A loud knock woke me from my sleep. I rubbed the sleep out of my eyes and trudged into the kitchen. A bowl of cereal waited for me and Serah was already finished with her bowl. After polishing off my breakfast, I put the bowl in the sink and headed into my bedroom. I brushed my teeth and my hair before getting dressed in my favourite jeans and a tee. I put blank exercise books I never used from my previous school and a pencil case into my satchel. I hid the Blazefire Pistol in my satchel and slung it over my shoulder. I came out of my bedroom and Uncle Rufus called out to me.
"Hey Claire. Can you drive?" he asked.
"Cocoon licence." I replied. He nodded and said goodbye before we headed to school.

The school was quite similar to Bodhum High. Students piled in through the doors and greeted each other in the weirdest ways. Genesis, Angeal and Sephiroth weren't that far ahead of me. Serah pointed to Sephiroth.
"Do you think he's hot?" she asked.
"Yes! He's a dream." I replied. Then I saw a brunette my age run up to Sephiroth and smooch him. My heart sank.
"Or not." I replied with a sigh and then trudged on, whether Serah was going to follow me or not. I picked up my music player and played one of Clawed Hearts' songs, 'Haunted Soul'. It was dark song about loving someone who loved someone else. I stormed past the group and made it in through the doors without being noticed. The violin humming its haunting melody seemed to make the pain bubble away.

The halls were busy and people were running amok with silly string and eggs. Great.
"Boo!" a voice a recognised whispered into my ear. I turned to find Genesis snickering like a three year old.
"Very mature, Genesis." I retorted.
"You need any help?" he asked.
"Yeah, do you know where the office is?" I asked in reply.
"Follow me." He replied, grabbed my hand and dragged me down the hall.
"Beep beep! New beach babe coming through!" he exclaimed with humour. I just rolled my eyes at him and sure enough, I was at the office.
"Thanks." I replied.
"I'll see you later!" he exclaimed and ran off, most likely to find Angeal and Sephiroth.

The desk was attended by a woman who used too much metallic make up. She looked up at me and then looked at the computer again.
"Name?" she asked.
"Claire Farron." I replied and she picked up the phone.
"Mr. Coates, Claire Farron is here." She said and then hung up.
"The principal will now see you." She replied and then she pointed to a door just across from her door. I knocked on the door and a male voice told me to come in. I went in and closed the door behind me.

"Please have a seat Ms. Farron." He said and I sat on the chair opposite him.
"Here is your locker number and code. Don't lose it or give it to anybody else." He said and handed me a piece of paper with two sets of numbers on it. I tucked it into my jeans and then turned my music player off.
"Now, I understand that you had accelerated study at your other school and in doing so, you may graduate this year with the seniors if you choose to. But, you have to do a few more years at the university. What course do you want to take?" he asked and handed me a sheet of paper with the courses they do listed. I was relieved to find a military course listed.
"Military." I replied and handed back the sheet. He took the sheet from me and laughed.
"No girl has ever entered that subject. The class is all male, as SOLDIER only take on males." He laughed.
"I've been going to the Sanctum Academy of Warfare since I was seven. They don't discriminate women back home. It's actually encouraged on Cocoon." I replied with one eyebrow raised. I took an accelerated study to keep up with Cid Raines.
"Here's my report from last semester." I said and handed him the report. His eyes widened at my results and I smirked.
"Ok, your marks are amongst the best. Fine. You just have to take an elective as well." He replied and punched the information into his computer.
"Music." I replied automatically. He then entered that little bit of info into the computer. He took out a freshly printed page and handed it to me.
"Your schedule. Homeroom starts soon." He said and I left the office.

I headed to locker thirteen and twirled the lock in the order written down. I opened the locker and emptied my bag. I checked my schedule and today was dedicated to military studies. I took out a book and my pencil case. I shut the door and locked it. I looked at my schedule and homeroom was in room F7. I ran into Genesis, Angeal, Sephiroth and his girlfriend as I was looking for homeroom.
"Hey Lightning! What room number?" Angeal asked.
"F7." I replied. Genesis placed his arm around my shoulder.
"Well, at least you know a few people in your homeroom!" he chirped. I chuckled at Genesis. He was quite odd, but he was still a nice guy. I took my earphones out of my ears and put them into my pocket. Genesis' hand moved down my arm and held my waist. He pulled me close to him and chuckled.
"Genesis! You dirty man-whore!" Sephiroth's girlfriend exclaimed.
"Piss off Aerith!" he retorted and let go of me. Angeal laughed and Sephiroth rolled his eyes at both of them.

The bell went and the girl named Aerith kissed Sephiroth before wandering off. Sephiroth sighed angrily and Genesis punched Angeal in the arm. Angeal laughed even harder.
"Who was that?" I asked.
"Aerith. My girlfriend." Sephiroth sighed.
"Well, let's go to homeroom." Angeal said and the four of us wandered through the busy halls and into F7.

Aerith stood at the back of the class, surrounded by a group of people who laughed at her jokes. She twirled her brown hair around her hand as she continued to soak up the attention. Sephiroth, Genesis and Angeal sat in a group and discussed the homework from a previous class. I sat in the back corner desk and placed a bud in my ear and continued to listen to mum and dad's respective bands. I looked at my schedule and my first course class was today in room M2. I sighed. I had no idea where anything was. Little did I realise that I was humming 'A Prayer for You' out loud as I colour coordinated my schedule. I heard a scoff come from Aerith's direction and I just ignored the immature girl. I could just hear whispering and giggling above the music playing in my ear. From the corner of my eye, I could see Aerith staring me down and then I saw the group of three guys chatting away as if they hadn't seen each other in years.

I checked over my schedule and after recess I had music. I was relieved. Genesis wandered over to me and tried to look over my shoulder at my schedule.
"What you got now?" he asked inquisitively.
"Course. In M2." I replied. I didn't want to reveal my course choice to them just yet. I wanted to know if they were genuine friends.
"Funny, I have next in M2. I'll take you anyways and ask the teacher about it." Genesis said and the picked up my schedule.
"Music? Hm... Thinking of doing the talent quest or performing for end of year prom?" he asked. I shook my head. No way in Pulse I would embarrass myself like that!
"I understand. Embarrassed or do you have stage fright?" he asked.
"A bit of both." I replied.
"I have massive issues with stage fright. I want to be an actor, but the stage scares me to death. I'm not worried about embarrassment, it's having many faces all focused on me that scares me. I can't even do oral presentations at school without freezing up." Genesis said.
"It's hard like that. You want to express yourself, but you're scared of what others may think of you. Especially strangers." I said.
"Yeah." He replied sadly.
"Hey, try pretending you're a character for the school presentations. Because, it's technically not you. It's someone else. Really become a character on stage and it should go away." I suggested. He perked up a little.
"That makes sense. Thanks Lightning! I'll try that." He replied and then headed back towards Angeal and Sephiroth whilst taunting Aerith.

The bell rang moments later and I put my music player away. Genesis pulled me over to the others. Aerith skipped over to Sephiroth and gave him a hug before strutting away with her posse of girly girls.
"Why don't we show our new friend to her next class?" Genesis asked.
"Sounds good." Angeal replied. Sephiroth nodded. He looked quite frustrated with something.
"What's up?" I asked.
"Aerith troubles. Ever since we got together two years ago, she's changed. I know that people change every day, but she's become 'popular' and became a bitch." Sephiroth replied.
"I'm glad you noticed." Genesis replied sarcastically.
"Come on. We'll be late." Angeal said and led us out of homeroom.

After squeezing through the crowd, we made it to M2.
"I thought we were taking Lightning to her class." Angeal asked.
"M2, this is it." I replied. I realised that I had to tell them about my course choice soon.
"This is the military course room." Sephiroth replied.
"Yeah, it took a bit of persuading to get me into this course." I said. The three looked at me as if I had done something inappropriate.
"No! I meant prove that my grades were good enough to be let into this class." I replied and handed Sephiroth my report. Their eyes widened in shock.
"Accelerated study? Whoa, all A's. What school?" Angeal asked.
"Sanctum Academy of Warfare. Sergeant rank at the moment. My uncle's allowing me to go back if my grades are good enough." I replied. It was obvious that they had heard of the academy as their jaws dropped.
"Sanctum? As in Guardian Corps and PSICOM?" Genesis asked. I nodded. Sephiroth handed my report back to me and I added it to my pile.

The teacher let us in. I approached him at his desk. The blonde haired man looked at me and then back at his papers.
"Knitting class is next door." He said.
"Um, I'm the new student in your class." I replied.
"I thought they were kidding. A fifteen year old girl in the military course? Next they'll tell me behemoths can fly." He said and handed me a textbook on warfare. I studied the cover closely and realised that this was the book that I was using at Sanctum.
"Sit next to Sephiroth." He said and pointed to the empty seat between Sephiroth and the window.
"Hey." I said with a small wave. He waved back and then shot me an apologetic smile. I guessed it was about the teacher. I sat down and placed my books on the table.

"I'm sure you all know me by now, but our new student doesn't. So girlie, I'm Mr. McCrae. Right everyone, this is our new student...?" he asked and expected me to fill in the blank.
"Lightning." I replied.
"Real name and previous school?" he asked with one eyebrow raised in annoyance.
"Claire Farron from the Sanctum Academy of Warfare." I replied. A few of the guys wolf-whistled and the others made cat noises. All except Genesis, Angeal and Sephiroth. Mr. McCrae folded his arms across his chest.
"Enough! Now, to briefly fill you in Claire on what we are going to discuss this lesson. What to do in situations that seem impossible to get out of. Who can tell me what they would do escape machine gun fire if you were in a jet?" he asked.

Only two hands shot up. Sephiroth's and mine.
"Sephiroth, what would you do?" he asked.
"Barrel roll and then manoeuvre around to shoot them." Sephiroth replied.
"Good. Claire, what would you do?" Mr. McCrae asked me.
"Well, a barrel roll is a great way to dodge aerial attack, but it's slow. An aileron roll would get out of the situation and then use a reverse barrel roll to turn around and then gun them down." I replied. I knew this from experience, sort of. It was a simulation and the trick worked for me.
"That is very complex combo. Would you trust yourself to execute this perfectly without being shot down?" he asked.
"Yes. It would be executed perfectly." I replied.
"Very well. Bring your books everyone! The simulator is waiting for our two responses." He announced and we headed into a separate part of the gym.

Sephiroth climbed into the simulator with ease. Outside on a monitor we could see what he saw. He tried to manoeuvre into a barrel roll but his simulated jet was shot down. He came out and looked really bummed about it.
"Good luck. The simulator is very complex." Sephiroth warned me.
"How much harder can they be from the ones back home?" I replied with a flirtatious smile and climbed into the jet.

Buttons were everywhere in the cockpit. It was cramped but I was surprised how very similar the jets were to the ones back home. The seat smelt of butt sweat and stale deodorant. The screens flicked to that of the sky. I noticed the black jet to the left of me. I saw that it moved behind me. Time to impress. The jet tried to shoot me down, but I executed the aileron/reverse barrel roll combo and shot them out of the sky. Another jet tried to surprise me, but I steered the jet to fly under the other and used the missiles to take it out. That jet fell out of the sky and then a large plane emerged from the clouds. It was ten times bigger than the enemy jets. I gripped the controls and told myself I knew how to handle this. Then I remembered the button for the anti-matter cannons in the jets back home. It was a big red one that was labelled in Cocoon script 'anti-matter cannon'. There was no label on this big red button in the same spot as the cannon so, hoping it was a weapon, I pressed the button and prayed. The button popped open and a circular shaped recess lay in the button. I found a box of spheres and picked up a yellow one. It had a luminous but electrical light about it. I pushed it into the recess, closed the top over and pressed the button again. A bolt of thunder struck the plane and it crashed to the ground.

The screen went black and then the door in the cockpit opened. I got out finding a bunch of open mouths. Even the teacher's jaw almost hit the floor. Genesis, Angeal and Sephiroth crowded me and held their hands in the air. I gave them each a high-five and then they gave me a little more space.
"Well, that was executed perfectly. Well done Claire." Mr. McCrae replied and then scribbled a few notes down onto his notepad.
"Where did you learn to fly like that?" one of the guys asked.
"My old school." I replied.
"Sir, she even knew how to use the materia cannon! We haven't even learnt that yet!" another of the guys exclaimed.
"In the jets back home that button was an anti-matter cannon. I just found a box of spheres and improvised from there." I replied. Sephiroth was really quiet. I guess he was the top of the class. At least until I came along. I walked up to him and the other two.
"Sephiroth, you ok?" I asked. He turned to me with a half hearted smile.
"Yeah. I'm fine. I'm just not used to being bested by a girl. No offence." He replied.
"None taken. Even the Sanctum guys have a problem with it." I said with a smile. He chuckled a little and then playfully punched my shoulder.