- Chapter 9

I stood staring at the bodies of four bandits. I killed them. The thought rang in my head, deep in my subconscious I knew that I hadn't really killed them, because it hadn't been me who actually was in control.

The man wiped a trail of blood off my lip. "Lucky shot." he mumbled as he stared at the latest dead bandit. That one had gotten a hit in, and it was a hard one. His attention turned to the fifth and final bandit.

The poor man was literally paralyzed with fear. "Please... don't."

I felt him shift the sword in my hand as he stepped towards him, "Give me a reason why I shouldn't."

Don't.

"What?"

You heard me, don't. Don't kill this one.

He sheathed the sword, "Consider yourself lucky."

The man breath a sigh of utter relief, "Thank you. Thank you so much!"

I made my hand remove the exsphere from my other hand, I walked over to the bandit, he cowered on fear. "Come on, he's gone now. You're safe."

"He?"

I laughed, "When I put on my exsphere the mana from the person it used to be sort of takes over my body." I held out my hand.

The bandit looked at me like I was insane. "Used to be?" He took my hand and I pulled him up.

"It's hard to explain, but go now. Shoo, I'm gonna need to put my exshpere back on and you won't want to be around when I do." The bandit nodded and ran for his life. I paused and wondered what that bandit might do with his new found will to live, he was a half-elf so he obviously wasn't going to be able to do much that's for sure.

After he was out of sight I put my exshpere back on. "What the hell lady?" He demanded as the mana flowed, "Why didn't you let me kill him?"

I scoffed, Did you see his face? He was completely terrified of you!

"So? He was a bandit, and on top of that he was a half-elf!" He picked up my back pack. I forced him to walk toward Sybak.

Just because he's a half-elf doesn't mean he's evil. I said stubbornly, After all there are some nice half-elves in the world.

"You mean like the ones that tore me away from my family?"

Well... I never said they were all good. I sighed, You know, here we are fighting, and I don't even know your name.

"Bates."

I laughed, Bates? Really? That's your name?

"Yes it's my name, and I like it so shut the hell up."

No need to be rude. I said to him, my name's Michi- Thursday, My name is Thursday.

"Oh, I see how it is, you make fun of my name being Bates when your name is Thursday."

Hey! There's absolutely nothing wrong with the name Thursday! Besides, I know an awesome book character named Thursday. I defended. But I guess there are a few good characters named Bates.

"Now that we've gotten that over with how about we just walk in silence?"

Agreed. I said as he continued walking.

And we kept walking until dawn. I finally removed the exsphere- no, Bates, from my hand. I stared at the tiny gem. "Bates... You sir, are a very odd man." I said as I slipped him back into the bag on my necklace. I plopped down on the grassy knoll and stretched looking at the sky.

"Ok, so after I take a nap, I arrive at the grand Tethe'alla bridge, then it'll be about another day before I reach Sybak, then I have a day to get settled before classes start."

It was a dreamless sleep. And the walk after that wasn't much better. The next two days went without incident. I never required Bates assistants for the small monsters I got attacked by, though I never killed them, an arrow or two near or in one of the legs and they would run off. I could imagine what Bates would say, he would call me weak.

I arrived in Sybak on schedule. The dean was over joyed to see me, he offered to show me around the school, I politely declined. Still he wouldn't have any of it, the dean called over a young boy. "This is Aster, I believe he's in your fourth class."

I looked at Aster in awe. He had spikey sand blond hair, blue eyes, and wore a large lab coat over khaki shorts and an off green shirt. But that's not what had me so surprised. The reason I was surprised was because Aster couldn't have been more than 14 years old!

"Hello." He said holding his hand out to me.

I shook it, "Hi."

"I would like you to show miss... Miss..." The dean looked at me.

"Michiko, just Michiko."

"Miss Michiko around the school."

"Right." He said as he started walking towards a building. "Come on, I'll show you your class rooms first."

The next two hours were dedicated to Aster showing me the various class rooms on campus. Then Aster said suddenly, "Oh, you know what, I think I'll show you the basement as well, I need to get some research notes anyway."

I only realized my mistake by the time we'd already gotten down to the basement. I remembered that the basement is where they kept the half-elves, and half-elves can read mana signatures. I cursed myself.

We entered the basement labs, and I must say that they are way bigger in real life than they are in the game, as apposed to one room they were actually several small rooms connected by door less frames. "Richter." Aster called, "Hey Richter!"

Some of the half-elves stirred from the work they were doing, few actually looked up, and when they did their eyes locked on me. Aster moved through the small room, I stayed planted on the stairs. I saw a red haired man walk into the lab from another, "Aster?"

"Ah!" Aster lit up, "Richter, I came down to get the research notes I asked you to finish."

"Of course." Richter disappeared into the other lab and reappeared a few seconds later with some papers in his hands. "Here they are."

Aster took them, "Thanks. Oh and there's someone I'd like you to meet," He turned and saw me still on the stairs, "Michiko," he said with a questioning tone, "Why are you still on the stairs?"

I thought of something fast. "I have an irrational fear of places underground." I stepped up a step to try and get out of the eye sight of some of the half-elves.

"What?" I could tell by his voice that he wasn't buying it.

"Aster, Please don't ask. Can we just go?" I bravely walked down and over to him. "Please?"

"Just a sec. Michiko, this is Richter. Richter, this is Michiko."

I looked up into Richter's eyes, and then got lost. They were just, green, but there was so much sadness in those eyes. "Hi..." My voice seemed to fail me.

Richter looked a little shocked. "You..."

I snapped out of his eyes, and turned to Aster. "Can we go now?"

I saw Aster's eyes shift between me and and Richter, then for the first time he actually looked at the other half-elves. "Michiko?"

"Please Aster."

The sandy blond 14 year old nodded. "Right, I think the dorms are next." we exited, though I paused at the top of the stairs to glance back at the labs. I really had nothing against the half-elves, it's just I couldn't have them telling anyone about my being manaless.

We walked to the dorms in silence. When we got there Aster showed me to my room. It was actually very nice. The walls were a nice red color, the bed was very large and very soft, there was a wardrobe as opposed to the small dresser I had seen in other rooms students had. I chalked this all up to Zelos's influence working it's magic.

"Well," I said to Aster as I stepped out of the dorms, "it's not as bad as I originally thought."

As the last word escaped my lips two blond haired twins entered the school grounds, my jaw dropped in recognition, I mean sure there were obvious differences like the girl was wearing a lab coat over a red dress, and the boy wasn't wearing a red military uniform, but there they were none the less.

"Who are they?" I whispered to Aster.

"Them? Those are the Ashford twins, they think they own the place."

"Ashford? Oh god. Tell me their names aren't Alexia and Alfred?"

"You know them?"

I groaned, Why? Why them? I prayed that they weren't like their Resident Evil counter parts. "They maybe different people, but I do know a set of twins named Alexia and Alfred Ashford."

Alfred caught sight of us. "Ah! Aster! How nice to see you again!"

My absolute worse nightmare had come true. Yes, it was Alfred Ashford, no, it was not his Resident Evil character. It was moderndayakatsukiman's Alfred, squeaky voice and all.

Aster smiled warmly, "Alfred!" He walked over to him and held out his hand. "It's so nice to see you."

Alfred shook Aster's hand, then turned his attention to me, "And who might this be?"

Aster glanced at me, "Ah, yes. Alfred this is the newest student, Michiko. Michiko, this is Alfred Ashford."

I put on my best smile, "Nice to meet you." I held my hand out to him.

Alfred hesitated, then took it. "Like wise."

His twin sister walked- no, she was so graceful she practically floated- over to us. "Aster." she said.

"Alexia!" He smiled, "You're looking the same as ever."

"Thank you, and," she paused and brushed a strand of her long elegant blond hair with her slender hand so she could get a better look at me, "And you must be the new girl that Annabel can't stop raving about. The Chosen's new pity project."

"I am not Zelos's new pity project."

Alexia and Alfred smiled, "Of course you aren't." She said.

"Aster, I'm going back to my room." I thought of Bates. "And please don't bother me." I walked back to my room, I sighed.

"What a day..." I pulled my necklace out from under my shirt and took the exshpere out of the bag. I had some ground rules to set with Bates.

I attached the exsphere to the back of my hand.

"What?" Bates demanded as soon as he had control.

We arrived. I said. Thought you might like to know. Bates, if this is ever going to work we need to set some ground rules beca-

"I don't give a damn about ground rules! I just want my body back! You have no idea what it's like inside that frickin' gem! At least before you came along I was unaware of my situation!"

It hit me like... well something hard. I realized that I had indeed forgotten to consider how Bates felt. Bates... I'm sorry... I didn't-

"Spare me your pity!"He shouted. "I don't even remember my own sister's name anymore! That's how long I was dormant! My memories are starting to fade away!" Bates was blind with rage. "You're only insulting me with your pit-"

There was a knock on the door. "Michiko, I was wondering if we could see if we have any classes together."

The voice registered to me as Alexia. Oh my god! Bates I'm sorry, but I have to deal with her! I removed Bates from my hand. "Hold on!" I shouted as I hastily shoved the exsphere back into the small bag. I opened the door. "Come in Alexia."

She smiled, "Thank you." Alexia gracefully walked into my room.

I rushed over to a small table in the corner of the room which had all the papers concerning my studies and other such things. I grabbed my class and studies list.

Alexia took my list and started comparing it to hers. According to her I had biological studies with her, the study of psychological problems with Alfred, and studies of summon spirits with Aster.

I was happy about the class with Aster, I could tell that he was sort of like Lloyd, the guy who thought that everything was going to be OK. It was the other two classes I was less than happy about. Biological studies with Alexia? I think Code Veronica taught me enough to know that you DO NOT want Alexia Ashford near several stands of mixable DNA. The study of psychological problems with Alfred? In Code Veronica Alfred WAS a psychological problem. I really wasn't much looking forward to my first day of classes.

A/N: In which the universe delivers for all the action Thursday is getting. If you have no idea what to base Alfred's voice off of watch this: https: /www .youtube .com /user/ moderndayakatsukiman ?feature= g-u#p/c /3DE04F61F58459E4 /0/8yNr4mcrKF0 (Remove spaces). He's in part 2.
If you don't recall, back in Chapter 4 and I quote "I would even put up with the Ashford twins if I could just get some bloody action!" Well Thursday, you just got your wish!
Anyway, Bates, Pick your poison, it's really up to you if it's a Psycho reference or a Clock Tower 2 (3 in japan) reference. And the book character Thursday is named after is Thursday Next, The first book is The Eyre Affair. Look it up yo. See you Thursday (no pun intended).

Anyway, You know the drill! Reveiw!

Your ever willing author,
Kari910