Chapter 4

Juuban high loomed only slightly higher then the surrounding buildings, but stuck out like a sore thumb to Usagi Tsukino. The bane of her very existence and she was sure, created with the sole purpose of torturing students.

She pushed sweaty silver blond hair off her forehead and paused only long enough to straighten her non-descript white school blouse before entering the classroom. Her tardy entrance didn't interrupt the flow of learning as each and every student had attended school with Usagi since babyhood and was quite used to her entrances. Haruna-sensei simply shot her the mandatory you have detention look and held out her hand for Usagis unfinished homework assignment.

Usagi spared a small smile for Naru and silenced a groan as she slid into her seat. If only she hadn't stopped to pet that strange cat this morning. The darn thing had followed her all the way to the school. She pursed her lips slightly; there had been something not quiet right about that cats eyes. They had pulled at her like quicksand and she was sure that if she had looked only a little deeper she would have discovered some hidden secret. Don't be silly Usagi. She mentally berated her self. It had been a simple cat. So what if it had had unusual sad eyes that had made her heart ache.

Naru jabbed at her from behind with a pencil, a clear warning to pay attention. Usagi sat up straight and looked to the front of the room where Hauna-sensei was introducing a new student. She perked up immediately. They hadn't had a new student in ages and now in the space of two weeks they had enrolled two of them, and both in the same grade! The small petite girl had the strangest bob of blue hair that she was tucking in a precise movement behind her ear. She stood uncertainly in the front of the room and seemed to wilt under the teacher's praise of her scholastic achievements. Mizuna Ami had apparently been the top student at Mugen Delta High before she moved districts. Having stellar grades wasn't a great mark for the girl in Usagis book, but never being one to turn down an opportunity to make a new friend she enthusiastically waved her hand when Haruna-sensai asked for a volunteer guide.

Haruna let out a small sigh when Usagi jumped up and waved her hand. Tsukino was a horrible student barring none, but the girl had a way about her that drew people like moths to a bright flame. Hoping that the Mizuno-san would be a good influence on the wayward student she directed her to take the unoccupied seat to Usagis left.

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Ami sighed in exasperation when she saw that the girl with the strange hairstyle was making a beeline toward her. Honestly, all day long where ever Ami looked she was there. At lunch she had plopped down next to her and talked nonstop. During class she whispered comments about Haruna sensei's love life. Now, she was waving a cheery hand high above her head.

" Ami-chan! I'm heading to the arcade; did you want to come with me?"

Ami felt her fingers grasped in a warm hand and found her self gazing into big soft puppy dog eyes.

The blue haired genius found herself for the first time in her life, at a loss for words.

"I mean, we don't have to, if you'd rather go somewhere else we can do that." Usagi smiled.

Ami wasn't being rude, and she certainly wasn't ignoring this strange bubbly girl in front of her. The simple fact was that Ami had never really had a friend before, and the idea that this girl wanted to be hers was something she wasn't able to wrap her mind around.

Certainly children had claimed to be her friend before, but those cruel imitations had usually ended in heartbreak. Her repeated refusal to give them the answers to school questions had cast her as a snob, and her supposed friends had taken to taunting her in retaliation. Rather then go thru the downward cycle with every new school her mother enrolled her in, she withdrew into herself, preferring to spend her time with items that couldn't hurt or wound.

So it came as an extreme shock when the blonde squeezed her hand and a warm feeling seeped from Usagis palm to hers. Her heart niggled for her to take the invitation, and after searching those big blue eyes and finding no hint of deception in their depths she relented and hesitantly squeezed back.

Usagi was so excited that she talked animatedly the entire way to the arcade. Ami couldn't get a word in edgewise, not that she wanted too. The warm feeling that had begun at the handclasp had continued and seemed to hover around her like a cloak. So far she had learned all about Usagis family, her best friend Naru, Haruna-senseis' unfair detentions after school….Ami jerked as if struck. School. Oh no.

"Usagi-san!"

Usagi tuned back and blushed.

"Ami-chan? I'm sorry, I was talking so much and I didn't let you say anything. How about you tell me all about your family. I bet they're all as brilliant as you are!" She walked back and grasped Amis hand intending to pull her along again.

" No, that's not…I mean, I forgot about cram school! I'm going to be late!"

Usagi frowned, unsure of why Ami was so upset, but knowing that it was obviously important to her.

" All right, we can go to the arcade tomorrow!" She grinned with inspiration.

A good ten minutes later when Ami slid into her seat in cram school she wore a foreign object on her face. A sunny smile graced her small lips, permanently stuck there from the moment she had glanced at her hand and seen Usagi's phone number written there in bright blue ink. In fact she was so giddy about it that she failed to notice the strange humming noise that started when she slipped the mandatory memory card into her drive, or when her eyes closed of her own accord slipping her into peaceful darkness.

It was the strange clicking noise that woke her. She groaned and tried to pull her pillow over her head to muffle the sound. When her hand encountered hard metal instead of soft feather tick she groaned and raised her head. Her bleary eyes took in familiar objects. Computers, blackboard, a youma sucking life energy out of a student….definitely not familiar. The sleepy feeling completely gone, Ami stood up. Sensing fresh prey, pale yellow eyes focused on her. Now Ami was a smart girl, noting that there was no one around to help and having already calculated that she would never make it to the door she did the only thing left to do. Her piercing shriek didn't slow the youma down a bit. In no time she was pinned to a desk trying desperately to draw breath thru a windpipe that was slowly being crushed by a slimy green tentacle. Helpless she gazed around the room, her brain hurriedly going thru each scenario looking for escape.

Every student in the room was out cold, some had an ashen tone to their skin she recognized dazedly from her many trips to the hospital. They were the ones too far gone to save. She cried out as energy stared to be sucked from her body, a black shadow growing at the ends of her vision. Clawing desperately at her throat she spotted a blue number 5 on her hand. She thought back to that warm feeling Usagi gave her and felt anger swell like a hot balloon inside her. Not now, she wasn't going to go quietly when she had just found something so precious.

She struggled back bringing all her anger into it. She felt a comforting cold start at her fingertips and work up her body. She didn't think to refuse it, it was familiar to her, and she embraced it. Suddenly a burning sensation flared on her forehead and lit the room a soft blue as her transformation took her. She dug her now gloved fingers into the offending appendage and watched with satisfaction as it broke into millions of icy particles. Screaming in pain it reared back ward allowing her enough room to flip backwards into a fighting stance.

Pulling the strange energy around her she allowed her instincts to take over and smirked as she formed a solid spear of ice. This was definitely going to hurt. Thrusting straight thru the eye of the youma and out the other side the deadly weapon took both its life and the stolen energy it had raped from the helpless students.

"Well played sister."

Deftly forming another spear Ami rounded on the intruder.

Please let me know how its going. C.W.