Disclaimer: I do not own PoT. Duh.

So, I'm trying this new fic out. This is a drastically different writing style from Swimming with the Big Fish, and I would love some feedback of what you guys think! This is developed from my one-shot I posted earlier; if you're curious, feel free to go take a look. It's mostly from Shiraishi's perspective.

This is the story about a girl who doesn't know what love really is and a boy who isn't really sure what normal girls are really like. This girl is drowning in her own past. Can he pull her out of the water before he too sinks below the waves?

Oh, and roe2, thanks for helping with my other fic. I saw that you were a Shitenhouji fan, so I hope you like this ;)

Shitenhouji was a school in the middle of Osaka. Known for their comedic background that supported their impressive academic and athletic record, the school churned out hundreds of people yearly who dominated in many industries. Shitenhouji prepped for the future well-rounded, and although it did not have the same amount of money as the famed Hyotei Gakuen school or the demanding rigor of Rikkai Daigaku Fuzoku, the laughter and smiles that adorned the halls was deemed a healthy alternative by the principal, who thought those pressure cooker schools were unnecessary for youth.

Therefore, Mikazuki Hisoka found herself slated down to attend the school that was the opposite of her forced personality. She could not remember the last time that she had truly laughed. Perhaps it had been when her brother snorted chocolate milk out of his nose during his tenth birthday. Nevertheless, she would have attended the first day of her third year at Shitenhouji, if the said brother had not been sick.

"Nope," he coughed weakly, sweating as he clutched at the blankets on top of his body while he twirled his favorite knife expertly in his hand. "Not going to school."

Hisoka rolled her eyes, deciding that if her brother was not going to attend the first day, she would not either. And by that, she missed the first day, second, and finally decided on the third that she was completely fed up with her brother's immune system and that she was going to visit the school, brother or no brother. Not caring for the scolding that would await her if she left home base without her sibling-come-bodyguard, she slipped out of the house and took the short bus ride to school.

Her quiet nature had grown even more hushed as she explained to the principal in the least amount of words necessary that her brother was sick and she was to take care of him. The principal smiled in that jovial nature of his and offered to show her around school grounds. She silently agreed and trailed next to him that early April morning, passing by several students who were hurrying into the school before classes began. She was just passing by the gate as she heard a THUMP, the unmistakable sound of a body hitting wood.

She turned just in time to see a silvery-brown haired teenager with a bandaged arm flop to the ground, backpack still grasped in his hand. Hisoka quickly looked away, not sure if he hit his head against the arch on purpose, and not wanting to embarrass the person if it was not. She passed right in front of him, looking straight ahead, as the principal turned back.

"Ah, Shiraishi! Just the person I was looking for!" he exclaims as he pulls the teenager in front of Hisoka. "He's the captain of the boy's tennis team," the principal clarifies.

Hisoka's throat constricts, contorts, and spits out a word willingly. Something about him forced her to speak unnecessarily; she could have easily given her usual nod, but instead she speaks of her own accord, "Pleasure."

Shiraishi's eyes wander over the face partially covered by the ebony hair and nods.

"Shiraishi, do show our new student, Mikasaki Hisoka around," the cheerful principal calls, walking away.

Shiraishi's mouth quirks upward and Hisoka can tell it is fake. If she did not know better, she would have thought that he was internally laughing at her, her appearance, and her quiet nature. But she did know better, and could tell he was just displeased with her in general.

So she says nothing, even though her mouth is itching to talk for the first time in a while. She listens obediently, like she always does, as he explains the traditions of the school gate, the importance of laughter, and the club activities. He specifically adds about the placement of the tennis team at nationals. It is not until the end of the personal tour when he points her towards the main office does she break her normal silence.

"Thank you," Hisoka bows, surprised by the sound of her own voice. She had voluntarily used it for the first time in months, maybe even years. She tucks the straight ebony locks behind her ear before fleeing to the main office, brownish eyes with a green tint sharp enough to cut steel.

Mikasaki Hisoka prided herself as being levelheaded and absolutely average, even if she really wasn't with her background and her silence. It was her job to blend in, to be normal, or at least to act like it. Her brother talked enough for the two of them and she was completely happy with that. He was the outgoing one, the one who stood out, and the one who was full of bubbly laughter. And that was always okay with her. Always.

But then, why did she want to open her mouth?

Oshitari Kenya's head turned as the door slid open, revealing Shiraishi, which was unusual in itself because it was the middle of the first class and Shiraishi was never late. Even Yamada-sensei turns in middle of scribbling equations, incredulous in seeing one of the best students in the school daring to be late.

He bows, and hands Yamada-sensei a note, "I am sorry. I was helping the principal with something and the note is proof from the principal himself."

Yamada-sensei smiles in understanding and gestures for him to take a seat. He does quietly, not wasting energy in plopping his body down similar to everyone else.

"And here I was," Kenya teases with a murmur, "thinking you were with a girl."

"Well I was," Shiraishi whispers back.

Kenya promptly drops the pen he was twirling between his fingers, shocked, "You were?"

"The principal asked me to show this new girl around," Shiraishi adds hastily.

Kenya's face morphs from unbelieving glee to rolling eyes, "Why do I bother getting excited every time you mention a girl? Was she cute, at least?"

"She was breathing, and walking, and had no visible abnormalities," Shiraishi answers with a wry smile. "So for you, that is a yes."

Kenya snorts and Yamada-sensei glares at him. "May I help you, Oshitari-san?"

"No, sorry," Kenya responds, pretending to be studying the text in front of him.

"It could do you well to learn from Shiraishi-san," she reminds him, thoroughly annoyed.

"Yes sensei," Oshitari answers, eyes closed and hands clenched into fists under his desk.

And with that, she turns back around and explains the basics of logarithmic functions, selectively deaf to Shiraishi laughing softly at Kenya and Kenya's frustration.

A few minutes after Hisoka arrives at her disguised house, she was informed that her father is calling her and her brother for a meeting. Meeting really meant scolding, a highly formal and public chastising.

Mikazuki Hisoka fumbled with the belt around her waist, wrinkling the delicate silk of the kimono. She curses to herself as she secures it tighter than she ever had before, not used to the lack of stomach that had been there previously. The white, flowing material turns to a light pink at her feet while the fabric rustles with every step. She slides her feet into the traditional footwear, the geta sandals, before walking out of her room to join the person who she considered her brother.

Another teenager is waiting for her, leaning against the doorframe, hand mussing the slightly spiky blonde hair with a blue streak behind the ear, barely noticeable unless one looks very closely. The previous sounds of his wheezes and coughs had disappeared over the course of the last few days and his swollen, red nose was the only hint that anything had been wrong with him. He straightens up at the sight of the girl clad in a kimono, "I have been waiting for you."

Mikazuki says nothing and blinks in acknowledgement.

"Come on," he grimaces, tugging at the leather jacket that conceals a sheathed knife and his favored gun, a holstered Berretta M9. "The sooner we get this done, the better."

She blinks again.

He turns and walks along the lengthy hallway, hands barely swinging and striding silently, feet not making a sound as Mikazuki steps after him, the geta sandals gently tapping against the marbled floor of the underground passage. With every gentle click from her feet, she can remember the berating from every moment she had embarrassed her father.

She had been too big in comparison to her classmates?

She was criticized in front of her father's men.

She had been found in a closet during the school day, bruised and dirty? And the witnesses who had seen her bullied claimed they had seen nothing?

She was disparaged, her father spitting on her, saying he never wanted someone so weak.

She had dyed a red streak through her hair?

That was one of the worst punishments of all. She had been forced to go through the paperwork for her father's work, noting the terrible things that she had become immune to.

People had once said her father was a man of great dignity and honor, trapped in a position that required him to be ruthless. Hisoka had memories of her father from when she was young; the smiling, clean-shaven man who played with her and took in an orphaned boy was a stark contrast to the constant scowl that now adorned his face along with a scar stretching from the bottom of his right eye and extending to the ear. The hope and trust she had for her father was long gone, save for those fleeting moments of optimism.

And now? She would probably be yelled at publicly for disobeying the fundamental rule.

Don't go anywhere, anywhere, without Ren.

Ren had turned from a small orphaned boy with puffy eyes and dirt streaks on his face to a strong and muscular teenager, Hisoka's bodyguard, Hisoka's brother. He had been trained in hand-to-hand combat along with several other forms of fighting, told that his sole purpose was to protect Hisoka at all costs.

So Ren did, most of the time. He shielded her from all physical threats, save for the previous bullying because the girls at Hisoka's previous school were cunning enough to distract and lure him away. It was the mental threats that penetrated right through Ren and hit Hisoka in the head. All the deaths, the gruesome dealings, the crime, Hisoka quietly analyzed the information and stored it away in her head, becoming more stony by the day. Ren selectively ignored these things, knowing the effects they would have on him psychologically, and therefore became slowly immune.

In a sense, they were the perfect pair. Ren had the ability to protect the two and Hisoka was beyond value in her ability to analyze and synthesize. Separated, they were opposites, water and fire. Ren was perceived to be the flames that only Hisoka could douse with her typically stoic and yet fluid nature. Ren knew that was completely wrong though. Hisoka was the inferno between the two of them; burning mind and silent roar could only be complimented by Ren's calming temperament. In a sense, the difference between the two was apparent as the difference between black and white. Black was known to be deadly, evil, mysterious, and was a barrier to light. But rather, Ren was the white; his mind still seemed pure with everything he had seen. His color shined brightly from him, the color of protection and encouragement. Without each other, they were useless. Without protection, Hisoka could be killed at any time. Without analyzing, Ren probably would have not survived to the age of fourteen, almost fifteen.

Ren and Hisoka pause before the large wooden door lighted dismally in the underground passage. Hisoka winces at the lack of light as two heavily armed men push open the wooden door and the pair stride through. The walk forward to the raised chair in the middle of the heavily seated room, covered with elegant furniture, probably bought by money that wasn't rightfully owned by the Mikazuki family.

The several men and the few women who were seated turned to see Ren and Hisoka stride past on the rug that led up to the raised chair. A few smiled, ready to see the girl berated and the boy praised. The monthly routine never failed to cheer them up from the otherwise depressing line of work.

The two bow in front of the raised chair, and their father lifts a single eyebrow, acknowledging their existence before beating it down, "Why did you leave without Ren?" he asks softly, slumped back in the seat, a hand on his chin. Hisoka bit her lip, knowing that a quiet father meant an angry father.

Well, in her case, everything meant an angry father.

"She went to go visit the new school," Ren answers for Hisoka. "I was too sick to."

"And I suppose she thought she could get away, unharmed, if someone decided to kidnap her?"

"I-well-she probably did use public transportation."

Hisoka found herself mentally retracing her journey to the school and back. She indeed did use public transportation and was in the sight of at least twenty normal-looking people at one time.

"It was the one rule that she was never to disobey. What? Does she think that now that she has lost twenty kilograms, she can simply run from attackers who would be bigger and faster than her?" the volume slowly increased as Hisoka and Ren's father ranted.

Titters of laughter broke out at the tirade intended to embarrass Hisoka. Instead of her normal blush and attempts to make herself look smaller, she raised her head and looked her father straight in the eye. She had never truly disobeyed her father; she usually followed the rules, making sure that the fundamental and most important rule was never broken. And yet, she felt so empowered when she did.

"Yes, I did," her voice flows throughout the room.

Ren's neck practically snaps to look at his sister's face, as if he could not believe that she actually spoke by choice. And he really could not believe it. Even their father raises his eyebrows in surprise as gasps echo in the room. No one had heard her speak in years, especially in front of her father. The plush seats and decorated walls had seen so much blood, death, but they had not seen Mikazuki Hisoka speak.

Oddly enough, the head Mikazuki tips his head back and laughs. Everyone else is silent for a full two minutes as he expresses his amusement, wiping tears of mirth. Finally, he wheezes, "Goodness. And I thought you had turned mute. I didn't know that you were silently growing a backbone."

Hisoka's eyes narrow, suspicious of her father's response that did not include yelling, threats, and reminders of her responsibility.

"Very well," he turns his head slightly to address Ren. "You can train her if you want. That's what you wanted, right?"

Ren's jaw drops at the granted request and Hisoka reaches out with her hand, shutting it, realizing that in that amount of time, someone could have hurled a hemlock pill down his throat. She blinks, annoyed and thinking that maybe she should not have spoken. Yes, she was no longer being berated, but did she really want to be trained in fighting? It meant more freedom, but it could also mean a life of more danger.

And Hisoka really did not like danger.

Ironically.

Hisoka stripped her kimono off and replaced it with the usual running clothes before departing from her above ground room and searching for her brother. She found him munching on something that looked suspiciously like her favorite biscuits. Eyes narrowed, she purposely lets him hear her footsteps.

He drops the bag and stops mid-chew.

"I'll buy new ones. I promise!" Ren begs.

Hisoka makes a sound from the back of her throat that makes Ren know that he better get on his running shoes fast.

And so he drops the package of biscuits and sprints to go pull on his shoes. He returns to find Hisoka, empty-handed.

"You hid it," Ren moans. "Didn't you?"

Hisoka frowns. Did he really expect her not to?

She slides her cutting-edge phone from her pocket, and presses a few toggles. Within seconds, upbeat running music is playing as the two exit from the normal-looking house that disguised the trapdoor leading to the underground crime-ridden place that had become part of their lives. The two jog off side-by-side, breathing in sync in the evening air.

"You know," Ren interrupts the music playing. "You could join the track team at the new school."

Hisoka shakes her head. She is supposed to act normal, to be normal. She was not particularly fast, but being athletic was not average.

"Screw being average," Ren's declaration interrupts her thoughts. "Be yourself for once."

Yeah, her silent, ostracized self.

"I am thinking of doing football again," he announces.

Of course he would do football. He was the best one on the team in their previous school while people laughed at Hisoka for being the chubby girl who tried art and failed miserably. Only he could chase the black and white round ball all day, dribbling and shooting into goals with ease just as only Hisoka could paint an apple on a blank canvas and make it look like the Japanese flag. In her defense, the Japanese flag was only a blank canvas with a large red dot in the middle anyways, not that she ever voiced her opinion aloud.

Her father had given up on her fitting in and being normal at her old school, and moved her to a school that was relatively closer and better academically. Why they didn't originally attend there before, Hisoka had no idea. When Ren asked, he had received some bullshit answer of "It will make Hisoka stronger."

As if being stuffed in a dumpster did anything.

No, Hisoka muses, she couldn't possibly do track.

Ren fingers the sheathed combat knife in his pocket. There was no way he would let his sister suffer the same way she had at her previous school.

Shiraishi Kuranosuke found himself pulled out of his house that evening by Oshitari Kenya who was muttering something about how stupid Zaizen was.

"He wanted to blog about something. Does that sound like an excuse to you?"

Shiraishi supposed anything sounded like a viable excuse to not run with Kenya. Shiraishi knew he was fast, and even he couldn't keep up with the Speed Star of Naniwa during runs. It was hopeless.

And yet Shiraishi found himself being dragged along with Kenya as the sun set, noting that Kenya was going slower than usual.

"What happened to normal speed?"

"I need to work on my footwork and how I place my feet while running," Kenya's nose twitches with distaste. "I usually just run on the balls of my feet but I need more balance."

Shiraishi says nothing, silently agreeing because Kenya had nearly sprained his ankle by falling over three weeks ago. Speed was nothing without balance.

Kenya would agree to disagree. With his motto, 'No speed, no life!' he could take on the world. So what if he had a mishap three weeks ago, making the nurse wrap his ankle? Speed was everything. Oshitari Kenya liked to think he had a relatively simple life; school, tennis, and speed were the only things that truly mattered to him anyways. The toughest decision he had to make was choosing tennis over track, and that was because he wanted the challenge. Something about the ability to be good at two sports appealed greatly to him. Life was black and white for him, and that is the way he liked it.

Kenya jogged alongside with Shiraishi, occasionally brushing strands of bleached hair from his eyes in his typical easygoing manner. It was not until Shiraishi suddenly halts in his tracks that Kenya looks up, startled, and promptly stumbles.

"That's the new girl," Shiraishi whispers as a light breeze blows hair in front of both their eyes.

"Where?" Kenya swipes the light-brown strands to the side.

Shiraishi extends his arm, pointing at the pair running together on the opposite side of the park. Kenya squints at the pair, making out a female and male. The female has her hair swept up, and yet her bangs still covered an eye while the male jogs along, slightly spiky blonde hair moving with each stride as words form on his lips, talking to the girl.

"Heh, she is cute," Kenya points out, continuing their run.

Shiraishi rolls his eyes. "And taken," referencing to the male running beside her to the beat of their fast-paced music.

"You didn't deny that she was cute though," Kenya grins.

Shiraishi grumbles to himself and saying something along the lines of "Hibiscus shampoo."

Kenya rolls his eyes at the botanophile. Even Kenjiro talked more to girls, and barely anyone even knew he existed. In fact, Chitose didn't even know Kenjiro was vice-captain until yesterday. Never mind the fact that the vice-captain had ranted to himself in a corner for an hour, but honestly Shiraishi could use a break.

"You could have at least said hello," Kenya protests as they jog past the park. Shiraishi says nothing and keeps running.

"You know those two boys were looking at you, right?" Ren pants as the rap part of the song comes on.

Hisoka knew and she recognized one as they had jogged past, the unmistakable silvery-brown hair dancing with every step. Hisoka's throat ached for her to say something but she didn't, not wanting to croak to a person who would probably not recognize her. Why this person made her want to speak again, she had no idea. It made no sense.

She pushed the thoughts of Shiraishi Kuranosuke out of her mind as Ren pulled out his sheathed knife.

"They scared me at first, you know. I thought I might have to get my hands dirty." he remarks before sliding the knife back into his jacket pocket.

Hisoka rolls her eyes. Why did everyone she know have to be so violence-happy?

Oh wait, their father ran an underground organization of hired assassins. That's why.

I really hope you guys liked the first chapter! Please tell me your thought, criticisms, anything!

I can promise that all of the Shitenhouji players will be shown in the story. I really love the Shitenhouji players; they are like a breathe of fresh air to the serious schools

I will be working on this fic along with Swimming with the Big Fish, so expect both! They are drastically different in both writing style and characters and I can't help but like both of them. So please stay tuned!

Also, I would like to give a special thank you to roastme and The Mysterious Mr. Anonymous and .37 along with a few others for supporting this fic.

Thank you! Please follow, favorite, and review!