Synopsis: There are five people who sit at a table at lunch. They're an odd combination of a Finnish Elf, a Swedish Werewolf, Peter the Water Elemental, Lukas the Necromancer and Mathias the Regenerator. No one questions why they sit together, but one day, questions are fired around like the ball in a pinball machine. There's a sixth member of their little group.

Alfred's POV

We were all at lunch. You'd think that people would sit together if they hung around each other a lot, like Arthur, Lukas and Vlad, the BTT or Ivan and his squad. That really wasn't the case though.

"Hey dudes! They had enough chips for me this week!" I dropped my tray in my usual seat between Arthur and Yao. It was a weird combination and we had nothing in common, besides a mutual hatred of each other, but our table wasn't even the weirdest. Kiku sat with Gilbert of all people, as well as the Italian twins. Ivan's sisters sat with Eddie, Ravis, Toris and Feliks, even though Natalya shot us death glares every few minutes. Elizabeta sat with Vladimir, the prissy Austrian and Mogens. She didn't even like half of the people at her table, yet they still sat together!

"Hey Artie?"

"It's Arthur, and yes?" Arthur didn't even look up from his book, besides to occasionally bite into his scone.

"Why do we all sit like this?"

"Well in polite society, most people sit on chairs at tables, unless you're Japanese, in-"

"Smartass. I meant, why do we sit in these groups?"

"It depends on who you know Américain. See, I was 'ere before Arthur, and I showed 'im around, Arthur showed you and Yao ze ropes and then Yao introduced Ivan to ze system. It is ze same for everyone else." That did make sense. People usually stuck to people they were familiar with around here and their life could easily be on the line if they messed with the way it all worked. As soon as I thought about it, the cogs in my head started whirring. What would happen if I sat with Kiku right now? What if I had never met Arthur? What if Ivan had been here before me and shown me around?

I finished lunch and headed over to the changing rooms; we had a soccer/ football/ whatever the heck they call it here match next week.

"Hey there Feli, Gilbert. How's it going?" Gilbert was our star defender. His usual attitude would make you assume he was more fitting of a more forward role, but that's why we had Feli. His striking skills were amazing.

"Ve~! I'm-a good grazie! And-a you? Is Arthur coming too?"

"I'm cool thanks Feli! Yeah, Artie's just a seriously slow eater!" The three of us laughed between us and caught up with the other players- including Ivan, Elizabeta and Matthias- as we strolled along to the pitch.

"Hey, Gil, stop flirting with Eliza, you're with Roderich now!" Gil scowled at me.

"You're totally unawesome! I wasn't flirting!"

"When do you think I can make some more pasta?"

"Fucking wanker! I told you to wait for me!"

"Become one with mother Russia?"

"Do you think Lukas saw me do that backflip off the second floor?"

After practice (and being forced into the shower), I headed back up to my room to finish off some last minute homework. Luckily, I only had Physics between lunch and dinner, which was one of my favourites, so I could hang in my room for the whole afternoon! I threw my (new) backpack into the corner of the room, before retrieving it again to fish out my crumpled homework sheets. Not even fifteen minutes later, Mattie slunk in. I didn't even notice that he was there until he coughed to get my attention.

"Fuck!" I screeched, whipping my head around, "I- Hey Mattie. What's up?"

"I was trying to get your attention when you got back from practice." Matthew said with a sigh. "Mathias wanted to talk to you." I was somewhat glad to see that Matthew wasn't quite as uneasy as he usually was.

"What's put you in such a good mood?" I said with a grin. "Got a boyfriend or something?" I was only teasing, but Matthew's face went a dark red as he spluttered. "Shit man I wasn't serious! Tell me, who is he?"

"She," Matthew corrected. "Her name is Katyusha. She's Ivan's younger sister. Not the ghost."

"The one with the big- Ah." I coughed as Matthew glared at me.

"Yes, Alfred." He said icily. "Are you finished?" He wasn't... That angry. Quite pissed, but not as mad as I had seen him before.

"Where am I meeting Mathias anyway?" I asked hurriedly. I sort of valued my life.

"On the roof, I think he said." Matthew said with a sigh, before disappearing. I groaned internally. Mathias being on the roof was never a good thing, seeing how often he liked showing off and breaking everything. Don't get me wrong, it was epic the first few times, but when he started doing it like, every other day, the novelty wore off. As I made my way onto the roof, I saw that he was attempting the knife game.

"Mathias dude, you need to stop like seriously." He looked up at my voice, narrowly missing his finger as he stabbed the knife down. "What did you want to talk about?"

"Waitin' for someone else too, then I'll tell you." He said with a grin, just as the door behind be burst open and a rather out of breath albino emerged.

"Making out with Roddy?" I asked, faux innocently.

"Yeah, actually, so what did you want Mat?" He asked, folding his arms with a huff. Before Mat could respond, however, my phone rang. I blinked in slight confusion, pulling it out. No one called me, especially now that the whole messaging system was in place.

"Yo! Alfred F. Jones. Who's speaking?" I hadn't recognised the caller ID, but I did recognise the voice.

"Alfred you know how I'm like, the Queen of Gossip?"

"Yes Feliks?"

"Okay so like, I need to speak to you. Like now. Library." I raised an eyebrow and, before I could respond, Feliks had hung up.

"That was weird," I mumbled, putting the phone back into my blazer pocket. "What was up Mat? I think I have to go again soon." Mathias looked crestfallen for a brief moment, but it was gone before I could tell what was going through his head.

"Nah man, go meet Feliks. It isn't that important." I nodded, before dashing back down the fire escape to the library.

When I finally got there (I got lost again), Feliks looked like he was about to scream at me for taking so long, but composed himself enough to usher me over and not get us both kicked out by the librarian. As soon as I sat down, a list was thrust into my hands.

Ivan's Squad:

- Natalya

- Katyusha

- Ravis

- Eduard

- Toris - Bae

- Feliks (The queen)

The White Flag Table:

- Feliciano

- Lovino

- Kiku

- Gilbert

- Ludwig (At dinner)

Al's Table:

- Alfred

- Arthur

- Francis

- Ivan

- Yao

- Mattie

Vash's Table:

- Vash

Eliza's Table:

- Elizabeta

- Roderich

- Bella

- Mogens

- Vladimir

- Vlad's little brother(?)

- Antonio

The Fucking Cold Table:

- Tino

- Berwald

- Lukas

- Peter

- Matthias

Sadiq's Table:

- Sadiq

- Heracles

- That Quiet Egyptian Kid

"It's a list?" I asked, confused.

"A list of where everyone sits," Feliks corrected. "But tonight we're expecting a new student."

"We are? Why don't we get told about any of this?" Feliks smirked at me, before glancing around the room.

"We don't," he said in a low voice, "I asked Eddie to hack into the school database." I wanted to say that that was surprising or morally wrong. Really, I did, but it didn't come as a surprise at all.

"So who is this new student?"

"That's the problem!" Feliks exclaimed. "Ed was like, cut out of the system before he could find a name, so someone with techie skills is behind this." I said nothing, mulling over who it could be. Arthur didn't even trust the Internet and Francis was petrified of his own phone, so both of them were out. There was just no chance of it being Mattie, Ivan or Yao...

"I don't reckon it's anyone on my table," I said, still thinking, "and I don't think the answer to this is 42." Feliks shot me a confused-meets-exasperated look and stormed off in a dramatic, glittery and grand exit.

Mathias' POV

All I wanted was for Lukas to notice me.

You really wouldn't expect it to be that hard, considering I literally threw myself off the second (or was it third?) floor (a crazy stunt, even in my books), but I might as well have been a ghost to him. When he did notice me, it usually resulted in injury and insult added to it. It was tragic, really, like that story they made us read in English way back in eighth grade. Not Romeo and Juliet, that would be awful, but probably a Shakespearian tragedy.

Oh the irony in my own words. I might as well have been a ghost to him. If only that were the case! After all, he dated Matthew, who was definitely not alive. Perhaps if I were a ghost, he'd finally realise how much I like him.

"Mr Køhler?" There we go. The day went from mope-filled to terrible. I forced a grin on my face.

"What's up Dr Beilschmidt?" Gilbert's dad examined me with narrowed eyes as a fidgeted under his glare. I had no idea how Gilbert and Ludwig survived for this long, because this man was terrifying. He didn't actually say anything (I had mixed opinions on whether that was a good thing or not), but beckoned me into the Infirmary.

"You aren't yourself," he muttered once we were out of the way of prying werewolves. Busying himself with shuffling papers and various medical paraphernalia, he continued. "Something's wrong with you." Curse the old man and his uncanny ability to diagnose everything! I felt my shoulders slump in defeat. How did I explain my unrequited love tragedy without being absolutely mortified?

"Ah, well," I began, not entirely sure where I was going with my sentence, "you see, Lukas' brother-" I saw something flash in his eyes, but he said nothing, "-is starting school here today." Dr Beilschmidt paused for a moment, fingers tapping a rhythm on the desk.

"You're worried that Lukas will ignore you?" Bless his heart for not reminding me that Lukas ignored me already.

"Yeah, I guess." Honestly, this was a little bizarre, but Dr Beilschmidt was probably one of the most approachable teachers, despite coming across like Professor Snape. "I know his brother, he's sort of..." How does one describe Emil? "It isn't Emil, really; he's a bit of a hipster wannabe but he's alright. It's the fact that Lukas has a major big brother complex. He'd get along well with Natalya." I wondered how exactly they hadn't met and discussed their siblings yet, but brushed that thought away quickly. Stupid ADHD was distracting me again.

"It seems to me that you want to be in Emil's position," Gilbert's dad said, a rather alarming smirk forming on his face. Sending up a quick prayer to whatever deity was out there, I slowly nodded.

"I suppose so, but Lukas seems to forget that I'm there or get annoyed at me," I whined.

"I suppose there might be a way to get close to Lukas..." he mused. I was really starting to worry because that smile wasn't one I wanted to be on the receiving end of; it was scarier than his scowl. "You have to get close to Emil, I'd say. If you're always with Emil, he'll talk about you to his brother." That actually seemed like a plan that could work. Surprised, I was about to thank him, when Antonio was rushed in, supported by the other members of his pack.

"Lovino broke his nose!" Francis supplied cheerfully. Taking that as my cue to leave, I nodded to Dr Beilschmidt and crept out, deep in thought.

Emil's POV

Lukas' school was weird. There were strange people who were alarmingly loud; the subjects weren't useful or interesting at all and Lukas had stolen my phone and set my name as 'Lillebror' and I couldn't change it. To top it all off, the only people I knew here were friends of my brother and they all treated me like a kid.

I'm only three years younger than Lukas!

After finally shaking my brother off my tail, I began moping around the school. The uniform was stiff; the blazer was too tight around my shoulders but it was too long, and the black trousers had already gotten covered in little white hairs because the boy on the plane with me, Leon, had somehow managed to smuggle a cat on with him.

So no, today was not a good day.

I was minding my own business, thumbing through a worn out copy of The Aeneid, when I literally crashed into someone in the most cliched way possible. I almost lost my glasses, but when I looked up, I almost did a double take.

"Mathias?"

"Hey Emil!" he said with a grin, offering me a hand up. "Isn't Lukas around somewhere?" Deflating slightly, I shrugged. Of course he only wanted to talk to my brother.

"Lost him a while back," I muttered, pushing my glasses up. What surprised me though was when he grabbed my arm, still smiling.

"Has he given you a tour yet?" he asked. "If not, I'd be happy to show you around!"

"-and then he showed me around the whole school!" I exclaimed to my brother, who was sitting cross legged on my bed, listening intently. "He even taught me all of the tricks, like the secret room off the third floor corridor, and the trick step to the kitchen that sets off the alarm!" Lukas seemed vaguely perturbed, but that was the only shift in his expression that I could see.

"Mathias Køhler?" he murmured, more to himself than to me, but I nodded regardless.

"He asked a lot about you. He's just as clingy as I remember," I grumbled. Despite being glad that someone finally wanted to spend time with me, Mathias so obviously wanted to get into Lukas' pants that it wasn't funny. "You should go out with him." I finally said.

"What?" Lukas said, just after inhaling sharply. I almost snorted at how horribly cliched this was. It was so going on Tumblr.

"You heard me," I said with a roll of my eyes. "He's wanted to date you since you were both in middle school. Give him a chance, at least." I was practically holding my breath as I watched Lukas' expression morph from disbelief to clarity.

"He was being serious?" he eventually blurted out.

"Oh my god you're all stupid."

Alfred's POV

From: HERO_

To: TwinkleTwinkleI'mTheQueen

Two new students dude! Emil, Lukas' little brother, and Leon, Yao's adopted brother. You owe me!

Nodding happily, I tucked my phone away into my pocket and headed down for dinner, where I noted some confused looks towards the Nordic table.

"So Mathias finally manned up, huh?" I muttered to myself.

"Not quite," Vlad said from behind me. "Looks like Lukie asked him out. I'm not complaining, he needs to get laid." The new student, Emil, looked somewhat content (if a permanently angry scowl could be considered 'content') as he picked at the salmon on his plate while Peter talking his ear off. All in all, I considered this to be a good day. Mattie had a girlfriend, Lukas had a boyfriend, and they were on friendly terms still, which was great.

After exchanging a nod with Feliks, it seemed that Phase Two could begin.

Okay I am so sorry that this took so long. I have no reasonable excuse, although I will claim exam amnesty. Hope you enjoyed, and my apologies for not actually sticking to anything I propose to!