A/N: I was feeling generous so everyone in this kendo class has their material provided for them. Otherwise, it's a fairly expensive sport.

Chapter 2: Day 1

"The world before zippers stinks," Eddie grumbled, still fumbling with the ties of his belt. There was one set for the back, another for the front, and you were supposed to slip the second set under the first… Just when he thought he had it, the baggy hakama came down in a heap around him again. Eddie plunked himself down on the locker room floor.

"At least you got the top part on," Howie said. He still had his jeans on.

"Need help?" a soft voice asked.

Eddie looked up. A boy who looked about his age stood with his navy blue uniform already on. Maybe it was how crisp the pleats looked or that even the outer tie of his gi was set properly – Eddie wanted to say it was something in his eyes, but that sounded stupid – anyway, the kid looked more like he stepped out of someone's history book than being just another student.

"What's it look like?" Eddie snorted, snapping out of it and replying to the kid's question.

"Hey, he's being kind to you!" Howie scolded. He approached the other boy. "Sorry, about Eddie's rudeness. I'm Howie. Are you in the same class with us?"

The boy nodded once, showing that the rest of his hair was tied up on top of his head. "Yeah, I'm Kohaku. It's nice to meet you." Without another word, Kohaku proceeded to belt the hakama properly around Eddie's waist.

"Couldja please explain to me why I have to wear a dress in the first place?" Eddie grumbled when he gave up trying to follow Kohaku's movements.

"These hakama are split," Kohaku observed. "They are almost like slacks."

"It still looks like a skirt." Eddie swayed a little, the fringes of his hakama nearly dusting the floor.

Kohaku didn't make any remark. "Howie, please come here." He quickly tied the other boy's uniform. "Let's go or we'll all be late." He bustled out of the locker room, not checking to see if he was followed.

"Konnichiwa!" Kohaku shouted when he stepped through the gym's entrance. He followed it with a curt bow.

"Um…hey." Eddie raised his hand feebly in sort of a wave. Then he felt a strong grip on the back of his head, shoving him down to look at the floor.

"Say hello loud and clearly so everyone can hear you," Kohaku instructed.

Eddie did as told. Mostly because of the pressure on the back of his head. He didn't think Kohaku was that strong. After another second or two, Kohaku let go. In the process, he snatched away Eddie's baseball cap. "You can recover this at the end of the session."

Eddie scowled. He was starting to like this class less and less. He glanced at Howie, who, benefitting from Eddie's example, smoothly made the perfect entrance. About ten other students were already inside. All three raced to join their seated classmates in the middle of the studio. Except for Kohaku. He sat a few feet opposite of everyone instead, closer to the teacher but not by much. The strange young man from Friday sat a distance from the rest of the class, his knees tucked under himself.

"Good afternoon," Kohaku greeted everyone. "I'm Kohaku, a new student at Bailey City Elementary School. I will be your captain and assistant to our instructor, Narita-sensei."

At his name, Narita-sensei's eyelids fluttered halfway open, giving a glimpse of the stunning gold underneath. Even from a ways off, they glittered. He was dressed like everyone else, however. And his silver-white hair stood out against the uniform's dark colors. It was almost as big a contrast as his demeanor to Kohaku's. Unlike his assistant, Narita-sensei didn't look very welcoming. Or pleased. In fact, he may have even looked closer to peeved that pleased, Liza noticed.

Kohaku didn't seem to mind. He went on to have everyone introduce each other, then to talking about kendo as an art form. All the while Narita-sensei didn't move a muscle. For that matter, he didn't even speak.

May be he doesn't speak very much English, Liza thought.

"Did everyone bring their shinai?" Kohaku asked at length, pulling his own bamboo sword into his lap. "Good," he said when everyone else showed theirs.

We paid enough for this course, Melody thought.

"Let's review some etiquette." Howie didn't think there could be so much protocol to handling a shinai. He wished it had brought a notebook to remember half the stuff! You had to kneel whenever you set it down or pick it up. Never lean on it. Always grip it just under the handguard when at rest. Treat it with all the respect of a real sword.

"And most importantly," Kohaku said as he wrapped up the lecture. "You will always, always greet your fellow kenshi whenever you walk through that door." He pointed to the gym's entrance. Eddie could've sworn Kohaku was smiling specifically at him. "Kon-nichi-wa," he enunciated carefully, "is the preferred greeting." He grinned. "Now, who's ready to start?"

The class clamored enthusiastically.

"Please take your shinai and gently place them against the wall over – Hey!" He waited until everyone stopped. "What did I say about etiquette? We'll do this over again." Kohaku demonstrated how properly pick up their equipment from the start. Once that was settled he set everyone to a two-minute run around the gym.

This is so mundane, Eddie thought. But he jogged quickly in hopes that Kohaku would have them swinging their swords in no time.

"Stretches," Kohaku called.

Right after this, Melody thought.

"Push-ups,"

Any time now, Howie hoped.

"Sit-ups."

I'm too tired to swing a shinai! Liza wiped her brow and puffed.

"Very good!" Kohaku praised everyone. "Now, we can go on to warm-ups."

The gym echoed with groans.

"What the heck did you call everything else, then?" Eddie blustered.

"Routine?" Kohaku looked at Narita-sensei, who just stared placidly back. He still hadn't moved. "Okay, so we're going first work on shuri ashi, or 'foot sliding.' If you want to be good at anything, you have to learn the basics. The basics of good swordsmanship is footwork." Kohaku lifted up his hakama enough to show the proper stance as he bounced on the balls of his feet. "You're going to slide one step forward with your right foot, then bring your left quickly up behind, maintaining shoulder distance…"

While the explanation went on into physical practice, Eddie cast a forlorn gaze on the shinai. When?

"Keep your back straight!"

Eddie grimaced. The floor rubbing against his bare feet was starting to make his soles sore. Howie gave him a doleful look. Him, too.

"Faster." Kohaku glided across the gym with enough speed to make the skirts of his hakama look like a feather duster. "Hey, don't have your feet cross! Keep the left foot behind."

"My feet hurt," Liza whined.

"Do we get a water break?" someone else asked.

"Just one more round," Kohaku said. They had lots of "one more rounds."

Eventually, they were down to the last half hour of class. Kohaku called everyone into their files again. "For our closing exercise, please take your shinai and…"

"Kohaku."

Liza's head snapped up. Narita-sensei had finally spoken.

"Sir?" Kohaku tilted his head.

"There will be none of that today," Narita-sensei said in faultless English, making a cutting motion toward the shinai.

Kohaku blinked.

"Shuri ashi," Narita-sensei clipped.

"Hai."

"Huh?" Howie blinked.

Kohaku turned to everyone else. "We will spend the remaining amount of class time on footwork."

A boy named Huey raised his hand. "Wait, so when do we get to use our shinai?"

Kohaku smiled, but it looked more sympathetic than happy. "Most kendo dojo will require you practice shuri ashi exclusively for three weeks straight."

"WHAT?"

Narita-sensei slanted his gaze toward Eddie. Melody elbowed her friend. "Keep your mouth shut or he'll have us doing this for four weeks," she hissed.

Narita-sensei smirked as if he had been able to hear her whispered comment. But that's not possible, Melody thought. She looked away from his strangely colored eyes anyway.

"Perhaps by the next meeting," their teacher said. Then Narita-sensei ordered, "Practice."

Kohaku took an effort to make it interesting. He had everyone doing their shuri ashi in a variation of Red Light, Green Light. "Mae is 'forward,'" he said. "And gyakko means 'go back.' Try to be quick!" Shouting out the commands, he helped After another twenty minutes of nothing but sliding and shuffling, Kohaku called class to a close. When everyone was lined up, then seated he taught them all how to bow accordingly. The Kohaku said something very quickly and politely in Japanese. He translated it immediately. "Thank you for coming!" He looked expectantly at Narita-sensei.

"Dismissed," the teacher droned.

Quickly running ahead of everyone else, Kohaku set his own example. "Please remember to bow before you leave and say goodbye. Sayonara!" He bowed and exited.

In the hallway, Melody, Liza, and Howie all caught up with him. Eddie was busy checking on his blisters from the day's exercise.

"Thank you for the lesson," Liza said, even though she winced as she shuffled from one foot to the other.

"I noticed that our teacher didn't bow with the rest of us." Melody crossed her arms thoughtfully. "I'm not an expert, but isn't that considered rude?"

Howie nudged her, but Kohaku smiled lopsidedly. "Narita-sensei…Narita-sensei doesn't really consider himself like everyone else."

Howie blinked. "Isn't he?"

Kohaku laughed. "No." Then his eyes widened as if he had something he shouldn't have. "Please excuse me." Still in uniform, Kohaku completely skipped the locker room, the skirts of his hakama flying in his haste.

.

A/N: While this story will have some of the finer points of kendo mentioned, it is by no means meant to be a crash course. So after this fairly technical chapter, I'm going to gloss over most of the details in favor of advancing the plot itself.