Just a little lost sheep Naomi thought to herself, with pity, as she watched another girl, a bit younger than her, walk towards the bento stand. It was obvious that the girl did not know the rules, maybe she didn't even know about the fight!

Naomi was a wolf from the east with a nom de guerre, and her nom de guerre was The Protector. She got it from the people she protected, the people who accidentally got involved and would have ended up seriously injured if she hadn't gotten them out of the fight. So as she watched the girl take another step onto the battlefield she made her move. In a few quick steps she had caught up to the girl and was now walking beside her.

"Excuse me, I haven't seen you here before. Are you from out of town?" Naomi asked friendly.

"Yeah, I just moved here last week. I'm about to enter a school here nearby, Karasuda High School, and I just wanted to check out the stores in the neighborhood before I started." she said as she returned Naomi's friendly smile.

Without the girl noticing, Naomi had lead her away from the bento stand as they talked. But the time was almost up. The God of Discount had already come out and she could hear the sweet sound of discount stickers being put on the bento boxes. Her stomach growled and her eyes scanned the store, looking for the famous Ice Witch. Where is she? What does she look like? And where's The Pervert I've heard so much about? Well, at least there are no boars. She silently left the new girls side and disappeared behind the next rack. She could hear the footsteps of The God of Discount as he walked away from the bento stand. The tension in the air had grown rapidly ever since The God of Discount started walking away. Naomi now stood on the edge of the battlefield, next to the noodle shelf.

"Hey, there you are!"

Shit! The new girl had found her.

"I didn't get your name."

The God of Discount raised his hands to open up the doors to the break room.

"Just stay away from the bento stand!" Naomi said quickly as the doors closed behind The God of Discount.

One silent second passed and then Naomi was off, running with all her might, towards the delicious looking "Pork Meat Bento with Rice and French Dressing". Her enemies came running in as well. Fists came flying and as she dodged, a blow from the right, she turned, bending her right leg and kicked hard into the flesh of a dog, a mere dog. Two more steps and a wolf came running in from the left, fist first. Naomi stopped and bent backwards to dodge but the wolf was already one step ahead of her and his right knee came rushing upwards towards her back, she could hear it. She pushed her left elbow down, into the rushing leg, keeping it from hitting her back, slid her right leg backwards to gain balance, grabbed his outstretched arm with her right hand and pulled him to the right as she punched him in the stomach, pushing him up and throwing him to the right onto tree other wolves. This only took about three seconds.

Just four more steps to go.

Something caught her eye.

Three steps.

She saw the back of the new girl, fighting a wolf, just a little to the left of Naomi.

Two.

The girl gave the wolf a kick in the groin and he collapsed.

One.

She turned and jumped towards Naomi's bento, Naomi's "Pork Meat Bento with Rice and French Dressing". No way!

Zero.

Naomi grabbed the bento with her right hand, but so did the girl. They faced each other; Naomi, a wolf, The Protector, holding on to the bento with her right hand, and the mysterious, new girl, holding on with her left hand. The girl's right fist came flying, but Naomi just grabbed it with her left hand, holding it still as she lifted her right knee and kicked her in the stomach, janking the bento back. The girl lost her grip on the bento and would have hit the floor if Naomi hadn't pulled her up, on the last second, with her left hand, still holding on to the new girl's right arm. When the girl was steady on her feet again, Naomi let go and walked away, holding her bento, which apparently had the honoured seal on it. She smiled, as she stepped over someone who lay unconscious on the floor, and thought about the delicious dinner she was gonna have. But before she left the battlefield she turned around and thanked, in her mind, the people she fought for the fight.

- - - - X - - - -

"Ding", said the microwave as he finished heating up Naomi's bento. Naomi opened it up and took the bento out of it.

"Thank you!" she called out to the owner of the little gas station she usually used to heat up her bento. Even though she had to walk a long way to get there this time it was worth it. It had this little microwave that customers could use and when she did she always bought a soda to drink with her meal, it was really cheap there!

When she came out of the gas station she turned right, towards a little park. There she sat down on a bench and waited. After a while she heard footsteps behind her. Those footsteps had followed her from the store in the west where she got her bento, all the way here to the east, and she suspected that they belonged to the new girl.

"You want to sit with me?" Naomi asked.

"Huh" said the girl in surprise "me?"

Naomi turned around and laughed.

"Who else?"

The girl looked around and saw that they were alone in the whole park.

"Um, yeah, I guess."

She walked to the bench and sat down with Naomi. She held a bento in her hand.

"How did you know I was there?" she asked.

"I heard you. I heard you the whole time." Naomi replied as she opened up her bento.

"Really!"

"Yeah. Thanks for the meal (itadakimasu)." she said and took up her chopsticks. "Lets talk after we eat, ok?"

"Ok." the girl said and took up her chopsticks. Naomi stopped for a moment, with the pork meat, on her chopsticks, halfway in the air, and watched the girl pick up a meatball.

"Wait!" Naomi said. "Are you not gonna say your thanks? Are you not gonna thank the people who made this? The people who worked hard to prepare it? The people you fought to get this?"

The girl blushed in shame. "Oh yeah, sorry, I forgot. Thanks for the meal (itadakimasu)."

Together they ate in silence.

- - - - X - - - -

"So, let me get this straight." Naomi said. "Your name is Manami (愛 (mana) "love, affection"+ 美 (mi) "beautiful") as in love and beautiful, not love and ocean."

"Yeah, exactly. And yours is honest and beautiful, right?" (Naomi (直 (nao) "honest, straight"+ 美 (mi) "beautiful")

"Aha."

"So basically, you're the honest beauty and I'm the lovely beauty!"

"Yeah, I guess."

They looked at each other and laughed. They were walking away from the park. Naomi's home was about two streets away and Manami was gonna walk with her, her house was in the same direction anyway, just a little further away (more like A WHOLE LOT further away, but that didn't really matter at the moment).

"But, if you're not from the west, then what were you doing in a store all the way here?" Manami asked.

Naomi hesitated.

"Well . . . I was checking the stores, like you, cus, well, I'm changing schools and I'm going to Karasuda High School, like you."Naomi said. Honest my ass. She was lying. Or, maybe not lying, but she was definitely not telling the whole truth. She was not just there to check the stores. What she really came here for, was to see the Ice Witch. And yes, she was changing schools but she didn't tell why, she was never gonna say why. What happened in Marutomi University Preparatory High School belonged to the past, and she wasn't going to let the past repeat itself.

Manami stopped and looked Naomi, gravely, in the eyes for a long time. Then she said quietly: "What are you hiding? What is it that's bothering you so much you can't tell me?" Her voice was like silk. It was so full of wisdom and even though it was still and quiet, she could hear a hint of curiosity, caring curiosity. But she looked like she was in a daze.

Naomi was shocked. She blushed, but she couldn't look away from those eyes. It was as Manami was looking into her soul. Her eyes were just so beautiful when you really looked. The iris was green, like a field of grass in the summer sun, but in the middle, her eyes looked like a sunflower, the dark pupil in the middle and little sprouts that looked like sunflower petals around it.

Then Manami woke up from the trance she had been in, blushed, and looked away, embarrassed.

"S-s-sorry about that! I crossed the line, sorry, it's not gonna happen again, I promise." She started walking again.

"Wait! What was that?" Naomi didn't know whether to be angry or shocked. She just stood there.

Manami stopped but she didn't look back at Naomi. "Um, it's just a thing, that . . . happens sometimes, you know."

Naomi raised an eyebrow. "You know, I can hear you're lying!"

Manami clapped her hands suddenly together and turned around with her eyes wide open. "That's it! Just like you can hear, I can see. That's how I figured out how the fight worked. I just . . . saw how it worked."

Naomi grinned. Manami was definitely a wolf material. And Naomi was going to teach her how to be one. A wolf.