An Attempt at School

Not for the first time, you have to go to school to see if you can manage to keep yourself in it for more than half an hour, so you might wind up able to challenge your mind for a little bit by asking questions to someone who knows the answer.

Unfortunately, a lot of the time, all you do is wind up getting suspended and withdrawing again.

Koenma's getting hopeful. Since you made friends with Yusuke, he figures that Yusuke might be able to help you keep the hell out of trouble. The suggestion is an insult to your will power, but you have to go along with it.

"Kali, calm down!" Yusuke says quietly as you visibly resist the urge to break the neck of the guy sitting behind you. Your knuckles are white, and you swear that you're about to break your own hands with the grip you have on your chair, since you've broken all your pencils. The guy behind you keeps "accidentally" touching your ass with his feet and knees.

"Calm down? I'm calm," you manage to sing in incredibly high, frustrated tones through your teeth. "But he won't be after I crush his eyeballs between my fingers!"

"You're supposed to be avoiding getting in trouble. Which means no attempting to kill anyone. Or fighting. Or arguing. Or hitting the teacher back when he tries to hit you, okay?"

"Fuck that, someone hits me, they're dead meat."

"For the sake of sanity, Kal..."

"Sanity's overrated," you hiss as the teacher comes in and slams something on the desk to quiet you all.

Not that you don't expect it, but a sarcastic remark leaves your mouth slightly louder than you mean for it to.

But how could you resist? He said something so incredibly stupid! Polar bears do not live in the Antarctic. And you didn't mean to make it sound so... rude.

"Stand up, Miss Kali."

"I'm sorry, I won't do it again?"

"Do not disrespect me, stand up."

You hear Yusuke sigh under his breath and see him duck his head. You stand up for sheer annoyance.

"Yeah, what?"

The teacher pulls his fist back and punches you in the jaw. You don't stagger. He, not satisfied with what pain is on your face, takes another swing. You duck it, which only seems to piss him off more. Yusuke stands up and starts to move toward you, but the teacher hits him on the side of the face to knock him back.

"Don't you take those tones with me," the teacher shouts at you.

"Hit me or Yusuke again, and you'll need a screwdriver to pry your teeth out of that desk."

He moves to hit you again, but Yusuke runs up and pulls you back, holding your arms and not letting go.

By now, half the class is on its feet, and the ones that aren't have moved to the back of the room and have decided to sit back down and watch the show. Or avoid it.

"Get off me, Yusuke!" you shout, pulling with a slight pressure forward, but not freeing yourself.

"Kali, please, calm down."

"I'm calm. Which is exactly why you're not on the floor or in that chick's lap and he's not three classrooms away getting emergency medical attention right now."

The teacher, unable to take a hint, approaches you and takes a swing. With Yusuke behind you and holding you still, you can't deflect the blow, so the punch lands on your cheek. It doesn't hurt too badly, and you haven't taken any damage, but you're more pissed off, now, and you always keep your word.

You shed Yusuke's grip on you, jump at the teacher, take him down to his knees, knock his knees away from him, and drive his head, mouth first, into a desk. You stand perfectly still while he tries to get to his feet.

Yusuke grabs your arm. "Kali, we have to go."

"I'm going. You can stay and tell me how many teeth they have to dig out," you growl, prying his hand off your arm and walking out of the room and back to your home.

"Kali got kicked out of school again?!" you hear Botan and Koenma cry from within Koenma's office. "But Yusuke was supposed to prevent that from happening!"

"Well, I guess Yusuke needs to brush up on his calming-Kali-down-skills," Ender answers with a chuckle.

"Oh, no, I was quite calm. I didn't break anything but Mr. Fuck-Face's teeth, and the desk that I rammed his mouth into," you say as you walk into the room. You scratch at your temple as you speak. Koenma puts his head down on his desk. "Better than last time."

"I remember that," Ender said. "What all was it you broke?"

"People-wise, or stuff?"

"Everything."

"Three arms, two legs, eight ribs, twenty-two teeth, seven desks, nine windows, all the lamps. And at least twenty people left pissing blood, or carrying a dislocated limb. Or a friend."

"Oh, yeah. I remember that. That was some carnage. News and everything."

"Yeah." You nod with a proud grin, thinking fondly of your second week of eighth grade

"Kali..."

"Kali, do you have the money to pay for his teeth and that desk?" Koenma asks.

"In my jar," you answer. "Ender knows where it is. I'm not paying if nothing makes me, by the way, in my eyes, he deserved it."

"Hmkay."

"Kali," Botan begins, "why don't you try to stay in normal school?"

"He hit me!"

"But he didn't hurt you."

"No, he didn't but he still hit me, the bastard, and then he hit Yusuke for moving to hold me back! And when Yusuke finally got around to holding me back, he hit me again! Unfair shot! He deserved what he got. Plus, I promised, the next time he hit me or Yusuke, he'd be picking his teeth out of that desk, and you know how I am about keeping my word."

All of them in the room sigh. "Kali..." Botan manages to drawl in whining tones.

"Oh shut up, like I need to go to school," you answer, looking at the senior level work books that are on Koenma's desk since you'd left them there the night before.

Just as you pick the books up, Yusuke comes into the room. Koenma looks up at him and makes a face. "What's the damage, Yusuke?"

"I've been suspended for getting involved, she's been expelled."

"I mean what kinds of surgery is the teacher supposed to get?"

"Oh! Uh... Well, it was the teeth she broke. Lots of broken teeth. And the desk. The desk has holes in it and little white chips in it. It'll be okay. He doesn't know enough to sue, personally, and even if he did, what you did could be qualified as self defense after I got involved, which is when you knocked his mouth into a desk."

"How many teeth?" you and Ender ask in sync.

"Eighteen are broken, six are missing."

"Let's see him hit another kid," you sing with a very broad grin.

"I heard that you hospitalized Yusuke's teacher," Kurama mentions idly as he walks up next to you at your house.

"Yeah. I did. Why?"

"I was simply stating it to start conversation."

"You want to hear the story, then?"

"If I may."

"Personality fishing," you hiss, letting him know that you know what he's doing. "I made a smart-ass remark, he got pissed off at me, decided to break me early on so I didn't do it again, and socked me in the jaw. If I was any less sturdy, it probably woulda done a lot of damage. But he hit me, then he almost hit me again, but I ducked, then he hit Yusuke. I told him that if he hit me again, he'd be digging his teeth out of a desk. And he didn't listen to me. Yusuke made him miss the next swing, but while he was holding me still, I got hit again, and I keep my word."

"Ah," you hear him say as he opens his book and puts his nose in it. But his eyes aren't moving back and forth properly. He's thinking. You can only wonder about what.