Theme Inspired by the 'Sailor Moon' series .
Magical Boy
「魔法少年」
{ TSUBASA「翼」VS Lion「獅子」 }
(By: Emerald Sonata)
[~PART 1~]
…,…*BRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR~*
"…Mm…mmm…"
A young high school boy was lying flat on his back across his bed. His blanket was lying in a skew across his body, not properly covering up the boy – but he did not give a care. An arm of his was curled over his face, shielding his eyes from the crack of sunlight coming from the window, as well as the screaming of his alarm clock.
"…Tch."
*SLAP~!*
In one swift move, the high school boy twisted onto his side and flung a hand at the source of the noisy. With a PANG-noise, the alarm clock was put down into several pieces – forever put to rest.
The sweet sound of silence filled his room again, and the boy lazily rolled back to his other side to return to a peaceful sleep.
"Stupid clock."
"I don't mean to be rude but, I kindly suggest you take my advice and wake up now."
The high school boy indeed woke up – a deadpan of a sneer on his face.
"…I thought I told you that you're not the boss of me – I am. Now keep quiet and give me five more minutes."
"As much as I hate disturbing others from their deserved sleep, like any other normal person, it is really unfortunate that you don't have 5 minutes."
"Oh yeah? Why do you say that?"
"Because it's 8:25 AM."
"…HAH?!" The high school boy sprung up from his bed, his blanket exploding off him. He flipped up the now-dead alarm clock that was lying on its face. The color in the boy's face drained out instantly.
"…,…I'M LAAAAAAAAA~TE!"
The high school boy immediately jumped off his bed and dove for the nearest bathroom he could find in his apartment. Within the first 10 seconds, he was already shampooing his hair while furiously brushing his teeth.
"WHY THE HECK DIDN'T YOU WAKE ME?!"
"…I have the right to remain silent about that."
"LIKE HECK YOU DO!"
While the high school boy continued to clean and wash up, he was arguing with someone from a distance. The voice belonged to that of a young woman, as if she was born and bred among the ranks of nobility or the aristocratic.
However, between his bedroom and the bathroom, there was no one there other than the boy. Unless this person was either invisible or out of view – the former, of course, being more far-fetched.
"Darn it! Darn it! DARN IT ALL!"
Normally, an average student would have taken about 15 or so minutes to prepare. This high school boy ran back into his room, fully cleaned and somewhat tidied, in less than 20 seconds.
He wore a simple white dress shirt and black tie, his school's coat-of-arms insignia stitched over his heart with its gold and red theme. While he stumbled into and about his room, he fixed the buckle of his tan-colored dress pants and hastily began to pull on some socks.
Once again, the unknown voice began to berate him.
"Ugh, you truly are an obscene man – dressing up in front of a pure maiden like that."
"SHUT UP!" The boy ignored the voice in his room and literally leapt over to a desk in his room.
Calling it a mess was an understatement. It was completely swamped with all sorts of stuff one would find from school. Textbooks from various subjects, piles of crumbled paper, scraps of homework pages, supplementary practice booklets, pens and pencils, a clump of eraser dust – the list can keep going on forever.
The high school boy ignored it all. There was just no time to worry about that now. So this was what he did: he picked up a history textbook from the pile, clamped its spine to his teeth, then stuffed everything else into his tiny school bag with one sweep of his arm.
Without another second wasted, he dashed straight for the door.
"Ahem…"
The high school boy twitched at the voice, screeching to an abrupt and smoking halt. A nasty snarl crossed his lips.
"Aren't you forgetting something?" the lady-like voice continued in a cool and expecting tone.
"Tch. And I thought if I was fast enough, I could've had the excuse that I completely forgot about you, so I can leave you behind…"
"…Vagabond."
The high school boy swiped up one more thing that was sitting on the corner of his desk and – rudely – stuffed it into his pocket.
"Bite me."
And he was off.
[******]
"Darn it all! There's no way I'll have time to study like this!"
"You're going to be late for your first class, and all you can think about is having no time to study?"
Through the streets of a certain commercial district in the middle of Tokyo, Japan, a certain high school boy was making a mad dash for it. If one were none the wiser, they would have thought he committed a crime and was now on the run from the law. Obviously, that was not the case.
Although he was sprinting at the speed of an amateur Olympic sprinter, he held open the history textbook and was more focused on that than the road ahead of him.
"You just don't get it! I've got a history exam in the second period! And thanks to that little debacle yesterday – not only did that thing wasted my entire day, I was so tired in the end I practically fell asleep halfway reading the material. Gah, this is all your fault!"
"Hmph. I only do what I must. Besides, it is also your responsibility as well as mine."
"THE HECK?! YOU'RE THE ONE WHO'S FORCING ME INTO THIS!"
The lady-like voice continued to follow the high school boy, keeping up closely despite his inhuman speed to reach to school 'on time'. However, other than the stragglers of pedestrians that went this way and that…there was no one in particular following him – not that one could obviously see.
Still, the voice kept sticking to him to the very—
"Stop."
"Huh?"
The high school boy instinctively skidded to a halt, in time for a large truck to whiz right by him. He stopped his studying for history and glimpsed over his book. The boy was greeted to the sight of a busy cross-walk, with all sorts of cars zipping past him, the walk-light flashing a large red hand.
At the same time, other pedestrians who wished to cross the road began to gather about – bunching up like marbles trying to sneak towards a plugged hole.
The lady-like voice broke the silence, "…Would it really kill you to say 'thank you?'."
"…Buzz off, I'm reading."
"?"
Apart from the duo's conversation, standing right behind the high school boy was a young girl with short hair. She wore a different kind of uniform to the boy, meaning she belonged to another school somewhere else in the Tokyo district. The girl was talking to a good friend on a cellphone, but having heard the high school boy's words, she thought he was referring to her (as there was no one else he was talking to in particular).
What a rude person, she thought, and continued on with her talk with her friend.
The high school boy was not at all aware of this cellphone girl.
"Guuuh. If only this was about the Sengoku Period, I know I can ace this test!"
"Seriously. You can't really rely on information you find in those history-inspired video games you play. They are not entirely accurate you know."
"Ssssh! Quit crushing my hopes!"
"?..." The cellphone girl heard the high school boy 'talking' to her again. His voice was getting louder, if not rougher. She could not help a sneer, and tried to ignore his existence and dove deeper into her friend's gossip for the day.
The lady-like voice went on, shrugging off the high school boy with a cool tone.
"In all honesty, you should be clear as to what your true priorities are. Instead of worrying about your meaningless grades, you should focus more on your responsibilities to the world. If you cannot find a resolution soon, your ignorance will only be this planet's very undoing…Such a pity."
The high school boy, blew his top off indiscriminately.
"SHUT UP – YOU WITCH!"
A certain cellphone was clapped shut in a single hand, its fingers squeezing its side like no tomorrow.
The walk-light switched from stopping-hand red to walking-man green.
*POW~!*
"OW!" The next thing the high school boy knew, an unknown force struck him in the back and he fell face first into the asphalt. The history textbook of his cluttered over his head like a cartoonish hat. "…THE – HECK?!"
The boy snapped his eyes behind him, locking stares with another pair that was just as dark.
The cellphone girl elegantly dropped down her right foot, slapping the dust off her ankles. With a 'hmph', she spun on her heels and walk off to another crosswalk. 'There was no way this prime young woman would walk the same road as that creep', was what she thought with a brush of her short hair.
"Seriously! What's your problem, for crying out loud?!" the high school boy snarled.
"Haaa, I can only imagine…" sighed the lady-like voice.
The high school boy glared burning daggers at the cellphone girl's fading image. He picked himself up, slapped the dust off his clothes, swiped up his history textbook (opening the page he was last reading) and—
"KYAA!"
—Stopped in the middle of his tracks.
A sudden surge of awareness filled the high school boy's eyes. Slowly, ever so slowly, he turned to the source of the sound. Even though he was standing the middle of a crosswalk that was instantly filled with swarming people, he could see through the open cracks of what was going on.
A girl was kicking all over the place and tried to scream as best as she could. However, several tall men bounded her up with their thick arms and muffled her cries with a single hand. With one tug, she was sucked into a nearby alleyway.
That girl had short hair, wore a school uniform different than the high school boy's, and clenched tightly onto a flip-open cellphone.
After a long pause, a rather sour look crossed the high school boy's face.
"…Well? Aren't you going to save her?" asked the voice. Whoever the voice belonged to, she seemed to have clearly seen the situation as well. Now, she was only waiting for a proper response.
"…"
Without an answer, the high school boy…kept walking along the crosswalk.
"…You vagabond."
"It's not my problem! I've got my own mess to deal with right now! I'm no super hero, you know!"
"Who says?"
"ME!" The high school boy tried to pick up his pace to leave the scene as quick as he can. He did his best to ignore what he saw by frantically memorizing all the dates and events conducted by the Japanese Emperors of the time. "The best I can do now is call the police for her at the nearest payphone – and that's it! I can't and don't want to get involved with something I have no handle over! Besides…what can I really do to help that girl on my own?…"
A scowl crossed the boy's lips, more to himself than anyone else regardless of what was happening around him.
"…If I can't take care of myself…how the heck do you expect me to take care of others?"
"…Then I will decide for you."
"Huh?—HEY!"
The high school boy staggered to a halt, before he was able to reach the end of the crosswalk. Something in his pocket was shaking violently and he tried to stop it by pressing it down. Also, he felt something searing like fire through his pant-legging as he began to frown even deeper.
The lady-like voice made one last warning.
"If you do not go and help that poor maiden…I shall help you change right here…"
"…You wouldn't…"
The next thing anyone knew, a brilliant green light blazed from the high school boy's pocket.
"A lady never tells a lie."
"…"
Then…the high school boy's face was ripped with a massive grimace.
[******]
Cellphone girl was slammed into a dark and wet wall. She tried to run away, but a kick stomped down next to her to block her off. Reluctantly, she turned to face four tall men who surrounded her.
Thugs of a small street gang.
"Morning girly. Mind handing us your pocket money so we can grab some breakfast? We're starving you know."
The group's leader was a thin looking man with shaggy blonde-dyed hair and wore a dirty toque on top of his head. A tooth or two of his were missing and he leaned in close to the cellphone girl as if he was leaning out a small window.
Cellphone girl held back the urge to throw up. Years of smoking and drinking alcohol contaminated the leader's breath.
"Well? Where's the dough?"
"…" Cellphone girl was shaking all over and she struggled a response.
She did not have any money.
"…Hah?" The leader tilted his head – too far off an angle to be considered normal.
Cellphone girl gave the following explanation: due to a little incident with her friends at a karaoke club, her parents grounded her with certain restrictions – and no allowance for two weeks was one of them.
Something cold touched her cheek and she instinctively felt for it with her small fingers.
A knife.
And it was pressed against her soft cheeks.
It took one full minute for that to register into cellphone girl's head…and her entire body went white as a ghost, if not stiff as a statue.
The leader, was not happy, "So, no money?"
Tears rolled out of cellphone girl's eyes.
"Hey, don't sweat it girly. If I give you a nice harmless mark on your face, I'm sure your mommy will reconsider in cutting off your allowance the next time she grounds you. Okay?"
Heartlessly, the leader wound back his knife-clasped hand for an unfortunate slash.
Cellphone girl could do nothing. She could only close her teary eyes…and pray.
"OI!"
Cellphone girl woke up – thinking it was all just a dream she had went through, until she saw a familiar knife hovering an inch over her forehead. The leader had stopped in mid-slash, and along with his three lackeys was looking off into space in a unified fashion.
Eventually, she gathered the courage to look where they were staring at…and saw a familiar high school boy racing straight towards them with a—
"UWOOOOOOOOOOOO~OOOOOOOOOOO~OOOOOOOOOOH~!"
*WHAAAAAAM~!*
"Hm? Mm…—GAAAAAAH!"
A fist collided straight into the leader's face – cracks undeniably spreading all over his skull. In the beginning, the blow never really occurred to be that important for the leader. Now…it was worse than being ploughed over by a semi-truck.
In a zip-lining flash, the leader's limp body shot through the air and crumbled into a garbage heap that was piled at the very end of the alley – over 10 meters in distance.
One by one, the other three thugs turned to look at where their boss went to – completely dumbfounded. Cellphone girl was the same, but she was quicker to turn back to stare at the owner of a hanging fist.
"*Pant*…*Pant*…*Pant*…You freaking douchebag…"
The high school boy kept his fist up, breathing like a novice runner after a 26 mile run – with no breaks in between.
But he did not stop there—
"ERAAAAAAAAAAA~AAAAAAAAAAAH!"
"Heh?" One of the thugs closest to the high school boy turned, received a devastating left hook into his big belly. The effect equaled to that of thick rubber being shot by a cannon ball – point blank range.
The first of the three thugs collapsed instantly without a sound.
Just as the two remaining thugs also turned about—
"SCREW – YOU!"
—A blinding heel-turn kick slashed across their faces. If the attack came any fast, the very skin on their heads could have melted right off on the spot. The two of them both slammed into the wall with swift bounce and then keeled over onto the side like a pair of dead dominoes.
The fight started and ended within 5 seconds.
Cellphone girl could only stare at what just happened. It was like something out of a Jackie C*** movie or so, she thought. It was just…unreal.
The high school boy straightened, swiping the sweat off his forehead with the back of his arm.
Cellphone girl gazed at him now, a strong feeling swelling up within her body. It felt…warm, comforting even. Was this…the feeling of being saved by a hero?
A flustering aura radiated from cellphone girl. Her feet and legs began to fidget. She bit her lips nervously while she twiddled a bit of her hair with her fingers. It somehow felt like she was in the middle of a fairy tale: a princess from a far away kingdom being kidnapped by nasty bandits and her knight/prince in shining armor comes riding to her rescue. It was a sweet and wonderful feeling.
Cellphone girl bravely turned to her savior, took in a deep breath, and—
"Deh! 8:28?! GAAAAH, I'M LAAAAAAAAAAAA~TE!"
"…" Cellphone girl said nothing – or rather, she was never given a chance to say anything.
Before she could even say 'Thank you', her savior ran off at Mach speed – dust trailing in his shrinking wake.
Surrounded by the unconscious bodies of the bandits/thugs, the princess/Cellphone girl was left all alone…a cold breeze drifting past her.
[******]
"DARN IT ALL – DARN IT ALL – DARN IT A~~~~~~~LL!"
A typhoon raced through the streets, kicking a deadly storm in its trail without mercy. The high school boy threw all possible logic out the window and ran as fast as reality could allow it.
At the same time, he stuffed his hand into his pocket and yanked something out to bring it to his glaring face.
A pink cellphone.
"Happy now – huh?! Tch, thanks to you, not only am I definitely going to be late for first period, but I'll never get the time to prepare for that history exam!"
The lady-like voice, belonging to the pink cellphone, replied while blinking a small light across its LED-screen to every word.
"Tardiness and poor grades are but trifles when it comes to protecting the pure heart of a maiden. You should instead feel proud for making such a noble sacrifice in the name of love and justice."
The high school boy just scowled at the level-headed pink cellphone.
"…Celestia…you really are a witch, you know that?"
"You're very welcome, lowly vagabond."