It was September first, and Alexander De Luce was angry; very angry.

It is only natural to be angry when your teacher comes to you on the first day of school and says something along the lines of "you worked like hell to pass the entrance exams, you paid us a lot of money, you said goodbye to your loving family for the rest of the year, all because you want to be a specialist, and now you have to go to a girl school because someone up there is a maniac".

So yeah, he was a little upset. Most of him, that is. The rest of him was jealous of the small group who got to stay in Redfountain. The ones who stayed didn't have to go through pink wallpaper-decorated corridors or velvety sheets, twinkly rainbow spells and love-potions bubbling in cauldrons, they didn't have to deal with teachers who acted like drama-queens or better yet, like drama-queers. They didn't have the strict Mrs. Florine or that lunatic Rivers in charge. They were lucky.

Lucky, lucky bastards who didn't have to go to sissyland for the first month of the school year.

"Yes," thought De Luce to himself, "I'm definitely mad." To show how mad he was, he took one of his shirts and violently stuffed it in his suitcase. The shirt couldn't care any less, being inanimate, but Alex felt guilty and, in a way, apologised to the shirt by taking it out and folding it to a perfect rectangle. Now he was a bit calmer, but he was still quite mad about the temporary transfer to -

"Ugh..." he hissed under his breath, "I have to go to Alfea..."

the thought re-boiled all the rage that may have soothed in the past thirty minutes. Alfea? They're kidding! Cloudtower had at least a reputation for being a school that teaches how to do real damage in combat, being a school for witches - but Alfea?! That would make him, and the other 99 boys who were moving with him, look so... gay.

And speaking of gay - this time in the original meaning of the word - a seventeen-year-old boy whistled a cheerful tune as he pulled out a marker (made especially for fabric) from his shirt pocket. While whistling, ha began to label all his belongings, just in case one didn't have to do his or her own laundry in Alfea. He stopped for a second to sniff the marker - smelled a bit like a new car - and began scribbling "Damien. C" on every tag in his clothing he could find. Afterwards he folded them and placed them in perfect, carefully placed stacks in his large suitcase. Tomorrow he was going to Alfea for a month - and unlike other Redfountainers, he wasn't enraged, angry, mad or even mildly aggravated; he thought the transfer was for the better, as he seemed to understand that a month in another's moccasins can make a man less judgemental; plus, he heard that prodigious boy Alexander De Luce will be in Alfea too. De Luce was not in his class, and maybe this'll give him a chance to have a glimpse at the genius, a boy skipped ahead to redfountain at age ten... Now that's one boy with skill!

Damien hummed a lullaby to himself and turned off the lights in the room. This is going to be one extraordinary month, yes, but the spice in life never comes in routine...