School Daze
By Raindrops28
Chapter 9: Mizore, part 2
"Huh…looks like we'll be late again."
The student besides the speaker nodded, then began looking around as a noise drifted past him.
"What's that?"
The other boy paused, looking around, before speaking.
"Sounds like someone's crying." No sooner than he spoke, did the boy spot a another student, curled into a ball, but obviously female, crumpled on the ground, clearly the source of the crying.
"Do you want any help?" The boy continued, oblivious to the other student's mutter of "Hey, she's cute…"
"…y're noyin'…" Muttered the girl, standing up, a book falling to the ground, unnoticed.
The boys did not have time to respond to this, as, suddenly, large claws of ice protruded from the girl's arm, capturing them instantly.
Wailing, the girl turned her back to the ice-encased students.
XXXTHISISAPAGEBREAKXXX
"You want us to check on Mizore?" Ichigo asked glancing down at Nekonome-sensei, who nodded.
"Yes," Nekonome continued, her 'ears' twitching, "I know you said you were going to visit Shirayuki-san in the hospital…but she snuck out last night, so you won't find her there."
Behind Ichigo Moka gasped softly. She had been intending to join Ichigo so she could apologize for other self's actions – she too, had felt Ura-chan had gone a little too far in stopping Mizore.
Ichigo's scowl intensified at Nekonome's statement, though it was not directed towards her. Youkai academy really needed to star caring about the safety of its students more, if one as injured as Mizore could just waltz out of the infirmary.
"I think she may have just gone back to her dorm…so, Ichigo-kun, could you drag her back to the hospital?"
As Ichigo nodded, Nekonome-sensei wrote down Mizore's dorm number on a piece of paper, twitching when she remarked it was expected of him as the class manager.
"Do you have a minute, Nekonome-sensei?"
Ichigo glanced up at the gym teacher, Kotsubo, suddenly brushed past them without glancing in their direction.
"I want to talk to you about Shirayuki…"
As Moka gasped in surprised, Ichigo took to staring stonily at the teacher's back as he explained the reason for his interruption – he wanted Mizore expelled. Ichigo's eyes narrowed.
Kotsubo's story…didn't make sense. Being incased in ice would not result in the injuries Kotsubo was describing, and Mizore wasn't the type to ruthlessly beat someone up and then seal them in ice – she would simply incase them from the start or not all.
Ichigo was surprised when Ririko-sensei, the math teacher, spied and cornered them after they walked away from the pair. What she said, however…was even more of a surprise.
"So Kotsubo has a thing for expelling students, huh?" Ichigo muttered, ignoring the woman's praises on his school work (he'd already learned what she was going over, so it was easy enough for him). And he had a thing for high school girls too….
Moka looked at him, curious about the muter, but didn't speak.
XXXTHISISAPAGEBREAKXXX
"EHHH?!" Was Kurumu's initial reaction to the news while Ichigo calmly walked towards the female dorm rooms.
Kurumu continued talking rather loudly, as Yukari, in her usual bluntness said Mizore has naturally attacked because Ichigo had rejected her. Ichigo was not paying attention, however.
Noticing his silence, Kurumu looked up from where she was arguing with Yukari, and asked what was wrong.
"There's something else going on here than Mizore just being upset." Was his only answer, as Ichigo returned to staring moodily in front of him.
To everyone's surprise, Tsukune nodded.
"Yeah…That girl…I think she's really lonely …but I don't think she'd do something like that."
A new, but familiar voice, interpreted them.
"Whether you believe it or not, I'm certain she did it."
"Kotsubo-sensei!"
Ichigo's scowl darkened considerably at his arrival. While the others seemed horrified, but believing of Kostubo's explanations – that her notebook had been found near the boys, that she had been suspended for trying to start a relationship with a teacher – that just so happened to be him. Ichigo however, was not buying any of Kotsubo's bullshit.
Leaning down to pickup Mizore's discarded notebook, Ichigo growled in the back of his throat in anger.
"I-Ichigo? What's wrong?" Moka asked, startled.
"I'm going to find Mizore before he does."
"A-ah but why?" Kurumu asked, also startled by the darkness of Ichigo's tone.
"Why?" Ichigo asked, turning incredulously to them, "What part of that speech didn't make sense to you? "I'll do whatever it takes to release her from this school" he said – he's going to try and attack her!"
Alarmed, Moka and the others did not protest when Ichigo suddenly flashed away, intent on making sure Kostubo did not make it to Mizore's dorm.
XXXTHISISAPAGEBREAKXXX
Ichigo rapped firmly on Mizore's door, and was unsurprised when she did not respond.
"Mizore…it's me, Ichigo." When he still did not hear any sounds of movement, despite the fact he could feel her reiatsu in the room, Ichigo sighed but continued. "I wanted to give you back your notebook, you dropped it."
Ichigo paused a moment before continuing.
"I wanted to say…that I'm sorry you got so hurt yesterday. I wasn't able to warn Moka before he attacked you…she wants to apologize to you too, if you want to hear her out."
Mizore remained stubbornly silent. Ichigo sighed, rubbing a hand through his hair.
"Mizore…I understand that you're still hurting from Kotsubo," Mizore gasp was so silent not even Ichigo picked up on it, "and that I hurt your feelings too, yesterday, but Kotsubo…he's really out to get you. He's trying to expel you because of some bullshit story of you attacking some soccer club members…"
Mizore's eyes widened.
Ice suddenly exploded from behind the door, but Ichigo did not even flinch, knowing Mizore wasn't intent on harming him. Mizore's wide eyes meet Ichigo's calm ones.
"Kotsubo wants to expel you, but I don't think he's going to stop there – and I think you know that too, Mizore."
Mizore twitched, but took Ichigo's outstretched hand.
XXXTHISISAPAGEBREAKXXX
Mizore spoke slowly, but Ichigo knew it was more of surprise that someone was hearing her out, than trying to buy time to figure out a convincing lie. Walking alongside the cliffs of Youkai academy, Mizore seemed to be automatically walking towards her favorite cliff in the area, where she went whenever she was feeling upset – which was quite often.
Along the way Mizore explained that while she had frozen the soccer players, she had immediately unfrozen them, as her powers tended to lash out on their own whenever her emotions where high. She also told him the truth about Kotsubo, she had approached him earlier in the year – but she had not been rejected. Instead Kotsubo had been readily accepting of the idea – too accepting. He had only wanted one thing, and Mizore had refused to give it him, so she had attacked, beating him soundly, and retreating to her rooms, she refused to attend school from that day on, fearful of what Kotsubo would try to do to her if they encountered each other again.
"I see. I thought it was something like that, Ririko-sensei had warned us about him." Mizore looked up, shocked that her words were being accepted so easily. Ichigo continued, " I''m going to do my best to get him off your back and clear your name…"
"And how do you expect to do that, Kurosaki Ichigo?"
Both of them spun around, shocked, as Kotsubo walked out from behind the tree he'd been hiding in.
"As usual, you come to this place when you're depressed, Shirayuki." Kotsubo smirked, delighting in the fearful step backwards Mizore took. "As for you, Kurosaki…I was planning on not bothering with you, but since the stupid bitch's spilled everything to you, I can't have you going and spreading it around, now can I?"
That was enough of a declaration of intent for Ichigo, who, not wasting time by speaking, immediate used bringer light to flash over where he was standing, and unhesitatingly throwing a right hook straight into Kotsubo's face.
It connected perfectly, propelling Kostubo away from Mizore and over the edge of the cliff. As Mizore gasped in shock, Ichigo marched confidently over the edge, fairly sure that the fall did not kill Kotsubo, as a youkai, he would likely to have managed to grab onto something, stopping the fall.
Ichigo's hunch was correct, glancing over the edge Ichigo could see Kotsubo clutching an outreach of rock, and snorting, turned to tell Mizore of this, only to be caught by surprise when a large tentacle suddenly shot up, grabbing diffidently onto Ichigo.
Grunting Ichigo glanced back down, and was surprised to see it was Kotsubo, who now had several large octopus-like tentacles protruding form his back.
As Kotsubo proudly announced himself to be a kracken, and his plan to make it seem like they had died tripping off the edge of the cliff, Ichigo was distracted by a shout.
"Ichigo-san!"
It was Tsukune, Kurumu and Yukari, having finally some to their senses and found Ichigo. Kotsubo tsked, muttering about how he'd have to take care of them too now, and Ichigo scowled. It was Kotsubo's only warning.
Activating his fullbring, Ichigo reached down, grabbing Kotsubo's tentacle arm, and hoisted him up.
"Wh-what are doing?!" Kotsubo screamed, suddenly finding himself being hoisted up and off the cliff.
"Deciding that he didn't exactly need or deserve an answer, Ichigo said nothing, but raised his fist. Bringing it down, Ichigo hit Kotsubo's chest square on, forcing Kotsubo's grip on Ichigo to disappear, freeing him, and sending Kotsubo pummeling onto the nearby tree that he'd been hiding behind, destroying it, and leaving him unconscious.
Everyone else could only blink as Ichigo released his fullbring.
XXXTHISISAPAGEBREAKXXX
Kotsubo had to be excused from work for two weeks, giving the newspaper club more than enough time to prove Mizore's innocence to the staff. Mizore's expulsion was reversed, and Kotsubo was fired.
Things changed further for Mizore as well.
After Ichigo had defeated Kotsubo, telling Mizore simply that she was now safe from him, Mizore had been unable to hold back her emotions, and had burst out in tears. Ichigo had stared in shock, and before he could think of what to do, Kurumu displayed exactly how much she had changed.
Quickly deducing that there had been some unwanted advances on part of the Kotsubo if Ichigo had just finished handing his ass to him, Kurmu ran up towards Mizore, quickly engulfing her into a hug. As Ichigo (and everyone else) started in shock, Kurumu began murmuring softly in her ear, succeeding in calming her slightly.
Ichigo, blinking, decided to leave the job of cheering Mizore up to Kurumu, and motion for the others to follow him as he hauled Kotsubo to the infirmary, deciding they should have a little privacy.
Since then, Mizore seemed to be recovering form her depression, little by little. She still stayed in her stalking tendencies, the physical separation a long used to comfort, but Ichigo made a point to try and include her in conversations.
Kururmu had pulled some strings, and had somehow managed to get Mizore as her dorm mate, and seemed to be making a concentrated effort to help the awkward girl adjust to having friends.
Their efforts seemed to be making progress though, as Ichigo noticed the physical distance Mizore tended to keep between her and anyone else was lessening, and she smiled more often.
Grinning, Ichigo thought that things might be looking up at Youkai Academy.
AN: Well, that's it people. The next posts will take you to the end of the fic.
So far Nozomi Higurashi and imran102 have expressed desire to continue this fic, so be on the look-out for them!