"We got out here later than I expected, so your school here is starting in about two days," Dirk said in between mouthfuls of – surprise, surprise – pizza, causing Lloyd to groan in horror and disgust and actually cease in his shoveling down of precious life-sustaining food for a moment to complain. He liked pizza but hated tomatoes, which was funny, because one time Anna had told him that pizza sauce was made with the tomatoes burned to remove their poison, like cashews, and ever since he'd believed it and refused to eat anything else with them in it.

"School! But Daaaaaaaad," he whined, putting down the pizza to cross his arms over his chest, "moving wasted the whole summer!"

"Then it's time to get a fresh start with the new school year," Dirk replied, looking at him sternly. "This isn't up to discussion, Lloyd. You need to meet new friends and start living here. Besides, being back in school will do you some good. You'll stop being so bored."

Lloyd looked at him. "You think school is interesting?"

Dirk considered this. "Well, I was never much for learning myself." He looked at him. "But you're getting out of the house, if I have to drive you there every day myself. At least you'll be able to meet new friends, Lloyd. Are you at least ready for the year to start, Anna sweetheart?"

"What?" Anna glanced up. "Oh. I guess?"

"Anna actually gets what they talk about," Lloyd whined, picking up his pizza again. "It isn't fair. Why are some people smart when some people just aren't, like me?"

"Because that's the way of the world." Dirk wagged a finger. "There's no use questioning it. You'd better eat the rest of your pizza, Lloyd, before it grows mold and attracts spiders."

Well, scientifically correct or not, that sure shut her brother up. Anna returned to her slice of pizza and still churning thoughts. Aurion. Gregory Aurion. I need to get to a computer, so I can look him up. I want to know more about the trial.

Of course, they didn't have a computer unpacked, and Dirk hadn't yet gotten the house Internet. There was a computer at the shop, but he would never let her use it. The library? She didn't know where it was. But school libraries had computers, with Internet. It should be easy enough to get on one and use it before class, and she'd get to one within two days.

Anna relaxed, now that there was something she'd be able to do. She was almost able to smile when Dirk and Lloyd traded jokes. When they played a board game after dinner, seeing as the DVD player still wasn't unpacked and neither was the TV or anything to watch, she played less carefully that usual and used a strategy that smoked them both. The game wasn't Monopoly.

She wore her iPod a lot the next two days as they began the unpacking process, listening to music nothing like what her parents had played, things people were always shocked to here in the ears of their teenagers. Well, her parents weren't there to be shocked. And if there wasn't a melody, a lullaby, she didn't have to miss one. She could concentrate on her new purpose.

--

"I wish Dad would have driven us," Lloyd muttered, shifting uncomfortably in his old sneakers on the asphalt of their street's bus stop. There was just enough light to see the mutinous, worried expression on his face. "Or that he had gotten you a car. You've got your learner's permit."

"Lloyd, I turned sixteen last month," Anna reminded him. "Dirk's not exactly rich, and I wouldn't know where to go, anyway. You know he would have driven us if he could. But he's starting a new work with Altessa, or we wouldn't have had to move here. At least Noishe will be waiting for us when we get home."

"I can't believe I haven't seen him in a week," Lloyd said, looking up the whole. "I wish Dad would have just taken me to work with him. It's what I'm going to do when I grow up, anyway."

She looked at him, shocked. "Not even college?" She'd already had eight thousand dollars in her fund, by age eight, even though her dad insisted his little girl was so smart she was a shoe-in for a scholarship. Anna didn't know where her life was headed, but she knew it involved higher education. She didn't think her brother hated school that much.

Lloyd stared at the ground. "I don't like school. It takes me forever to understand things there. I want to learn to work on cars and be a craftsman, like Dirk."

"But that involves math," Anna said reasonably, adjusting the strap on her old backpack, which still had the keychains she'd brought back from vacations on it. "You have to do measuring of materials and things, and you have to know how an engine works to even attempt fixing it. You have to know how to give change and work the business accounts either on paper or on the computer."

"Augh!" Lloyd said as he backed away, eyes wide with fear. "Stop making my future involve learning!" He tripped over the curb, falling and bonking his head on the street pole. "Don't come near me! Stay away, alien teacher-person fiend!"

The bus chose the second Lloyd was flat on his back to start screaming down the hill. Anna rushed over to him as he scrambled up, hitting away her hands with a look of abject fear. "Oh God, Anna. I'm starting high school. I'm a freshman, at a new school, with no friends! I'm going to be killed!"

"High school isn't that bad, Lloyd," Anna said quickly as the bus pulled to a stop and the door hissed open, even though she wasn't quite sure about that herself, as a fellow high schooler with no friends who'd struggled enough starting at home. "Besides, if anyone gives you a hard time, you have leave to beat them up. Dirk doesn't mind."

"You do," he pointed out.

"Well, I care more about you starting high school than I care about whether or not you should be taught violence is the answer. Just try not to do it indiscriminately."

He paused to look at her, on the bus steps. "What does that mean?"

Anna sighed. "Don't hit them unless you have to."

Their bus was noxious and rattled incessantly, making her worry that by the time the month was out she would no longer have cheekbones in the same position. She was possibly the first high schooler to ever willingly sit beside their younger brother or sister on the first day of school, she was sure. But then again, Lloyd would probably be more popular than she was.

The bus ride wore on and Lloyd, who didn't have something to read or any desire to stare out the window and look at the dim, dull world, picked up a habit of shifting restlessly with his feet and knees, into the seat in front of him. This went on for several minutes, at which point he began humming. It was a tune without a tune that went something like this: 'Doo … dooo … doo … dum de doo …. Dum dum duddle-doo … this is so freaking boring … doo .. doo doo … doo …"

This continued for several more minutes, and Lloyd was still as bored as ever. His sister hadn't even heard him. She was too busy reading. Lloyd kicked a little harder. Doo, doo, doo, he didn't want to get to school …

"Do you mind?" A head poked itself over the seat, glaring. A head with actual white hair, though the person looked young and otherwise normal, though not really for a high school bus. A fellow freshman? "Can you stop fidgeting and being so irritated? I'm trying to read."

"Yeah, well, my sister doesn't seem to be having any problems with it," Lloyd said, jerking his thumb. He leaned over the seat and frowned. "Or yours. Do you suppose it's a guy thing? And what's your name?"

"Of course not!" the boy said, rolling his eyes at Lloyd's stupidity. "My name's Genis, Genis Sage. You know, like wise, which you clearly are not. Your sister's just used to your antics and when Raine's reading, she shuts out anything. It's inhuman. So, will you stop? I'm trying to finish this book. And shouldn't you tell me your name, too?"

"But I'm bored," Lloyd whined, swinging his legs from side to side and nearly hitting Anna. "This bus ride is taking forever, and I keep getting more worried about getting to school. I'm Lloyd. You're going to be a freshman too, right? You must be really smart."

"I guess." Genis said. "Raine's smarter. You're a freshman, too? Seriously? You don't look like one."

"I sure feel like one." Genis laughed at that.

"I feel like that too. You're new around here, right? I don't remember you from my old school. Did they give you your schedule?"

"Nah." Lloyd grimaced. "I wish. I'm gonna be totally lost. Just my homeroom teacher and number, y'know, the usual. Do you have yours?"

"Yeah. Let's compare."

Lloyd fished his out of his backpack, an old maroon one that had served him well that Dirk had bought after he had insisted Lloyd could not keep carrying his old tool bag to school. He traded it with Genis and looked at the new slip. Callahan – Room 417 was all it read, same as his. "Huh. They don't even tell us what this guy teaches. At least we have the same homeroom."

"What kind of name is Callahan, anyway? Raine said she didn't have him," Genis said, offering the slip of paper to him to trade back.

"Callahan? Someone to the right of them made a loud, obnoxious snorting noise. Lloyd and Genis looked over with wide eyes. "That bipolar, black-haired loser? The one who talks about your feeling for the entire class and then turns around to dump a mountain of homework on you? I feel sorry for you, freshmen. And not just because the only two beautiful women who are ever going to come near you must be those two lovely ladies I'm assuming are your sisters."

Anna looked up at that. She blinked, focusing on Lloyd. "What? Lloyd, can you keep it down a little?"

The boy, who they now saw looked definitely older than them and had an annoyed-looking girl wedged in on the other side of his seat, leaned over to extend his hand to Anna and grinned. "He should, shouldn't he? Hello, beauty. I'm Zelos. Zelos Wilder. You're Lloyd's sister?"

Lloyd, personally, didn't think that Zelos had the potential to listen to someone male for more than two seconds, much less eavesdrop and catch his name. Anna, looking confused, took his hand gingerly and let him shake it, making his hand look rather like an overambitious glove. Zelos didn't seem to care about this. "So, my gorgeous hunny? Mind giving me a name to put to a pretty face?" The girl beside him snorted loudly.

"Um … Anna. Lloyd's sister. You were talking to Lloyd … um, Zelos?"

"That's right," Zelos announced, beaming. "At your service. Can you nudge the lovely lady to your other side, brat? So we can all be introduced properly?"

"Sure, pervert," Genis muttered, rolling his eyes and covering Raine's open page with his hand. "Raine, stop reading for a second. There's an idiot over here who wants to be introduced to you."

Raine – begrudgingly – looked up, blinked. Lloyd had expected her to be wearing glasses. Her hair was white like Genis's, too, and her eyes were nearly the same pale blue color. Zelos gasped. "The library beauty!"

Genis looked at him. "What are you talking about? Do you have problems or something?"

"A lot less than you do, brat," Zelos snapped, looking past him. "I saw you last year, every time I glanced in the library. I've been wanting to meet you for a long time. Raine, your brother says? That's a beautiful name. I'm Zelos Wilder."

Raine looked at him a lot more sharply. If she'd had spectacles, Lloyd figured she would have pushed them higher up on her nose. "I've heard of you. The school player. Why are you talking to him, Genis?"

"I'm not!" Genis protested swiftly, shooting Zelos a dirty glare. "I was talking to Lloyd, and Zelos butted in! Trust me, I'd be a lot happier if he'd just go away!"

Anna, in the meantime, was looking at Zelos. "Womanizer? I'm not sure you should be talking to my brother."

"I'm not sure you should be talking to my sister," Lloyd exclaimed hotly. He knew this Zelos guy was a jerk!

"Who says either of you should be talking to him!" the girl on Zelos's other side said, jumping up hotly and revealing that she actually had red hair of a shade close to Zelos's own and probably wasn't his girlfriend, like Lloyd had thought earlier. "Zelos isn't a womanizer, anyway! Woman are just attracted to him! He has a terrible time of it!"

"Whoa, I never denied it, Seles," Zelos said, putting a cautioning hand out, "but then again, I don't like the term womanizer much either. It sounds like women are shoes or something funny like that. I prefer to think of each woman as a distinct and delectable beauty."

"And that only sounds like each flavor of ice cream," Genis muttered, rolling his eyes. "I'd say come on, Lloyd, let's get out of here, but we're on a bus."

"Wow, astute observation," Zelos said, rolling his eyes, just as the bus stopped. Genis tugged at his sister's arm, who had since gone back to reading her enormous book. Lloyd had thought Anna's books were big.

"Come on, Raine, let's get out of here. The pervert can fend for himself."

"Same to you, brat!" Zelos called after him. "And as for you, my gorgeous hunny, I'm always free!" They disappeared hurriedly down the aisle, which may or may not have had something to do with the way the people trying to get into the aisle were skillfully blocked by Raine's book.

Zelos watched her go with a look of blatant admiration. "That girl's got killer spunk – and legs." He turned back in Lloyd's direction, looking past him at Anna. "I'll be seeing you around later, my quiet brunette beauty." Zelos got up and held out a hand to his sister. "Come on, Seles, let's go see how many hot girls are in your homeroom class." He escorted his little sister off the bus, Seles taking the time to glare back at them from under her fringe of red hair and ridiculous hat.

"Jerks," Lloyd muttered. "I hope I don't run into him again. But that Genis kid was cool. I hope I can sit next to him in home room."

"I'd say I told you so," Anna said, repositioning her backpack and shoving him out into the aisle, "except I didn't tell you."

Lloyd looked at her pitifully. "If I said you could say it anyway, would you walk me to homeroom? I don't wanna get lost," he confessed.

"Of course, baby brother. And I told you so."

--

Anna found her own first period class with relative ease after dropping Lloyd off, considering that the crowd in the hallways had slightly thinned out. More thankfully, Zelos wasn't in it, and the teacher had out an assigned seating chart. And his best glaring face, which he repeatedly downed miserably in his cup of coffee. She had no idea what that was about. Anna was sitting next to an empty seat, so far, though on the seating chart the scribble had said Yuan Kaafei. Interesting last name. Interestin first name, for that matter.

She was allowed to say that. She used to be named Anna Barnes, and Anna Irving isn't as bad as that.

Someone had moved her before she'd gotten a chance to look at the rest of the chart, unfortunately. Anna liked learning people's names, as long as she didn't after to talk to them. There was always attendance, luckily.

The five-minute bell rang, and the teacher – Mr. Feathers, perhaps that was the reason for his constant ill humor – went over to the door and shut it with a bang. Apparently coming in less than five minutes early deserved at least a simulation of a tardy punishment in his book. More timid late students drifted in, who were only timid after they saw them. The teacher's glare had no mercy.

And, well, after Anna had gotten bored with watching students saunter in and then cower and pulled out her book again, which she hadn't gotten as far as she would have liked to on the bus, thanks to Lloyd and Zelos, the last students entered.

Anna glanced up, halfway assuming one was going to be her still-absent seat partner.

It was four kids, and by the way everyone else looked, there was a reason they smiled at the teacher with extra beaming charm. Anna personally found the only thing remarkable about the newly arrived populars to be their hair colors, considering the girl's hair was green and the one guy's was blue and the other's pretty bright red. They were still talking about whatever conversation they'd been talking about in the hallway.

Anna started reading again. Unimportant. The one with the pageboy blue hair dropped into the seat behind her, and waiting for a few seconds as his friends got into their seats just before the bell rang. That was probably a lucky break, considering that Mr. Feathers wouldn't hesitate to obey the letter of the tardy rule.

She slid the book under her desk, in case the teacher got a little too boring. Yuan glanced at her and grinned. "You're Anna right?"

"If your name's actually Yuan Kaafei, yes."

"Sorry, my mistake, Amelia."

Mr. Feathers stood up at the center of the classroom and cleared his throat. He raked through the current selection of the study body with his piercing gaze, causing the few people who'd thought a cellphone was a good idea to slip it gingerly back into their purses. Yuan chuckled, which pretty much spoiled her plan for reading and staying out of the danger zone.

The teacher cleared his throat. "All right. I'll be taking attendance now, and, of course, making positive you're all in your assigned seats."

Under his breath Yuan muttered, "And I'll be offering your friendly commentary, compliments of the 'get this guy laid before he kills us' fund. Let's start with the girl wearing the ugly glasses in the front row, top left corner, who has an unfortunate tendency to snort when she laughs that I discovered while working on a project with her last year about anteaters, which she apparently found absolutely hilarious …"

Yuan continued in this vein for a while, which was interesting, if bordering on rude most of the time. Anna was unruffled by it until he got to his auburn-haired friend sitting near the back of the glass and staring into space with his hand beneath his head. "And that is my personal best friend, Kratos, named after one of those darling children of Nyx and Erebus and luckily not related to that man-whore Zelos in anything but name history, Kratos Aurion, school's uncontested hottest hunk and dark, silent, brooding one – "

Anna jerked her head off, cutting him off. "Aurion? As in, related to Gregory Aurion?"

Yuan nodded, practiced. "You've heard about that? Yeah. It's his dad. Kratos doesn't really talk about him, and he doesn't like it if people bring up the subject."

"I should say not," Anna said, clutching her hand on the desk so tightly the whiteness spread from her knuckles in waves or rather veins, the way her blood was currently pumping hatred. "His bastard of a father killed both of my parents."