*IMPORTANT NOTE: Before you read this chapter, you need to watch a video (the link is on our profile) to understand the reference in music class. :)

Chapter 4

May sprinted down the hallway as fast as her legs could carry her, her footsteps like a clap of thunder in the empty hallway. She skidded as she took a sharp turn around a corner and took off down another hallway, flying past the classroom doors lining the walls.

You're going to be late, a bubbly, cheerful voice chimed in her head, distinctively female. Professor Eilian won't be happy; you've been tardy nearly a week in a row now.

"No I'm no-AH!" May nearly ran past Professor Eilian's classroom, but caught herself at the last second and swung back to grab the door handle.

She threw the door open and stumbled inside, causing all of the students and the professor to turn around and stare at her. "Am I," she panted, trying to catch her breath, "la-"

At that moment, the tardy bell decided to ring.

"-te?"

The professor's thin lips stretched into a forced smile. "No, Ms. Maple, you're not. Now please, sit down," Professor Eilian said, disdain dripping from his words. May quickly nodded and scurried to her seat, head down. She knew Professor Eilian hated her, and always punished her if given the opportunity – though she had no idea why the man had a reason to dislike her. Just because Alkali had accidentally roasted her history book didn't mean he had to hate her… Either way, she knew she had escaped another day of detention.

As she sat down in her seat, letting her red-and-black-plaid messenger bag slide off of her shoulder and drop on to the ground, May sighed and immediately tuned out Professor Eilian, who was blabbering on about the "great dragon god Arceus. The first known dragon in existence", or something like that.

Propping her elbow up on the desk and resting her cheek on her palm, she stared out the window, daydreaming. I hope Leaf wasn't late to class too, she mused.

Leaf dashed into the academy's sparring room, cursing under her breath when she saw sparring matches already going on between various students in the room.

Skirting around a pair of boys locked hand-in-hand as they tumbled over the blue mat padding the ground, growling at each other like a pair of dragons, Leaf headed towards where Professor Amelian – the ground combat instructor – stood surveying the practice fights from the center of the room. As she approached him, she noticed her blunette friend (not a very close friend, mind you; just barely above being an acquaintance), Dawn Berlitz, arguing with the professor.

"But Professor Amelian," Dawn was whining as Leaf came closer, "if I have to go and fight on the ground like that, my hair will get all messed up! And it took me hours to get it looking like this, too!"

Professor Amelian sighed irritably, crossing his arms over his chest. "Dawn, we have this argument nearly every day; you and I both know what my answer is going to be."

"But Professor…" she complained.

"No buts." Professor Amelian shook his head. "Now go practice. Drew is waiting for you." He pointed towards where the green-haired student stood, impatiently waiting for his sparring partner. Dawn huffed, but complied and walked over to where Drew was.

"Um…Professor?" Leaf hesitantly asked, catching the attention of the man, who turned to face her.

"Hm? Oh, well if it isn't Leaf. You're late, you know," Professor Amelian said, smiling at her. Leaf nervously smiled back. Professor Amelian was one of the nicer sixth year teachers; probably Leaf's favorite. He never got mad at her for being late to class, but she still couldn't help but feel guilty when she was late. Yet somehow, she wasn't guilty when she skipped entire classes. Go figure.

"Yeah, I know. Sorry about that." Leaf wasn't about to tell him about how May had dragged her out of her dorm at the crack of dawn to "tell her something important" only for the blue-eyed brunette to get distracted when she smelled a pastry and ended up dragging her around the campus all morning in search of the delicious treat.

"Well, since class has already started, it doesn't look like there'll be time for you to change into your sparring clothes…" The professor was referring to the black sweats and gray t-shirt that all academy students were issued to wear for ground combat class. "Maybe you could…" Professor Amelian swiveled his head to look around the room. "…practice working with your sword?" he suggested, motioning the weapons rack on the far side of the room.

"Okay." Leaf nodded and made her way towards the area where the weapons were lined up and hung on the wall. Every student was given their own weapon at the beginning of third year based on their skill level and abilities, like how agile they were or accurate at throwing weapons (like daggers, etc.). What type their dragons were played a factor, too. Most riders in the active rebel ranks had weapons embedded with elemental powers based on what type their dragon was, like gloves that allowed you to throw fireballs and swords that controlled water.

Leaf had been given a sword as her weapon (along with two daggers, though she excelled more in fighting with her sword) during her third year. It was an older sword – a katana, or "samurai sword", as it was called – and had small pieces of jade embedded in the handle. The blade was extremely sharp, and the weapon as a whole very lightweight. This made it easy for Leaf to deliver fast hits to her targets and cut smoothly through them. She liked to think that the blade represented her sharp tongue (which often lashed people with sarcastic insults – mainly Gary), too.

Taking her sword off the rack it was resting on, Leaf moved over to where a line of fake dummies were hanging from the ceiling, made to look like the king's soldiers. The brunette positioned herself in the middle of a circle of the dummies and unsheathed her sword, pulling it out of its scabbard. The blade glistened under the lights of the training room as she wrapped her hands around its hilt.

Taking in a deep breath and then exhaling it slowly, Leaf closed her eyes and gathered her concentration. Then, with a yell, she opened her eyes and swung the sword at the nearest dummy, chopping its head off. Its body fell to the ground as she spun around and delivered a strike to another dummy's arm, leaving a deep gash in it for the stuffing inside the dummy to fall out.

She then proceeded to slash and twirl and attack the other dummies. Within a minute, all were cut up pieces of fabric, stuffing, and poorly drawn "soldiers'" faces, yet Leaf hadn't even broken a sweat.

Sighing, Leaf stared at the dummies she had just destroyed. Then, she looked at the clock on the far wall of the room. She had only killed a few minutes of her hour-long class so far. "Today's going to be a long day, isn't it?" she asked herself as she sheathed her sword and went to go fetch more fake dummies to hang up.

"Maybe if I imagined the dummies as Gary it would be more fun…"

May needed to correct herself; Professor Eilian hated all of the students, not just her, bar the teacher's pet – her annoyingly cocky and frustrating partner, broccoli head Hayden.

So as soon as the bell rang at the end of first, May flew out the door, eager to escape to her next class. Unluckily for Leaf, however, she had this class next.

After every student was present, Professor Eilian launched into the lesson, talking so fast that everyone had trouble taking notes – not that they had to, anyway, because this was something they had learned way back in first year (and for some, before they had even joined the academy.)

"As you all know, Arceus was the first known dragon in existence. It created all of the different varieties of dragons we have now – fire, water, grass, etcetera… Some say that it is a myth and that it never existed, but there is no way to prove if this is true or not because Arceus lived many a millennium ago and nobody alive then is still alive today. However- Yes, Dawn?"

All heads swiveled in the direction of the blunette, who was sitting near the back with her hand raised.

"How did it give birth to all the other dragons if it didn't have another one to mate with?"

Leaf slapped her palm against her face.

"Oh Dawn…" Professor Eilian sighed.

Third period rolled around at an extremely slow pace, and to be honest, Leaf wasn't looking forward to it. She just so happened to share music class, her elective, with her idiot-of-a-partner, Gary Oak, and where there's Gary, there are many insults to be received and retorted.

When Leaf arrived in the band room, most of the other students were already there; taking their instruments out of their lockers and warming up by playing a simple tune or two. This was the Symphonic Band's class period, so you would expect them to be well behaved and practicing their music, right?

Wrong.

When Leaf entered the room, she was met with a crowd of kids gathered around Gary, who was playing the "Sexy Sax Man" version of "Careless Whisper" on his saxophone. He had removed his gray sweater and unbuttoned the top few buttons on his white collared shirt to reveal his collarbone and part of his – Leaf couldn't believe she was thinking this – nicely toned chest underneath. His black tie hung loosely around his neck and he wore a pair of shades as he stood on a chair and played to "complete the look."

"Dun nun nun nun. Dun nun nun nun."

Leaf looked around wildly – where was Professor Marisol when you needed her? Sure, the female professor may have been a bit too relaxed and fun-loving for her own good, but surely even she wouldn't allow this!

Once she realized that the professor was nowhere in the room, Leaf let out an aggravated sigh and started towards the crowd, pushing other students out of the way to reach Gary. She made sure to keep her eyes on his face, though, dare she blush if she looked at his chest.

"Gary!" she yelled over the other students' cries of "Please teach me that!" and their humming along to the tune. The spiky-haired brunet quickly spotted his partner, and stopped playing to put his shades up on top of his head and smirk down at her.

"Hey Green," he said, a sparkle in his gray eyes – something that Leaf noticed. Apparently his eyes were sometimes gray after all. "Enjoying the music?"

"No." She frowned. "Quit playing that stupid song before Professor Marisol gets here."

"Oh, this stupid song?" Gary smugly smiled, and then proceeded to play the song again. "Dun nun nun nun, dun nun nun nun."

Leaf scowled and opened her mouth to speak. "Would you st-!"

"Dun nun nun nun, dun nun nun nun. Dun nun nun nun nuuuuuh, nu-nun-nun-nun-nun-nun-nun-nun-nun."

"Stop-!"

"Dun nun nun nun, dun nun nun nun."

"Gary, I will-!"

"Dun nun nun nun, dun nun nun n-AH!" The saxophone let out a shrill squeak as Leaf stepped up on to the chair and promptly kneed him right there, causing him to let out a shriek of pain and fall off the chair. Meanwhile, the students watching the partners' exchange burst out laughing.

"-kick you in the balls," Leaf finished.

With a triumphant smirk on her face, the brunette turned to go get her flute out of her locker just as Professor Marisol entered the room, leaving a moaning Gary lying on the floor.

"I tried to warn him…" Leaf shrugged when another student gave her a quizzical look.

"Ashy-boy, you just got beat by a girl!" Gary hollered with laughter as he watched Ash lose miserably to Misty in a sparring match. He had recovered from Leaf's, ahem, "warning" by fourth period, which – for him – was ground combat class.

Said girl was easily pinning the raven-haired boy to the ground while he flailed underneath her, desperately trying to shove her off.

"Gaaarrry!" Ash whined, accepting the redhead's hand after she got off him to help him up. "Thank you Misty," he thanked her, and she smiled in return.

"No problem." It wasn't very surprising that Misty had beat Ash. Ash may have been a phenomenal fighter, but Misty was on a whole other level.

"Okay, so who's next?" she asked, looking around and placing her hands on her hips. Every student gathered around where the sparring match between Ash and Misty had occurred took a step back, leaving Gary – who was still laughing up a storm – out in the open.

"Wait wha-?" he said in alarm when he realized what was happening.

Misty smiled evilly. "Show me what you got, Oak," she said, assuming a battle stance.

"WAIT, NO!"

. . .

Barely five minutes later, Gary lay moaning on the ground for the second time in one day – both times because of a girl. Seriously, what was wrong with all of the girls today? Normally they'd be flirting with Gary – not beating him up, he thought through his pain.

"Great job, Misty," Ash congratulated her, grinning while at his feet, Gary lay clutching his stomach where Misty had punched him in the gut. Misty smiled in return before Professor Amelian called her over to speak to her.

"Wow Misty, you took out both Gary and Ash out in no time flat! With fighting skill like that, you could even be an assistant combat instructor!" Professor Amelian praised her.

Misty smiled brightly. "Thanks, professor."

"Okay, so today, class, we will be learning how to start a fire with just two pieces of flint," Professor Mercury announced, holding up two pieces of the stone for all of the students to see.

"But Professor Mercury, haven't we learned how to do that already?" Gary questioned, crossing his arms over his chest and leaning on the trunk of tree.

Fifth period for Gary was survival class, taught by Professor Mercury – a tall, thin man with glasses and long black hair tied back into a ponytail. All in all, he screamed "scientist!" (just without the lab coat.)

Today they were out in the forest bordering the academy (although still inside of the academy boundary for safety reasons) to practice starting a fire without matches or the help of a Fire-type dragon.

"Yeah," Drew complained a few feet away. "Professor Orchid taught us how last year in fifth year."

"Well it's always good to practice how once in a while," Professor Mercury snapped, glaring at the two boys. Then, he returned to what he had previously been saying. "Now, you'll be paired into groups of three while you're trying to make a spark…"

. . .

"Uh…so what are we supposed to do again?" Dawn asked, staring at the pile of sticks in front of her and the two pieces of flint in her hands. Of course, Professor Mercury just had to put Dawn Berlitz, Gary Oak, and Drew Hayden in a group together.

"Simple, this," Gary said confidently. He held his two pieces of flint above the fire and hit them together at a sideways angle, just as Professor Mercury had shown them just minutes before. However, Gary didn't make a spark.

"What the…" His brow furrowed, and he hit the stones together again. Still, he couldn't get a spark to fly off them.

"Uh…do you know what you're doing?" Dawn asked meekly.

"Of course I do," Gary snapped, bashing the stones together with more force this time. Nothing happened.

So he tried again. Bang.

Still zero sparks.

Again. Clash.

Nada.

Again. Bam.

Nope.

"Why is this so damn frustrating?!" Gary cried out, throwing the pieces of flint into the air.

"Having trouble, Oak?" a snide voice asked from behind the two. "It's just a simple little fire, you know."

Gary's head whipped around, his eyes narrowed. "Oh, like you could even actually start a fire, Hay… Whoa." He gawked at the enormous bonfire proudly blazing beside a smirking Drew.

"How did you even-!"

"Oh hey, look, Gary! I got mine started, too!" Dawn squealed, and Gary looked to see a small fire starting in the blunette's pile of twigs.

"Wow, a girl got a fire started before you, Oak. How lame," Drew taunted.

"Hey, I can start a fire!" Gary retorted. "Just watch me!" He grabbed his angrily thrown aside pieces of flint and hit them together, hoping for a spark.

Nothing.

"Okay, just one class left!" May cheerful exclaimed as she skipped alongside Leaf on their way to sixth period. The two friends had both fifth and sixth period – dragon care and aerial combat, respectively – together. Leaf rolled her eyes and looked up to where a silver dragon and a slightly smaller red dragon were lazily flying above them.

The silver dragon was, of course, Lithium, and the red, May's dragon, Alkali. The dragons had to be present during the dragon care class because it was in that class that Professor Vaziri taught the riders how to heal basic wounds on their dragons and other things like that. However, since aerial combat was a class in which riders had to fight on their dragons in the air (hence the name of the class) their dragons just followed them there.

Once Leaf and May reached the large field Professor Alida – the aerial combat instructor – held the class at, Lithium and Alkali descended from the sky and landed next to their riders.

Alkali was slightly smaller than Lithium and a female as well, with shiny red scales that coated her body and bright silver eyes like the color of the dragon next to her. She was a lot like May – often acting childish and playful.

More and more students began to arrive, their dragons descending from the skies in all different sizes, colors, and shapes. There were only about fifteen people in each class (since there were only around fifty sixth years) but when they were all gathered in one place with their dragons it seemed like a pretty big class.

Leaf waited calmly beside Lithium, watching as people arrived. She saw Misty and her Water-type dragon, Seltore – a wingless "serpent" dragon with dark blue scales and a lithe body frame, and was about to go talk to her when a shrill whistle came from above, catching her attention.

Everyone looked up to watch as Professor Alida descended towards the ground atop her dragon; a small female dragon named Astelia, who had extremely light – almost white – lavender scales.

Once Astelia was close enough to the ground, Professor Alida dramatically leaped off of her, doing a flip before landing safely on the ground. As Astelia landed behind her Professor Alida smiled at the assembled students and their dragons.

"Hello, hello," she said cheerfully. "Today we're going to have a mock battle between two of the students and their dragons. Any volunteers?"

May was instantly next to Leaf. "You should volunteer, Leaf," May said excitedly. "You and Lithium are boss at aerial battles!"

"No, Lithium and I fight enough. Somebody else should get a chance to." Leaf shook her head, but smiled slightly at the compliment.

May pouted but that didn't seem to deter her, because a second later she grabbed Leaf's hand and stuck it up in the air. "Leaf volunteers as tribute!" the brunette exclaimed loudly, wildly waving her friend's hand around to catch the professor's attention.

Leaf's smile turned into an open mouth of shock. "Wait what-?"

"Oh goodie! Thank you for volunteering, Miss Leaf!" Professor Alida bounced up and down like a hyped May on steroids. "Let's see… No more volunteers? Okay then, Leaf, you'll fight…Paul!"

Leaf yanked her hand out of May's grip and glared at her before turning to look for her opponent.

Paul stood a good distance away with a scowl on his face, staring back at Leaf when she looked at him. Apparently, he didn't want to battle either – or at least, that's what his facial expression said. It was hard to tell with that scowl permanently etched on his face.

Next to him stood a large (large enough to rival Azreth in size, anyway) dark purple dragon, who – funnily enough – matched the color of his rider's hair color. His eyes glowed an eerie white color, making him look like he was dead. When Leaf looked closely, she noticed that Paul's dragon was partially transparent, too.

Oh fun, a Ghost-type dragon, she thought sarcastically. Lithium rumbled her agreement.

Wordlessly, Leaf and Paul exchanged a glance, and turned at the same time and mounted their dragons. (How Paul can sit on a transparent dragon is still unknown.)

Leaf climbed up Lithium's wing and on to her back, where she sat down between two of the small spikes running down the dragon's spine close to her neck. Ready, Lith? she asked.

Ready.

Leaf nodded to Paul, and at the same time their dragons leaped into the air, their strong wings flapping up and down rhythmically to gain altitude. Once the two dragons and their riders reached a certain height, they stopped.

"Jarkor, standby for battle," Paul said to his dragon.

Get ready to attack, Lithium. "That's a funny way to start a battle, Shinji," Leaf mused aloud as Professor Alida and her dragon rose up to circle above the two dragons. Paul merely grunted as the professor spoke.

"Students, dragons, are you ready?" she yelled, and Leaf and Paul nodded, their eyes never straying from the other's. "Okay then ready…set…GO!"

As soon as the last word was out of Professor Alida's mouth both dragons jumped into action, circling each other as they waited for the other to attack.

"Jarkor, lunge for the dragon's neck!" Paul shouted loud enough for his dragon, and in addition, Leaf and Lithium, to hear above the roaring wind around them created by the dragons' beating wings.

Bank sharply to the right.

The large ghost dragon lunged for Lithium's neck, jaws open wide, just like his rider had ordered, but at the last second Lithium swiftly ducked under and to the right of the other dragon, leaving him to bite empty air. Leaf clung on tightly to the spike in front of her as Lithium dipped before flying straight up and spinning around to face their opponents again.

Now would be a good time to set up an illusion, Lithium advised as Jarkor spun around to growl at them.

Yeah, Leaf agreed. Go for it.

Concentrating her psychic powers, Lithium hid the real Leaf and Lithium behind a wall of energy while she created a fake in the place of them. Not seeing the real Lithium, Paul had Jarkor attack the fake silver dragon, who easily dodged the ghost dragon as gracefully as the real Lithium had.

Let's circle around and catch them by surprise. Try to bite his tail, if you can.

On it. Slowly, Lithium and Leaf circled around so that they were hovering behind Paul and Jarkor, who were still fighting the fakes. Just as Jarkor managed to bite down on the fake Lithium's leg, shattering the illusion, the real Lithium lunged out from behind the psychic wall, aiming for the purple dragon's tail.

Lithium clamped down on Jarkor's tail, but to her shock her teeth sank right through it as if there was nothing there. Still, Jarkor roared in pain and lashed his tail from side to side until Lithium, confused, let go.

"Jarkor, create a ball of energy to hurtle at them!" Paul yelled, and the dragon instantly obeyed by opening his mouth and starting to form an orb of purplish-black energy. Once the sphere was large enough, Paul made a motion that was the order for Jarkor to release it. Jarkor threw back his head and then chucked the ball of energy at Lithium.

Quick, fly left!

Lithium banked to the left, barely avoiding getting hit by the dark purple orb; her wing almost getting clipped in the process.

Lunge forward to make it look like a direct attack to the throat, but at the last second swing your tail around and hit him.

Lithium grunted but proceeded to attack, beating her wings up and down quickly to propel herself towards Jarkor and Paul. She opened her mouth wide to make it look like she was going to bite the purple beast – causing Paul to yell for him to duck under to avoid the attack – but at the last second she spun around and lashed out with her tail, nailing Jarkor in the stomach.

Said dragon was flung backward, letting out a roar, while his rider held on for dear life. Once Jarkor had righted himself and Paul was safely seated again, the plum-haired boy opened his mouth to issue another command.

"Let out a barrage of shadow-!"

The cry of a dragon cut off Paul, but it was not Lithium or Jarkor that had made the sound. It was a low, pained cry – not the battle cry of an attacking dragon. Leaf, Paul, and their dragons paused to look around.

Professor Alida, as well, was scanning the skies atop Astelia, and quickly spotted the source of the noise. "Oh my!" The professor let out a gasp.

Flying towards the academy (or more specifically, the field where aerial combat class was held) were a pair of dragons, both covered in horrible wounds. Torn wings, gashes oozing blood, and other wounds were just some of the things visible on them from a distance.

"You two, land right now," Professor Alida yelled at Leaf and Paul, and without even having to be told Lithium and Jarkor quickly descended.

"Oh my gosh, what's going on?" May asked, clutching on to Leaf's arm as soon as the brunette was off of her dragon.

"I don't know," Leaf murmured, her eyes locked on the wounded dragons as they came closer. Professor Alida flew up to meet them, and then gently guided them to the ground, where both dragons collapsed.

"Arceus, what happened?" Leaf could hear Professor Alida exclaim loudly, and spotted her helping a girl off of one of the dragons. The girl was a seventh year, and also heavily wounded. She grimaced as the professor lightly touched her arm.

"My partner and I were… Oh gosh… Josh! You have to help him first! He's unconscious right now!" the girl panted, her eyes bright with fear as she struggled to climb back on to her dragon.

"Now, now, dear, calm down. Misty, Paul, get Josh!" Professor Alida said, and the two came forward. They quickly ascended the dragon, and appeared a moment later supporting the boy, "Josh", between them.

"Take him to the medical ward, and fast," Professor Alida murmured after examining Josh once Misty and Paul had gently laid him on the ground. "He's lost a lot of blood, and if he loses much more he's a goner."

Misty and Paul nodded before carefully lifting the boy up again and heading towards the medical ward as fast as they could without worsening Josh's wounds even more. Leaf watched them go as Professor Alida tried to calm the now blubbering girl, who was crying after hearing what the professor had said about her partner.

"Dear, you have to calm down," Professor Alida said softly. "Please tell me what happened."

"M-my p-partner and I…we were…coming back from mission…ambushed…s-soldiers," she sobbed. "I-it was near the academy, j-just over there." She pointed towards the forest to the west of the academy, not far from where the magical barrier was located around the school. "T-they can out of nowhere…we…we couldn't…"

"There, there, that's enough," Professor Alida soothed. "Thank you." She looked up. "Leaf, can you escort her to the medical ward? It wouldn't be good if any of her wounds got infected."

Leaf nodded and silently pulled her arm out of May's grip, who had a completely horrified expression on her face after watching everything that had just occurred in front of her. The green-eyed brunette took the girl from Professor Alida, and slowly began to walk with her towards the medical ward.

As she supported the sobbing girl, Leaf wondered why the king's soldiers would be so close to the camp. Sure, the magical barrier prevented them from actually finding the academy, but what if they knew it was here?

What would that mean for the academy?

Okay, so that was chapter 4, in which Gary gets beat up by girls twice and can't start a fire, Apheleia and I can't make up a stupid question for Dawn to ask, Leaf and Paul fight in an aerial battle, and S*** GETS SERIOUS.

Thanks for reading a please drop a review below, if you could. ;)

(Oh, and also, sorry for there not being any Contestshipping in this chapter at all you guys, but when I was writing I noticed that on the class schedules for the characters that Apheleia made, May and Drew weren't in ANY classes together! D: Next chapter will have some, I promise!)

-AquaStarlight