I hope you like this, as this is just the prologue. Nothing is what it seems! So it won't turn sappy and predictable, and OCs (I used a whole chapter of my Ouran Sue-guide to parodise the ones who show up here) will be played down, except for one.
On a side note, I decided to use the names Western-style, with the surname coming as second, to make it easier.
It was ten minutes to 3 PM, and Tamaki was crouching in the corner, for Haruhi had just refused his request to dress as the empress for that day's Ancient Rome cosplay (given that Tamaki, the King, was the emperor, of course).
"You're getting your toga dirty" Kyoya kept on scribbling in his notebook "and please, stop picking at the laurel wreath on your head."
Haruhi, after a while, came out of a dressing room wearing a cream-coloured toga. She didn't even bother asking Kyoya how much was just added to her debt.
"I'm without an empress…" muttered Emperor Tamaki.
"No" Kyoya checked the reservation list in his notebook, which he refused to change to a stylish roll of paper "today we're expecting a customer of yours whom you have to treat as an empress."
"Who?" asked Hunny, dressed in a cute white Roman servant's vest, as he held on to Mori's warrior helmet.
"On your schedule, there is Princess Kamimae, and also…"
Tamaki immediately stood up and adjusted the laurels.
"I will be more than happy to welcome her…"
Haruhi brushed her hair nervously in front of the mirror. She had seen that customer a few times before, and she never failed to make her feel not only a commoner, but even as some lowly homeless beggar, even though she didn't mean to. Having been a student at Ouran and a member of the Host Club for quite a while now, Haruhi got accustomed to rich and snobbish people, but that girl of class 2/B was the only one who showed it so openly and innocently that it still made her shiver. Of course, however, she was Kyoya's favourite as one of the best paying guests, who wasn't in class A only because her lineage wasn't so excellent.
She was awoken for her pondering by Kyoya's voice, reading up her reservation list. One of them was a friend of Princess Kamimae, and of course had to be welcomed warmly, for upsetting one of the richest girls at school wasn't a good strategy. Also, the fact that it would inevitably lead to upsetting Kyoya was an even worse scenario.
"You two, try to get ready in time" Kyoya turned at the twins, who were busy trying to adjust the clips on their respectivily light blue and dark yellow togas.
Just another normal day at the Ouran Host Club, thought Haruhi.
Soon the clock struck three. Exactly as the last stroke died down, the door of the Third Music Room opened to the first customers.
"EEEE! Emperor Tamaki!"
"Mori-senpai is a hero!"
"Hunny-senpai is so cute!"
"My my, which senator is Hikaru-kun?"
"Haruhi, you're like a real Roman from history!" a girl with short brown hair, her first customer that day, squealed.
Haruhi just smiled.
"Care for some tea? It's really from Rome…"
The girl didn't care it wasn't ancient Rome; she drank the tea happily, losing herself in Haruhi's eyes.
But those eyes caught a glance of the dreaded Princess Kamimae entering the door.
She walked in as if on the red carpet, and before the hosts could greet her, her sharp voice came down like thunder.
"Itsuko! How dare you come in before me!"
Haruhi went pale as a sheet.
"She's just joking" her customer, aforementioned "Itsuko", simply turned to her friend "hi, Aki!"
Aki Kamimae shook her messy blonde locks and held her hand out.
"My Princess Kamimae…" Tamaki went down on one knee "I would give my whole treasury to have you as my Empress…"
"That will do" Aki sat down on the couch "how about some tea to warm me up first?"
Haruhi turned to her customers, by then more than one, again. Aki somehow scared her, but she tried not to show it.
"Oh, Emperor Tamaki, how about the lowly girls in your Empire who would do anything to get a glimpse of you when you exit your Palace?"
"I will reward them with a smile…" Tamaki gently took a strand of his second customer's curly red hair in his hand "but will let them know that you, beautiful Riyoka, own a special place among them…"
Aki allowed this only because Riyoka was one of her small group of friends. As Riyoka nearly fainted and her eyes filled with tears, Tamaki's attention was all hers once again anyhow.
"Which one is Senator Hikaru?"
"Oh, blue toga! Oh, I'm surely wrong!"
The twins' customers were surely enjoying themselves.
"Yellow toga?" asked one with black hair tied back in a tight bun "oh, but no, I'm surely wrong too!"
"You should know if you're right, Orimi!" a careless voice shouted.
"Aki!" she blushed.
She's taking over the whole Host Club, thought Haruhi, as she stood up to bring some more tea to her growing group of customers.
The Host Club had been open for about two hours, and Aki still didn't seem ready to leave, when the door opened slightly.
"A new customer!" Tamaki smiled and stood up "welcome to the Host Club Empire, my beautiful princess!"
"Aki!" the black-haired girl looked past Tamaki without too much care "you're late!"
"Oh my, can't you wait a little longer?"
"But we were supposed to meet!"
"Well, let's enjoy the Host Club together! About time you became a customer, Kaname!"
Tamaki was visibly hurt.
"Oh, Emperor Tamaki" Riyoka clung to his arm "please forgive her…"
The girl Aki called Kaname walked to the couch a little reluctantly, a shojo manga titled Romantic Egoist sticking out of her bag.
"Which one do you choose?" asked Tamaki "princess…"
"Kaname Kinishi" hinted Aki, before Kyoya could check in his notebook.
"Princess Kinishi?" Tamaki looked at her in the most seductive way.
"I… I…" Kaname blushed "I don't want to…"
"Cake, Kana-chan?" Hunny bounced to her happily with a plate of cheesecake.
"Maybe… I'll have some…" she threw a quick look at the door, as if planning escape.
But it was too late, for Hunny dragged her to another couch, next to a table full of sweets.
Poor girl, thought Haruhi.
Aki smiled in satisfaction, holding out her empty cup to Tamaki.
"Tea" she commanded "and stand ready to welcome her in the days to come."
Why isn't she yet a regular customer of Kyoya's?
To Haruhi, Aki seemed more and more Kyoya stuffed into a girly Tamaki's body. Cold and calculating, she was the one who dragged all four of her best friends and classmates to the Host Club for the first time.
"Haruhi-kun?" Itsuko looked at her "if only I could know what you are thinking about when you look in the distance like that!"
"Um…" she put on a natural smile "oh, only about you… if you really feel comfortable when thrown into such a foreign world as this, Ancient Rome."
The natural response made all the girls around her squeal. Kyoya scribbled in his notebook.
After closure, as the members were all gathering their belongings and the Roman accessories, Kyoya seemed more than satisfied.
"Thirteen of them bought our Medieval Times album, based on one of the recent cosplays, and Princess Kamimae reserved five copies of the Host Club Empire, if it is ever to come out. Paying in advance, of course."
The twins looked a little annoyed, as Kyoya was always thinking about money. This was probably the only reason why he allowed Aki Kamimae to slow down the flow of customers sometimes.
"As for tomorrow, Lord, you will welcome Miss Aki Kamimae and Riyoka Ijiri again, while Itsuko Watabe and Orimi Tono, strangely not Milord's customer, are expected too."
Haruhi and the twins didn't mind, the two girls, despite belonging to her group, weren't by far as authoritary as Aki.
"Oh, and we have a new customer… hopefully a regular" added Kyoya "Kaname Kinishi, Class 2/B. Lineage: good, daughter of a semi-noble family. Wealth: adequate. Connections: superior, especially with the Kamimae company. She asked for a reservation with Mori-senpai."
Haruhi still didn't understand why even seemingly normal girls got entangled in the Host Club's net shortly after they entered.
"You'll enjoy it!" in her golden limousine, Aki patted her best friend's shoulder.
"Just a try… but really, I only wish to find true love… and I don't think they really…"
"Relax already!"
Kaname smiled weakly, still clutching her copy of Romantic Egoist.
In romance novels and shojo mangas, everything used to be so simple and beautiful!
Reviews and constructive criticism is always welcome. No flames, please, you gotta have a reason to dislike this apart from 'IT STINKS!", right?
