~Tokutei no Tenjō-kai no Chikyū-gai~
Chapter 1: Transcendent Dream Followed by Morning Noises. New Day, New Life.
"There…"
A girl of unknown origin raised her slender pearl-white hand, guiding the index finger up towards the heavens. An unworldly moon, too colossal, too brilliant for it to be of this world, loomed over the atmosphere. The bottom of this pale silver circlet was just barely hovering over the skyline; the farthest horizon was softly colored with a brush of a late night golden sunset. Countless celestial bodies placed in their rightful seats gleamed like polished jewels behind the transparent silky curtain of an aurora of infinite colors. To this sky, that transcends even above dreams, was what this mysterious girl was pointing to.
"I want to go there…"
This girl of mystery was endowed upon with indescribable beauty. Her complexion was that of a marble statue, full and complete without the slightest imperfection. But there was something more: her deep-blue eyes held an immeasurable depth, possibly the depth of the unfathomable universe itself. This infiniteness held within this girl's gaze would make one believe that she was far more knowledgeable than all the scholars, all the philosophers, and all the prophets, of the adolescent human existence combined, regardless of the many millennia of human civilization that it has struggled to stack up and balance. There was also her long mane of silver, tinted with the lightest sky blue. It flowed like wisps of smoke as the nighttime breeze gentle played along the vast meadow.
This girl, who was standing next to a boy as he lay down on a slope observing this dreamful scenery, turned to him. Her oceanic eyes shimmered and from them a drop of diamond trailed down and fell. And the boy knew, he understood the girl's desire deep within his heart.
"I want to go back…"
April 1st, 2XXX, 8:35 AM
"zzpiibiibii zzpiibiibii zzpiibiibii"
The painful wailing of the electronic alarm clock shattered the silence that reigned during the night as the morning star had overthrown the moon. The curtains were drawn over the sliding glass door to the veranda, but the sunlight was still able to pierce through the thin fabric and through the other tiny gaps between and around the curtains.
A boy lay in his bed with an agonized expression, not that he was being tortured by the alarm clock but rather by the rays of photons bombarding the eyelids shielding his eyes. There were many other noises that could wake anyone else from their peaceful slumber such as slamming doors, the yelping of neighbors, honking buses, and the constant whirring and blinking of the cleaning robots outside the apartment room. Despite the conundrum, the boy could not hear any of it; all sound was mute to him at the moment.
The apartment room that the boy takes residence in was small; from the entrance door, which leads away from the balcony that leads to other apartment room doors, the kitchen, separated from the living room by a wall with a windowless hole, was located at the right of the short entranceway. Passing by the kitchen and located in a hallway to the right were the bedroom and bathroom, on the left and right side of the hallway respectively. The living room, which is the largest of the rooms, consisted of bookshelves against the left wall, a television set at the farthest left corner, the veranda at the back, a low square table in the middle of the room, and the bed in which the boy was sleeping against the right wall and farthest right corner.
As for the bedroom located on the left of the hallway…
"Oh no, it's already this late!" cried a feminine voice.
The door to the bedroom swung open and a girl of the age of twelve ran out and into the bathroom. The girl had light brown neck-length hair, one side of her bangs clipped to the left of her forehead. Her brown eyes matched her hair; however, her sloppily worn uniform did not match her polished facial features.
The door to the bathroom slammed shut behind her and the sound of roaring water rushing out of the faucet was audible through the door. It still did not stir the sleeping boy.
From the bathroom, the fretting of the twelve year old could still be heard, "Oh no, ohnonononono! Why does this always happen on the first day of school! And I just became a middle schooler too, at THE Tokiwadai Middle School to top it all off!"
A crash of some sort resonated from the bathroom as the girl yelped and the sound of fire blowing could be heard. The smell of smoke started to singe the atmosphere.
The girl groaned in frustration, "Gah! I don't have time for this!"
The roaring of water stopped and the bathroom door swung open as the girl ran out into the living room. It looked like steam was rising from her head.
"Hibi-nii! I'll be leaving fir-… Hibi-nii?" the girl slowed to a stop in front of the bed in which her brother, who was three years older than her, continued to sleep, oblivious to the recently caused ruckus.
The twelve year old, who was fretting over her first year of middle school, looked dazedly at her brother who was sloppily rolling around his bed. His light grey hair was just as messy as the bed covers and the shirt that half-covered his torso. She was in such a hurry that her body was shaking as she constantly wondered about the bus schedule and her resolution for a perfect attendance. The girl knew that no amount of noise, no matter how raucous, would be able to stir her brother at the moment. She thought of lighting a candle and dripping hot wax over her brother's cheek to write out 'Idiot Brother', but the girl set aside the joke; she also wanted to avoid anything so uncouth and unrefined, especially on the first day.
She finally sighed, and came up to the side of the bed. She crouched down and looked at her brother's face with unimpressed eyes while puffing out her cheeks. The girl then pinched his cheek, lifted his head up, and screamed into his ear until flames literally spewed out from her tongue. "WAKE UP YOU IDIOT BROTHER!" She let go of her brother's red-hot cheek with a snap. The boy finally started to stir.
"Jeez, now it's going to take a few more minutes until he really gets up…" pouted the sister.
She looked at the alarm clock stationed up on the wide headboard holding other decorative items.
"Crap! I wasted too much time!"
The fiery girl dashed towards the front door. Just as she was about the close the door after hastily putting her shoes on, the sister yelled at her brother again, "You don't have to worry about breakfast today, but I still expect an expensive dinner at a family diner tonight!"
The door slammed shut and the rapid muted footsteps died away with the distance.
"zzpiibiibii zzpiibiibii zzpiibiibii"
The alarm clock that went to snooze during all the confusion wailed again. The curtains covering the entrance to the veranda automatically slid away to both sides, letting in a flood of golden light. Hit by this torrent of photons, the boy finally flinched and squeezed his already-shut eyes tighter. He slowly but surely sat up and looked around the room with tired, blurred grey eyes. He blinked several times until his eyes grew accustomed to the light and the room came into focus, though still slightly blurry. Sound, gradually increasing in volume, was now slowly seeping into his ears.
"Ugh… my cheek."
The boy rubbed his cheek that felt strangely hot as if a pocket heater was pressed against it. He then smelled a slight scent of smoke.
"Seeing that she's not here, Hota must have been in a hurry… I wonder why…"
The brother yawned loudly and stretched with a sense of carefree leisure. He got out of bed and made his way to the bathroom.
"Geh…"
The bathroom was a mess. The floor was wet and strewn with bottles, tubes, cups, toothbrushes, and bars of soap. The boy turned on the fan as he noticed the smell of smoke stung the air; the source of the smoke came from a shower curtain that was slightly burned.
The fifteen year old lightly scratched the back of his head in exasperation, "God, that girl… she really needs to calm down even when she's in a hurry. I know it's the first day of school, but still…"
The idiot of a brother realized something. He carefully reiterated the keywords, "F-first… day… of… s-s-scho-…?"
The boy felt as if his body would freeze over and that his hair would fall off his head as icicles.
"zzpiibiibii zzpiibiibii zzpiibiibii"
He hurriedly ran back into the living room and grabbed the alarm clock, squinting at the time. The boy, not being able to see the time clearly, snatched a pair of thin aluminum alloy glasses. The time was clear and in front of his face: 8:46 AM—homeroom starts in 19 minutes.
His face paled over and started to break into a cold sweat. He really wished that his sister could warm him up a bit.
"D-dammit, I knew something was off when I was going to bed last night! I should've thought twice and check the curtain's time settings! No, wait, I should've been more careful about putting up [Noise Canceller]. Gah, I shouldn't be thinking about stuff like that right now! Where the hell is my uniform! When's the next bus! Will I even be able to make it to the bus stop! WILL THE FRIGGIN' BUS EVEN BE ABLE TO GET TO THE SCHOOL ON TIME!"
8:47 AM—homeroom starts in 18 minutes.
"# %$!"
A bomb was dropped and the volume, so loud, shattered the glass door leading to the veranda.
"Shit…" grumbled the brother who complained about his fretful sister.
8:48 AM—homeroom starts in 17 minutes.
The bus was out of the option. In the haste that consumed his mentality, the boy had forgotten his wallet. He did have his ID and credit card, but the bus had already driven off a minute before the boy arrived at the bus stop. Now, he was off racing his heart out right after waking up from bed.
8:55 AM—homeroom starts in 10 minutes.
The boy was dodging pedestrians, lampposts, and patrol and cleaning robots alike. He thought of using the shortcut that he frequently used in past years to get to the school campus in times such as his current situation, but there was a problem. The roads were busy but had no serious traffic so the vehicles were able to pass through with ease and speed. It would be impossible to cut across the street and through the park. Either way he wanted to avoid jaywalking or the drum-barrle-like patrol robots would be chasing him. He would just have to run until he got to the end of the long block.
"Dammit, this is really not cool. I really wish that things wouldn't get any worse than this," the boy panted under his breath.
The boy started to calculate the distance and time it takes to get to the school campus from his apartment.
"If it takes the bus to get to the school in ten minutes with a speed of 72 kilometers per hour, I could probably get there by sprinting nonstop in twenty minutes."
His mental thought process stopped as he overlooked the scale of the virtual feat he planned out.
"What the hell! As if I can run ten meters per second nonstop! I can't even run a whole lap in under a minute!"
The boy started clawing at his head. It was the end, it's all over; there's no escaping the fate of confronting the monster of a gatekeeper and the militarily trained faculty.
He then heard something out of the ordinary: voices talking in English.
"Hey hey hey now, ya gotta be faster than that ta catch me!" laughed an energetic voice.
"God, just hold it right there you brat!" yelled back another yet brutal sounding voice.
"Both of you are just too immature. You two ought to try and contain all that energy of yours…" spoke a calmer and mature voice.
In the midst of his despair, the boy turned around only to be slammed into and carried off by someone running at an impossible speed. The energetic voice belonged to a Caucasian boy. His dark brown hair was swept back by the turbulence created from his running speed and his hazel eyes held an overwhelming amount of energy. The grin splayed on his face looked as if it would rip his cheeks all the way to the back of his head.
"W-w-w-w-w-wha-!" stuttered the boy startled by the energetic one's sudden appearance. His glasses lay crooked over his nose. If he had to guess from the blur of passing windows, vehicles, and pedestrians, the white boy was running at somewhere between 80 to 90 kilometers per hour.
"Hmm?" the white boy looked down at the person he was carrying. He then smiled and spoke in surprisingly fluent yet strange Japanese. "Oh, g'mornin'! Sorry 'bout that, I didn't see you there! What did you say, 'What's happenin'?'? Well, right now I'm tryin' ta run away from that gorilla behind me who's gonna rip me ta shreds if I get caught by her!"
"H-hah?" the boy skeptically looked at the white boy but he looked over the white boy's shoulder and, shattering his disbelief, saw a roaring demon enveloped in a dark figure. Its arms and clawed hands were raised up high and its eyes were flashing red. Of course, the boy was in a state of hysteria.
"JUST WHO THE HELL DID YOU CALL A GORILLA!"
"OH MY GOD! THE CURE HAS BEEN MISHANDLED BY A CHIMPANZEE!" the boy screamed in horror.
"See now? That's what I'm runnin' away from." the white boy reaffirmed his situation.
"What did you even do!"
The white boy put on a flowery innocent smile, "I flipped up her skirt and slapped her ass~!"
"YOU CAN DIE AND GO TO HELL FOR DOING SOMETHING LIKE THAT!"
The demon-like figure gave out another roar. Next thing the boy knew, the gorilla girl, who jumped from the top of one of the drum-barrel shaped robots, was several meters above the white boy's head.
"NEIL, YOU FRIGGING PERVERT!" the gorilla girl screamed.
The girl was also Caucasian but with long curly blonde hair and blue eyes. Her hair was bound up behind the top of her head and flowed down to the crest of her shoulders in waves. She pounced on the speedster and the three of them rolled and tumbled on the concrete sidewalk.
"Mmfph!" the boy gave out a muffled yelp. The blonde that pounced on the white boy missed as he dodged. From there, her trajectory was aimed at the boy being carried by the white boy, so in the end she was able to take both of them down with her. But the thing was… the boy had his hands in front of him when the blonde landed on him.
"Urgh…" The boy could see stars circling around his head. He could barely think as if he got smashed during a drinking party. His vision was blurred which meant his glasses were missing.
"That's weird… I'm pretty sure my fall was cushioned by those two weirdos,"
The boy then looked up and saw pedestrians standing around with curious expressions; but what caught his eyes most was a row of white lines leading to a red light shaped like a hand.
"Ah! The crosswalk!" The boy exclaimed with a voice of hope. He then remembered about his blurry vision and started moving his hands over the ground, "Oh yeah, glasses… glasses… gla-"
The boy's hand, or more accurately his palm, came into contact with a sensation commonly described as blissful. His initial expression was that of curiosity but he quickly knew what it was he was touching. Considering the series of events that have passed in recent moments and the pedestrians murmuring around him, the boy was able to deduce what was currently happening. His expression grew into one of fear; he paled over and was in a cold sweat and trembled. He looked down at his hand. There, the boy saw his hand groping…
The white boy's ass.
Caught off guard from his faulty assumption, the boy had an expression of that of a statue's on Easter Island.
The white looked behind over his shoulder and his mouth fell agape. With all the energy in his eyes evaporated and replaced by horror, his white face paled over to a surreal extent.
"I-I'm not gay!"
The victim of a homosexual-assault turned over and kicked the boy across the head with insuperable speed and precision. Enveloped in darkness, the boy's consciousness drifted away.
The blonde, who was sitting up just behind the boy, was half-witnessing the "crime" taking place before her. She was half-witnessing the situation because she was still slightly dazed from the fall, so she was not fully aware of what was currently happening.
"Ow… Aw man, that hurt,"
While the blonde was rubbing the back of her head, the boy's face was incoming toward her. It was coming in at a perfect parabola, the trajectory aimed at the blonde's… that's right, at the boy's initial calculated assumption: her amply rounded chest. At least, the boy's head was safely cushioned from the concrete. Having noticed the boy who had unintentionally planted his face on her bosom, the blonde's face turned blue and twitched with an expression of fearful surprise.
"ANOTHER PERVERT!"
The blonde clenched her fist and rammed it into the boy's gut. He flew up and away from her but before he was too far, the blonde came up with another punch up across his face. The boy spiraled up to an impossible height like a ragdoll ballerina and fell back to the sidewalk like one. The boy's body twitched and if the site was silent enough, one would have heard a *ding* sound as his soul leaked up from his gaping and foaming mouth.
"O-oh crap…" the blonde recovered from her moment of fright and realized what she had done.
"Damn, I didn't mean for that to happen," the white boy crawled to the body and checked to see if any sign of life was left in it.
"Hey, is he okay?"
"Far from okay, but he is still alive though just barely hanging on. On the other hand, I can still sense some vivid thought process within him." a boy caught up to the site. It was the one with third and more mature voice. He was also Caucasian but with a slightly darker complexion. He had semi-curly black hair and behind his black rectangular framed glasses were dark brown eyes.
"Oh good, that's relief," sighed the blonde with a hand over her chest, "By the way, what is he thinking about? You said it was pretty clear so it must been something really urgent."
"That is…" the tan boy hesitated and then cleared his throat, "He's thinking about a certain movie… about primates taking over the world…"
9:02 AM—homeroom starts in 3 minutes.
"C-CALL THE POLICE, THE WORLD POLICE! WAIT, NATIONAL SECURITY! NO WAIT, THE FBI! GAH, THAT'S NOT ENOUGH! THE MIB!"
The boy swung up into a sitting position, waving his arms about with his eyes still closed.
"H-huh?" He soon realized that he was sitting on a bed and that the area around him was not near the crosswalk. Instead, there was a white curtain covering the front and left of the bed and to his right was a wall which the bed was set against. He silently sat there with an awkward feeling welling inside of him.
"Wait… what the hell?" The boy placed his hand over his face, "I swear just a second ago I was being chased by angry green-eyed monkeys and got caught… Oh wait, that was a dream. God, I need to cut down on the movies, even on breaks." He shivered as he recounted the nightmare in which he was carried off tied to a stick deep down into a forest by the primates. They were just about ready to dump him into a boiling pot before he woke up from fright.
"Speaking of dreams… what was that about this morning?" The boy pondered about the dream he had of a place of indescribable beauty. He also remembered that in the dream there was a mysterious girl saying something, but for the life of him he could not remember any of the words except,
"There… back there," the boy pointed his finger up without much thought, "But where? Why? Who was that girl anyways?" The mane of silver and blue eyes flashed into his head. "She was… beautiful, extraordinarily beautiful..."
The boy furiously scratched at his head with both of his hands. "Gaaaaah! What am I thinking? It's just a dream, why am I fawning over an imaginary girl. It's not like I have ever met or will ever meet someone like… wait…" The boy remembered a simple fact about dreams: everyone and everything within a dream has been encountered with before in the physical world, no matter how brief a glance one glossed over them. "So, that must mean I've met her before, but when? I don't think I would unknowingly walk by a person with such unique features without catching my attention…" With his eyebrows scrunched together and his arms crossed, the boy dwelled upon the fact.
While the boy was preoccupied over his personal inquiries, the curtain surrounding the bed slid open. A nurse of delicate looks garmented in a short white outfit with a small red cross on the cap stood there with a clipboard in hand.
"You seem to be doing well," the nurse smiled at the boy, "You've been struggling and groaning for quite some time, but it looks like you calmed down now."
The boy averted his eyes in embarrassment after he heard of his unconscious behavior. "Crap, I thought Hota was lying about me sleeping-talking but looks like it's true."
"Umm, Miss?" He started but was cut off by the nurse's change of expression, from smiling to an unimpressed look.
"There's no need to call me 'Miss' yet. I'm still in my early twenties, you know…"
"Oh, uh... sorry. Umm, Onee…-san?"
"Hmm, I wasn't really expecting that but I guess it works just fine~."
"Y-yeah. So, this is the school infirmary right?" he inquired to the nurse.
"Yes. On top of that, you've been here for about three hours."
"Hmmm," the boy sat and rubbed his chin, "I wonder who brought me here. No matter how much I think I can't remember what in the world happen to me to land myself in the infirmary…"
He then realized (yet again) something of importance. "W-wait, th-three… hours?"
The boy turned to the nurse and asked, "Miss, what time is it right now?"
"Hmmm," the nurse turned over her wrist and looked at her watch, "it's around twenty-five before 1:00 PM. You were sleeping here since around 10:30 AM."
"Sh-shoot! Half the day's already gone by!" The boy turned blue in shock, "Aw man, it's the first day of school, that means I already missed the opening ceremony… AND THE HOMEROOM INTRODUCTIONS!"
He hung his head over and brooded over his misery. "What am I going to do? Right off the bat, my first impression on my classmates is ruined. Why am I put under such an awkward spotlight! Am I some kind of misfortunate guy who repels any speck of luck that comes toward him!"
The nurse just stared at her watch as the boy continued his over-exaggerated tragedy scene. "It shouldn't be that bad. The teacher may yell at you for being this late, but as long as you sit down without much fuss you should be okay."
The nurse took her eyes off the watch and headed over to a desk. She took a piece of paper from a folder lying on the desk and read the information on it. On the piece of paper, the boy caught a glimpse of a profile of himself; the information on the paper was regarded of him.
"Hmm, let me see. Looks like you're class is in room 1-8. That's Morinozuka-sensei's homeroom and right now it should be…" The nurse stopped halfway through her sentence as her eye caught hold of the next word.
"Wh-what? Is there something wrong?" The boy lifted his head after noticing the nurse's silence.
"Aya ya~…"
"Stop smiling like some kind of sympathetic parent! Who are trying to be? My mother!"
The nurse put the papers down and went toward the boy's bedside. She then took hold of his arm and pulled him out of the bed. "You might want to hurry. Things might get bad to worse if this drags on any longer."
"L-like I said, what's wro-" The boy was cut off when the nurse leaned in closely with shadowy eyes that held a sense of seriousness.
"You probably heard about the rumored gorilla-sensei, right?"
The boy stiffened as an image of a muscle-bound brute of a counselor standing in front of the school gates formed in his head.
"Y-you… don't… mean…"
"Yes exactly," the nurse leaned in closer until her lips were barely about to brush the boy's sweat covered ear. Just barely whispering the words, the nurse named the terror, "Yamada-sensei."
"I GOTTA GO NOW!"
The boy zoomed out of the infirmary.
Her eyes trained on the door which the boy left through, the nurse still stood with her body bent forward. She had a devious smirk crease over her delicate face. The nurse fixed her posture and stretched with an attitude definable of a completely carefree person.
"Haah," she sighed, "That was really fun. Teasing the patients can be such a kick from time to time."
The nurse looked back to the door. "For some reason, I get the feeling I'll be seeing that guy more often. Oh well." She then giggled, "He sure can be funny when he's panicking, though he may be a little too noisy."
The nurse sighed and stretched again, turning away from the door. "Ah," She tilted her head to the side after having realized something. "I forgot to introduce myself…"
1:41 PM—homeroom started 4 hours and 36 minutes ago.
The amount of noise he was making as he sprinted through the hallway of a certain high school was of no concern to the boy at the moment. The only thing that ran through his head was:
"ROOM 1-8 ROOM 1-8 ROOM 1-8 ROOM 1-8 ROOM 1-8 ROOM 1-8 ROOM 1-8 ROOM 1-8 ROOM 1-8 ROOM 1-8 ROOM 1-8 ROOM 1-8 ROOM 1-8 ROOM 1-8 ROOM 1-8 ROOM 1-8 ROOM 1-8 ROOM 1-8 ROOM 1-8 ROOM 1-8 ROOM 1-8 ROOM 1-8 ROOM 1-8 ROOM 1-8 ROOM 1-8 ROOM 1-8 ROOM 1-8 ROOM 1-8 ROOM 1-8 ROOM 1-8 ROOM 1-8 ROOM 1-8 ROOM 1-8 ROOM 1-8 ROOM 1-8 ROOM 1-8 ROOM 1-8 ROOM 1-8 ROOM 1-8 ROOM 1-8 ROOM 1-8 ROOM 1-8 ROOM 1-8 ROOM 1-8 ROOM 1-8 ROOM 1-8 ROOM 1-8 ROOM 1-8 ROOM 1-8 ROOM 1-8 ROOM 1-8 ROOM 1-8 ROOM 1-8 ROOM 1-8 ROOM 1-8 ROOM 1-8 ROOM 1-8 ROOM 1-8 ROOM 1-8 ROOM 1-8 ROOM 1-8 ROOM 1-8 ROOM 1-8 ROOM 1-8 ROOM 1-8 ROOM 1-8 ROOM 1-8 ROOM 1-8 ROOM 1-8 ROOM 1-8 ROOM 1-8 ROOM 1-8 ROOM 1-8 ROOM 1-8 ROOM 1-8 ROOM 1-8 ROOM 1-8 ROOM 1-8 ROOM 1-8 ROOM 1-8 ROOM 1-8 ROOM 1-8 ROOM 1-8 ROOM 1-8 ROOM 1-8 ROOM 1-8 ROOM 1-8 ROOM 1-8 ROOM 1-8 ROOM 1-8 ROOM 1-8 ROOM 1-8 ROOM 1-8 ROOM 1-8 ROOM 1-8 ROOM 1-8 ROOM 1-8 ROOM 1-8 ROOM 1-8 ROOM 1-8 ROOM 1-8 ROOM 1-8 ROOM 1-8 ROOM 1-8 ROOM 1-8 ROOM 1-8 ROOM 1-8 ROOM 1-8 ROOM 1-8 ROOM 1-8 ROOM 1-8 ROOM 1-8 ROOM 1-8 ROOM 1-8 ROOM 1-8 ROOM 1-8 ROOM 1-8 ROOM 1-8 ROOM 1-8 ROOM 1-8 ROOM 1-8 ROOM 1-8 ROOM 1-8 ROOM 1-8 ROOM 1-8 ROOM 1-8 ROOM 1-8 ROOM 1-8 ROOM 1-8 ROOM 1-8 ROOM 1-8 ROOM 1-8 ROOM 1-8 ROOM 1-8 ROOM 1-8! WHERE THE HELL IS ROOM 1-8!"
The boy was obviously in a state of extreme panic. Adrenaline was running through his muscles making him run faster, but he felt as if liquid nitrogen was flowing through his veins making him freeze up and slow down.
When he came to the stairs the boy did not run down each step. Instead, he jumped down the whole flight. However, when he jumped down the second flight, which was a few steps taller, the boy felt a shock of temporary paralysis crawl up from his feet to his head.
"Oh god…" he groaned through chattering teeth. The boy shivered and could not move his trembling legs. "No, come on! Move damn it!"
He looked down the spanning hallway and saw a sign with a two numbers on it: 1-8. "Ah! There it is! Just a little more… come on!"
Just as he was able to lift up his feet from the floor and about to run again, the boy heard a cry resound from a certain classroom.
"SUCH MISFORTUNE!"
There was a commotion going on in the classroom where the cry of despair came from.
"Things just don't let up for you, eh Kami-yan?" laughed a voice with a fake Kansai accent.
"Well it can't be helped, right nya? I mean, Kami-yan is Kami-yan!" another voice chuckled.
"Would you three just shut up the hell up already! Jeez, you idiots are always like this!" shouted a rough yet feminine voice.
The ruckus still continued even with the teacher's plea to settle down.
"What's that about?" The boy looked up at the sign that hung above the door to the room: 1-7. "Gah, it's none of my business. I need to get going!"
He dashed passed the loud classroom without even stealing a peek through the windows; however, he could still hear the clatter of chairs and desks, quite possibly the elements of a mild skirmish.
In just a few seconds, the boy was finally in front of his classroom, Room 1-8. He could hear every vein in his body pulse in unison with his rapidly beating heart; anyone could infer that it was beating at an unhealthy rate. Along with his pulse, the boy could hear the tapping and scraping of chalk against board coming from the classroom, yet there was no voice lecturing the class.
"Looks like they're just taking notes," he whispered his deduction, "Then that means this is my chance!"
The boy bent his knees and stood on his toes. He then carefully put his hand on the sliding door's handle and continued to open it without a sound. The tapping and scraping grew clearer and started to give the boy Goosebumps. He thought of canceling the irritating noise but shook his head and rejected the idea; if the boy cancelled the surrounding noise, he wouldn't be able to know the amount noise he would make upon entering the classroom.
So he continued to creep into the classroom as stealthily as humanly possible. A few of the students sitting at the back of the classroom noticed the boy coming in and gave sideways glances at him. His classmates noticing him did not concern the boy; what he was worried about was whether the gorilla of a teacher would hear him or his whole body was through the door's entryway, the boy quietly slid the door closed. He then crept down the nearest aisle where the boy saw, on the left side of the aisle, an empty seat three rows ahead of him.
"Oh, you're up."
"Huh?"
The boy heard a familiar voice just as he passed the second row. It was speaking in fluent Japanese but with a hint of a western accent. He turned around and saw pale skin, blue eyes, and long curly blonde hair tied back into a wavy ponytail; it was the Caucasian girl from this morning.
"Hey there sleepyhead, you okay? Sorry for beating you up like that thi-"
"Y-y-you're that gorilla girl!"
"SAY WHAT!" The blonde stood up from her chair and slammed her hands down on her desk.
"You two better quiet down,"
Another familiar face, tan, brown eyed, and black haired, came into the boy's focus. The tan Caucasian was sitting in just two seats behind the empty seat. He then sighed, "The water is about to boil over…"
He could sense, or more specifically hear, that the tan Caucasian was right. The rapid rising of a pulse, the flexing of muscles, the clack of chalk against blackboard, and the tightening grip around a wooden blackboard eraser were coming from behind him where a formidable entity stood. The boy did not even take the time to look back and hastily headed for the back entrance door he came from. But even before his brain could send a signal to his body to move, a piece of chalk was shot square at the blonde's forehead, knocking her over. A girl sitting behind her yelped as the back of the blonde's head hit her desk.
The boy just passed by the surprised girl and the wooden blackboard eraser bulleted across the classroom and ricocheted off the back of his head. The force that carried the eraser caused the boy to lose his balance. He fell forward and crashed into the cabinets at the back of the classroom.
"YOU'RE LATE!" roared the gorilla counselor, Yamada-sensei. Everyone in the classroom could see that he was enraged as a pulse of anger swelled over his temples. Huge, muscular, formidable-looking teachers, such as Yamada-sensei, tended to be the scariest of all teachers. "Unbelievable. Right on the first day, you come into class nearly five hours late and start making a racket as if nothing's the matter."
The boy staggered up from the floor and tried to clear his name, "N-no wait sensei, I-I can explain-" He frantically waved his arms in front of him and managed to dodge another bullet of chalk. It barely zipped past his cheek and shattered after it hit the wall; a small yet deadly crack was dented into the wall.
"I don't want any excuses from you, young man! I don't care whether you've been knocked out cold and sent to the infirmary with a minor concussion. It is unacceptable that you have overextended your little nap at the nurse's office. And you, Straus!" Yamada-sensei turned his attention to the blonde. "You yourself were reported to have been an hour late. Even with that you still manage to ignore your tardiness and burst out in the middle of a class lecture. Is there really no ends to-" Yamada-sensei stopped. He slowly put his hand over his face and pressed his fingers against both his temples. The gorilla counselor was said to have a few health problems mainly related to high blood pressure; strenuous exercise and his short temper are the main suspects of these symptoms. With that said, Yamada-sensei would have to simmer down a bit before his anger got the best of him. "Just, just hurry up and introduce yourself and take a seat… now." He grunted as he waved his hand at the boy.
"S-sorr-… Excuse my rudeness sensei…" the boy bowed his head low in apology, his hand still rubbing the back of his head.
The boy walked up to the front of the classroom, turned around, and faced his classmates. All the students returned their curious gazes at the boy that disrupted their teacher's lecture. The rather embarrassing entrance caught hold of the boy's mentality, but he was able to shake off the trembling in his hands. He nervously cleared his throat, nervously put on an awkward smile, and finally nervously introduced himself.
"N-nice to meetchya, my name's Zhanshin Hibiki. Please… take good care of me?" A nervous chuckle trailed out from the boy's stiff smile.
The classroom stayed silent, unblinkingly staring at their new classmate. A hand then became visible over the heads of the students.
"Hey, what Level are you?" asked the questioner.
The rewound up tension in the lesson-disruptor's heart loosened when he heard the question; the threat of an awkward introduction has been rubbed out.
"At least I get to have a friendly exchange with the class…" the boy thought with relief.
"What Level am I?" The boy straightened up as he gathered up confidence. He then grinned with more enthusiasm behind his voice, "Level 3 aural ESPer, [Audio Manipulating Pulse]… [AMP] for short."
1:50 PM—2 hours and 15 minutes left until the end of the first day of school.
Author's notes: Aaaaaah, well... to tell you people the truth I am pretty nervous right now... even though this isn't my first time uploading my story onto the internet (though it is my first on this website), I still feel a little uneasy. I'll be honest, I myself have high hopes for this work of mine, but it's just that I am unsure how other's will take it (probably because this is a story that focuses on my OCs rather than the original characters from the main story). However, that will not stop me from seeing the results; people and my potential reviewers, give me all your support and bolster my enthusiam! I want to write like never before, again!
(Oh, and yes I used the "disaster-gorilla of a student-counseling sensei" from Volume 16 of the original series. [I wonder if that is legal... labeling a name on top of that...])
PS. okay, so apparently I can't put double spaces in between "timeleaps", so i used lines instead.
PSS. Betchya can't guess the movie reference! ;P