I love it chu". *Facepalm*
That's just...God, it's so...*Buries face into a nearby book*...Do I really need to say more on that topic? Because I swear, if I don't shut myself up I'm going to feel enough embarrassment for thousands of people.
A-anyhow, I-I hope you liked this beginning and...*Clears throat* maybe you'll want to see more of this story? Just let me know what you think so far in a review if you want to, or you can sit back with some snacks until I stop being lazy and continue with the story.
The Chosen Storyteller is signing out, baby. Have a good year, and don't stare at your computer for too many hours. Should you feel pain, consult a local doctor before reading more. See you around~