Chapter 1
My name is Ririn Kamachi. I am 15 years old and I have a perfect record. I haven't missed a single day of school in 9 years, haven't missed a single assignment, ever, and I never ever get in trouble. At least that's how it's been before I met her. It's because of her that I'm in detention with these people.
"So, Ririn, did you think about what I said?" asked the reason I'm here; Haruhi Inoue.
"Yes, and I think you're an absolute nutcase. And you're not my friend, so call me Kamachi-san."
She frowned. "Search your feelings, Rin-chan, you know it to be true."
"Miss Inoue, does 'this is detention, so don't speak' mean anything to you?" That's Kanei-sensei. He has a really dull, monotone voice, kind of like Ben Stein from America.
"Sorry, dude-sensei." She said before turning around and actually being silent for once. She's weird I thought to myself. I started thinking back to lunchtime Wednesday, when it happened.
(Begin flashback)
It was the second day of high school. Math class had just ended and the bell rang for lunch. It was a nice spring day and I couldn't wait to eat lunch on the roof. I found this nice little spot to eat at by the edge protected by a large fence on my left with a vent on the right. This is a place where nobody could see me.
I was about to dig into my Teriyaki Chow Mein when I heard a faint scream. I looked over to see a little girl being chased by a… pile of leaves shaped like a man. I was about to get up to move when I saw a girl with red hair run out, yelling something, and the leaf-man suddenly caught fire.
Just then, another girl came out and hugged the small victim who disappeared in a puff of pink smoke. After inspecting the pile of leaves, they pulled out what looked like a slip of paper and returned to wherever they were, and I continued eating. I kept thinking to myself that I was hallucinating because I haven't eaten since the day before yesterday.
I got up to go to my next class as soon as the bell rang. I turned the corner and ran into someone. After falling flat on my butt, I looked up to see this huge gorilla of a guy.
"Watch it, Chic." I apologized as I started gathering my things. I finally stood up just in time for him to knock the books out of my hands.
"What was that for?" I asked.
"I don't know. I'm just really bored. How about a little skin, girlie?" He said as he pushed me against the wall. He had both of my wrists in the tight grip of one of his huge hands. With his free hand, he untucked my shirt and started feeling upward. I kneed him between the legs and he let go, yelling.
I turned around to leave when I tripped. I didn't think there was anything to trip on. I turned around to see another guy, not as burley as the other one, but almost as tall.
"Nobody defies Kisame." He said as he reached for me. I closed my eyes out of fear.
A few seconds had passed, but I didn't feel anybody touch me, but I did hear a zapping sound. I opened my eyes to see some kind of transparent blue shield in front of me.
"What the hell?" He said, cradling his bleeding hand.
What the hell? I thought to myself. The bigger guy, Kisame, got up and charged at me. Just then, all sound left my ears and everything looked like it was in slow motion. Quietly, I heard a faint whisper 'First Strike, Snap Dragon'.
Suddenly, the marble in my ball and claw necklace started glowing and floating. Purple swirls started flowing all around me and what looked like a purple dragonhead formed and lunged at them, knocking both guys down, rendering them unconscious.
My necklace fell to its normal condition. The swirls and the shield disappeared and I felt really dizzy. I got up after feeling like I could stand, gathered my things, and ran to my next class. I really didn't feel like reporting this, because nobody would believe me.
All during the class, I couldn't pay attention. Luckily, it was art where nobody pays attention anyway. I kept thinking about what happened. Where did all that come from? What does First Strike, Snap Dragon mean? Isn't a Snapdragon a kind of flower? Wait, flower...
I remembered what happened before I started eating, with those girls and the leaf guy and the little disappearing girl. Maybe I should talk to them. But, what would I say? I decided against approaching them because I didn't think that actually happened. Plus, I didn't get a good look at them.
I was in mid-thought when this girl with bright red hair and reddish-brown eyes came right up in my face. "Hi, I'm Haruhi Inoue. Want to be friends?"
I raised an eyebrow. "Der… who're you?"
"Haruhi Inoue. I think we'll get along famously, since we share a common bond!" I gave her a strange look. Then, she went serious and the smile left her face. "Listen, we saw what happened on the roof. That was amazing, and I really think you should join us."
I scooted my desk away from her. "Join who? Wait a sec…." I suddenly remembered that one of the girls had hair just like hers. "Are you the girl who set that leaf thing on fire to save that little girl?" I asked.
She raised an eyebrow. "You saw that?" I nodded. "Yeah, Ayame and I saved her. Oh, and she's not a girl. She's a –"
"You know what, I don't care. I'm sure this is just a weird dream and I'll wake up in just a sec." I interrupted, closing my eyes tight, hoping that would wake me up.
Suddenly, I felt a pinch on my arm. "Ouch, what was that for?" She smiled again. "You felt that, therefore, you're awake."
"Miss Inoue and Miss Kamachi. Detention, Friday morning. Be on time or it doubles."
"Why both of us?" I asked.
"You disrupted class and Miss Inoue inflicted physical harm on someone."
Inoue stood up. "But, why morning detention?" She wasn't even going to deny it?
The teacher narrowed her eyes. "Because lunch and after school detentions are filled up." I gave Inoue a dirty look.
She smiled at me. "See you there!"
(End Flashback)
I still don't know why I'm here. All I did was verbally react to her abuse. Nonetheless, I'm stuck in Friday morning detention with six other students besides Inoue and myself. I looked at the clock and saw that there was only 5 minutes left.
"Well class," Sensei said, "since you all showed up on time, and you were good, I'll let you go to class early." At that, I packed my bag and left the room. I made it out the door when I felt an arm wrap around my shoulder. I didn't need to look over to know who it was.
"Well, this is her, Ayame. Promising, huh?"
"I suppose." I turned toward the other voice to see another girl, about my height with shoulder length pink hair and black-rimmed glasses reading a manga.
"That's Ayame Tsukinowa, the other one. She's great."
"Umm, I don't know who you think I am or what you want with me, but I'm not interested." I said, trying to get her to let me go.
Inoue laughed. "That's cute. You think you have a choice."
I stopped walking. "Umm, free will. If I don't want to, I don't have to."
"Actually," Tsukinowa responded, "You do not, in fact, have a choice. We didn't, so what makes you think you can?" I got out of Inoue's grip and ran off to class.
All throughout the day, whenever I had a class with Inoue, she would pester me. There were two instances where we almost got another detention. Luckily, the teachers got sidetracked and forgot all about us.
Finally, the last class of the day, and the only other class, besides advanced geometry and Home Economics, that I don't have with that red haired pest: Gym.
I went to my locker in the changing room and got on my uniform which consists of red shorts with a white tee-shirt with 2 red stripes going down one side and the school's logo on the front. I tied my hair back and headed upstairs.
I entered the gymnasium behind a bunch of girls who kept looking back at me, giggling. Walking over to my line-up spot, I began stretching. We had just started crunches when I heard some girl trying to get my attention.
"Psst. Hey, you! Girl with the purple hair!"
Ignoring her, I finished the crunches.
"Okay class, now, everyone do 5 laps around the gym and head outside." Sensei instructed.
I got up and started running not long before the person who was trying to get my attention caught up to me. She had her jet-black hair in braided pigtails.
"You're a first year, right?"
I nodded.
"Do you have any friends yet?"
I shook my head.
"But you seem to be pretty friendly with Haruhi Inoue."
"She's not my friend." I said between breaths.
"My names Yuki Hoshikumo. What's yours?"
"Ririn Kamachi."
She giggled. "That's a cute name. Oh, and, my friends and I were wondering why your hair is so long."
I thought that was a strange question to ask. "I just never got around to getting it cut."
"I see." She responded.
I saw out of the corner of my eye that she had fallen back to run alongside her friends. Why would someone come up to me just to ask that?
After running, some people got a drink of water and everyone else went straight outside. I stepped out the door and was suddenly pulled to the side. I noticed it was the guys from the roof incident, and they were pretty banged up.
"I don't know what happened or how you did it, but I'm going to make sure you never cross me again."
Just then, I felt a third person pull me back and hold my hand. "There you are, babe. What are you doing talking to them?"
I saw him wink at me. That's when I had another flashback, this time to Biology this morning where he and I first met.
(Begin Flashback)
I had gone into my first class of the day and sat down in the second row in the third column furthest from the door. People were filing in and, to my horror, I saw none other than…
"Wow, what a coincidence!" The obnoxious pain in my side exclaimed. "Well, it looks like this seat is empty." Inoue sat down before I could utter one word of protest. She turned around in her seat and started bugging the girl behind her, Ayame.
Great I thought to myself. First class of the day and it's with both of them. Oh, the joy…
The bell rang and everyone sat down quietly, even though Sensei hadn't gotten here yet. Then, this guy in front of me with messy-ish brown hair turned around to talk to me.
"Hey, could I borrow a pencil? I left mine at home." I pulled out my pencil tin and got him my green mechanical pencil. I didn't even get a word of thanks. Unfortunately, Haruhi noticed this.
"Hey, she just gave you one of her pencils. The least you could do is thank her, Kaien." At that, I heard a bunch of girls gasp.
"Nobody talks to Master Kenji like that!"
"Who does she think she is?"
"Does she even know who she's talking to?"
Those were just a few phrases I could make out that were uttered by, presumably, his fangirls.
"I know," He began. "I was just waiting for the right time. Anyway, thank you for the pencil. I'll return it at the end of class." He said to me with this cute boyish smile that made my heart skip a beat or two.
"Oh, well, since you left your stuff at home, why don't you keep it? I mean, I have a bunch at home." He nodded and turned around.
"I think he likes you." Inoue whispered.
"Shut up." I replied.
"Ooh, do you like him?" I felt myself blush; I shook my head.
"But, if you do end up liking him, get in line. He has, like, seven fan clubs, two are at neighboring schools and one is by the school's gay boys. He was nominated prom king last year, and he was in 8th grade." I that sounded kind of far-fetched.
He turned around. "You know, I may not have won, but if I did, I'd turn it down."
"Why?" Inoue asked.
"Because, the prom queens were nowhere near as good looking as you." I felt my face turn beet red.
(End Flashback)
"So, what are you doing talking to these hooligans?" He repeated.
"Oh, no reason." We started walking away from them when they tried to stop us.
"Hey, we were talking to her."
"Is that what you call it nowadays?" He responded, looking over his shoulder with a sinister grin.
The big guy grabbed him and was about to punch him when we heard a whistle blow.
"You two, go back to your classes! Kamachi, Amane, get on the field." Sensei ordered. We split up, but I didn't notice that guy, Amane and I were holding hands.
"So, do they have a beef with you or something?" He asked as I released my hand from his grip.
"Umm, thanks for that, but, umm... I need to go." I said catching up with the rest of the class.
"Alright class, today we're playing soccer. Remember those pieces of paper I gave you? Open them. On them is a color and that'll tell you what team you're on." We all looked at our slips of paper. I got red. "However, one of you has orange and one of you has purple. That means you're a goalie. Orange is goalie for red and purple for blue." After thinking about it, it made sense.
Everyone flocked for the buckets after sensei gave the signal. There was a guy handing out the blue shirts, and a pink haired girl handing out the reds. I hadn't realized until now that Tsukinowa was in my gym class. I handed her my slip of paper and she handed me the shirt, but she didn't let go.
"Come see me after class." She said. I gave a nervous nod, and she let go of the shirt; I ran off to join the red team.
"Hey, looks like we'll be playing together!" I turned around and saw him. "So, what's your name? I think I should at least know the name of the one I saved."
"My names Ririn Kamachi and you didn't 'save' anyone. I could've handled that myself."
He nodded. "Ririn, huh? That's a cute name. My name is Kaien Amane. I saw you talking to Yuki Hoshikumo earlier. She's my cousin and I hope you two can be friends. So, how about I take you out sometime?"
I felt my face blush a little bit.
"Is that a yes?"
I shook my head "N-no, it's not. I'm sorry, but, I won't be going out with anyone for a long time."
He took my hand. "Then, how about I walk you home then? I'll make it worth your time."
"No. I don't want to go anywhere with you." I said, releasing my hand from his. "I never should've accepted your help. Now you think I owe you something."
He laughed. "No, you don't owe me anything. I did it out of the kindness of my heart. But it would be great if you'd be nice and let me take you out." He gave me this sad puppy-dog look.
I could suddenly feel someone burning a hole in the back of my head. I glanced over and saw Hoshikumo's group of girls glaring at me.
They must be fan girls I thought to myself. I turned to him again. "No, but, I bet those girls over there would be happy to-"
He put his finger over my lips. "No. The only girl for me… is you." He interrupted me, taking my hand again and kissing it. I pulled my hand away and ran off to the field with my heart pounding.
When the game was finally over, I was exhausted and my shins and knees hurt. Rather, my whole body hurt. My team lost, and they decided to pass the blame unto me. I decided to ignore their ridicule because their opinions of me don't matter.
I returned the red shirt to the bucket and went to the locker room. All while I was changing, I heard those girls whining.
"She's such a klutz, tripping over her own feet." One voice said.
"Yeah, she's the reason we lost the game. She made Master Kaien look bad." A second voice said.
"But did you see how she was flirting with him? I mean, gross. She needs to back off my cousin. He deserves someone much better, like, Saya Matsumoto." Said Hoshikumo.
"Oh, Yuki, you're making me blush."
"But, it's true." She continued.
"I want my cousin to be happy and with someone I approve of."
"Does this mean you approve of Saya?" There was a silence for a couple seconds.
"Of course!" Hoshikumo and Matsumoto said at once.
"This means," Hoshikumo continued, "We need to get rid of that eye sore, Kamachi."
I had finished getting dressed by now, so I locked my locker and left, passing them. They were quiet when I walked by, but once I was out the door, I heard them continue.
I turned to continue walking when I came close to running right into Tsukinowa. "Just ignore them. All they do is gossip because they're so insecure about themselves." She was standing against the wall reading her manga.
I looked at the cover of the novel and saw that she was reading the third book of the series 'FAKE'. "Come on. Let's go get Haruhi; we'll walk you home." She suggested, turning to walk down the hall.
"You don't have to walk me; I can take care of myself."
"We're walking you home. You have no idea how vicious those fan girls can be. Come on." She told me, not breaking her focus from her book.
I realized I was still standing by the door, so I ran off to catch up to her.
It had only been a few minutes, but it felt like an eternity to get to the destination. When we finally made it to the locker, Inoue had just shut the door.
"Hey! It's nice to know you two get along." I glanced over to Tsukinowa.
"Yeah, I suppose…" I muttered.
"Well, shall we go?" Inoue asked, putting us under each arm. "So, did you tell her yet?" She asked Tsukinowa. I looked over to see Tsukinowa sigh.
"No."
"Well, tell her!"
Tsukinowa removed her glasses and looked at me. "Haruhi is mentally retarded." She said as serious as a doctor telling a family that their child has cancer.
"No, not that, I meant about your powers." She turned her head to me. "I'm not, by the way." She whispered.
I nodded as I got myself out from under her arm. I knew something must be wrong with her, but I highly doubt that was it.
"We'll discuss that later, you know, someplace private." Tsukinowa suggested. "That isn't the kind of thing you just go around talking about with total disregard as to who might be listening."
We continued walking, released from the redhead's embrace.
"Well, this is my house." I pointed out. "I'd invite you in, but if my father found out I had people over, he'd shit a brick."
"Literally?" Inoue asked.
"Yeah, Inoue, he'd literally crap a brick out his ass." I turned to Tsukinowa. "Is she for real?" She nodded. "I see, well, I'll see you tomorrow, I guess." I said as I turned to enter my house.
"Hey, Kamachi," The pink one said. I turned to look at her, "When will your father be home?"
"He won't be back for another month. He's in America on a business trip."
"What about your mom? Where is she?" Inoue asked.
"Uh, well, let's just say I won't be seeing her for a long time."
"What do you mean? Is she on a business trip, too? Who does she work for?"
"Haruhi!" Tsukinowa interrupted. "Shut up. It's none of our business." She turned her attention onto me. "I'm telling you this now: we'll be back." I gave a confused look. "We're going home, but we're coming back later to discuss what happened."
"But, my father-"
"We'll cover for you. This is really important and it can't wait."
"'Kay." I said as they turned to leave.
"Oh, and, call us by our first names. We are friends, after all." I nodded before going into my home.